NOTES ON CHINESE MATEBIA MEDIUA. 213 



that is interesting, there is a large admixture of the absurd and seo-62. 

 fabulous, so that it is questionable whether the labour of trans- 

 lating so voluminous a work in its integrity would be repaid by 

 the value of the information acquired. It is much to be desired, 

 however, that a list of the woodcuts should be drawn up and List of the 

 printed, together with the Latin names of such minerals, plants, 

 or animals as can be identified. Such a list would form a con- 

 venient key to the Pun-tsaou, and although but a compara- 

 tively small number of the names might at first be determined, 

 a basis wo aid be laid for future labours. 



To give some idea of the subjects treated in the Pun-tsaou, 

 and the manner in which they are arranged, I have drawn up 

 the synoptical table of its contents printed on the following 

 page, which Professor Stanislas Julien of Paris has favoured me 

 by examining and correcting. 1 



With regard to European works touching upon Chinese Ma- Specimen 

 teria Medica, the first to be mentioned is one entitled Specimen 

 Medicince Sinicce, published in 4to, at Frankfort, in 1682. This 

 work, which was edited by Andrew Cleyer, a physician and 

 botanist in the service of the Dutch East India Company, is a 

 collection of Latin treatises, some of them being translations 

 from the Chinese. A list of these treatises (not, however 

 agreeing with the titles of the treatises themselves) is placed 

 on the title-page. The author or translator of most, if not of 

 all, of these works, was not Cleyer, but Michael Boym, a Polish 

 Jesuit missionary, who went to China and India in 1643. After 

 Boym's death in 1656, his MSS. were sent to Europe, where those 

 constituting the work in question were published in 1682. 

 Owing, however, to disagreements between the Dutch East India 

 Company and the Jesuit missionaries, the name of Boym was 

 suppressed, and the work appeared as edited by Dr. Cleyer, first 

 physician to the Company. The treatises comprised in the 



1 I may also here acknowledge the information I have derived from Du 

 Halde (op. cit. iii., 437 9), as well as from Mr. S. Wells Williams, in the 

 comprehensive account of the Pun-tsaou given in his Middle Kingdom, vol. i. 

 chap. vi. I have also to thank my friends Messrs. Lockhart and W, G. 

 Stronach, who have kindly determined for me many points involving a 

 knowledge of the Chinese language. 



