Mateer was at no time a very prolific contributor to the home newspapers and periodicals. For about ten years, with some frequency, he wrote for “The Presbyterian Banner” letters concerning the work of the mission done by himself and others in China; but after that he was too busy to continue such writing, except at long intervals. Once or twice he sent to the United States more labored replies to what he considered misleading articles that had appeared in such periodicals as “The Princeton Review,” in regard to the condition of things in China. He greatly deprecated laudation of matters Chinese and unwarranted hopefulness as to the immediate future of their country. He was strongly inclined to question the wisdom of the policy which the United States was pursuing in China forty or fifty years ago, and he did not hesitate to express in print here at home his views on that line of topics. Beyond these fugitive contributions to the newspapers and periodicals he published little else in this country, save a booklet or two, one or more of which he prepared for the use of the Board at their request. Sometimes he questioned whether his slight use of the home press might not leave the impression there that he was not doing as much as others who were more frequent in their contributions; but all the same he gave himself to the other work which his hands found to do.

Most of his contributions to current literature appeared in China and were written for “The Chinese Recorder.” His articles in this periodical extend over almost his entire missionary life, some of them being brief, but many of them being elaborate discussions of great subjects affecting directly or indirectly the work of evangelization in non-Christian lands. His book on the Chinese term for God was not published until 1902, and, of course, was in English, though with copious extracts from Chinese literature. His only other English book was a review of Dr. Nevius’ “Methods of Missions.”

His publications in Chinese, as we shall presently see, were very considerable in number, and were of large importance to the work of missions; for he at no time allowed himself to be diverted to the production of any treatise that would not be helpful in the one service to which he consecrated his life. But before he began to avail himself of the press for his own books, he was somewhat unwillingly compelled for a while to take the management of a printing establishment. Down at Shanghai there was already a mission press, the funds for the establishment of which had in large part been contributed for that distinct purpose, and which had been left hitherto to the management of the Presbyterian missionaries of that general region. The Synod of China—by order of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States—was organized in the autumn of 1870, and the first meeting was held at Shanghai. The condition of the mission press at that place was brought before the synod, and was by that body handed over to the foreign missionaries in attendance, as more properly belonging to their control. A plan covering the entire operation of the plant, as drawn up by Mateer in a committee and approved by the entire body, was sent home to the Board for sanction, which in due time it received. One of the things for which immediate provision was necessary was a man to take charge of the establishment, and the choice, after repeated efforts to secure some other suitable person, and after his own refusal to take the place, returned to him in such a way that he felt that he could not decline it, if limited to a period of a year, and with the privilege of spending some time as necessary up at Tengchow. Of course, temporary arrangements had to be made for the conduct of the school. For this purpose Julia’s sister, Maggie, was called into service; and with such assistance as she could command she gave excellent satisfaction. She was also in possession of the Mateer home. As to the work to which he was thus temporarily called at Shanghai, he said in his Journal:

It was not until August, 1872, that he finally went back to Tengchow to resume his work there.

The details of his life while at Shanghai probably would not interest most readers. He said of it in his Journal, under date of January 29, 1872:

Two sides of his capabilities were there brought into special requisition. One of these was his efficiency as a business manager,—a characteristic due partly to his native qualities, and partly to his habits of accuracy, of wise forethought, of careful oversight, and of insistence on the faithful performance of duty by all employees. This side of his character is brought out by his “letter books.” Separation by the space of half a globe from the base of supplies made it necessary to anticipate wants by eight or ten months. For convenient reference he caused every business letter, and many others, to be copied. Especially as the school and college at Tengchow grew on his hands he had to conduct what was in reality a large miscellaneous business, under conditions that were very exceptionally difficult. He had not only to provide for his own wants in his family and in his work, but also to accommodate others by acting as their agent. His orders had to go sometimes to Shanghai, but more frequently to London, or to New York, or to some place in the interior of the United States. Many are curiosities, owing to the nature and the range of articles included—from a steam engine or a telescope or costly chemical supplies to a paper of pins. Some of the lists cover more than ten pages in the copy. Woe to the merchant or agent in London or New York or Shanghai who by mistake or for other reason sent without adequate explanation any article that was not quite in accordance with the order! He might expect to get a sharp letter, and a demand to rectify the mistake if that were practicable. Service as treasurer of the mission also gave him drill. Shilly-shally workmen are one of the horrors which sometimes call from him in his Journal groans of anguish. When he had completed his charge of the press establishment, including as it did a book department, a job department, a dwelling for the superintendent, quarters for the workmen, all of whom were Chinese, a chapel for these workmen, and other equipments, it was a well-organized business, running regularly and smoothly, and doing its work about as efficiently as was possible under the conditions.

