190 EE VIEWS OF BOOKS. [July 



Keviews of ^ooks. 



Bussian Central Asia, including Kuldja, BoMiara, Khiva, and Merv. 

 By Henry Landsdell, D.D. In two volumes, London : 

 Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Eivington. 1885. 



IN 1882, after a day's deliberation, and with a celerity only 

 paralleled by that of the great Indian general, Dr. Landsdell 

 determined on his mission of Bible distribution in eight provinces, 

 with a total population of 4,908,000, including upwards of twenty 

 towns with populations varying from 1000 to 80,000, in only one 

 of which, or perhaps two, the British and Foreign Bible Society had 

 been able to send a consignment of Scriptures. One of the other 

 English travellers, attempting to penetrate to Eussian Central Asia, 

 a clergyman, too, who proceeded as far as Tashkend, had been 

 ordered to be off within four-and-twenty hours ; whilst the last two 

 Englishmen who entered Bokhara were put to death, and Dr. Wolff, 

 who went to ascertain their fate, nearly lost his life. Yet ou.r 

 author made his will, committed himself to God's keeping, and 

 started. In 179 days (during half the nights he slept in his clothes) 

 he made this journey of 12,000 miles, meeting with peoples whose 

 customs are similar to those of the days of Abraham, and traversing 

 districts now made prominent by the Eusso-Afghan disputes. The 

 general reader will find in the perusal of these volumes a treat of 

 the rarest intellectual kind, but they contain besides an epitome 

 of the latest researches made by Eussian scientists in these regions, 

 some of which we reproduce. 



On the Thian Shan range, which may be reckoned amongst the 

 chief mountains of the glofce, the snow-line varies from 10,000 feet 

 to over 15,000 feet above the level of the sea. The spruce fir is 

 the most widely distributed tree along it. Its straight stem attains 

 a height of from 70 to 90 feet, and its branches gradually shorten- 

 ing towards the top, give the tree the appearance of a pyramid. Its 

 cones, the size of one's fist, are of dark blue, and hang at the end of 

 long stems quite vertically. In the fir forests of this region, the 

 trees stand apart so as to allow pedestrians and horsemen room for 

 free passage. The fir grows in a region 6000 to 9000 feet above 

 the sea; the birch, between 3000 and 8000; and the juniper, 

 between 5000 and 10,000, except in the Alai, Turkistan, and 

 Kissar ranges, where it reaches 1000 feet higher. 



On the western Thian Shan, the upper and lower limits of the 

 growth of trees run parallel to" the line of perpetual snow, running 

 from 8800 to 9800 feet. The juniper {Junijpcnis pseudosabina) is 



