1827. 



184 VOYAGE TO THE 



Chinese character, viz. since 1372, and the Chinese, 

 whose written character is easier to learn than the 

 ivily, other, have always heen the favourite nation of the 

 Loo Choo people, that it is very prohable the Japa- 

 nese character may now be obsolete. An-yah would 

 give us no information on this subject, nor would he 

 bring us any of the books which were in use in Loo 

 Choo, One which I saw in the hands of a boy at 

 Abbey Point appeared to be written in Chinese cha- 

 racters, which are so different from those of the 

 Japanese that they may be readily detected. 



M. Grosier on this subject, quoting the Chinese 

 authors, says that letters, accounts, and the king's pro- 

 clamations are written in Japanese characters ; and 

 books on morality, history, medicine, astronomy, &c. 

 in those of China. One of the authors whom he 

 quotes adds, that the priests throughout the kingdom 

 have schools for teaching the youth to read according 

 to the precepts of the Japanese alphabet Y-ro-fa. As 

 we may presume they teach morality in these schools, 

 it would follow, as books on those subjects are all 

 written in Chinese characters, that the boys must be 

 taught both languages ; but had this been the case, I 

 think we should have seen the Japanese character 

 written by some of them. It is to be observed, that 

 the invocations in the temples and on the kao-roo 

 stones are all in the character of China. 



While upon this subject, I must observe, that the 

 idea of Mons. P. S. Du Ponceau,* "that the meaning 

 of the Chinese characters cannot be understood alike 

 in the different languages in which they are used," 

 is not strictly correct, as we found many Loo Choo 



* See a letter from this gentleman to Captain Basil Hall, R. N., 

 published in the Annals of Philosophy for January, 1829. 



