THE 



POPULAR SCIENCE 

 MONTHLY. 



APRIL, 1882. 



CHINESE IMMIGRATION: A SOCIOLOGICAL STUDY. 



By GEEEIT L. LANSING. 



TO any one who has thought about the Chinese, the contrast pre- 

 sented by a comparison of their civilization with the civilization 

 of the Western nations must have given rise to frequent speculation as 

 to the cause of so great a difference. Should we be brought into com- 

 munication wfth another planet, we could hardly expect to find a peo- 

 ple more unlike us than the inhabitants of China. They have existed 

 substantially as at present from, a time long before a single language 

 existed which is spoken to-day in Europe, and even before our classic 

 dead languages were born. While the tribes, nations, and civilizations 

 of the West have come and gone, the Chinese have remained the same, 

 generation after generation and century after century, content always 

 to live and die in the conditions that Fate has imposed upon them 

 in the Middle Kingdom. A century and a half ago Du Halde wrote 

 of their incurable conservatism, " that they have continued the same 

 with regard to the attire, morals, laws, customs, and manners, without 

 deviating in the least from the wise institutions of their ancient legis- 

 lators." * And in our time we are told by the Abbe Hue than whom 

 no one has had better opportunities from which to judge that " they 

 seem to have been always living in the same stage of advancement as 

 in the present day." f Peaceful occupations, untiring industry, and a 

 careful frugality have characterized the habits of the people in the 

 past as they do in the present. Wars were never justified except to 

 secure peace, and upon the cessation of hostilities the armies eagerly 

 returned to their peaceful pursuits. 



The Western nations present a different picture. Our Aryan an- 



* "History of China," vol. i, p. 237, folio edition, London, 1738. 

 f " Chinese Empire," vol. ii, p. 255, London, 1855. 

 vol. xx. 46 



