China

CHINA, a vast country of Eastern Asia, the scene of the old est contemporary civilization and the world's largest cultural unit. The official name is Chung-Hua, Min-Kuo, i.e., Republic of China.

See CHINESE ARCHITECTURE, CHINESE LITERATURE etc. The territory of China now comprises: (a) China Proper with 18 provinces. The three Manchurian provinces (Liaoning, Kirin and Heilungkiang) were incorporated in China Proper in 1907.

In 1932 they were incorporated in the new state of Manchoukuo set up by the Japanese Empire.

(b) Mongolia.

The term Mongolia, as used to denote a political or even a cultural entity, is now very misleading. There is a vital distinction between Outer and Inner Mongolia. Outer Mongolia, still essentially Mongol in race and character, is omous, with centre of government at Ulan Bator Hoto, and has asserted its independence. Its orientation is to the Trans-Siberian railway and the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics; but China has not relinquished its claims, and the Sino-Soviet Treaty of 1924 recognized that "Outer Mongolia is an integral part of the Repub lic of China and respects China's sovereignty therein." Its pre cise international status must be regarded as still uncertain. Until the Japanese advance Inner Mongolia was becoming more and more linked with China. The area comprised within it. together with portions of the adjacent provinces of Hop-eh and Shansi, was divided into three provinces (Jehol, Chahar, and Suiyuan) in creasingly Chinese in character, and a special administrative dis trict (Sitao), attached to Kansu province.

(c) Sinkiang,

or the New Dominion, consisting of Chinese or sense is now applicable primarily to that south-western portion of the country which is under the Lhasa Government, and whose relationship to China is like that of Outer Mongolia. The Anglo Chinese treaty of 1906 recognized China's suzerainty. Great Britain and Russia (1907) agreed to negotiate with Tibet only through China. But the Lhasa Government is virtually independ ent. On the other hand China has actively asserted her interests in those peripheral portions of Tibet which can menace either China Proper or the vital corridor leading by way of Kansu province to Sinkiang and the Pamir passes. To protect China's interests on the Tibetan border two important administrative divisions under direct Chinese rule have been formed: I. Sikang (Szechwan Marches) or Chwanben, formed by unit ing eastern Tibet with the western mountainous part of Szechwan. This acts as a buffer between Tibet Proper and the Red basin of Szechwan.

2. Chinglaai or Koko-nor embracing the Koko-nor depression and the Nanshan mountains, the north-eastern ramparts of the Tibetan plateau, similarly protects the Kansu-Tarim corridor and presses back the Chinese frontier into what physically and racially is Tibet.

Stated in physical terms, the essential China consists of the middle and lower basins of the Hwang-ho, Yangtze Kiang and Si-kiang to the east of the high buttresses of the Tibetan and Mongolian plateaux. The Manchurian plain marks the continua tion of the monsoon-watered lowlands beyond the sea-ward end of the Great Wall which delimited the original Chinese culture area. The three districts of Inner Mongolia denote the more fertile southern and eastern margins of the Desert of Gobi, open to colo nization from China and Manchuria. The distant Sinkiang oc cupies the deep Tarim depression between the Kunlun, the lofty northern buttress of the Tibetan plateau, and the Tien Shan. Where these great chains converge in the mountain-knot of Kash garia and the Pamirs occur the famous passes, which through all history have connected China with the West by routes following the northern and southern margins of the depression to Kashgar and Yarkand. The Tien Shan mountains and the grasslands of the Jungarian gate between them and the Altai, are also included within Sinkiang province which derives its main significance in re lation to the land communications of China. The oasis-studded margins of the Tarim depression and the rich grasslands of Jun garia give it also agricultural importance.

Thus the outlying "dependencies" still more or less vaguely attached to China are in varying degrees related geographically to the main scene of Chinese civilization and are vital factors in her future. Tibet, in the more restricted sense, and Outer Mongolia, now virtually lost, are geographically remote. Man churia, or Manchoukuo, is dominated by the Japanese and is re garded by Japan as independent of China. Inner Mongolia is also now partly controlled by Japan, although the large majority of its population is Chinese. The Chinese dominion in the widest acceptance of the term, including those parts of Mon golia and Tibet which are only technically subject to Chinese sovereignty and the Japanese-controlled Manchoukuo and Inner Mongolia, occupies an area estimated at 4,277,26o square miles. It is made up as follows : China Proper (excluding Manchuria) 1,532,42o Manchuria 363, 7.

