Indian Antiquary Vol 31

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 28

THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[JANUARY, 1902.
twelve persons; at night all watch vigilantly, as they are afraid of the natives. All the houses are protected by timber on wooden props; the walls of a few are of mats, but in most cases of canes and mud with clay with a facing of lime, and generally floored with small planks. Thus they are all a very flimsy affair; and for the most part the whole family lives within one door, and all have one surname. Each family has a family name by which they are known: in addition to this they have their names, Mirandas33 or any other cognomen. Besides this patronymic (?) they have their own names. The oldest person of this family has the names, in order to give an account of how many there are; and no person can go twenty miles out of the village where he dwells without a letter from the mandarins: if he is found without it he is imprisoned as a robber; because all the roads are full of spies. For this letter they give something: the letter declares what person he is and his age and all for which he is given leave.
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With respect to the courts of justice that there are in this city of Cantão, [f. 117] the first is the Cancheufu,35 which is the court of the city. This has twelve or thirteen mandarins and one hundred clerks: every mandarin lives in the court where he is a mandarin. The court of the pochançi has some twenty mandarins petty and great, clerks, chimchaes, 36 messengers, and other persons, with clerks: in all there are more than two hundred. The court of the anchaçy has as many other great and petty mandarins, clerks, and other persons. The court of the toçi has six or seven mandarins and many clerks. The cehi is one who has charge of the men of arms and of the salt: he has many clerks; and the cuchi who has charge of all the affairs of justice is one who has many clerks. The court of the tutão and the choypi and the great and lesser congom and of the tiqos.37 Besides these there are some fifteen or twenty whom I do not name. There is no doubt that all the mandarins of this city of Cantão must have over seven or eight thousand servants all employed at the expense of the people. I do not speak of other great courts of the mandarins who keep sheep, 38 who have no charges, so that they may be reckoned as houses of men of the people. Take note that every house of those of the mandarins has terraces and freestone for the purpose of being able in each one to erect a tower, and here there is cut stone in blocks enough to build anew a Babylon. I pass over their houses of prayer and the streets which are so much carved as to defy description. Then as regards wood, one of these houses has enough to timber a fortress with ten towers. These houses have teiçães3 of strong gates within, all with houses and stables. Each of these houses covers enough ground to form a handsome town. The house of the aytao also is very large, and has great, strong, beautiful gates, and the wall at the hinges stands on the surface. Of all those of Cantão this is the abundance of the mandarins; and every day some go and others come, so that in every three years and more all have gone and others come. Since I have been in this city many crews have been changed.
As I have said of the much stone, so also of the much craft, that there is [f. 117v] in this province of Cantão,40 not one of war, all of peace, of such a number of royal galleys and foists and brigantines, all with gunwales and beaks and masted in the manner of galleys. If
92 The writer here several times uses the word parenteira, for parentela. (For a similar use of the word see D. Lopes's Textos em Aljamía Portuguesa, p. 136, 1. 11.)
33 I cannot explain the use of this name in this connection. Perhaps the copyist has blundered.
The orig. has "aboanha," which I cannot explain, unless it be connected with avo, grandfather. Kwangchau-fil="the city district of Canton, with the surrounding country; also the magistrate who presides over it." (Mor., Chin.-Eng. Dict. p. 508.)
36 See Introd,
Regarding the various officials mentioned see Introd.
38 Orig. "que teem ovelhas." I cannot explain this, and suspect some error of the copyist's. Perhaps we should read "que são velhos"="who are old."
I cannot explain this word, which appears to be a copyist's blunder. Sr. Lopes suggests trações forms. 40 Cf. Gaspar da Cruz in Purchas, Pilg. III. p. 178.
I am not certain if this is the exact meaning of postica here. (Cf. Jal, Gloss, Naut., s. vv. 'Posticcio,' 'Postiza,' etc.)