The London Saturday Journal: 4 Abril 1840

Na edição de 4 de Abril de 1840  - há 183 anos - do semanário The London Saturday Journal foi publicada uma das descrições mais pormenorizadas da primeira metade do século 19 sobre a viagem marítima entre Macau e Cantão. Esta ligação era obrigatória para todos os que pretendiam fazer comércio com a China. O artigo intitula-se "China and the Chinese nº 1 - Landing at Macao and Passage from thence do Canton or a Sail up the Pearl River". É o grande destaque daquela edição do jornal que ocupa a mancha da capa com um mapa do delta do rio das pérolas. Aqui ficam alguns excertos e, para melhor contextualizar o texto, adicionei algumas imagens, neste caso, pinturas da época.

Macao is situated upon a peninsula at the southern of Heang Shan, an island in the magnificent estuary of the River and therefore lies on the left hand of seafaring men in their voyage to that city.

Now, after an individual has endured the tedium of crossing the line, amidst heavy rains and long calms, a month's driving before a gale of wind in the southern ocean and then sweated under the sultry heats of the Chinese Sea till, in all, four moons or more have passed over his head, he hails with a thrilling sense of delight the sight of the well built edifices of Macao, as they glisten in the sun and readily consents to pay the pilot a certain number of dollars to allow a partner to convey ashore in the boat that had brought the said pilot to the ship. The sum varies, as a Chinaman knows how to ask enough but, if I remember rightly, I paid six dollars for a distance of about 8 miles, which was not unreasonable. As the boat draws within the semicircular indentation of the land in front of Macao, a shoal little skiffs, or floating cots, gather round and a peal of voices 'My boote' 'My boote', salute the ear of the stranger. The beings from whom these sounds issue are the Tanka women, who make their little vessels both their home and the means of their livelihood. (...)

She is obliged to land him opposite the Chinese custom house which through the wretched of the imbecility of the Portuguese is allowed to hoist its official flag and foreigners within a few yards of the governor's residence.

The paid to this custom house is one dollar for each person it is sort of paying one's footing upon the celestial land .If you refuse the sum is exacted of the poor boatwoman who conveyed you; generosity, therefore, prompts you to payment.

After the stranger has saluted his friends, or beaten up for a acquaintances by means of commendatory letters, which is not a difficult thing, as the residents are hospitable and courteous, he prepares for the necessary voyage to Canton.

This was performed in one of the schooners which at intervals plied between Macao and Canton to carry passengers goods and forth. The fare was for some time ten dollars and the passenger, of course, provided for himself. Every one, when he sets out the place of embarkation, is followed by one or more Colies, carrying fowls, eggs, rice, wine ale and items for the tea table, a stock of all kinds of fruit besides his luggage. He is obliged by authority to start from the landing opposite to the custom where his trunks are opened and examined by the Chinese. This, with a little tact, is generally a very slight business; without it, oftentimes a source of great annoyance. (...)

The process of examination is thus settled in a few seconds and you are allowed to proceed on board the schooner and choose your berth for the night. The first objects that meet you on the way are the Nine Islands, a cluster of small islets that are strewed upon the surface of the water like so many ant-hills.

If your passage is in the summer, when the wind is from the north west or the south west monsoon prevails, you advance gaily towards the point of your destination, with a calm or two, perhaps during the hotter parts of the day. If, on the contrary, your passage be during the winter, when the north-east monsoon prevails, you not unfrequently get a foul wind and rough weather which modify the pleasure of a trip not a little.

The island of Lintin or Linting as it ought to be spelt lies in your way about twenty miles from Macao. It is a conical island terminating in a peak which renders it a conspicuous object from a great distance. (...)

Detalhe do mapa publicado e que o jornal diz ser do  The Chinese Repsitory.

The hills on the island where on Macao is situate are lofty and barren and present a peculiarly rugged appearance. These as you proceed up the river stretch to a distance partly behind and partly to the left or as seamen say upon your larboard quarter. On your right you have series of lofty hills of rude and castellated forms. (...) A few miles above Macao on the west is the anchorage of Cum Sing Moon, formed by an island and an indentation in the coast. Here the foreign ships used to lie during the summer months and brave the typhon in July or August with very little shelter from the land by which they were too partially surrounded. Here I landed in my last visit to China and was very courteously treated by the inhahitants who were much amused at my botanical pursuits and still more in inspecting my clothes boxes pins and so on. I bought some sweet cakes of a man and presented an old lady who was sitting by with one This act of attention seemed to overwhelm her she smiled blushed and sat motionless in a conscious fit of confusion.

Stretching far to the west is the harbour of Cap Suy Moon to which the vessels were compelled to repair after they had been driven away from Cum sing moon for the misconduct of the opium dealers who sold the drug to buyers under the patronage of the government cruisers whose commanders received a fee for every chest that was lowered down the ship's side. After the ebbs and flows of a day or two the voyager comes in sight of the Bocca Tigris, or narrow entrance into what is more evidently a branch of the Canton River for on the outside of this one might fancy oneself at sea from the breadth of the estuary. The hills near this entrance on the left side are of a peculiar form gibbous or hump backed on one side and nearly perpendicular on the other. (...)

