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Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 9.djvu/59

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RECENT GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS.
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intercourse of the world. The extensive explorations "by them in Northern Siberia, and of the rivers that flow into the Arctic. The many journeys, explorations, geographical and archæological, made through Southern Arabia, Persia, Afghanistan, Beloochistan, and the northern regions of India, and explorations of the like character in Burmah, Siam, and Cambodia. The settlement of the French in Cochin-China, and journeys to a partial extent in Corea, and to a greater extent in Mantchooria. The Euphrates Expedition. The continuation of the great survey of India. The survey of Palestine, and the cutting of the Suez Canal.

In Africa: the discovery of the great lakes, as well those which are the reservoirs of the Nile, as those lying south of the equator. The exploration of the country south of Abyssinia, between these lakes and the eastern coast, and the discovery of the great range of mountains in that region, with their snow-capped peaks, the most elevated land in Africa. The military occupation of Abyssinia and of Ashantee by the English; the extensive journeys and researches in Northern and Northeastern Africa, by Barth, Overweg, Richardson, Rohlfs, Schweinfurth, Miani, Nachtigal, and others. The various expeditions and individual journeys along the western coast, and the explorations of its immediate interior by Du Chaillu, Burton, Baines, Blyden, Gandy, Güssfeldt, etc., etc. The two journeys across Central Africa, from east to west, and west to east, by Dr. Livingstone; his journey from the Cape upward; his exploration of the Zambezi, and of the countries by which it is watered; his discovery of the great network of rivers and lakes in Central Africa, below the equator, which he was pursuing at the time of his death, and the following up of that exploration by Lieutenant Cameron, with the latter's journey through Central Africa, from east to west. The numerous explorations in South and Southeastern Africa, from the Orange River to the Limpopo, and from that point along the eastern coast and its interior, as far as the parallel of Zanzibar, which, with the exploration of the imperfectly known parts of the Island of Madagascar by Grandidier and Mullins, is but a very general statement of what has been done in Africa. What exploration has accomplished in Africa may be judged by a single fact. In 1850 the area of cultivated land in Egypt was 2,000,000 of acres; in 1874 it was 5,000,000.

I may next refer to the numerous explorations around and across the great continent of Australia from Sturt's early journey to the last ones of Warburton and Forster. The survey of large portions of the coast of Papua or New Guinea, and explorations in the interior by Beccaria, D'Albertis, Meyer, Van Rosenberg, and MacLeay. The explorations in Formosa by Steere, Le Gendre, and others, and the settlement of colonies and the establishment of governments by the English in New Zealand and the Feejee Islands. The explorations of the Arctic to within sight of the eighty-third parallel of north latitude,