NAN-KIN. 
157 
they changed its name of Nankin, or the southern court, for Kiang- 
ning-foo. Its older name is still retained in common discourse, but 
its later one appears in all the public acts of the empire. 
Known to Europeans by the writings of the Missionaries, and 
more generally by the peculiar manufacture which bears its name, the 
city of Nankin was an object of much interest to the members of 
the Embassy. On approaching it, every eye endeavoured to obtain 
a general view of its more elevated buildings, but could only trace 
the appearance of a wall skirting a distant hill. The lateness of 
the hour when the boats anchored, prevented any attempt to reach 
it that evening. 
Early the next morning a party entered the suburbs, and fol- 
lowing the direction of a paved road which led through them, 
reached the desired gate, and entered, not a city thronged with 
people, but a thick coppice bounding their view on all sides. 
Turning to the left, they ascended a hill three or four hundred feet 
in height, and overlooked an extensive space intersected with paved 
roads, probably the remains of streets, now leading through planta- 
tions of bamboo surrounding detached buildings and cultivated fields, 
interspersed with hills of different elevations; the whole being en- 
closed by a wall whose limits they could not precisely define. Its form 
seemed to be an irregular polygon of the computed area of thirty 
miles.* Near one of its angles appeared what might be the inha- 
bited part of the city; but, seen at the distance of five miles, was only 
marked by confused buildings surrounded by a wall, and the cele- 
brated porcelain pagoda which stood in its immediate vicinity. 
The following morning four gentlemen reached, by a paved 
road, a hill that overlooked the inhabited part of the city ; and 
commanded a view of a common Chinese town, surrounded by an 
* “ The area under our view could not be less than thirty miles, throughout diversified 
with groves, houses, cultivation, and hills; this expanse might be said to be enclosed within 
the extensive wall, and formed an irregular polygon.” — Ellis’s Embassy, page 304. 
