GEOGEAPHY AOT) ANTIQUITIES. 



SIR RODERICK MURCHISON*S ADDRESS. AFRICAN EXPLORATION. 



SIR RODERICK IMPEY MURCIIISON, Bart., K.C.B., President of 

 the Royal Geographical Society, and Member of the Institute of 

 France, delivered an address at the meeting of the British Asso- 

 ciation, of which the following is an extract: 



" Before I speak of some few of the contributions which will, I 

 trust, be brought under our consideration, let me glance at the 

 rapid progress of discovery in recent years, and, first of all, at the 

 great and important additions to pure geography which have been 

 made in Central Asia both by Russian and British explorers. 

 With all the western portion of that vast region in which lie the 

 Khanats of Khiva, Bokhara, and Khokan, some of you may now 

 be acquainted, through the accounts of Russian observers, who 

 have already fixed the correct positions of the chief towns, moun- 

 tains, and rivers of Western Turkistan. Proceeding eastwards 

 from the Sea of Aral, the Russians have, for the first time in his- 

 tory, rendered the river Syr Daria (the Jaxartes of Alexander the 

 Great) navigable by steam vessels of a limited size, and, fixing 

 military posts on its banks, have ascended towards its sources and 

 taken possession of the populous and flourishing city of Tashkent, 

 a great mart of caravan commerce. Again, Russia has triumphed 

 over the Khan of Bokhara, the savage ruler who in years gone 

 by barbarously put to death two British officers, Stoddart and 

 Conolly, and who has now met with a due humiliation. As peace 

 has been concluded between the Emperor of Russia and those 

 turbulent chiefs, who have now been rendered subordinate to a 

 great civilized nation, we may hope that the blessings of com- 

 merce will restore this fine region to some portion, at least, of the 

 wealth and dignity which it held in those ages when its monarchs 

 ruled over nearly one-half of the then civilized world. The crude 

 and ill-founded apprehensions which once existed that these ad- 

 vances of Russia would prove highly prejudicial to British India, 

 have, through due reflection, entirely evaporated from among 

 British statesmen, who are now convinced that it is much better 

 for the commerce and peace of both nations that intermediate 

 warring chiefs should be kept under by a strong power. After 

 all, between the great territories of Russian Turkistan and those 

 of British India there lies the long, broad, and mountainous region 

 of Afghanistan, with whose present ruler we are on good terms. 

 But what about Eastern Turkistan ? some of my hearers may say ; 



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