Chronometric connection of the city of Quito with Tomependa, on the upper course of the Amazon River, and the Callao de Lima, the position of which was accurately determined by the transit of Mercury on the 9th of November, 1802—p. 428. On the tedious court ceremonies. of the Incas. Atahuallpa’s imprisonment and unavailing ransom—p. 429. Free-thinking of the Inca Huayna Capac. Philosophical doubts on the official worship of the sun, and obstacles to the diffusion of knowledge among the lower and poorer classes of people, according to the testimony of Padre Blas Valera—p. 431. Raleigh’s project for the restoration of the Inca dynasty under English protection, which should be granted for an annual tribute of several hundred thousand pounds—p. 432. Columbus’ earliest evidence of the existence of the Pacific. It was first seen on the 25th of September, 1513, by Vasco Nunez de Balboa, and first navigated by Alonso Martin de Don Benito—p. 432. On the possibility of constructing an Oceanic canal through the isthmus of Panama (with fewer locks than the Caledonian Canal). Points, the exploration of which has been hitherto totally neglected—p. 435. Determination of the longitude of Lima—p. 435. ON STEPPES AND DESERTS. At the foot of the lofty granitic range which, in the early age of our planet, resisted the irruption of the waters on the formation of the Caribbean Gulf, extends a vast and boundless plain. When the traveller turns from the Alpine valleys of Caracas, and the island-studded lake of Tacarigua[1], whose waters reflect the forms of the neighbouring bananas,—when he leaves the fields verdant with the light and tender green of the Tahitian sugar-cane, or the sombre shade of the cacoa groves,—his eye rests in the south on Steppes, whose seeming elevations disappear in the distant horizon. From the rich luxuriance of organic life the astonished traveller suddenly finds himself on the dreary margin of a treeless waste. Nor hill, nor cliff rears its head, like an island in the ocean, above the boundless plain: only here and there broken strata of floetz, extending over a surface of two hundred square miles, (more than three thousand English square miles[C],) appear sensibly higher than the surrounding district. The natives term them _banks_[2], as if the spirit of language would convey some record of that ancient condition of the world, when these elevations formed the shoals, and the Steppes themselves the bottom, of some vast inland sea.