" The furniture is simple, and the ornaments are few. Whatever is made of wood is painted red and varnished. These towns all exhibited the bustle of commerce. Trad ing vessels were constantly passing on the river." P.390, 391.
In Plate CLVI. we have given a view of the viceroy's palace at Canton, which Patrick Begbie, Esq. of Castle hill, has been so obliging as to permit us to copy, from a drawing he had made by a Chinese upon the spot. This, though very deficient in the perspective, appears to have been performed with the minute attention peculiar to that people. The architecture is in a meaner style than that of the pagodas shewn in Plate CLV.; but Europeans not being admitted into these places, this view is valu able, as exhibiting the disposition of their paltry sheds and ridiculous decorations; and likewise of the dress and positions assumed during some of their processions.
The impressions from these descriptions are certainly very different ; but, from the whole, we may conclude, that a time has been when the whole of China was modelled by a people previously accustomed to live in tents; and that if any other mode ever did prevail, it has been completely annihilated. The Chinese cities have not, as in most other countries, that irregularity which is the result of rising from small beginnings, and under varying circumstances; on the contrary, they have precisely the same formality of character as if their plans had been previously arranged, and carried into effect under the contrail' of despotism ; the tent having been rendered a fixed habitation, the patriarchal government directing every operation by fixed rules, and never per mitting their notions to be disturbed by foreign inter course. Chinese skill has been limited to dexterity and neatness in the whimsical decoration of the trifling mem bers of tent architecture ; instead, therefore, of rousing genius by public estimation and rewards, it has been re pressed by custom and arbitrary enactments. The ut
most of their exertions in architecture appears in their city gateways, which having no prototype in tent encamp ments, were, in some measure, left for genius to invent ; but the system of precedent was too powerfully root ed to suffer even this to proceed beyond the demands of absolute necessity, and a system of gateways was al so established. The same unpropitious regulation per vades all ranks, from the mandarin to the peasant ; the former barely enjoying a precarious comfort, and the lat. ter too generally existing in wretchedness, justify, we suspect, too frequently, UrB:'rrow's remarks. With the feelings which such reflections must unavoidably excite, he has possibly been led to notice and describe rather un favourable traits of the Chinese; but if we refer to the evidently partial descriptions of Duhalde, Le Compte, and Chambers, they present only gaudy, superficial, and trifling operations, adapted to the early stages of civili zation, or the childish years of more advanced society. Although this style is totally unfit for producing im pressions of dignity, sublimity, or strength, yet some of its features. are admirably calculated for scenes of gaiety and festivity. Nothing can be more airy and elegant than a slender colonnaded building, raised upon a properly con structed basement, surrounded by slight curved roofs of varnished tyles, light latticed galleries, and crowned with a small open cupola, with a pierced globe and flower at the top ; it seems scarcely attached to the earth ; and, in country habitations, for the middle ranks of society, instead of aping the gigantic members of Greek and Ro man temples, the Chinese mode of arrangement in two stories only, with their simple and unassuming members, seem deserving of attention. This climate will not admit of the precise forms or distribution being adopted, but the ingenious architect will be at no loss to preserve the character, and at the same time construct au appropriate edifice.