None will remember him, but they, who feared. Scorning the pains to count ye. He, who cheats, LITERARY INTELLIGENCE. THE Baron HUMBOLDT has lately visited the city of Washington, where he was received with great respect. He is about thirty two years of age. At a very early period of life he commenced his travels; and for nineteen years past has been principally engaged in contemplating the physical and moral state of the different countries, he has explored. Having made himself well acquainted with the European world, he embarked, about six years since, for America. The first place he landed at on the continent was Cumana; thence he passed along the coast of Paria, and through several Indian tribes until he reached Chamays. Passing through the province of New Andalusia, he stopped at Barcelona, the Caraccas, and Portocabello. He then entered the desert of Apure, where the mercury of Farenheit is often 120 degrees in the shade. He proceeded by water on the Apure, the Oronoco, (whose course, as indicated on the maps, was found to be extremely erroneous) the Atabapo, and the Terni; and then by land to Pemichin, Black river, Cassiquare, to the mouth of the Oronoco at St. Thomas. On this river there is an immense fall of three hundred feet in a distance of three miles. Passing through the Caribbean tribes of Indians, he reached Barcelona, and thence directed his course through Cumana to the Havannah. From thence he embarked, and passed to Batob ano and Carthagena; he then proceeded down the river Madel na to Hunda; and then by land through the forests of Peru; where the tree, from which we derive the Peruvian bark, towers above the oak, with which it is mixed. But little use is made by the natives of this valuable drug, which they take with great reluctance. Having reached Santa Fee, he entered on the passage of the Andes of Quindin, never before explored. Here, at an elevation of 9,200 feet above the level of the sea, was found the wax palm tree, near the region of snow. Passing through Buga, Popayou, and Pesto, he arrived at Quito. From this point he explored, with great patience and minuteness; the most interesting volcanoes: Among these he gained the summit of Pinchincha, after repeated ineffectual efforts. His predecessor Condamine attempted in vain to gain this eminence. When the Baron obtained a full view of the crater, he found all below him in agitation, insomuch that in half an hour there were between fifteen and twenty earthquakes. After exploring the country around Quito for about a year, he proceeded to Maynas and Lima. At Lima he embarked on the Pacific for the Bay of Guayaquil ; whence he proceeded on the ocean to Acapulca, in the province of Mexico. Having explored the various departments of this province, and paid a particular attention to its mountains and mines, he embarked on the Gulf of Mexico for the Havannah; after having travelled a distance, computed at about 9,000 leagues. Through the whole route, Baron Humboldt was assisted by M. Bonpland, a distinguished Botanist of France, who paid particular attention to the collection of plants. His collection, in perfect preservation, exceeds 40,000 specimens, of which, it is suppo sed, there are about 6,500 different species, a large portion of which were previously unknown. The Baron proposes in a few weeks to return to Europe, attended by M. Bonpland, and M. Montusa, a respectable native of Quito. The result of his researches and learning will probably appear at Paris, in the course of a year or two. From his extensive knowledge and enlarged views, we have no doubt but his work will fully reward the curiosity, its expectation has already excited. Mr. CARITAT of New York has issued proposals for publishing the Travels of General COLLOT, through Upper and Lower Louisiana. Having procured the original manuscript in France, he has engaged the celebrated Miss HELEN MARIA WILLIAMS TO make a translation into English. He has also employed artists to execute the Maps and Engravings, in the most elegant manner. The whole has been purchased at great expense, and is to be printed in two quarto volumes, with an Atlas of Maps, &c. Since his proposals for publishing have been issued, the Newspapers have communicated articles from New Orleans, declaring the whole to be a fabrication, and that General Collot never visited the interior of the country. .....4.. The Rev. Mr. HOLMES of Cambridge has it in contemplation to publish a work, to be entitled AMERICAN ANNALS. It will commence with the discovery of America, by Christopher Columbus, in 1492, and extend to the present time; and is designed to give a concise history of the most important events, that have taken place within that period, on the continent of North and South America, and in the West India Islands; and of such events, in foreign parts, as had special relation to this country, or ultimately affected its interests. Beginning with the causes, means, and circumstances, of the first discovery of America, it will proceed to notice its subsequent settlement by various nations of Europe; the principal charters, granted by European princes to individuals, or to companies; the principal emigrations from the Eastern Continent to the Western ; the causes of those emigrations; the numbers of the emigrants; the places, to which they removed; the