A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18 / Historical Sketch of the Progress of Discovery, Navigation, and / Commerce, from the Earliest Records to the Beginning of the Nineteenth / Century, By William Stevenson

by Robert Kerr; William Stevenson

CHAPTER V.

HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE PROGRESS OF DISCOVERY AND COMMERCE, FROM THE MIDDLE OF THE FIFTEENTH TO THE BEGINNING OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

The improvement of mankind in knowledge and civilization evidently depends on the union of three circumstances,--enlarged and increased desires, obstacles in the way of obtaining the objects of these desires, and practicable means of overcoming or removing these obstacles. The history of mankind in all ages and countries justifies and illustrates the truth of this remark; for though it is, especially in the early periods of it, very imperfect and obscure, and even in the later periods almost entirely confined to war and politics, still there are in it sufficient traces of the operation of all those three causes towards their improvement in knowledge and civilization.

That they operated in extending the progress of discovery and commerce is evident. We have already remarked that from the earliest periods, the commodities of the east attracted the desires of the western nations: the Arabians, Carthaginians, Greeks, and Romans of the ancient world; the Italian and Hanseatic states of the middle ages, all endeavoured to enrich themselves by trading in commodities so eagerly and universally desired. As industry and skill increased, and as the means as well as the desire of purchase and enjoyment spread, by the rise of a middle class in Europe, the demand for these commodities extended. The productions and manufactures of the north, as well as of the south of Europe, having been increased and improved, enabled the inhabitants of these countries to participate in those articles from India, which, among the ancients, had been confined exclusively to the rich and powerful.

On the other hand, even at the very time that this enlarged demand for Indian commodities was taking place in Europe, and was accompanied by enlarged means as well as extended skill and expedience in discovery and commerce,--at this very time obstacles arose which threatened the almost entire exclusion of Europeans from the luxuries of Asia. It may well be doubted, whether, if the enemies of the Christian faith had not gained entire possession of all the routes to India, and moreover, if these routes had been rendered more easy of access and passage, they could have long supplied the increased demands of improving Europe. But that Europe should, on the one hand, improve and feel enlarged desires as well as means of purchasing the luxuries of the east, while on the other hand, the practicability of acquiring these luxuries should diminish, formed a coincidence of circumstances, which was sure to produce important results.

As access to India by land, or even by the Arabian Gulf by sea, was rendered extremely difficult and hazardous by the enmity of the Mahometans, or productive of little commercial benefit by their exactions, the attention and hopes of European navigators were directed to a passage to India along the western coast of Africa. As, however, the length and difficulties of such a voyage were extremely formidable, it would probably have been either not attempted at all, or have required much longer time to accomplish than it actually did, if, in addition and aid of increased desires and an enlarged commercial spirit, the means of navigating distant, extensive, and unknown seas, had not likewise been, about this period, greatly improved.

We allude, principally, to the discovery of the mariners' compass. The first clear notice of it appears in a Provençal poet of the end of the twelfth century. In the thirteenth century it was used by the Norwegians in their voyages to and from Iceland, who made it the device of an order of knighthood of the highest rank; and from a passage in Barber's Bruce, it must have been known in Scotland, if not used there in 1375, the period when he wrote. It is said to have been used in the Mediterranean voyages at the end of the thirteenth or beginning of the fourteenth century.

With respect to the nations of the east, it is doubted whether they derived their knowledge of it from the Europeans, or the Europeans from them. When we reflect on the long and perilous voyages of the Arabians, early in the Christian era, we might be led to think that they could not be performed without the assistance of the compass; but no mention of it, or allusion to it, occurs in the account of any of their voyages; and we are expressly informed by Nicolo di Conti, who sailed on board a native vessel in the Indian seas, about the year 1420, that the Arabians had no compass, but sailed by the stars of the southern pole; and that they knew how to measure their elevation, as well as to keep their reckoning, by day and night, with their distance from place to place. With respect to the Chinese, the point in dispute is not so easily determined: it is generally imagined, that they derived their knowledge of the compass from Europeans: but Lord Macartney, certainly a competent judge, has assigned his reasons for believing that the Chinese compass is original, and not borrowed, in a dissertation annexed to Dr. Vincent's Periplus of the Erythrean Sea. At what period it was first known among them, cannot be ascertained; they pretend that it was known before the age of Confucius. That it was not brought from China to Europe by Marco Polo, as some writers assert, is evident from the circumstance that this traveller never mentions or alludes to it. The first scientific account of the properties of the magnet, as applicable to the mariner's compass, appears in a letter written by Peter Adsiger, in the year 1269. This letter is preserved among the manuscripts of the university of Leyden; extracts from it are given by Cavallo, in the second edition of his Treatise on Magnetism. From these extracts it is evident that he was acquainted with the attraction, repulsion, and polarity of the magnet, the art of communicating those properties to iron, the variation of the magnetic needle; and there are even some indications that he was acquainted with the construction of the azimuth compass.

Next in importance and utility to the mariners' compass, in preparing the way for the great discoveries by which the fifteenth century is distinguished, maps and charts may be placed. For though, in general, they were constructed on very imperfect and erroneous notions of the form of the world, and the relative size and situation of different countries, yet occasionally there appeared maps which corrected some long established error, or supplied some new information; and even the errors of the maps, in some cases, not improbably held out inducements or hopes, which would not otherwise have been entertained and realized, as we have already remarked, after D'Anville, that the greatest of Ptolemy's errors proved eventually the efficient cause which led to the greatest discovery of the moderns.

Malte Brun divides the maps of the middle ages into two classes: those in which the notions of Ptolemy and other ancient geographers are implicitly copied, and those in which new countries are inserted, which had been either discovered, or were supposed to exist.

In most of the maps of the first description, Europe, Asia, and Africa are laid down as forming one immense island, and Africa is not carried so far as the equator. One of the most celebrated of these maps was drawn up by Marin Sanuto, and inserted in his memorial presented to the pope and the principal sovereigns of Europe, for the purpose of persuading and shewing them, that if they would oblige their merchants to trade only through the dominions of the Caliphs of Bagdat, they would be better supplied and at a cheaper rate, and would have no longer to fear the Soldans of Egypt. This memorial with its maps was inserted in the Gesta Dei per Francos, as we are assured by the editor, from one of the original copies presented by Sanuto to some one of the princes. Hence, as Dr. Vincent remarks, it probably contains the oldest map of the world at this day extant, except the Peutingerian tables. Sanuto, as we have already noticed, in giving an abstract of the commercial information contained in his memorial, lived in 1324.

In the monastery of St. Michael di Murano, there is a planisphere, said to be drawn up in 1459, by Fra Mauro, which contains a report of a ship from India having passed the extreme point south, 2000 miles towards the west and southwest in 1420.

Ramusio describes a map, supposed to be this, which he states to have been drawn up for the elucidation of Marco Polo's travels.

On this map, so far as it relates to the circumnavigation of Africa, Dr. Vincent has given a dissertation, having procured a fac-simile copy from Venice, which is deposited in the British Museum; the substance of this dissertation we shall here compress. He divides his dissertation into three parts. First, whether this was the map noticed by Ramusio, and by him supposed to be drawn up to elucidate the travels of Marco Polo. On this point he concludes that it was the map referred to by Ramusio, but that his information respecting it is not correct. The second point to be determined is, whether the map procured from Venice was really executed by Mauro, and whether it existed previous to the Portuguese discoveries on the west coast of Africa. Manro lived in the reign of Alphonso the Fifth, that is between 1438 and 1480; the whole of this map, therefore, is prior to Diaz and Gama, two celebrated Portuguese navigators. Consequently, if it can be proved that the map obtained by Dr. Vincent is genuine, it must have existed previous to the Portuguese discoveries. The proof of the genuineness of the map is derived from the date on the planisphere, 1459; the internal evidence on the work itself; and the fact that Alphonso, or Prince Henry of Portugal, who died in 1463, received a copy of this map from Venice, and deposited it in the monastery of Alcobaca, where it is still kept. The sum paid for this copy, and the account of expenditure, are detailed in a MS. account in the monastery of St. Michael.

The third, and by far the most important part of Dr. Vincent's dissertation, examines what the map contains respecting the termination cf Africa to the south. On the first inspection of the map it is evident, that the author has not implicitly followed Ptolemy, as he professes to do. The centre of the habitable world is fixed at Bagdat. Asia and Europe he defines rationally, and Africa so far as regards its Mediterranean coast. He assigns two sources to the Nile, both in Abyssinia. On the east coast of Africa, he carries an arm of the sea between an island which he represents as of immense size, and the continent, obliquely as far nearly as the latitude and longitude of the Cape of Good Hope. This island he calls Diab, and the termination on the south, which he makes the extreme point of Africa, Cape Diab.

The great object of Mauro, in drawing up this map, was to encourage the Portuguese in the prosecution of their voyages to the south of Africa. This is known to be the fact from other sources, and the construction of the map, as well as some of the notices and remarks, which are inserted in its margin, form additional evidence that this was the case. Two passages, as Dr. Vincent observes, will set this in the clearest light. The first is inserted at Cape Diab; "here," says the author, about the year 1420, "an Indian vessel, on her passage across the Indian ocean was caught by a storm, and carried 2000 miles beyond this Cape to the west and south-west; she was seventy days in returning to the Cape." This the author regards as a full proof that Africa was circumnavigable on the south.

In the second passage, inserted on the margin, after observing that the Portuguese had been round the continent of Africa, more than 2000 miles to the south-west beyond the Straits of Gibraltar; that they found the navigation easy and safe, and had made charts of their discoveries; he adds, that he had talked with a person worthy of credit, who assured him he had been carried by bad weather, in an Indian ship, out of the Indian Ocean, for forty days, beyond Cape Sofala and the Green Islands, towards the west and south-west, and that in the opinion of the astronomer on board, (such as all Indian ships carry,) they had been hurried away 2000 miles. He concludes by expressing his firm belief that the sea surrounding the southern and south-eastern part of the world is navigable; and that the Indian Sea is ocean, and not a lake. We may observe, by the bye, that in another passage inserted in the margin, he expressly declares that the Indian ships had no compass, but were directed by an astronomer on board, who was continually making his observations.

It is evident that the two accounts are at variance, as the first asserts that the passage was round Cape Diab, at the termination of Africa, and the second that it was round Cape Sofala, fifteen degrees to the north of the extremity of this quarter of the world: but without attempting to reconcile this contradiction, it is abundantly evident that Mauro, by noticing the Portuguese navigators, as having reached 2000 miles to the south of Gibraltar, and adding that 2000 miles more of the coast of Africa had been explored by an Indian ship, meant to encourage the further enterprises of the Portuguese, by the natural inference that a very small space of unsailed sea must lie between the two lines, which were the limits of the navigation of the Portuguese and Indian vessel. The unexplored space was indeed much greater than Mauro estimated and represented it in his map to be; but, as Dr. Vincent remarks, his error in this respect manifestly contributed to the prosecution of the Portuguese designs, as the error of the ancient geographers, in approximating China to Europe, produced the discovery of America by Columbus.

We have dwelt thus long on the map of Mauro, as being by far the most important of the maps of the second description, or those in which were inserted real or supposed discoveries. The rest of this description require little notice.

A map of the date of 1346, in Castilian, represents Cape Bojada in Africa as known, and having been doubled at that period. A manuscript, preserved at Genoa, mentions that a ship had sailed from Majorca to a river called Vedamel, or Rui Jaura (probably Rio-do-Ouro,) but her fate was not known. The Genoese historians relate that two of their countrymen in 1291, attempted to reach India by the west; the fate of this enterprize is also unknown. The Canary Islands, the first discovery of which is supposed to have taken place before the Christian era, and which were never afterwards completely lost sight of, being described by the Arabian geographers, appear in a Castilian map of 1346. Teneriffe is called in this map Inferno, in conformity with the popular notion of the ancients, that these islands were the seat of the blessed. In a map of 1384, there is an island called Isola-di-legname, or the Isle of Wood, which, from this appellation, and its situation, is supposed by some geographers to be the island of Madeira. It would seem that some notions respecting the Azores were obscurely entertained towards the end of the fourteenth century, as islands nearly in their position are laid down in the maps of 1380.

In the library of St. Marc, at Venice, there is a map drawn by Bianco, in 1436. In it the ancient world is represented as forming one great continent, divided into two unequal parts by the Mediterranean, and by the Indian Ocean, which is carried from east to west, and comprises a great number of islands. Africa stretches from west to east parallel to Europe and Asia, but it terminates to the north of the equator. The peninsula of India and the Gulf of Bengal scarcely appear. The eastern part of Asia consists of two great peninsulas, divided by an immense gulf. Then appear Cathai, Samarcand, and some other places, the names of which are unintelligible. All the kingdoms of Europe are laid down except Poland and Hungary. To the west of the Canaries, a large tract of country is laid down under the appellation of Antitia; some geographers have maintained that by this America was indicated, but there does not appear any ground for this belief.

Having offered these preliminary and preparatory observations, we shall now proceed to the discoveries of the Portuguese. From the slight sketch which has already been given of the progress of geography and commerce, between the time of Ptolemy and the fifteenth century, it appears that the Portuguese had distinguished themselves less, perhaps, than any other European nation, in these pursuits; but, long before the beginning of the fifteenth century, circumstances had occurred, connected with their history, which were preparing the way for their maritime enterprizes. So early as the year 1250, the Portuguese had succeeded in driving the Moors out of their country; and, in order to prevent them from again disturbing them, they in their turn invaded Fez and Morocco, and having conquered Ceuta in 1415, fortified it, and several harbours near it, on the shores of the Atlantic. So zealous were the Portuguese in their enterprizes against the Moors, that the ladies of Lisbon partook in the general enthusiasm, and refused to bestow their hand on any man who had not signalized his courage on the coast of Africa, The spirit of the nation was largely participated by Prince Henry, the fifth son of John I., king of Portugal, who took up his residence near Cape St. Vincent, in the year 1406. The sole passion and object of his mind was to further the advancement of his country in navigation and discovery: his regard for religion led him to endeavour to destroy or diminish the power of the Mahometans; and his patriotism to acquire for Portugal that Indian commerce, which had enriched the maritime states of Italy. He sought every means and opportunity by which he could increase or render more accurate his information respecting the western coast, and the interior of Africa: and it is probable that the relations of certain Jews and Arabs, respecting the gold mines of Guinea, weighed strongly with him in the enterprizes which he planned, encouraged, and accomplished.

It is not true, however, that he was the inventor of the astrolobe and the compass, or the first that put these instruments into the hands of navigators, though he undoubtedly was an excellent mathematician, and procured the best charts and instruments of the age: the use and application of these, he taught in the best manner to those he selected to command his ships.

With respect to the compass, we have already stated all that is certainly known respecting its earliest application to the purposes of navigation. The sea astrolobe, which is an instrument for taking the altitude of the sun, stars, &c., is described by Chaucer, in 1391, in a treatise on it, addressed to his little son, Louis; and Purchas informs us, that it was formerly applied only to astronomical purposes, but was accommodated to the use of seamen by Martin Behaim, at the command of John II., king of Portugal, about the year 1487.

About the year 1418, when Prince Henry first began his plan of discovery, Cape Nun, in latitude 28° 40', was the limit of European knowledge on the coast of Africa. With this part of the coast, the Portuguese had become acquainted in consequence of their wars with the Moors of Barbary. In 1418, two of Henry's commanders reached Cape Boyada in latitute 26° 30'; but the Cape was not actually doubled till 1434. The Canary islands were visited during the same voyage that the Cape was discovered: Madeira was likewise visited or discovered; it was first called St. Laurence, after the saint of the day on which it was seen, and afterwards Madeira, on account of its woods. In 1420, the Portuguese set fire to these woods, and afterwards planted the sugar cane, which they brought from Sicily, and the vines which they brought from Cyprus. Saw mills were likewise erected on it.

About the year 1432, Gonzalos was sent with two small vessels to the coast of Africa on new discoveries. In 1434, Cape Boyada was doubled: in 1442, the Portuguese had advanced as far as Rio-do-Ouro, under the tropic of Cancer. On the return of the ships from this voyage, the inhabitants of Lisbon first saw, with astonishment, negroes of a jet black complexion, and woolly hair, quite different from the slaves which had been hitherto brought from Africa; for, before this time, they had seized, and sold as slaves, the tawny Moors, which they met with on the coast of Africa. In the year 1442, however, some of these had been redeemed by their friends, in exchange for negroes and gold dust. This last article stimulated the avarice of the Portuguese to greater exertions, than Prince Henry had been able to excite, and an African company was immediately formed to obtain it, slaves, &c.; but their commerce was exclusively confined to the coast of Africa, to the south of Sierra Leone. Dr. Vincent justly remarks, that Henry had stood alone for almost forty years, and had he fallen before these few ounces of gold reached his country, the spirit of discovery might have perished with him, and his designs might have been condemned as the dreams of a visionary. The importation of this gold, and the establishment of the African company in Portugal, to continue the remark of the same author, is the primary date, to which we may refer that turn for adventure which sprung up in Europe, which pervaded all the ardent spirits in every country for the two succeeding centuries, and which never ceased till it had united the four quarters of the globe in commercial intercourse.

In 1445, the Portuguese reached Senegal, where they first saw Pagan negroes: in 1448 and 1449, their discoveries extended to Cape Verd. The islands of that name were discovered in 1456. The exact extent of their discoveries from this time till 1463, when Prince Henry died, is not certainly known. According to some, Cape Verd, or Rio Grande, was the limit; according to others, one navigator reached as far as the coast of Guinea, and Cape Mesanado: some extend the limit even as far south as the equator. Assuming, however, Rio Grande as the limit of the discoveries made in Prince Henry's time, Rio Grande is in latitude 11 north, and the straits of Gibraltar in latitude 36 north; the Portuguese had therefore advanced 25 degrees to the south; that is 1500 geographical, or 1750 British miles, which, with the circuit of the coast, may be estimated at 2000 miles.

For nearly 20 years after the death of Prince Henry, little progress was made by the Portuguese in advancing to the south. At the time of the death of Alonzo, in 1481, they had passed the equator, and reached Cape St. Catherine; in latitude S. 2° 30'. The island of St. Thomas under the line, which was discovered in 1471, was immediately planted with sugar cane; and a fort, which was built the same year on the gold coast, enabled them to extend their knowledge of this part of Africa to a little distance inland. Portugal now began to reap the fruits of her discoveries: bees' wax, ostrich feathers, negro slaves, and particularly gold, were imported, on all of which the profits were so great, that John II., who succeeded Alonzo, immediately on his accession, sent out 12 ships to Guinea; and in 1483, two other vessels were sent, which in the following year reached Congo, and penetrated to 22° south. The river Zaire in this part of Africa was discovered, and many of the inhabitants of the country through which it flows embarked voluntarily for Portugal. Benin was discovered about the same time; here they found a species of spice, which was imported in great quantities into Europe, and sold as pepper: it was, however, nothing else but grains of paradise. The inhabitants of Benin must have had considerable traffic far into the interior of Africa, for from them the Portuguese first received accounts of Abyssinia. By the discovery and conquest of Benin and Congo, the Portuguese traffic in slaves was much extended, but at the same time it took another character for a short time; for the love of gold being stronger than the hope of gain they might derive from the sale of negroes, (for which, indeed, till the discovery of the West Indies there was little demand,) the Portuguese used to exchange the natives they captured for gold with the Moors, till John II. put an end to this traffic, under the pretence that by means of it, the opportunity of converting the negroes was lost, as they were thus delivered into the hands of Infidels. About eighty years after Prince Henry began his discoveries, John I. sent out Diaz with three ships: this was in 1486, and in the following year Covilham was sent by the same monarch in search of India, by the route of Egypt and the Red Sea.

The king displayed great judgment in the selection of both these persons. Diaz was of a family, several members of which had already signalized themselves by the discoveries on the coast of Africa. His mode of conducting the enterprize on which he was sent, proved at once his confidence in himself, his courage, and his skill; after reaching 24° south latitude, 120 leagues beyond any former navigator, he stood right out to sea, and never came within sight of the coast again, till he had reached 40 degrees to the eastward of the Cape, which, however, he was much too far out at sea to discover. He persevered in stretching still farther east, after he made land, till at length he reached the river Del Infante, six degrees to the eastward of the most southern point of Africa, and almost a degree beyond the Cape of Good Hope. He then resolved to return, for what reason is not known; and on his return, he saw the Cape of Good Hope, to which, on account of the storms he encountered on his passage round it, he gave the appellation of Cabo Tormentoso. John II., however, augured so well from the doubling of the extremity of Africa having been accomplished, that he changed its name into that of the Cape of Good Hope.

As soon as John II. ascended the throne, he sent two friars and a layman to Jerusalem, with instructions to gain whatever information they could respecting India and Prester John from the pilgrims who resorted to that city, and, if necessary, to proceed further to the east. As, however, none of this party understood Arabic, they were of little use, and in fact did not go beyond Jerusalem. In 1487, the king sent Covilham and Paayva on the same mission: the former had served in Africa as a soldier, and was intimately acquainted with Arabic. In order to facilitate this enterprise, Covilham was entrusted with a map, drawn up by two Jews, which most probably was a copy of the map of Mauro, of which we have already spoken. On this map, a passage round the south of Africa was laid down as having been actually accomplished, and Covilham was directed to reach Abyssinia, if possible; and ascertain there or elsewhere, whether such a passage did really exist. Covilham went from Naples to Alexandria, and thence to Cairo. At this city he formed an acquaintance with some merchants of Fez and Barbary, and in their company went to Aden. Here he embarked and visited Goa, Calicut, and other commercial cities of India, where he saw pepper and ginger, and heard of cloves and cinnamon. From India he returned to the east coast of Africa, down which he went as low as Sofala, "the last residence of the Arabs, and the limit of their knowledge in that age, as it had been in the age of the Periplus." He visited the gold mines in the vicinity of this place: and here he also learnt all the Arabs knew respecting the southern part of Africa, viz. that the sea was navigable to the south-west (and this indeed their countrymen believed, when the author of the Periplus visited them); but they knew not where the sea terminated. At Sofala also Covilham gained some information respecting the island of the Moon, or Madagascar. He returned to Cairo, by Zeila, Aden, and Tor. At Cairo, he sent an account of the intelligence to the king, and in the letter which contained it, he added, "that the ships which sailed down the coast of Guinea, might be sure of reaching the termination of the continent, by persisting in a course to the south, and that when they should arrive in the eastern ocean, their best direction must be to enquire for Sofala and the island of the Moon."

"It is this letter," observes Dr. Vincent, "above all other information, which, with equal justice and equal honour, assigns the theoretical discovery to Covilham, as the practical to Diaz and Gama; for Diaz returned without hearing any thing of India, though he had passed the Cape, and Gama did not sail till after the intelligence of Covilham had ratified the discovery of Diaz." One part of the instructions given to Covilham required him to visit Abyssinia: in order to accomplish this object, he returned to Aden, and there took the first opportunity of entering Abyssinia. The sovereign of his country received and treated him with kindness, giving him a wife and land. He entered Abyssinia in 1488, and in 1521, that is, 33 years afterwards, the almoner to the embassy of John de Lima found him. Covilham, notwithstanding he was as much beloved by the inhabitants as by their sovereign, was anxious to return to Portugal, and John de Lima, at his request, solicited the king to grant him permission to that effect, but he did not succeed. "I dwell," observes Dr. Vincent, "with a melancholy pleasure on the history of this man,--whom Alvarez, the almoner, describes still as a brave soldier and a devout Christian;--when I reflect upon what must have been his sentiments on hearing the success of his countrymen, in consequence of the discovery to which he so essentially contributed. They were sovereigns of the ocean from the Cape of Good Hope to the straits of Malacca: he was still a prisoner in a country of barbarians."

It might have been supposed, that after it had been ascertained by Diaz that the southern promontory of Africa could be doubled, and by Covilham, that this was the only difficulty to a passage by sea to India, the court of Portugal would have lost no time in prosecuting their discoveries, and completing the grand object they had had in view for nearly a century: this, however, was not the case. Ten years, and another reign, and great debates in the council of Portugal were requisite before it was resolved that the attempt to prosecute the discovery of Diaz to its completion was expedient, or could be of any advantage to the nation at large. At last, when Emanuel, who was their sovereign, had determined on prosecuting the discovery of India, his choice of a person to conduct the enterprise fell on Gama. As he had armorial bearings, we may justly suppose that he was of a good family; and in all respects he appears to have been well qualified for the grand enterprise to which he was called, and to have resolved, from a sense of religion and loyalty, to have devoted himself to death, if he should not succeed. Diaz was appointed to a command under him, but he had not the satisfaction of witnessing the results of his own discovery; for he returned when the fleet had reached St. Jago, was employed in a secondary command under Cabral, in the expedition in which Brazil was discovered, and in his passage from that country to the Cape, four ships, one of which he commanded, perished with all on board.

As soon as the fleet which Gama was to take with him was ready for sea, the king, attended by all his court, and a great body of the people, formed a solemn procession to the shore, where they were to embark, and Gama assumed the command, under the auspices of the most imposing religious ceremonies. Nearly all who witnessed his embarkation regarded him and those who accompanied him "rather as devoted to destruction, than as sent to the acquisition of renown."

The fleet which was destined to accomplish one of the objects (the discovery of America is the other)--which, as Dr. Robertson remarks, "finally established those commercial ideas and arrangements which constitute the chief distinction between the manners and policy of ancient and modern times,"--consisted only of three small ships, and a victualler, manned with no more than 160 souls: the principal officers were Vasco de Gama, and Paul his brother: Diaz and Diego Diaz, his brother, who acted as purser: and Pedro Alanquer, who had been pilot to Diaz. Diaz was to accompany them only to a certain latitude.

They sailed from Lisbon on the 18th of July, 1497: in the bay of St. Helena, which they reached on the 4th of November, they found natives, who were not understood by any of the negro interpreters they had on board. From the description of the peculiarity in their mode of utterance, which the journal of the voyage calls sighing, and from the circumstance that the same people were found in the bay of St. Blas, 60 leagues beyond the Cape, there can be no doubt that they were Hottentots. In consequence of the ignorance or the obstinacy of the pilot, and of tempestuous weather, the voyage to the Cape was long and dangerous: this promontory, however, was doubled on the 20th of November. After this the wind and weather proving favourable, the voyage was more prosperous and rapid. On the 11th of January, 1498, they reached that part of the coast where the natives were no longer Hottentots, but Caffres, who at that period displayed the same marks of superior civilization by which they are distinguished from the Hottentots at present.

From the bay of St. Helena till they passed Cape Corrientes, there had been no trace of navigation,--no symptom that the natives used the sea at all. But after they passed this cape, they were visited by the natives in boats, the sails of which seem to have been made of the fibres of the cocoa-palm. A much more encouraging circumstance, however, occurred: some of the natives that came off in these boats were clothed in cotton, silk, and sattin,--evident proofs that intercourse, either direct or indirect, was practicable, and had in fact been held between this country and India. The language of these people was not understood; but from their signs it was inferred that they had seen ships as large as the Portuguese, and that they had come from the north.

This part of Africa lies between latitudes 19° and 18° south; and as Gama had the corrected chart of Covilham on board, in which Sofala was marked as the limit of his progress, and Sofala was two degrees to the south of where he then was, he must have known that he had now passed the barrier, and that the discovery was ascertained, his circumnavigation being now connected with the route of Covilham. This point of Gama's progress is also interesting and important in another respect, for we are here approaching a junction with the discoveries of the Arabians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans.

At this place Gama remained till the 24th of February, repairing his ships and recruiting his men. On the 1st of March, he arrived off Mozambique; here evidences of a circumnavigation with India were strong and numerous. The sovereign of Mozambique ruled over all the country from Sofala to Melinda. The vessels, which were fitted out entirely for coasting voyages, were large, undecked, the seams fastened with cords made of the cocoa fibres, and the timbers in the same manner. Gama, in going on board some of the largest of those, found that they were equipped with charts and compasses, and what are called æst harlab, probably the sea astrolabe, already discovered. At the town of Mozambique, the Moorish merchants from the Red Sea and India, met and exchanged the gold of Sofala for their commodities, and in its warehouses, which, though meanly built, were numerous, pepper, ginger, cottons, silver, pearls, rubies, velvet, and other Indian articles were exposed to sale. At Mombaça, the next place to which Gama sailed, all the commodities of India were found, and likewise the citron, lemon, and orange; the houses were built of stone, and the inhabitants, chiefly Mahomedans, seemed to have acquired wealth by commerce, as they lived in great splendour and luxury.

On the 17th of March, 1498, Gama reached Melinda, and was consequently completely within the boundary of the Greek and Roman discovery and commerce in this part of the world. This city is represented as well built, and displaying in almost every respect, proofs of the extensive trade the inhabitants carried on with India, and of the wealth they derived from it. Here Gama saw, for the first time, Banians, or Indian merchants: from them he received much important information respecting the commercial cities of the west coast of India: and at Melinda he took on board pilots, who conducted his fleet across the Indian Ocean to Calicut on the coast of Malabar, where he landed on the 22d of May, 1498, ten months and two days after his departure from Lisbon. He returned to Lisbon in 1499, and again received the command of a squadron in 1502; he died at Cochin in 1525, after having lived to witness his country sovereign of the Indian seas from Malacca to the Cape of Good Hope. "The consequence of his discovery was the subversion of the Turkish power, which at that time kept all Europe in alarm. The East no longer paid tribute for her precious commodities, which passed through the Turkish provinces; the revenues of that empire were diminished; the Othmans ceased to be a terror to the western world, and Europe has risen to a power, which the three other continents may in vain endeavour to oppose."

The successful enterprize of Gama, and the return of his ships laden not only with the commodities peculiar to the coast of Malabar, but with many of the richer and rarer productions of the eastern parts of India, stimulated the Portuguese to enter on this new career with avidity and ardour, both military and commercial. It fortunately happened that Emanuel, who was king of Portugal at this period, was a man of great intelligence and grasp of mind, capable of forming plans with prudence and judgment, and of executing them with method and perseverance; and it was equally fortunate that such a monarch was enabled to select men to command in India, who from their enterprize, military skill, sagacity, integrity, and patriotism, were peculiarly qualified to carry into full and successful execution all his views and plans.

The consequences were such as must always result from the steady operation of such causes: twenty-four years after the voyage of Gama, and before the termination of Emanuel's reign, the Portuguese had reached, and made themselves masters of Malacca. This place was the great staple of the commerce carried on between the east of Asia, including China, and the islands and the western parts of India. To it the merchants of China, Japan, the Moluccas, &c. came from the east, and those of Malabar, Ceylon, Coromandel and Bengal, from the west; and its situation, nearly at an equal distance from the eastern and western parts of India, rendered it peculiarly favorable for this trade, while by possessing the command of the straits through which all ships must pass from the one extremity of Asia to the other, it had the monopoly of the most extensive and lucrative commerce completely within its power.

From Malacca the Portuguese sailed for the conquest of the Moluccas; and by achieving this, secured the monopoly of spices. Their attempt to open a communication and trade with China, which was made about the same time, was not then successful: but by perseverance they succeeded in their object, and before the middle of the sixteenth century, exchanged, at the island of Sancian, the spices of the Moluccas, and the precious stones and ivory of Ceylon, for the silks, porcelain, drugs, and tea of China. Soon afterwards the emperor of China allowed them to occupy the island of Macao. In 1542 they succeeded in forming a commercial intercourse with Japan, trading with it for gold, silver and copper; this trade, however, was never extensive, and it ceased altogether in 1638, when they were driven from the Japanese territories.

As the commodities of India could not be purchased except with large quantities of gold, the Portuguese, in order to obtain it, as well as for other commercial advantages, prosecuted their discoveries on the east of Africa, at the same time that they were extending their power and commerce in India. On the east of Africa, between Sofala and the Red Sea, Arabian colonies had been settled for many centuries: these the Portuguese navigators visited, and gradually reduced to tribute; and the remains of the empire they established at this period, may still be traced in the few and feeble settlements they possess between Sofala and Melinda. In 1506 they visited and explored the island of Madagascar; in 1513, by the expulsion of the Arabs from Aden, the Red Sea was opened to their ships; and they quickly examined its shores and harbours, and made themselves acquainted with its tedious and dangerous navigation. In 1520 they visited the ports of Abyssinia, but their ambition and the security of their commerce were not yet completely attained; the Persian Gulf, as well as the Red Sea, was explored; stations were formed on the coasts of both: and thus they were enabled to obstruct the ancient commercial intercourse between Egypt and India, and to command the entrance of those rivers, by which Indian goods were conveyed not only through the interior of Asia, but also to Constantinople. By the conquest of Ormus, the Portuguese monopolised that extensive trade to the East, which had been in the hands of the Persians for several centuries. "In the hands of the Portuguese this island soon became the great mart from which the Persian empire, and all the provinces of Asia to the west of it, were supplied with the productions of India: and a city which they built on that barren island, destitute of water, was rendered one of the chief seats of opulence, splendour, and luxury in the eastern world."

The Venetians, who foresaw the ruin of their oriental commerce in the success of the Portuguese, in vain endeavoured to stop the progress of their rivals in the middle of the sixteenth century: the latter, masters of the east coast of Africa, of the coasts of Arabia and Persia, of the two peninsulas of India, of the Molucca islands, and of the trade to China and Japan, supplied every part of Europe with the productions of the east, by the Cape of Good Hope; nor was their power and commerce subverted, till Portugal became a province of Spain.

We have purposely omitted, in this rapid sketch of the establishment and progress of the Portuguese commerce in the East, any notice of the smaller discoveries which they made at the same time. These, however, it will be proper to advert to before we proceed to another subject.

In the year 1512, a Portuguese navigator was shipwrecked on the Maldives: he found them already in the occasional possession of the Arabians, who came thither for the cocoa fibres, of which they formed their cordage, and the cowries, which circulated as money from Bengal to Siam. The Portuguese derived from them immense quantities of these cowries, with which they traded to Guinea, Congo, and Benin. On their conquest, they obliged the sovereigns of this island to pay them tribute in cinnamon, pearls, precious stones, and elephants. The discovery and conquest of the Malaccas has already been noticed, and its importance in rendering them masters of the trade of both parts of India, which had been previously carried on principally by the merchants of Arabia, Persia from the West, and of China from the East. In Siam, gum lac, porcelain, and aromatics enriched the Portuguese, who were the first Europeans who arrived in this and the adjacent parts of this peninsula.

In the year 1511 the Portuguese navigators began to explore the eastern archipelago of India, and to make a more complete and accurate examination of some islands, which they had previously barely discovered. Sumatra was examined with great care, and from it they exported tin, pepper, sandal, camphire, &c. In 1513, they arrived at Borneo: of it, however, they saw and learned little, except that it also produced camphire. In the same year they had made themselves well acquainted with Java: here they obtained rice, pepper, and other valuable articles. It is worthy of remark, that Barros, the Portuguese historian of their discoveries and conquests in the East, who died towards the close of the sixteenth century, already foresaw that the immense number of islands, some of them very large, which were scattered in the south-east of Asia, would justly entitle this part, at some future period, to the appellation of the fifth division of the world. Couto, his continuator, comprehends all these islands under five different groups. To the first belong the Moluccas. The second archipelago comprises Gilolo, Moratai, Celebes, or Macassar, &c. The third group contains the great isle of Mindinao, Soloo, and most of the southern Philippines. The fourth archipelago was formed of the Banda isle, Amboyna, &c.; the largest of these were discovered by the Portuguese in the year 1511: from Amboyna they drew their supplies of cloves.

The Portuguese knew little of the fifth archipelago, because the inhabitants were ignorant of commerce, and totally savage and uncultivated. From the description given of them by the early Portuguese writers, as totally unacquainted with any metal, making use of the teeth of fish in its stead, and as being as black as the Caffres of Africa, while among them there were some of an unhealthy white colour, whose eyes were so weak that they could not bear the light of the sun;--from these particulars there can be no doubt that the Portuguese had discovered New Guinea, and the adjacent isles, to whose inhabitants this description exactly applies. These islands were the limit of the Portuguese discoveries to the East: they suspected, however, that there were other islands beyond them, and that these ranged along a great southern continent, which stretched as far as the straits of Magellan. It is the opinion of some geographers, and particularly of Malte Brun, that the Portuguese had visited the coasts of New Holland before the year 1540; but that they regarded it as part of the great southern continent, the existence of which Ptolemy had first imagined.

We have already alluded to the obstacles which opposed and retarded the commercial intercourse of the Portuguese with China. Notwithstanding these, they prosecuted their discoveries in the Chinese seas. In the year 1518, they arrived at the isles of Liqueou, where they found gold in abundance: the inhabitants traded as far as the Moluccas. Their intercourse with Japan has already been noticed.

From these results of the grand project formed by Prince Henry, and carried on by men animated by his spirit, (results so important to geography and commerce, and which mainly contributed to raise Europe to its present high rank in knowledge, civilization, wealth, and power,) we must now turn to the discovery of America, the second grand cause in the production of the same effects.

For the discovery of the new world we are indebted to Columbus. This celebrated person was extremely well qualified for enterprizes that required a combination of foresight, comprehension, decision, perseverance, and skill. From his earliest youth he had been accustomed to regard the sea as his peculiar and hereditary element; for the family, from which he was descended, had been navigators for many ages. And though, from all that is known respecting them, this line of life had not been attended with much success or emolument, yet Columbus's zeal was not thereby damped; and his parents, still anxious that their son should pursue the same line which his ancestors had done, strained every nerve to give him a suitable education. He was accordingly taught geometry, astronomy, geography, and drawing. As soon as his time of life and his education qualified him for the business he had chosen, he went to sea; he was then fourteen years old. His first voyages were from Genoa, of which city he was a native, to different ports in the Mediterranean, with which this republic traded. His ambition, however, was not long to be confined to seas so well known. Scarcely had he attained the age of twenty, when he sailed into the Atlantic; and steering to the north, ran along the coast of Iceland, and, according, to his own journal, penetrated within the arctic circle. In another voyage he sailed as far south as the Portuguese fort of St. George del Mina, under the equator, on the coast of Africa. On his return from this voyage, he seems to have engaged in a piratical warfare with the Venetians and Turks, who, at this period, disputed with the Genoese the sovereignty and commerce of the Mediterranean; and in this warfare he was greatly distinguished for enterprize, as well as for cool and undaunted courage.

At this period he was attracted to Lisbon by the fame which Prince Henry had acquired, on account of the encouragement he afforded to maritime discovery. In this city he married the daughter of a person who had been employed in the earlier navigations of the prince; and from his father-in-law he is said to have obtained possession of a number of journals, sea charts, and other valuable papers. As he had ascertained that the object of the Portuguese was to reach India by the southern part of Africa, he concluded, that, unless he could devise or suggest some other route, little attention would be paid to him. He, therefore, turned his thoughts to the practicability of reaching India by sailing to the west. At this time the rotundity of the earth was generally admitted. The ancients, whose opinions on the extent and direction of the countries which formed the terrestrial globe, still retained their hold on the minds even of scientific men, had believed that the ocean encompassed the whole earth; the natural and unavoidable conclusion was, that by sailing to the west, India would be reached. An error of Ptolemy's, to which we have already adverted, contributed to the belief that this voyage could not be very long; for, according to that geographer, (and his authority was implicitly acceded to,) the space to be sailed over was sixty degrees less than it actually proved to be,--a space equal to three-fourths, of the Pacific Ocean. From considering Marco Polo's account of his travels in the east of Asia, Columbus also derived great encouragement; for, according to him, Cathay and Zepango stretched out to a great extent in an easterly direction; of course they must approach so much the more towards the west of Europe. It is probable, also, that Columbus flattered himself, that if he did not reach India by a western course, he would, perhaps, discover the Atlantis, which was placed by Plato and Aristotle in the ocean, to the west of Europe.

Columbus, however, did not trust entirely to his own practical knowledge of navigation, or to the arguments he drew from a scientific acquaintance with cosmography: he heard the reports of skilful and experienced pilots, and corresponded with several men of science. He is said, in a particular manner to have been confirmed in his belief that India might be reached by sailing to the west, by the communications which he had with Paul, a physician of Florence, a man well known at this period for his acquaintance with geometry and cosmography, and who had paid particular attention to the discoveries of the Portuguese. He stated several facts, and offered several ingenious conjectures, and moreover, sent a chart to Columbus, on which he pointed out the course which he thought would lead to the desired object.

As Columbus was at the court of Lisbon, when he had resolved to undertake his great enterprise, and, in fact, regarded himself as in some degree a Portuguese subject, he naturally applied in the first instance to John II., requesting that monarch to let him have some ships to carry him to Marco Polo's island of Zepango or Japan. The king referred him to the Bishop of Ceuta and his two physicians; but they having no faith in the existence of this island, rejected the services of Columbus. For seven years afterwards he solicited the court of Spain to send him out, while, during the same period, his brother, Bartholomew, was soliciting the court of England: the latter was unsuccessful, but Columbus himself at length persuaded Isabella to grant 40,000 crowns for the service of the expedition. He accordingly sailed from Palos, in Andalusia, on the 3d of August, 1492; and in thirty-three days landed on one of the Bahamas. He had already sailed nine hundred and fifty leagues west from the Canaries: after touching at the Bahamas, he continued his course to the west, and at length discovered the island of Cuba. He went no farther on this voyage; but on his return home, he discovered Hispaniola. The variation of the compass was first observed in this voyage. In a second voyage, in 1492, Columbus discovered Jamaica, and in a third, in 1494, he visited Trinidad and the continent of America, near the mouth of the Orinoco. In 1502, he made a fourth and last voyage, in which he explored some part of the shores of the Gulph of Mexico. The ungrateful return he met with from his country is well known: worn out with fatigue, disappointment, and sorrow, he died at Valladolid, on the 20th of May, 1506, in the fifty-ninth year of his age.

In the mean time, the completion of the discovery of America was rapidly advancing. In 1499, Ogeda, one of Columbus's companions, sailed for the new world: he was accompanied by Amerigo Vespucci: little was discovered on the voyage, except some part of the coast of Guana and Terra Firma. But Amerigo, having, on his return to Spain, published the first account of the New World, the whole of this extensive quarter of the globe was called after him. Some authors, however, contend that Amerigo visited the coasts of Guiana and Terra Firma before Columbus; the more probable account is, that he examined them more carefully two years after their discovery by Columbus. Amerigo was treated by the court of Spain with as little attention and gratitude as Columbus had been: he therefore offered his services to Portugal, and in two voyages, between 1500 and 1504, he examined the coasts of that part of South America which was afterwards called Brazil. This country had been discovered by Cabral, who commanded the second expedition of the Portuguese to India: on his voyage thither, a tempest drove him so far to the west, that he reached the shores of America. He called it the Land of the Holy Cross; but it was afterwards called Brazil, from the quantity of red wood of that name found on it.

For some time after the discovery of America it was supposed to be part of India: and hence, the name of the West Indies, still retained by the islands in the Gulph of Mexico, was given to all those countries. There were, however, circumstances which soon led the discoverers to doubt of the truth of the first conceived opinion. The Portuguese had visited no part of Asia, either continent or island, from the coast of Malabar to China, on which they had not found natives highly civilized, who had made considerable progress in the elegant as well as the useful arts of life, and who were evidently accustomed to intercourse with strangers, and acquainted with commerce. In all these respects, the New World formed a striking contrast: the islands were inhabited by savages, naked, unacquainted with the rudest arts of life, and indebted for their sustenance to the spontaneous productions of a fertile soil and a fine climate. The continent, for the most part, presented immense forests, and with the exception of Mexico and Peru, was thinly inhabited by savages as ignorant and low in the scale of human nature as those who dwelt on the islands.

The natural productions and the animals differed also most essentially from those, not only of India, but also of Europe. There were no lemons, oranges, pomegranates, quinces, figs, olives, melons, vines, nor sugar canes: neither apples, pears, plumbs, cherries, currants, gooseberries, rice, nor any other corn but maize. There was no poultry (except turkeys), oxen, sheep, goats, swine, horses, asses, camels, elephants, cats, nor dogs, except an animal resembling a dog, but which did not bark. Even the inhabitants of Mexico and Peru were unacquainted with iron and the other useful metals, and destitute of the address requisite for acquiring such command of the inferior animals, as to derive any considerable aid from their labour.

In addition to these most marked and decided points of difference between India and the newly discovered quarter of the globe, it was naturally inferred that a coast extending, as America was soon ascertained to do, many hundred miles to the northward and to the southward of the equator, could not possibly be that of the Indies. At last, in the year 1513, a view of the Grand Ocean having been attained from the mountains of Darien, the supposition that the New World formed part of India was abandoned. To this ocean the name of the South Sea was given.

In the mean time, the Portuguese had visited all the islands of the Malay Archipelago, as far as the Moluccas. Portugal had received from the Pope a grant of all the countries she might discover: the Spaniards, after the third voyage of Columbus, obtained a similar grant. As, however, it was necessary to draw a line between those grants, the Pope fixed on 27-1/2° west of the meridian of the island of Ferro. The sovereigns, for their mutual benefit, allowed it to 370 leagues west of the Cape Verd islands: all the countries to the east of this line were to belong to Portugal, and all those to the west of it to Spain. According to this line of demarcation, supposing the globe to be equally divided between the two powers, it is plain that the Moluccas were situated within the hemisphere which belonged to Spain. Portugal, however, would not yield them up, contending that she was entitled to the sovereignty of all the countries she could discover by sailing eastward. This dispute gave rise to the first circumnavigation of the globe, and the first practical proof that India could be reached by sailing westward from Europe, as well as to other results of the greatest importance to geography and commerce.

During the discussions which this unexpected and embarrassing difficulty produced, Francis Magellan came to the court of Spain, to offer his services as a navigator, suggesting a mode by which he maintained that court would be able to decide the question in its own favour. Magellan had served under Albuquerque, and had visited the Moluccas: and he proposed, if the Spanish monarch would give him ships, to sail to these islands by a westerly course, which would, even according to the Portuguese, establish the Spanish right to their possession. The emperor Charles, who was at this period king of Spain, joyfully embraced the proposal, although a short time previous, Solis, who had sailed in quest of a westerly passage to India, had, after discovering the Rio de la Plata, perished in the attempt.

It is maintained by some authors that Magellan's confidence in the success of his own plan arose from the information he received from a chart drawn up by Martin Behaim, in which the straits that were afterwards explored by Magellan, and named after him, were laid down; and that he carried the information he derived from it to Spain, and by means of it obtained the protection of Cardinal Ximenes, and the command of the fleet, with which he was the first to circumnavigate the world.

As this is a point which has been a good deal discussed, and as it is of importance, not only to the fame of Magellan, but to a right understanding of the actual state of geographical knowledge, with respect to the New World, at this era, it may be proper briefly to consider it.

The claim of Behaim rests entirely on a passage in Pigafetta's journal of the voyage of Magellan, in which it is stated that Magellan, as skilful as he was courageous, knew that he was to seek for a passage through an obscure strait: this strait he had seen laid down in a chart of Martin Behaim, a most excellent cosmographer, which was in the possession of the king of Portugal. In describing the nature of the maps and charts which, during the whole of the middle ages, were drawn up, we observed that it was very usual to insert countries, &c. which were merely supposed to exist. The question, therefore, is--allowing that a strait was laid down in a chart drawn up by Behaim, whether it was a conjectural strait or one laid down from good authority? That Behaim himself did not discover such a strait will be evident from the following circumstances: in the Nuremberg globe, formed by Behaim, it does not appear: there is nothing between the Azores and Japan, except the fabulous islands of Aulitia and St. Brandon; no mention of it is made in the archives of that city or in his numerous letters, which are still preserved. The date of the Nuremberg globe is 1492, the very year in which Columbus first reached the West Indies: Behaim therefore cannot be supposed to have contributed to this discovery. It is said, however, that he made a long voyage in 1483 and 1484: but this voyage was in an easterly direction, for it is expressly stated to have been to Ethiopia; probably to Congo, and the cargo he brought home, which consisted of an inferior kind of pepper, proves that he had not visited America. Besides, if he had visited any part of America in 1483 or 1484, he would have laid it down in his globe in 1492, whereas, as we have remarked, no country appears on it to the west of St. Brandon. We may, therefore, safely conclude that he did not himself discover any passage round the south point of America.

