The consonants are sounded generally as they are in the English alphabet. Ch as in church; hw as in when; j soft, as s in pleasure; kw as in awkward; ng, as an initial, as in singing, leaving off the first two letters; sz’ and tsz’ are to be sounded full with one breathing, but none of the English vowels are heard in it; the sound stops at the z; Dr. Morrison wrote these sounds tsze and sze, while Sir Thomas Wade, whose system bids fair to become the most widely employed, turns them into ssŭ and tzŭ. The hs of the latter, made by omitting the first vowel of hissing, is written simply as h by the author. Urh, or ’rh, is pronounced as the three last letters of purr.
All these, except No. 12, are heard in the court dialect, which has now become the most common mode of writing the names of places and persons in China. Though foreign authors have employed different letters, they have all intended to write the same sound; thus chan, shan, and xan, are only different ways of writing 閂; and tsse, tsze, tsz’, 𝔷h, tzŭ, and tzu, of 字. Such is not the case, however, with such names as Macao, Hongkong, Amoy, Whampoa, and others along the coast, which are sounded according to the local patois, and not the court pronunciation—Ma-ngau, Hiangkiang, Hiamun, Hwangpu, etc. Many of the discrepancies seen in the works of travellers and writers are owing to the fact that each is prone to follow his own fancy in transliterating foreign names; uniformity is almost unattainable in this matter. Even, too, in what is called the court dialect there is a great diversity among educated Chinese, owing to the traditional way all learn the sounds of the characters. In this work, and on the map, the sounds are written uniformly according to the pronunciation given in Morrison’s Dictionary, but not according to his orthography. Almost every writer upon the Chinese language seems disposed to propose a new system, and the result is a great confusion in writing the same name; for example, eull, olr, ul, ulh, lh, urh, ’rh, í, e, lur, nge, ngí, je, jí, are different ways of writing the sounds given to a single character. Amid these discrepancies, both among the Chinese themselves and those who endeavor to catch their pronunciation, it is almost impossible to settle upon one mode of writing the names of places. That which seems to offer the easiest pronunciation has been adopted in this work. It may, perhaps, be regarded as an unimportant matter, so long as the place is known, but to one living abroad, and unacquainted with the language, the discrepancy is a source of great confusion. He is unable to decide, for instance, whether Tung-ngan, Tungon hien, Tang-oune, and Tungao, refer to the same place or not.
In writing Chinese proper names, authors differ greatly as to the style of placing them; thus, Fuhchaufu, Fuh-chau-fu, Fuh Chau Fu, Fuh-Chau fu, etc., are all seen. Analogy affords little guide here, for New York, Philadelphia, and Cambridge are severally unlike in the principle of writing them: the first, being really formed of an adjective and a noun, is not in this case united to the latter, as it is in Newport, Newtown, etc.; the second is like the generality of Chinese towns, and while it is now written as one word, it would be written as two if the name were translated—as ‘Brotherly Love;’ but the third, Cambridge, despite its derivation, is never written in two words, and many Chinese names are like this in origin. Thus applying these rules, properly enough, to Chinese places, they have been written here as single words, Suchau, Peking, Hongkong; a hyphen has been inserted in some places only to avoid mispronunciation, as Hiau-í, Sí-ngan, etc. It is hardly supposed that this system will alter such names as are commonly written otherwise, nor, indeed, that it will be adhered to with absolute consistency in the following pages; but the principle of the arrangement is perhaps the simplest possible. The additions fu, chau, ting, and hien, being classifying terms, should form a separate word. In conclusion, it may be stated that this system could only be carried out approximately as regards the proper names in the colonies and outside of the Empire.
THE
MIDDLE KINGDOM.
[CHAPTER I.]
GENERAL DIVISIONS AND FEATURES OF THE EMPIRE.
