Travels in South America, from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean, The Amazon and Madeira Rivers: Sketches and Descriptions from the Note-book of an Explorer Two Years in Peru, with Exploration of its Antiquities

Abstract

WE notice these three works together, because to a considerable extent the first-mentioned embraces the ground gone over by the other two. Like Mr. Hutchinson, M. Marcoy devotes considerable space to the prehistoric antiquities and native populations of Peru, and, like Mr. Keller, the French traveller has much to say on the hydrography of the Amazon, on its fauna and flora, and on some of the numerous tribes that people the region contained within its vast basin. Of the three writers, M. Marcoy alone can be called a professional traveller,—at least, he appears as such in the present narrative; while Messrs. Keller and Hutchinson only took advantage of their vocation calling trnm to South America, to investigate what interested them in the particular regions which they visited. It is very gratifying to find men who do not profess to devote their lives to the advancement of scientific knowledge, so willing and competent as this engineer and this consul are to add to its sum. The number of such unprofessional—if we may so call them—advancers of scientific knowledge has in recent years been gradually increasing; and we hope that with improved systems of education, both in Europe and in America, systems in which a training in science will have a prominent place, such scientific volunteers will become more and more numerous. Considering the large number of Englishmen alone who occupy positions in our own colonies and other foreign countries, in the midst of districts of which we have very little accurate knowledge, what a rich harvest might be expected if only one half of them had the scientific training to be obtained at a German Realschule!

Travels in South America from, the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean,

By Paul Marcoy. Illustrated by 525 engravings and ten maps. Two vols. (London: Blackie and Son, 1875.)

The Amazon and Madeira Rivers: Sketches and Descriptions from the Note-book of an Explorer.

By Franz Keller. With sixty-eight illustrations on wood. (London: Chapman and Hall, 1874.)

Two Years in Peru, with Exploration of its Antiquities.

By T. J. Hutchinson. With map and numerous illustrations. Two vols. (London: Sampson Low, 1873.)