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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


9,1 


BY 
O 


Berkeley.  California 

THIS     BOOK 

WAS  SOLD  TO 

HENRY     BYRON      PHILLIPS 

fTS^/Wo^  for    ^^^    . 

f 


WANDERINGS    IN    CHINA 


FROM    A    PHOTOGRAPH    BY   W.  CROOKE     103    PRINCES    ST       EDINBURGH. 


WANDEPJNGS    IN    CHINA 


C.    F.    GOEDON    GUMMING 

AUTBOB  01 

■AT  UOMS  IN  FIJI,'   'A  LADY'S  CBUIBI  IN  A  Kl'.l'.Nril  MAX-ni' WAH,' 

'Mi  BAMDWIGB  ISLES,' 

'QBANIT1   I  WOBNIA,'  'IN   TIIK  HIMALAYAS  AMI  OH   INDIAN   Il.AINS. 

'  IN  Tin    in  11:11.1.  ."  •  VIA  COBMWAU    TO  XGYPT' 


ILLUSTRATED    r.Y    Till:    AUTHOR 


N  K\V      KIH  I  [ON 


WILLIAM    BLACK  Won  I>     AND    SONS 

EDINBURGH     A.ND     LONDON 

MDCCCLXX  Will 


All  Rights  r 


CONTENTS. 


CHAP. 

I.    A   MEMORABLE   CHRISTMAS, 

n.  FROM    HONG-KONG   TO    CANTON . 

III.  A    VERY   STRANGE    CITY, 

IV.  CHINESE   NEW   YEAR, 

V.  FROM    HONG-KONG   TO   AMOY, 

VI.  ON    THE    MIN    RIVER, 

VII.  LIFE   ON    THE    RIVER, 

VIII.  FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION, 

IX.  IN   FOO-CHOW   CITY, 

X.  FEMALE   INFANTICIDE, 

XI.  A   CHINESE   DINNER-PARTY, 

XII.  A   FIELD   FOR   WOMAN'S   WORK, 

XIII.  A   MANDARIN   AT   HOME, 

XIV.  THE   KESHAN  MONASTERY,   . 
XV.  TEMPLE   THEATRES,   . 

XVI.  THE   OFFERINGS   OF   THE   DEAD, 

XVII.  A   SINGULAR    ENTERTAINMENT, 

XVIII.  FENG-SHUT,    . 

XIX.  AN    EXTRAORDINARY   TRIAL, 

XX.  JUNKS    AND   SAMPANS, 

XXI.  SHANGHAI,     . 

XXII.  CITY   OF   NINGPO, 


TAOE 

1 

18 
42 
72 
78 
87 
103 

116 

125 
134 
151 
158 
174 
17s 
187 
192 
223 
229 
245 
256 
265 
276 


VI 


CONTENTS. 


Will.    l\    A    BUDDHIST  MONASTERY, 
XXIV.   COMMENCEMENT   OF   THE   CHEH-KIANG    MISSION, 
XXV.    AMONG   Tin:   AZALEAS, 

XXVI.    WALKS    WITH    BISHOP    II' 
XXVII.   ECCLESIASTICAL   BARRACKS, 
XX VIII.    NOTES   ON    VARIOUS   MATTERS, 
XXIX.    FROM   SHANGHAI   TO  TIEN-T8IN, 
XXX.    IN   A    HOUSE-BOAT  ON   THE   PEI-HO 
-XXXI.    PROM   TUNG-CHOW   TO   PEKING, 
XXXII.    THE   TEMPLE   OF   HEAVEN, 
XXXIIT.    Till'    GREAT    I.AM  A   TEMPLE, 
XXXIV.    COMPETITIVE   EXAMINATIONS, 
XXXV.    BLIND   MEN   AND    COLPORTEURS, 
XXXVI.    A   GLIMPSE   OF   THE   FORBIDDEN   CITY, 
XXXVII.    PEKING   SEEN   FROM   THE   WALLS, 
XXXVIII.    MEDICAL   MISSION-WORK, 
XXXIX.   THE   SUMMER   PALACE,       . 
XL.    FROM    TEKING   TO   CHE-FOO, 
XLI.    FROM   CHE-FOO   TO   NAGASAKI, 
INDEX, 


284 
298 
312 
:>,■>:, 
337 
341 
351 
360 
366 
374 
392 
403 
414 
438 
455 
468 
490 
502 
508 
520 


CD 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS. 


PORTRAIT   OF  THE   AUTHOR, 

Frontispiea 

HONG-KONG — CITY    OF    VICTORIA, 

Page    78 

CITY   OF   FOO-CHOW, 

..      124 

A   TEMPLE   THEATRE, 

..       188 

A   VAl-LQ\\\    ..... 

..      286 

GODDESS   OF   MERCY, 

-      328 

WALLS   OF    PEKING,  .... 

,.      360 

MAP   SHOWING    PEKING    TO    NAGASAKI, 

.1/  end 

WANDERINGS    IX    CHINA. 


CHAPTEE     L 


A     MEMORABLE     CHRISTMAS. 


A  glimpse  of  Shanghai  —  On  board  the  Pei-ho  —  "Earth-laden  waters" — 
Hong-Kong — A  beautiful  city — Christmas-day — Cathedral  service — Walk 
through  the  city — A  hospitable  welcome — A  terrible  conflagration. 

Ox  Board  the  Pei-ho,  Messageries  Maritime-. 
Xearing  Hong-Kong, 

Christmas-Eve,  1378. 

You  will  wonder  when  you  receive  this  letter  posted  in  Hong- 
Kong,  where  I  hope  to  arrive  to-morrow  ! 

It  is  not  that  my  four  months  in  Japan  have  hy  any  means 
exhausted  its  fascination, — on  the  contrary,  I  purpose  returning 
there  in  spring,  when  the  double  cherry-blossoms  are  in  their 
glory;  but  meanwhile  the  hills  are  white  with  snow,  and  I  have 
been  nearly  frozen,  living  in  paper  houses,  without  fires — only  such 
warmth  as  we  could  extract  from  ornamental  little  charcoal  braziers. 
So  I  have  fled  southward  with  the  swallows,  and  .-ailed  from  Naga- 
saki, intending  to  spend  Christmas  at  Shanghai.  There,  however, 
1  only  stayed  three  days,  for  the  horrid  river  of  yellow  mud  and 
the  hideousness  of  the  flat  country  round,  and,  above  all,  notwith- 
standing the  genuine  kindness  of  several  residents,  the  oppressive 
dreariness  of  finding  myself  alone  in  a  great  dull  hotel,  where  there 
was  not  a  creature  to  be  seen  except  Chinese  servants,  depressed 
me  to  such  a  pitch,  that  I  resolved  to  risk  spending  Christ  mas-,  lav 
at  sea  rather  than  remain  there. 

A 


'2  A    MEMORABLE   CHBISTMAS. 

Bi  ides,  Song-Kong  Ilea  aboul  nine  hundred  miles  farther  south, 
which  means  journeying  inwards  warmth  and  sunlight,  and  of 
course  mid-winter  is  the  very  best  time  to  arrive  there,  whereas 
even  al  Shanghai  it  was  cold,  and  seemed  quite  in  keeping  with 
the  real  holly,  stag's-horn  moss,  &c.  (all  brought  from  afar),  with 
which  the  ladies  of  the  congregation  were  preparing  to  decorate  the 
cathedraL  This  is  by  far  the  finest  Christian  church  I  have  seen 
in  any  Eastern  land,  and  would  of  itself  have  been  a  very  strong 
inducement  to  remain  for  its  Christmas  services.  It  is  a  large  red 
brick  building,  cruciform,  and  very  lofty,  with  well-proportioned 
short  transept  and  good  glass,  the  reredos  simple,  but  all  harmoni- 
ous. The  design  is  Gilbert  Scott's;  but  the  whole  creation  of  the 
building — the  choir,  and  all  that  combines  to  produce  so  excellent 
a  whole — is  the  work  of  Dean  Butcher,  a  man  greatly  beloved  by 
all  classes  of  the  community,  and  to  whose  personal  influence  alone 
is  attributed  the  existence  of  a  church  so  very  superior  to  those  of 
other  English  settlements.  The  services  are  in  every  detail  those 
of  a  very  well-appointed  church  in  England. 

The  American  Episcopal  chapel  for  the  Chinese  was  also  in  full 
course  of  decoration  by  Chinese  women,  and  seemed  to  me  almost 
the  only  clean  spot  in  the  foully  filthy,  old,  native  Availed  city,  in 
which  I  spent  two  afternoons,  under  the  kind  escort  of  old  resi- 
dents. I  confess  that,  notwithstanding  all  testimony  on  that  point, 
the  reality  of  its  filth  quite  surpassed  my  worst  expectations ! 
Never  could  I  have  conceived  the  possibility  of  such  varied  com- 
binations of  bad  smells  !  and  even  the  eye  remains  unsatisfied,  for 
the  streets  are  all  narrow  and  crowded ;  and  though  the  multitude 
of  quaint  figures,  open  shops,  strange  sign-boards,  and  occasional 
curly  roofs  cannot  but  be  somewhat  picturesque,  the  marvel  is  that 
they  produce  so  little  effect.  Even  the  temples  are  mean  and 
disgusting  —  a  marvellous  contrast  to  those  of  clean,  delightful 
Japan. 

Dirt — foulest  dirt — is  the  one  impression  which  remains  indel- 
ibly stamped  on  my  mind  :  however,  as  I  shall  have  to  return  to 
Shanghai  later,  I  may  possibly  see  it  in  a  rosier  tone.  Much  as  I 
generally  delight  in  oriental  cities,  I  felt  it  a  relief  to  pass  from 
this  one,  back  to  the  handsome  European  settlement  of  large  clean 
houses,  of  which  a  most  imposing  row  stretch  along  the  embank- 
ment of  the  fine  crescent-shaped  harbour.  I  confess  I  do  not  envy 
the  125,000  persons  who  are  crowded  inside  the  walls  of  that 
native  city  I1 

1  The  total  population  of  Shanghai  is  estimated  at  156,000.     In  addition  to  the 


YELLOW    WATERS.  6 

Xor  do  I  envy  the  Europeans  who  have  to  keep  themselves 
alive  by  a  weekly  or  bi-weekly  paper-chase  across  the  dreary  level 
waste  which  lies  beyond  the  city  !  And  yet  I  believe  that,  on 
account  of  its  social  advantages,  and  also  the  good  sport  (chiefly  in 
the  way  of  pheasant-shooting),  which  is  to  be  had  within  a  moder- 
ate distance,  Shanghai  is  the  favourite  station  in  China. 

For  my  own  part,  I  was  glad  to  be  afloat  again,  even  on  the 
turbid  yellow  waters  of  the  dirty  Woo-Sung  river,  though  we 
seemed  literally  to  be  ploughing  through  liquid  yellow  mud,  till 
we  bad  passed  the  new  Woo-Sung  Fort — in  other  words,  the  junc- 
tion of  the  tributary  stream  with  the  great  Yang-tse-Kiang,  which, 
although  at  all  times  emphatically  a  Yellow  River,  had  been  less 
affected  by  local  causes ;  and  so  when  we  reached  the  mouth  of 
the  river,  which  is  fully  twelve  miles  in  width,  the  mud  was  so  far 
diluted  that  the  waters  were  only  of  a  yellowish  grey,  and  by  the 
time  we  were  fairly  afloat  on  the  "  Hoang-Ho," — i.e.,  the  Yellow 
Sea, — we  rejoiced  to  find  ourselves  on  a  clear  ocean  changing  from 
blue  to  green. 

But  we  fully  realised  how  well  this  sea  might  deserve  its  name, 
when  after  prolonged  rains  the  flooded  Yang-tse  (which  ranks  third 
of  the  world's  greatest  rivers)  pours  down  its  vast  volume  of  earth- 
laden  waters  (accumulated  in  its  long  and  busy  life-journey  of  3000 
miles,  from  its  crystalline  source  amid  the  mountains  of  Thibet) 
to  discolour  the  ocean  for  a  distance  of  200  miles  or  more.  Still 
more  must  this  have  been  the  case  when  the  real  Yellow  River, 
the  Hoang-Ho,  emptied  itself  into  this  sea,  only  about  150  miles 
to  the  north  of  the  Yang-tse,  instead  of,  as  now,  flowing  north 
into  the  Gulf  of  Peh-chi-li,  a  change  of  course  which  was  a  freak 
of  quite  recent  years. 

Now  the  repellent  yellow  mud  lies  far  behind  us,  and  we  are 
steaming  swiftly  south,  but  as  yet  there  is  no  sensible  improve- 
ment in  climate.  On  the  contrary,  we  all  feel  it  intensely  cold, 
and  are  sitting  with  our  warm  wraps  on,  huddled  round  two 
wretched  stoves  in  the  large,  dark,  uncomfortable  cabin,  which  at 
night  is  dimly  Lighted  only  by  a  few  candles, — no  lamps  !  Alto- 
gether it  is  a  dreary  ship,  quite  unlike  my  previous  experience  of 
*'  Mcssageries  "  vessels. 

above,  the  boat  population  is  reckoned  at  11,000,  while  foreigners  ami  their  re- 
tainers muster  73.0m>  in  the  English  settlement,  22,500  in  Hong-Kew,  and  50,000 
in  the  French  settlement. 


4  A    MEMORABLE   CHRISTMAS. 

Note — "  Earth-laden  Waterb."  These  Chinese  rivera  deposil 
such  quantities  of  Boil,  that  fchey  are  continually  raising  their  chan 
nels  higher  and  higher  above  the  level  of  the  surroanding  plain; 
consequently  it  i>  ao1  only  necessary  to  construct  stupendous 
embankments  to  keep  the  water-floods  in  their  self-chosen  beds; 
but  also  in  continue  ceaselessly  raising  and  strengthening  them. 
These  cyclopean  banks  of  mud,  or  of  basket-work  full  of  small 
boulders  and  faced  with  brick  and  stone,  extend  for  hundreds  of 
miles,  and  at  some  points  are  so  high  that  to  reach  the  summit 
one  has  to  ascend  sixty  or  seventy  granite  steps,  above  the  level 
of  the  boundless  plain,  to  find  one's  self  standing  on  the  brink  of 
a  swift  mighty  river,  perhaps  half  a  mile  in  width.  Such  banks 
have  to  be  built  so  as  to  allow  for  the  river's  natural  rise  of  fully 
20  feet  in  the  rainy  season. 

It  is  evident  that  only  by  ceaseless  vigilance  can  these  enormous 
earthworks  be  kept  in  thorough  repair,  and  Government  officials 
are  enjoined  to  bestow  the  utmost  attention  to  this  subject. 
Needful  repairs  are  executed  in  winter  and  spring,  when  the 
waters  are  at  the  lowest,  and  enormous  sums  are  thus  expended 
even  in  ordinary  years. 

But  no  amount  of  human  care  can  always  avail  against  the  might 
of  such  a  stream  as  the  Great  Yellow  River,  when,  in  autumn,  it 
pours  down  from  the  mountains  with  about  ten  times  its  winter 
volume,  flowing  rapidly  for  a  distance  of  about  2000  miles,  its 
waters  charged  with  sand  and  yellow  earth,  which  it  deposits  all 
along  its  course,  raising  its  bed  and  forming  shallows,  till  at  length 
the  flood  either  overflows  the  channel  or  forces  a  passage  through 
embankments,  soddened  by  weeks  of  rain.  Then  follow  appalling 
inundations,  transforming  whole  counties  into  gigantic  lakes,  drown- 
ing all  living  creatures,  and  covering  the  land  with  a  deposit  which, 
for  one  season  at  least,  is  fatal  to  all  agriculture,  and  often  leaves 
great  tracts  transformed  into  feverish  swamps. 

When  the  waters  subside,  the  river  is  certain  to  create  for  itself 
a  totally  new  channel,  so  a  legion  of  workers  must  immediately 
construct  new  embankments,  which,  like  those  now  abandoned  by 
the  stream,  must  be  heightened  year  by  year,  as  the  deposit  of  silt 
raises  the  river-bed."  Nine  distinct  channels  have  thus  been  occu- 
pied by  this  fickle  stream  within  the  last  2500  years;  but  for  the 
five  centuries  prior  to  1852  the  Hoang-Ho  proved  wonderfully 
constant  to  the  course  it  had  last  selected,  pouring  its  waters  into 
those  of  the  Yellow  Sea  about  150  miles  to  the  north  of  Shanghai. 

The  present  generation  has,  however,  had  full  experience  of  the 


AN    ERRATIC    RIVEfi.  O 

erratic  tendencies  of  these  unstable  waters,  for  in  1852  they  sud- 
denly burst  the  northern  bank  near  the  city  of  Kaifang,  about  250 
miles  inland,  flooding  the  country,  and  spreading  ruin  and  desola- 
tion as  they  swept  onward  in  a  north-easterly  direction,  their  course 
being  guided  by  the  rocky  range  which  borders  the  huge  promon- 
tory dividing  tbe  Yellow  Sea  from  the  Gulf  of  Peh-chi-li.  Thus  the 
river  was  compelled  to  flow  northward  till  it  reached  the  latter  sea, 
at  a  distance  of  fully  500  miles  from  its  old  mouth,  leaving  its  former 
bed  a  level  plain  of  dust,  only  to  be  fertilised  by  toilsome  irrigation. 

Strange  to  say,  so  little  did  foreigners  even  then  know  of  any- 
thing that  occurred  beyond  the  limits  of  the  treaty  ports,  that  live 
years  elapsed  ere  the  Europeans  living  in  Shanghai  had  any  inkling 
of  the  tremendous  catastrophe  which  had  occurred  scarcely  so  far  from 
their  homes  as  Edinburgh  is  from  London  !  Two  years  later,  though 
it  was  then  known  beyond  a  doubt  that  the  great  river  had  vanished 
from  its  accustomed  bed,  no  foreigners  knew  what  had  become  of  it ! 

One  thing  we  do  now  know — namely,  that  although  the  stream 
has  for  the  last  thirty  years  traversed  the  very  same  part  of  the 
country  as  it  did  500  years  previously,  yet  it  nowhere  flows  in  ex- 
actly the  same  channel,  where  the  strong  ready-made  embankments 
would  have  been  so  helpful.  It  selected  for  its  bed  the  channel 
of  a  much  smaller  stream,  and  only  by  the  construction  of  stupen- 
dous new  embankments  have  these  turbulent  vagrant  waters  been 
prevented  from  overflowing  their  boundaries  at  every  rainy  season. 
Notwithstanding  all  vigilance,  they  have  repeatedly  burst  these 
banks,  flooding  large  tracts  of  country  and  drowning  the  luckless 
cultivators. 

In  1885,  "  China's  Sorrow  "  (as  this  Bohemian  river  is  poetically 
called)  inundated  a  large  tract  of  the  province  of  Shansi,  destroy- 
ing two  important  towns,  and  occasioning  great  loss  of  life.  But 
this  was  as  nothing  compared  with  its  playful  freaks  in  the  autumn 
of  1887,  when  prolonged  rains  had  so  swollen  the  waters  that  the 
embanked  portion  resembled  a  gigantic  reservoir,  500  miles  in 
length  and  about  one  in  width.  This  raging  river,  driven  by  a 
fierce  wind,  and  rushing  down  at  headlong  speed,  bore  with  un- 
wonted violence  against  a  bend  in  the  embankment,  forty  miles  to 
the  west  of  Kaifung,  which  was  the  scene  of  the  disaster  in  L852. 

At  last,  on  the  night  of  September  28,  a  breach  was  effected, 
and  then,  with  awful  resistless  rush,  the  escaped  torrent  poured 
forth  in  a  deluge,  forming  a  mass  of  water  about  20  feel  deep  in 
the  centre  and  about  30  miles  wide,  and  thus  overswept  the  pro- 
vince   of  Honan   (which,  by  reason  of  its  fertility  and   admirable 


G  A    MEMORABLE    CHRISTMAS. 

cultivation,  is  commonly  called  "The  Garden  of  China"),  flooding 
an  area  of  about  10,000  square  miles.  In  other  Avoids,  a  den 
peopled  plain  about  half  the  size  of  Scotland, dotted  over  with  about 
three  thousand  large  villages  and  cities,  inhabited  by  millions  of 
the  most  industrious  people  on  the  face  of  the  earth,  was  suddenly 
overwhelmed  by  this  awful  Hood  and  transformed  into  a  raging  sea. 

Imagination  can  scarcely  picture  a  scene  so  appalling — the  great 
peaceful  plain  where  at  eventide  several  millions  of  prosperous 
people  lay  down  to  rest  in  safety  and  comfort,  without  one  thought 
of  danger,  only  to  be  awakened  by  the  crashing  of  falling  walls 
and  houses  collapsing  on  every  side,  and  the  deafening  roar  as  the 
wild  flood  of  raging  waters,  rushing  on  through  the  darkness  of 
night,  overwhelmed  one  city  or  village  after  another. 

When  morning  broke,  in  place  of  a  vast  expanse  of  richly  culti- 
vated fields,  there  was  only  to  be  seen  a  boundless  waste  of  surg- 
ing waters,  sportively  tossing  thousands  of  corpses  of  men,  women, 
and  children,  buffaloes,  oxen,  and  other  animals,  together  with 
Avreckage  of  every  description.  The  three  thousand  villages  lay 
buried — some  10,  some  30  feet — beneath  the  waters,  and  of  their 
inhabitants,  incalculable  multitudes  must  have  found  a  grave 
beneath  their  own  roofs.  In  China  it  is  almost  impossible'  to 
obtain  anything  like  definite  statistics  on  such  subjects,  but  it  is 
generally  believed  that  at  least  two  million  persons  perished  on 
that  dread  night. 

As  an  example  of  the  danger  incurred  even  by  those  who  are 
aAvake  and  on  guard,  I  may  mention  that  some  days  later,  when  all 
hands  were  summoned  to  endeavour  to  construct  a  breakwater  to 
arrest  the  further  progress  of  the  flood,  it  sportively  swept  away 
four  thousand  of  these  vigilant  Avorkmen. 

For  several  months  the  immense  volume  of  the  waters  of  the 
Great  YelloAv  River  continued  to  pour  doAvn  from  the  mountains 
on  to  the  inhabited  lands,  ever  enlarging  the  boundaries  of  the  re- 
created great  inland  sea,  Avhich  has  thus  once  more  reclaimed  the 
lands  drained  by  the  Emperor  Yii.  (He  receives  divine  honours 
as  the  mightiest  of  engineers,  because  it  is  believed  that  prior  to 
his  reign,  the  whole  province  of  Honan  Avas  a  ATast  lake,  coA'ering 
an  area  of  65,000  square  miles,  till  he  devised  means  for  the  con- 
struction of  such  stupendous  embankments  that  the  Avaters  of  the 
Hoang-Ho  were  therein  captured,  and  this  most  fertile  province 
was  created.)  Whether  the  river  will  again  submit  to  imprison- 
ment, and  to  be  once  more  guided  to  that  YelloAv  Sea  which  it  for- 
sook in  1852,  is  a  problem  still  unsolved. 


HONG-KONG.  7 

Care  ok  Mrs  Snowden,  City  of  VICTORIA, 

ISI-E   OF    HONC-KONC, 

Chrlgtmaa-Day. 

Certainly  fortune  has  favoured  me,  for  we  readied  this  most 
lovely  city  early  this  morning,  and  have  had  a  most  enjoyahle 
Christmas-day.  I  had  not  the  remotest  conception  that  I  was 
coming  to  anything  so  heautiful ;  so,  when  with  the  earliest  light 
of  dawn,  Ave  slowly — very  slowly — steamed  into  this  exquisite 
harbour,  its  beauty,  so  suddenly  revealed,  left  me  mute  with 
delight.  Perhaps  the  contrast  between  these  encircling  ranges  of 
shapely  hills  and  the  dead  level  of  the  Shanghai  coast,  help  to 
make  these  seem  more  impressive.  Certainly  I  have  seen  no  har- 
bour to  compare  with  this,  though  I  suppose  Eio  Janeiro  claims 
the  palm  of  beauty  above  all  others. 

