Such are the most recent discoveries in this portion of Africa.

The settlement of the Cape of Good Hope, originally established by the Dutch, and at present in possession of the English, was naturally the point from which European travellers set out to explore the southern parts of Africa.  Their progress hitherto has not been great, though, as far as they have advanced, the information they have acquired of the face of the country, its productions, the tribes which inhabit it, and their habits, manners, &c. may be regarded as full and accurate.  The principal travellers who have visited this part of Africa, and from whose travels the best information may be obtained of the settlement of the Cape, and of the country to the north of it for about 900 miles, are Kolbein, Sparman, Le Vaillant, Barrow, Lichtenstein, La Trobe, Campbell, and Burcheli.  To the geography of the east coast of Africa, and of the adjacent districts, little or no addition has been made for a very considerable length of time.

II.  The discoveries in Asia may in general be divided into those which the vast possessions of the Russians in this quarter of the globe, and the corresponding interest which they felt to become better acquainted with them, induced them to make, and into those to which the English were stimulated, and which they were enabled to perform, from the circumstance of their vast, important, and increasing possessions in Hindostan.

The most important and instructive travels which spring from the first source, are those of Bell of Antermony, Pallas, Grnelin, Guldenstedt, Lepechin, &c.  Bell was a Scotchman, attached to the Russian service:  his work, which was published about the middle of the last century, contains an account of the embassy sent by Peter the Great to the emperor of China, and of another embassy into Persia; of an expedition to Derbent by the Russian army, and of a journey to Constantinople.  Of the route in all these directions he gives an interesting and accurate account, as well as of the manners, &c. of the people.  Indeed, it is a valuable work, especially that portion of it which conducts us through the central parts of Asia,—­an immense district, which, as we have already remarked, is not much better known at present, (at least considerable portions of it,) than it was three or four centuries ago.  The travels of Pallas, &c. were undertaken by order of the Russian government, for the purpose of gaining a fuller and more accurate account of the provinces of that immense empire, especially those to the south, which, from climate, soil, and productions were most valuable, and most capable of improvement.