A totem origin may probably be ascribed to the animal ancestry claimed by a chief or his tribe. Thus, it is said by M. M. Valikhanof[308] that “a characteristic feature in Central Asiatic traditions is the derivation of their origin from some animal.” The Kastsché, or Tele people, are said to have sprung from the marriage of a wolf and a beautiful Hun Princess. The Tugas professed to be descended from a she-wolf, and the Tufans, or Tibetans, from a dog. The Chinese affirmed, moreover, that Balaché, the hereditary chief of the Mongol Khans, was the son of a blue wolf[309] and a white hind. Traces of the use of totems by the Chinese themselves are not wanting. Their expression for the people is _Pih-sing_, meaning “the hundred family names.” As a fact, there are about four hundred such names in China, and the intermarriage of persons having the same family name is absolutely forbidden. The importance of this prohibition will be apparent when we come to consider the incidents of totemism. Mr. Robert Hart states[310] that some of the Chinese surnames have reference to animals, fruits, metals, natural objects, &c., such as Horse, Sheep, Ox,[311] Fish, Bird, Flower, Rice, River, Water, Cloud, Gold, &c., &c. He adds, “In some parts of the country large villages are met with, in each of which there exists but one family name; thus, in one district will be found, say, three villages, each containing two or three thousand people, the one of the ‘Horse,’ the second of the ‘Sheep,’ and the third of the ‘Ox’ family name.” According to the rule that a man cannot marry a woman of his own family name, a ‘Horse’ cannot marry a ‘Horse,’ but must marry a ‘Sheep,’ or an ‘Ox,’ and we may suppose that these animals were originally the totems or devices of particular family groups; in like manner, as the Wolf, the Bear, and the Beaver are, among the American aborigines, totems of the groups of kin to which the term gens is applied.