Part 42

Generally speaking, the Nan-shan highlands are a region raised 12,000 to 14,000 ft. above the sea, and intersected by wild, stony and partly snow-clad mountains, towering another 4000 to 7000 ft. above its surface, and arranged in narrow parallel chains all running N.W. to S.E. The chains of mountains are severally from 8 to 17 m. wide, seldom as much as 35, while the broad, flat valleys between them attain widths of 20 to 27 m. As a rule the passes are at an altitude of 12,000 to 14,000 ft., and the peaks reach 18,000 to 20,000 ft. in the western portion of the highlands, while in the eastern portion they may be about 2000 ft. lower. The glaciers also attain a greater development in the western portion of the Nan-shan, but the valleys are dry, and the slopes of both the mountains and the valleys, furrowed by deep ravines, are devoid of vegetation. Good pasture grounds are only found near the streams. The soil is dry gravel and clay, upon which bushes of _Ephedra_, _Nitraria_ and _Salsolaceae_ grow sparsely. In the north-eastern Nan-shan, on the contrary, a stream runs through each gorge, and both the mountain slopes and the bottoms of the valleys are covered with vegetation. Forests of conifers (_Picea obovata_) and deciduous trees--Przhevalsky's poplar, birch, mountain ash, &c., and a variety of bushes--are common everywhere. Higher up, in the picturesque gorges, grow rhododendrons, willows, _Potentilla fruticosa_, _Spriaeae_, _Lonicereae_, &c., and the rains must evidently be more copious and better distributed. In the central Nan-shan it is only the north-eastern slopes that bear forests. In the south, where the Nan-shan enters Kan-suh province, extensive accumulations of loess make their appearance, and it is only the northern slopes of the hills that are clothed with trees. (P. A. K.)

AUTHORITIES.--An enumeration of the works published before 1890, and a map of itineraries, will be found in Wegener's _Versuch einer Orographie des Kuen-lun_ (Marburg, 1891), but his map is only approximately correct. Of the books published since 1890 the most important are Sven Hedin's _Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia_, 1899-1902 (Stockholm, 1905-1907, 6 vols.), with an elaborate atlas and a general map of Tibet on the scale of 1 : 1,000,000; H. H. P. Deasy's _In Tibet and Chinese Turkestan_ (London, 1901), with a good map; F. Grenard's vol. (iii.) of J. L. Dutreuil de Rhins's _Mission scientifique dans la haute Asie, 1890-1895_ (n.p., 1897), also with a very useful map; W. W. Rockhill's _Diary of a Journey through Mongolia and Tibet in 1891 and 1892_ (Washington, 1894); M. S. Wellby's _Through Unknown Tibet_ (London, 1898); P. G. Bonvalot's _De Paris au Tonkin à travers le Tibet inconnu_ (Paris, 1892); St G. R. Littledale's "A Journey across Tibet," in _Geog. Journal_ (May 1896); H. Bower's _Diary of a Journey across Tibet_ (London, 1894); the _Izvestia_ of the Russian Geog. Soc. and _Geog. Journal_, both _passim_.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] In "Orographie des Kwen-lun," in _Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu Berlin_ (1891).

[2] It is used, for instance, on the map of "Inner-Asien" (No. 62) of _Stieler's Hand-atlas_ (ed. 1905) and in the _Atlas_ of the Russian General Staff. Etymologically the correct form is Astin-tagh or Astun-tagh, meaning the Lower or Nearer Mountains. Ustun-tagh, which appears on Stieler's map as an _alternative_ name for Altyn-tagh, means Higher or Farther Mountains, and though not used locally of any specific range, would be appropriately employed to designate the higher and more southerly of the twin border-ranges of the Tibetan plateau.

[3] The Northern Mountains are the Pe-shan in the desert of Gobi (see GOBI).

[4] On the opposite or north side of the desert of Lop (desert of Gobi).

[5] Sven Hedin, _Scientific Results_, iii. 308.

[6] _Ibid._ 310-311.

[7] This is the correct form, Arka-tagh meaning the Farther or Remoter Mountains. The form Akka-tagh is incorrect.

[8] The form Tumenlik-tagh is erroneous.

