

I.I BRA I: IKS. 



I.IUKAICIKS. 



2:* 



three dMbnat fureriimejrta. mar be often assembled in London 



UMT mcei on Uwtr native (oil. On that native soil nuuiy of the literary 



,_._ of the Polish ' emigration ' are of oourse forbidden to 

 appear at all. while at the Museum they are still but imperfectly 

 mracnud. though cere i* now taken to collect them from the 

 di&NBt localities where they appear, at Leipzig, or Poitiers, or Totten- 

 ham. Amid the convukion* of the continent, and the dangers and 

 cfavam*criptioni which surround Polish libraries in Poland, it is far 

 from improbable that the future historian of Polish literature may 

 have to wet Mine of hU beat materials in Great Russell Street 



The literature of Russia commenced in the year 1708. It was then 

 that Peter the Great issued his new alphabet, an improvement on the 

 old and clumsy Slavonic alphabet which it supplanted, but still re- 

 taining one of it* wurst defect*, in a silent letter, which in every 

 Roaaan volume wastefully consume* at least a sheet Along with the 

 alphabet the old Slavonic language was abandoned, and the Russian, 

 which had hitherto been spoken, not written, became the language of 

 literature. A collection of it wa located in a very siflgular quarter. 

 DenM, the author of the ' Introduction to Bibliography,' tells us in 

 tnd again in 1796, in his account of the libraries of Italy, that in 

 that of Modena was a collection of all the Russian books ever printed, 

 and the statement is repeated in 1S46, in Koncetti's Italian translation 

 of Denis, a carefully edited book, with excellent illustrative notes. 

 Meanwhile, with regard to the great Zaluski library of Warsaw, 

 collected by a Pole, and rich in Slavonic literature, there is a dis- 

 agreement among authorities a* to the number of Russian books it 

 contained, some stating that there were five, and. others that there 

 were only four. When the library was removed to St. Petersburg, 

 and made the public library of Russia, measures were taken to remedy 

 this defect, and in the official guide to that library, published in 1S50, 

 the number of Russian books, forming a separate department with a 

 separate librarian, is stated at 40,000, and it has since been materially 

 augmented. The literature of Russia is now in a period of gigantic 

 growth, and some of it* productions are individually of gigantic size. 

 A single number of a Russian monthly or fortnightly magazine, is 

 generally of the dimensions of an English quarterly review, and a 

 periodical of the first class, of which there are several, presents its 

 reader* in the course of a twelvemonth with six or seven thousand 

 cloeely printed octavo pages, in which ore inserted as articles among 

 the original matter, complete translations of such works as Prescott's 

 ' Conquest of Mexico,' or Kingsley's ' Two Years Ago.' 



It u one of the most singular literary phenomena of our time that this 

 great movement is taking place among a nation of nearly seventy millions 

 of population, and that it is in most other countries so thoroughly 

 iymorid. The Russian authors abound in talent, and some of them 

 have manifested genius ; their subjects are full of interest. If they 

 treat of their own topography, it is that of so mighty a portion of the 

 earth'* surface, that it cannot fail to have a general bearing ; if of their 

 own history, it is *o intimately connected in modern times with that 

 of Europe in general, and England in particular, that a more intimate 

 acquaintance with it is highly desirable. They are great travellers also, 

 and there i* much in their observations on our own and other countries 

 that deserve* attention. Their admiration of English literature is 

 warm, but not indiscriminate; and while in Spain or Italy we might 

 seek in rain for critic* who appreciate our merits or detect our faults, 

 the observation* of Russians may perhaps anticipate the judgment of 

 posterity. In matters of politics, their freedom of speech is greater 

 than we suppose, and they write much on subjects of contemporary 

 hi*tory. Of late years, a' Russian Free Press' has been established in 

 London, in which aume of their most eloquent writers express their 

 opinion* altogether without restraint, and as these publications are 

 known to be constantly read by the cni|vrr, they exercise an im- 

 portant political influence in Russia itaelf. Beyond the limits of 

 Russia there ia now apparently no Russian library of great extent 

 that of Modena being anterior to the great movement in Russian 

 literature except the collection in il,, Ilritish Museum. Four or 

 five-and-twrt>ty year* ago, a solitary English student who hod set 

 himself to master the Russian language, found himself thrown . 

 on hi* own resources for prosecuting the study of its literature. It was 

 the same, not only with Human, but with Polish, with !', i 

 with Servian, with Hungarian, with Dutch, with Danish, with Swedish 

 in abort, with all the secondary languages of Knn.pe. No large col- 

 lection of any one of them then existed in England, unless pomiHy in 

 private hand*. No large public collection of any of them i* known 

 now to exint in England except under one roof, that of the British 

 MoMum, and there they are ail assembled. Small as has been the cost 

 of amassing it- -lew probably for the whole, than was given at Paris a 

 few jmn ago for a single nne of Marshal Soult'a ' Mmill. s ' it is a 

 collection unrivalled of its kind in Europe. The poorest student who 

 ha* acces* to the British Museum ha* now access to unlimited stores, 

 of which be ha* only to bring the key. 



