2 THE RELATION OF CHINESE AND SIAMESE 



For both races are Mongolian, and for millenniums have 

 been neighbors. The late Professor Lacouperie says, in his 

 Introduction to Colquhoun's "Amongst The Shans" : — 



"One, it' not the most striking, discovery of modern re- 

 searches is the comparative youth of the Chinese as a great 

 homogeneous and powerful people. . . . The Bak tribes, or 

 Peh Sing (name of the Chinese immigrants), were overpowered 

 by the numerous populations which had preceded them to the 

 Flowery Land. ... So that, under cover of Chinese titles 

 and geographical names, large regions occupied by populations 

 entirely non-Chinese were included (in the historical Annals of 

 ( 'hina) as homogeneous parts of the nation. . . . The mixture 

 of the Ugro-Altaic early Chinese immigrants with the native 

 populations of China (of which the primitive Tai, or Shan, was 

 not the least important) was not confined to the area of their 

 political power. This deep mixture which has produced the 

 Chinese physical type and peculiar speech . . . had begun 

 outside long before the extension of the Chinese political supre- 

 macy." 



Mr. Holt S. Hallett, m.t.ce., f.r.g.s., writing of the 

 Shan or Tai Race says : — 



"Not only do they stretch away far to the eastward, perhaps 

 as far as the China Sea, but they actually form one of the chief 

 ingredients that compose the so-called Chinese race. Mr. 

 Colquhoun, in his journey through the south of China, came to 

 the conclusion that most of the aborigines whom he met, although 

 known to the Chinese by various nicknames, were Shans ; and 

 that their propinquity to the Chinese was slowly changing their 

 habits, manners and dress, and gradually incorporating them with 

 that people." 



Repeated journeys which I have taken through various 

 sections of southern China enable me to confirm Mr. 

 Colquhoun's deduction, so far as the plain-dwellers of south- 

 western China are concerned. Most, not all, of these are 

 Tai in all the low-lying plains. But, still another quotation 

 as to the close relation of the Chinese and Tai racially. 

 Major Davies, in his standard work on Yunnan, says : — 



"The Yunnan Chinaman in fact says that the Cantonese are 

 Shans by race ; and the facial resemblance between the Shan and 

 the southern Chinaman is certainly remarkable. . . . It is 

 probable they (the Tai) at one time inhabited a great part of 

 China south of the Yangtze, but many of them have been 

 absorbed by the Chinese. The physical resemblance between the 

 Shan and the Cantonese Chinaman is remarkable, and it seems 

 likely that the latter is chiefly Shan in blood, though now pretty 

 thoroughly imbued with Chinese customs and ways of thought." 

 In tracing the detailed history of the Tai I am indebted 

 chiefly to translations from the Annals by the late lamented 

 Professor Lacouperie. But for the analysis into successive 

 migrations southward and for incidental sidelights from per- 

 sonal exploration and investigation, I shall have to take in- 

 dividual responsibility. This is done with fear and trembling 

 in the presence of an audience of learned Sinologists, but 

 with a considerable degree of confidence in the various lines 



