The Portugueze embassy entered Pekin the 1st May 1753, and left it the 8th June following, being only thirty-nine days.
The British embassy arrived in Pekin the 21st August 1793, and departed the 7th October, being forty-seven days.
The third Dutch embassy entered the capital the 10th January 1795, and left it the 15th February, being thirty-six days.
On the whole, then, it may be concluded, that neither Monsieur Grammont, nor they who conceived that an unconditional and servile compliance, on the part of the British Embassador, would have been productive of more favourable results, were right in their conjectures. On the contrary, it may, perhaps, be rather laid down as a certain consequence, that a tone of submission, and a tame and passive obedience to the degrading demands of this haughty court, serve only to feed its pride, and add to the absurd notions of its own vast importance.
CHAP. II.
Occurrences and Observations in the Navigation of the Yellow
Sea, and the Passage up the Pei-ho, or White River.
Different Testimonies that have been given of the Chinese Character.—Comparison of China with Europe in the sixteenth Century.—Motives of the Missionaries in their Writings.—British Embassy passes the Streights of Formosa.—Appearance of a Ta-fung.—Chu-san Islands.—Instance of Chinese Amplification.—Various Chinese Vessels.—System of their Navigation—their Compass, probably of Scythian Origin—foreign Voyages of.—Traces of Chinese in America—in an Island of the Tartarian Sea—in the Persian Gulph—traded probably as far as Madagascar.—Commerce of the Tyrians.—Reasons for conjecturing that the Hottentots may have derived their Origin from China.—Portrait of a Chinese compared with that of a Hottentot.—Malays of the same descent as the Chinese.—Curious coincidences in the Customs of these and the Sumatrans.—Cingalese of Chinese Origin.—One of the Brigs dispatched to Chu-san for Pilots.—Rapid Currents among the Islands.—Visit to the Governor.—Difficulties in procuring Pilots.—Arbitrary Proceeding of the Governor.—Pilots puzzled with our Compass—Ignorance of—Arrive in the Gulph of Pe-tche-lee.—Visit of two Officers from Court, and their Present—enter the Pei-ho, and embark in convenient Yachts.—Accommodating Conduct of the two Officers.—Profusion of Provisions.—Appearance of the Country—of the People.—Dress of the Women.—Remarks on their small Feet.—Chinese an uncleanly and frowzy People.—Immense Crowds of People and River Craft at Tien-sing.—Decent and prepossessing Conduct of the Multitude.—Musical Air sung by the Rowers of the Yachts.—Favourable Traits in the Chinese Character.—Face and Products of the Country.—Multitudes of People Inhabitants of the Water.—Another Instance of arbitrary Power.—Disembark at Tong Tchoo, and are lodged in a Temple.
"If any man should make a collection of all the inventions, and all the productions, that every nation, which now is, or ever has been, upon the face of the globe, the whole would fall far short, either as to number or quality, of what is to be met with in China." These, or something similar, are the words of the learned Isaac Vossius.
The testimony given by the celebrated authors of the Encyclopédie des Connoissances humaines is almost equally strong: "The Chinese who, by common consent, are superior to all the Asiatic nations, in antiquity, in genius, in the progress of the sciences, in wisdom, in government, and in true philosophy; may, moreover, in the opinion of some authors, enter the lists, on all these points, with the most enlightened nations of Europe."