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blooms clothe it in a colour very different to the turf which is buried beneath it. Last year th s bank was cleared of the intruder to all appearance-the fact being that the roots, which are strong and deep, were not removed-and it sprang up again this year, and is flourishing with seven-fold strength. All along the line of tramway, between the Bowen Road and St. Johns Place it can be traced by its purple heads of bloom, and it should be promptly weeded out and, if possible, ex- terminated. The lantana is another unde- strable plant, which flourishes greatly near the banks of the streams. It has overrun whole districts of Ceylon, and cannot now be eradicated there, but here it has not made so much way, possibly owing to a less fertile soil. These intruders want watching, or they spread, like a fire, and prove even more difficult of control or elimination.
OCCUPATION OF LHASŠA.
(Daily Press, 10th August.)
It is satisfactory to learn that the British entry into Lhassa has been accomplished without further fighting. Our London correspondent, telegraphing on the 8th inst., : says that Colonel YOUNGHUSBAND'S forces.
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THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
Tibetan capital and lived to tell the story of his adventures. Lhassa lwil now, however, soon be as well known to the world as Seoul, the formerly secluded capital of Korea, but now connected with its port by railway and the centre of a good deal of Japanese and Western activity. The public will have much that is interesting to learn of the great Buddhist centre and will look forward to the descriptions and illustrations which will no doubt soon be published of this unique city. Much of the glamour which at present surround this capital will naturally he dissipated by .. closer and more intimate acquaintance with it. The mystery that has hung about this depository of the lore and learning of the Buddhistic sages, and the vague idea that much knowledge is hidden in the monasteries of Tihet inay perhaps be rather rudely dispelled, for we have a strong suspicion that there is less learning thau pretension, less treasure than gaudy display, and more dirt than eisher in the lamaseries,
(August 13, 1904.
criticism, the blunder is by no means with- out precedent, and our knowledge of the. Buddhistie literature of ancient India was marked by a precisely similar contretemps, which might, and certainly should have heen known to Dr. Leoon. I quote from Vol. I. of Max Muller's "Chips from & Ger- man Workshop." Spanking of the lack of knowledge of that literature which prevail. ed in England in the early part of the las century, MAX MULLER remarks :--The "Honourable GEORGE TURNOUr suddenly
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presented to the world the Buddhist "literature of Ceylon composed in the au- "cient language of that island, the ancient "Pali. The existence of this literature had "been known before, and Sir A. JounsroN "had collected certain well-known works, "which nt his suggestion had been trans- "Inted from Pali into modern Singhales e "and thence into English. The translation
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appeared in 1833, and was dedicated to "WILLIAM IV. Unfortunately, whether through frand or through misunderstand- ing, the priests who were to have procured an authentic copy of the Pali originals "and translated them into the vernacular language, appear to have formed a com. 'pilation of their own from various sources. "The official translators by whom this "mutilated Singhalese abridgment was to "have been rendered into English, took "still greater liberties; and the Sacred and
'Historical Books of Ceylon' had hardly "been published before BURNOUF, then a mere beginner in the study of Pali, was "able to prove the utter uselessness of that "translation.
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CHINESE CLASSICAL BALLADS.
(Daily Press 11th August.) China has been unfortunate in her tros- marched into Lhassa on Wednesday, the lators, and the great body of her early 3rd inst., unopposed. The Chinese Amban literature, interesting not alone from its assisted in the necessary negotiations con-historical importance but from its actual sequent on the occupation of quarters in beau ies, still remains for the most part a this stronghold of the Dalai Lama. It is sealed book. In one respect Chins is almost evident from this account that the Chinese unique amongst ancient nations, and that is Amban, who previously had shown a rather in having preserved a great number of her hostile attitude to the British Expedition, ancient ballads, which we find in the col- has been instructed from Peking to execute lection called the Shi-King or "Classic of a prompt and complete volte face, and Ballads." The preservation of these, we owe did so accordingly. The Chinese Govern- entirely to the loving care of Covrucius, ment have no sympathy with Russian and it is certainly oe of the greatest, if not intrigues in Central Asia; they have suffer- absolutely the greatest boon he has con- ed too much already from Muscovite push. ferred on posterity. Yet this collection, fulness; and they have no doubt recognised invaluable for the light it throws on the the fact that the policy of rigid exclusion early history and ancient mythology of hitherto so successfully followed by the Eastern Asia, remains to all intents and Tibetan Authorities was neither desirable purposes absolutely unknown, 80 en- nor possible. The British Indian Govern-tirely have the modern Chinese. anding of the original, with an equal contempt
ment could not submit to be flouted by a coterie of Buddhist priests before the whole Buddhistic world, and the Eek ng Autho- rities have had sufficient experience of British methods to know that once the order to march has been given, nothing will be allowed to arrest the progress of British troops to their goal short of irretrievable disaster. Such a check the expedition under Colonel YOUNGHUSBAND was not at all likely to meet from the Tibetans, and the opposition offered to it was both gratui- tous and impolitic, a mere courting of de. feat and an unnecessary loss of life. The Lamas had to be taught a lesson, however, which we trust they will take to heart and profit by in the future. They will hence forward know better, perhaps, than to listen
Russian
Disrepresentations. We hope that the British Commander has full powers to deal with the Lhussa Authorities, even to the point, if necessary, of setting up another and inore intelligent priest in power than the Dalai Lama or those who govern in his name.
