108 GEOGRAPHY. 



population amounts to over fifty millions. The prevailing religion of North 

 America is the Protestant ; that of Central and South America, Catholic. In 

 addition to these, there are numerous tribes in both Americas, which have 

 not embraced any form of Christianity. 



A. NORTH AMERICA. 



1. Continental and Insular Region of the North Pole. 



a. Lands to the west of Baffin's Bay. On the west side of Baffin's Bay 

 is situated Baffin's Land, consisting of one or more islands (called Cock- 

 burn Island in the north, and Cumberland Island in the south), to the west 

 of which is Melville Peninsula. North of Barrow's Straits lies the land of 

 North Devon ; west of it, the North Georgian Islands, Cornwallis, Bathurst, 

 Byam Martin, Sabine, and Melville ; to the south of the ffi'st and last 

 respectively, lie North Somerset, whose southern part is called Boothia 

 Felix, and Banks Land. 



h. Greenland, to the east of Baffin's Bay, is probably an island, and is 

 inhabited by copper-colored Esquimaux. The Danes have settlements on 

 the west coast (New Greenland), embracing from 20-25,000 inhabitants, 

 and divided into a north and a south Inspectorate, with about 9000 

 Christian inhabitants. The southern and most thickly populated place is 

 Julianenhaab, with 16,000 inabitants ; the oldest is Goodshaab, the most 

 northern Upernavik. Disco is the largest of all the numerous islands on the 

 w^est coast. The east coast, discovered in 982, was almost inaccessible for 

 nearly one hundred years previous to 1822,owing to numerous icebergs. 



c. Spitzbergen, the most northern land known (extending to 81° N. L.), 

 consists of three large, and several smaller islands, all together possessing 

 an area of 22,400 square geographical miles. It is uninhabited, save by a 

 few Russians in summer, who carry on fishing and hunting for several 

 months in the year. 



2. The Hudson's Bay Territory and Russian Possessions. 



The territory embraced under this head, and lying between the Atlantic 

 and the Pacific Oceans, covers an area of over 3.570,000 square statute 

 miles. Individual portions are: 1. Labrador and East Main, together 

 constituting a peninsula between Hudson's Bay and the Atlantic. 2. New- 

 Wales or West Main, called New North Wales in the north, and New 

 South Wales in the south, situated south and west of Hudson's Bay. 3. 

 Along the Pacific from north to south. New Norfolk, New Cornwall, New 

 Hanover, New Georgia. The whole country has been termed New 

 Britain. All the region north of 60° N. lat., and vv^est of the meridian of 

 141° W. longitude from Greenwich, belongs to Russia, the territories of the 

 United States beginning with the parallel of 49^ N. lat. in the western 

 108 



