The European islands are numerous, and some of them extensive and highly important. On the west in the Atlantic Ocean, are the Azores, situated about thir teen degrees west of Cape St Vincent in Portugal. Though frequently classed under Africa, they more pro perly belong to Europe, to which they are nearer, front which they were peopled, and to which they have always been subject. The British isles, consisting of Great Britain and Ireland, with the numerous circumjacent islands belonging to them, the seat of the greatest and most powerful empire on the face of the earth. The Faroe islands, belonging to the crown of Denmark. The large and celebrated island of Iceland, subject to the same power, lying about 400 miles from the continent in the Western Ocean ; and numerous other but unim portant islands on the Norwegian coast. In the great Northern Sea, the chief and most extensive are the remote and dreary and almost uninhabited islands of Nova Zembla and Spiizbergen. In the Baltic Sea, are the islands of Denmark, Zealand, the chief seat of the Danish monarchy, Funen, Laland, Talster, Bornholm, &c. ; the islands of Rugen, Oeland, Gothland, and Aland, belonging to Sweden ; and those of Cronstadt, Oesal, Dago, &c. subject to Russia. In the Mediterranean, are the islands of Majorca and Minorca, of Corsica and Sardinia, the large and fertile island of Sicily, Malta, Camila the ancient Crete, Ncgropont the ancient Eu bcea, with the numerous other islands of the Grecian Archipelago.
Europe contains numerous peninsulas. Some of its finest and most celebrated regions are peninsular. Be sides innumerable Utilers of lesser extent and import ance, we may notice Criin-Tartary in the Black Sea ; the peninsulas of Greece and of Italy in the Mediter ranean ; Spain and Portugal, contained between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic ; and Jutland, formed by the Atlantic and the Baltic. We may include also Scan dinavia, which is only a large peninsula formed by the Baltic and the Northern Ocean.
The mountains of Europe do not form ridges of such vast extent as those Asia, and arc much inferior in height to those in Thibet and in South America. Of the European mountains, the Alps undoubtedly hold the first place. They extend, in a kind of semicircular form, from the Gulf of Genoa, through Switzerland, which contains their centre and highest parts, and ter minate in the Cantle Alps, on the north of the Adriatic Sea—a length of about 550 British miles. Mount Blanc, the highest point of the Alpine chain, and the greatest elevation of the ancient continent, rises 15 662 feet above the level of the sea. Next to the Alps are the Pyrenees, which divide France from Spain, extending between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. Mont Perch', which is considered as the highest elevation of the Pyrenees, as cends above the level of the sea about 11,000 feet. Be tween Norway and Sweden runs the extensive Scandi navian chain, known by distinct appellations as it passes through different provinces. The elevation of these mountains have not been very accurately ascertained ; hut they do not equal the Alps, or even the Pyrenees. The grand and extensive ridge of the Carpathian moun tains extends, in a semicircular form, from the mountain of Javornick, south of Silesia, hounds Hungary on the north and east, and sends off branches to Tiansylvama and Wallachia. Its whole circuit may be about 500
miles ; and the highest summits of these mountains do not exceed 8000 or 9e00 feet. On the south of the Danube, in Turkey, runs the grand range of the mus, stretching from Emilie)) to the south of Servia, a tract of 400 miles, known under various names. From the western extremity of the Ilxmus branch off two other extensive chains, one running between Dalmatia and Bosnia ; the other passing south, and forming the mountains of Albania on the west of Greece. The Ap penines, branching off from the Alps near Ormea, sepa rate the plains of Piedmont float the sea, and stretch, in one extensive and uninterrupted chain, through the whole length of Italy to its farthest extremities. Of the volcanic mountains of Europe, mount liAna, in Sicily, claims the first distinction. The other volcanoes are those of mount Vesuvius near Naples, and mount Ilecla in Iceland. The islands of Lipari, to the north of Sicily, also contain many volcanoes, of which Stromboli is the chief. The Europe]) mountains which we have enume rated, with various others of inferior importance, will be more minutely described under their own names, or un der the different countries to which they belong.
On the west of Europe flows the great Atlantic Ocean, which separates it from the new continent of America. To different pacts of this sea local names have been given, from the coasts washed by its waves : As the German Sea, flowing between Great Britain and the opposite shores of Germany and Denmark ; the British Channel, between the south of England and the coast of France; St George's Channel and the Irish Sea, between Great Britain and Ireland ; the Bay of Biscay, betw een France and Spain, &c. On the Eu ropean coasts of the Atlantic Ocean are various exten sive banks or shoals, the resort of cod and other fish, which prove a useful source of industry and subsistence to the inhabitants. To the north of Europe lies the Arctic Ocean, extending over the polar regions, the dreary and solitary abode of cold and of ice ; yet even this enormous and apparently barren waste furnishes a fertile source of provisions for the human race. Here the vast and innumerable tribes of herrings find a re treat from their numerous foes, and breed their mil lions in security. About the middle of winter they crime forth from their retreat, and spread themselves in three divisions. One directs its course westward, and reaches the shores of America ; another smaller squa dron passes through the Straits of Beering, and visits the north-eastern coasts of Asia. The principal division reaches Iceland about the beginning of March, in a close shoal of surprising depth, and of such extent, that its surface is supposed to equal the dimensions of Great Britain and Ireland. They are afterwards, however, sub divided into numerous smaller columns of five or six miles in length, and three or four in breadth, which ar rive during spring and summer on different parts of the not th western coasts of Europe. The whale fisheries, too, which these northern seas supply, is another source of considerable wealth to various of the European nations.