THEORY OF THE EARTH. 181 



possess, commences the history of their country 

 with the reign of an emperor named Yao, whom 

 it represents to us as occupied in removing the wa- 

 ters, which, having risen to the skies, still bath- 

 ed the foot of the higher mountains, covered the 

 less elevated hills, and rendered the plains impas- 

 sahle *. According to some, the reign of Yao 

 was 4163 years before the present time ; accord- 

 ing to others, 3943. The discrepancy in the opi- 

 nions regarding this epoch even amounts to 284 

 years. 



A few pages farther on we find one Yu, a mi- 

 nister and engineer, re-establishing the courses of 

 the waters, raising embankments, digging canals, 

 and regulating the taxes of all the provinces in 

 China, that is to say, in an empire extending 600 

 leagues in all directions. But the impossibility 

 of such operations, after such events, shews clear- 

 ly that the whole is nothing else than a moral 

 and political romance f. 



More modern Chinese historians have added 

 a series of emperors before Yao, but with a mul- 

 titude of fabulous circumstances, without ventu- 

 ring to assign them fixed epochs. These writers 



* Chou-king, French translation, p. 9- 



t See the Yu-kong, or first chapter of the second part 

 of the Chou-king, pp. 4-3-60. 



