The British Crown Colony of Hong-Kong includes the is'and of HongKong, off the south-eastern coast of China, at the mouth of the Canton Kiver, and the adjoining peninsula of Kowloon, from which it is separated by a narrow strait-the Ly-ee-mun Pass-not more than a quarter of a mile in width.

The island of Hong-Kong is about 11 miles long and from 2 to 5 miles broad, and, with the Kowloon Peninsula on the mainland, has an area of about 30 square miles, and a population of 297,000, about two-thirds of whom are Chinese.

The surface of the island is irregular and hilly, and rises in Victoria Peak-a Lavourite place of residence in the hot season-to a height of 1,800 feet. Though well watered, it is naturally barren, and the climate' is rather insalubrious and oppressively hot in summer, but cooler and more invigorating in winter.

The mainland immediately behind Hong-Kong, together with a few adjacent islands, was in June, 1897, leased to Great Britain by China for a term of 99 years. It was essential for the proper protection and development of the colony that this district, which has an area of about 200 square miles, and 100,000 Chinese, should be brought under British control.

Hong-Kong, which half a century ago was a bare rock, with a fisherman's hut here and there as the only sign of habitation, its great sea basin but very rarely disturbed by a passing keel, has become one of the most important commercial, military, and naval stations of the British Empire. The capitalVictoria on the northern side of the island, has a magnificent natural harbour, and is the main artery of British commerce in Chinese waters. Hong-Kong is, in fact, the third port in the British Empire, and therefore, with the possible exception of New York, the third port in the world. The tonnage frequenting its harbour is greater than that of the whole of the British possessions in the American continent, or than that of the four principal colonies of Australia.

Nowhere, perhaps, is to be found crowded into the same space such a swarming mass of humanity as in the Chinese quarter of Victoria, and alongside this eastern hive are found all the most characteristic and highly developed features of Western civilization. Long lines of quays and wharves, large warehouses teeming with merchandize, shops stocked with all the luxuries, as well as with all the needs of two civilizations, line for four miles the island shores. Behind these, interspersed with tropical foliage, and rising, tier on tier, up the mountain-side, are handsome streets and stately public buildings, and higher still, solidly constructed roads, lined with bamboos and other delicately fronded trees, climb up to and over the heights behind, and are so studded with houses as to give almost an urban aspect to the higher elevation of the island, and indeed it seems as if, at no distant period, every available corner of Hong-Kong will be covered with houses. Kowloon, also, until recently an uninhabited waste of red rock, is becoming covered with houses, docks, warehouses, and verdure."

More than half the foreign trade of Hong-Kong is with the United Kingdom, and a great deal of the British trade with China is done through Hong-Kong. The staple exports are silk and tea, and the chief imports, cotton and woolien goods, metals, coal, rice, sugar, flour, tea, and oil.

Over 50,000 junks belong to Hong-Kong, and about 4,000 foreign vessels call annually at the port. There is no Custom House, but the actual trade of the colony, exclusive of the transit traffic, is estimated to amount to over 20 millions sterling a year.

The Governor of Hong-Kong, who is aided by an Executive and a Legislative Councils also controls the British trade with all the "Treaty Ports" of China. The Revenue and Expenditure for 1905, each amounted to nearly £700,000. There is a small Public Debt, incurred for waterworks, &c.

WEI-HAI-WEI, a former naval arsenal of China, facing Port Arthur in the Gulf of Pe-che-lee, was granted on a lease of 99 years to Great Britain in June, 1893; and Low forms a British sanatorium. At the same time China pledged herself never to alien.te any territory in the Yang tse basin to any foreign power other than Great Britain.

MACAO, now small and unimportant, was formerly the centre of Portuguese commerce with the Far East, and still belongs to Portugal.

The city, which has a population of about 68,000, occupies a peninsula on the southeastern side of a small island in the Bay of Canton, exactly opposite Hong-Kong, at a distance of about 40 miles.

PORT ARTHUR and TA-LIEN-WAN BAY.-In March, 1898, Russia, in spite of British protests, succeeded in obtaining from China a 25 years' lease of Port Arthur and Ta-lien-wan Bay, lying at the south of the Li: o-tung Peninsula, in the Gulf of Pe-chi-li, and also the right to extend the Siberian Railway through Manchuria. Port Arthur was converted into a strongly fortified naval base, and a new town, Dalny, on Ta-lien-wan Bay, which remains ice-free throughout the year, was built. In the Russo-Japanese war, Port Arthur was captured after a long and memorable siege, and the lease of the territory was ceded by Russia to Japan by the Treaty of Portsmouth, in September, 1905. Dalny was opened as a Treaty Port at the end of 1906. The total area of Kwantung, the leased territory, is 1,200 square miles, population 100,000.

KIAO-CHAU BAY, to the south of the Shantung peninsula, was leased by China to Germany in March, 1898. The area of the leased territory is 143 square miles, and of the German "Sphere of Influence" 2.750 square miles. The chief commodities are coal, silk, straw braid, and cotton. A railway connects Tsin-tau, the chief port, with Tsinan on the Hoang Hồ.