The other side of his capabilities there especially called into exercise was his mechanical gifts. As an illustration, the following from his Journal, under the same date as that just given, will answer:

He consented to manage the press only until a competent man could be secured to take it off his hands. When casting about for such a person, his mind had been directed to his brother John, nearly a year before he was himself forced into this position. John had hoped to go to college, and to prepare for the ministry, and to go out as a missionary, but, on account of certain tendencies developed as to his health, he was compelled to abandon his purpose. As to his mechanical gifts and his ability to turn them into use in a great variety of ways, he resembled Calvin; and the latter was so confident that John could soon fit himself to be a competent superintendent of the press at Shanghai that he advised the Board of Missions to make inquiry in regard to him. The result was that eventually he was selected for the place, and he arrived in China early in August, 1871. Before he could satisfactorily enter on his duties it was necessary for him to acquire some knowledge of the language and to acquaint himself with the business committed to his charge. This detained Calvin until late in that year; and after a period of some three months spent at Tengchow, he returned to Shanghai to assist John in moving the press to new and much better premises that had been purchased. The moving proper was a heavy job, requiring a week of hard, dirty labor. The distance was about a mile, mostly by water, but by land a hundred or more yards at either end. While thus engaged, although he was no longer officially at the head of the business, he took the main charge, so as to allow his brother to give his time chiefly to the acquisition of the language and to other things that he needed to learn.

The new place is the same now occupied by the press in Peking Road. Under the superintendency of Rev. G. F. Fitch, it has become the center not only of the Presbyterian missions, but of the general missionary activity all over China. In writing to his brother as early as November, 1869, he said of this plant: “It is a very important place, and would give you an extensive field for doing good. The establishment is not very large, it is true, as compared with similar establishments in such cities as New York or Philadelphia; yet it is the largest and best of the kind in China. It not only does all the printing for all our missionaries, but a great deal of job work for others; besides making and selling a large amount of type.” After he had completed his term of the management, and while helping John to get into the traces, he wrote to one of the secretaries of the Board:

The last record that has come down to us concerning his work there is: “We have just sold to the Chinese government a large font of Chinese type. They are going to use movable metal type. This is a large step for them to take, and it will do good. China yields slowly, but she is bound to yield to Christianity and Christian civilization.”

At no subsequent period of his life had he any part in the management of a printing establishment, but indirectly he continued to have much to do with the press. He was a member of a joint committee of the Shantung and the Peking mission, in charge of publications, and as such he had to acquaint himself with what was needed, and with what was offered, so as to pass intelligent judgment. Unofficially and as a friend whose aid was solicited, he revised one or more of the books which his associates submitted to him for criticism. At the General Conference of Missionaries, held at Shanghai in 1877, a committee, of which he was a member, was appointed to take steps to secure the preparation of a series of schoolbooks for use in mission schools. Not long afterward he published an elaborate paper on the subject, discussing in it the character which such publications should have, and especially calling attention to the need of peculiar care as to the Chinese words which ought to be employed in the treatises on the sciences. That committee diligently set itself to work, and initiated measures for a rather comprehensive set of books by various missionaries to meet the want recognized in this general field. He was himself called upon to prepare several books, some of which he was willing to undertake; others he put aside as not properly falling to him. In one or two instances he claimed for himself precedence as to treatises suggested for others to write. Some friction occurred, and when the Conference met again in 1890 that committee was discharged, and an Educational Association, composed of missionaries familiar with the needs of schools, and confining its functions more exclusively to the publication of books for teaching—largely under his leadership—was formed. He was its first chairman. This change he had warmly favored, and he was an active member of the Association. In it he was chairman of a committee on scientific terms in Chinese, a subject of great difficulty, and of prime importance in the preparation of text-books. In the subsequent years he was so much occupied with the revision of the Mandarin Bible, and with other duties, that he could give to the technical terms only a secondary place in his activities. Still, six years after he accepted this chairmanship he says: “I have collected a large number of lists of subjects for terms in chemistry, physics, mathematics, astronomy, geology, metallurgy, photography, watch-making, machinery, printing, music, mental and moral philosophy, political economy, theology, and so forth.” Subsequently he continued this work.

