REVIEWS OF RECENT BOOKS 215 



present volume contains three parts. Therefore it should either be 

 Vol. I. or Parts I-III. 



Part I we do not propose to review or criticize, as it might be an 

 introduction to Foreign Relations with China or anything else. It 

 has no particular concern with Shanghai. A chapter on the moon 

 would have been more pertinent, as Shanghai does directly depend on 

 tidal influences. Owing to the lamented death of Mr. Lanning and 

 for the reason stated previously it would be unwise to deal with this 

 part as it should be dealt with. 



The second part deals with the Cradle of Shanghai — and we 

 thought that things were getting hot, to use a children's play phrase. 

 We anticipated at least that we should be dealing with the baby of 

 the Settlement. But here again disappointment met us, for the first 

 eighteen chapters of Part II are as irrelevant to Shanghai as Part I. 

 It is only when, we come to the chapter on the Gift of the Yangtze 

 that we begin to touch on matters that concern the history of 

 Shanghai proper. 



In justice to the author it should be said that the foregoing 

 chapters contain a vast amount of information and in many respects 

 make very interesting reading; but they are alien to the subject. 



With this chapter (28) then, the history of Shanghai begins. 

 It is a part and parcel of the Yangtze. We have to think then of 

 the location of this Settlement as being, once in the dim past, a 

 part of the sea, but in process of time the silt carried down by the 

 Yangtze gradually filled up the watery bed and formed dry land, 

 yet leaving abundant water courses to run through this newly formed 

 flat, such as the Soochow creek, and the Huangpu and many other 

 streams of smaller size all forming a complicated network of water- 

 ways. 



The great historical thing is the emergence of solid land for a 

 standing ground for this cosmopolitan settlement of Shanghai — the 

 great emporium of China. Mr. Lanning traces the history of the 

 Chinese town from ancient times and its situation on the Huangpu. 

 In early days this river was far smaller than its neighbour, the 

 Soochow creek, which in the Tang time was 20 li wide. How the 

 great dimunition has come about is not stated. In the name of 

 Sung Chiang we have preserved the name Chiang, however it came 

 about, showing that this place, at one time, was near the Chiang — 

 and we venture to make a suggestion as a help to solve the difficulty. 

 This is without any data to go on, it must be confessed, and therefore 

 may be worthless. But may it not be possible that in antiquity the 

 waters of the Yangtze were in some way connected with the channel 

 of the Huangpu and Soochow creek thus forming a broad river of 



