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point and shout the offensive epithet as the stranger passed by. Some would even go out of their way or desist from their work to gratify their railing propensities. ... Those who understood these abusive epithets felt them the more keenly, and it required no little forbearance to restrain the temper and pass the assailants unnoticed. It has been urged that the people of Canton had been so long accustomed to call foreigners 'devils' that they scarcely knew when they did it; but this excuse is by no means tenable, for the Chinese employed the term with a zest and emphasis indicative of an intention to annoy. They even accompanied it with a chirping noise, which they supposed to be the cry of devils, and varied the epithet so as to leave no doubt of their real meaning. They never employed the term to their own countrymen except when highly offended and disgusted."

This description is quoted from the works of Mr. W. H. Medhurst. It was written in 1835, and it embodies his own experiences at Canton. In addition to its interest as the account of an eyewitness, it derives vicarious value from another record penned by the same author showing the conditions that he found existing at the same era in a different part of China. At the time of Mr. Medhurst's visit foreign trade was illegal in any part of the Empire except Canton, and foreigners were forbidden to travel in the interior. Christian missionaries, however, were not deterred