“If two men unite, their money will buy gold.”

兩人同心，其利斷金

The British traders who went to Canton in the eighteenth century and the Americans who followed them could not speak the Chinese language and few made any attempt to learn it. Cantonese is the most difficult of all the spoken dialects of China. Words of the same sound are given a variety of meanings by changes in tone. A single slip in the tone of a word may change the whole meaning of a sentence and turn a pious phrase into a ribald joke – a circumstance of which Chinese punsters have taken the fullest advantage. Anyone who undertakes to learn that particular dialect must not only master the vocabulary but also become as proficient as a professional singer in the control of his voice.

十八世紀來到廣東的英國人與後來跟隨他們美國人都不會講中文，而且很少有人嘗試要學。廣東話是中國最困難的方言。相同發音的字會因為音調的改變而有不同的意思。音調輕輕微地滑動就能改變整個句子的意思，把一句好話變成下流的笑話，就像中國愛說雙關語的人最擅長的。任何人試圖學習這個特殊方言不僅要精通字彙，還必須變得像職業歌手的專家，擅長控制自己的聲音。

Under the most favorable circumstance it would have taken years of study to become proficient enough in the language for it to be of any practical use. There were no teachers. The Manchu government had threatened with death anyone who taught the language to a foreigner. This was not a new regulation directed against this new generation of traders. For several thousands years there had been a similar prohibition against the teaching of the language to barbarian tribes which was relaxed in the case of Marco Polo and others as a mark of Imperial favor. The early missionaries learned Chinese and translated and printed their tracts by methods as clandestine as those of the counterfeiter.

在最理想的狀況下，需要幾年的時間來熟練語言到足夠實際應用的程度。過去沒有老師。滿州政府威脅人民，教導外國人語言者需處死。然而這並不是直接對抗這一代貿易者的新法規。早在幾千年前，就有相似的禁令阻止野蠻部落學習中國話，但對馬可波羅與其他帝國的貴客們是例外。早期的傳教士學習中文，並用類似偽造者所使用的方法，偷偷摸摸地翻譯、出版他們的教義。

The foreign merchant in fact was equipped with nothing more than a cargo of opium, furs or sandalwood, or a few barrels of Spanish dollars and a desire to trade with the Chinese. He did not know how or where to secure the cargoes of tea and other Chinese commodities, or what he should pay for them. He had only general and often mistaken ideas as to what Chinese might to buy. The problems of finding markets in the interior for the sale of goods or the purchase of produce; of packing and inland transportation and complicated transit taxes were all mysteries and his Chinese associates did not help him to solve them. That was their secret and they guarded it carefully.

外來的商人除了鴨片、毛皮與檀香木這些貨物，幾桶西班牙銀幣，一股想跟中國人做生意的渴望之外，沒有帶上其他東西。他不知道如何或是上那去買茶葉與其他中國商品，或是他該拿什麼付錢。他只有普遍而且經常是錯的想法，像是中國人可能會想要買什麼。在內地如何找到市場做買賣、打包與運輸、複雜的通關稅，這些問題都是團謎，而且被雇用的中國人不會幫忙解決。這是他們的秘密而且被小心看守著。

The Treaty of Nanking which opened a number of ports to the foreigner also ended the Cantonese trading monopoly and gave every Chinese equal opportunity to sell and buy from the foreigners. They were quick to see the possibilities of profit in this new business but there were as helpless as the foreigners in all matters beyond their own shores. Except for the clerks who had worked with foreigners in Canton the Chinese had only a vague idea of what kind of goods a foreigner bought and sold. They knew little or nothing about ocean freight, marine insurance, bill of lading, exchange contracts and all the other complicated mechanism by which the goods of one country are shipped across the sea and sold to the customers in another. Like the British and the Americans, the Chinese business man was faced by the language difficulty. He had an inadequate knowledge of English, the language in which nine-tenths of the international commercial correspondence of the world was conducted.

開放一些港口給外國人的南京條約，不僅終止了廣東人的貿易壟斷，還給予每一個中國人跟外國人做生意的平等機會。中國人馬上就聞到新事業賺錢的可能性，但是對於遠在海岸之外的世界，他們跟外國人一樣無助。除了曾在廣東跟外國人一起工作過的職員，中國人只有大概知道，什麼樣的貨物是外國人想要買賣的。他們幾乎不知道遠洋貨運、海事保險、裝卸費用、交換合約以及其他要把這國家的貨物運送過海賣給另一個國家的顧客，這些複雜的機制。就像英美兩國人，中國生意人被迫面對語言窘境。他大概不知道，全世界有九成的商業通信是用英文在流通的。

This gap between two groups of business men was bridged by the employment of the compradore, a personage peculiar to the China Coast, who represented the taipan in all of hid dealings with Chinese traders. The name is derived from the Portuguese word “compra,” which means “to buy” and it is probable that the first compradores were solely engaged in buying tea and other Chinese produce for export trade. The exporting of Chinese produce was the most important function of the foreign trade at the time that the first compradores were employed. When the foreigner finally found goods the Chinese wanted to buy, the compradores took on the task of selling them. He was a good trader but a pool salesman and it was not until the selling of goods to the Chinese became of equal importance with the purchase of produce from them that he began to lose his dominant position.

