most remote regions. China,
Tartary, India, Persia, Syria, Muscovy, Poland, Hungary, Austria,--all
these countries successively felt the terrible blows of the victorious
Tartar. France, Italy, and the other regions further west, escaped with
their fear.

In the year 1260 of our era, Khan-Khoubilai, grandson of Tchinggis, who
had commenced the conquest of China, succeeded in subduing that vast
empire. It was the first time that it had passed under the yoke of
foreigners. Khoubilai died at Peking in the year 1294, aged eighty. His
empire was, without dispute, the largest that had ever existed. Chinese
geographers state that, under the Mongol dynasty of the Youen, the empire
northwards went beyond the In-Chan mountains; westwards it extended
beyond the Gobi or sandy desert; to the east, it was terminated by the
countries situated on the left of the river Siao; and in the southern
direction it reached the shores of the Youe Sea. It is obvious that this
description does not include the countries tributary to the empire.
Thibet, Turkestan, Muscovy, Siam, Cochin China, Tonking, and Corea,
acknowledged the supremacy of the Grand Khan of the Tartars, and
faithfully paid him tribute. Even European nations were, from time to
time, insolently summoned to acknowledge the Mongol supremacy. Haughty
and threatening letters were sent to the Pope, to the King of France, to
the Emperor, commanding them to send as tribute the revenues of their
states to the depths of Tartary. The descendants of Tchinggiskhan, who
reigned in Muscovy, Persia, Bactriana, and Sogdiana, received investiture
from the Emperor of Peking, and undertook nothing of importance without
first giving him notice. The diplomatic papers which the King of Persia
sent, in the thirteenth century, to Philip the Fair, are a proof of this
dependance. On these precious monuments, which are preserved to this day
in the archives of France, are seals in Chinese characters, which testify
the supremacy of the Grand Khan of Peking over the sovereigns of Persia.

The conquests of Tchinggiskhan and of his successors; and, in later
times, those of Tamerlan or Timour, which transferred the seat of the
Mongol empire to Samarcand, contributed, in as great, and perhaps a
greater degree than the Crusades, to renew the intercourse of Europe with
the most distant states of the East, and favoured the discoveries which
have been so useful to the progress of the arts, of the sciences, a