collections of like characters. Nor do his troubles end here: he is frequently harassed by characters which bear but a faint resemblance to each other in mere form, but which are alike in sound and tone and perhaps somewhat similar in meaning; he is puzzled by whole families of characters the sound or approximate sound of which he can tell from their possessing a common phonetic, but to the meaning of which the radical in many cases gives not the slightest clue. Several of these phonetic lists have been inserted in this volume at the risk of entrenching upon ground already occupied by M. Callery.
What little there was in native works of practical value to foreign students has been embodied in the present collection, and for the rest, it can hardly be expected that every comparison drawn will meet with general approval. At the same time, it must be borne in mind that all the characters in any group are not necessarily to be compared one with another, though an element of sameness will be found always to pervade each group and frequently a whole series of such which have been placed intentionally in juxtaposition. Further, although this volume begins from the beginning and leaves the student on the threshold of written Chinese, yet a thorough analytical knowledge of all the characters here given will make future classification a comparatively easy matter—and the bitterness of Chinese is past.
The advantages of an Index will, it is hoped, be too patent to need any comment, except perhaps that with its assistance a character may be found even if its sound is unknown, provided that some other character be familiar in the group to which it belongs.
Hankow Consulate,
