Volume 1

An authentic account of the embassy of the Dutch East-India Company, to the court of the Emperor of China, in the years 1794 and 1795 : (subsequent to that of the Earl of Macartney.) Containing a description of several parts of the Chinese empire, unknown to Europeans / taken from the journal of André Everard van Braam. Translated from the original of M.L.E. Moreau de Saint-Mery.

  • Van Braam Houckgeest, André Everard, 1739-1801.
Date:
1798
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An authentic account of the embassy of the Dutch East-India Company, to the court of the Emperor of China, in the years 1794 and 1795 : (subsequent to that of the Earl of Macartney.) Containing a description of several parts of the Chinese empire, unknown to Europeans / taken from the journal of André Everard van Braam. Translated from the original of M.L.E. Moreau de Saint-Mery. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    OF THE EDITOR. The more diffant the Regions which the Traveller defcribes, the more they differ in their moral ajid phy- fical nature from the nations for whofe inftru&ion and gratification he deffines his obfervations, the more im- portant is it to the reader to know in what degree his confidence is due to the man who fpeaks to him of what is palling in remote countries, and aimoff at the other end of the world. It is particularly in refpeft to China that the Fear of receiving the produftions of an imagination more or lefs fertile for a true recital is eafily awakened. That immenfe Empire is fo little known ; the prejudices of its inhabitants, or rather the wifdom of its government, has thrown fo many obllacles in the way of thofe Eu- ropeans who might feel a defire to penetrate into th* country in order to fatisfy their curiofity and to ex- amine what imperfect and hafty fketches have given them a faint idea of, that if it js eafy to give imaginary a 4 details