Christians. In 1253 Rubruquis was in like manner despatched by St. Louis, during his crusade to the Holy Land, with directions to procure the friendship of the Mongols. He reached at length the court of the Great Khan, where, like his predecessor, he observed the near resemblance of Lama worship to the forms of Roman Catholicism, and concluded that it must be derived from a spurious Christianity; perhaps that of the Nestorians.

It is needless in this place to enter into any detailed notice of the work of Marco Polo, which has been illustrated with so much erudition and industry by our countryman Marsden. The doubts which were once entertained of the veracity of Marco have long since given way to admiration of his simple and faithful narrative. Most of our readers will, perhaps, be aware that in the reign of Coblai Khan, the Mongol conqueror of China, Nicholas and Matthew Paolo or Polo, two noble Venetians, reached his court: they were extremely well received, and invited to return to China on their departure for Europe. In 1274 they accordingly came back, bearing letters from Pope Gregory X., and accompanied by young Marco, son to one of them. The youth, by his talents and good conduct, became a favourite with the Khan, and was employed by him for seventeen years, after which he with some difficulty obtained permission to return to his own country. The accounts which he gave at Venice, of the vast wealth and resources of the Chinese empire, appeared so incredible to Europeans in those days, that his tale was most undeservedly discredited; and he obtained the nickname of " Messer Marco Millione." Another account of Cathay or China was some time after written by Hayton, an Armenian, and translated into Latin. According to him, the Chinese considered the rest of the world as blind, or seeing with only one eye; while themselves alone were blessed with a perfectvision.

John De Corvino, despatched to Asia in 1288 by Pope Nicholas IV., was the first successful promoter of the Roman Catholic faith in China: he arrived at Cambalu, (as Peking was called by the Tartars,) and met with a kind reception from the Emperor, notwithstanding the hostility of the jealous Nestorians. He was allowed to build a church, furnished with a steeple and bells, and is said to have baptized some thousands of converts, as well as to have instructed numbers of children in the Latin language, and the tenets of Christianity. The news of his progress reached Clement V. on his accession to the popedom, and he was immediately appointed Bishop of Cambalu, with a numerous body of priests, who were despatched to join him in his labours. On the death of Corvino, however, it is probable that no successor, possessed of the same enterprise and industry, was ready to succeed him; for the establishment which he had founded appears to have ceased, or at least sunk into insignificance.

Abundant evidence is afforded by Chinese records, that a much more liberal as well as enterprising disposition once existed, in respect to foreign intercourse, than prevails at present. It was only on the conquest of the empire by the Manchows that the European trade was limited to Canton; and the jealous and watchful Tartar dominion, established by this handful of barbarians, has unquestionably occasioned many additional obstacles to an increased commerce with the rest of the world. We have already noticed the Chinese junks, which were seen by Ibn Batuta as far west as the coast of Malabar, about the end of the thirteenth century. Even before the seventh century, it appears from native records that missions were sent from China to the surrounding nations, with a view to inviting mutual intercourse. The benefits of industry and trade have always been

extolled by the people of that country; the contempt, therefore, with which the present Tartar Government affects to treat the European commerce, must be referred entirely to the fears which it entertains regarding the influence of increased knowledge on the stability of its dominion.

According to the Chinese books, commerce, on its first establishment at Canton, remained free from duties for many years, but its increasing importance soon led the officers of Government to convert it into a source of gain. As in Siam and Cochin-china at present, the pre-emption of all imported goods seems at one time to have been claimed; but this did not last long, and the trade, after having continued to increase at Canton, was subsequently carried to other ports of the empire. The endeavour to prevent the exportation of silver appears to have been an error very early established; but the regulations on this subject, as might be expected, have always been as futile as they are at the present day.

It was not many years after the passage of the Cape by De Gama, that the Portuguese in 1516 made their first appearance at Canton. Their early conduct was not calculated to impress the Chinese with any favourable idea of Europeans; and when, in course of time, they came to be competitors with the Dutch and the English, the contests of mercantile avarice tended to place them all in a still worse point of view. To this day the character of Europeans is represented as that of a race of men intent alone on the gains of commercial traffic, and regardless altogether of the means of attainment. Struck by the perpetual hostilities which existed among these foreign adventurers, assimilated in other respects by a close resemblance in their costumes and manners, the Government of the country became disposed to treat them with a degree of jealousy and exclusion which

it had not deemed necessary to be exercised towards the more peaceable and well-ordered Arabs, their predecessors.

The first places of resort to the Portuguese were the islands at the mouth of the Canton river *. The vessel despatched by Alfonzo Albuquerque, the Captaingeneral of Malacca, reached one of these, under the command of Perestrello, and, as his voyage proved very successful, it had the effect of engaging others in similar enterprises. Being distinguished as the first person who ever conducted a ship to China under a European flag, he was followed in the ensuing year by a fleet of eight vessels, under the command of Perez de Andrade, who, on reaching the coast, was surrounded by junks of war, and his movements watched with suspicion. He was, however, permitted to proceed with two of his vessels to Canton; and, while successfully negotiating for a trade, received accounts that the remainder of his fleet had been attacked by pirates. Some of his vessels returned with cargoes to Malacca ; the remainder sailed in company with some junks, belonging to the Loo-choo Islands, for the province of Fokien on the east coast, and succeeded in establishing a colony at Ningpo. The Portuguese subsequently brought their families to that port, carrying on a gainful trade with other parts of China, as well as with Japan. But in the year 1545 the provincial government, provoked by their ill conduct, expelled them the place; and thus was for ever lost to them an establishment on the continent of China, in one of the provinces of the empire best adapted to the ends of European trade. The general behaviour of the Portuguese had, from the first, been calculated to obliterate the favourable impression which the Chinese had received from the

*We here quote, for convenience, from a small work printed at Macao in 1831, but never regularly published, called "The Canton Miscellany."

justice and moderation of Perez de Andrade. Only shortly after his visit, a squadron, under the orders of his brother Simon, was engaged in open hostilities, having established a colony at San Shan, near Macao (vulgarly called St. John's), and erected a fort there: they were finally defeated by a Chinese naval force, but continued to commit acts of piracy on the native trading vessels. Subsequently to this career of violence, and during the more recent periods of their connexion with China at Macao, the Portuguese appear, on the other hand, to have entertained too extreme an apprehension of giving umbrage to the native Government; and while they imagined they were securing favour to themselves, their conduct has often served to encourage Chinese encroachment.

Among the early and desperate adventurers from Portugal, the exploits of Ferdinand Mendes Pinto have, by the help of some exaggeration, handed his name down as one of the principal. Having arrived with a crew of other desperadoes at Ningpo, he learned from some Chinese that to the north-east there was an island containing the tombs of seventeen Chinese Kings, full of treasure. Pinto and his companions succeeded in finding the place, and plundered the tombs, in which they found a quantity of silver: being attacked, they were obliged to retire with only part of the booty; and a gale having overtaken them upon their return, in the neighbourhood of Nanking, only fourteen Portuguese escaped with their lives: these were taken by the Chinese, and after some maltreatment were sent to Nanking, and condemned to be whipped, and to lose each man a thumb. They were next conducted to Peking, and on his way thither Pinto had occasion to admire the manners of the Chinese, their love of justice, and the good order and industry that prevailed among them. Arrived at Peking, they were at length condemned to one year's