But all the other great discoveries of the Portuguese and Spaniards (except that of Diaz in 1486) were made between 1492, the date of the Nuremberg Globe, and 1506, the date of the death of Behaim, and between these periods, he constantly resided at Fayal. It is much more probable that he inserted this strait in his chart on supposition, thinking it probable that, as Africa terminated in a cape, so America would. That Magellan did not himself believe the strait was laid down in Behaim's chart from any authority is evident, from a circumstance mentioned by Pigafetta, who expressly informs us, that Magellan was resolved to prosecute his search after it to latitude 75°, had he not found it in latitude 52°. Now, as Behaim undoubtedly was the greatest cosmographer of the age, and had been employed to fit the astrolobe as a sea instrument, it is not to be supposed that, if he had good authority for the existence of a passage round South America, he would have left it in any chart he drew, with an uncertainty of 23 degrees.

Magellan sailed from Spain in 1519, with five ships: he explored the river Plate a considerable way, thinking at first it was the sea, and would lead him to the west. He then continued his voyage to the south, and reached the entrance of the straits which afterwards received his name, on the 21st October, 1520, but, in consequence of storms, and the scarcity of provisions, he did not clear them till the 28th of November. He now directed his course to the north-west: for three months and twenty days he saw no land. In 15 south, he discovered a small island; and another in 9 south. Continuing his course still in the same direction, he arrived at the Ladrones, and soon afterwards at the Phillippines, where he lost his life in a skirmish. His companions continued their voyage; and, on the twenty-seventh month after their departure from Spain, arrived at one of the Molucca islands. Here the Spaniards found plenty of spices, which they obtained in exchange for the cloth, glass, beads, &c., which they had brought with them for that purpose. From the Moluccas they returned home round the Cape of Good Hope, and reached Seville in September, 1552. Only one ship returned, and she was drawn up in Seville, and long preserved as a monument of the first circumnavigation of the globe. The Spaniards were surprised, on their return to their native country, to find that they had gained a day in their reckoning--a proof of the scanty knowledge at that time possessed, respecting one of the plainest and most obvious results of the diurnal motion of the earth.

The voyage of Magellan occupied 1124 days: Sir Francis Drake, who sailed round the world about half a century afterwards, accomplished the passage in 1051 days: the next circumnavigator sailed round the globe in 769 days; and the first navigators who passed to the south of Terra del Fuego, accomplished the voyage in 749 days. In the middle of the eighteenth century, a Scotch privateer sailed round the world in 240 days.

In the meantime, several voyages had been performed to the east coast of North America. The first voyages to this part of the new world were undertaken by the English: there is some doubt and uncertainty respecting the period when these were performed. The following seems the most probable account.

At the time when Columbus discovered America, there lived in London a Venetian merchant, John Cabot, who had three sons. The father was a man of science, and had paid particular attention to the doctrine of the spheres: his studies, as well as his business as a merchant, induced him to feel much interest in the discoveries which were at that period making. He seems to have applied to Henry VII.; who accordingly empowered him to sail from England under the royal flag, to make discoveries in the east, the west, and the north, and to take possession of countries inhabited by Pagans, and not previously discovered by other European nations. The king gave him two ships, and the merchants of Bristol three or four small vessels, loaded with coarse cloth, caps, and other small goods. The doubt respecting the precise date of this voyage seems to receive the most satisfactory solution from the following contemporary testimony of Alderman Fabian, who says, in his Chronicle of England and France, that Cabot sailed in the beginning of May, in the mayoralty of John Tate, that is, in 1497, and returned in the subsequent mayoralty of William Purchase, bringing with him three sauvages from Newfoundland. This fixes the date of this voyage: the course he steered, and the limits of his voyage, are however liable to uncertainty. He himself informs us, that he reached only 56° north latitude, and that the coast of America, at that part, winded to the east: but there is no coast of North America that answers to this description. According to other accounts, he reached 67-1/2° north latitude; but this is the coast of Greenland, and not the coast of Labrador, as these accounts call it. It is most probable that he did not reach farther than Newfoundland, which he certainly discovered. To this island he at first gave the names of Prima Vista and Baccaloas; and it is worthy of notice, that a cape of Newfoundland still retains the name of Bona Vista, and there is a small island still called Bacalao, not far from hence.

From this land he sailed to the south-west till he reached the latitude of Gibraltar, and the longitude of Cuba; if these circumstances be correct, he must have sailed nearly as far as Chesapeak Bay: want of provisions now obliged him to return to England.

Portugal, jealous of the discoveries which Spain had made in the new world, resolved to undertake similar enterprizes, with the double hope of discovering some new part of America, and a new route to India. Influenced by these motives, Certireal, a man of birth and family, sailed from Lisbon in 1500 or 1501: he arrived at Conception Bay, in Newfoundland, explored the east coast of that island, and afterwards discovered the river St. Lawrence. To the next country which he discovered, he gave the name of Labrador, because, from its latitude and appearance, it seemed to him better fitted for culture than his other discoveries in this part of America. This country he coasted till he came to a strait, which he called the Strait of Anian. Through this strait he imagined a passage would be found to India, but not being able to explore it himself, he returned to Portugal, to communicate the important and interesting information. He soon afterwards went out on a second voyage, to prosecute his discoveries in this strait; but in this he perished. The same voyage was undertaken by another brother, but he also perished. As the situation of the Strait of Anian was very imperfectly described, it was long sought for in vain on both sides of America; it is now generally supposed to have been Hudson's Strait, at the entrance of Hudson's Bay.

The Spaniards were naturally most alarmed at the prospect of the Portuguese finding a passage by this strait to India. Cortez, the conqueror of Mexico, undertook himself an expedition for this purpose; but he returned without accomplishing any thing. After him the viceroy, Mendoza, sent people, both by sea and land, to explore the coast as far as 53° north latitude; but neither party reached farther than 36 degrees. The Spanish court itself now undertook the enterprize; and in the year 1542, Cabrillo, a Portuguese in the service of that court, sailed from Spain. He went no farther than to 44 degrees north latitude, where he found it very cold. He coasted the countries which at present are called New California, as far as Cape Blanco: he discovered, likewise, Cape Mendocino; and ascertained, that from this place to the harbour De la Nadividad, the land continued without the intervention of any strait. In 1582, Gualle was directed by the king of Spain to examine if there was a passage to the east and north-east of Japan, that connected the sea of Asia with the South Sea. He accordingly steered from Japan to the E.N.E. about 300 leagues: here he found the current setting from the north and north-west, till he had sailed above 700 leagues, when he reckoned he was only 200 leagues from the coast of California. In this voyage he discovered those parts of the north-west coast of America which are called New Georgia and New Cornwall. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Spaniards, alarmed at the achievements of Sir Francis Drake on this part of America, and still anxious to discover, if possible, the Straits of Anian, sent out Sebastian Viscaino from Acapulco: he examined the coasts as far as Cape Mendocino, and discovered the harbour of Montery. One of his ships reached the latitude of 43 degrees, where the mouth of a strait, or a large river, was said to have been discovered.

The expedition of Sir Francis Drake, though expressly undertaken for the purpose of distressing the Spaniards in their new settlements, must be noticed here, on account of its having contributed also, in some degree, to the geographical knowledge of the north-west coast of America. He sailed from Plymouth on the 15th November, 1577, with five vessels, (the largest only 100 tons, and the smallest 15,) and 164 men. On the 20th of August, 1578, he entered the Strait of Magellan, which he cleared on the 6th of September: "a most extraordinary short passage," observes Captain Tuckey, "for no navigator since, though aided by the immense improvements in navigation, has been able to accomplish it in less than 36 days." After coasting the whole of South America to the extremity of Mexico, he resolved to seek a northern passage into the Atlantic. With this intention, he sailed along the coast, to which, from its white cliffs, he gave the name of New Albion. When he arrived, however, at Cape Blanco, the cold was so intense, that he abandoned his intention of searching for a passage into the Atlantic, and crossed the Pacific to the Molucca islands. In this long passage he discovered only a few islands in 20° north latitude: after an absence of 1501 days, he arrived at Plymouth. The discoveries made by this circumnavigator, will, however, be deemed much more important, if the opinion of Fleurien, in his remarks on the austral lands of Drake, inserted in the Voyage of Marchand, in which opinion he is followed by Malte Brun, be correct; viz. that Drake discovered, under the name of the Isles of Elizabeth, the western part of the archipelago of Terra del Fuego; and that he reached even the southern extremity of America, which afterwards received, from the Dutch navigators, the name of Cape Horn. These are all the well authenticated discoveries made in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, on the north-west coast of America. Cape Mendocino, in about 40-1/2 degrees north latitude, is the extreme limit of the certain knowledge possessed at this period respecting this coast: the information possessed respecting New Georgia and New Cornwall was very vague and obscure.

In the beginning of the sixteenth century, the coasts of the east side of North America, particularly those of Florida, Virginia, Acadia and Canada, were examined by navigators of different countries. Florida was discovered in the year 1512, by the Spanish navigator, Ponce de Leon; but as it did not present any appearance of containing the precious metals, the Spaniards entirely neglected it. In 1524, the French seem to have engaged in their first voyage of discovery to America. Francis I. sent out a Florentine with four ships: three of these were left at Madeira; with the fourth he reached Florida. From this country he is said to have coasted till he arrived in fifty degrees of north latitude. To this part he gave the name of New France; but he returned home without having formed any colony. Towards the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries, the English began to form settlements in these parts of North America. Virginia was examined by the famous Sir Walter Raleigh: this name was given to all the coast on which the English formed settlements. That part of it now called Carolina, seems to have been first discovered by Raleigh.

The beginning of the seventeenth century was particularly distinguished by the voyage of La Maire and Schouten. The States General of Holland, who had formed an East India Company, in order to secure to it the monopoly of the Indian trade, prohibited all individuals from navigating to the Indian Ocean, either round the Cape of Good Hope or through the Straits of Magellan. It was therefore an object of great importance to discover, if practicable, any passage to India, which would enable the Dutch, without incurring the penalties of the law, to reach India. This idea was first suggested by La Maire, a merchant of Amsterdam, and William Schouten, a merchant of Horn. They had also another object in view: in all the maps of the world of the sixteenth century, a great southern continent is laid down. In 1606, Quiros, a Spanish navigator, had searched in vain for this continent; and La Maire and Schouten, in their voyage, resolved to look for it, as well as for a new passage to India. In 1615 they sailed from Holland with two ships: they coasted Patagonia, discovered the strait which bears the name of La Maire, and Staten Island, which joins it on the east. On the 31st of January next year, they doubled the southern point of America, having sailed almost into the sixtieth degree of south latitude; this point they named Cape Horn, after the town of which Schouten was a native. From this cape they steered right across the great southern ocean to the northwest. In their course they discovered several small islands; but finding no trace of a continent, they gave up the search for it, and steering to the south, passed to the east of the Papua Archipelago. They then changed their course to the west; discovered the east coast of the island, afterwards called New Zealand, as well as the north side of New Guinea. They afterwards reached Batavia, where they were seized by the president of the Dutch East India Company. This voyage was important, as it completed the navigation of the coast of South America from the Strait of Magellan to Cape Horn, and ascertained that the two great oceans, the Pacific and the Atlantic, joined each other to the south of America, by a great austral sea. This voyage added also considerably to maritime geography, "though many of the islands in the Pacific thus discovered have, from the errors in their estimated longitudes, been claimed as new discoveries by more recent navigators." In the year 1623, the Dutch found a shorter passage into the Pacific, by the Straits of Nassau, north-west of La Maire's Strait; and another still shorter, by Brewer's Straits, in the year 1643.

The success of the Portuguese and Spaniards in their discoveries of a passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope, and of America, induced, as we have seen, the other maritime nations to turn their attention to navigation and commerce. As, however, the riches derived from the East India commerce were certain, and the commodities which supplied them had long been in regular demand in Europe, the attempts to discover new routes to India raised greater energies than those which were made to complete the discovery of America. In fact, as we have seen, the east coast, both of South and North America, in all probability would not have been visited so frequently, or so soon and carefully examined, had it not been with the hope of finding some passage to India in that direction. But it was also supposed, that a passage to India might be made by sailing round the north of Europe to the east. Hence arose the frequent attempts to find out what are called the north-west and north-east passages; the most important of which, that were made during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, we shall now proceed to notice.

We have already mentioned the earliest attempts to find out the Straits of Anian; the idea that they existed on the northwest coast of America seems to have been abandoned for some time, unless we suppose, that a voyage undertaken by the French in 1535 had for its object the discovery of these straits: it is undoubted, that one of the objects of this voyage was to find a passage to India. In this voyage, the river St. Lawrence was examined as far as Montreal. In 1536, the English in vain endeavoured to find a north-west passage to India. The result of this voyage was, however, important in one respect; as it gave vise to the very beneficial fishery of the English on the banks of Newfoundland. The French had already engaged in this fishery.

In 1576, the idea of a north-west passage having been revived in England, Frobisher was sent in search of it, with two barks of twenty-five tons each, and one pinnace of ten tons. He entered the strait, leading into what was afterwards called Hudson's Bay: this strait he named after himself. He discovered the southern coast of Greenland; and picking up there some stone or ore which resembled gold, he returned to England. The London goldsmiths having examined this, they reported that it contained a large proportion of gold. This induced the Russian Company to send him out a second time, in 1577; but during this voyage, and a third in 1578, no discoveries of consequence were made. In the years 1585, 86, and 87, Captain Davis, who was in the service of an English company of adventurers, made three voyages in search of a north-west passage. In the first he proceded as far north as sixty-six degrees forty minutes, visited the southwest coast of Greenland, and gave his own name to the straits that separate it from America. At this time the use of a kind of harpoon was known, by which they were enabled to kill porpoises; but though they saw many whales, they knew not the right manner of killing them. In his second voyage an unsuccessful attempt was made to penetrate between Iceland and Greenland, but the ships were unable to penetrate beyond sixty-seven degrees north latitude. The west coast of Greenland was examined; but not being able to sail along its north coast, he stretched across to America, which he examined to latitude fifty-four. In his last voyage, Davis reached the west coast of Greenland, as far as latitude seventy-two. All his endeavours, however, to find a north-west passage were ineffectual.

In 1607, Hudson, an experienced seaman of great knowledge and intrepidity, sailed in search of this passage. He directed his course straight north, and reached the eighty-second degree of latitude, and the seventy-third degree of west longitude. During this voyage more of the eastern coast of Greenland was discovered than had been previously known. In his second voyage, which was undertaken in 1608, he endeavoured to sail between Nova Zembla and Spitzbergen, but unsuccessfully: of this and his first voyage we have very imperfect accounts. His third voyage was undertaken for the Dutch: in this he discovered the river in America which bears his name. His fourth and last voyage, in which he perished, and to which he owes his principal fame as a navigator, was in the service of the Russia Company of England. In this voyage he reached the strait which bears his name: his crew mutinied at this place, and setting him on shore, returned to England. As soon as the Russia Company learned the fate of Hudson, they sent one Captain Button in search of him, and also to explore the straits which he had discovered: in this voyage Hudson's Bay was discovered. Button's journal was never published: it is said, however, to have contained some important observations on the tides, and other objects of natural philosophy.

The existence of such a bay as Hudson's was described to be, induced the merchants of England to believe that they had at length found out the entrance to a passage which would lead them to the East Indies: many voyages were therefore undertaken, in a very short time after this bay had been discovered. The most important was that of Bylot and Baffin: they advanced through Davis's Straits into an extensive sea, which they called Baffin's Bay: they proceeded, according to their account, as far north as the latitude 78°. The nature and extent of this discovery was very much doubted at the time, and subsequently, till the discoveries of Captains Ross and Parry, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, proved that Baffin was substantially accurate and faithful.

Baffin's voyage took place in the year 1616: after this there was no voyage undertaken with the same object, till the year 1631, when Captain Fox sailed from Deptford. He had been used to the sea from his youth, and had employed his leisure time in collecting all the information he could possibly obtain, respecting voyages, to the north. He was besides well acquainted with some celebrated mathematicians and cosmographers, particularly Thomas Herne, who had carefully collected all the journals and charts of the former voyages, with a view to his business, which was that of a maker of globes. When Fox was presented to Charles I, his majesty gave him a map, containing all the discoveries which had been made in the north seas. He discovered several islands during the voyage, but not the passage he sought for; though he is of opinion, that if a passage is to be found, it must be in Sir Thomas Roe's Welcome,--a bay he discovered near an island of that name, in north latitude 64° 10', not far from the main land, on the west side of Hudson's Bay. He published a small treatise on the voyage, called The North-west Fox, which contains many important facts and judicious observations on the ice, the tides, compass, northern lights, &c. Captain James sailed on the same enterprise nearly at the same time that Fox did. His account was printed by King Charles's command, in 1633: it contains some remarkable physical observations respecting the intenseness of the cold, and the accumulation of ice, in northern latitudes; but no discovery of moment. He was of opinion, that no north-west passage existed.

The last voyage in the seventeenth century, in search of this passage, was undertaken in consequence of the representations of a Frenchman to Charles II. From the same cause proceeded the establishment of the Hudson's Bay Company by that monarch.

Canada was at this time colonized by the French; and a French settler there, De Gronsseliers, an enterprising and speculative man, after travelling in various directions, reached a country, where he received information respecting Hudson's Bay: he therefore resolved to attempt to reach this bay by sea. In the course of this undertaking he met with a few English, who had settled themselves near Port Nelson River: these he attacked, and by their defeat became master of the country. He afterwards explored the whole district, and returned to Quebec with a large quantity of valuable furs and English merchandize; but meeting with ill-treatment in Quebec, and afterwards at the court of France, he came to England, where he was introduced to the Count Palatine Rupert. The prince patronized all laudable and useful enterprises; and persuaded the king to send out Captain Gillam, and the Frenchman with him. The ship was loaded with goods to traffic for furs. They passed through Hudson's Straits to Baffin's Bay, as far as 75 degrees north latitude: they afterwards sailed as far to the south as 51 degrees, where, near the banks of a river, called after Prince Rupert, they built Charles Fort. This was the first attempt to carry on commerce in this part of America.

We must now return to the period of the first attempt to find out a north-east passage to India. A society of merchants had been formed in London for this purpose. Sebastian Cabot, either the son or the grandson of John Cabot, and who held the situation of grand pilot of England under Edward VI., was chosen governor of this society. Three vessels were fitted out: one of them is particularly noticed in the contemporary accounts, as having been sheathed with thin plates of lead. Sir Hew Willoughby had the chief command: Captain Richard Chanceller and Captain Durfovill commanded the other two vessels under him. Willoughby, having reached 72 degrees of north latitude, was obliged by the severity of the season to run his ship into a small harbour, where he and his crew were frozen to death. Captain Durfovill returned to England. Chanceller was more fortunate; for he reached the White Sea, and wintered in the Dwina, near the site of Archangel. While his ship lay up frozen, Chanceller proceeded to Moscow, where he obtained from the Czar privileges for the English merchants, and letters to King Edward: as the Czar was at this period engaged in the Livonian war, which greatly interrupted and embarrassed the trade of the Baltic, he was the more disposed to encourage the English to trade to the White Sea. We have already remarked, in giving an account of the voyage of Ohter, in King Alfred's time, that he had penetrated as far as the White Sea. This part of Europe, however, seems afterwards to have been entirely lost sight of, till the voyage of Chanceller; for in a map of the most northern parts of Europe, given in Munster's Geographia, which was printed in 1540, Greenland is laid down as joined to the north part of Lapland; and, consequently, the northern ocean appears merely as a great bay, enclosed by these countries. Three years afterwards, the English reached the coasts of Nova Zembla, and heard of, if they did not arrive at, the Straits of Waygats. The next attempts were made by the Dutch, who were desirous of reaching India by a route, in the course of which they would not be liable to meet with the Spaniards or Portuguese. They accordingly made four attempts between 1594 and 1596, but unsuccessfully. In the last voyage they reached Spitzbergen; but after striving in vain to penetrate to the north-east, they were obliged to winter on the north coast of Nova Zembla, in 76° latitude. Here they built a smaller vessel out of the remains of the one they had brought from Holland, and arrived the following summer at Kola, in Lapland.

In 1653, Frederic III, king of Denmark, sent three vessels to discover a north-east passage: it is said that they actually passed through Waygats' Straits; but that in the bay beyond these straits they found insurmountable obstacles from the ice and cold, and consequently were obliged to return.

The last attempt made in the seventeenth century, was by the English: it was proposed and undertaken by John Wood, an experienced seaman, who had paid particular attention to the voyages that had been made to the north. His arguments in favour of a north-east passage were, that whales had been found near Japan, with English and Dutch harpoons in them; and that the Dutch had found temperate weather near the Pole, and had sailed 300 leagues to the east of Nova Zembla. The first argument only proved, that there was sea between Nova Zembla and Japan; but not that it was navigable, though passable for whales: the other two positions were unfounded. Wood, however, persuaded the Duke of York to send him out in 1676. He doubled the North Cape, and reached 76 degrees of north latitude. One of the ships was wrecked off the coast of Nova Zembla, and Wood returned in the other, with an opinion that a north-east passage is impracticable, and that Nova Zembla is a part of the continent of Greenland.

But we must turn from these attempts to discover a northwest or north-east passage to India, which, from the accounts given of them, it will be evident, contributed very little to the progress of geographical knowledge, though they necessarily increased the skill, confidence, and experience of navigators.

While these unprofitable voyages were undertaken in the north, discoveries of consequence were making in the southern ocean. These may be divided into two classes; viz., such as relate to what is now called Australasia; and those which relate to the islands which are scattered in the southern ocean.

We have already stated that there is reason to believe some part of New Holland was first discovered by the Portuguese: two ancient maps in the British Museum are supposed to confirm this opinion; but the date of one is uncertain; the other is dated 1542, and certainly contains a country, which, in form and position, resembles New Holland, as it was laid down prior to the voyage of Tasman. But allowing this to be New Holland, it only proves, that at the date of this map it was known, not that it had been discovered by the Portuguese.

The Dutch, however, certainly made several voyages to it between 1616 and 1644: the western extremity was explored in 1616. The same year Van Dieman's Land was discovered. In the course of the ten following years, the western and northern coasts were visited. The southern coast was first discovered in 1627, but we have no particulars respecting the voyage in which it was discovered. In 1642, Tasman, a celebrated Dutch navigator, sailed from Batavia, and discovered the southern part of Van Dieman's Land and New Zealand. From this time to the beginning of the eighteenth century, little progress was made in exploring the coast of New Holland. Dampier, however, a man of wonderful talents, considering his education and mode of life, collected, during his voyage, some important details respecting the west coast. And among the numerous voyages undertaken by the Dutch East India Company towards the close of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth century, to examine this vast country, which the Dutch regarded as belonging to them, there was one by Van Vlaming deserving of notice: this navigator examined with great care and attention many bays and harbours on the west side; and he is the first who mentions the black swans of this country.

Papua, or New Guinea, another part of Australasia, was discovered by the Portuguese in 1528. The passage that divides this country from New Britain was discovered by Dampier, who was also the first that explored and named the latter country in 1683. The discovery of Solomon Islands by the Spaniards took place in 1575: Mendana, a Spanish captain, sailed from Lima, to the westward, and in steering across the Pacific, he fell in with these islands. On a second voyage he extended his discoveries, and he sailed a third time to conquer and convert the natives. His death, which took place in one of these islands, put an end to these projects. They are supposed to be the easternmost of the Papua Archipelago, afterwards visited by Carteret, Bougainville, and other navigators. Mendana, during his last voyage, discovered a group of islands to which he gave the name of Marquesas de Mendoza.

This group properly belongs to Polynesia: of the other islands in this quarter of the globe, which were discovered prior to the eighteenth century, Otaheite is supposed to have been discovered by Quiros in 1606. His object was to discover the imagined austral continent; but his discoveries were confined to Otaheite, which he named Sagittaria, and an island which he named Terra del Esperitu Sancto, which is supposed to be the principal of the New Hebrides. The Ladrones were discovered by Magellan in 1521. The New Philippines, or Carolinas, were first made known by the accidental arrival of a family of their natives at the Philippines in 1686. Easter island, a detached and remote country, which, however, is inhabited by the Polynesian race, was discovered by Roggewein in 1686.

Having thus exhibited a brief and general sketch of the progress of discovery, from the period when the Portuguese first passed the Cape of Good Hope to the beginning of the eighteenth century, we shall next, before we give an account of the state and progress of commerce during the same period, direct our attention to the state of geographical science in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

We have already stated that the astrolobe, which had been previously applied only to astronomical purposes, was accommodated to the use of mariners by Martin Behaim, towards the end of the fifteenth century. He was a scholar of Muller, of Koningsberg, better known under the name of Regiomontanus, who published the Almagest of Ptolemy. The Germans were at this time the best mathematicians of Europe. Walther, who was of that nation, and the friend and disciple of Regiomontanus, was the first who made use of clocks in his astronomical observations. He was succeeded by Werner, of Nuremberg, who published a translation of Ptolemy's Geography, with a commentary, in which he explains the method of finding the longitude at sea by the distance of a fixed star from the moon. The astronomical instruments hitherto used were, with the exception of the astrolobe, those which had been employed by Ptolemy and the Arabians. The quadrant of Ptolemy resembled the mural quadrant of later times; which, however, was improved by the Arabians, who, at the end of the tenth century, employed a quadrant twenty-one feet and eight inches radius, and a sextant fifty-seven feet nine inches radius, and divided into seconds. The use of the sextant seems to have been forgotten after this time; for Tycho Brahe is said to have re-invented it, and to have employed it for measuring the distances of the planets from the stars. The quadrant was about the same time improved by a method of subdividing its limbs by the diagonal scale, and by the Vernier. The telescope was invented in the year 1609, and telescopic sights were added to the quadrant in the year 1668. Picard, who was one of the first astronomers who applied telescopes to quadrants, determined the earth's diameter in 1669, by measuring a degree of the meridian in France. The observation made at Cayenne, that a pendulum which beat seconds there, must be shorter than one which beat seconds at Paris, was explained by Huygens, to arise from the diminution of gravity at the equator, and from this fact he inferred the spheroidal form of the earth. The application of the pendulum to clocks, one of the most beautiful and useful acquisitions which astronomy, and consequently navigation and geography have made, was owing to the ingenuity of Huygens. These are the principal discoveries and inventions, relating to astronomy, which were made prior to the eighteenth century, so far as they are connected with the advancement of the art of navigation and the science of geography.

The discoveries of Columbus and Gama necessarily overturned the systems of Ptolemy, Strabo, and the other geographers of antiquity. The opinion that the earth was a globe, which had been conjectured or inferred prior to the voyage of Magellan, was placed beyond a doubt by that voyage. The heavenly bodies were subjected to the calculations of man by the labours of Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, and Galileo. Under these circumstances it was necessary, and it was easy, to make great improvements in the construction of maps, in laying down the real form of the earth, and the relative situations of the countries of which it is formed, together with their latitudes and longitudes. The first maps which displayed the new world were those of the brothers Appian, and of Ribeiro: soon afterwards a more complete and accurate one was published by Gemma Frisius. Among the geographers of the sixteenth century, who are most distinguished for their science, may be reckoned Sebastian Munster; for though, as we have already mentioned, he joins Greenland to the north of Lapland in his map, yet his research, labour, and accuracy were such, that he is compared by his contemporaries to Strabo. Ortelius directed his studies and his learning to the elucidation of ancient geography; and according to Malte Bran, no incompetent judge, he may yet be consulted on this subject with advantage.

But modern geography may most probably be dated from the time of Mercator: he published an edition of Ptolemy, in which he pointed out the imperfection of the system of the ancients. The great object at this time, was to contrive such a chart in plano, with short lines, that all places might be truly laid down according to their respective longitudes and latitudes. A method of this kind had been obscurely pointed at by Ptolemy; but the first map on this plan was made by Mercator, about the year 1550. The principles, however, on which it was constructed, were not demonstrated till the year 1559, when Wright, an Englishman, pointed them out, as well as a ready and easy way of making such a map. This was a great help to navigators; since by enlarging, the meridian line, as Wright suggested and explained, so that all the degrees of longitude might be proportional to those of latitude, a chart on Mercator's projection shews the course and distance from place to place, in all cases of sailing; and is therefore in several respects more convenient to navigators than the globe itself. Mercator, in his maps and charts, chose Corvo, one of the Azores, for his first meridian, because at that time it was the line of no variation of the compass.

We have already alluded to Regiomontanus, as a celebrated mathematician, and as having published the Almagest of Ptolemy. He seems, likewise, to have written notes on Ptolemy's Geography. In 1525, a later translation of Ptolemy was published, which contained these annotations. To Ptolemy's maps, tables, &c., are added a new set of maps on wooden plates, according to the new discoveries: from these we find, that in consequence of the voyages of the Portuguese, the charts of the coasts of Arabia, Africa, Persia, and India, are laid down with tolerable accuracy. Nothing is noticed regarding China, except that it may be reached by sea from India. America is called Terra Nova inventa per Christ. Columbus: this seems to be all the editor knew of it. That part of the work which relates to the north of Europe, is most grossly erroneous: Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and the Baltic, seem to have been little known. A great bay is laid down between Greenland and Lapland, which bay is bounded on the north by a ridge of mountains, thus retaining the error of Ptolemy with respect to this part of Europe. There are two maps of England and Scotland: in one they are represented as one island; in the other as different islands. These maps and charts must have been the work of the editor or translator, as Regiomontanus, whose annotations are subjoined, died before the discovery of America.

We have been thus particular in describing the principal maps of this work, as they prove how imperfect geography was, prior to the time of Mercator, and with how much justice it may be said that he is the father of modern geography. There were, however, some maps of particular countries, drawn up in the sixteenth century with tolerable accuracy, considering the imperfection of those sciences and instruments, by which alone perfect accuracy can be attained. George Lilly, son of William, the famous grammarian, published, according to Nicholson, (English Historical Library,) "the first exact map that ever was, till then, drawn of this island." This praise must, however, be taken with great qualification; for even so late as the beginning of the nineteenth century, the distance from the South Foreland to the Lands-end was laid down, in all the maps of England, half a degree more than it actually is. We may here remark, that Nicholson represents Thomas Sulmo, a Guernsey man, who died in 1545, as our oldest general geographer.

In some of the MSS. of Harding's Chronicle, written in the reign of Edward IV., there is a rude map of Scotland. In 1539, Alexander Lindsey, an excellent navigator and hydrographer, published a chart of Scotland and its isles, drawn up from his own observations, which were made when he accompanied James V. in 1539, on his voyage to the highlands and islands. This chart is very accurate for the age; and is much superior to that published by Bishop Lesley, with his history, in 1578.

The first map of Russia, known to the other nations of Europe, was published in 1558 by Mr. Anthony Jenkinson, agent to the English Russia Company, from the result of his enquiries and observations during his long residence in that kingdom.

These are the most important maps, either general or of particular countries, with which the sixteenth century supplies us.

The seventeenth century continued the impulse which was given to the science of geography by Mercator. As new discoveries were constantly in progress, errors in maps were corrected, vacant spaces filled up, more accurate positions assigned, and greater attention paid to the actual and relative sizes of different countries. Malte Brun justly reckons Cluverius, Riccioli, and Varenius, as amongst the most celebrated geographers of this century. Cluverius was a man of extensive and accurate erudition, which he applied to the illustration of ancient geography. Riccioli, an Italian Jesuit, devoted his abilities and leisure to the study of mathematics, and the sciences dependent upon it, particularly astronomy; and was thus enabled to render important service to the higher parts of geography. Varenius is a still more celebrated name in geographical science: he excelled in mathematical geography; and such was his fame and merit in the higher branches of physics, and his ingenuity in applying them to geography, that a system of universal geography, which he published in Latin, was deemed worthy by Newton, to be republished and commented upon. Cellarius bestowed much pains on ancient geography. That branch of the science which pays more especial regard to the distances of places, was much advanced by Sanson, in France; Blew, in Holland; and Buraeus, in Sweden.

We must now turn to the progress of commerce during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

The discovery of a passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope, gave immediately a great impulse to commerce; whereas, it was a long time after the discovery of America before commerce was benefited by that event. This arose from the different state and circumstances of the two countries. The Portuguese found in India, and the other parts of the East, a race of people acquainted with commerce, and accustomed to it; fully aware of those natural productions of their country which were in demand, and who had long been in the habit of increasing the exportable commodities by various kinds of manufactures. Most of these native productions and manufactures had been in high estimation and value in Europe for centuries prior to the discovery of the Cape. The monarchs of the East, as well as their subjects, were desirous of extending their trade. There was, therefore, no difficulty, as soon as the Portuguese arrived at any part of the East; they found spices, precious stones, pearls, &c., or silk and cotton stuffs, porcelaine, &c., and merchants willing to sell them. Their only business was to settle a few skilful agents, to select and purchase proper cargoes for their ships. Even before they reached the remote countries of the East, which they afterwards did, they found depôts of the goods of those parts, in intermediate and convenient situations, between them and the middle and western parts of Asia and Europe.

It was very different in America: the natives here, ignorant and savage, had no commerce. "Even the natural productions of the soil, when not cherished and multiplied by the fostering and active hand of man, were of little account." Above half a century elapsed before the Spaniards reaped any benefit from their conquests, except some small quantities of gold, chiefly obtained from plundering the persons, the houses, and temples of the Mexicans and Peruvians. In 1545, the mines of Potosi were discovered; these, and the principal Mexican mine, discovered soon afterwards, first brought a permanent and valuable revenue to Spain. But it was long after this before the Spaniards, or the other nations of Europe, could be convinced that America contained other treasures besides those of gold and silver, or induced to apply that time, labour, and capital, which were requisite to unfold all the additions to the comforts, the luxuries, and the health of man, which the New World was capable of bestowing. When, however, European skill and labour were expended on the soil of America, the real and best wealth of this quarter of the world was displayed in all its importance and extent. In addition to the native productions of tobacco, indigo, cochineal, cotton, ginger, cocoa, pimento, drugs, woods for dying, the Europeans cultivated the sugar cane, and several other productions of the Old World. The only articles of commerce supplied by the natives, were furs and skins; every thing else imported from the New World consists at present, and has always consisted of the produce, of the industry of Europeans settled there.

But though it was long before Europe derived much direct benefit from the discovery of America, yet in one important respect this discovery gave a great stimulus to East India commerce. Gold and silver, especially the latter, have always been in great demand in the East, and consequently the most advantageous articles to export from Europe in exchange for Indian commodities. It was therefore absolutely necessary for the continuance of a commerce so much extended as this to India was, in consequence of the Portuguese discoveries, that increased means of purchasing Indian commodities should be given; and these were supplied by the gold and silver mines of America.

If these mines had not been discovered about the time when trade to India was more easy, expeditious, and frequent, it could not long have been in the power of Europe to have availed herself of the advantages of the Portuguese discoveries; gold and silver would have become, from their extreme scarcity, more valuable in Europe than in India, and consequently would no longer have been exported. But the supply of the precious metals and of Indian commodities increasing at the same time, Europe, by means of America, was enabled to reap all possible advantage from the Portuguese discoveries. The gold and silver of Mexico and Peru traversed the world, in spite of all obstacles, and reached that part of it where it was most wanted, and purchased the productions of China and Hindostan.

Yet, notwithstanding the effectual demand for East India commodities was necessarily increased by the increased supply of the precious metals, yet the supply of these commodities being increased in a much greater proportion, their price was much lowered. This lowering of price naturally arose from two circumstances: after the passage to India by the Cape, the productions and manufactures of the East were purchased immediately from the natives; and they were brought to Europe directly, and all the way, by sea. Whereas, before the discovery of the Cape, they were purchased and repurchased frequently; consequently, repeated additions were made to their original price; and these additions were made, in almost every instance, by persons who had the monopoly of them. Their conveyance to Europe was long, tedious, and mostly by land carriage, and consequently very expensive. There are no data by which it can be ascertained in what proportion the Portuguese lowered the price of Indian commodities; but Dr. Robertson's supposition appears well founded,--that they might afford to reduce the commodities of the East, in every part of Europe, one half. This supposition is founded on a table of prices of goods in India, the same sold at Aleppo, and what they might be sold for in England,--drawn up, towards the end of the seventeenth century, by Mr. Munn: from this it appears, that the price at Aleppo was three times that in India, and that the goods might be sold in England at half the Aleppo price. But as the expense of conveying goods to Aleppo from India, may, as Dr. Robertson observes, be reckoned nearly the same as that which was incurred by bringing them to Alexandria, he draws the inference already stated,--that the discovery of the Cape reduced the price of Indian commodities one half. The obvious and necessary result would follow, that they would be in greater demand, and more common use. The principal eastern commodities used by the Romans were spices and aromatics,--precious stones and pearls; and in the later periods of their power, silk; these, however, were almost exclusively confined to rare and solemn occasions, or to the use of the most wealthy and magnificent of the conquerors of the world. On the subversion of the Roman empire, the commodities of the East were for a short time in little request among the barbarians who subverted it: as soon, however, as they advanced from their ignorance and rudeness, these commodities seem strongly to have attracted their notice, and they were especially fond of spices and aromatics. These were used very profusely in their cookery, and formed the principal ingredients in their medicines. As, however, the price of all Indian commodities was necessarily high, so long as they were obliged to be brought to Europe by a circuitous route, and loaded with accumulated profits, it was impossible that they could be purchased, except by the more wealthy classes. The Portuguese, enabled to sell them in greater abundance, and at a much cheaper rate, introduced them into much more general use; and, as they every year extended their knowledge of the East, and their commerce with it, the number of ships fitted out at Lisbon every year, for India, became necessarily more numerous, in order to supply the increased demand.

Commerce in this case, as in every other, while it is acted upon by an extension of geographical knowledge, in its turn has an obvious tendency to extend that knowledge; this was the case with respect to India. The ancients had indeed made but small advances in their acquaintance with this country, notwithstanding they were stimulated by the large profits they derived from their eastern commerce; but this was owing to their comparative ignorance of navigation and the sciences on which it depends. As soon as the moderns had improved this art, especially by the use of the compass, and the Cape of Good Hope was discovered, commerce gave the stimulus, which in a very few years led the Portuguese from Calicut to the furthest extremity of Asia.

It is remarkable that the Portuguese were allowed to monopolize Indian commerce for so long a time as they did; this, however, as Dr. Robertson observes, may be accounted for, "from the political circumstances in the state of all those nations in Europe, whose intrusion as rivals the Portuguese had any reason to dread. From the accession of Charles V. to the throne, Spain was either so much occupied in a multiplicity of operations in which it was engaged by the ambition of that monarch, and of his son Philip II., or so intent on prosecuting its own discoveries and conquests in the New World, that although by the successful enterprize of Magellan, its fleets were unexpectedly conducted by a new course to that remote region of Asia, which was the seat of the most gainful and alluring branch of trade carried on by the Portuguese, it could make no considerable effect to avail itself of the commercial advantages which it might have derived from that event. By the acquisition of the crown of Portugal, in the year 1580, the kings of Spain, instead of the rivals, became the protectors of the Portuguese trade, and the guardians of all its exclusive rights. Throughout the sixteenth century, the strength and resources of France were so much wasted by the fruitless expeditions of their monarchs to Italy; by their unequal contest with the power and policy of Charles V., and by the calamities of the civil wars which desolated the kingdom upwards of forty years, that it could neither bestow much attention on commerce, nor engage in any scheme of distant enterprize. The Venetians, how sensibly soever they might feel the mortifying reverse of being excluded almost entirely from the Indian trade, of which their capital had been formerly the chief seat, were so debilitated and humbled by the league of Cambray, that they were no longer capable of engaging in any undertaking of magnitude. England, weakened by the long contests between the houses of York and Lancaster, and just beginning to recover its proper vigour, was restrained from active exertions during one part of the sixteenth century, by the cautious maxims of Henry VII., and wasted its strength, during another part of it, by engaging inconsiderately in the wars between the princes on the continent. The nation, though destined to acquire territories in India more extensive and valuable than were ever possessed by any European power, had no such presentiment of its future eminence there, as to take an early part in the commerce or transactions of that country, and a great part of the century elapsed before it began to turn its attention to the East.

"While the most considerable nations in Europe found it necessary, from the circumstances which I have mentioned, to remain inactive spectators of what passed in the East, the seven United Provinces of the Low Countries, recently formed into a small state, still struggling for political existence, and yet in the infancy of its power, ventured to appear in the Indian Ocean as the rivals of the Portuguese; and, despising their pretensions to an exclusive right of commerce with the extensive countries to the eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, invaded that monopoly which they had hitherto guarded with such jealous attention. The English soon followed the example of the Dutch, and both nations, at first by the enterprizing industry of private adventurers, and afterwards by the more powerful efforts of trading companies, under the protection of public authority, advanced with astonishing ardour and success in this new career opened to them. The vast fabric of power which the Portuguese had opened in the East, (a superstructure much too large for the basis on which it had to rest) was almost entirely overturned in as short time, and with as much facility, as it had been raised. England and Holland, by driving them from their most valuable settlements, and seizing the most lucrative branches of their trade, have attained to that pre-eminence of naval power and commercial opulence by which they are distinguished among the nations of Europe." (Robertson's India, pp. 177-9. 8vo. edition.)

Before, however, we advert to the commerce of the Dutch in India, it will be proper to notice those circumstances which gave a commercial direction to the people of the Netherlands, both before their struggle with Spain, and while the result of that struggle was uncertain. The early celebrity of Bruges as a commercial city has already been noticed; its regular fairs in the middle of the tenth century; its being made the entrepôt of the Hanse Association towards the end of the thirteenth. It naturally partook of the wealth and commercial improvement which Flanders derived from her woollen manufactures, and was in fact made the emporium of that country at the beginning of the fourteenth century; and within 100 years afterwards, the staple for English and Scotch goods. When the increased industry of the north of Europe induced and enabled its inhabitants to exchange the produce of their soil, fisheries, and manufactures, for the produce of the south of Europe, and of India, Bruges was made the great entrepôt of the trade of Europe. In the beginning of the sixteenth century its commercial importance began to decline, but the trade which left it, did not pass beyond the limits of the Netherlands; it settled in a great measure at Antwerp, which, as being accessible by sea, was more convenient for commerce than Bruges. This city, however, would not have fallen so easily or rapidly before its rival, had it not been distracted by civil commotions. From it the commerce of the Netherlands, and with it of the north of Europe, and the interchange of its commodities with those of the south of Europe and of Asia, gradually passed to Antwerp; and about the year 1516, most of the trade of Bruges was fixed here, the Portuguese making it their entrepôt for the supply of the northern kingdoms.

Even before this time the ships of the Netherlands seem to have been the carriers of the north of Europe; for in 1503, two Zealand ships arrived at Campveer, laden with sugars, the produce of the Canary Islands. Antwerp, however, continued till it was taken by the Spaniards, and its port destroyed by the blocking up of the Scheldt, to be most distinguished for its commerce, and its consequent wealth:--its situation, its easy access by sea, joined to the circumstance of its being made the Portuguese entrepôt for spices, drugs, and other rich productions of India, mainly contributed to its commerce. Merchants from every part of the north of Europe settled here, and even many of the merchants of Bruges removed to it, after the decline of their own city. Its free fairs for commerce, two of which lasted each time six weeks, attracted merchants from all parts, as they could bring their merchandize into it duty free, and were here certain of finding a market for it. In it also bills of exchange on all parts of Europe could be easily and safely negotiated. We have already mentioned the most wealthy merchants of England and France, in the fifteenth century: there existed at Antwerp, in the sixteenth, a firm of the name of Fugger, whose wealth was very great, and indicates the extent of their commercial dealings. From this firm the Emperor Charles V. had borrowed a very large sum, in order to carry on an expedition against Tunis. In the year 1534, Charles, being at Antwerp, Fugger invited him to an entertainment at his house, made a fire in his hall with cinnamon, and threw all the emperor's bonds into that fire. About eleven years afterwards, the same merchant gave an acquittance to Henry VIII. of England, for the sum of 152,180 l. Flemish, which the king had borrowed of him. The Fuggers had a licence from the king of Portugal to trade to India; and they used to send their own factor in every ship that sailed thither, and were the owners of part of every cargo of pepper imported.

In the year 1541, it contained 100,000 inhabitants: soon afterwards the persecutions on account of religion in Germany, England, and France, drove many people thither, and of course increased both its population and wealth. If we may believe Huet, in his History of Dutch Commerce, it was, at this time, not uncommon to see 2500 ships at once lying in the Scheldt.

The picture, however, which Guicciardini draws of Antwerp in 1560, when it had reached the zenith of its prosperity and wealth,--being that of a contemporary author, and entering into detail,--is at once much more curious and interesting, and may be depended on as authentic. It is also valuable, as exhibiting the state of the manufactures, commerce, &c. of most of the nations of Europe at this period.

"Besides the natives and the French, who are here very numerous, there are six principal foreign nations, who reside at Antwerp, both in war and peace, making above 1000 merchants, including factors and servants, viz. Germans, Danes, and Easterlings--that is, people from the ports in the south shores of the Baltic, from Denmark to Livonia--Italians, Spaniards, English, and Portuguese of these six nations; the Spaniards are the most numerous. One of those foreign merchants, Fugger, of Augsburg, died worth above six millions of crowns; there are many natives there with from 200,000 to 400,000 crowns."

"They meet twice a day, in the mornings and evenings, one hour each time, at the English bourse, where, by their interpreters and brokers, they buy and sell all kinds of merchandize. Thence they go to the new bourse, or principal exchange, where, for another hour each time, they transact all matters relating to bills of exchange, with the above six nations, and with France; and also to deposit at interest, which is usually twelve per cent. per annum."

"They send to Rome a great variety of woollen drapery, linen, tapestry, &c.: the returns are in bills of exchange. To Ancona, English and Flemish cloths, stuffs, linen, tapestry, cochineal; and bring in return such spices and drugs as the merchants of Ancona procure in the Levant, and likewise silks, cotton, Turkey carpets, and leather. To Bologne they export serges, and other stuffs, tapestry, linen, merceries, &c. and bring in return for it, wrought silks, cloth of gold and silver, crapes, caps, &c. To Venice they send jewels and pearls, English cloth and wool, Flemish drapery, cochineal, &c. and a little sugar and pepper: thus, with respect to these two latter articles, sending to Venice what they formerly obtained from her. For, prior to the Portuguese discovery of the Cape, the merchants of Antwerp brought from Venice all sorts of India spices and drugs: and even so late as the year 1518, there arrived in the Scheldt, five Venetian ships, laden with spices and drugs, for the fair at Antwerp. In 1560, however, the imports from Venice consisted of the finest and choicest silks, carpets, cotton, &c. and colours for dyers and painters."

