14 ASIA 



The climate may be described as cool temperate, 

 although winters are very hard and protracted. The 

 rivers, especially in the northern part, are ice-bound for 

 four or five months in the year ; but the region, on the 

 whole, enjoys the benefit of the summer monsoon, which 

 gives it a fair rain-supply. The conditions are temperate 

 enough to permit of the occurrence of broad-leaved, de- 

 ciduous forests of a central and north-European type. 

 This is essentially a timber country, and the lower forest- 

 belt is similar to our oak and beech zones. It consists 

 of mixed forests, including the Mongolian oak, Man- 

 churian kinds of walnut, hazel-nut, barberry, and vine, 

 pines, maples, elms, lime-trees, and rowans : the Man- 

 churian shrub dimorphanthus is freely grown in our 

 gardens. This broad-leaved vegetation is, however, re- 

 stricted to valleys, lower slopes, and foot-hills. In the 

 mountains, the resinous forests naturally predominate, but 

 they are also of a mixed type, including larches, cedars, 

 pines, and tsugas, with birches and aspens, and giving 

 the usual aspect of northern temperate mountains. In 

 the broad valleys, the Amur and its tributaries flow amid 

 luxuriant pastures of rich grass and tall herbs, among 

 which umbellifers are most remarkable. 



In spite of its hard winters, Amuria is a fertile land, 

 replete with possibilities. Cattle-breeding, dairying, and 

 mixed farming certainly find there as promising a field 

 as in eastern Canada, with which this region has much 

 in common : all northern cereals and green crops 

 accommodate themselves to this climate. In Amuria 

 proper the timber is well preserved, but in lower 

 Manchuria, the western slopes of the Sungari hills and 

 mountains have been largely deforested by the Chinese 

 settlers, with the usual disastrous consequences. 



Though in latitude it corresponds to central Europe, 