KUFA, a Moslem city, situated on the shore of the Hindieh canal, about 4 m. E. by N. of Nejef (32° 4´ N., 44° 20´ E.), was founded by the Arabs after the battle of Kadesiya in A.D. 638 as one of the two capitals of the new territory of Irak, the whole country being divided into the _sawads_, or districts, of Basra and Kufa. The caliph 'Ali made it his residence and the capital of his caliphate. After the removal of the capital to Bagdad, in the middle of the following century, Kufa lost its importance and began to fall into decay. At the beginning of the 19th century, travellers reported extensive and important ruins as marking the ancient site. Since that time the ruins have served as quarries for bricks for the building of Nejef, and at the present time little remains but holes in the ground, representing excavations for bricks, with broken fragments of brick and glass strewn over a considerable area. A mosque still stands on the spot where 'Ali is reputed to have worshipped. (For history see CALIPHATE.)

KUHN, FRANZ FELIX ADALBERT (1812-1881), German philologist and folklorist, was born at Königsberg in Neumark on the 19th of November 1812. From 1841 he was connected with the Köllnisches Gymnasium at Berlin, of which he was appointed director in 1870. He died at Berlin on the 5th of May 1881. Kuhn was the founder of a new school of comparative mythology, based upon comparative philology. Inspired by Grimm's _Deutsche Mythologie_, he first devoted himself to German stories and legends, and published _Märkische Sagen und Märchen_ (1842), _Norddeutsche Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche_ (1848), and _Sagen, Gebräuche und Märchen aus Westfalen_ (1859). But it is on his researches into the language and history of the Indo-Germanic peoples as a whole that his reputation is founded. His chief works in this connexion are: _Zur ältesten Geschichte der Indogermanischen Völker_ (1845), in which he endeavoured to give an account of the earliest civilization of the Indo-Germanic peoples before their separation into different families, by comparing and analysing the original meaning of the words and stems common to the different languages; _Die Herabkunft des Feuers und des Göttertranks_ (1859; new ed. by E. Kuhn, under title of _Mythologische Studien_, 1886); and _Über Entwicklungsstufen der Mythenbildung_ (1873), in which he maintained that the origin of myths was to be looked for in the domain of language, and that their most essential factors were polyonymy and homonymy. The _Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung auf dem Gebiete der Indogermanischen Sprachen_, with which he was intimately connected, is the standard periodical on the subject.

See obituary notice by C. Bruchmann in Bursian's _Biographisches Jahrbuch_ (1881) and J. Schmidt in the above _Zeitschrift_, xxvi. n.s. 6.

KÜHNE, WILLY (1837-1900), German physiologist, was born at Hamburg on the 28th of March 1837. After attending the gymnasium at Lüneburg, he went to Göttingen, where his master in chemistry was F. Wöhler and in physiology R. Wagner. Having graduated in 1856, he studied under various famous physiologists, including E. Du Bois-Reymond at Berlin, Claude Bernard in Paris, and K. F. W. Ludwig and E. W. Brücke in Vienna. At the end of 1863 he was put in charge of the chemical department of the pathological laboratory at Berlin, under R. von Virchow; in 1868 he was appointed professor of physiology at Amsterdam; and in 1871 he was chosen to succeed H. von Helmholtz in the same capacity at Heidelberg, where he died on the 10th of June 1900. His original work falls into two main groups--the physiology of muscle and nerve, which occupied the earlier years of his life, and the chemistry of digestion, which he began to investigate while at Berlin with Virchow. He was also known for his researches on vision and the chemical changes occurring in the retina under the influence of light. The visual purple, described by Franz Boll in 1876, he attempted to make the basis of a photochemical theory of vision, but though he was able to establish its importance in connexion with vision in light of low intensity, its absence from the retinal area of most distinct vision detracted from the completeness of the theory and precluded its general acceptance.

KUKA, or KUKAWA, a town of Bornu, a Mahommedan state of the central Sudan, incorporated in the British protectorate of Nigeria (see Bornu). Kuka is situated in 12° 55´ N. and 13° 34´ E., 4½ m. from the western shores of Lake Chad, in the midst of an extensive plain. It is the headquarters of the British administration in Bornu, and was formerly the residence of the native sovereign, who in Bornu bears the title of shehu.

