14 ABORIGINAL RACES OF MANKIND. 



social scale. The consequence is they have always 

 remained, as in Africa, either in a state of unmitigated 

 barbarism, or else, taken at their very best, they have 

 advanced up to a certain point, but seem to be in- 

 capable of progressing beyond it. 



The history of the oriental races furnishes a good 

 illustration of nations coming under this second cate- 

 gory. 



In Asia, the reputed cradle of the human race, 

 where the records relating to the early history of 

 mankind are at present held to reach further back 

 than in any other quarter of the globe, into the 

 fringe of an unknown and boundless antiquity: its 

 history is to this day, for the most part, that of the 

 tented field, where the traveller is compelled to make 

 his way through trackless plains and forests, or through 

 mountain fastnesses, into almost unknown and inhos- 

 pitable regions, inhabited by wild and hostile races, 

 which the narrow policy of exclusion still endeavours 

 to keep closed against the inroads of foreigners. Nearly 

 all Central Asia remains in this condition to the pre- 

 sent day. 



Wherever, in portions of the great Asiatic conti- 

 nent, a civilized government has established those con- 

 ditions which render progress possible, we owe it to 

 the sturdy European adventurer, who, planting trading 

 posts in the first instance, has subsequently, under the 

 protection of his country's flag, displaced the native 

 rulers, or compelled them by force of arms to submit 

 to these elementary conditions of civilized society. 

 The history of the British Empire in India is replete 

 with such instances. 



But, amid the busy whirl of modern life, where so 