Lo
Meantime one more triumph has been achieved, one more forward movement made and the last of the hermit kingdoms has been compelled to give up its jealously guarded isolation. The natural barriers to exploration in the great bighlands of Tibet have hitherto enabled the Lamas to draw an impassable cordon round Lhassa, which Europeans have found it impossible to break, and the only veracious account of the city yet received has been that written by an intrepid Indian traveller who managed by a careful disguise to penetrate into the
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Now, mutatis mutandis, this is precisely what happened in the case of Dr. LEGOE'S "Chinese Classics." Unable or unwilling to translate for himself the ancient text, he had recourse to the ever-present "teacher," who, as ignorant of ancient language as were the Ceylon priests of the ancient Pali, palmed off on him a paraphrase in the modern vernacular, which Dr. LeGes, doubtless in good faith, gave to the world as his render- for the real meaning. The result is equally unsatisfactory for all enquirers into Chinese antiquities, but unfortunately no BURNOUF has risen over the horizon to expose the blunder. The effect of all this is, of course, that no progress has been made in Chinese studies, and that the history and antiquities of ancient China are still in the same be fogged and absolutely false predicament as bali a century ago.
We have been led to make these remarks by the recent publication of another so- called "translation” of “The Odes" founded on the extremely inaccurate and misleading version of LEGGE. Had LEGGE's knowledge of the early history of bis own language been a little more extensive the very fact would have led him to pause before pre- senting such a crude and ill-digested farago of bad English and worse sense as a possi ble rendering of ballads whose intrinsic merits had enabled them to pass down from mouth to mouth for nearly a thou- sand years. Had Leoor had better know. ledge of the classical meaning of the word
sequacious translators, failed to grasp not only the language, but still more the circumstances under which its contents were originally produced. Amongst Euro- pean authors one of the chief causes of this continued misunderstanding has been the erroneous form under which they have been presented to the modern world; and it is unfortunately the case that for this no one individual is more to blame than the late Dr. LEGGE, who in giving the ballads the misleading title of "Odes" has perpetunted all the errors of the school of CHU-HI-a school originated when criticism had fallen to the very lowest depths of ignorance and ineptitude. Unfortunately, from want of previous training, and from a too pronounced devotion to established authority, no worse translator than Dr. LEGGE could possibly have been selected for the task of presenting the ancient Chinese literary remains to the scholars of Europe. With no better pre- paration for the task than the ordinary pass" theological curriculum of the Scottish university; and with but scant acquaintance with the literary treasures of his own land, ode," which although theso compositions and entirely ignorant of what had elsewhere were intended to be sung, always pre- been accomplished in the world of criticism, supposed a previously written cooy, he be set to in a lighthearted way to translate would have found some apter title for his a body of literature, which even in China uncouth renderings. Had he possessed a itself had long becoine a dead language. It better knowledge of the old Chinese lan is true that in this Dr. LEGGE proceeded guage and antiquities he would have from no malice prepense; the fault was recognised that as they are handed down ignorance, but ignorance of such a nature they could never have been intelligible to that it would seem incomprehensible, ❘ the ear. As a fact, when they were com- evon with the slight knowledge of modern English literature at his disposal. Unfortunately for the history of British
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posed, like the earliest compositions of all- nations not yet attained to the use of writing, they were ballads pure and simple;
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