Chapter VIII: Chinese Literature (2)

_Military Writers._--Not much, relatively speaking, has been written
by the Chinese on war in general, strategy or tactics. There is,
however, one very remarkable work which has come down to us from the
6th century B.C., as to the genuineness of which there now seems to be
no reasonable doubt. A biographical notice of the author, Sun Wu, is
given in the _Shih Chi_ (see above), from which we learn that "he knew
how to handle an army, and was finally appointed General." His work,
entitled the _Art of War_, is a short treatise in thirteen chapters,
under the following headings: "Laying Plans," "Waging War," "Attack by
Stratagem," "Tactical Dispositions," "Energy," "Weak Points and
Strong," "Manoeuvring," "Variation of Tactics," "The Army on the
March," "Terrain," "The Nine Situations," "The Attack by Fire," and
"The Use of Spies." Although the warfare of Sun Wu's day was the
warfare of bow and arrow, of armoured chariots and push of pike,
certain principles inseparably associated with successful issue will
be found enunciated in his work. Professor Mackail, in his _Latin
Literature_ (p. 86), declares that Varro's _Imagines_ was "the first
instance in history of the publication of an illustrated book." But
reference to the Art Section of the history of the Western Han
dynasty, 206 B.C.-A.D. 25, will disclose the title of fifteen or
sixteen illustrated books, one of which is Sun Wu's _Art of War_.

Hsue Kuang-ch'i.

_Agriculture._--In spite of the high place accorded to agriculturists,
who rank second only to officials and before artisans and traders, and
in spite of the assiduity with which agriculture has been practised in
all ages, securing immunity from slaughter for the ploughing ox--what
agricultural literature the Chinese possess may be said to belong
entirely to modern times. Ch'en Fu of the 12th century A.D. was the
author of a small work in three parts, dealing with agriculture,
cattle-breeding and silkworms respectively. There is also a well-known
work by an artist of the early 13th century, with forty-six woodcuts
illustrating the various operations of agriculture and weaving. This
book was reprinted under the emperor K'ang Hsi, 1662-1723, and new
illustrations with excellent perspective were provided by Chiao
Ping-chen, an artist who had adopted foreign methods as introduced by
the famous Jesuit, Matteo Ricci. The standard work on agriculture,
entitled _Nung Cheng Ch'uean Shu_, was compiled by Hsue Kuang-ch'i,
1562-1634, generally regarded as the only influential member of the
mandarinate who has ever become a convert to Christianity. It is in
sixty sections, the first three of which are devoted to classical
references. Then follow two sections on the division of land, six on
the processes of husbandry, none on hydraulics, four on agricultural
implements, six on planting, six on rearing silkworms, four on trees,
one on breeding animals, one on food and eighteen on provision against
a time of scarcity.

Pen Ts'no.

_Medicine and Therapeutics._--The oldest of the innumerable medical
works of all descriptions with which China has been flooded from time
immemorial is a treatise which has been credited to the Yellow Emperor
(see above), 2698-2598 B.C. It is entitled _Plain Questions of the
Yellow Emperor_, or _Su Wen_ for short, and takes the form of
questions put by the emperor and answered by Earl Ch'i, a minister,
who was himself author of the _Nei Ching_, a medical work no longer in
existence. Without accepting the popular attribution of the _Su Wen_,
it is most probable that it is a very old book, dating back to several
centuries before Christ, and containing traditional lore of a still
more remote period. The same may be said of certain works on cautery
and acupuncture, both of which are still practised by Chinese doctors;
and also of works on the pulse, the variations of which have been
classified and allocated with a minuteness hardly credible. Special
treatises on fevers, skin-diseases, diseases of the feet, eyes, heart,
&c., are to be found in great quantities, as well as veterinary
treatises on the treatment of diseases of the horse and the domestic
buffalo. But in the whole range of Chinese medical literature there is
nothing which can approach the _Pen Ts'ao_, or _Materia Medica_,
sometimes called the Herbal, a title (i.e. _Pen Ts'ao_) which seems to
have belonged to some book of the kind in pre-historic ages. The work
under consideration was compiled by Li Shih-chen, who completed his
task in 1578 after twenty-six years' labour. No fewer than eighteen
hundred and ninety-two species of drugs, animal, vegetable and
mineral, are dealt with, arranged under sixty-two classes in sixteen
divisions; and eight thousand one hundred and sixty prescriptions are
given in connexion with the various entries. The author professes to
quote from the original _Pen Ts'ao_, above mentioned; and we obtain
from his extracts an insight into some curious details. It appears
that formerly the number of recognized drugs was three hundred and
sixty-five in all, corresponding with the days of the year. One
hundred and twenty of these were called _sovereigns_ (cf. a sovereign
prescription); and were regarded as entirely beneficial to health,
taken in any quantity or for any time. Another similar number were
called _ministers_; some of these were poisonous, and all had to be
used with discretion. The remaining one hundred and twenty-five were
_agents_; all very poisonous, but able to cure diseases if not taken
in over-doses. The modern _Pen Ts'ao_, in its sixteen divisions, deals
with drugs classed under water, fire, earth, minerals, herbs, grain,
vegetables, fruit, trees, clothes and utensils, insects, fishes,
crustacea, birds, beasts and man. In each case the proper name of the
drug is first given, followed by its explanation, solution of doubtful
points, correction of errors, means of identification by taste, use in
prescriptions, &c. The work is fully illustrated, and there is an
index to the various medicines, classed according to the complaints
for which they are used.

_Divination, &c._--The practice of divination is of very ancient date
in China, traceable, it has been suggested, back to the Canon of
Changes (see above), which is commonly used by the lettered classes
for that purpose. A variety of other methods, the chief of which is
astrology, have also been adopted, and have yielded a considerable
bulk of literature. Even the officially-published almanacs still mark
certain days as suitable for certain undertakings, while other days
are marked in the opposite sense. The spirit of Zadkiel pervades the
Chinese empire. In like manner, geomancy is a subject on which many
volumes have been written; and the same applies to the pseudo sciences
of palmistry, physiognomy, alchemy (introduced from Greek sources) and
others.

