SUMMERS, James.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

The Rudiments of the Chinese Language, First edition, uncommon complete with the folding table as here. Aged just 25, the author (1828-1891) was appointed Professor of Chinese at King's College, London, where he taught a young Ernest Satow.Summers's contributions to Chinese and Japanese studies have only been recently appreciated. His publications reached a far wider audience than those printed by sinological presses in Malacca and Hong Kong, he catalogued the extensive Asian collections of the India Office Library, and produced the first translations of Shakespeare into Japanese. He also had a knack for attracting trouble: "On 7 June 1849, while Summers was strolling around the city in Macao, he run into the local celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi. There, he encountered a Catholic procession in a narrow alley. Catholic tradition expected all male passers-by to remove their hats and, thereby, show respect. But as Summers was a Protestant, he resolutely refused to comply and ended up in prison. One day later, Summers wrote to the U.S. consul in Macao and to other Westerners who had travelled to Macao with him, and asked for their help. Somehow, his message reached Captain (later Admiral of the Fleet Sir) Henry Keppel (1809-1904), a senior British naval officer on the China Station, who thought it his duty to rescue his countryman and therefore sent ships to Macao to demand Summers' release. Somehow in the melée, several English and Portuguese soldiers were either kill

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