THE ETHNOLOGY OF SOUTH EASTERN ASIA.

SECT. 2. Inner, Middle and Outer or Oceanic Divisions. Their influence on ethnic movements in different eras. The present distribution of the races inhabiting them. Influence of the region on physical and mental character and civilisation. Intermixture with surrounding races.

For ethnographical arrangement the Hoangho-Gangetic region may, in accordance with the differences in climate and aspect which we have before indicated, be divided into certain districts marked out by strong physical characteristics. The first is the inner or central division, the mountainous plateau of Tibet, including a portion of the western margin of China. This division is about 4,000 feet above the level of the sea in its northern part where it joins the great Asiatic plateau. In the south where the swelling of the Himalaya begins to be felt, it is 11,000 to 12,000 feet in height. At its western extremity, where the Zangbo basin meets that of the Indus and its trans-Himalayan tributaries in the locality of the sacred lakes, it rises to 17,000 feet. The most fertile and accessible part of the region is the narrow southern depression included between the Himalaya on the S. and the Kara Koram and Zang chains on the N., descending on both sides so as to form the upper basin of the Zangbo on the east and that of the Indus on the west. The middle part of this division consists of dreary plateaus, at some places 10,000 feet above the sea, inclosed between mountain chains rising 3,000 to 4,000 feet above them. The W. and N. portion between the Karakorum-Zang chain and the Kuenlun, is very little known. The north eastern portion or the upper basin of the Hoang-ho, between the ranges of Bain Khara Oola and Kilian-shan, is also traversed by lofty mountains but they are separated by plateaus of considerable extent. With the exception of some portions of the basin of the Zangpo, the whole region is dreary and inhospitable in the extreme. The south eastern portion of the division also contains plateaus, but as we advance to the east and south east, the mountain chains converge till the whole country becomes a vast and lofty highland, consisting of great chains running to the S. E., the deep central vallies between which give an outlet to all the rivers of the region save the Hoang-ho.

Between this portion of the second or middle division and the inner one there is no well defined demarcation. The eastern part is a great arc of mountainous country, extending from the northern line of the Hoang-ho nearly to Ava, and embracing S. E. Tibet, the eastern part of the province of Kansuh, the western part of Shensi, the greater part of Szechuen, all Yunan and the northern part of Burmah. From the upper basin of the Hoang-ho to the southern extremity of Yunnan, it is above 700 miles in length and about 240 miles in breadth. Amongst the western chains is the Mangli

which has the Yang-tse-kiang (Kin-sha-kiang) on its eastern side, and the Me-kong (Lachu) on its western. This chain must be very high as a great part of it is always covered with snow. Many of the passes are 10,000 to 11,000 feet in height, and in some places the summits are supposed to rise to 26,000 feet. The great eastern chain is the Yun-ling which extends from the Pe-lin grange into Yunnan, the Yang-tse-kiang finding a passage in a great depression across it on the north of that province. Save in this depression and the lower parts of the vallies of tributaries which here join it from the north, the alpine tract appears to be, for the most part, uninhabitable from snow, barrenness and steepness. But in some districts many of the vallies are hot in summer and inhabitable all the year round.

The western portion of the middle division consists of the Hima. layan range, about 1,500 miles in length and with a probable average breadth of about 100 miles,-by which the eastern alpine land is continued without interruption to the mountains which immemorially formed the grand ethnic boundary between Turan and Iran.

