Further, the same writer, after describing the immense variety of climate that occurs within this limited space, adds:
“From the extremity of these table-lands, especially on the _south-east and north-east, south-west and north-west_, there issue several separate mountain-chains, not connected with one another, but which form more or less a part of the table-lands themselves.
“_The valleys, which are produced by this indentation on the borders of the table-lands, offer peculiar advantages for the progress of civilization._ For, as we have already observed, the highland of Asia does not sink on _one side only_, but on _all sides_ and towards every point of the compass; it also sinks towards _different_ oceans, which are separated from the highland by extensive plains, varying greatly in magnitude and form. This circumstance, added to the valleys formed by the indentations in the exterior margins of the highlands, has given rise to numerous and most extensive _river systems_, which, descending through the intervening terraces, direct their winding course _towards the north, south, west, and east_, and thus give to _the distant internal countries of this continent the advantage of an easy communication with the ocean_.”
2. The Climate and Natural productions of Cashmire and Tibet.
Influenced solely by its high elevation, De Pauw, Zimmerman, and Pallas concluded that Central Asia must have been the birthplace of the human race. To this conclusion the rigorous climate of those parts of it which were best known to them appeared to present an insuperable objection. But as Adelung observes, those regions of Central Asia which border upon the Indus have been shown by the accounts of travellers to fulfil all the requisite conditions in this respect. Had these celebrated writers been possessed of the information these accounts contain, they might have discovered in Cashmire a suitable locality for the first abode of man, in Tibet a fitting school of discipline to prepare him for the various climes and countries he was destined to inhabit!
CASHMIRE. Adelung’s description of this enchanting country calls to mind in many of its features the “Happy Valley” in Rasselas!
The faculties with which man has been endowed enable him to contend with the most unfavorable climes: but not until these faculties have been ripened by Time and experience! At his first creation he required an abode where nature’s free bounty would supply all his wants; in fine he needed, with reference even to his mere physical necessities, a Paradise! To this appellation no country in Asia can assert a better claim than the lovely land of Cashmire, which is, in fact, a mere Valley, separated by inaccessible mountains from India, Persia, and Tibet! Owing to its high elevation, the heat of the South is tempered into a perpetual Spring, and nature here puts forth all her powers to bring all her works, Plants, Animals, and Man, to the highest state of perfection! Cashmire is a region of fruitful hills, countless fountains and streams, which unite in the River Behut, that, like the Pison of Paradise, “compasseth the whole land!”