966 



ANNUAL REGISTER, 1804. 



•wreck, attraft their attention. One 

 fellow was observed very busily em- 

 ployed in picking up, with his boat 

 hook, the hat of a drowning man. 

 It was in vain we endeavoured to 

 prevail on the people of our vessel 

 to heave to, and send the boat to 

 their assistance. It is true, we were 

 then going at the rate of seven miles 

 an hour, which was the plea they 

 made for not stopping. I have no 

 doubt that several ol' these unfortu- 

 nate people must inevitably have pe- 

 rished. 



" Being thus insensible to the suf- 

 ferings of their companions, and 

 countrymen, little compassion is to 

 be cxpcdled from them towards 

 strangers. From a manuscript jour- 

 nal, kept by a gentleman in the 

 suite of the Dutch embassador, it 

 appears, that on their route to the 

 capital, the writer felt an inclina- 

 tion to try his skaits on a sheet of 

 ice that they passed by on the road- 

 side ; he was also urged to it by the 

 conducing ofllcers. Having pro- 

 ceeded some distance from the shore, 

 the ice gave way, and he fell in up 

 to the neck. The Chinese, instead 

 of rendering him any assistance in 

 the absence of his own countrymen, 

 who had gone forwards, ran away 

 laughing at his accident, and left 

 him to scramble out as well as he 

 could, which was not cife6tcd with- 

 out difficulty. 



" But, if further proofs were 

 wanting to establish the insensible 

 and incompassionate chara6tcr of 

 the Chinese, the horrid pra6tice of 

 Infanticide, tolerated by custom, 

 and encouraged by the government, 

 can leave no doubt on this subje6l. 

 I venture to say encouraged, because 

 w here the legislature does not inter- 

 fere to prevent crimes, it certainly 

 may be said to lend them its coun- 



tenance. No law, however, allows, 

 as I observe it noticed in a modern 

 author of reputation, a father to 

 expose all the daughters and a third 

 son. I believe the laws of China 

 do not suppose such an unnatural 

 crime to exist, and have, therefore, 

 provided no punishment for it. It 

 it true, they have left a child to tlie 

 entire disposal of the father, con- 

 cluding, perhaps, that if his feelings 

 will not prevent him from doing it 

 an injury, no other consideration 

 will. Thus, though the commission 

 of infanticide be frequent in China, 

 it is considered as more prudent to 

 wink at it, as an inevitable evil, 

 which natural afledtion will better 

 corrcdb than penal statutes ; an evil 

 that, on the other hand, if publicly 

 tolerated, would dire(5lly contradict 

 the grand principle of fdial piety, 

 upon which their system of obedi- 

 ence rests, and their patriarchial 

 form of government is founded. 



It is, however, tacitly considered 

 as a part of the duty of the police of 

 Pekin to employ certain persons to 

 go their rounds, at an early hour in 

 the morning, with carts, in order to 

 pick up such bodies of infants as 

 may have been thrown out into the 

 streets in the course of the night. 

 No enquiries are made, but the bo- 

 dies arc carried to a common pit 

 without the city walls, into which all 

 those that may be living, as well as 

 those that are dead, are said to be 

 promiscuously thrown. At this 

 horrible pit of destruction the Ro- 

 man Catholic missionaries, estab- 

 lished in Pekin, attend by turns, as 

 a part of the duties of their oiTice, 

 in order, as one of them expressed 

 himself to me on this subject, to 

 chuse among them those thataru the 

 most liveljjy to make future prose- 

 lytcsj and by the administration of 



baptism 



