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Mekong in Cochin-China, and the delta of the Irrawaddy in 
Burma. Innumerable local regions of swampland exist also. 
There are a number of important lakes in the region. One 
very interesting one, Lake Baikal of south central Siberia, 
draining into the Yenesei River, is important zoologically be- 
cause it contains a species of Seal, Phoca sibirica. Another lake, 
lying 100 miles north of Vladivostok, empties through the 
River Ussuri into the Amur, and several more exist west of the 
lower course of that river. At least three large lakes lie along 
the course of the Yangtse River : Lake Tung Ting, 600 miles 
from the sea, contains the peculiar White Dolphin Lipotes; 
Lake Poyang is some 300 miles inland, and Lake T'ai is less 
than 100 miles from the mouth of the river. Other lakes are 
known in Yunnan and Szechwan. A large lake in Cambodia 
named Tonle Sap, located about 120 miles from the South 
China Sea, is drained by a tributary of the Mekong River. In 
Burma there are only two rather small lakes, Indawgi near 
Mogaung in northeast Burma, and Inle in the Southern Shan 
States. Bodies of water as large as these may well harbor unique 
faunal elements. 
Deserts are chiefly represented in Asia by the great central 
wastes, the Gobi, the Ordos, and the Tarim, and other deserts 
of Mongolia and Sin-kiang. The fauna of such huge desert 
areas is specialized to a considerable degree. Only the extreme 
eastern portion of the Gobi can by any stretch of the imagination 
be included in this book. It is better to mark the inner limit of 
our area at the Hsing-an (Khingan) Mountains. 
The Climates of Eastern AsrA. The broad strip of land 
extending from the northeastern tip of Siberia to the Malay 
Peninsula, of which the physical form has just been pictured, 
is nearly 6000 miles in length, or about one-fourth the circum- 
ference of the earth. An aeroplane flying through its length 
must traverse successively arctic, temperate, subtropical, and 
tropical climatic zones. Except near the coast the average annual 
