the high lands, graduates from indifferent to good, and becomes excellent, especially in the whole length of the left bank, and still more in proceeding towards the Marodi.

The lands are covered with trees of different kinds, well adapted in general for all the purposes of timber. Hurricanes and the yellow fever are unknown in Guiana. The country is intersected with rivers that disembogue into the Mana and the Maroni, and are either already navigable, or capable of being easily made so.

The thirteen falls in the Mana, in the distance between eleven leagues above its mouth to an advance of about fifty more, may be passed over at all times by canoes and flat-bottomed boats. In the rainy season the falls disappear, and there is a sufficiently strong current of

the commissioners were unable to execute, penetrating further into the interior, and by surmounting the heights, to get at the source of the Oyapock; but the rainy season approaching, and with it the rise of the rivers, these were obstacles which, in an unknown country, could not be overcome. It is, however, intended, by means of the establishments already fixed on the Mana, to ac complish the whole object of the commission.

The principal aim has already been attained, as the commandant and governor-general for the king at Cayenne, has signified in a letter to Baron Portal.

Between the Mana and the Maroni, and especially from the 5 degrees to the 4 degrees of north latitude, the whole country is accessible, and presents so many circumstances subservient to the advantages of population and industry, that, considering the extent, it would be difficult to find a space parallel to it on the surface of the globe.

Notwithstanding the fatigues inseparable from such an expedition, not one of those who enbarked in it suffered from any bodily complaint.

Some difficulties will, at first, attend getting inured to the climate, but with the precautions recommended by M. le Baron Laussat, these will be very much lessened.

M. Laussat, the governor, gives it as his opinion that the new colony, differing totally from the one actually established in all its local relations, should form a go vernment altogether separate and distinct.

In conclusion, the possibility of forming a colony of French

families and cultivators on the left bank of the Mana is announced as an incontrovertible fact.

The baron then touches on certain preparatory measures that would be requisite, and terminates his paper by an address to

the king, requesting his majesty to authorise him, in concert with a commission to be appointed, to investigate the plan and means of colonising a settlement on the Mana.

A letter from M. F. Caillaud, dated the 11th of July last, 1821, has been received in Paris, written from Senaar.

"In my preceding letter from Assour," says M. Caillaud, "I made you acquainted with the discovery of forty pyramids, part of 45 of which I have taken the dimensions. I have also seen traces of a town, the remains of a great temple with six sphynx-lions cut in brown free-stone. Discoveries since made, confirm me in the opinion that this was the position of Meroë, and that the peninsula which is formed between the Nile of Bruce and the river Atbara, is in reality the Isle Meroë of the ancients. I remained fourteen days there among numerous pyramids, and took many plans and copies of hieroglyphics. These pyramids are to the east; all, with the exception of one, have a little sanctuary towards the same quarter. Leaving that place, we arrived, after one day's march, at Chendi; I found the army on the left bank of the river, about three quarters of a day's march from Chendi. To the north of Webete Naga are still fifteen other pyramids, but they have no sanctuary, nor edges at the corners, as the last had. They were in size about the same as the middling ones among those first mentioned.

After nine days march from Chendi, we arrived at the mouth of the White River; we were the first Europeans who had ever seen it, though Bruce was very close to it. Its mouth is narrow, about 4 or 500 paces wide, but about half a league more to the southward it greatly enlarges itself. This river, and not that seen by Bruce, is, I believe, the main branch, and in consequence the real Nile. I am more than ever decided to follow it, and to discover all that is interesting belonging to it.-Shall I succeed in reaching its source, or not? I am far from calculating on the success of such a project. The province of El Aïse, on the White River, terminates at the height of Senaar; it is inhabited by poor Musulmen fishermen. Farther to the south is a pagan race of people who are said to be anthropophagi, and to use poisoned arrows, &c. We have determined the latitude and longitude of the White River; I have reason to be satisfied with our observations, to take which we spared no pains. In threc days the Pacha passed with his army over the White River, to follow his route on the peninsula of Senaar. To lose nothing of the two banks of the Nile of Bruce, M. Letorzec continued his route with the army, and I

