I n o c u l a t io n .
P r in t in g .
P a p e r .
not only judge of the fpecies and nature o f the difeafe, but apply
their remedy according to the fymptoms it exhibits. I refer
to Du Halde *, for the long but curious account o f the pracftice.
They were well acquainted with the circulation o f the blood,
long before the Europeans attained that knowlege. As they
know nothing o f anatomy, it muft be by reafoning on the force
and adtion o f the pulfe. They bleed, even with a bit of broken
china.
T h e y had the knowlege o f inoculation a great many years
a go ; it is a difputed point whether the Turks (from whom we
learned the falutary art) received it from the Cbinefe, by means
of the Armenian caravans, or whether the fame people might
not have communicated it to the Cbinefe; certain it is that they
have long been in pofleflion o f the method; and the emperor
Kam-bi made a noble ufe, o f it, fending Ikilful perfons into
Tartary, and other parts o f his dominions, to inoculate the
children o f his Tartarian fubjedts, and others; the diftemper
in every part o f the empire being dreaded to the higheft degree,
making the fame havoc among thefe eaftern people, as the
plague in the weftern world.
T h e art o f printing Was invented under the emperor Ming-
Tfong, about the year of our Lord 904, being above five hundred
years before it was difcovered in Europe. They trace the types
through the written copy on blocks of wood; fo never have
occafion to break the prefs, as we do in our quarter o f the
globe.
T h e m a n u f a c t u r e o f p a p e r w a s o r i g in a l ly d i f c o v e r e d b y Tfay-
* Vol. ii. p. 183.
Jun,
Jun, a great Mandarine o f the palace, A. D. 95, who made it
nearly in the manner we do, from old fragments o f cloth or filk,
and the bark of trees, boiled and reduced to a thin pafte. The
confumption of paper in this empire is prodigious; the Cacoethes
Scribendi occafions an amazing demand, and the quantity ufed
for the papering o f their rooms is inconceivable. Their painted
papers are more famed for the richnefs o f the colors, than the
juftnefs and elegance of the defign. They have no notion of
perfpeftive, nor the leaft fkill in delineating the human figure,
all. which appear like fo many caricatures. The fubjedis are
chiefly domeftic fcenes, agriculture, fueh as the cultivation of
rice, 8tc. &c. of tea, and the various procefles, from the planting
to the package for foreign markets.
T h e c o n fu m p t io n o f in k m u f t n e c e f la r i ly b e e q u a l to t h a t o f Imc-
p a p e r ; t h e m a n u f a i l u r e em p lo y s * in t h e p r o v in c e o f Nanquin,
■whole villages ; lamp-black is the bafis, whether o f the liquid
ink ufed for printing, or o f that which is brought over to us
under the name o f Indian ink, in flicks, with Cbinefe characters,
and ornamented with colored figures o f flowers, 8ec. The invention
of ink in China, is faid to have been in the reign o f
Ven-ti, about a hundred and fixty years before Chrift.
T h e emperor Kam-hi can fed the wa’-s.againft the Eluths, and
thofe on the frontiers of little Bucbaria, to be painted, and fent
long after into Europe, in order to be engraven by the beft ar-
tifts; thefe were the performances of the Jefuits, and done in a
very good manner. They were placed in the hands of Le Bas at
Paris, and engraven in 1770; the plates were fent to China ; but
becaufe the figures in the back grounds were not drawn as large
as