Mongolia i,367,600 Sin Kiang 550640 Tibet 463,000 Provinces of Hwang-ho basin 522,260 Provinces of Yangtze basin (including Chekiang) 572,830 Provinces of Si Kiang basin (including Fukien) Important administrative changes were made in 1928. The three Inner Mongolian divisions of Jehol, Chahar and Suiyuan were given definite provincial status, and a further portion of northern Chihli (now known as Hop-eh) was incorporated with Chahar. Moreover, the military territory of Sitao together with the north-eastern part of Kansu was constituted a province, called Ningsia. Chinghai (Koko-nor) and Sikang (Chwanben) were also given the status of provinces.

The immense terrain indicated in the preceding section is infi nitely diverse. Even within China Proper there is great variety of structure, climate and vegetation.

It is to middle and south-eastern China that the description of China as a land of river-valleys is most applicable. There the Yangtze Kiang and Si-kiang occupy well-defined valleys, each of which is the focus of the population and of the activity of the basin and still serves as the principal artery of commerce within it. In contrast the Hwang-ho, the great river of the north, has no such well-defined valley. In its upper course it hurries through deep trenches and in its lower course it wanders over the wide open plain in a channel liable to shift bodily for hundreds of miles. Thus the Hwang-ho is clearly not the arterial line of north China as the Yangtze is of middle China, and, in the absence of any such unifying influence, the natural division of the north is into the great plains of its eastern and the loess-covered plateaux of its western sections. Thus the initial distinction to be made is between the plains and loess-covered uplands which make up north China and the mountain and valley country of middle and south China. Between the two interpose, in the west, the high ranges of the Tsin-ling-shan, an eastern extension of the Kunlun and the sharpest climatic and vegetational divide in the whole of China. Eastwards the Tsin-ling ranges sink into the Fu-niu-shan and then the Hwai-yang-shan.

The loess-covered uplands of north-west China form a broad belt from Jehol to Kansu keeping north of the Tsin-ling divide. Loess, it is true, extends down from the uplands into the western margins of the north China plain, but it here lies too low to affect the topography in the same distinctive way as in the uplands, the loess-lands proper. These take the form of a girdle around Mon golia, a high rolling tableland, in places swept clean of any rock detritus, but in others piled high with sand-dunes, the most prob able source of the wind-borne loess of north-west China. The loess mantle, leaving only the ridges exposed, yet with a thickness of rarely more than 200 ft., weathers because of a strongly developed vertical cleavage into a topography of cliff-edges and steep-sided terraces. The same vertical cleavage is responsible for the porosity of the loess which, while accentuating the dryness of the plateau surface, gives rise to a relative abundance of water in the numerous basins within it. The loess is, however, no more than a mantle cast over a pattern of relief independent of it.

The northern part of the belt consists of a parallel series of high broad-backed ridges separated by equally broad loess-filled troughs, the whole trending from north-east to south-west athwart the routes between the north China plain and the Mongolian pla teau. The route between Peking and Kalgan, the gateway into Mon golia, utilizes, however, the transverse valley of the Hun-ho and the easy Nankou pass. Southwards the ridges gradually sink be neath the plateau of south Shansi whose south-eastern part consti tutes a coalfield of the size of Wales. Let down beneath the gen eral surface of this plateau is a chain of exceedingly fertile loess basins stretching from Taiyuan in the north by way of the Fen ho to the Wei-ho valley in Shensi. Leading from the plain into west China, this chain of basins was followed by the Imperial Courier road from Peking to the western province of Szechwan and from the establishment of Peking as capital until the advent of the railway, it was this rather than the Hwang-ho which formed the main artery of commerce in the southern loess-lands. The loess belt as a whole constitutes one of the most distinctive re gions in all China and was the cradle-land of Chinese civilization.

The North China Ptain. The

second major division of north China is the great plain which in the north communicates by a narrow lowland corridor with the plains of Manchuria and in the south-east merges imperceptibly with the delta of the Yangtze. Rising partly out of the plain and partly out of the Yellow sea, on which the plain is steadily encroaching, are the broken uplands of Shantung. The Hwang-ho has passed at certain periods to the south and at others to the north of them. The drainage of the plain is, however, to a large extent independent of the Hwang-ho, the streams of the northern portion finding their outlet by the Hai-ho at Tientsin and of the southern by the Hwai-ho, much of whose basin was for long a vast swamp. Shifting of channels has spread river sand and gravel, and the plain is not so continuously fertile as the deltaic alluvium of the Lower Yangtze.