The modern town of Kuka was founded c. 1810 by Sheikh Mahommed al Amin al Kanemi, the deliverer of Bornu from the Fula invaders. It is supposed to have received its name from the _kuka_ or monkey bread tree (_Adansonia digitata_), of which there are extensive plantations in the neighbourhood. Kuka or Kaoukaou was a common name in the Sudan in the middle ages. The number of towns of this name gave occasion for much geographical confusion, but Idrisi writing in the 12th century, and Ibn Khaldun in the 14th century, both mention two important towns called Kaou Kaou, of which one would seem to have occupied a position very near to that of the modern Kuka. Ibn Khaldun speaks of it as the capital of Bornu and as situated on the meridian of Tripoli. In 1840 the present town was laid waste by Mahommed Sherif, the sultan of Wadai; and when it was restored by Sheikh Omar he built two towns separated by more than half a mile of open country, each town being surrounded by walls of white clay. It was probably owing to there being two towns that the plural _Kukawa_ became the ordinary designation of the town in Kano and throughout the Sudan, though the inhabitants used the singular _Kuka_. The town became wealthy and populous (containing some 60,000 inhabitants), being a centre for caravans to Tripoli and a stopping-place of pilgrims from the Hausa countries going across Africa to Mecca. The chief building was the great palace of the sheikh. Between 1823 and 1872 Kuka was visited by several English and German travellers. In 1893 Bornu was seized by the ex-slave Rabah (q.v.), an adventurer from the Bahr-el-Ghazal, who chose a new capital, Dikwa, Kuka falling into complete decay. The town was found in ruins in 1902 by the British expedition which replaced on the throne of Bornu a descendant of the ancient rulers. In the same year the rebuilding of Kuka was begun and the town speedily regained part of its former importance. It is now one of the principal British stations of eastern Bornu. Owing, however, to the increasing importance of Maidugari, a town 80 m. S.S.W. of Kuka, the court of the shehu was removed thither in 1908.

For an account of Kuka before its destruction by Rabah, see the _Travels_ of Heinrich Barth (new ed., London, 1890); and _Sahara und Sudan_, by Gustav Nachtigal (Berlin, 1879), i. 581-748.

KU KLUX KLAN, the name of an American secret association of Southern whites united for self-protection and to oppose the Reconstruction measures of the United States Congress, 1865-1876. The name is generally applied not only to the order of Ku Klux Klan, but to other similar societies that existed at the same time, such as the Knights of the White Camelia, a larger order than the Klan; the White Brotherhood; the White League; Pale Faces; Constitutional Union Guards; Black Cavalry; White Rose; The '76 Association; and hundreds of smaller societies that sprang up in the South after the Civil War. The object was to protect the whites during the disorders that followed the Civil War, and to oppose the policy of the North towards the South, and the result of the whole movement was a more or less successful revolution against the Reconstruction and an overthrow of the governments based on negro suffrage. It may be compared in some degree to such European societies as the Carbonara, Young Italy, the Tugendbund, the Confréries of France, the Freemasons in Catholic countries, and the Vehmgericht.

The most important orders were the Ku Klux Klan and the Knights of the White Camelia. The former began in 1865 in Pulaski, Tennessee, as a social club of young men. It had an absurd ritual and a strange uniform. The members accidentally discovered that the fear of it had a great influence over the lawless but superstitious blacks, and soon the club expanded into a great federation of regulators, absorbing numerous local bodies that had been formed in the absence of civil law and partaking of the nature of the old English neighbourhood police and the ante-bellum slave patrol. The White Camelia was formed in 1867 in Louisiana and rapidly spread over the states of the late Confederacy. The period of organization and development of the Ku Klux movement was from 1865 to 1868; the period of greatest activity was from 1868 to 1870, after which came the decline.

The various causes assigned for the origin and development of this movement were: the absence of stable government in the South for several years after the Civil War; the corrupt and tyrannical rule of the alien, renegade and negro, and the belief that it was supported by the Federal troops which controlled elections and legislative bodies; the disfranchisement of whites; the spread of ideas of social and political equality among the negroes; fear of negro insurrections; the arming of negro militia and the disarming of the whites; outrages upon white women by black men; the influence of Northern adventurers in the Freedmen's Bureau (q.v.) and the Union League (q.v.) in alienating the races; the humiliation of Confederate soldiers after they had been paroled--in general, the insecurity felt by Southern whites during the decade after the collapse of the Confederacy.