The first literary production of his own pen in Chinese was a tract on infant baptism; this was called forth by local conditions at Tengchow. A small sheet tract, entitled “A Prayer in Mandarin,” also followed early. As chairman of the committee appointed by the Educational Association, he made a report on chemical terms, and recommended a new and distinctively Chinese method for the symbols in that science. This was printed.

In a preliminary report of the Shanghai press, made in September, 1871, he, in a list of books in course of preparation, mentions under his own name as author the following: “1. Catechism on Genesis, with answers to the more difficult questions,—finished, needing only a slight revision. 2. An explanation of the moral law as contained in the ten commandments,—half-finished. 3. Scripture Text-Book and Treasury, being Scripture references by subjects, supplying in great part the place of a concordance,—one-third finished.” All of these had been under way for several years, but had been frequently shunted off the track by other imperative work. Very soon after that date the catechism was published. He had a good deal to do with Julia’s “Music Book,” especially in coining appropriate terminology, though he never claimed joint authorship in it. Along with Dr. Nevius, he published a hymn book for use in Chinese services; and down to the close of his life, especially on a Sabbath when he did not preach, he now and then made an additional Chinese version of a hymn. In fact, whenever he heard a new hymn that especially moved him he wished to enrich the native collection by a translation of it into their speech. One which the Chinese came greatly to like was his rendering of the Huguenot song, “My Lord and I.” A subject that was always dominant in his mind and heart was the call to the ministry, and it was significant that one of the last things on which he worked was a translation of the hymn which has the refrain, “Here am I, send me.” It was not quite finished when his illness compelled him to lay down his pen; but recently at a meeting of the Chinese student volunteers, constituting a company rising well toward one hundred and fifty, that hymn was printed on cards, and a copy was given to each of these candidates for the ministry. In 1907 he had carried a theological class through the Westminster Shorter Catechism, and as an outcome his translation was published. This is the last religious book he made in Chinese. During his long service as a missionary he taught a number of theological classes in various studies, and his lectures were regarded as very superior, but he published none of them.

His schoolbooks all originated in the necessities of his own work as a teacher. The first thus to force itself upon his attention was an arithmetic. He was already at work on it in 1868, and it went to press while his brother John was superintending the plant at Shanghai. The preparation of such a book, to one unacquainted with the conditions under which this one was made, may seem to have been a rather easy undertaking, and to have required little more than a sufficient mastery of the Chinese language and of English; yet there were some perplexing questions that arose in connection with it. For instance, the method of writing numbers horizontally was wholly unknown to the Chinese. Should the new arithmetic use the western, or should it retain the Chinese method? To retain the Chinese would be to train the pupils in a usage that would be confusing in subsequent reading of western mathematics; to abandon it would be equally confusing in printing the text of the book, which, according to Chinese usage, must be arranged perpendicularly. The difficulty was gotten over by duplicating each pattern example, giving it once horizontally and once perpendicularly. Pupils using the book were permitted to take their choice in performing their work, but in the text proper all numbers appeared vertically. Such lines as those dividing the numerator and denominator of a fraction stood perpendicularly, with the figures to the right and the left. Until he published his arithmetic, the Chinese numerals had been employed; he introduced the Arabic. At the dawn of the new era subsequent to the Boxer outbreak, almost the first book in demand by Chinese teachers and pupils outside the mission schools was a western arithmetic; and among others put upon the market were many “pirated” editions of Mateer’s book, printed on cheap paper and with wooden blocks. The publishers had not yet learned the significance of “copyright.” The circulation of the book, however brought about, had at least the effect of immediately increasing the reputation of its author among the scholarly classes outside the church. Of the editions issued by the press at Shanghai tens of thousands of copies have been sold. Dr. Fitch writes that “it is impossible to state the total number,” and that “the book has gone into all parts of the empire.”