The outer or oceanic division comprises the remainder of the region, the eastern or Chinese, the south or Anam Burmese districts, and the west or Cis-Himalayan portion of the Gangetic* basin. Its chief features are the great alluvial plains of the principal basins, the long mountain chains which divide the south western ones, and the numerous ranges which traverse the Chinese provinces to the west and south of the Great Plain. One of the most remarkable of all the mountain chains is the Malayan, which advances from the continent and extends for 540 miles into the southern ocean. The eastern face of the region thus acquires an extraordinary extension, for Pekin near its N.E. extremity is in 40 N.L., while Singapore almost touches the equator. The whole of the oceanic division contains lands eminently adapted for the habitation of man. It is abundantly watered, its alluvial plains are capable of containing an enormous population, the great rivers which traverse them compel and favour internal communication, and the far divergent basins are again united by the highway of the ocean. It is far however from presenting a surface tending to the rapid amalgamation of its human races. It contains twelve great and innumerable small ethnic districts, for from the alpine land numerous mountain chains diverge or are continued, which extend to the ocean, and in the east carry far into the oceanic division many peaks, perpetually covered with snow. By these ranges the plains of the large rivers are secluded from each other. But we must look more closely on the features of the whole region as affecting ethnic movements.

* In this I include the Bramahputra basin.

ages

A region of which the physical features are so strongly marked must always have powerfully influenced the distribution, movements and condition of the human families located in it. As in all other parts of the world, this influence must have been gradually modified as population and development progressed. The existence of extremely rude tribes in different parts of the region, the little advancement which the Tibetan, eastern Tartarian and N. E. Asian tribes have made, independently of their acquisitions from China and India, the barbarity of the oldest Indonesian tribes, and, above all, the very archaic character of the Chinese and Ultraindian languages, compared with those of the surrounding races, lead us to the inference that the tribes of the present families which first inhabited S. E. Asia were ruder than the rudest of the peoples which now encompass it. In the first era of their history they must have slowly spread down the mountain vallies and through the dense forests of the middle region. After they first entered the river basins of the outer division, numerous scattered families and scanty tribes would long continue to occupy each lateral or secondary basin. We cannot conjecture when arts first arose, but until they did, the whole region must have contained almost innumerable separate ethnic locations. Amongst the 200,000 square miles of Alps of which the western part of China consists, rude savages might be enclosed for an indefinite number of before any families emerged into the lower and more open land. The great plains of the lower basins would oppose their progress to the eastern shores, because they continued until a recent period to be overspread with marshes, while the obstructions in the rivers prevented their offering a free outlet to the vast bodies of water that from time to time poured down from the upper regions and inundated the low lands. The geography of a large part of the region is too imperfectly known to enable us to examine the details of its ethnic influences. But the leading characteristics are easily seized. The inner and middle regions not only, as a whole, form an enormous barrier between middle Asia and the southern and eastern plains, but by the extraordinary reticulations of the mountain chains which rise above the table land or are pressed together so as to leave hardly room for vallies, each district within the mountains is surrounded by barriers of its own. Even now, with all the aids of civilisation, the routes by which China can be reached from the valley of the Zangbo are full of difficulties and dangers. Between the upper basin of the Hoang-ho and the Zangbo several chains of steep and icy mountains have to be crossed. The pssage of one of them occupies twenty days, and the whole journey over these ranges and the bleak and snowy steppes between them, can only be accomplished by considerable companies, and with a sacrifice of life. The routes across the mountain band to the east of Tibet are still more formidable, for in addition to the great elevation of the chains, they are worn full of terrific ravines and

chasms, by the numerous rivers which issue from them. The snowy range of the Himalaya, again, forms a barrier between the valley of the Zang-bo and that of the Ganges which must have been insurmountable in the earlier ages of the Tibetan tribes. Α large portion of the outer division, as we have seen, consists of prolongations of the middle mountain chains, with most extensive ramifications. The whole eastern and southern land indeed is compacted of bands and groups of mountain chains. China, notwithstanding its two long vallies and the great N. E. plain, is mountainous for two thirds of its surface, and Ultraindia is almost wholly composed of a succession of ranges of lower elevation. The great highways must have long continued to be separated from each other. The inland valley of the Hoang-ho, where it flows southward between the provinces of Shansi and Shensi, must have been cut off from the low lands of Pichili on the east,-with which it still communicates by a single route,-and from the basin of the Yangtse-kiang on the south, while separated by similar barriers from its upper basins between the Khilian-shan and Bayan-khara-oola. The central valley of the Yang-tse-kiang must have been insulated during the greater part of its eastern course between the Nang-lin mountains on the south and the Yun-ling, Tapa-ling and Pe-ling on the north. The southern maritime provinces must have presented several ethnic districts divided from each other by considerable obstacles, and totally secluded from the valley of the Yang-tse-kiang behind them. Even now there appear to be only three passes by which the Nang-lin chain is crossed. The valley of the Ton-kin river must also have been isolated from those of the Canton river, the Yang-tse-kiang and the Mekong. All these districts must have retained a great degree of ethnic independence long after the numerous subordinate or included ones were united. Amongst the mountainous regions between them many tribes must still longer have continued to be secluded. There are still numerous remnants in the Nang-lin and all the other ranges of S. E. Asia that lie to the south and west of the Yang-tse-kiang.

