CHAPTER II.
PROBABLE POPULATION.
Scarcely any thing has been the subject of so much controversy, and at the same time of so much interest, relative to China, as the number of its population. The philosopher, the politician, the merchant, and the Christian are alike concerned to know, how many individuals are congregated together in that immense empire, and what is the rate of increase of its inhabitants. The population of China has formed the basis of numerous hypotheses among those who treat of the wealth or poverty of nations, and its exceeding populousness has been assumed or denied, according as different writers have sought to establish various propositions relative to the rapid or slow growth of the human family; and in proportion to the amount of their fears lest the increase of population should entrench upon the means of subsistence and produce an extensive and insupportable famine. The Malthusites have caught at the fact, that China, already over-peopled, is yet increasing in population and is doubling the number of its inhabitants every twenty-five years; which, connected with the circumstance of the scarcity and misery which already prevail, have led them to form the most gloomy apprehensions for the future, and to discourage marriage and encourage wars, lest the world should, like China, become overstocked, and universal want and misery envelope and engulph the whole family of man. The anti-Malthusites, on the other hand, shocked at this dreadful picture, and still more alarming prospect, have greedily embraced the suggestion thrown out by some writers, that the population of China has been exaggerated; and finding different returns given by various authors, have argued that the subject is questionable and undecided; then taking the lowest census they can find, they have come boldly forward and declared that China is one of the most thinly peopled countries of the globe, that her soil is not one-tenth part cultivated, and that her peasantry and mechanics are enjoying an ease and luxury, devoid of all appearance of want or penury, unknown and unequalled in any other part of the world. These extreme differences of opinion, established as they both appear to be by irrefragable arguments, tend to perplex the enquirer; but we must remember that the advocates of opposing systems generally go to extremes in defence of their favourite propositions; and that the truth usually lies between the two, to be elicited only by a dispassionate research, and an unprejudiced mind; determined to judge according to the evidence adduced, independent of previously existing opinions.
The politician is not less interested in the question of China's population; for, if it be true that that empire contains its hundreds of millions, it will become an important enquiry how she is to be dealt with; and what precautions are necessary to prevent her enterprizing, though not warlike people, from pressing with their teeming myriads upon the neighbouring populous and fertile states. If they be so numerous, and if they threaten to become doubly so, not only will the restrictive policy of the Chinese, which would prevent its inhabitants from emigrating, be broken down, but the welfare, if not the peace of surrounding nations be disturbed by the influx of a mass of shrewd and hungry intruders; who, if they cannot obtain a livelihood by honest competition, will first by petty thefts, and then by more daring robberies, become dangerous to the colonies where they reside; and in time present such annoyances as can only be checked by their exclusion from the scene of their chosen residence.
There are already two colonies in the eastern Archipelago, one under the Dutch and the other under English authority, where the annual influx of Chinese colonists has, whether right or wrong, been the occasion of much alarm; and in one district in particular the revolt, or supposed revolt, of the Chinese has ended in the utter extermination of the suspected tribe: while in Borneo the Chinese have settled themselves down in the interior—have made head against the European authorities—and carried on the war for a considerable time; concluding with an honourable peace, by which they have retained full possession of a rich province,—abounding in the precious metals,—and secured the mouth of a river, affording a favourable outlet for foreign trade. Hence European colonies in the east have begun to forbid the introduction of Chinese emigrants, some levying a heavy fine on all new comers, which amounts to an actual prohibition, and others sending whole cargoes away, bidding them seek another home.
To the merchant and manufacturer, this subject is not devoid of interest; particularly at a period when by the invention of machinery, goods are manufactured more than doubly sufficient for all the civilized tribes of Europe and America; when even our East Indian possessions are overstocked with the productions of art; and when a new market for our manufactures becomes a matter of serious concern to those who have already exceeded the necessities of neighbouring nations, and who are compelled to look out for purchasers in new and untried fields of commerce. But if China really contain so large a population as is assigned to it, in a climate where warm clothing is annually required, how large a field is thus opened to the speculations of capitalists and the energies of operatives, which for years and ages they would not be able fully to exhaust. Say not, the Chinese are poor and cannot pay for our goods; they already pay four millions of pounds sterling for our opium, which only injures and destroys them; and how is it that they cannot afford to purchase useful and necessary commodities, the wearing of which will as much promote their interests, as the sale will ours. It is true, their system is exclusive, and commerce with them is carried on under numerous restrictions; yet if such a vast mass of people exist and must be clothed; and if our merchants and manufacturers can furnish them with the necessary articles cheaper and better than they can supply themselves, the trade must extend, and our manufactures gain admission.
