We were now on shore in China; if I thought myself banished, and remote from my own country at Bengal, where I had many ways to get home for my money, what could I think of myself now, when I was about a thousand leagues farther off from home, and destitute of all manner of prospect of return?  All we had for it was this:  that in about four months’ time there was to be another fair at the place where we were, and then we might be able to purchase various manufactures of the country, and withal might possibly find some Chinese junks from Tonquin for sail, that would carry us and our goods whither we pleased.  This I liked very well, and resolved to wait; besides, as our particular persons were not obnoxious, so if any English or Dutch ships came thither, perhaps we might have an opportunity to load our goods, and get passage to some other place in India nearer home.  Upon these hopes we resolved to continue here; but, to divert ourselves, we took two or three journeys into the country.

First, we went ten days’ journey to Nankin, a city well worth seeing; they say it has a million of people in it:  it is regularly built, and the streets are all straight, and cross one another in direct lines.  But when I come to compare the miserable people of these countries with ours, their fabrics, their manner of living, their government, their religion, their wealth, and their glory, as some call it, I must confess that I scarcely think it worth my while to mention them here.  We wonder at the grandeur, the riches, the pomp, the ceremonies, the government, the manufactures, the commerce, and conduct of these people; not that there is really any matter for wonder, but because, having a true notion of the barbarity of those countries, the rudeness and the ignorance that prevail there, we do not expect to find any such thing so far off.  Otherwise, what are their buildings to the palaces and royal buildings of Europe?  What their trade to the universal commerce of England, Holland, France, and Spain?  What are their cities to ours, for wealth, strength, gaiety of apparel, rich furniture, and infinite variety?  What are their ports, supplied with a few junks and barks, to our navigation, our merchant fleets, our large and powerful navies?  Our city of London has more trade than half their mighty empire:  one English, Dutch, or French man-of-war of eighty guns would be able to fight almost all the shipping belonging to China:  but the greatness of their wealth, their trade, the power of their government, and the strength of their armies, may be a little surprising to us, because, as I have said, considering them as a barbarous nation of pagans, little better than savages, we did not expect such things among them.  But all the forces of their empire, though they were to bring two millions of men into the field together, would be able to do nothing but ruin the country and starve themselves; a million of their foot could not stand before one embattled body of