On your right is the beautiful little anchorage of Chuen Pe, formed in part by a jutting ridge of hills whose summits fairly crested with pine trees. On the extremity of the hilly projection is a small watch tower which among the shady fir trees has a very picturesque effect. (...) On each side of the entrance the Chinese have erected fortifications to keep out aggressors. As we draw near to Canton we find few objects of an architectural kind to elicit our admiration. There is an edifice on our right which is a comhination of the temple and the pagoda and being under the shade of some spreading trees has a very pretty effect a Chinese fort or two which were erected in consequence of the hammering the Imogene and the Andromache gave to the forts at the Bogue in 1834 a very small allowance of skill and intrepidity would suffice to take them. There are besides two objects called the French and the Dutch Folly the remains of some defences erected some years ago by the Dutch and l rench with the view of obtaining a footing in China. (...) 

A different spectacle is presented by the flower boats and others of a similar construction occupied by families of the wealthy who love to roam and to enjoy a kind of amphihious life. These are a sort of floating house with a flat roof and upright sides and chapiters or cornices of fantastic carvings they are also panelled and adorned with a vast deal of open work they are often painted green with a profusion of gilded points flowers. In a word they are very beautiful in a sense which can readily appreciate and nothing seems wanting to recommend them to the heart as well as to the eye but the thought that are the abodes of innocence and truth. (...)

Feitorias estrangeiras em Cantão: primeira metade séc. 19

We are now supposed to be in front of the European factories which are a line of edifices built in foreign style and present a goodly sight. I said a line but perhaps I might have said square with as much propriety for each gate within the line facade conducts you to a multitude of dwellings and warehouses in which some of the most enterprising of merchants transact business or lay up their stores. Apart from these factories there is not a single specimen of architecture to merit a attention buildings we have without number but all alike and contemptible in their aspect. The style and taste which us so well when we beheld a hamlet bosomed in a grove here disappoints us beyond measure. We land perhaps at the steps conduct us to a garden once owned by the East India Company where the trees and shrubs in full bloom perchance comfort the eye and make us ready to forgive the Chinese architect who seems to have been aware that a city of cottages makes a despicable figure.

The factories are surmounted with broad terraces where foreigners refresh themselves morning and evening with the winds that happen to blow in the hotter seasons of the year. From one of these we can take a survey of the whole city of Canton with the lofty hills that lie upon the back and north side of it a countless display of buildings congregated together in thick and confused array without a single structure of size or elevation to relieve the monotonous sameness of the entire landscape.

"New China Street in Canton"1836–1837, ilustração de Lauvergne; litografia de Bichebois

This has arisen from the deficiency of Chinese architectural skill which will not allow them to form a roof of any considerable span Instead of rafters and tie beams and other mechanical contrivances for resisting a lateral pressure their beams run from end to end and must be helped by pillars if there be any breadth in the slope at all. The general reader may not have directed his attention to the manner in which our roofs are constructed and therefore may not understand me but this I may say without the risk of being unintelligible that every ingenious device which a workman takes among us to strengthen his roof and to render pillars unnecessary is altogether overlooked by the Chinese.

In front of the factory once tenanted by the chiefs of the East India Company is a large quadrangular gallery covered by a broad roof and used as a promenade. This was built by an English architect who was obliged to use Chinese assistants. At the head of these assistants was a man who laid claim to certain architectural pretensions and thought himself more than a match for the fank kwei builder. The latter of course constructed the roof so as to render

intermediate pillars unnecessary and I dare say valued himself upon the skill he had displayed in the contrivance. The Chinese viewed the matter in a different light and felt that to hang a roof upon nothing was only possible in a dream he applied therefore to the chief of the factory and stated his reasons with so much effect that he obtained an order for the rearing of sundry unwieldy pillars for helping a roof which could have helped itself. The foreigner was mortified exceedingly but his science went for nothing with a man who ought to have been a Chinese or anything else for the mind and conception he had. To relieve the unsightliness he fluted the pillars but this was only to gain a second discomfiture for the Chinese architect and the Anglo Chinese chief decided that they looked better without it there they stand therefore in all their naked and useless deformity They say it broke the poor man's heart.

Sailing Distances
From Macao to Nine Islands 6 miles
From Macao to Lintin 20 miles
From Macao to Cum-Sing-Moon 15 miles
Breadth of river measured across Lintin nearly 18 miles
Sailing distance from Macao to the Bogue about 50 miles
Sailing distance from the Bogue to Whampoa nearly 30 miles
From Whampoa to Canton 12 miles
There are many shallows near the Bogue but there is water enough in Narrowest part of the Bogue  mid channel to admit ships of the largest size as far as Whampoa."