KACES OF CENTRAL ASIA. 373 



r ore than the Himalayas, or the Snowy IMountains of chapter 

 Sirinagur and Gorka, and placed permanent limits to the -^ ^^^^ ^ 

 1 rogress of civilization and refinement in a northerly 

 direction. 



" History cannot, however, resrard the plains of Central ^J-^'"''' 9^ • 



1,1 <• ? Central Asi.^ 



Asia under the character of obstructive barriers alone. 

 Tliey have frequently proved tlie means of spreading 

 misery and devastation over the face of the earth. Some 

 of the pastoral tribes inhabiting this steppe, — the Mon- 

 gols, Getse, Alani, and Usiini, — have convulsed the 

 world. If in the course of earlier ages, the dawn of civi- 

 lization spread like the vivifying light of the sun from 

 east to west ; so, in subsequent ages and from the same 

 quarter, have barbarism and rudeness threatened to over- 

 cloud Europe. , 



" A tawny tribe of herdsmen of Tukiuish, i.e. Turkish The Turkish 

 origin, the Hiongnu, dwelt in tents of skins on the ele- 

 vated steppe of Gobi. A portion of this race had been 

 driven southward towards the interior of Asia, after 

 continuing for a long time formidable to the Chinese 

 power. This dislodgement of the tribes was communi- 

 cated uninterruptedly as far as the ancient land of the 

 Fins, near the sources of the Ural. From thence poured 

 forth bands of Huns, Avars, Chasars, and a numerous 

 admixture of Asiatic races. Warlike bodies of Huns The Huna 

 first appeared on the Volga, next in Pannonia, then on 

 the Marne and the banks of the Po, laying waste those 

 richly cultivated tracts, where, since the age of Antenor, 

 man's creative art had piled monument on monument. 

 Thus swept a pestilential breath from the Mongolian 

 deserts over the fair Cisalpine soil, stifling the tender, 

 long-cherished blossoms of art I" 



Thus remarkably are the features of nature, and the History of 

 lavFS which science discloses, intimately blended with the race, 

 history of the human race, on which the great Creator 

 of the universe has bestowed, as their inheritance, the 

 theatre of the world. It is at all times, indeed, equally 

 instructive and remarkable to contemplate the connexion 



