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the condition of his people. Mr. Abel may be permitted to speak contemptuously of him after the rude treatment experienced at his court; but the character which we have received of him from a resident in the capital fully justifies all that he has said. He is, in fact, vain, effeminate, and licentious-giving himself up to every species of sensuality-governed by favourites one day, whom, without reason, he disgraces the next. Song, his chief minister and bottle companion, (for among his other vices he reckons that of drunkenness,) being asked respecting a journey into Tartary, endeavoured to dissuade him from it, hinting that, as happened a few years before, the season of his absence might again be the season of revolt. This displeased the royal ear, and availing himself of an edict published by Kien-lung, which declared any minister guilty of high treason, who should attempt to dissuade his descendants on the throne from visiting the tombs of his ancestors in Tartary, Kia-king decreed Song to have merited death: in consideration, however, of the advice having been solicited by himself, he contented himself with stripping him of his honours and banishing him to Ely in Tartarywhither his son, as a mark of the royal favour, was permitted to accompany him.

We regret, on many accounts, the illness of Mr. Abel: the little which he saw of the peasantry of China, in his botanical excursions, is exceedingly favourable to their character, and we should have been glad of a fuller description of this most important class of people from his hands.

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'They afforded,' he tells us, a pleasing contrast in their simple. manners and civil treatment of strangers, to the cunning designs of the salesmen of Tung-Chow, and the brutal importunity of the courtiers of Yuen-ming-yuen. When they have accompanied me along the banks of the river, far in advance of my boat, and have beheld me overcome by fatigue and heat, they have always appeared anxious to relieve my distress. One has hastened to the nearest house for a seat, another has brought me water, and a third has held an umbrella over my head to defend me from the sun, whilst their companions have at some distance formed a circle around me. We were to these people as the inhabitants of another world. Our features, dress, and habits were so opposed to theirs, as to induce them to infer that our country, in all its natural characters, must equally differ from their own. Have you a moon, and rain, and rivers in your country?" were their occasional questions. Comprehending no other rational object for the collecting of plants than their useful qualities, and seeing me gather all indiscriminately, they at once supposed that I sought them merely as objects of curiosity, and laughed heartily at my eagerness to obtain them. They pitied my ignorance, and endeavoured to teach me their relative worth, and were anxious for me to learn the important truth, that from one seed many might be obtained. A young man having shaken some ripe seeds from

66

the

the capsules of the Sesamum and the Sida, described to me, with much minuteness, that if I took them to my own country, and put them into the ground, they would produce many plants, and I might thus in time obtain the blessing of good rope and oil.'-pp. 130, 131.

We are by no means satisfied that we have yet obtained a true and impartial portrait of the Chinese. Indeed we are almost sure that we have not. We want to know something more of their domestic habits. In the few novels and dramas which have reached us, we find nothing of that dull uniformity in private life, which the books written by Europeans have been pleased to attribute to them; but, on the contrary, we meet with great variety of character, of dispositions strongly marked, and of eccentricities and whims as much out of the way, and incidents as oddly diversified, as among ourselves, and which could not have been imagined if they had not existed in the common intercourse of society. It can scarcely be doubted, that in one of the most ancient and populous empires on the face of the earth, where literature has always been respected, and where, at a very early period, an exalted system of ethics was promulgated, the national character would be found, in real life, to have its bright as well as its dark side; and the only question is which of the two occupies the larger surface of the picture. We should always remember that we view the Chinese character only as drawn by foreigners, who, from the nature of the government, have at all times been the objects of suspicion, and who hold a very limited intercourse with the natives. Mr. Abel echos the old and oft repeated charge against them of knavery; in support of which he quotes the inference of Pauw, that the shop-keepers would never have thought of writing on their sign-boards, 'No cheating here,' if they had not predetermined to cheat all the world. But if this inscription Poo hau' be common, as Du Halde says it is, it can produce no effect, one way or the other, among themselves; and it could not be intended to cheat foreigners, because foreigners are not allowed to domiciliate themselves in China, nor even, except on special occasions, to enter its territory. Poo hau,' therefore, is quite as harmless as the word genuine,' the abuse of which is so common on our sign-boards, that a Chinese would be justified in retorting the observation of M. Pauw, and telling his countrymen that the English shopkeepers would never have thought of writing 'genuine' on every sign, if they were not convinced that all their articles were' spurious.'

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On the subject of infanticide, and the apparent indifference to human life, with which the Chinese have been charged, we did not look for much information from Mr. Abel. The little he procured, however, is against the supposed practice being general or

common.

• Respecting

Respecting the validity of those general charges of inhumanity brought against the whole Chinese people, and founded on their reputed practice of infanticide, and their apathy in withholding assistance to their countrymen when in danger, my information is chiefly of a negative kind. It will readily be supposed that in our almost linear progress through the empire, we were not in the way of obtaining a sufficient number of facts for estimating the different degrees of credibility attached to the statements, according as little on the subject of infanticide as on that of population, respecting the causes and extent of the exposure of children in China.'

That the practice exists, admits not of a shadow of doubt; to what extent it exists is not likely ever to be known. The little value that attaches to females throughout the East, leads too frequently, it is to be feared, to their exposure. In all those nations the parent seems to be armed with uncontrolled authority over his children, even to the taking away of life. The Chinese laws, in particular instances, appear to admit this; but the Chinese people deny the practice. That it is but too common however, at least among the lower classes, may be inferred from the remonstrance of a magistrate of Kiang-nan, published in the Pekin Gazette, praying the Emperor, that the selling and putting away of wives, and the drowning of female infants might be prohibited :-on which KiaKing very shrewdly observes, that the existence of male and female is essential to the continuance of the human species;' and concludes, doubtingly, that if it be true that a common practice exists among poor families of drowning their female infants, it is a very shocking and wicked thing, and should be put a stop to by admonitory and prohibitory edicts.'

