52 MAMMALIA. 



golian race begins, whence it extends to the eastern ocean. Its branches, 

 the Calmucs, &c. still wandering- shepherds, are constantly traversing the 

 desert. Thrice did their ancestors under Attila, Genghis, and Tamerlane, 

 spread far the terror of their name. The Chinese are the earliest and 

 most civilized branch not only of this race, to which they belong, but of all 

 the nations upon earth. A third branch, the Mantchures, recently con- 

 quered, and still govern China. The Japanese, Coreans, and nearly all 

 the hordes which extend to the north-east of Siberia, subject to Russia, 

 are also to be considered, in a great measure, as originating from this race; 

 and such also is esteemed the fact, with regard to the original inhabitants 

 of various islands of that Archipelago. With the exception of a few Chi- 

 nese literati; the different nations of the Mongoles are universally addicted 

 to Buddism, or the religion of Fo. 



The origin of this great race appears to have been in the mounfadns of At- 

 lai, but it is impossible to trace the filiation of its different branches with 

 the same certainty as we have done those of the Caucasian. The history 

 of these wandering nations is as fugitive as their establishments, and that of 

 the Chinese, confined exclusively to their own empire, gives us nothing 

 satisfactory with respect to their neighbours. The affinities of their lan- 

 guages are also too little known to direct us in this labyrinth. 



The languages of the north of the peninsula beyond the Ganges, as well 

 as that of Thibet, are somewhat allied to the Chinese, at least in their mo- 

 nosyllabic structure, and the people who speak them have features some- 

 what resembling other Mongoles. The south of this peninsula, however, is 

 inhabited by Malays, whose forms approximate them much nearer to the In- 

 dians, whose race and language are extended over all the coasts of the islands 

 of the Indian Archipelago. The innumerable little islands of the southern 

 ocean are also peopled by a handsome race, nearly allied to the Indians, 

 whose language is very similar to the Malay; in the interior of the lai'gest 

 of these islands, particularly in the wilder portions of it, is another race 

 of men, with black complexions, crisped hair, and negro faces, called Al- 

 fourous. On the coast of New Guinea, and in the neighbouring islands, 

 we find other negroes, nearly similar to those of the eastern coast of Africa, 

 named Papuas; to the latter, are generally referred the people of Van-Die- 

 men'sland, and those of New Holland to the Alfoui-ous. 



These Malays, and these Papuas are not easily referable to either of the 

 three great races of which we have been speaking, but can the^brmer be 

 clearly distinguished from their neighbours, the Caucasian Hindoos and the 

 Mongolian Chinese? As for us, we confess we cannot discover any suffi- 

 cient characteristics in them for that purpose. Are the Papuas Negroes, 

 which may formerly have strayed into the Indian ocean ? "We posess neither 

 figures nor descriptions sufficiently precise to enable us to answer this 

 question. 



The northern inhabitants of both continents, the Samoiedes, the Lap- 

 landers, and the Esquimaux, spring, according to some, from tlie Mongolian 