This  is  like  a  great  inland  lake,  so  entirely  do  the  jagged  moun- 
tain-ranges of  the  mainland  and  the  island  of  Kowlung  seem  to 
close  around  this  rocky  isle,  whose  great  city  bears  the  name  of 
England's  Queen,  and  from  whose  crowning  peak  floats  the  union- 
jack.  The  said  peak  is  really  only  1825  feet  in  height.  Though 
it  looks  so  imposing,  it  is  simply  the  termination  of  the  ridge 
which  forms  the  backbone  of  the  isle,  and  along  whose  base  extends 
the  city — a  granite  city,  hewn  from  the  granite  mountains,  with 
granite  fortifications,  granite  drains  to  provide  for  the  rush  of  the 
summer  rains ;  everything  seems  to  be  granitic,  but  yet  there  is 
nothing  cold  in  its  appearance,  for  all  is  gilded  by  the  mellow  sun- 
light. All  the  principal  houses  have  lovely  shrubberies,  with  line 
ornamental  trees,  which  soften  the  effect,  and  make  each  terraced 
road  seem  delightful 

There  is  so  very  little,  if  any,  level  ground,  save  what  has  been 
reclaimed  artificially,  that  steep  streets  of  stairs  lead  from  the  busi- 
ness quarters  on  the  sea  embankment,  right  up  the  face  of  the  hill, 
the  lower  spurs  of  which  are  all  dotted  over  with  most  luxurious 
houses  and  shady  gardens,  now  gay  with  camellias  and  roses  and 
scarlet  poinsettias.  And  in  the  midst  of  it  all  is  the  loveliest 
Botanical  Garden,  beautifully  laid  out,  and  where  all  rich  and  rare 
forms  of  foliage,  from  tropical  or  temperate  climes,  combine  to 
produce  a  garden  of  delight,  whence  you  look  down  upon  tin' 
emerald  green  and  dazzling  blue  of  this  beautiful  harbour,  where  a 
thousand  vessels,  and  boats  and  junks  without  number,  can  ride  in 
absolute  safety. 

i  had  a  glimpse  of  it  all  this  afternoon,  but  indeed  it  would  be 
difficult  to  obtain  a  more  eiitraneiiiv;  view  than  from  this  house 


8  a   .mi:moi:a )'.!>]•:  Christmas. 

itself,  which  really  belongs  to  Sir  John  Small,  the  Chief-Justice,1 
but,  iii  his  absence,  is  tenanted  by  Mr  Snowden,  the  acting  Chief- 
Justice,  who,  on  the  strength  of  a  letter  from  Sir  Harry  Parkes 
(one  of  the  many  acts  of  kindness  for  which  I  am  indebted  to 
him),  came  to  offer  me  a  welcome  to  Hong-Kong  and  to  this  lovely 
home. 

But  I  must  tell  you  first  of  our  arrival.  My  fellow-passenger 
from  Japan,  Miss  Shervinton,  had  come  to  rejoin  her  father,  and 
we  waited  a  little  while  expecting  to  see  him  appear.  But  being 
impatient  to  get  ashore,  we  chartered  a  sampan — i.e.,  a  covered 
boat,  inhabited  by  a  whole  Chinese  family,  consisting  of  a  long- 
tailed  father,  four  funny  little  children,  and  a  comely  mother,  with 
beautifully  dressed  glossy  hair,  a  comfortable  blouse,  and  very  loose 
short  trousers,  showing  neat  firm  feet  and  ankles.  Xot  having 
previously  been  in  a  sampan,  I  was  glad  to  begin  the  day  with  a 
new  experience  ! 

We  met  Colonel  Shervinton  almost  as  soon  as  we  landed,  and 
we  all  went  together  to  breakfast  at  the  principal  hotel,  and  thence 
to  the  cathedral,  which,  though  not  to  be  compared  in  beauty  with 
that  at  Shanghai,  is  a  fine  roomy  church.  There  is  a  surpliced 
choir,  but  the  Christmas  decorations  are  of  a  severe  type,  being 
confined  to  flowers  in  pots  on  the  chancel-steps  and  round  the  font. 
A  full  congregation,  and  a  nice  hearty  service,  with  sermon  by 
Bishop  Burdon  (the  bishop  of  this  diocese  of  Victoria),  who, 
though  still  in  the  prime  of  life,  is  the  fortunate  possessor  of  such 
snow-white  locks  and  beard  as  must  surely  be  accounted  a  special 
episcopal  endowment  in  a  land  where  even  grey  hair  commands 
such  special  honour  as  in  China ! 

We  returned  to  the  hotel  for  luncheon,  immediately  after  which, 
in  prompt  answer  to  letters  from  various  friends  in  Japan,  came 
several  most  kind  residents,  inviting  me  to  their  homes.  Fortu- 
nately for  me,  the  first  to  arrive  was  Mr  Snowden  (fortunately,  I 
mean,  because  this  house  is  so  beautifully  situated  some  way  up 
the  hill,  overlooking  the  whole  town  and  harbour,  whereas  the 
other  quarters,  so  cordially  offered  to  me,  lay  in  the  town  itself). 

Having  despatched  my  luggage,   Mr  Snowden   took  me  for  a 

1  In  case  the  address  at  the  head  of  this  letter  should  appear  needlessly  elal>o- 
rate,  I  may  quote  a  little  conversation  which  I  overheard  soon  after  my  return  to 
England.  Said  a  young  barrister  to  the  wife  of  an  English  M.P.,  — "  Didn't  Miss 
G.  C.  say  she  was  staying  with  the  Chief-Justice  of  Hong-Kong?  How  do  we 
come  to  have  a  Chief-Justice  there I     Isn't  it  somewhere  in  Japan.''' 

Said  the  lady,  — "  Well,  really  I  never  thought  about  it  before,  though  we  have 
relations  there.     But  now  you  come  to  mention  it,  I  think  you  are  right  "  ! 


CITY    OF    VICTORIA.  9 

turn  through  the  crowded  business  parts  of  the  city — the  Chinese 
and  the  Portuguese  quarters — all  built  in  terraces  along  horizontal 
streets,  but  connected  one  with  another  by  steep  streets  of  stairs. 
There  is  a  specially  picturesque  spot  right  below  this  house,  where 
five  Chinese  and  Portuguese  streets  meet. 

From  this  crowded  centre  we  went  on  to  a  very  different  scene, 
namely,  the  beautiful  gardens,  where  we  revelled  in  the  fragrance 
of  flowers  bathed  in  sunlight,  and  as  we  wandered  through  shady 
bamboo-groves,  or  stood  beneath  the  broad  shadow  of  great  ban  van- 
trees,  at  every  turn  we  caught  glimpses  of  white  sails  floating  on 
the  calm  blue  harbour  far  below  us,  reflecting  the  cloudless  blue  of 
heaven — a  scene  of  most  perfect  peace,  with  never  a  jarring  sound 
to  suggest  the  busy  bustling  life  and  all  the  noise  of  the  city. 

In  short,  I  have  already  seen  enough  to  convince  me  that  it 
would  be  difficult  to  find  more  fascinating  winter-quarters  than 
this  oft-abused  city.  As  to  climate,  although  in  the  same  latitude 
as  Calcutta,  it  is  far  cooler,  and  whatever  it  may  be  in  June  or 
July,  to-day  it  is  delicious  and  balmy,  like  the  sweetest  summer 
day  in  England  ;  and  1  am  told  that  this  is  a  fair  sample  of  the 
whole  winter  at  Hong-Kong,  and  that  for  five  consecutive  months 
there  will  probably  not  be  even  a  shower !  Only  think  what  a 
paradise  for  an  artist!  Every  day  at  the  same  hour  the  identical 
lights  and  shadows,  and  any  number  of  willing  and  intelligent 
coolies  ready  to  fetch  and  carry  him  and  his  goods,  and  save  him 
all  physical  fatigue! 

We  arrived  here  in  time  to  find  Mrs  Snowden  waiting  to  wel- 
come me  to  cosy  five-o'clock  tea  in  the  pretty  English  drawing- 
room.  In  short,  everything  is  so  pleasant  that  already  I  have 
begun  to  feel  myself  quite  at  home  in  this  British  isle  of  Hong- 
Kong.  Xow  it  is  time  to  dress  for  dinner.  Every  one  here  seems 
to  have  a  dinner-party  to-night. 

Dec.  -27th. 

I  seem  to  have  lived  many  days  since  writing  so  far.  I  can 
hardly  realise  that  it  was  only  the  night  before  last  thai  my  im- 
pressions of  Hong-Kong  were  all  so  peaceful  and  so  calm,  for  ever 
since  we  have  been  surrounded  with  so  wild  a  turmoil,  and  a  scene 
of  such  awful  dread,  that  it  feels  as  if  we  had  been  living  in  a 
dream. 

Surely  never  before  has  Christmas  so  vividly  exemplified  the 
familiar  words  of  its  church  service,  which  tell  of  the  battle  with 
"  burning  and  fuel  of  lire  "  !  x 

1  1st  Lesson  for  Christmas-day — Isaiah  be.  5. 


10  A    MEMORABLE    CHRISTMAS. 

On  Christmas  night,  just  as  (lie  guests  were  preparing  to  leave 
at  11  p.m.,  suddenly  a  startling  Bound  of  sharp  clanging  rang 
through  the  night.  The  others  knew  well  what  it  meant,  and  I  was 
not  long  lft't  in  doubt.  It  was  the  fire-alarm  !  We  all  ran  to  the 
verandah,  which,  as  I  have  told  you,  overlooks  the  whole  town  and 
harbour.  These  lie  otitspread  below,  as  it  were,  the  base  of  a 
great  amphitheatre. 

We  had,  a  few  moments  before,  been  noticing  what  a  calm 
beautiful  scene  it  was,  with  its  thousand  points  of  gleaming  light, 
the  reflections  of  the  glittering  stars  overhead,  blending  with  those 
of  the  vessels  floating  on  the  still  waters,  and  all  the  lights  of  the 
city — stationary  and  locomotive,  the  latter  indicating  the  paper 
lanterns  carried   by  all  wayfarers  and  chair-coolies. 

Now  a  new  feature  was  added  to  the  scene.  From  the  very 
point  where  the  five  streets  met,  rose  a  tall  column  of  fiery  smoke, 
with  shooting  tongues  of  flame.  Another  moment  and  the  gentle- 
men had  rushed  off,  some  being  members  of  the  fire-brigade,  and 
others  having  a  very  personal  interest  in  the  danger  which  might 
so  quickly  approach  their  own  offices. 

The  alarm-bells  rang  on  more  and  more  wildly — sharp  jangling 
bells,  which  once  heard  could  never  be  forgotten,  so  unlike  any 
other  peal  is  that  affrighted  clanging, — no  seasonable  Christmas 
chimes,  but  an  awful  appeal ;  a  far-reaching  sound  that  should 
summon  all  the  engines  from  every  corner  of  the  city,  and  all  men 
enlisted  in  the  brigades,  from  their  festivities.  These,  as  a  rule, 
pride  themselves  on  the  extraordinary  rapidity  with  which  they 
respond  to  such  a  call,  and  many  a  fire  has  been  quenched  at  the 
very  outset,  owing  to  the  velocity  with  which  its  first  indication 
has  been  smothered. 

But,  of  course,  on  this  night  everything  was  a  little  lax.  Many 
men  had  been  dining  with  friends  at  some  distance  from  the  city, 
and  it  was  near  midnight  ere  they  could  get  back.  Others  re- 
turned unsuspectingly  to  find  the  awful  havoc  that  had  taken  place. 
So  the  bells  tolled  on  in  wild  appeal,  and  those  of  the  Roman  Cath- 
olic cathedral  took  up  the  alarm,  while  fire-drums  beat  in  the  streets 
to  hasten  the  laggards,  and  meanwhile  the  smoke-clouds  grew  denser 
and  more  dense,  and,  to  make  matters  worse,  a  sharp  breeze  sprang 
up  from  the  north,  fanning  the  flames,  and  carrying  sparks  and  burn- 
ing fragments  to  ignite  new  buildings  at  a  distance. 

There  is  little  doubt  that  the  fire  was  the  work  of  an  incendiary. 
It  began  in  the  store  of  a  small  general  dealer — an  Englishman, 
lie   was  absent,  and   when  the   place  was  broken  open,  the  whole 


FIRE  !  1 1 

was  found  saturated  with  kerosene.  It  is  also  believed  that  some 
men  spread  the  fire  to  their  own  stores  for  the  sake  of  the  insur- 
ance money.  Curiously  enough,  three  fires  broke  out  simultane- 
ously on  other  parts  of  the  isle ;  but  there  really  seems  to  have 
been  no  object  to  make  it  appear  that  these  were  incendiary,  as 
there  was  no  general  attempt  at  looting.  On  the  contrary,  every 
one  appeared  half  stupefied,  as  the  flames  rapidly  gained  the  mas- 
tery, suddenly  bursting  from  fresh  houses  here  and  there,  where 
least  suspected,  and  spreading  from  street  to  street. 

That  livelong  night  we  stood  or  sat  on  the  verandah  watching 
this  appallingly  magnificent  scene — the  flames  rising  and  falling, 
leaping  and  dancing,  now  bursting  from  some  fresh  house,  shooting 
up  in  tongues  of  fire,  now  rolling  in  dense  volumes  of  black  smoke. 
Now  it  was  a  paraffin-store  which  blazed  with  fierce  light,  and,  a 
moment  later,  a  New-Year  store  of  fireworks  were  all  aflame, 
shooting  and  exploding  all  on  their  own  account. 

From  house  to  house  and  from  street  to  street  the  beautiful,  ter- 
rible Fire  Demon  swept  on  its  destroying  path,  for  the  flames,  now 
fanned  by  a  keen  breeze,  rushed  hungrily  on,  sometimes  sweeping 
right  across  a  street  to  devour  the  opposite  houses, — sometimes,  for 
some  reason  utterly  incomprehensible,  working  right  round  a  block, 
and  leaving  one  or  two  houses  in  the  very  heart  of  the  conflagra- 
tion utterly  untouched  (like  the  Three  Children  in  the  burning 
fiery  furnace). 

From  our  high  post  we  looked  down  on  the  awful  sea  of  fire, 
watching  it  work  onward, — stealing  under  roofs — lighting  in  a  rain 
of  fire  on  distant  houses  where  we  could  see  sparks  smouldering  on 
some  weak  corner  of  a  roof  or  an  inflammable  verandah  :  then 
would  come  a  little  puff  of  smoke,  followed  by  a  burst  of  flame, 
and  then  would  come  another  outburst  in  quite  a  different  part  of 
the  town,  till  so  many  places  were  blazing  at  once,  that  the  firemen 
were  utterly  bailled. 

Very  soon  it  was  evident  that  neither  their  numerical  strength, 
their' engines,  nor  their  meagre  water-supply  could  possibly  master 
the  fire — a  very  startling  revelation  to  the  colony,  winch  prided 
itself  on  the  perfect  organisation  of  its  fire-brigade.  Whether  the 
actual  water-supply  was  insufficient,  or  whether  the  engines  were 
not  sufficiently  powerful,  seems  uncertain;  but  even  when  they 
were  got  to  work,  the  puny  jets  failed  to  reach  the  top  of  the 
loftier  houses,  and  where  once  the  fire  had  fairly  obtained  a  footing, 
any  attempt  at  extinguishing  it  was  so  obviously  hopeless,  that  the 
firemen's  efforts  were  chiefly  directed  to  savins  the  neighbouring  or 


12  A     MKMoKAHLK    CHRISTMAS. 

opposite  buildings,  by  tearing  down  the  verandahs  and  all  the 
woodwork,  and  by  covering  the  walls  with  carpets,  curtains,  or 
matting,  and  endeavouring  to  keep  these  saturated. 

Among  the  houses  thus  saved  is  the  Oriental  Bank,  in  which  I 
take  a  special  interest,  because,  had  Mr  Knowden  reaehed  me  five 
minutes  later  this  afternoon,  I  should  at  this  momenl  have  been 
the  guest  of  Mrs  Crombie  at  the  said  bank,  and  instead  of  being 
safely  housed  here  (we  believe  this  house  is  now  safe  !)  I  should 
have  heen  sharing  her  night  of  awful  anxiety.  The  room  which  I 
should  have  occupied  is  now  saturated  with  the  water-jets  thrown 
on,  as  a  preventive  means  while  houses  close  by  were  blazing. 
The  whole  opposite  side  of  the  street  was  burnt,  and  only  by  super- 
human efforts  was  the  bank  saved,  the  whole  outside  being  hung 
as  aforesaid,  with  mats  and  carpets,  which  were  incessantly  pumped 
upon.  Of  course  preparations  for  the  worst  were  made,  and  the 
wife,  and  other  treasure,  were  sent  to  safe  quarters  on  land  and 
sea.  I  believe  that  all  the  banks  sent  their  treasure  and  valuable 
papers  on  board  one  of  the  men-of-war  lying  in  harbour. 

A  large  force  of  blue-jackets  and  of  military  came  to  the  assist- 
ance of  the  firemen,  and  did  right  hearty  work,  though  perhaps 
with  less  success  than  would  have  been  the  case  on  any  other  night. 
Unfortunately  many  were  on  leave  for  their  Christmas  night,  and 
not  only  was  it  difficult  to  collect  these  for  organised  work  under 
any  recognised  leader,  but  a  considerable  number  were  none  the 
steadier  for  their  Christmas  festivities,  and  so  a  good  deal  of 
British  valour  was  misapplied. 

The  chief  point  in  which  the  lack  of  generalship  revealed  itself, 
was  when  it  became  evident  that  the  only  possible  means  of  stay- 
ing the  progress  of  the  fire  lay  in  blowing  up  whole  blocks  of 
houses,  in  order  to  save  worse  loss.  But  no  one  present  would 
take  the  responsibility  of  giving  the  necessary  commands. 

The  Commander  of  the  Forces  placed  all  his  men  (74th  High- 
landers and  artillerymen)  at  the  disposal  of  the  authorities  for  this 
service,  and  there  they  stood  at  ease,  waiting  for  the  orders  that  no 
one  could  give ;  and  meanwhile  the  fire  did  not  wait,  but  swept 
onward  quite  unceremoniously,  and  devoured  everything  to  right 
and  to  left.  Nothing  was  safe  in  any  direction,  for  the  breeze 
varied  in  the  most  unaccountable  manner,  suddenly  shifting  from 
north-east  round  by  north  to  north-west;  so  while  some  houses  were 
saved  almost  miraculously,  others  that  had  deemed  themselves  out 
of  harm's  way  were  suddenly  aflame. 

At  last,  after  orders  and  counter-orders  had  been  so  freely  given 


THE    FIEE    DEMON.  13 

that  the  willing  workers  were  fairly  bewildered,  the  tardy  decision 
was  made,  and  then  a  good  many  houses  were  blown  up  every  here 
and  there,  almost  always  too  late  to  save  those  beyond.  Besides 
which,  the  luckless  owners  of  course  tried  to  save  as  much  of  their 
furniture  as  possible,  so  that  piles  of  inflammable  stuff  (invariably 
capped  with  a  lot  of  wicker-chairs  !)  were  heaped  up  in  the  streets, 
forming  an  excellent  lead  for  the  fire,  as  of  course  a  chance  spark 
almost  invariably  ignited  these  heaps. 

And  so  the  awful  flames  gained  intensity,  and  we  watched  them 
pass  away  from  the  poor  densely  croAvded  Chinese  town  to  the 
larger  houses  of  Portuguese,  Parsees,  and  English.  In  each  by 
turn  we  watched  first  the  destruction  of  pleasant  verandahs,  then 
the  gutting  of  the  interior,  revealed  by  the  flames  rushing  from 
every  window,  and  finally  with  resounding  crash  the  roof  would 
fall  in,  and  from  the  roaring  furnace  within,  sheets  of  white  or  red 
flame,  and  lurid  smoke  of  many  colours,  swept  heavenward  in  awful 
grandeur. 

Although  the  smoke  and  the  intense  colour  made  it  difficult  to 
judge  accurately  of  relative  distances,  my  companions  were  able  in 
many  cases  to  recognise  different  houses,  and  we  could  plainly  dis- 
cern individuals  on  the  roofs  watching  for  the  fall  of  sparks  which 
they  might  extinguish  ere  they  did  any  damage.  Oh  how  tantalis- 
ing it  was  sometimes  from  where  we  stood,  to  see  sparks  fall  .just 
beyond  their  ken,  and  lie  quickly  developing,  when  literally  within 
their  reach,  coidd  they  but  have  perceived  them  ! 

Amongst  all  the  confused  noises — the  roar  of  human  voices,  the 
yelling  and  shunting  of  the  Chinese  rabble,  the  crackling  and  rush 
of  flames,  the  crash  of  falling  timbers,  and  the  occasional  blasting  of 
houses  with  gunpowder  or  dynamite — there  was  one  oft-recurring 
sound  which,  for  a  while,  puzzled  me  exceedingly,  till  I  learnt  that 
it  was  a  familiar  sound  at  every  Chinese  festival,  namely,  the  firing 
of  crackers.  Thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  these  must  have 
gone  off.  Many  doubtless  were  offered  by  the  frightened  people  to 
propitiate  the  Fire  Dragon,  but  vast  numbers  were  stored  ready  for 
the  New-Year  festival. 

There  was  one  moment  of  gorgeous  scenic  effect  when  the  Haines 
caught  a  great  timber-merchant's  yard,  wherein  was  stored  a  vast 
accumulation  of  seasoned  wood  and  firewood,  which  of  course  be- 
came a  sheet  of  fire  glowing  at  white  heat.  Yon  can  imagine  with 
what  breathless  excitement  Ave  watched  the  deadly  hard-fought 
battle  betwixt  fire  and  water,  in  which  fire  seemed  to  be  gettu 
entirely  the  best  of  it. 


14  A    MEMORABLE   CHRISTMAS. 

For  a  long  time  it  spread  with  almost  equal  strength  in  two  op- 
posite directions;  hut  the  wind  urged  it  most  fiercely  in  the  direct 
line  of  the  nia^nilieent  houses  of  the  Lfi'-al  merchant  primes,  many 
of  whom  (at  least  the  women  folk)  spent  the  night  in  packing  such 
of  their  most  precious  valuables  as  there  seemed,  some  cham 
saving.  It  did  not  take  me  long  to  repack  mine,  and  my  hostess 
only  collected  her  chief  treasures,  as  it  really  seemed  hopeless  to 
commence  work,  with  such  an  accumulation  of  beautiful  curios,  and 
the  conviction  that  if  this  house  did  take  fire,  it  would  he  impos- 
sible to  get  coolies  to  carry  our  goods,  and  indeed,  we  knew  not 
where  to  seek  safety. 

But  certainly  we  were  in  considerable  danger,  for  the  fiery 
smoke  swept  right  over  our  heads,  and  fell  in  a  hail  of  sparks 
and  blazing  fragments  all  about  the  place ;  and  at  any  moment 
one  of  these  alighting  on  the  woodwork,  and  there  smouldering 
unnoticed,  or  else  falling  on  the  flimsy  Chinese  bouses  just 
beyond  this  garden  wall,  Avould  have  placed  this  bouse  in  frightful 
jeopardy. 

