during the year 1829-30. I^d 



Messrs Hardy and Thompson were engaged, during their 

 excursions in Mexico and Guatemala, in adding to our previous 

 information with regard to the soil and inhabitants of these new 

 republics. M. Franck, introduced to yon some time ago by 

 M. Poinsett, one of your most esteemed correspondents, has 

 also recently brought to Paris numerous drawings which he 

 collected during a residence of several years in Mexico, and: an 

 account of which will shortly be laid before the society. . ; 



MM. Yos}^, Lhotski, Le Prieur, and d'Acosta, to whom the 

 central commission has presented instruments and instructions, 

 are on their road to visit several parts of the New World. We 

 have every reason to believe that these travellers will not neglect 

 any thing which can make the time ihQj devote to the advance- 

 ment of geography profitable to that science. 



I may besides mention the labours of Mr Pentland in the 

 Republic of Bolivia ; those now being carried on in California by 

 Dr Coulter, an excellent English naturalist, who, provided with 

 good instruments, himself a good astronomer, and full of ardour, 

 will certainly deduce useful results from his voyage, which he 

 has undertaken solely for the interest of science. 



M. Henri Ternaux, a member of this society, has returned a 

 short time ago from America, and will soon give you an account 

 of all that he has observed in the countries through which he 

 has passed. 



We owe to his Royal Highness Prince Christian Frederick of 

 Denmark, the communication of the journal of Captain Graah 

 of the royal navy, emploj'^ed by the Danish government in 

 exploring the east coast of Greenland. * This extract leads us 

 to expect, that, at his return from so perilous a duty crowned 

 with success, M. Graah will have reached, in this third attempt, 

 the most northern point of that coast of iron and ice, where, it 

 is said, he has even found human inhabitants. Let us hope, 

 gentlemen, that this intrepid navigator, when returned safe and 

 sound to his country, may receive testimony of the esteem due 

 to so much devotion, and that he may publish the materials 

 which he shall have collected, in order to extend our knowledge 

 of the geography of those northern lands. 



Western Asia, 



The Ottoman empire, which the colossus of the North 

 threatened with total destruction in 1828 and 1829, continues 

 still to attract into the vast provinces under her sway a great 

 number of travellers, desirous perhaps of being witnesses of a 

 great catastrophe, which the events of the last four months, and 

 those to which we still look forward, maj^ put off for an indefinite 

 period. I shall say little to you of Mr M'Farlane, the author of 

 two volumes, which in realitj^ tell us nothing new, and in which 

 there predominates a narrow spirit and inveterate prejudices 



* See our last Number, p. 99, and Geographical Collections, infra. 