_Painting._--Calligraphy, in the eyes of the Chinese, is just as much
a fine art as painting; the two are, in fact, considered to have come
into existence together, but as might be expected the latter occupies
the larger space in Chinese literature, and forms the subject of
numerous extensive works. One of the most important of these is the
_Hsuean Ho Hua P'u_, the author of which is unknown. It contains
information concerning two hundred and thirty-one painters and the
titles of six thousand one hundred and ninety-two of their pictures,
all in the imperial collection during the dynastic period _Hsuean Ho_,
A.D. 1119-1126, from which the title is derived. The artists are
classified under one of the following ten headings, supposed to
represent the line in which each particularly excelled: Religion,
Human Figures, Buildings, Barbarians (including their Animals),
Dragons and Fishes, Landscape, Animals, Flowers and Birds, The Bamboo,
Vegetables and Fruits.

_Music._--The literature of music does not go back to a remote period.
The Canon of Music, which was formerly included in the Confucian
Canon, has been lost for many centuries; and the works now available,
exclusive of entries in the dynastic histories, are not older than the
9th century A.D., to which date may be assigned the _Chieh Ku Lu_, a
treatise on the deerskin drum, said to have been introduced into China
from central Asia, and evidently of Scythian origin. There are several
important works of the 16th and 17th centuries, in which the history
and theory of music are fully discussed, and illustrations of
instruments are given, with measurements in each case, and the special
notation required.

_Miscellaneous._--Under this head may be grouped a vast number of
works, many of them exhaustive, on such topics as archaeology, seals
(engraved), numismatics, pottery, ink (the miscalled "Indian"),
mirrors, precious stones, tea, wine, chess, wit and humour, even
cookery, &c. There is, indeed, hardly any subject, within reasonable
limits, which does not find some corner in Chinese literature.

Lung Wei Pi Shu.

_Collections_.--Reprints of miscellaneous books and pamphlets in a
uniform edition, the whole forming a "library," has long been a
favourite means of disseminating useful (and other) information. Of
these, the _Lung Wei Pi Shu_ may be taken as a specimen. In bulk it
would be about the equivalent of twenty volumes, 8vo, of four hundred
pages to each. Among its contents we find the following. A handbook of
phraseology, with explanations; a short account of fabulous regions to
the N., S., E. and W.; notes on the plants and trees of southern
countries; biographical sketches of ninety-two wonderful personages;
an account of the choice of an empress, with standard measurements of
the height, length of limb, &c., of the ideal woman; "Pillow Notes" (a
term borrowed by the Japanese), or jottings on various subjects,
ranging from the Creation to an account of Fusang, a country where the
trees are thousands of feet high and of vast girth, thus supporting
the California, as opposed to the Mexico, identification of Fusang;
critiques on the style of various poets, and on the indebtedness of
each to earlier writers; a list of the most famous bronze vessels cast
by early emperors, with their dimensions, inscriptions, &c.; a
treatise on the bamboo; a list of famous swords, with dates of forging
and inscriptions; an account of the old Mongol palace, previous to its
destruction by the first Ming emperor; notes on the wild tribes of
China; historical episodes; biographical notices of one hundred and
four poets of the present dynasty; notes on archaeological,
supernatural and other topics, first published in the 9th century;
notes for bibliophiles on the care of books, and on paper, ink,
pictures and bric-a-brac; a collection of famous criminal cases; night
thoughts suggested by a meteor. Add to the above, numerous short
stories relating to magic, dreams, bilocation, and to almost every
possible phase of supernatural manifestation, and the reader will have
some idea of what he may expect in an ordinary "library" of a popular
character. It must always be remembered that with the Chinese, style
is of paramount importance. Documents, the subject-matter of which
would be recognized to be of no educative value, would still be
included, if written in a pleasing style, such as might be serviceable
as a model.

_Individual Authors_.--In a similar manner it has always been
customary for relatives or friends, sometimes for the trade, to
publish the "complete works" of important and often unimportant
writers; usually, soon after death. And as literary distinction has
hitherto almost invariably led to high office under the state, the
collected works of the great majority of authors open with selected
Memorials to the Throne and other documents of an official character.
The public interest in these may have long since passed away; but they
are valued by the Chinese as models of a style to be imitated, and the
foreign student occasionally comes across papers on once burning
questions arising out of commercial or diplomatic intercourse with
western nations. Then may follow--the order is not always the
same--the prefaces which the author contributed from time to time to
the literary undertakings of his friends. Preface-writing is almost a
department of Chinese literature. No one ever thinks of publishing a
book without getting one or more of his capable associates to provide
prefaces, which are naturally of a laudatory character, and always
couched in highly-polished and obscure terms, the difficulty of the
text being often aggravated by a fanciful and almost illegible script.
Prefaces written by emperors, many examples of which may be seen, are
of course highly esteemed, and are generally printed in coloured ink.
The next section may comprise biographical notices of eminent men and
women, or of mere local celebrities, who happened to die in the
author's day. Then will follow Records, a title which covers
inscriptions carved on the walls of new buildings, or on memorial
tablets, and also notes on pictures which the author may have seen,
places which he may have visited, or allegorical incidents which he
may have imagined. Then come disquisitions, or essays on various
subjects; researches, being short articles of archaeological interest;
studies or monographs; birthday congratulations to friends or to
official colleagues; announcements, as to deities, a cessation of
whose worship is threatened if the necessary rain or fair weather be
not forthcoming; funeral orations, letters of condolence, &c. The
above items will perhaps fill half a dozen volumes; the remaining
volumes, running to twenty or thirty in all, as the case may be, will
contain the author's poetry, together with his longer and more serious
works. The essential of such a collection is, in Chinese eyes, its
completeness.

San Kuo Chih.

Hung Lou Meng.

Liao Chai.

