“No country in the world, certainly no pagan land, has ever possessed such voluminous documents calculated to elucidate the condition of the empire generally, or of its cities in particular, as China. The Statistical Account of the territories ruled over by the present Tartar Dynasty, comprises two or three hundred volumes. It gives an account of the extent, population, division, productions, antiquities, mountains, rivers, revenue, defences, schools of learning, public buildings, and remarkable men of the whole empire; and, if properly studied and well translated, would present a more complete picture of China, than has ever yet been exhibited. In addition to the general statistics of this great country, there exist separate accounts of each particular province, prefecture, and district, contained in the mighty whole.”
This work is the earliest Western monograph on the history of Shanghai. Medhurst gives a fascinating account of the walled town based entirely on Chinese sources going back to the early 11th century. All of the maps are reproduced from Chinese gazetteers. Rare in commerce. No copy recorded at auction.
