In manners they are always civil, or rather obsequious and in dress they are remarkably neat and clean, to whatever rank of life they belong. I shall not attempt a description either of their persons or habits, for the better kind of China paper, which is now common in England, exhibits a perfect representation of both, though perhaps with some slight exaggerations approaching towards the caricatura.

In eating they are easily satisfied, though the few that are rich have many savory dishes. Rice, with a small proportion of flesh or fish, is the food of the poor; and they have greatly the advantage of the Mahometan Indians, whose religion forbids them to eat of many things which they could most easily procure. The Chinese, on the contrary, being under no restraint, eat, besides pork, dogs, cats, frogs, lizards, serpents of many kinds, and a great variety of sea animals, which the other inhabitants of this country do not consider as food: they eat also many vegetables, which an European, except he was perishing with hunger, would never touch.

Voyaging Accounts