Page:The Chinese Repository - Volume 01.djvu/47

 THE

REVIEWS.

The vast dominions of the Mantchou-Chinese, comprising many kingdoms, formerly distinct and independent, which, long ere Europe had emerged from the darkness and ignorance of the middle ages, were far advanced in civilization and the arts, present a wide field for the researches of the geographer, the virtuoso, or the grammarian. It is in the first of these characters, that we will now endeavour to trace, on the map before us, the boundaries and divisions of this great and most ancient Empire, Thanks to the labours of the Catholic missionaries, who preceded us at a time when more liberty was granted to the "sons of the Western Ocean," and to whom the Chinese are indebted for whatever systematic knowledge of geography they possess, our task is comparatively easy. In the present confined situation of foreigners in China, we can be expected to add but little to the geographical information already within reach of the scholars of Europe and America. Our object is simply to place in the hands of our readers, in an English dress, that knowledge which now lies almost concealed, in the ponderous folios and quartos of France, or in the multitudinous volumes of bare compilation, to which the present talent of China is confined.

Le-Ming-che, more generally called Le-Tsing-lae, author of the map of which the title is given at the head of this article, is a priest of the Taou sect, and a native of Canton. His astronomical and geographical studies were prosecuted for some years, we have understood, under an European residing in the interior of China; and the fruit of them has been given to the