SI 



TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 



When in 1859 Mr. Church exhibited his " Heart of the Andes," men 

 of science began to hope that the time had arrived when their endea- 

 vours to spread a correct knowledge of the physical features of our globe 

 would be aided from a side from which they have long anticipated assist- 

 ance ; that artists, encouraged by the success which Mr. Church's well- 

 known painting achieved, and taking advantage of the great facilities of 

 reaching the remotest portions of the world in an incredibly short space of 

 time, would have suspended for a while the studies of the shady lanes and 

 babbling brooks of Northern Europe, or the purple skies of beautiful 

 Italy, in order to devote themselves to the rich field that the unknown 

 regions of the tropics or little known countries of the temperate or frigid 

 zones offer. These sanguine hopes have been disappointed. Our exhi- 

 bitions of paintings are annually overflowing with landscapes, but they are 

 of the old stamp. 



When every branch of science, enlarging its horizon, is seized with a 

 laudable desire to take a comprehensive grasp of the matter appertaining 

 to its respective department ; when no historian, who values his repute, 

 now writes the history of a country without ascertaining its bearing and 



