Giles should have consulted original authorities, and not relied solely on a commentary, before pronouncing judgment. Had he adopted this course, he would have saved himself from some ludicrous blunders, which do not look well when committed by one so 'cocksure' as Mr. Giles invariably is.
Mr. Parker, who has reviewed my book
and who has been pleased to pronounce it
good, states its chief defect to be the large
number of cases in which the Pekingese
pronunciation is given wrongly. I regret
that, as regards this defect, I must cry
peccavi. The instances in which the sounds of
Chinese characters according to Wade's
spelling have been given incorrectly are too
numerous. It is unfortunate, as Mr. Parker
says, that the work in this respect was
not revised before publication by a competent
Pekingese student. This would have
saved it from the monstrosities,
to quote
Mr. Giles, which appear so frequently. But
Mr. Giles considers correct romanisation in
such a work entirely secondary and
subordinate to correct rendering of the text and
commentary, and in this I think most people
will agree with him, though for 'commentary'
I should prefer to substitute 'meaning
as explained in the original sources.' The
test to apply to such a work is whether
each phrase in the text has been correctly
translated and its meaning, where
explanation is necessary, has been correctly
explained. And this is the test to which
I am about to submit Mr. Giles' criticisms of
my work.
In considering those criticisms, I desire it
to be remembered that the text of the Ch'êng Yü K'ao
is made up of more than 3,500
phrases or combinations of characters.
Even Mr. Giles acknowledges that to translate,
print and publish such a volume is no
mean undertaking.
He says that the
plan of the book is good and the Index
(with reservations) is excellent, but the
execution is faulty and betrays an insufficient
knowledge of the Chinese language.
This opinion is apparently based on the
belief that he has found 80 entries which
seem to require more or less radical alteration
and on the fact that, where references are
given, chapter and verse are not invariably
quoted. The latter objection comes somewhat
strangely from Mr. Giles, the compiler
of the latest Chinese-English Dictionary,
in which innumerable phrases are
given without the slightest indication as
to whether they are colloquial or classical
and without any reference to the sources
from which they are derived. Mr. Giles
complains that in my work the sucking
student is coolly referred to the Han Shu.
But the History of the Han dynasty or Han Shu
is a classical work written by a
historian as well known in China as Macaulay is in Europe. Though reference to
chapter and page would no doubt facilitate
research, the few students who are able to
consult the original would have no difficulty
in finding the passage quoted, and the
students who are not able to consult it would
not be benefited even if chapter and page
were given. Both classes of students, however,
are made aware by a bare reference to
the work that the phrases taken from it
have been used by a writer who is regarded
as a classic. If Mr. Giles had been cool
enough to give even a bare reference to
the Han Shu and other works, when he
inserted in his Dictionary phrases borrowed
from them, he would have been forgiven
his coolness for not quoting chapter and
verse.
I now proceed to deal with the 80 entries which seem to form the head and front of my offending in the eyes of Mr. Giles. I cannot help thinking, however, that those who know something of the difficulties of Chinese, when they remember that over 3,500 phrases or combinations of characters have been translated or explained, would not regard eighty mistakes, if they could really be considered as such, a sufficient reason for condemning a work which has been favourably noticed by the most distinguished sinologues of the day. But what will be thought if it
