China and the West

Washington Irving and China. Works.
1807-1808
Irving, Washington. Salmagundi, or, The whim-whams and opinions of Launcelot Langstaff, esq. & others. (New York, N.Y. : D. Longworth, 1807-1808).
https://archive.org/stream/salmagundi02irvi/salmagundi02irvi_djvu.txt.
He has improved his taste by a long residence abroad, particularly at Canton, Calcutta, and the gay and pohshed court of Hayti. He has also had an opportunity seeing the best singing-girls and tragedians of China, is a great connoisseur in mandarine dresses, and porcelain, and
particularly values himself on his intimate knowledge of the buffalo, and war dances of the northern Indians…
We have seen this character performed in China by the celebrated Chow-Chow, the Roscius of that great empire, who in the dagger scene always electrified the audience by blowing his nose like a trumpet…
I, like the honest Chinese, thanked them heartily for the jewels and finery with which they loaded themselves, merely ior the entertainment of by-standers, and blessed my stars that I was a bachelor…
Honest Andrew, as he dehvered it, informed me that his master, who resides a httle way from town, on reading a small pamphlet in a neat yellow cover, rubbed his hands with symptoms of great satisfaction, called for Lis favourite Chinese inkstand, with two sprawling Mandarines for its supporters, and wrote the letter which he had the honour to present me…
The first time he saw tin instance of this kind, he came home with great precipitation, packed up his trunk, his old-fashioned writing-desk, and his Chinese ink-stand, and made a kind of growling retreat to Cockloft-Hall, where he has resided ever since…
But above all, he prided himself upon his waistcoat of China silk, which might almost have served a good housewife for a shortgown ; and he boasted that the roses and tulips upon it were the work of Nang Fou, daughter of the great Chin-Chin-Fou, who had fallen in love with the graces of his person, and sent it to him as a parting present ; he assured me she was a remarkable beauty, with sweet obliquity of eyes, and a foot no larger than the thumb of an alderman;— he then dilated most copiously on his silver-sprigged dickey, which he assured me was quite the rage among the dashing young mandarins of Canton…
What was to be done with such an incorrigible fellow? — to add to my distress, the first word he spoke was to tell Miss Sparkle that something she said reminded him of a circumstance that happened to him in China; — and at it he went, in the true traveller style— described the Chinese mode of eating rice with chop-sticks;— entered into a long eulogium on the succulent qualities of boiled bird's nests; and I made my escape at the very moment when he was on the point of squatting down on the floor, to show how the little Chinese Joshes sit cross-legged….
He was sucking the end of a little stick ; he was a 'gemman' from head to foot ; but as to his face, there was no more expression in it than in the face of a Chinese lady on a teacup…
In China, on the contrary, the first thing they do is to run for the doctor and tchoouc, or notary. The audience are entertained throughout the fifth act with a learned consultation of physicians, and if the patient must die, he does it secundum artem, and always is allowed time to make his will. The celebrated Chow-Chow was the completest hand I ever saw at killing himself; he always carried under his robe a bladder of bull's blood, which, when he gave the mortal stab, spirted out, to the infinite delight of the audience. Not that the ladies of China are more fond of the sight of blood than those of our own country ; on the contrary, they are remarkably sensitive in this particular…
In China a puissant Mandarin loads at least three elephants with style…
A Chinese lady is thought prodigal of her charms if she expose the tip of her nose, or the,ends of her fingers, to the ardent gaze of bystanders : and I recollect that all Canton was in a buzz in consequence of the great belle, Miss Nangfous, peeping out of the window with her face uncovered !...
Now I assure my readers there was no flattery in this, for they no more suspected me of being Launcelot Langstaff , than they suspected me of being the emperor of China, or the man in the moon…
If, therefore, I choose to make a hop, skip, and jump, to China, or New-Holland, or Terra Incognita…
Will put down there one night by a sea-captain, in an argument concerning the era of the Chinese empire Whangpo…
On opening his budget, and perceiving the motto, it struck me that Will had brought me one of his confounded Chinese manuscripts, and I was forthwith going to dismiss it with indignation…
Had my gravity been like the Chinese philosopher's within one degree of absolute frigidity," here would have been a trial for it.— I could not stand it, but burst into such a laugh as I do not indulge in above once in a hundred years ; — this was too much for Will ; he emerged from his cloud, threw his segar into the fire-place, and strode out of the room, pulling up his breeches, muttering something which, I verily beheve, was nothing more than a horrible long Chinese malediction…
" Good," said I, "you remind me of a lubberly Chinese who was flogged by an honest captain of my acquaintance, and who, on being advised to retaliate, exclaimed — '…
It became dangerous to walk through the court-yard for fear of an explosion ; and the whole family was thrown into absolute distress and consternation by a letter from the old housekeeper to Mrs. Cockloft ; informing her of his having blown up a favourite Chinese gander, which I had brought from Canton, as he was majestically sailing in the duck-pond…
The Chinese may adore his Fo, or his Josh; the Egyptian his stork; and the Mussulman practise, unmolested, the divine precepts of our immortal prophet…
The greatest man in China is he who can trace his ancestry up to the moon ; and in this country, our great men may generally hunt down their pedigree until it burrows in the dirt like a rabbit…
Dear Mr. Evergreen :— The other night, at Richard the Third, I sat behind three gentlemen, who talked very loud on the subject of Richard's wooing Lady Ann directly in the face of his crimes against that lady. One of them declared such an unnatural scene would be hooted at in China…
A China ship proudly arrives in our bay. Displaying her streamers and blazing away…
America, so far from being, as the writers of upstart Europe denominate it, the new world, is at least as old as any country in existence, not excepting Egypt, China, or even the land of the Assiniboins…
Now I solemnly pledge myself to the world, that in all my travels through the east, in Persia, Arabia, China, and Egypt…
Nay, he has taken unpardonable liberties with my own person I — elevating me on the substantial pedestals of a worthy gentleman from China…