_Fiction_.--Although novels are not regarded as an integral part of literature proper, it is generally conceded that some novels may be profitably studied, if for no other reason, from the point of view of style. With the novel, however, we are no longer on perfectly safe ground in regard to that decency which characterizes, as has been above stated, the vast mass of Chinese literature. Chinese novels range, in this sense, from the simplest and most unaffected tale of daily life, down to low--not the lowest--depths of objectionable pornography. The _San Kuo Chih_, an historical romance based upon a period of disruption at the close of the 2nd century A.D., is a delightful book, packed with episodes of battle, heroism, self-sacrifice, skilful strategy, and all that goes to make up a stirring picture of strenuous times. Its author, who might almost have been Walter Scott, cannot be named for certain; but the work itself probably belongs to the 13th century, a date at which the novel begins to make its appearance in China. Previous to that time, there had been current an immense quantity of stories of various kinds, but nothing like a novel, as we understand the term. From the 13th century onwards, the growth of the novel was continuous; and finally, in the 17th century, a point was reached which is not likely to be surpassed. The _Hung Lou Meng_, the author of which took pains, for political reasons, to conceal his identity, is a creation of a very high order. Its plot is intricate and original, and the _denouement_ startlingly tragic. In the course of the story, the chief clue of which is love, woven in with intrigue, ambition, wealth, poverty, and other threads of human life, there occur no fewer than over four hundred characters, each one possessed of a distinctive personality drawn with marvellous skill. It contains incidents which recall the licence tolerated in Fielding; but the coarseness, like that of Fielding, is always on the surface, and devoid of the ulterior suggestiveness of the modern psychological novel. But perhaps no work of fiction has ever enjoyed such vogue among literary men as a collection of stories, some graceful, some weird, written in 1679 by P'u Sungling, a disappointed candidate at the public examinations. This collection, known as the _Liao Chai_, is exceedingly interesting to the foreign student for its sidelights on folklore and family life; to the native scholar, who professes to smile at the subject-matter as beyond the pale of genuine literature, it is simply invaluable as an expression of the most masterly style of which his language is capable.

Hsi Hsiang Chi.

_Drama._--Simultaneously with the appearance of the novel, stage-plays seem to have come into existence in China. In the earliest ages there were set dances by trained performers, to the accompaniment of music and singing; and something of the kind, more or less ornate as regards the setting, has always been associated with solemn and festive occasions. But not until the days of the Mongol rule, A.D. 1260-1368, can the drama proper be said to have taken root and flourished in Chinese soil. The probability is that both the drama and the novel were introduced from Central Asia in the wake of the Mongol conquerors; the former is now specially essential to the everyday happiness of the Chinese people, who are perhaps the most confirmed playgoers in the world. There is an excellent collection of one hundred plays of the Mongol dynasty, with an illustration to each, first published in 1615; there is also a further large collection, issued in 1845, which contains a great number of plays arranged under sixty headings, according to the style and purport of each, besides many others. There is one famous play of the Mongol period which deals largely in plot and passion, and is a great favourite with the educated classes. It is entitled _Hsi Hsiang Chi_, or the Story of the Western Pavilion; and as if there was a doubt as to the reception which would be accorded to the work, a minatory sentence was inserted in the prolegomena: "If any one ventures to call this book indecent, he will certainly have his tongue torn out in hell." So far as the written play is concerned, its language is altogether unobjectionable; on the stage, by means of gag and gesture, its presentation is often unseemly and coarse. What the Chinese playgoer delights in, as an evening's amusement, is a succession of plays which are more of the nature of sketches, slight in construction and generally weak in plot, some of them based upon striking historical episodes, and others dealing with a single humorous incident.

_Dictionaries._--The _Erh Ya_, or Nearing the Standard, is commonly
classed as a dictionary, and is referred by native scholars generally
to the 12th century B.C. The entries are arranged under nineteen
heads, to facilitate reference, and explain a large number of words
and phrases, including names of beasts, birds, plants and fishes. The
work is well illustrated in the large modern edition; but the actual
date of composition is an entirely open question, and the insertion of
woodcuts must necessarily belong to a comparatively late age (see
_Military Writers_).

Shuo Wen.

With the _Shuo Wen_, or Explanation of Written Words, we begin the
long list of lexicographical works which constitute such a notable
feature in Chinese literature. A scholar, named Hsue Shen, who died
about A.D. 120, made an effort to bring together and analyse all the
characters it was possible to gather from the written language as it
existed in his own day. He then proceeded to arrange these
characters--about ten thousand in all--on a system which would enable
a student to find a given word without having possibly to search
through the whole book. To do this, he simply grouped together all
such as had a common part, more or less indicative of the meaning of
each, much as though an English dictionary were to consist of such
groups as

Dog-days
Dog-kennel
Dog-collar
Dog-meat
Dog-nap

and so on.

Horse-collar
Horse-flesh
Horse-back
Horse-fly
Horse-chestnut

and so on.

Hsue Shen selected five hundred and forty of these common parts, or
Radicals (see _Language_), a number which, as will be seen later on,
was found to be cumbrously large; and under each Radical he inserted
all the characters belonging to it, but with no particular order or
arrangement, so that search was still, in many cases, quite a
laborious task. The explanations given were chiefly intended to
establish the pictorial origin of the language; but whereas no one now
disputes this as a general conclusion, the steps by which Hsue Shen
attempted to prove his theory must in a large number of instances be
dismissed as often inadequate and sometimes ridiculous. Nevertheless,
it was a great achievement; and the _Shuo Wen_ is still indispensable
to the student of the particular script in vogue a century or two
before Christ. It is also of value in another sense. It may be used,
with discretion, in testing the genuineness of an alleged ancient
document, which, if an important or well-known document before the age
of Hsue Shen, would not be likely to contain characters not given in
his work. Under this test the _Tao Te Ching_, for instance, breaks
down (see _Huai-nan Tz[)u]_).

