Early Relations between the United States and China. 123 



past fifty or sixty years, but at best was still imperfect. China 

 was a separate world, and was regarded as the embodiment of 

 all that was remote.'- Some few facts did sift in from time to 

 time, and a general notion had gradually been obtained of the 

 empire, its extent, its government, and its people. Books on it 

 were occasionally published in the United States, as, for instance, 

 an edition of Barrows, "Travels in China,"'^ and the work of 

 Lay, another Englishman, on "The Chinese as They Are."-° 

 De Ponceau had published a dissertation on the nature and char- 

 acter of the Chinese system of writing,*^ and Niles Register 

 contained from time to time items of news from the country. 

 In addition to tliese printed sources of information, a few Chinese 

 had come to the United States. In 1800 James Magee brought 

 one over to learn the English language.^- In 1845, Atit, a 

 Cantonese who had resided in Boston for eight years, became 

 a citizen of the United States.*^ In 1819 another Chinese had 

 lived in Boston for two or three years®* and still another had 

 been partially educated in this country.®^ Chinese were still so 

 few and so much of a curiosity, however, that in 1834 a girl in 

 native costume had been imported for purposes of exhibition,®*' 

 and things Chinese were still so little known that a museum of 



lee, Voyage en Chine, Paris, 1853, p. 356. Lockhart, Med. Missny. in 

 China, p. 144. 



"* Providence Gazette and Country Journal, Oct. 17, 1789, in comment- 

 ing on the salaries of Congressional officers while Rhode Island was still 

 outside the Union, said : "Till this state shall adopt their government 

 [of the United States] as well may we cavil at the salary annexed to the 

 office of the chief mandarin at Pekin." 



"John Barrows, Travels in China, Philadelphia, 1803. Van Bram, 

 Voyage de I'embasade de la Compagnie de Indies Orientates vers 

 I'empereur de la Chine dans les annees 1794 et 1795, etc., was first pub- 

 lished in Philadelphia in 1797-98, 2 vols. The American Oriental Society 

 was formed in 1842. Journ., i: 11. 



^ G. Tradescent Lay, The Chinese as They Are, Albany, N. Y., 1843. 



®' Peter S. A. DuPonceau, Dissertation on the Nature and Character 

 of the Chinese System of Writing, in Trans, of the Histl. and Literary 

 Com. of the Am. Phil. Soc, Philadelphia, 1838. 



*■ Providence Gazette, Aug. 2, 1800. 



"= Niles Reg., 67:384, Feb. 15, 1845. 



^^Panoplist and Missny. Mag., 15:448. Oct., 1819. 



*° Abeel, Residence in China, p. 106. 



"^ Niles Register, 47 : 134. 



