The people of the second or Mongolian group agree in certain well-marked characteristics in such a way as to be well separated from the other divisions of mankind; these characteristics we may speak of as constituting a second “theme,” of which the various peoples of the group are so many variations.  To visualize them we need only to recall the appearance of the Chinaman, perhaps the most familiar example of the entire series.  Here the hair is coarse and black, and straight because of its round transverse section; the mustache and beard of the Caucasians are seldom found except in later life; the skin is a fleshy yellow in color; the skull is round, indeed, it is one of the roundest that we know; the jaws are not so straight as in the Caucasian, for the angle at the point of the chin is about sixty-eight degrees.  The cheek bones project laterally, with greater or less prominence; the nose is very small, tilted up slightly at the end, and is usually hollowed instead of arched.  The eyes are small and black in color, set somewhat obliquely, and the upper lid is drawn down over the eye at its inner corner so as to make the obliquity still more marked.  The teeth are larger than those of the Caucasian.  Finally, the Mongol is below the average of all men as regards height, being usually about five feet four inches tall.

The original Mongolians probably developed the characteristic features we have just noted in a Central Asiatic region, and then almost immediately they divided into two great groups.  Each of these evolved along certain lines of its own, one sweeping northward to develop into what are now called the Northern Mongols, the other working its way eastward and southward to produce the peoples of China proper, Indo-China, and many parts of Malaysia.  Considering first the peoples of the Northern Mongolian division, we find in the typical Manchurian what is perhaps the nearest among modern people to the original race.  Spreading northward and westward from the middle Asiatic plains, this great wave has produced the nomadic tribes of Siberia, like the Chukchi, the Buryats, and the Yukaghir.  The present inhabitants of Turkestan connect those forms which have remained near the original home with the races of Mongolian origin that live farther to the westward, like the Turks of Asia.  But the Mongolian tide originally swept much farther to the west, although it was driven back later by conquering Caucasian peoples; and it has left behind such remnants as the Finlander and the Laplander, the Bulgar, and the Magyar.  It is evident that these western branches of the Mongol stock are not at all pure in their racial characteristics, for they clearly show the effects of a mixture with alien European peoples.  To assign them to the Northern Mongol division means only that their dominant characteristics are mainly those of Mongolian nature.  We have referred the Russians to the middle Caucasian division even though the Slav or Tartar infusion is very great, but it does not dominate over the Caucasian peculiarities as it does in the case of the peoples we have mentioned.  As regards the remaining types we must add to this brief list the Koreans and the Japanese, the former being far purer in Mongolian nature than the latter people, which has apparently been affected by a Malay influence from the south.