Just a Cycle ago, a gentleman came on board the ship 'Citizen,' as she
anchored at Lintin, China, from New York, to hear the _latest_ news she
may have brought--125 days old!--the interval was a short one at that
time.
Such as Canton _then_ was in its commercial, social, and domestic life
it has been for two generations a sealed book; nor will the world ever
see its like again! May those who _now_ seek China Opened be as well
received, as little molested, as much protected, as were those over whom
the ægis of treaties never existed, and as bountifully rewarded as those
whose enterprise led them to what was _then_ a 'mysterious land.'
It is _now_, through the untiring encouragement and assistance of the
gentleman above referred to (and who will, I trust, excuse my naming
him)--Robert B. Forbes, Esq., of Boston, U.S.A.--that I have reproduced
in the foregoing pages the days of Old Canton, with which we became
familiar; regretting that to restore those scenes--all of which we saw,
and part of which we were--it fell not to a more able pen.