Passing over a long series of dictionaries and vocabularies which
appeared at various dates, some constructed on Hsue Shen's plan, with
modifications and improvements, and others, known as phonetic
dictionaries, arranged under the finals according to the Tones, we
come to the great standard lexicon produced under the auspices, and
now bearing the name of the emperor K'ang Hsi, A.D. 1662-1723.

Phonetic dictionaries.

But before proceeding, a rough attempt may be made to exhibit in
English terms the principle of the phonetic as compared with the
radical dictionary described above. In the spoken language there would
occur the word _light_, the opposite of dark, and this would be
expressed in writing by a certain symbol. Then, when it became
necessary to write down _light_, the opposite of heavy, the result
would be precisely what we see in English. But as written words
increased, always with a limited number of vocables (see _Language_),
this system was found to be impracticable, and Radicals were inserted
as a means of distinguishing one kind of _light_ from another, but
without altering the original sound. Now, in the phonetic dictionary
the words are no longer arranged in such groups as

Sun-light
Sun-beam
Sun-stroke
Sun-god, &c.

according to the Radicals, but in such groups as

Sun-light
Moon-light
Foot-light
Gas-light, &c.

according to the phonetics, all the above four being pronounced simply
_light_, without reference to the radical portion which guides towards
the limited sense of the term. So, in a phonetic dictionary, we should
have such a group as

Brass-bound
Morocco-bound
Half-bound
Spell-bound
Homeward-bound
Wind-bound

and so on, all the above six being pronounced simply _bound_. To
return to "K'ang Hsi," as the lexicon in question is familiarly
styled, the total number of characters given therein amounts to over
forty-four thousand, grouped no longer under the five hundred and
forty Radicals of Hsue Shen, but under the much more manageable number
of two hundred and fourteen, as already used in earlier dictionaries.
Further, as the groups of characters would now be more than four times
as large as in the _Shuo Wen_, they were subdivided under each Radical
according to the number of strokes in the other, or phonetic part of
the character. Thus, adopting letters as strokes, for the purpose of
illustration, we should have "dog-nap" in the group of Radical "dog"
and three strokes, while "dog-days" and "dog-meat" would both be found
under Radical "dog" with four strokes, and so on. The two hundred and
fourteen Radicals are themselves arranged in groups according to the
number of strokes; so that it is not a very arduous task to turn up
ordinary characters in a Chinese dictionary. Finally, although Chinese
is a monosyllabic and non-alphabetic language, a method has been
devised, and has been in use since the 3rd century A.D., by which the
sound of any word can be indicated in a dictionary otherwise than by
simply quoting a word of similar sound, which of course may be equally
unknown to the searcher. Thus, the sound of a word pronounced _ching_
can be exhibited by selecting two words, one having the initial _ch_,
and the other a final _ing_. E.g. the sound _ching_ is given as _chien
ling_; that is _ch[ien l]ing = ching_.

_The Concordance._--Considering the long unbroken series of years
during which Chinese literature has always, in spite of many losses,
been steadily gaining in bulk, it is not astonishing to find that
classical, historical, mythological and other allusions to personages
or events of past times have also grown out of all proportion to the
brain capacity even of the most brilliant student. Designed especially
to meet this difficulty, there are several well-known handbooks,
elementary and advanced, which trace such allusions to their source
and provide full and lucid explanations; but even the most extensive
of these is on a scale incommensurate with the requirements of the
scholar. Again, it is due to the emperor K'ang Hsi that we possess one
of the most elaborate compilations of the kind ever planned and
carried to completion. The _P'ei Wen Yuen Fu_, or Concordance to
Literature, is a key, not only to allusions in general, but to all
phraseology, including allusions, idiomatic expressions and other
obscure combinations of words, to be found in the classics, in the
dynastic histories, and in all poets, historians, essayists, and
writers of recognized eminence in their own lines. No attempt at
explanation is given; but enough of the passage, or passages, in which
the phrase occurs, is cited to enable the reader to gather the meaning
required. The trouble, of course, lies with the arrangement of these
phrases in a non-alphabetic language. Recourse has been had to the
Rhymes and the five Tones (see _Language_); and all phrases which end
with the same word form one of a number of groups which appear under
the same Rhyme, the Rhymes themselves being distributed over five
Tones. Thus, to find any phrase, the first point is to discover what
is its normal Rhyme; the next is to ascertain the Tone of that Rhyme.
Then, under this Tone-group the Rhyme-word will be found, and under
the Rhyme-word group will be found the final word of the phrase in
question. It will now only remain to run through this last group of
phrases, all of which have this same final word, and the search--so
vast is the collection--will usually yield a satisfactory result. The
_P'ei Wen Yuen Fu_ runs of course to many volumes; a rough estimate
shows it to contain over fifteen million words.

Yuan Lo Ta Tien.

