1866. | Geography. 93 
worm ;” by Mr.G.J. Bowles, “On the Occurrence of Pieris Rape 
in Canada;” by Mr. W. C. Hewitson, “On a variety of Chrysophanus 
virgaurex, from Zermatt ;” and by the same author, “ Descriptions 
of New Hesperide ;” by Mr. J. 8. Baly, “ New Genera and Species 
of Gallerucide ;” and by Mr. D. Sharp, “A Monograph of the 
British Species of Agathidiwm.” This paper contains descriptions 
of three new species. 
VI. GEOGRAPHY. 
(Including the Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society.) 
THE geographical intelligence since our last chronicle has been 
small in amount. An account of Mr. Baker’s discoveries will be 
found in a paper read before the Geographical Society. It is 
strange that each of the new discoveries tends to confirm the general 
accuracy of the old Arabian geographer of the Middle Ages, who 
made the Nile rise from vast lakes in the centre of Africa. Above 
500 sketches in oils and water-colours by Mr. Baines, whose book 
we noticed before, bring before us vividly the peculiarities of 
African scenery, especially the part about the Victoria Falls of the 
Zambesi. The latter are remarkable, inasmuch as the river disap- 
pears through a cleft from which it emerges to descend again. 
The spray ascends to a height of 1,200 feet, and by its subsequent 
fall it waters the country round for some distance. 
The work of Mr. Palgrave on Central Arabia is not the mere 
narrative of an acute and accurate traveller, it is the experience 
of a man whose whole heart was in his work, who had had an 
excellent training, who had read all that was known about the land 
he visited, and was thoroughly and perfectly acquainted with the 
language and the religion of the country he visited. Even without 
the knowledge acquired by traversing a land where still the Arabic 
of the Koran, a grammatical and nervous language, not the weak 
colloquial dialect of Egypt and Syria, is spoken, the dissertations 
on many points of the Mahommedan religion would have become 
standard references. The doctrine and practices of the Wahabees 
throw much light on the Koran and on the position that the 
Mahommedan religion may be expected to hold: a subject of much 
importance at a time when the African missions are being discussed 
by bodies of men from a purely external point of view, utterly 
unconnected with religion. 
Captain Wilson, R.E., has succeeded in obtaining the true level 
of the Dead Sea. Previous observers had made it 710 feet above, 
710 feet below, on a level with, and at all kinds of depths below the 
Mediterranean. Captain Wilson, from the work of two inde- 
