perature in January is below zero, and the summer heat in July averages about 72° F. In winter whenever low pressure areas develop along the Yangtze valley, a high northwester blows across the plains of Manchuria, bringing with it an extremely cold spell. In the spring terrific winds come out of the Mongolian plains. The great plains of Manchuria are heir to all the violent changes of a continental climate.

The rainfall in Manchuria amounts to about one half to one third of that of Japan, and about half of it comes in the two summer months of July and August. It is this downpour which causes the periodic floods in the valleys of all the great streams of the land from the Liao to the Nonni. In winter, which is dry, one rarely sees a foot of snow on the ground. The crops and all vegetation suffer from the lack of this blanket protection of snow. It rains more in the northern section than in the country south of Mukden. About Changchun there are some 80 to 90 days of rain a year; in southern sections not more than 60 to 70 days yearly. What hurts Manchurian farms more than anything else is the lack of sufficient moisture at seed-sowing time. It often altogether prevents the seeds from sprouting. Small wonder that drought is considered one of the major curses of nature by Manchurian farmers.

In South Manchuria the River Liao begins to freeze in the middle of November, and by the middle of December it is frozen all over. It remains frozen until the close of March, some ninety or more days of the year. River men count on 140 days of open season on the average. In North Manchuria the Sungari freezes up toward the close of November and remains closed until the middle of April. The Amur freezes up between the middle of October and the early days of November and does not open for navigation until about the middle of April.

CHAPTER III

THE PEOPLE

SUCH was the homeland of the race of people called the Tungus. They were as far away and as different from the Chinese in all essential and dominant characteristics as the Anglo-Saxon is from the Jew. In those twilight days of history while a wolf was still suckling Romulus on the banks of the Tiber the Chinese knew the original owners of the present Manchuria under the vague name of Sushen. They centered about the upper reaches of the Hurka River and along the Sungari, minding their own fields and flocks and nothing else. The future had much in store for them. The present people of Chosen and of Nippon are the posterities of the Tungus more than of any other races.

From the very dawn of history this race showed promise of its great destiny. The Tungus were, like Genghis Khan and his followers, hunters, nomads, warriors and herdsmen. They were no doubt closely allied to the Mongol Tartars in blood. But they were also, unlike them, but like the Chinese to the south, tillers of the soil. It is this combination of occupations by this singular race that tells a story that is really big. The racial trait which this combination of their occupations indicates came to flower in the rise of two states in the valleys of Manchuria-the Kaoli and the Fuyu State.

The people of Kaoli were largely huntsmen and warriors. They rose to power some 1,800 years ago, about the middle of the Han Dynasty in China. They centered in the valley of the Yalu and dominated most of what

is now North Chosen and the eastern section of the valleys of the Sungari and the Hurka in Manchuria. "Corea" is doubtless a corruption of Kaoli.

The State of Fuyu spread over the plains of the Nonni and into the western valley of the Sungari and centered about where the present cities of Changchunthe northern terminus of the South Manchuria Railway -and Nungan stand. Unlike the Kaoli, the people of Fuyu were farmers.

These two states maintained their supremacy for many years, until toward the close of the Han Dynasty. The Fuyu went first, and then the Kaoli were crushed by the aggressive imperialism of the Tang Dynasty of China. On the wreck of the two states rose the Kingdom of Pohai, which marked the triumphal entry of a northern tribe called Kitan into the plains of Manchuria. The Kingdom of Pohai extended its sway from the Yalu valley on the east up along the valley of the Sungari and its tributaries past the present Mukden (which in those days was known under the name of Shenchou), and took in the old state of Fuyu around Changchun and Nungan. The Pohai lasted about 300 years. With the decline of the Kingdom of Pohai the old Manchu stock came again to power under the name of the Kingdom of Kin, the Golden. It was some 800 years ago. With the coming of the Kingdom of Gold Manchuria entered into the practical politics of continental Asia as one of the leading actors.

KINGDOM OF KIN

From its base at Paicheng near the present city of Harbin the Kin extended its domain eastward into north Chosen. To the west and south it overran the old state of Pohai of the Kitan. The Chinese under the Sung Dynasty entered into a secret understanding with the