_Encyclopaedias._--In their desire to bring together condensed, yet
precise, information on a large variety of subjects, the Chinese may
be said to have invented the encyclopaedia. Though not the earliest
work of this kind, the _T'ai P'ing Yue Lan_ is the first of any great
importance. It was produced towards the close of the 10th century
A.D., under the direct supervision of the emperor, who is said to have
examined three sections every day for about a year, the total number
of sections being one thousand in all, arranged under fifty-five
headings. Another similar work, dealing with topics drawn from the
lighter literature of China, is the _T'ai P'ing Kuang Chi_, which was
issued at about the same date as the last-mentioned. Both of these,
and especially the former, have passed through several editions. They
help to inaugurate the great Sung dynasty, which for three centuries
to follow effected so much in the cause of literature. Other
encyclopaedias, differing in scope and in plan, appeared from time to
time, but it will be necessary to concentrate attention upon two only.
The third emperor of the Ming dynasty, known as Yung Lo, A.D.
1403-1425, issued a commission for the production of a work on a scale
which was colossal even for China. His idea was to collect together
all that had ever been written in the four departments of (1) the
Confucian Canon, (2) History, (3) Philosophy and (4) General
Literature, including astronomy, geography, cosmogony, medicine,
divination, Buddhism, Taoism, arts and handicrafts; and in 1408 such
an encyclopaedia was laid before the Throne, received the imperial
approval and was named _Yung Lo Ta Tien_, or The Great Standard of
Yung Lo. To achieve this, 3 commissioners, with 5 directors, 20
sub-directors and a staff of 2141 assistants, had laboured for the
space of five years. Its contents ran to no fewer than 22,877 separate
sections, to which must be added an index filling 60 sections. Each
section contained about 20 leaves, making a total of 917,480 pages for
the whole work. Each page consisted of sixteen columns of characters
averaging twenty-five to each column, or a total of 366,992,000
characters, to which, in order to bring the amount into terms of
English words, about another third would have to be added. This
extraordinary work was never printed, as the expense would have been
too great, although it was actually transcribed for that purpose; and
later on, two more copies were made, one of which was finally stored
in Peking and the other, with the original, in Nanking. Both the
Nanking copies perished at the fall of the Ming dynasty; and a similar
fate overtook the Peking copy, with the exception of a few odd
volumes, at the siege of the legations in 1900. The latter was bound
up in 11,100 volumes, covered with yellow silk, each volume being 1
ft. 8 in. in length by 1 ft. in breadth, and averaging over 1/2 in. in
thickness. This would perhaps be a fitting point to conclude any
notice of Chinese encyclopaedias, but for the fact that the work of
Yung Lo is gone while another encyclopaedia, also on a huge scale,
designed and carried out sonic centuries later, is still an important
work of reference.

T'u Shu.

The _T'u Shu Chi Ch'eng_ was planned, and to a great extent made
ready, under instructions from the emperor K'ang Hsi (see above), and
was finally brought out by his successor, Yung Cheng, 1723-1736.
Intended to embrace all departments of knowledge, its contents were
distributed over six leading categories, which for want of better
equivalents may be roughly rendered by (l) Heaven, (2) Earth, (3) Man,
(4) Arts and Sciences, (5) Philosophy and (6) Political Science. These
were subdivided into thirty-two classes; and in the voluminous index
which accompanies the work a further attempt was made to bring the
searcher into still closer touch with the individual items treated.
Thus, the category Heaven is subdivided into four classes,
namely--again, for want of better terms--(_a_) The Sky and its
Manifestations, (_b_) The Seasons, (_c_) Astronomy and Mathematics and
(_d_) Natural Phenomena. Under these classes come the individual
items; and here it is that the foreign student is often at a loss. For
instance, class _a_ includes Earth, in its cosmogonic sense, as the
mother of mankind; Heaven, in its original sense of God; the Dual
Principle in nature; the Sun, Moon and Stars; Wind; Clouds; Rainbow;
Thunder and Lightning; Rain; Fire, &c. But Earth is itself a
geographical category; and all strange phenomena relating to many of
the items under class _a_ are recorded under class _d_. Category No.
6, marked as Political Science, contains such classes as Ceremonial,
Music and Administration of Justice, alongside of Handicrafts, making
it essential to study the arrangement carefully before it is possible
to consult the work with ease. Such preliminary trouble is, however,
well repaid, the amount of information given on any particular subject
being practically coextensive with what is known about that subject.
The method of presenting such information, with variations to suit the
nature of the topics handled, is to begin with historical excerpts,
chronologically arranged. These are usually followed by sometimes
lengthy essays dealing with the subject as a theme, taken from the
writings of qualified authors, and like all the other entries, also
chronologically arranged. Then come elegant extracts in prose and
verse, in all of which the subject may be simply mentioned and not
treated as in the essays. After these follow minor notices of
incidents, historical and otherwise, and all kinds of anecdotes,
derived from a great variety of sources. Occasionally, single poetical
lines are brought together, each contributing, some thought or
statement germane to the subject, expressed in elegant or forcible
terms; and also, wherever practicable, biographies of men and women
are inserted.

Chronological and other tables are supplied where necessary, as well
as a very large number of illustrations, many of these being
reproductions of woodcuts from earlier works. It is said that the _T'u
Shu Chi Ch'eng_ was printed from movable copper type cast by the
Jesuit Fathers employed by the emperor K'ang Hsi at Peking; also that
only a hundred copies were struck off, the type being then destroyed.
An 8vo edition of the whole encyclopaedia was issued at Shanghai in
1889; this is bound up in sixteen hundred and twenty-eight handy
volumes of about two hundred pages each. A copy of the original
edition stands on the shelves of the British Museum, and a translation
of the Index has recently been completed.

_Manuscripts and Printing._--At the conclusion of this brief survey of Chinese literature it may well be asked how such an enormous and ever-increasing mass has been handed down from generation to generation. According to the views put forth by early Chinese antiquarians, the first written records were engraved with a special knife upon bamboo slips and wooden tablets. The impracticability of such a process, as applied to books, never seems to have dawned upon those writers; and this snowball of error, started in the 7th century, long after the knife and the tablet had disappeared as implements of writing, continued to gather strength as time went on. Recent researches, however, have placed it beyond doubt that when the Chinese began to write in a literary sense, as opposed to mere scratchings on bones, they traced their characters on slips of bamboo and tablets of wood with a bamboo pencil, frayed at one end to carry the coloured liquid which stood in the place of ink. The knife was used only to erase. So things went on until about 200 B.C., when it would appear that a brush of hair was substituted for the bamboo pencil; after which, silk was called into requisition as an appropriate vehicle in connexion with the more delicate brush. But silk was expensive and difficult to handle, so that the invention of paper in A.D. 105 by a eunuch, named Ts'ai Lun, came as a great boon, although it seems clear that a certain kind of paper, made from silk floss, was in use before his date. However that may be, from the 1st century onwards the Chinese have been in possession of the same writing materials that are in use at the present day.

