Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 82.djvu/127

Rh rugged mountain country. The soft red sandstone beds which underlie it have therefore been sculptured into a network of valleys with intervening red hills or buttes. With a climate as mild and moist as that of Alabama, and a diversified topography, there is opportunity for many industries, and for the cultivation of a great variety of crops. Sze-chuan leads all the provinces in the exportation of silk. Here grow the lacquer and oil nut trees and a wide range of field and garden fruits, grains and vegetables. Ample water for irrigation and especially for rice-culture is supplied by the many perennial streams which descend from the encircling mountains. These uplifted and now mountainous tracts have also served as a barrier to invaders from all directions, so that this has been less subject to wars than almost any other part of China, and hence has been more stable in development. Its inhabitants are among the most substantial and progressive components of the Chinese nation.

We now come to the last of the geologic divisions which were laid out for consideration. From the Sze-chuan basin southwest to the

 Fig. 32. One of the great Limestone Gorges through which the Yang-tze-kiang pierces the Central Ranges.