18 ON THE CHINESE SYSTEM OF WRITING. 



of conversing orally does not appear to be, by any means, so great as it has 

 been represented ; it appears to me, on the contrary, that there is no such diffi- 

 culty at all, and that the inhabitants of China may converse, with the greatest 

 ease, with those who speak the mandarin language, and be understood by 

 them, notwithstanding the difference of their dialects. 



The Rev. Mr. Medhurst, whose various writings have thrown considerable 

 light on this important subject, in his interesting work entitled " China, its 

 State and Prospects," relates that, in the year 1835, he hired, at Canton, the 

 brig Huron, for a voyage of several months along the eastern coast of China. 

 Their object was to stop at every place where they could get admittance, to 

 converse with the inhabitants and distribute to them Chinese Bibles, tracts, 

 and other religious books. Mr. Medhurst took with him the Rev. Mr. Ste- 

 vens, who had accompanied your correspondent, in 1831, on a similar voyage, 

 and who was acquainted with the Chinese language. They sailed from Can- 

 ton, and visited the whole coast and all the maritime provinces of the empire, 

 except Petchelee, which is the northernmost, and where the capital of the 

 empire is situated. They landed at a great number of towns and villages in 

 the different provinces, and there freely conversed with the inhabitants, and 

 distributed their books, sometimes with, and sometimes without interruption 

 from the authorities. At every place where they landed they held conversa- 

 tions, not only with the mandarins and officers of the government, but with 

 persons of all descriptions, and with assembled multitudes, even in places 

 where, as he says, "few of the inhabitants, if any, could either read or write." 

 There is not, at any time or at any place throughout the whole of this widely 

 extended coast, containing several large provinces and a multitude of districts, 

 the least mention made of an interpreter being employed or conversation 

 carried on in writing, but every thing, as far as appears, was said, and all 

 business transacted by word of mouth, always with the greatest ease. The 

 pure Chinese or mandarin dialect would seem to have been the medium used. 

 In one place the people wondered that foreigners could speak so purely the 

 Chinese language; they believed the missionaries to be natives of the empire; 

 in another they believed that as their emperor was the master of the whole 

 world, there could be but one language on the face of the earth, and that was 

 the Chinese. The missionaries were acquainted with the dialect of Canton, 

 and with three of those of the adjoining province of Fo-kien, to wit, that of 