In organization the Klan was modelled after the Federal Union. Its Prescript or constitution, adopted in 1867, and revised in 1868, provided for the following organization: The entire South was the Invisible Empire under a Grand Wizard, General N. B. Forrest; each state was a Realm under a Grand Dragon; several counties formed a Dominion under a Grand Titan; each county was a Province under a Grand Giant; the smallest division being a Den under a Grand Cyclops. The staff officers bore similar titles, relics of the time when the order existed only for amusement: Genii, Hydras, Furies, Goblins, Night Hawks, Magi, Monks and Turks. The private members were called Ghouls. The Klan was twice reorganized, in 1867 and in 1868, each time being more centralized; in 1869 the central organization was disbanded and the order then gradually declined. The White Camelia with a similar history had a similar organization, without the queer titles. Its members were called Brothers and Knights, and its officials Commanders.

The constitutions and rituals of these secret orders have declarations of principles, of which the following are characteristic: to protect and succour the weak and unfortunate, especially the widows and orphans of Confederate soldiers; to protect members of the white race in life, honour and property from the encroachments of the blacks; to oppose the Radical Republican party and the Union League; to defend constitutional liberty, to prevent usurpation, emancipate the whites, maintain peace and order, the laws of God, the principles of 1776, and the political and social supremacy of the white race--in short, to oppose African influence in government and society, and to prevent any intermingling of the races.

During the Reconstruction the people of the South were divided thus: nearly all native whites (the most prominent of whom were disfranchised) on one side irrespective of former political faith, and on the other side the ex-slaves organized and led by a few native and Northern whites called respectively scalawags and carpet-baggers, who were supported by the United States government and who controlled the Southern state governments. The Ku Klux movement in its wider aspects was the effort of the first class to destroy the control of the second class. To control the negro the Klan played upon his superstitious fears by having night patrols, parades and drills of silent horsemen covered with white sheets, carrying skulls with coals of fire for eyes, sacks of bones to rattle, and wearing hideous masks. In calling upon dangerous blacks at night they pretended to be the spirits of dead Confederates, "just from Hell," and to quench their thirst would pretend to drink gallons of water which was poured into rubber sacks concealed under their robes. Mysterious signs and warnings were sent to disorderly negro politicians. The whites who were responsible for the conduct of the blacks were warned or driven away by social and business ostracism or by violence. Nearly all southern whites (except "scalawags"), whether members of the secret societies or not, in some way took part in the Ku Klux movement. As the work of the societies succeeded, they gradually passed out of existence. In some communities they fell into the control of violent men and became simply bands of outlaws, dangerous even to the former members; and the anarchical aspects of the movement excited the North to vigorous condemnation.[1] The United States Congress in 1871-1872 enacted a series of "Force Laws" intended to break up the secret societies and to control the Southern elections. Several hundred arrests were made, and a few convictions were secured. The elections were controlled for a few years, and violence was checked, but the Ku Klux movement went on until it accomplished its object by giving protection to the whites, reducing the blacks to order, replacing the whites in control of society and state, expelling the worst of the carpet-baggers and scalawags, and nullifying those laws of Congress which had resulted in placing the Southern whites under the control of a party composed principally of ex-slaves.

AUTHORITIES.--J. C. Lester and D. L. Wilson, _Ku Klux Klan_ (New York, 1905); W. L. Fleming, _Civil War and Reconstruction in Alabama_ (New York, 1905), and _Documentary History of Reconstruction_ (Cleveland, 1906); J. W. Garner, _Reconstruction in Mississippi_ (New York, 1901); W. G. Brown, _Lower South in American History_ (New York, 1901); J. M. Beard, _Ku Klux Sketches_ (Philadelphia, 1876); J. W. Burgess, _Reconstruction and the Constitution_ (New York, 1901). (W. L. F.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] The judgment of the historian William Garrott Brown, himself a Southerner, is worth quoting: "That violence was often used cannot be denied. Negroes were often whipped, and so were carpet-baggers. The incidents related in such stories as Tourgée's _A Fool's Errand_ all have their counterparts in the testimony before congressional committees and courts of law. In some cases, after repeated warnings, men were dragged from their beds and slain by persons in disguise, and the courts were unable to find or to convict the murderers. Survivors of the orders affirm that such work was done in most cases by persons not connected with them or acting under their authority. It is impossible to prove or disprove their statements. When such outrages were committed, not on worthless adventurers, who had no station in the Northern communities from which they came, but on cultivated persons who had gone South from genuinely philanthropic motives--no matter how unwisely or tactlessly they went about their work--the natural effect was to horrify and enrage the North."

