aroundworldortra00peebiala-1

142 AEOUND THE WORLD.
under the pall of the dark ages ; that printing, originating
with, was used by them for centuries before known in the
West; that they discovered electro-magnetism, the curse
gunpowder, and that they have excelled in silks, chinawares,
and porcelains from time immemorial. It should
be further borne in mind that the Chinese inoculated for the
small-pox nearly three thousand years before the Christian
era, putting the virus in the nostril instead of the arm ; and
that a medical work published prior to Christ's time,
during the Hau dynasty, treats in part of the circulation
the blood.
Chinese scholars are proud of their past. They admit
that " Western barbarians " excel them, at present, in science
and the mechanical arts ; but they claim the pre-eminence
in literature, metaphysics, and the mysterious sciences,
such as ontology, geomancy, physiognomy, divination, and
necromancy, or methods of conversing with the dead.
During the tedious voyage from New Zealand with a crew
of Chinese, I was surprised one day to see a young coolie
perusing a fine old Chinese volume, thickly embellished
with pictures and plates of the human form, the human
brain laid open, the curves and facial features indicating
character delicately marked, and the fortune-lines of the
hand clearly traced. Inquiring through the intei-preter
when written, and by whom, I ascertained that it was one
of a series of volumes by an ancient sage, treating of reading
character by the brain-organs, the facial
of
angles, and the
general contour of the person, alias a volume upon phrenology
and physiognomy.
It can not be consistently alleged that Christian missionaries
would be partial to, or inclined to overrate, the virtues
and intellectual altitudes of the " heathen " they were sent
to save. And yet the Rev. J. L. Nevius, ten years a missionary
in China, says in his work entitled " China and the
Chinese," " China may well point with pride to
her authentic
history, reaching back through more than thirty cen-