OF BAEON HUMBOLDT. 27 



wonderfully free from any break in its crust, 

 "the Pacific Ocean," as Humboldt writes, 

 " whose surface is nearly one-sixth greater than 

 that of the whole dry land of our planet, whose 

 breadth in the equatorial regions, from the Gali- 

 pagos to the Pelew Islands, is nearly two-fifths 

 of the whole circumference of the globe, pre- 

 sents fewer smoking volcanoes, fewer openings 

 through which the interior of the planet still 

 maintains active communication with its atmo- 

 spheric envelope than does the single island of 

 Java. On the other hand, we find this vast 

 basin surrounded by a well-marked line of vol- 

 canic fracture, at present containing, as already 

 stated, seven-eighths of the known volcanoes of 

 the globe." 



Thus, " beginning from New Zealand," in the 

 words of Humboldt, " and proceeding first for 

 a considerable distance in a north-west direc- 

 tion, we can pass through New Guinea, the 

 Sunda Islands, the Philippines, and the east of 

 Asia, and, ascending to the Aleutian Islands, 

 can redescend to the southward through the 

 north-west portion of America, Mexico, Central 

 and South America, to the extremity of Chili, 

 thus making the entire circuit of the Pacific 

 Ocean, and finding it surrounded, throughout a 

 length of 26,400 geographical miles, by a 