Owing  to  the  infatuated  delay  in  not  blowing  up  houses  till 
they  were  actually  on  fire,  the  Civil  Hospital  wras  entirely  de- 
stroyed, though,  happily,  no  lives  were  lost,  the  patients  being 
carried  to  another  hospital.  There  was  a  time  of  awful  anxiety  as 
the  fire  swept  on  directly  towards  the  jail,  wherein  are  stowed  five 
hundred  prisoners — scoundrels  of  the  very  worst  type.  A  strong 
military  guard  were  on  duty  to  guard  the  prison,  and  remove  the 
prisoners  in  case  of  need.  Had  this  become  necessary,  they  bad 
orders  to  shoot  any  who  attempted  to  escape,  as  they  would  inevit- 
ably become  leaders  of  a  terrible  lot  of  scoundrels  of  all  sorts  wTbo 
are  said  to  have  drifted  here,  escaping  from  Canton  and  other  cities 
where  supervision  is  more  rigid,  in  order  to  profit  by  the  exceeding 
leniency  of  the  present  Government  of  Hong-Kong.  I  am  told 
that  they  keep  the  police  exceedingly  busy,  though  these  number 
about  six  hundred,  and  a  very  fine  body  they  are.  There  are  three 
distinct  lots  of  these  guardians  of  the  peace,  each  with  a  distinctive 
uniform.  There  are  genuine  British  "  bobbies,"  Chinamen,  and 
Sikhs — the  latter  a  very  picturesque  body,  with  their  blue  uniform, 
red  turban,  and  high  boots.  In  addition  to  all  these  public  ser- 
vants, every  householder  of  any  standing  keeps  a  private  patrol  to 
guard  his  home  and  his  offices. 

Very  near  the  jail  lies  the  Roman  Catholic  cathedral,  and  this 
also  was  in  dire  jeopardy :  in  fact,  some  sparks  alighting  on  the 


AWFUL    BEAUTY.  15 

roof  did  ignite  one  corner,  which,  however,  was  quickly  ex- 
tinguished by  hand  service  with  buckets.  Xo  jet  from  the  feeble 
engines  could  have  reached  so  high. 

Of  course  the  tremendous  glare  lighted  up  the  great  buildings 
and  the.  mountains  all  round  with  a  hot  red  glow,  while  intervening 
towers  and  spires  stood  out  in  black  relief  against  the  red  light,  or 
the  cold  steely  grey  of  harbour  and  sky.  I  never  could  have  con- 
ceived a  scene  so  awful  and  yet  so  wonderfully  beautiful.  All 
night  it  was  like  a  succession  of  pictures  in  the  style  of  Martin's 
"  Destruction  of  Jerusalem,"  or  "  The  Last  Day."  Then  morning 
broke — first  a  cold  grey,  just  clearing  the  mountains  all  round  the 
harbour  ;  and  then  the  rosy  dawn,  gradually  changing  to  the  mellow 
sunlight,  which,  while  it  revealed  the  full  measure  of  the  night's 
ravages,  yet  gilded  the  smoke-clouds,  transforming  the  beautiful 
tire-illumined  darkness  into  the  lovely  panorama  of  yesterday  : 
only  in  the  centre  lay  a  confused  mass  of  dark  ruin  veiled  by 
filmy  blue  or  white  smoke  and  tremulous  mirage  of  hot  air  play- 
ing above  the  smouldering  ruins,  while  here  and  there  a  denser 
volume  of  black  wicked  smoke  indicated  where  the  mischief  was 
still  spreading. 

It  is  a  frightful  confession  to  make,  but  any  artisl  will  sym- 
pathise when  I  say,  that  as  each  picture  thus  presented  seemed 
more  gorgeously  effective  than  the  last,  I  positively  again  and 
again  found  myself  forgetting  its  horror  in  the  ecstasy  of  its 
beauty  !  It  really  felt  as  if  we  were  sitting  luxuriously  in  the 
dress  circle  watching  some  wondrous  panoramic  play,  with  amaz- 
ingly realistic  scenic  effects  ! 

For  seventeen  hours  the  fire  raged  on  with  unabated  might,  till 
it  had  made  a  clean  sweep  of  about  four  hundred  houses,  covering 
about  ten  acres  of  ground,  and  leaving  thousands  of  poor  creatures 
homeless. 

Even  hours  after  we  thought  all  was  safely  over,  flames  suddenly 
burst  from  one  more  large  house  just  beyond  the  hospital  :  it  was 
entirely  consumed,  and  the  heaps  of  ruin  still  smoulder,  sending 
up  dense  volumes  of  white  smoke,  and  ready  to  break  out  at  a 
thousand  spots. 

As  soon  as  the  fire  ceased  (which  it  did  apparently  simply  of  its 
own  free  will,  as  both  the  cathedral  and  the  jail  offered  an  easy 
prey),  Mr  Snowden  took  me  down  to  the  town,  and  we  went  over 
a  great  part  of  the  ruined  city,  and  a  truly  heartrending  Bight  it 
was.      In  every  corner  of  the   unburnt  streets  whole  families  were 


16  A    MEMORABLE    CHRISTMAS. 

huddled  together  beside  a,  little  pile  of  the  poor  household  stuff 
they  h;ul  succeeded  in  saving,  while  the  houses,  which  a  few  hours 

before  had  hccn  happy  homes,  lay  in  smouldering  ruins.  I  Dever 
could  have  believed  that  any  community  could  have  borne  SO 
awful  a  calamity  so  bravely  and  patiently.  Xot  a  murmur  was 
heard;  not  a  tear  have  1  seen  shed  by  women  who  have  losi 
everything,  and  crouched,  shivering  and  half  dressed,  in  a  really 
chilling  breeze. 

But  they  seem  to  have  a  curiously  suspicious  and  by  no  means 
nattering  feeling  towards  such  kindly  Britons  as  wish  to  help 
them,  various  offers  of  assistance  and  loan  of  blankets  having 
been  flatly  declined  by  women  whose  children  were  crying  with 
cold. 

One  very  remarkable  instance  of  this  is,  that  the  captain  of  the 
Perusia,  a  large  vessel  now  lying  in  the  harbour,  offered  good 
quarters  to  upwards  of  six  hundred  of  the  houseless  Chinese 
sufferers.  The  offer  was  made  through  the  Tung  "Wah  Hospital 
Committee,  who  regulate  all  such  matters  for  their  countrymen, 
and  these  positively  refused  the  good  offer,  which  included  com- 
fortable provision  for  cooking,  and  whatever  else  kindness  could 
have  bestowed.  It  appears  that  this  vessel  was  at  one  time  in  the 
coolie  trade,  and  the  supposition  is  that  the  people  thought  they 
would  be  kidnapped.  However,  the  Tung  AVah  people  made  no 
other  provision  for  the  luckless  wretches,  who  have  been  all  this 
time  living  in  the  open  street,  and  at  night  are  half  perished  with 
cold. 

The  extent  of  ground  utterly  ruined  is  quite  awful.  We  walked 
up  one  street  and  down  another,  uphill  and  downhill,  by  the  streets 
of  stairs,  and  along  the  horizontal  streets,  for  between  two  and 
three  hours,  and  even  then  had  not  gone  all  over  the  ground.  It 
is  such  a  scene  of  desolation  that  I  find  it  hard  to  realise  that  these 
are  the  very  streets  which  on  Christmas-day  I  saw  crowded  with 
comfortable-looking  people.  Now  there  are  only  a  few  blackened 
walls,  and  engines  are'  still  pumping  vigorously  on  the  mountains 
of  fallen  bricks,  which  in  some  places  quite  block  the  streets,  and 
from  which  puffs  of  smoke  still  rise,  as  if  to  show  that  the  foe  is 
not  dead,  but  only  sleeping.  It  needs  but  a  little  neglect  and  a 
fresh  breeze,  and  the  chances  are  that  the  fire  might  break  out 
again,  and  there  is  no  saying  where  it  would  end.  It  would  have 
a  better  chance  now,  for  all  the  firemen  are  fairly  worn  out,  as  are 
also  the  soldiers  and  sailors,  who  have   been  on  duty  with  very 


DESOLATION.  1 7 

small  intermission  for  about  forty  hours,  and  who  are  still  on  guard 
at  all  points  to  check  looting,  and  to  prevent  foolhardy  people  from 
going  into  danger  in  the  neighbourhood  of  unsound  walls.  There 
will  be  an  immense  amount  of  work  in  even  pulling  these  down. 
when  they  have  cooled. 

Mr  Snowden  met  many  of  his  acquaintances  still  in  their  fire- 
brigade  helmets,  all  looking  scorched  and  utterly  exhausted. 
Several  have  been  hurt.  They  say  that  never  before  has  there 
been  so  disastrous  a  conflagration  in  Hong-Kong. 

It  is  marvellous  to  see  how  capricious  the  fire  has  been.  Here 
is  a  street  with  one  side  intact — the  other  wholly  destroyed ;  here 
stands  part  of  a  gable  with  here  and  there  a  wooden  shelf  un- 
scathed, on  which  rest  securely  a  few  delicate  china  vases  or  some 
growin;j;  plants.  In  one  house  which  had  blazed  most  fiercely,  I 
saw  the  verandah  up-stairs,  of  lattice  woodwork,  alone  standing  in- 
tact, while  tlic  whole  house  was  gutted,  and  on  the  verandah  were 
arranged  pots  with  flowers  and  variegated  leaves  not  even  scorched, 
and,  just  above  them,  from  a  skeleton  roof,  hung  a  paper  lantern 
untouched ! 

Some  of  the  best  curio  shops  are  burned,  and  it  is  pitiful  to  see 
the  beautiful  great  jars  smashed,  and  lacquer  all  dirt-begrimed.  In 
one  place  we  came  on  the  whole  stock  of  a  poor  artist-photographer 
(who  paints  wonderfully  correct,  if  not  artistic,  portraits  in  oil, 
from  any  old  photograph)  all  strewn  over  the  street,  where  lay  his 
careful  paintings  all  torn  and  soiled.  Everywhere  there  is  the 
-aim-  pitiful  destruction,  and  stupefied  people  hanging  listlessly 
about  the  smouldering  wreck  of  their  .poor  little  property.  Of 
course  their  losses  strike  one  as  more  pathetic  than  the  far  larger 
destruction  of  fully  insured  rich  men's  houses. 

I  have  just  returned  from  a  second  long  walk  all  over  the  scene 
of  ruin.  It  has  a  horrible  sort  of  attraction,  even  while  it  makes 
me  feel  sick  at  heart.  Now  I  too  confess  to  feeling  utterly  ex- 
hausted, though  I  have  had  nothing  to  do  but  just  to  sit  still  and 
watch  at  highest  tension.  And  I  devoutly  hope  never  again  to 
witness  such  a  scene. 


18  FROM    HONG-KONG    TO    CANTON. 

CHAPTER    II. 

FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

New-Year's  Day  in  Hong-Kong — Good  winter-quarters  —  Pleasant  society 
— Lights  and  shadows — Census — Deficient  water-supply  —  Defective 
drainage— The  summit  of  the  peak — Across  the  isle  to  Aberdeen  Docks 
— Primitive  sugar-crushing — Dyeing  nets — The  Happy  Valley — Ceme- 
teries— Voyage  to  Canton — Pawn-towers — The  foreign  settlement — It- 
origin — Riot  of  1883 — Walk  through  the  city — Shops — Street  names — 
Primitive  mills — Crowded  streets — Beggars — Provisions — Fruit-shops — 
Flowers  for  New  Year — Visit  divers  temjdes — Fireproof  walls — Tartar 
and  Chinese  cities — The  tornado  of  1878. 

Hoxo-Kono,  Wed.,  Jan.  1,  1S79. 

This  has  been  the  perfection  of  a  lovely  New-Year's  day.  The 
climate  here  at  this  season  is  quite  delicious,  like  a  soft,  balmy 
English  summer,  redolent  of  flowers.  You  can  walk  comfortably 
at  any  hour  of  the  day ;  but  the  mornings  and  evenings  are  pleas- 
antest,  and  then  the  lights  are  most  beautiful. 

In  the  early  morning  there  was  a  very  nice  service  at  the  cathe- 
dral, the  bishop  giving  a  short  and  practical  Xew-Year  address, 
followed  by  celebration  of  the  Holy  Communion. 

Hong-Kong  society  has  adopted  the  American  custom  of  con- 
verting this  day  into  a  social  treadmill.  All  ladies  sit  at  home 
the  livelong  day  to  receive  the  calls  of  all  gentlemen  of  their 
acquaintance,  while  these  rush  from  house  to  house,  endeavouring 
to  fit  in  the  whole  circle  of  their  visiting  list.  Here  the  stream  of 
callers  began  soon  after  breakfast,  and  continued  all  day,  including 
all  the  foreign  consuls,  and  others  of  divers  nations  —  Japanese, 
Portuguese,   Indians,  French,   Italian,  &c. 

To-night  we  dine  at  Government  House,  where  there  is  to  be 
a  grand  ball  in  honour  of  the  New  Year,  and  where  we  are  to  be 
enlivened  by  the  pipers  of  the  74th  and  some  cheery  Highland 
reels. 

Glen-ealy,  Wed.  8th,  cftea  Mrs  Lowcock. 

Another  week  has  glided  by,  and  each  day  convinces  me  more 
and  more  that  it  would  simply  be  impossible  to  find  more  delight- 
ful winter-quarters. 

Morning,  noon,  evening,  and   night   are  all   beautiful   and  all 


PLEASANT    WINTER-QUARTERS.  19 

pleasant,  and  there  is  the  delight  of  continuous  fine  weather, 
which  is  warranted  to  continue  throughout  the  five  winter  months, 
without  the  slightest  chance  of  rain,  or  the  faintest  possibility  of 
snow.  Some  days  are  just  a  trifle  too  cold — just  enough  to  make 
us  welcome  a  cheery  fire  in  the  evening;  hut  all  day  there  is 
1  night  sunlight  and  a  cloudless  blue  sky.  The  climate  is  semi- 
tropical,  and  has  rewarded  the  care  of  many  gardeners  by  trans- 
forming what,  forty  years  ago,1  must  have  been  a  very  barren  rock, 
into  a  succession  of  pleasant  shrubberies,  so  that  all  these  palatial 
houses  (which  cover  the  hillside  to  a  height  of  400  feet  above  the 
sea)  are  embowered  in  rich  foliage. 

To-day  we  have  been  sitting  in  the  garden  of  this  pleasant  home, 
beneath  the  cool  shade  of  large  thick-leaved  India-rubber  trees — 
noble  trees,  with  great  stems  and  spreading  branches — which  look 
as  if  they  must  have  reigned  here  for  centuries,  so  rapid  has  been 
their  growth.  And  the  camellia-trees  are  laden  with  snowy  blos- 
soms, while  the  air  is  scented  with  roses,  mignonette,  and  jessamine, 
and  now  and  again  a  faint  breeze  shakes  the  fluffy  yellow  balls  of 
the  sweet  babool,2  and  floats  on  laden  with  a  perfume  that  seems 
like  a  dream  of  Indian  jungles  and  Hawaiian  isles  and  far-away 
English  conservato  >iies. 

( lertainly  I  am  exceptionally  favoured  in  the  situation  of  the 
various  homes  to  which  I  am  so  kindly  welcomed,  my  present 
luxuriant  quarters3  (which  stand  on  a  considerable  elevation  over- 
looking the  harbour)  having  extensive  private  grounds  almost 
adjoining  the  beautiful  public  gardens,  just  beyond  which  lies 
Government  House — a  fine  building,  with  a  pleasant  garden — and 
in  the  valley  just  below  this  house  stands  St  Paul's  College,  which 
is  the  bishop's  home.  Of  all  this,  and  indeed  of  all  the  principal 
points  of  interest  about  the  city,  this  house  commands  a  splendid 
view — a  rare  combination  of  a  lovely  harbour  with  shipping  of  all 
nations,  high  mountains,  picturescpue  streets  with  overshadowing 
trees — and  beyond  the  blue  straits  rise  mountain-ridges  on  the 
mainland  of  China. 

And  the  human  life  is  equally  characteristic.  There  is  a  very 
large,  agreeable    European    society — naval,  military,  and   civil — 

1  Another  forty  years  bida  fair  to  transform  the  island  into  a  forest,  as,  in  the 
hope  of  improving  the  climate,  Sir  John  Pope  Hennessey  has  most  lit.  rally  obeyed 
sir  Walter  Scott's  injunction  to  "be  aye-  stickin'  in  a  tree,"  and  in  the  course  of 
1880  and  1881  he  planted  nearly  1,000,000  young  Pinvs  sinensis,  and  about 
60,000  other  useful  trees. 

-  Mimosa. 

3  The  property  of  a  great  mercantile  house,  Messrs  Gibb,  Livingsl 


20 


FROM  BONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 


with  surroundings  of  quaint  Chinese  men  and  women — the  former 
with  their  long  plaits,  the  hitter  with  wonderfully  dressed,  glossy 
hair.  Judging  from  my  own  experience,  I  can  never  again  pity 
any  one  who  is  sent  to  Hong-Kong — at  least  in  winter.  I  am, 
however,  assured  that  there  are  two  sides  to  the  picture,  and  that 
we  who  rejoice  in  a  thermometer  which  now  never  exceeds  65° 
in  the  shade,  can  scarcely  realise  how  different  life  is  when,  in  the 
close  murky  rains  of  summer,  it  stands  at  90°,  and  the  peak, 
which  is  now  so  clear,  is  all  shrouded  with  heavy  clouds  which 
overhang  the  city  like  a  thick  pall,  and  prevent  the  stifling  atmos- 
phere from  rising. 

And  there  are  other  matters,  too,  which  to  the  great  mass  of 
the  inhabitants  may  make  life  in  this  city  anything  but  a  delight, 
and  which  present  knotty  problems  so  difficult  of  solution  as 
sorely  to  tax  the  ingenuity  and  ability  of  those  who  have  to  deal 
with  them — such  matters  as  may  in  a  measure  suggest  themselves 
to  any  one  who  considers  hoAV  a  very  narrow  strip  of  moderately 
level  ground  at  the  base  of  this  steep  mountain,  which,  forty  years 
ago,  was  inhabited  only  by  a  handful  of  Chinese  fishermen,  now 
has  a  total  population  of  130,000  persons  (without  counting  that 
of  the  villages  in  different  parts  of  Hong-Kong — some  of  which 
may  almost  rank  as  little  towns — and  which  run  up  the  population 
to  1 60,000.! 

Moreover,  although  the  level  strip  of  shore  at  the  base  of  the 
mountain  has  been  greatly  enlarged  by  reclamation,  and  now  forms 
the  harbour  frontage  of  the  city  (and  although  the  city  itself  ex- 
tends along  the  shore  for  a  distance  of  very  nearly  four  miles  from 
east  to  west,  running  back  inland  for  about  half  a  mile,  and  climb- 
ing the  hillside  in  a  succession  of  terraces  to  a  height  of  upwards  of 

1  Statistics  of  the  City  of  Victoria— Census  of  1881. 


Europeans 

and 
Americans. 

Portuguese, 

Indian,  and 

Mixed  Blood. 

Chinese. 

Chinese 

Boat 

Population. 

Men     .... 

5499 

1161 

69,455 

7635 

Women 

899 

1S1 

18,067 

3440 

Boys    .... 

857 

191 

8,872 

3061 

Girls    .... 

735 

189 

8,701 

2551 

If  we  omit  tlic  Chinese  boat  population,  which  lives  quite  apart  from  the  rest  of 
the  community,  we  find  that  the  proportion  of  men  to  women  in  this  city  is  76,000 
to  19,000 — a  detail  in  itself  suggestive  of  serious  social  difficulties. 


.SANITATION.  21 

400  feet),  a  very  large  portion  of  this  space  is  covered  with  a 
dense  mass  of  Chinese  houses,  where  the  greatest  possible  number 
of  human  beings  are  packed  into  the  very  smallest  possible  amount 
of  space. 

But  for  all  this  multitude  of  human  habitations,  no  sort  of 
effective  drains  or  sewers  have  been  provided — only  conduits  for 
the  superfluous  rains,  to  carry  their  torrents  by  the  straightest 
course  into  the  harbour — and  whatever  sewerage;  finds  its  way 
into  these,  is  simply  deposited  along  the  whole  harbour  front,  thus 
poisoning  what  else  might  be  a  pleasant  situation.  But,  as  regards 
all  that  is  generally  understood  by  the  term  "sanitary  arrange- 
ments," except  in  the  palatial  homes  of  Europeans,  all  such  neces- 
sary matters  are  provided  for  in  a  manner  primitive  in  the  extreme  ; 
and  the  arrangements  for  the  daily  (or  among  the  poorer  classes 
only  bi-weekly  !)  removal  of  nuisances  from  every  house  (for  sub- 
sequent conveyance  to  the  mainland  as  an  article  of  agricultural 
commerce)  form  a  very  unpleasant  page  in  the  details  of  sanitary 
statistics  of  her  Majesty's  empire. 

Then,  too,  although  this  "  Island  of  fragrant  streams  "  (which 
is  one  of  its  Chinese  names)  is  really  by  nature  well  supplied  with 
such  pure  sparkling  waters  as  percolate  through  a  soil  composed 
win  illy  of  disintegrated  granite  and  other  primitive  rock,  the  actual 
Avater-supply  of  the  city  is  miserably  inadequate,  and  it  i>  esti- 
mated that  in  the  dry  season  (just  when  there  is  the  greatest 
danger  of  fires),  the  whole  quantity  available  cannot  exceed  six 
gallons  a-day  per  head.  Even  if  this  miserably  insufficient  supply 
could  be  equally  distributed  and  stored  with  the  greatest  economy, 
it  would  barely  suffice  for  drinking  and  cooking  purposes,  leaving 
no  margin  for  the  baths  which  we  deem  such  a  downright  neces- 
sary of  life. 

On  the  present  system,  however,  it  is  found  that  there  is  large 
waste,  and  while  some  houses  secure  an  ample  supply,  an  immense 
number  of  the  inhabitants  have  to  pay  water-carriers  at  the  rate  of 
from  |d.  to  Id.  per  bucket  (according  to  the  distance  and  height 
to  which  it  has  to  be  carried).  These  men  assemble  at  early  dawn 
round  the  street  fountains,  waiting  till  the  water  is  turned  on, 
when  a  general  scramble  for  precedence  ensues,  as  the  supply  is 
often  shut  off  ere  all  can  get  a  turn.  Then  these  poor  folk  have 
either  to  buy  water  from  some  well,  or  else  to  climb  the  steep  hill 
and  seek  their  day's  supply  wherever  they  can  find  it  in  one  of  the 
rivulets  or  water-holes. 

In  the  absence  of  proper  laundries,  all  the  most  accessible  of 


22         FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

these  streams  are  used  for  washing  purposes,  and  the  stagnant  pools 
are  filled  with  putrefying  soap-suds.  Moreover,  though  there  are 
many  shallow  surface-wells  in  various  parts  of  the  town,  they  are 
in  so  many  cases  in  such  close  proximity  to  the  house-drain,  that 
their  waters  are  almost  inevitably  contaminated. 

A  very  curious  point  in  connection  with  the  subject,  is  the  sin- 
gular injustice  of  the  Government  water-rate,  by  which  a  uniform 
rate  of  two  per  cent  is  levied  on  the  assessed  annual  rental  of  all 
houses  in  Victoria,  whether  they  have  water  laid  on  or  not.  As 
there  is  no  extra  charge  for  extra  consumption,  the  man  whose 
house  is  amply  provided  with  luxurious  baths,  and  whose  garden 
is  not  only  well  watered  but  perhaps  even  adorned  with  fountains, 
pays  no  more  than  does  his  neighbour  whose  house  has  no  water- 
service,  and  who  is  consequently  compelled  to  pay  a  coolie  for 
fetching  his  supply  from  wherever  he  may  be  able  to  find  or 
purchase  it  (which  is  probably  from  one  of  the  wells  of  doubtful 
purity). 

As  regards  the  sufficiency  of  supply,  however,  there  is  every 
reasonable  hope  that  this  will  shortly  be  remedied,  as  it  is  now 
proposed  to  create  a  great  reservoir  in  a  valley  which  receives  the 
natural  drainage  of  the  granite  hills  on  every  side,  and  where  it  is 
supposed  that  an  ample  supply  may  be  secured,  even  in  view  of 
still  further  extension  of  the  city. 

A  few  such  details  as  these,  however,  unhappily  suggest  that 
here,  as  elsewhere,  the  brightest  lights  contrast  with  darkest 
shadows ;  and  while  to  the  few,  including  such  birds  of  passage 
as  myself,  this  island  appears  quite  delightful,  life  here  must  to 
the  vast  majority  have  its  decided  disadvantages.  Certainly  the 
perfumed  breath  of  flowers,  which  is  so  pleasant  a  characteristic  of 
our  daily  life  here,  is  a  joy  altogether  unknown  to  the  inhabitants 
of  the  densely  packed  houses  below,  where  the  close  stifling  atmos- 
phere of  crowded,  airless  rooms  must  be  suggestive  of  anything 
but  fragrance  ! 