In A.D. 170, Ts'ai Yung, who rose subsequently to the highest offices of state, wrote out on stone in red ink the authorized text of the Five Classics, to be engraved by workmen, and thus handed down to posterity. The work covered forty-six huge tablets, of which a few fragments are said to be still in existence. A similar undertaking was carried out in 837, and the later tablets are still standing at a temple in the city of Hsi-an Fu, Shensi. With the T'ang dynasty, rubbings of famous inscriptions, wherein the germ of printing may be detected, whether for the style of the composition or for the calligraphic excellence of the script, came very much into vogue with scholars and collectors. It is also from about the same date that the idea of multiplying on paper impressions taken from wooden blocks seems to have arisen, chiefly in connexion with religious pictures and prayers. The process was not widely applied to the production of books until the 10th century, when in A.D. 932 the Confucian Canon was printed for the first time. In 981 orders were issued for the _T'ai P'ing Kuang Chi_, an encyclopaedia extending to many volumes (see above) to be cut on blocks for printing. Movable types of baked clay are said to have been invented by an alchemist, named Pi Sheng, about A.D. 1043; and under the Ming dynasty, 1368-1644, these were made first of wood, and later of copper or lead, but movable types have never gained the favour accorded to block-printing, by means of which most of China's great typographical triumphs have been achieved. The process is, and always has been, the same all over China. Two consecutive pages of a book, separated by a column containing the title, number of section, and number of leaf, are written out and pasted face downwards on a block of wood (_Lindera tz[)u]-mu_, Hemsl.). This paper, where not written upon, is cut away with sharp tools, leaving the characters in relief, and of course backwards, as in the case of European type. The block is then inked, and an impression is taken off, on one side of the paper only. This sheet is then folded down the middle of the separating column above mentioned, so that the blank halves come together, leaving two pages of printed matter outside; and when enough sheets have been brought together, they are stabbed at the open ends and form a volume, to be further wrapped in paper or pasteboard, and labelled with title, &c. It is almost superfluous to say that the pages of a Chinese book must not be cut. There is nothing inside, and, moreover, the column bearing the title and leaf-number would be cut through. The Chinese newspapers of modern times are all printed from movable types, an ordinary fount consisting of about six to seven thousand characters.

See J. Legge, _The Chinese Classics_ (1861-1872); A. Wylie, _Notes on
Chinese Literature_ (1867); E. Chavannes, _Memoires historiques_
(1895-1905); H.A. Giles, _Chuang Tz[)u]_ (1889), _A Chinese
Biographical Dictionary_ (1898), and _A History of Chinese Literature_
(1901); A. Forke, _Lun-Heng_ (1907); F. Hirth, _The Ancient History of
China_ (1908); L. Giles, _Sun Tz[)u]_ (1910). (H. A. GI.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] As to the origin of the names China and Cathay (the medieval
name) see below Sec. _History_. According to one theory the name China
is of Malay origin, designating originally the region now called
Indo-China, but transferred in early times to China proper. By the
Chinese the country is often called _Shih-pa-sheng_, "the Eighteen
Provinces," from the number of its great territorial divisions. It
is also called _Chung-kwo_, "the Middle Kingdom," properly used of
the central part of China, and _Hwa-kwo_, "the Flowery Kingdom."

[2] A Chinese mile, _li_, or _le_ = 0.36 English mile.

[2] For the Grand Canal the chief authority is Dominique Gandar, S.J.,
"Le Canal Imperial. Etude historique et descriptive," _Varietes
sinologiques_ No. 4 (Shanghai, 1903); see also Stenz, "Der
Kaiserkanal," in _Beitraegen zur Kolonialpolitik_, Band v. (Berlin,
1903-1904), and the works of Ney Elias, Sir J.F. Davis, A.
Williamson, E.H. Parker and W.R. Carles.

[4] Nevertheless there is considerable local traffic. The transit
trade with Shan-tung, passing the Chin-kiang customs and using some
250 m. of the worst part of the canal, was valued in 1905 at
3,331,000 taels.

[5] The portion of the wall which abutted on to the sea has been
destroyed.

[6] See the _Geog. Jnl._ (Feb. and March 1907). For a popular
account of the wall, with numerous photographs, see _The Great Wall
of China_ (London, 1909), by W.E. Giel, who in 1908 followed its
course from east to west. Consult also A. Williamson, _Journey in
North China_ (London, 1870); Martin, "La Grande Muraille de la
Chine," _Revue scientifique_ (1891).

[7] For Shanghai the figures are compiled from twenty-six years'
observations. See _China Sea Directory_, vol. iii. (4th ed., 1904)
p. 660.

[8] The thermometer registered 23 deg. F. in January 1893, on the river
28 m. below Canton. This is the lowest reading known. Ibid, pp.
104-105.

[9] See W.W. Rockhill, _Inquiry into the Population of China_
(Washington, 1904).

[10] For a bibliography of works relating to the aboriginal races of
China see Richard's _Comprehensive Geography of the Chinese Empire_
(1908 ed.), pp. 371-373.

[11] Evidences of the social changes taking place in China are to be
found in the strong movement for the education of girls, and in the
formation of societies, under official patronage, to prevent the
binding of women's feet.

[12] It must be remembered that there is great variety in the
costumes worn in the various provinces. The particulars here given
are of the most general styles of dress.

[13] Richard's _Comprehensive Geography_, &c. (1908 edition), pp.
340-341.

[14] Otherwise Ab[=u] Ja'far Ibn Mahommed al-Mans[=u]r (see CALIPHATE,
C. Sec. 2).

[15] For a summary of Chang Chih-tung's treatise, see _Changing
China_ (1910 edition), chap. xxii.

[16] It was announced in June 1910 that the throne had approved a
recommendation of the Board of Education that English should be the
official language for scientific and technical education, and that
the study of English should be compulsory in all provincial
scientific and technical schools.

[17] See _The Times_ of the 19th of February and the 3rd of May 1910.