But the Christian philanthropist is still more interested in this important question. When each individual possesses a never dying spirit, and each sinner is exposed to endless wrath, the greater the number of persons involved in the calamity, the more serious the evil; and the more must the contemplation of it oppress the mind of the thoughtful Christian. As this view of the subject, however, will be more fully enlarged upon in the sequel, it will be sufficient now, to discuss the question of China's population; and endeavour to ascertain the real state of the case, leaving the deduction of inferences to the close.
To clear the way to this important subject, it will be necessary, first, to show the possibility and probability of China's containing the assumed population; and then, the reality of its existence.
That it is a possible case that China contains as many inhabitants as even the largest census would give, few who have paid any attention to the subject will be disposed to deny. Though there have not been wanting those who strenuously affirm that the soil is incapable of sustaining so vast a population; yet, by a comparison of that land with others, calculating the number of occupants and the area of their territory, we find that such a priori reasonings are not founded in fact, nor entitled to our regard. China Proper is said to contain 1,297,999 square miles, or 830,719,300 English acres of ground. If then we allow only one-half of the land to be capable of cultivation, (though some would allow two-thirds,) and each acre of cultivated ground to be capable of sustaining one individual. (though some say each acre will support five,) then we have cultivable ground in China sufficient for the support of 415,000,000 of persons. Thus by a very moderate calculation, we see that it is by no means impossible for China to contain the full population which the highest census assigns to it.
Again, if we compare China with other countries of the globe, and calculate the population of each square mile, we shall find that that empire is not more thickly peopled than some other countries; and if it be possible for other regions to sustain their population, then is it also possible for China to do the same. In Holland, for instance, we have 210 inhabitants to the square mile; in England, including the army and navy, 244; in Ireland, 256; and in Belgium, 333. While in China, if we take the population at the highest census, given in 1812, namely, 361,279,897, we shall find that its population is about 278 individuals to the square mile, being somewhat more than the population of Ireland, but by no means equal to that of Belgium. Now as the people of Ireland can live, and those of Belgium can afford to maintain a separate and expensive government, and keep a large army on foot,—there is nothing extravagant in the supposition that China contains and is able to sustain the population assigned to it.
We next come to consider the probability of such a supposition; and in so doing we shall find that it is not unlikely that China contains a large amount of population from the fertility of its soil, combined with the great quantity of land under cultivation; the encouragement that is given to agriculture; and the industry and skill of the inhabitants, contrasted with the economy observed; notwithstanding which the people in many provinces are reduced to the most abject state of want and misery, many dying of actual starvation, and thousands emigrating every year, in order to procure a precarious subsistence abroad.
It is true that China is in some parts hilly, and in others marshy; that wild men and wild beasts occupy the higher regions, and reeds and rushes the lower; in such situations we do not of course expect to find fertility; yet the vallies and the level plains, which are by no means circumscribed, are proverbially productive, and in some favoured spots, the fertility is amazing. Barrow says, "that an acre of land, in China, with proper culture, will afford a supply of rice for ten persons, for a whole year, in the southern provinces; and sufficient for the consumption of five in the northern; allowing each person two pounds a day."[1] This estimate may be considered high; but on minute enquiry of the natives, who are acquainted with the cultivation of the interior, it appears, that an acre of land in China, well cultivated, will produce 3600 pounds of rice, in two crops, per year; which is equal at two pounds a day, to the sustenance of five individuals. But the Chinese peasantry generally cannot calculate on two pounds of rice a day, or scarcely one, and are obliged to make up the deficiency by sweet potatoes, pulse, or any thing else that will satisfy hunger. The observation of travellers, who have visited the country, tends to shew, that the borders of the grand canal, and the two gigantic streams—the Yellow River, and the Yang-tsze-keang—are extraordinarily productive, yielding two crops in the year, without needing to lie fallow a single season. The provinces of Keang-soo and Gan-hwuy, Shan-tung and Shan-se, Chĕ-keang and Ho-nan, are those which yield the greatest revenue to the emperor, and consequently those which are most productive to the people; while the thick set stalks of waving corn in the vicinity of those places fully substantiate the character given of them by foreign travellers and native documents, as being the granary of the land.