In October, 1884, he submitted to the schoolbook committee of the Educational Association the manuscript of his geometry, and in doing so he said of it:

The book was published the following year. To the same committee he reports in March, 1882, that his algebra was then all in manuscript, and only needing revision and some rearrangement before printing. The geometry was followed by his algebra, first part. These have had a large sale, though, because fewer studied this branch, not the equal of the arithmetic.

On January 14, 1908, he sent to the manager of the press the preface to the second volume of his algebra, which covers the same ground as the “University” edition in the United States. Of this Dr. Hayes says: “Over twenty years ago he began the preparation of Part II of his algebra, and the draft then made was used in manuscript for many years. Other duties pressed upon him, and he was compelled to lay it away unfinished. Yet he had not forgotten it, but from time to time he would make a step in advance. It was only a few months before his death that the work was completed and published.”

There were a number of other books which he planned, on some of which he did considerable work, but none of which he completed. One of these was so colossal in its projected scope and scholarship that it deserves special notice because indicative of the large things to which early in his missionary career he was already eager to give his time and abilities. This was a Mandarin dictionary. In its preparation he sought to associate with himself Rev. Chauncey Goodrich, of Peking; and in writing to him under date of June 6, 1874, he thus stated his conception of the work:

Considerable preliminary work had already been done, when the death of Mrs. Goodrich compelled her husband to withdraw from the partnership; and the project was abandoned by Mateer, though with a hope that it might be resumed. In 1900, however, as the fruit of this and kindred studies he published an analysis of two thousand one hundred and eighteen Chinese characters. This little book was designed to help children in dictation exercises to write characters, and is still largely used for this purpose by mission schools. The huge dictionary, though never completed, had three direct descendants. With Dr. Goodrich it produced first a Chinese phrase book, and then a pocket Chinese-English dictionary, which for brevity and comprehensiveness is a marvel, and which is regarded by almost every student of Chinese as a necessity. In marked contrast with these two volumes is an immense dictionary left behind in manuscript by Dr. Mateer. It is wholly in Chinese; and as it lies unfinished it occupies more than a cubic foot of space, and consists of a set of volumes. No comprehensive dictionary of the Chinese language has been published for two hundred and fifty years, and the last issued had been mainly classical. The object of this was to supply the evident need of a great new work of that sort. One insurmountable difficulty encountered was a phonetic arrangement commanding common usage. None had the requisite approval. Fortunately, on this undertaking Dr. Mateer did not spend his own time, except so far as that was necessary to direct the preparation of it by his scribes when they were not otherwise employed.

In his letter to his college classmates in 1897 he says that he has “well in hand a work on electricity, and one on homiletics prepared when teaching theology.” Neither of these was finished and published. To his college classmate, S. C. T. Dodd, Esq., he wrote in 1898 that he was trying also to finish a work on moral philosophy. In March, 1878, he wrote to Dr. W. A. P. Martin, of Peking: “You will remember probably that when you were here I spoke of my intention to make a natural philosophy by and by. You said, ‘Go ahead,’ and that you would retire in my favor by the time mine was ready, say, ten years hence. If I am spared I hope to have the book ready within the time, if not sooner. As you know, natural philosophy is my hobby, and I have taught it more thoroughly probably than has been done in any other school in China. I intend when I visit America to prepare myself with the material and the facilities for such work.” He was not able to find time for this work; and when later Dr. Martin invited him to write for the revised edition of his treatise the chapter on electricity, this privilege had for the same reason to be put aside. He had also advanced far toward the completion of a translation of “Pilgrim’s Progress” into Mandarin.

