The face of China

Transcriber’s Note
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THE AUTHOR AS CHINESE “FEMALE TRAVELLING SCHOLAR”
THE FACE OF CHINA
TRAVELS IN EAST, NORTH, CENTRAL AND WESTERN CHINA ¶ WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF THE NEW SCHOOLS, UNIVERSITIES, MISSIONS, AND THE OLD RELIGIOUS SACRED PLACES OF CONFUCIANISM, BUDDHISM, AND TAOISM THE WHOLE WRITTEN & ILLUSTRATED BY E. G. KEMP, F.R.S.G.S.
NEW YORK DUFFIELD & COMPANY 1909
All rights reserved
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO THE FRIEND
TO WHOSE SUGGESTION AND ENCOURAGEMENT IT OWES ITS EXISTENCE
PRINCIPAL MARCUS DODS, D.D.
Every intelligent person that I have met whose good fairy has led him to the Celestial Empire has fallen under the spell of that marvellous people and marvellous land. I am fired with the ambition to cast that spell even on those who have never been there, by showing them as accurately and vividly as I can, with pen and brush, what the face of China actually is.
People may describe with success the soul of a people, provided it is sufficiently near the surface, but the foreigner who has known and loved China for a lifetime would be the first to repudiate the possibility of doing this in the case of China. I would rather take Browning’s view—“Nor soul helps body more than body soul”—and try to set down faithfully the things I have seen, that they may lead others to study China for themselves.