To the fertility of the soil, we may add the consideration that it is very extensively cultivated. China contains, as has been before observed, 830,719,360 English acres; and if we allow one third of this area for hills, rivers, marshes, and waste lands, we shall have 553,812,906 acres for cultivable ground. In ascertaining this, however, we are not left to conjecture; as there exists a report made to the emperor Këen-lung, in the year 1745, of the amount of land then under cultivation, according to which it appears, that reckoning the land belonging to individuals, with that in the possession of the Tartar standards, the military, the priests, and the literary there were, at that time, 595,598,221 English acres under cultivation; since which period, a new estimate has given 640,579,381 English acres, as the total extent of occupied land in China. Thus it appears, that more that three-fourths of the surface are owned and tilled by man, allowing, according to the highest census, nearly one acre and three-quarters to each individual. The greatest part of this area is laid out exclusively in arable land, and devoted to the production of food for man alone. In China, the natives make no use of butter or cheese, and very seldom of milk; the principal animal food is pork, which is generally home-fed; they have few horses for travelling, pomp, or war; and the only cattle they keep are such as are needed in husbandry: hence, there are no grazing farms, no meadows, and very little pasture; while every acre of ground, capable of cultivation, is turned up by the spade or the plough, in order to afford sustenance for the teeming inhabitants. The few beasts of burden, or of draught, which they keep, are either tethered to a string, by the side of the road, or turned out to graze on the hills; while they are supplied, by night, with a little straw or bean stalks, which is also their principal food during the winter. A common is quite unusual throughout the eastern half of China; while parks and pleasure grounds are proportionably scarce, as the anxiety to satisfy the appetite prevails over the desire of amusement.
Wheel carriages being rare, particularly in the south, the roads are comparatively few and narrow; generally consisting of raised pathways through the rice fields, or of winding lanes over the mountains. The statement of Barrow, that "the imperial roads are triple," with the declaration of Le Compte, that "they are fourscore feet broad, or near it," does not interfere with the general assertion, that the roads of China are narrow; for the two writers just quoted, are speaking of the public roads in the vicinity of he capital, and of the royal way from Peking to the imperial residence in Chinese Tartary. Broad ways may comport with a high state of civilization, but where the people are little accustomed to luxury and self-indulgence, they will be content with narrow paths; particularly when every particle of improvable soil is needed to sustain the population. What an immense quantity of land is occupied in England, in order to indulge the locomotive propensity of the inhabitants, and to enable them to move, with ease and expedition, from one place to another. This expenditure of the energies of the soil, in feeding millions of horses, and this laying out of good ground, in constructing several thousand miles of road, is almost entirely spared in China, where the public are content to walk, or to carry each other about, if they may but get enough to eat and to wear.
It has been objected to the statement regarding the occupancy of a great proportion of the land in tillage, that the cemeteries of the Chinese are both numerous and extensive; and much of the soil being consecrated to the service of the dead, there must of necessity be a smaller quantity left for the support of the living. The force of this objection seems to be heightened by the consideration, that the Chinese never allow old graves to be disturbed; and, generally speaking, dig a new pit for each individual. But, an acquaintance with the fact, obviates the supposed difficulty; for, the Chinese seldom select, for burial places, situations capable of agricultural use and improvement; and inter their deceased friends on the hill side, or under the craggy precipice, where little else could be made of the soil. During the various excursions, which the writer has made into the interior, along the shores of three or four maritime provinces, he was particularly struck with the extreme paucity of graves. In one part of the province of Shan-tung, a cemetery was discovered in a sequestered glen; and, here and there, a white monument presented itself by the road side; but by no means equal to the hosts of living inhabitants everywhere met with. Near the populous city of Shang-hae, coffins were seen in the corners of the fields, kept above ground till the bodies should decay; when the bones might be collected into jars, placed by the cottage door, and the coffin and the room might serve for other occupants. At the great island of Choo-san, scores of coffins were observed under a precipice, scattered about in confusion, some fresh, and others in a state of decay, all denied the right of sepulture, from the crying necessity of a want of room. In the neighbourhood of Peking, the cemetery may be large, because the population is great, and the ground round the capital comparatively barren; but generally throughout the country, and particularly in the more level and fertile provinces, the living cannot afford much room for the dead, and the cemeteries are therefore contracted and few.
