371 



this position is probably far too much to the west, although 

 the parallel chains of the Rocky Mountains fill a space of 

 more than 3° of longitude, in this parallel. The coast of 

 the Pacific Ocean has been surveyed with the greatest care 

 by Vancouver, Galiano, and Valdes ; the relative longitudes 

 leave little to desire, but the absolute longitudes remain in 

 uncertainty more than half a degree. According to the 

 learned researches of Mr. Oltmanns, the Nook of the Friends 

 at the isle of Nootka is probably 128 0 57 7 j but the partial 

 results of Galiano (8 h 35' 40*), Marchand (8»» 35' 44"), Cook 

 (8 h 36' 10") and of Vancouver (8 h 36' 55"), are not in the 

 accordance we might have hoped from the concurrence of so 

 many chronometers, and such a series of lunar distances. 

 (Sse my Obs. astron. Tom. ii, p. 596, and Oltmans, Geogr. 

 Unte-isuchungen, Tom. ii, p. 439). 



The five great lines of demarcation which we have just dis- 

 cussed, divide the immense territory of the United States 

 into four unequal parts : 



a) Between the Atlantic coast and the Alleghanies, in suppos- 

 ing those mountains prolonged on the north 3 towards 

 Plattsburg, and on the south, by following the banks of 

 the Apalachicola. According to this prolongation, pro- 

 posed by Mr. Gallatin in a very interesting memoir 

 which he permitted me to insert in the Political Essay on 

 New Spain, (Vol. iv. p. 324), the grestest part of Florida 

 is comprehended in this first division, the area of which 

 I found to be at least 324,000 square English miles, or 

 27,064 square marine leagues. I calculated separately 

 the portion of the Atlantic States that falls on the west of 

 the Alleghany Mountains, those mountains crossing the 

 states of New York, Pensylvania, Virginia, and North 

 Carolina. The extent of country which we must deduct 

 from the total territory of the Atlantic Stales, compre- 

 hending West Florida, is 97,071 square miles. In divid- 

 ing the 324,000 square miles of the first division in the 



2 b 2 