"To Naples they export great quantities of Flemish and English cloths and stuffs, tapestry, linens, small wares of metal, and other materials: and bring back raw, thrown and wrought silk, fine furs and skins, saffron and manna. The exports to Sicily are similar to those of the other parts of Italy: the imports from it are galls in great quantity, cinnamon, oranges, cotton, silk, and sometimes wine. To Milan, Antwerp exports pepper, sugar, jewels, musk, and other perfumes, English and Flemish woollen manufactures, English and Spanish woollinens, and cochineal. The imports are gold and silver, thread, silks, gold stuffs, dimities, rich and curious draperies, rice, muskets and other arms, high priced toys and small goods; and Parmesian cheese. The exports to Florence are nearly the same as to the other parts of Italy, but in addition, fans are specified. Besides the usual imports of silks and gold stuffs, there are also fine furs. Household furniture is exported to Genoa, besides the usual articles: velvets, which were then the best in the world; satins, the best coral, mithridate, and treacle, are the principal or the peculiar imports. Genoa, is the port through which Antwerp trades with Mantua, Verona, Modena, Lucca, &c."

"Besides all these articles, Antwerp imports from Italy by sea, alum, oil, gums, leaf senna, sulphur, &c. and exported to it by sea, tin, lead, madder, Brazil wood, wax, leather, flax, tallow, salt fish, timber, and sometimes corn. The imports from Italy, including only silks, gold and silver, stuffs, and thread camblets and other stuffs, amount to three millions of crowns, or 600,000 l. yearly.

"Antwerp exports to Germany precious stones and pearls, spices, drugs, saffron, sugars, English cloths, as a rare and curious article, bearing a high price: Flemish cloth, more common and not so valuable as English, serges, tapestry, a very large quantity of linen and mercery, or small wares of all sorts: from Germany, Antwerp receives by land carriage, silver, bullion, quicksilver, immense quantities of copper, Hessian wool, very fine, glass, fustians of a high price, to the value of above 600,000 crowns annually; woad, madder, and other dye stuffs; saltpetre, great quantities of mercery, and household goods, very fine, and of excellent quality: metals of all sorts, to a great amount; arms; Rhenish wine, of which Guicciardini speaks in the highest terms, as good for the health, and not affecting either the head or the stomach, though drunk in very large quantities:--of this wine 40,000 tuns were brought to Antwerp annually, which, at thirty-six crowns per tun, amounted to 1,444,000 crowns."

"To Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Eastland, Livonia, and Poland, Antwerp exports vast quantities of spices, drugs, saffron, sugar, salt, English and Flemish cloths, fustians, linens, wrought silks, gold stuffs, tapestries, precious stones, Spanish and other wines, alum, Brazil wood, merceries, and household goods. From these countries, particularly from Eastland and Poland, that is, the countries on the south shore of the Baltic, Antwerp receives wheat and rye to a large amount; iron, copper, brass, saltpetre, dye-woods, vitriol, flax, honey, wax, pitch, tar, sulphur, pot-ashes, skins and furs, leather, timber for ship building, and other purposes; beer, in high repute; salt meat; salted, dryed, and smoked fish; amber in great quantities, &c."

"To France, Antwerp sends precious stones, quicksilver, silver bullion, copper and brass, wrought and unwrought, lead, tin, vermillion; azure, blue, and crimson colours, sulphur; saltpetre, vitriol, camblets, and Turkey grograms, English and Flemish cloths, great quantities of fine linen, tapestry, leather, peltry, wax, madder, cotton, dried fish, salt fish, &c. Antwerp receives her returns from France, partly by land and partly by sea. By sea, salt to the annual value of 180,000 crowns; fine woad of Thoulouse, to the value annually of 300,000 crowns; immense quantities of canvass and strong linen, from Bretagne and Normandy; about 40,000 tuns of excellent red and white wines, at about twenty-five crowns per tun; saffron; syrup, or sugar, or perhaps capillaire; turpentine, pitch, paper of all kinds in great quantities, prunes, Brazil wood, &c. &c. By land, Antwerp receives many curious and valuable gilt and gold articles, and trinkets; very fine cloth, the manufacture of Rouen, Peris, Tours, Champagne, &c.; the threads of Lyons, in high repute; excellent verdigrise from Montpelier, merceries, &c."

"To England, Antwerp exports jewels and precious stones, silver bullion, quicksilver, wrought silks, cloth of gold and silver, gold and silver thread, camblets, grograms, spices, drugs, sugar, cotton, cinnamon, galls, linens, serges, tapestry, madder, hops in great quantities, glass, salt fish, small wares made of metal and wood, arms, ammunition, and household furniture. From England, Antwerp imports immense quantities of fine and coarse woollen goods; the finest wool; excellent saffron, but in small quantities; a great quantity of lead and tin; sheep and rabbit skins, and other kinds of fine peltry and leather; beer, cheese, and other sorts of provisions, in great quantities; also Malmsey wines, which the English import from Candia."

Guicciardini observes, that Antwerp exported but little to Scotland, as that country was principally supplied from England and France: some spiceries, sugars, madder, wrought silks, camblets, serges, linen, and merceries, are exported. In return, Antwerp received from Scotland vast quantities of peltry of various kinds, leather, wool, cloth of coarse quality, fine large pearls, but not of quite so good a water as the oriental pearls.

The exports to Ireland were nearly the same as to Scotland: the returns were skins and leather, some low-priced cloths, and other coarse and common articles of little value.

The exports to Spain consisted chiefly of copper, brass, and latten, wrought and unwrought; tin, lead; much woollen cloth, both Flemish and English; serges, tapestry, linens, flax-thread, wax, pitch, madder, tallow, sulphur, wheat, rye, salted meat and fish, butter, cheese, merceries, silver bullion and wrought, arms, ammunition, furniture, tools; and every thing also, he adds, produced by human industry and labour, to which the lower classes in Spain have an utter aversion. From Spain, Antwerp received jewels, pearls, gold and silver in great quantities; cochineal, sarsaparilla, guiacum, saffron; silk, raw and thrown; silk stuffs, velvets, taffeties, salt, alum, orchil, fine wool, iron, cordovan leather, wines, oils, vinegar, honey, molasses, Arabian gums, soap; fruits, both moist and dried, in vast quantities, and sugar from the Canaries.

The exports to Portugal were silver bullion, quicksilver, vermilion, copper, brass, and latten; lead, tin, arms, artillery and ammunition; gold and silver thread, and most of the other articles sent to Spain. From Portugal, Antwerp received pearls and precious stones, gold, spices, to the value of above a million of crowns annually; drugs, amber, musk, civet, great quantities of ivory, aloes, rhubarb, cotton, China root, (then and even lately much used in medicine,) and many other rare and valuable Indian commodities, with which the greatest part of Europe is supplied from Antwerp; also, sugars from St. Thomas, under the line, and the other islands belonging to the Portuguese on the African coast; Brazil wood, Guinea grains, and other drugs from the west coast of Africa; Madeira sugar and wines. Of the produce of Portugal itself, Antwerp imported salt, wines, oils, woad, seeds, orchil, fruits, &c. &c.

To Barbary, Antwerp exported woollen goods, linen, merceries, metals, &c.; and received from it sugar, azure or anil, gums, coloquintida, leather, peltry, and fine feathers.

From this sketch of the commerce of Antwerp, when it was at its height, we see, that it embraced the whole commerce of the world: and that in it centered all the commodities supplied by Asia, America, Africa, and the south of Europe on the one hand, and England, the Baltic countries, Germany, and France on the other. The account given by Guicciardini is confirmed by Wheeler, who wrote in 1601. He observes, that a little before the troubles in the Low Countries, the people of Antwerp were the greatest traders to Italy in English and other foreign merchandize; and also to Alexandria, Cyprus, and Tripoli in Syria; "beating the Italians, English, and Germans, almost entirely out of that trade, as they also soon did the Germans in the fairs of their own country." He adds, that the Antwerp merchants, being men of immense wealth, and consequently able to supply Spain for the Indies at long credit, set their own prices on their merchandize. Antwerp also supplied Germany, Spain, Portugal, and Eastland with the wares, which France was wont to supply them. He adds, "It is not past eighty years ago, (that would be about 1520,) since there were not, in London, above twelve or sixteen Low Country merchants, who imported only stone pots, brushes, toys for children, and other pedlar's wares; but in less than forty years after, there were, in London, at least one hundred Netherland merchants, who brought thither all the commodities which the merchants of Italy, Germany, Spain, France, and Eastland, (of all which nations there were, before that time, divers famous and notable rich merchants and companies,) used to bring into England out of their own country directly, to the great damage of the said strangers, and of the natural born English merchants."

Guicciardini informs us, that in his time the port of Armuyden, in the island of Walcheren, was the place of rendezvous for the shipping of Antwerp: in it have often been seen 500 large ships lying at one time, bound to, or returning from distant parts of the world. He adds, that it was no uncommon thing for 500 ships to come and go in one day; that 10,000 carts were constantly employed in carrying merchandize to and from the neighbouring countries, besides hundreds of waggons daily coming and going with passengers; and 500 coaches used by people of distinction. In his enumeration of the principal trades, it is curious that there were ninety-two fishmongers, and only seventy-eight butchers; there were 124 goldsmiths, who, it must be recollected, at that time acted as bankers, or rather exchangers of money. The number of houses was 13,500. With respect to the shipping, which, according to this author, were so numerous at the port of Antwerp, comparatively few of them belonged to this city, as most of its commerce was carried on by ships of foreign nations.

This circumstance, of its having but few ships of its own, may be regarded as one cause why, when it was taken and plundered by the Spaniards in the year 1585, it could not recover its former commerce, as the shipping removed with the nations they belonged to. The forts which the Dutch built in the Scheldt were, however, another and a very powerful cause. The trade of Holland rose on the fall of Antwerp, and settled principally at Amsterdam; this city had indeed become considerable after the decline of the Hanseatic confederacy; but was not renowned for its commerce till the destruction of Antwerp. The commerce of Holland was extended and supported by its fisheries, and the manufactures of Flanders and the adjoining provinces, which in their turn received support from its commerce. Guicciardini informs us, that there were in the Netherlands, in time of peace, 700 busses and boats employed in the herring fishery: each made three voyages in the season, and on an average during that period, caught seventy lasts of herring, each last containing twelve barrels of 9OO or 1000 herrings each barrel; the price of a last was usually about 6£. sterling: the total amount of one year's fishery, was about 294,000£. sterling. About sixty years after this time, according to Sir Walter Raleigh, the cod and ling fishery of Friesland, Holland, Zealand, and Flanders, (the provinces included by Guicciardini in the maritime Netherlands) brought in 100,000£. annually: and the salmon-fishing of Holland and Zealand nearly half that sum.

The woollen manufactures of the Netherlands had, about the time that Guicciardini wrote, been rivalled by those of England: yet he says, that, though their wool was very coarse, above 12,000 pieces of cloth were made at each of the following places; Amsterdam, Bois-le-duc, Delft, Haarlem, and Leyden. Woollen manufactures were carried on also at other places, besides taffeties and tapestries. Lisle is particularised by him as next in commercial importance to Antwerp and Amsterdam. Bois-le-duc seems to have been the seat of a great variety of manufactures; for besides woollen cloth, 20,000 pieces of linen, worth, on an average, ten crowns each, were annually made; and likewise great quantities of knives, fine pins, mercery, &c. By the taking of Antwerp, the Spanish or Catholic Netherlands lost their trade and manufactures, great part of which, as we have already observed, settled in the United Provinces, while the remainder passed into England and other foreign countries.

The destruction of the Hanseatic league, which benefited Amsterdam, seems also to have been of service to the other northern provinces of the Netherlands: for in 1510, we are informed by Meursius, in his History of Denmark, there was at one time a fleet of 250 Dutch merchant ships in the Baltic: if this be correct, the Dutch trade to the countries on this sea must have been very great. The circumstance of the Dutch, even before their revolt from Spain, carrying on a great trade, especially to the Baltic, is confirmed by Guicciardini; according to him, about the year 1559, they brought annually from Denmark, Eastland, Livonia, and Poland, 60,000 lasts of grain, chiefly rye, worth 560,000 l. Flemish. They had above 800 ships from 200 to 700 tons burden: fleets of 300 ships arrived twice a year from Dantzic and Livonia at Amsterdam, where there were often seeing lying at the same time 500 vessels, most of them belonging to it. He mentions Veer in Zealand (Campveer) as at that time being the staple port for all the Scotch shipping, and owing its principal commerce to that circumstance.

The destruction of Antwerp brought to Amsterdam, along with other branches of commerce, the valuable trade which the former city had with Portugal for the produce and manufactures of India; these the Dutch merchants resold to all the nations of the north. As soon, however, as Philip II. had obtained possession of the throne of Portugal in 1580, he put a stop to all further commerce between Lisbon and the Dutch. The latter, having tasted the sweets of this commerce, resolved to attempt a direct trade to India. We have already mentioned the voyages of Barentz in search of a north-east passage; these proving unsuccessful, the Dutch began to despair of reaching India, except by the Cape of Good Hope; and this voyage they were afraid to undertake, having, at this time, neither experienced seamen nor persons acquainted with Indian commerce. A circumstance, however, occurred while Barentz was in search of a north-west passage, which determined them to sail to India by the Cape. One Houlman, a Dutchman, who had been in the Portuguese Indian service, but was then confined in Lisbon for debt, proposed to the merchants of Rotterdam, if they could liberate him, to put them in possession of all he knew respecting Indian commerce; his offer was accepted, and four ships were sent to India in 1594 under his command. The adventurers met with much opposition from the Portuguese in India, so that their voyage was not very successful or lucrative: they returned, however, in twenty-nine months with a small quantity of pepper from Java, where they had formed a friendly communication with the natives. The arrival of the Dutch in India,--the subjugation of Portugal by Spain, which circumstance dispirited and weakened the Portuguese, and the greater attention which the Spaniards were disposed to pay to their American than their Indian commerce, seem to have been the causes which produced the ruin of the Portuguese in India, and the establishment of the Dutch.

The Dutch pushed their new commerce with great vigour and zeal. In the year 1600 eight ships entered their ports laden with cinnamon, pepper, cloves, nutmegs, and mace: the pepper they obtained at Java, the other spices at the Moluccas, where they were permitted by the natives, who had driven out the Portuguese, to establish factories.

In consequence of a wild and ruinous spirit of speculation having seized the Dutch merchants, the government, in 1602, formed all the separate companies who traded to India, into one; and granted to this extensive sovereignty over all the establishments that might be formed in that part of the world. Their charter was for twenty-one years: their capital was 6,600,000 guilders (or about 600,000 l.) Amsterdam subscribed one half of the capital, and selected twenty directors out of sixty, to whom the whole management of the trade was entrusted.

From this period, the Dutch Indian commerce flourished extremely: and the company, not content with having drawn away a large portion of the Portuguese trade, resolved to expel them entirely from this part of the world. Ships fitted, either to trade or to fight, and having on board a great number of soldiers, were sent out within a very few years after the establishment of the company. Amboyna and the Moluccas were first entirely wrested from the Portuguese: factories and settlements were in process of time established from Balsora, at the mouth of the Tigris in the Persian Gulf; along the coasts and islands of India, as far as Japan. Alliances were formed with many of the Indian princes: and in many parts, particularly on the coasts of Ceylon, and at Pulicat, Masulipatam, Negapatam, and other places along the coasts of Coromandel and Malabar, they were themselves, in fact, the sovereigns. The centre of all their Indian commerce was fixed at Batavia in Java, the greatest part of this island belonging to them. From this general sketch of the extent of country, which was embraced, either by their power or their commerce, it is evident that the Indian trade was almost monopolized by them; and as they wisely employed part of the wealth which it produced, to establish and defend their possessions, they soon became most formidable in this part of the world, sending out a fleet of 40 or 50 large ships, and an army of 30,000 men.

They were not, however, content, but aimed at wresting from the Portuguese almost the only trade which remained to them; viz. their trade with China. In this attempt they did not succeed; but in the year 1624, they established themselves at Formosa. Soon after this, the conquest of China by the Tartars, induced or compelled an immense number of Chinese to leave their native country and settle in Formosa. Here they carried on a very extensive and lucrative trade; and Formosa became the principal mart of this part of Asia. Vessels from China, Japan, Siam, Java, and the Philippines, filled its harbours. Of this commerce the Dutch availed themselves, and derived great wealth from it, for about forty years, when they were driven out of the island. In 1601, the Dutch received permission to trade to Japan, but this privilege was granted under several very strict conditions, which were, however, relaxed in 1637, when they discovered a conspiracy of the Spaniards, the object of which was to dethrone the emperor, and seize the government. The jealousy of the Japanese, however, soon revived; so that by the end of the seventeenth century, the lucrative commerce which the Dutch carried on with this island for fine tea, porcelaine, lacquered or Japan ware, silk, cotton, drugs, coral, ivory, diamonds, pearls, and other precious stones, gold, silver, fine copper, iron, lead, and tin; and in exchange for linen, and woollen cloths, looking-glasses, and other glass ware; and the merchandize of India, Persia, and Arabia, was almost annihilated.

Before proceeding to narrate the events which arose from the arrival of the English in the East Indies, and the effects produced on the Dutch power and commerce there, by their arrival, it will be proper to take a short notice of the commerce of the Dutch to the other parts of the world. As their territories in Europe were small and extremely populous, they were in a great measure dependent on foreign nations for the means of subsistence: in exchange for these, they had few products of their manufactures to give. The sources of their wealth, therefore, as well as of the means of their existence, were derived from the exchange of their India commodities, and from their acting as the great carriers of Europe. From these two circumstances, their cities, and especially Amsterdam, became the great mart of Europe: its merchants had commercial transactions to an immense amount with all parts of the world. In consequence of the vastness and extent of their commerce, they found great payments in specie very inconvenient. Hence arose the bank of Amsterdam. It is foreign to our purpose, either to describe the nature of this bank, or to give a history of it; but its establishment, at once a proof, and the result of the immense commerce of Amsterdam, and the cause of that commerce becoming still more flourishing, and moreover, as the principal of those establishments, which have changed the character of the commerce of Europe, could not be passed over without notice. It was formed in the year 1609.

In this year, the Dutch had extended their trade to the west coast of Africa so much, that they had about 100 ships employed in the gold coast trade. About the same time, they formed a colony in North America, in that province now called New York. In 1611, having formed a truce with Spain, they resolved to venture into the Mediterranean, and endeavour to partake in the lucrative trade with the Levant: for this purpose, they sent an ambassador to Constantinople, where he concluded a favourable treaty of commerce. But by far the most extensive and lucrative commerce which the Dutch possessed in Europe, was in the Baltic: there they had gradually supplanted the Hanseatic League, and by the middle of the seventeenth century, nearly all the commodities of the countries lying on, or communicating with this sea, were supplied to the rest of Europe by the Dutch. In the year 1612, they first engaged in the whale fishery at Greenland. In 1648, taking advantage of the civil troubles in England, and having by this time acquired a powerful influence at the Russian court, they interfered with the trade of the English Russian Company at Archangel; and this new branch of trade they pushed with their national industry and perseverance, so that in 1689 they had 200 factors in this place.

In the year 1621 the Dutch formed a West India Company: their first objects were to reduce Brazil and Peru: in the latter they were utterly unsuccessful. By the year 1636 they had conquered the greater part of the coast of Brazil: they lost no time in reaping the fruits of this conquest: for in the space of thirteen years, they had sent thither 800 ships of war and commerce, which were valued at 4-1/2 millions sterling; and had in that time taken from Spain, then sovereign of Portugal, 545 ships. In the year 1640 the Portuguese shook off the Spanish yoke, and from this event may be dated the decline of the Dutch power in Brazil: in 1654 they were entirely expelled from this country.

In the year 1651, they colonized the Cape of Good Hope; and in the same year, began the obstinate and bloody maritime, war between Holland and England. This arose principally from the navigation act, which was passed in England in 1650: its object and effect was to curtail the commerce between England and Holland, which consisted principally of foreign merchandize imported into, and English merchandize exported from, England in Dutch vessels. In this war, the Dutch lost 700 merchant ships in the years 1652 and 1653. In 1654, peace was made. The object of the navigation act, at least so far as regarded the Dutch acting as the carriers of the English trade, seems to have been completely answered, for in 1674, after a great frost, when the ports were open, there sailed out of the harbour of Rotterdam above 300 sail of English, Scotch, and Irish ships at one time. The example of the English being followed by the nations of the north, the Dutch carrying trade was very much reduced. Between the years 1651 and 1672, when Holland was overrun by the French, their commerce seems to have reached the greatest extent, which it attained in the seventeenth century; and perhaps, at no subsequent period, did it flourish so much. De Witt estimates the increase of their commerce and navigation from the peace with Spain in 1648 to the year 1669, to be fully one-half. He adds, that during the war with Holland, Spain lost the greater part of her naval power: that since the peace with Spain, the Dutch had obtained most of the trade to that country, which had been previously carried on by the Easterlings and the English;--that all the coasts of Spain were chiefly navigated by Dutch shipping: that Spain had even been forced to hire Dutch ships to sail to her American possessions; and that so great was the exportation of goods from Holland to Spain, that all the merchandize brought from the Spanish West Indies, was not sufficient to make returns for them.

The same author informs us, that in the province of Holland alone, in 1669, the herring and cod fisheries employed above one thousand busses, from twenty-four to thirty lasts each; and above 170 smaller ones: that the whale fishery was increased from one to ten; that the cod and herring, when caught, were transported by the Hollanders in their own vessels throughout the world; thus obtaining, by means of the sea alone, through their own industry, above 300,000 lasts of salt fish.

As the Dutch commerce was decidedly and undoubtedly more extensive than that of all the rest of Europe, about the middle of the seventeenth century, it may be proper, before we conclude our notice of it at this time, to consider briefly the causes which cherished it into such full growth and vigour. These causes are explained in a very judicious and satisfactory manner by Sir William Temple, in his observations on the Netherlands. He remarks, that though the territory of the Dutch was very small, and though they laboured under many natural disadvantages, yet their commerce was immense; and it was generally esteemed that they had more shipping belonging to them than there did to all the rest of Europe.

They had no native commodities towards the building or equipping their ships; their flax, hemp, pitch, wood, and iron, coming all from abroad, as wool does for clothing their men, and corn for feeding them. The only productions or manufactures of their own, which they exported, were butter, cheese, and earthern wares. They have no good harbours in all their coast; even Amsterdam is difficult of approach, from the dangerous entrance of the Texel, and the shallowness of the Zuider Zee.

What then were the causes which, in spite of these disadvantages, rendered Holland so commercial? In the first place, great multitudes in small compass, who were forced to industry and labour, or else to want. In the second place, the emigration of men of industry, skill, and capital, driven into Holland from Germany, France, and England, by persecution and civil wars. In the third place, the security to property established by the government of the United States; and akin to this, general liberty of conscience in religious matters. The great fairs in the Netherlands may be regarded as another cause. These Sir W. Temple regards as the principal causes of the foundation of their trade. He next enquires into the chief advancers and encouragers of trade in that country.

These he considers to have been low interest, which caused money to be easily obtained, not only for the purposes of commerce, but also to make canals, bridges, &c. and to drain marshes. The use of their banks, which secures money, and makes all payments easy and trade quick,--the sale by registry, which makes all purchases safe,--the severity of justice, especially with regard to forging bills,--the convoys of merchant ships, which gives trade security, the nation credit abroad, and breeds up seamen,--the lowness of their custom duties and freedom of their ports, which rendered their cities magazines as well as markets,--order and exactness in managing their trade,--each town affecting some particular commerce or staple, and so improving it to the greatest height; as Flushing, the West India trade; Middleburgh, French wines; Terveer, the Scotch staple; Dort, the English staple and Rhenish wines; Rotterdam, the English and Scotch trade at large, and French wines; Leyden, the manufacture of all sorts of stuffs, silk, hair, gold, and silver; Haerlem, linen, mixed stuffs, and flowers; Delft, beer and earthen ware; Swaardam, ship building; Sluys, herring fishery; Friezeland, the Greenland trade; and Amsterdam, the East India, Spanish, and Mediterranean trade. Sir W. Temple mentions other two causes, the great application of the whole province to the fishing trade, and the mighty advance the Dutch made towards engrossing the whole commerce of the East Indies. "The stock of this trade," he observes, "besides what it turns to in France, Spain, Italy, the Straits, and Germany, makes them so great masters in the trade of the northern parts of Europe, as Muscovy, Poland, Pomerania, and all the Baltic, where the spices, that are an Indian drug and European luxury, command all the commodities of those countries which are so necessary to life, as their corn; and to navigation, as hemp, pitch, masts, planks, and iron."

The next question that Sir William Temple discusses is, what are the causes which made the trade of Holland enrich it? for, as he remarks, "it is no constant rule that trade makes riches. The only and certain scale of riches arising from trade in a nation is, the proportion of what is exported for the consumption of others, to what is imported for their own. The true ground of this proportion lies in the general industry and parsimony of a people, or in the contrary of both." But the Dutch being industrious, and consequently producing much,--and parsimonious, and consequently consuming little, have much left for exportation. Hence, never any country traded so much and consumed so little. "They buy infinitely, but it is to sell again. They are the great masters of the Indian spices, and of the Persian silks, but wear plain woollen, and feed upon their own fish and roots. Nay, they sell the finest of their own cloth to France, and buy coarse out of England for their own wear. They send abroad the best of their own butter into all parts, and buy the cheapest out of Ireland or the north of England for their own use. In short, they furnish infinite luxury which they never practise, and traffic in pleasures which they never taste." "The whole body of the civil magistrates, the merchants, the rich traders, citizens, seamen and boors in general, never change the fashion of their cloaths; so that men leave off their cloaths only because they are worn out, and not because they are out of fashion. Their great consumption is French wine and brandy; but what they spend in wine they save in corn, to make other drinks, which is brought from foreign parts. Thus it happens, that much going constantly out, either in commodity or in the labour of seafaring men, and little coming in to be consumed at home, the rest returns in coin, and fills the country to that degree, that more silver is seen in Holland, among the common hands and purses, than brass either in Spain or in France; though one be so rich in the best native commodities, and the other drain all the treasures of the West Indies." (Sir W. Temple's Observations on the Netherlands, Chapter VI.)

Having thus sketched the progress and nature of Dutch commerce, during that period when it was at its greatest height, and brought our account of it down to the commencement of the eighteenth century, we shall next proceed to consider the English commerce from the time of the discovery of the Cape and America, till the beginning of the same century.

From the sketch we have already given of English commerce prior to the end of the fifteenth century, it is evident that it was of very trifling extent and amount, being confined chiefly to a few articles of raw produce, and to some woollen goods. The improvement of the woollen manufacture, the establishment of corporations, and the settlement of foreign merchants, as well as the gradual advancement of the English in the civilization, skill, and industry of the age,--in the wants which the first occasions, and in the means to supply those wants afforded by the two latter,--these are the obvious and natural causes which tended to improve English commerce. But its progress was slow and gradual, and confined for a long time to countries near at hand; it afterwards ventured to a greater distance. Companies of merchant adventurers were formed, who could command a greater capital than any individual merchant. Of the nature and extent of their foreign commerce at the close of the fifteenth century we are informed by an act of parliament, passed in the 12 Hen. VII. (1497.)

From this act it appears, that England traded at this time with Spain, Portugal, Bretagne, Ireland, Normandy, France, Seville, Venice, Dantzic, Eastland, Friesland, and many other parts. The woollen cloth of England is particularly specified as one of the greatest articles of commerce. In a licence granted by Henry VII. to the Venetians, to buy and sell at London, and elsewhere in England, Ireland, and Calais, woollen cloth, lead, tin, and leather, are enumerated as the chief exports. From this document it also appears, that there resided in or traded to England, the following foreign merchants: Genoese, Florentines, Luccans, Spaniards, Portuguese, Flemings, Hollanders, Brabanters, Burgundians, German, Hanseatic, Lombards, and Easterlings.

From these two documents, the nature and extent of English commerce at this period may be inferred: its exports were sent as far north as the southern countries of the Baltic, and to all the rest of Europe, as far south and east as Venice; but this export trade, as well as the import, seems to have been almost entirely carried on by foreign capital and ships; the merchant adventurers having yet ventured very little from home.

In 1511, English commerce, in English ships, extended into the Levant, chiefly from London, Bristol, and Southampton. Chios, which was still in the possession of the Genoese, was the port to which they traded. This branch of trade flourished so much in a few years, that in 1513 a consul, or protector of all the merchants and other English subjects in Chios, was appointed. The voyages were gradually lengthened, and reached Cyprus, and Tripoli, in Syria. The exports were woollen goods, calf-skins, &c.; and the imports were silks, camblets, rhubarb, malmsey, muscadel, and other wines: oils, cotton wool, Turkey carpets, galls, and Indian spices. The commerce was in a small degree carried on by English ships, but chiefly by those of Candia, Ragusa, Sicily, Genoa, Venice, Spain, and Portugal. The voyages to and from England occupied a year, and were deemed very difficult and dangerous. So long as Chios remained in the possession of the Genoese, and Candia in that of the Venetians, England traded with these islands; but ceased to trade when the Turks conquered them. From 1553, to 1575, the Levant commerce was quite discontinued by England, though during that period, the French, Genoese, Venetians, and Florentines, continued it, and had consuls at Constantinople.

The small and temporary trade with the Genoese and Venetian possessions in the Levant, seems to have been attended with such profit, and to have opened up such further prospects of advantage, as to have given rise to a direct trade with Turkey, and the formation of the Turkey Company. The enlightened ministers of Elizabeth effected these objects: they first sent out an English merchant to the Sultan, who obtained for his countrymen all the commercial advantages enjoyed by the Venetians, French, Germans, and Poles. Two years afterwards, in 1581, the Turkey Company was established. Sir William Monson, in his Naval Tracts, assigns the following as the causes and reasons why England did not sooner embark in the Turkey trade for Persian and Indian merchandize: 1. That there was not sufficient shipping; 2. the hostility of the Turks; and, lastly, England was supplied with Levant goods by the Venetian ships, which came annually to Southampton. He adds, "the last argosser that came thus from Venice was unfortunately lost near the isle of Wight, with a rich cargo, and many passengers, in the year 1587." The Turkey Company carried on their concern with so much spirit, that the queen publicly thanked them, with many encouragements to go forward for the kingdom's sake: she particularly commended them for the ships they then built of so great burden. The commodities of Greece, Syria, Egypt, Persia, and India, were now brought into England in greater abundance, and sold much cheaper than formerly, and yet the returns of this trade are said to have been, at its commencement, three to one.

It is not our object, nor would it be compatible with our limits, to trace the progress of commerce minutely, in any of its branches, but rather to point out, as it were, its shootings in various directions; and any special causes which may have given vigour to its growth, or have retarded it. In conformity with this plan, we shall only notice some of the more marked and important eras of our Levant trade, prior to the commencement of the eighteenth century. The trade to the Levant, in its infancy, like all other trades, at a time when there was little capital and commercial knowledge, required the formation of a company which should possess exclusive privileges. Charters were granted to such a company for a term of years, and renewed by Elizabeth. In 1605 king James gave a perpetual charter to the Levant Company: the trade was carried on with encreasing vigour and success: our woollen manufactures found a more extensive market: the Venetians, who had for many years supplied Constantinople and other ports of the Levant, were driven from their markets by the English, who could afford to sell them cloths cheaper; and English ships began to be preferred to those of Venice and other nations, for the carrying trade in the Mediterranean. According to Sir W. Monson, England exported broad cloth, tin, &c. enough to purchase all the wares we wanted in Turkey; and, in particular, 300 great bales of Persian raw silk yearly: "whereas a balance of money is paid by the other nations trading thither. Marseilles sends yearly to Aleppo and Alexandria at least 500,000 l. sterling, and little or no wares. Venice sends about 400,000 l. in money, and a great value in wares besides: the Low Countries send about 50,000 l., and but little wares; and Messina 25,000 l. in ready money: besides great quantities of gold and dollars from Germany, Poland, Hungary, &c.; and all these nations take of the Turks in return great quantities of camblets, grograms, raw silk, cotton wool and yarn, galls, flax, hemp, rice, hides, sheep's wool, wax, corn, &c."

The first check which the Levant trade received was given by the East India Company: about the year 1670 the Levant Company complained that their trade in raw silk was much diminished; they had formerly imported it solely from Turkey, whereas then it was imported in great quantities direct from India. In 1681, the complaints of the one company, and the defence of the other, were heard before the Privy Council. The Levant Company alleged, that for upwards of one hundred years they had exported to Turkey and other parts of the Levant, great qualities of woollen manufactures, and other English wares, and did then, more especially, carry out thither to the value of 500,000 l; in return for which they imported raw silks, galls, grograms, drugs, cotton, &c.; whereas the East India Company exported principally gold and silver bullion, with an inconsiderable quantity of cloth; and imported calicoes, pepper, wrought silks, and a deceitful sort of raw silk; if the latter supplants Turkey raw silk, the Turkey demand for English cloth must fail, as Turkey does not yield a sufficient quantity of other merchandize to return for one fourth part of our manufactures carried thither.

The East India Company, on the other hand, alleged that the cloth they exported was finer and more valuable than that exported by the Turkey Company, and that, if they were rightly informed, the medium of cloths exported by that company, for the last three years, was only 19,000 cloths yearly: it is admitted, however, that before there was any trade to China and Japan, the Turkey Company's exportation of cloth did much exceed that of the East India Company. With respect to the charge of exporting bullion, it was alleged that the Turkey Company also export it to purchase the raw silk in Turkey. The East India Company further contended, that since their importation of raw silk, the English silk manufacturers had much encreased, and that the plain wrought silks from India were the strongest, most durable, and cheapest of any, and were generally re-exported from England to foreign parts.

We have been thus particular in detailing this dispute between these companies, partly because it points out the state of the Levant Company and their commerce, at the close of the seventeenth century, but principally because it unfolds one of the principal causes of their decline; for, though some little notice of it will afterwards occur, yet its efforts were feeble, and its success diminished, chiefly by the rivalry of the East India Company.

The Levant trade, as we have seen, was gradually obtained by the English from the hands of the Venetians and other foreign powers. The trade we are next to notice was purely of English origin and growth;--we allude to the trade between England and Russia, which began about the middle of the sixteenth century. The discovery of Archangel took place, as we have already related, in 1553. Chanceller, who discovered it, obtained considerable commercial privileges from the Czar for his countrymen. In 1554, a Russian Company was established; but before their charter, the British merchants had engaged in the Russian trade. The first efforts of the company seem to have been confined to attempts to discover a north-east passage. Finding these unsuccessful, they turned their attention to commerce: they fortunately possessed a very enterprising man, peculiarly calculated to foster and strengthen an infant trade, who acted as their agent. He first set on foot, in 1558, a new channel of trade through Russia into Persia, for raw silk, &c. In the course of his commercial enquiries and transactions, he sailed down the Volga to Nisi, Novogorod, Casan, and Astracan, and thence across the Caspian Sea to Persia. He mentions that, at Boghar, which he describes as a good city, he found merchants from India, Persia, Russia, and Cathay,--from which last country it was a nine months journey to Boghar. He performed his journey seven different times. It appears, however, that this channel of trade was soon afterwards abandoned, till 1741, when it was resumed for a very short time, during which considerable quantities of raw silk were brought to England by the route followed by the Russian agent in the sixteenth century. The cause of this abandonment during the sixteenth century seems to have been the length and danger of the route; for we are informed that one of the adventures would have proved exceedingly profitable, had not their ships, on their return across the Caspian, with Persian raw silk, wrought silks of many kinds, galls, carpets, Indian spices, turquois stones, &c., been plundered by Corsair pirates, to the value of about 40,000 l. The final abandonment of this route, in the eighteenth century, arose partly from the wars in Persia, but principally from the extension of India commerce, which being direct and by sea, would, of course supply England much more cheaply with all eastern goods than any land trade. Beside the delay, difficulty, and danger of the route from the Volga, already described, the route followed in the sixteenth century, till the merchants reached the Volga, was attended with great difficulty. The practice was to transport the English goods, which were to be exchanged, in canoes, up the Dwina, from Archangel to Vologda, thence over land, in seven days, to Jeroslau, and thence down the Volga, in thirty days, to Astracan.

The Russians having conquered Narva, in Livonia in 1558, the first place they possessed in the Baltic, and having established it as a staple port, the following year, according to Milton, in his brief history of Muscovia, the English began to trade to it, "the Lubeckers and Dantzickers having till then concealed that trade from other nations." The other branches of the Baltic trade also encreased; for it appears by a charter granted by Elizabeth, in 1579, to an Eastland Company, that trade was carried on between England and Norway, Sweden, Poland, Lithuania, Prussia, Pomerania, Dantzic, Elbing, Konigsberg, Copenhagen, Elsinore, and Finland. This company was established in opposition to the Hanseatic merchants; and it seems to have attained its object; for these merchants complained to the Diet of the Empire against England, alleging, that of the 200,000 cloths yearly exported thence, three-fourths went into Denmark, Sweden, Poland, and Germany; the other fourth being sent to the Netherlands and France.

It was not to be supposed that our commerce with Archangel and Narva would long remain without a rival. The Dutch, aware of its importance, prevented by their influence or presents, the Czar from renewing the Russian Company's privileges. As this trade was become more extensive, and carried off, besides woollen goods, silks, velvets, coarse linen cloth, old silver plate, all kinds of mercery wares, serving for the apparel of both sexes, purses, knives, &c. Elizabeth used her efforts to re-establish the company on its former footing; and a new Czar mounting the throne, she was successful.

The frequent voyages of the English to the White Sea made them acquainted with Cherry Island, of which they took possession, and where they carried on for a short time the capture of morses: the teeth of these were regarded as nearly equal in quality and value to ivory, and consequently afforded a lucrative trade; oil was also obtained from these animals. Lead ore is said to have been discovered in this island, of which thirty tons were brought to England in 1606. The Russian Company, however, soon gave up the morse fishery for that of whales. They also carried on a considerable trade with Kola, a town in Russian Lapland, for fish oil and salmon: of the latter they sometimes brought to England 10,000 at one time. But in this trade the Dutch likewise interfered.

The fishery for whales near Spitzbergen was first undertaken by the company in 1597. In 1613, they obtained from King James an exclusive charter for this fishery; and under this, fitting out armed ships, they expelled fifteen sail of French, Dutch, and Biscayners, besides some private English ships. But the Dutch persevered, so that next year, while the Russian Company had only thirteen ships at the whale fishery, the former had eighteen. The success of their whale fishery seems to have led to the neglect of their Russian trade, for, in 1615, only two vessels were employed in it, instead of seventeen great ships formerly employed. From this period, the commerce carried on between Russia and England, by the Russian Company, seems gradually to have declined.

The commerce between England and the other parts of Europe, during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, presents little that calls for notice; as the manufactures and capital of England encreased, it gradually encreased, and was transferred from foreign to English vessels. The exports consisted principally of woollen goods, prepared skins, earthen-ware, and metals. The imports of linens, silks, paper, wines, brandy, fruits, dye-stuffs, and drugs. The woollen cloths of England were indeed the staple export to all parts of England during the whole of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries: as our cotton, earthen-ware, and iron manufactures sprung up and encreased, they supplied other articles of export;--our imports, at first confined to a few articles, afterwards encreased in number and value, in proportion as our encreased industry, capital, and skill, enlarged our produce and manufactures, and thus enabled us to purchase and consume more. A very remarkable instance of the effect of skill, capital, and industry, is mentioned by Mr. Lewis, a merchant, who published a work entitled, The Merchant's Map of Commerce, in 1641. "The town of Manchester," he says, "buys the linen yarn of the Irish in great quantity, and, weaving it, returns the same again, in linen, into Ireland to sell. Neither doth her industry rest here, for they buy cotton wool in London, that comes first from Cyprus and Smyrna, and work the same into fustians, vermilions, dimities, &c., which they return to London, where they are sold, and from thence not seldom are sent into such foreign parts where the first materials may be more easily had for that manufacture." How similar are these two instances to that which has occurred in our own days, when the cotton-wool, brought from the East Indies, has been returned thither after having been manufactured, and sold there cheaper than the native manufactures.

But though there are no particulars relative to the commerce between England and Europe, which call for our notice, as exhibiting any thing beyond the gradual extension of commercial intercourse already established; yet in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, there were other commercial intercourses into which England entered, that deserve attention. These may be classed under three heads: the trade to Africa, to America, and India.

I. The trade to Africa.--The first notice of any trade between England and Africa occurs in the year 1526, when some merchants of Bristol, which, at this period, was undoubtedly one of our most enterprising cities, traded by means of Spanish ships to the Canaries. Their exports were cloth, soap, for the manufacture of which, even at this early period, Bristol was celebrated, and some other articles. They imported drugs for dyeing, sugar, and kid skins. This branch of commerce answering, the Bristol merchants sent their factors thither from Spain. The coast of Africa was, at this period, monopolized by the Portuguese. In 1530, however, an English ship made a voyage to Guinea for elephants' teeth: the voyage was repeated; and in 1536, above one hundred pounds weight of gold dust, besides elephants' teeth, was imported in one ship. A few years afterwards, a trade was opened with the Mediterranean coast of Africa, three ships sailing from Bristol to Barbary with linens, woollen cloth, coral, amber, and jet; and bringing back sugar, dates, almonds, and molasses. The voyages to Guinea from the ports of the south and southwest of England, particularly Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Bristol, were frequently repeated: the returns were uniformly gold dust and elephants' teeth. But it does not appear that other ports followed the example of these, that these sent many ships, or that the commerce became very regular and lucrative, till the west coast of Africa was resorted to for slaves.

This infamous trade was first entered upon by the English in the year 1562. Mr. John Hawkins, with several other merchants, having learnt that negroes were a good commodity in Hispaniola, fitted out three ships, the largest 120, the smallest forty tons, for the coast of Guinea. Here they bought slaves, which they sold in Hispaniola for hides, sugar, ginger, and pearls. The other branches of the African trade continued to flourish. In 1577, English merchants were settled in Morocco; Spanish, Portuguese, and French merchants had been settled there before. In this year, Elizabeth, always attentive to whatever would benefit commerce, sent an ambassador to the Emperor of Morocco, who obtained some commercial privileges for the English. In 1588, the first voyage to Benin was made from London, by a ship and a pinnace: in 1590, a second voyage was made from the same port with the same vessels. Their exports were linen, woollen cloths, iron manufactures, bracelets of copper, glass beads, coral, hawks' bells, horses' tails, hats, &c. They imported Guinea pepper, elephants' teeth, palm oil, cotton cloth, and cloth made of the bark of trees.

An African Company had been formed in Elizabeth's reign; but neither this, nor two others succeeded; their ruin was occasioned by war, misconduct, and the interference of what were called interlopers. In 1672, a fourth company was established, whose efforts at first seem to have been great and successful. They bought the forts the former companies had erected on the west coast: instead of making up their assortments of goods for export in Holland, as the former companies had been obliged to do, they introduced into England the making of sundry kinds of woollen goods not previously manufactured. They imported large quantities of gold dust, out of which 50,000 guineas were first coined in one year, 1673. Their other imports were red wood for dyes, elephants' teeth, wax, honey, &c. The value of the English goods exported to them averaged annually 70,000 l. This company was broken up at the Revolution.

II. Though the Portuguese and Spaniards were very jealous of the interference of any nation with their East India commerce; yet they were comparatively easy and relaxed with regard to their American possessions. Accordingly, we find that, in 1530, there was some little trade between England and Brazil: this is the first notice we can trace of any commercial intercourse between this country and the New World. The first voyage was from Plymouth: in 1540 and 1542 the merchants of Southampton and London also traded to Brazil. We are not informed what were the goods imported; but most probably they were Brazil wood, sugar, and cotton. The trade continued till 1580, when Spain, getting possession of Portugal, put a stop to it.

The next notice of any trading voyage to America occurs in 1593, when some English ships sailed to the entrance of the St. Lawrence for morse and whale fishing. This is the first mention of the latter fishery, or of whale fins, or whale bones by the English. They could not find any whales; but on an island they met with 800 whale fins, the remains of a cargo of a Biscay ship which had been wrecked here.

In 1602, the English had suspended all intercourse with America for sixteen years, in consequence of the unsuccessful attempts of Raleigh. But, at this time, the intercourse was renewed: a ship sailed to Virginia, the name then given to the greater part of the east coast of North America; and a traffic was carried on with the Indians for peltry, sassafras, cedar wood, &c. Captain Gosnol, who commanded this vessel, was a man of considerable skill in his profession, and he is said to have been the first Englishman who sailed directly to North America, and not, as before, by the circuitous course of the West Indies and the Gulf of Florida. In the subsequent year there was some traffic carried on with the Indians of the continent, and some of the uncolonized West India islands.

Prior to the year 1606 several attempts had been made to colonize different parts of the new world by the English, but they all proved abortive. In this year, however, a permanent settlement was established near James River, within the Chesapeake. It is not our plan to detail all the particular settlements, or their progress to maturity; but merely to point out the beginnings of them, as evidence of our extending commerce, and to state such proofs as most strikingly display their improvement and the advantages the mother country derived from them. In conformity with this plan, we may mention that sugar plantations were first formed in Barbadoes in 1641: this, as Mr. Anderson, in his History of Commerce, justly observes, "greatly hastened the improvement of our other islands, which soon afterwards followed it in planting sugar to very great advantage. And, as it was impossible to manage the planting of that commodity by white people in so hot a climate, so neither could sufficient numbers of such be had at any rate. Necessity, therefore, and the example of Portugal gave birth to the negro slave trade to the coast of Guinea and it is almost needless to add, that such great numbers of slaves, and also the increase of white people in those islands, soon created a vast demand for all necessaries from England, and also a new and considerable trade to Madeira for wines to supply those islands." The immediate consequence of the spread of the sugar culture in our West India islands was, that the ports of London and Bristol became the great magazines for this commodity, and supplied all the north and middle parts of Europe; and the price of the Portuguese-Brazil sugars was reduced from 8 l. to 2 l. 10s. per cwt.

The rapid growth of the English colonies on the continent and in the islands of America, during the seventeenth century, is justly ascribed by Sir Josiah Child, to the emigration thither, occasioned by the persecution of the Puritans by James I. and Charles I.; to the defeat of the Royalists and Scotch by Cromwell; and, lastly, to the Restoration, and the consequent disbanding of the army, and fears of the partizans of Cromwell. It may be added, that most of the men who were driven to America from these causes, were admirably fitted to form new settlements, being of industrious habits, and accustomed to plain fare and hard work.

The American plantations, as they were called, increased so rapidly in commerce that, according to the last author referred to, they did, even in the year 1670, employ nearly two-thirds of all our English shipping, "and therefore gave constant sustenance, it may be, to 200,000 persons here at home." At this period New England seems to have directed its chief attention and industry to the cod and mackerel fisheries, which had increased their ships and seamen so much as to excite the jealousy of Sir Josiah Child, who, however, admits that what that colony took from England amounted to ten times more than what England took from it. The Newfoundland fishery, he says, had declined from 250 ships in 1605, to eighty in 1670: this he ascribes to the practice of eating fish alone on fast days, not being so strictly kept by the Catholics as formerly. From Carolina, during the seventeenth century, England obtained vast quantities of naval stores, staves, lumber, hemp, flax, and Indian corn. About the end of this century, or at the very commencement of the next, the culture of rice was introduced by the accident of a vessel from Madagascar happening to put into Carolina, which had a little rice left; this the captain gave to a gentleman, who sowed it.

The colony of Virginia seems to have flourished at an earlier period than any of the other English colonies. In the year 1618, considerable quantities of tobacco were raised there; and it appears, by proclamations of James I. and Charles I., that no tobacco was allowed to be imported into England, but what came from Virginia or the Bermudas.

