270 Captain Gerard's Account of a Survey 



vels in Java, writes me, that he found the mean temperature 

 of Batavia, near the sea shore, 82* F. ; and at Buitenzoig, 

 about 40 English miles from Batavia, 737 feet above the level 

 of the sea, the mean temperature was 79° P." 



These observations, so far as they go, confirm the opinion 

 of Humboldt, which has been called in question by Mr At- 

 kinson,* that the mean temperature of the equator cannot be 

 assumed above 82*^ of Fahrenheit. This very important sub- 

 ject will be resumed in another paper. 



Art. XV. — Account of a Survey of the Valley of the Setlej 

 River, in the Himalaya Mountains. From the Journal of 

 Captain Alexander Gerard, Surveyor to the Board of 

 Commissioners. 



The Journals of the preceding excursions of Captain Gerard 

 having been printed for the first time in the pages of this Jour- 

 nal,f as communicated to us by his uncle, the late Colonel 

 Gerard of Rochsoles, we have been anxious to procure an ac- 

 count of his more recent examination of the Valley of the Set- 

 lej, and had written to India, with the view of obtaining it. 

 The journal, however, of the examination having been trans- 

 mitted to the East India Company, it was, at the request of 

 its author, communicated to Thomas Colebrooke, Esq. Direc- 

 tor of the Royal Asiatic Journal, who has given a very able 

 and interesting summary of it in the newly published part of 

 the Transactions of the Asiatic Society. I As this work must 

 be in the hands of a very few of our readers, we need not 

 make any apology for drawing from it a continuation of the 

 travels of our enterprising and intelligent countryman. Cap- 

 tain A. Gerard was accompanied with his brother, Mr J. G. 

 Gerard, and their Journal begins on the 6th June 1821. 



R6l, at the foot of the Shatul pass,§ is a small district in 

 Chuara, one of the larger divisions of Basehar. It contains 



* See this Journal, vol. vi. p. ISO- 

 t See No. I. p. 41, and No. II- p. 215. 

 J Vol. i. part ii. p. 343. 



§ See the Map of the Countries north of the Sutlej, given in No- iii. 

 of this Journal. 



