liable to this very serious objection, that such sentences may or may not be good Chinese, according to the proficiency or unskilfulness of the Compiler; and to adduce ungrammatical or un-idiomatical sentences in elucidation would be to lead the mind astray, and to retard instead of promote the progress of the student. Should the author be spared to compose the Second Part of this Dictionary, viz. the English and Chinese, it is his intention to adduce, under each important word, a phrase from some English author, and to give the sense of it in Chinese, by which means the student will be enabled to judge of the familiar way of writing and speaking Chinese, and of the method of rendering English composition into it.
For the short historical and statistical account of Hok-këèn, the author is indebted to Chinese histories and geographical works, to Malte Brun's Universal Geography, aud to an account of the Dutch embassy to Hok-këèn in the seventeenth century. These productions are most of them old, yet, as China remains long stationary, the present state of the province differs perhaps little from what it was formerly. In estimating the population of Hok-këèn, a different opinion is hazarded from what Dr. Morrison has given, in his View of China for Philological Purposes: it is however proposed with diffidence, and not without being substantiated by two independant authorities. Hok-këèn contains ten counties, of which only one, viz. 漳州 Chëang chew, near the port of Emöey, is the identical spot where the dialect illustrated in this Dictionary is spoken in its purity; in the adjoining county to the east, viz. 泉州 Chwân chew, the dialect differs very little; and in the neighbouring county on the opposite side, viz. 潮州 Tëâou chew, in the province of Canton, the dialect differs a little more, but still the inhabitants of each district are mutually intelligible to each other. Of the dialects of the northern counties, of 汀州 T’heng chew, and 延平 Yëên pêng, as well as of the north-eastern counties of 興化 Hin hwà, and 福州 Hok chew, the author is unable to speak with any degree of decision.
For any typographical errors, which may creep in during the excution of the work, the author hopes for the indulgences of the public, as, the work being printed at the distance of nearly two thousand miles from his place of abode, it is impossible for him to correct the sheets as they are put to press, or to mark out any errors which might have inadvertently dropped from his pen in the composition. To the Rev. Dr. Morrison and his son, who have kindly undertaken the revision of the proofs, the author would express his unfeigned obligations, and his earnest hopes that they may succeed; in the difficult task of reading and comparing the very minute distinctions, of accent as well as sound,