雇用買辦這方法替兩個集團的生意人搭起一座橋。買辦是中國沿岸一個相當獨特的角色，他代表大班去處理所有面對中國人的交易（編按：大班就是老闆）。這個名字是由葡萄牙文的「compra」所衍生出來的，意思是「去買」，而且很可能第一批買辦的任務就只是去買要出口的茶葉與其他商品。在那時候，出口中國商品是對外貿易裡最重要的功能。當外國人終於發現中國人想要什麼商品時，買辦同時也被賦予販賣的任務。他是個好交易員卻是個差勁的銷售員，但他不會失去他舉足輕重的職位，直到進貨與銷售變得同樣重要為止。

The foreign trader could not do business with the compradore and the compradore could not do business alone. Each supplied the defects in the knowledge and the training of the other so that foreign trade was made possible only by the dual system in which each played his part. Although each safeguarded himself by contracts and agreements, no written undertakings could possibly foresee and provide for all of the problems which might arise and the arrangement was practical and workable only because of the mutual trust and confidence which was built up between them. Assuming a reasonable amount of honesty and fair play in each side this was a natural growth.

外國商人缺少買辦無法做生意，買辦自己一人也無法做。他們互相彌補知識上與歷練上的弱點，所以對外貿易在彼此各司其職的雙系統運作下變得可能。雖然他們彼此還是會靠一些合約與協議來防衛，但是白紙黑字寫下的承諾並不能預見以及提供來解決所有可能發生的問題；不過基於建立於他們之間的信任與信心，協議依然是實際可行的。假設兩邊各有合理的誠實與公平，信任自然就會滋長。

Neither learned the other’s language. A staff of Chinese interpreter took care of translating documents. The compradore and foreign manager carried on their conversations and negotiated very important deals by the use of pidgin or business English, a language which had been invented by the Cantonese clerks and servants so that they could make themselves understandable to their employers. The word pidgin represents the Cantonese attempts to pronounce the word business. The language contains a vocabulary of several hundreds English words adapted to Chinese pronunciation. The words are used without regard to English grammar but placed in the sentence as they would be in Chinese phrase. In fact the language developed through attempts to make word for word translations from Chinese into English, expressing the sounds of English words by means of Chinese characters in which many words can only be approximated. This accounts for the fact that the English word “security” becomes “sclew” and “that” is hardly recognizable as “lat.” Most of the early British traders came to Canton by way of India and brought with them a few Hindustani words which came into general use and added to the picturesqueness of the pidgin glossary.

誰都沒去學習對方的語言。文件檔案的翻譯由另一個中國翻譯員來處理。買辦與外國管理者繼續用商業英文或是一種被稱為pidgin的奇特語言來對話以及談判重要的交易，這種語言是由廣東籍的辦事員與服務生所發明，好讓雇主可以瞭解他們所想表達的意思。Pidgin這個字代表著廣東人嘗試對business的發音。這種語言包含著數百個被發成廣東腔的英文單字。文字的使用根本不管英文文法，而是把它們放進中文句子裡。事實上這種語言是把中文句子一字一字翻譯成英文字而來的，而發音的方式也是藉由較相似的中文字來表示。這解釋了英文字「security」會被唸成「sclew」，「that」變成難辨認的「lat」。（編按：不要問我這是哪兩個中文字，我投降了。Orz…）大多數早期經由印度來到廣東的英國商人帶來一些常用的印度語，也被加進pidgin這個想像力豐富的專業辭典。

（編按：11/13補充。香港朋友Kary提供一種假設，sclew發音近似「實Q」，廣東話意指吝嗇。「Q」在閩南話也有類似的意義。所以security原意是保護好自己的東西，用吝嗇去聯想還蠻有道理的。）

The language is adequate for most business purposes. For example a typical conversation in the office of a foreign hong might run as follows.

  Taipan: “How fashion that chow-chow cargo he just now stop godown inside?”

  Compradore: “Lat cargo he no can walkee just now. Lat man Kong Tai he no go ploper sclew.”

  Taipan: “How come you talkie sclew no paper? My have got sclew paper safe inside.”

  Compradore: “Aiyah! Lat scelw paper he no can do. Lat sclew man he have go Ningpo more far.”

To the outsider this conversation would be completely meaningless but to the taipan and the compradore and any old-time resident it was perfectly intelligible. The inquiry was about the reason why a shipment if mixed cargo (chow-chow) was still in the godown (warehouse). The compradore replied that the cargo could not be moved (walkee) because security (sclew) of Kong Tai, the purchaser, was not in order. To the taipan’s assertion that he had the security in his safe the compradore replied that it was now worthless because the man who had guaranteed payment for the cargo – “sclew man had go Ningpo more far” – which was the local idiom for stating that he had defaulted and run away from his creditors.

這種語言對大部分的商業用途來說足夠了。舉個例子，下面是一般外國公司辦公室裡的典型對話。

大班：「怎麼這樣 那個 混裝 貨櫃 他 還 現在 停 倉庫 裡面？」

買辦：「那個 貨櫃 他 不 能 走 還 現在。那個 人 光泰 他 沒 得到 合約書 保證。」

大班：「怎麼會 你 說 保證 沒 合約書？ 我 有 得到 保證 合約書 保險櫃 裡面。」

買辦：「唉呀！ 那個 保證 合約書 他 不 能 做。 那個 保證 人 他 有 去 寧波 更 遠。」

對一個局外人來說這場對話完全不知道在講什麼，但是對大班、買辦還有老居民來說完全可以理解。詢問的內容是關於什麼原因讓混裝的貨櫃(Chow-Chow)現在還停在倉庫(godown)裡。買辦回答，貨櫃還不能移動(walkee)，因為買家「光泰」的保證(sclew)不在訂單裡。大班堅持說，他的保險箱裡有擔保品，買辦說那已經沒有價值了，因為那個保證要付款的人- “sclew man had go Ningpo more far” – 這是一句當地的土話，表示他已經違約，跑給債主追去了。

（編按：Aiyah! My English no want go bad, A mi tou fuo.）