KUKU KHOTO (Chinese _Kwei-hwa_), a city of the Chinese province of Shan-si, situated to the north of the Great Wall, in 40° 50´ N. and 111° 45´ E., about 160 m. W. of Kalgan. It lies in the valley of a small river which joins the Hwang-ho 50 m. to the south. There are two distinct walled towns in Kuku Khoto, at an interval of a mile and a half; the one is the seat of the civil governor and is surrounded by the trading town, and the other is the seat of the military governor, and stands in the open country. In the first or old town more especially there are strong traces of western Asiatic influence; the houses are not in the Chinese style, being built all round with brick or stone and having flat roofs, while a large number of the people are still Mahommedans and, there is little doubt, descended from western settlers. The town at the same time is a great seat of Buddhism--the lamaseries containing, it is said, no less than 20,000 persons devoted to a religious life. As the southern terminus of the routes across the desert of Gobi from Ulyasutai and the Tian Shan, Kuku Khoto is a great mart for the exchange of flour, millet and manufactured goods for the raw products of Mongolia. A Catholic and a Protestant mission are maintained in the town. Lieut. Watts-Jones, R.E., was murdered at Kwei-hwa during the Boxer outbreak in 1900.

Early notices of Kuku Khoto will be found in Gerbillon (1688-1698, in Du Halde (vol. ii., Eng. ed.), and in Astley's _Collection_ (vol. iv.)

KULJA (Chinese, _Ili-ho_), a territory in north-west China; bounded, according to the treaty of St Petersburg of 1881, on the W. by the Semiryechensk province of Russian Turkestan, on the N. by the Boro-khoro Mountains, and on the S. by the mountains Khan-tengri, Muz-art, Terskei, Eshik-bashi and Narat. It comprises the valleys of the Tekez (middle and lower portion), Kunghez, the Ili as far as the Russian frontier and its tributary, the Kash, with the slopes of the mountains turned towards these rivers. Its area occupies about 19,000 sq. m. (Grum-Grzimailo). The valley of the Kash is about 160 m. long, and is cultivated in its lower parts, while the Boro-khoro Mountains are snow-clad in their eastern portion, and fall with very steep slopes to the valley. The Avral Mountains, which separate the Kash from the Kunghez, are lower, but rocky, naked and difficult of access. The valley of the Kunghez is about 120 m. long; the river flows first in a gorge, then amidst thickets of rushes, and very small portions of its valley are fit for cultivation. The Narat Mountains in the south are also very wild, but are covered with forests of deciduous trees (apple tree, apricot tree, birch, poplar, &c.) and pine trees. The Tekez flows in the mountains, and pierces narrow gorges. The mountains which separate it from the Kunghez are also snow-clad, while those to the south of it reach 24,000 ft. of altitude in Khan-tengri, and are covered with snow and glaciers--the only pass through them being the Muzart. Forests and alpine meadows cover their northern slopes. Agriculture was formerly developed on the Tekez, as is testified by old irrigation canals. The Ili is formed by the junction of the Kunghez with the Tekez, and for 120 m. it flows through Kulja, its valley reaching a width of 50 m. at Horgos-koljat. This valley is famed for its fertility, and is admirably irrigated by canals, part of which, however, fell into decay after 55,000 of the inhabitants migrated to Russian territory in 1881. The climate of this part of the valley is, of course, continental--frosts of -22° F. and heats of 170° F. being experienced--but snow lasts only for one and a half months, and the summer heat is tempered by the proximity of the high mountains. Apricots, peaches, pears and some vines are grown, as also some cotton-trees near the town of Kulja, where the average yearly temperature is 48°.5 F. (January 15°, July 77°). Barley is grown up to an altitude of 6500 ft.