the early progress in knowledge and in the arts, never passing a certain low point, so that they exhibit the only instance in the history of our species of improvement being permanently arrested in its progress :-the resources of this civilized state incalculable, yet not able to prevent two complete conquests by a horde of barbarians, and to chastise the piracies of a neighboring island, (Japan,) or to subdue a petty tribe, (Meaoutse,) existing, troublesome and independent, in the centre of a monarchy, which seems as if it could crush them by a single movement of its body:-the police of the state, all-powerful in certain directions, and in others so weak as to habitually give way for fear of being defeated: the policy of the state an unexampled mixture of wisdom and folly, profound views and superficial errors :-patronage of arts and sciences, combined with prohibition of foreign improvements :-encouragement of domestic industry, with exclusion of internal commerce:-promotion of inland manufacture and trade, without employing the precious metals as a medium of exchange :-suffering perpetually from the population encroaching upon the means of subsistence, and yet systematically stimulating the increase of its numbers; removing every check which might mitigate the evil, and closing every outlet for the redundancy."

There seems good reason to believe, that the great jealousy of intercourse with foreigners, which the rulers of China have for so many years exhibited in so remarkable a manner, arose mainly from the fears of the Tartar rulers, lest their people, by acquaintance with other nations, should acquire inclination or power to throw off their foreign yoke; and that the vexatious and insulting obstructions to commerce, so long persisted in, were scarcely more obnoxious to us than to the wishes and habits of the Chinese people, although their love of order and reverence for the authority of their rulers checked any exhibition of this feeling on their part.

If this be the case, we may indulge a not unreasonable hope that the war, so recently waged by England against China, contemptible, not to say disgraceful, as it was in its origin, may, in its consequences, be beneficial to the Chinese, as well as to other nations.

Sir Henry Pottinger, (who negotiated on the part of England the treaty of Nanking which was concluded in 1843,) with wise and liberal policy, stipulated for no exclusive privilege to England, but included other nations in its provisions for free commercial intercourse. Sir Henry speaks most highly of the ability and uprightness of some of the Chinese Mandarins, who conferred with him upon

the provisions of the treaty; and the esteem appears to have been mutual, and to have ripened into friendship.

The Chinese, astonished that an island of inconsiderable size could exhibit, at such an immense distance from home, power and resources sufficient to baffle all the efforts of their own great empire, in the very centre of its dominions, have lost much of that overweening selfconceit which made them affect to treat all visitors as tributaries and subjects, and therefore as objects of contempt and insult. The English, as their acquaintance with the language and customs of this singular people increases, appear to find more and more to respect and to admire, and less to ridicule; and let us hope that, by the mutual exercise of forbearance and confidence, the newly cemented friendship between England and China may continue undisturbed by oppression on one part, and by ill faith on the other.

I have thus endeavored to afford a few general "Glimpses of the Wonderful" in this great portion of the human family; for seeing that so many works, of easy access for all readers, have recently appeared, containing descriptions of China in every aspect, it seemed needless to repeat the process here. Every reader, young and old, is by this time familiar with the quaint, unwieldy forms

of Chinese junks, with their high, overhanging sterns, their bamboo sails, and ornaments of paint and gilding ;the nine-storied pagodas, with their porcelain roofs, peaked, and ornamented with bells and flags, are known to us all from the days of childhood, when we admired the blue pictures on our plates, beneath the meat and pudding; and there too, and in many a pictured page of greater pretensions, we have become familiar with Chinese bridges, fish-ponds, and pleasure-houses, and the neverabsent willow-the doll-like lady, with her pinched and stunted feet, and the fat Mandarin, with his long tail. The Chinese Exhibition, too, has shown to thousands of delighted visitors the manners and productions of the empire in yet more vivid reality. And as to the Great Northern Wall, one of the "wonders of the world," be they limited to seven, or extended to a hundred, it is familiar to every young student of geography; and so we need not enlarge upon it here, but will take our flight to other scenes in search of other wonders.

BOOTHIA FELIX AND THE ESQUIMAUX.

For the last three hundred years, attempts have been made by navigators of different European nations to find a northern passage to India and China, and the other rich countries and islands of eastern Asia, and thus to avoid the long voyages round the southern extremities of Africa or South America. There is hardly a doubt that such a passage exists, both in a western and in an eastern direction; the one along the northern shore of Asia, the other through Baffin's Bay, and between the islands that are clustered along the Arctic shore of North America. But it is almost equally certain that, even should some fortunate voyager be able, in some very mild season, to force his way by either channel, the discovery will be of little practical utility for merchant-vessels, until the climate of that part of the globe materially alters. It is only during unusually mild years that the snow ever disappears from the land, or the ice from the sea, even in the height of summer; and this is only for a very few weeks, or even