Directory_and_Chronicle_1842 — Page 398

380

Topography of Kiungsi.

JULY,

64

'There were,

able the surface, the more extended the cultivation.” he says, lying at anchor at Náncháng, four or five hundred revenue vessels, one of which he measured. It was in length 115 feet, breadth 15 feet, and depth 6 feet; the sides straight, and the width nearly the saine fore and aft; so that the burden might fairly be estimated at 350 tons. Independent therefore, of the innumerable small craft, there were lying before the city, 100,000 tons of ship- ping."

II. The department of Jáuchau forms the northeastern portion of the province: and in that quarter is bounded by the department of Hwuichau in Anhwúi; on the southeast it is bounded by Kwáng- sin; on the south by Fúchau; on the west by Náncháng and Nán- káng; and by Kiúkiáng on the northwest. On the west it is washed by the waters of the Poyáng lake, into which four considerable rivers flow, two from the north, one from the east. Its form is nearly cir- cular; and its surface, in many places, uneven and mountainous. Its chief magistrate resides at Jáuchau, on the eastern shores of the lake, and his jurisdiction extends over seven districts. In one of these, Fauliáng hien, is the site of the celebrated manufactories of porcelain. It stands forty or fifty miles northeast from Jauchau, on the river Cháng, and is called Kingte chin (1) the mart of Kingte. The Chinese historian says, "it is situated thirty li (eight or ten miles) southwest from Fauliúng, and was founded in the reign of Kingte of the Sung family (who began to reign A. d. 1004), and hence derived its name. The books say," continues the same his- torian, “that the earth and water of that site are suitable for porce- lain; and that in the time of Siuente (about 1426), the manufacto- ries of imperial wares were established."

D'Entrecolles, one of the learned Jesuits, had a church at Kingte, and among his parishioners there were several who both made and traded in these wares. From them and from books, he obtained a most thorough knowledge of the art. From his writings, and those of some of the other Jesuits, Du Halde has given a full account of its manufacture. Vol. I., p. 338, fol. ed.

III. The department of Kwangsin occupies that portion of the province, which is situated between Jauchau and Fukien on the east. It constitutes a wide valley, down which Macartney and his party traveled on their return from Peking. Having left Hángchau, the embassy ascended the Tsientáng in boats as far as practicable; it had then four-and-twenty miles to pass over laud to Yushán, the chief cown of a district of the saine name, standing on the northern side of