The Austrian geographer, E. Suess, in his great work The Countenance of the Earth, first drew attention to the fact that an observer approaching the earth from outer space would be struck by the onesided distribution and formation of the earth's continents. He would notice that most of the dry land is in the northern hemisphere, leaving the southern hemisphere covered mainly with water. In terms of the basic elementary qualities, this means that the earth is predominantly 'dry' in its northern half, and 'moist' in its southern.