The colony of Pennsylvania was not settled by Pen till the year 1680: he found there, however, many English families, and a considerable number of Dutch and Swedes. The wise regulations of Pen soon drew to him industrious settlers; but the commerce in which they engaged did not become so considerable as to demand our notice.

III. The commercial intercourse of England with India, which has now grown to such extent and importance, and from which has sprung the anomaly of merchant-sovereigns over one of the richest and most populous districts of the globe, began in the reign of Elizabeth. The English Levant Company, in their attempts to extend their trade with the East, seem first to have reached Hindostan, in 1584, with English merchandize. About the same time the queen granted introductory letters to some adventurers to the king of Cambaya; these men travelled through Bengal to Pegu and Malacca, but do not seem to have reached China. They, however, obtained much useful information respecting the best mode of conducting the trade to the East.

The first English ship sailed to the East Indies in the year 1591; but the voyage was rather a warlike than a commercial one, the object being to attack the Portuguese; and even in this respect it was very unfortunate. A similar enterprize, undertaken in 1593, seems, by its success, to have contributed very materially to the commercial intercourse between England and India; for a fleet of the queen's ships and some merchant ships having captured a very large East India carrack belonging to the Spaniards or Portuguese, brought her into Dartmouth: if she excited astonishment at her size, being of the burthen of 1600 tons, with 700 men, and 36 brass cannon, she in an equal degree stimulated and enlarged the commercial desires and hopes of the English by her cargo. This consisted of the richest spices, calicoes, silks, gold, pearls, drugs, China ware, ebony wood, &c., and was valued at 150,000 l.

The increasing commercial spirit of the nation, which led it to look forward to a regular intercourse with India, was gratified in the first year of the seventeenth century, when the queen granted the first charter to an East India Company. She seems to have been directly led to grant this in consequence of the complaints among her subjects of the scarcity and high price of pepper; this was occasioned by the monopoly of it being in the power of the Turkey merchants and the Dutch, and from the circumstance that by our war with Portugal, we could not procure any from Lisbon. The immediate and principal object of this Company, therefore, was to obtain pepper and other spices; accordingly their ships, on their first voyage, sailed to Bantam, where they took in pepper, to the Banda isles; where they took in nutmeg and mace, and to Amboyna, where they took in cloves. On this expedition the English established a factory at Bantam. In 1610, this Company having obtained a new charter from James I., built the largest merchant ship that had ever been built in England, of the burthen of 1100 tons, which with three others they sent to India. In 1612 the English factory of Surat was established with the permission of the Great Mogul; this was soon regarded as their chief station on the west coast of India. Their first factory on the coast of Coromandel, which they formed a few years afterwards, was at Masulipatam: their great object in establishing this was to obtain more readily the cloths of Coromandel, which they found to be the most advantageous article to exchange for pepper and other spices. For at this time their trade with the East seems to have been almost entirely confined to these latter commodities. In 1613, the first English ship reached a part of the Japan territories, and a factory was established, through which trade was carried on with the Japanese, till the Dutch persuaded the emperor to expel all Europeans but themselves.

The year 1614 forms an important era in the history of our commercial intercourse with India; for Sir Thomas Roe, whom James sent ambassador to the Mogul, and who remained several years at his court, obtained from him important privileges for the East India Company. At this time, the following European commodities were chiefly in repute in India; knives of all kinds, toys, especially those of the figures of beasts, rich velvets and satins, fowling pieces, polished ambers and beads, saddles with rich furniture, swords with fine hilts inlaid, hats, pictures, Spanish wines, cloth of gold and silver, French shaggs, fine Norwich stuffs, light armour, emeralds, and other precious stones set in enamel, fine arras hangings, large looking glasses, bows and arrows, figures in brass and stone, fine cabinets, embroidered purses, needlework, French tweezer cases, perfumed gloves, belts, girdles, bone lace, dogs, plumes of feathers, comb cases richly set, prints of kings, cases of strong waters, drinking and perspective glasses, fine basons and ewers, &c. &c. In consequence of the privileges granted the East India Company by the Mogul, and by the Zamorine of Calicut, their factories were now numerous, and spread over a large extent of coast.

If we may trust the controversial pamphlets on the East India Company which were published in 1615, it appears that up to this year they had employed only twenty-four ships; four of which had been lost; the largest was 1293 tons, and the smallest 150. Their principal imports were still pepper, cloves, mace, and nutmegs, of which 615,000 lbs. were consumed in England, and the value of 218,000 l. exported: the saving in the home consumption of these articles was estimated at 70,000 l. The other imports were indigo, calicoes, China silks, benzoin, aloes, &c. Porcelain was first imported this year from Bantam. The exports consisted of bays, kersies, and broad cloths, dyed and dressed, to the value of 14,000 l.; lead, iron, and foreign merchandize, to the value of 10,000 l.; and coin and bullion, to the value of 12,000 l.; the outfit, provisions, &c. of their ships cost 64,000 l.

The Dutch, who were very jealous of the successful interference of the English in their eastern trade, attacked them in every part of India; and though a treaty was concluded between the English and the Dutch East India Company, yet the treachery and cruelty of the Dutch, especially at Amboyna, and the civil wars into which England was plunged, so injured the affairs of the English East India Company, that at the death of Charles I. its trade was almost annihilated. One beneficial consequence, however, resulted from the hostility of the Dutch; the English, driven from their old factories, established new ones at Madras and in Bengal.

Before, however, this decline of the English trade to India, we have some curious and interesting documents relating to it particularly, and to the effects produced on the cost of East Indian commodities in Europe generally, by the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope. These are supplied by Mr. Munn, in a treatise he published in 1621; in favour of the East India trade. We have already given the substance of his remarks so far as they relate to the lowering the price of Indian commodities, but as his work is more particularly applicable to, and illustrative of the state of English commerce with India, at this time, we shall here enter into some of his details.

According to them, there were six million pounds of pepper annually consumed in Europe, which used to cost, when purchased at Aleppo, brought over land thither from India, at the rate of two shillings per lb.; whereas it now cost, purchased in India, only two-pence halfpenny per lb.: the consumption of cloves was 450,000 lbs.; cost at Aleppo four shillings and nine-pence per lb., in India nine-pence: the consumption of mace was 150,000 lbs.; cost at Aleppo the same per lb. as the cloves; in India it was bought at eight-pence per lb.: the consumption of nutmegs was 400,000 lbs.; the price at Aleppo, two shillings and four-pence per lb.; in India only four-pence; the consumption of indigo was 350,000 lbs.; the price at Aleppo four shillings and four-pence per lb.; in India one and two-pence, and the consumption of raw silk was one million lbs., the price of which at Aleppo was twelve shillings per lb., and in India eight shillings. It will be remarked that this last article was purchased in India, at a rate not nearly so much below its Aleppo price as any of the other articles; pepper, on the other hand, was more reduced in price than any of the other articles. The total cost of all the articles, when purchased at Aleppo, was 1,465,000 l.; when purchased in India, 511,458 l.; the price in the latter market, therefore, was little more than one-third of their Aleppo price. As, however, the voyage from India is longer than that from Aleppo, it added, according to Mr. Munn's calculation, one-sixth to the cost of the articles beyond that of the Turkey voyage. Even after making this addition, Mr. Munn comes to the conclusion we have formerly stated, "that the said wares by the Cape of Good Hope cost us but about half the price which they will cost from Turkey."

Mr. Munn also gives the annual importation of the principal Indian goods into England, by the East India Company, and the price each article sold for in England; according to this table, the quantity of pepper was 250,000 lbs., which, bought in India for twopence halfpenny, sold in England for one shilling and eightpence:--150,000 lbs. of cloves, which bought in India for ninepence, sold in England for six shillings:--150,000 lbs. of nutmegs, bought for four-pence, sold for two shillings and sixpence:--50,000 lbs. of mace, bought for eightpence, sold for six shillings:--200,000 lbs. of indigo, bought for one shilling and twopence, sold for five shillings:--107,140 lbs. of China raw silk, bought for seven shillings, sold for twenty shillings:--and 50,000 pieces of calico, bought for seven shillings a piece, sold for twenty-six shillings.

In a third table he gives the annual consumption of the following India goods, and the lowest prices at which they used to be sold, when procured from Turkey or Lisbon, before England traded directly to India. There was consumed of pepper, 400,000 lbs., which used to be sold at three shillings and sixpence per lb.; of cloves, 40,000, at eight shillings; of mace, 20,000, at nine shillings; of nutmegs, 160,000, at four shillings and sixpence; and of indigo, 150,000, at seven shillings. The result is, that when England paid the lowest ancient prices, it cost her 183,500 l. for these commodities; whereas, at the common modern prices, it costs her only 108,333 l. The actual saving therefore to the people of England, was not near so great as might have been expected, or as it ought to have been, from a comparison of the prices at Aleppo and in India.

There are some other particulars in Mr. Munn's Treatise relating to the European Trade to the East at this period, which we shall select. Speaking of the exportation of bullion to India, he says that the Turks sent annually 500,000 l. merely for Persian raw silk; and 600,000 l. more for calicoes, drugs, sugar, rice, &c.: their maritime commerce was carried on from Mocha; their inland trade from Aleppo and Constantinople. They exported very little merchandize to Persia or India. Marseilles supplied Turkey with a considerable part of the bullion and money which the latter used in her trade with the East,--sending annually to Aleppo and Alexandria, at least 500,000 l. and little or no merchandize. Venice sent about 400,000 l. and a great value in wares besides. Messina about 25,000 l., and the low countries about 50,000 l., besides great quantities of gold and dollars from Germany, Poland, Hungary, &c. With these sums were purchased either native Turkish produce and manufactures, or such goods as Turkey obtained from Persia and other parts of the East: the principal were camblets, grograms, raw silk, cotton wool and yarn, galls, flax, hemp, rice, hides, sheeps' wool, wax, corn, &c. England, according to Mr. Munn, did not employ much bullion, either in her Turkey or her India trade; in the former she exported vast quantities of broad cloth, tin, &c. enough to purchase nearly all the wares she wanted in Turkey, besides three hundred great bales of Persian raw silk annually. In the course of nineteen years, viz. from their establishment in 1601 to 1620, the East India Company had exported, in woollen cloths, tin, lead, and other English and foreign wares, at an average of 15,383 l. per annum, and in the whole, 292,286 l. During the same period they had exported 548,090 l. in Spanish silver. The East India Company employed in 1621, according to this author, 10,000 tons of shipping, 2500 mariners, 500 ship carpenters, and 120 factors. The principal places to which, at this period, we re-exported Indian goods, were Turkey, Genoa, Marseilles, the Netherlands, &c.; the re-exportations were calculated to employ 2000 more tons of shipping, and 500 more mariners.

From a proclamation issued in 1631, against clandestine trade to and from India, we learn the different articles which might be legally exported and imported: the first were the following: perpalicanos and drapery, pewter, saffron, woollen stockings, silk stockings and garters, ribband, roses edged with silver lace, beaver hats with gold and silver bands, felt hats, strong waters, knives, Spanish leather shoes, iron, and looking glasses. There might be imported, long pepper, white pepper, white powder sugar, preserved nutmegs and ginger preserved, merabolans, bezoar stones, drugs of all sorts, agate heads, blood stones, musk, aloes socratrina, ambergris, rich carpets of Persia and of Cambaya, quilts of satin taffety, painted calicoes, Benjamin, damasks, satins and taffeties of China, quilts of China embroidered with silk, galls, sugar candy, China dishes, and porcelain of all sorts.

Though several articles of Chinese manufacture are specified in the proclamation, yet we have no notice of any direct trade to China till nearly fifty years after this time, viz. in the year 1680. In this year the East India Company sent out eleven ships, including two to China and the Moluccas; their general burden was between 500 and 600 tons: in these ships there was a stock of nearly 500,000 l. Besides the articles imported from India enumerated in the proclamation of 1631, there now appear cowries, saltpetre, muslins, diamonds, &c.

In 1689 the East India Company published a state of their trade, from which it appeared that in the last seven years they had built sixteen ships from 900 to 1300 tons each,--that they had coming from India eleven ships and four permission ships, the value of their cargoes being above 360,000 l.: that they had on their outward voyage to Coast and Bay, seven ships and six permission ships, their cargoes valued at 570,000 l.: that they had seven ships for China and the South Seas, whose cargoes amounted to 100,000 l. That they had goods in India unsold, to the amount of 700,000 l. About this period, Sir John Child, being what would now be called governor general of India, and his brother, Sir Jonah, leading member of the Court of Committees, the policy was introduced through their means, on which the sovereign power, as well as the immense empire of the East India Company was founded; this policy consisted of the enlargement of the authority of the Company over British subjects in India, and in attaining political strength and dominion, by retaliating by force of arms, on those Indian princes who oppressed their settlements.

In the year 1698, in consequence of complaints against the East India Company, and their inability to make any dividend, they thought it necessary to give in a statement of their property in India. In this they asserted that they had acquired, solely at their own expence, revenues at Fort St. George, Fort St. David, and Bombay, as well as in Persia, and elsewhere, to the amount of 44,000 l. per annum, arising from customs and licenses, besides a large extent of land in these places; they had also erected forts and settlements in Sumatra, and on the coast of Malabar, which were absolutely necessary to carry on the pepper trade; they had a strongfort in Bengal, and many factories, settlements, &c. in other places. The result of the complaints against the Company was, that a new company was established this year; the two companies, however, united in the beginning of the eighteenth century.

We shall conclude our account of the state of English commerce during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, with some more general and miscellaneous topics.

I. Exports. In the year 1534, the total value of our exports did not exceed 900,000 l. of the present value of our money: the balance of trade was estimated at 700,000 l.: this arose principally from the very great exportation of woollen goods, tin, leather, &c., on which an export duty was laid, bringing in 246,000 l.; whereas, the duty on imports did not produce more than 1700 l. In the year 1612, according to Missenden, in his Circle of Commerce, the exports to all the world amounted to 2,090,640 l., and the imports to 2,141,151 l.; on the latter, however, the custom duties are charged; the custom duties on the exports were 86,794 l.; the impost paid outwards on woollen goods, tin, lead, pewter, &c. 10,000 l.; and the merchants' gains, freight, and other charges, to 300,000 l.:--if these be added to the value of the exports, the total amount will be 2,487,435 l,-- from which the imports, including custom duty on them, being deducted, leaves 346,283 l.,--which Missenden regards as the balance gained that year by the nation. The principal articles of export have been enumerated: the principal articles of import were silks, Venice gold and silver stuffs, Spanish wines, linen, &c. At this time, London paid nearly three times as much for custom duties as all the rest of England together. In the year 1662, according to D'Avenant, the inspector general of the customs, our imports amounted to 4,016,019 l., and our exports only to 2,022,812 l.; the balance against the nation being nearly two millions. In the last year of the seventeenth century, according to the same official authority, there was exported to England from all parts, 6,788,166 l.: of this sum, our woollen manufactures were to the value of 2,932,292 l.; so that there was an increase of our exports since 1662, of 4,765,534 l. The yearly average of all the merchandize imported from, and exported to the north of Europe, from Michaelmas, 1697, to Christmas, 1701, is exhibited in the following table:

Annual Countries. Imported from. Exported to. Loss
Denmark and Sweden 76,215 l 39,543 l. 36,672 l.
East Country 181,296 149,893 31,403
Russia 112,252 58,884 53,568
Sweden 212,094 57,555 154,539
---------
Total annual average loss 275,982 l.

II. Ships. In the year 1530, the ship which first sailed on a trading voyage to Guinea, and thence to the Brazils, was regarded as remarkably large; her burden amounted to 250 tons. And in Wheeler's Treatise of Commerce, published in 1601, we are informed, that about 60 years before he wrote (which would be about 1541), there were not above four ships (besides those of the royal navy) that were above 120 tons each, in the river Thames; and we learn from Monson, in his Naval Tracts, that about 20 years later, most of our ships of burden were purchased from the east countrymen, or inhabitants of the south shores of the Baltic, who likewise carried on the greatest trade of our merchants in their own vessels. He adds, to bid adieu to that trade and those ships, the Jesus of Lubec. a vessel then esteemed of great burden and strength, was the last ship bought by the queen. In 1582, there were 135 merchant vessels in England, many of them of 500 tons each: and in the beginning of King James's reign, there were 400, but these were not so large, not above four of these being of 400 tons. In 1615, it appears, that the East India Company, from the beginning of their charter, had employed only 24 ships, four of which had been lost. The largest was 1293 tons; one 1100, one 1060, one 900, one 800, and the remainder from 600 to 150. In the same year, 20 ships sailed to Naples, Genoa, Leghorn, and other parts of the Mediterranean, chiefly laden with herrings; and 30 from Ireland, to the same ports, laden with pipe staves: to Portugal and Amsterdam, 20 ships for wines, sugar, fruit, and West India drugs: to Bourdeaux, 60 ships for wines: to Hamburgh and Middleburgh, 35 ships: to Dantzic, Koningsberg, 30 ships: to Norway 5;--while the Dutch sent above 40 large ships. The Newcastle coal trade employed 400 sail;--200 for London, and 200 for the rest of England. It appears, that at this time many foreign ships resorted to Newcastle for coals: whole fleets of 50 sail together from France, besides many from Bremen, Holland, &c. The Greenland fishery employed 14 ships.

The following calculation of the shipping of Europe in 1690, is given by Sir William Petty. England, 500,000 tons; the United Provinces, 900,000; France, 100,000; Hamburgh, Denmark, Sweden, Dantzic, 250,000; Spain, Portugal, Italy, 250,000: total 2,000,000. But that this calculation is exceeding loose, so far as regards England at least, is evident from the returns made to circular letters of the commissioners of customs: according to these returns, there belonged to all the ports of England, in January 1701-2., 3281 vessels, measuring 261,222 tons, and carrying 27,196 men, and 5660 guns. As we wish to be minute and enter into detail, while our commerce and shipping were yet in their infancy, in order to mark more decidedly its progress, we shall subjoin the particulars of this return.

Ports. Vessels. Tons. Men.

London 560 84,882 10,065 Bristol 165 17,338 2,359 Yarmouth 143 9,914 668 Exeter 121 7,107 978 Hull 115 7,564 187 Whitby 110 8,292 571 Liverpool 102 8,619 1,101 Scarborough 100 6,860 606

None of the other ports had 100 vessels: Newcastle had sixty-three, measuring 11,000 tons; and Ipswich thirty-nine, measuring 11,170; but there certainly is some mistake in these two instances, either in the number of the ships, or the tonnage. The small number of men employed at Hull arose from eighty of their ships being at that time laid up.

III. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the great rivals of the English in their commerce were the Dutch: they had preceded the English to most countries; and, even where the latter had preceded them, they soon insinuated themselves and became formidable rivals: this was the case particularly with respect to the trade to Archangel. Some curious and interesting particulars of this rivalry are given by Sir Walter Raleigh, in his Observations concerning the Trade and Commerce of England with the Dutch and other foreign Nations, which he had laid before King James. In this work he maintains that the Dutch have the advantage over the English by reason of the privileges they gave to foreigners, by making their country the storehouse of all foreign commodities; by the lowness of their customs; by the structure of their ships, which hold more, and require fewer hands than the English; and by their fishery. He contends that England is better situated for a general storehouse for the rest of Europe than Holland: yet no sooner does a dearth of corn, wine, fish, &c. happen in England, than forthwith the Hollanders, Embedners, or Humburghers, load 50 or 100 ships, and bring their articles to England. Amsterdam, he observes, is never without 700,000 quarters of corn, none of it the growth of Holland; and a dearth of only one year in any other part of Europe enriches Holland for seven years. In the course of a year and a half, during a scarcity in England, there was carried away from the ports of Southampton, Bristol, and Exeter alone, nearly 200,000 l.: and if London and the rest of England were included, there must have been 2,000,000 more. The Dutch, he adds, have a regular trade to England with 500 or 600 vessels annually, whereas we trade, not with fifty to their country. After entering into details respecting the Dutch fishery, by means of which, he says, they sell herrings annually to the value of upwards of one million and a half sterling, whereas England scarcely any, he reverts to the other branches of Dutch commerce, as compared with ours. The great stores of wines and salt, brought from France and Spain, are in the Low Countries: they send nearly 1,000 ships yearly with these commodities into the east countries alone; whereas we send not one ship. The native country of timber for ships, &c. is within the Baltic; but the storehouse for it is in Holland; they have 500 or 600 large ships employed in exporting it to England and other parts: we not one. The Dutch even interfere with our own commodities; for our wool and woollen cloth, which goes out rough, undressed, and undyed, they manufacture and serve themselves and other nations with it. We send into the east countries yearly but 100 ships, and our trade chiefly depends upon three towns, Elbing, Koningsberg, and Dantzic; but the Low Countries send thither about 3,000 ships: they send into France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy, about 2,000 ships yearly with those east country commodities, and we, none in that course. They trade into all cities and port towns of France, and we chiefly to five or six.

The Low Countries have as many ships and vessels as eleven kingdoms of Christendom have; let England be one. For seventy years together, we had a great trade to Russia (Narva), and even about fourteen years ago, we sent stores of goodly ships thither; but three years past we sent out four thither, and last year but two or three ships; whereas the Hollanders are now increased to about thirty or forty ships, each as large as two of ours, chiefly laden with English cloth, herrings, taken in our seas, English lead, and pewter made of our tin. He adds, that a great loss is suffered by the kingdom from the undressed and undyed cloths being sent out of the kingdom, to the amount of 80,000 pieces annually; and that there had been annually exported, during the last fifty-three years, in baizes, northern and Devonshire kersies, all white, about 50,000 cloths, counting three kersies to one cloth.

Although there is undoubtedly much exaggeration in the comparative statement of the Dutch and English commerce and shipping in the details, yet it is a curious and interesting document, as exhibiting a general view of them. Indeed, through the whole of the seventeenth century, the most celebrated and best informed writers on the commerce of England dwell strongly on the superior trade of the Dutch, and on their being able, by the superior advantages they enjoyed from greater capital, industry, and perseverance, aided by the greater encouragement they gave to foreigners as well as their own people, to supply the greatest part of Europe with all their wants, though their own country was small and unfertile. A similar comparative statement to that of Raleigh is given by Child in 1655; he asserts that in the preceding year the Dutch had twenty-two sail of great ships in the Russia trade,--England but one: that in the Greenland whale fishery, Holland and Hamburgh had annually 400 or 500 sail,--and England but one last year: that the Dutch have a great trade for salt to France and Portugal, with which they salt fish caught on our coasts; that in the Baltic trade, the English have fallen off, and the Dutch increased tenfold. England has no share in the trade to China and Japan: the Dutch a great trade to both countries. A great part of the plate trade from Cadiz has passed from England to Holland. They have even bereaved us of the trade to Scotland and Ireland. He concludes with pointing out some advantages England possesses over Holland: In the Turkey, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese trades, we have the natural advantage of our wool:--our provisions and fuel, in country places, are cheaper than with the Dutch;--our native commodities of lead and tin are great advantages:--of these, he says, as well as of our manufactures, we ship off one-third more than we did twenty years ago; and he adds, that we have now more than double the number of merchants and shipping that we had twenty years ago. He mentions a circumstance, which seems to indicate a retrograde motion of commerce, viz., that when he wrote most payments were in ready money; whereas, formerly, there were credit payments at three, six, nine, twelve, and even eighteen months. From another part of his work, it appears that the tax-money was brought up in waggons from the country.

The gradual advancement of a nation in knowledge and civilization, which is in part the result of commerce, is also in part the cause of it. But besides this advancement, in which England participated with the rest of Europe, during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, there were other circumstances peculiar to this country, some of which were favourable, and others unfavourable to the increase of its commerce.

Among the favourable circumstances may be reckoned the taking away of the exclusive privileges of the steelyard merchants by Edward VI., by which native merchants were encouraged, private companies of them formed, and the benefits of commerce more extensively diffused:--the encouragement given by Elizabeth, particularly by her minister Cecil, to commerce; this was so great and well directed, that the customs which had been farmed, at the beginning of the reign, for 14,000 l. a year, towards its close were fanned for 50,000 l.;--the pacific character of James I., and the consequent tranquillity enjoyed by England during his reign;--the strong and general stimulus which was given to individual industry, by the feeling of their own importance, which the struggle between Charles I. and the Parliament naturally infused into the great mass of the people;--the increased skill in maritime affairs, which was produced by our naval victories under Cromwell;--the great vigour of his government in his relations with foreign powers; and the passing of the navigation act. The Restoration, bringing a great fondness for luxury and expence, naturally produced also exertions to gratify that fondness. If to these and other causes of a similar nature, we add the introduction of East India commodities direct to England, and the import trade to the West Indies and America, the emigration of the industrious Flemings during the Spanish wars in the Low Countries, and of the French after the revocation of the edict of Nantz, we shall have specified most of the efficient circumstances, which, in conjunction with the progress of mankind in industry and civilization, were beneficial to our commerce.

The causes and circumstances which were unfavourable to it during the same period are much fewer in number; and though some of them were powerful, yet, even these, for the most part, when they ceased to operate, gave birth to a reaction favourable to commerce. The more general causes may be sought for in the erroneous notions entertained respecting commerce, in consequence of which monopolies were granted, especially in the reign of James I.; and laws were made to regulate what would have gone on best, if it had been left to itself. The civil wars, and the emigration occasioned by them, and the religious persecutions in the time of Mary, Elizabeth, and Charles, may be regarded as the most remarkable particular causes and circumstances, which were injurious to commerce.

We must again lay down the position, that in what respects the improvement of a country in industry and wealth, whether agricultural manufacturing, or commercial, the same circumstances may often be viewed in the light both of effect and cause. This position will be clearly illustrated by a very common and plain case. The trade in a certain district improves, and of course requires more easy and expeditious communication among different parts of this district: the roads are consequently made better, and the waggons, &c. are built on a better construction; these are the effects of an improved trade: but it is plain that as by the communication being thus rendered quicker, the commodities interchanged can be sold cheaper, a greater quantity of them will be sold; and thus better roads, which in the first instance proceeded from an improvement in trade, will, when made, improve the trade still more.

We have introduced these observations as preparatory to our notice of the establishment of the Bank of England. This undoubtedly was the effect of our increased commercial habits, but it was as undoubtedly the cause of those habits becoming stronger and more general: it supposed the pre-existence of a certain degree of commercial confidence and credit, but it increased these in a much greater ratio than they existed before: and if England owes its very superior wealth to any other causes besides its free government, its superior industry, and improvements in machinery, those causes must be sought for in the very extensive diffusion of commercial confidence and credit. The funding system, which took place about the same, time that the Bank of England was established, may be regarded as another powerful cause of the increase of our commerce: we do not mean to contend that the national debt is a national blessing, but it is certain that the necessity of paying the interest of that debt produced exertions of industry, and improvements in manufactures, which would not otherwise, have been called forth; while, on the other hand, the funds absorbed all the superfluous capital, which, otherwise, as in Holland, must have had a bad effect on commerce, either by reducing its profits very low, or by being transferred to other countries; and the interest, which so many individuals felt in the stability of the funds, induced them most steadily and strongly to support government.

The commerce of Scotland and Ireland during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, supplies us with very few materials. In the year 1544, Scotland must have had no inconsiderable foreign trade, as in the war which took place at this time between that country and England, twenty-eight of the principal ships of Scotland, laden with all kinds of rich merchandize, were captured by the English, on their voyage from France, Flanders, Denmark, &c.; and in the same year, when the English took Leith, they found more riches in it than they had reason to expect. While Scotland and England were at peace, however, the former was principally supplied through the latter with the commodities which Antwerp, during the sixteenth century, dispersed over all Europe. The exports of Scotland to Antwerp, &c. were indeed direct, and consisted principally, as we have already remarked from Guicciardini, of peltry, leather, wool, indifferent cloth, and pearls.

The earliest account which occurs of the Scotch carrying on commerce to any port out of Europe, is in the year 1589, when three or four Scotch ships were found at the Azores by the earl of Cumberland. In the year 1598, it appears, from a letter of king James to Queen Elizabeth, that some Scotch merchants traded to the Canaries. There is evidence that the Scotch had some commerce in the Mediterranean in the beginning of the seventeenth century; for in the "Cabala," under the year 1624, the confiscation of three Scotch ships at Malaga is noticed, for importing Dutch commodities. The principal articles of export from Scotland to foreign countries consisted of coarse woollen stuffs and stockings, linen goods, peltry, leather, wool, pearls, &c. The principal imports were wine and fruits from France, wine from Spain and Portugal, the finer woollen goods from England, timber, iron, &c. from the Baltic, and sugars, spices, silks, &c. from Antwerp, Portugal, &c.

The following statement, with which we shall conclude our account of Scotch commerce, is interesting, as exhibiting a view of the commercial intercourse by sea between England and Scotland, from the commencement of the inspector general's accounts in 1697, to the Union in 1707.

England received from Scotland Scotland received from England Merchandize to the value of merchandize to the value of

1697. £91,302 £73,203 1698. 124,835 58,043 1699. 86,309 66,303 1700. 130,087 85,194 1701. 73,988 56,802 1702. 71,428 58,688 1703. 76,448 57,338 1704. 54,379 87,536 1705. 57,902 50,035 1706. 50,309 60,313 1707. 6,733 17,779

The earliest notices of Irish trade, to which we have already adverted, particularly mention linen and woollen cloth, as two of the most considerable articles of export from that country. Hides, wool, fish of different kinds, particularly salmon, and the skins of martins, otters, rabbits, sheep, kids, &c. are also specified, as forming part of her early export. From Antwerp in the middle of the sixteenth century she received spices, sugar, silks, madder, camblets, &c. Pipe staves were a considerable article of export in the beginning of the seventeenth century; they were principally sent to the Mediterranean. In 1627 Charles issued a proclamation respecting Ireland, from which we learn that the principal foreign trade of Ireland was to Spain and Portugal, and consisted in fish, butter, skins, wool, rugs, blankets, wax, cattle, and horses; pipe staves, and corn; timber fit for ship-building, as well as pipe staves, seem at this period to have formed most extensive and valuable articles of export from Ireland. In the middle of this century, Irish linen yarn was used in considerable quantities in the Manchester manufactures, as we have already noticed. The importation into England of fat cattle from Ireland seems to have been considerable, and to have been regarded as so prejudicial to the pasture farmers of the former country, that in 1666 a law was passed laying a heavy duty on their importation. This statute proving ineffectual, another was passed in 1663, enacting the forfeiture of all great cattle, sheep, swine, and also beef, pork, or bacon, imported from Ireland. Sir W. Petty remarks, that before this law was passed, three-fourths of the trade of Ireland was with England, but not one-fourth of it since that time. Sir Jonah Child, in his Discourse on Trade, describes the state of Ireland as having been much improved by the soldiers of the Commonwealth settling there; through their own industry, and that which they infused into the natives, he adds, that Ireland was able to supply foreign markets, as well as our plantations in America, with beef, pork, hides, tallow, bread, beer, wood, and corn, at a cheaper rate than England could afford to do. Though this country, as we have seen, exported linen goods at a very early period, yet this manufacture cannot be regarded as the staple one of Ireland, or as having contributed very much to her foreign commerce, till it flourished among the Scotch colonists in Ulster towards the middle of the seventeenth century. As soon as they entered on it with spirit, linen yarn was no longer exported to Manchester and other parts of England, but manufactured into cloth in Ireland, and in that state it formed the chief article of its commerce. The woollen manufactures of Ireland, which were always viewed with jealousy by England, and were checked in every possible manner, gradually gave way to the restraints laid on them, and to the rising and unchecked linen manufacture, and of course ceased to enter into the exports.

The commerce of Scotland during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was kept low, by ignorance and want of industry, by the disturbed state of the country, by disputes between the king and nobility, and, till the union of the crowns, by wars with England. The commerce of Ireland had still greater difficulties to struggle with; among which may be mentioned the ignorant oppression of the English government in every thing that related to its manufactures or trade.

The commerce of France, during the sixteenth century, presents few particulars worthy of notice; that, which was carried on between it and England, was principally confined to the exportation of wines, fruit, silk and linen, from France; and woollen goods, and tin and lead, from England. There seems to have been a great exchange between the woollens of England and the linens of Bretagne. The French, however, like all the other nations of Europe at this period, were ignorant of the principles, as well as destitute of the enterprize and capital essential to steady and lucrative commerce; and amply deserve the character given of them by Voltaire, that in the reign of Francis I., though possessed of harbours both on the ocean and Mediterranean, they were yet without a navy; and though immersed in luxury, they had only a few coarse manufactures. The Jews, Genoese, Venetians, Portuguese, Flemings, Dutch, and English, traded successively for them. At the very close of this century we have a very summary account of the commerce of France by Giovani Bolero. France, says he, possesses four magnets, which attract the wealth of other countries;--corn, which is exported to Spain and Portugal;--wine, which is sent to Flanders, England, and the Baltic;--salt, made by the heat of the sun on the Mediterranean coast, and also on that of the ocean, as far north as Saintoigne; and hemp and cloth, of which and of cordage great quantities are exported to Lisbon and Seville:--the exportation of the articles of this fourth class, he adds, is incredibly great.

In the middle of the seventeenth century, the finer manufactures of woollen and silken goods having been carried to great perfection in France, her exports in these articles were greatly increased. In the political testament of Richelieu, we are informed that a considerable and lucrative trade in these articles was carried on with Turkey, Spain, Italy, &c., and that France had driven, in a great measure, out of those markets the serges of Milan, the velvets of Genoa, and the cloth of gold of Italy.

Early in the reign of Louis XIV., Colbert directed his attention to the improvement of manufactures and commerce; and though many of his plans were frustrated from the operation of causes over which he had no control, and principally because he went before the age in which he lived, yet there can be no doubt that to him France was indebted for the consolidation, extension, and firm footing of her commerce. Immediately before the revocation of the edict of Nantes, her commerce was at its greatest heighth, as the following estimates of that she carried on with England and Holland will prove. To the former country the exportation of manufactured silks of all sorts is said to have been to the value of 600,000 l.;--of linen, sail-cloth, and canvass, about 700,000 l.;--in beaver hats, watches, clocks, and glass, about 220,000 l.;--in paper, about 90,000 l.;--in iron ware, the manufacture of Auvergne, chiefly, about 40,000 l.;--in shalloons, tammies, &c. from Picardy and Champagne, about 150,000 l.;--in wines, about 200,000 l.; and brandies, about 80,000 l. The exports to Holland, shortly before the revocation of the edict of Nantes, in silks, velvets, linen, and paper, are estimated at 600,000 l.; --in hats, about 200,000 l.;--in glass, clocks, watches, and household furniture, about 160,000 l.;--in small articles, such as fringes, gloves, &c., about 200,000 l.;--in linen, canvass, and sail cloth, about 160,000 l.; and in saffron, dye-wood, woollen yarn, &c., about 300,000 l.

In the year 1700 a council of commerce was constituted in France, consisting of the principal ministers of state and finance, and of twelve of the principal merchants of the kingdom, chosen annually from Paris, Rouen, Bourdeaux, Lyons, Marseilles, Rochelle, Nantes, St. Maloe, Lisle, Bayonne, and Dunkirk.

From the first report of this board, we gain some information of the state of French commerce at this time; according to it, the French employed in their West India and Guinea trade only 100 vessels, whereas the English employed 500. The principal articles they drew from these islands were sugar, indigo, cotton, cocoa, ginger, &c. The exclusive trades formed in 1661, when France was little versed in commerce and navigation, are deprecated: the chief of them were, that granted to Marseilles for the sole trade to the Levant;--the East India Company;--the prohibiting foreign raw silk to be carried to Paris, Nismes, Tours, &c., till it had passed through Lyons;--the Canada and Guinea Companies, besides various farms or monopolies of certain merchandize in trade: the principal of these last was lead from England, with which, made into shot, the persons who had the monopoly supplied not only France, but, through France, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, the Levant, and the French West Indies.

The report contains some information respecting the comparative commerce of France, and the other nations of Europe. The Spaniards, it is observed, though they possess within their own country wool, silk, oil, wine, &c., and are in no want of good ports, both on the ocean and Mediterranean, nevertheless neglect all these advantages. Hence it happens that the raw silk of Valencia, Murcia, and Grenada, is exported to France: the wool of Castile, Arragon, Navarre, and Leon, to England, Holland, France, and Italy; and these raw articles, when manufactured, are sent back to Spain, and exchanged for the gold and silver of the American mines. France also supplies Peru and Mexico, through Spain, receiving in return, cochineal, indigo, hides, &c., besides a balance of eighteen or twenty million of livres, and by the flotas, seven or eight million more. The report adds, on this head, that latterly the English and Dutch have interfered with some branches of this trade with Spain; and it also complains that the former nation carry on the Levant trade to much more advantage than the French, their woollen cloths being better and cheaper. The English also carry to the Levant, lead, pewter, copperas, and logwood, together with a great deal of pepper;--with these, and the money received on the coasts of Portugal, Spain and Italy, for the dry fish and sugar they sell there on their outward voyage, they purchase their homeward cargoes. This superiority of England over France in the Levant trade, is ascribed in the report to the monopoly enjoyed by Marseilles.

The report, in relation to the commerce of France with the northern nations of Europe, observes, that it appears from the custom books, that the Dutch had possession of almost the whole of it. The Dutch also are accused of having, in a great measure, made themselves masters of the inland trade of France. In order to secure to this latter country the direct trade with the north of Europe, certain plans are suggested in the report; all of which were objected to by the deputies from Nantes, principally, it would seem, on the ground, that the Dutch trade to the Baltic was so well settled, that it governed the prices of all the exports and imports there, and that the Dutch gave higher prices for French goods than could be obtained in the Baltic for them, while, on the other hand, they sold at Amsterdam Baltic produce cheaper than it could be bought in the Baltic. One objection to a direct trade between France and the Baltic affords a curious and instructive proof of the imperfect state of navigation at this time, that is, at the beginning of the eighteenth century. The deputy from Marseilles urged that the voyage from Dantzic, or even from Copenhagen to Marseilles, was too long for a ship to go and come with certainty in one season, considering the ice and the long nights; and that therefore, there is no avoiding the use of entrepots for the trade of Marseilles. Mr. Anderson, in his History of Commerce, very justly observes, "that the dread of a long voyage from the north to the south parts of Europe, contributed, in a great measure, to make Antwerp, in former times, the general magazine of Europe."

The decline of the commerce of the Italian states, in consequence of the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, has been already mentioned; their efforts however to preserve it were vigorous, and we can trace, even in the middle of the sixteenth century, some Indian commerce passing through Venice. Indeed in the year 1518, Guicciardini informs us that there arrived at Antwerp, five Venetian ships laden with the spices and drugs of the East: and 1565, when the English Russia Company sent their agents into Persia, they found that the Venetians carried on a considerable trade there; they seem to have travelled from Aleppo, and to have brought with them woollen cloths, &c. which they exchanged for raw silks, spices, drugs, &c. The agents remarked, that much Venetian cloth was worn in Persia: in 1581, Sir William Monson complains that the Venetians engrossed the trade between Turkey and Persia, for Persian and Indian merchandize. In 1591, when the English Levant Company endeavoured to establish a trade over land to India, and for that purpose carried some of their goods from Aleppo to Bagdat, and thence down the Tigris to Ormus and to Goa, they found that the Venetians had factories in all these places, and carried on an extensive and lucrative trade. It is difficult to perceive how Indian commodities brought by land to Europe, could compete with those which the Portuguese brought by sea. The larger capital, more numerous connexions, greater credit, and skill of the Venetians, must however have been much in their favour in this competition.

We have noticed that, even so late as the beginning of the eighteenth century, a voyage from Marseilles to the Baltic and back again, was thought by French navigators an impracticable undertaking in the course of one year; and yet a century earlier, viz. in 1699, Venice sent at least one ship annually for Archangel: the first instance we believe of a direct commercial intercourse between the northern and southern extreme seas of Europe.

We must turn to the northern nations of Europe, Sweden, Denmark and Russia, and glean what few important materials we can respecting their commerce during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. We have already seen that the commerce of the Scandinavian nations of the middle ages was by no means despicable, though it was chiefly confined to Britain and Iceland, and among themselves: the establishment of the Hanseatic League, some of the cities composing which lay in the Baltic, gradually made the Scandinavian nations better known, and by creating a demand for their produce, stimulated them to industry and commerce. In a poor country, however, with a sterile soil and ungenial climate; where winter prevented intercourse by sea, for several months every year, capital must increase very slowly, and commerce, reciprocally the cause and effect of capital, equally slow. Besides the piratical habits of the early Scandinavians, were adverse to trade; and these habits shed their influence even after they were discontinued. But though the Scandinavian nations were long in entering into any commercial transactions of importance, yet they contributed indirectly to its advancement by the improvements they made in ship-building, as well as by the ample materials for this purpose which their country supplied. Their ships indeed were constructed for warfare, but improvements in this description of ships naturally, and almost unavoidably, led to improvements in vessels designed for trade. In 1449, a considerable commerce was carried on between Bristol, and Iceland, and Finmark, in vessels of 400, 500, and even 900 tons burden, all of which, there is reason to believe, were built in the Baltic; and, about six years afterwards, the king of Sweden was the owner of a ship of nearly 1000 tons burden, which he sent to England, with a request that she might be permitted to trade.

Gustavus I. who reigned about the beginning of the sixteenth century, seems to have been the first Swedish king who directed the attention and industry of his subjects to manufactures and commerce; but, in the early part of his reign, the inhabitants of Lubec had the monopoly of the foreign trade of Stockholm. This sovereign, in 1540, entered into a commercial treaty with Francis I., King of France; the principal article of which was, that the Swedes should import their wine, salt, &c. directly from France, instead of obtaining them indirectly from the Dutch. The conquest of Revel by Sweden, and the consequent footing obtained in Livonia, in 1560, greatly increased its commerce and wealth; while important improvements were introduced into its manufactures of iron a few years afterwards by the Flemings, who fled there on the destruction of Antwerp. Prior to their arrival, most of the Swedish iron was forged in Dantzic and Prussia; but they not only taught the Swedes how to forge it, but also how to make iron cannon, and other iron, copper, and brass articles. The Swedes had from an early period, been sensible of the real riches of their territory, and how much their timber, iron, pitch, and tar, were converted for maritime and other purposes. The pitch and tar manufacture especially had long constituted a very considerable part of their commerce. In 1647, Queen Christiana very unwisely granted a monopoly of these articles, which was productive of the usual effects, injury to commerce, without a correspondent benefit to those who held it. In the beginning of the eighteenth century, the tar company in Sweden not only put a very high price on their goods, but refused to sell them, even for ready money, unless they were exported in Swedish vessels. In consequence of this, England began at this period to encourage the importation of tar, pitch, hemp, and naval timber, from her American colonies.

The commerce of Denmark, besides its common origin with that of the rest of Scandinavia, seems, in the middle ages, to have been chiefly nourished by two circumstances:--The trade which Iceland carried on, and the establishment of Bergen, first as the staple of the German merchants, and afterwards as the chief factory of the Hanse merchants. In 1429, it was also established by the king of Denmark, as the sole staple for the fish trade. In 1553, its trade began to decline, in consequence, it is said, of its being deserted by the Hanseatics. The historian of the Hanseatic League adds, that "whereas the ancient toll of the Sound had been only a golden rose-noble on every sail, which was always understood to be meant on every ship; the court of Denmark had for some time past put a new and arbitrary construction on the word sail, by obliging all ships to pay a rose-noble for every sail on, or belonging to each ship". In consequence of this, the Vandalic-Hanse Towns, or those on the south shores of the Baltic, deserted the Bergen trade.

The same sovereign, however, who increased the tolls of the Sound, counterpoised the bad effects of this measure, by the encouragement he gave to manufactures and commerce; in this he was seconded by the Danish gentry, who began to carry on merchandize and factorage themselves, and also established manufactories. Copenhagen at this time was the staple for all Danish merchandize, especially corn, butter, fish, &c.

The commercial history of this country, towards the close of the sixteenth century, is remarkable for having given rise to the earliest dispute, of which we have any notice, respecting, the carrying of naval stores, of contraband of war, in neutral bottoms, to any enemy. It seems that the English merchants endeavoured to evade the custom duties in the Danish ports, particularly on their skins, woollen goods, and tin; on which they were siezed. On a remonstrance however from Elizabeth, they were restored, when the king of Denmark, on his part, complained that the English committed piracies on his subjects; for now, says Camden, there began to grow controversies about such matters, that is, the carrying naval stores, &c. to the Spaniards.

The commercial history of Denmark, during the period to which we are at present confined, presents no other circumstance sufficiently striking or interesting to detain us; for the establishments of this country in the East Indies are too trifling to deserve or require notice in a work whose limits and objects equally confine it to those points which are of primary importance.

The locality of Russia, cut off from the sea till a comparatively late period, except the almost inaccessible sea on which Archangel stands; the ignorance and barbarism of its inhabitants, and its wars with the Tartars, necessarily prevented and incapacitated this immense empire from engaging in any commercial intercourse with the rest of Europe till the beginning of the sixteenth century, when it became independent, and began to be powerful. Novogorod, indeed, which was in fact a republic under the jurisdiction of a nominal sovereign, enjoyed in the fifteenth century, a great trade, being then the mart between Russia and the Hanseatic cities. On its conquest by the Russians in the beginning of the next century, the Hanseatic merchants deserted it, though it continued for a considerable period afterward the largest and most commercial city in Russia. In 1509, Basilicus IV. conquered the city and territory of Pleskow and Smolensko, and consolidated the Russian empire, by reducing all the petty principalities into which it had been previously divided. Pleskow, situated near the head of the lake Czudskoc, soon became a celebrated emporium, and before the end of this century was frequented by merchants from Persia, Tartary, Sarmatia, Livonia, Germany, Britain, and other countries.

The accidental discovery of the White Sea by the English, in 1553, has been already narrated: this led to the first intercourse by sea between Russia and the rest of Europe, for previously, whatever of their produce was exported, was carried in Livonian ships. In the following year, the facilities of Russia with Asia were encreased by the conquest of the city and kingdom of Astracan: by this conquest the entire navigation of the Wolga became theirs, and by crossing the Caspian, they carried their commercial transactions into Persia. The spirit of conquest was now alive among them, and exerting itself both to the east and west; for in 1558 they conquered Narva, in Livonia, and by means of it formed a communication with the rest of Europe by the Baltic sea. To this city the Hanseatic merchants removed their mart from Revel. The conquest of Samoieda and Siberia near the close of the sixteenth century, contributed to encrease the exportable commodities of Russia by their furs, salmon, sturgeon, &c.

In the mean time the Russian commerce in the Caspian was increasing: the Persian vessels brought into Astracan dyed silks, calicoes, and Persian stuffs, and returned with cloth, sables, martens, red leather, and old Russia money. The trade from Archangel also increased in a still more rapid manner, principally, as we have already seen, with the English and Dutch. In the year 1655, the exports were valued at the 660,000 rubles, two rubles at that period being equal to one pound sterling. The principal articles were potash, caviare, tallow, hides, sables, and cable yarn; the other articles of less importance, and in smaller quantities, were coarse linen, feathers for beds, tar, linen yarn, beet, rhubarb, Persian silk, cork, bacon, cordage, skins of squirrels, and cats; bees' wax, hogs' birstles, mice and goats' skins, swan and geese down, candles, &c.

