In 2 vols. 8vo. THE RELIGION OF THE ZOROASTRIANS, AS CONTAINED IN THEIR SACRED WRITINGS; With a History of the Zend and Pehlevi Literatures; and a Grammar of the Zend and Pehlevi Languages. By MARTIN HAUG, PH.D., late Superintendent of Sanscrit Studies in the Poona College. Combining brevity with utility; and illustrated by Exercises and Dialogues. By H W. BELLEW, Assistant Surgeon, Bengal Army. In 1 vol. super royal 8vo. A DICTIONARY of the PUKKHTO or PUKSHTO LANGUAGE, With a Reversed Part, or, English and Pukkhto. By H. W. BELLEW, Assistant Surgeon, Bengal Army. In 1 vol. 8vo. 600 pages. Price £2 88. CHINA AND JAPAN, AND [In February. A COMPLETE GUIDE TO THE OPEN PORTS OF THOSE COUNTRIES, TOGETHER WITH PEKING, YEDDO, HONGKONG, AND MACAO. Forming a Guide Book and Vade Mecum for Travellers, Merchants, and Residents in General. WITH 26 MAPS AND PLAN S. By WM. FREDERICK MAYERS, F.R.G.S., H.M.'s Consular Service; N. B. DENNYS, late H.M.'s Consular Service and CHARLES KING, Lieut. Royal Marine Artillery. Edited by N. B. DENNYS. LANGUAGE AND THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE; A COURSE OF LECTURES ON THE PRINCIPLES OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE. In 1 vol. 8vo. STUDIES IN ENGLISH; OR, GLIMPSES OF THE INNER LIFE OF OUR LANGUAGE. [In April. By M. SCHELE DE VERE, LL.D., Professor of Modern Languages in the University of Virginia. NEW MONTHLY PERIODICAL. NOTES AND QUERIES ON CHINA AND JAPAN. IN contemplating the issue of a Monthly Periodical devoted to Eastern subjects on the plan of that which, under the title of "Notes and Queries," has proved so useful and so popular during long series of years in Great Britain, the publishers have had in view the great and constantly increasing interest felt in all parts of the civilized world with relation to China, Japan, and the adjacent countries, together with the rapid accession of means of knowledge in various departments of research which has been the consequence of so large an influx of European residents as has taken place within the last few years. With Peking and Yeddo open to travellers and officials, with the whole Empire of China accessible to explorers, and the barriers hitherto so jealously maintained in Japan becoming daily weakened, numbers of new facts and much curious information are being accumulated in the note-books of individuals, who would be glad to preserve in type many little particulars, for embodying which, in a form accessible to the public, no means now exist. It is intended that both notes and inquiries received shall be carefully classified and indexed with minute care; whilst, as in the home work which has been adopted as a model, a list of books wanted, or for disposal, relating to China or Japan will be inserted. The advertising page will be devoted to literary matters on the same subject only. The periodical, the first number of which is intended to appear about the end of January, 1867, will be edited by Mr. N. B. DENNYS, of Hongkong. The Work will be divided as follows: 1.-NOTES:-Historical, Geographical, Ethnological, Social, Linguistic, etc. 2.-QUERIES:-(In the same order). 8.-REPLIES. 4.-ADDENDUM. NOTES ON BOOKS, CATALOGUES, ETC. 5.-NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS. LITERARY ADVERTISENENTS, EUROPEAN AGENTS: TRÜBNER & CO., 60, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON. Now Ready, price 2s. 6d., A SHORT PRACTICAL GRAMMAR OF THE TIBETAN LANGUAGE, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE SPOKEN DIALECTS. By H. A. JAESCHKE, Moravian Missionary. 8vo. pp. 60. Kye-lang, 1865. "The great interest attaching to Jaeschke's Tibetan Grammar centres in the constant reference that is made in it to the spoken dialects. A. Csoma Körösi-the first European who acquired a thorough acquaintance with the literary language of Tibet-followed in his Grammar and Dictionary the pronunciation as current in Great Tibet (Tibet Proper, Eastern Tibet), and this precedent, once established, has been adopted by I. J. Schmidt and Ph. E. Foncaux. The first successful attempt at examining and fixing the linguistical position of the Tibetan language was made by A. Schiefner, who pointed out its radical affinity to the Burmese and some ruder tongues spoken on the confines of Assam, all of which, as to their grammatical structure, stand widely apart from the remaining groups of Indo-Chinese languages, and should more properly be classed with the Bod or Tibetan dialects. Jaeschke's Short Grammar is calculated to throw much new light on some of the chief peculiarities-we might almost say mysteries of the Tibetan language. The author, a Moravian Missionary, has for many years been living with a Tibetan Tribe at Kyelung, in Lahul, where he has made the most of his opportunities for studying the language of literature as well as several of the spoken dialects of Western Tibet. The information he has embodied in this Grammar, and in two previously published letters to R. Lepsius and A. Schiefner, on the pronunciation, quantity, accent, and dialectical variations of the language, is exceedingly curious and valuable, and allows us to hope that we may receive some day at his hands a larger and fuller work on the subject,-a work that will not come to us in the humble garb of lithography, but commend itself to the Student by its European type no less than by the interest of its contents." LONDON: TRÜBNER & Co., 60, PATERNOSTER ROW. Now Ready, 8vo. sewed, pp. 16, xxxii., 257-522, price 88., JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. New Series. Vol. II. Part 2. CONTENTS.-ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS.-ART. VIII. On the Relation of the Priests to the other Classes of Indian Society in the Vedic Age. By J. Muir, LL.D., D.C.L.-IX. On the Interpretation of the Veda. By the same.-X. An attempt to translate from the Chinese a work known as the Confessional Services of the Great Compassionate Kwan Yin, possessing 1000 hands and 1000 eyes. By the Rev. S. Beal, R.N.-XI. The Hymns of the Gaupâyanas and the Legend of King Asamâti. By Professor Max Müller, M.A., Hon. M.R.A.S.-XII. Specimen chapters of an Assyrian Grammar. By the Rev. E. Hincks, D.D., Hon. M.R.A.S.-Proceedings of the Anniversary Meeting of the Royal Asiatic Society; Report of the Council; Auditors' Report; List of Members. LONDON: TRÜBNER & Co., 60, PATERNOSTER ROW. Now Ready, in 1 vol. 4to. pp. 418, price 218., AN HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL ESSAY. By J. N. VALETTA, Professor of Greek; Editor of "Epistles of Photius," etc. andfangenfafe THE PANDIT: A Monthly Journal of the Benares College, devoted to Sanskrit Literature. Vol. I. No. 6. Benares, November 1, 1866. Folio, pp. 73-88. CONTENTS. I. Conclusion of the first chapter of the fifth Prakaraṇa, entitled Pramânapârâyana, of the Prakaraṇapanchikâ, by 'Sâlikânâtha. In Sanskrit. (Continued from No. 5). II. The thirteenth and fourteenth Sargas of Kâlidâsa's Kumarasambhava, entitled severally Kumarasainâpatyâbhisheka and Senâprayâņa. In Sanskrit. (Continued from No 5). III. Paribhâshendusekharațippanîsârâsâraviveka, a critical examination of Nâgesa's grammatical work, the Paribhâshendusekhara, by Professors Râjârâmasâstrin and Bâlas' âstrin. In Sanskrit. (Continued from No. 5). IV. Prâchînajyotiḥs'âstrâchâryâsayavarṇana, on some of the tenets held by the old astronomers. By Bâpûdevasástrin. In Sanskrit. V. The tenth chapter of the Sáhitya-darpana, or Mirror of Composition. By Bâbû Pramadâdâsa Mittra. In English. (Continued from No. 5). VI. The Eternity of Sound; a dogma of the Mímánsá. By Dr. Ballantyne. [From the Benares Magazine, August, 1852.] (Continued from No. 5.) The object of the Pandit is to publish rare Sanskrit works which appear worthy of careful editing hereafter; to offer field for the discussion of controverted points in Old Indian Philosophy, Philology, History, and Literature; to communicate ideas between the Aryan scholars of the East and of the West; between the Pandits of Benares and Calcutta and the Sanskritists of the Universities of Europe. The Journal, which will be enlarged as soon as the subscriptions cover the actual expenses of publication, will contain also Original Articles in Sanskrit and English, Critical Notices of new Sanskrit Books, and Translations from and into Sanskrit. Annual subscription, 24s. Intending subscribers are requested to address the European Publishers, Messrs. TRUBNER & Co., 60, Paternoster Row, London. ORIENTAL LITERARY INTELLIGENCE. THE STUDY OF CHINESE.-A letter has been published in the Hankow Times, purporting to have been written by a welleducated Chinaman, which contains some striking illustrations of the arguments we recently used as to the necessity of foreigners learning Chinese. It is strange that most foreigners in China, who are generally wide awake enough to judge correctly of the importance of being able to deal "first hand " with buyers or sellers of other nations, are unwilling to admit the necessity of mastering the language, and to a slight extent the written character, of a people so essentially habituated to habits of deception as the Chinese-a people amongst whom a go-between in commercial transactions becomes a more powerful agent for "bleeding" the foreigner than would be the case in almost any other part of the world. It matters little whether the letter we refer to has been actually written by a Chinaman or not. The observations it contains will be indorsed by all who have even a slight knowledge of the language and have heard the Chinese talk of foreigners amongst themselves. After stating the aptitude generally exhibited by foreigners for acquiring foreign languages when their interests require that they should study them, the writer goes on to ask the following very pertinent questions, and gives his own answer