418
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
LATINISATION OF FAR EASTERN | Wenchow reports: "I consider that the
LANGUAGES.
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At
adoption of romanisation in mandarin- speaking districts is likely to result in the unification of the Chinese spoken language and in the production of a national literature easily read everywhere." present, remarks our contemporary, a magni- ficent collection of Chinese poetry and prose is easily read nowhere. In Japan, we are told by the Yokohama Advertiser, which regards the project unsympathetically, | there was a Roman Character Association some years ago which failed. That Associa- tion perhaps failed to persevere, but we cannot agree that its efforts were wasted, siuce we are able now to see the work con- tinuing, and know that in Japan the supply of "Romaji "literature is greater even than in China. Indeed, if there be reason to hope for success in China, we should say there is il reasonable certainty of it in Japan, where the difficulty of the "tones" does not appear. It will be admitted by those familiar with both Euro- peau and Far Eastern written languages that each achieves the same result, and that one (our own) is the more easily and economically acquired. At the same time, it will not be out of place to indicate the obstacles in the way, consideration of which will help the enthusiastic to avoid the despair born of impatience at slow progress, The chief difficulties are natural prejudices, which we cannot help excusing when we think of the British dislike of any proposal on the lines of chauge. The much needed spelling reform, for instance, has been almost unanimously rejected because of the sacrifice of literary associations it entails. Anyone reading Professor CHAMBERLAIN's delightful introduction to the study of the ideograph will realise that there is a rare wealth of such associations that must suffer when the Roman letters are adopted. The British are strangely shy of the decimal system, which has more to recommend it and less to fight against than reformel spelling, so that we have no right to criticise any hesitation of the Chinese and Japanese literati. The precious associations of their written characters are on a much higher plane even than ours. We that each of those "spidery marks" is essentially a picture representing an idea; our words built of letters represent first a sound. The psychological process in each case has been thus crudely described in China and Japan the impression tele. graphed direct from eye to brain is of things, the evolution of abstractions from concretions having a natural progress: in Europe the impression travels from eye to brain via ear, and the process of evoking associations is more arbitrary. That would be more wholly true if the ideograph were what it is supposed to be, and what it undoubtedly once was. But it has to be remembered that ideograms have long been reduced to forms almost as arbitrary as our own. Professor CHAMBERLAIN and the
(Daily Press, 11th December.) The globetrotter class, which says on seeing the ideographic writing of China and Japan, "However do they learn to dis- tinguish one spidery mark from another?" will not be surprised to hear that efforts are being made in both countries to introduce a system of writing the language with the Roman alphabet. It will to them appear as a simple necessity and a matter of course. There are difficulties in the way, and even objections, at which they would express surprise. We referred to the subject last year, and now note that it is receiving renewed attention in both coun tries. The Educational Association of China, which held its triennial meeting at Shanghai in May, has reported considerable progress on the continent, and the "Romaji Hirome Kwai," a society working in the island empire for a like object, has within the last few weeks published the first number of a periodical designed to further that object. According to extracts in the N.-C. Daily News, Amoy, which claims to be the pioneer in romanisation. reports that there it is an acknowledged success.' Any question as to its usefulness is never raised among Amoy missionaries. In Canton the interest has revived. Hitherto it has never been given a fair trial, but it is now expected that equally good results will follow its use in the south as elsewhere. Even the Chungchias, a tribe of non-Chinese living in the Kueichou province, have had provided for them the privilege of learning to read and write in their own tongue. In Foochow, increasing popularity and influence are the keynote of the report, and this will not be lessened by the fact that there is a monthly newspaper now printed in the now well-known type, and read by an ever- widening circle of "romanists." In the island of Hainan and amongst the Hakkas a beginning has been made, and we learn that the islanders greatly prize the new acquirement as a means of letter-writing. A partial failure in Hangchow is accounted for by the fact that " there seems to have been no very great interest in pushing the romanised" in that important centre. But in Hinghua "the success of the romanised has been phenomenal.' It seems that in this district everything combines to favour the new style of learning. "A large and growing church: missionaries awake to the need of helps for the illiterate: a system of romanisation upon which all are agreed: no vernacular boks in Chinese character to interfere with the general use of the roman- ised: and a vigorous prosecution of the work of preparing books and teaching the Chinese to read them." The movement is still in the initiatory stage at Kashing, comparatively new at Kienning and Kienyang, but is in full flood at Ningpo, one of the pioneer stations in the use of the roman character. Mr. R. FITCH writes thence that the popula- sinologues, native and foreign, are able to rity of the romanised "has been at an