Peter the Great became emperor in 1689; he soon unfolded and began to execute his vast plans of conquest, naval power, and commerce. He gained for his country a passage into the Black Sea, by reducing Asoph, at the mouth of the Don, and he soon established a navy on this sea. His personal exertions in Holland and England, to make himself acquainted with ship-building, are well known. The event of his reign, however, which most completely changed the relative situation of Russia, and established her as a commercial nation, was the conquest from Sweden of Livonia, Ingria, and Carelia. Scarcely were these provinces secured to him, when he built, first Cronstadt, and then St. Petersburgh. The erection of this city, and the canals he constructed in the interior for the purpose of facilitating the transportation of merchandize from the more southerly and fertile districts of his empire to the new capital, soon drew to it the greater portion of Russian commerce. Archangel, to which there had previously resorted annually upwards of one hundred ships from England, Holland, Hamburgh, &c. declined; and early in the eighteenth century Petersburgh, then scarcely ten years old, beheld itself a commercial city of great importance.

Having now brought the historical sketch of the progress of discovery and of commercial enterprise down to the commencement of the eighteenth century, it will be necessary, as well as proper, to contract the scale on which the remainder of this volume is to be constructed. For, during nearly the whole of the period which intervenes between the commencement of the eighteenth century and the present time, the materials are either so abundant or so minute, that to insert them all without discrimination and selection, would be to give bulk, without corresponding interest and value, to the work.

So far as discovery is concerned, it is evident, from the sketch of it already given, that nearly the entire outline of the globe had been traced before the period at which we are arrived: what remained was to fill up this outline. In Asia, to gain a more complete knowledge of Hither and Farther India, of China, of the countries to the north of Hindostan, of the north and north-east of Asia, and of some of the Asiatic islands. In Africa, little besides the shores were known; but the nature of the interior, with its burning sands and climate, uninhabitable, or inhabited by inhospitable and barbarous tribes, held out little expectation that another century would add much to our knowledge of that quarter of the world; and though the perseverance and enterprise of the eighteenth century, and what has passed of the nineteenth, have done more than might reasonably have been anticipated, yet, comparatively speaking, how little do we yet know of Africa! America held out the most promising as well as extensive views to future discovery; the form and direction of her north-west coast was to be traced. In South America, the Spaniards had already gained a considerable knowledge of the countries lying between the Atlantic and the Pacific, but in North America, the British colonists had penetrated to a very short distance from the shores on which they were first settled; and from their most western habitations to the Pacific, the country was almost entirely unknown.

The immense extent of the Pacific Ocean, which presented to navigators at the beginning of the eighteenth century but few islands, seemed to promise a more abundant harvest to repeated and more minute examination, and this promise has been fulfilled. New Holland, however, was the only portion of the world of great extent which could be said to be almost entirely unknown at the beginning of the eighteenth century; and the completion of our knowledge of its form and extent may justly be regarded as one of the greatest and most important occurrences to geography contributed by the eighteenth century.

The truth and justice of these observations will, we trust, convince our readers, that, in determining to be more general and concise in what remains of the geographical portion of our works, we shall not be destroying its consistency or altering the nature of its plan, but in fact preserving both; for its great object and design was to trace geographical knowledge from its infancy till it had reached that maturity and vigour, by which, in connection with the corresponding increased civilization, general information and commerce of the world, it was able to advance with rapid strides, and no longer confining itself to geography, strictly so called, to embrace the natural history of those countries, the existence, extent, and form of which it had first ascertained.

The great object and design of the commercial part of this work was similar; to trace the progress of commercial enterprises from the rudest ages of mankind, the changes and transfers it had undergone from one country to another, the causes and effects of these, as well as of its general gradual increase, till, having the whole of Europe under its influence, and aided by that knowledge and civilization with which it had mainly contributed to bless Europe, it had gained its maturity and vigour, and by its own expansive force pushed itself into every part of the globe, in which there existed any thing to attract it.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century, commerce had not indeed assumed those features, or reached that form and dimensions by which it was distinguished at the end of this century; but as its dimensions gradually enlarge, it will be necessary to be less particular and more condensed.

Our plan indeed of being more minute in the early history of geographical science and commercial enterprise, is founded on an obvious as well as a just and important principle. In the infancy of geography and commerce, every fact is important, as reflecting light on the knowledge and state of mankind at that period, and as bearing on and conducing to their future progress; whereas when geography and commerce have been carried so far as to proceed in their course as it were by their own internal impulse, derived from the motion they have been acquiring for ages, their interest and importance is much diminished from this cause, as well as from the minuteness of the objects to which,--all the great ones having been previously occupied by them,--they must necessarily be confined.

Several circumstances co-operated to direct geographical discovery, during the eighteenth century, principally towards the north and north-east of Asia, and the north-west of America. The tendency and interest of the Russian empire to stretch itself to the east, and the hope still cherished by the more commercial and maritime nations of Europe, that a passage to the East Indies might be discovered, either by the north-east round Asia, or by the north-west, in the direction of Hudson's Bay, were among the most powerful of the causes which directed discovery towards those parts of the globe to which we have just alluded.

The extent of the Russian discoveries and conquests in the north and north-east of Asia, added much to geographical knowledge, though from the nature of the countries discovered and conquered, the importance of this knowledge is comparatively trifling. About the middle of the seventeenth century, they ascertained that the Frozen Ocean washed and bounded the north of Asia: the first Russian ship sailed down the river Lena to this sea in the year 1636. Three years afterwards, by pushing their conquests from one river to another, and from one rude and wandering tribe to another, they reached the eastern shores of Asia, not far distant from the present site of Ochotsk. Their conquests in this direction had occupied them nearly sixty years; and in this time they had annexed to their empire more than a fourth part of the globe, extending nearly eighty degrees in length, and in the north reaching to the 160° of east longitude; in breadth their conquests extended from the fiftieth to the seventy-fifth degree of north latitude. This conquest was completed by a Cossack; another Cossack, as Malte Brun observes, effected what the most skilful and enterprising of subsequent navigators have in vain attempted. Guided by the winds, and following the course of the tides, the current and the ice, he doubled the extremity of Asia from Kowyma to the river Anadyn. Kamschatcka, however, which is their principal settlement in the east of Asia, was not discovered till the year 1690; five years afterwards they reached it by sea from Ochotsk, but for a long time it was thought to be an island. The Kurile Islands were not discovered till the beginning of the eighteenth century.

The direction of discovery to this part of the world, as well as the plan by which it might be most advantageously and successfully executed, was given by Peter the Great, and affords one proof, that his mind was capacious, though his manners, morals, and conduct, might be those of a half-civilized tyrant. Peter did not live to carry his plan into execution: it was not, however, abandoned or neglected; for certainly the Russian government, much more than any other European government, seems to pursue with a most steady and almost hereditary predilection, all the objects which have once occupied its attention and warmed its ambition. On his death, his empress and her successors, particularly Anne and Elizabeth, contributed every thing in their power to carry his plan into full and complete execution. They went from Archangel to the Ob, from the Ob to the Jenesei. From the Jenesei they reached the Lena, partly by water and partly by land; from the Lena they went to the eastward as far as the Judigirka: and from Ochotsk they went by the Kurile Islands to Japan.

One of the most celebrated men engaged in the Russian discoveries in the early part of the eighteenth century was Behring: he was a Dane by birth, but in the service of Catherine, the widow of Peter the Great, who fixed upon him to carry into execution one of the most favourite plans of her husband. During Peter's residence in Holland, in the year 1717, the Dutch, who were still disposed to believe that a passage might be discovered to the East Indies in the northern parts of America, or Asia, urged the Emperor to send out an expedition to determine this point. There was also another point, less interesting indeed to commercial men, but on which geographers had bestowed much labour, which it was stated to the Emperor might be ascertained by the same expedition; this was, whether Asia and America were united, or divided by a sea, towards their northern extremities.

When Peter the Great returned to Russia, he resolved to attempt the solution of these problems; and with his own hand drew up a set of instructions for the proposed voyage; according to these, the vessels to be employed were to be built in Kamschatka; the unknown coasts of Asia and America were to be explored, and an accurate journal was to be kept.

It is not known whether the Emperor was induced to plan this expedition solely on the representations which were made to him in Holland, or from a belief that the close vicinity of the two continents of Asia and America had already been ascertained, or at least rendered highly probable, by some of his own subjects. It is certain that the Russians and the Cossacks in their service had reached the great promontory of Asia opposite to America; and it is said that the islands lying in Behring Straits, and even the continent beyond them, were known to them by report.

Peter, however, did not live to accomplish his design; and, as we have already noticed, his widow Catherine fixed upon Behring to conduct the expedition. After building a vessel in Kamschatka, he sailed in 1728: his first object was to examine the coast of this part of Asia. He was the first who ascertained Kamschatka to be a peninsula, and he framed an accurate chart of it, which is still regarded as one of the best extant. After reaching a Cape in north latitude 67° 18', and being informed by the inhabitants that beyond it the coast bended to the west, he resolved to alter his course to the south. This was accordingly done, but he did not discover the opposite coast of America; several circumstances were noticed, however, which indicated that there was land to the east, at no great distance, such as floating pine branches and other species of plants, unknown on the coast of Asia; these were always driven ashore when easterly winds prevailed. The inhabitants also informed him, that, in very clear weather, they were able, from the top of their highest mountains, to descry land to the east.

Encouraged by these circumstances, Behring resolved to undertake a second voyage from Kamschatka: in this voyage he was accompanied by a Russian, named Tchirikoff. They steered east, and first sought for land, which was said to have been discovered between the latitude of 40° and 50°; but finding none, they separated, and steering further north, the Russian discovered the continent of America in about 56-1/2°, and Behring 2° further north. On his return, the latter was wrecked in the island which bears his name, where he died.

About four years after the death of this navigator, which happened in 1741, the sea between Asia and America was visited by some Russian merchants, who obtained permission from the government to make discoveries, hunt and trade; the vessels employed for this purpose were formed of a few boards fastened together with leathern thongs; yet in these were discovered the Aleutian Islands. Soon afterwards another group of islands were discovered; and then a third group, the Black Fox Islands, which are near the American continent. It was not, however, till the year 1760, that the Russians learnt that Ochotsk was only separated from America by a narrow strait; and it is said that in 1764, a Russian mercantile company sent out some vessels, which passed through a strait to some inhabited islands in 64° north latitude; these were supposed to belong to the continent of America; but if a strait was discovered by these adventurers, there must be an error in the latitude, as in 64° there is no opening known to exist.

It was reserved for an English navigator to ascertain the truth of the report which the Russians had received from the inhabitants of Ochotsk, that their country was separated from America only by a narrow strait.

This was done during the third and last voyage of Captain Cook; the principal design of which was to ascertain the existence and practicability of a passage between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, either to the north-east or north-west. For this purpose he carefully examined the north- west coast of America, beginning this examination in the latitude of 44° 33' north. Previously to this voyage an act of Parliament was passed, granting a reward of 20,000 l. to any person who should discover any northern passage by sea between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, in any parallel to the northward of the 52° of northern latitude. This voyage of Cook began in 1778; on the 9th of August, in that year, he ascertained the position and latitude of the western extremity of America, and soon afterwards he determined the width of that strait which divides the two continents. He then steered to the north, and continuing up the strait till he was in the latitude 70° 41', he found himself close to the edge of the ice which "was as compact as a wall," and ten or twelve feet high. He was of course obliged to return to the south, and in this part of his voyage he observed, on the American side, a low point in latitude 70° 29', to which he gave the name of Icy Cape. After the death of Cook, Captain Clarke entered the strait on the Asiatic side, and reached the latitude of 70° 33'; he afterwards got sight of the land on the American side in latitude 69° 34'. Such were the results of the last voyage of Captain Cook, respecting the proximity of Asia and America, and the nature of the strait by which they were divided.

Although the Spaniards seemed to be most interested in whatever concerned the west coast of America, yet they made no attempt to explore it from the commencement of the seventeenth century till the year 1774. In 1769, indeed, being alarmed at the evident design of the Russians to settle in the north-west coast, they formed establishments at St. Diego and Montory. In 1774 they traced the American coast from latitude 53° 53' to latitude 55°, and it is said discovered Nootka Sound. In the following year an expedition was sent from St. Blas, which proceeded along the north-west coast, and reached to latitude 57° 58'.

The voyage of Cook roused the Russian government to further exertions; and they accordingly fitted out an expedition to explore the sea between Asia and America: the command of it was given to an Englishman of the name of Billings, who had served as a petty officer under Captain Cook. He was, however, by no means qualified for his situation, and abandoned the enterprise in the latter end of July, having proceeded only a few leagues beyond Cape Barrenoi: the whole amount of the information procured during this voyage being confined to a few of the Aleutian Islands, and some points in the coast of America and Asia.

A few years afterwards the Empress Catherine sent out a secret expedition; the principal object of which was to ascertain the situation of the islands between the two continents. Little is known respecting this expedition, except that some observations were made on Behring's Straits, which, however, were not passed. The distance between the continents was estimated at forty-eight miles.

About the same time, the great profits which it was expected would be derived from the fur trade on the north-west coast of America, induced several commercial vessels to visit it; and during their voyages, nearly all the parts of it which had not been visited by Cook, were examined as far as the inlet which was named after him, in latitude 61° 15'. This extent of coast was found to consist of a vast chain of islands; and the appearance and nature of it revived the hope which Cook's last voyage had extinguished, that in this part of the coast there might be a practicable passage from the Pacific to the Atlantic ocean.

This hope was again extinguished in the opinion of most people, by the result of two of the most celebrated voyages which have been performed since the death of Captain Cook: we allude to the voyages of La Perouse, and of Vancouver: the former sailed with two frigates from Brest on the 1st of August, 1785: the object of this voyage was very comprehensive and important, being no less than to fill up whatever had been left deficient or obscure by former navigators, and to determine whatever was doubtful, so as to render the geography of the globe as complete and minute as possible: he was directed to supply the island in the South Seas with useful European vegetables. At present we shall confine our notice of this voyage to what relates to the more immediate object of this part of our work, the coast of North-west America.

The north-west coast of America was made by La Perouse, in latitude sixty degrees north: from this latitude he carefully traced and examined it to the Spanish settlement of Monterey.--an extent of coast of which Cook had had only a transient and imperfect view. Of this he constructed a chart, which at the time was justly regarded as extremely accurate and complete, but was subsequently rendered much more so by the survey of particular points and bays made by the vessels engaged in the fur trade, and especially by that which was constructed by Vancouver, from a close and careful examination of the numerous channels with which this coast abounds, principally performed in boats, and therefore descending into very minute details.

The accessions made by him to geography in other parts of the globe, as well as his unfortunate fate, will be afterwards related.

In the year 1790, a dispute arose between Britain and Spain, respecting Nootka Sound: on the adjustment of this dispute, the British government determined to send out an officer to secure possession of the settlement, and also to determine the question respecting the existence of a navigable passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Captain Vancouver was selected for these purposes: his instructions were, after accomplishing his mission at Nootka Sound, to examine that part of the coast occupied by the chain of islands, discovered by the vessels in the fur trade, "and to ascertain, with the greatest exactitude, the nature and extent of every communication by water which might seem to tend to facilitate commercial relations between the north-west coast and the countries on the east of the continent, inhabited by British subjects or claimed by Great Britain;" and in particular to search for the strait of John de Fuca, and to examine if Cook's River had not its source in some of the lakes frequented by the Canadian traders, or by the servants of the Hudson's Bay Company.

He sailed from England with a sloop and brig on the 1st of April, 1791. He began his examination of the west coast of America, in latitude 39° 27' north, and continued it as far as Nootka: finding that the Spaniards raised difficulties to the restoration of this settlement, he proceeded to carry into execution the other objects of this voyage. During three summers, he surveyed the north-west coast of America as far as Cook's River, with a diligence, attention, and accuracy which could not have been surpassed. Every opening which presented itself was explored, and never left till its termination was determined; so that on a very careful and minute inspection of every creek and inlet of a coast consisting almost entirely of creeks and channels, formed by an innumerable multitude of islands, he thought himself justified in pronouncing, that there is no navigable passage between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, unless there may be a possibility of sailing through the strait between Asia and America, and navigating the Frozen Ocean. The surveys which were made during this voyage, may justly be said to have rendered perfect the geography of that part of the north-west coast of America to which it extended, and indeed to have completed the whole geography of this coast, which, from the multitude of its creeks, inlets, islands, &c., presents formidable as well as petty and troublesome difficulties in the way of its accurate and complete survey. Captain Vancouver, however, was extremely fortunate in the weather which attended him during the whole of the three summers which he spent on this coast.

Upwards of twenty years elapsed after the voyage of Vancouver, before another attempt was made to find out a passage from the north Pacific into the Atlantic Ocean. This attempt proceeded from Russia: not however from the government, but an individual. Count Romanzoff, a Russian nobleman, is well known for his liberal and judicious encouragement of every thing which can promote useful knowledge, especially in what relates to the improvement and benefit of his country. His first design was to fit out an expedition to explore the north-west passage by Hudson's Bay or Davis' Straits; but learning that the British government were making preparations to attempt it by that route, he changed his plan, and resolved to fit out an expedition to attempt the discovery of a passage from the eastward.

A ship was accordingly built and equipped, and the command given to Lieutenant Kotzebue. He sailed from Russia in the autumn of 1815, and on the 19th of June in the following year he reached Kamschatka. This he left on the 15th of July and on the 20th of that month, Behring's Islands were seen to the northward of Cape Prince of Wales. A tract of low land was ascertained to be an island about seven miles long, and a mile across, in the widest part: beyond it was a deep inlet running eastward into the continent. Lieutenant Kotzebue, animated and encouraged by this appearance, proceeded in a northerly direction, and found that the land continued low, and tended more to the eastwards. On the 1st of August the entrance into a broad inlet was discovered, into which the current ran very rapidly. The opening of this inlet was known before, and is indeed laid down in the charts attached to Marchand's Voyage round the World; but Kotzebue is certainly the first person who explained it. As it was perfectly calm when he reached this inlet, he resolved to go on shore, and examine from some eminence the direction of the coast. "We landed," he observes, "without difficulty, near a hill, which I immediately ascended; from the summit I could no where perceive land in the strait: the high mountains to the north either formed islands, or were a coast by themselves; for that the two coasts could not be connected together was evident, even from the very great difference between this very low and that remarkably high land. It was my intention to continue the survey of the coast in the boats, but a number of baydares coming to us along the coast from the east, withheld me." He afterwards had an interview with the Americans who came in these baydares: he found that they prized tobacco very highly, and that they received this and other European goods from the natives of the opposite coast of Asia. It was probably the first time in their lives that these Americans had seen Europeans. They were of the middle size; robust and healthy; ugly and dirty; with small eyes, and very high cheek bones: "they bore holes on each side of their mouths, in which they wear morse bones, ornamented with blue glass beads, which give them a most frightful appearance. Their dresses, which are made of skins, are of the same cut as the Parka, in Kamtschatka; only that there they reach to the feet, and here hardly cover the knee: besides this, they wear pantaloons, and small half boots of seal skins."

The latitude of this place, or rather of the ship's anchorage, at the time this survey was made, was 66° 42' 30", and the longitude 164° 12' 50". There were several circumstances which induced Kotzebue to hope that he had at length found the channel which led to the Atlantic: nothing was seen but sea to the eastward, and a strong current ran to the north-east. Under these circumstances, thirteen days were occupied in examining the shores of this opening; but no outlet was discovered, except one to the south-east, which seemed to communicate with Norton Sound, and a channel on the western side, which of course could not be the one sought for. Kotzebue, however, remarks, "I certainly hope that this sound may lead to important discoveries next year; and though a north-east passage may not with certainty be depended on, yet I believe I shall be able to penetrate much farther to the east, as the land has very deep indentures." The name of Kotzebue's Sound was given to this inlet. Next year he returned to prosecute his discovery; but in consequence of an accident which happened to the ship, and a very dangerous blow which he received at the same time, he abandoned the attempt.

That there is an opening, either by Kotzebue's Inlet or near to it, to the Frozen Ocean, is probable, not only from the circumstances we have mentioned of an opening and a strong current to the north-east having been observed, but also from other circumstances noticed in the account of this voyage. This current brings large quantities of drift wood into Kotzebue's Sound: and in the breaking up of the ice in the sea of Kamschatka, the icebergs and fields of ice do not drift, as in the Atlantic, to the south, nor do they drive to the Atlantic islands, but into the strait to the north. The direction of the current was always north-east in Behring's Straits; and it was so strong and rapid, as to carry the ship fifty miles in twenty-four hours; that is, above two miles an hour. On the Asiatic side of the strait it ran at the rate of three miles an hour; and even with a fresh north wind, it ran equally strong from the south. The inference drawn by Kotzebue is as follows: "The constant north-east direction of the current in Behring's Straits, proves that the water meets with no opposition, and consequently a passage must exist, though perhaps not adapted to navigation. Observations have long been made, that the current in Baffin's Bay runs to the south; and thus no doubt can remain that the mass of water which flows into Behring's Straits takes its course round America, and returns through Baffin's Bay into the Ocean."

In 1819 the Russian government sent out another expedition, whose object was to trace the continent of America to the northward and eastward. In July, 1820, they reached Behring's Straits, and were supposed to have passed them in that year; in the winter they returned to some of the Russian settlements on the coast of America: what they have since done or discovered is not known.

Such is the result of what has hitherto been discovered by sea, with respect to the contiguity of Asia and America, the northern parts of these continents, and the probability of a passage from the Pacific to the Atlantic.

Very lately some attempts have been made to reach the north-eastern extremity of Asia by land. "In February, 1821, Baron Wrangel, an officer of great merit and of considerable science, left his head-quarters in the Nishney Kolyma, to settle by astronomical observations the position of Shatatzkoi Noss, or the North-east Cape of Asia, which he found to lie in latitude 70° 5' north, considerably lower than it is usually placed in the maps. Having crossed this point, he undertook the hazardous enterprize of crossing the ice of the Polar Sea, on sledges drawn by dogs, in search of the land said to have been discovered in 1762 to the northward of the Kolyma, He travelled directly north eighty miles, without perceiving any thing but a field of interminable ice, the surface of which had now become so broken and uneven, as to prevent a further prosecution of his journey. He had gone far enough, however, to ascertain that no such land had ever been discovered." (Quarterly Review, No. LII. p. 342.)

Another attempt, still more extraordinary and hazardous, has lately been made to explore the north-east of Asia, and particularly to determine whether the two continents of Asia and America do not unite at the North-east Cape, or in some other point. This enterprize was undertaken by Henry Dundas Cochrane, a commander in the British navy; who received assurances from the Russian government that he should not be molested on his journey; that he should receive any assistance, protection, and facilities he should require; and that he might join an expedition sent by the Russian government toward the Pole, if he should meet it, and accompany it as far as he might be inclined. He left Petersburgh in the beginning of the summer of 1820, and in one hundred and twenty-three days reached the Baikal, having traversed eight thousand versts of country, at the rate of forty-three miles a day. He seems afterwards to have gone as far as the Altai Mountains, on the frontiers of China. As, however, his principal object was to explore the extreme north-east of Asia, he went down the Lena, and reached Jakutzk on the 16th of October, 1820. On the Kolyma, where he arrived on the 30th of December, in longitude 164°, he met the Russian polar expedition. From Jakutzk to this place he travelled four hundred miles, without meeting a single human being. At the fair held at Tchutski, whither he next directed his steps, he received much information respecting the northeast of Asia. He ascertained the existence of this cape; all doubts, he says, being now solved, not by calculation, but by ocular demonstration. Its latitude and longitude, are well ascertained: he places this cape half a degree more to the northward than Baron Wrangel; but it is doubtful whether he himself reached it, and if he did, whether he had the means of fixing its latitude, or whether he depends entirely on the information he received at the fair of Tchutski. His expressions, in a letter to the President of the Royal Society, are, "No land is considered to exist to the northward of it. The east side of the Noss is composed of bold and perpendicular cliffs, while the west side exhibits gradual declivities; the whole most sterile, but presenting an awfully magnificent appearance." From the fair he seems to have returned to Kolyma, and thence proceeded to Okotsk, a dangerous, difficult, and fatiguing journey of three thousand versts, a great part performed on foot, in seventy days. From this last place he proceeded to Kamschatka, where it is supposed he was obliged to terminate his investigations, in consequence of an order or intimation from the Russian government not to proceed further.

We must next direct our attention to what has been done since the commencement of the eighteenth century, toward discovering a passage in the north-east of America, from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean.

One of the conditions on which the Hudson's Bay Company obtained their charter, in the year 1670, from Charles II., was, that they should prosecute their discoveries; but so far from doing this, they are accused, and with great appearance of reason, of not only suffering their ardour for discovery to cool, but also of endeavouring to conceal, as much as possible, the true situation and nature of the coast about Hudson's Bay, partly in order to secure more effectually their monopoly, and partly from the dread they entertained, that if a passage to the Pacific were discovered by this route, government would recal their charter, and grant it to the East India Company. They were indeed roused, but very ineffectively, from their torpor, by one of their captains intimating, that if they refused to fulfill the terms of their charter, by making discoveries, and extending their trade, he would himself apply to the crown. In order to silence him, they sent him and another captain out in two vessels, in 1719 or 1720; but they both perished, it is supposed, near Marble Island, without effecting any thing.

Two years afterwards they sent out another ship under the command of a person, who, destitute of the requisite knowledge and enterprize, was totally unfit for such an undertaking: the result was such as might have been anticipated--nothing was effected. An interval of twenty years passed over, and the company again sank into apathy on the subject of a north-west passage, when the attention of government was directed to the subject by the enthusiasm of an Irish gentleman of the name of Dobbs. Having well considered what preceding navigators had ascertained, and especially the remarkable circumstance particularly noticed by Fox, that the farther he removed from Sir Thomas Roe's Welcome the smaller was the height to which the tide rose, and who thence inferred, that if a passage were practicable, it must be in this direction, this gentleman applied to the company to send out a vessel. Accordingly, a vessel was sent; but all that is known of this voyage, and probably all that was done, amounts merely to this, that the vessel reached 62° 30' north latitude: here they saw a number of islands, and of white whales, and ascertained that the tide rose ten or twelve feet, and came from the north.

Mr. Dobbs next applied to government, who at his request sent out two vessels under Captain Middleton. But Middleton, who had been in the service of the company for many voyages, returned after having sailed up the Welcome to Wager's River, and looked into, or perhaps sailed round, a bay, which he named Repulse Bay. Mr. Dobbs accused him of having misrepresented or concealed his discoveries; and there seems good ground for such an accusation, which indeed was confirmed by the evidence of his officers, and not explicitly denied by himself. Government was undoubtedly of opinion that the voyage of Middleton had not determined the non-existence or impracticability of a passage; for the next year an act of parliament was passed, granting a reward of 20,000 l. to the person or persons who should discover a northwest passage through Hudson's Straits to the western and southern ocean of America.

Stimulated by the hope of obtaining this large sum, a company was formed, who raised 10,000 l., in shares of 100l., with which they fitted out two ships; the Dobbs, commanded by Captain More; and the California, by Captain Smith. They sailed from London on the 20th of May, 1746. When they reached the American coast near Marble Island, they made some observations on the tides, which they found flowed from the north-east, and consequently followed the direction of the coast; they likewise ascertained that the tide rose to the height of ten feet. While they were in their winter quarters at Port Jackson, they received little or no assistance from the servants of the Hudson's Bay Company. On resuming their voyage, and reaching the vicinity of Knight's Island, the needles of their compasses lost their magnetic quality, which they did not recover till they were kept warm. Proceeding northwards, they examined Wager's Strait; but in consequence of a difference of opinion between the commanders, they returned to England. The only points ascertained by this voyage were, that Wager's Strait was a deep bay, or inlet, and that there existed another inlet, which, however, they did not explore to the termination, named by them Chesterfield's Inlet. The fresh buffalo's flesh, which was sold to them by the Esquimaux, was probably the flesh of the musk ox.

After this voyage nothing was done, either by the Hudson's Bay Company, government, or individuals, towards the exploring of a passage in the north, till the year 1762, when the company, coinciding with the opinion that was then prevalent, that Chesterfield's Inlet ought to be examined, as affording a fair prospect of a passage into the Pacific Ocean, sent a vessel to determine this point. The report of the captain, on his return, was, that he had sailed up the inlet in a westerly direction for more than one hundred and fifty miles, till he found the water perfectly fresh; but he acknowledged that he did not go farther, or reach the head of it. As the result of this voyage was deemed unsatisfactory, still leaving the point which it had been its object to determine doubtful, the same captain was again sent out, in company with another ship, with express directions to trace the inlet to its western limits, if practicable. They ascertained that the fresh water, which had been discovered in the former voyage, was that of a river, which was the outlet of a lake, and this lake they explored; it was twenty-four miles long, and six or seven broad; they likewise found a river flowing into the lake from the west, but they were prevented from exploring it to any great distance by falls, that intercepted the progress of their boats. These particulars are detailed in Goldson's Observations on the Passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans; the voyages themselves were never published, do not seem to be generally known, and have escaped the notice of Forster, the author of the History of Voyages and Discoveries in the North. Forster is likewise silent respecting an expedition that was equipped and sent out by some gentlemen of Virginia in 1772, to attempt a north-west passage. The captain on his return reported that he reached a large bay in latitude 69° 11', which he supposed hitherto unknown; that from the course of the tides, he thought it probable there might be a passage through it, but that as this bay was seldom free from ice, the passage could seldom if ever be practicable.

In the year 1770 the Hudson's Bay Company, more alive to the prospect of gain than to the interests of discovery and geographical science, having received some information from the Indians that copper might be obtained in great quantity far to the west of Fort Prince of Wales, resolved to dispatch Mr. Hearne, belonging to that fort, in search of it. This gentleman made four different excursions for this purpose, but it was only during the fourth that he reached to any great distance from the fort. In this excursion he penetrated to what he conceived to be the mouth of the Coppermine River, in the Frozen Ocean, about the latitude of 72° north. According to his account, Chesterfield Inlet is not the north-west passage, and the American continent stretches very considerably to the north-west of Hudson's Bay. The whole extent of his journey was about thirteen hundred miles. It was however doubted, whether what he deemed to be the mouth of the Coppermine River was actually such. It is certainly singular, that though he staid there for twenty-four hours, he did not actually ascertain the height to which the tide rose, but judged at that circumstance from the marks on the edge of the ice. There are other points in the printed account, as well as discrepancies between that and his MS., which tended to withhold implicit belief from his assertion, that he had reached the Frozen Ocean.

In the year 1789 the North-west Company having received information from an Indian, that there was at no great distance from Montreal, to the northward, a river which ran into the sea, Mr. M'Kenzie, one of the partners of that company, resolved to ascertain the truth of this report, by going himself on an expedition for that purpose. He set out, attended by a few Indians; and after traversing the desert and inhospitable country in which the posts of the company are established, he reached a river which ran to the north. He followed the course of this river till he arrived at what he conceived to be the Frozen Ocean, were he saw some small whales among the ice, and determined the rise and fall of the tide. This river was called after him, Mackenzie's River, and to the island he gave the name of Whale Island. This island is in latitude 69° 14'.

In 1793 Mr. M'Kenzie again set out on an inland voyage of geographical and commercial discovery, taking with him the requisite astronomical instruments and a chronometer. His course he directed to the west. After travelling one hundred miles on foot, he and his companions embarked on a river, running westward, which conveyed them to an inlet of the Pacific Ocean. Here he observed the rise and fall of the tide, and saw porpoises and sea otters. The claim of the discovery of the Frozen Ocean by a north-west route, to which Mr. M'Kenzie lays claim, has been questioned, as well as Mr. Hearne's claim. It has been remarked, that he might have ascertained beyond a doubt whether he had actually reached the sea, by simply dipping his finger into the water, and ascertaining whether it was salt or not. The account he gives of the rise of the tides at the mouth of Mackenzie River serves also to render it very doubtful whether he had reached the ocean; this rise he does not estimate greater than sixteen or eighteen inches. On the whole, we may conclude, that if Mr. Hearne actually traced the Coppermine River to its entrance into the sea, or Mr. M'Kenzie the river that bears his name, they have not been sufficiently explicit in their proofs that such was really the case.

At the time when the British government sent out Captain Cooke on his last voyage of discovery, Lieutenant Pickersgill was also sent out by them, to examine the western parts of Baffin's Bay, but he never entered the bay. Government were equally unfortunate in their choice of Lieutenant Young, who was sent with the same object the following year: he reached no farther than the seventy-second degree of latitude; and instead of sailing along the western side of the bay, which is generally free from ice, he clung to the eastern side, to which the ice is always firmly attached. Indeed, if Dr. Douglas's character of him was just, he was ill fitted for the enterprize on which he was sent; for his talents, he observes, were more adapted to contribute to the glory of a victory, as commander of a line-of-battle ship, than to add to geographical discoveries by encountering mountains of ice, and exploring unknown coasts.

Notwithstanding the unsuccessful issue of all these attempts to discover a north-west passage, the existence and practicability of it still were cherished by many geographers, who had particularly studied the subject. Indeed, nothing had resulted from any of the numerous voyages to the Hudson's or Baffin's Bay, which in the smallest degree rendered the existence of such a passage unlikely. Among those scientific men who cherished the idea of such a passage with the most enthusiasm and confidence, and who brought to the investigation the most extensive and minute knowledge of all that had been done, was Mr. Dalrymple, hydrographer to the Admiralty. "He had long been of opinion, that not only Greenland, but all the land seen by Baffin on the northern and eastern sides of the great bay bearing his name, was composed of clusters of islands, and that a passage through the Fretum Davis, round the northern extremity of Cumberland Island, led directly to the North Sea, from the seventy to the seventy-first degree of latitude." This opinion of Mr. Dalrymple was grounded, in part at least, on the authority of an old globe, one of the first constructed in Britain, preserved in the library of the Inner Temple: this globe contains all the discoveries of our early navigators. Davis refers to it; and Hackluyt, in his edition of 1589, describes it "as a very large and most exact terrestrial globe, collected and reformed according to the newest, secretest, and latest discoveries, both Spanish, Portugal, and English, composed by Mr. Emmeric Molyneaux, of Lambeth, a rare gentleman in his profession, being therein for diverse years greatly supported by the purse and liberality of the worshipful merchant Mr. William Sanderson."

Mr. Dalrymple prevailed on the Hudson's Bay Company to send out Mr. Duncan, a master in the navy, who had displayed considerable talent on a voyage to Nootka Sound. This gentleman was very sanguine of success, and very zealous in the cause in which he was employed. But this attempt also was unsuccessful: Mr. Duncan, after a considerable lapse of time, reaching no farther than Chesterfield Inlet.

The attention of scientific men, and of the public at large, was called again to this important problem in the geography of the northern seas, by some elaborate and well informed articles in the Quarterly Review, which are generally supposed to be written by Mr. Barrow, the under secretary of the Admiralty, who also published an abstract of voyages to the Northern Ocean.

The British government, influenced by a very laudable love of science, and perhaps regarding the discovery of a north-west passage as of the same importance to commerce as the reviewer evidently did, resolved to send an expedition for the purpose of attempting the discovery. Accordingly, on the 8th of April 1818, two ships, the Isabella and Alexander, well fitted by their construction, as well as strengthened and prepared in every possible manner for such a voyage, sailed from the Thames. Captain Ross had the principal command. It is not our design here to follow them during their voyage to their destination: suffice it to say, that on the 18th of August, exactly four months after they sailed from the Thames, the ships passed Cape Dudley Digges, the latitude of which they found to agree nearly with that assigned to it by Baffin, thus affording another proof of the accuracy of that old navigator, whose alleged discoveries have been latterly attempted to be wrested from him, or rather been utterly denied. The same day they passed an inlet, to which Baffin had given the name of Wolstenholme Sound. Captain Ross, in his account of his voyage, says it was completely blocked up with ice; but in the view taken of it, and published by him, there is a deep and wide opening, completely free from ice. In fact, on this occasion, as well as others of more consequence, to which we shall presently advert, Captain Ross, unfortunately for the accomplishment of the object on which he was sent, contented himself with conjecture where proof was accessible; for all he remarks respecting this sound is, that it seemed to be eighteen or twenty leagues in depth, and the land on the east side appeared to be habitable. When it is considered that in these high and foggy latitudes much deception of sight takes place, it ought to be the absolute and undeviating rule of the navigator to explore so far, and to examine so carefully and closely, that he may be certain, at least, that his sight does not deceive him. The same negligence attended the examination of Whale Sound: all the notice of it is, that they could not approach it in a direct line, on account of ice; it was, in fact, never approached nearer than twenty leagues. Captain Ross does not seem to have been fully sensible of the nature of the object on which he was sent out. If there existed a passage at all, it must be in a strait, sound, or some other opening of the sea: it could exist no where else. Every such opening, which exhibited the least appearance, or the smallest symptoms of stretching far, especially if it stretched in the proper direction, ought to have been practically and closely examined, not merely viewed at a distance in a foggy atmosphere. As for the impediments, they were what were to be expected, what the ships were sent out to meet and overcome; and till persevering and even highly hazardous efforts had proved that they could not be overcome, they ought not to have been suffered to weigh the least with the captain or his men, and especially not with the former.

But to proceed: about midnight on the 19th of August, the sound described by Baffin to be the largest of all the sounds he discovered, and called by him Sir Thomas Smith's Sound, was distinctly seen; and the two capes which formed its entrance were called by Captain Ross after the two ships Isabella and Alexander. "I considered," he informs us, "the bottom of this sound to be about eighteen leagues distant, but its entrance was completely blocked up by ice." Here again, a sound which seemed to promise fair to lead them into the great Polar Sea was left undiscovered, and in fact unapproached; for at the distance of eighteen leagues, in that deceptive climate, nothing could be really known of its real state or practicability. Had Captain Ross made the attempt; had he spent but a couple of days, and actually encountered serious obstacles, even though he had not experienced that those obstacles were insurmountable, he would have had some excuse; but it is impossible not to censure him for approaching no nearer than eighteen leagues to a sound such as this, and pronouncing at this distance that the ice blocked it up completely. His reasoning to support his belief that this sound afforded no passage, and to defend his not having explored it, is weak and inconclusive; but we shall not examine it, because the commander to whom such an expedition is entrusted, should never reason, where he can prove by actual observation and experiment. It is unsafe in him to reason, because he will most assuredly be tempted to make his line of conduct bend to his hypothesis and reasoning.

Captain Ross returned down the western side of Baffin's Bay. On the 21st an opening was seen, which answered to the description of Alderman Jones Sound, given by Baffin; but here again the ice and fog prevented them from approaching near; as if the fog might not have cleared up in a day or two, and the ice might not either have been drifted off in as short a space, or, if it could not, have been passed by the crew, so far, at least, as to have gained a nearer and better view of this sound.

Baffin describes this sound as a large inlet, and adds, that the coast tended to the southward, and had the appearance of a bay. This is confirmed by Captain Ross; for he informs us that the land was observed to take a southerly direction. On the 28th of August the sea became more clear of ice, and no bottom was found with three hundred fathoms of line: in the afternoon of that day they succeeded in getting completely clear of the ice, and once more found themselves in the open sea. Baffin and Davis both mention that the northern parts of Baffin's Bay were clear of ice when they were there, so that it is probably generally the case. On the 29th a wide opening was descried in the land; this they entered on the following day. "On each side was a chain of high mountains; and in the space between, W. S.W., there appeared a yellow sky, but no land was seen, nor was there any ice on the water, except a few icebergs; the opening therefore took the appearance of a channel, the entrance of which was judged to be forty-five miles; the land on the north side lying in an E.N.E. and W.S.W. direction, and the south side nearly east and west." "As the evening closed, the wind died away, the weather became mild and warm, the water much smoother, and the atmosphere clear and serene."

Even those who are little acquainted with the symptoms which in this high latitude indicate an open sea, must be struck with the wide difference between these circumstances and those which had met the navigators in almost every other part of their voyage, since they had approached the place where a passage might possibly exist and be found. Yet, even at this time and place, when expectation must have been high, and not without good reason, and when we are expressly informed by Captain Ross that much interest was excited by the appearance of the sound, the attempt to ascertain, by close and accurate investigation, whether this sound was really closed at its extremity, or led into another sea, was given up, after having sailed into it during the night, and till three o'clock the following day. It is unnecessary here to examine the reasons which induced Captain Ross to leave this sound without putting the question of its nature and termination beyond a doubt, by an accurate and close survey. He says, that at three o'clock he distinctly saw the land round the bottom of the bay, forming a connected chain of mountains with those which extended along the north and south sides. No person seems to have been on deck when this land was seen by the captain, and orders in consequence given to put the ships about, except Mr. Lewis, the master, and another. So that in this latitude, where the sight at all times is mocked with fogs and other circumstances which mislead it, and where, therefore, it is absolutely necessary that as many eyes as possible should be employed, that these should get as near the object as possible, that it should be viewed for a considerable length of time, and under as many aspects, and from as many points as possible--not a subordinate or incidental design of the voyage, but that for which it was expressly made, was abandoned, and on the sole responsibility of the captain and two other persons.

It is evident, too, that the entrance to many inland seas seems, when viewed from a distance, to be blocked up by connected land. It is well observed by the reviewer, whom we have already quoted, that there is not a reach in the Thames that to the eye does not appear to terminate the river; and in many of them (in the Hope, for instance) it is utterly impossible to form a conjecture, at the distance of only two or three miles, what part of the land is intersected by the stream.

Although, however, this voyage was abandoned when it ought not to have been, and consequently failed in its peculiar and important object, yet some access to geographical knowledge was gained by it. The existence of Baffin's Bay is confirmed, though its width and form are different from those which were previously assigned it in the maps; and thus this enterprising and deserving navigator has at length justice done to him.

Other branches of science were benefited and extended by this voyage, however unsuccessful it proved in its grand and leading object; and some of the accessions were of a very interesting nature. We allude principally to the observations made on the swinging of the pendulum,--the variation and dip of the magnetic needle,--especially by the influence of the iron in and about the ship,--and on the temperature of the sea at different depths.

Soon after the return of this expedition, an order in council was issued, which empowered and authorized the Board of Longitude to adopt a graduated scale of rewards, proportioned to the progress of discovery made to the westward in these high northern latitudes, from Hudson's or Baffin's Bay, in the direction of the Pacific Ocean. The first point of this graduated scale is the meridian of the Coppermine River of Hearne, and whatever ship reaches this is entitled to a reward of 5000l. Government were so convinced that Captain Ross's voyage had increased the probability of a north-west passage, that they determined to lose no time in making another attempt to discover it; and in order to afford every chance of success to this second attempt, they also determined, not only to send out a maritime expedition, to follow out the route which Captain Ross had so unaccountably and provokingly abandoned, but also to send out a land expedition, to co-operate in the same grand object.

The latter, under the command and direction of Lieutenant Franklin, was ordered to proceed from Fort York, on the shores of Hudson's Bay, to the mouth of the Coppermine River; and from thence along the shores of the Polar Sea, either to the east or to the north, as circumstances might determine: they were expressly to have in view the determination of the question regarding the position of the northeastern extremity of the continent of America. As the route of this land expedition lay for a great part of it through those districts within which the Hudson's Bay Company were accustomed to travel and trade, their co-operation and assistance was requested and obtained. The exact results of this land expedition are not yet fully and clearly known; but it is generally understood, that after having undergone infinite hardships and sufferings, they have been enabled to confirm Hearne and Mackenzie's discoveries or conjectures respecting the Coppermine River, and to ascertain other points connected with the geography and natural history of these remote and almost inaccessible regions, though the most important and leading points of the expedition have not been settled. [6]

[6] Since this part of our work was written, the narrative of Lieutenant Franklin has been published: from this it appears, that he was engaged in this arduous undertaking during the years 1819, 1820, 1821, and 1822; that the route he followed to the Coppermine River was to the east o the routes of M'Kenzie and Hearne; that he reached the river three hundred and thirty-four miles north of Fort Enterprize; and the Polar Sea in lat. 67° 47' 50"; and in longitude 115° 36' 49" west; that he sailed five hundred and fifty miles along its shores to the eastward, and then returned to Port Enterprize.

In consequence of Captain Ross having penetrated into Baffin's Bay, an object only accomplished once before by Baffin himself, and which for two hundred years had been frequently again fruitlessly attempted, the Greenland ships which left England during the season immediately following Captain Ross's return, were induced, in order to reach a fresh and unfished sea, to pursue the course that he had opened for them. The circumstance that fourteen of them were wrecked, proves, unless the season had been uncommonly tempestuous, that Captain Ross must have conducted his expedition with considerable care and skill, notwithstanding he missed an excellent opportunity of either discovering a north-west passage, or of adding one more opening to those which were proved not to contain it.

The second sea expedition, to which we have already alluded, was under the direction of Captain Parry, who had sailed along with Captain Ross in the first expedition; he was therefore possessed of much knowledge and experience, which would prove essentially useful and directly applicable to the object he was about to undertake. Two ships were fitted out with all necessary preparations for such a voyage, the Hecla bomb, and Griper gun-brig, and they sailed from the Thames early in the month of May 1819. Of the high importance and value to navigators of the chronometer, Captain Parry had a striking and undoubted proof in the early part of his voyage. On the 24th of May he saw a small solitary crag, called Rockall, not far from the Orkney Islands. "There is," he observes, in this part of his journal, "no more striking proof of the infinite value of chronometers at sea, than the certainty with which a ship may sail directly for a single rock, like this, rising like a speck out of the ocean, and at the distance of forty-seven leagues from any other land."

About the middle of July he reached the latitude of 73°, after having made many fruitless attempts to cross the ice that fills the central portion of Davis's Strait and Baffin's Bay. the instructions of Captain Parry particularly pointed out the sound which Captain Ross had left unexplored, and which there could be no doubt was the Sir James Lancaster's Sound of Baffin, to be most carefully and minutely examined, as the one by which it was most probable a north-west passage might be effected, or which, at least, even if not navigable, on account of the ice, would connect the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. On the seventh day after entering this sound, he succeeded in reaching open water; but this was not reached without infinite difficulty and labour, as the breadth of the barrier of ice was found to be eighty miles; through this they penetrated by the aid of sailing, tracking, heaving by the capstan, and sawing, being able to advance, even with the assistance of all the methods, only at the rate of half a mile an hour, or twelve miles a day.

For some days after this, their patience was tried, and nearly exhausted, by contrary winds, but on the 3d of August a favourable and fresh breeze arose from the eastward. Advantage was immediately taken of it. "We all felt," says Captain Parry, "it was that point of the voyage which was to determine the success or failure of the expedition, according as one or other of the opposite opinions respecting the termination of the sound should be corroborated. It is more easy to imagine than to describe (he continues) the almost breathless anxiety which was now visible in every countenance, while, as the breeze increased to a fresh gale, we ran quickly up the sound. The masts' heads were crowded by the officers and men during the whole afternoon; and an unconcerned observer (if any could have been unconcerned on such an occasion) would have been amused by the eagerness with which the various reports from the crow's-nest were received, all, however, hitherto favourable to our most sanguine hopes."