ascended in a bark that I might observe the right bank. At one day's journey to the south of the mouth of the White River I found, under the name of Soba, an immense space covered with ruins and hillocks of baked brick, the position no doubt of a great city. The name of Soba given to these ruins bears an analogy with the ancient Saba. Among them I found nothing, save à sphynx-lion in hard freestone, tinged with oxide of iron, in the Egyptian style. I have visited the mouth of the Ratte (Rahhad) and of the Dender rivers, which swell the stream of the Nile. Bruce is erroneous in placing the mouth of the Dender in the Katte; both run into the Nile. The entire peninsula formed on the east by the Dender, and on the west by the Nile of Bruce, bears the name of Gaba. I think I have found the real Ibis of the ancients. It is very common in the Isle of Meroë: I have preserved several, for the feathers and skeletons. Be not astonished if the name of Meroë has been given to the mountain Barkal: a colony might have descended there after the fall of Meroë. Two Englishmen and M. Frediani, who saw those antiquities a little time before me, no doubt flattered themselves that they had found the Isle of Meroë, but they were mistaken: the real discovery belongs to me, and I arrived alone at it fourteen days before the army. I have not spoken yet of the ruins of Christian churches abandoned by the Copts; that in the best preservation is at Dongola el Agouz, the old Dongola. On the fine and rich Isle of Argo are the remains of three other churches, with granite Ionic co

lumns, having the Greek cross as an ornament of the chapiters. On more than thirty rocks which form the Isles of the cataract of Wolad el Atfe (Wadi Hulfa) are other Christian ruins. In the province of Chaguy there are yet some with columns of granite, and others in Barber and Chendi. To this place there are four cata. racts or rapids: that of Assouan; that of Wolad el Atfe, which finishes in the province of Socot, 57 leagues from Wolad el Atfe, but for the greater part of this distance the Nile is clear and navigable. The third is at Hanneke, at the entrance of the king. dom of Dongola: this is a very small one. The fourth is in the province of Chaguy: this is larger, and is forty-five leagues from one extremity to the other. For three parts of the distance all is rocky. These cataracts have not any remarkable fall; they are very rapid, and obstructed in all parts by vast rocks of black granite, and a rock amphibolic, and full of feldspar, black and greenish. Ismael Pacha brought up 120 barks to this place, where they remained when the waters were low. Some small barks, however, mounted the river to Senaar, but this was looked upon as a grand effort. Now the Nile begins to rise, we expect larger vessels up. At the extremity of this cataract, in the province of Rabatate, during the time when the waters are low, there is a fall of water occupying three quarters of the breadth of the river, and three metres in descent; two more, very rapid, are at Gebel Môli and Râs el Kelb: it is situated in the elbow which the Nile makes to the north and north-west. We must pay a due

tribute of praise to D'Anville, whose map of this part of the river was exact. It was here for the first time since my leaving Europe, that I saw a mountain covered with wood and verdure: it was about 400 feet high. The eye, fatigued by the wild aspect of the mountains of Egypt, reposed upon it with pleasure. The cloudy sky, the rolling of the thunder, all reminded us of Europe. What a contrast with the arid and burning hills of Egypt, of Nubia and the surrounding

deserts, where the eye can perceive no trace of vegetation! We now enter upon the rainy season, which lasts three months. We have already had violent storms, and frequently thunder. We shall pass that season here, where there are no antiquities, and I despair of finding any higher up. The limits of the rains are placed too much to the south, they are really 18 deg. 40 min. in the province of Rabatate, and not in 16 deg. as Bruce makes them."

ΤΗ NHIBET Goats.-The Société d'Emulation having appointed a committee to report on the state of the Thibet goats, at present kept near Belbeuf, have decided that the climate of France agrees very well with those animals, that they do not seem to degenerate, but their hair appears to possess all the qualities necessary to the manufacture of the much-admired shawls. These goats are easy to feed, and have nothing of the disagreeable qualities of the common goats. Their milk is richer, and the male has not that strong odour which marks these animals in general. They do not seem to be subject to any particular disorders, and multiply with rapidity. From attempts already made, it seems that by crossing their breed with that of the indigenous race, great advantages will be obtained.

The Leech of Ceylon.-This animal is seldom more than half an inch in length, and is nearly semitransparent. It is very active, and is said occasionally to spring. Its powers of contraction and extension are very great when fully extended, it is like a fine cord, and its point is so sharp, that it easily makes its way through very small openings. It is supposed to have an acute sense of smell, for no sooner does a person stop where leeches abound, than they appear to crowd eagerly to the spot from all quarters. "Those who have had no experience of these animals," says Dr. Davy, "of their immense numbers in their favourite haunts,—of their activity, keen appetite, and love of blood, can have no idea of the kind and extent of annoyance they are to travellers in the interior, of which they may be truly