the Tartar'countenance, fo different from that o f the Hindus,
are the inhabitants o f Bootan. “ The Booteeas,” fays Captain
Turner, “ have invariably black hair, which it is their faihion
“ to cut fhort to the head. The eye is a very remarkable
“ feature o f the face; fmall, black, with long pointed cor-
“ ners * , as though ftretched and extended by artificial means.
“ Their eye-laihes are fo thin as to be fcarcely perceptible, and
“ the eye-brow is but flightly lhaded. Below the eyes is the
“ broadeft part o f the face, which is rather flat, and narrows
“ from the cheek-bones to the chin ; a character o f countenance
“ appearing firft to take its rife among the -Tartar tribes, but
“ is by far more ftrongly marked in the Chinefe.”
The heights o f Tartary, bulging out beyond the general fur-
face o f the globe, have been confidered, indeed, by many as
the cradle o f the human fpecies, or ilill more emphatically, and
perhaps more properly, a s the foundery o f the human race. This
opinion did not arife folely from the vaft multitudes -of people-
correfponding with the Tartar charadter, that are fpread over,
every part o f the eaftern world, and w ho in countlefs fwarms-
once overran all Europe, but was grounded on a fuppofition,.
that the whole furface o f the globe, or the greater part o f it,
has at one time been fubmerfed in water, and that Tartary was'-
the laft to be covered, and the firft that was uncovered ; and the
place from whence, o f courfe, a new fet o f creatures were forged
as in a workihop, from fome remnant o f the old ftock, to be the
germs o f future nations.
* The exterior angles are here meant which» in the Chinefe alfo, are extended in
the fame or a greater proportion than the interior ones are rounded off.
Almoft
>
, Almoft every part o f the earth, indeed, affords the rooft unequivocal
indications that fqch has, actually been tlje cafe, not
only in the feveral marine, produdtions that havg been difco-
ve red .in high mountains, at a diftance, from any fea, and
equally deep under the furface o f the earth; but, more efpecially
in the formation o f the, mountains, themielves, the very-higheft
o f which, except thofe o f granite, confifting frequently o f tabular
maffes piled on each other in fuch regular and horizontal
ftrata, that their Ihape and' appearance cannot be otherwife
accounted for, or explained by any, known principle in nature,
except by fuppofing them at one time to have exifted in a ftate
o f fluidity, b y the agency o f fire or o f water, a point which feems
to be not quite decided between the Volcanifts and the Nep-
tunifts. The heights o f Tartary are unqueftionably the higheft
land in the old world. In America they may, perhaps, be exceeded.
Gerbillon, who was, a tolerable good mathematician
and furnilhed with instruments, allures us, that the mquntain
Pe-tcfya, very inferior to many in Tartary, is nine Chinefe lees,
or about, fifteen thoufand feet, above the level o f the plains o f
China-i This mountain, aS wel.1 as all, the others in the fame
country, is, compofed o f fand ftpne, and refts upon plains of,
land; mixed with rock fait and fijltpetre. The Sha-moo, or im-
menfe defert o f fand, which ftretches.along the north-weft frontier,
o f China and divides it from weftern Tartary, is not left
elevated than the Pe-tcha, and is faid to refemble the bed o f the.
ocean. Some o f the mountains ftarting out o f this fea o f fan d,
which its name implies, cannot be lefs than twenty thoufand ,
feet above the level o f the eaftern ocean.
The