James Mew

“ The houses are so lofty that you may pluck the stars. The virtuous read their sacred book. They hate the French. The little girls have red cheeks, but the ladies are fair as the white gem. The husbands and wives love each other. The playhouses are shut in the day, but open at night; the players are handsome, and their performance delightful.”
Such is the style of Chinese poetry. ”

“ CHINESE POETRY.
The origin of Chinese poetry is shown by the component parts of the character which they use to express it. They signify “words of the temple,” and point out the primarily religious nature of Chinese verse. The people have a great respect for this species of art, and most of them are themselves poets. The moral maxims of their philosopher Confucius are written in the terse epigrammatical style which seems to be synonymous with poetry among them. The accuracy and conciseness of their poetical ideas cannot fail to remind us of the ancient poetry of the Hebrews. ”

“ The Sheerking contains upwards of three hundred odes. One of them, on marriage, has been well translated by Sir William Jones. The lines consist of no definite number of syllables, and the rhyme is equally irregular, and seems to be altogether arbitrary. ”