EUROPE surpasses all the other continents in the magnitude of its
indentations and projections. Three great peninsulas--the Balkan
peninsula, Italy, and Spain, project into the Mediterranean; while
Brittany, Denmark, and Scandinavia jut into the shores of the Atlantic.
Even the British Isles are scarcely more than a projection of the
continent.
ASIA is a second in the relative extent of its peninsula. Asia Minor on
the west, Arabia, India, and Indo-China on the south, and China,
Manchuria with Corea and Kamchatka, advancing into the waters of the
Pacific, form a wide border of projecting lands, containing the richest
regions of the continent.
NORTH AMERICA is considerably less indented. Florida, Nova Scotia and
Labrador are more prominent on the Atlantic coast, and California
Peninsula and Alaska on the Pacific.
The southern continents on the contrary, are nowhere deeply penetrated
by the waters of the ocean. The Gulf of Arica in South America, the Gulf
of Guinea in Africa, and the Great Australian Bight, are merely gentle
bends in the coast line.