54 



TROPICAL RACES 



Mongolic Division. 



Mongolic man probably evolved in the Tibetan Plateau of long 

 ago. 



Characters. — The characters of Mongolic man are : Height, rather under the 

 average; hair, black, lank, coarse, round on transverse section; skull, brachy- 

 cephalic; eyes, small, black, oblique, with outer canthus slightly higher than 

 the inner, and with a vertical fold of skin over the inner canthus ; nose, very 

 small, mesorrhine; cheek-bones, prominent laterally ;yaze's, mesognathous ; teeth, 

 medium ; heard, slight or absent, but moustache present; speech, agglutinating, 

 with postfixes, the families being Ural-Altaic, Tibeto-Indo-Chinese, and 

 Malayo-Polynesian ; temperament, reserved, sullen, and apathetic in the 

 Mongols, industrious in the Chinese, and indolent in the Malays; they are all 

 gamblers; religion, animism. Shamanism, Lariiaism, Buddhism, Moham- 

 medanism, Confucianism, Taoism, etc. ; medicine, mostly theurgic, associated 

 with invocations, but in China there has been an attempt to evolve a higher 

 state of efficiency. The Hungarians have the usual highly evolved modern 

 medicine. 



Population. — The total number of Mongols is estimated to be 540,000,000 

 persons, of whom 380,000,000 are believed to reside in China, 55,000,000 in 

 Japan and Korea, 35,000,000 in Indo-China, 30,000,000 in Malaysia, 

 10,000,000 in Mongolia and Manchuria, 6,000,000 in Tibet, 7,000,000 in 

 Turkestan and Siberia, 13,000,000 in West Asia, and 4,000,000 elsewhere, 

 but estimates vary very much. 



Migrations. — The common stock of Mongol-Amerind man, migrating from 

 the primeval home in the Indo-African continent, passed into Asia, and while 

 the Amerind division travelled through that continent into America, it is 

 probable that the Mongolic division made its home in Tibet. This would be 

 in later Pliocene times, when the Tibetan Plateau would not be the elevated 

 region which it is to-day. 



In Tibet to-day the original type is best preserved among the Drupa, who 

 are about 5 feet 4 inches in height, with light brown skin, somewhat resembling 

 that of the Armerindians, with brachycephalic skulls, long black hair, brown 

 eyes, slightly prominent cheek-bones, depressed nose, wide nostrils, and large 

 ears. They are semi-nomadic pastoral peoples, living at a height of about 

 14,000 feet above the sea-level. The other groups in Tibet are the Bodpa, 

 the dominant peoples, who are of mixed descent, and the Tanguts, predatory 

 peoples along the north-east boundary. 



From this Tibetan home Mongolic man wandered westwards, giving rise to 

 the celebrated Akkads and Sumerians of Babylonia, and much earlier entered 

 Europe, giving rise to the many Asiatic invasions of that continent. With 

 regard to the Akkads and Sumerians, it may be stated that they early evolved 

 a form of culture which grew and flourished after their fusion with their early 

 Semitic conquerors, thus laying the foundations of one of the most ancient 

 forms of human civilization. According to some authorities (though by no 

 means proved), the Chinese took their origin from early Akkadian emigrants. 



Another migration from Tibet was southwards along the valleys of the 

 Irawadi, Salwin, and Mekhong Rivers into Indo-China, giving rise to the 

 Mishmi, the Abors (with whom there has been trouble recently), the Kuki, 

 the Luohai, the Chins, the Nagas, the Karens, the Khas, and the Moi, who, 

 though perhaps not the makers of the stone implements recently discovered 

 in the Irawadi Basin, may be looked upon as the aborigines of these regions, 

 because there is at present no evidence as to who these earlier peoples were. 

 The above-mentioned tribes have remained in a primitive condition, but 

 others have developed, under Hindu influences, a high degree of civilization — 

 as, for example, the Burmese. An immigration from the north brought the 

 Malayans and the Tai race, which, coming from Central China about the 

 Yang-tse-Kiang, gave rise to the Shans, the Laos, and the Siamese; while 

 yet another migration, this time from the valley of the Si-Kiang and South- 

 Eastern China, gave rise to the Annamese, Tongkinese, and Cochin Chinese. 