KWANG-CHAU, situated on the Leichau Peninsula, north of Hainan, was granted in leasehold to France in April, 1898, and at the same time China guaranteed never to alienate Hainan to any other foreign power.

ASIATIC RUSSIA.

The Asiatic division of the Russian Empire embraces more than a third of Asia-the largest of the continents-and nearly oneseventh of the total land-area of the globe. But this immense territory is very thinly peopled, the total population amounting to not more than 23 millions, an average of only 4 persons to the square mile.

Asiatic Russia is conterminous with European Russia on the west, and its southern frontier "marches" with that of the Chinese Empire, from the Pacific coast to the northern edge of the Pamir Plateau, a distance of 3,000 miles, while, on the south-west, the Russian territories extend to the borders of Afghanistan and Persia. The gigantic Eurasian empire of "Holy Russia" is thus "one continuous and connected whole," with but one nominal "break" in the south-west, where the "protected" Khanates of Khiva and Bokhara intervene between the Trans-Caspian Territory and Russian TurkBut hundreds of thousands of square miles of this immense territory are, and must always remain, uninhabited and uninhabitable; dreary "Tundras" line the Arctic coasts, and barren "Steppes" and sandy deserts cover large areas. But even Siberia possesses a very extensive and valuable black earth zone, which, together with vast stores of mineral wealth, is now making this portion of the Russian Empire populous and

estan.

prosperous.

Asiatic Russia includes three distinct divisions, namely :-Siberia, Russian Centra Asia, and Caucasia.

SIBERIA.

SIBERIA includes all the northern belt of the Asiatic continent, comprising the vast plain which slopes from the Altai Mountains to the Arctic Ocean. This immense region is bounded on the north by the Arctic Ocean; on the east, by the Pacific; on the south, by

the Chinese Empire and Russian Central Asia; and on the west, by Russia in Europe.

Strictly speaking, with the exception of the south-eastern coasts of the peninsula of Kamtchatka, no part of Siberia borders directly on the Pacific Ocean. On referring to the map, the student will find that the eastern coasts are washed by the Bering Sea, the Sea of Okhotsk, and the Sea of Japan. All these, however, are but parts of the Pacific Ocean.

EXTENT: The area of Siberia is officially estimated at 4,830,000 square miles, i.e., 83 times the size of England and Wales.

The greatest length of Siberia, from Bering Strait to the Ural Mountains, is 4,000 miles; and the greatest breadth, from north to south, about 2,000 miles

COASTS: The northern coasts of Siberia, though generally low, are deeply indented by several gulfs or rather estuaries, but their navigation is closed by ice during the greater part of the year. The eastern coasts are washed by three land-locked seas-the Bering Sea, the Sea of Okhotsk, and the Sea of Japan, all opening into the Pacific.

The North-East Passage was accomplished by Nordenskiöld in 1878-79, in the "Vega," and it was confidently expected that some maritime intercourse would be carried on during the summer months between Siberia and Europe. Several attempts have been made, but none on any considerable scale or with any great profit.

The seas which wash the castern coasts of Siberia are separated from the ocean by chains of islands; the Bering Sea or the Sea of Kamtchatka, by the Aleutian Islan is; the Sea of Okhotsk, by the Kurile Islands; and the Sea of Japan, by the Japanese Islands. But they are not true inland seas, like the Mediterranean or the Baltic. They are "generally shallow, but, contrary to the general law of depth, the coasts are on the whole lofty, except at the mouths of the larger rivers."

The principal capes are North-East Cape or Cape Chelyuskin, the northernmost point of the Old World; East Cape, the most easterly point of Asia; and Cape Lopatka, the extreme south point of the peninsula of Kamtchatka.

The chief arms of the sea are the Gulfs of Obi and Yeaisei, Taimyr Bay, and Khatanga Bay on the north, opening into the Arctic Ocean; and, opening directly or indirectly into the Pacific, are the Gulf of Anadir, a part of the Bering Sea; the Sea of Okhotsk, with the Gulfs of Penjinsk and Ghijinsk; and the Sea of Japan, with the Gulf of Tartary.

The most notable channels and straits are Bering Strait, which divides Asia from North America, and is only about 60 miles wide; La Perouse Strait, between the islands of Saghalien and Yeso; and the Gulf, or rather Channel, of Tartary, between the island of Saghalien and the mainland.

The most important islands are the Liakhov Islands or New Siberia, off the north coast of Siberia, famous for their fossil ivory; De Long Islands, further north, and Wrangel Island, further east; with the Bear Islands, off the mouth of the Kolyma. Off the eastern coast are St. Lawrence Island and Bering Island, in the Bering Sea; the Aleutian Islands; and the northern part of the I-land of Sakhalin, which is divided from the mainland by the Gulf of

1. Sighalen (or Sakhalin) is over 550 miles long, and from 1 to 80 miles broad.

Tartary. The southern half (south of 50° N. lat.) was surrendered by Russia to Japan by the Treaty of Portsmouth, in September, 1905. *

NATURAL FEATURES: Nearly the whole of Siberia is a vast lowland plain. The Altai Mountains form its southern border, and impart diversity of surface to the country which adjoins their base. Great level plains, or steppes, stretch out thence to the northward, and become more barren and desolate as they approach the Polar Sea. Towards the latter they form the Tundras, a level waste of ice and snow during the larger portion of the year, but converted into a series of swamps and marshy lakes during the brief summer of these high latitudes.