The Shantung uplands are divided into two masses by a broad lowland now followed by the Shantung railway from Kiaochow bay. The eastern peninsular half faces the very similar peninsula of Liaotung. Both lie athwart the seaward approaches to the plains of Hop-eh and of Manchuria and their well-articulated coasts offer the best harbours in north China.

Thus in north China the loess and the plain give considerable uniformity of surface conditions and have always been in close re lationship. In south and middle China mountain ridge and valley succeed each other apparently without end. The only large table land is that of Yunnan in the south-west. The largest plains are simply expanded valley-basins and nowhere approach the bulk of the north China plain. Again, there is nothing to parallel the super ficial uniformity bestowed on north-west China by the loess man tle. If the key-note of the surface of north China be uniformity, that of middle and south China is variety.

South China Highlands.

To the rugged dissected massif south of the Yangtze the term South China Highlands is often applied. In the east high axial ranges overlook the broken country of the coastal provinces (Chekiang, Fukien and Kwangtung) . In the west and south-west the characteristic form is that of massive and lofty plateaux. The intermediate country of south-central China is in the nature of a saddle between the eastern scarps and the western tableland, and across it the main routes from the Yang tze valley pass to that of the Si-kiang. The approach from the Yangtze is by way of the Siang and Kan valleys leading up to the Che-ling and Mei-ling passes respectively, the routes from both of which converge to pass down the Pei-kiang valley to the delta of the Si-kiang.

The Central Asian background of middle and south China is not the Mongolian plateau but high mountain ranges trending from north to south, the eastern border of the Tibetan highlands and the "march-lands" of Szechwan. These ranges confine the drainage in parallel longitudinal channels and of the great rivers which flow southwards from Tibet only the Yangtze, by means of a complex series of gorges, escapes to the east. After this torren tial descent from the Tibetan highlands the Yangtze enters on the Red basin of Szechwan, the first of the chain of basins char acterizing its later course. But, unlike those farther downstream, the Red basin is an upland basin so vigorously dissected into hilly country that the only plain of any extent, that of Chengtu at the foot of the high ranges of Szechwan Marches, is due to quite spe cial causes. The basin, almost completely ringed round by high mountain country, is a region apart, communicating with the rest of China mainly by way of the difficult route of the Yang-tze gorges cut through the mountain rim. Below the gorges the Yang-tze begins its true valley course. It is aligned alternately to the north-east when it is broad and open and to the south-east when it is confined and almost gorge-like, as it cuts through the north-east–south-west ridges of the eastern part of the south China highlands. In this valley course the Yang-tze first flows through the lowland alluvium-covered basin of Hupeh, on which converge the important river valleys of the Han from the north-west, the Yang-tze from the west, the Yuen and Siang from the south-west and south. The routes from north to south China, soon to be crystallized in the Peking-Hankow-Canton railway, here cross the west-to-east arterial route of the Yang-tze valley. This is pre eminently the central basin of China. Below it the Yang-tze, though passing through several small basins as that of Wuhu and skirting the margin of the larger Po-yang basin of Kiangsi, does not itself flow through a basin of comparable size until its delta begins at Nanking. The delta is in the nature of an incompletely filled basin (the Chusan archipelago marks part of its eastern rim), but it is advancing seawards at the rate of one mile in every 6o years. As the Yang-tze has at this stage deposited all its coarser detritus, the delta consists much more uniformly of fertile silt than the central basin farther upstream.

South China.

The Si-kiang of south China has a facies very different from that of the Yang-tze. It has a normal valley course, without basins, through the south China highlands until it finally broadens out to form its delta. Its upper valley is entrenched in the south-easterly prolongations of the Yunnan-Kweichow plateau but its lower cuts through the scarped country of south-east China. The routes linking the Si-kiang with the rest of China, whether by land over the saddle between the south-eastern ranges and the south-western plateau, or by sea, all lead from Canton, the unmis takable focus of south China. The orientation of Canton, separated from the central Yang-tze basin by the whole breadth of the south China highlands and looking out over the sea towards the Indies, strongly contrasts with that of the north, encompassed by steppes and deserts. (See CANTON.) The maritime provinces of south-east China, between the Canton and Yang-tze deltas, form a very distinct region dominated by the south-west–north-east ridges which culminate westwards in the high axial range of the Ta-sha-ling on the Fukien-Kiangsi border, the watershed between the Yang-tze drainage and the basins of several relatively small coastal streams.

