European adventurers during the late Revolution.*
•
The dress of both sexes is becoming,—and the
same as the old costume of China, before the Chinese
were compelled to adopt the fantastic one of
their Tartar conquerors. Both sexes dress nearly
alike. For the lower part of the body, the covering
consists of a pair of loose trowsers, secured at
the waist by a sash. The main portion of dress
consists of two or more loose frocks, reaching
half-way down the thigh. This, for such matters
as amoftg other Eastern people is uniform and
constant, overlaps to the right side, and is secured
by five buttons and as many loops. Its
sleeves are loose, and with persons not compelled
to labour, they dangle a foot, or even a foot and a
half, beyond the extremities of the fingers; but
the lower orders, from necessity, wear them short.
* Shall I speak of their literati, who pass a great part of their
lives in the study of their own language and that of China,—
monosyllabic tongues, of which every word, varying in meaning,
according to pronunciation, may signify ten or a dozen things entirely
different ? They have no hooks hut Chinese books. The
philosophy of Confucius, and for a few Medicine, are the objects
of their habitual study. Would it he believed that the system
of Brown is to he found in Cochin China, were it not known
that reveries make the circle of the globe ? The physicians are
divided between two opinions ; the one party employing only
stimulants, and the other refrigerants.* Fashion runs in favour
of the first. Some miraculous cures are quoted by this practice,
which is conceivable in a country where the fibre is relaxed, and
man is exposed to a crowd of debilitating causes.’ ^-Manuscript
of M. Chaigneau.