1823.] 
RUSSIA. 
The vessels Golounin and Baranoff, 
expedited by the Russian American 
Company, to explore the north-west 
coast of America, have returned from 
their voyage. 
discovery of a pretty large island, 
called Mumirak, situated, according 
to their calculation,-in 59° 54! 57" 
North latitude, and 190° 17’ 12” East 
longitude. 
Recent antiquarian researches make 
it evident that Tschernigof is the most 
ancient recorded town in all Russia, 
properly so denominated. The Mus- 
covite annals do not mention the 
name of its founder; but it was in the 
number of those for which, when peace 
was concluded with Oleg, in 907, the 
Greeks were obliged to pay a tribute. 
Since 1810, there has been esta- 
blished at Petersburgh a Society of 
Amateurs of Russian Literature; the 
president is M. Antonski, rector of 
the university. They have published 
twenty-one volumes of their labours, 
containing poetry, and pieces illustra- 
tive of the history and state of Rus- 
sian literature. 
The Bible Society has, throughout 
the Russian empire, 54 divisions in the 
different governments, and 168 auxi- 
liary societies. The society of Mos- 
cow published and distributed, within 
the two last years, 106,000 copies, in 
thirty-two languages; and, since its 
first establishment in 18138, has printed 
more than, 550,000. 
' SWEDEN. 
The legislation of Sweden is ad- 
vancing in progressive .ameliorations, 
The committee of the Constitution 
have proposed to the states of the 
kingdom to abolish the indirect cen- 
sorship, which the Chancellor has long 
exercised over journals and periodi- 
cal writings, extending so far as to an 
arbitrary right of suppressing them. 
it is demanded that the responsibility 
of the journals is to -be fixed by the 
ordinary tribunals. 
In the university of Upsal is a very 
beautiful chest of drawers, made of 
ebony and cypress wood, and adorned 
with precious stones. It was present- 
ed to Gustavus Adolphus, in 1632, by 
the city of Augsburgh. Among other 
curiosities, it contains a large agate: 
one of the faces of the stone represents 
the Last Judgment, and the others 
the passage of the Red Sea by the 
Israelites. The figures are well co- 
Montuty Mac. No, 385. 
Literary and Philosophical Intelligence. 
They announce the 
73 
loured, and are in the style of the 
German painters that succeeded to 
Albert Durer. The tints of the stone 
have been so skilfully adjusted, as to 
represent the clouds with much effect, 
as also the wall formed by the waters 
opening to let the Israelities pass, and 
the waves ready to swallow up Pha- 
raoh and his army. The name of the 
artist who drew these two designs was 
John King. . 
3 DENMARK. 
The Bible Society of Copenhagen 
have distributed in Denmark 44,169 
copies of the New Testament, in the 
years from 1815 to 1821. Within the 
same time, the Society of Holstein- 
Schleswick has distributed 24,000 co- 
pies of the Bible. To these adding 
the distributions of Iceland and Lauen- 
burg, it will appear that more than 
80,000 copies of the Sacred Writings 
have been. delivered in the Danish 
states in the course of six years. The 
Society is now printing some detached 
volumes of the Bible, translated into 
the Greenland tongue by Bishop 
Fabricius. win PR 
A letter from the Capt. Chevalier 
Abrahamson, dated Copenhagen, April 
14, 1823, contains a notice that the 
establishment of schools of mutual 
instruction is proceeding in Denmark 
with rapidity. It was on the 21st of 
August, 1822, that the king first autho- 
rised the introduction of the new me- 
thod, by way of trial, in eighteen 
schools. Four months later, M. Abra- 
hamson had established it in ‘100 
schools; and it is now in use in 147, 
FRANCE. 
M. Paravey, officer in the royal 
corps of French engineers, in a pam- 
phlet recently published, professes to 
demonstrate that the planisphere of 
Denderah is no other than the sphere 
of Hipparchus, as delineated on the 
Farnese globe. It appears now that 
there is a Roman mark on the .Zo- 
diac, which has been but lately disco- 
vered. 
Extract of a letter from M. Parissot, 
Professor of, Physics in the College of 
Epinal, a canton of the Vosges. 
On the 13th of September last, at-7 in 
the morning, an acrolite fell m the com- 
mune of La Basse, two leagues east of 
Epinal. Its noise, in falling, was. like 
that of a carriage, not well greased, ra- 
pidly rolling over a rugged road. Its 
direction was from south-west to north- 
west. Its force increased as it approached, 
to a frightful degree of intensity, It 
L was 
