and of objects dear to the collector
and the connoisseur. Though a nation of what the Scotch would call
"sober eaters," they love the banquet hour, and to a certain extent
verify their own saying that "Man's heart is next door to his stomach."
In centuries past a drunken nation, some two to three hundred years
ago they began to come under the influence of opium, and the abuse of
alcohol dropped to a minimum. Opium smoking, less harmful a great deal
than opium eating, took the place of drink, and became the national
vice; but the extent of its injury to the people has been much
exaggerated, and is not to be compared with that of alcohol in the West.
It is now, in consequence of recent legislation, likely to disappear, on
which result there could be nothing but the warmest congratulations to
offer, but for the fact that something else, more insidious and deadly
still, is rapidly taking its place. For a time, it was thought that
alcohol might recover its sway, and it is still quite probable that
human cravings for stimulant of some kind will find a partial relief in
that direction. The present enemy, however, and one that demands serious
and immediate attention, is morphia, which is being largely imported
into China in the shape of a variety of preparations suitable to the
public demand. A passage from opium to morphia would be worse, if
possible, than from the frying-pan into the fire.

The question has often been asked, but has never found a satisfactory
answer, why and how it is that Chinese civilization has persisted
through so many centuries, while other civilizations, with equal if not
superior claims to permanency, have been broken up and have disappeared
from the sites on which they formerly flourished. Egypt may be able to
boast of a high level of culture at a remoter date than we can reach
through the medium of Chinese records, for all we can honestly claim
is that the Chinese were a remarkably civilized nation a thousand years
before Christ. That was some time before Greek civilization can be said
to have begun; yet the Chinese nation is with us still, and but for
contact with the Western barbarian, would be leading very much the same
life that it led so many centuries ago.

Some would have us believe that the bond which has held the people
together is the written language, which is common to the whole Empire,
and which all can read in the same sense, though the pronunciation of
words varies in different provi