This was forcibly illustrated in regard to the introduction of the telegraph, against which the Chinese had set their faces, partly because of the disturbance of geomantic influences caused by the tall telegraph poles, and partly because they sincerely doubted that the wires could achieve the results claimed.

But when it was discovered that some wily Cantonese had learnt over the telegraph the names of the three highest graduates at the Peking triennial examination, weeks before the names could be known in Canton by the usual route, and had enriched himself by buying up the tickets bearing those names in the great lotteries which are always held in connexion with this event, Chinese opposition went down like a house of cards; and the only question with many of the literati was whether, at some remote date, the Chinese had not invented telegraphy themselves.
Moveable types of baked clay were invented about A.D.1043, and some centuries later they were made of wood and of copper or lead; but they have never gained the favour accorded to block-printing, by which most of the great literary works have been produced.

The newspapers of modern days are all printed from moveable types, and also many translations of foreign books, prepared to meet the increasing demand for Western learning.

The Chinese have always been a great reading people, systematic education culminating in competitive examinations for students going back to the second century A.D.This is perhaps a suitable place for explaining that the famous _Peking Gazette_, often said to be the oldest newspaper in the world, is not really a newspaper at all, in that it contains no news in our sense of the term.

It is a record only of court movements, list of promoted officials, with a few selected memorials and edicts.