four large fowls. But
they were extremely embarrassed with their knives and forks, and were
quite incapable of making use of them: So that, after some fruitless
attempts to help themselves, which were sufficiently awkward, one of
the attendants was obliged to cut their meat in small pieces for them.
But whatever difficulty they might have in complying with the European
manner of eating, they seemed not to be novices in drinking. The
commodore excused himself in this part of the entertainment, under the
pretence of illness; but there being another gentleman present, of a
florid and jovial complexion, the chief mandarine clapped him on the
shoulder, and told him by the interpreter, that certainly he could not
plead sickness, and therefore insisted on his bearing him company; and
that gentleman perceiving, that after they had dispatched four or five
bottles of Frontiniac, the mandarine still continued unruffled, he
ordered a bottle of citron-water to be brought up, which the Chinese
seemed much to relish; and this being near finished, they arose from
table in appearance cool and uninfluenced by what they had drank,
and the commodore having, according to custom, made the mandarine a
present, they all departed in the same vessels that brought them.

After their departure, the commodore with great impatience expected
the resolution of the council, and the necessary licences for his
refitment. For it must be observed, as hath already appeared from
the preceding narration, that he could neither purchase stores nor
necessaries with his money, nor did any kind of workmen dare to engage
themselves to work for him, without the permission of the government
first obtained. And in the execution of these particular injunctions,
the magistrates never fail of exercising great severity, they,
notwithstanding the fustian eulogiums bestowed on them by the catholic
missionaries and their European copiers, being composed of the same
fragile materials with the rest of mankind, and often making use
of the authority of the law, not to suppress crimes, but to enrich
themselves by the pillage of those who commit them; for capital
punishments are rare in China, the effeminate genius of the nation,
and their strong attachment to lucre, disposing them rather to make
use of fines; and hence arises no inconsiderable profit to those
who compose their tribunals: Consequently prohibitions of all kinds,
particularly such as the alluring prospect of great p