[18] Another peculiarity of loess in China is that it lends itself
readily to the excavation of dwellings for the people. In many
places whole villages live in cave dwellings dug out in the vertical
wall of loess. They construct spiral staircases, selecting places
where the ground is firm, and excavate endless chambers and recesses
which are said to be very comfortable and salubrious.

[19] See J. Edkins, _The Poppy in China_, and H.B. Morse, _The Trade
and Administration of the Chinese Empire_, chap. xi.

[20] Richard's _Comprehensive Geography, &c._ (1908 edition), p. 144.

[21] In the 18th century foreign trade was restricted to Canton. In
the 17th century, however, the Dutch traded to Formosa and Amoy, and
the English to Amoy also. The Portuguese traded with Canton as early
as 1517. For the early intercourse between Portugal and China see
the introductory chapter in Donald Ferguson's _Letters from
Portuguese Captives in Canton_ (Bombay, 1902).

[22] From _The Statesman's Year Book_, 1910 edition.

[23] See _The Times_ of the 28th of March 1910.

[24] See Morse, _op. cit._ chap. x.

[25] The maritime customs had established a postal service for its
own convenience in 1861, and it first gave facilities to the general
public in 1876. An organized service for the conveyance of
government despatches has existed in China for many centuries, and
the commercial classes maintain at their own expense a system
("letter hongs") for the transmission of correspondence.

[26] For the causes leading to this movement and the progress of
reform see Sec. _History_.

[27] For recent authoritative accounts of the government of China
see H.B. Morse, _The Trade and Administration of the Chinese
Empire_, chap. iii.; Richard's _Comprehensive Geography_, &c., Bk.
I. Sec. v., and _The Statesman's Year Book_.

[28] The empress-consort is chosen by the emperor from a number of
girls selected by his ministers from the families of Manchu nobles.
From the same candidates the emperor also selects
secondary-empresses (usually not more than four). Concubines, not
limited in number, are chosen from the daughters of Manchu nobles
and free-men. All the children are equally legitimate.

[29] Recent emperors have been children at accession and have been
kept in seclusion.

[30] See "Democratic China" in H.A. Giles, _China and the Chinese_.

[31] W.F. Mayers, _The Chinese Government_ (1878).

[32] This body is superseded by the Imperial Senate summoned to meet
for the first time on the 3rd of October 1910.

[33] Yamen is the name given to the residences of all high
officials. Tsung-li Yamen = the bureau for managing each (foreign)
kingdom's affairs.

[34] An edict of the 15th of July 1909 created a naval and military
advisory board. Up to that time the navy was controlled by the
viceroys at Canton, Nanking, Fu-chow and Tientsin; the viceroys at
Canton and Tientsin being ministers superintendent of the southern
and northern ports respectively.

[35] Thus in 1910 Prince Ching, president of the grand council, was,
for the third time, impeached by censors, being denounced as an "old
treacherous minister," who filled the public service with a crowd of
men as unworthy as himself. The censor who made the charge was
stripped of his office (see _The Times_ of the 30th of March 1910).

[36] For details of local government see Richard's _Comprehensive
Geography_, 1908 edition, pp. 301 et seq.

[37] Morse, op. cit., 1908 edition, p. 76

[38] See _The Times_ of the 28th of February 1910.

[39] See _The Statesman's Year-Book_ (1910 edition).

[40] A few of the old native customs stations, which are deemed
perquisites of the imperial court, may also be excepted, as, for
instance, the native custom-house at Canton, Hwei Kwan on the Grand
Canal, and various stations in the neighbourhood of Peking.

[41] The production of a budget in 1915 was promised in one of the
reform edicts of 1908.

[42] In this article the tael used as a standard is the Haikwan (i.e.
customs) tael, worth about 3s. It fluctuates with the value of
silver.

[43] Roughly L43,000,000.

[44] _Trade and Administration of the Chinese Empire_ (1910), p. 118.

[45] Temporary reductions are granted in provinces affected by
rebellion, drought or flood.

[46] Information as to what extent the expenses of the new army and
navy are met by the central government is lacking.

[47] To meet the expenditure on interest and redemption of the
indemnities for the Boxer outrages the Peking government required
the provincial authorities to increase their annual remittances by
taels 18,700,000 during the years 1902-1910.

[48] It must be remembered that the Haikwan tael is here indicated.

[49] See Morse's _Trade and Administration of the Chinese Empire_,
chap. ix.

[50] A supplementary exchange of notes of the same date excepted
from the scope of this agreement the Shan-hai-kwan-Niu-chwang
extension which had already been conceded to the Hongkong & Shanghai
Bank.

[51] The religious aspect of the Boxer movement gave it strength.
Its disciples believed that the spirits which defended China were
incensed by the introduction of Western methods and ideals. Many of
them believed themselves to be invulnerable to any Western weapon.
(See Lord W. Cecil, _Changing China_, 1910, ch. i.)

[52] The diary of a Manchu noble printed in _China under the Empress
Dowager_ (1910) by J.O. Bland and E. Backhouse throws light on the
subject. It was to Jung-Lu, father-in-law of Prince Chin, that the
legations owed their escape from extermination.

[53] It was at this time (July 17th) that the intense anxiety of the
civilized world with regard to the fate of the besieged reached its
culminating point. Circumstantial accounts of the fall of the
legations and the massacre of their inmates were circulated in
Shanghai and found general credence. It was not till near the end of
the month that an authentic message from the American minister
proved these fears to be premature.

[54] In negotiating this agreement Lord Salisbury appears to have
been largely influenced by the aggressive features of Russia's
action in North China, while Germany appears to have been actuated
by a desire to forestall isolated action by Great Britain in the
Yangtsze basin. In Germany the agreement was known as the Yangtsze
Agreement. Great Britain held, however, that it applied equally to
Manchuria.

[55] Liu Kun-yi died in 1902. In the same year died Tao-mu, the
viceroy of Canton. In these men China lost two of her most capable
and enlightened officials.

[56] Prince Chun was born in 1882. He was the first member of the
imperial family to be sent on a foreign mission.

