The Coming China (Classic Reprint)

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Excerpt from The Coming China Before really beginning to write about what that great nation, China, may do and probably will do when once the leaven which is now working shall have brought about an activity along lines of development that we of the West, and - to speak with what may be rather displeasing frankness - we of America especially, arc disposed to look upon as a trait of character sharply differentiating us from the continental Asiatic, it is only honest to mention some impressions that were made forty-five years ago, when as a lad I first went to China to live in one of the smallest, most conservative of the treaty-ports, Swatow, up the coast about two hundred miles or so from Hongkong. The long journey from New York to Hongkong was far more picturesquely made at that time than it is now, if it was not so quickly done. To go by way of Europe, the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the China Sea was altogether too costly, so I went by steamer to Aspinwall (Colon) - let it be remembered that even the pioneer trans-continental railway, the Union and the Central Pacific, was not opened until three years after I made my first trip to the Far East. From Aspinwall I crossed the Isthmus by the Panama Railway, taking the best part of a day to accomplish the forty or so miles, went up the west coast by another steamer to San Francisco, and, after three weeks' delay there, took passage in a large sailing vessel, loaded with wheat and flour, direct for Hongkong, although we passed in front of Honolulu and so close to the beach that we could distinguish a single individual on the shore, and our numbers were read from the observatory so that our passing was reported by the next mail going back to San Francisco. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.