FOURTH REVISED EDITION. A SYSTEM OF MODERN GEOGRAPHY, COMPRISING A DESCRIPTION OF THE PRESENT STATE OF THE WORLD, AND ITS FIVE GREAT DIVISIONS, AMERICA, EUROPE, ASIA, AFRICA AND OCEANICA, WITH THEIR SEVERAL EMPIRES, KINGDOMS, STATES, TERRITORIES, ETC. EMBELLISHED BY NUMEROUS ENGRAVINGS. Entered, according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for Electro-stereotyped by Mumford and Brother, 111 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia. Replacing discarded copy 31958A TO THE FOURTH REVISED EDITION. THE various changes, political and territorial, which have occurred in all quarters of the earth during the past few years, the large number of new geographical discoveries made,—and the great amount of information furnished by the United States' census of 1850-have rendered indispensable a new edition of Mitchell's Geography and Atlas. The present revision has been altogether more thorough and complete than any heretofore attempted. The book has been entirely rewritten, and fully brought up to the present time. Advantage has been taken of many suggestions kindly offered by distinguished practical teachers, to improve the work in its general plan and arrangement; and it is believed it will bear the closest criticism both with reference to its geographical accuracy and adaptation for use as a school manual. The Atlas, accompanying the new edition, contains thirty-two beautiful maps, handsomely colored, and finely executed in the best style of the engraver's art, fully representing all the recent geographical discoveries. With the United States' maps especially, great pains have been taken to exhibit correctly the numerous railroads of the country, new county lines, and the true position of many new and important towns not generally represented in school atlases. New and excellent maps of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Texas, have been introduced. Others, showing the various routes to the Pacific, by the Isthmuses of Panama, Tehuantepec and Nicaragua, are now added, together with a new map of the Sandwich Islands. The information obtained with reference to the new States and Territories west of the Mississippi,-the discoveries of Lieutenant De Haven, in his search for Sir John Franklin,—and those of late travellers in Central and Southern Africa, and in Australia, have been incorporated in the work. In short, it is believed that no discovery or change of any importance for the last ten years, is left unnoticed in this edition. The Atlas also contains nine quarto pages of statistical matter, arranged in tables and compiled from the most authentic sources. The author and publishers, in tendering their grateful acknowledg. ments to the public for the generous support so long extended to their geographical series, confidently anticipate for the present edition an even higher degree of popular favour than that with which former impressions have been everywhere received. (5) 39X1364 INTRODUCTION. GEOGRAPHY is a description of the earth, with its inhabitants and productions. It is not only an entertaining but a highly useful study. It opens and enlarges the mind; gives a true knowledge of the various situations of countries, with their rivers, mountains, &c.; and is of such importance in its connexion with history, that without it that important branch of human knowledge must be very imperfectly understood. Geography must have attracted the attention of mankind at a very early period. The desire to become acquainted with the country they lived in, and to determine and establish its boundaries, would naturally direct their attention to it. The study of Geography will enable young persons, when they hear of distant countries, to tell where they are situated—what are their productions-how they are governed, and what is the character of the inhabitants. To know these things is very important, and will give all who are acquainted with them an advantage over those who do not possess such knowledge. This will be a satisfaction to themselves and to their parents, and prove that they have attended well to their studies. TO THE PUPIL. The engraving on the opposite page is a picture of one side of our earth, as it would appear if seen from a great distance. It rolls like an immense ball through the heavens, surrounded on every side by the planets and the countless myriads of stars, all performing their stated motions, under the guidance of the great Creator who first called them into existence. Men live upon, and are constantly walking about, this great ball, the earth. Cities and towns are built on it; trees and plants grow on it, and ships sail on the sea: yet the earth is all the time turning round and round, like a ball or an apple rolled on the floor, or thrown from you into the air. All this is true; but it is hard to understand. It is done by the power of God, who made us, and all things on the earth, with the sun, the moon, and the vast multitude of stars we see in the sky. "In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth; the heavens, and all the host of them." GEN. i. 2. (6) |