To my devoted sons Morrison Brown and Bartlett Golden Yung these reminiscences are affectionately dedicated...

The first five chapters of this book give an account of my early education, previous to going to America, where it was continued, first at Monson Academy, in Monson, Massachusetts, and later, at Yale ...

I was born on the 17th of November, 1828, in the village of Nam Ping (South Screen) which is about four miles southwest of the Portuguese Colony of Macao, and is situated on Pedro Island lying west of...

The Morrison School was opened on the 1st of November, 1839, under the charge of the Rev. S. R. Brown who, with his wife, Mrs. Brown, landed at Macao on the 19th of February, 1839. Brown, who was afte...

Being thus generously provided for, we embarked at Whompoa on the 4th of January, 1847, in the good ship Huntress under Captain Gillespie. As stated above, she belonged to the Olyphant Brothers and wa...

We were in East Windsor for about a week; then we went up to Monson, MA, to enter the Academy there. Monson Academy was, at one time, quite a noted preparatory school in New England, before high schoo...

Before entering Yale, I had not solved the problem of how I was to be carried through the collegiate course without financial backing of a definite and well-assured character. It was an easy matter to...

In entering upon my life’s work which to me was so full of meaning and earnestness, the first episode was a voyage back to the old country, which I had not seen for nearly ten years, but which had nev...

Having at last succeeded in mastering the spoken language sufficiently to speak it quite fluently, I at once set to work to find a position in which I could not only support myself and mother, but als...

The next turn I took, after leaving the Imperial Customs, was clerk in an English house⁠—tea and silk merchants. During the few months that I was with them, I gained quite an insight into mercantile b...

On the 11th of March, 1859, I found myself on board of a Woo-Sik-Kwei, a Chinese boat built in Woo-Sik, a city situated on the borders of the Grand Canal, within a short distance of the famous city of...

In the fall of 1859 a small party of two missionaries, accompanied by Tsang Laisun, planned a trip to visit the Taiping rebels in Nanking. I was asked to join them, and I decided to do so. My object i...

Rebellions and revolutions in China are not new and rare historic occurrences. There have been at least twenty-four dynasties and as many attendant rebellions or revolutions. But with the exception of...

My Nanking visit was utterly barren of any substantial hope of promoting any scheme of educational or political reform for the general welfare of China or for the advancement of my personal interest. ...

In 1863, I was apparently prospering in my business, when, to my great surprise, an unexpected letter from the city of Ngan Khing, capital of An Whui province, was received. The writer was an old frie...

A week after my last interview with the Viceroy and after I had been told that I was to be entrusted with the execution of the order, my commission was made out and issued to me. In addition to the co...

The machinery was not finished till the early spring of 1865. It was shipped direct from New York to Shanghai, China; while it was doubling the Cape of Good Hope on its way to the East, I took passage...

Having scored in a small way this educational victory, by inducing the Viceroy to establish a mechanical training school as a corollary to the arsenal, I felt quite worked up and encouraged concerning...

Taking advantage of their presence, I seized the opportunity to press my educational scheme upon the attention of Ting Yih Chang and urged him to present the subject to the Board of Commissioners of w...

In the spring of 1873, I returned to China on a flying visit for the sole purpose of introducing the Gatling gun⁠—a comparatively new weapon of warfare of a most destructive character. I had some diff...

In the fall of 1875 the last installment of students arrived. They came in charge of a new commissioner, Ou Ngoh Liang, two new Chinese teachers and a new interpreter, Kwang Kee Cheu. These new men we...

The treatment which the students received at the hands of Chinese officials in the first years after their return to China as compared with the treatment they received in America while at school could...

In 1894⁠–⁠5 war broke out between China and Japan on account of Korea. My sympathies were enlisted on the side of China, not because I am a Chinese, but because China had the right on her side, and Ja...

The coup d’état of September, 1898, was an event memorable in the annals of the Manchu Dynasty. In it, the late Emperor Kwang Su was arbitrarily deposed; treasonably made a prisoner of state; and had ...

A visitor to the City of Hartford, at the present time, will be likely to meet on the streets groups of Chinese boys, in their native dress, though somewhat modified, and speaking their native tongue,...

Such in brief outline is the Chinese Educational Mission to the United States. The head and front of the whole marvellous enterprise, humanly speaking, is Commissioner Yung Wing. While others whose co...

Yung Wing, after two years and a half spent at Monson, MA, was, in 1850, though but poorly fitted for want of time, admitted to the Freshman Class in Yale College. His career in college was, in some r...

As for his grand scheme, he had settled it in his own mind that the first step to be taken toward carrying it out was to contrive a way of getting it before some influential public man or men⁠—a thing...

The result of the interview was that Wing entered his service and was made a Mandarin of the fifth rank, there being nine degrees of that dignity in the Chinese official system. At this time the great...

Yung Wing was at this time under official control of the last named, who, on being summoned to Tientsin, sent him word, for he was at a distance from him, to join the Commission at Tientsin as soon as...

The doctrine held by the Chinese in relation to the spirits or genii that rule over winds and waters, especially running streams and subterranean waters. This doctrine is universal and inveterate amon...