2Q4 REVIEWS OF RECENT BOOKS 



nmil | oi tin- reader about the people. We think that if the author 

 taken Whitman's Saint cm Monde with him and read it occasion- 

 ally we sin .iild have a record more deeply tinged with the life of 

 the people. So there is a certain lack of inspiration and warmth 

 and colour in the book. It must not be thought however that these 

 things have been wholly neglected. Indeed most useful information 

 and interesting facts are frequently offered. And lest our remark 

 as to the lack of colour and enthusiasm be taken, too literally, and 

 rob the book of some of its great merits, we would call special atten- 

 tion to many of the impressions of the traveller on such, and many 

 other subjects that cannot but create a deepened knowledge of these 

 regions and of the Chinese people generally. For instance the depre- 

 dations of the White Wolf bandits are brought to our view anew 

 with new facts, especially from the point of the suffering such out- 

 bursts occasion the patient people of China. Many incidents of eco- 

 nomics are given us and the possibility of the growth of trade, which 

 things are of great importance to the world to-day. Many local 

 customs too, as they were met, are written down. Little bits of 

 history and an insight of how the country is undergoing change 

 under the pressure of revolutions and new thought are supplied. It 

 will be news to some to read of the factories and bridges of distant 

 Lanchou. Much information is given on the Mohamedan in Kansu 

 and the nomad life of the Thibetans. And we are reminded of the 

 rich supply of wheat in Shensi and Kansu, whose fertile and wide 

 fields form the granaries of China. The population of Kansu is 

 mixed, the Mohamedens forming the third part. But we think that 

 Mr. Teichman is quite mistaken in the observation he makes in the 

 comparison of the relative success of conversions to that religion and 

 that of the Christian religion. He thinks that the latter has been 

 very slow in comparison with the propaganda of Mohamedanism. 

 But he has surely forgotten that Mohamedanism has made but few 

 converts from the Chinese. Its church is composed of the descendants 

 of those who came in early days to China. That is to say they 

 are not Chinese at all. Only a few Chinese have ever become 

 Mohamedans. Really the comparison is in favour of the Christian 

 propaganda. 



By such historical references and incidents of the journey, and 

 such amusing experiences as that recorded, on page 156, where the 

 authorities took one of the traveller's own mules to supply the place 

 t a wornout mule the narrative is much enlivened and the monotony 

 of the journey is broken for the reader as it must have been to the 

 traveller. 