But  to  such  as  have  no  call  to  look  below  the  surface,  all  may 
be  very  bright  and  pleasant ;  and  although  the  anxieties  and 
fatigues  connected  with  the  great  fire  did  cause  a  perceptible  lull 
in  the  programme  of  the  Christmas-week  festivities,  which  were  to 
have  included  sundry  great  picnics,  there  has  been  no  lack  of 
pleasant  social  gatherings,  and  as  to  the  picnics,  we  have  had  prob- 
ably more  enjoyable  expeditions  by  ourselves  to  the  chief  points  of 
interest  on  the  isle,  to  all  of  which  we  are  carried  (at  least  part  of 
the  way)  in  comfortable  arm-chairs,  slung  on  bamboos,  and  borne 


THE    OTHER    SIDE    OF    HONG-KOXG.  23 

on  the  shoulders  of  two  men,  with  two  more  to  relieve  guard. 
Here  all  manner  of  transport  service,  whether  of  human  heings  or 
goods,  is  done  by  man-power.  Horses,  carriages,  and  carts  are 
virtually  non-existent.  There  may  he  in  all  about  half-a-dozen 
(or  possibly  at  the  outset  a  dozen)  horses  and  ponies  to  all  this 
great  population,  and  one  or  two  pony-carriages,  which  alone  repre- 
sent wheeled  vehicles,  the  steepness  of  the  roads  making  such 
practically  useless.1 

There  are  pretty  villages  and  valleys  all  along  the  hack  of  the 
isle,  so  some  days  we  journey  round  the  base  of  the  mountain  mass, 
and  sometimes  follow  some  steep  hill-path  which  leads  us  over  a 
pass,  and  down  the  other  side.  A  favourite  expedition  is  to  the 
summit  of  the  peak,  where  the  Governor,  the  Chief-Justice,  and 
some  of  the  principal  foreign  residents  have  cottages,  where  they 
can  live  for  change  of  air  in  summer,  coming  down  1800  feet  to 
their  daily  work.  (I  think  their  coolies  must  sorely  regret  this 
migration  to  summer-quarters !)  The  view  hence  in  every  direc- 
tion is  very  hne.2 

Yesterday  we  crossed  the  main  ridge  which  forms  the  backbone 
of  the  island,  at  a  point  called  "Victoria  Gap,"  and  down  the  other 
side  to  "  Aberdeen,"  a  town  which  has  grown  up  round  the  Hong- 
Kong  docks,  where  we  saw  a  huge  American  steamer  undergoing 
repairs,  and  surrounded  by  innumerable  little  sampans  (native 
house-boats).  The  scene  was  very  suggestive  of  Gulliver  in 
Liliput !  It  was  to  a  great  banyan-tree  on  a  small  island  in  this 
harbour  that  Commodore  Anson  fastened  his  ship  to  haul  her  over 
for  repairs,  just  about  150  years  ago.  Little  did  he  dream  what 
familiar  names  Britons  would  hereafter  bestow  on  these  scenes ! 

Continuing  along  the  coast,  we  came  to  Little  Hong-Kong,  a 
very  pretty  richly-wooded  valley  between  rugged  hills,  with  the 
sea  forming  an  inland  lake,  and  a  foreground  of  fantastic  screw- 
pine.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  fine  timber  on  that  side  of  the  isle, 
and  we  halted  at  a  lovely  shady  spot  to  boil  our  kettle  and  enjoy 
a  cheery  tea. 

A  little  farther  avc  paused  to  watch  a  most  primitive  method  of 
crushing  sugar-cane  between  two  stone-rollers,  which  are  turned  by 
three  bullocks,  the  juice  falling  between  the  rollers  into  a  bucket 
beside  the  man  who  feeds  the  machine  with  fresh  cane.  Another 
man  at  the  back  of  the  rollers  removes  the  crushed  canes. 

1  Recently,  however,  the  jinricksha,  or  Japanese  bath-chair,  drawn  by  oin-  or 
two  men,  lias  come  largely  into  fashion. 

2  Since  my  visit  to  the  peak,  a  church  has  been  erected  for  the  good  of  this  aspir- 
ing colony. 


24         FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

In  "Deep  Bay"  we  found  a  colony  of  fishers  boiling  their  nets 
in  an  exceedingly  tall  vat,  containing  a  decoction  of  mangrove-bark, 
which  produces  much  the  same  rich  brown  colour  as  our  own 
fishers  extract  from  alder-bark.  Here,  however,  it  is  considered 
necessary  subsecpuently  to  steep  the  nets  in  pig's  blood  to  fix  the 
colour.  Those  in  common  use  are  made  of  hemp,  but  others  are 
made  of  a  very  coarse  silk,  which  is  spun  by  wild  silk-worms, 
which  feed  on  mountain-oaks.  In  order  to  give  these  additional 
strength,  they  are  soaked  in  wood-oil. 

We  saw  nets  of  very  varied  shape  and  divers-sized  mesh  hang- 
ing up  to  dry  all  along  the  shore,  beneath  the  weird  screw-pines. 
I  am  told  that  at  the  beginning  of  every  fishing  season  they  are 
formally  consecrated  to  the  Queen  of  Heaven,  the  protectress  of 
fisher-folk,  to  whom  sacrifices  and  incense  are  duly  offered,  while 
the  nets  are  outspread  before  her  to  receive  her  blessing. 

Once  more  facing  the  hill,  and  "  setting  a  stout  heart  to  a  stey 
brae,"  we  ascended  to  the  Stanley  Gap,  whence  the  view  on  either 
side  is  very  grand ;  and  we  watched  a  red  sunset  glowing  over  sea 
and  isles,  and  glorifying  the  Chinese  mainland,  while  a  full  moon 
shone  gloriously  over  this  harbour  and  the  farther  hills,  which  are 
also  part  of  the  mainland. 

Then  we  had  to  turn  away  from  the  red  glow  and  be  content 
with  moonlight  only  (but  such  lovely  moonlight !)  as  we  came 
down  through  the  Happy  Valley,  where  the  beautiful  cemeteries 
for  Hindoos,  Parsees,  Protestants,  Roman  Catholics,  and  Moham- 
medans lie  side  by  side  along  the  base  of  the  hill,  overlooking  the 
very  fine  racecourse ;  on  the  farther  side  of  which,  on  another  hill, 
lies  the  Chinese  cemetery,  suggesting  curious  contrasts  between  the 
races  to  be  run  and  those  that  are  run.  The  Happy  Valley  la}r 
very  still  and  peaceful  in  the  moonlight,  its  beauty  seeming  an 
additional  point  in  favour  of  a  colony  whose  dead  may  rest  in  so 
fair  a  spot. 

I  have  seen  various  very  attractive  scenes  for  sketches,  but  for 
these  I  must  wait  till  my  return  from  Canton,  where  I  go  to-mor- 
row, being  anxious  to  see  the  city  in  its  normal  condition,  before 
the  commencement  of  all  the  feverish  excitement  of  the  Xew-Vear 
festival,  which  (varying  from  year  to  year  in  consecpience  of 
reckoning  by  lunar  months)  will  this  year  fall  on  the  2  2d  Jan- 
uary, after  which  there  follows  a  spell  of  festivity,  when  all  busi- 
ness is  at  a  standstill. 

The  distance  from  here  to  Canton  is  about  95  miles — an  eight 
hours'  trip  by  an  American  daily  steamer. 


ANTI-PIRATE    PRECAUTIONS.  2o 


Che:  Mrs  Lend, 

Shameek,  the  Foreign  Settlement, 

Canton,  Jitm.  9th. 

Embarked  at  7.30  this  morning,  Captain  Benning  kindly  pro- 
viding me  with  a  chair  on  his  high  deck,  that  I  might  have  full 
enjoyment  of  the  scenery,  which  in  the  early  morning  light  was 
most  beautiful.  Presently,  when  we  were  clear  of  the  island,  he 
took  me  all  over  the  ship  to  see  the  manner  in  which  the  Chinese 
passengers,  to  the  number  of  about  1500,  are  stowed  away,  the 
more  respectable  class  on  a  lower  deck,  and  the  common  herd  in 
the  hold,  where  they  are  packed  close  as  herring  in  a  barrel.  Each 
stair  connecting  their  quarters  with  the  rest  of  the  ship  is  bar- 
ricaded by  a  heavy  iron  grating,  securely  padlocked,  and  at  each 
stands  a  sentry  with  drawn  sword  and  revolver,  keeping  a  keen 
look-out  down  the  gangway.  This  guard  is  relieved  every  hour. 
All  the  officers  are  similarly  armed,  and  in  the  wheel-house  are 
stands  of  arms  all  ready  for  use  in  case  of  need. 

All  these  precautions  are  against  the  ever-present  danger  of 
pirates,  who  might  so  easily  take  passage  among  their  inoffensive 
countrymen — in  fact,  these  measures  have  been  adopted  in  conse- 
quence of  a  pirate  band  having  thus  seized  the  s.s.  Spark,  mur- 
dered the  captain  and  some  of  the  officers  and  passengers,  and 
made  good  their  escape  with  a  lot  of  specie.  Some  of  them  were 
eventually  captured,  and  confessed  that  on  a  previous  day  they  had 
been  on  board  this  very  ship  with  similar  intent,  and  a  boatdoad  of 
their  confederates  were  waiting  at  a  given  point,  where  the  attack 
was  to  be  made.  But  just  as  they  reached  this  spot,  four  foreign 
sail  were  in  sight  (a  very  unusual  circumstance),  and  they  were 
alarmed,  so  refrained  from  action.  On  referring  to  his  log,  Cap- 
tain Benning  found  these  four  sail  mentioned  at  this  very  hour,  and 
fully  realised  how  narrow  had  been  his  own  escape. 

At  about  eleven  o'clock  we  passed  between  the  Bogue  Forts 
(dull-looking  earthworks),  which  mark  the  entrance  to  Pearl  River. 
(Bogue  apparently  answers  to  our  Aber — "the  mouth  of.")  The 
stream  here  is  half  a  mile  wide.  About  thirty  miles  farther  we 
passed  a  nine-storied  pagoda,  and  the  old  town  of  Whampoa, 
and  more  fortifications;  and  steering  an  intricate  course  through 
an  innumerable  crowd  of  junks  and  sampans,  we  noted  the  richly 
cultivated  lands  and  market-gardens,  which  provide  not  only  for 
the  1,500,000  inhabitants  of  Canton  (some  say  2,000,000),*  but 
also  for  the  markets  of  Hong-Kong. 

The  shores  are  dotted  with  villages,  in  each  of  which  stands  one 


2G         FHOM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

conspicuous  greal  solid  square  structure  of  granite,  lined  with  brick, 

about  four  stories  high.  It  looks  like  an  old  Border  keep,  but  it 
really  is  the  village  pawn-shop,  which  acts  as  the  safe  store-house 
for  everybody's  property.  Here  in  -winter  are  deposited  all  summer 
garments,  and  when  spring  returns  they  are  reclaimed;  and  as  the 
winter  garments  which  are  then  left  in  pawn  are  more  valuable, 
the  owner  sometimes  receives  an  advance  of  seed  for  sowing  his 
crops.  Here  there  is  no  prejudice  against  the  pawning  of  goods. 
It  is  a  regular  institution  of  the  country,  and  even  wealthy  people 
send  their  goods  here  for  safe  keeping.  Some  foreigners  thus  dis- 
pose of  their  furs  in  the  winter  season.  All  goods  are  neatly 
packed  and  ticketed,  and  stored  in  pigeon-hole  compartments  of 
innumerable  shelves,  ranged  tier  above  tier,  to  the  very  summit  of 
the  tall  building,  which  is  strongly  protected  both  against  fire  and 
thieves ;  in  fact,  the  latter  must  be  mad  indeed  to  face  the  danger 
of  attacking  a  pawn-tower,  on  whose  flat  roof  are  stored  not  only 
large  stones  ready  to  be  dropped  on  their  devoted  heads,  but  also 
earthenware  jars  full  of  vitriol,  and  syringes  wherewith  to  squirt 
this  terrible  liquid  fire  !  As  we  approached  nearer  and  nearer  to 
the  city,  the  number  of  these  great  towers  multiplied,  and  I  am 
told  that  there  are  in  Canton  upwards  of  a  hundred  first-class 
pawn-towers,  besides  a  multitude  of  the  second  and  third  class, 
sufficiently  proving  how  good  must  be  their  business ;  and  it  seems 
that  notwithstanding  the  very  high  rate  of  interest  on  money  lent, 
ranging  from  20  to  36  per  cent,  the  people  prefer  borrowing  money 
from  these  brokers  to  applying  to  the  banks. 

With  the  exception  of  these  numerous  square  towers,  some  forti- 
fications, and  the  very  imposing  Roman  Catholic  cathedral  (ab- 
horred by  the  Chinese  chiefly  as  having  been  built  on  land  unjustly 
appropriated  by  the  French),  we  saw  little,  save  a  moderate  amount 
of  smoke,  to  suggest  that  we  were  approaching  a  mighty  city — the 
great  southern  capital  of  the  Empire — so  entirely  are  its  low  level 
streets  concealed  by  the  forest  of  masts  of  innumerable  junks  and 
vessels  of  all  sorts.  Only  in  the  distance  rose  a  background  of  low 
hills,  which  are  the  White  Cloud  range.  Altogether  the  first  im- 
pressions of  Canton  are  in  most  notable  contrast  to  those  of  lovely 
Hong-Kong. 

Approaching  the  city,  we  noted  the  little  English  cemetery  on  a 
low  hillock  near  the  river,  and  about  two  o'clock  we  came  in  sight 
of  this  wondrously  green  isle — the  Shameen,  or  "  Sandy  Face," 
where  handsome  foreign  houses  appear  mingling  with  shady  banyan 
and  other  trees. 


AX    ARTIFICIAL    ISLE.  27 

Among  the  crowd  assembled  on  the  embankment  to  watch  the 
arrival  of  the  steamer,  I  noticed  a  group  of  chair-coolies  in  pretty 
uniform,  bearing  a  resplendent  palanquin,  which  I  supposed  to  con- 
tain some  great  mandarin,  and  was  considerably  taken  aback  on 
learning  that  it  had  been  sent  for  me,  being  the  special  property  of 
my  hostess  —  the  equivalent  of  a  carriage  in  England.  I  must 
honestly  confess  that  my  ideas  of  life  in  Canton  were  altogether 
bouleverse  by  this  first  glimpse  of  the  luxuries  of  foreign  life  up 
here.  I  had  imagined  that  a  few  exiles  from  Hong-Kong,  who 
could  not  help  themselves,  had,  owing  to  the  exigencies  of  business, 
to  live  here,  picnic  fashion,  in  the  dirty  city  itself,  which  I  sup- 
posed to  be  much  on  a  par  with  the  native  town  at  Shanghai,  only 
more  picturesque.  I  daresay  I  ought  to  have  known  better,  but  I 
did  not.  So  it  was  a  most  startling  revelation  to  find  myself  in  a 
very  smart,  purely  foreign  settlement,  as  entirely  isolated  from  the 
native  city  as  though  tiny  were  miles  apart,  instead  of  being  only 
divided  by  a  i  anal,  which  constitutes  this  peaceful  green  spot  an 
island. 

Here  is  transplanted  an  English  social  life  so  completely  ful- 
filling all  English  requirements,  that  the  majority  of  the  inhabitants 
rarely  enter  the  city  !  They  either  walk  round  the  isle,  or  up  and 
down  the  wide  grass  road,  overshadowed  by  banyan-trees,  which 
encircles  the  isle  (a  circuit  of  a  mile  and  a  half),  and  which  is  the 
"  Rotten  Row  "  of  the  island — the  meeting-place  for  all  friends  ; 
but  in  place  of  horses  and  carriages,  its  interests  centre  in  boats 
without  number,  and  from  this  embankment  those  who  wish  to  go 
farther,  embark  in  their  own  or  in  hired  boats. 

A  handsome  English  church,  and  large  luxurious  two-storied 
houses  of  Italian  architecture,  with  deep  verandahs,  the  homes  of 
wealthy  merchants,  are  scattered  over  the  isle,  embowered  in  the 
shade  of  their  own  gardens;  and  altogether  this  little  spot — washed 
on  one  side  by  the  Pearl  River,  and  on  the  other  by  the  canal — is 
as  pleasant  a  quarter  as  could  be  desired. 

It  is  hard  to  realise  that,  previous  to  the  capture  of  Canton  in 
1857,  a  hideous  mud-flat  occupied  the  place  where  this  green  isle 
now  lies.  Having  been  selected  as  a  suitable  spot  for  a  foreign 
settlement,  piles  were  driven  into  the  river  and  filled  up  with  sand, 
and  on  this  foundation  was  built  an  embankment  of  solid  granite, 
which  is  now  the  daily  recreation-ground  of  all  the  foreign  popula- 
tion. But  nothing  that  now  meets  the  eye  on  this  artificial  island 
suggests  the  enormous  labour  by  Avhich  this  transformation  was 
accomplished. 


28  FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

Indescribable,  however,  is  the  contrast  between  the  peace  and 
calm  which  here  reign  and  the  crowds  and  dirt  and  bustle  of  the 
great  Chinese  city,  from  which  it  is  only  separated  by  a  narrow 
canal  bridged  at  two  points,  each  bridge  being  guarded  by  a  sentry.1 
We  can  saunter  beneath  shady  trees  on  the  canal  embankment  and 
— overlooking  the  closely-packed  house-boats  which  lie  moored 
close  below  us — we  see  the  busy  tide  of  life  surging  on  the  oppo- 
site shore.  I  hope  ere  long  to  find  myself  in  the  midst  of  it,  and 
explore  all  the  wonders  of  the  great  city. 

Saturday  Night,  11' 

For  two  whole  days  we  have  been  wandering  through  this  won- 
derful city,  and  how  to  describe  it  in  sober  English  is  more  than  I 
ran  tell  ! 

Fascinating  as  the  bazaars  of  Cairo  to  an  untravelled  artist ; 
bewildering  as  the  thronged  and  narrow  streets  of  Benares,  yet 
differing  so  essentially  from  these  as  to  form  a  totally  new  expe- 
rience in  the  annals  of  travel, — Canton  stands  by  itself  in  every  im- 
pression it  conveys.  Alike  in  this  only,  that  the  days  spent  in 
each  of  these  three  cities  must  for  ever  rise  above  the  ordinary 
level  of  our  memory-pictures,  as  some  tall  pagoda  towers  above  the 
plain. 

What  chiefly  strikes  one  on  arriving  in  Canton  is  not  so  much 
the  temples  (though  of  these  there  are,  I  believe,  about  eight  hun- 
dred, dedicated  to  gods  and  goddesses  innumerable,  and  all  more 
or  less  richly  adorned  with  shrines,  images,  fine  temple-bronzes,  and 
elaborate  wood-carving).      What  really  fascinates  the  eye  and  be- 

1  Till  September  10,  1883,  that  slight  barrier  was  effectual,  for  something  of 
the  "  divinity  that  doth  hedge  a  king"  seemed  to  enfold  these  foreigners,  and  to 
act  as  a  magic  protection.  Then,  alas  !  the  charm  was  broken,  and  the  illusion 
dispelled.  As  usual,  "  a  little  matter"  kindled  a  great  fire.  A  "mean  white" 
shot  at  a  Chinaman  in  a  drunken  brawl,  and  another  Chinaman  was  thrown  over- 
board by  a  Portuguese  sailor,  from  a  British  ship,  and  unfortunately  was  drowned. 

As  the  offenders  were  not  immediately  punished,  the  mob  took  the  law  into 
its  own  hands,  and  attacked  the  foreign  settlement.  Some  think  that  if  the 
French,  English,  and  Germans  had  organised  a  defence,  barricading  their  houses 
and  displaying  their  firearms  from  the  upper  verandahs,  the  assailants  would  not 
have  attempted  to  cross  the  bridge.  As  it  was,  however,  they  simply  abandoned 
the  isle,  and  embarked  on  two  large  river-steamers,  whereupon  the  much-astonished 
rabble  proceeded  to  loot  and  burn  several  large  houses.  The  wonder  was  that  they 
should  have  been  so  moderate,  and  abstained  from  further  destruction.  Unfortu- 
nately the  blackened  roofless  houses  remain  to  remind  the  mob  how  easy  it  would 
be  to  complete  their  task  on  the  nest  occasion  ;  and  though  the  residents  soon  ven- 
tured to  return  (the  isle  being  defended  on  one  side  by  a  guard  of  nondescript 
Chinese  soldiers,  and  on  the  other  by  three  foreign  gunboats  anchored  in  the  river), 
they  have,  since  then,  been  virtually  prisoners,  not  venturing  on  their  accustomed 
expeditions  inland,  and  scarcely  into  the  town,  and  subject  to  ever-recurring  panics 
on  account  of  the  anti-foreign  feeling  stirred  up  by  French  action. 


STREETS    OF    CANTON.  29 

wilders  the  mind  is  simply  the  common  street-life,  which,  from 
morning  till  night,  as  you  move  slowly  through  the  streets,  presents 
a  succession  of  pictures,  each  of  intense  interest  and  novelty.  In  all 
this  there  is  life — the  real  life  of  a  great  busy  people — and  one  feels 
that  it  is  really  an  effort  to  turn  aside  from  these  to  see  any  recog- 
nised "  sight,"  In  the  temples  there  is  stagnation.  Their  gilding 
and  beautiful  carving  are  defaced  and  incrusted  with  dirt;  the 
worshippers  are  only  occasional,  for  they  have  so  very  many  gods, 
all  requiring  worship  by  turns. 

But  the  interest  of  the  streets  cannot  be  surpassed,  though  most 
of  them  are  dirty  and  all  are  narrow,  some  being  only  about  six 
feet  wide,  and  many  not  exceeding  eight  feet  !  Even  this  is 
further  reduced  by  the  singular  but  very  effective  manner  of  hang- 
ing out  sign-boards  at  right  angles  to  the  shops,  some  suspended 
like  the  signs  of  old  English  inns,  and  some  set  upright  in  carved 
and  gilded  Btands  at  the  corners  of  the  shop.  They  are  just  great 
planks,  ten  to  fifteen  feet  in  height,  some  black,  some  scarlet,  some 
blue,  some  white,  and  a  few  green,  and  on  which  are  embossed 
strange  characters  in  scarlet  or  gold,  which,  though  perhaps  really 
merely  stating  the  name  of  the  shop,  appear  to  our  ignorant  eyes 
both  beautiful  and  mysterious  ! 

Some  shops  hang  up  a  great  pasteboard  model  of  their  principal 
goods:  a  satin  skull-cap  or  a  conical  straw  hat  denote  a  hatter,  a 
shoe  for  a  shoemaker,  a  fan  or  an  umbrella  for  the  seller  of  these  ; 
a  huge  pair  of  spectacles  or  a  great  gilded  dragon  each  convey  their 
invitation  to  all  comers.  Some  streets  are  all  given  over  to  the 
workers  in  one  trade — they  are  all  Lvory-carvers,  or  coffin-makers, 
or  purveyors  of  strange  offerings  for  the  dead  or  for  the  gods. 

I  believe  the  chief  secret  of  the  fascination  of  these  streets  lies 
in  the  fact  that  you  see  right  into  every  shop,  so  that  whenever  you 
can  turn  your  eyes  aside  from  looking  light  along  the  street,  and 
ran  gaze  either  to  right  or  left,  each  shop  frontage  of  ten  feet 
reveals  a  scene  which  would  make  the  fortune  of  the  artist  who 
could  render  it  faithfully. 

Here  a  shop  is  not  merely  a  receptacle  of  articles  for  sale,  it  is 
also  a  manufactory,  where,  if  you  have  leisure  to  linger,  you  can 
watch  each  process  from  the  beginning;  and  if  the  various  things 
in  common  use  among  these  strange  people  strike  us  as  quaint. 
much  more  curious  is  it  to  see  them  actually  made. 

