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Rh 1898), a thoughtful study of the political geography of the Far East and its possible changes; “La Perse” (''Bul. Soc.'' Neuchateloise, 1899); “La Phénicie et les Phéniciens ” (ibid., 1900); La Chine et la diplomatie européenne (“L’Humanité nouvelle” series, 1900); L'Enseignement de la géographie (Instit. Géograph. de Bruxelles, No. 5,1901). Shortly before his death Reclus had completed L’Homme et la terre, in which he set the crown on his previous greater works by considering man in his development relative to geographical environment. Reclus died at Thourout, near Bruges, on the 4th of July 1905.

RECOGNIZANCE (from Lat. recognoscere, to acknowledge), a term of English law usually employed to describe an obligation of record, entered into before some court or magistrate duly authorized, whereby the party bound acknowledges (recognizes) that he owes a personal debt to the Crown, with a defeasance, i.e. subject to a condition that the obligation to pay shall be avoided if he shall do some particular act—as if he shall appear at the assizes, keep the peace, or the like. The system of taking recognizances in favour of the Crown at an early date superseded the common law practice as to pledges and main-prize (see re Nottingham Corporation, 1897, 2 Q.B. 502, 514).

Blackstone’s definition extends the term recognizance to bonds in favour of private persons. But at present it is rarely if ever used in this sense. Recognizances are now used almost solely with reference to criminal proceedings. In the Court of Chancery it was the practice to require recognizances from the guardian of a ward of court that the ward should not marry or leave the country with the privity of the guardian and without the leave of the court. The security given by a receiver appointed by the High Court is still in the form of a recognizance acknowledging a debt to named officers of the court, and securing it on the real and personal estate of the receiver.

By an act of 1360 (34 Edw. III. c. 1), extended to Ireland by Poyning’s Act, and by the terms of the commission of the peace, justices of the peace have jurisdiction to cause to come before them or any one of them “all those who to any one or more of our people concerning their bodies or the firing of their houses have used threats to find sufficient security for the peace or their good behaviour towards us and our people; and if they shall refuse to find such security, then there in our prisons until they shall find such security to cause to be safely kept.” The security taken is by recognizance of the party and his sureties, which can be forfeited on conviction of any offence which is a breach of the conditions of the recognizance.

RECONNAISSANCE (from Fr. reconnaître, to recognize, Lat. recognoscere), a military term denoting the reconnoitring or examination of an enemy's position or movements, or of a tract of ground. Reconnaissances naturally vary indefinitely according to the purposes for which they are undertaken. A topographical reconnaissance is practically a survey of a tract of country or route, comprising both a map and a report as to its advantages and disadvantages. All reconnoitring work of this character is done by officers with small patrols, escorts or assistants. Strategical reconnaissance is performed by contact squadrons, which send forward officers and patrols to find the enemy. Tactical reconnaissance falls to the lot of troops of all arms, whether in contact with the enemy or for self-protection. A reconnaissance by a large force of all arms with the idea of provoking an enemy into showing his hand, if necessary by fighting, is called a reconnaissance in force.

RECORD (Lat. recordari, to recall to mind, from cor, heart or mind), a verb or noun used in various senses, all derived from the original one of preserving something permanently in memory. In this article, however, we are only concerned with documentary records, or archives. In its accurate sense a record is a document regularly drawn up for a legal or administrative purpose and preserved in proper custody to perpetuate the memory of the transaction described in it; for the most part it forms a link in a complicated process, and unless the connexion between it and the other documents making up the process has been preserved, a portion of its meaning will have perished. The first care, therefore, of the custodian of records should be to preserve this connexion, where it exists. In the majority of countries a previous task awaits him; it has been his duty to collect and arrange his documents. There are few countries in which records have not passed through a period of neglect; each office of state has kept or rather neglected its own papers; each court of justice has been the keeper of its own records; the student has been paralysed by a multitude of repositories among which he vainly sought the documents he required. To this stage two systems have succeeded; the system of centralization both of records and of