THE EAP.TH. Ict5 



uiidation was much greater at that time than at preseiit. Mr 

 Biiffon- has ascribed the present diminution, as well to the les- 

 sening of the Mountains of the Moon, by their substance having 

 so long been washed down with the stream, as to the rising of 

 the earth in Egypt, that has for so many ages received this ex- 

 traneous supply. But we do not find, by the buildings that 

 have remained since the times of the ancients, that the earth is 

 much raised since then. Besides the Nile in Africa, we may 

 reckon the Zara, and Coanza, from the greatness of whose open- 

 ings into the sea, and the rapidity of whose streams, we form 

 an estimate of the great distance from whence they come. 

 Their courses, however, are spent in watering deserts and sav- 

 age countries, whose poverty or fierceness have kept strangers 

 away. 



But of all parts of the world, America, as it exhibits the most 

 lofty mountains, so also it supplies the largest rivers. The 

 foremost of these is the great river Amazon, which, from its 

 source in the lake of Lauricocha, to its discharge into the 

 Western Ocean, performs a course of more than twelve hundred 

 leagues.' The breadth and depth of this river are answerable 

 to its vast length ; and, where its width is most contracted, its 

 depth is augmented in proportion. So great is the body of its 

 waters, that other rivers, though before the objects of admira- 

 tion, are lost in its bosom. It proceeds, after their junction, 

 with its usual appearance, without any visible change in its 

 breadth or rapidity ; and, if we may so express it, remains great 

 without ostentation. In some places it displays its whole mag- 

 nificence, dividing into several large branches, and encompassing 

 a multitude of islands ; and, at length, discharging itself into the 

 ocean, by a channel of a hundred and fifty miles broad. An- 

 other river, that may almost rival the former, is the St Lawrence, 

 in Canada, which rising in the lake Assiniboils, passes from one 

 lake to another, from Christinaux to Alempigo ; from thence to 

 lake Superior ; thence to the lake Hurons ; to lake Erie ; to 

 lake Ontario ; and, at last, after a course of nine himdred leagues 

 pours their collected waters into the Atlantic Ocean. The 

 river Mississippi is of more than seven hundred leagues in length, 

 beginning at its source neai* the lake Assiniboils, and ending at 



2 Diiffon, vol. ii. p 82. 3 UUoa, vol i. p. 38a 



