Tales and Novels — Volume 02 / Popular Tales

by Maria Edgeworth

I regretted more the fine pine-apples, which my companions assured me were in such abundance that they cleaned their swords in them, as being the cheapest acid that could be there procured. But, far beyond these vulgar objects of curiosity, I regretted not having learned any thing concerning the celebrated upas-tree. I was persuaded that, if I had been at Batavia, I should have extracted some information more precise than these gentlemen obtained from the keepers of the medical garden.

I confess that my mortification at this disappointment did not arise solely from the pure love of natural history: the upas-tree would have made a conspicuous figure in my quarto volume. I consoled myself, however, by the determination to omit nothing that the vast empire of China could afford to render my work entertaining, instructive, interesting, and sublime. I anticipated the pride with which I should receive the compliments of my friends and the public upon my valuable and incomparable work; I anticipated the pleasure with which my father would exult in the celebrity of his son, and in the accomplishment of his own prophecies; and, with these thoughts full in my mind, we landed at Mettow, in China.

I sat up late at night writing a sketch of my preface and notes for the heads of chapters. I was tired, fell into a profound sleep, dreamed I was teaching the emperor of China to pronounce ‘chrononhotonthologos,’ and in the morning was wakened by the sound of the gong; the signal that the accommodation junks were ready to sail with the embassy to Pekin. I hurried on my clothes, and was in the junk before the gong had done beating. I gloried in my celerity; but before we had gone two leagues up the country, I found reason to repent of my precipitation: I wanted to note down my first impressions on entering the Chinese territories; but, alas! I felt in vain in my pocket for my pencil and note-book: I had left them both behind me on my bed. Not only one note-book, but my whole dozen; which, on leaving London, I had stuffed into a bag with my night-gown. Bag, night-gown, note-books, all were forgotten! However trifling it may appear, this loss of the little note-books was of material consequence. To be sure, it was easy to procure paper and make others; but, because it was so easy, it was delayed from hour to hour, and from day to day; and I went on writing my most important remarks on scraps of paper, which were always to be copied to-morrow into a note-book that was then to be made.

We arrived at Pekin, and were magnificently lodged in a palace in that city; but here we were so strictly guarded, that we could not stir beyond the courts of the palace. You will say that in this confinement I had leisure sufficient to make a note-book, and to copy my notes: so I had, and it was my firm intention so to have done; but I put it off because I thought it would take up but a few hours’ time, and it could be done any day. Besides, the weather was so excessively hot, that for the first week, I could do nothing but unbutton my waistcoat and drink sherbet. Visits of ceremony from mandarins took up much of our time: they spoke and moved like machines; and it was with much difficulty that our interpreter made us understand the meaning of their formal sentences, which were seldom worth the trouble of deciphering. We saw them fan themselves, drink tea, eat sweetmeats and rice, and chew betel; but it was scarcely worth while to come all the way from Europe to see this, especially as any common Chinese paper or screen would give an adequate idea of these figures in their accustomed attitudes.

I spent another week in railing at these abominably stupid or unnecessarily cautious creatures of ceremony, and made memorandums for an eloquent chapter in my work.

One morning we were agreeably surprised by a visit from a mandarin of a very different description. We were astonished to hear a person in the habit of a Chinese, and bearing the title of a mandarin, address us in French: he informed us that he was originally a French Jesuit, and came over to China with several missionaries from Paris; but as they were prohibited from promulgating their doctrines in this country, most of them had returned to France; a few remained, assumed the dress and manners of the country, and had been elevated to the rank of mandarins as a reward for their learning. The conversation of our Chinese Jesuit was extremely entertaining and instructive; he was delighted to hear news from Europe, and we were eager to obtain from him information respecting China. I paid particular attention to him, and I was so fortunate as to win his confidence, as far as the confidence of a Jesuit can be won. He came frequently to visit me, and did me the honour to spend some hours in my apartment.

