What Portions, Then, Of Asia, America, And Africa, Are Still
_Unknown?_ - And What Comparison, In Point Of Extent And Importance, Do
They Bear To What Was _Known_ To The Ancients?
In Asia, the interior
of the vast kingdom of China is very imperfectly known, as well as Daouria
and
Other districts on the confines of the Chinese and Russian empires;
central Asia in general, and all that extensive, populous, and fertile
region which extends from the southern part of Malaya, nearly under the
equator, in a northerly direction, to the fortieth degree of latitude, are
still not explored, or but very partially so, by European travellers. This
region comprehends Aracan, Ava, Pegu, Siam, Tsiompa, and Cambodia. The
south and east coasts of Arabia still require to be more minutely and
accurately surveyed. In the eastern archipelago, Borneo, Celebes, and
Papua, are scarcely known. Though all these bear but a small proportion to
the vast extent of Asia, yet some of them, especially the country to the
north of the Malay peninsula, and the islands in the eastern archipelago,
may justly be regarded as not inferior, in that importance which natural
riches bestows, to any part of this quarter of the globe.
Still, however, we possess some general notice, and some vague reports of
all these countries; but it is otherwise with respect to the unknown
portions of Africa. The whole of this quarter of the world, from the Niger
to the confines of the British settlement at the Cape of Good Hope, may,
with little limitation, be considered as unknown. Travellers have indeed
penetrated a short distance from the western coast into the interior, in
some parts between the latitude of the Niger and the latitude of the
extreme northern boundary of the Cape settlement: and a very little is
known respecting some small portions of the districts closely adjoining to
the eastern coast; but the whole of central Africa is still unexplored, and
presents difficulties and dangers which it is apprehended will not be
speedily or easily overcome. To the north of the Niger lies the Sahara, or
Great Desert; of this, probably, sufficient is known to convince us that
its extent is such, that no country that would repay a traveller for his
fatigue and risk, is situated to the north of it. To the east of the Niger,
however, or rather along its course, and to the north of its course, as it
flows to the east, much remains to be explored; many geographical details
have been indeed gathered from the Mahomedan merchants of this part of
Africa, but these cannot entirely be trusted. The course and termination of
the Niger itself is still an unsolved problem.
Captain Scoresby, a most intelligent and active captain in the whale
fishery trade, has very lately succeeded in reaching the eastern coasts of
Greenland, and is disposed to think that the descendants of the Danish
colonists, of whose existence nothing is known since this coast was
blocked, up by ice at the beginning of the fifteenth century, still inhabit
it. The northern shores of Greenland, and its extent in this direction are
still unknown.
Notwithstanding the zeal and success with which the government of the
United States prosecute their discoveries to the west of the Mississippi,
there is still much unexplored country between that river and the Pacific
Ocean. It is possible that lands may lie within the antartic circle, of
which we have hitherto as little notion as we had of South Shetland ten
years ago; but if there are such, they must be most barren and
inhospitable. It is possible also, that, notwithstanding the care and
attention with which the great Pacific has been so repeatedly swept, there
may yet be islands in it undiscovered; but these, however fertile from soil
and climate, must be mere specks in the ocean.
But though comparatively little of the surface of the globe is now utterly
unknown, yet even of those countries with which we are best acquainted,
much remains to be ascertained, before the geography of them can justly be
regarded as complete. Perhaps we are much less deficient and inaccurate in
our knowledge of the natural history of the globe, than in its geography,
strictly so called; that is, in the extent, direction, latitudes and
longitudes, direction and elevation of mountains, rise, course, and
termination of rivers, &c. How grossly erroneous geography was till very
lately, in some even of its most elementary parts, and those, too, in
relation to what ought to have been the most accurately known portion of
Europe, may be judged from these two facts, - that till near the close of
the last century, the distance from the South Foreland, in Kent, to the
Land's End, was laid down in all the maps of England nearly half a degree
greater than it actually is; and that, as we have formerly noticed, "the
length of the Mediterranean was estimated by the longitudes of Ptolemy till
the eighteenth century, and that it was curtailed of nearly twenty-five
degrees by observation, no farther back than the reign of Louis XIV."
To speak in a loose and general manner, the Romans, at the height of their
conquests, power, and geographical knowledge, were probably acquainted with
a part of the globe about equal in extent to that of which we are still
ignorant; but their empire embraced a fairer and more valuable portion than
we can expect to find in those countries which remain to reward the
enterprise of European travellers. The fertile regions and the beautiful
climate of the south of Europe, of the north of Africa, and above all of
Asia Minor, present a picture which we can hardly expect will be
approached, certainly will not be surpassed, under the burning heats of
central Africa, or even the more mitigated heats of the farther peninsula
of India. The short and easy access of all portions of the Roman Empire to
the ocean, gave them advantages which must be denied to the hitherto
unexplored districts in the interior of Asia and Africa.
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