Page:Inside Canton.djvu/226

Rh make it evident that the value consists entirely in the literary productions confided to its keeping. After the dinner which Huan-gan-Toun gave to M. de Ferrières, in the pagoda of the Nenufar at Macao, he presented to me the fan he had been using, which contained in its folds the counsels of a learned sage to a young man desirous of visiting China. On these frail and foliated sheets are inscribed the letter of an academician to his colleague, or the strophes, sonnets, and madrigals exchanged by two rival poets. M. de Ferrières has reproduced in his book the verses sent to him by Huan-gan-Toun, and I finally insert in this place those which the ugliest of the Han-lin, the descendant of Confucius, Chao-Chan-Lin, presented to our friend Callery. These verses are, at present, quite unedited; but they form a portion of the book which my friend proposes to publish shortly, and he has been so good, with that disinterestedness which characterises him, as to allow me to print them beforehand. These, then, are—

THE VERSES OF CHAO-CHAN-LIN.

"Macao, grouped like a flower not yet developed, resembles a pedicle tipped with a young bud.

"Its storeyed houses are like the stairs which lead up to the heavenly abodes.

"In this city there is a stranger come from the far, far West.

"His heart loveth China, and his spirit delighteth in the studies of our land.

"Having had the honour of following those to whom