Embassy to the Eastern Courts of Cochin-China, Siam, and Muscat. Edmund Roberts

far superior in intellect to the common cast of Asiatic women—are very ingenious in their needlework, &c. To be a good mother, in the estimation of this class of the Chinese, a woman must be a weaver. It is to be regretted, that they have very little regard for the cleanliness either of their persons or houses; their children crawl in the dirt, and the few articles of furniture in their dwellings are covered with filth.

      Infanticide of females is not unknown among the Chinese. They are far from regarding this crime with the horror it deserves. “It is only a female,” is the answer generally given when they are reproved for it.

      The account of the Charitable Institutions of Canton is brief. They are few in number, of small extent, and of recent origin:—

      First: Yuh-ying-tang, or the “foundling hospital.” This institution was founded in 1698, and it was rebuilt and considerably enlarged in 1732. It stands without the walls of the city, on the east—has accommodations for two or three hundred children, and is maintained at an annual expense of two thousand, five hundred and twenty-two taels.

      Second: Yang-tse-yuen.—This is a retreat for poor, aged and infirm, or blind people, who have no friends to support them. It stands near the foundling hospital, and like it, enjoys imperial patronage, receiving annually, five thousand, one hundred taels. Both this sum, and that for yuh-ying-tang, are received in part, or wholly, from duties, paid by those foreign ships which bring rice to Canton. Every such ship must pay the sum of six hundred and twenty taels, which, by imperial order, is appropriated to these two hospitals. The number of “rice-ships,” last year, was twenty-eight, yielding the sum of seventeen thousand, three hundred and sixty taels. The English, American, Dutch, Spanish, and Portuguese, are the only foreign vessels that bring rice to Canton.

      Third: Ma-fung-yuen, or the “hospital for lepers.” This is also on the east side of the city; the number of patients in it, is three hundred and forty-one, who are supported at an expense of three hundred taels per annum! The condition of the three hospitals, if such they may be called, is wretched in the extreme. The foundlings are often those children which have been exposed; and who, when grown up, are often sold, and not unfrequently, for the worst of purposes. Such is a specimen of the benevolent institutions of the celestial empire!

      GOVERNMENT GRATUITIES.

      The government, in times of calamity and scarcity, grant small gratuities to the distressed, but the amount is so trifling, the difficulty of obtaining it so great, that it is not worth the time lost in seeking for it. During the month of August, 1833, owing to heavy gales, accompanied with much rain, the rivers overflowed their banks, and these united calamities destroyed a vast number of the humble dwellings of the poor. The government, knowing the great distress of many thousands, sent surveyors to take a list of the sufferers. About five months afterward, the two magistrates who divide the city of Canton between them, gave public notice, that the sums subscribed by the public for their relief, would be paid out in the following proportions, viz.: “To the poor, who were unable to rebuild their houses—two mace, five candareens,” (about forty cents,) and if they were altogether destitute, two months’ food in addition, viz., for every “big mouth,” two mace and seven candareens: to every “little mouth,” (child’s,) one half of that sum. The aged and feeble who are unable to reach the distributing officer without several days’ hard struggle, are frequently obliged to give up the scanty pittance, and depend upon the cold charities of the world, or otherwise find their grave on the roadside in a loathsome ditch.

CHAPTER VII.

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