1809
Irving, Washington. A history of New York : from the beginning of the world to the end of the Dutch dynasty. (New York: Inskeep and Bradford, 1809).
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/search?author=washington+irving&amode=words.
But the Chinese, who deservedly rank among the most extensive and authentic historians, inasmuch as they have known the world ever since some millions of years before it was created, declare that Noah was no other than Fohi, a worthy gentleman, descended from an ancient and respectable family of Hong merchants, that flourished in the middle ages of the empire. What gives this assertion some air of credibility is, that it is a fact, admitted by the most enlightened literati, that Noah travelled into China next hit, at the time of the building of the Tower of Babel (probably to improve himself in the study of languages) and the learned Dr. Shackford gives us the additional information, that the ark rested upon a mountain on the frontiers of previous hit China next hit…
I shall neither enquire whether it was first discovered by the Chinese, as Vossius with great shrewdness advances, nor by the Norwegians in 1002, under Biorn; nor by Behem, the German navigator, as Mr. Otto has endeavoured to prove to the Sçavans of the learned city of Philadelphia…
I pass over the supposition of the learned Grotius, who being both an ambassador and a Dutchman to boot, is entitled to great respect; that North America, was peopled by a strolling company of Norwegians, and that Peru was founded by a colonyfrom previous hit China next hit—Manco or Mungo Capac, the first Incas, being himself a Chinese…

1822
Irving, Washington. Bracebridge Hall ; or, The humorists. (London : J. Murray, 1822).
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=14228.
A coach was a strange monster in those days, and the sight of one put both horse and man into amazement. Some said it was a great crabshell brought out of China, and some imagined it to be one of the Pagan temples in which the Cannibals adored the divell…

1828
Irving, Washington. A history of the life and voyages of Christopher Columbus. (London : John Murray, 1828).
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/8519/8519.txt.
The first vague reports of a Christian potentate in the interior of Asia, or, as it was then called, India, were brought to Europe by the Crusaders, who it is supposed gathered them from the Syrian merchants who traded to the very confines of China…
Marco Polo (1271) places Prester John near the great wall of China, to the north of Chan-si, in Teudich, a populous region full of cities and castles…
Francis Pepin, author of the Brandenburgh version, styles Polo a man commendable for his piety, prudence, and fidelity. Athanasius Kircher, in his account of China, says that none of the ancients have described the kingdoms of the remote East with more exactness…
It is evident that his narration, as far as related from his own observations, is correct, and that he had really traversed a great part of Tartary and China, and navigated in the Indian seas…
But though Marco Polo is magnificent in his description of the provinces of Cathay, and its imperial city of Cambalu, he outdoes himself when he comes to describe the province of Mangi. This province is supposed to be the southern part of China. It contains, he says, twelve hundred cities. The capital, Quinsai (supposed to be the city of Hang-cheu), was twenty-five miles from the sea, but communicated by a river with a port situated on the seacoast, and had great trade with India...
The name Quinsai, according to Marco Polo, signifies the city of heaven; he says he has been in it and examined it diligently, and affirms it to be the largest in the world; and so undoubtedly it is if the measurement of the traveler is to be taken literally, for he declares that it is one hundred miles in circuit. This seeming exaggeration has been explained by supposing him to mean Chinese miles or li, which are to the Italian miles in the proportion of three to eight; and Mr. Marsden observes that the walls even of the modern city, the limits of which have been considerably contracted, are estimated by travelers at sixty li. The ancient city has evidently been of immense extent, and as Marco Polo could not be supposed to have measured the walls himself, he has probably taken the loose and incorrect estimates of the inhabitants. He describes it also as built upon little islands like Venice, and has twelve thousand stone bridges, the arches of which are so high that the largest vessels can pass under them without lowering their masts. It has, he affirms, three thousand baths, and six hundred thousand families, including domestics. It abounds with magnificent houses, and has a lake thirty miles in circuit within its walls, on the banks of which are superb palaces of people of rank. The inhabitants of Qninsai are very voluptuous, and indulge in all kinds of luxuries and delights, particularly the women, who are extremely beautiful. There are many merchants and artisans, but the masters do not work, they employ servants to do all their labor. The province of Mangi was conquered by the Great Khan, who divided it into nine kingdoms, appointing to each a tributary king. He drew from it an immense revenue, for the country abounded in gold, silver, silks, sugar, spices, and perfumes…