The western or inner division is chiefly occupied by the Tibetan tribes who possess the whole of the great trans-Himalayan depression which slopes westward to the margin of the Hindu-Khush, forming the transalpine basin of the Indus, and eastward to the unknown point where the basin of the Zangbo bends south and sends its waters into the basin of the Brahmaputra or of the Irawadi. They have even extended to the S. East and entered the upper part of the eastern basin of the Brahmaputra where they are in contact with the Mishmi. Tibetan tribes and others allied to them have spread over the basin of the Ganges, although they are now chiefly confined to the Himalayas, the Vindyas and the basin of the Brahmaputra. In the basin of the Brahmaputra they are blended with allied tribes of the Mayama family. Rude Tibetan tribes of nomadic predacious habits, known in Tibet chiefly under

the generic name of Kham and in China under that of Si-fan, are spread over all Tibet to the northward of the depression of the Indus and Zangbo, and eastward along the greater part of the eastern margin of the inner division to a considerable distance within the boundaries of the Chinese Provinces. They probably come in contact with the inner tribes of the Brahmaputra and Irawadi basins, and are intermixed with the most westerly Chinese tribes and the Mangolian tribes who chiefly occupy the northern and N.E. portions of Tibet.

The ethnology of the E. middle division is very obscure, and will probably prove to be of extraordinary interest. In a region of which a great portion is inaccessible from lofty mountains and snow, many of the inhabited districts must still be secluded. Numerous petty tribes must retain their ancient independence and their aboriginal languages and manners, and it is probable that amongst the former some will be found intermediate between the Chinese, the Burmese and the Tibetan. This region promises to be the richest for ethnological discoveries of any that yet remains unexplored in Asia, or perhaps in the world. All the Š. E. Asian tribes appear to meet in it. On the south the upper division of Burmah and the Chinese province of Yun-nan are known to contain many rude tribes akin to the Burmese and the Lau and all or most of the Turanian races who now occupy the lower basins of the rivers which descend through this region must have been derived from it. The great provinces of Sze-chuen and Kan-suh are also known to contain rude tribes, and the languages of even the more civilised communities of the latter are peculiar.+ In the western parts of these provinces the Kham or Sifan of Mongolian habits, and the true Mongol tribes of the Mongfan and Kukunor Tartars meet the Chinese tribes. In the S. the Mongfan are in contact with the most northerly tribe of the Irawadi basin, the Khanung. The civilised Chinese have pushed themselves into all the more open and fertile portions of the western Provinces. It is through the Province of Kan-suh that the great trading route lies which connects China with Western Asia, and the movements along which must in all eras have affected the distribution of the tribes of middle Asia.

The outer division is occupied by the great bulk of the Chinese peoples in its eastern section or in the basins of the Peiho, Hoang-ho, Yang-tse-kiang and Hong-kiang, the subject Mongol tribes extending along the northern boundary. The S. W. section is occupied by the Anamese in Tonkin and Anam, the Muong and Moi in the mountains separating this region from the valley of the Mekong; the Loi or Cham (Champa) Kammen, or Kommen, (Kambojans),

*They are found to the west of the Yalong and probably in some places reach to the Yun-ling mountains.

+ According to Chinese writers some of the eastern Tibetan dialects approximate to the Chinese.