This highly diversified region communicates with the rest of China more naturally by sea than by the difficult interior mountain passes. It is a little world apart, with a distinctive set of space relations. (See FUKIEN.) The deeply dissected plateau of south-west China stands apart from the scheme of river-basins here outlined, and as an immense watershed, forms another distinct entity. In Kweichow the plateau is lowest and most dissected by winding river courses, but it rises towards the west and in eastern Yunnan the rolling surface of the tableland is broken only by deeply trenched valleys and sunken lake basins. Farther west the trenches become deeper and the tableland between them narrower until, in western Yunnan the plateau disappears and there is left a succession of high, narrow north–south ranges and very deep river troughs, belonging to the system of parallel chains and troughs of west Indo-China. The approaches to the south-west plateau from the heart of China are tortuous enough, but these north–south ranges and troughs of West Yunnan make it almost inaccessible from the west. Hence its orientation is towards China with which it has been gradually incorporated, but it was the latest part of the country to be colonized.

Mineral Resources.

Coal measures of workable bulk occur at two geological horizons—the Permo-Carboniferous and the Rhaetic-Lias ; the coals of the latter are commonly more friable and of generally poorer quality than those of the Permo Carboniferous. There is an important difference, too, in their distribution. The Permo-Carboniferous occur mainly in north, the Rhaetic-Lias mainly in south China. In both north and south China the larger fields lie towards the west, so that even the smaller fields near the sea have considerable significance.

The Permo-Carboniferous plateau of south-east Shansi forms by far the greatest Chinese coalfield; continued, in more broken form, on either side in the troughs of south-west Shansi and in the faulted blocks at the foot of the Tai-hang-shan. Coastal position gives significance to the small fields of Fushun in south Manchuria, Kaiping in Chihli, and, though less important, Poshan and Ihsien in Shantung. In south China the most accessible and most valuable fields lie in the Siang valley along the corridor route from the central basin to the Canton delta. These are of Permian and, at Pinghsiang, of Rhaetic age. In the west the Rhaetic coal measures cover immense areas in the plateau of Kweichow and west Kwangsi and underlie most of the Red basin of Szechwan. Their coals are, however, very friable, especially those of Szech wan. Many synclinal troughs of south-east China contain Permo Carboniferous coal measures which owe their significance to their proximity to the coast.

In the distribution of metallic ores there are again real differ ences between north and south. In north China and in the lower Yang-tze valley iron is almost the only metallic ore of importance, but in south China there is a great variety of ores including tin, copper, lead, zinc, antimony, tungsten, manganese and mercury as well as iron. Of the iron ores four main types occur. Inter bedded with both Permo-Carboniferous and Rhaetic-Lias coal measures are nodules and lenses of carbonate ores which must comprise an enormous reserve but occur under conditions unsuited to modern mining. The Archaean ores in the Liaotung massif of south Manchuria are similar in nature to those of the Lake Superior ranges though of lower grade. Scattered over north China but especially abundant along the line of the Lower Yang tze, just outside the Sinian mole, there have been developed numerous magnetite-haematite iron ore bodies wherever grano diorite is intrusive into limestone. Although limited, they are important in the iron industry of the Far East owing to accessibil ity from the Yang-tze. About equal in bulk to these contact de posits along the Yang-tze are the oolitic haematites bedded in the pre-Cambrian of the "grill of Peking." Most of the larger de posits of other ores are concentrated into two areas: the first around the Nan-ling mountains on the border of Hunan with Kwangsi and Kwangtung and in upper Hunan ; the second, in eastern Yunnan and adjoining parts of Szechwan and Kweichow. The Nan-ling is the centre of a number of tin-fields as yet largely unworked. Northwards the tin is replaced by the lead-zinc ores of Shui-kou-shan in the upper Siang valley, which in turn give way to the antimony of central Hunan. In Yunnan the tin also lies in the south, near Mengtz, and the lead-zinc farther north in north-east Yunnan with Tungchwan as the centre. Even more important, however, in this region is copper. Yunnan indeed with its tin, lead-zinc and copper is the most important mineral region in China for ores other than iron.