There is certainly something in all this, not extremely favourable to the Chinese, and yet they should not be too generally condemned. Unfeeling and unamiable as their character has been represented by all the visitors of Canton, from Lord Anson to the present writer, there are traits of excellence to be found in it. It is but common justice to allow them credit for instances of individual generosity and humanity as a set-off against the knavery and brutality, of which they have been so unceremoniously and so universally ac cused. Mr. M'Leod gave us an instance of a Chinese wanting neither feeling nor gratitude; and we took occasion to supply a still stronger one. Captain Ross, the commander of the East India Company's ship the Discovery, has enabled us, from his own experience, to furnish a third. While surveying those dangerous rocks, called the Paracells, off the coast of Cochin-china, he perceived the wreck of a large Chinese junk, and, on approaching nearer, observed on a barren rock, not exceeding fifty fathoms in length, a group of people amounting nearly to a thousand, who had

escaped

escaped the wreck only to perish by famine. With the utmost difficulty they were taken, by eight or ten at a time, from this desolate spot, on which they had already remained four days; and all landed safe on the opposite coast of Cochin-china.

Some time after this, when Captain Ross was surveying the south-eastern coast of China, near the strait of Formosa, he landed at a small town not far from Aimoy; on passing through one of the streets, he was noticed by a young man who ran up to him, threw himself on his knees, and eagerly embraced his legs: it appeared that he was one of those who had been released from their desperate situation on the rock of the Paracells. He made known his liberator to his towns-people, who immediately crowded round the Captain, loading him with blessings on every side; and nothing that the place afforded was considered as too good for him.

One more, and we have done. Con-se-qua, one of the Hong merchants of Canton, who is still living, had large concerns with the Americans. The master of a ship belonging to that nation, on pretence of inability, had refused to settle the balance of his account with him, and was preparing to leave the river. Con-se-qua complained of this conduct in the presence of a Mr. Robinson, chief mate of one of the East India Company's ships, who, knowing that the American captain had ample means to settle his balance, undertook to procure it for the Hong merchant. He accordingly remonstrated with the American, stating the bad impression which such dishonourable conduct must leave on the minds of the Chinese, and that, for the credit of his country, he ought to settle his accounts before his departure-in short, the account was settled. Con-se-qua strongly expressed his feelings of gratitude, and told Mr. Robinson that in future he would take his investment off his hands whatever it might be, at a certain profit, regardless of the market being overstocked. This went on for a few years, when one day Con-se-qua thus addressed Mr. Robinson-Mr. Robinson, you come here one, two, three year, and all year chief mate -why you no come captain? Mr. Robinson informed him that he had not sufficient money to purchase the investment. What money you want? asked Con-se-qua. No less, answered Robinson, than eight thousand pounds. Nothing more was said at the time; but, just as the ships were about to sail, Con-se-qua put into the hands of Mr. Robinson, an order on the house of Baring and Co. (with whom he was connected) to advance on his account the sum of eight thousand pounds, saying, Now you come captain, and when you rich you pay me. Poor Robinson however did not live to avail himself of this noble act of generosity.

Nor ought we to forget, while professing to give an impartial view of this people, that in the unbounded respect and veneration of

children

children for their parents, and the sobriety which prevails generally among all ranks and conditions of men, they probably excel all other nations. But a Chinese is not only of sober but of industrious habits; he is also naturally dexterous and ingenious, and whatever he undertakes he performs with neatness and propriety. The faculties of his mind are clear and acute; his perceptions quick, and would be comprehensive if called into action; but the system of his education and the nature of the institutions under which he lives, constitute him too much of a machine, whose motions are regulated by certain invariable rules. So singularly uniform indeed are the features, the appearance, and the public manners of this people, that it was well observed by one of the missionaries, Parcourez l'empire de la Chine; tout vous semblera fondé dans le même creuset, et façonné par le même moule.'

To this sameness, arising from legislative interference in all that concerns a man's conduct in life, it is owing that, while in most parts of the western world the human faculties have been either in a state of progressive improvement or deterioration, most of the Oriental nations have remained very nearly stationary. Time would seem to have stood still with the Chinese. We find them neither improved in learning nor in morals, nor in the system of government and legislation, nor one whit more enlightened in religion or in the sciences, than they were three thousand years ago. The cut of their robes, the plan of their houses, the form of their furniture, have not changed in all that time, so much are they under the dominion of ancient custom-and while no inconsiderable portion of the globe has been agitated by the capricious tyranny of fashion, they have had the advantage (if advantage it be) of reposing in peace under that alone.

But as human nature is every where pretty much the same, China would appear to have its male and female elegantés as well as other countries. In a Chinese novel called Hung-how-Mung, or, The Red Chamber Dreams, part of which has been translated by Mr. Davis, of whom we have had frequent occasions to speak favourably, two characters are introduced, whose costume may be amusing to the belles and beaux of Great Britain. The dress of the lady, who is denominated a La-tzé-(something sharp or pungent)—is thus described: On her head her knot of hair was adorned with gold and silk and eight precious stones pendent. It was fastened with a pir of pearls dropping from five little eagles. An ornament of virgin gold, enlivened with insects, embraced her neck. Around her waist was an upper dress of deep red-coloured silk, on which were embroidered an hundred golden butterflies, fluttering among flowers. Over this was a narrow garment made of the skins of stone-blue mice, and silk of five different colours. Below all, was a petticoat

of

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