.Moreover,  limited  as  is  the  space  in  these  tiny  shops,  each  has 
at  least  three  shrines  set  apart  for  family  worship.  At  the  thresh- 
old is  a  tablet  to  the  Karth  ( lods,  before  which  on  certain  eveningG 


30  FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

are  set  red  tapers  and  incense-sticks.  Within  the  home  are  the 
Ancestral  Tablets,  and  the  altar  of  the  Kitchen  God,  each  of  which 
requires  many  offerings  and  an  ever-burning  light.  A  vast  multi- 
tude of  shops  have  also  an  altar  to  the  God  of  Wealth. 

As  seen  from  the  street,  the  central  and  most  .striking  objecl  is 
invariably  the  name  of  the  shop,  painted  on  a  large  board  in  gold 
and  bright  colours,  with  so  much  carving  and  gilding  as  to  make 
it  really  a  gorgeous  object.  Above  this  is  generally  placed  an 
image  or  picture  of  some  lucky  sage,  or  the  God  of  Wealth,  while 
below  are  two  gaudy  fans,  to  which  at  the  Xew-Year  festival  are 
added  enormous  ornaments  of  gold  and  coloured  flowers,  while  gay 
lanterns  of  very  varied  form  and  pattern  hang  in  front  to  light  up 
the  whole. 

To  the  initiated,  some  of  the  quaint-looking  characters  inscribed 
on  these  gorgeous  shop  -  boards  are  full  of  interest.  Here  is  a 
wealthy  merchant  who  gratefully  acknowledges  the  favours  of  that 
fat  God  of  Wealth  who  occupies  so  conspicuous  a  place  in  his 
shop,  and  who  day  by  day  receives  such  devout  worship.  So  the 
tall  sign-post  announces  the  house  as  being  "  Prospered  by 
Heaven."  Another  declares  himself  to  be  "  Ten  thousand  times 
fortunate,"  while  his  neighbour  claims  "  Xever-ending  Good  Luck." 
Here  Ave  come  to  "  Celestial  Bliss,"  and  a  little  farther  an  honest 
soul  proclaims  his  heart's  desire  in  the  name  assumed,  "  Great 
Gains,"  while  another  announces  his  store  as  "  The  Market  of 
Golden  Profits." 

Put  when  we  come  to  note  the  names  of  the  streets,  they  really 
are  touchingly  allegorical.  Here  is  the  street  of  Everlasting  Love, 
the  street  of  Ten  Thousandfold  Peace,  of  Benevolence  and  Love, 
of  Accumulated  Blessings,  of  a  Thousand  Beatitudes.  Special 
streets  are  consecrated  to  "  the  Saluting  Dragon,"  "  the  Dragon  in 
Bepose,"  "  the  Ascending  Dragon."  A  peculiarly  unfragrant  street, 
in  this  unsavoury  city,  is  characterised  as  the  "  Street  of  Befresh- 
ing  Breezes "  !  The  value  attached  to  numerous  descendants  is 
suggested  by  the  streets  of  "  One  Hundred  Grandsons  "  and  the 
still  more  auspicious  "  One  Thousand  Grandsons." 

Picture  to  yourself  a  vast  city,  with  miles  and  miles  of  such 
streets,  all  so  narrow  that  the  blue  sky  overhead  seems  but  a  strip, 
which  in  many  places  is  shut  out  by  screens  of  matting  or  board- 
ing, extending  from  roof  to  roof,  casting  deep  shadows  which 
intensify  the  wealth  of  colour  below. 

The  streets  are  paved  with  long  narrow  stone  slabs,  but  with  no 
causeway  for  foot-passengers,  for  riders  are  few  and  far  between  : 


CHINESE    DRESSES.  31 

and  as  to  chairs,  they  block  up  the  street,  so  that  the  patient  crowd 
must  step  close  to  the  shops  to  let  them  pass.  "With  the  exception 
of  a  few  wealthy  tradesmen,  who  indulge  in  silks  and  satins  of 
divers  colours,  all  the  crowd  are  dressed  in  blue,  and  all  alike  have 
quaintly  shaven  heads,  and  a  long  plait  of  glossy  black  hair,  which 
for  convenience  is  sometimes  twined  round  the  head  during  work, 
but  must  always  bang  full  length  when  in  presence  of  a  superior. 
A  closely-fitting  black  satin  skull-cap  is  apparently  an  essential 
part  of  the  costume  of  a  well-dressed  tradesman  or  domestic  ser- 
vant. There  is  no  drowsiness  here — all  are  intent  on  their  own 
business,  and  hurry  to  and  fro,  yet  never  seem  to  jostle  or  even 
touch  one  another. 

After  the  gay  crowds  of  Japanese  women  and  children,  tin- 
predominance  of  men  in  a  Chinese  crowd  is  a  very  marked  feature  ; 
Avomen  are  comparatively  few,  and  all  are  large-footed — in  other 
words,  plebeian  (none  the  worse  for  that  in  our  eyes).  But  the 
ladies  of  the  lily  feet  (/.'/.,  the  distorted  hoofs)  must  remain  in  the 
seclusion  of  their  homes,  or  at  best  must  be  carried  through  the 
street  in  closely-covered  chairs.  Those  we  do  see  are  very  simply 
dressed  in  prune-coloured  loosely-fitting  clothes ;  but  all  have  bare 
heads  and  black  hair  elaborately  dressed  and  ornamented  with 
clasps  of  imitation  jadestonej  most  have  ear-rings  and  bangles  to 
match. 

Young  unbetrothed  girls  wear  their  hair  all  brushed  back,  and 
plaited  in  one  heavy  tress  just  like  the  men;  but,  instead  of  their 
shaven  forehead,  they  comb  the  front  hair  right  over  the  brow  in 
a  straight  fringe.  So  soon  as  a  girl  is  affianced  she  must  change 
her  style  of  hair-dressing,  and  adopt  the  large  chignon  with  the 
eccentric  twist,  which  is  so  suggestive  of  a  teapot  with  its  handle. 

To  my  uneducated  eye,  all  these  men  and  all  these  women  are 
extraordinarily  alike.  The  same  features,  the  same  yellow  skin, 
the  same  black  hair  and  dark  eyes,  and,  at  first  sight,  even  the 
same  expression.  Talk  of  being  "as  like  as  two  peas;"  I  think 
we  might  say,  as  like  as  two  Chinamen.  It  is  odd  to  see  a  whole 
crowd  of  such,  especially  as  even  their  clothes  are  so  much  alike. 
The  vast  majority,  both  of  men  ami  women,  wear  an  upper  garment 
of  dark-blue  material,  precisely  the  shape  of  an  ordinary  shirt 
[minus  neck  or  wrist-bands).  The  peculiarity  of  the  said  shirt  is 
that  it  is  worn  as  the  outer  garment !  This  being  mid-winter,  the 
weather  is  supposed  to  be  cold,  so  every  one  is  wearing  thickly 
wadded  clothes,  and  the  whole  population  has  a  general  look  of 
comfortable  stoutness  ! 


32         FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

Another  remarkable  feature  of  this  crowd  is  that  almost  all  are 
on  foot,  except  when  a  foreigner,  a  woman,  or  a  mandarin  is  carried 
along  on  men's  shoulders  in  a  curious  closed-up  chair.  The  won- 
der is  how  the  bearers  can  make  their  way  through  the  crowded 
streets ;  hut  they  keep  up  a  constant  shouting,  and  the  patient 
people  stand  aside.  So  the  cumbersome  chair  passes  rapidly,  un- 
checked by  the  multitude  of  busy  tradesmen,  who  also  hurry  along, 
each  carrying  on  his  shoulder  a  pole,  from  which  are  suspended 
his  very  varied  goods. 

Thus  a  confectioner,  or  baker,  has  two  large  boxes,  with  trays 
of  good  things ;  a  fishmonger  carries  two  large  flat  tubs  full  of 
live  fish,  that  most  in  favour  being  a  long,  narrow  flat  fish,  resem- 
bling a  silver  sword ;  or  perhaps  he  carries  two  trays  of  bleeding 
fish,  cut  up  into  portions  suited  to  the  humblest  purses,  and 
smeared  with  blood  to  make  them  look  fresh  and  inviting.  The 
stationary  fishmongers  keep  their  fresh-water  fish  alive  in  tubs, 
which  are  not  only  full  of  water,  but  through  which  a  running 
stream  is  made  to  trickle  ceaselessly.  The  locomotive  butcher 
likewise  has  two  trays  of  raw  meat,  divided  into  infinitesimal 
portions  of  dubious  animals.  The  gardener  brings  his  flowers  and 
vegetables  slung  in  two  large  flat  baskets ;  the  artificial  florist 
carries  his  in  a  box  with  trays,  and  rings  a  sort  of  small  bell  as  he 
goes  along ;  and  the  barber  carries  his  quaint  scarlet  stool,  brass 
basin,  and  razors,  ready  to  do  any  amount  of  shaving  and  hair- 
dressing  in  the  open  street. 

Each  of  these  figures  is  picturesque  in  his  way ;  but  the  barber 
is  especially  so,  with  his  broad-brimmed  straw  hat,  and  loose  dark- 
blue  trousers  and  blouse,  which  contrast  so  well  with  the  bright 
scarlet  of  the  very  ornamental  stand  on  which  rests  the  brass 
basin.  This  hangs  from  one  end  of  his  shoulder-pole,  balanced  by 
the  aforesaid  scarlet  stool,  which  is,  in  fact,  a  small  pyramidal  cabinet 
with  several  drawers  and  flat  top.  I  should  like  to  invest  in  one, 
as  I  think  no  one  has  yet  thought  of  taking  home  a  barber's  stool 
as  a  cabinet  ! 

Our  old  apple-women  are  represented  by  men  selling  sugar-cane, 
and  oranges  all  ready  peeled,  the  latter  being  sold  for  a  smaller 
sum  than  the  unpeeled,  inasmuch  as  the  rind  is  worth  more  for 
medicinal  purposes  than  the  fruit  itself. 

Eight  through  the  busy  crowd  rush  men  bearing  brimming  buck- 
ets of  fresh  water,  slung  from  the  bamboo  on  their  shoulders,  as 
the  sole  water-supply  of  a  multitude  of  the  citizens ;  and  others, 
without  any  sort  of  warning,  trot  along  bearing  most  objectionable 


"dog-days."  33 

and  unfragrant  uncovered  buckets,  inclining  foreigners  to  believe 
that  Chinamen  were  created  without  the  sense  of  smell;  and  prov- 
ing that  the  sanitary  arrangements  of  the  city  are  of  the  same 
primitive  order  (and  with  the  same  view  to  economical  agriculture) 
as  in  Hong-Kong,  the  very  elaborate  system  of  city  drains  being 
designed  only  to  carry  off  superfluous  water  from  the  streets. 

One  singular  feature  in  the  streets  of  Canton  is  the  multitude 
of  blind  beggars,  who  go  about  in  strings  of  eight  or  ten  together 
— literally  the  blind  leading  the  blind.  I  met  a  gentleman  the 
other  day  who  assured  me  that  he  once  saw  six  hundred  of  these 
blind  beggars,  all  assembled  to  share  a  beneficent  distribution  of 
rice.  ]STor  are  other  beggars  lacking  —  wild,  unkempt  -  looking 
creatures,  who  gather  in  picturesque  groups  round  the  clay  ovens, 
where,  on  payment  of  infinitesimal  coin,  savoury  food  is  pre- 
pared and  served  out  to  them  smoking  hot. 

Of  course  we  made  a  point  of  going  to  see  the  shops  where 
dried  rats  and  fresh  frogs,  and  nicely  cooked  cats  and  dogs,  are  dis- 
played for  sale,  at  so  much  a  portion,  the  more  highly  esteemed 
pieces  being  charged  extra.  Some  people  are  so  prejudiced  as  to 
consider  these  cat  and  rat  stalls  rather  a  nasty  sight  ;  but  I  don't 
see  that  a  nice  fat  puppy  is  much  worse  than  the  sucking-pig  on 
the  next  stall,  or  indeed  anything  like  so  unpleasant  as  the  great 
bleeding  carcasses  in  our  own  butchers'  shops.  It  is  only  at  cer- 
tain restaurants  that  these  dainties  are  provided  to  suit  special 
customers,  who  are  chiefly  respectable  tradesmen ;  but  in  the  early 
summer  men  of  all  ranks,  and  in  all  parts  of  China,  make  a  point 
of  eating  dogs,  fried  in  oil,  with  garlic  and  water-chestnuts,  as  a 
sort  of  tonic  and  antidote  against  probable  illness.  So  summer 
brings  "  dog-days  "  even  in  China  ! 

At  present  many  of  the  provision  shops  seem  to  be  entirely 
filled  with  ducks,  split  open  and  dried,  these  being  evidently  the 
correct  thing  to  eat  on  New- Year's  eve.  The  marvel  is  where  so 
many  ducks  could  have  come  from  ! 

As  to  the  fruit-shops,  it  may  be  merely  the  accident  of  the 
season,  but  it  seems  as  if  the  fruiterers  purposely  adorned  their 
stalls  with  gold  and  yellow  fruits  (this  being  the  auspicious  colour), 
— masses  of  oranges  of  all  sorts,  gourds,  bananas,  and  especiallj 
that  extraordinary  lemon  known  as  "Buddha's  fingers,"  winch 
does  bear  some  resemblance  to  a  grotesque  human  hand  with  the 
fingers  pressed  together,  and  is  a  favourite  subject  for  BOapstone 
and  jade  carvers. 

I  wish  I  could  give  you  a  faint  idea  of  a  thousandth  part  of 

C 


34:  FROM    HONG-KONG    TO    CANTON. 

what  I  saw  in  yesterday's  morning  walk  through  the  principal 
streets  of  Canton,  before  we  even  began  to  explore  its  temples  and 

other  wonderful  sights.  This  was  merely  an  idle  morning  on  foot, 
when  we  had  leisure  to  look  about  us  and  watch  the  preparations 
already  being  made  for  the  great  New-Year  festival.  The  tall 
sign-boards  in  the  open  streets  were  being  adorned  with  festoons 
of  crimson  cloth  and  large  tassels  and  bunches  of  gilt  flowers, 
adding  yet  more  colour  to  the  scene. 

A  very  pretty  symptom  of  the  approaching  festival  is  the  large 
number  of  peasants  who  come  in  from  the  country  with  branches 
of  early  blossoming  peach,  and  bundles  of  budding  sticks.  These 
buds  open  in  a  few  days,  and  bunches  of  small  red,  rather  wax- 
like bells  appear.  Every  man,  however  poor,  and  every  boat  on 
the  crowded  river,  endeavours  to  have  some  blossom  ready  to  greet 
the  New  Year.  Pots  of  narcissus,  chrysanthemums,  and  fragrant 
Japanese  daphnes  find  ready  customers,  and  the  market  flower- 
gardeners  of  Fa-tee  obtain  much  custom  from  the  rich  mandarins, 
both  for  the  adornment  of  their  own  houses  and  of  their  splendid 
guilds. 

"We  explored  shops  where  curious  masks  and  gorgeous  crowns 
and  other  theatrical  properties  are  manufactured.  We  passed  by 
exchanges  of  money,  whose  sign  is  a  huge  string  of  gilt  cash  like 
those  in  use  here,  and  which  are  worth  about  a  thousand  to  a 
dollar ;  and  we  lingered  long,  watching  jewellers  making  exquisite 
ornaments  of  kingfishers'  feathers,  green  and  blue,  inlaid  like  en- 
amel on  a  gold  ground.  A  few  steps  farther  we  paused  beside  an 
ivory-carver,  producing  the  most  delicate  and  costly  work,  undis- 
turbed by  passers-by.  Next  we  halted  to  see  the  processes  of  rice 
being  husked  and  pounded  by  foot-mills,  and  wheat  ground  to  flour 
by  bullocks  turning  grindstones  which  are  placed  one  above  the 
other.     The  oxen  are  blindfolded  to  save  them  from  giddiness. 

It  was  so  odd  to  be  standing  in  the  street  and  to  look  in  at  a 
narrow  frontage,  past  a  party  of  men  quietly  dining,  and  to  see 
away  into  the  long  perspective  of  a  far  back  store,  wherein  at  least 
a  dozen  of  these  primitive  bullock-mills  were  working  in  a  Hne. 
Beyond  the  blue  haze  and  gloom  of  this  interior  we  could  see 
bright  sunlight  in  the  inner  court,  where  the  women  were  spin- 
ning cotton.  Then  we  turned  into  a  glass-blower's  house,  and 
watched  the  glass  being  blown  into  the  form  of  a  huge  globe,  and 
afterwards  cut  in  pieces  and  flattened  in  a  furnace. 

Need  I  tell  you  how  gladly  we  would  have  lingered  for  hours 
at  the  shops  of  paper-umbrella  makers,  fan  makers,  artificial-flower 


ATTRACTIVE    SHOPS.  35 

makers,  manufacturers  of  quaint  and  beautiful  lanterns,  and  lamps 
of  all  sorts  1  Coopers,  carpenters,  wood-carvers — each  had  its  own 
special  interest  for  us.  Even  the  tailors  cutting  out  strange  silken 
garments,  and  the  washermen  ironing,  were  novelties  in  the  way  of 
street  scenes ;  and  the  very  tallow-chandlers  become  picturesque 
in  this  country,  with  their  bunches  of  little  red  candles  of  veg- 
etable tallow  mixed  with  insect  wax  for  domestic  shrines,  and 
gorgeously  ornamented  ones  for  the  use  of  the  temples  and  wealthy 
men. 

Another  whole  street  is  devoted  solely  to  the  sale  of  feathers  of 
all  sorts — but  especially  of  peacocks  and  pheasants,  chiefly  those 
of  the  silvery  Amherst  pheasant,  which  is  found  on  the  Yang-foo 
river,  and  the  Eeeves  pheasant :  the  male  bird  of  the  latter  has 
two  beautiful  feathers  of  extraordinary  length  (from  four  to  five 
feet),  which  are  worn  on  the  stage  by  actors  as  a  head  decoration. 

Then  we  came  to  more  ivory-carvers,  and  more  workers  in 
kingfishers'  feathers,  and  then  a  whole  street  for  the  sale  of  beau- 
tiful blackwood  furniture,  which  is  really  made  of  Singapore  red- 
wood, but  which  takes  a  colour  and  polish  equal  to  the  finest 
ebony,  and  is  very  much  less  brittle.  I  think  the  goods  produced 
are  handsomer  and  far  more  solid  than  the  black  carved  furniture 
of  Bombay. 

Every  now  and  then  some  great  man  was  borne  past  us  in  his 
heavy  chair,  followed  by  lesser  men  riding,  while  retainers  on  foot 
ran  before  to  clear  the  way,  a  process  in  which  they  turn  their 
long  plait  to  a  most  singular  purpose,  namely,  that  of  a  whip,  with 
which  they  strike  the  bystanders,  as  a  hint  to  move  aside  quickly  ! 

We  saw  a  gay  marriage-party,  the  bride's  chair  gorgeous  with 
scarlet  and  gold,  and  her  wedding-gifts  carried  in  scarlet  boxes, 
all  siqjposed  to  be  full.  Soon  after  we  met  a  great  procession  in 
honour  of  some  idols,  which  were  conveyed  along  in  gaudy  cars, 
and  preceded  by  crowds  of  small  boys  carrying  lanterns  and  ban- 
ners. Then  a  funeral  overtook  us,  with  mourners  all  dressed  in 
while,  bearing  the  dead  in  the  massive  wooden  coffin  which  had 
probably  been  given  him  many  years  previously  by  his  dutiful 
children,  and  which  even  now  was  not  on  its  way  to  burial,  but 
to  be  laid  in  the  City  of  the  Dead,  there  to  remain  in  its  own 
hired  house,  rented  at  so  much  a-month,  perhaps  for  years,  till  the 
priests  choose  to  announce  that  the  auspicious  moment  U>v  burial 
has  at  length  arrived,  when  it  may  be  laid  in  a  horse-shoe-shaped 
tomb  on  some  bleak  hillside. 

This  morning  we  secured  the  services  of  a  guide  who  has  long 


36  FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

been  a  servanl  of  Archdeacon  Gray,  who  La  the  great  authority  on 

all  matters  of  local  interest,  having  himself  an  extraordinary  know- 
ledge of  Chinese  manners  and  customs,  rites  and  ceremonies.  I 
believe  there  is  not  a  corner  in  all  the  intricate  turns  and  twists  of 
the  rity,  nor  a  court  in  its  countless  temples,  with  which  he  is  Dot 
perfectly  familiar.  T  had  been  greatly  counting  on  the  privilege  of 
making  his  acquaintance,  on  the  strength  of  an  introduction  from 
Sir  Harry  Parkes,  but,  to  my  great  regret,  find  that  he  has  returned 
to  England.  So  we  had  to  console  ourselves  with  the  second-hand 
erudition  of  Ah  Kum,  whom  the  Archdeacon  carefully' instructed 
in  all  the  points  most  certain  to  interest  travellers,  all  of  whom 
are  therefore  deeply  indebted  to  him  for  this  living  guide,  as  well 
as  for  the  written  records  of  all  his  own  wanderings  in  the  city. 

AVe  started  in  chairs,  so  as  to  make  the  most  of  our  time ; 
besides,  the  distances  are  very  great,  and  we  were  carried  at  a 
bewildering  pace  through  miles  of  the  narrowest,  quaintest  streets, 
which  at  intervals  are  spanned  by  stone  archways,  forming  part 
of  the  fireproof  walls  which  intersect  the  city  in  every  direction, 
dividing  the  city  into  separate  wards.  Each  archway  has  a  strong- 
fireproof  door,  which  is  locked  every  night,  and  can  at  any  time 
be  closed  in  case  of  disturbance,  so  as  to  isolate  each  section  of  the 
great  city.  These  archways  are  generally  adorned  with  sculpture, 
and  form  a  characteristic  feature  in  the  scene. 

Among  the  many  temples  we  visited  to-day,  one  was  dedicated 
to  the  Five  Hundred  Disciples  of  Buddha,  whose  five  hundred 
life-sized  gilded  images  are  ranged  all  round  the  temple,  so  as  to 
form  a  double  square,  while  others  are  ranged  in  cruciform  lines, 
meeting  at  a  bronze  dagoba  which  doubtless  contains  a  relic  of 
some  great  saint.  Each  of  these  statues  is  different,  though  all 
are  alike  hideous,  and  are  supposed  to  be  life-like.  Some  are 
sad,  some  merry,  some  in  tattered  garments  and  barefoot,  while 
some  are  well  dressed  and  well  shod.  An  extra  statue  represents 
the  Emperor  Kienlung,  who  was  greatly  revered,  and  the  three 
Buddhas  watch  over  all. 

Then  we  proceeded  to  the  Temple  of  Longevity,  where  I  noted 
in  the  first  place  that  the  four  frightful  images  who  act  as  gate- 
keepers have  little  prayers  glued  all  over  them,  instead  of  the  little 
prayer-papers  being  chewed  and  spat  at  them  as  in  Japan  !  Here 
there  are  the  usual  three  great  gilded  images  of  Buddha,  past, 
present,  and  future  ;  in  a  second  shrine  stands  a  gilded  pagoda 
containing  a  relic  of  Gautama  himself.  In  a  third  shrine  is  a 
colossal   image   of   the   very    fat,   most  jovial-looking   Buddha   of 


SIGHT-SEEING.  3  7 

Longevity,  to  whom  parents  return  thanks  for  the  rilling  of  their 
quivers. 

Here  we  were  admitted  to  see  the  monastic  refectory  and  the 
abbot's  apartments,  as  also  a  very  characteristic  Chinese  garden 
with  artificial  pond  and   fantastic  bridges. 