His “Mandarin Lessons” was published early in 1892, and immediately commanded a success even larger than its author may have anticipated. Ever since, it has gone on toward a more general use by foreigners wishing to master the language, and has now far outstripped every other work of its kind. He was a quarter of a century in making the book. June 28, 1873, he made the following entry in his Journal concerning it:

Guided by the hint in this quotation, we are able to trace the book still farther back to its very beginning. June 20, 1867, he said in his Journal: “Maggie Brown [Julia’s sister] has been pushing on pretty lively with the Chinese. I made her lessons for a good while, which she studies, and now she is reading ‘The Peep of Day.’ I tried to make her lessons with a view to bringing out the peculiarities of Chinese idiom. It led me to a good deal of thinking and investigating. I have a mind to review and complete the work, and may some day give it to the world. My great difficulty is in classifying the results attained.”

As the years went by his ideas of the plan for the work took definite shape. In one of his letters concerning it he wrote:

In the pursuit of his plan he sought the aid of competent scholars in the north and in central China, so as to learn the colloquialisms and the usage of words; also in the preparation of a syllabary of the sounds of characters as heard in each of the large centers where foreigners are resident. To accomplish this he also traveled widely. Late in 1889, after a summer spent in studying the dialects of China, he, in company with Julia, made a three months’ trip to the region of the Yangtse, going down on the Grand Canal, spending a month on the great river, and remaining a month at Nanking; always with the main purpose of informing himself as to the current Mandarin, so as to perfect his book. This tour enabled him to give it the final revision; and in his opinion it “more than doubled the value” of the “Lessons.” As finished, they were a huge quarto of six hundred pages, which with the help of Mrs. Julia Mateer he saw through the press down at Shanghai. In 1901, assisted by Mrs. Ada Mateer, he issued a more elementary work of the same general nature.

The protracted study and care which he put upon the “Lessons” were characteristic of him in all his literary productions. Upon this subject no one is better qualified to bear testimony than is Dr. George F. Fitch, Superintendent of the Presbyterian Mission Press, at Shanghai, who speaks from direct personal observation. He says:

None of his books at all reveal the protracted and toilsome process of the preparation. We see only the result of years of research. For instance, in his library there was a long row of Chinese books each one of which showed a large number of little white slips at the top. Each one of this multitude of marks had been placed there by some student whom he had employed respectively to read works in Chinese likely to use the word Shen, in order to indicate the passages at which he needed to look. All these were canvassed, and the different shades of meaning were classified.

From the “Mandarin Lessons,” and recently from the arithmetic, he received substantial pecuniary returns, though not at all sufficient to entitle him to be regarded as wealthy. In his manner of living he would have been untrue to his training and impulses if he had not practiced frugality, economy, and simplicity. As the means came into his possession he used them generously both for personal friends and for the promotion of the cause to which he had consecrated his life. Of his outlays for the school and college we shall presently need to speak. The expenses of the Yangtse trip came out of his own pocket. March 9, 1895, he wrote to one of the secretaries of the Board:

May 20, 1905, he wrote to a secretary: “I may say, however, that in view of the great importance of the school both to the Tengchow station and as a feeder to the college at Wei Hsien, I have set apart from the profit of my ‘Mandarin Lessons’ enough to support the school for the present year.” December 13, 1906, he wrote to a friend in the United States: “My brother is now holding a large meeting of elders and leading men from all the stations in this field. There are about three hundred of them. It is no small expense to board and lodge so many for ten days. I am paying the bill.” In one of his latest letters to me he mentions this ability pecuniarily to help as affording him satisfaction.