Page:The Chinese Repository - Volume 14.pdf/1



It is not less a matter of astonishment than regret that, during the long intercourse which has existed between the nations of Christendom and eastern Asia, there has been so little commerce in intercultural and moral commodes. The very vehicle of thought even, has been contraband. The embargo has been rigorous as death, and has prevented what might have communicated vica voca. Every visitor at Canton must be struck, not to say confounded, with the strange jargon spoken alike by natives and foreigners, in their mutual intercourse; it has been a most fruitful source of misunderstanding; and in a few instances, it has paved the way for misinterpretation altercation, detention, vexation, and other suck like evils. Thirty years ago, There was living more than one individual of translating Chinese into English; and there was not one of the sons of the "Son of heaven," who could read or write, or speak correctly, the English language.

The empire, of which, as residents, we form constituent atoms, stands at this moment, in the "midst of the earth," a stupendous anomaly; and beyond all controversy, presents the widest, and the most interesting field of research under heaven. By what right of inheritance, by what favorite law of "justice and property," a very large portion of.