equivalency or opposition of sense, or in the form of grammatical construction. The learned prelate adduces examples of these different sorts of parallelism from the Psalms; as, for instance

"The memory of the just is a blessing :
But the name of the wicked shall rot.".

"Dart forth thy lightnings and scatter them:
Shoot out thine arrows and consume them."

There are perpetual examples in the Chinese, answering to the above description of the Hebrew; and the peculiar structure of that language generally renders the parallelism much more exact, and therefore much more striking, as it is usually word for word, the one written opposite to the other. The following is a translation of such parallelisms, taken from the 'Heir in Old Age,' but it can of course but imperfectly represent the original :

"Supinely gazing, now I vent my sighs,

Now, bending down, in tears my sorrow flows;
The wealthy alien claims connubial ties—

The needy kinsman no relation knows."

To proceed from the structure of Chinese verse to the character of their poetry-this seems to consist principally of odes and songs, of moral and didactic and of sentimental and descriptive pieces; which different kinds, however, are so blended together, and run so much into one another, that it would not always be easy to separate them. One of the most ancient pieces in the Book of Odes,' the date of which may perhaps reach to three thousand years, has reference to the pain felt by the poet at the unworthy conduct of some ungrateful friend. The allusions to the storm, &c., are of course figurative; and the translation of this antique specimen may serve to show

the similarity that pervades the tone of human sentiment in the most distant ages and countries :

"Now scarce is heard the zephyr's sigh

To breathe along the narrow vale;
Now sudden bursts the storm on high,
In mingled rush of rain and hail :
-While adverse fortune louring frown'd,
Than ours no tie could closer be;
But, lo! when ease and joy were found,
Spurn'd was I, ingrate-spurn'd by thee!

Now scarce is felt the fanning air
Along the valley's sloping side;
Now winds arise, and lightnings glare,
Pours the fell storm its dreadful tide!
-While fears and troubles closely press'd,
By thee my love was gladly sought;
But once again with quiet bless'd,

Thou view'st me as a thing of nought!

The faithless calm shall shift again,
Another gale the bleak hill rend,
And every blade shall wither then,
And every tree before it bend :
-Then shalt thou wail thy lonesome lot,
Then vainly seek the injur'd man
Whose virtues thou hadst all forgot,

And only learn'd his faults to scan.'

The style of descriptive poetry among the Chinese may perhaps be best shown by the way in which they describe ourselves, for which purpose are selected the following stanzas from a poem on London, written as long ago as 1813, by a person better instructed than the generality of his countrymen who quit the celestial empire to travel abroad. This singular production has already excited some notice, and been quoted in several publications from the treatise in the Royal Asiatic Transactions, where it was printed with the original text,* and where the trans

* It has been found in the possession of Chinese, and led to the mistaken application of London for England.

lator observed that the poem, being a simple description, contains few flights of fancy. As it would, therefore, have been a hopeless attempt, however well they may sound in Chinese, to give dignity in verse to matters so perfectly domestic and familiar to ourselves, it was judged best to afford a literal prose translation, but with all the extravagancies and hyperboles of the original.

I.

Afar in the ocean, towards the extremities of the north-west,
There is a nation, or country, called England:

The clime is frigid, and you are compelled to approach the fire;
The houses are so lofty that you may pluck the stars.
The pious inhabitants respect the ceremonies of worship,
And the virtuous among them ever read the sacred books.
They bear a peculiar enmity towards the French nation,
The weapons of war* rest not for a moment (between them).

II.

Their fertile hills, adorned with the richest luxuriance,

Resemble, in the outline of their summits, the arched eyebrows (of
a fair woman):

The inhabitants are inspired with a respect for the female sex,
Who in this land correspond with the perfect features of nature;
Their young maidens have cheeks resembling red blossoms,
And the complexion of their beauties is like the white gem:
Of old has connubial affection been highly esteemed among them,
Husband and wife delighting in mutual harmony.-

V.

The two banks of the river lie to the north and south:

Three bridges † interrupt the stream, and form a communication;

Vessels of every kind pass between the arches,

While men and horses pace among the clouds (fogs?):

A thousand masses of stone rise one above the other,

And the river flows through nine channels:

The bridge of Loyâng, which outtops all in our empire,

Is in shape and size somewhat like these

*Written in 1813.

† Old London, Blackfriars, and Westminster bridges were then the only three in existence.

VII.

The towering edifices rise story above story,
In all the stateliness of splendid mansions:
Railings of iron thickly stud the sides of every entrance,
And streams from the river circulate through the walls.
The sides of each apartment are variegated with devices;
Through the windows of glass appear the scarlet hangings;
And in the street itself is presented a beautiful scene;
The congregated buildings have all the aspect of a picture . . .

IX.

The spacious streets are exceedingly smooth and level,
Each being crossed by others at intervals:

On either side perambulate men and women,

In the centre career along the carriages and horses:

The mingled sound of voices is heard in the shops at evening;
During winter the heaped-up snows adhere to the pathway:
Lamps are displayed at night along the street sides,
Whose radiance twinkles like the stars of the sky.-&c.

It remains to take some notice of the Chinese works of fiction, in the shape of moral tales, novels, and romances, which, by the aid of printing, so early invented, have become altogether innumerable. Among them, however, some have of course grown more famous and popular than others, and a very few are ranked under the title of Tsaetsze, or "works of genius." Under the existing system of exclusion from the interior of the country, to which all Europeans are subject, they are perhaps the best sources to which we can address ourselves in order to obtain a knowledge of the every-day habits of the people. As the writers address themselves solely to their own countrymen, they need not be suspected of the spirit of misrepresentation, prejudice, and exaggeration, with which the Chinese are known to speak of themselves to strangers. An odd instance of this kind once occurred at Canton. A native, being told that the King of England was accustomed, on particular occasions, to be drawn in a

carriage with eight horses, answered with the utmost readiness, "China Emperor twenty-four!"

Many of the Chinese novels and romances which were written in the fifteenth century of our era, and some much earlier than that date, would contrast very advantageously, either as literary compositions or as pictures of society, with their contemporaries of Europe. The Chinese at that period were long past the stage of civilization which gives birth only to apologues or extravagant fictions, and could relish representations of actual life, and of the complicated situations into which men are thrown by the contests of interest and of passion in an artificial state of things. Their novels and romances paint Chinese society as it really exists; and if they are on this account less amusing for children, they may be more interesting to such grown persons as have the curiosity to contemplate a state of civilization which has grown up of itself, and owes none of its features to an intercourse with Europe, or with the rest of the world.

Under the existing circumstances (we repeat) of our exclusion from the interior of the country, these works have a peculiar value, as they supply the information regarding manners, customs, and sentiment, which might otherwise be obtained from the observation of travellers, but can at present be gained only from books. Late changes in the trade have excited the jealousy and raised the vigilance of the government to a degree which may render the access to any spot, except Canton, more difficult than ever; and the barrier seems to be one which nothing but a change in the present Tartar dynasty, or a successful appeal to arms, can remove.* Under these circumstances, we must acquire our knowledge of the

* This was written in 1835, and the successful appeal to arms has only partially removed the barrier.