As he made it understood that these were literary visits, and as his character for propriety was well established with the government, he excited no suspicion, and we spent our time most delightfully between books and conversation. He gave me, by his anecdotes and descriptions, an insight into the characters and domestic lives of the inhabitants of Pekin, which I could not otherwise have obtained: his talent for description was admirable, and his characters were so new to me that I was in continual ecstasy. I called him the Chinese La Bruyere; and, anticipating the figure which his portraits would make in my future work, thought that I could never sufficiently applaud his eloquence. He was glad to lay aside the solemn gravity of a Chinese mandarin, and to indulge the vivacity of a Frenchman; his vanity was gratified by my praises, and he exerted himself to the utmost to enhance my opinion of his talents.

At length we had notice that it was the emperor’s pleasure to receive the embassy at his imperial residence in Tartary, at Jehol; the seat of grateful coolness, the garden of innumerable trees. From the very name of this place I augured that it would prove favourable to the inspirations of genius, and determined to date at least one of the chapters or letters of my future work from this delightful retreat, the Sans Souci of China. Full of this intention, I set out upon our expedition into Tartary.

My good friend, the Jesuit, who had a petition to present to the emperor relative to some Chinese manuscripts, determined, to my infinite satisfaction, to accompany us to Jehol; and our conducting mandarin, Van-Tadge, arranged things so upon our journey that I enjoyed as much of my friend’s conversation as possible. Never European travelling in these countries had such advantages as mine; I had a companion who was able and willing to instruct me in every minute particular of the manners, and every general principle of the government and policy, of the people. I was in no danger of falling into the ridiculous mistakes of travellers, who, having but a partial view of things and persons, argue absurdly, and grossly misrepresent, while they intend to be accurate. Many people, as my French mandarin observed, reason like Voltaire’s famous traveller, who happening to have a drunken landlord and a red-haired landlady at the first inn where he stopped in Alsace, wrote down among his memorandums—“All the men of Alsace drunkards: all the women red-haired.”

When we arrived at Jehol, the hurry of preparing for our presentation to the emperor, the want of a convenient writing-table, and perhaps my habit of procrastination, prevented my writing the chapter for my future work, or noting down any of the remarks which the Jesuit had made upon our journey. One morning when I collected my papers and the scraps of memorandums with which the pockets of all my clothes were stuffed, I was quite terrified at the heap of confusion, and thrust all these materials for my quarto into a canvas bag, purposing to lay them smooth in a portfolio the next day. But the next day I could do nothing of this sort, for we had the British presents to unpack, which had arrived from Pekin; the day after was taken up with our presentation to the emperor, and the day after that I had a new scheme in my head. The emperor, with much solemnity, presented with his own hand to our ambassador a casket, which he said was the most valuable present he could make to the king of England: it contained the miniature pictures of the emperor’s ancestors, with a few lines of poetry annexed to each, describing the character, and recording the principal events, of each monarch’s reign. It occurred to me that a set of similar portraits and poetical histories of the kings of England would be a proper and agreeable offering to the emperor of China: I consulted my friend the French mandarin, and he encouraged me by assurances that, as far as he could pretend to judge, it would be at present peculiarly suited to the emperor’s taste; and that in all probability I should be distinguished by some mark of his approbation, or some munificent reward. My friend promised to have the miniatures varnished for me in the Chinese taste; and he undertook to present the work to the emperor when it should be finished. As it was supposed that the embassy would spend the whole winter in Pekin, I thought that I should have time enough to complete the whole series of British sovereigns. It was not necessary to be very scrupulous as to the resemblance of my portraits, as the emperor of China could not easily detect any errors of this nature: fortunately, I had brought from London with me striking likenesses of all the kings of England, with the principal events of their reign, in one large sheet of paper, which belonged to a joining-map of one of my little cousins. In the confusion of my packing up, I had put it into my trunk instead of a sheet almanack, which lay on the same table. In the course of my life, many lucky accidents have happened to me, even in consequence of my own carelessness; yet that carelessness has afterward prevented my reaping any permanent advantage from my good fortune.