Mr St John on the Mongols. 261 



branches, the Turks, became the most beautiful, by migrating 

 into the balmy Ionia, Macedonia, and Greece, and by mixing 

 with the Circassians and the descendants of the ancient Hel- 

 lenes. It appears, however, that the reports of the ugliness 

 of the Mongols have been greatly exaggerated. Timkowski 

 observes, that many of the women, with their clear complexions, 

 cheerful countenances, and lively, animated eyes, would be 

 esteemed handsome even in Europe ; and the Baron de Bode 

 assures me that he has seen Tatars who possessed great per- 

 sonal beauty. 



From this, however, it must not be understood that I in- 

 tend to break a lance in favour of the peerless charms of the 

 Mongols, male or even female. What I mean is, that they 

 are very far from possessing the diabolical assortment of 

 features which has been attributed to them ; and that their 

 countenances do at least exhibit a capacity for beauty. Among 

 the principal characteristic features are a slightly pointed 

 head and chin, and high or rather wide cheek-bones. The 

 bare knowledge of these facts, unaccompanied by personal 

 experience, has induced some naturalists to compare the face 

 of the Mongols to a lozenge ; but that this resemblance is 

 arbitrarily traced, will appear from the fact that Timkowski, 

 who had seen thousands of specimens, expressly says that 

 their face is round. Their temples are slightly hollow, and 

 the upper maxillar is square, whilst the lower, on the contrary, 

 is somewhat pointed. Like the Chinese, too, the upper teeth 

 of the Mongols project, so as to rest sometimes upon the lower 

 lip, whilst the other range inclines rather inwards. This 

 peculiarity of construction influences greatly the pronuncia- 

 tion of their language. But the most remarkable traits in 

 the physiognomy of the Mongol, are the oblique position of the 

 eyes, and the distance between them, by some exaggerated to 

 more than the breadth of a man's hand. The former charac- 

 teristic is common to the Chinese, whom I believe to be the 

 first Tatars who came down from their plateaus to settle on 

 the plain, being tempted by the fertility of the banks of the 

 Hoang-ho. In later times the same impulse led to the fre- 

 quent conquest of the country, and the transformation of suc- 

 cessive tides of invaders into peaceful, and at length effemi- 



