It is evident that this custom, combined with the celibacy of fuch a numerous body of ecclefiatics, muft operate in the most powerful manner as a preventive check to population. Yet, notwithstanding this exceffive check, it would appear from Mr. Turner's account of the natural fterility of the foil, that the population is kept up to the level of the means of fubfiftence; and this feems to be confirmed by the number of beggars in Tefhoo Loomboo. thefe beggars, and the charity which feeds them, Mr. Turner's remark, though common, is yet fo juft and important, that it cannot be too often repeated. On "Thus I unexpectedly difcovered," he says, "where I had constantly seen the round of life moving in a tranquil regular routine, a mass of indigence and idleness, of which I had no idea. "But yet it by no means surprised me, when "I confidered, that, wherever indifcriminate charity exifts, it will never want objects on "which to exercife its bounty, but will always "attract expectants more numerous than it has "the means to gratify. No human being can "fuffer want at Tefhoo Loomboo. It is on "this humane difpofition, that a multitude even "of Muffelmen, of a frame probably the largest "and " and moft robuft in the world, place their re"liance for the mere maintenance of a feeble life; and befide thefe, I am informed, that "no less than three hundred Hindoos, Gofeins, "and Sunniaffes, are daily fed at this place by "the Lama's bounty." * Turner's Embaffy, part ii. c. ix. p. 330. CHAP. XII. Of the Checks to Population in China and Japan. THE account which has lately been given of the population of China is fo extraordinary, as to ftartle the faith of many readers, and tempt them to suppose, either that fome accidental error must have crept into the calculations from an ignorance of the language; or that the mandarin, who gave Sir George Staunton the information, must have been prompted by a national pride, which is common every where, but is particularly remarkable in China, to exaggerate the power and refources of his country. It must be allowed, that neither of these circumstances is very improbable; at the fame time it will be found, that the statement of Sir George Staunton does not very effentially differ from other accounts of good authority; and, so far from involving any contradiction, is rendered probable by a reference to thofe defcriptions of the fertility of China, in which all the writers who have vifited the country agree. According According to Duhalde, in the poll made at the beginning of the reign of Kang-hi, there were found 11,052,872 families, and 59,788,364 men able to bear arms; and yet neither the princes, nor the officers of the court, nor the mandarins, nor the foldiers who had ferved and been discharged; nor the literati, the licentiates, the doctors, the bonžas, nor young perfons under twenty years of age; nor the great multitudes living either on the fea or on rivers in barks, are comprehended in this number." The proportion which the number of men of a military age bears to the whole population of any country is generally estimated as 1 to 4. If we multiply 59,788,364 by 4, the refult will be 239,153,456; but in the general calculations on this subject, a youth is considered as capable of bearing arms before he is twenty. We ought therefore to have multiplied by a higher number. The exceptions to the poll feem to include almost all the fuperior claffes of faciety, and a very great number among the lower, When all these circumftances are taken into confideration, the whole population, according to Duhalde, will not appear to fall very fhort of a Duhalde's Hift. of China, 2 vols. folio, 1738. vol.i. p. 244. the 333,000,000 mentioned by Sir George Staunton.' The small number of families, in proportion to the number of perfons able to bear arms, which is a striking part of this statement of Duhalde, is accounted for by a custom noticed by Sir George Staunton as general in China. In the enclosure belonging to one dwelling, he obferves, that a whole family of three generations, with all their refpective wives and children, will frequently be found. One small room is made to ferve for the individuals of each family, fleeping in different beds, divided only by mats hanging from the ceiling. One common room is used for eating. In China there is befides a prodigious number of flaves, who will of course be reckoned as part of the families to which they belong. These two circumstances may perhaps be fufficient, to account for what at first appears to be a contradiction in the statement. To account for this population, it will not be neceffary to recur to the fuppofition of Montef quieu, that the climate of China is in any peculiar manner favourable to the production of children, and that the women are more prolific 2 Embaffy to China, vol. ii. Appen. p. 615. 4to. than |