The number of the China Review for July-August begins the third volume of the magazine, and we congratulate the Editor on the success with which the period dical has been kept up. Tts pages have become the repository of varied and valuable contributions, which have added much to popular knowledge on Eastern and particularly Chinese matters. Thisisespecially true of the number before us. It opens and the inadequacy of their postal to the requirements of a great nation, Jeave with a paper by Mr. Alfred Lister, entitled "The Shroff's Mystery," which forms an exhaustive notice of a Chinese Shroffing made easy" by a Kwangtung Professor, a new edition of whose work appeared in 1864. The Chinese treatise deals with the peculiarities of foreign dollars principally, in order to guard the shroff against coun-forfeit and debased coin, and some curious information is afforded with regard to the practices of Chinese coiners and smashers. Hollowing out or drilling the dollar by means of a lathe seems to be the favorite them badly served in this respect. Court news and Imperial rescripts take precedence in the Gazette, than memorials from Provincial Governments, Metropolitan Departments and the Board of Censorate; and by a new set of regulations, framed last year, the practice of spreading the publication of a long memorial over successive days is specially forbidden. Ga-zattes may be enlarged, but memorials are not to be contimned in our next." Some years ago the Athencum contained a para graph about a Peking journal printed on practice with the debasers of coin, and the writer remarks that anyone who has seen the Chinese cutting the " laban orient ivory sphere in sphere" will understand how the heart can be drilled out of acoin. Some of the Chinese Professor's facsimiles of dollars, and illustrations of the process of debasement, are reproduced in Mr. Lister's paper. The learned Professor, it seems, prides himself on his minute acquaintance with the foreign character, and gives some ludicrous English alphabets, while his facsimiles bear such inscriptions as" verted. SIATESYNE, ABUOIO4." and—a rather better shot—"xourrep. states. asrnioa." His handbook furnishes pictures of no less than sixty-one different sorts of dollars, to wit:—31 Spanish, 4 Peruvian, 4 Bolivian, 8 Mexican and 14 miscellaneous, The making of dollars wus it appears attempted in the reign of Kienlung (1735-1795), but as usual the Chinese mint did not keep faith with the public, and foreigners—or "the devils,' as the Professor politely calls them, even while he is praising their skill—had again to be relied on for silver coinage. En passant, Mr. Lister remarks that the humjinese cash have also their science, their collectors of rare lustrated literature, their spurious imitations, their broken and worn varieties, their skilled experts and specialists, and their wholesale and retail dealers. Mr. W. F. Mayers contributes a silk, and which had existed over 1,000 years. The historical reference was prosumably to the Peking Gazette, but how far it is correct as to the printing on silk, we are unable to say. Mr. Mayers does not attempt to fix the ago of the venerable record of the doings of the Chinese Court, but notes a passage in 2 Chinese work, Explanations of Common Things," which goes to show that "Court Announcements" were issued so far back as the reign Kai-yon—A. D. 713-741, In conclusion, he reproduces a decree published in 1853, as illustrating the strict official watch kept on the Gazette, Mr. C.F. R, Allen continues his entertaining translations from the Liao Chai Chih Yi, or "ales of the Marvellous collected in moments of leisure." In a translation of the Asi Yuan Ly, or Instructions to Coroners, Mr. H. A. Giles introduces us to Ohinese medical jurisprudence, The Instructions are as remarkable as they are elaborate. The Japanese and China" is " historical paper of special interest just now. The author, Mr. Geo, Hughes, dealt in a former number principally with the early visits of the Japanese to the const of China and to Formosa, and his present contribution is mainly taken up with an account of the war in Formosa betwoon the Dutch and Coxinga, and a recapitulation of the taking of Amoy by the British in 1841, which in by out of place, at a time when short but instructive paper on the publication known to foreigners as the Peking Gazette, translations from which regularly appear in our columns. Its ordinary designation among Chinese is that of " Metropolitan Announcements," but it is also styled "Copies from the Capital," or "Court Announcements." An official status is given to it in the Institutes of the reigning dynasty, and provision is made for the supply of material, the exercise of control over its issue, and its transmission to the provinces. Three forms of Gazette are prepared by different offices: one, the regulation copy for post-officials, to be sent to the provinces; one quasi-official written copy, which has the advantage of coming out in advance of its contemporaries; and one apparently unofficial, which also comes out early, but is badly printed. The fact that the agents of the Gazette offices are always foremost at the Nui Koh, or Cabinet, in endeavouring to get informal copies of papers before the official communication arrives, shows that an eagerness for early news characterises the Chinese as welles foreigners, though the absence of newspapers to war, The subject of the Early Relations of Japan and China is taken up by Mr, Allen, who carries it back to o period before the Christian era, and gives some very interesting information on the connection of Japan, Corea and China, The Formosan dialects and their connection with the Malay, by Mr. Bullock, will attract philologists. The writer say:
"From the position of Formosa, there is a likelihood that its inhabitants reached it through the Philippines, A comparison of the Formosan languages with those. the Philippines, and of the latter with those of the Archipelago, would afford more hope than any other method of obtaining information as to the origin of the Formosan islanders. I have heard enough of the aboriginal long Manila to know that it conta words common to both the Formosan and the Malayan languages."
The description given by Mr. Wallace in his book, "the Malay Archipelago," of the physical characteristics of that race would, he says, apply almost equally well to all the Formosan tribes, that he has seen, with one exception, The course of West River, or Si-kiang,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.