Excerpt from Sketches of China, Vol. 1: Partly During an Inland Journey of Four Months, Between Peking, Nanking, and Canton; With Notices and Observations Relative to the Present War To the deep and growing interest which the present crisis in our relations with China has excited in the public mind, the following work owes its publication. Whatever may be the ultimate result of our armed measures to wards the government of that country - whe ther one of renewed and more intimate inter course, or of exclusive and lasting hostility this account of the internal features, physical and moral, of the empire, may in either case be useful: in the first, as an introduction to more extended and familiar knowledge of the subject; in the last, as an improvement of Opportunities not likely very soon to recur. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.