advantages accruing to manufactures from the introduction of the Thibet goat. The skin being first laid out, the different articles produced from it followed in regular order. From the finest portion of the wool very beautiful shawls and stockings were made; a second quality was manufactured into hats which receive any color with great a facility, while the skin itself forms a very good imitation of Morocco leather; the remainder of the hair is appropriated to tooth, flesh, and shaving bushes; the horns are converted into knife and razor handles. On Subterraneous Sounds. ib. M. HUMBOLDT was informed by credible witnesses that subterraneous sounds, like those of an organ, are heard towards sunrise, by those who sleep upon the granite rocks upon the banks of the Oronoko. He supposes them to arise from the difference of temperature between the external air, and the air in the narrow and deep crevices of the shelves of the rocks. During the day these crevices are heated to 48° or 50°. The temperature of their surface was often 39° when that of the air was only 28°. As this difference of temperature will be at a maximum about sunrise, the current of air issuing from the crevices, he imagines, will produce sounds, which may be modified by their impulse against the elastic films of mica that may project into the crevices. The statement has been employed to account for the celebrated tones of the statue of Memnon. Atmospheric Dust. ib. PROFESSOR RAFINESQUE, of Kentucky, in a paper on atmospheric dust, maintains, that an imperceptible dust falls at all times from the atmosphere, and that he has seen it on Mount Etna, on the Alps, on the Allegany and Catskill mountains in America, and also on the ocean. This is the dust which accumulates in our apartments, and renders itself peculiarly visible in the beams of the sun. He has found it to accumulate at the rate of from one fourth of an inch to one inch in a year, but in such a fleecy state, that it could be compressed to one third of its height. He takes the average of the yearly deposit at about one sixth of an inch. Temperature of the High Lands of Asia. ib. IT is well known, that considerable pains have been taken by the Baron de Humboldt and others, to ascertain the temperature of the most elevated regions on the globe, and particularly to fix upon the precise point of perpetual congelation. From the extensive researches of Humboldt, made during a continued series of travels both in Europe and America; from his indefatigable exertions, and the variety and accuracy of his experiments, the opinion seemed to be justified, that he had put the question at rest, and that we might as confidently say, that everlasting snow is found at a certain elevation above the level of the ocean, the latitude being known, as we can pronounce on the certainty of any other physical truth. The height at which the reign of endless frost begins in the equatorial regions is stated at 15,700 feet. This ingenious traveller in his isothermal lines of temperature," and Professor Leslie, in the construction of his tables of "the lower limit of perpetual congelation," seemed to have entertained not the least doubt that the theory was equally applicable to every region of the globe. Nor did their readers and admirers give a very reluctant assent to the correctness of the principles, which were supposed to be supported by too many unquestionable facts to be ever overthrown. Recent experiments made on those immense mountains which separate Nepaul from Tartary, show that the theory, which had gained so much credit, and was well supported by observations on the mountains of Europe and America, is utterly inapplicable to those elevated regions of Asia. From the observation of Capt. Webb, as stated in a late Quarterly Review it appears, that at a place called the Nitee Pass, situated 16,814 feet above the level of the sea, on the 21 of August, not "a vestige of snow appeared in the Ghaut, nor on the projecting shoulder of the mountain ridge, rising about 300 feet on the left or western side of the pass; so that we may assume the height of the lower point of congelation, on the northern side of the Himalaya Mountains, at not less than seventeen thousand feet!" Although "on the southern face of this enormous chain the lower point of perpetual congelation, differs very considerably from that on the opposite side;" yet "neither on the southern face does the line of perpetual snow agree with the theory of Humboldt, Leslie, Kirwan, or any of the tables constructed in Europe. Thus Kedar-nath, on the verge of perpetual snow, was found to be 11,897 feet above Calcutta, or 12,000 feet above the level of the sea; being about 700 feet higher than Leslie's table would give for the height of this temple." Captain Webb had previously ascertained that the village and temple of Milem, in lat. 30° 25′ were, one 11,512, the other 11,790 feet above the sea, both of which, according to theory, would have been some hundreds of feet within the limit of perpetual snow; yet here he found extensive fields of buck wheat and Tartaric barley, occupying the space between the village and the temple. The following year, on the 21st of June 1818, on a ridge of mountains south of the Dauli river, he ascertained, barometrically, the elevation to be 11,790 feet