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which relates to astronomy, geography, and medicine. The two former departments have been infinitely indebted to the Romish missionaries, and to the patronage which those scientific and learned persons received from Kânghy, the most liberal and enlightened of Chinese monarchs, who condescended even to take lessons in mathematics from the Jesuits.

In the department of medicine (surgery they do not attempt) we shall see that the Chinese works contain their whole knowledge of natural history, with their peculiar theory of the circulation, and the materia medica of the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, as contained in that voluminous work the Pun-tsaou. Considering the little intercourse that the Chinese have had with other countries, it is perhaps quite as surprising that they should know so much, as that they should know no more; for everything they possess, with the exception of the two departments of astronomy and geography, may fairly be considered as their own.

Reserving the lighter literature of China (its belles lettres), as poetry, drama, and romance, for a separate chapter, we may observe that specimens of more serious works have, in the course of rather more than a century, been but scantily presented, in various European translations, to the knowledge of the Western world. It was as early as 1711 that Père Noel's Latin version of the Four Books, with two other subordinate classics, was printed; at a long interval after that date appeared Gaubil's translation of the Shoo-king; and in 1785 was published Mailla's voluminous work in fourteen quartos, entitled 'Histoire générale de la Chine,' being a version of the native annals called Tongkien-kang-mo. Fresh translations of several portions of the Four Books' have since been made; among the rest, Mencius by M. Stanislas Julien; while a com

plete English version of the whole issued from the AngloChinese press in 1828. A French translation of the ancient ritual and ceremonial code of China is said to be in preparation by M. Julien.

Of some of the missionary translations, especially those of our own country, it may be observed that, if there is much that is obscure or worthless in the original works, this has been rendered still worse by the wretched attempt to render word for word, thus exhibiting the whole in a jargon which has not inaptly been distinguished as "missionary English." This of course must be anything but a faithful picture of the originals, which, with all their defects in point of matter, are well known to be, in respect to manner and style, the models of the language in which they were composed. It is to this foolish and injudicious system of translation that we must attribute the following harsh judgment on that particular department of Chinese letters, which appeared some years ago in a critical work: “The specimens which have reached us through the medium of the missionaries are not the best adapted to convey information respecting the present state of the Chinese. Their labours are sufficiently voluminous, but their choice of subjects is not always the most happy. We may find an apology for the Chinese in endeavouring to make sense of their ancient records; but we cannot conceive what interest a few insulated Europeans can possibly take in toiling to unravel the inextricable confusion of their king, or canonical books." The fact is, that the confusion of the originals has occasionally, by means of uncouth translation, been made "confusion worse confounded."

CHAPTER XVIII,

LITERATURE (continued.)

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Belles Lettres - The drama Passion for theatrical exhibitions Absence of scenic deception - Neglect of the unities Stage costume Character of plays Comparison with Greek drama · 'The Heir in Old Age' — Analysis of a tragedy - Poetry Structure of verse - Character of poetry Ancient ode - Poem on

London Romances and novels

"The Fortunate Union.'

"THE Chinese stand eminently distinguished," says a writer very correctly in the 'Quarterly Review,'* "from other Asiatic nations, by their early possession and extensive use of the art of printing-of printing, too, in that particular shape, the stereotype, which is best calculated, by multiplying the copies and cheapening the price, to promote the circulation of every species of their literature. Hence they are, as might be expected, a reading people; a certain quantity of education is universal among even the lower classes-and, among the higher, it is superfluous to insist on the great estimation in which letters must be held under a system where learning forms the very threshold of the gate that conducts to fame, honours, and civil employAmidst the vast mass of printed books, which is the natural offspring of such a state of things, we make no scruple to avow that the circle of their Belles Lettres, comprised under the three heads of Drama, Poetry, and Romances or Novels, has always possessed the highest place in our esteem; and we must say that there appears

ment.

*Vol. xli. p. 85.

no readier or more agreeable mode of becoming intimately acquainted with a people from whom Europe can have so little to learn on the score of either moral or physical science, than by drawing largely on the inexhaustible stores of their ornamental literature." We may therefore proceed to consider Chinese belles lettres, in the threefold division of Drama, Poetry, and prose Fiction.

In a moderate collection of Chinese books belonging to the East India Company, there are no less than two hundred volumes of plays, and a single work in forty volumes contains just one hundred theatrical pieces. The government of the country, though it does not (like that of imperial Rome) provide spectacles for the people at its own cost, gives sufficient countenance and encouragement to such amusements, by permitting them to be erected in every street by subscriptions among the inhabitants. On some particular days the mandarins themselves supply the funds. The principal public occasions of these performances are certain annual festivals of a religious nature, when temporary theatres, constructed with surprising facility of bamboos and mats, are erected in front of their temples, or in open spaces through their towns, the spectacle being continued for several days together. The players, in general, come literally under our legal definition of vagabonds, as they consist of strolling bands of ten or a dozen, whose merit and rank in their profession, and consequently their pay, differ widely according to circumstances. The best are those who come from Nanking, and who sometimes receive very considerable sums for performing at the entertainments given by rich persons to their friends.*

The female parts are never performed by women, but generally by boys. "No women ever appeared on the Greek and the Roman theatres; but the characters in the dramas of the latter, as (occasionally) in those

To prove the rage of the Chinese for their theatrical

exhibitions, we insert an account of the expenses annually incurred at Macao-which is partly a Portuguese town, and contains few rich Chinese-on account of play-acting. In front of the large temple, near the barrier-wall that confines the Portuguese, twenty-two plays are performed, the acting of which alone amounts, without including the expenses of erecting the theatre, to 2200 Spanish dollars. At the Chinese temple, near the entrance of the inner harbour, there are annual performances, for which 2000 dollars are paid; and various lesser exhibitions through the year make up the total expenditure under this head to upwards of 6000 dollars, or 15007., among a small population of mere shopkeepers and artisans. A circumstance, however, occurred at Macao in 1833, which must have impressed the Chinese with a notion that Europeans were fully as much devoted to such amusements as themselves. A party of Italian opera-singers from Naples, consisting of two women and five men, after having exercised their vocation with success in South America, proceeded on their way across the Pacific westward towards Calcutta, as to a likely and profitable field. Circumstances having occasioned their touching at Macao, they met there with inducements to remain some six months, until the season should admit of their prosecuting the voyage; and a temporary theatre having been contrived, they performed most of Rossini's operas with great success. The Chinese were surprised to find what, in the jargon of Canton, is called a Sing-song, erected by the foreigners on the

of China, were sometimes played by eunuchs. The soft and delicate female characters of Shakspere had not the advantage of being played by a female during his life; Mrs. Betterton, about 1660, being the first, or nearly the first female, who played Juliet and Ophelia."-Brief View of the Chinese Drama, p. 14.

* Chinese Gleaner, 1821, p. 60.

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