WERTURIAN or URALLIAN Mountains, a famous chain of mountains forming part of the boundary of Asia. It begins difficultly (for it may be traced interruptedly farther south) near the town of Kungur, in the government of Kafan, in latitude 57° 20'; runs north, and ends opposite to the Waygatz strait, and rises again in the isle of Novo Zemlya. The Russians also call this range Semennoi Potas, or, the girdle of the world; from a supposition that it encircled the universe. These were the Riphrei montes: Pars mundi damnata a natura rerum, et denfa merfa caligine*; of which only the southern part was known to the ancients, and that to little as Hift. Nat. to give rise to numberless fables. Beyond these were placed the happy Hyperborei, a fiction most beautifully related by Pomponius Mela. Moderns have not been behind-hand in exaggerating several circumstances relative to these noted hills. Yfbrand Ides, who crossed them in his embaflly to China, afferts that they are 5000 toiles or fathoms high; others, that they are covered with eternal snow. The last may be true in their more northern parts; but in the usual passages over them, they are free from it three or four months.

The heights of part of this chain have been taken by M. l'Abbé d'Auterche: who, with many assurances of his accuracy, says, that the height of the mountain Kyria near Solikamkaia, in latitude 60°, does not exceed 471 toiles from the level of the sea, or 286 from the ground on which it stands. But, according to M. Gmelin, the mountain Pauda is much higher, being 752 toiles above the sea. From Petersburgh to this chain is a vast plain, mixed with certain elevations or platforms, like islands in the midst of an ocean. The easterm side defends gradually to a great distance into the wooded and morally Siberia, which forms an im- Werturian, menfe inclined plane to the Icy fea. This is evident from all the great rivers taking their rise on that fide, fome at the amazing diftance of latitude 46°; and, after a course of above 27 degrees, falling into the Frozen ocean, in latitude 73° 30'. The Yalik alone, which rises near the southern part of the eastern fide, takes a southern direction, and drops into the Cafpian fea. The Dvina, the Peccora, and a few other rivers in European Russia, shew the inclined plane of that part. All of them run to the northern fea; but their courfe is comparatively fhort. Another inclination directs the Dnieper and the Don into the Eaxine, and the vall Wolga into the Cafpian fea.