Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1921.djvu/816

 764 CHINA

and the Conference was dissolved without accomplishing anything. Since then the Chinese Government has more than once offered to renew negotia- tions with the British Government, but the latter. has up to the present declined to do so.

Sin-Kiang, or the New Dominion, consists of Chinese Turkestan, Kulja, and Kashgaria, ;and comprises all Chinese dependencies lying between Mongolia on the north and Tibet on the south. It is now regarded as a separate province, its Civil Governor residing at Hi, the capital. Its area is estimated at about 550,340 square miles and population at about 1,200,000. The inhabitants are of various races, known as Turki (Kashgari, Kalmuk, Khirghiz, Taranchi, etc.), mostly Mohammedan and Chinese, who have of recent years greatly increased in numbers. The chief towns are Hi, Kashgar, Yarkand, Khotan, and Aksu. The country is administered under Chinese officials, residing at Hi, the sub- ordinates being usually natives of the country. In regions about the Kashgar and Yarkand rivers the soil is fertile, irrigation is practised, and cereals, fruits and vegetables are grown. Other productions of the country are wool, cotton, and silk. Jade is worked, and in some districts gold is found. The whole territory is yearly increasing in population and prosperity.

Mongolia.

The vast and indefinite tract of country called Mongolia stretches from the Kinghan mountains on the east to the Tarbagatai mountains on the west, being intersected towards its western end by the Altai mountains and the Irtish river. On the north it is bounded by Siberia and on the south by the outer Kan-su and other regions which are united into Sin-Kiang. The area of Mongolia is about 1,367,600 square miles, and its population about 2,600,000. A wide tract in the heart of this region is occupied by the Desert of Gobi which extends south-westwards into Chinese Turkestan. The inhabitants are nomadic Mongols and Kalmucks who range the desert with camels, horses, and sheep. Even in fertile districts they are little given to agriculture. But of recent years there has been a great extension of Chinese immigration, and a large area of what was known as Mongolia, extending from China proper and Manchuria to the Gobi Desert, is now indistinguishable from Chinese territory. Chinese settlers are gradually invading the Gobi Desert. Irrigation alone is needed. The chief town or centre of population is Urga, 170 miles due south of Khiakta, a frontier emporium for the caravan trade carried on with China across the Gobi Desert, goods being easily transported to the Siberian frontier town of Kiakhta, which stands about 100 miles from the south end of Lake Baikal. Chief exports were wool, skins and hides, furs, horns, &c. During the summer months a motor-car service for freight purposes crosses the Gobi desert, the journey between Kalgan and Urga occupying four days. It was inaugurated in 1917.

Shortly after the outbreak of the Chinese Revolution, Outer Mongolia declared its independence and proclaimed the Hutuktu (Living Buddha) as Emperor. Its autonomy was recognised by the Russian Government, and on November 3, 1912, a Convention and a Protocol were signed at Urga by the Russian Envoy and the Cabinet of the Hutuktu. By this Convention the Russian Government undertook to assist Mongolia to maintain the autonomous regime she had established, to support her right to have a national army, and to admit neither the presence of Chinese troops on her soil nor the colonization by the Chinese of her ' territory. The Mongolian