The encouragement given to agriculture would also argue a dense population. It is an ancient maxim with the Chinese, that when people are hungry there is no attending to the dictates of justice and propriety, and only when a population is well fed, can they be well governed. Hence from the earliest antiquity, the emperor has set an example of industry to his people, by personally and publicly holding the plough once a year, while the empress does the same with regard to the loom. In arranging the various classes of the people, the Chinese place the literati in the foremost rank, as learning is with them the stepping stone to honour; but immediately after the learned, the husbandman takes the precedence of all others, because being engaged in raising the necessaries of life, he is abundantly more important than the mechanic, who merely changes the forms of matter; and the merchant, who originates nothing, and only barters and exchanges commodities for the sake of gain. This honour put upon agricultural employments is evidently the result of design; and shews that the country, being overstocked with inhabitants, needs cultivating to its utmost extent, in order to provide the people with sustenance.
The industry and skill of the Chinese, striving to produce as many of the necessaries of life as possible, would also argue a dense population, ever struggling against threatening want, and compelled to exert themselves for their daily bread. In tropical climates, where the ground is fertile, and the population scanty, the natives find that , by a few months' labour, they can produce sufficient food for a whole year's consumption, and are therefore indisposed to exert themselves further. But in China, the inhabitants are incessantly employed, and every individual is obliged to be busy in contributing his quota to the common weal. Everyone, in the least acquainted with the manners of the Chinese, knows that they are untiring in their exertions to maintain themselves and families. In the business of agriculture, they are more particularly active, raising two crops from the ground every year, extending their cultivation in every possible direction, and bringing the most unpromising spots into use, in order that nothing may be lost. Their skill in effecting these objects is not, considering their few advantages, contemptible. They thoroughly understand the importance of varying the crops; they know perfectly well the seasons and soils adapted for certain productions; and they are fully sensible of the importance of manuring the ground, in order to maintain its fertility. A stranger is struck with this, on first setting his foot on the shores of China.
Almost every individual met with, in the paths and fields, is provided with a basket and a rake; and every evening, the cottager brings home a certain quantity to add to the mest heap, which is a most important appendage to every dwelling. Having but few sheep and cattle, they are obliged to make the most of the stercoraceous stock of men and swine. This is carefully collected, and actually sold at so much per pound, while whole strings of city scavengers may be seen cheerily posting into the country, every successive morning, with their envied acquisitions; little heeding the olfactory nerves of the less interested passengers. Every other substance likely to answer the end, is anxiously collected, and carefully disposed, so as to provide for future exigencies; such as decayed animal and vegetable matter, the sweeping of streets, the mud of canals, burnt bones, lime; and, what is not a little singular, the short stumpy human hair, shaven from millions of heads, every ten days, is industriously gathered up, and sold for manure throughout the empire. In the high importance placed on stercoration, in China, we see an illustration of that passage in 2 Kings, vi. 25, that when there was a great famine in Samaria, "the fourth part of a cab of dove's dung was sold for five pieces of silver."