1836
Irving, Washington. Astoria : or, Anecdotes of an enterprise beyond the Rocky Mountains. (Philadelphia : Carey, Lea, & Blanchard, 1836).
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=1371.
He was now enabled to import them from Montreal into the United States for the home supply, and to be shipped thence to different parts of Europe, as well as to China, which has ever been the best market for the richest and finest kinds of peltry…
The last voyage of that renowned but unfortunate discoverer, Captain Cook, had made known the vast quantities of the sea-otter to be found along that coast, and the immense prices to be obtained for its fur in China…
In the following year they would resume their summer trade, commencing at California and proceeding north: and, having in the course of the two seasons collected a sufficient cargo of peltries, would make the best of their way to China…
As China was the grand mart for the furs collected in these quarters, the Russians had the advantage over their competitors in the trade. The latter had to take their peltries to Canton, which, however, was a mere receiving mart, from whence they had to be distributed over the interior of the empire and sent to the northern parts, where there was the chief consumption. The Russians, on the contrary, carried their furs, by a shorter voyage, directly to the northern parts of the Chinese empire; thus being able to afford them in the market without the additional cost of internal transportation…
It was his opinion, also, that a settlement on this extremity of America would disclose new sources of trade, promote many useful discoveries, and open a more direct communication with China and the English settlements in the East Indies, than that by the Cape of Good Hope or the Straits of Magellan…
It would take on board the furs collected during the preceding year, carry them to Canton, invest the proceeds in the rich merchandise of China, and return thus freighted to New York…
It is true they would contend with him to a vast disadvantage, from the checks and restrictions to which they were subjected. They were straitened on one side by the rivalry of the Hudson's Bay Company; then they had no good post on the Pacific where they could receive supplies by sea for their establishments beyond the mountains; nor, if they had one, could they ship their furs thence to China, that great mart for peltries; the Chinese trade being comprised in the monopoly of the East India Company. Their posts beyond the mountains had to be supplied in yearly expeditions, like caravans, from Montreal, and the furs conveyed back in the same way, by long, precarious, and expensive routes, across the continent. Mr. Astor, on the contrary, would be able to supply his proposed establishment at the mouth of the Columbia by sea, and to ship the furs collected there directly to China, so as to undersell the Northwest Company in the great Chinese market…
The situation of this group of islands, far in the bosom of the vast Pacific, and their abundant fertility, render them important stopping-places on the highway to China, or to the northwest coast of America…
It appears, from the accounts of subsequent voyagers, that Tamaahmaah afterwards succeeded in his wish of purchasing a large ship. In this he sent a cargo of sandal-wood to Canton, having discovered that the foreign merchants trading with him made large profits on this wood, shipped by them from the islands to the Chinese markets. The ship was manned by natives, but the officers were Englishmen. She accomplished her voyage, and returned in safety to the islands, with the Hawaiian flag floating gloriously in the breeze. The king hastened on board, expecting to find his sandal-wood converted into crapes and damasks, and other rich stuffs of China, but found, to his astonishment, by the legerdemain of traffic, his cargo had all disappeared, and, in place of it, remained a bill of charges amounting to three thousand dollars. It was some time before he could be made to comprehend certain of the most important items of the bill, such as pilotage, anchorage, and custom-house fees; but when he discovered that maritime states in other countries derived large revenues in this manner, to the great cost of the merchant, "Well," cried he, "then I will have harbor fees also." He established them accordingly. Pilotage a dollar a foot on the draft of each vessel. Anchorage from sixty to seventy dollars. In this way he greatly increased the royal revenue, and turned his China speculation to account…
It must be noted that this flattening of the head has something in it of aristocratical significancy, like the crippling of the feet among the Chinese ladies of quality…
It is one of those instances of human caprice, like the crippling of the feet of females in China, which^are quite incomprehensible. This custom prevails principally among the tribes on the sea-coast, and about the lower parts of the rivers…
At length, about the 20th of June, the ship Albatross, Captain Smith, arrived from China, and brought the first tidings of the war to the Sandwich Islands…
We should have had a fortified post and port at the mouth of the Columbia, commanding the trade of that river and its tributaries, and of a wide extent of country and sea-coast; carrying on an active and profitable commerce with the Sandwich Islands, and a direct and frequent
communication with China…
In 1780 furs had become so scarce in Siberia that the supply was insufficient for the demand in the Asiatic countries. It was at this time that the sea-otter was introduced into the markets for China…
At one period, the fur seals formed no inconsiderable item in the trade. South Georgia, in south latitude fifty-five degrees, discovered in 1675, was explored by Captain Cook in 1771. The Americans immediately commenced carrying seal skins thence to China, where they obtained the most exorbitant prices. One million two hundred thousand skins have been taken from that island alone, and nearly an equal number from the Island of Desolation, since they were first resorted to for the purpose of commerce…
The fur of the black fox is the most valuable of any of the American varieties; and next to that the red, which is exported to China and Smyrna. In China, the red is employed for trimmings, linings, and robes; the latter being variegated by adding the black fur of the paws, in spots or waves…
The silver-tipped rabbit is peculiar to England, and is sent thence to Russia and China…
Such are the inhabitants of Poland, of Southern Russia, of China, of Persia, of Turkey, and all the nations of Gothic origin in the middle and western parts of Europe…

