REVIEWS OF RECENT BOOKS 263 



outlet for our surplus population." Mr. J. 0. P. Bland has recently 

 asserted that it is impossible for China to produce more and support 

 more people. What answer would be given, to Mr. Bland by Dr. 

 Lee is not very clear from her thesis. D. M. G. ' 



Travels of a Consular Officer in North-West China. By Eric 



Teichman, b.a. Cambridge University Press. 24/-. 

 There are two ways of travelling. One is to do so and say nothing 

 about it. The other is to record experiences and publish them for 

 the instruction of the public. Mr. Teichman has chosen the latter, 

 much- to be benefit of the public. Not much has hitherto been published 

 on the routes taken by Mr. Teichman into distant Shensi, Kansu and 

 Ssiichuan. Colonel Bruce published an account of his journey from 

 India to China, but the route described by him is different from the 

 journeys related in this work. Two excellent maps accompany the 

 volume which are of great help in following the traveller in his 

 long and devious ways. The journeys are marked in red lines and 

 % glance at the maps will show the extensive regions covered by Mr. 

 Teichman in his arduous journeys. Any future traveller will consult 

 this work and find it of much service. It is almost needless to mention 

 that these districts have often been trodden by missionary travellers 

 but they have not left such minute record of their journey and ex- 

 periences. If Mr. Teichman errs at all it is in a too minute and 

 detailed record of his daily stages. Indeed we think that the book 

 would not be less valuable if there had been less account of the day's 

 routine — of when the day was begun and where they stopped for lunch 

 and so on. A little of such experience is good but it tends to become 

 monotonous when often repeated, as it is in this work. And again the 

 book is full of such descriptions as the following. "The track climbs 

 out of the gorge to the top of a plateau of a similar height on the 

 other side, and then runs across the undulating uplands for fifteen li to 

 the village of Kao Ts'un in the district of Pin Chou, 90 li from Yung- 

 shou." A little of this is interesting but becomes wearying when most 

 of the book is taken up with the record of such details. It could 

 have been wished that Mr. Teichman had given rein to his imagination 

 occasionally and described in vivid language the toute en semble of 

 some great plateau or given us the impression created on his mind 

 by the lofty mountains that he crossed. The people too might have 

 formed more the subject of the narrative. He must have mixed 

 with all sorts and conditions of men as he moved on from place to 

 place, and his experiences of the people could not but be varied and 

 curious. Yet the narrative does not leave any distinct colour on the 