The skill of the Chinese husbandman is also manifested in the arrangement and irrigation of his rice lands. The centre and south of China rice is the staple commodity; and it is well known that rice will not thrive unless supplied with water. From the preparing of the ground for the seed, almost to the reaping of the harvest, the rice fields must be overspread with water. In order to this, each field is made perfectly level, with an elevated ridge or border, and a stream of water constantly flowing into it, to provide against the loss by evaporation, and to yield an overplus for the fields around and beneath it. For this purpose water must either be raised by artificial means, such as pumps, levers, wheels, &c., from a lower to a higher region; or conducted with great skill and care from some elevated position, along the sides of hills, and across valleys, to the desired spot; where, introduced into the highest field of the series, it gradually flows down to the lower terraces, until it is lost in the river or the sea. The very ingenious methods which the Chinese employ for raising water have often been illustrated; and shew at once their adroitness, and the necessity which has thus driven them to their wits' ends, to increase the produce of their soil. The water brought over the land brings fertility along with it, and the debris accompanying the fluid, thus conveyed from the surrounding heights, tends alike to moisten and fruetify the soil. The Chinese may be considered adepts in terrace cultivation, notwithstanding the observations of Barrow, that he saw but few instances of it in his route. From all the information that can be gathered from the natives, the contrary is the fact; and though in places where a supply of water cannot be commanded at an elevated spot, the natives necessarily leave the hill uncut into terraces; yet in every instance in which the locality is favourable, they do not fail to adopt a mode of cultivation so essential to the production of rice in southern latitudes. All travellers agree in the opinion that in minute spade husbandry, the Chinese more than equal Europeans; and Lord Macartney denominates them the best husbandmen in the world. The activity and acutèness of the Chinese husbandmen, therefore, tend to shew, that so much energy and mind have been necessarily called into display by an overflowing population.
Not less remarkable, nor less available to our argument, is the economy observed by the Chinese in the use of the necessaries of life, in order that they may make them go as far as possible. This is apparent in their food, their dress, and their dwellings; in all of which they avoid extravagance, and restrict themselves to such kinds as need the smallest quantity of ground to produce and rear them. It is not meant by this, that the Chinese are not fond of good food, and plenty of it, when they can get it; they are, in fact, both epicures and gormands, when good things fall in their way; but they manage to do with little and coarse food, when necessity compels them, which is, alas! but too often. The diet of a Chinese is generally a little rice and salt fish, or salted vegetable; a species of brassica being commonly used for this purpose, which being thoroughly impregnated with salt, helps to flavour the insipid rice, and enables them to relish their food. This mess is sometimes varied by certain preparations of pulse or millet, and more rarely a few ounces of pork are stewed down with the vegetable preparations, in the proportion of one to five. The common food of the poor, however, is sweet potatoes or yams, with occasionally a little rice boiled in a large quantity of water; and once a month, it may be, a pork meal, or on grand festive occasions, a little poultry. Against the eating of beef they have a strong prejudice, not so much on account of religious scruples, as because oxen are used in husbandry, and they think it a shame, after a poor animal has been labouring all his life in their service, to cut him to pieces at last, and then to feed upon his flesh, and make shoes of his hide. Hence in the hortatory tracts, which they sometimes publish, they draw the figure of an ox, composed entirely of words or characters, which set forth the complaint of the cow kind, relative to their hard usage during life, and their still harder fate at death, concluding by assigning the lowest place in Pandemonium to the villanous beef-butchers, who mercilessly cut them up for gain.
Having no inclosed pastures, they cannot breed many sheep or goats, which, wandering over the corn fields and gardens, would destroy more than they are worth. It is only in hilly and barren regions where these animals are allowed to roam, and even there not beyond the shepherd's eye; hence in the more fertile and more populous parts of the country, mutton is scarce and seldom eaten. Instead of beef and mutton, however, the Chinese have recourse to dogs and cats, the flesh of which animals is equal in price to that of swine. In default of these, they have no objection to make a dish of rats and snakes; and cockroaches and other reptiles come in to be used either as food or medicine, by a people who are driven frequently to great straits for want of sustenance; animals that die of disease, and those already far gone in a state of decay, are when discovered eagerly devoured by a hungry peasantry in search of food. In short, the Chinese have the most unscrupulous stomachs imaginable; every thing animal from the hide to the entrails,—and almost every thing vegetable, from the leaves to the roots, is made available to the support of life; and even some parts of the mineral kingdom are laid under requisition for this important purpose.[2]
In their dress, the Chinese are alike anxious to economize the soil. Barrow says, "that an acre of cotton will clothe two or three hundred persons:" and as cotton can be planted between the rice crops, and thus vary the productions, and relieve the soil, the Chinese prefer such clothing as they can raise, at the least expense of ground and labour. Were the hundreds of millions of China to be clothed in woollens, an immense tract of grazing land would be required, which would deduct materially from the area devoted to food, and greatly exceed what the Chinese could afford. In their dwellings, likewise, they are particularly frugal of room: living together in a very small compass, and crowding into closely built cities, as though ground with them were an object of great moment. A room twenty feet square would afford sufficient space for a dozen people to eat, drink, work, trade, and sleep; while the streets of their towns and cities are so narrow, that it is quite possible to touch each side of the way with the hand as you pass along. Now, if we compare this frugality with the extravagance of European nations in regard to room, living on beef and mutton, and wearing woollen clothes, we may easily see that the ground which would sustain one Englishman, would be sufficient for the support of three or four Chinese. Amongst such a selfish and sensual people, so much economy would not be observed, did not stern necessity compel; and what greater necessity can exist than the difficulty of sustaining a crowded population from a contracted soil.
