First published in 1847, this is an important description of what were then little-known parts of China by the botanist Robert Fortune (1812–80). Son of a hedger, Fortune rose to be one of the most famous gardeners, botanists and plant hunters of his day, making several visits to China to bring out commercially important plants, especially tea for introduction to British India, and ornamental plants (many now bearing the name fortunei) which were enthusiastically taken up by Victorian gardeners. His three years in China took him to areas newly open to Europeans after Chinese defeat in the First Opium War (1839–42). His sometimes trenchant criticisms of the Chinese - like his contemporaries, he was fully persuaded of the superiority of the West - are balanced by his knowledgeable comments on local flora and plant cultivation, and the book remains an insightful early description of inland regions of China.
Contents
1. Introduction; 2. First view of China and the impressions produced; 3. Leave Hong-Kong for Amoy; 4. Leave Amoy; 5. Land at Chusan; 6. First visit to Ning-po; 7. Remarks on the Chinese language; 8. Shanghae visited at the end of 1843; 9. Return to the South of China; 10. Visit to the Ning-po green tea district; 11. The tea-plant of China; 12. Chusan archipelago; 13. Shanghae in 1844; 14. Chinese cotton cultivation; 15. Climate of China; 16. Chinese agriculture; 17. Return to Chusan; 18. Plants shipped for England; 19. Spring in the north of China; 20. Sail for Foo-chow-foo on the River Min; 21. Engage a passage in a junk.
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