Geographic Notes 



403 



by the reduction in prices of the articles 

 exported, and in large part by the fact 

 that the exports to Hawaii and Porto 

 Rico, which were included in last year's 

 statistics, are not included in the figures 

 for the present year, the total exports 

 ®f iron and steel to these islands in the 

 fiscal year 1900 having been about 

 $7,000,000. 



IMMIGRATION DURING 1901 



NEARIyY half a million immigrants 

 entered the United States during 

 the fiscal year ending July i, 1901. 

 This number was some 40,000 more 

 than that of the previous year and more 

 than double that of 1898, the year of 

 smallest immigration for 22 years. A 

 comparison of the arrivals during 1901 

 with those of 1882 shows in marked de- 

 gree that the character of the immigra- 

 tion has very radically changed, a fact 

 also discussed on page 385 of this num- 

 ber. In 1882, when 788,992 immigrants 

 entered the country, the largest inflow 

 in the history of the United States, the 

 northwestern countries of Europe, Ger- 

 many, Norway and Sweden, Great Brit- 

 ain, and Ireland, furnished the bulk 

 of the new Americans. During 1901, 

 on the other hand, the arrivals from 

 these countries formed but a very small 

 share of the inflow. Their place was 

 taken by Austria-Hungary, Italy, and 

 Russia. 



For instance, in 1882, 250,630 Ger- 

 mans entered. the United States, but in 

 the fiscal year just ended their number 

 fell to 21,651, the number of Swedes 

 from 64, 607 to 23,331 , and of the English 

 from 82,3^4 to 12,214. Meanwhile the 

 number of Italians has increased from 

 32,159 in 1882 to 135,996 in 1901, and 

 of Russians from 21,590 to 85,257. 



The following table shows the num- 

 ber of immigrants from the principal Eu- 

 ropean countries during the two years 

 compared and the per cent of the total 



immigration contributed by each coun- 

 try. 



EXPLORING TIBET. 



THE Japanese Buddhist Priest, Mr. 

 Nokai, who went to China in No- 

 vember, 1898, to visit I^assa, Tibet, to 

 study the lyama philosophy, is now mak- 

 ing his third attempt to reach that for- 

 bidden land, his two previous attempts 

 having ended in failure. The first at- 

 tempt was made by way of Szechuen 

 and the second by that of Kansu, and now 

 he is trying the Yunnan route. Miss E. 

 R. Scidmore, Foreign Secretary of the 

 National Geographic Society, is confident 

 that he will reach Eassa this time. The 

 explorer left the provincial capital of 

 Szechuen on February 21 and reached 

 the capital of Kuichau on March 9. 

 Writing his impressions of Kuichau, 

 he says that Roman Catholic churches 

 are found at all the important places in 

 the province, showing the untiring zeal 

 with which the French missionaries have 

 been conducting their work. The num- 

 ber of the Miaotsz aborigines in Kuichau 

 and Kwangsi is believed to reach ten 

 million. The French missionaries that 

 had withdrawn from Yunnan on the oc- 