The literature of Rumia i* one of the most recent, the literature of 

 its bordering empire, China, is the most ancient, to which the art of 

 printing ha* been applied. It i* no lea* strange than tnic, that that 

 admirable art was first invent..) in tl.. i all the world to 



wbne* language iU benefit* are leant applicable in a country destitute 

 of an alphabet and that while exercised there for centuries, it 



* into the neighbouring state* of India, a land of literature 



mil civilisation, with the most perfect alphal>et in The 



late of its first discovery is stated by M. Stanislas Julien, the eminent 

 Chinese scholar, to be assigned by Chinese authorities to the 6th cen- 

 tury of the Christian era, more than eight hundred years prior to the 

 discovery of Gutenberg. Through all the vicissitudes from the time 

 of " the burning of the books " by the first emperor of united China, to 

 the war against learning carried on by the present insurgents, litera- 

 ture has flourished in the " middle kingdom." in which it has in part 

 taken the place of religion. The literature of China ha* alway- 

 more akin to that of modern Europe than that of any other A 

 country. The Chinese have plays, which are a kind of com)* 

 unknown to the Arabs and Persians ; they have novels and newspapers ; 

 they publish criminal trials ; they circulate gratuitously religion 

 temperance tracts of their own. In regard to libraries their state is 

 somewh;it probleniatie.il. M . Abel Romusat, in many respect* a most 

 judicious and critical writer, tells us in one of his Essays, that an 

 Emperor of China ordered the publication of a select collection of the 

 Chinese classics in 186,000 volumes. 



A native Chinese, who was asked in the present year (1860), at the 

 British Museum, what was the largest library in China, said that he 

 bad never been to Peking, but that at Hong-chew he had seen one of 

 6,000,000 volumes; an excellent library to receive the gigantic edition 

 of the Chinese classics. Nothing con be more different from these 

 extraordinary statements, than those of other Chinese scholars and 

 travellers. There is in the liritish Museum, as in other European 

 libraries, a catalogue printed in China in 1790, of the library of the 

 Emperor Keen Lung, the same who received Lord Macartney. M. 

 lla/.in, who published on analysis of this catalogue in the 

 ' Journal Asiatique ' for 1850, states that he found it only contained 

 10,500 distinct works, including, it may be observed, 303 ot the nature 

 of encyclopaedias, some of which were of large extent. The library iliil 

 not contain any work in the common and familiar language of China, 

 and all plays, novels, and works of light literature were thus excluded. 

 Rcmusat himself, in a subsequent work to that in which he mentioned 

 the edition of the classics, fixed the number of volumes in the largest 

 Chinese library at 300,000, and his first statement respecting the 

 classics is so obviously the fruit of some confusion between " volume* " 

 and " books " or " chapters," that it is surprising other Chinese 

 scholars should have repeated it without suspicion. It is evident that 

 large libraries are rare in China. Europeans who have spent nearly 

 twenty years in the country, and seen more than one of its large cities, 

 report that they never happened to see an extensive collection of 

 books. Collections of ancient porcelain vases are numerous in China, 

 but not collections of ancient volumes. Dr. Sehott, in his Survey of 

 Chinese Literature, in the Transactions of the Berlin Academy, quotes 

 the existence of a Chinese printed book at St. Petersburg with the 

 date 1419, as a phenomenon, and observes that it shows the opinion 

 to be erroneous, that a Chinese book can hardly last longer than three 

 centuries on account of the thickness of the paper. The white ants 

 are also great enemies of Chinese literature. In fact, in the libraries 

 of Chinese temples, founded by the Emperor Rang He, who reigned 

 from 1661 to 1722, it is reported by European observer.-, that many of 

 the books are now illegible from decay, and it is far from improbable 

 that some of the Chinese books presented to the Bodleian, by Arch- 

 bishop Laud, soon after its foundation in 1602, may be of older date 

 than any to be readily met with in China itself. 



Chinese libraries are more numerous in Europe than Russian 

 libraries. There is a fine one at Paris, containing many volumes 

 presented to Louis XIV. by the then reigning Emperor of China ; 

 there is one at St. Petersburg, one at Berlin, one at IVienna, and 

 iu London. There is a collection at the East India House, 

 Sir George Staunton's collection in the library of the Royal Asiatic 

 Society, Dr. Morrison the lexicographer's collection at University Col- 

 lege, and Dr. Morrison the younger's collection united to Mr. Hull's 

 and several others, at the British Museum. The Museum collection, 

 to which the presentation of Dr. Morrison the younger's library by the 

 Hi -itiwh government, added 11,500 volumes at once, is probably of not 

 leas than 20,000 volumes, and is scarcely inferior iu numbers to any 

 other in Europe. 



The nations which are under the influence of Chinese civilisation 

 are all cultivators of printing. The literature of the Manchoo- 

 Tartors, who arc intellectually subject to China, though they hold 

 -ition of its conquerors, is devoid of interest, as consisting 

 almost entirely of servile translations from Chinese. The Japanese 

 books arc not translations from the Chinese, but in most coses Chinese 

 books with Japanese notes and ex) <'. IIM il up in such a state 



of confusion that the accounts which recent travellers give us of the 

 superiority of the Japanese to the Chinese in point of sagacii 

 ingenuity, appear to require confirmation before they can be admitted 

 in matters of literature. Sieljold, who enjoyed unusual opportunities 

 of observation, stated that libraries are numerous in Japan, and that 

 those liotli of the secular and the ecclesiastical empire were exti 

 but declined giving any opinion as to the numbers which Balbi 

 assumed to be about 160,000 volumes in each. If Siebuld's statement 

 11 found, d, that " from five to ei^'lit thousand " small volumes, 

 maps, Ac. were annually published in the Japanese cities, this estimate 



Mni,' iuiproKiMu. 

 Of Mauchoo-Tartar books the largest collections in Europe are at 



