612 KEPORT— 1882. 



2. Notes on a visit to the ChuJccJd Peninsula in 1881, based on letters 

 from Drs. Arthur and Attrel Krause. Communicated bij the Bremer* 

 Geographical Society. 



The brothers Krause, who were sent by the Bremen Geographical Society for 

 the purpose of making scientific observations in Bering's Strait, landed in Lawrence 

 Bay in August 1881, and visited twelve diff"erent localities before the middle of 

 September, from Plover Bay in the south, to Uddle, just within the Arctic circle. 

 This, the largest village met with, is on the northern side of East Cape, with 

 eighty-three huts and some 2G0 inhabitants. The travellers made considerable 

 collections of plants, obtained many objects of ethnological interest, took dredgings 

 and soundings, and made rapid surveys of various parts as yet imperfectly repre- 

 sented in charts. 



The Chiikchis were found to be much reduced in numbers by famine, partly 

 caused by their parting with necessary fur clothing for drink, and partly by whales 

 and walruses being driven from their coasts. The division of this tribe into two 

 classes, distinguished by their habits of hunting marine or land animals, is found to 

 be imaginary, as members of the same family are found in both of them, and their 

 languages do not differ. Tattooing is universal among their women, and their 

 clothing in general resembles that of the Eskimo, with whom they retain com- 

 mercial relations. Here and there along the coast small communities also were 

 found, differing completely in language, and to some extent in features, from the 

 other Chukchis, and indicating a relationship with the Greenland Eskimo. 



The region examined was divisible into three well-marked classes: — 1, a stony 

 or licheniferous tundra ; 2, a wet-moss tundra ; 3, slopes and valleys with com- 

 paratively luxui'iant vegetation, the willows attaining a height of three feet. Of 

 land mammals only Siberian marmot and the whistling hare {Lagomys hyper- 

 boreus) were met with ; but according to the natives, wild reindeer, mountain 

 sheep, foxes, bears, and wolves occasionally make their appearance on the coast. 



The travellers returned to San Francisco early in November, and afterwards 

 passed the winter in Alaska, where one of them remains, with the object of 

 examining the basin of the Yukon river. 



3. The question of an Overland Boute to China from India via Assam, with 

 some remarhs on the source of the Irrawaddi River. By Chaeles H. 

 Lepper, F.B.G.S., M.B.A.S. 



The author traced a short history of the little already done to solve the important 

 problem indicated by the title, and showed that there is steam-transit all the way from 

 Europe to our extreme north-eastern frontier outpost nearest to China, viz. Makum, 

 and that there is no physical objection against continuing the railway now in progress 

 of construction to Makum from that outpost all the way to the banks of the Irra- 

 waddi river. He pointed out that the inhabitants of the country through which 

 this extension of the railway would have to pass are Singphos, who are very 

 friendly to the English, and are quite independent of the Burmese, and also of the 

 Chinese. These Singphos have further expressed a wish that a road should be 

 made through their country, as they are alive to the advantages they would reap 

 from it. Mr. Lepper then explained that Chinese traders already visit and settle 

 amongst these Singphos, on this independent, or as he calls it ' neutral ground,' 

 and that were a road or railway continued from Makum to the Irrawaddi, a dis- 

 tance of only about 120 miles, there can be little doubt the adventurous Chinese 

 traders who now traffic on the Irrawaddi would be induced to come to us for 

 British merchandise. Thus the whole of Western China would be thrown open to 

 British commerce, without the necessity of any treaty with China, and without 

 any European having to cross the Chinese frontier. Further, the Thibetans, who 

 already trade in this western part of China, would avail themselves of these Chinese 

 traders as intermediaries between themselves and us, and in this way Eastern 