We  passed  by  the  prisons,  but  had  heard  too  much  of  their 
awful  horror  to  wish  to  pause  to  look  upon  misery  which  we  could 
not  alleviate.  Besides  the  appalling  tortures  which  are  judicially 
inflicted,  the  brutal  oppressions  and  extortions  of  the  jailers  make 
these  places  hells  of  the  most  terrible  description.  It  was  grievous 
enough  to  see  the  poor  fellows  who,  being  convicted  only  of  minor 
offences,  are  as  a  great  favour  allowed  (laden  with  chains  and  with 
fetters  round  neck,  arms,  and  feet)  to  take  up  a  position  outside 
the  prison,  and  there  earn  a  pittance  by  working  at  their  re- 
spective trades — knowing,  however,  that  their  cruel  oppressors 
will  mulct  them  of  the  greater  part  of  their  little  gains. 

Considering  all  we  know  of  the  fearful  condition  of  the  prisons, 
it  is  almost  superfluous  to  remark  that  the  services  of  a  barber 
are  dispensed  with,  and  an  unshaven  Chinaman  is  a  most  miser- 
able-lookiiiL;  being — worse  even  than  a  Fijian  who  has  been  mulcted 
of  his  external  polish  of  cocoa-nut  oil. 

Our  next  visit  was  to  the  Temple  of  the  Five  Bams,  on  which 
the  Five  Genii  (who  preside  over  the  five  elements  of  Earth,  Fire, 
Metal,  "Water,  and  Wood)  descended  from  Heaven  to  Canton,  bearing 
ears  of  corn,  and  all  manner  of  blessings.  The  Earns  are  said  to 
have  petrified,  and  the  great  interest  of  this  temple  centres  in  five 
roughlydiewn  stones,  which  are  supposed  to  be  the  genuine  ani- 
mals. Here,  too,  is  an  image  of  the  Monkey-God,  clad  in  a  silken 
suit ;  and  here,  in  a  great  belfry,  is  a  huge  bell,  the  striking  of 
which  inevitably  brings  disaster  to  Canton.  (Strange  to  say,  an 
English  shell  did  strike  it  during  the  siege  of  1862 — an  era  of 
horror,  of  which  one  minor  incident  was  the  massacre  by  the 
French  of  ninety-six  men,  women,  and  children,  in  the  street 
called  "Wing-Tsing-Kai,  to  avenge  the  death  of  a  French  cook  who 
had  here  been  assassinated  in  a  provision  shop.) 

Another  notable  object  in  this  temple,  which  to  me  was  especi- 
ally interesting,  is  Fuiddha's  colossal  footprint,  which  is  artificially 
dug  out  of  the  rock,  and  is  now  half  full  of  water.  Having  already 
travelled  as  a  true  pilgrim  to  the  Sri  Pada — the  "  Holy  Footprint 
of  Ceylon — I  was,  of  course,  in  a  position  to  look  upon  this  humble 
imitation  with  a  sense  of  superiority!  There  was,  however,  a  feel- 
ing of  great  peace  and  quietness  about  this  temple,  owing  to  lie1 


38  FllOM    HONG-KONG    TO    CANTON. 

exclusion  of  the  staring,  pressing  crowd,  so  we  acknowledged  the 
wisdom  of  our  guide's  suggestion  that  we  should  resl  awhile,  and 
have  our  luncheon  beside  the  Holy  Footprint,  which  we  accord- 
ingly did,  under  the  guardianship  of  the  Five  Rams. 

Ah  Kum  next  carried  us  off  to  see  a  temple  tower  wherein  is 
kept  a  clepsydra  or  water-clock  —  a  most  ingenious  contrivance 
which  seems  to  have  been  in  use  among  various  ancient  nations. 
The  simple  apparatus  consists  of  four  copper  buckets  placed  one 
above  the  other,  on  four  steps  of  brickwork.  The  four  buckets 
are  connected  by  tiny  troughs,  by  which  the  water  drips  drop  by 
drop  from  the  base  of  each  bucket  into  the  one  below.  Hence  the 
Chinese  name,  "  Copper-jar  water-dropper." 

The  lowest  vessel  is  covered.  In  it  is  a  wooden  float,  through 
which  is  passed  an  upright  copper  tablet,  marked  with  divisions  of 
time.  This  is  set  at  a  given  height  twice  daily — at  5  a.m.  and  at 
5  p.m. — and  as  the  index  rises  through  an  opening  in  the  cover,  the 
watchman  in  charge  of  this  strange  clock  announces  the  hours  by 
placing  on  the  clock-tower  large  white  boards  on  which  the  hour  is 
marked  in  black  characters.  During  the  watches  of  the  night  he 
strikes  the  hour  on  two  great  drums.  Twice  a-day  the  water  is 
transferred  from  the  lowest  vessel  to  the  upper  one,  and  once  in 
three  months  a  fresh  supply  is  allowed. 

A  man  in  charge  of  this  place  sells  time-sticks,  32  inches  in 
length,  which  are  warranted  to  burn  for  twelve  hours ;  and  so  ex- 
actly are  the  divisions  calculated,  that  they  are  true  time-keepers. 
Two  sorts  are  sold,  however,  a  special  stick  being  calculated  for 
windy  weather,  when  the  consumption  is  more  rapid.  They  are 
advertised  as  being  constructed  according  to  the  direction  of  official 
astrologers.  This  method  of  reckoning  is  so  ancient,  that  its  origin 
is  lost  in  the  mists  of  ages.  But  here  we  find  both  fire  and  water 
enlisted  in  the  service  of  Old  Time. 

On  the  top  storey  of  this  temple  tower  is  a  shrine  to  the  god 
Sin-Fuung,  whose  aid  is  besought  by  masters  or  mistresses  whose 
slaves  have  run  away.  Near  his  image  waits  an  attendant  on 
horseback  ready  to  do  his  bidding;  so  the  suppliants  tie  cords 
round  this  horse's  neck,  as  a  gentle  hint  that  their  slaves  may  be 
securely  tied  up  and  restored  to  them. 

Ill-used  slaves  likewise  seek  the  protection  of  the  gods.  In  the 
case  of  female  slaves,  whose  lives  are  embittered  by  harsh  mis- 
tresses, they  can  resort  to  the  shrine  of  a  sympathetic  goddess,  to 
whom  all  unhappy  women  confide  their  woes,  and  assist  her 
memory  by  laying  on  her  altar  simple  paper  effigies  of  those  who 


DOMESTIC    SLAVERY.  39 

have  caused  their  sorrow.  Thus  a  slave  brings  a  paper  image  of 
her  mistress ;  a  sorrowful  mother  brings  one  of  her  son  or  daughter  : 
the  neglected  wife  brings  a  rude  likeness  of  her  husband.  These 
are  stuck  up  with  the  head  downwards,  to  show  that  the  heart  is 
misplaced,  and  that  the  goddess  alone  can  change  it  to  its  rightful 
position. 

The  existence  of  slavery  as  a  recognised  institution  in  Chinese 
domestic  life  is  to  me  an  altogether  new  idea,  and  yet  I  now  learn 
that  it  is  a  most  real  fact — a  system  of  absolute,  hereditary  slavery, 
from  which  there  is  no  possibility  of  escape  for  three  generations, 
though  the  great-grandson  of  the  original  slave  is  entitled  to  pur- 
chase his  freedom  if  he  can  raise  a  sum  equal  to  the  price  at  which 
his  master  values  him.  The  slave-market  is  supplied  from  the 
families  of  rebels,  and  of  poor  parents  who  in  very  hard  times  are 
driven  to  sell  their  sons  and  daughters.  Many  also  are  the  chil- 
dren of  gamblers  who  are  sold  to  pay  gambling  debts.  A  large 
number  have  been  kidnapped  from  distant  homes,  and  though  this 
offence  is  criminal,  it  is  constantly  practised.  Under  pressure  of 
extreme  poverty,  girls  are  sometimes  sold  for  about  £1,  but  the 
average  price  of  both  sexes  ranges  from  £10  to  £20,  according  to 
health,  strength,  beauty,  and  age.  Before  a  purchase  is  effected, 
the  slave,  male  or  female,  is  minutely  examined,  and  made  to  go 
through  his,  or  her,  paces,  to  prove  soundness  in  all  respects. 
Should  the  result  prove  satisfactory,  the  purchaser  becomes  ab- 
solute owner  of  soul  and  body.  He  can  sell  his  slave  again  at  any 
moment,  and  for  any  purpose ;  or  should  he  see  fit  to  beat  him  to 
death  or  drown  him,  no  law  can  touch  him,  for  his  slave  is 
simply  his  chattel,  and  possesses  no  legal  rights  whatsoever.  In- 
stances have  actually  come  to  light  in  which  ladies  have  thus 
beaten  their  female  slaves  to  death,  but  the  action  is  looked  upon 
merely  as  an  extravagant  waste  of  saleable  property.  In  wealthy 
houses,  where  there  are  generally  from  twenty  to  thirty  slaves, 
kindly  treatment  seems  to  be  the  general  rule ;  but  in  smaller 
families,  where  only  two  or  three  are  kept,  the  treatment  is  often 
so  harsh  that  slaves  run  away,  whereupon  the  town-crier  is  senl 
through  the  streets  to  offer  a  reward  for  the  capture  of  the  fugi- 
tive. He  attracts  attention  by  striking  a  gong,  to  which  is  at- 
tached a  paper  streamer  on  which  all  particulars  arc  inscribed. 
Sometimes  street  placards  are  pasted  up,  with  a  full  description  of 
the  runaway.  Here,  as  in  other  slave-owning  communities,  parents 
have  no  rights  whatever  to  their  own  children,  who  can  be  taken 
from  them  and  sold  at  the  will  of  the  master.      So  the  system  of 


40  FROM  HONG-KONG  TO  CANTON. 

slavery  is  absolute,  and  its  victims  may  be  the  children  of  fellow- 
citizens,  and  in  the  case  of  gamblers,  of  boon  companion-. 

Our  next  visit  was  to  the  "City  Wall,"  from  which  it  was  pos- 
sible to  obtain  a  sort  of  general  notion  of  the  lie  of  the  land,  and 
how  tlic  walled  Tartar  city  lies  within  the  heart  of  the  Civil  city. 
(The  latter  has  a  circumference  of  eight  miles,  and  a  walk  right 
round  it  on  the  walls  is  an  excellent  way  to  obtain  a  bird's-eye 
view  of  the  surroundings.)  The  inner  city  is  garrisoned  by  a 
strong  force  of  Tartar  troops,  while  the  military  police  garrison  the 
gateways  of  the  outer  city. 

The  city  is  divided  into  thirty-six  wards,  each  separated  from 
the  others  by  those  fire-proof  walls  to  which  I  have  alluded.  At 
short  intervals  I  notice  a  tall  scaffolding  in  connection  with  a  little 
watch-tower,  and  I  learn  that  these  are  fire  look-outs.  Each  watch- 
man has  a  gong  whereby  to  give  the  alarm  to  all  the  others  in  case 
he  detects  a  fire,  and  by  a  certain  code  of  striking  he  makes  known 
in  what  quarter  it  lies.  Then  from  each  of  the  forty-eight  guard- 
houses of  the  city  two  men  hurry  off  to  assist  the  regular  fire- 
brigade,  who  are  said  to  be  a  very  efficient  and  courageous  body  of 
men,  both  here  and  throughout  the  empire ;  and  indeed  there  is 
every  inducement  to  energy  in  subduing  fires,  for,  apart  from  all 
general  considerations  concerning  danger  to  life  and  property,  every 
official  in  the  neighbourhood  knows  that  his  personal  rank  is  at 
stake,  as  every  fire  sufficiently  large  to  destroy  ten  houses  must  be 
reported  at  Pekin,  and  should  the  conflagration  have  been  allowed 
so  to  spread  that  eighty  houses  have  been  burnt,  every  officer  in 
the  city  is  degraded  one  step. 

Very  severe  punishment  is  also  meted  out  to  those  persons 
through  whose  carelessness  the  fire  has  originated.  No  matter 
how  respectable  is  their  position  in  life,  they  are  condemned  to 
stand  daily  in  the  open  streets  for  a  period  of  from  one  to  four 
weeks,  wearing  the  ponderous  wooden  collar — the  cangue — just  as 
if  they  were  thieves. 

Here  and  there,  as  we  passed  through  the  city,  we  came  on 
traces  of  a  terrific  tornado,  which  one  day  last  spring1  swept  across 
the  city,  marking  its  course  by  the  total  demolition  of  all  it 
touched — a  roadway  of  utter  devastation,  nowhere  exceeding  200 
yards  in  width,  yet  utterly  destroying  upwards  of  nine  thousand 
native  houses,  two  large  temples,  and  property  of  immense  value. 
.-1/  the  very  lowest  estimate,  upwards  of  ten  thousand  persons  lay 
buried  beneath  the  ruins  of  their  own  houses ;  and  considering  the 
1  April  11,  187S. 


THE    TORNADO    OF    1878.  41 

crowded  population  of  the  native  dwellings,  this  is  probably  far 
below  the  mark.  For  instance,  it  was  known  that  in  one  large 
eating-house  upwards  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  people  were  quietly 
dining,  when,  without  one  moment's  warning,  the  house  fell  with 
an  awful  crash,  and  buried  them  all  beneath  its  ruins.  Elsewhere 
two  large  temples  were  shaken  to  their  foundations,  every  pillar 
cracked,  the  roofs  broken  in,  but  the  idols  left  sitting  uninjured. 
In  another  place  the  great  wall  of  a  temple  was  overthrown,  and 
buried  a  whole  row  of  small  houses,  with  fully  one  hundred  inhab- 
itants. So  sharply  defined  was  the  course  of  the  wind,  that  in 
places  one  side  of  a  street  stood  uninjured,  while  the  other  lay  in  a 
chaotic  mass  of  ruin. 

And  this  was  literally  the  work  of  a  few  moments.  One  minute 
all  seemed  perfectly  secure — the  stormy  weather  which  had  pre- 
vailed for  some  time  previously  seemed  to  have  abated;  no  symp- 
tom whatever  warned  the  busy  citizens  of  the  awful  blast  that, 
one  moment  later,  swept  over  the  peaceful  city,  leaving  ruin,  death, 
ami  utter  desolation  on  its  track.  For  some  days  previously  there 
had  been  incessant  thunder-storms,  accompanied  by  heavy  rain  and 
occasional  hail-showers — the  hail  on  the  morning  of  the  tornado 
falling  in  pieces  described  by  English  witnesses  as  being  like 
pigeons'  eggs.     The  thunder,  too,  roared  ceaselessly. 

In  the  afternoon  there  came  a  lull — a  strange  brooding  stillness. 
Suddenly  about  3  p.m.  a  sound  was  heard  as  of  a  rushing  mighty 
wind — a  loud,  awful,  shrieking  blast.  Those  living  on  the  river- 
bank  looked  southward,  and  beheld  a  dense  cloud  of  dust,  leaves, 
branches,  birds,  and  objects  of  every  description,  rapidly  moving 
towards  the  city.  In  a  moment  it  was  sweeping  over  the  green 
isle — the  Shameen.  It  passed  through  the  middle  of  the  foreign 
settlement,  destroying  about  a  dozen  houses,  and  uprooting,  or 
seriously  injuring,  about  two  hundred  of  the  carefully-cherished 
large  trees.  It  swept  the  river,  capsizing  or  crushing  to  atoms 
hundreds  of  boats,  each  of  which  was  the  home  of  a  whole  family, 
most  of  whom  perished.  One  boat  was  lifted  from  the  canal  to 
the  top  of  a  house  in  the  city.  The  river  and  creeks  were  fairly 
blocked  with  broken  fragments.  A  junk,  with  about  one  hundred 
people  on  board,  sank  in  the  river;  large  blocks  of  hewn  stone 
were  torn  up  from  the  roadway.  A  strong  iron  lamp-posl  in  fronl 
of  this  house  was  twisted  like  a  corkscrew,  but  the  house  itself 
only  lost  a  few  slates!  Others  were  greatly  damaged.  All  this 
was  the  work  of  eleven  minutes. 

Then  the  destroying  angel  (or  dragon!)  passed   onwards   in   a 


42  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

devious  course,  but  confining  the  work  of  desolation  to  the  same 
narrow  limits — a  belt  of  less  than  200  yards  wide.  The  Chinese 
marked  with  wonder  that,  though  the  whirlwind  passed  right 
through  the  quarter  where  the  various  Christian  Missions  are 
established,  not  one  was  injured.  It  passed  close  to  the  Londm 
Mission,  destroying  a  bouse  just  beyond,  then  made  its  way  be- 
tween the  homes  of  the  American  Presbyterian  and  English  "Wes- 
leyan  Missions;  but  not  one  house  belonging  to  these  was  injured, 
nor  was  a  single  life  lost  in  the  foreign  settlement.  To  add  to  the 
consternation  of  the  people,  five  fires  broke  out  simultaneously,  and 
raged  for  many  hours  ere  they  could  be  subdued,  the  loud  beating 
of  the  fire-alarm  gongs  adding  to  the  general  confusion  and  terror. 
Then  came  the  terrible  task  of  recovering  and  burying  the  dead, 
one  item  of  charitable  aid  coming  in  the  form  of  a  gift  of  four 
thousand  coffins  from  a  Chinese  benevolent  society. 


CHAPTER  III. 

A     VERY     STRANGE     CITY. 

Roman  Catholic  cathedral — A  disputed  site — Recent  persecutions — Walk  on 
the  walls — Evening  service — The  home  of  a  great  mandarin — The  great 
market  for  jade-stone — Jade-mines — A  water-street — Sucking-pig  market 
— Pursuing  creditors — A  concert  of  larks — An  idol  procession— Pagodas 
at  a  fancy-ball — The  boat  population — Dirty  water — Water  police — All 
manner  of  market  boats— Flower  boats — Floating  hotels — Floating  tem- 
ples— Leper  boats — Duck-boats — Duck-hatching  establishments  —  Goose- 
rearing  gardens — Dwarfing  trees — The  Ocean  Banner  Monastery — Crema- 
tion of  priests — The  City  of  the  Dead — Lepers  at  funerals — Monasteries 
on  the  White  Cloud  Mountains. 

Sunday  Night. 

This  has  been  a  long  day  full  of  interest,  with  very  varied  Sunday 
fare  ! 

I  first  accompanied  my  hostess  to  the  eight  o'clock  Mass  for 
Chinese  women,  at  a  Roman  Catholic  church  in  the  heart  of  the 
city.  To  reach  it,  we  passed  through  an  endless  succession  of  very 
narrow,  very  busy,  and  most  picturesque  streets,  in  curious  contrast 
with  the  stillness  of  the  church,  which  was  crowded  with  a  very 
devout  female  congregation.     A  succession  of  Masses  for  men  had 


THE  ROMAN  CATHOLIC  CATHEDRAL.        43 

been  celebrated  at  intervals  from  5  a.m.,  and  at  the  close  of  the 
Avornen's  service  one  for  foreigners  was  to  follow.  Bishop  Oilman 
was  present.  A  French  priest  was  celebrant,  and  the  acolytes 
were  small  Chinese  boys.     The  women  sang  hymns  in  Chinese. 

On  our  homeward  way  we  turned  aside  to  see  the  splendid  new 
Roman  Catholic  cathedral,  where  it  struck  me  as  strangely  incon- 
gruous to  find  all  the  builders  and  carpenters  hard  at  work.  But 
the  Church  of  Rome  adapts  her  requirements  to  circumstances,  and 
as  Sunday  labour  is  the  rule  of  the  heathen  Chinese,  it  is  not 
deemed  needful  to  interrupt  even  church-building !  The  cathe- 
dral is  a  handsome  structure  of  solid  granite — a  fine  specimen  of 
Perpendicular  Gothic. 

With  many  nervous  qualms,  and  inward  appeals  to  my  head  to 
keep  steady,  I  ascended  the  steep  inclined  planes  of  scaffolding,  till 
I  reached  a  good  sianding-ground  just  above  the  west  door,  whence 
the  view  is  very  extensive  and  very  fine.  The  country  all  round 
being  so  flat,  even  this  moderate  elevation  commands  an  immeasur- 
able horizon  bounded  only  in  one  direction  by  the  White  Cloud 
hills,  while  all  around,  as  on  a  map,  lies  outspread  this  vast  city, 
with  its  sea  of  dark-tiled  roofs,  all  wellnigh  level,  save  where  the 
hundred  square  pawn-towers,  or  some  tall  pagoda,  or  here  and  there 
some  slightly  raised  temple  roof,  breaks  the  uniform  monotony 
which  Chinese  superstition  considers  so  essential,  as  securing  to  all 
alike  an  equable  distribution  of  the  good  influences  of  Wind  and 
Water — the  mysterious  Fung-Shui. 

Viewed  from  this  light  only,  one  can  well  understand  the  ab- 
horrence with  which  the  population  watch  the  erection  of  these 
two  great  twin  steeples,  which,  when  finished,  will  so  far  overtop 
all  their  highest  buildings,  and  make  this  temple  of  "  the  French 
religion,"  as  they  call  it,  the  most  prominent  object  in  the  city. 

They  have,  however,  another  most  serious  cause  of  complaint,  in 
what  they  declare  to  have  been  the  unjust  manner  in  which  the 
site  was  obtained.  When  the  city  was  captured  by  the  French 
and  English  allies,  a  clause  was  inserted  in  the  treaty  stipulating 
that  all  sites  ever  held  by  Roman  Catholic  missions  should  be  re- 
stored to  them.  The  treaty  was  no  sooner  signed  than  forgotten 
deeds  of  conveyance  of  land  in  Chinese  cities  (which  had  been 
granted  to  the  Jesuits  in  the  early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century 
by  the  Emperor  Kang-he,  ere  they  so  unfortunately  made  them- 
selves obnoxious  by  meddling  in  politics)  were  forwarded  from  the 
Vatican. 

These  included  eighteen  acres  of  land  in  Canton  itself,  on  which, 


44  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

for  several  generations,  had  stood  the  Governor's  official  residenee, 
which  had  been  reduced  to  ruins  in  the  homhardment.  Viceroy 
Yeh  himself  had  heen  eil'cctually  disposed  of,  and  the  Chinese 
authorities  protested  and  remonstrated  in  vain,  while  a  cordon  of 
French  soldiers  was  stationed  found  the  land  thus  claimed,  so  that 
if  might  could  not  make  right,  at  least  possession  might  prove  nine 
points  of  the  law.  So  now  the  stately  cathedral  has  arisen — in 
itself  a  thing  of  beauty,  but  in  the  eyes  of  the  citizens  a  constant 
reminder  of  injustice  and  robbery  which  may  yet  lead  to  a  repeti- 
tion of  the  massacre  of  Tien-tsin.1 

We  returned  to  the  Shameen  for  breakfast,  and  then  to  the  Eng- 
lish service  in  the  Episcopal  church. 

After  luncheon  I  accompanied  my  host  and  hostess  for  a  long 
pleasant  walk  on  the  city  walls,  obtaining  most  interesting  views  of 
the  densely  crowded  city  within,  and  of  the  lines  of  intersecting 
wall  which  divide  it  into  the  various  anti-fire  wards.  We  wan- 
dered on  for  about  three  miles,  passing  the  Flowery  Pagoda,  the 
Canton  and  Whampoa  Pagodas,  and  finally  reached  a  great  five- 
storied  building  to  the  summit  of  which  we  climbed,  and  so  obtained 
another  excellent  view  of  the  surroundings. 

We  also  visited  a  temple  with  a  green-tiled  roof,  in  which  an 

1  Though  the  cathedral  has  as  yet  escaped  the  retributive  rage  of  the  mob, 
French  aggression  has  been  sorely  visited  on  a  multitude  of  unoffending  native 
Christians,  both  Roman  Catholic  and  Protestant.  In  the  summer  of  1884,  scores 
of  chapels  and  schools  belonging  to  various  societies  were  attacked  and  looted. 
Many  of  the  luckless  converts  were  cruelly  beaten,  their  children  stolen  from  them, 
their  property  seized,  and  their  houses  dismantled  and  burnt.  Hundreds  of  fami- 
lies were  thus  rendered  homeless.  Appeals  to  the  local  magistrates  (for  the  pro- 
tection which  by  the  English  treaty  they  are  bound  to  extend  to  all  native  Chris- 
tians when  persecuted  on  account  of  their  faith)  were  all  in  vain,  as  these  positively 
refused  to  interfere,  assuring  the  Christians  that  they  richly  deserved  death  as  the 
penalty  for  adopting  the  religion  of  foreigners. 