above the sea, being considerably within the limit of eternal snow according to theory; yet, says Mr. Colebrook, "his encampment, where the observation was made, was surrounded by flourishing woods of hoary oaks, long-leaved pine, and arborescent rhododendron; and the surface was clothed with a rank vegetation of herbs." "Nay, more, from an observation made the following day, on the summit of the Pilgointichurhai Pass, he concluded the elevation to be more than 12,700 feet above the level of the sea, yet no snow was visible, and the black soil was clad with creeping plants, and flowering shrubs in luxuriant abundance; and the shoulder of a mountain, on the one hand, rising still higher, was without a vestige of snow, and appeared, as far as the view extended through the mist, enamelled * No. 44, pp. 417, &c. with flowers; on the other hand a sloping declivity exhibited a forest of birch, pine, and rhododendron." We continue in the words of the Reviewer. "Whatever be the cause, it is now pretty certain, that an extraordinary degree of heat does prevail in the summer months on the elevated plain of Tartary; otherwise, the point of the curve of congelation, in the 30th parallel of latitude, could not be higher here, as it is, than under the equator on the continent of America, for the limit of perpetual snow on the side of Chimboraco is, according to the observtions of Baron de Humboldt, at an elevation of 15,747 feet, whereas, that in Nitee Ghaut is, as we have seen, at not less than 17,000 feet, or 1,253 feet higher than the former, and at 5,500 feet, or more than a mile higher than it ought to be in that parallel of latitude according to the table constructed by Professor Leslie. "The only explanation, which this anomaly seems to admit, is just contrary to that which would be applied to the comparatively small mountain masses of Europe, or other parts of the world; as in the instances of the Pic of Teneriffe, and the Abyssinian Geesh, the one at 13,000 having no snow for three or four months; the other, by Bruce's account, from 14,000 to 15,000 feet, being without snow at all times, owing, it is thought, to their peaked forms and their proximity to the sea. In the Himalaya and its northern plateau we have a vast extent of elevated land, which rises out of central Asia, as M. Pauw has observed, like the boss of a shield; whose extensive surface, instead of cooling the superincumbent atmosphere, has the effect of raising its temperature by the radiation of the heat collected from the rays of the summer sun; while the surfaces of slender pointed peaks, affording not the means of such radiation, suffer the heat to mount into the higher strata, where the capacity for caloric is greater. M. de Humboldt observes that these mountainous ranges of central Asia, and the vast plains which they support, form an immense mass of elevated land, stretching from Daouria on the East to Belur-tagh on the West, through forty seven degrees of longitude,-and from the Altai on the North to the Himalaya on the South, a mean breadth of twenty degrees of latitude:-presenting thus a surface of regions more or less elevated, equal to 3,266,500 square British miles, scarcely one of which is known in modern times, though it formerly contained the flourishing cities of Balk, Samarcand, Bokhara, Cashgar, &c. and was, as some have conjectured, the cradle of the human race. The Kylas, however, which joins the Himalaya in an acute angle, within the sides of which is the sacred lake of Manasarowar, appears to be the highest ridge; for behind it the waters flow northerly, by northwesterly, and northeasterly; shewing that in all these directions this vast plain declines in gradual slope, interrupted only by insulated mountain masses, or broken ranges. In crossing one of the gorges of the Kylas on the 15th and 16th of July, Moorcroft experienced a hard frost at night, beds of frozen snow lay in the ravines, and splashes of snow half melted in various parts, all which denoted a higher elevation than the Nitee pass. Baron de Humboldt further observes, that the Cordilleras of the Andes, though they extend from north to south one hundred and twenty degrees of latitude, are not more, generally speaking, than from two to three, and very rarely from four to five degrees in breadth. It was no doubt a want of co sideration of this great difference in the extent of surface, that led th Baron to make the erroneous comparison of the elevation of the great plateau of Tartary with that of the province of Los Pastos, in the Andes, the mean height of which he states only at, 5000 metres, o 9,928 English feet. "This conclusion of his is the more remarkable, as the explanation which we have offered of the high degree of temperature, at the extraordinary elevation of the plains of Tartary, seems to coincide with the doctrine laid down in Humboldt's Essay on Isothermal lines. 