The possessions of the ruling dynasty of China,—that portion of the Asiatic continent which is usually called by geographers the Chinese Empire,—form one of the most extensive dominions ever swayed by a single power in any age, or any part of the world. Comprising within its limits every variety of soil and climate, and watered by large rivers, which serve not only to irrigate and drain it, but, by means of their size and the course of their tributaries, affording unusual facilities for intercommunication, it produces within its own borders everything necessary for the comfort, support, and delight of its occupants, who have depended very slightly upon the assistance of other climes and nations for satisfying their own wants. Its civilization has been developed under its own institutions; its government has been modelled without knowledge or reference to that of any other kingdom; its literature has borrowed nothing from the genius or research of the scholars of other lands; its language is unique in its symbols, its structure, and its antiquity; its inhabitants are remarkable for their industry, peacefulness, numbers, and peculiar habits. The examination of such a people, and so extensive a country, can hardly fail of being both instructive and entertaining, and if rightly pursued, lead to a stronger conviction of the need of the precepts and sanctions of the Bible to the highest development of every nation in its personal, social, and political relations in this world, as well as to individual happiness in another. It is to be hoped, too, that at this date in the world’s history, there are many more than formerly, who desire to learn the condition and wants of others, not entirely for their own amusement and congratulation at their superior knowledge and advantages, but also to promote the well-being of their fellow-men, and impart liberally of the gifts they themselves enjoy. Those who desire to do this, will find that few families of mankind are more worthy of their greatest efforts than those comprised within the limits of the Chinese Empire; while none stand in more need of the purifying, ennobling, and invigorating principles of our holy religion to develop and enforce their own theories of social improvement.
ORIGIN OF THE NAME CHINA.
The origin of the name China has not yet been fully settled. The people themselves have now no such name for their country, nor is there good evidence that they ever did apply it to the whole land. The occurrence in the Laws of Manu and in the Mahâbhârata of the name China, applied to a land or people with whom the Hindus had intercourse in the twelfth century B.C., and who were probably the Chinese, throws the origin far back into the remotest times, where probability must take the place of evidence. The most credible account ascribes its origin to the family of Tsin, whose chief first obtained complete sway, about B.C. 250, over all the other feudal principalities in the land, and whose exploits rendered him famous in India, Persia, and other Asiatic states. His sept had, however, long been renowned in Chinese history, and previous to this conquest had made itself widely known, not only in China, but in other countries. The kingdom lay in the northwestern parts of the empire, near the Yellow River, and according to Visdelou, who has examined the subject, the family was illustrious by its nobility and power. “Its founder was Tayé, son of the emperor Chuen-hü. It existed in great splendor for more than a thousand years, and was only inferior to the royal dignity. Feitsz’, a prince of this family, had the superintendence of the stud of the emperor Hiao, B.C. 909, and as a mark of favor his majesty conferred on him the sovereignty of the city of Tsinchau in mesne tenure, with the title of sub-tributary king. One hundred and twenty-two years afterwards, B.C. 770, Siangkwan, petit roi of Tsinchau (having by his bravery revenged the insults offered to the emperor Ping by the Tartars, who slew his father Yu), was created king in full tenure, and without limitation or exception. The same monarch, abandoning Sí-ngan (then called Hao-king, the capital of his empire) to transport his seat to Lohyang, Siangkwan was able to make himself master of the large province of Shensí, which had composed the proper kingdom of the emperor. The king of Tsin thus became very powerful, but though his fortune changed, he did not alter his title, retaining always that of the city of Tsinchau, which had been the foundation of his elevation. The kingdom of Tsin soon became celebrated, and being the place of the first arrival by land of people from western countries, it seems probable that those who saw no more of China than the realm of Tsin, extended this name to all the rest, and called the whole empire Tsin or Chin.”[2]
This extract refers to periods long before the dethronement of the house of Chau by princes of Tsin; the position of this latter principality, contiguous to the desert, and holding the passes leading from the valley of the Tarim across the desert eastward to China, renders the supposition of the learned Jesuit highly probable. The possession of the old imperial capital would strengthen this idea in the minds of the traders resorting to China from the West; and when the same family did obtain paramount sway over the whole empire, and its head render himself celebrated by his conquests, and by building the Great Wall, the name Tsin was still more widely diffused, and regarded as the name of the country. The Malays and Arabians, whose vessels were early found between Aden and Canton, knew it as China, and probably introduced the name into Europe before 1500. The Hindus contracted it into Ma-chin, from Maha-china, i.e., ‘Great China;’ and the first of these was sometimes confounded with Manji, a term used for the tribes in Yunnan. Thus it appears that these and other nations of Asia have known the country or its people by no other terms than Jin, Chin, Sin, Sinæ, or Tzinistæ. The Persian name Cathay, and its Russian form of Kitai, is of modern origin; it is altered from Ki-tah, the race which ruled northern China in the tenth century, and is quite unknown to the people it designates. The Latin word Seres is derived from the Chinese word sz’ (silk), and doubtless first came into use to denote the people during the Han dynasty.