[57] Tung Fu-hsiang died in 1908. A sum of some L80,000 belonging to
him, and left in the provincial treasury, was appropriated for works
of public utility (see _The Times_, April 9th, 1910).

[58] Lord W. Cecil, op. cit. p. 9.

[59] This institution was nominally a private concern which financed
the Manchurian railway, but it acted as part of the Russian
government machinery. The existence of the contract of the 27th of
August 1896 was frequently denied until expressly admitted by the
Russo-Chinese agreement of the 8th of April 1902.

[60] On the 8th of October the Russian troops had been withdrawn
from Mukden, but they reoccupied the town on the 28th of the same
month, Admiral Alexeiev, the viceroy of the Far East, alleging that
the inertia of the Chinese officials seriously hindered the work of
extending civilization in Manchuria.

[61] The form of outrage, probably the first of its kind in China,
was itself a symptom of the changed times. The bomb injured Prince
Tsai Tse and another commissioner, and the departure of the
commission was consequently delayed some months.

[62] In 1907 further commissions were appointed, on the initiative
of Yuan Shih-kai, to study specifically the constitutions of Great
Britain, Germany and Japan.

[63] This department was organized at Shanghai in 1854. The Taiping
rebels being in possession of the native city, the collection of
customs dues, especially on foreign ships, was placed in the hands
of foreigners. This developed into a permanent institution, the
European staff being mainly British.

[64] The British official view, as stated in parliament on the 27th
of April 1910, was that the changes resulting from the creation of
the Board of Control had, so far, been purely departmental changes
of form, and that the position of the inspector-general remained
unaltered.

[65] See _The Times_ of the 21st of April and 11th of May 1910.

[66] A chest contained from 135 lb to 160 lb.

[67] A picul = 133-1/2 lb.

[68] _Changing China_, p. 118.

[69] See _The Times_ of 7th and 8th of March and 8th of April 1910.

[70] The first recorded importation of morphia into China was in
1892, and it is suggested that it was first used as an anti-opium
medicine. Morphia-taking, however, speedily became a vice, and in
1902 over 195,000 oz. of morphia were imported (enough for some
300,000,000 injections). To check the evil the Chinese government
during 1903 imposed a tax of about 200% _ad valorem_, with the
result that the imports declared to the customs fell in 1905 to 54
oz. only. The falling off was explained "not by a diminished demand,
but by smuggling" (Morse's _Trade and Administration of the Chinese
Empire_, p. 351).

[71] A regulation by the ministry of education, dated the 14th of
January 1910, ordered that no girl should be admitted to school
dressed in foreign clothes or with unnatural (i.e. bound) feet.

[72] For the growth of the education movement see _The Times_, 4th
of September 1909.

[73] The Dalai Lama left Peking in December 1908 on his return to
Lhassa, which he reached in November 1909. Differences had arisen
between him and the Chinese government, which sought to make the
spiritual as well as the temporal power of the Dalai Lama dependent
on his recognition by the emperor of China. Early in 1910 the Dalai
Lama, in consequence of the action of the Chinese amban in Lhassa,
fled from that city and sought refuge in India.

[74] Chang Chih-tung died in October 1909. He was a man of considerable
ability, and one whose honesty and loyalty had never been doubted. He
was noted as an opponent of opium smoking, and for over thirty years
had addressed memorials to the throne against the use of the drug.

[75] See _The Times_ of the 7th of September 1909.

[76] Proposals made early in 1910 by the American secretary of state
for the neutralization of the Manchurian railway received no
support.

[77] By a convention signed on July 4th, 1910, Russia and Japan agreed
to "maintain and respect" the _status quo_ in Manchuria.

[78] See the _Quinzaine coloniale_ of the 10th of December 1909.

[79] See _The Times_ of the 20th of January 1910.

[80] See for the prospects of reform _The Times_ of 30th May 1910.

[81] _La Sculpture sur pierre en Chine ait temps des deux dynasties
Han_ (Paris, 1893).

CHINA, the common name for ware made of porcelain, given because it came from China, where the first vitrified, translucent, white ware was produced. The Portuguese or Italians gave it the name of "porcelain" (q.v.). English usage was influenced by India and the East, where the Persian _ch[=i]n[=i]_ was widely prevalent as the name of the ware. This is seen also in some of the earlier forms and pronunciations, e.g. _chiney_, _cheney_, and later _chaney_ (see CERAMICS; and for "china-clay" KAOLIN).

CHINANDEGA, or CHINENDEGA, the capital of the department of Chinandega in western Nicaragua, 10 m. N.N.E. of the seaport of Corinto by the Corinto-Managua railway. Pop. (1900) about 12,000. Chinandega is the centre of a fertile corn-producing district, and has a large transit trade owing to its excellent situation on the chief Nicaraguan railway. Its manufactures include coarse cloth, pottery and Indian feather ornaments. Cotton, sugar-cane and bananas are cultivated in the neighbourhood.

CHI-NAN FU, the capital of Shan-tung, China, in 36 deg. 40' N., 117 deg. 1' E. Pop. about 100,000. It is situated in one of the earliest settled districts of the Chinese empire. The city, which lies in the valley of the present channel of the Yellow river (Hwang-Ho), and about 4 m. south of the river, is surrounded by a triple line of defence. First is the city wall, strongly built and carefully guarded, outside this a granite wall, and beyond this again a mud rampart. Three springs outside the west gate throw up streams of tepid water to a height of about 2 ft. This water, which is highly prized for its healing qualities, fills the moat and forms a fine lake in the northern quarter of the city.

Chi-nan Fu was formerly famous for its manufacture of silks and of imitation precious stones. It is now the chief commercial entrepot of Western Shan-tung but no longer a manufacturing centre. A highway connects it with the Yellow river, and it is joined by a railway 280 m. long to Kiaochow. The city has a university for instruction on Western lines, and an efficient military school. American Presbyterians began mission work in the city in 1873; it is also the see of a Roman Catholic bishop.