xl INTKODUCTION. 



from the dusky colour of the Hindoo to the fine dark olive of 

 the Central Asiatics, the swarthy tinge of the Greeks and 

 Italians, and the florid complexions of the nations of the 

 north. The face is oval, straight, and relatively small, with 

 the features distinct, the nose tending to the aquiline, the 

 mouth small, the teeth perpendicular. The hair is soft and 

 slightly curling, black in the warmer countries, and of 

 various colours in the colder, as black, flaxen, brown, red. 

 The irides are generally dark when the skin is of that colour, 

 but in other cases light-blue, with intervening shades. In 

 this race the intellectual endowments of the species have 

 been the most highly developed. With it have originated 

 nearly all the sciences, and the most useful of the arts ; and 

 in literature and arms it has hitherto surpassed, and yet sur- 

 passes, the other races. 



Turning to the elevated regions of Central Asia about the 

 70 of longitude east, at the great Altaic chain of mountains, 

 termed by the ancients Imaus, and held by them to separate 

 the Scythi of the West from the Scythi of the East, another 

 group of races, or, as we may rather say, another great 

 Family of mankind, presents itself, as if derived from some 

 region to the east or south-east. This family is commonly 

 termed Mongolian, from the supposed name of a great country 

 of Eastern Asia, comprehended within the boundaries of 

 Chinese Tartary. But the name Mongolia, it is believed, is of 

 European origin, and applied erroneously to a great country 

 of Asia ; the term Mog-huls, from which the name seems to 

 have been taken, being merely applicable to a certain tribe of 

 Tartars. Be this as it may, the Mongolian Family, so called, 

 comprehends all the Kalmuks, and other allied tribes of East- 

 ern Asia. It comprehends the inhabitants of Thibet, of China 

 Proper, of Japan, of Corea, of the greater part of the coun- 

 tries termed Indo-China. The Mongolian Family thus in- 

 cludes a great proportion of the whole human race. It is 

 characterised by the head tending to the square form, by 

 the face being broad, the nose flat, the cheek-bones promi- 



