THE GEOLOGIC HISTORY OF CHINA 115 



In these incessant shiftings, the river has strewn all over an enormous 

 area, 500 miles from north to south by 300 miles from east to west, 

 layer after layer of fine yellow loam or silt; the very name "Yellow 

 Eiver," which is a translation of the Chinese " Hwang-ho," suggests the 

 close resemblance to our own mud-laden Missouri. Almost every 

 square foot of this vast alluvial fan is of course underlain by a deep and 

 fertile soil and is intensively cultivated by the industrious Chinese inhab- 

 itants. One sees no large fields of grain, such as those on our Dakota 

 prairies, but instead, thousands of small truck gardens belonging to the 

 inhabitants of the hundreds of little mud-walled villages with which 

 the plain is dotted. The ever-present town walls have doubtless been 

 built because the inhabitants have no natural refuges, as their moun- 

 tain cousins have, and their very accessibility has made them in the 

 past the frequent prey of Mongol and Tartar invaders, or of rebels and 

 rioters from within their own country. 



Since the water supply of the plain is not lavish, but little rice is 

 grown there. The dry-land grains, and such vegetables as cabbages and 

 potatoes, are the staple crops. The small gardens are sparingly irri- 

 gated, however, in times of drought, by water taken from the canals or 

 wells with the help of various types of crude pumps, operated by men 

 or by donkeys. 



In this densely populated alluvial plain there is practically no pas- 

 turage and no woodland. From the very nature of the plain it could 

 not yield coal, which is always associated with the solid rocks. To 

 bring fuel, as we do, from distant parts of the country is impossibly ex- 

 pensive for the Chinese, without an adequate railroad system, and that 

 is still a thing of the future. When the harvest has been gathered in 

 the autumn, the village children are therefore sent out to gather up 

 every scrap of straw or stubble that can be used either for fodder or for 

 fuel. The fields thus left perfectly bare in the dry winter season af- 

 ford an unlimited supply of fine dust to every wind that blows. This 

 is doubtless the explanation of the disagreeable winter dust-storms with 

 which every foreigner who has lived in northern China is only too 

 familiar. 



Although carts and wheel-barrows are much used on the Huang-ho 

 plain, their traffic is chiefly local. That may be due in part to the fact 

 that the numerous wide and shifty rivers are difficult to bridge, while 

 ferrying is relatively expensive. Another, and perhaps more important, 

 reason is that the rivers, and particularly their old abandoned courses, 

 afford natural waterways which are available nearly everywhere. By 

 taking advantage of these, or by deepening them, and in some places by 

 actually digging canals through the soft material of the plain, the 

 Chinese have put together the wonderful system of interlaced canals 

 for which they have been renowned since Europeans first visited them. 