thereto : "But how come it that they suddenly become dull and stupid when they set foot on Chinese shores? The riddle is not difficult of solution. Foreigners are not subject to either dulness or stupidity. The truth is that the moment a foreigner arrives, the cunning Cantonese places himself at his disposal, speaks for him, and writes for him, gives him to understand that no communication with natives is safe or even possible save through the self-elected medium, encou rages and feeds his natural disinclination to enter upon the exertion of acquiring an unknown tongue, and ere very long persuades the willing victim to wear a yoke, which, could he have foreseen all the consequences of its imposition when he first arrived, he would have broken into a thousand pieces ere he would have consented to place it upon his neck. The writer would not have foreigners throw aside their Canton servants. It would not by any means be to their interest so to do. Natives of Canton are, without doubt, amongst the most intelligent, energetic, and enterprising of the eighteen provinces, and their peculiar characteristics fit them better for association with foreigners than perhaps any other of the Chinese people. But what the writer advocates is that foreigners should use their Canton men, not be used by them. With the check upon what they say and write that a knowledge of even the rudiments of the language would give, the former position may be easily secured, without it the latter must ever be an inevitable consequence." The evils of the Compradore system are so obvious, that under the present system of free communication with the natives one can only wonder that they are for a moment tolerated. As disbursers of the money expended on account of table and household expenses they are all very well, but the plan now pursued renders them, as the writer of the above well suggests, the masters, and not the servants, of their nominal employers. To arguments of this kind a very common and not unnatural answer is :-That it is all very well to declaim about the importance of knowing Chinese, but that to expect men who have passed several years in the trying climate, and following the still more trying habits of the foreign community of China, to begin to learn it, is to expect a great deal more than could possibly be carried out. So much may be freely granted; but what is to prevent the heads of firms insisting that all young men who hereafter joined them, and those who had been but a short time in their employ, should devote a certain period every day to the acquisition of the local dialect? As we mentioned in our former article, this system was tried by a well-known firm at Amoy, and with the best results. Of course it is not to be expected that such would all turn out sinologues, or even colloquial scholars, of the first water. But it may fairly be assumed, that out of every three or four men of average intelligence, one at all events would be able to acquire a competent knowledge of the language, and these would find their advantage in the superior qualification they possessed. The following additional remarks, in the letter we have alluded to, will probably astonish the minds of many of our readers not a little. We do not think that the writer exaggerates the evil he complains of, though it has doubtless decreased of late years, with the better knowledge now possessed by Chinese of foreigners. He says that "natives of Canton, when called upon to express any foreign name, be it that of a vessel or a merchant, by Chinese sounds, they invariably select characters possessing the most offensive meanings that they can set their hands on. The writer has noticed this propensity repeatedly in business notes, contracts, &c., connected with foreigners. Why they do this the writer cannot explain. Possibly it arises from that traditionary hatred and contempt for the foreigners, natural to the Canton mind, and which even the overthrow and long occupation of their famous city of Rams has not had the effect of eradicating. They even carry the feeling into their demeanour towards foreigners, a fact which often strikes northerners with surprise, and which the writer thinks, with regret, is highly calculated to prejudice the foreigner in the opinion of the most well meaning natives. What can a northern tea-man or a broker think, when he hears a Canton compradore, or a boy speak of his master as the foreign devil,' of his master's wife as the 'foreign devil's woman,' of any child as the 'little imp,' &c.? The natural inference in the listener's mind is either that the speaker is unnecessarily abusive in the terms he used, or that they are richly merited; unfortunately, the tendency to the latter conclusion is the more easy, and the foreigner suffers in consequence." From some little experience in the North of China we can fully endorse these words. Whatever the Cantonese may be here, they are in the North what the above describes them to be, and Northern Chinese frequently express their astonishment at the insolence of the Cantonese to foreigners. The cool "cheek" of a Canton boy is unknown to natives of the North, and they cannot comprehend the reason why foreigners who never tolerate a rudeness from them should allow an AUSTRALIAN Adamson's Australian Gardener; an Epitome of THE VICTORIA ALMANAC for 1867. Melbourne. THE AUSTRALASIAN WESLEYAN AND GENE- Australian Medical Journal.