Notwithstanding all this diligence and care, however, the people in most of the provinces find a difficulty in procuring the necessaries of life; many die of actual want, and many more are obliged to emigrate: while every encouragement is given to the importation of grain, in order to relieve a needy population. The general poverty of the people has already been alluded to, in shewing them to be content with a diminished quality and sometimes quantity of food; yet many of them can hardly find food enough, and numbers die annually of sheer starvation. When a drought or inundation occurs, when locusts invade the coasts, and the crops fail from blight or mildew, imperial bounty is obliged to be extended to the sufferers; otherwise a people, considerably straitened on common occasions, would in a season of scarcity actually perish for want. For this purpose, a great quantity of grain is annually left in the various provinces, besides that which is forwarded to Peking, in order that the supply maybe ready when necessity demands it. According to one statement, there are reserved in different parts of the country about 26,000,000 bushels of grain, and 12,000,000 bushels of rice, to be sold out at a low price to the poor in seasons of scarcity; a quantity sufficiently indicative of the wants of the people, and of the straits to which they are sometimes driven, to need such a supply. And yet this royal munificence sometimes proves inadequate to the relief of the wretched; or being pillaged by underlings in its way to the necessitous, leaves the hungry to starve ere the provision reaches them. The extreme poverty of the people in the south of China is well known to all who are acquainted with those regions, and the piteous scenes presented in winter by whole hosts of peasants almost destitute of food or fuel, are enough to affect most deeply the minds of the compassionate. The common wages of the day labourer is but fourpence a day, and the remuneration to a schoolmaster from each of his scholars is only ten shillings a year; while provisions are sometimes nearly as high as they are in Europe.
The want of feeling generally apparent among the Chinese, argues their deep poverty; for where provisions are scarce and dear, the human heart, unsanctified by Divine grace, soon becomes closed against the cry of distress, and the sick poor are allowed to perish by the road side, without a helping hand to relieve them. There is some charity manifested towards kindred, but none to strangers, who are left alike destitute of public provision and private benevolence. Canton is infested with beggars, who gain a scanty relief by their untiring importunity; and, in other parts of the country, the needy present their dismal tale of miseries to the too heedless spectators.
Persons in danger of being' drowned, or burnt, are seldom rescued; and numbers are turned out to die in the open air, to save the trouble of tending them while sick, and the expense of cleansing the house of their ghosts, when dead. This disregard of the wants and miseries of others, must be partly occasioned by the pressure of personal want, and the great number of individuals needing relief.
