[VOL IV] NANKING, FROM THE PORCELAIN TOWER

NANKING, FROM THE PORCELAIN TOWER

Cover Image: Nanking, from the Porcelain Tower / NanJing JiangSu China / Drawn by T. Allom Engraved by E.Radclyffe – ALAMY Image ID:2X55NG5

*Overlooking the scenery of Nanjing City. / Sketched on the Spot by Capt Stoddart R.N..

There is a majesty more felt than seen,
In the vast city with its peopled homes;
And hearts all full of an immortal life,
Thousands and tens of thousands beating there.

CONSTANTINOPLE.

THE form of the enclosure, or enceinte, of ancient Nanking is very irregular, having been accommodated to the inequalities of surface and limits of inundations that occasionally take place. In one part lofty hills arise, affording a prospect over the whole urban and suburban area; in another the dwellings are brought into close and constant contact. At the south-west angle, where the public offices are placed, and a water-gate leads to a spacious four-arched bridge, that crosses the canal, is that suburb situated on which the famous tower has looked down for many centuries. A few cash procure ready admission, and having examined the relics of superstition which have escaped the ferocity of the Tartar, and rudeness of more recent iconoclasts, an ascent to the summit will repay rational curiosity. Eastward, yet at the pagoda’s base, is seen the Tartar keep, an imperium in imperio, city within city, being securely enclosed by its own walls, although in the very centre of the great fortified area itself. Beyond and northward, lofty, steep, and sterile hills, some of them included within the mural cincture, rival the pagoda in towering height.

Farther still, continuously, the Yang-tse-kiang, like an inland sea, expands its broad surface to the mountain’s foot; and at some three miles’ distance, is the junction of the canal of Nanking with that great and noble river. Casting the eye beneath, from the narrow balcony’s dizzy height, a court-yard of oblong form is discovered, having at its further extremity a hall of learning or of religion, according to circumstances; and on either side are cells, appropriated to the idle bonzes, who live in tolerable ease on public generosity. Large tracts of uncultivated land appear to be the property of this inactive community; but whether they disdain labour, while they are not ashamed to beg, or some religious scruple intervenes, these appear devoted to eternal sterility. From this bird’s-eye view of Nanking, a correct idea may be formed of the social architecture of the Chinese, and the systematic arrangement of their civic avenues. Discipline, method, established obedience, are conspicuous in every part; and when the populousness of the empire is considered, the statesman may possibly find reason to conclude, that the freedom of the subject has not been unnecessarily coerced, nor the administration of justice neglected, in this ancient and absolute despotism.

It was at the influx of the canal of Nanking, the north-west corner of the city, that the British vessels of war, Cornwallis and Blonde, cast anchor, with orders to effect a breach in the walls; which catastrophe the astonished citizens averted by a timely submission. This point is distinctly visible in the panorama witnessed from the tower, as well as the extremity of the paved road, seven miles in length, leading from the gate of victory to a landing-place, on the Yang-tse-kiang, near to which the transports were directed to anchor on the same occasion. The imaginative portion on the right of the accompanying view, is the enceinte of the ancient city; – on the left, the remainder of the town-suburb. (*Vide further details of Nanking, its towers and temples, in vol. i. p. 74, vol. ii. p. 16–32, et seq.)

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