'As the heat,' he says, "of high regions of the atmosphere depends on the radiation of the plains, it is conceived that, under the same geographical parallels, one may not find, in the system of trans-atlantic climates, the isothermal lines at the same elevation above the level of the sea, as in the system of European climates.' Had this observation on the difference caused by the radiation of plain surfaces occurred to him, when writing on the height of the plains of Tartary, he would scarcely have thought of comparing the effects of the latter with those of the very circumscribed plains of Los Pastos. "Besides, the extraordinary effect produced by radiation on elevated plains of vast extent, had been demonstrated by him, in the instance of the great height which the line of perpetual congelation reaches on the mountains rising out of the plain of Mexico. This line he finds by actual experiment to be, in lat. 19°-20°, at 15,090 feet above the level of the sea, which is much higher than it ought to be according to theory; by Professor Leslie's table it would only be at 18,560 feet, making a difference of 1,530 feet, occasioned, no doubt, by the radiation of the plain. This effect is also obvious from the small difference in the height of the lower point of congelation on the side of Chimboraco, nearly under the equator, and on the mountains of Mexico in 20° of north latitude; the former being 15,746, and the latter 15,090 feet, making a difference only, in twenty degrees difference of latitude, of 656 feet,-whereas according to Leslie's table, the difference ought to be, 1,729 feet." OBITUARY. DIED, At Quincy, Ms. MADAM SARAH APTHORP, aged 84, relict of the late James Apthorp, Esq. At Malden, Mrs. PHEBE SARGENT, aged 94. In Quebec, Col. COUNT DUPRE, aged 90. He is said to have been second in command of the Canadian militia during the siege of Quebec in 1775—6. At Robbinstown, Me. a Child of Mr. Shallady, aged 7 years. His death was occasioned by drinking rum, given him by some older boys to make sport. At New-Brunswick, N. J. the REV. LEVERETT I. F. HUNTINGTON, Pastor of the Presbyterian Church in that city. Near Detroit LIEUT. FISHER, murdered in a duel with Capt. Farley. In Poland, GEN. SIERAKOWSKI. His interment was attended by the Grand Duke Constantine, brother of the Emperor Alexander. At Beverly, MOSES BROWN, Eso, aged 72. March 16, 1820. Father Hoyt and sister Sarah left Brainerd on a journey to Tallony; he on business relating to the projected school there, and she chiefly as a nurse, he being in a very feeble state of health. 18. Brother Reece being invited into the little room, where we keep the clothing sent for the use of the mission, and looking round upon the articles as they were laid up in their several apartments, was soon observed to be suffused with tears. Observing that he was noticed, he said, with a heart so full that he could scarcely speak, "I cannot keep from weeping, when I see what the good people are doing for us poor heathens. It makes me astonished to think we are so hard hearted and stupid, when others are thinking and doing so much for us." Another boat load of corn arrived at our ware-house, containing about 1000 bushels. This is from the same man, who brought the 1500 bushels last winter, which got wet in the boats, and is designed to make up the deficiency of that, the greatest part of which was so damaged as to be unfit to eat, immediately after the warm weather commenced. 20. Brother Chamberlain went out for the purpose of inquiring into the expediency of immediately commencing a local school, in the vicinity of Fort Armstrong, with instructions to make arrangements for said school, if, in his opinion when on the spot, appearances are as favorable, and the case as urgent, as they have been represented. 24. Brother and sister Conger returned from Father Gambold's. She has been very low, for a time apparently near the grave, and is still very feeble; but through the mercy of God, she is so far recovered, that she appears to have sustained no injury from riding home. This evening brother Chamberlain returned from Fort Armstrong. In his opinion it is a very favorable and important time to establish a local school there. In an interview with the principal chief of that district, brother C. inquired, if the people wanted a school. He answered by the interpreter, that they did not merely want a school, but that they wanted one very much. He said, they would be very glad of a large school, like that at Brainerd, and proposed a place for it on the Coosa river, where he said supplies of all kinds might be brought by water. On being told, we were not able to give them such a school,at least for the present,-but could only furnish a teacher for such children as could board at home, he said they would be very thankful for such a school: that he had a small cabin, situated precisely where they wanted the school, which he would give for the use of the teacher; and that himself and neighbors would build the school house. So far as could be ascertained, the chief spoke the mind of the whole district. All were agreed, that it would be best to have the school at the place named by the chief, which is on the Chatooga creek, about six or eight miles from Fort Armstrong; and brother C. gave encouragement to send a teacher in a few days. He also understood, that the Path Killer intended soon to ask for such a school in his neighborhood. This aged warrior and king, is telling his people, wherever he goes, that schools are very good for them, and they must keep their children at school until their teachers say they have learned enough; winch, he tells them, will require at least four years. This venerable old man, VOL. XVI. 40 |