Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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It Is, Perhaps, Scarcely Necessary To Remind The Reader That Since
The Time When This Work Was First Published In
Paris, the
separation of the Spanish Colonies from the mother-country,
together with subsequent political events, have wrought great
changes
In the governments of the South American States, as well as
in the social condition of their inhabitants. One consequence of
these changes has been to render obsolete some facts and
observations relating to subjects, political, commercial, and
statistical, interspersed through this work. However useful such
matter might have been on its original publication, it is wholly
irrelevant to the existing state of things, and consequently it has
been deemed advisable to omit it. By this curtailment, together
with that of some meteorological tables and discussions of very
limited interest, the work has been divested of its somewhat
lengthy and discursive character, and condensed within dimensions
better adapted to the taste and requirements of the present time.
An English translation of this work by Helen Maria Williams, was
published many years ago, and is now out of print. Though faultless
as respects correctness of interpretation, it abounds in foreign
turns of expression, and is somewhat deficient in that fluency of
style without which a translated work is unsatisfactory to the
English reader. In the edition now presented to the public it is
hoped that these objections are in some degree removed.
A careful English version is given of all the Spanish and
Portuguese terms, phrases, and quotations which occur in this work.
Though the author has only in some few instances given a French
translation of these passages, yet it is presumed that the
interpretation of the whole in English will not be deemed
superfluous; this new edition of the "Personal Narrative" having
been undertaken with the view of presenting the work in the form
best suited for the instruction and entertainment of the general
reader.
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