towns, which they built; the colonies, which they planted; the churches, which they founded; and the principal persons, concerned in the several enterprises for the settlement of America, whether navigators, adventurers, statesmen, divines, or warriors, with biographical sketches; the most material facts in the progress of the American settlements; the population of the natives, and of the colonists, at different periods; the formation of new colonies or states; the foundation of colleges and other seminaries of learning; the establishment of societies for promoting useful knowledge; the progress of arts and sciences; the progress of commerce; new inventions, or useful improvements; military and naval strength; civil wars, or insurrections; wars with the Indians; memorable battles; the principal events of the late revolutionary war; changes in the civil and ecclesiastical state; deaths and ages of eminent men; and providential occurrences. It is the design of the author, to relate events in the order of time, on the plan of chronology, and yet to dilate on articles of peculiar importance, after the manner of history. The authorities will be given with precision ; and the work will probably consist of two octavo volumes. ............ There has lately been published at the University Press, in Cambridge, the "COLLECTANEA GRECA MINORA" of Professor DALZEL. In respect to paper, type, and neatness of execution, we think this superior to any Greek book, printed in our country. The publication is intended to accommodate Academies and Schools with a book, an acquaintance with which is now made requisite for admission into HARVARD UNIVERSITY. LITERARY MISCELLANY. PRIMITIVE HISTORY. CHAP. I. Of the Geography of the Old World. THE brevity of the Mosaic history makes the read ers of it wish, that the facts had been detailed at greater length. But it is to be considered, that the historian wrote for the immediate benefit of his own people, and while the materials were still numerous. He, under the divine direction, gave only such an abstract, as would enable his readers to understand the larger accounts then extant. Those accounts are now in a great measure lost. But the industry of European literati settled in India, by acquiring a knowledge of the books esteemed sacred in that country, has rescued from total oblivion a number of facts, which may be of service to us in acquainting ourselves with the state of the antediluvian world. It is true, that they have no regular treatises of history, chronology or geography; but as all these branches are occasionally referred to in their religious books, where directions are given for the due observance of festivals and pilgrimages, European skill is sufficient to arrange the materials into systematic order. In chronology the book of Genesis furnishes the general canon, to which the genealogical references in the Hindoo books must be conformed. In the ensuing work it is hoped, that nothing will be found contrary to the principles of religion, moral or natural philosophy, or the policy of civilized nations. The design of the writer is, to use all those principles in such a manner, as best to connect the historical facts, that have been preserved from former times. By this course we shall see. the events in their order, and if the connection is not prov ed by historic evidence, it is sustained by theoretic truth, and the narrative form is preserved. Moses informs us, that when God had made the first human pair, he placed them in the garden of Eden. The tract of country he describes by four great rivers. In two of them, the Euphrates and Hiddekel, the learned are agreed. They mean the Euphrates and Tigris. The other two, Pison and Gihon, are in dispute. While some have looked among the branches of the two first rivers to find the other two, different writers have passed the mountains at the head of the Euphrates, and applied the name Pison to Phasis, a river of Colchis. In my estimation they might as well have adopted the Don or the Volga; for Moses tells us, that though these rivers joined in some part of their course, they came from four distinct heads. It is necessary, in order to find suitable companions for the two first named rivers, to suppose some change to have been wrought in the face of the country by the flood or other convulsions of nature. Yet the change was such, that the rivers were known in the time of Moses. After these remarks we shall hazard an opinion, that the Pison and Gihon are the Indus and the Ganges. We shall admit with Mr. Wilford, the great Asiatic antiquary, that these two rivers formerly joined, and a part at least of the water of the Ganges was discharged into the Arabian gulf by the present channel of the Indus. When we come to consider the effects of the flood, we shall probably find reason to think that the sea has here extended over a part of the shore, and that those bays distinguished on the maps as the gulf of Persia and Guzurat were formerly joined together. Gihon contains the radicals of Ganga or Ganges, and is still applied to it near Delhi.* If Phasis be supposed to be the same name with Phison, but differing only in its termination, we ought by the same mode of reasoning to recollect, that the same name at the time of Alexander, with a * Map in Dow's Hindostan. |