or TOU-FANS, a people inhabiting the country on the west of China. Their country is only General Description Hoang-ho on the north, Ya-long on the west, and Yang-tse-kiang on the east, between the 36th and 35th degrees of north latitude.
The Si-fans are divided into two kinds of people; the one are called by the Chinese Black Si-fans, the other Yellow; names which are given them from the different colours of their tents. The black are the most clownish and wretched; they live in small bodies, and are governed by petty chiefs, who all depend upon a greater.
The yellow Si-fans are subject to families, the oldest of which becomes a lama, and assumes the yellow dress. These lama princes, who command in their respective districts, have the power of trying causes, and punishing criminals; but their government is by no means burdensome; provided certain honours are paid them, and they receive punctually the dues of the god Fo, which amount to very little, they molest none of their subjects. The greater part of the Si-fans live in tents; but some of them have houses built of earth, and even brick. Their habitations are not contiguous; they form at most but some small hamlets, consisting of five or six families. They feed a great number of flocks, and are in no want of any of the necessaries of life. The principal article of their trade is rhubarb, which their country produces in great abundance. Their horses are small; but they are well shaped, lively, and robust.
These people are of a proud and independent spirit, and acknowledge with reluctance the superiority of the Chinese government, to which they have been subjected: when they are summoned by the mandarins, they rarely appear; but the government, for political reasons, Sigaultian winks at this contempt, and endeavours to keep these intractable subjects under by mildness and moderation; it would, besides, be difficult to employ rigorous means in order to reduce them to perfect obedience; their wild and frightful mountains (the tops of which are always covered with snow, even in the month of July) would afford them places of shelter, from which they could never be driven by force.
The customs of these mountaineers are totally different from those of the Chinese. It is, for example, an act of great politeness among them to present a white handkerchief of taffeta or linen, when they accept any person whom they are desirous of honouring. All their religion consists in their adoration of the god Fo, to whom they have a singular attachment; their superstitious veneration extends even to his ministers, on whom they have conferred it as their duty to confer supreme power and the government of the nation.