Hfilorie of the Indies, lib.?. 44,1 



language and writing , wherein they have ftudied day 

 and night above tenne yeares, with a continual! labour- 

 for the charitie of Chrift, andthedefireof falvation 

 of foules , prevailed in them above all this labourand 

 difficultie. For this reafon learned men are fo much e- 

 fteemed in China, for the difficultie there is to conceive 

 them: & thofe only have the offices of Mandarins > Go- 

 vernoursjudges, and Captaincs. For this caufe the fiu 

 thers take great pains to inftruft their children to reade 

 and write. There are many of thefe fchooles where the 

 children are taught, where the matters teach them by 

 day,and the fathers at home by night : fb as they hurt 

 their eyes- much , and they whippe them often with 

 reedes D although not fo feverely as they doc offenders. 

 They call it the Mandarin tongue , which requires a 

 mans age to be conceived, Andyou muftvnderftand, 

 that although the tongue which the Mandarins fpeakc, 

 bee peculiar and different from the Vulgar, which 

 are many, and that they ftudie it, as they doe La- 

 tine & Greeke heere,and that the learned only throgh- 

 outallC&*M,do vnderftand it : foitis notvvithftanding 

 that all that is written in it,is vnderflood in all tongues: 

 and although all the Provinces doc not vnderftand 

 one another by fpeaking,yet by writing they doe : for 

 there is bu tone fort of figures and characters for them 

 all , which fignifie one thing , but not the fame word 

 and prolation : (ceing(as Lhave (aid,) they are onely to 

 denote the things,and not the worde, as we may eafily 

 vnderftand by the examples of numbers in ciphering,. 

 And they of'typon & the Chinois, do reade and vnder- 

 ftand well the writings one of another, although they 

 be divers Nations , and different in tongue and lan 

 guage . If they fpeake what they ^reade or write,they 



fliould 



