The Springfield herald., 1901-11-15

Excluding Australia, Baffin Land, sit
uated near the east coast of the Ameri-
can continent, Il short distance north of
Hudson strait, is the second island OF
the world in point of size, and still lit
tie is known about it. 1t has long been
represented on the maps as composed
of number of islands. 1t Is still
shown in this way on Il number of
maps now in use. One by one these
supposed islands, Cumberland island,
Fox Land, Meta lncognitn, Sussex
island and others have been found to be
part of the main island; thus Batiin
Land has been gradually increasing in
size on the maps until to-day 1t Is
known to be inferior only to Greenland
in size The latest edition of the best
map of the polar regions published in
any American atlas, however, still
shows Cockburn island, which is about
as large as Iceland, as separated from
Batiin Land by wide channel, though
n number of foreign maps show that
it is Il part of Battin Land.
Dr. Robert Bell, the new director of
the geological survey of Canada, who
mapped Il long stretch of the west
coast In 1897, has just published in the
Geographical Journal ii report of his
explorations. He says that it is "the
third largest island in the world, being
only exceeded by Australia and Green
land" AS Australia is now ranked by
nearly all geographers as the smallest
of the continents, Batiin Land will un-
doubtedly take its place among the
islands as the second in area.
All the best maps of Batiin Land now
show a great lake region in the central
part of the southern portion of the
island. These lakes lie between noun
tain ranges. DIR. Bell says that the two
greatest bodies of water are larger
than any of the lakes in the whole
peninsula of Labrador, and that they
may almost be compared to Lake On
tario in extent. He visited the south
ernmost, Lake Amadjuak, which may
be 100 miles in length by forty in
breadth in the middle. According to
Eskimo accounts, Lake Amadjuak dis
charges northward into Lake Mettil-
ling by n short river. without rapids,
the natives passing from one lake to
another in their kyalis. Lake Mettil-
ling is perhaps 40 miles long and sixty
miles wide. and its waters reach the
sea through II large and rapid river.
| fifty or sixty miles long, that has de-
scent of about five feet to the mile.
| The conspicuous honor of being the
largest island in the world has been
| held by quite n number of islands mt
| various stages of geographical knowl-
edge. School children We're taught for
many years that Australia was the
largest island. Then Australia came
properly to be regarded as one of the
continental masses and Borneo took its
place as the largest island.
Less than twenty years ago it was
| discovered that New Guinea was larger
| than Borneo, and so the latter island
took second place. When Peary prac-
tically outlined the northern coast of
Greenland. early in the last decade,
geographers began to think that they
| had overlooked an important section of
| the earths surface. and so they placed
Greenland at the head of the list of
islands. At last Bafiin Land looms up
as an island 1.005 statute miles in
| length. with n breadth varying from
300 to 800 miles. the average being 800
miles. Its area is therefore about 300,
0OO square miles. In other words. the
| island is larger than the state of Texas
! by about 10000 square miles, or about
ten times as large rs either Scotland or
Ireland. Though it takes its place as
second in the list of islands, Batlin
Land appears to be of no great value,
since it is composed. as far as we
know. of barren rocks, partly covered
with ice.
| The twelve largest islands in the
world in order of size. are: Greenland,
Batfin Land, New Guinea. Borneo.
Madagascar. Sumatra, Nippon uhc
largest island of Japan) Great Britain.
Celebes, New Zealand (South island),
Java and Cuba.