From  other  districts  several  thousand  Roman  Catholics,  being  driven  from  their 
work  and  from  their  homes,  fled  for  refuge  to  Macao  and  Hong-Kong.  Conse- 
quently there  are  now  villages  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Cantou  left  utterly  de- 
populated. 

Writing  on  this  subject,  the  correspondent  of  the  '  Daily  News '  stated  : — 
"  Canton,  Oct.  13,  1884  :  The  English  and  American  Protestant  missions  have 
sustained  serious  losses,  and  their  converts  have  been  bitterly  persecuted.  No 
lives  have  been  sacrificed,  but  homes  have  been  broken  up,  men  have  been  brutally 
beaten,  and  women,  stripped  of  their  clothing,  and  with  the  sword  above  their 
heads,  have  been  required  to  renounce  their  faith.      We  have  h  <ned  to 

think  dubiously  of  the  conversion  of  Chinese  to  the  Christian  faith,  but  the  nrmness 
which  tlaii  hare  itisjilai/n/  in  tin-  midst  <f  these  trying  persecutions  can  only  be 
regarded  as  strong  evidence  of  their  sincerity." 

Those  who  for  years  have  been  intimately  acquainted  with  the  daily  lives  of 
these  native  Christians  needed  no  such  test  to  convince  them  of  their  sincerity — or 
rather,  they  have  seen  them  sorely  tried  over  anil  over  again  :  but,  of  course,  the 
persecution  of  a  few  individuals  does  not  often  attract  public  attention  in  such  a 
manner  as  when  political  questions  invest  all  such  details  with  general  interest. 


A    MANDARIN    AT   HOME.  45 

object  of  interest  is  a  sacred  black  wooden  dog  with  one  horn  on 
its  forehead.      Ft  is  adorned  with  votive  offerings  of  pink  cloth. 

"We  were  not  sorry  to  avail  ourselves  of  our  strong  human  ponies 
for  the  return  journey,  especially  as  I  had  trysted  to  accompany 
Mrs  Chalmers  to  an  evening  service  at  a  private  house  in  the  city, 
where  the  missionaries  of  all  denominations,  who  have  all  day  been 
teaching  in  Chinese,  meet  every  Sunday  evening  to  worship  to- 
gether in  English.  We  walked  along  the  canal  and  through  the 
city,  just  at  sunset,  and  found  about  forty  persons  assembled  for  a 
nicely  conducted  and  hearty  service. 

At  its  close  we  walked  back  through  the  very  dark  streets,  with 
apparently  no  reason  for  any  anxiety,  the  people  being  all  quite 
civil.  Some  of  the  streets,  lighted  with  painted  glass  or  horn 
lamps,  silk-fringed  or  gay  paper  lanterns,  were  most  picturesque, 
and  as  full  of  busy  shop-life  as  when  we  started  in  the  morning. 
In  some  places  Ave  came  on  crowds  gambling  for  cash  or  small 
pieces  of  food. 

As  we  emerged  from  the  closely  packed  houses  to  the  street  fac- 
ing the  canal,  a  great  yellow  moon  was  rising,  and  reflected  on  the 
waterSj  where  lie  many  house-boats,  each  the  home  of  a  family. 

We  paused  awhile  to  watch  the  scene,  but  a  chilling  miasma 
floated  up  from  the  waters,  bidding  us  hurry  onward,  wondering 
how  the  boat-children  escape  croup  and  diphtheria  ! 

Monday,  13th  Jan. 

A  very  wealthy  mandarin  having  invited  Mrs  Lind  to  bring  her 
foreign  friend  to  his  house,  I  have  had  a  capital  opportunity  of  see- 
ing the  interior  of  a  genuine  Chinese  home  of  the  very  best  type, 
and  very  puzzling  it  would  be  to  describe.  It  covers  so  much 
ground,  and  there  are  so  many  open  halls,  consisting  chiefly  of 
pillars  and  ornamental  roofs,  scattered  promiscuously  about,  among 
paved  courtyards,  decorated  with  flowers  in  pots ;  and  then  there 
are  walls  pierced  by  oddly  shaped  portals,  formed  like  octagons,  or 
circles,  or  even  teapots,  and  all  placed  at  irregular  intervals,  never 
opposite  one  another ;  and  then  shady  morsels  of  garden  with  all 
manner  of  surprises  in  the  way  of  little  ponds  and  angular  bridges 
and  quaint  trees.  Then  somehow,  quite  unexpectedly,  you  lind 
yourself  in  highly  ornamental  suites  of  small  rooms  which  seem 
to  have  originally  been  one  great  room,  subdivided  by  partitions 
of  the  most  elaborate  wood-carving,  and  furnished  with  beautiful 
polished  blackwood,  and  hangings  of  rich  materials. 

Such  homes  are  in  fact  the  patriarchal  encampment  of  a  whole 


4G  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

clan,  to  which  all  the  suns  and  brothers  of  the  house  bring  their 
wives,  and  there  take  up  their  quarters,  living  together  apparently 
in  very  remarkable  peace. 

As  no  ladies  except  those  connected  with  the  missions  ever 
attempt  to  master  Chinese,  and  as  a  very  few  Chinese  gentlemen 
and  no  ladies  can  speak  English,  or  even  the  barbarous  jargon 
known  as  pigeon-English,  Mrs  Lind  took  her  amah  to  interpret  for 
us.  "VYe  were  received  by  our  host  and  half-a-dozen  gentlemen  of 
the  family,  and  for  some  time  we  sat  in  a  fine  open  reception-hall, 
drinking  pale  straw-coloured  tea  in  its  simple  form,  and  playing 
with  a  nice  small  son,  the  hope  of  the  house. 

Presently  our  host  (who  is  very  friendly  to  foreigners,  and  from 
intercourse  with  them  is  less  punctilious  than  most  Chinamen  on 
the  matter  of  being  seen  speaking  to  his  women-folk)  led  us  aside, 
and  presented  us  to  his  most  kindly  and  courteous  old  mother,  who 
conducted  us  to  her  apartments,  her  son  accompanying  us.  He 
then  introduced  us  to  his  little  bride,  aged  thirteen.  His  matri- 
monial ventures  have  so  far  been  unlucky,  two  previous  wives  hav- 
ing died  very  early.     This  one  seems  a  nice,  bright  little  lady. 

She  was  very  highly  rouged,  as  was  also  her  sister-in-law.  An- 
other sister  being  indisposed,  was  not  rouged,  nor  was  the  mother, 
and,  therefore,  pleasanter  to  our  eyes ;  but  the  Canton  ladies  love 
to  lay  on  the  colour  thick.  There  is  no  deception  about  it !  it  is 
good  honest  red,  laid  thick  upon  the  cheek,  and  carried  right  round 
the  eyebrows.  The  latter  are  shaved  to  refine  their  form.  They 
cannot  understand  why  English  ladies  should  abstain  from  such  an 
embellishment.  Only  when  in  mourning  do  they  refrain  from  its 
use,  and  one  notable  exception  is  that  of  a  bride,  who  on  her  wed- 
ding-day may  wear  no  rouge,  so  that  when  her  red  silk  veil  is 
removed  and  the  fringe  of  artificial  pearls  raised,  her  husband,  look- 
ing on  her  face  for  the  first  time,  may  know  for  certain  what  share 
of  beauty  unadorned  has  fallen  to  his  lot ! 

But  of  all  eccentricities  of  personal  decoration,  the  oddest,  I 
think,  is  that  of  gilding  the  hair,  which,  I  am  told,  young  Canton 
girls  do  on  very  full-dress  occasions.  Certainly  I  do  remember  a 
time  when  some  English  ladies  powdered  their  hair  with  gold  dust, 
but  then  they  owned  golden  locks  to  start  with,  whereas  these  are 
all  black,  and  glossy  as  the  raven's  wing. 

Our  host  next  led  us  into  his  fine  large  garden,  which  is  all 
dotted  over  with  delightful  little  summer-houses,  with  picturesque 
double  roofs  much  curved  up,  and  with  a  wealth  of  fine  wood- 
carving— beautiful  blackwood  furniture  like  polished  ebony,  with 


DRINKING    HEALTHS.  47 

scarlet  embroidered  draperies ;  here  and  there  a  window  of  delicate 
pearly  oyster-shells  set  in  a  fine  lattice-work,  so  as  to  form  a  trans- 
lucent screen.  Shady  trees  overhang  cunningly-contrived  miniature 
streams  and  lakes,  with  fanciful  bridges,  one  of  which  is  constructed 
in  zigzags,  as  an  embleiu  of  the  much-esteemed  dragon.  It  is  a 
wonderful  garden  to  be  the  property  of  a  private  citizen  in  the 
heart  of  this  great  crowded  city  ! 

The  dragon-bridge  and  the  quaintly-shaped  portals  are  not  the 
only  lucky  emblems  which  are  here  cherished.  A  couple  of  tame 
deer,  which  symbolise  happiness,  and  several  gorgeous  peacocks, 
which  denote  exalted  rank,  enliven  the  garden.  Some  geese  are 
also  admitted  as  being  emblematic  of  constancy,  for  which  reason 
they  figure  among  the  gifts  of  a  bridegroom  to  his  bride. 

Returning  to  the  house,  or  rather  to  one  of  its  many  scattered 
portions,  we  find  an  abundant  luncheon  awaiting  us,  but  only  the 
gentlemen  shared  it  with  us.  Even  the  fine  old  mother  could  not 
venture  so  far  to  depart  from  the  customs  of  well-bred  Chinese 
ladies  as  to  cross  the  threshold,  though  she  just  glanced  in  to  see 
that  we  were  happy.  Everything  was  excellent  and  abundant  and 
semi-European,  some  of  the  party,  including  our  host,  using  forks, 
while  others  preferred  chop-sticks.  AVe  tasted  a  spirit  called  rose 
vine,  and  our  hosts  enjoyed  good  English  sherry.  There  was 
much  health-drinking,  quite  in  what  we  should  call  old  English 
style,  which  here,  however,  is  genuine  old  Chinese  style.  Gentle- 
men pledge  one  another  in  brimming  wine-cups  of  small  exquisitely 
chased  metal-work,  and  having  drained  the  cup,  they  turn  it  upside 
down  on  the  table  (which  table,  of  course,  has  no  cloth) — a  white 
table-cloth  would  be  deemed  a  most  unlucky  symbol  of  mourning. 

Leaving  the  gentlemen  to  finish  their  wine,  Ave  rejoined  the 
ladies,  who  now,  in  the  absence  of  any  lord  of  the  creation,  were 
much  more  at  their  ease.  They  were  sitting,  as  is  their  custom,  in 
one  of  their  bedrooms  (also  handsomely  furnished  with  polished 
blackwood  and  beautifully  carved  bedsteads).  They  gathered 
round  us  to  examine  such  jewels  as  we  wore,  and  to  show  lis 
theirs,  and  were  pleased  by  our  admiration  of  their  quaint  and 
very  elaborate  head-dressing,  their  glossy  hair  being  ornamented 
with  artificial  flowers  (one  had  natural  flowers),  ami  valuable 
hair-pins  of  gold,  pearl,  or  jade-stone.  Some  wore  butterflies  of 
the  kingfishers'  feather  jewellery,  but  the  principal  ladies  wore 
necklaces  and  bracelets  of  clear,  bright-green  jade,  the  Chinese 
equivalent  of  diamonds.  One  lady  who  wore  large  pendants  of 
jade   as  ear-rings,   and   also   attached  to  the  silken   curd   of   her 


48  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

fan,  was  the  proud  owner  of  enormously  long  third  and  fourth 
finger-nails  on  the  loft  hand.  These  were  shielded  by  golden  nail- 
protectors — excellent,  weapons  for  the  infliction  of  a  vicious  scratch  1 
They  are  simply  half-thimbles  about  three  inches  in  length.  I 
have  invested  in  a  very  pretty  silver  set  of  four. 

All  these  ladies  wore  the  same  excess  of  jewellery  covering  the 
back  of  the  head,  but  a  singular  prejudice  forbids  a  woman  ever 
to  cover  the  top  of  her  head,  even  when  out  of  doors ;  so  they 
think  our  hats  very  eccentric  indeed,  though  these  town  ladies 
understand  that  it  is  not  indecorous  for  foreign  women  to  wear 
such  headgear. 

There  is  just  one  exception  to  this  otherwise  general  rule, 
namely,  that  if  a  lady  is  of  sufficiently  high  rank  to  attend  court, 
she  then  appears  in  a  hat  precisely  similar  to  that  which  her  hus- 
band is  entitled  to  wear,  and  adorned  with  the  coloured  button 
which  denotes  his  exact  rank.  The  mother  of  our  host  being 
entitled  to  this  honour,  has  had  her  portrait  painted  in  oils,  in  full 
court-dress,  with  beautiful  symbolic  embroidery  of  birds,  and  a 
handsome  rosary  of  jade-stone,  such  as  is  worn  by  high  man- 
darins. 

"We  also  unfeignedly  admired  these  ladies'  exquisitely  embroidered 
silken  skirts,  all  of  different  colours,  and  all  folded  into  tiny  plaits. 
These  skirts  are  worn  one  above  the  other.  But  their  chief  pride 
evidently  centred  in  their  poor  little  "  golden  lily  "  feet,  reduced  to 
the  tiniest  hoof  in  proof  of  their  exalted  station.  Of  course,  the- 
so-called  foot  is  little  more  than  just  the  big  toe,  enclosed  in  a 
dainty  wee  shoe,  which  peeps  out  from  beneath  the  silk-embroidered 
trousers.  Whether  to  call  attention  to  these  beauties,  or  as  an 
instinctive  effort  to  relieve  pain,  I  know  not,  but  we  observe  that 
a  favourite  attitude  in  the  zenana  is  to  cross  one  leg  over  the 
other,  and  nurse  the  poor  deformed  foot  in  the  hand. 

As  they  could  scarcely  toddle  without  help,  their  kindly-looking, 
strong,  large-footed  attendants  were  at  hand,  ready  to  act  as  walk- 
ing-sticks or  ponies,  as  might  be  desired.  However  ungraceful  in 
our  eyes  is  the  tottering  gait  of  these  ladies  when  attempting  to 
walk,  it  is  certainly  not  so  inelegant  as  the  mode  of  transport 
which  here  is  the  very  acme  of  refined  fine-ladyism.  The  lady 
mounts  on  the  back  of  her  amah,  whom  she  clasps  round  the  neck 
with  both  her  arms,  while  the  amah  holds  back  her  hands,  and 
then  grasps  the  knees  of  her  mistress.  Very  fatiguing  for  the  poor- 
human  pony,  who  sometimes  is  called  upon  to  carry  this  awkward 
burden  for  a  considerable  distance,  at  the  end  of  which  it  is  the 


CHINESE    HOSPITALITY.  49 

lady,  not  the  amah,  who  refreshes  her  exhausted  strength  with  a 

few  whiffs  from  a  long  tobacco-pipe  ! 

To-day  the  only  work  of  the  attendants  was  to  fan  us,  and 
assiduously  feed  us  with  luscious  preserved  fruits  and  cakes,  which 
it  would  have  been  deemed  uncourteous  to  refuse,  though  it  was 
terrible  to  have  to  swallow  so  many.  One  or  two  would  really 
have  been  enjoyable,  but  here  hospitality  involves  surfeit.  It  was 
a  delightful  relief  when  one  of  the  amahs  brought  in  a  basket  of 
pumeloes  (the  huge  pink-fleshed  citron),  whose  sweet  acid  flavour 
was  a  blessed  change ;  and  then  another  woman  produced  some 
of  the  nut-like  seeds  of  the  lotus  plant,  which  are  very  nice. 
Chinese  hospitality  is  only  satisfied  so  long  as  the  mouth  of  the 
guest  is  well  filled. 

One  of  the  older  ladies  of  the  last  generation  was  Buffering  from 
headache,  and  as  a  cure  she  wore  a  circular  patch  of  black  plaister 
on  each  temple.  "We  very  soon  felt  that  the  like  fate  would  be 
ours  were  we  to  stay  much  longer  in  the  small  crowded  room, 
where  the  atmosphere  was  most  oppressive  for  lack  of  ventilation, 
though  it  is  hard  to  see  why  it  should  be  so,  as  there  are  no  doors 
in  any  Chinese  house,  only  open  portals  embellished  with  the  high- 
est open-work  carving,  and  there  is  much  carved  lattice-work  all 
about  the  place. 

As  soon  as  we  could  venture,  we  rose  to  take  our  leave,  which 
is  necessarily  a  slow  process,  as  in  any  case  Chinese  politeness 
requires  the  hosts  to  make  every  effort  for  the  detention  of  their 
guests,  and  in  the  case  of  such  raven  aves  as  ourselves,  I  have  no 
doubt  the  regret  at  parting  was  genuine.  "When  at  last  Ave  had 
successfully  manoeuvred  our  way  out,  hospitality  still  followed  us 
in  the  form  of  baskets  of  fruit  and  of  rice-cakes  made  with  burnt 


Jan.  14th. 

I  have  had  the  good  fortune  to  have  a  long  day  in  the  city  with 
Mr  Chalmers  of  the  London  Mission,  who,  having  been  at  work 
here  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  and  having  a  keen  interest  in  the 
manners  and  customs  of  the  land  in  which  he  lives  (which  is  by 
no  means  a  necessary  sequence  of  long  residence  !),  is  a  delightful 
companion  on  such  a  ramble,  and  I  need  scarcely  say  that  really  t.> 
enjoy  such  an  expedition,  one  must  go  quietly  on  foot,  with  all 
powers  of  observation  on  the  alert,  never  knowing  what  strange 
novelty  will  entail  a  halt  at  any  moment. 

We  started  at  sunrise,  but  already  the  tide  of  busy  life  wras  well 

D 


50  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

astir  in  the  narrow  streets  of  shops,  through  which  we  walked  on 
our  way  to  the  great  market  for  jade-stone,  which  is  held  daily  at 
early  morning  in  the  open  air  near  the  temple  of  the  Five  Hun- 
dred I  >isciples,  and  closes  before  ordinary  mortals  are  astir. 

Considering  the  extraordinary  value  which  attaches  to  this  pre- 
cious mineral,  I  was  chiefly  amazed  at  the  enormous  quantity  which 
we  saw  offered  for  sale.  Not  only  is  the  market  itself  (a  very  large 
square  building)  entirely  filled  with  stalls  exclusively  for  the  sale 
of  objects  manufactured  from  jade,  but  many  of  the  surrounding 
streets  are  lined  with  open  booths  and  shops  for  the  same  object ; 
and  truly,  though  every  Chinese  woman  who  can  possibly  obtain  a 
jade  ornament  delights  in  it,  as  a  European  or  an  American  glories 
in  her  diamonds,  the  prices  are  so  prohibitive  that  it  is  difficult  to 
imagine  how  a  sale  can  be  obtained  for  such  a  mass  of  bracelets 
and  brooches,  ear-rings  and  finger-rings,  and  especially  of  very  orna- 
mental pins  for  the  hair. 

Here  poor  women  and  middle-class  tradesmen  who  cannot  afford 
the  genuine  article  solace  themselves  with  imitation  gems  of  green 
glass,  or  some  such  composition,  which  take  the  place  of  spurious 
diamonds,  and  effectually  deceive  the  untrained  eye.  But  at  this 
market,  I  believe,  only  the  genuine  article  is  sold.  "We  saw  speci- 
mens of  very  varied  colours,  from  a  semi-opaque  cream  or  milky- 
white  tint  to  the  clearest  sea-green,  or  a  dark  hue  the  colour  of 
blood-stone. 

I  am  told  that  it  is  all  imported  from  the  Kuen-luen  mountains 
in  Turkestan,  where  there  are  mines  of  this  mineral — the  only  mines 
in  the  world  which  are  worked,  so  far  as  is  known.  It  has  thence 
been  brought  to  China  as  an  article  of  tribute  from  the  earliest 
times  of  which  even  the  Celestials  have  any  record,  and  so  highly 
have  they  prized  it  that  they  have  jealously  striven  to  keep  it  en- 
tirely  in  their  own  hands.  It  is,  however,  thought  possible  that 
as  this  mineral  is  not  known  to  occur  anj'where  in  Europe,1  jade- 

1  It  lias  recently  been  proved  that  jade  does  exist  not  only  in  Europe,  but 
even  in  our  own  isles.  Though  its  cradle  remains  a  mystery,  fragments  have  been 
found  in  the  glacial  drift  of  Northern  Germany — some  near  Potsdam,  and  one  large 
block  at  Schwensal,  near  Leipzig.  But  specially  interesting  to  ourselves  is  the 
fact,  proved  by  Mr  C.  G.  Leland,  that  among  the  pretty  green  pebbles  offered  for 
sale  by  the  children  on  the  island  of  Iona,  some  are  undoubtedly  real  jade  of  the 
best  quality — namely,  of  the  transparent  clear  dark-green  hue,  which  is  so  greatly 
prized  by  the  Chinese.  In  fact,  his  attention  was  first  aroused  by  the  extreme 
interest  evinced  by  some  Chinese  gentlemen  to  whom  he  presented  a  few  of  these 
pebbles,  telling  them  how  of  old  pilgrims  to  "the  holy  isle'7  carried  these  home 
as  mementoes.  Mr  Leland  thinks  it  probable  that  in  prehistoric  times  fetiches 
were  made  of  the  jade  here  obtained,  and  that  thus,  perhaps.  Iona  first  acquired 
its  pre-Christian  reputation  for  sanctity. — See  chapter  on  Iona,  in  'In  the  Hebrides,* 
p.  99,  by  C.  F.  Gordon  dimming.     Chatto  &  Windus. 


THE    JADE-STONE    MARKET.  51 

celts,  which  have  been  found  in  European  lake-dwellings,  and  other 
prehistoric  remains,  have  probably  travelled  thither  as  baiter,  in 
the  course  of  the  great  Aryan  westward  migration  from  the  high- 
lands of  Central  Asia.  Tradition  affirms  that  the  Aryans  regarded 
the  wearing  of  a  jade  ornament  as  the  most  effectual  charm  against 
lightning,  a  faith  which  would  naturally  account  for  their  carrying 
with  them  many  such  treasures. 

'  So  in  Hindostan,  though  specimens  of  carved  jade  inlaid  with 
rubies  and  diamonds  were  among  the  priceless  treasures  of  the 
Mogul  Emperors,  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  that  this  mineral  has 
ever  been  found  in  the  Empire,  and  it  is  supposed  that  the  raw 
material  must  have  been  brought  from  those  same  mines,  of  which 
there  are  considerably  over  a  bundled,  one  great  mountain-side 
being  riddled  by  dark  tunnels,  which  are  the  entrances  to  long 
winding  galleries,  excavated  in  every  direction,  and  in  some  cases 
piercing  right  through  the  mountain  to  its  farther  side.  The  jade 
is  found  in  veins  which  are  sometimes  several  feet  in  depth,  but  it 
is  so  full  of  fissures  that  it  is  rare  to  obtain  a  perfect  block  more 
thaD  a  few  inches  thick.  Hence  the  great  value  of  large  pieces 
when  found  without  a  Haw.  Such  are  reserved  for  the  Imperial 
tribute,  and  the  Emperor  himself  awards  such  blocks  to  the  artist 
who  is  most  certain  to  do  it  justice,  the  natural  form  of  the  block 
deciding  what  shall  be  the  character  of  the  sculpture. 

Such  an  Imperial  commission  is  equivalent  to  a  life-work,  for 
although,  when  first  broken  from  its  rocky  bed,  the  jade  may  be 
scratched  with  an  ordinary  knife,  it  soon  hardens,  so  as  to  become 
the  most  difficult  of  minerals  for  the  sculptor's  art.  Hence,  such 
vases  and  other  ornaments  as  became  so  familiar  to  us  after  the 
looting  of  the  Summer  Palace,  each  represented  twenty  or  thirty 
years  of  ceaseless  toil  at  the  hands  of  a  patient  and  most  diligent 
worker.  And  yet  I  have  seen  some  of  these  priceless  art-treasures 
in  British  homes,  where  their  value  in  this  respect  seems  un- 
dreamt of. 