The subject of emigration, is one which considerably affects the question of the population of China. The government of that country being restrictive and exclusive, have gone on the principle of forbidding alike the emigration of natives and the immigration of strangers. Standing in need, however, of foreign supplies; and being unable to provide for their own subjects, they have, in the first place, been induced to allow a sort of restricted commerce at Canton; and, finally, to wink at the departure of natives to foreign lands. Still they consider those who go abroad, as forfeiting all claim to the protection of their own government, constituting themselves outlaws, as well as aliens, by the same act of expatriation. When a misunderstanding occurred between the Chinese colonists and the Dutch authorities, at Batavia, some years ago, and a massacre of the Chinese followed: the colonial government afraid, lest the emperor of China should take umbrage at the transaction, sent an embassy to that country, explaining the matter, and attributing the blame to the emigrant Chinese themselves. The emperor, however, coolly replied, that, as they had chosen to place themselves without the pale of his benign and fostering sway, they were no longer entitled to his protecting influence; thus, whatever happened to them, he should not interfere. Those who return to their native land, after having amassed considerable property, if not screened and sheltered by their friends and relatives, are liable to be accused of having had intercourse with barbarians; when their crime increases in malignity, according to the amount of their possessions, until, by repeated extortions, they are deprived of all. Notwithstanding, however, the original restrictions on emigration, the forfeiture of the rights of citizenship which they thereby incur, and the prospect of a good squeezing when they return; yet, such is the difficulty many of them find in procuring a subsistence, that they willingly quit friends and home, and brave the dangers of the deep, with the inhospitalities of a foreign clime, in a state of poverty, rather than stay at home, and drag on a miserable existence in want of all things. Hence they have not only removed from the more populous provinces of China, to those more thinly peopled; but have crossed the wall, the desert, and the ocean—pouring forth their hordes to the east, west, north, and south—occupying the waste lands of Tartary—colonizing Thibet, Burmah, Camboja, and Siam, and basking under the fostering care of European governments, in the islands of the Malayan Archipelago. What stronger proof of the dense population of China could be afforded than the fact, that emigration is going on, in spite of restrictions and disabilities; from a country, where learning and civilization reign, and where all their dearest interests and prejudices are found—to one where comparative ignorance and barbarity prevail, and where the heat or cold of a tropical or frozen region, is to be exchanged for a mild and temperate climate; added to the consideration, that not a single female is permitted, or ventures to leave the country, when consequently all the tender attachments, that bind heart to heart, must be burst asunder, and perhaps for ever. Where is the country—where, under such circumstances, emigration would prevail, unless stern necessity compelled, and unless the ever-increasing progeny pressed on the heels of the adult population, and obliged them to seek a precarious subsistence in a less thickly peopled part of the earth?
The breaking through of another restriction, in the otherwise unalterable system of Chinese policy, proves the existence of a dense population in that country. It has been before observed, that the Chinese discourage intercourse with foreign nations, and only permit a limited and heavily burthened commerce at Canton. All foreign vessels, trading to Canton, have to pay a measurement charge, amounting, on vessels of eight hundred tons, to two thousand dollars, and an entreport fee of nearly equal value; but, by command of the present emperor, in the year 1825, the former, and by previous orders, the latter charge, were both dispensed with, in case of all vessels loaded with rice, in order to encourage the importation of so necessary an article from abroad. This permission is taken advantage of by foreign merchants, at Canton, and great quantities of rice are thus imported, to supply the wants of a needy population. Nothing but necessity will induce the Chinese government to swerve from its usual regulations, and to grant any immunities to foreigners:—when they do so, as in the case alluded to, it shews that rice is greatly needed in the country; and, if rice be needed in so fertile a region as China, it is evident that China is overstocked with inhabitants.
