4® COMPRADORS, AND THEIR DIALECT. 



description of their journey through MongoHa and 

 Tibet ; and we ourselves, in 1872, saw a wall of this 

 kind on the borders of Ala-shan and Kan-su. 



We passed five days at Kalgan, where we met 

 with the greatest kindness from M. Matrenitsky and 

 some others of our countrymen, who, in their mer- 

 cantile capacity, manage the tea-carrying trade for 

 the Russian firms at Hankau. Their residences are 

 outside the town of Kalgan, near the entrance of the 

 beautiful valley by which we descended : a situation 

 which has the advantage of escaping the dirt and 

 smells, — those inseparable adj'uncts of every town in 

 the Celestial Empire. 



Like other foreigners in China, the Russians at 

 Kalgan transact business through the medium of 

 compradors, i.e. Chinese who are entrusted to con- 

 duct negotiations with their countrymen ; but some 

 of the Kalcran merchants know enouo^h Chinese to 

 do business for themselves, and others are brought 

 into direct intercourse with the Mongol carriers. At 

 Tien-tsin, however, and all the other ports of China 

 open to Europeans, every mercantile house must 

 have its compradors. They transact all the business, 

 and rob their employers so outrageously that in a 

 few years a comprador is generally able to set up 

 a business establishment of his own. 



The compradors living with foreigners learn to 

 speak the language of their master, whatever may 

 be his nationality. The Russian language is less 

 easily acquired than any other, on account of the 

 difficulty of pronouncing the words and mastering 