The weather, most fortunately at this interesting and important period, continued remarkably clear; and the ships having reached the longitude of 83° 12', the two shores of the sound were ascertained to be still at least fifty miles asunder, and what was still more encouraging, no land was discerned to the westward. In fact, there seemed no obstacle; none of those mountains with which, according to Captain Ross, the passage of the sound was eternally blocked up, nor even any ice, an object of a less serious and permanent nature. Other circumstances were also encouraging; the whole surface of the sea was completely free from ice, no land was seen in the direction of their course, and no bottom could be reached with one hundred and seventy fathoms of line, so that "we began," observes Captain Parry, "to flatter ourselves that we had fairly entered the Polar Sea, and some of the most sanguine among us had even calculated the bearing and distance of Icy Cape, as a matter of no very difficult or improbable accomplishment. This pleasing prospect was rendered the more flattering, by the sea having, as we thought, regained the usual oceanic colour, and by a long swell which was rolling in from the southward and eastward." The first circumstance that threw a damp over their sanguine expectations, was the discovery of land a-head; they were however renewed by ascertaining that this was only a small island: but though the insurmountable obstacle of a land termination of the sound was thus removed, another appeared in its place; as they perceived that a floe of ice was stretched from the island to the northern shore. On the southern shore, however, a large inlet was discovered, ten leagues broad at its entrance, and as no land could be seen in the line of its direction, hopes were excited that it might lead to a passage into the Polar Sea, freer from ice than the one above described. At this period of the voyage a singular circumstance was remarked: during their passage down Sir James Lancaster's Sound, the compass would scarcely traverse, and the ship's iron evidently had great influence over it: both these phaenomena became more apparent and powerful, in proportion as their westerly course encreased. When they were arrived in the latitude of 73°, the directive power of the needle became so weak, that it was completely overcome by the attraction of the iron in the ship, so that the needle might now be said to point to the north pole of the ship. And by an experiment it was found, that a needle suspended by a thread, the movements of which were of course scarcely affected by any friction, always pointed to the head of the ship, in whatever direction it might be.

To this inlet, which Captain Parry was now sailing down, he gave the name of the Prince Regent. The prospect was still very flattering: the width increased as they proceeded, and the land inclined more and more to the south-westward. But their expectations were again destroyed: a floe of ice stretched to the southward, beyond which no sea was to be descried. Captain Parry therefore resolved to return to the wide westerly passage which he had quitted. On the 22d of August, being in longitude 92-1/4°, they opened two fine channels, the one named after the Duke of Wellington; this was eight leagues in width, and neither land nor ice could be seen from the mast head though the weather was extremely clear; this channel tended to the N.N.W. The other stretched nearly west: and though it was not so open, yet as it was more directly in the course which it was their object to pursue, it was preferred by Captain Parry. By the 25th they had reached 99° west longitude, about 20 degrees beyond Lancaster Sound. On the 30th they made the S.E. point of Melville Island. By the 4th of September they had passed the meridian of 110° west longitude, in latitude 74° 44' 20": this entitled them to the first sum in the scale of rewards granted by parliament, namely 5000 l; as at this part of their course they were opposite a point of land lying in the S.E. of Melville Island; this point was called Bounty Cape. On the 6th of September they anchored, for the first time since they had left England, in a bay, called after the two ships.

During the remainder of the season of 1819, which however contained only twenty more days, in which any thing could be done, Captain Parry prosecuted with much perseverance, and in the midst of infinite difficulties and obstacles, a plan which had suggested itself to him some time before; this was to conduct the ships close to the shore, within the main body of the ice; but their progress was so extremely slow, that, during the remainder of the year they did not advance more than forty miles. On the 21st Captain Parry abandoned the undertaking, and returned to the bay which was called after the two ships. Here they lay ten months; and the arrangements made by Captain Parry for the safety of the vessels, and for the health, comfort, and even the amusement of the crew, were planned and effected with such admirable good sense, that listlessness and fatigue were strangers, even among sailors, a class of men who, above all others, it would have been apprehended, would have soon wearied of such a monotonous life. The commencement of winter was justly dated from the 14th of September, when the thermometer suddenly fell to 9°. On the 4th of November the sun descended below the horizon, and did not appear again till the 8th of February. A little before and after what in other places is called the shortest day, but which to them was the middle of their long night, there was as much light as enabled them to read small print, when held towards the south, and to walk comfortably for two hours. Excessive cold, as indicated by the thermometer, took place in January: it then sunk from 30° to 40° below Zero: on the 11th of this month it was at 49°; yet no disease, or even pain or inconvenience was felt in consequence of this most excessive cold, provided the proper precautions were used; nor did any complaint arise from the extreme and rapid change of temperature to which they were exposed, when, as was often the case, they passed from the cabins, which were kept heated up to 60° or 70°, to the open air, though the change in one minute was in several instances 120° of temperature.

Cold, however, as January was, yet the following month, though, as we have already observed, it again exhibited the sun to them, was much colder; on the 15th of February the thermometer fell to 55° below Zero, and remained for fifteen hours not higher than 54°. Within the next fifteen hours it gradually rose to 34°. But though the sun re-appeared early in February, they had still a long imprisonment to endure; and Captain Parry did not consider it safe to leave their winter quarters till the 1st of August, when they again sailed to the westward: their mode of proceeding was the same as that which they had adopted the preceding year, viz. crawling along the shore, within the fast ice; in this manner they got to the west end of Melville Island. But all their efforts to proceed further were of no avail. Captain Parry was now convinced, that somewhere to the south-west of this there must be an immoveable obstacle, which prevented the ice dispersing in that direction, as it had been found to do in every other part of the voyage.

At last, on the 16th of August, further attempts were given up, and Captain Parry determined to return to the eastward, along the edge of the ice, in order that he might push to the southward if he could find an opening. Such an opening, however, could not be found; but by coasting southward, along the west side of Baffin's Bay, Captain Parry convinced himself that there are other passages into Prince Regent's Inlet, besides that by Lancaster Sound. The farthest point in the Polar sea reached in this voyage was latitude 71° 26' 23", and longitude 113° 46' 43:5". On the 26th of September they took a final leave of the ice, and about the middle of November they arrived in the Thames.

In every point of view this voyage was extremely creditable to Captain Parry; it is not surpassed by any for the admirable manner in which it was conducted, for the presence of mind, perseverance, and skill of all the arrangements and operations. It has also considerably benefited all those branches of science to which the observations and experiments of Captain Ross and his companions were directed, and to which we have already adverted. Perhaps in no one point has it been of more use to mariners, than in proving the minute accuracy of going to which chronometers have been brought.

As this expedition very naturally encouraged the hope that a north-west passage existed, and might be discovered and effected, and as Captain Parry was decidedly of this opinion, government very properly resolved to send him out again; he accordingly sailed in the spring of the year following that of his return. He recommended that the attempt should be made in a more southern latitude, and close along the northern coast of America, as in that direction a better climate might be expected, and a longer season by at least six weeks; and this recommendation, it is supposed, had its weight with the admiralty in the instructions and discretionary powers which they gave him.

We must now direct our attention to the southern polar regions. Geographers and philosophers supposed that in this portion of the globe there must be some continent or very large island, which would serve, as it were, to counterbalance the immense tracts of land which, to the northward, stretched not only as near the pole, as navigation had been able to proceed, but also west and east, the whole breadth of Europe and Asia.

The second voyage of Captain Cook was planned and undertaken for the express purpose of solving the question respecting the Terra Australis which occupied the older maps. He sailed on this voyage in July 1772, having under his command two ships, particularly well adapted and fitted up for such a service, the Resolution and Adventure; he was accompanied by a select band of officers, most of whom were not only skilful and experienced navigators, but also scientific astronomers and geographers; there were also two professed astronomers, two gentlemen who were well skilled in every branch of natural history, and a landscape painter.

On the 12th of December, Captain Cook entered the loose and floating ice, in latitude 62° 10'; on the 21st he met with icebergs in latitude 67°; and by the end of the month he returned to latitude 58°. On the 26th of January in the following year, he again penetrated within the Antarctic circle, and on the 30th, had got as far as latitude 71° 16'. This was the utmost point to which he was able to penetrate; and he was so fully persuaded, not only of the impracticability of being able to sail further to the south, but also of remaining in that latitude, that he returned to the northward the very same day, deeming it, as he expresses it, a dangerous and rash enterprize to struggle with fields of ice. "I," he continues, "who had ambition not only to go farther than any one before, but as far as it was possible for man to go, was not sorry to meet with this interruption." The existence of a southern continent was thus considered by Captain Cook, and all other geographers, as disproved to an almost absolute certainty.

In this voyage Captain Cook also obtained a correct knowledge of the land discovered by La Roche in 1675, and gave to it the name of New Georgia; he discovered, too, Sandwich land, which was then supposed to be the nearest land to the South Pole; he ascertained the extent of the Archipelago, of the New Hebrides, which had been originally seen by Quiros, and superficially examined by Bougainville. New Caledonia, and many of the islands among the groupe to which he gave the name of the Friendly Islands, were also among the fruits of this voyage.

The French government had sent out an expedition, about the same time that Captain Cook sailed in quest of a southern continent, on a similar pursuit. A French navigator some time before had stated that he had discovered land, having been driven far to the south, off the Cape of Good Hope. This supposed land the expedition alluded to was also to look after. The person selected to conduct it, M. De Kerguelen, does not seem to have been well chosen or qualified for such an enterprize; for after having discovered land, situated in 49° south latitude, and 69° east longitude from Greenwich, he returned rather precipitately to France, without having explored this land, concluding very rashly, and without any sufficient grounds, that the Terra Australis was at length ascertained to exist, and its exact situation determined. He was received and treated in France as a second Columbus: but as the French court seems to have had some doubts on the extent and merit of his alleged discoveries, notwithstanding the reception which it gave him, he was sent out a second time, with two ships of war of 64 and 32 guns each, and 700 men, to complete his discovery and take possession of this new continent. But he soon ascertained, what indeed he might and ought to have ascertained in his first voyage, that what he deemed and represented to be the Terra Australis was only a dreary and inhospitable island, of small size, so very barren and useless, that it produces no tree or even shrub of any kind, and very little grass. On such an island, in such a part of the globe, no inhabitants could be looked for; but it is even almost entirely destitute of animals; and the surrounding sea is represented as not more productive than the land. The French navigator was unable to find safe anchorage in this island, though it abounded in harbours; to this miserable spot he gave his own name. It was afterwards visited by Captain Cook, in his third voyage, and also by Peyrouse.

As the southern ocean, in as high a latitude as the climate and the ice rendered accessible and safe, had been as it were swept carefully, extensively, and minutely, by Captain Cook, and some subsequent navigators, without discovering land of any considerable extent, it was naturally supposed that no southern continent or even large island existed.

In the year 1819, however, this disbelief was partly destroyed by an unexpected and singular discovery. Mr. Smith, who commanded a vessel trading between Rio Plato and Chili, was naturally desirous to shorten, as much as possible, his passage round Cape Horn. With this object in view, he ran to a higher latitude than is usual in such voyages; and in latitude 62° 30' and in longitude 60° west, he discovered land. This was in his voyage out to Chili; but as he could not then spare the time necessary to explore this land, he resolved to follow the same course on his return voyage, and ascertain its extent, nature, &c. This he accordingly did; and likewise on a subsequent voyage. "He ran in a westward direction along the coasts, either of a continent or numerous islands, for 200 or 300 miles, forming large bays, and abounding with the spermaceti whale, seals, &c. He took numerous soundings and bearings, draughts and charts of the coast." He also landed and took possession of the country in the name of his sovereign, and called his acquisition New South Shetland. He represents the climate as temperate, the coast mountainous, apparently uninhabited, but not destitute of vegetation, as he observed firs and pines in many places; and on the whole, the country appeared to him very much like the coast of Norway.

It may seem extraordinary that land of this extent should not have been discovered by any former navigator; but the surprise will cease, when we reflect that though Captain Cook penetrated much further to the south than the latitude of New South Shetland, yet his meridian was 45 degrees farther to the west, and that he thus left a large expanse of sea unexplored, on the parallel of 62° between that and Sandwich land, the longitude of which is 22° west. He indeed likewise reached 67° south latitude: but this was in longitude from 137° to 147° west. Now the longitude of New South Shetland being 60° west, it is evident that Captain Cook in his first attempt, left unexplored the whole extent of longitude from 28°, the longitude of Sandwich land, to 60°, the longitude of New South Shetland; and in his second attempt, he was still further from the position of this new discovered land. Peyrouse reached no higher than 60° 30' latitude, and Vancouver only to 55°. Thus we clearly see that this land lay out of the track, not only of those navigators, whose object being to get into the Pacific by the course best known, pass through the Straits of Magellan and Le Maire, or keep as near Cape Horn as possible, but also of those who were sent out expressly to search for land in a high southern latitude.

The intelligence of the discovery of New South Shetland, and that its coasts abounded in Spermaceti whales, and in seals, quickly and powerfully roused the commercial enterprise both of the British and the Americans. In the course of a short time, numerous ships of both these nations sailed to its coasts; but from their observations and experience, as well as from a survey of it which was undertaken by the orders of one of His Majesty's naval officers, commanding on the southwest coast of America, it was soon ascertained that it was a most dangerous land to approach and to continue near. Its sterility and bleak and forbidding appearance, from all the accounts published respecting it, are scarcely equalled, certainly are not surpassed, in the most inhospitable countries near the North Pole; while ships are suddenly exposed to most violent storms, from which there is little chance of escaping, and in which, during one of the seal-catching seasons, a great number were lost.

There are, however, counterbalancing advantages: the seals were, at least during the first seasons, uncommonly numerous, and taken with very little trouble or difficulty, so that a ship could obtain a full cargo in a very short time; but, in consequence of a very great number of vessels which frequented the coasts for the purpose of taking these animals, they became soon less numerous, and were captured with less ease. The skins of these seals fetched a very high price in the China market; the Chinese, especially in the more northern parts of that vast and populous empire, use these skins for various articles of their dress; and the seal skins of New South Shetland being much finer and softer than those which were obtained in any other part of the world, bore a proportionably higher price in the China market. But the English could not compete with the Americans in this lucrative trade; for in consequence of the charter of the East India Company, the English ships were obliged to bring their cargoes of skins to England; here they were sold, and as none but the East India Company could export them to China, and consequently none except the Company would purchase; they in fact had the monopoly of them, and obtained them at their own price. The English indeed might take them directly from New South Shetland to Calcutta, whence they might be exported in country ships to China; but even in this case, which was not likely to happen, as few vessels, after having been employed in catching seals off such a boisterous coast, were prepared or able to undertake a voyage to Calcutta; much unnecessary expence was incurred, additional risk undergone, and time consumed. To these disadvantages in the sale of their seal skins, the Americans were not exposed; they brought them into some of their own ports, and thence shipped them directly and immediately to China.

The last navigator whom we noticed as having added to our knowledge respecting New Holland, was Dampier, who in this portion of the globe, not only discovered the Strait that separates New Guinea from New Britain, but also surveyed the north-west coast of New Holland; and, contrary to the Dutch charts, laid down De Witt's land as a cluster of islands, and gave it as his opinion that the northern part of New Holland was separated from the lands to the southward by a strait. Scarcely any thing was added to the geography of this portion of the globe, between the last voyage of Dampier, and the first voyage of Cook. One of the principal objects of this voyage of our celebrated navigator, was to examine the coast of New Holland; and he performed this object most completely, so far as the east coast was concerned, from the 38th degree of latitude to its northern extremity; he also proved that it was separated from New Guinea, by passing through the channel, which he called after his ship, Endeavour Strait. In the year 1791, Captain Vancouver explored 110 leagues of the south-west coast, where he discovered King George's Sound, and some clusters of small islands. In the same year two vessels were dispatched from France in search of La Peyrouse; in April 1792, they made several observations on Van Dieman's Land, the south cape of which they thought was separated from the main land; they also discovered a great harbour. In the subsequent year 1793, they again made the coast of New Holland, near Lewin's Land, and they ascertained that the first discoveries had been extremely accurate in the latitudes which they had assigned to this part of it.

In consequence of the British forming a settlement at Botany Bay, much additional information was gained, not only regarding the interior of New Holland, in the vicinity of the settlement, but also regarding part of its coast: the most interesting and important discovery relative to the latter was made towards the end of the year 1797, by Mr. Bass, surgeon of His Majesty's ship Reliance. He made an excursion in an open boat to the southward of Port Jackson, as far as 40 degrees of south latitude, and visited every opening in the coast in the course of his voyage: he observed sufficient to induce him to believe that Van Dieman's Land was no part of New Holland. Soon after the return of Mr. Bass, the governor of the English colony sent out him and Captain Flinders, then employed as a lieutenant of one of His Majesty's ships on the New South Wales station, with a view to ascertain whether Mr. Bass's belief of the separation of Van Dieman's Land was well founded. They embarked on board a small-decked boat of 25 tons, built of the fir of Norfolk island. In three months they returned to Port Jackson, after having circumnavigated Van Dieman's Land, and completed the survey of its coasts. The strait that separates it from New Holland was named by the governor, Bass's Strait. The importance of this discovery is undoubted. In voyages from New Holland to the Cape of Good Hope, considerable time is gained by passing through it, instead of following the former course. In the year 1800, Captain Flinders was again sent out by the governor, to examine the coast to the northward of Port Jackson; of this nothing more was known but what the imperfect notices given of it by Captain Cook supplied. In this voyage he completely examined all the creeks and bays as far to the northward as the 25th degree of latitude, and more particularly Glasshouse and Harvey's Bays. The English government at length resolved that they would wipe off the reproach, which, as Captain Flinders observes, was not without some reason attributed to them, "that an imaginary line of more than 250 leagues of extent, in the vicinity of one of their colonies, should have been so long suffered to remain traced upon the charts, under the title of UNKNOWN COAST," and they accordingly appointed him to the command of an expedition fitted out in England for this purpose.

Before giving an account of this voyage of Captain Flinders, we shall abridge, from the Introduction prefixed to it, his clear and methodical account of the progressive discoveries which have been made on the coast of New Holland, and of what was still to be explored. He particularly dwelt on the advantages that would result from a practicable passage through Torres' Strait; if this could be discovered, it would shorten the usual route by the north of New Guinea, or the Eastern Islands, in the voyage to India and China. The immense gulf of Carpentaria was unknown, except a very small portion of its eastern side. The lands called after Arnheim and Van Dieman also required and deserved a minute investigation, especially the bays, shoals, islands, and coasts of the former, and the northern part of the latter. The north-west coast had not been examined since the time of Dampier, who was of opinion that the northern portion of New Holland was separated from the lands to the northward by a strait. The existence of such a strait, Captain Flinders completely disproved.

With respect to the south coast, at least 250 leagues were unexplored. Captain Flinders had examined with considerable care and minuteness the east coast and Van Dieman's Land; but there were still several openings which required to be better explored.

Such were the principal objects which Captain Flinders had in view in his voyage; and no person could have been found better qualified to accomplish these objects. On the 18th of July, 1801, he sailed from England in the Investigator, of 334 tons: there were on board, beside the proper and adequate complement of men, an astronomer, a naturalist, a natural history painter, a landscape painter, a gardener, and a miner. As soon as he approached the south coast of New Holland, he immediately began his examination of the coasts, islands, and inlets of that large portion of it, called Nuyts' Land; he particularly examined all that part of the coast, which lies between the limit of the discoveries of Nuyts and Vancouver, and the eastern extremity of Bass' Straits, where he met a French ship, employed on the same object. In the month of July, 1802, he left Port Jackson, whither he had gone to refit, and sailing through Torres' Straits in 36 hours, he arrived in the Gulf of Carpentaria in the latter end of the season. In the course of this part of his voyage, he examined Northumberland and Cumberland islands, and the great barrier reefs of coral rock; and every part of the eastern side of the Gulf of Carpentaria; not a cape, creek, bay, or island on this coast of the gulf escaped his notice and examination. It was his intention to have pursued the same mode of close and minute examination: "following the land so closely, that the washing of the surf upon it should be visible, and no opening nor any thing of importance escape notice;" but he was prevented by ascertaining that the vessel was in such a crazy state, that, though in fine weather she might hold together for six months longer, yet she was by no means fit for such an undertaking. After much deliberation what conduct he ought to pursue under these circumstances, as it was impossible, with such a vessel, he could at that season return to Port Jackson by the west route, in consequence of the monsoon (and the stormy weather would render the east passage equally improper) he resolved to finish the survey of the Gulf of Carpentaria. This occupied him three months: at the end of this period he was obliged, by the sickness of his crew, to sail for Timor, which he reached on the 31st of March, 1803.

As the Investigator was no longer fit for service, she was condemned. Captain Flinders resolved, as he could not finish the survey, to return to England, in order to lay his journals and charts before the Admiralty: he accordingly embarked on board the Porpoise store ship, which, in company with the Cato and Bridgwater, bound to Batavia, sailed in August, 1803. The Porpoise and Cato were wrecked on a reef of rocks nearly 800 miles from Botany Bay: most of the charts, logs, and astronomical observations were saved; but the rare plants, as well as the dried specimens, were lost or destroyed. On the 26th of August, Captain Flinders left the reef in the cutter, and after a passage of considerable danger, reached Port Jackson on the 8th of September. As he was extremely anxious to lodge his papers as soon as possible with the Lords of the Admiralty, he embarked from Port Jackson in a vessel, something less than a Gravesend passage boat, being only 29 tons burden. Even in such a vessel, Captain Flinders did not lose sight of the objects nearest his heart: he passed through Torres' Straits, examined Pandora's entrance, explored new channels among the coral reefs, examined Prince of Wales Island, crossed the Gulf of Carpentaria, and after anchoring at some islands on the western side of the gulf, directed his route to Timor: here he refitted his vessel, and then sailed for the Isle of France, where it was absolutely necessary he should touch, in order that she might undergo a repair, as she was very leaky. Though he possessed passports from the French government, he was detained at the Isle of France, under the absurd pretence that he was a spy. All his books, charts, and papers were seized; and he himself was kept a prisoner in a miserable room for nearly four months. He was afterwards removed to the garden prison, a situation not so uncomfortable and prejudicial to his health as that from which he was taken; at length, in consequence of an application from the Royal Society to the National Institute, the French government sent an order for his liberation; but it was not received, or, at least, it was not acted upon till the year 1810; for it was not till that year that Captain Flinders was permitted to leave the Isle of France: he arrived in England on the 24th of October of that year.

There are few voyages from which more important accessions to geographical knowledge have been derived, than from this voyage of Captain Flinders, especially when we reflect on the great probability that New Holland will soon rank high in population and wealth. Before his voyage, it was doubtful, whether New Holland was not divided into two great islands, by a strait passing between Bass' Straits and the Gulf of Carpentaria. Captain Flinders has put an end to all doubts on this point: he examined the coast in the closest and most accurate manner: he found indeed two great openings; these he sailed up to their termination; and, consequently, as there were no other openings, and these were mere inlets, New Holland can no longer be supposed to be divided into two great islands, but must be regarded as forming one very large one; or, rather, from its immense size, a species of continent. He made another important and singular discovery, viz. that there are either no rivers of any magnitude in New Holland, or that if there be such, they do not find their way to the sea coast. This country seems also very deficient in good and safe ports: in his survey of the south coast, he found only one. He completed the survey of the whole eastern coast; of Bass's Straits and Van Dieman's Land, observing very carefully every thing relative to the rocks, shoals, tides, winds, currents, &c. Coral reefs, which are so common in most parts of the Pacific, and which, owing their origin entirely to worms of the minutest size, gradually become extensive islands, stretch along the eastern coast of New Holland. These were examined with great care by Captain Flinders: he found that they had nearly blocked up the passage through Torres' Straits, so that it required great care and caution to pass it with safety. But one of the most important results of this voyage respects the survey of the Gulf of Carpentaria; previously the extent and bearings of this gulf were not known; but from Captain Flinders's geography we have received an accurate and full survey of it. Its extent was ascertained to be 5 1/2 degrees of longitude, and 7 degrees of latitude; and its circuit nearly 400 leagues. On the coast of this gulf he found a singular trade carried on. Sixty proas, each about the burden of 25 tons, and carrying as many men, were fitted out by the Rajah of Boni, and sent to catch a small animal which lives at the bottom of the sea, called the sea slug, or biche de mer. When caught, they are split, boiled, and dried in the sun, and then carried to Timorlaot, when the Chinese purchase them: 100,000 of these animals is the usual cargo of each proa, and they bring from 2000 to 4000 Spanish dollars.

Notwithstanding the English had had settlements in New Holland for upwards of 26 years, little progress had been made in exploring the interior of the country even in the immediate vicinity of Botany Bay. It was supposed that a passage across the Blue Mountains, which are within sight of that settlement, opposed insurmountable obstacles. At length, about the end of the year 1813, the Blue Mountains were crossed for the first time, by Mr. Evans, the deputy surveyor of the colony. He found a fertile and pleasant district, and the streams which took their rise in the Blue Mountains, running to the westward; to one of the most considerable of these he gave the name of Macquarrie river; the course of this river he pursued for ten days. On his return to the colony, the governor, Mr. Macquarrie ordered that a road should be made across the mountains; this extended 100 miles, and was completed in 1815. Mr. Evans soon afterwards discovered another river, which he called the Lachlan.

As it was of great consequence to trace these rivers, and likewise to examine the country to the west of the Blue Mountains more accurately, and to a greater distance than it had been done, the governor ordered two expeditions to be undertaken. Lieutenant Oxley, the surveyor-general of the colony had the command of both. It does not fall within our plan or limits to follow him in these journeys; we shall therefore confine ourselves to an outline of the result of his discoveries. He ascertained that the country in general is very unfertile: the Lachlan he traced, till it seemed to loose itself in a multitude of branches among marshy flats. "Perhaps," observes Lieutenant Oxley, "there is no river, the history of which is known, that presents so remarkable a termination as the present: its course, in a strait line from its source to its termination, exceeds 500 miles, and including its windings, it may fairly be calculated to run at least 1200 miles; during all which passage, through such a vast extent of country, it does not receive a single stream in addition to what it derives from its sources in the Eastern mountains."--"One tree, one soil, one water, and one description of bird, fish, or animal, prevails alike for ten miles, and for 100." There were, however, tracks, especially where the limestone formation prevailed, of great beauty and fertility; but these were comparatively rare and of small extent. Level, bare, sandy wastes, destitute of water, or morasses and swamps, which would not support them, formed by far the greatest part of the country through which they travelled.

The second object Lieutenant Oxley had in view was the survey of the course of the Macquarrie river; this he knew to be to the north-west of the Lachlan. In crossing from the banks of the latter in search of the former, they reached a beautiful valley; in the centre of which flowed a clear and strong rivulet. This they traced till it joined a large river, which they ascertained to be the Macquarrie. From this point to Bathurst Plains, the country was rich and beautiful.

As from the size of the Macquarrie where they fell in with it, it seemed probable that it either communicated with the sea itself or flowed into a river which did, the governor sent Lieutenant Oxley on another expedition to trace its course, and thus settle this point. For twelve days the country was rich and beautiful: the river was wide, deep, and navigable. The country then changed its character: no hill was to be seen; on all sides it was as level and uninteresting as that through which thay had traced the Lachlan in their former journey. Soon afterwards it overflowed its banks; and as the country was very flat, it spread over a vast extent. Under these circumstances, Lieutenant Oxley proceeded down it in a boat for thirty miles, till he lost sight of land and trees. About four miles farther it lost all appearance of a river; but he was not able to continue his route, and was obliged to return, without having ascertained whether this great inland lake, into which the Macquarrie fell, was a salt or fresh water lake.

On his return he crossed the highest point of the mountains which divides the waters running west from those which run into the east; the most elevated peak he calculates to be from 6000 to 7000 feet. Here he found a river rising, which flowed to the east; and following it, he arrived at the place where it fell into the ocean.

It is pretty certain from these expeditions, that no river of any size empties itself into the sea, on the northern, western, or southern coasts of New Holland. Captain Flinders and the French navigators had examined all the line of coast on the western side, except from latitude 22° to 11° south; it might therefore be supposed that the Macquarrie, after freeing itself from the inland lake to which Lieutenant Oxley had traced it, might fall into the sea, within these limits. This, however, is now proved not to be the case. In the year 1818, Lieutenant King was sent by the Board of Admiralty, to survey the unexplored coast, from the southern extremity of Terre de Witt. He began his examination at the north-west cape, in latitude 21° 45', from this to latitude 20° 30', and from longitude 114° to 118°, he found an archipelago, which he named after Dampier, as it was originally discovered by this navigator. Dampier had inferred, from a remarkable current running from the coast beyond these islands, that a great strait, or river, opened out behind them. Lieutenant King found the tide running strong in all the passages of the archipelago, but there was no appearance of a river; the coast was in general low, and beyond it he descried an extensive tract of inundated marshy country, similar to that described by Lieutenant Oxley. Cape Van Diemen, Lieutenant King ascertained to be the northern extremity of an island, near which was a deep gulf. Although we have not learnt that Lieutenant King has completed his survey, 8 or 9 degrees of latitude on the north-west coast still remaining to be explored, yet we think it may safely be inferred that no great river has its exit into the ocean from the interior of New Holland. This circumstance, added to the singular nature of the country through which Lieutenant Oxley journeyed, and the peculiar and unique character of many of its animals, seems to stamp on this portion of the globe marks which strongly and widely separate it from every other portion.

It is remarked in the Quarterly Review, that, before Captain Flinder's voyage, "the great Gulf of Carpentaria had as yet no definite outline on our nautical charts. It was the imaginary tracing of an undulating line, intended to denote the limits between land and water, without a promontory, or an island, a bay, harbour, or inlet, that was defined by shape or designated by name. This blank line was drawn and copied by one chart maker from another, without the least authority, and without the least reason to believe that any European had ever visited this wide and deeply-indented gulf; and yet, when visited, this imaginary line was found to approximate so nearly to its true form, as ascertained by survey, as to leave little doubt that some European navigator must at one time or other have examined it, though his labours have been buried, as the labours of many thousands have been before and since his time, in the mouldy archives of a jealous and selfish government."

This remark may be extended and applied to other parts of the globe beside Australasia; but it is particularly applicable to this portion of it. There can be no doubt that many islands and points of land were discovered, which were never traced in maps, even in the vague and indistinct manner in which the Gulf of Carpentaria was traced; that many discoveries were claimed to which no credit was given; and that owing to the imperfect mode formerly used to determine the longitude, some, from being laid down wrong, were afterwards claimed as entirely new discoveries.

We have stated that this remark is particularly applicable to Australasia: to the progress of geography in this division of the globe (including under that appellation, besides New Holland, Papua or New Guinea, New Britain, New Ireland, Solomon's Isles, New Caledonia, New Zealand, &c.) we are now to direct our attention; and the truth of the remark will soon appear to be confirmed in more than one instance.

One of the objects of Rogewein, a Dutch navigator, who, sailed from Amsterdam in 1721, was to re-discover Solomon's Islands, and the lands described by Quitos. In this voyage he visited New Britain, of which he has enlarged our information; and be discovered Aurora Island, and a very numerous archipelago, to which he gave the name of the Thousand Islands. Captain Carteret, who sailed from England in 1767, along with Captain Wallis, but who was separated from him in the Straits of Magellan, discovered several isles in the South Pacific, the largest of which there is little doubt is that which was visited by Mandana in 1595, and called by him Santa Cruz. In prosecuting his voyage in the track pursued by Dampier, Captain Carteret arrived on the east coast of the land named New Britain, by that celebrated navigator. This he found to consist of two islands, separated by a wide channel; to the northern island he gave the name of New Ireland.

At this period the French were prosecuting voyages of discovery in the same portion of the globe. An expedition sailed from France in 1766, commanded by M. Bougainville: he arrived within the limits of Australasia in May, 1768. Besides visiting a group of islands, named by him Navigators' Islands, but which are supposed to have been discovered by Rogewein, and a large cluster, which is also supposed to be the archipelago of the same navigator, M. Bougainville discovered a beautiful country, to which he gave the name of Louisiade: he was not able to examine this country, and as it has not been visited by subsequent navigators, it is generally believed to be an extension of the coast of Papua. After discovering some islands not far from this land, M. Bougainville directed his course to the coast of New Ireland; he afterwards examined the north coast of New Guinea.

About the same time, M. Surville, another Frenchman, in a voyage from the East Indies into the Pacific, landed on the north coast of a country east of New Guinea; he had not an opportunity of examining this land, but it seems probable that it was one of Solomon's Islands.

We have already had occasion to notice the first voyage of Captain Cook, during which he traced the eastern coast of New Holland, and ascertained that it was separated from New Guinea. In this voyage he made further additions to our geographical knowledge of Australasia; for he visited New Zealand, which Tasman had discovered in 1642, but on which he did not even land. Captain Cook examined it with great care; and ascertained not only its extent, but that it was divided into two large islands, by a strait, which is called after him. During his second voyage he explored the New Hebrides, the most northern of which is supposed to be described by Quitos: Bougainville had undoubtedly sailed among them. The whole lie between the latitude of 14° 29' and 24° 4' south, and between 166° 41' and 170° 21' east longitude. After having completed his examination of these islands, he discovered an extensive country, which he called New Caledonia. In his passage from this to New Zealand he discovered several islands, and among the rest Norfolk Island. The great object of his third voyage, which was the examination of the north-west coast of America, did not afford him an opportunity of visiting for any length of time Australasia; yet he did visit it, and examined New Zealand attentively, obtaining much original and important information respecting it, and the manners, &c. of its inhabitants.

The voyages which we have hitherto noticed, were principally directed to the southern parts of Australasia. Between the years 1774 and 1776, some discoveries were made in the northern parts of it by Captain Forrest: he sailed from India in a vessel of only ten tons, with the intention of ascertaining whether a settlement could not be formed on an island near the northern promontory of Borneo. In the course of this voyage he examined the north coast of Waygiou; and after visiting several small islands, he arrived on the north coast of Papua.

The next accessions that were made to our geographical knowledge of Australasia, are derived from the voyage in search of La Peyrouse. The object of La Peyrouse's voyage was to complete the discoveries made by former navigators in the southern hemisphere: in the course of this voyage he navigated some portion of Australasia; but where he and his crew perished is not known. As the French government were naturally and very laudably anxious to ascertain his real fate, two vessels were despatched from France in the year 1791, for that purpose. In April, 1792, they arrived within the limits of Australasia: after having examined Van Diemen's Land, they sailed along an immense chain of reefs, extending upwards of 3OO miles on the east coast of New Caledonia. As Captain Cook had confined his survey to the north, they directed their attention to the south-west coast. After visiting some islands in this sea, they arrived at New Ireland, part of which they carefully explored. In 1793, after having visited New Holland, they sailed for New Zealand; and near it they discovered an island which lies near the eastern limit of Australasia: to this they gave the name of Recherche. The New Hebrides, New Caledonia, and New Britain, were also visited and examined; near the coast of the last they discovered several mountainous islands. Beside the accessions to our geographical knowledge of Australasia which we derived from this voyage, it is particularly valuable "on account of the illustrations of the natural history of the different countries, and the accuracy with which the astronomical observations were made." It is worthy of remark that the two ships lost nearly half their men; whereas, British navigators have been out as long, in a climate and circumstances as unfavourable to health, and have scarcely lost a single man.

At the beginning of this century, the French government planned a voyage of discovery, the chief object of which was to explore the seas of Australasia. Those parts of New Holland which were entirely unknown, or but imperfectly ascertained, were to be examined; the coast of New Guinea to be surveyed, principally in the search of a strait which was supposed to divide it into two parts; a passage by Endeavour Straits to the eastern point of the Gulf of Carpentaria was to be attempted; and then the expedition was to sail to Cape Northwest. Besides these objects in Australasia, the Indian Ocean was to be navigated.

Two vessels, the Geographe and Naturaliste, sailed on this expedition in October, 1800; but they did not by their discoveries add much that was important to the geography of Australasia. They indeed have made known to future navigators, reefs and shoals on the coast of New Holland; have fixed more accurately, or for the first time, some latitudes and longitudes belonging to this and other parts of Australasia, and have traced some small rivers in New Holland. They also confirmed the accuracy and justice of preceding observations in several points; particularly relative to the singular fineness of the weather, and serenity of the heavens in these seas.

Their greatest discovery undoubtedly consisted in a great archipelago, which they named after Bonaparte: the islands that composed it were in general small; some volcanic or basaltic; others sandy. After examining these, they were obliged to return to Timor, in consequence of the sickness of their crews. After they were recovered, they returned to the grand object of their expedition, which, though interesting and important to the navigator, or to the minute researches of the geographer, presents nothing that requires to be noticed in this place.

Such is the sum of the additions to our geographical knowledge of Australasia which has resulted from the voyages of discovery during the last one hundred years. The great outline, and most of the subordinate parts, are filled up; and little remains to be discovered or ascertained which can greatly alter our maps, as they are at present drawn. Additions, however, will gradually be made; errors will be corrected; a stronger and clearer light will be thrown on obscure points. Much of this will be done by the accidental discoveries and observations of the many ships which are constantly sailing from England to New Holland; or which trade from the latter country to New Zealand or other parts of Australasia, to India, or to China. By means of these voyages, additions have already been made to our knowledge, especially of New Zealand; and its inhabitants are beginning to feel and acknowledge the benefits which must always be derived from the intercourse of civilized people with savages.

Polynesia, extending from the Pelew Isles on the west, to the Isle of All Saints on the north-east, and the Sandwich Isles in the east, and having for its other boundaries the latitude of 20° north, and of 50° south, near the latter of which it joins Australasia, is the only remaining division of the globe which remains to come under our cognizance, as having been explored by maritime expeditions; and as it consists entirely of groups of small islands, we shall not be detained long in tracing the discoveries which have been made in these seas.

The Pelew Islands, one of the divisions of Polynesia, though they probably had been seen, and perhaps visited by Europeans before 1783, were certainly first made completely known to them at this period, in consequence of the shipwreck of Captain Wilson on them. The Sandwich Isles, the next group, have been discovered within the last century by Captain Cook, on his last voyage. The Marquesas, discovered by Mandana, were visited by Captain Cook in 1774, by the French in 1789, and particularly and carefully examined during the missionary voyage of Captain Wilson in 1797. Captain Wallis, who sailed with Captain Carteret in 1766, but was afterwards separated from him in his course across the South Pacific, discovered several islands, particularly Otaheite; to this and the neighbouring islands the name of Society Isles was given. Such are the most important discoveries that have been made in Polynesia during the last century; but besides these, other discoveries of less importance have been made, either by navigators who have sailed expressly for the purpose, as Kotzebue, &c., or by accident, while crossing this immense ocean. In consequence of the advances which the Sandwich Islands have made in civilization, commerce, and the arts, there is considerable intercourse with them, especially by the Americans; and their voyages to them, and from thence to China, whither they carry the sandal wood, &c. which they obtain there, as well as their voyages from the north-west coast of America with furs to China, must soon detect any isles that may still be unknown in this part of the Pacific Ocean.

Although, therefore, much remains yet to be accomplished by maritime expeditions, towards the extension and correction of our geographical knowledge, so far as the bearings of the coast, and the latitudes and longitudes of various places are concerned, there seems no room for what may properly and strictly be called discovery, at least of any thing but small and scattered islands.

It is otherwise with the accessions which land expeditions may still make to geographical knowledge; for though within these one hundred years the European foot has trodden where it never trod before, and though our geographical knowledge of the interior of Africa, Asia, and America, has been, rendered within that period not only more extensive, but also more accurate and minute than it previously was, yet much remains to be done and known.

In giving a short and rapid sketch of the progress of discovery, so far as it has been accomplished by land expeditions during the period alluded to, we are naturally led to divide what we have to say according to the three great portions of the globe which have been the objects of these expeditions, viz. Africa, Asia, and America.

1. Africa. This country has always presented most formidable obstacles to the progress of discovery: its immense and trackless deserts, its burning and fatal climate, its barbarous and treacherous inhabitants, have united to keep a very large portion of it from the intercourse, and even the approach of European travellers. Even its northern parts, which are most accessible to Europe, and which for 2000 years have been occasionally visited by Europeans, are guarded by the cruel jealousy of its inhabitants; or, if that is overcome, advances to any very great distance from the coast are effectively impeded by natives still more savage, or by waterless and foodless deserts.

The west coast of Africa, ever since it was ascertained that slaves, ivory, gold dust, gums, &c. could be obtained there, has been eagerly colonized by Europeans; and though these colonies have now existed for upwards of three hundred years, and though the same love of gain which founded them must have directed a powerful wish on those interior countries from which these precious articles of traffic were brought, yet such have been the difficulties, and dangers, and dread, that the most enthusiastic traveller, and the most determined lover of gain, have scarcely penetrated beyond the very frontier of the coast. If we turn to the east coast, still less has been done to explore the interior from that side; the nature, bearings, &c. of the coast itself are not accurately known; and accessions to our knowledge respecting it have been the result rather of accident than of a settled plan, or of any expedition with that view. The Cape of Good Hope has now been an European settlement nearly two hundred years: the inhabitants in that part of Africa, though of course barbarians, are neither so formidable for their craft and cruelty, and strength, nor so implacable in their hatred of strangers, as the inhabitants of the north and of the interior of Africa; and yet to what a short distance from the Cape has even a solitary European traveller ever reached!

But though a very great deal remains to be accomplished before Africa will cease to present an immense void in its interior, in our maps, and still more remains to be accomplished before we can become acquainted with the manners, &c. of its inhabitants, and its produce and manufactures, yet the last century, and what has passed of the present, have witnessed many bold and successful enterprizes to extend our geographical knowledge of this quarter of the globe.

As the sovereigns of the northern shores of Africa were, from various causes and circumstances, always in implacable hostility with one another, and as, besides this obstacle to advances into Africa from this side, it was well known that the Great Desert spread itself an almost impassable barrier to any very great progress by the north into the interior, it was not to be expected that any attempts to penetrate this quarter of the globe by this route would be made. On the other hand, the Europeans had various settlements on the western coast: on this coast there were many large rivers, which apparently ran far into the interior; these rivers, therefore, naturally seemed the most expeditious, safe, and easy routes, by which the interior might, at least to a short distance from the shore, be penetrated.

But it was very long before the Senegal, one of the chief of these rivers, was traced higher than the falls of Felu; or the Gambia, another river of note and magnitude, than those of Baraconda. In the year 1723, Captain Stebbs, who was employed by the Royal African Company, succeeded in going up this river as far as the flats of Tenda. Soon afterwards, some information respecting the interior of Africa, especially respecting Bonda, (which is supposed to be the Bondou of Park, in the upper Senegal,) was received through an African prince, who was taken prisoner, and carried as a slave to America.

All the information which had been drawn from these, and other sources, respecting the interior, was collected and published by Moore, the superintendent of the African Company's settlements on the Gambia; but though the particulars regarding the manners, &c. of the inhabitants are curious, yet this work adds not much to our geographical knowledge of the interior of this part of the world.

In the year 1788, the African Institution was formed: its object was to send persons properly qualified to make discoveries in the interior of Africa. The first person engaged by them was Mr. Ledyard; and, from all accounts of him, no person could have been better qualified for such an arduous enterprise: he was strong, healthy, active, intelligent, inquisitive, observant, and undaunted; full of zeal, and sanguine of success; and, at the same time, open, kind, and insinuating in his looks and manners. At Cairo he prepared himself for his undertaking, by visiting the slave market, in order to converse with the merchants of the various caravans, and learn all the particulars connected with his proposed journey, and the countries from which they came. But be proceeded no farther than Cairo: here he was seized with an illness, occasioned or aggravated by the delay in the caravans setting out for Sennaar, which proved fatal.

Mr Lucas was the next person employed by the African Institution. In October, 1788, he arrived at Tripoli, from whence he set out with two shereefs for Fezzan, by the way of Mescerata. On the fourth day after his departure, he reached Lebida, on the sea coast, the Leptis Magna of the Romans. He found, on his arrival at Mescerata, that he should not be able to procure the number of camels necessary to convey his goods to Fezzan; and was obliged to abandon his enterprize. From the information which he derived, at Mescerata, confirmed as it was by what the Association had learnt from the narrative of a native of Morocco, the geography of Africa was extended from Fezzan, across the eastern division of the Desert, to Bornou, Cashna, and the Niger.

In a year or two after the return of Mr. Lucas, the African Association, who were indefatigable in endeavouring to obtain information from all sources, learnt some interesting and original circumstances from an Arab. This person described a large empire on the banks of the Niger, in the capital of which, Housa, he had resided two years: this city he rather vaguely and inconsistently described as equalling London and Cairo in extent and population. As it was necessary to scrutinize the truth and consistency of his narrative, what he related was at first received with caution and doubt, but an incidental circumstance seemed to prove him worthy of credit; for in describing the manner in which pottery was manufactured at Housa, which he did by imitating the actions of those who made it, it was remarked that he actually described the ancient Grecian wheel.

In order to learn whether the accounts of this man were true and accurate, the African Institution sent out Major Houghton: he was instructed to ascertain the course, and, if possible, the rise and termination of the Niger; to visit Tombuctoo and Housa, and to return by the Desert. Accordingly he sailed up the Gambia to Pisania, and thence he proceeded to Medina, the capital of the Mandingo kingdom. His course from this city was north-east, which led him beyond the limit of European discovery, to the uninhabited frontier which separates Bondou and Mandingo. After some time spent in endeavouring to ingratiate himself with the king of the latter country, but in vain, he resolved to proceed into Bambouk. On arriving at Firbanna, the capital, he was hospitably treated by the king. Here be formed a plan to go with a merchant to Tombuctoo; but on his way he was robbed, and either perished of hunger, or was murdered: the exact particulars are not known. To Major Houghton we are indebted for our first knowledge of the kingdom of Bondou; and for the names of several cities on the Niger, as well as the course of that river.

Mr. Park was next employed by the African Association; and what he learnt, observed, did, and suffered, fully justified them in the choice of such a man. "His first journey was unquestionably the most important which any European had ever performed in the interior of Africa. He established a number of geographical positions, in a direct line of eleven hundred miles from Cape de Verde: by pointing out the positions of the sources of the Senegal, Gambia, and Niger, he has given a new aspect to the physical geography of this continent; he has fixed the boundaries of the Moors and Negroes; unfolded to us the empire of Ludamar; and described, from personal observation, some important towns on the banks of the Niger, or Joliba. The information which he has communicated concerning this part of Africa, and their manners, is equally new and interesting. He has traced with accuracy the distinction betwixt the Mahometans and Pagans." This journey was accomplished between the 2d of December, 1795, when he left Pisania, a British factory two hundred miles up the Gambia, and the 10th of June, 1797, when he returned to the same place, an interval of eighteen months.

Notwithstanding the dangers and fatigues which he had undergone; notwithstanding that, on his return to his native country, he had married, and entered on a life which promised him competence and domestic happiness; yet his mind yearned for a repetition of those scenes and adventures to which he had lately been accustomed. No sooner, therefore, did he learn that another mission to Africa was in contemplation, than he set his inclination on undertaking it, if it were offered to him. This it was: he accepted the offer; and on the 30th of January, 1805, he left Portsmouth.

It is surprising and lamentable, that notwithstanding his knowledge and experience of the climate of the country to which he was going, he should have begun his expedition at a time when her was sure to encounter the rainy season long before he could reach the Niger.

The expedition was most unfortunate: Mr. Park perished in it, after having undergone dreadful hardships, and witnessed the death of several of his companions; and of one of them who was his most intimate friend. The exact place and circumstances of his own fate are not known: it is known, however, from his own journal, which he transmitted to England, that he had reached Sansandang, which is considerably short of Silla, which he had reached in his first journey; and from other sources, it is known, that from the former place he went to Yaour in Haoussa, where he is supposed to have been killed by the natives.

The African Association were still indefatigable in their endeavours to explore the interior of Africa; and they found little difficulty in meeting with persons zealously disposed, as well as qualified, to second their designs. Mr. Horneman, a German, who possessed considerable knowledge, such as might be of service to him on such an enterprise, and who was besides strong, active, vigorous, undaunted, endowed with passive courage, (a most indispensable qualification,) temperate, and in perfect health, was next selected. He prepared himself by learning such of the Oriental languages as might be useful to him; and on the 10th of September, 1797, arrived at Alexandria. Circumstances prevented him from pursuing his route for nearly two years, when he left Cairo, along with a caravan for Fezzan. His subsequent fate is unknown; but there is reason to believe that he died soon after his departure from Fezzan.