The easterly division of Siberia is less generally level than its westerly portion. A high chain of mountains, several among which are active volcanoes, extends through the peninsula of Kamtchatka. The long range of the Yablonoi or Stanovoi Mountains forms the natural boundary between the east coast territory and the Amur Province and the great Siberian plains. The central provinces of Siberia are divided from Mongolia by the Altai Mountains,' which are not so much a distinct range as a series of more or less elevated chains running in various directions between the upper valleys of the Yenisei and the Irtish. The entire length of the Maritime Province is traversed by the plateau-like range of the Sikhota-Alin,

The three great rivers of Northern Asia-the Obi, Yenisei, and Lena-belong to Siberia. The Irtish, Tobol, and Ishim are the chief tributaries of the Obi. The chief tributary of the Yenisei is the Angara, which flows out of Lake Baikal, the largest freshwater lake of Asia.

Each of the three great rivers of Siberia has a course of between two and three thousand miles before its waters reach the ocean, but the high latitudes through which they flow prevent their being much navigated, excepting in their upper portions. Many of their tributaries, however, which run in an easterly and westerly direction, i.e., transverse to that of the main streams, are extensively used as channels of intercourse. The magnificent natural waterway thus formed is, from the River Ural to Yakutsk, broken only by two short portages-one between the Obi and the Yenisei, and the other between the Yenisei and the Lena.

Lake Baikal is nearly 400 miles in length, and has an area of about 13.000 square miles. In winter it is frozen over, but in summer it is regularly navi gated by numerous steamers. The Siberian Railway passes round its southern

shore.

CLIMATE: The climate of Northern Siberia is intensely cold, and it is only in the south that a moderate temperature is experienced.

The extreme north, towards the shores of the Arctic Ocean, exceeds any other region on the globe in the intense severity of its winter, which is prolonged through nearly ten months of the year. The pole of maximum cold is near Verkhoiansk, on the Upper Lena, in the north-eastern part of Siberia,

1. Altai, or "Gold Mountains," so called from their rich gold mines.

2. The average temperature for January at Verk hoiansk is 56° below zero Fahrenheit.

and just within the Arctic circle. Here the glass rises in summer to over 100" F. and sometimes sinks in winter to 117° F. below the freezing-point. No other region can show such amazing extremes as these, and North-Eastern Siberia has thus the most essentially continental climate on the globe. It would seem to be at once colder than the North Pole and hotter than many uplands under the Equator.'

PRODUCTIONS: Siberia, however, has natural productions of great value. These are of two kinds, belonging to distinct divisions of the natural world-metals and furs.

The former occur in the neighbourhood of the Ural and the Altai Mountains, in both of which localities gold is worked to a considerable extent. Mines of silver and lead are also worked in the region to the east of Lake Baikal. Iron, copper, and many other metallic and mineral productions, as well as valuable masses of porphyry and marbles, are also supplied by Siberia. which is a carbonate of copper, is extensively derived thence.

Malachite,

The other source of wealth is found in the variety and abundance of animals furnished by nature with warm coats of fur, to enable them to withstand the cold of a Siberian climate. Among these are the sable, otter, mink, ermine, fox, and many others; but their numbers have materially diminished under the pursuit of Russian and the native Siberian hunters.

The Black Earth region, immediately north of the Altai, is so extraordinarily fertile, that wheat from it may be bought for one-twentieth of its cost in England, while the rivers, both here and in the Tundras, literally swarm with fish, large quantities of which are frozen and sent more than 2,000 miles to St. Petersburg.

Vast quantities of fossil ivory-the tusks of mammoths and other antediluvian animals, are found embedded in the frozen soil in the Liakhov Islands and on the Arctic coast, near the mouth of the Lena.

INHABITANTS: Siberia, although it embraces nearly onethird of Asia, has a population of less than 5 millions, an average of only I person per square mile. A large proportion of the inhabitants of Siberia are exiles from European Russia and their descendants.

The rest are Kirghiz, in the south-west; Kalmucks and other tribes along the borders of the Altai Mountains; the Tungus, east of the Yenisei; Ostiaks and o her Tartar-Finnish tribes, in the west and north-west; and the Samoyedes, along the shores of the Arctic Ocean.

Those dwelling

The native tribes of Siberia are for the most part idolaters. in the eastern parts of the country exhibit a low and barbarous condition of life, and subsist by hunting and fishing. The people of Kamtchatka are of short stature; they have few settled habitations, and are remarkable for the extent to which they use the dog for the purpose of draught, as we do the horse.

INDUSTRIES: By far the larger portion of Siberia is too cold and dreary to be fitted for permanent habitation, but there are fertile and cultivated tracts in the south, towards the mountain-region of the Altai and the shores of Lake Baikal.

1. Compendium of Geography and Travel-Asia: Edited by Sir R. Temple (London: Stanford).