NOTES. CXXV 



( 484 ) p. 349. Compare Dana's ingenious remarks " On the Curvatures of 

 Ranges of Islands, whose Convexity, in the Pacific, is almost always turned to 

 the south or south-east," U.S. Explor. Exped., by Wilkes, vol. x. (Geology by 

 James Dana) 1849, p. 419. 



( 485 ) p. 349. The island Saghalin, Tschoka, or Tarakai, is called by Japa- 

 nese sailors Krafto (written Karafuto). It lies opposite to the mouth of the 

 Amur (the Black River, Saghalian Ula), and is inhabited by a good-humoured, 

 dark-coloured, and sometimes rather hairy race. Admiral Krusenstern sup- 

 posed, as did previously the companions of La Pe'rouse (1787), and Broughtun 

 (1797), that Saghalin is connected with the Asiatic continent by a narrow sandy 

 isthmus (in 52 5' N. lat.) ; but we find among the important Japanese infor- 

 mation obtained by Siebold, by a survey chart laid down in 1808 by Mamia 

 Rinso, chief of an Imperial Japanese commission, that Krafto is not a peninsula, 

 but is surrounded by the sea on all sides (Ritter, Erkunde von Asien, Bd. iii. 

 S. 488). This result of the meritorious Mamia Rinso has been recently (1855) 

 confirmed by the fact that the Russian fleet, in the Baie de Castries, at Alexan- 

 drowsk (lat. 51 29'), therefore south of the supposed isthmus, were able to 

 retreat into the mouth of the river (lat. 52 54') just as Siebold had said. In 

 the strait, where the isthmus was supposed to be, there are at some points only 

 five fathoms water. The island begins to be politically important on account of 

 its vicinity to the Amur, or Saghalian River. The name pronounced Karafto w 

 Krafto is a contraction of Kara-fu-to, i. e. according to Siebold, "the island ad- 

 jacent to the Kara ; " Kara being a Japano-Chinese designation for the extreme 

 north of China, Tartary, and " fu," " adjacent to." Tschoka is a corruption of 

 Tsokai, and Tarakai is taken by a misunderstanding from the name of a single 

 village, Taraika. According to Klaproth (Asia Polyglotta, p. 301) Taraikai, or 

 Tarakai, is the native Eino name of the whole island. Compare Leopold 

 Schrenk's and Captain Bernard Wittingham's remarks in Petermann's Geogr. 

 Mittheilungen, 1856, S. 176 and 184; and also Perry, Exped. to Japan, vol. i. 

 p. 468. 



( 486 ) p. 350. Dana, Geology of the Pacific Ocean, p. 16. The coasts of 

 Cochinchina, from the bay of Tonquin ; those of Malacca, from the bay of Siam ; 

 and even those of New Holland south of the twenty-fifth parallel also run 

 nearly north and south. 



( 487 ) p. 360. Compare the translations of Stanislas Julien from the Japanese 

 Encyclopedia in my Asie Centr. t. ii. p. 551. 



C 488 ) p. 360. Compare Kaart van den Zuid- en Zuidwest-kust van Japan, 

 door F. von Siebold, 1851. 



( 489 ) p.361. Compare my Fragmens de Ge'ulogieet de Climatologie asiatiques, 