It is not necessary to mention any of the subsequent expeditions which were sent by the Association into the interior of Africa; since none of them have added to our knowledge of this portion of the globe. There have, indeed, been communications received from some of the merchants trading from the north of Africa to the Niger, which confirm the accounts of large and powerful kingdoms on its banks, and the inhabitants of these kingdoms are comparatively far advanced in manufactures and commerce; but, besides these particulars, little respecting the geography of the interior has been ascertained. The course of the Niger is proved beyond a doubt to be, as Herodotus described it, upwards of 2000 years ago, from west to east; but the termination of this large river is utterly unknown. Some think it unites with the Nile, and forms the great western branch of that river, called the Bahr el Abiad, or White River; others think that it loses itself in the lakes or swamps of Wangara, or Ghana, and is there wasted by evaporation; while another opinion is, that its course takes a bend to the west, and that it falls into the Atlantic, or that it discharges itself into the Indian Ocean.

The British government, anxious to determine, if possible, this curious and important question, sent out two expeditions, about seven years since, to explore in every possible way the course and termination of the Niger. The first, under the conduct of Captain Tuckey, proceeded up the Zaire; the other ascended the Nunez in north Africa, in order, if possible, to reach the navigable part of the Niger by a shorter course than that followed by Park, and with the design of proceeding down the river till it reached its termination. The issue of both these expeditions, particularly of the former, was singularly melancholy and unfortunate: Captain Tuckey, and fifteen persons out of the thirty who composed it, perished in consequence of the excessive fatigue which they underwent after they had reached above the cataracts of the river, the want of sufficient and proper food, and a fever brought on, or aggravated, by these causes. Captain Tuckey was the last who fell a victim, after having traced the Zaire, till it became from four to five miles in breadth. The mountains were no longer seen, and the course of the river inclined to the north; these circumstances, joined to that of its becoming broader, render the opinion that it is the same with the Niger more probable than it previously was: the accounts given to Captain Tuckey were also to the same effect. The second expedition, under the direction of Major Peddir, reached Kauendy on the Nunez, where he died: his successor in the command, Captain Campbell, penetrated about 150 miles beyond this place, but not being able to procure the means of proceeding, he was obliged to return to it, where he also died.

Within 150 miles of the British settlement at Cape Coast Castle, there is a powerful and rich nation, called the Aahantees: they seem first to have been heard of by Europeans about the year 1700; but they were not seen near the coast, nor had they any intercourse with our factories till the year 1807: they visited the coast again in 1811, and a third time in 1816. These invasions produced great distress among the Fantees, and even were highly prejudicial to our factory; in consequence of which, the governor resolved to send a mission to them. Of this journey an account has been published by Mr. Bowdich, one of those engaged in it. The travellers passed through the Fantee and Assen territories. The first Ashantee village was Quesha; the capital is Coomastee, which the mission reached on the 19th of May, 1817. Mr. Bowdich paints the splendour, magnificence, and richness of the sovereign of the Ashantees in the most gorgeous manner; and even his manners as dignified and polished. But though his work is very full of what almost seems romantic pictures and statements of the civilization and richness of the Ashantees, and gives accurate accounts of their kingdom, yet, in other respects, it is not interesting or important, in a geographical point of view. There are, indeed, some notices which were collected from the natives or the travelling Moors, regarding the countries beyond Ashantee, and some of their opinions respecting the Niger. The most important point which he ascertained was, that the route from the capital to Tombuctoo is much travelled; and it is now supposed that this is the shortest and best road for Europeans to take, who wish to reach the Niger near that city. Indeed, we understand that merchants frequently come to the British settlement at Sierra Leone, who represent the route into the interior of Africa and the neighbourhood of the Niger from thence, as by no means arduous or dangerous.

We shall next direct our attention to the north of Africa.

The hostility of the Mahometans, who possessed the north of Africa, to Christians, presented as serious an obstacle to travels in that quarter as the barbarism and ferocity of the native tribes on the west coast did to discoveries into the interior in that direction. In the sixteenth century, Leo Africanus gave an ample description of the northern parts; and in the same century, Alvarez, who visited Abyssinia, published an account of that country. In the subsequent century, this part of Africa was illustrated by Lobo, Tellea, and Poncet; the latter was a chemist and apothecary, sent by Louis XIV to the reigning monarch of Abyssinia; the former were missionaries. From their accounts, and those of the Portuguese, all our information respecting this country was derived, previously to the travels of Mr. Bruce.

Pocock and Norden are the most celebrated travellers in Egypt in the beginning of the seventeenth century; but as their object was rather the discovery and description of the antiquities of this country, what they published did not much extend our geographical knowledge: the former spent five years in his travels. The latter is the first writer who published a picturesque description of Egypt; every subsequent traveller has borne evidence to the accuracy and fidelity of his researches and descriptions. He was the first European who ventured above the cataracts.

The great ambition and object of Mr. Bruce was to discover the source of the Nile; for this purpose he left Britain in 1762, and after visiting Algiers, Balbec, and Palmyra, he prepared for his journey into Abyssinia. He sailed up the Nile a considerable way, and afterwards joined a caravan to Cosseir on the Red Sea. After visiting part of the sea coast of Arabia, he sailed for Massoucut, by which route alone an entrance into Abyssinia was practicable. In this country he encountered many obstacles, and difficulties, and after all, in consequence of wrong information he received from the inhabitants, visited only the Blue River, one of the inferior streams of the Nile, instead of the White River, its real source. This, however, is of trifling moment, when contrasted with the accessions to our geographical knowledge of Abyssinia, the coast of the Red Sea, &c., for which we are indebted to this most zealous and persevering traveller. Since Mr. Bruce's time, Abyssinia has been visited by Mr. Salt, who has likewise added considerably to our knowledge of this country, though on many points he differs from Mr. Bruce.

The most important and interesting accession to our knowledge of the north of Africa was made between the years 1792 and 1795, by Mr. Browne. This gentleman seems to have equalled Mr. Bruce in his zeal and ardour, but to have surpassed him in the soundness and utility of his views; for while the former was principally ambitious of discovering the sources of the Nile,--a point of little real moment in any point of view,--the latter wished to penetrate into those parts of the north of Africa which were unknown to Europeans, but which, from all accounts of them, promised to interest and benefit, not only commerce, but science. His precise and immediate object was Darfur, some of the natives of which resided in Egypt: from their manners and account of their country, Mr. Browne concluded the inhabitants were not so hostile to Christians and Europeans as Mahometans are in general. He therefore resolved to go thither; as from it he could either proceed into Abyssinia by Kordofan, or traverse Africa from east to west. He therefore left Assiou in Egypt with the Soudan caravan in 1793, passed through the greater Oasis, and arrived at Sircini in Darfur: here he resided a considerable time, but he found insurmountable obstacles opposed to his grand and ulterior plan. He ascertained, however, the source and progress of the real Nile or White River. The geography of Darfur and Kordofan is illustrated by him in a very superior and satisfactory manner. The geography of Africa to the west of these countries is likewise elucidated by him: he mentions and describes a large river which takes its rise among the mountains of Kumri, and flows in a north-west course. This river is supposed to be that described by Ptolemy under the name of Gir, and by Edrisi as the Nile of the Negroes. The fate of Mr. Browne, who from all the accounts of him seems to have been admirably fitted by nature and habits for a traveller, was very melancholy. After his return to England from Darfur he resolved to visit the central countries of Asia: he accordingly set out, but on his way thither he was murdered in Persia.

At the commencement of this century, circumstances occurred Which rendered Egypt and the countries adjacent more accessible to Europeans than they had ever been before. In the first place, the French, who most unjustly invaded it, took with their invading army a number of literary and scientific men, by whom were published several splendid works, principally on the antiquities of this ancient country. In the second place, the English, by driving out the French, and by their whole conduct towards the ruling men and the natives in general, not only weakened in a very considerable degree the dislike to Europeans and Christians which the Mahomedans here, as elsewhere, had ever entertained, but also created a grateful sense of obligation and of favour towards themselves. Lastly, the pacha, who obtained the power in Egypt, was a man of liberal and enlightened views, far above those who had preceded him, and disposed to second and assist the researches and journies of travellers.

In consequence of these favourable circumstances, and the additional circumstance, that by the conquests and influence of Bonaparte English travellers were shut out from a great part of Europe, they directed their course towards Egypt. Their object was chiefly to investigate the numerous, stupendous, and interesting antiquities.

In the year 1813, Mr. Legh, a member of the House of Commons, performed a journey in this country, and beyond the cataracts. Above the cataracts he entered Nubia, and proceeded to Dehr, its capital. These travels are, however, chiefly interesting and instructive for that which indeed must give the chief interest to all travels in Egypt and Nubia--the description of antiquities.

The second cataract continued the limit of the attempts of European travellers, till it was reached and passed, first by Mr. Burckhardt, and afterwards by Mr. Banks. No modern traveller has excelled Mr. Burckhardt in the importance of his travels; and-few, in any age, have equalled him in zeal, perseverance, fortitude, and success.

He was employed by the African Association to explore the interior of Africa. Having perfected himself in the knowledge of the religion, manners, and language of the Mahomedan Arabs, by frequent and long residences among the Bedouins, he proceeded to Cairo. Here, finding that the opportunity of a caravan to Fezzan or Darfur was not soon likely to occur, he resolved to explore Egypt and the country above the cataracts. He accordingly "performed two very arduous and interesting journies into the ancient Ethiopia; one of them along the banks of the Nile from Assouan to Dar al Mahas on the frontiers of Dongola, in the months of February and March, 1813, during which he discovered many remains of ancient Egyptian and Nubian architecture, with Greek inscriptions; the other between March and July in the following year, through Nubia to Souakun. The details of this journey contain the best notices ever received in Europe of the actual state of society, trade, manufactures, and government, in what was once the cradle of all the knowledge of the Egyptians."

Although it will carry us a little out of our regular and stated course, to notice the other travels of this enterprising man in the place, yet we prefer doing it, in order that our readers, by having at once before them a brief abstract of all he performed for geography, may the better be enabled to appreciate his merits.

Soon after his second return to Cairo, he resolved to penetrate into Arabia, and to visit Mecca and Medina. In order to secure his own safety, and at the same time gain such information as could alone be obtained in the character of a Mahomedan, he assumed the dress, and he was enabled to personate the religion, manners, and language of the native Hadje, or pilgrims. Thus secure and privileged, he resided between four and five months in Mecca. Here he gained some authentic and curious information respecting the rise, history, and tenets of the Wahabees, a Mahomedan sect. These travels have not yet been published.

The last excursion of Mr. Burckhardt was from Cairo to Mount Sinai and the eastern head of the Red Sea. This journey was published in 1822, along with the travels in Syria and the Holy Land; the latter of which he accomplished while he was preparing himself at Aleppo for his proposed journey into the interior of Africa. These travels, therefore, are prior in date to those in Nubia, though they were published afterwards.

He spent nearly three, years in Syria: his most important geographical discoveries in this country relate to the nature of the district between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Elana; the extent, conformation, and detailed topography of the Haouran; the situation of Apanea on the river Orontes, which was one of the most important cities of Syria under the Macedonian Greeks; the site of Petreea; and the general structure of the peninsula of Mount Sinai. Perhaps the most original and important of these illustrations of ancient geography is that which relates to the Elanitic Gulph: its extent and form were previously so little known, that it was either entirely omitted, or very erroneously laid down in maps. From what he observed here, there is good reason to believe that the Jordan once discharged itself into the Red Sea; thus confirming the truth of that convulsion mentioned and described in the nineteenth chapter of Genesis, which interrupted the coarse of this river; converted the plain in which Sodom and Gomorrah stood into a lake, and changed the valley to the southward of this district into a sandy desert.

But Mr. Burckhardt, considering all these excursions, and their consequent numerous and important accessions to geographical knowledge, as only preludes to the grand expedition for which he had expressly come to the East, still looked forward to the interior of Africa. This, however, he was not destined to reach; for while at Cairo, waiting for a caravan, which was to proceed by Mourzouck,--a. route which he had long decided on as the most likely to answer his purpose,--he was suddenly seized with a dysentery, on the 5th of October, 1817, and died on the 15th.

Travellers in. Egypt and Nubia have been numerous since the time of Mr. Burckhardt; but as they chiefly directed their investigations and inquiries to the antiquities of the country, they do not come within our proper notice; we shall therefore merely mention the names of Belzoni, (whose antiquarian discoveries have been so numerous and splendid,) Mr. Salt, Mr. Bankes, &c. To this latter gentleman, however, geography is also indebted for important additions to its limits; or, rather, for having illustrated ancient geography. He penetrated, as we have already mentioned, as far as the second cataract: he visited some of the most celebrated scenes in Arabia, and made an excursion to Waadi Mooza, or the Valley of Moses. He also visited Carrac; but the most important discovery of this gentleman relates to the site of the ancient Petraea, which was also visited by Burckhardt. Onr readers will recollect that this city has been particularly noticed in our digression on the early commerce of the Arabians, as the common centre for the caravans in all ages; and that we traced its ancient history as far down as there were any notices of it. Its ruins Mr. Bankes discovered in those of Waadi Mooza, a village in the valley of the same name.

Since Mr. Burckhardt travelled, geographical discoveries have been made in this part of the world by Messrs. Ritchie and Lyon, Lord Belmore and Dr. Richardson, Messrs. Waddington and Hanbury, Messrs. Caillaud and Drovetti, Sir Archibald Edmonstone, Sir Frederick Henniker, and by an American of the name of English. The travels of Messrs. Ritchie and Lyon were confined to Fezzan, and are chiefly curious for the notices they give, derived from native merchants, of the course of the Niger, By means of the travels of Lord Belmore and Dr. Richardson, the latitudes and longitudes on the Nile have been corrected from Assouan to the confines of Dongola. Mr. Waddington and Mr. Hanbury, taking advantage of an expedition sent into Ethiopia by the pacha of Egypt, examined this river four hundred miles beyond the place to which Burckhardt advanced. The travels of the two French gentlemen extended to the Oasis of Thebes and Dakel, and the deserts situated to the east and west of the Thebaid. In the Thebaic Oasis some very interesting remains of antiquity were discovered: the great Oasis was well known to the ancients; but the Thebaic Oasis has seldom been visited in modern times. Brown and Poncet passed through its longest extent, but did not see the ruins observed by Mr. Caillaud.

This gentleman, who was employed by the pacha to search for gold, silver, and precious stones, after a residence of five months at Sennaar, traversed the province of Fazocle, and followed the Arrek, till it entered the kingdom of Bertot. At a place called Singue, in the kingdom of Dar-foke, which is the southern boundary of Bertot, situated on the tenth parallel of latitude, and five days' journey to the westward of the confines of Abyssinia, the conquests of Ishmaei Pacha terminated. Only short notices of these travels of Mr. Caillaud have as yet been published.

Sir A. Edmonstone's first intention was to visit the Thebaic Oasis; but understanding from Mr. Belzoni that Mr. Caillaud had already been there, but that there was another Oasis to the westward, which had never been visited by any European, he resolved to proceed thither. This Oasis was also visited by Drovetti much about I he same time: he calls it the Oasis of Dakel. It seems to have escaped the notice of all the ancient authors examined by Sir Archibald, except Olympiodorus. Speaking of the Thebaic Oasis, he mentions an interior and extensive one, lying opposite to the other, one hundred miles apart, which corresponds with the actual distance between them.

The American traveller accompanied the expedition of the pacha of Egypt as far as Sennaar. He commences the account of his voyage up the Nile at the second cataract; and as far as the pyramids of Meroe, where the voyage of Messrs. Waddington and Hanbury terminated, his accounts correspond with what they give. He did not, however, follow the great bend of the river above Dongola: this he describes as 250 miles long, and full of rocks and rapid. He again reached the Nile, having crossed the peninsula in a direct line, at Shendi. Near this place he discovered the remains of a city, temples, and fifty-four pyramids, which are supposed, by a writer in the Quarterly Review, to be the ruins of the celebrated Meroc, as their position agrees with that assigned them by a draughtsman employed by Mr. Bankes. The army halted on the western bank of the Nile, opposite Halfaia: about five hours' march above this place the Bahr el Abiad, or White River, flows into the Bahr el Azreck, or Nile of Bruce. In thirteen days from the junction of these two rivers, the army, marching along the left, or western branch of the Azreck, reached Sennaar.

In the year 1817, Delia Cella, an Italian physician, accompanied the army of the bashaw of Tripoli as far as Bomba, on the route towards Egypt, and near the frontiers of that country. He had thus an opportunity "of visiting one of the oldest and most celebrated of the Greek colonies, established upwards of seven hundred years before the birth of Christ; and in being the first European to follow the footsteps of Cato round the shores of the Syrtis, and to explore a region untrodden by Christian foot since the expulsion of the Romans, the Huns, and the Vandals, by the enterprising disciples of Mahomet." In this journey he necessarily passed the present boundary between Tripoli and Bengaze, the same which was anciently the boundary between Carthage and Cyrene; and our author confirms the account of Sallust, that neither river nor mountain marks the confines. He also confirms the description given by Herodotus of the dreadful storms of sand that frequently arise and overwhelm the caravans in this part of the Syrtis. At the head of the Syrtis the ground is depressed, and this depression, our author supposes, continues to the Great Desert. Soon after he left this barren country, he entered Cyrenaica, the site of Cyrene: that most ancient and celebrated colony of the Greeks was easily ascertained by its magnificent ruins. From Cyrene the army marched to Derna, and from this to the gulf of Bomba, an extensive arm of the sea, where the expedition terminated.

Such are the most recent discoveries in this portion of Africa.

The settlement of the Cape of Good Hope, originally established by the Dutch, and at present in possession of the English, was naturally the point from which European travellers set out to explore the southern parts of Africa. Their progress hitherto has not been great, though, as far as they have advanced, the information they have acquired of the face of the country, its productions, the tribes which inhabit it, and their habits, manners, &c. may be regarded as full and accurate. The principal travellers who have visited this part of Africa, and from whose travels the best information may be obtained of the settlement of the Cape, and of the country to the north of it for about 900 miles, are Kolbein, Sparman, Le Vaillant, Barrow, Lichtenstein, La Trobe, Campbell, and Burcheli. To the geography of the east coast of Africa, and of the adjacent districts, little or no addition has been made for a very considerable length of time.

II. The discoveries in Asia may in general be divided into those which the vast possessions of the Russians in this quarter of the globe, and the corresponding interest which they felt to become better acquainted with them, induced them to make, and into those to which the English were stimulated, and which they were enabled to perform, from the circumstance of their vast, important, and increasing possessions in Hindostan.

The most important and instructive travels which spring from the first source, are those of Bell of Antermony, Pallas, Grnelin, Guldenstedt, Lepechin, &c. Bell was a Scotchman, attached to the Russian service: his work, which was published about the middle of the last century, contains an account of the embassy sent by Peter the Great to the emperor of China, and of another embassy into Persia; of an expedition to Derbent by the Russian army, and of a journey to Constantinople. Of the route in all these directions he gives an interesting and accurate account, as well as of the manners, &c. of the people. Indeed, it is a valuable work, especially that portion of it which conducts us through the central parts of Asia,--an immense district, which, as we have already remarked, is not much better known at present, (at least considerable portions of it,) than it was three or four centuries ago. The travels of Pallas, &c. were undertaken by order of the Russian government, for the purpose of gaining a fuller and more accurate account of the provinces of that immense empire, especially those to the south, which, from climate, soil, and productions were most valuable, and most capable of improvement.

The English possessions in Hindostan have led the way to two sets of discoveries, or rather advancements in geographical knowledge: one which was derived from the journies frequently made overland from India to Europe; and the other, which was derived from embassies, &c. from Calcutta to the neighbouring kingdoms. In general, however, the journies overland from India, having been undertaken expressly for the purpose of expedition, and moreover being through countries which required the utmost caution on the part of the travellers to preserve them from danger, did not admit of much observation being made, or much information being acquired, respecting the districts that were passed through. The travels of Jackson, Forster, and Fitzclarence, are perhaps as valuable as any which have been given to the public respecting the route from India to Europe, and the countries, and their inhabitants, passed through in this route.

From the embassies and the wars of the British East India Company in Hindostan, we have derived much valuable information respecting Persia, Thibet, Ava, Caubul, &c.; and from their wars, as well as from the institution of the Asiatic Society, and the facilities which their conquests afforded to travellers, the whole of the peninsula of Hindostan, as well as the country to the north of it, as far as Cashmere and the Himaleh mountains, may be regarded as fully explored. Perhaps the most valuable accession to geographical knowledge through the English conquests, relates to these mountains. They seem to have been known to Pliny under the name of Imaus: they are described by Plotemy; and they were crossed by some of the Jesuit missionaries about the beginning of the seventeenth century; but they were not thoroughly explored till the beginning of the nineteenth. Mr. Moorcroft was the first European, after the missionaries, who penetrated into the plains of Tartary through these mountains. The fullest account, however, of the singular countries which lie among them, is given by Mr. Frazer, who in 1814 passed in a straight line, in a direction of this chain, between 60 and 70 miles, and also visited the sources of the Ganges.

Our commerce with China for tea, and the hope of extending that commerce to other articles, produced, towards the end of the last century and the beginning of this, two embassies to China, from both of which, but especially from the first, much additional information has been gained respecting this extensive country, and its singular inhabitants; so that, regarding it and them, from these embassies, and the works of the Jesuit missionaries, we possess all the knowledge which we can well expect to derive, so long as the Chinese are so extremely jealous of strangers.

The British embassies to China, besides making us better acquainted with this country, added no little to our information respecting those places which were visited in going to and returning from China. Perhaps the most important correction of geography is that which was made by Captains Maxwell and Hall, who took out the second embassy: we allude to what they ascertained respecting the kingdom of Corea. They found a bay, which, according to the charts of this country, would be situated 120 miles in the interior; and at the same time they ascertained, that along the southern coast of Corea there was an archipelago of more than 1000 islands. These discoveries; the valuable additions which were made during the voyage of Captain Maxwell to the geography and hydrography of the Yellow Sea; the correction of the vague and incorrect notions which were long entertained respecting the isles of Jesso and the Kuriles, by the labours of La Perouse, Broughton, Krusentein, &c., and the full and minute information given to the public respecting Java, and other parts of the southern Indian archipelago, by Raffles, Craufurd, &c. seem to leave little to be added to our geographical knowledge of the eastern and southeastern portions of Asia.

III. We come now to America;--and though Africa is one of the most ancient seats of the human race, and of civilization and science, and America has been discovered only about 350 years, yet we know much more respecting the coasts and interior of the latter than of the former portion of the globe.

Although the Spaniards and Portuguese, who, till very lately, possessed nearly the whole of South America, guarded their possessions strictly from the curious intrusion of foreigners, and were themselves very sparing in giving to the world the information respecting them which they must have acquired,--yet, even during their power there, the geography of this part of America was gradually developed and extended; the face of the country; the great outline of those immense mountains, which, under the torrid zone, are visited by the cold of the Pole; the nature of the vast plains which lie between the offsets of these mountains; and the general direction of the rivers, not less remarkable for their size than the mountains and plains, were generally known. The geography of South America, however, taking the term in the most philosophical and comprehensive sense, has been principally enriched within these few years, by the labours of Humboldt and his fellow-traveller Bompland, of Depons, Koster, Prince Maximilian, Luccock, Henderson, and by those Englishmen who joined the Spanish Americans during their struggle with the mother country. From the observations, enquiries, and researches of these travellers, our information respecting all those parts of South America which constituted the Spanish and Portuguese dominions there, especially of Mexico, Terra Firma, Brazil, and Buenos Ayres, and generally the eastern and middle portions, has been much extended, as well as rendered more accurate and particular. Humboldt, especially, has left little to be gleaned by any future traveller, from any of those countries which he has visited and described.

The rapid and wonderful increase in the territories and inhabitants of the United States, has necessarily laid open the greater part of North America to our acquaintance. The United States, limited in their wish and endeavours to extend themselves on the north by the British possessions there, and on the south by the Spanish territories, and moreover drawn towards the interior and the shores of the Pacific by the grand natural navigation which the Mississippi and its numerous streams afford for inland commerce, and by the commercial access to the wealth of the East which the possession of the shores of the Pacific would open to them, have pushed their territories towards the west. First, the Alleghany Mountains, a feeble barrier to an encreasing population, and a most enterprising as well as unsettled people, were passed; then the Mississippi was reached and crossed; and at present the government of the United States are preparing the way for extending their territories gradually to the Western Ocean itself, and for spreading their population, as they go westwards, to the north and the south, as far as their limits, will admit.

All those countries, over which they have spread themselves, are of course now well known, principally from the accounts published by Europeans, and especially Englishmen, who have been tempted to explore them, or to settle there. The government of the United States itself has not been backward in setting on foot exploratory travels into the immense districts to the west of the Mississippi: to these enterprizes they seem to have been particularly directed and stimulated by the acquisition of Louisiana from France, a country "rich and varied in its soil, almost inexhaustible in natural resources, and almost indefinite in extent."

This acquisition was made in the year 1803, and within four years of this period, three exploratory expeditions were sent out by the United States. The principal object of the first, which was under the direction of Major Pike, was to trace the Mississippi to its source, and to ascertain the direction of the Arkansa and Red Rivers, further to the west. In the course of this journey, an immense chain of mountains, called the Rocky Mountains, was approached, which appeared to be a continuation of the Andes. The ulterior grand object, however, of this expedition was not obtained, in consequence of the Spaniards compelling Major Pike to desist and return. A second attempt was made, by another party, but the Spaniards stopped them likewise. In the years 1804, 5, and 6, Captains Lewis and Clarke explored the Missouri to its source, crossed the Rocky Mountains, and proceeding towards the North Pacific Ocean, ascertained, the origin and course of the River Columbia.

In the years 1819 and 1820, several persons, well qualified for the undertaking by their science, spirit, and enterprize, accompanied by riflemen, hunters, and assistants, were sent out by the government of the United States, for the purpose of gaining a more full and accurate knowledge of the chain of the Rocky Mountains, and of the rivers, winch, rising there, flowed into the Mississippi. After passing through a great extent and variety of country, and gaining some curious information respecting various Indian tribes, especially of those who inhabit the upper course of the Missouri, they reached the Mountains: these and the adjacent districts they carefully examined. They next separated, one party going towards the Red River, and the other descending the Arkansa. The former party were misled and misinformed by the Indians, so that they mistook and followed the Canadian River, instead of the Red River, till it joined the Arkansa. They were, however, too exhausted to remedy their error. The latter party were more successful.

The great outline of the coast, as well as of the greater portion of the vast continent of America, is now filled up. In the northernmost parts of North America, the efforts of the British government to find a north-west passage, the spreading of the population of Canada, and the increasing importance of the fur trade, bid fair to add the details of this portion; the spread of the population of the United States towards the west, will as necessarily give the details of the middle portion; while, with respect to the most southern portions of North America, and the whole of South America, with the exception of the cold, bleak, and barren territory of Patagonia, the changes which have taken place, and are still in operation, in the political state of the Spanish and Portuguese provinces, must soon fill up the little that has been left unaccomplished by Humboldt, &c.

What portions, then, of Asia, America, and Africa, are still unknown?--and what comparison, in point of extent and importance, do they bear to what was known to the ancients? In Asia, the interior of the vast kingdom of China is very imperfectly known, as well as Daouria and other districts on the confines of the Chinese and Russian empires; central Asia in general, and all that extensive, populous, and fertile region which extends from the southern part of Malaya, nearly under the equator, in a northerly direction, to the fortieth degree of latitude, are still not explored, or but very partially so, by European travellers. This region comprehends Aracan, Ava, Pegu, Siam, Tsiompa, and Cambodia. The south and east coasts of Arabia still require to be more minutely and accurately surveyed. In the eastern archipelago, Borneo, Celebes, and Papua, are scarcely known. Though all these bear but a small proportion to the vast extent of Asia, yet some of them, especially the country to the north of the Malay peninsula, and the islands in the eastern archipelago, may justly be regarded as not inferior, in that importance which natural riches bestows, to any part of this quarter of the globe.

Still, however, we possess some general notice, and some vague reports of all these countries; but it is otherwise with respect to the unknown portions of Africa. The whole of this quarter of the world, from the Niger to the confines of the British settlement at the Cape of Good Hope, may, with little limitation, be considered as unknown. Travellers have indeed penetrated a short distance from the western coast into the interior, in some parts between the latitude of the Niger and the latitude of the extreme northern boundary of the Cape settlement: and a very little is known respecting some small portions of the districts closely adjoining to the eastern coast; but the whole of central Africa is still unexplored, and presents difficulties and dangers which it is apprehended will not be speedily or easily overcome. To the north of the Niger lies the Sahara, or Great Desert; of this, probably, sufficient is known to convince us that its extent is such, that no country that would repay a traveller for his fatigue and risk, is situated to the north of it. To the east of the Niger, however, or rather along its course, and to the north of its course, as it flows to the east, much remains to be explored; many geographical details have been indeed gathered from the Mahomedan merchants of this part of Africa, but these cannot entirely be trusted. The course and termination of the Niger itself is still an unsolved problem.

Captain Scoresby, a most intelligent and active captain in the whale fishery trade, has very lately succeeded in reaching the eastern coasts of Greenland, and is disposed to think that the descendants of the Danish colonists, of whose existence nothing is known since this coast was blocked, up by ice at the beginning of the fifteenth century, still inhabit it. The northern shores of Greenland, and its extent in this direction are still unknown.

Notwithstanding the zeal and success with which the government of the United States prosecute their discoveries to the west of the Mississippi, there is still much unexplored country between that river and the Pacific Ocean. It is possible that lands may lie within the antartic circle, of which we have hitherto as little notion as we had of South Shetland ten years ago; but if there are such, they must be most barren and inhospitable. It is possible also, that, notwithstanding the care and attention with which the great Pacific has been so repeatedly swept, there may yet be islands in it undiscovered; but these, however fertile from soil and climate, must be mere specks in the ocean.

But though comparatively little of the surface of the globe is now utterly unknown, yet even of those countries with which we are best acquainted, much remains to be ascertained, before the geography of them can justly be regarded as complete. Perhaps we are much less deficient and inaccurate in our knowledge of the natural history of the globe, than in its geography, strictly so called; that is, in the extent, direction, latitudes and longitudes, direction and elevation of mountains, rise, course, and termination of rivers, &c. How grossly erroneous geography was till very lately, in some even of its most elementary parts, and those, too, in relation to what ought to have been the most accurately known portion of Europe, may be judged from these two facts,--that till near the close of the last century, the distance from the South Foreland, in Kent, to the Land's End, was laid down in all the maps of England nearly half a degree greater than it actually is; and that, as we have formerly noticed, "the length of the Mediterranean was estimated by the longitudes of Ptolemy till the eighteenth century, and that it was curtailed of nearly twenty-five degrees by observation, no farther back than the reign of Louis XIV."

To speak in a loose and general manner, the Romans, at the height of their conquests, power, and geographical knowledge, were probably acquainted with a part of the globe about equal in extent to that of which we are still ignorant; but their empire embraced a fairer and more valuable portion than we can expect to find in those countries which remain to reward the enterprise of European travellers. The fertile regions and the beautiful climate of the south of Europe, of the north of Africa, and above all of Asia Minor, present a picture which we can hardly expect will be approached, certainly will not be surpassed, under the burning heats of central Africa, or even the more mitigated heats of the farther peninsula of India. The short and easy access of all portions of the Roman Empire to the ocean, gave them advantages which must be denied to the hitherto unexplored districts in the interior of Asia and Africa. The farther peninsula of India is infinitely better situated in this respect.

At that very remote period, when sacred and profane history first displays the situation, and narrates the transactions of the human race, the countries, few in number, and comparatively of small extent, that were washed by the waters of the Mediterranean, comprised the whole of the earth which was then known. Asia Minor, which possessed the advantage of lying not only on this sea, but also on the Euxine, and which is moreover level in its surface, and fertile in its soil, seems to have been the first additional portion of the earth that became thoroughly known. The commercial enterprize of the Phoenicians, and their colonists the Carthaginians,--the conquests of Alexander the Great, and of the Romans, gradually extended the knowledge of the earth in all directions, but principally in the middle regions of Europe, in the north of Africa, and in Asia towards the Indus. At the period when the Roman empire was destroyed, little more was known; and during the middle ages, geography was feebly assisted and extended by a desire to possess the luxuries of the East, (which seems to have been as powerful and general with the conquerors of the Romans as with the Romans themselves,) by the religious zeal of a few priests, and by the zeal for knowledge which actuated a still smaller number of travellers.

The desire of obtaining the luxuries of the East, however, was the predominating principle, and the efficient cause of the extension of geography. Actuated by it, the passage of the Cape of Good Hope was accomplished; the eastern limits of Asia were reached; America was discovered, and even the Frozen Seas were braved and carefully examined, in the hope that by them a speedier passage might be found to the countries which produced these luxuries. At length the love of conquest, of wealth, and of luxury, which alone are sufficiently gross and stimulating in their nature to act on men in their rudest and least intellectual state, and which do not loose their hold on the most civilized, enlightened, and virtuous people, was assisted by the love of science; and though when this union took place, little of the globe was unknown, as respected its grand outline, and the general extent and relative situation of the seas and lands which compose its surface, yet much remained to be accomplished in determining the details of geography; in fixing accurately and scientifically the situation of places; in exhibiting the surface of the land, as it was distinguished by mountains, plains, lakes, rivers, &c.; in gaining a full and accurate knowledge of the natural history of each country, and of the manners, customs, institutions, religion, manufactures and commerce of its inhabitants.

Before we give a sketch of the progress of commercial enterprize during the last hundred years, it will be proper to notice the advancement of geographical science during the same period, and the assistance which was thus afforded, as well as from other sources, to those who travelled both by sea and land, for the purpose of discovering or exploring foreign and distant countries. This part of our subject seems naturally to divide itself into three parts; viz. the improvement of maps, which was equally advantageous to sea and land travellers; those particulars which rendered navigation more safe, easy, and expeditious; and those particulars which bestowed the same benefit on land travellers.

The science of geography dates its origin, as we have already mentioned, from Mercator, though he was unable to point out and explain the law, according to which the projection which bears his name might be laid down on fixed principles: this was effected by an Englishman of the name of Wright. Mathematical geography, strictly so called, seems to have owed its origin to the discussion respecting the flattening of the Poles, which took place, in the beginning of the eighteenth century, among Newton, Huygens, and Cassini, and which was afterwards continued by some of the most distinguished mathematicians and natural philosophers of France and England. Still, however, the construction of maps derived little advantage from the application of strict science to geography, till Delisle, in France, and Haase, in Germany, directed their attention and talents to this particular subject: their efforts were indeed great, but in some measure unavailing, in consequence of the want of sufficient materials. The same impediment lay in the way of Busching, notwithstanding he brought to the task the characteristic patience and research of a German. To him, however, and the more illustrious D'Anville, accurate delineations and descriptions of the countries of the globe may first justly be ascribed.

D'Anville possessed excellent and ample materials, in authentic relations, and plans and delineations made on the spot: with these he advanced to the task, calling to his aid mathematical principles. He first exhibited in his maps the interior of Asia free from that confusion and error by which all former maps had obscured it; and struck out from his map of Africa many imaginary kingdoms. Ancient geography, and the still more involved and dark geography of the middle ages, received from him the first illumination; and if subsequent geographers have been able to add to and correct his labours, it has been chiefly owing to their possessing materials which did not exist in his time.

Busching confined himself entirely to modern geography; and though his minuteness is generally tiresome and superfluous, yet we can pardon it, for the accuracy of his details: he was patronized and assisted in his labours by all the governments, of the north, who gave him access to every document which could further his object.

Since the time of D'Anville and Busching, the description of countries, and the construction of maps, have proceeded with a rapidly encreasing decree of accuracy. In ancient geography, Gosselin, Rennell, Vincent, and Malte Brun, are among the most celebrated names. Two Germans, Voss and Munnert, have directed their labours to illustrate and explain the geographical details and hints of the Greek poets. It would be almost endless to enumerate those to whom modern geography, and the construction of modern maps are principally indebted. Gaspari and Zimmerman, among the Germans, have thrown into a philosophical and interesting form the labours and heavy details which were supplied them by less original but more plodding men. The English, though, as Malte Brun observes, they are still without a system of geography which deserves the name, are rich in excellent materials, which have been supplied by the extent of their dominions and their commerce in various parts of the globe; by their laudable and happy union of conquest, commerce, and science; and by the advantage which Dalrymple, Arrowsmith, and other geographers have derived from these circumstances. The French, Russians, Spaniards, Danes, and indeed most nations of Europe, sensible of the vast importance of accurate maps, especially such as relate to their respective territories, have contributed to render them much more accurate than they formerly were; so that at present there is scarcely any part of the globe, which has been visited by sea or land, of-which we do not possess accurate maps; and no sooner has the labour of any traveller filled up a void, or corrected an error, than the map of the country which he has visited becomes more full and accurate.

The most direct and perfect application of mathematical and astronomical science to the delineation of the surface of the globe, so as to ascertain its exact form, and the exact extent of degrees of latitude in different parts of it, has been made by the English and French; and much to their honour, by them in conjunction. The first modern measurement of degrees of latitude was made by an Englishman of the name of Norwood: he ascertained the difference of latitude between London and York in 1635, and then measured their distance: from these premises he calculated, that the length of a degree was 122,399 English yards. At this time there was no reason to suppose that the earth was flattened at the Poles. Shortly afterwards, it having been discovered that the weights of bodies were less at the equator than at Paris, Huygens and Cassini directed their attention, as we have already stated, to the subject of the figure of the earth. In 1670 Picard measured an arc of the meridian in France; and in 1718, the whole area extending through France was measured by Cassini and other philosophers. The results of this measurement seemed to disprove Newton's theory, that the curvature of the earth diminished as we recede from the equator. To remove all doubts, an arc near the equator was measured in Peru, by some French and Spanish astronomers; and an arc near the arctic circle by some French and Swedish astronomers; the result was a confirmation of Newton's theory, and that the equatorial diameter exceeded the polar by about 1/204 part of the whole.

Since this period, arcs of the meridian have been measured in several countries. In 1787 it was determined by the British and French governments to connect the observatories of Greenwich and Paris by a series of triangles, and to compare the differences of latitudes and longitudes, ascertained by astronomical observations, with those ascertained by actual measurement. The measurement in England was extended to a survey of the whole kingdom; and the accurate maps thus obtained have been since published. Arcs of the meridian have also been measured lately from Dunkirk to Barcelona,--in Lapland, by which an error in the former measurement there was corrected;--and in India.

We have been thus particular in our notice of this subject, because it is evident that such measurements must lie at the foundation of all real improvements in the construction of maps.

Let us next turn our attention to the improvements in navigation which have taken place during the last and present centuries; these seem to consist, principally, in those which are derived from physical science, and those which are derived from other sources.

The grand objects of a navigator are the accurate knowledge of where he exactly is, in any part of his course, and how he ought to steer, in order to reach his destination in the shortest time. The means of ascertaining his latitude and longitude, of calculating how far he has sailed, and at what rate he is sailing, and the direction of his course with reference to the port to which he is desirous to proceed, are what he principally requires. We do not intend, by any means, to enter at any length, or systematically, on these subjects; but a brief and popular notice of them seems proper and necessary in such a work as this.

Astronomy here comes essentially to the aid of navigation: we have already seen how, even in the rudest state of the latter, it derived its chief assistance from this sublime science, confined as it then was to a knowledge of the position of a few stars. Astronomy enables the navigator to ascertain his latitude and longitude, and to find the variation of the compass. The principal difficulty in ascertaining the latitude at sea, arose from the unsteady motion of the ship: to remedy this, several instruments were invented. We have already alluded to the astrolobe; but this, as well as the others, were imperfect and objectionable, till such time as Hadley's quadrant was invented, the principle and uses of which were first suggested by Newton.

To ascertain the longitude was a much more difficult task: there are evidently two methods of doing this,--by time-keepers or chronometers, and by making the motions of the celestial bodies serve instead of time-keepers. About the middle of the seventeenth century, Huygens proposed the pendulum clock for finding the longitude at sea; but it was unfit for the purpose, for many and obvious reasons. Watches, even made with the utmost care, were found to be too irregular in their rate of going, to be depended upon for this purpose. In the reign of Queen Anne the celebrated act was passed, appropriating certain sums for encouraging attempts to ascertain the longitude. Stimulated by this, Mr. Harrison invented his time-keeper, which on trial was found to answer the purpose with such tolerable accuracy, that he was deemed worthy to receive the sum awarded by parliament: it went within the limit of an error of thirty miles of longitude, or two minutes of time, in a voyage to the West Indies. Since this period, chronometers have been much improved, and excellent ones are very generally used: perhaps the most trying circumstances in which any were ever placed, existed during the voyage for the discovery of a northwest passage by Captain Parry; and then most of those he had with him were found to be extremely accurate.

It is evident, however, that chronometers are liable to a variety of accidents, and that in very long voyages the means of verifying their rate of going seldom occur. Hence the lunar method, or the method of ascertaining the longitude by means of the motions of the moon, is more useful and valuable. Here again, the profoundest researches of Clairaut, Euler, D'Alembert, and La Place, were brought practically to bear on navigation. Guided and aided by these, Tobias Mayer, of Gottingen, compiled a set of solar and lunar tables, which were sent to the lords of the admiralty, in the year 1755; they gave the longitude of the moon within thirty seconds. They were afterwards improved by Dr. Maskelyne and Mr. Mason, and still more lately by Burg and Burckhardt; the error of these last tables will seldom exceed fifteen seconds, or seven miles and a half. The computations, however, necessary in making use of these tables, were found to be very laborious and inconvenient; to obviate this difficulty, the nautical almanack, suggested by Dr. Maskelyne, was published, which is now annually continued. The longitude is thus ascertained to such a nicety, as to secure the navigator from any danger arising from the former imperfect modes of finding it; "he is now enabled to make for his port without sailing into the parallel of latitude, and then, in the seaman's phrase, running down the port, on the parallel, as was done before this method was practised. Fifty years ago, navigators did not attempt to find their longitude at sea, unless by their reckoning, which was hardly ever to be depended on."

Not long after the mariner's compass was employed, its variation was noticed; as it is obvious that, unless the degree and direction of this variation are accurately known, the compass would be of little service in navigation, the attention of navigators and philosophers was carefully directed to this point; and it was ascertained that the quantity of this variation is subject to regular periodical changes. By means, therefore, of a table indicating those changes, under different latitudes and longitudes, and of what are called variation charts, the uncertainty arising from them is in a great measure done away. Another source of error however existed, which does not seem to have been noticed till the period of Captain Cook's voyages: it was then found, "that the variation of the needle differed very sensibly on the same spot, with the different directions of the ship's head." Captain Flinders attributed this to the iron in the ship, and made a number of observations on the subject; these have been subsequently added to and corrected, so that at present the quantity of variation from this cause can be ascertained, and of course a proper allowance made for it. It does not appear that any material improvement has been made in the construction and use of the log,--that useful and necessary appendage to the compass,--since it was invented about the end of the sixteenth century.

These are the most important improvements in nautical knowledge and science, which renders navigation at present so much more safe and expeditious than it formerly was; there are, however, other circumstances which tend to the same object; the more full, accurate, and minute knowledge of the prevalent winds at different times of the year, and in various parts of the ocean; the means of foretelling changes of weather; and, principally, a knowledge of the direction and force of the currents must be regarded as of essential advantage to the seaman. When to these we add, the coppering of ships, which was first practised about the year 1761, and other improvements in their built and rigging, we have enumerated the chief causes which enable a vessel to reach the East Indies in two-thirds of the time which was occupied in such a voyage half a century ago.

Nor must we forget that the health of the seamen has, during the same period, been rendered infinitely more secure; so that mortality and sickness, in the longest voyages, and under great and frequent changes of climate, and other circumstances usually affecting health, will not exceed what would have occurred on land during the same time.

The great advantages which the very improved state of all branches of physical science, and of natural history, bestow on travellers in modern times, are enjoyed, though not in an equal degree, by navigators and by those who journey on land. To the latter they are indeed most important, and will principally account for the superiority of modern travels over those which were published a century ago, or even fifty years since. It is plain that our knowledge of foreign countries relates either to animate or inanimate nature: to the soil and geology, the face of the surface, and what lies below it; the rivers, lakes, mountains, climate, and the plants; or to the natural history, strictly so called:--and to the manners, institutions, government, religion, and statistics of the inhabitants. Consequently, as the appropriate branches of knowledge relating to these objects are extended, travellers must be better able, as well as more disposed, to investigate them; and the public at large require that some or all of them should at least be noticed in books of travels. The same science, and many of the same instruments, which enable the seaman to ascertain his latitude and longitude, and to lay down full and accurate charts of the shores which he visits, are also useful to the land-traveller; they both draw assistance from the knowledge of meteorology which they may possess, to make observations on the climate, and from their acquaintance with botany and natural history, to give an account of the plants and animals. But it is evident that so far as the latter are concerned, as well as so far as relates to the inhabitants, the land traveller has more opportunities than he who goes on a voyage.

But there are other advantages enjoyed by modern travellers besides those derived from superior science: foreign languages are at present better and more generally understood; and it is unnecessary to point out how important such an acquisition is, or rather how indispensible it is to accurate information. The knowledge of the languages of the East which many of the gentlemen in the service of the East India Company, and the missionaries, possess, has been of infinite service in making us much better acquainted with the antiquities, history, and present state of those countries, than we could possibly have otherwise been. There is at present greater intercourse among even remote nations; and prejudices, which formerly operated as an almost insurmountable barrier, are now either entirely destroyed, or greatly weakened: in proof of this, we need only refer to the numerous travellers who have lately visited Egypt,--a country which it would have been extremely dangerous to visit half a century ago. At the same distance of time, natives of Asia or Africa, especially in their appropriate costume, were seldom or never seen in the streets of London, or, if seen, would have been insulted, or greatly incommoded by the troublesome curiosity of its inhabitants; now there are many such, who walk the streets unmolested, and scarcely noticed.

Commerce, which has derived such advantages from the progress of geographical knowledge, has in some measure repaid the obligation, by creating a much greater, more intimate, and more frequent mutual intercourse among nations; and by doing away with those prejudices and antipathies which formerly closed many countries effectually against Christian and European travellers: and to the zeal and perseverance of modern travellers, assisted as they are by commercial intercourse, we may reasonably hope that we shall, before long, be indebted for a knowledge of the interior of Africa. Those countries still imperfectly known in the south-east of Asia will, probably, from their vicinity to our possessions in Hindostan, be explored from that quarter. The encreasing population of the United States, and the independence of South America, will necessarily bring us acquainted with such parts of the new world as are still unknown. But it is difficult to conjecture from what sources, and under what circumstances, the empires of China and Japan will be rendered more accessible to European travellers: these countries, and some parts of the interior of Asia, are cut off from our communication by causes which probably will not speedily cease to operate. The barriers which still enclose all other countries are gradually yielding to the causes we have mentioned; and as, along with greater facilities for penetrating into and travelling within such countries, travellers now possess greater capabilities of making use of the opportunities thus enjoyed, we may hope that nearly the whole world will soon be visited and known, and known, too, in every thing that relates to inanimate and animate nature.

