first of the race obtained the sovereignty two hundred and two years before the Christian era, and commenced one of the most celebrated periods of Chinese history. In spite of the Great Wall, the Tartars continued their predatory warfare, and sorely disquieted the more polished and peaceful Chinese, who vainly attempted to propitiate them with alliances and tribute. The first emperors of this race endeavored to make friends of the great Tartar chiefs by giving them their daughters in marriage. A native historian of the period exclaims: "Our disgrace could not be exceeded: from this time China lost her honor!" In the reign of Yuen-ti, the ninth emperor, the Tartars having been provoked by the punishment inflicted by the Chinese on two of their chiefs, who had transgressed the boundaries of the Great Wall while engaged in hunting, the empire was again invaded by the "erratic nations," and a princess was demanded and yielded in marriage. These incidents form the subject of one of the hundred plays of Yuen, an English version of which was printed in London under the name of the "Sorrows of Han." The impolitic system of buying off the barbarians, which commenced thus early, led many centuries afterward to the total overthrow of the empire by the Tartars.

During this period, however, the Chinese made very important advances in civilization. The arts and sciences were improved, literature was encouraged, agriculture was in a progressive state, and several useful inventions date their origin from the same era. Among the latter, one of the most important is the manufacture of paper, which is supposed to have been commenced toward the end of the first century. The Egyptians had long pos

sessed the art of making paper from the rush called papyrus, which was also used at Rome for the same purpose in the first century; but that the Chinese obtained their knowledge from either Rome or Egypt may well be doubted. Before they were acquainted with this useful art they were accustomed to write on thin slips of bamboo, not with ink, but with pointed tools, similar to` those used by engravers, with which they cut or engraved the characters. Books were formed of bamboo by taking off the outside bark, and cutting it into thin sheets, all of the same shape and size; which, after the writing was finished, were strung together in such a manner as to form a compact, though rather clumsy, volume. At length, about the year of our era 95, it was ascertained, by what means does not appear, that bamboo might be made into a better material for writing upon than it furnished in its natural state, by pounding it in a mortar with water until it became a thin paste, which, being spread out on a flat surface, was dried into what we call paper. The earliest specimens of this new art in China were probably of a very rough description, but the manufacture was gradually improved by the mixture of silk and other materials, until the Chinese were able to produce a paper of the most beautiful texture, adapted for printing, which we now call India paper, and another kind for painting, known by the name of rice paper.

The history of paper, as we now possess it in Europe and America, is curious. The Tartars borrowed the art from their neighbors, substituting cotton, which abounded in their country, for the bamboo. At the commencement of the eighth century, when the conquests of the Arabs carried them to Samarkand, in the heart of the

Scythian wilds, they found the manufacture of cotton paper established there. The Arabs learned the art from the Tartars, as the Tartars had learned it from the Chinese, and in their turn substituted linen for cotton. To the Arabs, therefore, we are indebted for the inestimable article or paper made from linen; but whether the art of making it was introduced by the Italians of Venice, Gaeta and Amalfi, who, during the eighth, ninth and tenth centuries kept up a constant commercial intercourse with Syria and Egypt, or whether the Saracens (Arabs under another name), who conquered Spain in the early part of the eighth century, made known the manufacture in that country, has not, as yet, been clearly ascertained. Mr. Mills reasonably supposes that the flourishing linen manufactories at Valencia suggested the idea of the substitution of linen for cotton in that part of Europe, as the cotton manufactories at Samarkand induced the Tartars to employ cotton instead of bamboo.

The invention of paper naturally leads to that of ink, which in China is always made in those cakes which are imported by the merchants of Western countries under the name of Indian ink; it is used with the camel's-hair pencils for writing by the Chinese, who do not require such pens as ours in the formation of their hieroglyphical characters.

Most of the princes of the Han dynasty were munificent patrons of learning; they bestowed the highest dignities on men of literary fame, and thus learning, as in earlier times, continued to be the only sure road to wealth and honors. Nobility was not hereditary except in the imperial family, but depended entirely on personal merit;

and as it was always bestowed by the emperor, so it could be taken away at his pleasure. Thus the nobles, or highest class of mandarins in China, are not necessarily persons of high birth, but are men of learning, who must have passed a public examination with credit before they can aspire to rank and office in the state. This peculiar constitution of the government of China has continued down to the present time.

They are not, however,

Under the Han dynasty lands were, for the first time, frequently bestowed on men of rank, with people to cultivate them, who were bound to the soil and were to a certain extent slaves: but it is not very clear how far the authority of their masters extended, how large a portion of the peasantry was thus held in vassalage, or how long the system continued. There are a few slaves in China at the present time. people of other races or countries. It is a mild servitude, like that among the Hebrews, which is sometimes entered into voluntarily by debtors or persons in distress through famine or other calamities. Poor parents often sell their children. The absurd stories that rich capitalists bring slaves to the mines in California are without foundation; they arise from the custom of forming "companies" or associations for their mutual benefit.

Reference has already been made to the extraordinary commission' of the emperor Ming-ti in the year 65 A.D., while several of the apostles were yet living and preaching in various parts of the continent of Asia, in search of further light as to some new religion, of which he

1 It is said to have consisted of eighteen officers of state, with a prince of Chu, the brother of the emperor, as the head.

had heard, and which it is far from impossible was Christianity. Eusebius, the historian of the early Church, says that to Thomas was allotted Parthia, and to Andrew, Scythia. These names were each commonly applied to Northern and Eastern Asia. And traces of their primitive labors yet remain in some parts of the East. The counsels of Heaven alone can solve the reason why China was allowed to remain in the darkness of heathenism, while the gospel preached in the West was efficacious in converting multitudes and became the religion of its nations.

Some account of Buddhism will here be interesting. One of its leading doctrines was, and is, that of metempsychosis or transmigration of souls; according to which the Buddhists believe that the soul quits one corporeal frame to animate another, not necessarily of the human species; for that reason a Buddhist is forbidden by the laws of his creed to destroy animal life in any shape. When Buddha died, his followers believed that he was transformed into the god Fuh, by which name he is also worshiped; and is said to have passed through one great incarnation, is now in another, and another will take place in the future. These they usually represent in their temples by three great gilded idols, which they term the three precious Buddhas.

The Buddhist priesthood dwell together in communities in the manner of monks, subsisting chiefly upon alms, like those of the Roman and other churches. The head of this religion in Tibet, who holds the same rank among the votaries of Buddhism there, at least, as the Pope does among those of the Roman Church, is called the Grand Lama. He resides with much state in