Papal yoke, to undertake similar expeditions. In 1578, 
Sir Francis Drake discovered the southern extremity of 
Terra del Fuego, with some p on the western coast 
of America, and completed the cireumnavigation of the 
3. globe in 1051 days. In 1556, some English naviga- 
tors, in seeking a north-east to India, fell in 
with Nova Zembla, and about the same time the Dutch 
discovered Spitzbergen. Of the discovery of New Hol- 
jand, or Australasia, various opinions have been enter- 
tained, some ascribing it to Gonneville in 1503, others 
to Menezes, a Portuguese navigator, in 1527; but the 
first authentic account of a landing on the coast is 
Captain Dirk Hartigh, a Dutchman, in 1616, (See Aus- 
TRALASIA.) It would be tedious to enumerate the va- 
rious voy of discovery, as well as land travels, that 
have been undertaken by different nations since the com 
mencement of the 17th century, and still more so to give 
a catalogue of the islands and countries with which 
their labours have made us acquainted. We cannot 
Pag conclude this sketch, however, without mentioning the 
, Fline names of Cook, Flinders,’ and Park, who may all be 
and justly denominated martyrs in the cause of geographi- 
cal discovery. With Captain Cook’s discoveries in the 
South Sea, Captain Flinders’ expedition to the south of 
‘Australasia, and Mr Park’s interesting travels in Africa, 
our readers cannot fail to be acquainted. Cook, indeed, 
has been accused, by some French writers, of having 
entertained a mean jealousy of other navigators, unbe- 
coming in any man, but particularly unworthy of one 
who had deserved so well, and enjoyed so much, of the 
grateful admiration of mankind. But the history of his 
~ successor proves, that even those who are loudest in 
their praises of liberality, and the most strenuous advo- 
cates for the maxim pa/mam _ meruit ferat, are not al« 
ways proof against the pitiful and degrading vanity of 
6. 
CHAP. I. 
oo Or tue SPHERE. 
Seer. I. Of the Figure of the Earth, and of’ the Sphere 
in General, 
_ Tur fundamental principle of all mathematical geo- 
_ gtaphy, and what of course naturally claims our first at- 
~ tention, is the spherical figure of the earth. The proof of 
this, however, is neither elaborate nor abstruse, the vari- 
_ ous phenomena from which it is inferred being so obvious 
___ and so conclusive, as to require only to be mentioned. 
__ The first, and perhaps the most simple of these which 
we shail notice, is the appearance of a ship at sea, ei- 
ther approaching to, or receding from, an observer on 
the shore, In the former case the vessel seems to rise 
out of the water, and in the latter to sink beneath it, a 
phenomenon that can only be accounted for from the 
_ convexity of the earth’s surface; and as the same appear- 
“4 ance is observed at all times and in all situations, this 
{ vari- convexity must also hold in every direction, that is, the 
ny earth must be spherical. The same conclusion may 
also be drawn from other phenomena ; as the change 
which takes place in the visible part of the earth’s sur- 
face, as well as of the heavens, to an observer who 
changes his situation—from the circular form of the 
earth’s shadow, as observed in eclipses of the moon— 
4 and, finally, from the actual circumnavigation of the 
globe. Our readers will find these appearances illus- 
VOL, X. PART, I, 
GEOGRAPHY. 
145 
attributing to themselves the discoveries made by ano- History. 
ther. At the very moment that the accusation above 
alluded to was brought against Cook, the accusers ps a 
themselves were joining a national league to deprive o¢ Captain 
the deeply injured Captain Flinders of his hard earned Flinders 
glory, as they had re done of his freedom and his by the 
property. Accident and misfortune threw him into French 
their hands.in the isle of France, where he was, in 199% 
violation of every law, both of hospitality and huma- 
nity, detained a prisoner, and treated as a criminal for 
more than six years, obyiously for no other 
but to afford time to the French navigators who had 
followed his track under the protection of British pass- 
sea to publish the account of discoveries which had 
n stolen from another. Justice indeed has at length 
extorted an:acknowledgment of the fraud, and the 
graphers of other countries are erasing from cheie 
charts the names, by which the authors of this infa- 
mous plot thought to immortalise themselves at the ex- 
pence of an individual. This much was due to the me« 
rits and memory of Captain’ Flinders, and a triumph 
more honourable or more complete, the friends and ad- 
mirers of that lamented navigator can neither desire nor 
expect. But what expiation will ever wipe away from 
the character of a great nation, the blot which it has 
sustained, by permitting itself to be either deluded or 
wilfully drawn into a participation of such baseness, as 
to lend its sanction to.an imposition, the most abomina- 
ble in the annals of science? See Strabonis Rerum 
Geograph. libri xvii. &c: Oxon. 1807; Rennel’s Geo« 
graphy of Herodotus; Malte Brun Precis de la Geogra~ 
phie Universelle, tom. i.; Flinders’ Voyage to Terra 
Australis, 1801, 1802, 1803: also our articles Arrica, 
Cook, and Park. 
MATHEMATICAL GEOGRAPHY. 
trated at greater length under the article Astronomy, 
hs Mathemati 
at_p. 658 of the second volume of our work. Without, cal Geogra 
phy: 
therefore, attempting any farther t peewt of the fact, we 
shall proceed on the supposition that the earth is a per- 
fect sphere. This, indeed, is not exactly the case, the 
globe being ‘flattened or- compressed at two opposite 
points, forming what mathematicians call an oblate 
spheroid, and at the same time having its surface di- 
versified with numerous elevations and depressions. 
But to the geographer, these inequalities are of no im- Not affect- 
portance, as they are too inconsiderable to affect any ed by the 
of the problems that he may have ‘occasion to solve. ry gy 
The longest diameter of the earth is to. the shortest f...° 
nearly as 1 to .9968, or as 301 to 300, and the highest 
mountain on the earth, if represented ona sphere of six 
feet nine inches diameter, would not. project from: its 
surface farther than .4th of an.inch, In asystem of 
graphy, therefore, we may safely omit the consi« 
Seration of such minute irregularities, and regard the 
globe as really a perfect sphere. 
As our ‘chief object in the present article is to ren- General 
der the principles of geography intelligible to our rea- properties 
ders in general; we shall endeavour, as much as possi- of the 
ble, to exhibit a popular view of the subject, referring “P°"° 
the scientific, wade to those articles of our work; where 
the propositions that we may assume, and the pheno- 
mena that we shall have occasion to explain, are exami- 
ned and illustrated on the most rigid principles. Agree- 
ably to this plan, we shall here throw into the form of 
definitions, some of the properties of the sphere in ge« 
T 
