THE SHE KING; OR, THE BOOK OF ANCIENT POETRY

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THE CHINA OF THE BOOK OF FOETEY. 4-1
CHAPTER IV.
THE CHINA OF THE BOOK OF POETRY, CONSIDERED IN
RELATION TO THE EXTENT OF ITS TERRITORY, AND
ITS POLITICAL STATE; ITS RELIGION; AND
SOCIAL CONDITION.
1. A GLANCE at the map prefixed to this chapter will
give the reader an idea of the extent of the kingdom of
Chow,—of China as it was during the period to which
the Book of Poetry belongs. The China of The terrltory
the present day, what we call China proper, of the kingdom
, " - ii • i A • r r ,o£ Chow.
embracing the eighteen provinces, may be
described in general terms as lying between the 20th and
40th degrees of north latitude, and the 100th and 121st
degrees of east longitude, and containing an area of about
1,300,000 square miles. The China of the Chow dynasty
lay between the 33rd and 38th parallels of latitude, and
the 106th and 119th of longitude. The degrees of longijude
included in it were thus about two-thirds of the
present; and of the 20 degrees of latitude the territory
of Chow embraced no more than five. It extended nearly
to the limit of the present boundaries on the north and
west, because it was from the north, along the course of
the Yellow river, that the first Chinese settlers had come
into the country, and it was again from the west of the
Yellow river that the chiefs of the Chow family and their
followers pushed their way to the east, and took posses
sion of the tracts on both sides of that river, which had
been occupied, nearly to the sea, by the dynasties of Hea
and Shang. The position of the present departmental
city of Pin-chow,in which neighbourhood we find duke Lew
with his people emerging into notice, in the beginning of
the 18th century before our era, is given as in lat. 35°
4', and long. 105° 46'.
The She says nothing of the division of the country
under the Chow dynasty into the nine Chow or provinces,
of which we read so much in the third Part of the Shoo,
in connection with the labours of Yu. Four times in the