trace these arbitrary sigus to their pictorial unchanging climax for several years." At radicals, and to show us how obviously a Shanghai the success of the past three
woman and a house represent domesticity; years has been very marked. Soochow but the masses who have to learn these reports no progress. "The number of illit. | characters to get at the instruction recorded erate Christians is comparatively small," by them see as little of this as the English and those who want to read have to boy sees of the origin of the word learn the character. In Swatow on the
The foundations of expressed knowledge come to us orally, naturally; and it follows that the supplementary form, by writing, should be as simple as possible. Without spelling reform, Romaji or Roman letter writing remains an imperfect system phonetically; but it is in the meantime a system much more easily acquired, costing less in time and effort, than the cumbrous
other hand, "the romanised is growing in favour with all classes." Taichow intro- duces a new note: Quite a number of
non-Christians of the scholar class are buying primers, and a new edition is being prepared for their use with Chinese characters added, so that scholars can learn without a teacher." Mr. SOOTHILL of
Cal.
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e are told
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[December 16, 1905.
languages of China and Japan. In the case of Japan, they have already adopted a system which is better than Romaji, and therefore we hardly see what they hope to gain by using Roman characters, which, as at present used to indicate Japanese words, have to be disfigured by all sorts of accents. We refer to their kana, which are more accurately phonetic than our alphabet appears at present, in the absence of a unifor usage. Romaji commits them to our confusion as illustrated by "cough" and "
Their own kana offer what plough.'
not: our alphabet ought to, but does one symbol one sound. That is a much more reasonable objection to Romaji than the one which dwells on the fact that there are no less than ninety-two different charac- ters pronounced ko, with sixteen compounds to sho, and twenty-four compounds ko shi. Context has to be relied upon in speech, so it would be no hardship to rob the Japanese scholar of the alleged 132 variations in writing that sound, the task of
must be learning which
stupendous. Sir ISAAC PITMAN had to face that difficulty with words like " all, awl, haul, whole, Io China the difficulties are hole."
enormous.
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We have tried to produce the tones in both Roman letters and in phono- graphy, and failed of course.
It seems impertinent to offer Romanised writing to China while we are at present undecided whether the Chinese sound-name of a Hongkong suburb is best represented by "Kowloon or "Kaulun "; and we would almost as soon learn the ideograph itself as puzzle out the phonetic significance of compositions like "hsien-ch'en-shueh." But these are difficulties to be surmounted, not despaired over; and the success of the movement will mean a wonderful spread of culture when it does away with the far more formidable difficulties of ideography. The reformers do not deserve, at any rate, that we should discourage their gallant enterprise.
DECAY IN MIDDLE RUSSIA.
1
-we drew
(Daily Press, 12th December.) Some three years ago, speaking of the apointment of Admiral ALEXIEFF to what was practically the Satrapy of Eastern Siberin he being free from accountability to the Government of Russia, and answer- able only to the TSAR in person- a comparison with the decay of the ancient Persian regime owing in a great measure to the want of efficient control over the distant satrapies; and ventured on the forecast that the long line of empire, stretching, as it did, from the Baltic to the Japan Sea, was already overweighted at the extremities, and that the new appointment of a practi- cally irresponsible chief over the eastern extremity would in time lead to the fracture of the slender connecting rod between St. Petersburg and Vladivostock. We pointed to the glaring manner in which the military commanders in Central Asia had openly contravened the plainest orders of the responsible Government at home; and had in consequence plunged the Empire in a series of costly and unproductive wars which had already seriously hampered the financial stability of the State; and owing to the extent of the new territory overrun, as well as to the practical dissolution of the bonds of discipline, were threatening its very existence. Already the action of Adiniral ALEXIEFF was leading up to still further encroachments, and towards this the conduct of the TSAR himself, then under the influence of the dangerous alventurer BESO BRASOFF, was directly tending. The war, even then impending, however success-
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