-The Australian Australian Views.-The Cabinet Album of Aus- ignorant pigeon-English-speaking-coolie to behave in a manner which would assuredly lead to the infliction of the bamboo on the seat of honour if practised towards their own respectable countrymen. We conclude by one more quotation from this very interesting letter, and would impress the truth of what is therein stated on the minds of our readers. "It has been the fashion for a long time past to declare that such an attainment as colloquial Chinese is impossible without years of labour, and alas there are too many whose interest it is to keep this impression. But the writer is convinced it is a delusion, and he gladly raises his weak voice in denouncing it as such."-China Mail. THE STORY OF ARJI BORJI, IN MONGOLIAN.-In our notice of Professor Jülg's edition and translation of the Kalmük Siddhi-Kür (Record, No. 13.), we took occasion to advert to the praiseworthy liberality evinced by Mr. Wagner, the publisher of that work, in having a font of Mongolian type cast for the purpose of printing the nine supplementary tales of the Siddhi-Kür, and the history of Arji Borji Khan, in the eastern Mongolian dialect. The latter is likewise a favourite work of fiction with the Mongols, and corresponds in substance to the well-known Sanskrit story-book, the Vikramacharitra. Pending the preparation of these two collections for publication, Prof. Jülg has brought out as a specimen, on the plan followed in his "Siddhi-Kür," a chapter from the Arji Borji Khan, the peculiar interest of which centres in the striking resemblance it bears to a celebrated episode, called "the Ordeal," in the medieval German epic of "Tristan and Isolde." We must refer the reader to the preface of the book itself, for the Professor's reasons for considering the latter as the prototype of the former. The Mongolian text is the first that has issued from a German press, and the type employed strikes us as being as clear and correct as the one of St. Petersburg, and certainly neater than the one of Kazan, and it may so far be called a great success. AUSTRALIAN LITERATURE.-With the kind assitance of our friend Mr. George Robertson, of Melbourne, we hope to give, with tolerable regularity, a full account of the Literature of our Australian Colonies-a literature which we feel sure will have a more than ordinary interest to Englishmen. On another page will be found our first list of current literature. - Dr. Beane's "Contributions to the Practice of Conservative Surgery," the first Medical Work published in Australia, has passed through one edition, and the second is preparing for publication.-Mr. F. Sinnett, the son of Mrs. Percy Sinnett, and for some time editor of the Melbourne Herald, died at Melbourne in November last. He was for three years editor of the Melbourne Punch, afterwards editor of the Geelong Daily News, then connected with the Adelaide Telegraph, The Wallet, and other publications, and for the last twelve months of his life held an important position on the Melbourne Argus. LITERATURE.* Bailliere's County Atlas of Victoria. 21 coloured Coles's Religions of the World.-Coles's Informa- Cooper. The Science of Spiritual Life. By the * Supplied by Trübner & Co., 60, Paternoster Row, London. De Gruchy and Leigh's Guide to Melbourne.— Exhibition Essays.-No. 1. Mining and Mineral Exhibition Essays.-No. 2. Notes on the Physical Johnson.-The Culture of the Rose. By THOMAS McLean.-Lindigo, the White Woman; or, the Melbourne Punch. Vol. I. 4to. pp. viii. and 210. Morris." Let no Man deceive you;" An Answer Penny Readings in Melbourne: What They Are, Rogerson.-The Poetical Works of David Roger- Thomas.-Britannia Antiquissima; or a Key to Thozet.-Notes on some of the Roots, Tubers, ENGLISH BOOKS PRINTED IN INDIA AND CHINA.* ARMY LIST.-The Official Quarterly Army List of Her BRITISH AND NATIVE COCHIN. By C.A.L. With CONTENTS.-Missionary Schools in India-Indian Law Reform- DASS.-DOMESTIC MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF DRURY.-HANDBOOK OF THE INDIAN FLORA ; GAGE (THE) OF THE TWO CIVILIZATIONS: shall CONTENTS.-The Treaties of Tien-Tsin-Series of Reports to the China-Americans at Peking-Correspondence of H. E. Mr. Bruce GEOLOGICAL PAPERS ON WESTERN INDIA, in- GOIDILICA, OR NOTES ON THE GAELIC MANU- INDIAN COMPANIES' ACT, 1866 (Act X. of 1866). With * Supplied by Tühner & Co., 60, Paternoster Row, London. |