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culties the traveller experienced from the nature of the 

 climate and of the roads, or rather the want of roads, and 

 what is more to our purpose, they contain most important 

 Botanical information. My readers will receive with 

 pleasure Ledebour's account of the geographical distribu- 

 tion of vegetables in the regions he visited, and the prefate 

 likewise includes some general remarks, which cannot fail 

 to prove interesting. 



Our author, a German, I believe, by birth, had, from his 

 earliest youth, entertained the strongest desire to visit the 

 interior of the Russian dominions. In 1810, he became 

 acquainted with the celebrated Pallas, who encouraged hmi 

 in these wishes, and furthered his views to the utmost of 

 his power. Still it was not till 1818, that the Counsellor 

 of State, Ledebour, made a journey through the Taurian 

 Peninsula ; but more with the hope of establishing his health 

 than for the purposes of scientific information. 



Up to this period, very little, comparatively, was known 

 of Asiatic Russia ; and for what concerns its Natural History, 

 we are indebted solely to the early travels of the Academi- 

 cians. At those times, notwithstanding the most liberal 

 assistance afforded by Government, they encountered many 

 difficulties ; in a great measure owing to the then unsettled 

 state of the countries, which rendered some districts inac- 

 cessible, and compelled travellers to confine themselves to 

 the post roads. This was eminently the case with the 

 Altaic chain of mountains, and the country situated to the 

 south-west of it — the Soongarien Kirgisen Steppe, which 

 extends to the northern boundary of the Chinese provinces, 

 and which is interrupted, to the west, by lofty ridges. The 

 elder Gmelin travelled along the foot of the Altaic Moun- 

 tains, as did Talk. Pallas went as far as Tigerak, without, 

 however, visiting the lofty mountains. Sievers only ex- 

 plored the frontiers. Patrin also went to Tigerak. Nothing 

 is known of Laxmann's expedition. Schangin is the first 

 man of science who reached the lofty range of the Altai; 

 but he seems to have gone exclusively in the character of a 

 mineralogist. Salessow travelled thither : he was a physician, 



