lightened mind. These results comprise in one view the climate, and it's influence on organized beings, the aspect of the country, varied according to the nature of the soil and it's vegetable covering, the direction of the mountains, and the rivers which separate the races of men as well as the tribes of vegetables; and finally, those modifications, which the state of nations, placed in different latitudes, and in circumstances more or less favorable to the display of their faculties undergoes. I am not afraid of having too much enlarged on objects so worthy of attention: one of the noblest privileges, which distinguish modern civilization from that of remoter times, is the having enlarged the mass of our conceptions, having rendered us more capable of perceiving the connection between the physical and intellectual world, and having thrown a more general interest over objects, which heretofore occupied only a small number of scientific men, because these objects were contemplated separately, and from a narrower point of view.

It is probable that the volumes, which I am now about to publish, will fix the atten

tion of a greater number of readers than the detail of observations merely scientific, or than my researches on the population, the commerce, and the mines of New Spain. I may therefore be permitted to enumerate in this place all that we have hitherto published. When several works are interwoven in some sort with each other, it may perhaps be interesting to the reader, to know the sources from which he may obtain more circumstantial information. In the journey of Pallas, which is so remarkable for the precision and depth of his researches, the same Atlas contains geographical maps, the costumes of different nations, relicks of antiquity, and figures of plants and animals. In conformity to the plan of our work, we have distributed these plates into distinct parts; having divided them into the two geographical and physical Atlasses, which belong to the narrative of the travels, and the Political Essay on the Kingdom of New Spain; the Views of the Cordilleras, and the monuments of the natives of America; and the Equinoctial Plants, the Monography of the Melastomas, and the Collection of zoological observations.

As I shall often be obliged to cite these different works, I shall mention in notes the abbreviations, which I have used to indicate the titles.

I. Astronomical observations, trigonometrical operations and barometrical measurements made during the course of a journey to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent * from 1799 to 1804. This work, to which are added historical researches on the position of several points important to navigators, contains, first, the original observations which I made from the 12° of southern, to the 41° of northern latitude; the transits of the sun and stars over the meridian; distances of the moon from the sun and the stars; occultations of the satellites ; eclipses of the sun and moon; transits of mercury over the disk of the sun; azimuths;

* Astron. Observations, two volumes in 4to. I have discussed in the introduction, placed at the head of this work, the choice of the most proper instruments to employ in distant journies, the degree of precision that can be obtained in the different kinds of observations, the peculiar motions of certain great stars of the southern hemisphere, and several methods, the use of which is not sufficiently common among navigators.

circum-meridian altitudes of the moon, to determine the longitude by the differences of the declination; researches on the relative intensity of the light of the austral stars ; geodesical measures, &c. Secondly, a treatise on the astronomical refractions under the torrid zone, considered as the effect of the decrement of caloric in the strata of the air; thirdly, the barometric measurement of the Cordillera of the Andes, of Mexico, of the province of Venezuela, of the kingdom of Quito, and of New Grenada; followed by geological observations, and containing the indication of four hundred and fifty-three heights, calculated, according to the method of Mr. Laplace, and the new coefficient of Mr. Ramond; fourthly, a table of near seven hundred geographical positions on the New Continent; two hundred and thirty-five of which have been determined by my own observations, according to the three coordinates of longitude, latitude, and height.

II. Equinoctial plants collected in Mexico, in the Isle of Cuba, in the provinces of Caraccas, Cumana, and Barcelona, on the Andes of New Grenada, Quito, and Peru,

and on the banks of the Rio Negro, the Oroonoko, and the river of Amazons *. Mr. Bonpland has given the figures of more than forty new genera† of plants of the torrid zone, classed according to their natural families. The methodical descriptions of the species are both in French and in Latin, and accompanied by observations on the medicinal properties of the plants, on their use in the arts, and on the climate of the countries where they are found.

III. Monography of the Melastomas, rhexia, and other genera of this order of plants This work will comprise upwards of a

Equinoctial plants, 2 vols. folio, with more than 120 plates. This number of plates has been greatly augmented since M. de Humboldt wrote this introduction. The number contained in the two volumes will exceed 150. See the prospectus of M. de Humboldt's works, at the end of the volume..

+ We shall cite here only the genera, ceroxylon, marathrum, cassupá, saccellium, cheirostemon, thetiniphyllum, machaonia, limnocharis, bertholetia, exostema, vauquelinia, guardiola, turpinia, salpianthus, hermesia, cladostyles, lilæa, culcitium, espeletia, bonplandia, platycarpum, andromachia, menodora, gaylussaica, podopterus, leucophyllum, angelonia.

Melastomas, 2 vols. folio, with colored plates.