54 



NATURE 



IMay 19, 1 88 1 



and physiological explanation. Cannot sontie one of your nume- 

 rous scientific contributors favour us with one ? 



It is this : Tske a slip of thin card about three inches long 

 and one wide. Bend up the two end inches at right angles. 

 Perforate one of these vertical ends with a pin-hole, and the 

 other directly and concentrically opposite with a square hole 



about one-eighth of an inch square. Place a tmall pin in this 

 end, so that the head may be nearly in the middle of the square 

 hole. Now apply this end to your eye and look through both holes 

 at the sky, and you \\ ill see the pin apparently beyond the round 

 hole and reversed in position ! William Wilson 



Eirene, Chester, May 4 



[This very pretty experiment seems novel. The explanation 

 is, of course, excessively simple. What is seen is the shadcm.' of 

 the pin, thrown on the retina by the light diverging from the 

 small hole. As the shadow is erect on the retina, it produces 

 vision of an inverted pin. This appears to be situated about the 

 distance of most distinct vision (ten inches or so), and therefore 

 behind the hole. — Ed.] 



Laurence Hargrave, .Sydney, should refer to the letter of 

 the Rev. R. Abbay on the "Rayons deCrepuscule " in vol. xviii. 

 p. 329, and the articles and correspondence therein referred to. 



SCIENCE IN CHINA ^ 

 II. 

 TT is a generally received opinion that the Chinese 

 ^ language presents extraordinary difficulties, both in 

 its acquisition by Europeans and in its use for the expres- 

 sion of the more e.xalted ideas of Western learning. The 

 attempt to translate modern scientific or technical books 

 into a language so ancient, so crude, and so unchanging 

 is regarded by many who have not given careful attention 

 to the matter as almost absurd. It is readily granted by 

 them that such subjects as the doctrines of Christianity 

 or affairs of a political nature might be expressed easily 

 in the language of a people among whom religion and 

 diplomacy have for ages been carried to a considerable 

 state of advancement. But from the almost total absence 

 of native scientific literature and pursuits there is neces- 

 sarily a paucity of scientific terms, and this appears at 

 • first sight to form an almost impassable barrier to the use 

 of Chinese for scientific purposes. A little investigation 

 however will show that this opinion is without foundation ; 

 and that from the time the early Jesuit missionaries 

 commenced their compilations up to the present day 

 no serious difficulties have been experienced by foreign 

 translators. 



The question of nomenclature, however, is one that 

 naturally has to be met at the outset. If it were necessary 

 to use only such terms as are to be found in standard 

 Chinese dictionaries, or if it were forbidden to give any 

 new shades of meaning to existing characters the task of 

 translation could never be accomplished. But it must be 

 borne in mind that the Chinese, like other languages, is 

 capable of growth. The increasing intercourse of China 



' By Mr. John Fryer, Chief Translator 10 the Chinese Arsenal. Continued 

 from p. II, 



with Western nations is undoubtedly making vast additions 

 to the number of words in current use. The Emperor, it 

 is true, has the power of deciding the e.xact manner in 

 which characters are to be written, and in various 

 instances certain characters have been forbidden to be 

 written in certain ways ; but he is powerless to check the 

 changes and additions that are now fast taking place in 

 the language all over the Empire. Where it has become 

 necessary to express a new idea, or to give a name to a 

 new otjject in Chinese, there has always been found a 

 way of managing the matter more or less satisfactorily ; 

 and hence some very clumsy specimens of nomenclature 

 are gradually becoming current, especially among such 

 natives as have much intercourse with foreigners. Of 

 course all such new terms have to stand or fall on their 

 own merits, and if radically wrong or misleading they are 

 pretty certain eventually to be supplanted by better ones. 

 This is merely what naturally happens in the growth of 

 all languages, and although many inconveniences neces- 

 sarily occur when terms have to be changed, yet there 

 seems to be no help for it. It will be remembered that 

 when the English language began to borrow largely from 

 Greek and Latin, many scientific and technical terms 

 were coined which have since fallen into disuse or been 

 supplanted by others. So it must necessarily be in 

 Chinese with regard to the words borrowed from the 

 English or other languages. 



It ought, however, to be possible for the pioneers of 

 modern sciences and arts in China, by exercising great 

 care and by working in harmony, to establish such a 

 system of nomenclature that no very extensive alterations 

 need be made in future years. A Chinaman of ordinal y 

 intelligence ought to be able to take up the translation of 

 a work on such a subject as chemistry, for instance, and 

 understand the nomenclature quite as well as a European 

 of similar capacity, and, knowing nothing of chemistry, 

 would understand the original when placed in his hands 

 for the first time. Every new term being explained or 

 defined only when first used, it would of course be useless 

 for an ordinary Chinaman to begin in the middle of such 

 a work and expect to understand everything he read. And 

 yet not only Chinese but foreigners have been known to 

 treat the translations published at the Arsenal in this way. 

 Finding the nomenclature uninteUigible to themselves or 

 their Chinese friends, or their teachers or writers, they 

 have condemned all such attempts to express the higher 

 branches of Western learning in Chinese as useless, and 

 have come [to the conclusion that the study of European 

 languages is the only way in which satisfactory progress 

 will ever be made in China. 



Before commencing the work of the Translation De- 

 partment it was seen to be necessary to establish a system 

 by which the nomenclature to be employed should be 

 determined. After considerable discussion the following 

 plan was agreed upon by those who organised the 

 department : — 



1. Existing Nomenclature. — Where it is probable a 

 term exists in Chinese, though not to be found in 

 dictionaries — 



a. To search in the principal natire works on the arts 

 and sciences, as well as those by the Jesuit missionaries 

 and recent Protestant missionaries ; 



b. To inquire of such Chinese merchants, manu- 

 facturers, mechanics, &c., &c., as would be likely to have 

 the term in current use. 



2. Coining of New Terms. — Where it becomes neces- 

 sary to invent a new term, there is a choice of three 

 methods : — 



a. Make a new character, the sound of which cin 

 easily be known from the phonetic portion, or use an 

 existing but uncommon character giving it a new 

 meaning. 



b. Invent a descriptive term, using as few characters as 

 possible. 



c. Phoneticise the foreign term, using the sounds of the 



