102 Discourse delivered by Baroii Humboldt to the 



present year of his Majesty's reign, by speaking of the trigono- 

 metrical observations of the west, which, by the union of the la- 

 bours of Generals Schubert and Tenner, and of M. Struve, the 

 great astronomer of Dorpat, will elucidate the figure of the 

 Earth on a great scale ; — of the geological constitution of Lake 

 Baikal, which has been examined by M. Hess ; — of the magne- 

 tic expedition of MM. Hansteen, Erman and Dowe, justly cele- 

 brated over all Europe, the most extensive and adventurous 

 that has ever been undertaken by land (from Berlin and Chris- 

 tiania to Kamtchatka, where it connects itself with the great la- 

 bours of Captains Wrangell and Anjou) ; — lastly, of the cir- 

 cumnavigation of the globe, which, by the command of the So- 

 vereign, Captain Luethe has performed, and which, through 

 the co-operation of three excellent naturalists, Dr Mertens, Ba- 

 ron Kittliz, and M. Postels, has been productive of important 

 results in Astronomy, Physics, Botany and Anatomy. 



I have undertaken to point out this community of efforts by 

 which several portions of the empire have been explored, by the 

 aid of modern science, by that of new instruments, and new 

 methods, founded upon the analogy of facts formerly unknown. 

 It is also by a community of interests that, having once more 

 ventured upon a new journey, I have found pleasure in adorn- 

 ing my discourse with names which have become dear to science. 

 After having admired the richness of the mineral productions, 

 the wonders of physical nature, one loves to point out (and it is 

 a pleasant duty to perform in a strange land, in the midst of 

 the assembly which listens to me) the intellectual richness of a 

 nation, the labours of those useful men, disinterested in their 

 devotion to science, who traverse their country, or, in solitude, 

 prepare by study, by calculation and experiment, the discoveries 

 of future generations. 



If, as we have proved by recent examples, the vast extent of 

 the Russian Empire, which surpasses that of the visible part of 

 the moon, requires the concurrence of numerous observers, this 

 very extent also presents advantages of another kind, which 

 have long been known to you. Gentlemen, but which, in their 

 relation to the present state of our knowledge of the physical 

 history of the earth, do not appear to me to have been suffi- 

 ciently appreciated ; I would not speak of that immense scale, 



