Rivers provide the primary link between land and sea. Utilizing the world's largest database, this book presents a detailed analysis and synthesis of the processes affecting fluvial discharge of water, sediment and dissolved solids. It also discusses the ways in which climatic variation, episodic events and anthropogenic activities - past, present and future - affect the quantity and quality of river discharge. The book contains more than 165 figures - many in full color - including global and regional maps. An extensive appendix presents the 1534-river database as a series of 44 tables that...