In addition to the above mentioned considerations, the prevalence of infanticide, in China, has been adduced, by some, as a proof of that empire's extreme populousness. While, however, we would by no means argue, that this abominable practice is kept up, in order to keep down the population, or that it has any considerable influence in diminishing the numbers of the people, we may still contend that infanticide in China, is more the result of poverty than prejudice, and has to do with economical, rather than religious considerations. In the first place, it is to be observed, that infanticide in China, is wholly confined to the female sex; boys, it is imagined, can provide sufficiently well for themselves; are likely to repay, by their labour, the care and expense bestowed on them; and contribute to the building up of the family name and fortunes; in all of which matters, girls are of little value. Hence the birth of a son is hailed, in every Chinese family, with delight; while the house is only filled with lamentation, on the appearance of a wretched daughter. A son is, therefore, valued and cherished, while a daughter is despised and neglected. This feeling, carried to excess, leads many, in extreme poverty, to perpetrate infanticide, in the one case; and to practise forbearance, in the other. Again, the abominable custom alluded to, is not taught or enjoined by any religious system prevalent in China—either Confucianism, Taou-ism, or Buddhism; it is not done to propitiate the gods, as was the case, formerly, amongst the cruel worshippers of Moloch; nor do the natives expect to reap any spiritual advantage, by giving "the fruit of their body for the sin of their soul;" but the Chinese perpetuate this infernal custom merely from parsimonious motives, and just to save themselves the care and expense of bringing up a useless and troublesome being, who is likely to cost more than ever she will fetch, on being sold out in marriage. It prevails, therefore, in proportion to the general indigence of the people, and affords by its prevalence, a criterion by which to judge of the density of the population, and the poverty of the inhabitants. Hence, we find that it obtains more in the southern provinces, where the numbers of human beings exceed the powers of the soil to produce sufficient sustenance; or, in a crowded capital, where the myriads of citizens find hardly room to live or to breathe. In the southern parts of the empire the natives themselves, who might be supposed anxious to conceal the fact, bear ample testimony to its existence, and that in a proportion which it is fearful to contemplate; while the lightness with which they treat the murder of female infants, shews that it must have prevailed, in no ordinary degree, in order so far to blunt their sensibilities on the subject, as to lead them to contemplate the drowning of a daughter as far more excusable than the treading of a printed paper under foot. The extent of infanticide in the capital has been calculated by the number of infants thrown out every night, and gathered by the police in the morning, to be buried in one common hole, without the city. One writer informs us that ten or a dozen infants are picked up every morning, in Peking alone; hence the murders in that city must amount to several thousands annually.
Some writers and travellers have questioned the prevalence of infanticide in China, because they have never, in their intercourse with the Chinese, seen any instances of it. Thus, Ellis remarks, "that in passing along the populous rivers of China, through upwards of 1600 miles of country, they met with no proofs of its existence." De Guignes has been brought in also, as saying, "that in his route, through the whole extent of China, in travelling by water, he never saw an infant drowned; and, in travelling by land, although he had been early in the morning, in cities and in villages, and at all hours, on the highways, he never say an infant exposed or dead." But this negative kind of evidence is contradicted by the direct testimony of Messrs. Bridgman and Gutzlaff, who have both met with instances of what neither Ellis nor De Guignes could trace or discover.
The fact that foundling hospitals are more easily filled in China than elsewhere, is corroborative of the little regard in which female infants are held. The more tender-hearted parents, rather than lay violent hands on their offspring, prefer giving them away; or if they can find no one to receive the charge, depositing them in some temple or monastery, where there is, at least, a chance of their being noticed and preserved. The Buddhists, in China, avail themselves of this circumstance, to fill their nunneries; while the Catholics, in that country, increase the number of their adherents, by rescuing the outcast daughters of the inhabitants, and bringing them up for wives to the native converts. Others, actuated by base motives, pick up the abandoned children, and rear them for the purpose of sordid gain, which they accomplish by selling them for domestic slaves, or training them up for wanton gratifications, or condemning them to beg through the streets, after having cruelly put out their eyes, to make them objects of charity.
It is not meant to be argued, that the Chinese murder, expose, or sell their female infants to prevent the country becoming overpeopled; or that the practice is so general as to have any material effect on the population. Whatever the motive be, it is altogether personal, and not patriotic; it is merely to save themselves pains and money, and not to benefit the country by decreasing the number of consumers. To whatever extent, also, the practice may prevail, it is not likely materially to affect the aggregate of the population. For if we allow that one per mille only of the female infants born in China are smothered, which is much below the mark in the populous provinces and crowded cities, while it would exhibit a fearful estimate as the aggregate of murders, it would still be very inconsiderable as affecting a population, which amounts to several hundred millions, and which increases at the rate of three per cent, per annum. The object of the argument is to shew that the children being sacrificed to Mammon rather than to Moloch, the prevalence of the custom indicates the great poverty and overwhelming numbers of the people,—that there is a disproportion between the supply of food and the number of consumers,—that human life is cheaper than human provender,—and hence the conclusion, considering the fertility of the soil, that China is immensely populous.