1848
Irving, Washington. The Crayon papers. In : Irving, Washington. The sketch book ; Crayon papers : Wolfert's roost. (New York, N.Y. : Thomas Y. Crowell, 1848).
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7994/7994.txt.
I had repeatedly been struck with the similarity of all that I had seen in this amphibious little village to the buildings and landscapes on Chinese platters and tea-pots; but here I found the similarity complete; for I was told that these gardens were modeled upon Van Bramm's description of those of Yuen min Yuen, in China. Here were serpentine walks, with trellised borders; winding canals, with fanciful Chinese bridges; flower-beds resembling huge baskets, with the flower of "love lies bleeding" falling over to the ground…

1849
Irving, Washington. Oliver Goldsmith : a biography. (New York : George P. Putnam, 1849).
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7993/7993.txt.
His most valuable and characteristic contributions to this paper were his Chinese Letters, subsequently modified into the Citizen of the World…
Johnson had felt and acknowledged the merit of Goldsmith as an author, and been pleased by the honorable mention made of himself in the "Bee" and the Chinese Letters…
His connection with Newbery the bookseller now led him into a variety of temporary jobs, such as a pamphlet on the Cock-lane Ghost, a Life of Beau Nash, the famous Master of Ceremonies at Bath, etc.; one of the best things for his fame, however, was the remodeling and republication of his Chinese Letters under the title of The Citizen of the World, a work which has long since taken its merited stand among the classics of the English language…
"I think he had published nothing with his name, though it was pretty generally understood that one Dr. Goldsmith was the author of An Inquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe, and of The Citizen of the World, a series of letters supposed to be written from London by a Chinese."…
The custom among the natives of Otaheite of eating dogs being once mentioned in company, Goldsmith observed that a similar custom prevailed in China; that a dog-butcher is as common there as any other butcher; and that when he walks abroad all the dogs fall on him. Johnson…
"Lest it should be supposed that I have been willing to correct in others an abuse of which I have been guilty myself, I beg leave to declare, that, in all my life, I never wrote or dictated a single paragraph, letter, or essay in a newspaper, except a few moral essays under the character of a Chinese, about ten years ago, in the 'Ledger,' and a letter, to which I signed my name in the 'St. James' Chronicle.'…
"Upon entering the gardens," says the Chinese philosopher, "I found every sense occupied with more than expected pleasure; the lights everywhere glimmering through the scarcely-moving trees; the full-bodied concert bursting on the stillness of the night; the natural concert of the birds in the more retired part of the grove, vying with that which was formed by art; the company gayly dressed, looking satisfaction, and the tables spread with various delicacies, all conspired to fill my imagination with the visionary happiness of the Arabian lawgiver, and lifted me into an ecstasy of admiration."…