The progress of commerce during the last hundred years, the period of time to which we are at present to direct our attention, has been so rapid, its ramifications are so complicated, and the objects it embraces so various and numerous, that it will not be possible, within the limits to which we must confine ourselves, to enter on minute and full details respecting it; nor would these be consonant to the nature of our work, or generally interesting and instructive.

During the infancy of commerce, as well as of geographical science, we deemed it proper to be particular in every thing that indicated their growth; but the reasons which proved the necessity, or the advantage, of such a mode of treating these subjects in the former parts of this volume, no longer exist, but in fact give way to reasons of an opposite nature--reasons for exhibiting merely a general view of them. Actuated by these considerations, we have been less minute and particular in what relates to modern geography, than In what relates to ancient; and we shall follow the same plan in relation to what remains to be said on the subject of commerce. So long as any of the causes which tended to advance geography and commerce acted obscurely and imperfectly--so long as they were in such a weak state that the continuance of their progress was doubtful, we entered pretty fully into their history; but after a forward motion was communicated to them, such as must carry them towards perfection without the possibility of any great or permanent check, we have thought it proper to abstain from details, and to confine ourselves to more general views. Guided by this principle which derives additional weight from the vastness to which commerce has reached within the last hundred years, we shall now proceed to a rapid and general sketch of its progress during that period, and of its present state.

From the first and feeble revival of commerce in the middle ages, till the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, the Italian republics, and the Hanseatic League, nearly monopolized all the trade of Europe; the former, from their situation, naturally confining themselves to the importation and circulation of the commodities supplied by the East, and by the European countries in the south of Europe, and the districts of Africa then known and accessible; while the latter directed their attention and industry to those articles which the middle and north of Europe produced or manufactured.

The discovery of the Cape of Good Hope gave a different direction to the commerce of the East, while at the same time it very greatly extended it; but as it is obvious that a greater quantity of the commodities supplied by this part of the world could not be purchased, except by an increase in the produce and manufactures of the purchasing nations, they also pushed forward in industry, experience, skill, and capital. The Portuguese and Spaniards first reaped the fruits of the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope; subsequently the Dutch; and at the period at which this part of our sketch of commerce commences, the English were beginning to assume that hold and superiority in the East, by which they are now so greatly distinguished. The industry of Europe, especially of the middle and northern states, was further stimulated by the discovery of America, and, indirectly, by all those causes which in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries tended to increase information, and to secure the liberty of the mass of the people. The invention of printing; the reformation; the destruction of the feudal system, at least in its most objectionable, degrading, and paralizing features; the contentions between the nobility and the sovereigns, and between the latter and the people; gave a stimulus to the human mind, and thus enlarged its capacities, desires, and views, in such a manner, that the character of the human race assumed a loftier port.

From all these causes commerce benefited, and, as was natural to expect, it benefited most in those countries where most of these causes operated, and where they operated most powerfully. In Holland we see a memorable and gratifying instance of this: a comparatively small population, inhabiting a narrow district, won and kept from the overwhelming of the ocean, by most arduous, incessant, and expensive labour,--and the territory thus acquired and preserved not naturally fertile, and where fertile only calculated to produce few articles,--a people thus disadvantageously situated, in respect to territory and soil, and moreover engaged in a most perilous, doubtful, and protracted contest for their religion and liberty, with by far the most potent monarch of Europe,--this people, blessed with knowledge and freedom, forced to become industrious and enterprizing by the very adverse circumstances in which they were placed, gradually wrested from their opponents--the discoverers of the treasures of the East and of the new world, and who were moreover blessed with a fertile soil and a luxurious climate at home,--their possessions in Asia, and part of their possessions in America. Nor did the enterprising spirit of the Dutch confine itself to the obtaining of these sources of wealth: they became, as we have already seen, the carriers for nearly the whole of Europe; by their means the productions of the East were distributed among the European nations, and the bulky and mostly raw produce of the shores of the Baltic was exchanged for the productions and manufactures of France, England, Germany, and the Italian states.

From the middle of the eighteenth century, the commerce of the Dutch began to decline; partly in consequence of political disputes among themselves, but principally because other nations of Europe now put forth their industry with effect and perseverance. The English and the French, especially, became their great rivals; first, by conducting themselves each their own trade, which had been previously carried on by the Dutch, and, subsequently, by the possessions they acquired in the East. The American war, and soon afterwards the possession of Holland by the French during the revolutionary war, gave a fatal blow to the remnant of their commerce, from which it has not recovered, nor is likely at any time to recover, at least nearly to its former flourishing state. For, as we have remarked, the Dutch were flourishing and rich, principally because other nations were ignorant, enslaved, and destitute of industry, skill, and capital.

England took the place of the Dutch in the scale of commercial enterprise and success: the contest between them was long and arduous; but at length England attained a decided and permanent superiority. She gradually extended her possessions in the East; and after expelling the French from this part of the world, became in reality the only European sovereign power there.

The manufactures of England, those real and abundant causes and sources of her immense commerce, did not begin to assume that importance and extent to which they have at present reached, till the middle, or rather the latter part of the eighteenth century; then her potteries, her hardware, her woollens, and above all her cotton goods, began to improve. Certainly the steam engine is the grand cause to which England's wealth and commerce may be attributed in a great degree; but the perfection to which it has been brought, the multifarious uses to which it is applied, both presuppose skill, capital, and industry, without which the mere possession of such an engine would have been of little avail.

At the termination of the American war, England seemed completely exhausted: she had come out of a long and expensive contest, deprived of what many regarded as her most valuable possessions, and having contracted an enormous debt. Yet in a very few years, she not only revived, but flourished more than ever; it is in vain to attribute this to any other causes but those alone which can produce either individual or national wealth, viz. industry, enterprize, knowledge, and economy, and capital acquired by means of them. But what has rendered Britain more industrious, intelligent, and skilful than other nations?--for if we can answer this question, we can satisfactorily account for her acquisition of capital; and capital, industry, and skill existing, commerce and wealth must necessarily follow.

Britain enjoys greater political freedom, and greater security of property than any other European nation; and without political freedom, the mass of the people never can be intelligent, or possess either comprehensive views or desires; and where views and desires are limited, there can be no regular, general, and zealous industry. Unless, however, security of property is enjoyed, as well as political liberty, industry, even if it could spring up under such circumstances, must soon droop and decay. It is a contradiction in terms to suppose that comprehensive views and desires can exist and lead to action, when at the same time it is extremely doubtful whether the objects of them could be realized, or, if realized, whether they would not immediately be destroyed, or torn from those whose labour, and skill, and anxious thought had acquired them.

But there are other causes to which we must ascribe the extension of British manufactures and commerce; of these we shall only enumerate what we regard as the principal and the most powerful: the stimulus which any particular improvement in manufactures gives to future and additional improvements, or rather, perhaps, the necessity which it creates for such additional improvements; the natural operation of enlarged capital; the equally natural operation of encreased wealth among the various classes of the community; the peculiar circumstances in which Britain has been placed since the termination of the war which deprived her of her American colonies; and, lastly, her national debt. A short view of each of these particulars will, we believe, sufficiently account for the present unparalleled state of British manufactures and commerce.

The direct effect of improvement in the mode of manufacturing any article, by the introduction of a more powerful machinery, is to encrease the quantity, and to lower the price of that article. Hence it follows, that those who manufacture it on the old plan must be undersold, unless they also adopt such machinery; and as knowledge, both speculative and practical, has greater chance to improve in proportion as it is spread, from this cause, as well as from the more powerful cause of rival interests, wherever improvements in manufactures have begun and been extended, they are sure to advance.

That this is not theoretical doctrine requires only an appeal to what has been effected, and is yet effecting in Britain, to prove. A very curious, interesting, and instructive work might be written on the improvements in the cotton machinery alone, which have been made in this country during the last forty years: we mean interesting and instructive, not merely on account of the tacts relative to mechanical ingenuity which it would unfold, but on account of the much higher history which it would give of the mechanism of the human mind, and of the connections and ramifications of the various branches of human knowledge. In what state would the commerce of Great Britain have been at this time, if the vast improvements in the machinery for spinning cotton had not been made and universally adopted?--and how slowly and imperfectly would these improvements have taken place, had the sciences been unconnected, or greater improvements, which at first were unseen or deemed impracticable, not been gradually developed, as lesser improvements were made. The stimulus of interest, the mutual connection of various branches of science, and above all the unceasing onward movement of the human mind in knowledge, speculative as well as practical, must be regarded as the most powerful causes of the present wonderful state of our manufactures, and, consequently, of our commerce.

2. The natural operation of enlarged capital is another cause of our great commerce. There is nothing more difficult in the history of mankind--not the history of their wars and politics, but the history of their character, manners, sentiments, and progress in civilization and wealth--[as->than] to distinguish and separate those facts which ought to be classed as causes, and those which ought to be classed as effects. There can be no doubt that trade produces capital; and, in this point of view, capital must be regarded as an effect: there can be as little doubt, that an increase of capital is favourable to an increase of commerce, and actually produces it; in this point of view, therefore, capital must be regarded as a cause. As in the physical world action and reaction are equal, so are they, in many respects, and under many circumstances, in the moral and intellectual world; but, whereas in the physical world the action and reaction are not only equal but simultaneous, in the moral and intellectual world the reaction does not take place till after the immediate and particular action from which it springs has ceased.

To apply these remarks to our present subject, it is unnecessary to point out in what manner trade must increase capital; that capital, on the other hand, increases trade, is not, perhaps, at first sight, quite so obvious; but that it must act in this manner will be perceptible, when, we reflect on the advantages which a large capital gives to its possessor. It enables him to buy cheaper, because he can buy larger quantities, and give ready money; buying cheaper, he can sell cheaper, or give longer credit, or both; and this must ensure an increase of trade. It enables him immediately to take advantage of any improvement in the mode of manufacturing any article; and to push the sale of any article into countries where it was before unknown. Such are some of the more important effects on commerce of large capital; and these effects have been most obviously and strikingly shewn in the commercial history of Britain for the last thirty years, and thus give a practical confirmation to the doctrine, that capital, originally the creature of trade, in its turn gives nourishment, rigour, and enlarged growth to it.

3. Encreased wealth among the various classes of the community, may be viewed In the same light as capital; it flows from increased trade, and it produces a still further increase of trade. The views, and desires, and habits of mankind, are like their knowledge, they are and must be progressive: and if accompanied, as they generally are, by increased means, they must give birth to increased industry and skill, and their necessary consequences, increased trade and wealth.

Had the views, desires, and habits of mankind, and especially of the inhabitants of Europe and the United States, continued as they were fifty years ago, it is absolutely impossible that one half of the goods manufactured in Great Britain could have been disposed of; and unless these additional and enlarged views, desires, and habits, had been accompanied with commensurate means of gratifying them, our manufactures and commerce could not have advanced as they have done. Minutely and universally divided as human labour is, no one country can render its industry and skill additionally productive, without, at the same time, the industry and skill of other countries also advance. No one nation can acquire additional wealth, unless additional wealth is also acquired in other nations. Before an additional quantity of commodities can be sold, additional means to purchase them must be obtained; or, in other words, increased commerce, supposes increased wealth, not only in that country in which commerce is increased, but also in that where the buyers and consumers live.

4. Since the termination of the American war, Britain has been placed in circumstances favourable to her commerce: the human mind cannot long be depressed; there is an elasticity about it which prevents this. Perhaps it is rather disposed to rebound, in proportion to the degree and time of its restraint. It is certain, however, that the exhaustion produced by the American war speedily gave place to wonderful activity in our manufactures and commerce; and that, at the commencement of the first French revolutionary war, they had both taken wonderful and rapid strides. The circumstances, indeed, of such a country as Britain, and such a people as the British, must be essentially changed,--changed to a degree, and in a manner, which we can hardly suppose to be brought about by any natural causes,--before its real wealth can be annihilated, or even greatly or permanently diminished. The climate and the soil, and all the improvements and ameliorations which agriculture has produced on the soil, must remain: the knowledge and skill, and real capital of the inhabitants, are beyond the reach of any destroying cause: interest must always operate and apply this knowledge and skill, unless we can suppose, what seems as unlikely to happen as the change of our climate and soil, the annihilation of our knowledge and skill, or that interest should cease to be the stimulating cause of industry; unless we can suppose that political and civil freedom should be rooted out, and individual property no longer secure.

Circumstances, however, though they cannot destroy, must influence, beneficially or otherwise, the wealth and commerce of a country; and it may happen that circumstances apparently unfavourable may become beneficial. This was the case with Britain: during the American war, her manufactures and commerce languished; during the French wars they increased and throve most wonderfully. The cause of this difference must be sought for principally in the very artificial and extraordinary circumstances in which she was placed during the French war: and of these circumstances, the most powerfully operative were her foreign loans; her paper circulation; the conquests and subsequent measures of Bonaparte on the continent; and her superiority at sea. Foreign loans necessarily rendered the exchange unfavourable to Britain; an unfavourable exchange, or, in other words, a premium on bills, in any particular country, enabled the merchant to sell his goods there at a cheaper rate than formerly, and consequently to extend his commerce there. The paper circulation of Britain,--though a bold and hazardous step, and which in a less healthy and vigorous state of public credit and wealth than Britain enjoyed could not have been taken, or, if taken, would not have produced nearly the beneficial effects it did, and would have left much more fatal consequences than we are at present experiencing,--undoubtedly tended to increase her commerce; and the very stimulus which it gave to all kinds of speculation has been favourable to it. The ruinous consequences of such speculation, though dreadful, are comparatively of short duration; whereas it is impossible that speculation should be active and vigorous, with commensurate means, without improving manufactures, and opening new channels for commerce; and these effects must remain. In what manner the measures of Bonaparte on the continent, and our superiority at sea, were favourable to our commerce, it is unnecessary to explain.

Lastly. It only remains to explain how our national debt has been beneficial to our commerce. Necessity, if it is not absolutely overpowering, must act as a stimulus to industry as well as interest: the desire to avoid evil, and the desire to obtain good, are equally powerful motives to the human mind. In the same manner as an increase of family, by creating additional expense, spurs a man to additional industry; so the certainty that he must pay additional taxes produces the same effect. Individuals may contrive to shift the burden from themselves, and pay their taxes by spending less; but there can be no doubt that the only general, sure, and permanent fund, out of which additional taxes can be paid, must arise from the fruits of additional industry. We wish to guard against being taken for the advocates for taxation, as in any shape a blessing: we are merely stating what we conceive to be its effect. But we should no more regard taxation as a blessing, because it increased commerce, than we should regard it as a blessing to a man, that, from any cause, he was obliged to work fourteen hours a day instead of twelve. In both cases, increased labour might be necessary, but it would not the less be an evil.

The only other nation, the commerce of which has increased very materially and rapidly, is the United States of America; and if we trace the chief and most powerful causes of their commercial prosperity, we-shall still further be confirmed in the opinion, that at least some of the causes which we have assigned for the extension of British commerce are the true ones; and that, in fact, commerce cannot generally or permanently increase where these causes do not exist, and that where they do they must encourage and extend it

It is not our intention to enter into a detail of the causes of American prosperity, except so far as they are connected with its commerce. They may, however, be summed up in a few words. An inexhaustible quantity of land, in a good climate, obtained without difficulty, and at little expence; with the produce of it, when obtained and cultivated, entirely at the disposal and for the exclusive advantage of the proprietor. The same with regard to all other labour; or, in other words, scarcely any taxes: and with respect to labour in general, great demand for it, and extremely high wages. These are causes of increased population and of prosperity, and indirectly of commerce, peculiar to America. It requires no illustration or proof to comprehend how the increased produce of a new soil must supply increased articles for commerce. While Britain, therefore, finds increased articles for her commerce, from her improvements in the machinery applicable to manufactures, by means of which the same quantity of human labour is rendered infinitely more productive,--the United States finds materials for her increased commerce, in the increasing stock of the produce of the soil.

Political and civil liberty, and the consequent security of property, are causes of commercial prosperity, common to the United States and Britain.

It may also be remarked, that the circumstances of Europe, almost ever since the United States have had a separate and independent existence, have been favourable to its commerce. The long war between Britain and France afforded them opportunities for increasing their commerce, which they most sedulously and successfully embraced and improved. They became, in fact, the carriers for France, and in many cases the introducers of British produce into the continent.

There is only another circumstance connected with the United States to which we deem it necessary to advert in this brief and general developement of the causes of their commercial prosperity: we allude to the wonderful facilities for internal commerce afforded them by their rivers, and especially by the Mississippi and its branches. There can be no doubt that easy, speedy, cheap, and general inter-communication to internal trade,--whether by means of roads and canals, as in England, or by means of rivers as in America, is advantageous to foreign commerce, both directly and indirectly. It is advantageous directly, in so far as it enables the manufacturer with great facility, and at little expence, to transmit his goods to the places of exportation; and to ascertain very quickly the state of the markets by which he regulates his purchases, sales, and even the quantity and direction of his labour. It is advantageous indirectly, in so far as by stimulating and encouraging internal trade, it increases wealth, and with increased wealth comes the increased desire of obtaining foreign produce, and the increased means to gratify that desire.

We deemed it proper to preface the details we shall now give on the subject of the present state of commerce with these general remarks on the principal causes which have enlarged it, in those two countries in which alone it flourishes to a very great extent. But, as we have already remarked, commerce cannot extend in one country, without receiving an impulse in other countries. While, therefore, British and American commerce have been increasing, the general commerce of the whole civilized world, and even of parts hardly civilized, have been increasing; but in no country nearly to the extent to which it has reached in Britain and the United States, because none are blessed with the political advantages they enjoy, or have the improved machinery and capital of the one, or the almost inexhaustible land of the other.

In the details which we are now about to give, we shall confine ourselves to the statement of any particular circumstance which may have been favourable or otherwise to the commerce of any country during the last hundred years, and to an enumeration of the principal ports and articles of import and export of each country. We shall not attempt to fix the value of the imports and exports in toto, or of any particular description of them, because there are in fact no grounds on which it can be accurately fixed. We shall, however, in the arrangement of the order of the goods exported, place ihose first which constitute the most numerous and important articles.

1. The countries in the north of Europe, including Russia, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and the countries generally on the south shores of the Baltic. From the geographical situation of these countries, and their consequent climate, the chief articles of the export commerce must consist in the coarsest produce of the soil. These, and the produce of their mines, are the sources of their wealth, and consequently of their commerce.

The principal exports of Norway consist of timber, masts, tar, potash, hides, (chiefly those of the goat,) iron, copper, cobalt, tallow, salted provisions, and fish. Corn, principally from the southern shores of the Baltic, is the most considerable article of import. The only event in the modern history of this country, which can affect its commerce, is its annexation to Sweden; and whether it will be prejudicial or otherwise, is not yet ascertained.

Denmark consists of the islands in the Baltic, and the peninsula lying in the north-west of Germany, comprizing Jutland, Sleswig, and Holstein. The face of the country, both insular and continental, presents a striking contrast to that of Norway, being flat, and fertile in corn and cattle. Denmark possesses a large extent of sea coast, but the havens do not admit large vessels. The communication between the insular and continental possessions, the German ocean and the Baltic, and consequently the commerce of Denmark, was much facilitated by the canal of Keil, which was finished in 1785. Prior to the year 1797, the commerce was much injured by numerous restraints on importation. During the short wars between this country and Britain, it suffered considerably. At present it cannot rank high as a commercial kingdom. Denmark and the Duchies, as they are called, export wheat, rye, oats, barley, rape seed, horses, cattle, fish, wooden domestic articles, &c.; and import chiefly woollen goods, silks, cottons, hardware, cutlery, paper, salt, coals, iron, hemp, flax, wines, tobacco, sugar, and other colonial produce.

Sweden in general is a country, the wealth, and consequently the objects of commerce of which, are principally derived from its mines and woods. Its principal ports are Stockholm and Gothenburgh. The political event in the history of this country which gave the most favourable impulse to its commerce in modern times, is the alteration in its constitution after the death of Charles XII.; by this the liberties of the people were encreased, and a general stimulus towards national industry was given: agriculture was improved, the produce of the mines doubled, and the fishery protected. More lately, the revolution in 1772, and the loss of Finland, have been prejudicial to Sweden. The principal exports are, iron, copper, pine-timber, pitch, tar, potash, fish, &c.; the principal imports are, corn, tobacco, salt, wines, oils, wool, hemp, soap, cotton, silk and woollen goods, hardware, sugar, and other colonial produce.

The most important commercial port on the southern shore of the Baltic is Dantzic, which belongs to Prussia. This town retained a large portion of the commerce of the Baltic after the fall of the Hanseatic League, and with Lubec, Hamburgh, and Bremen, preserved a commercial ascendency in the Baltic. It suffered, however, considerably by the Prussians acquiring possession of the banks of the Vistula, until it was incorporated with the kingdom in 1793. Dantzic exports nearly the whole of the produce of the fertile country of Poland, consisting of corn, hides, horse-hair, honey, wax, oak, and other timber; the imports consist principally of manufactured goods and colonial produce. Swedish Pomerania, and Mecklenburgh, neither of which possess any ports of consequence, draw the greater part of their exports from the soil, as salted and smoked meat, hides, wool, butter, cheese, corn, and fruit; the imports, like those of Dantzic, are principally manufactured goods and colonial produce.

The immense extent of Russia does not afford such a variety, or large supply of articles of commerce, as might be expected: this is owing to the ungenial and unproductive nature of a very large portion of its soil, to the barbarous and enslaved state of its inhabitants, and to the comparatively few ports, which it possesses, and the extreme distance from the ocean or navigable rivers of its central parts. We have already mentioned the rise of Petersburgh, and its rapid increase in population and commerce. The subsequent sovereigns of Russia have, in this as in all other respects, followed the objects and plans of its founder; though they have been more enlightened and successful in their plans of conquest than in those of commerce. The most important advantage which they have bestowed on commerce, arises from the canals and inland navigation which connects the southern and the northern provinces of this vast empire. The principal commerce of Russia is by the Baltic. Petersburgh and Riga are the only ports of consequence here; from them are exported corn, hemp, flax, fir timber, pitch, tar, potash, iron and copper, hides, tallow, bristles, honey, wax, isinglass, caviar, furs, &c. The principal imports consist of English manufactures and colonial produce, especially coffee and sugar, wines, silks, &c. The commerce of the Black Sea has lately increased much, especially at Odessa. The principal exports are, corn, furs, provisions, &c.; its imports, wine, fruit, coffee, silks, &c. Russia carries on a considerable internal trade with Prussia, Persia, and China, especially, with the latter. Nearly the whole of her maritime commerce is in the hands of foreigners, the Russians seeming rather averse to the sea; and the state of vassalage in the peasants, which binds them to the soil, preventing the formation of seamen. Latterly, however, she has displayed considerable zeal in posecuting maritime discoveries; and as she seems disposed to extend her possessions in the north-west coast of America, this will necessarily produce a commercial marine.

2. The next portion of Europe to which we shall direct our attention consists of Germany, the Netherlands, and France.

Germany, though an extensive and fertile country, and inhabited by an intelligent and industrious race of people, possesses few commercial advantages from its want of ports: those on the Baltic have been already mentioned; those on the German Ocean are Hamburgh and Embden, of which Hamburgh is by far the most important, while, to the south, the only port it possesses is Trieste. It is, however, favoured in respect to rivers: the Elbe, Weser, Rhine, and Danube, with their tributary streams affording great facilities, not only for inland commerce, but also for the export and import of commodities. The chief political disadvantage under which Germany labours, affecting its commerce, arises from the number of independent states into which it is divided, and the despotic nature of most of its governments. As might be expected from such a large tract of country, the productions of Germany are various. Saxony supplies for exportation, wool of the finest quality, corn, copper, cobalt, and other metals, thread, linen-lace, porcelain, &c. Hanover is principally distinguished for its mines, which supply metals for exportation. The chief riches of Bavaria arise from its corn and cattle: these, with pottery, glass, linen, and silk, are the exports of Wurtemburgh. Prussia Proper affords few things for exportation: the corn of her Polish provinces has been already mentioned, as affording the principal export from Dantzic. Silesia supplies linen to foreign countries. Austria, and its dependant states, export quicksilver, and other metals, besides cattle, corn, and wine.

The commerce of the Netherlands, including Holland, though far inferior in extent and importance to what it formerly was, is still not inconsiderable. Indeed, the situation of Holland, nearly all the towns and villages of which have a communication with the sea, either by rivers or canals, and through some part of the territory of which the great rivers Rhine, Meuse, and Scheld empty themselves into the sea, must always render it commercial. The principal ports of the Netherlands are Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Antwerp. The exports of the Netherlands consist either of its own produce and manufactures, or of those which are brought to it from the interior of Germany: of the former, butter, cheese, madder, clover-seed, toys, &c. constitute the most important; from Germany, by means of the Rhine, vast floats of timber are brought. The principal imports of the Netherlands, both for her own use and for the supply of Germany, consist of Baltic produce, English goods, colonial produce, wines, fruits, oil, &c.

There is perhaps no country in Europe which possesses greater advantages for commerce than France: a large extent of sea coast, both on the Atlantic and the Mediterranean; excellent harbours; a rich soil and genial climate, adapted to a great variety of valuable productions; and some manufactures very superior in their workmanship,--all these present advantages seldom found united. Add to these her colonial possessions, and we shall certainly be surprized that her commerce should ever have been second, to that of any other country in Europe. Prior to the revolution it was certainly great; but during and since that period it was and is vastly inferior to the commerce of Great Britain, and even to that of the United States.

The extent of sea coast on the Atlantic is 283 leagues, and on the Mediterranean eighty leagues: the rivers are numerous, but none of the first class. The canal of Languedoc, though from its connecting the Atlantic and the Mediterranean it would naturally be supposed highly advantageous to commerce, is not so; or rather, it is not turned to the advantage to which it might be applied. In England such a canal would be constantly filled with vessels transporting the produce of one part to another. It is not, however, so; and this points to a feature in the French character which, in all probability, will always render them indisposed, as well as unable, to rival Britain, either in manufactures or commerce. Besides the want of capital, which might be supplied, and would indeed be actually supplied by industry and invention, the French are destitute of the stimulus to industry and invention. As a nation, they are much more disposed to be content with a little, and to enjoy what they possess without risk, anxiety, or further labour, than to increase their wealth at such a price.

The principal commercial ports of France on the Atlantic are Havre, St. Maloes, Nantes, Bourdeaux, and Bayonne: Marseilles is the only commercial port of consequence in the Mediterranean. The principal exports of France are wines, brandy, vinegar, fruit, oil, woollen cloth of a very fine quality, silk, perfumery, &c.: the imports are Baltic produce, the manufactures of England; fruits, drugs, raw wool, leather, &c. from Spain, Italy, and the Mediterranean states.

3. The next division of Europe comprehends Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Greece.

Spain, a country highly favoured by nature, and at one period surpassed by no other kingdom in Europe in civilization, knowledge, industry, and power, exhibits an instructive and striking instance of the melancholy effects of political degradation. Under the power of the Arabians, she flourished exceedingly; and even for a short period after their expulsion, she retained a high rank in the scale of European kingdoms. The acquisition of her East Indian and American territories, and the high eminence to which she was raised during the dominion of Charles V. and his immediate successors,--events that to a superficial view of things would have appeared of the greatest advantage to her,--proved, in fact, in their real and permanent operation, prejudicial to her industry, knowledge, and power. It would seem that the acquisition of the more precious metals, which may be likened to the power of converting every thing that is touched into gold, is to nations what it was to Midas,--a source of evil instead of good. Spain, having substituted the artificial stimulus of her American mines in the place of the natural and nutritive food of real industry, on which she fed during the dominion of the Moors, gradually fell off in commercial importance, as well as in political consequence and power. The decline in her commerce, and in her home industry, was further accelerated and increased by the absurd restrictions which she imposed on the intercourse with her colonies. All these circumstances concurring, about the period when she fell into the power of the house of Bourbon,--that is, about the beginning of the eighteenth century,--she sunk very low in industry and commerce, and she has, since that period, continued to fall.

And yet, as we have observed, she possesses great natural advantages: a sea coast on the Atlantic and Mediterranean of considerable extent; a great variety of climate and soil, and consequently of productions,--she might become, under a wise and free government, distinguished for her political power and her commerce.

On the Atlantic, the first port towards the north is Saint Sebastian; then succeeds Bilboa, St. Andero, Gijon, Ferrol, and Corunna; but though some of these, especially Ferrol and Corunna, possess excellent harbours, yet the poverty of the adjacent country prevents them from having much trade. To the south of Portugal is Seville, on the Guadalquiver, sixteen leagues from the sea; large vessels can ascend to this city, but its commerce was nearly destroyed by the transfer of the colonial trade to Cadiz. This last town, one of the most ancient commercial places in the world, is highly favoured both by nature and art as a port; and before the French revolutionary war, and the separation of the American colonies from the mother state, was undoubtedly the first commercial city in Spain. The exports of the northern provinces consist principally in iron, wool, chesnuts and filberts, &c.; the imports, which chiefly come from England, Holland, and France, are woollen, linen, and cotton goods, hardware, and salted fish.

On the Mediterranean, Malaga may be regarded as the third commercial city in Spain, though its harbour is not good; the other ports in this sea, at which trade is carried on to any considerable extent, are Carthagena, Alicant, and Barcelona, which ranks after Cadiz in commercial importance, and now that the colonial trade is destroyed, may be placed above it. The principal exports from these Mediterranean towns are wines, dried fruits, oils, anchovies, wool, barilla, soap, kermes, antimony, vermilion, brandy, cork, silk, &c. Barcelona formerly exported an immense number of shoes to the colonies. The imports consist chiefly of Baltic produce, the articles enumerated as forming the imports of the north of Spain, and some articles from Italy and Turkey.

Portugal, not nearly so extensive as Spain, nor blessed with such a fertile territory, is before her in commerce: she possesses two sea-ports of the first consideration, Lisbon and Oporto; and five of the second class. There are few cities that surpass Lisbon in commerce. The principal trade of Portugal is with England; from this country she receives woollens and other manufactures; coals, tin, salted cod, Irish linen, salt provisions, and butter: her other imports are iron from the north of Spain; from France, linens, silks, cambrics, fine woollens, jewellery; from Holland, corn, cheese, and drugs for dying; from Germany, linens, corn, &c.; and from Denmark, Sweden, and Russia, Baltic produce. The principal exports of Portugal are wine, oil, fruits, cork, &c.

The Italian States, the origin of the commerce of the middle ages, are no longer remarkable for their trade; the principal ports for commerce are Leghorn, Naples, Venice, Genoa, Messina, and Palermo. The exports of Leghorn are silk, raw and manufactured; straw hats, olive oil, fruits, marble, &c.: its chief trade, however, consists in the importation of English merchandize, which it distributes to all parts of the Mediterranean, receiving in return their produce to load the British ships on their home voyage. The greatest import to Naples consists in European manufactured goods, and salt fish; its exports are those of Leghorn, with capers, wool, dye stuffs, manna, wax, sulphur, potash, macaroni, &c. Venice has declined very much, from the influence of political circumstances: her exports are olives, looking-glasses, rice, coral, Venice treacle, scarlet cloth, and gold and silver stuffs; the imports are similar to those of Leghorn and Naples. The exports and imports of Genoa, consisting principally of those already enumerated, do not require particular notice. Sicily, a very rich country by nature, and formerly the granary of Rome, has fallen very low from bad government: her exports are very various, including, beside those already mentioned, barilla, a great variety of dying drugs and medicines, goat, kid, and rabbit skins, anchovies, tunny fish, wheat, &c.: its chief imports are British goods, salted fish, and colonial produce.

The principal trade of Greece is carried on by the inhabitants of Hydra, a barren island. The commerce of the Hydriots, as well as of the rest of Greece, was very much benefited by the scarcity of corn which prevailed in France in 1796, and subsequently by the attempts of Bonaparte to shut British manufactures from the continent. These two causes threw the greatest part of the coasting trade of the Mediterranean into their hands. The chief articles of export from Greece are oil, fruits, skins, drugs, volonia, and gall nuts, cotton and wool. The imports are principally English goods, and colonial produce, tin, lead, &c.

We have already dwelt on the causes which produced the immense commercial superiority of England; and we shall, therefore, now confine ourselves to an enumeration of its principal ports, and the principal articles of its export and import. London possesses considerably above one-half of the commerce of Great Britain; the next town is undoubtedly Liverpool; then may be reckoned, in England, Bristol, Hull, Newcastle, Sunderland, Yarmouth, &c.; in Scotland, Greenock, Leith, Aberdeen, Dundee, &c.; in Ireland, Cork, Dublin, Limerick, Belfast, Waterford, &c. From the last return of the foreign trade of Great Britain it appears, that by far the most important article of export is cotton manufactures and yarn, amounting in real or declared value to nearly one-half of the whole amount of goods exported; the next articles, arranged according to their value, are woollen manufactures, refined sugar, linen manufactures, iron, steel and hardware, brass and copper manufactures, glass, lead, and shot, &c. &c.; of colonial produce exported, the principal articles are coffee, piece goods of India, rum, raw sugar, indigo, &c. &c. The principal imports of Great Britain are cotton wool, raw sugar, tea, flax, coffee, raw silk, train oil and blubber, madder, indigo, wines, &c. &c. The principal imports into Ireland consist of old drapery, entirely from Great Britain; coals, also entirely from Great Britain; iron wrought and unwrought, nearly the whole from Great Britain; grocery, mostly direct from the West Indies; tea, from Britain, &c. &c. In fact, of the total imports of Ireland, five-sixths of them are from Great Britain; and of her exports, nine-tenths are to Great Britain. The principal articles of export are linen, butter, wheat, meal, oats, bacon, pork, &c. &c.

On the 30th September, 1822, there belonged to the United Kingdom 24,642 vessels, making a total of 2,519,044 tons, and navigated by 166,333 men; of the vessels employed in the foreign trade, including their repeated voyages, in the year ending the 5th of January 1823, there were about 12,000, of which upwards of 9,000 were British and Irish, and the rest foreign vessels. The coasting trade of England is calculated to employ 3000 vessels. We have already stated the proportion which the trade of Ireland to Britain bore to her trade with the rest of the world; this point may be still further elucidated by the following fact: that the number of vessels, (including their repeated voyages,) which entered the ports of Ireland, from all parts of the world, in the year ending the 5th of January, 1823, was 11,561, and that all these, except 943, came from Great Britain.

From this rapid view of the commerce of the European states, it appears that, with the exception of Great Britain, by far the largest portion and greatest value of the exports of each country consist in the produce of the soil, either in its raw and natural state, or after having undergone a change that requires little industry, manual labour, or mechanical agency. Britain, on the contrary, derives her exports almost entirely from the produce of her wonderful mechanical skill, which effects, in many cases, what could alone be accomplished by an immense population, and in a few cases, what no manual labour could perform.

In reviewing the commerce of the remaining parts of the world, we shall find the articles that constitute it almost exclusively the produce of the soil, or, where manufactured, owing the change in their form and value to the simplest contrivances and skill. We shall begin with Asia.

Turkey possesses some of the finest portions of this quarter of the globe; countries in which man first emerged into civilization, literature, and knowledge; rich in climate and soil, but dreadfully degraded, oppressed, and impoverished by despotism. The exports from the European part of Turkey are carpets, fruit, saffron, silk, drugs, &c.: the principal port is Constantinople. From Asiatic Turkey there are exported rhubarb and other drugs, leather, silk, dye stuffs, wax, sponge, barilla, and hides: nearly the whole foreign trade is centered in Smyrna, and is in the hands of the English and French, and Italians. The imports are coffee, sugar, liqueurs, woollen and cotton goods, lead, tin, jewellery, watches, &c.

China, from the immense number of its population, and their habits, possesses great internal commerce; but, with the exception of her tea, which is taken away by the English and Americans, her export trade is not great. She also carries on a traffic overland with Russia, to which We have already alluded, and some maritime commerce with Japan. Besides tea, the exports from China are porcelain, silk, nankeens, &c.; the imports are the woollen goods, and tin and copper of England; cotton, tin, pepper, &c. from the British settlements in India; edible birds' nests, furs, &c.

The trade of Japan is principally with China: the exports are copper, lackered ware, &c.; the imports are raw silk, sugar, turpentine, drugs, &c. The trade of the Birman empire is also principally with China, importing into it cotton, amber, ivory, precious stones, betel nuts, &c., and receiving in return raw and wrought silk, gold leaf, preserves, paper, &c. European broad cloth and hardware, Bengal muslins, glass, &c. are also imported into this country.

But by far the most important commerce that is carried on in the eastern parts of Asia, consists in that which flows from and to Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras. In fact, the English country trade there, as it is called, is of great value, and embraces a very great variety of articles. Bombay is the grand emporium of the west of India, Persia, and Arabia; here the productions of those countries are exchanged against each other, and for the manufactures, &c. of England. The principal articles of export from Bombay to these places, as well as to England, are cotton piece goods, sugar, and saltpetre, received from Bengal; pepper from Sumatra; coffee from the Red Sea. The imports from Europe are woollens, tin, lead, &c. A very lucrative trade is carried on from Bombay to China, to which it exports cotton in very great quantity, sandal wood, &c., and receives in return sugar, sugar-candy, camphire, nankeens, &c. There is also considerable traffic between Bombay and Bengal, Ceylon, Pegu, and the Malay archipelago. The exports of Ceylon are cinnamon, arrack, coir, cocoa nuts: the imports are grain, piece goods, and European merchandize. The commerce of the eastern coast of Hindostan centers in Madras: the exports from this place are principally piece goods, grain, cotton, &c.; the imports, woollen manufactures, copper, spirits, pepper, and other spices. The trade of Bengal may be divided into four branches: to Coromandel and Ceylon, the Malabar coast, Gulph of Persia and Arabia, the Malay archipelago and China and Europe. The principal exports by the port of Calcutta are piece goods, opium, raw silk, indigo, rice, sugar, cotton, grain, saltpetre, &c.: the principal imports are woollen goods, copper, wine, pepper, spices, tea, nankeen, camphire, &c.

A considerable trade is carried on in the Malay archipelago from Prince of Wales Island, which, since it was settled by the English, has become the emporium of this trade.--Batavia, Bencoolen, and Achen; the principal articles of export from these islands are cloves, nutmegs, camphire, pepper, sago, drugs, bichedemer, birds' nests, gold dust, ivory, areca nuts, benzoin, tin, &c.: the imports are tea, alum, nankeens, silks, opium, piece goods, cotton, rice, and European manufactures. Manilla is the depôt of all the productions of the Philippines, intended to be exported to China, America, and Europe. The exports of these islands are birds' nests, ebony, tobacco, sugar, cotton, cocoa, &c. The commerce of New Holland is still in its infancy, but it promises to rise rapidly, and to be of great value: a soil very fertile, and a climate adapted to the growth of excellent grain, together with the uncommon fineness of its wool, have already been very beneficial to its commerce.

The external commerce of Persia is principally carried on by the foreign merchants who reside at Muscat, on the Persian Gulph: into this place are imported from India, long cloths, muslins, silks, sugar, spices, rice, indigo, drugs, and European manufactures; the returns are copper, sulphur, tobacco, fruits, gum-arabic, myrrh, frankincense, and all the drugs which India does not produce.

The Red Sea, washed on one side by Asia, and on the other by Africa, seems the natural transit, from this consideration, of the commerce of the former quarter of the globe to that of the latter. Its commerce is carried on by the Arabians, and by vessels from Hindostan: Mocha and Judda are its principal ports. The articles sent from it are coffee, gums and drugs, ivory, and fruit: the imports are the piece goods, cotton, and other produce of India; and the manufactures, iron, lead, copper, &c. of Europe.

Egypt, in which anciently centered all the commerce of the world, retains at present a very small portion of trade: the principal exports from Alexandria consist in the gums and drugs of the east coast of Africa, Arabia, Persia, and India; rice, wheat, dates, oil, soap, leather, ebony, elephants' teeth, coffee, &c. The imports are received chiefly from France and the Italian States, and England; and consist in woollen and cotton goods, hardware, copper, iron, glass, and colonial produce. The commerce of the Barbary States is trifling: the exports are drugs, grain, oil, wax, honey, hides and skins, live bullocks, ivory, ostrich feathers, &c.; the imports, colonial produce, (which indeed finds its way every where,) cutlery, tin, woollen and linen goods, &c. The exports of the rest of Africa are nearly similar to those enumerated, viz. gums, drugs, ivory, ostrich feathers, skins, gold dust, &c. From the British settlement at the Cape are exported wine, wheat, wool, hides, &c.

The United States claim our first notice in giving a rapid sketch of the commerce of America: we have already pointed out the causes of their extraordinary progress in population and wealth. American ships, like English ones, are found in every part of the world: in the South Sea Islands, among people just emerging into civilization and industry; among the savages of New Zealand; on the north-west coast of America; and on the dreadful shores of New South Shetland. Not content with exporting the various productions of their own country, they carry on the trade of various parts of the globe, which, but for their instrumentality, could not have obtained, or ever have become acquainted with each other's produce.

The exports from America, the produce of their own soil, are corn, flour, timber, potash, provisions, and salt fish from the northern States; corn, timber, and tobacco from the middle States; and indigo, rice, cotton, tar, pitch, turpentine, timber, and provisions, to the West Indies, from the southern States. The imports are woollen, cotton goods, silks, hardware, earthen-ware, wines, brandy, tea, drugs, fruit, dye-stuffs, and India and colonial produce. By far the greatest portion of the trade of the United States is with Great Britain. The principal ports are Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New Orleans.

The British settlements in America export, chiefly from Quebec and Halifax, corn, potash, wheel timber, masts, lumber, beaver and other furs, tar, turpentine, and salted fish from Newfoundland. The imports are woollen and cotton goods, hardware, tea, wine, India goods, groceries, &c.

The exports of the West India Islands are sugar, coffee, rum, ginger, indigo, drugs, and dye stuffs. The imports are lumber, woollen and cotton goods, fish, hardware, wine, groceries, hats, and other articles of dress, provisions, &c.

Brazil, and the late Spanish settlements in America, countries of great extent, and extremely fertile, promise to supply very valuable articles for commerce; even at present their exports are various, and chiefly of great importance. Some of the most useful drugs, and finest dye stuffs, are the produce of South America. Mahogany and other woods, sugar, coffee, chocolate, cochineal, Peruvian bark, cotton of the finest quality, gold, silver, copper, diamonds, hides, tallow, rice, indigo, &c. Carthagena, Porto Cabello, Pernambucco, Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, and Buenos Ayres, are the principal ports on the east coast of South America; and Valparaiso, Calloa (the port of Lima), Guayaquil, Panama, and Acapulco, on the west coast.

Our sketch of commerce would be incomplete, did it not comprehend a short notice of the manner in which the trade of great part of Asia and Africa is conducted, by means of caravans. This is, perhaps, the most ancient mode of communication between nations; and, from the descriptions we possess, the caravans of the remotest antiquity were, in almost every particular, very similar to what they are at present. The human race was first civilized in the East. This district of the globe, though fertile in various articles which are well calculated to excite the desires of mankind, is intersected by extensive deserts; these must have cut off all communication, had not the camel,--which can bear a heavy burden, endure great famine, is very docile, and, above all, seems made to bid defiance to the parched and waterless desert, by its internal formation, and its habits and instinct,--been civilized by the inhabitants. By means of it they have, from the remotest antiquity, carried on a regular and extensive commerce.

The caravans may be divided into those of Asia and those of Africa: the great centre of the former is Mecca: the pilgrimage to this place, enjoined by Mahomet, has tended decidedly to facilitate and extend commercial intercourse. Two caravans annually visit Mecca; one from Cairo, and the other from Damascus. The merchants and pilgrims who compose the former come from Abyssinia; from which they bring elephants' teeth, ostrich feathers, gum, gold dust, parrots, monkies, &c. Merchants also come from the Senegal, and collect on their way those of Algiers, Tunis, &c. This division sometimes consists of three thousand camels, laden with oils, red caps, fine flannels, &c. The journey of the united caravans, which have been known to consist of 100,000 persons, in going and returning, occupies one hundred days: they bring back from Mecca all the most valuable productions of the East, coffee, gum arabic, perfumes, drugs, spices, pearls, precious stones, shawls, muslins, &c. The caravan of Damascus is scarcely inferior to that of Cairo, in the variety and value of the produce which it conveys to Mecca, and brings back from it, or in the number of camels and men which compose it. Almost every province of the Turkish empire sends forth pilgrims, merchants, and commodities to this caravan. Of the Asiatic caravans, purely commercial, we know less than of those which unite religion and commerce; as the former do not travel at stated seasons, nor follow a marked and constant route. The great object of those caravans is to distribute the productions of China and Hindustan among the central parts of Asia. In order to supply them, caravans set out from Baghar, Samarcand, Thibet, and several other places. The most extensive commerce, however, carried on in this part of Asia, is that between Russia and China. We have already alluded to this commerce, and shall only add, that the distance between the capitals of those kingdoms is 6378 miles, upwards of four hundred miles of which is an uninhabited desert; yet caravans go regularly this immense distance. The Russians and Chinese meet on the frontiers; where the furs, linen and woollen cloth, leather, glass, &c. of Russia, are exchanged for the tea, porcelain, cotton, rice, &c. of China. This intercourse is very ancient. There are also caravans of independent Tartars, which arrive on the Jaik and Oui, and bring Chinese and Indian commodities, which they interchange for those of Russia.

Tombuctoo is the great depot of central Africa: with it the maritime states of Egypt, Tripoli, Algiers, Tunis, and Morocco carry on a very extensive and lucrative trade by means of caravans. They take 129 days in travelling to Tombuctoo from the borders of the desert, but only fifty-four are spent in actual travelling. There is also another caravan which sets off from Wedinou, and after collecting salt at West Tagossa, proceeds to Tombuctoo. This goes as far as the White Mountains, near Cape Blanco, and is occupied five or six months in its journey. The merchandize carried by these caravans is German linens, Irish linens, muslins, woollen cloth, coral beads, pearls, silk, coffee, tea, sugar, shawls, brass nails, &c. &c. In exchange they bring back chiefly the produce of Soudan, viz. gold dust, gold rings, bars of gold, elephants' teeth, gum, grains of paradise, and slaves. There are also several caravans that trade between Cairo and the interior of Africa, which are solely employed in the traffic of slaves. There can be no doubt that caravans arrive at Tombuctoo from parts of Africa very distant from it, and not only inaccessible, but totally unknown, even by report, to Europeans, and even to the inhabitants of North Africa.

What a picture does modern commerce present of the boundless desires of man, and of the advancement he makes in intellect, knowledge, and power, when stimulated by these desires! Things familiar to use cease to attract our surprise and investigation; otherwise we should be struck with the fact, that the lowest and poorest peasant's breakfast-table is supplied from countries lying in the remotest parts of the world, of which Greece and Rome, in the plenitude of their power and knowledge, were totally ignorant. But the benefits which mankind derives from commerce are not confined to the acquisition of a greater share and variety of the comforts, luxuries, or even the necessaries of life. Commerce has repaid the benefits it has received from geography: it has opened new sources of industry; of this the cotton manufactures of Britain are a signal illustration and proof:--it has contributed to preserve the health of the human race, by the introduction of the most valuable drugs employed in medicine. It has removed ignorance and national prejudices, and tended most materially to the diffusion of political and religious knowledge. The natural philosopher knows, that whatever affects, in the smallest degree, the remotest body in the universe, acts, though to us in an imperceptible manner, on every other body. So commerce acts; but its action is not momentary; its impulses, once begun, continue with augmented force. And it appears to us no absurd or extravagant expectation, that through its means, either directly, or by enlarging the views and desires of man, the civilization, knowledge, freedom and happiness of Europe will ultimately be spread over the whole globe.