ulty speakers, such as that of the student who told his
servant to bring him a goose, when what he really wanted was some salt,
both goose and salt having the same sound, _yen_, but quite different
intonations. The following specimen has the advantage of being true.
A British official reported to the Foreign Office that the people of
Tientsin were in the habit of shouting after foreigners, "Mao-tsu,
mao-tsu" (pronounced _mowdza_, _ow_ as in _how_), from which he gathered
that they were much struck by the head-gear of the barbarian. Now, it is
a fact that _mao-tsu_, uttered with a certain intonation, means a hat;
but with another intonation, it means "hairy one," and the latter,
referring to the big beards of foreigners, was the meaning intended to
be conveyed. This epithet is still to be heard, and is often preceded by
the adjective "red."

The written characters, known to have been in use for the past three
thousand years, were originally rude pictures, as of men, birds, horses,
dogs, houses, the numerals (one, two, three, four), etc., etc., and
it is still possible to trace in the modified modern forms of these
characters more or less striking resemblances to the objects intended.
The next step was to put two or more characters together, to express by
their combination an abstract idea, as, for instance, a _hand_ holding
a _rod_ = father; but of course this simple process did not carry the
Chinese very far, and they soon managed to hit on a joint picture and
phonetic system, which enabled them to multiply characters indefinitely,
new compounds being formed for use as required. It is thus that new
characters can still be produced, if necessary, to express novel objects
or ideas. The usual plan, however, is to combine existing terms in
such a way as to suggest what is wanted. For instance, in preference
to inventing a separate character for the piece of ordnance known as
a "mortar," the Chinese, with an eye to its peculiar pose, gave it the
appropriate name of a "frog gun."

Again, just as the natives and the dialects of the various parts of
China differ one from another, although fundamentally the same people
and the same language, so do the manners and customs differ to such an
extent that habits of life and ceremonial regulations which prevail in
one part of the empire do not necessarily prevail in another. Yet once
more it will be found that the differences which appear irreconcilable
at first, do not affect what i