Excerpt from English and Cantonese Dictionary

The preparation of this edition of the late Dr. Chalmers' Hugh's/i and Cantonese Dz'rtz'onnry/ has engrossed the whole of my limited leisure during the past three years. The labour entailed has been peculiarly fascinating, and with special significance for me, since it was partly under the distinguished and safe guidance of Dr. Chalmers that I acquired my first quickening insight into the Chinese language, script and spoken. I still vividly retain very clear recollection of a periodical after-dinner meeting which I was privileged to attend, in the middle eighties, at the former London Mission House, where, round a lamp lighted table, under the personal presidency of the then venerable head of the London Mission, sat the late Dr. Faber, Mr. J. H. Stewart Lockhart (now His Honour the Com missioner for Wei-hai-wei), Mr. (now Dr.) G. H. Bateson Wright Head Master of Queen's College, Mr. Addys of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank, the late Mr. A. Falconer Second Master of the old Government Central School, and Others, eagerly discussing, assiduously comparing, commenting on, and revising, translations of portions of a minor Chinese classic made, since the previous session, by individualmembers of the class. Ihence regard it as a distinct honour to have been entrusted with the making and launch ing of a new edition of this dictionary, which, when first issued, was one of the earliest first-fruits of Dr. Chalmers' arduous and varied labours in the wide field of Sinology.

I have interfered neither with the original method of transliteration - highly praised by so competent and exacting a critic as Dr. Eitel, formerly Inspector of Schools in this Colony - nor with the system of tone-marks adopted; both are possibly as effective and useful as any Other of several in present use. If, in any subsequent edition, it is deemed advisable to change the mode of marking the pronunciation, such change, I think, should be made on the lines indicated in the reform movement for acquiring modern languages now in active progress among the recognized leaders of phonetic reform in Europe; and with which, in Germany, Professor Vietor; in France, Monsieur Paul Passy, and Monsieur l'abbc Rousselot - the discoverer of the system of experimental phonetics which, with its remarkable instruments of precision, brings to bear on the analysis of sounds the exactitude of microscopic examination; and in England, Mr. Walter Rippmann, are so closely and prominently connected. In which case, it might be found necessary to adopt the alphabetic symbols authorized by the Association Phonétique Internationale. The change implied is not so radical as would seem; the difficulties in the way of such an enterprise are not as great as might, at first sight, be imagined. There can be no question about a careful study of phonetics being essential, both to the correct and fluent acquirement of any spoken foreign language, and to the checking and setting right of the mai-pronunciations of oue's own mother tongue. To all teachers, but especially to such as are engaged in imparting a. Knowledge of English to foreigners, an intelligent grounding in phonetics seems an absolute sine qua non. The study of this subject is still in its infancy; but, at least one dictionary, based on phonetic principles, is already in existence.

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