matter of the dialogue. Peace is to be
established by the surrender of an obnoxious
councillor, whose son-in-law is appointed to bear the
accepted proposals to the court that is to be
conciliated. He undertakes the mission,
expecting to obtain more favourable conditions for
his relative from the offended prince, and in
order to make his journey without exciting too
much observation, he returns home and disguises
himself by a change of apparel. When he
arrives at his destination he discovers that he
has lost his letter of credentials, and recollects
that he has left it in the garments which he had
thrown off. He is denounced as an impostor
and a spy, and with great difficulty escapes,
wends his way homeward, rushes to his chamber,
shakes garment after garment, but no letter is
to be found. He throws himself into a chair,
exhibiting the utmost agony. The servants
gather round in sympathy, and he turns to a
female slave and asks whether she knows
anything about the missing letter. She tells him
she had seen such a letter in the hands of her
mistress, who is sitting nursing her baby in a
remote part of the stage. On hearing this he
looks upon her with a flood of light and a smile
of affection which warms the whole audience
to admiration. He moves his chair towards her,
lays one hand on her shoulder, fondles the infant
with the other, and she, with a look of love,
surrenders the desired document, and all ends
happily, as it should do.

The piece most familiar to Europe is the
groundwork of Voltaire's tragedy, "L'Orphelin
de la Chine." It was selected for translation by
Father Premare, one of the earliest and best
helps to the study of the Mandarin language.
In the preface Voltaire makes some sagacious
remarks on the connexion between theatrical
representations in use among the Chinese for
more than thirty centuries, and the general
civilisation of the people. He says that even the
defects of the dramatists of China are not
greater than those of the "monstrous farces of
Shakespeare," whom, it will be recollected, he
called on another occasion an "inspired
barbarian." (It may be remarked in passing, that
Frenchmen now, more enlightened and better able
to appreciate Shakespeare than was Voltaire,
would recognise the "inspiration" but eliminate
the "barbarism.") He calls the tragedy a
chef-d'Å“uvre as compared with anything that
France or Germany had produced at the time it
was written, namely, the fourteenth century.
He remarks that Metastasio has chosen a kindred
subject for one of his dramas, and says, with much
truth, that the Chinese theatre has all the
fascination of the Arabian Nights; that the interest
is kept alive, however incredible the story may
be; and that, in the midst of the entanglement
of events, the purpose and the plot are steadily
and constantly kept in view.

The tragedy begins by a fearful picture of the
slaughter and desolation which have
accompanied the invasion of the Chinese capital by
Ghenghis Khan. He has murdered the whole
of the imperial family, except the youthful heir
to the throne. A virtuous mandarin and his
beautiful wife determine to conceal and to
save the prince, whom the conqueror has
determined to discover, in order to extirpate
the last of the legitimate race. Being traced to
the mandarin's family, they decide in their
agony to surrender and sacrifice their own son
as a substitute for the intended victim; but,
when he is led to be beheaded, maternal tenderness
overcomes every other feeling, the mother
breaks in upon the execution place, denounces
the imposture, and reclaims her son. The
officers stay the hand of the headsman in order
to report the matter to the great Khan. It
turns out that the mother of the child had in
earlier days fascinated the young Ghenghis,
when he bore another name, and before he had
entered upon his career of victory. She is
brought to his presence; his old affection bursts
out anew; every menace that despotism can
urge, the threatened murder of her husband, of
her son; every promise that sovereign power
can suggest, are urged in vain, to assault and
overcome her purity. At last the piece closes
by a declaration of the conqueror that he has
been conquered—conquered by a woman's
virtue.

One might almost fancy the renowned
judgment of Solomon (1 Kings iii. 16-28) had
passed the borders of China, and suggested
to the author of the Hwiu-han-ki, literally
"Lime-circle Story," the incident on which
this drama turns. The Chinese play exhibits
a very lively picture of the social habits of
the Chinese; the relations existing between
husbands, wives, and handmaids, and the
descendants of both; the modes of educating
boys and girls; the superstitions, sacrifices, and
religious services; the injustice and cruelties of
the tribunals; the corruptions of the officials,
from the meanest to the mightiest. After all
sorts of complications, and intrigues, and the
temporary triumph by falsehood and bribery of
a wicked wife and her confederates, the story
culminates in their exposure and punishment
by the sagacious magistrate, who is the last
appellant judge. The closing scenes are here
rendered from the translation of Stanislas Julien
in his Cercle de Craie, published by the Asiatic
Society:

There are present: The Governor Ching, bearing
from the emperor the golden ensign, and the
sword of power—he has inscribed over the
tribunal "Imperial orders," and "Silence;" the
Widow Ma, who had been living in adultery
during her husband's lifetime with Chao, and they
are now in collusion in order to obtain the
property of the deceased, and claim the child as her
legitimate offspring; Hai-tang, Ma's concubine
—the real mother of the child; Chang-lin, her
brother; and sundry other persons in attendance.
They all kneel in the presence of the governor.

CHING. Who is the mother of the child?

WIDOW MA. I—I!

CHING. All you who are gathered together,
tell me who is the mother of the child.

ALL. Ma, Ma is the mother.