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mayor, with a market on Tuesday. The church
is large, and was formerly collegiate. It is seated
on the Ash, near its confluence with the Stour,
14 m. S.W. of Canterbury, and 55 S. E. of London.
Pop. in 1821, 2,773.
Ashland, ph. Montgomery township, Richland
Co. Ohio, 90 m. from Columbus.
Ashmunein, a town of Egypt, built on the ruins
of a city, supposed to be the ancient Hermopolis,
on the left bank of the Nile', 140 m. S. S. W. of
Cairo. Long. 31. 7. E. lat. 28. 10. N.
Ashnagur, a town of Hindoostan, in the prov-
ince of Uabul, seated on the Kameh, 80 m. N.
xc2xbbf Attock, and 110 S. E. of Cabul.
Ashtabula, a County at the N. E. extremity of
Ohio, bordering on fake Erie. Pop. 14,584. Jef-
ferson is the chief town.
Ashtabula, ph. in the above County, on L. Erie,
200 m. from Columbus. It has a good harbour
and is a flourishing town.
Ashtabula, a stream of Ohio, about 30 m. in
length, running into L. Erie.
Ashton-under-line, a town and populous parish
of Lancashire, Eng.; the town is seated on a
high bank which rises from the river Tame, 7 m.
east of Manchester. The parish is divided into
four districts, viz. that of the town, which in 1821
contained 9,225 inhab. Audenshaw, 3,781, Harts-
head, 9,137, and Knott-Lanes, 3,827: total 25,967,
forming together one of the most important seats
of the cotton manufacture, containing upwards of
60 large establishments for spinning and machine-
weaving, four iron and brass foundries, as many
machine manufactories, and about 30 establish-
ments for the manufacture of hats. It has also
extensive collieries in its vicinity, and it is inter-
sected by the Manchester, and the Huddersfield
and Peat Forest canals. The foundation stone of
anew church in the gothic style was laid in 1821.
There are 16 other towns or villages in different
parts of England named Ashton, or to which it is
prefixed.
Askuelot, r. Cheshire Co. N. Hampshire, flows
S. W. into the Connecticut.
Asm, one of the three grand divisions of the
eastern hemisphere; its boundaries are so exceed-
ingly irregular as to render it difficult to convey
an accurate idea of its position, limits, and extent,
except by a map; it lies however wholly north
of the equator. Point Romaine, the most souther-
ly point of the Malaya promontory, being in lat.
1. 23. 30. N. Bounded on the north by the Arctic
Ocean, or as a medial line by the 70th deg. of N.
lat. from west to east it extends in its extreme
limits from the Dardanelles in 26. to Behring’s
straits in 190. E. but exclusive of the promonto-
ries of Natolia, Hindoostan, Malaya, Kamschatka,
and the islands under the equator, Asia may be
considered as lying between the 15th and 701.1*
deg. of N. lat. and the 40th and 130th of E. long,
and containing an area of about 11,000,000 of sq
m. Asia is separated from Europe on the wins!
by the Ural mountains, extending from the line
of the Arctic circle in the long, of 63. E. bearing
winst to the long. 54. in the lat. of 63. from which
point they again bear to the east to the long, of
59. in the fat of 55., from which point, while the
Ural mountains run in a parallel line with the
59th of long, the Asiatic boundary becomes part-
ly conventional, bearing west to the sea of Asoph;
from which, the Black Sea, the Sea of Marmora,
the Dardanelles, and Levant, form the winstern
boundary to the isthmus of Suez which separates
h from Africa xe2x80xa2 the Arabian gulf or Red Sea. |
then forms the remainder of its western bounda-
ry, and the Arabian Sea, Indian Ocean, and Chi-
na Sea, bounds it on the south, and the North
Pacific Ocean on the east, and the Arctic. Ocean
as previously stated, forms its northern boundary;
this vast extent of territory is divided into 11
great parts, viz. Siberia, Chinese Tartary, China,
Thibet, Western or Independent Tartary, the
iBirman empire, Hindoostan, Persia, Arabia, Asiat-
ic Turkey, and Japan, the latter being exclusive-
ly insular. Several noble rivers flow in various
directions; the Obi, the Ynessei and Lena, fall
into the Arctic Ocean, the Amoor or Saghalien,
into the sea of Ochotsk, in the North Pacific, the
Yellow and Great Rivers intersect China from
west to east falling into the bay of Nankin, and
the Ganges, Indus, and Euphrates flowing from
north to south; but it is worthy of remark, tha*
neither in Asia or Europe, or in either of the two
grand divisions of the western hemisphere, are
there any rivers of importance that flow from east
to west, whilst in Africa there are none that flow
from west to east.
Although the rivers ofj Asia do not vie in mag-
nificence with those of the western hemisphere,
Asia far exceeds it in the magnificence of its
mountains. The Himalaya range which separates
Hindoostan from Tartary in the fat. of 29. N
rises to the prodigious height of 27,677 ft. above
the level of the sea; the Ural ridge extends in a
uniform and unbroken chain, from the line of the
Arctic circle to the sea of Aral, and although not
rising higher than about 4,500 ft. they are em-
phatically denominated by the Russians, the back,
and by the Tartars, the girdle of the world; the
Altaian chain intersects the entire territory in a
N. E. direction, from the Arabian Sea to the eact*
cape in Behring’s straits, and in the lat. of 49. N.
rises to the height of 12.800 ft. and M.mnls Cau-
casus, Taurus, Ararat. &c. &c. spread over the
western part of Asia, rising to itn height of 8 to
10,000 ft. The Caspian, Baikal, and sea of Ara7,
are the only inland winters "jiet merit notice in
this place, and when compr/ed with those of the
north division of the we-hem hemisphere, they
are very insignificant. The islands of the east-
ern ocean are so numerous, and so diffusely scat-
tered, as to render fa difficult to decide which prop-
erly belong to A ti?, and which do not; those
however wffifah admit of no dispute may be enu-
merated as fo’iows, beginning at the north : viz.
Saghalien, .ffisuo, the Japanese, Loo Choo, For-
mosa, F. cf ran, the Philippines, Borneo, Cele-
bes, S? n, Sumatra, Ceylon, the Maldives, and
Laccah iv j ; the Ladrone, New Carolines, Pelew,
New Grur-ea, Solomon’s, New7 Hebrides, New
C'.falouia, Sandwich, Society, Friendly, New
Zealand; and Van Diemen's Land, wall most
probably hereafter become more particularly iden-
tified wfith New Holland.
Asia was the parent of nations, and the scene
of most of those remarkable transactions whicf
are recorded in sacred history. After the deluge,
Noah is said to have settled near the borders cl
the Euphrates, and to have peopled the whole
continent, the posterity of Shem occupying the
central regions, Japhet the northern, and Ham the
southern. Javan and his descendants, Ashkenaz,
Dodanim, Tharshish, Elisha, Togermah, and Rip-
hath, are supposed to have been the ancient in-
habitants of Asia Minor. The Canaanites and
Amalekites w7ere the people of Syria and Arabia
Petrea. Modern writers have referred the pres-
ent natives of Asia to those different stocks the |