The  Chinese  name  of  the  stone  is  Yu-shek,  and  that  by  which 
we  call  it  is  said  to  be  a  corruption  of  a  Spanish  word  referring  to 
a  superstition  of  the  Mexican  Indians,  who  deemed  that  to  wear  a 
bracelet  of  this  stone  was  the  surest  protection  against  all  diseases 
of  the  loins:  hence  the  Spaniards  named  the  mineral  Piedra  <(i 
hijcuJa  (stone  of  the  loins),  by  which  name  it  became  known  in 
Europe,  and  ere  long  was  contracted  to  its  present  form.  Where 
the  Mexicans  obtained  their  specimens  is  not  known,  mineralogists 
having  failed  to  discover  this  mineral  on  the  American  continent 


52  A   VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

New  Zealand,  however,  has  supplied  hei  own  jade  in  the  form 
of  great  pebbles,  which  with  infinite  labour  have  been  wrought 
into  those  large  celts  and  grotesque  amulets  which  formed  the  most 
priceless  possessions  of  the  high  chiefs. 

As  a  matter  of  course,  in  this  daily  market  of  the  modern  work- 
produced  in  the  jade-cutters'  street,  we  saw  no  specimens  of  very 
artistic  work — such  can  rarely  come  into  the  market ;  but  the 
prices  of  even  simple  thumb-rings  or  ear-rings  are  so  great,  that  I 
had  to  console  myself  by  the  thought  that  I  could  get  much  more 
show  for  my  money  by  investing  in  some  very  pretty  vases  of  a 
cheap  green  stone  mounted  in  well-carved  stands  of  polished 
blackwood. 

It  really  is  amazing  to  think  of  the  value  of  the  goods  offered 
for  sale  on  those  stalls  of  rough  wooden  planks !  The  real  price — 
not  the  price  asked  with  a  view  to  its  being  beaten  down,  in  the 
wearisome  manner  in  which  all  shopping  is  here  conducted,  but 
the  price  which  a  Chinese  mandarin  would  pay  for  a  string  of 
really  good  bright-green  beads — might  be  £1000  !  For  two  buttons 
suitable  for  his  use  he  would  pay  £30.  The  most  costly  colour 
is  a  vivid  green  like  that  of  a  young  rice-field,  and  for  a  really 
good  specimen  of  this,  £500  or  £600  is  sometimes  paid  for  a 
personal  ornament  of  very  moderate  size. 

A  large  amount  of  the  jade  offered  for  sale  in  the  market  is 
quite  in  the  rough,  and  here  the  lapidaries  come  to  select  such  pieces 
as  seem  likely  to  be  sound  and  of  good  colour  throughout.  It  is 
extremely  interesting  to  see  these  men  at  work  in  their  primitive 
shops,  which  form  a  whole  street  by  themselves.  First  the  rough 
block  is  placed  between  two  sawyers,  who  saw  it  in  two  by  the 
horizontal  movement  of  a  saw  of  steel  wire,  with  bow-shaped 
handle.  From  time  to  time  they  drop  a  thin  paste  of  emery 
powder  and  water  along  the  line  they  purpose  cutting.  These 
reduced  portions  are  then  passed  on  to  other  men,  who  work  with 
small  circular  saws,  and  thus  fashion  all  manner  of  ornaments. 

Not  very  far  from  this  street,  there  is  one  wholly  inhabited  by 
silk-weavers,  whose  hand-looms  are  of  the  most  primitive  descrip- 
tion. A  little  farther  lies  a  curious  water-street,  a  sort  of  Chinese 
Venice,  where  the  houses  edge  a  canal  so  closely  that  the  people 
step  from  their  doors  into  boats.  This  canal  runs  straight  to  one 
of  the  water-gates,  by  which  all  the  market-boats  enter  the  city 
every  morning.  These  gates,  being  the  portals  beneath  which  the 
canal  flows  through  the  city  walls,  are  closed  at  night,  so  all  boats 
arriving  after  sunset  must  lie  outside  till  morning ;  and  great  is 


SUCKING-PIG    MARKET.  53 

the  rush  when  at  sunrise  the  portcullis  is  raised,  and  each  boat 
seeks  to  enter  first. 

Amongst  the  produce  thus  brought  to  the  daily  market  are 
sucking-pigs  in  search  of  a  mother,  as  Chinese  farmers  do  not  care 
to  allow  one  mother  to  suckle  more  than  a  dozen  little  piggies, 
whereas  bountiful  nature  occasionally  sends  a  litter  nearly  double 
that  number.  So  whenever  the  births  exceed  the  regulation  limit, 
a  litter  of  the  supernumeraries  is  conveyed  to  the  sucking-pig 
market,  which  is  held  daily  in  the  early  morning,  and  there  the 
farmer  whose  sties  have  not  been  so  abundantly  blessed,  buys  a 
few  of  the  outcasts  to  make  up  his  number.  But  lest  the  maternal 
sow  should  object  to  adopting  the  little  strangers,  her  own  babies 
arc  taken  from  her,  and  placed  with  the  new-comers,  when  all  are 
sprinkled  with  wine.  "When  the  combined  litter  is  restored  to  the 
anxious  parent,  she  is  so  bamboozled  by  the  delightful  fragrance 
of  the  whole  party,  that  she  forgets  to  count  them  (or  fears  she 
may  be  seeing  double),  so  she  deems  it  prudent  "  to  keep  a  calm 
sough,"  as  we  say  in  the  north,  and  accepts  the  increased  family 
without  comment ! 

Of  course,  in  passing  through  the  shop  streets  I  could  not 
resist  many  a  halt,  while  my  good  guardian,  with  inexhaustible 
patience,  explained  to  me  the  use  or  meaning  of  sundry  objects, 
which  to  me  were  all  strange  curios.  In  many  of  the  shops  an 
unusual  willingness  to  sell  goods  at  reasonable  prices  plainly  indi- 
cates the  approach  of  the  New  Year,  as  do  also  the  number  of 
street-stalls  for  the  sale  of  small  curios,  inasmuch  as  it  is  a  positive 
necessity  for  all  accounts  to  be  settled  before  the  close  of  the  Old 
Year,  and  therefore  a  tradesman  will  sometimes  even  sell  at  a  loss, 
in  order  to  realise  the  sum  necessary  to  meet  his  liabilities.  Should 
he  fail  to  do  so,  he  is  accounted  disgraced,  his  name  is  written  on 
his  own  door  as  a  defaulter,  his  business  reputation  is  lust,  and  no 
one  will  henceforth  give  him  credit. 

I  believe  that  debts  which  are  not  settled  on  New  Year's  eve 
cannot  subsequently  be  recovered,  for  a  curious  custom  exists 
whereby  a  creditor  who  has  vainly  pursued  a  debtor  all  through 
the  night  may  still  follow  him  after  daybreak,  provided  lie  con- 
tinues to  cany  his  lighted  lantern,  as  if  he  believed  it  was  still 
night.     This,  however,  is  his  last  chance. 

We  wandered  on  from  shop  to  shop,  and  from  temple  to  temple, 
till  I  was  fairly  bewildered.  But  one  scene  remains  vividly  before 
my  memory  as  the  finest  subject  for  a  picture  that  1  have  seen  in 
Canton.      It  is  in  the  western  suburbs,  close  to  the  temples  of  the 


54  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

<  loils  of  War  and  of  Literature,  and  of  the  Queen  of  Heaven  (in 
one  of  which  I  was  especially  fascinated  hy  the  multitude  of  small 
figures,  carved  and  gilt,  which  adorn  the  roof,  the  sides  of  the 
temple,  and  the  altar).  Standing  on  the  temple-steps,  you  look 
aliing  the  street,  and  combine  a  picturesque  bridge  with  an  arched 
gateway  of  the  fire-wall  spanning  the  highway.  It  is  in  such  a 
quiet  quarter  that  I  think  I  shall  be  able  to  secure  a  drawing  of 
the  scene.1 

Of  course,  in  arranging  to  sketch  near  a  temple,  the  el  unices  of 
qniet  depend  on  the  day,  as  every  god  has  his  day,  when  the  whole 
population  crowd  to  do  him  homage,  and  then  the  neighbouring 
streets,  however  dull  on  other  occasions,  are  decorated  and  thronged. 
I  am  told  that  one  of  the  prettiest  of  these  festivals  will  occur  in 
the  middle  of  April,  in  honour  of  the  very  beneficent  and  popular 
god,  Paak-tai,  who  has  at  various  times  been  incarnate  upon  the 
earth  for  the  good  of  mankind.  One  of  these  incarnations  occurred 
after  the  deluge  which  destroyed  the  whole  world  in  the  reign  of 
the  Chinese  Emperor  Yaou,  B.C.  2357  (a  date  which  closely  corre- 
sponds with  that  of  the  universal  Deluge  recorded  in  the  Hebrew 
Scriptures,  and  noted  in  our  chronology  as  B.C.  2349).  After  this 
terrible  flood  all  knowledge  of  agriculture,  art,  and  science  was  lost, 
so  Paak-tai  came  back  to  earth  to  instruct  the  survivors. 

The  really  pretty  and  unique  feature  of  his  festival  is  that,  on 
three  successive  evenings,  all  his  worshippers  bring  their  pet  sing- 
ing-birds (generally  larks,  which  they  habitually  carry  about  with 
them  in  their  pretty  cages,  just  as  Englishmen  go  out  accompanied 
by  their  dogs.  I  am  not  sure,  however,  that  a  Briton  would  appre- 
ciate the  trouble  of  always  carrying  his  pet,  as  the  Celestials  do  !) 

Thus  a  crowd  of  several  hundred  larks  is  assembled,  and  all  are 
brought  into  the  brilliantly  illuminated  temple.  The  cages  (which 
are  covered  for  the  occasion)  are  suspended  from  horizontal  bam- 
boos, so  that  presently  the  whole  temple  is  full  of  them.  On  a 
given  signal,  all  the  coverings  are  removed,  and  the  astonished 
larks,  supposing  that  they  have  overslept  themselves,  and  allowed 
the  sun  to  rise  without  the  tribute  of  their  morning  hymn,  make 
up  for  lost  time  by  bursting  forth  into  a  most  jubilant  chorus  of 
song,  which  they  keep  up  for  about  a  couple  of  hours,  greatly  to 
the  delight  of  the  human  crowd,  rich  and  poor,  and  of  the  bene- 
ficent deity  who  is  thus  honoured.     So  these  people  who  enlist  the 

1  The  innumerable  interests  of  Canton,  especially  the  crowds  assembled  for  the 
New  Year,  prevented  my  even  devoting  a  day  to  the  subject.  I  therefore  be- 
queath this  discovery  to  sjme  more  resolute  artist. 


FESTIVAL    OF    LAKKS.  55 

breezes  and  the  streams  to  sound  the  hells  which  chime  the  praises 
of  Buddha,  teach  the  birds  also  to  do  their  part  in  the  general 
thanksgiving. 

On  the  third  and  last  evening  of  the  bird  concert,  the  festival 
concludes  with  the  most  gorgeous  procession.  First  come  huge 
lanterns,  on  each  of  which  is  inscribed  the  name  of  the  god ;  then 
a  number  of  gay  banners  embroidered  with  scenes  in  his  history. 
Then  come  several  score  of  tiny  children  splendidly  dressed  to 
represent  characters  in  the  old  legends;  these  are  mounted  on  little 
ponies,  and  led  by  attendants  in  rich  silken  robes.  They  are  chil- 
dren of  wealthy  parents,  who  deem  it  an  honour  to  take  part  in  the 
festival.  The  children's  interest  is  sustained  by  frequent  pauses, 
when  they  are  fed  with  cakes  and  sweetmeats.  In  the  procession 
are  carried  several  canopied  shrines,  some  of  carved  and  polished 
blackwood,  containing  the  images  of  the  god  and  of  his  parents; 
others  are  more  ornamental,  and  are  covered  with  figures  appar- 
ently enamelled,  but  really  made  of  lovely  kingfishers'  feathers. 
These  shrines  contain  only  beautiful  objects,  such  as  old  bronze  or 
jade-stone  vases,  which  are  lent  by  the  owners  to  grace  the  proces- 
sion. All  along  the  road  where  the  procession  is  to  pass,  the 
people  prepare  small  altars  outside  their  doors,  and  make  offerings 
to  the  idol  as  it  is  carried  past,  sometimes  pouring  libations  of 
wine  on  to  the  ground. 

Our  last,  but  not  least,  curious  experience  on  this  morning  of 
strange  sights  was  a  visit  to  one  of  the  innumerable  shops  devoted 
solely  to  the  manufacture  of  pasteboard  models  of  every  conceiv- 
able object,  from  a  doll-house  ten  feet  square  to  a  good  large  pony, 
boots,  hats,  sedan-chairs,  but  above  all  money, — all  with  a  view  to 
supplying  offerings  of  burnt-sacrifice  to  the  spirits  of  the  dead. 
Just  at  present  some  less  reverent  foreigners  have  enlisted  the 
services  of  these  purveyors  of  Hades  in  that  of  their  own  amuse- 
ment, for  there  is  a  fancy-ball  in  prospect,  at  which  one  gentleman 
purposes  appearing  as  Punch,  another  as  a  gigantic  black  bottle 
marked  "Bass's  Pale  Ale,"  while  two  young  ladies  who  have  not 
yet  "come  out,"  but  are  determined  to  see  the  fun,  have  solved  the 
problem  of  how  to  "stay  in"  without  missing  the  ball,  by  ordering 
two  tall  seven-storied  pagodas,  made  of  bamboo  and  pasteboard, 
within  which  they  will  remain  securely  hidden,  peeping  out 
through  cunningly  contrived  windows.  Surely  a  quainter  device 
than  that  of  a  brace  of  locomotive  pagodas  never  was  invented  ! 


56  A    VERY    STKANUK    CITY 


■  In  a.  17//'. 


The  masked  fancy-ball  came  off  last  night,  and  was  very  amus- 
ing. There,  were  nearly  fifty  people — some  very  pretty  characters 
and  some  very  funny  ones.  Most  of  the  gentlemen  wore  Chinese 
masks  for  the  first  half-hour.  The  young  ladies  in  the  pagodas 
were  highly  successful,  but  ere  long  found  their  tall  prisons  so 
very  hot  that  they  were  allowed  to  transgress  all  rules,  and  "  came 
out  "  before  their  time. 

Each  day  slips  by  full  of  many  interests,  even  when  we  go  no 
farther  than  the  limits  of  this  green  isle,  but  sit  watching  the  in- 
finitely varied  boats  or  junks  gliding  past  with  their  great  brown 
or  yellow  sails;  or  else,  at  sunset,  doing  "joss-pigeon,"  throwing 
burning  gilt  paper  into  the  river,  as  an  offering  to  the  Water 
Dragon,  firing  noisy  crackers  to  keep  off  evil  spirits,  or  lighting 
sweet  incense-sticks  and  candles  to  place  on  the  tiny  boat  altar. 

I  often  linger  on  the  embankment  to  watch  these,  till  I  am  con- 
scious of  a  cold  mist  rising,  and  am  glad  to  retreat  to  a  cheery  fire- 
side— not  without  a  thought  of  pity  for  the  children  who  can 
never  know  the  meaning  of  that  word. 

Jan.  \Sth. 

The  miasma,  which  on  these  really  chill  nights  rises  from  the 
rivers  and  canals,  is  by  no  means  the  sole  danger  which  these  little 
ones  survive  !  One  of  the  most  apparent  is  the  amazing  amount  of 
diluted  filth  which  they  swallow !  I  observe  here  the  same  peculi- 
arity which  struck  me  so  forcibly  at  Benares — namely,  the  large 
amount  of  washing  of  clothes  which  is  done,  but  the  utter  indiffer- 
ence to  the  condition  of  the  water  used  for  the  purpose. 

All  these  thousands  of  boats  which  lie  moored  in  compact 
phalanx  along  the  shores  of  the  river  (at  the  mouths  of  creeks 
which  are  little  better  than  sewers),  get  their  water-supply  by  just 
dipping  their  bucket  overboard,  although  they  could  easily  obtain 
comparatively  pure  water  in  mid-stream  !  And  this  terribly  un- 
clean water  is  used  unfiltered  for  all  cooking  purposes ! 

Considering  our  own  terrible  experiences  of  how  luxurious  homes 
in  Britain  have  been  left  desolate  by  a  draught  of  sparkling  water 
into  which,  all  unheeded,  some  taint  of  drainage  had  filtered,  or 
even  from  the  use  of  milk-vessels  washed  in  such  water,  it  does 
seem  amazing  that  all  this  goes  on  with  impunity,  and  that  the 
whole  population  does  not  die  wholesale  in  consequence — a  won- 
derful proof  of  the  safeguard  of  only  drinking  boiled  water,  as  is 
the  Chinese  invariable  custom,  in  the  form  of  tea. 


THE    RIVER    POPULATION.  "7 

We  have  plenty  of  opportunities  for  watching  these  people,  as 
the  boats  lie  moored  around  us  in  every  direction,  so  that  even 
without  our  leaving  the  shore  they  are  always  before  our  eyes,  and 
whenever  we  go  an  expedition  on  the  river,  we  necessarily  pass 
through  crowds  of  boats,  innumerable  and  indescribable,  and  some 
are  very  ornamental.  Of  their  number  some  idea  may  be  formed 
from  the  fact  that  the  boating  population  of  Canton  alone  is  estim- 
ated at  three  hundred  thousand  persons,  who  possess  no  other 
home — whose  strange  life  from  their  cradle  to  the  grave  is  spent 
entirely  on  the  rivers,  with  the  dipping  of  the  oars,  or  the  trem- 
ulous quiver  of  the  long  steering-scull,  as  the  ceaseless  accompani- 
ment of  all  life's  interests.  This  is  especially  true  of  the  women, 
who  work  the  boats,  for  many  of  the  men  work  on  land  all  day, 
only  returning  at  night  to  the  tiny  but  exquisitely  clean  floating 
home  which,  though  barely  twenty  feet  in  length,  probably  shelters 
three  generations ! 

These  are  the  sampans,  or  slipper-shaped  boats  with  movable 
roofs  of  rain-proof  bamboo  basket-work. 

Somewhat  different  from  these  are  the  boat-homes  of  sailors 
who  are  absent  for  months  on  long  voyages  on  board  of  ocean- 
going junks,  who  return  year  after  year,  to  find  the  home  in  which 
they  were  probably  born,  moored  in  the  self-same  spot  in  one  of 
the  multitudinous  water-streets,  for  every  boat  has  its  own  ap- 
pointed anchorage;  and  the  municipal  regulations  affecting  the 
water- population  are  most  minute,  and  strictly  carried  out.  as  in- 
deed must  be  necessary  where  so  enormous  a  community  is  con- 
cerned. 

For  this  purpose  a  special  river-magistrate  has  command  of  a 
strong  body  of  water-police,  who  live  in  police-boats,  and  are  bound 
to  row  about  all  night,  blowing  on  shrill  conch-shells,  which  are 
most  effectual  for  awakening  peaceful  sleepers,  and  for  giving  notice 
of  their  approach  to  all  evil-doers,  more  especially  to  those  very 
daring  river  pirates  from  whose  depredations  they  are  bound  to 
protect  the  public. 

These  water-constables,  however,  enjoy  a  very  evil  reputation, 
and  arc  said  frequently  to  be  in  league  with  malefactors,  accepting 
bribes  from  pirates  to  keep  well  out  of  the  way  when  any  unusual 
deed  of  darkness  is  in  prospect,  such  as  capturing  a  wealthy 
citizen  while  crossing  the  river  at  night,  and  carrying  him  olf 
as  a  prisoner  until  a  large  ransom  can  be  extracted  from  his  re- 
lations, which  is  one  of  the  cheerful  possibilities  of  lite  in  these 
parts  ! 


58  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

Still  more  frequently,  however,  the  guardians  of  the  peace  are 
said  to  levy  blackmail  on  their  own  account,  helping  themselves 
gratis  from  the  market-boats,  whose  proprietors  dare  not  complain, 
lest  they  should  be  falsely  accused  of  some  offence  which  would 
lead  to  their  prosecution  and  imprisonment,  quite  as  certainly  as  if 
they  were  really  guilty. 

As  regards  cargo  or  passenger  boats,  fines,  severe  flogging,  or  im- 
prisonment, or  even  a  combination  of  all  three,  await  the  captain 
and  crew  of  any  boat  which  neglects  to  report  its  movements  to 
the  authorities,  or  which  has  the  misfortune  to  lose  any  of  its 
passengers.  Should  such  an  one  fall  overboard  and  be  drowned, 
the  boat  or  junk  is  compelled  to  lie-to  or  anchor  till  the  corpse  has 
been  recovered.  Grievous,  indeed,  is  the  lot  of  all  concerned 
should  a  junk  or  boat  capsize  in  a  squall,  more  especially  if  it  can 
be  proved  that  her  masts  and  sails  exceeded  the  regulation  size. 
If,  under  such  circumstances,  only  one  or  even  two  passengers 
are  drowned,  the  captain  alone  suffers ;  but  should  three  perish, 
the  vessel  is  confiscated,  and  not  only  the  captain  but  every 
man  of  the  crew  is  condemned  to  wear  the  ponderous  wooden 
collar  (the  cangue)  for  thirty  days,  and  then  to  endure  a  judicial 
flogging ! 

Our  barbaric  notion  that  the  captain  must  be  absolute  autocrat 
of  his  vessel  is  by  no  means  allowed  in  China,  where  the  law  pro- 
vides that  in  the  event  of  an  approaching  storm,  the  passengers 
may  require  the  captain  to  strike  sail  and  wait  till  the  danger  is 
past.  Should  he  refuse  to  comply  with  the  requirements  of  the 
land-lubbers,  he  is  liable  to  receive  forty  blows  of  a  bamboo  !  but 
terrible  as  are  Chinese  floggings,  they  are  mere  trifles  compared 
with  the  penalty  of  enduring  for  three  months  the  tortures  of  a 
Chinese  prison,  as  a  sequence  to  shipwreck  ! 

I  notice  one  class  of  boat  which  seems  to  ply  a  very  busy  trade, 
namely,  that  of  the  river-barbers,  Avho  devote  themselves  exclu- 
sively to  shaving  and  head-scraping  their  floating  customers.  Each 
barber  has  a  tiny  boat  in  which  he  paddles  himself  about  in  and 
out  among  the  crowd  of  sampans,  attracting  attention  by  ringing 
a  little  bell. 

The  river-doctor  likewise  gives  warning  of  his  whereabouts  by 
means  of  a  bell,  so  that  as  he  goes  on  his  way  he  can  be  called  to 
any  one  needing  his  services. 

There  is  not  a  phase  of  life  on  land  which  has  not  its  counter- 
part on  the  river,  and  every  variety  of  boat  has  its  distinctive  name. 
To  begin  with,  there  are  whole  fleets  of  market  boats,  each  of  which 


RIVER    TRADESMEN.  59 

supplies  the  boating  population  with  some  one  article.  There  are  oil 
boats  and  firewood  boats,  rice  boats  and  sugar-cane  boats,  boats  for 
vegetables  and  boats  for  the  sale  of  flowering  -plants  ;  there  arc 
fruit  boats,  bean-curd  boats,  confectioners'  boats,  shrimp  boats,  and 
fish  boats ;  boats  for  sundry  meats,  and  for  pork  in  particular ; 
boats  for  the  sale  of  crockery,  of  salt,  or  of  clothing.  Some  boats 
advertise  their  cargoes  by  a  realistic  sign  hung  from  the  mast-head 
— such  as  an  earthenware  jar,  an  oil-cask,  a  bundle  of  sugar-cane  or 
of  firewood,  that  their  customers  may  espy  them  from  afar. 

There  are  floating  kitchens,  provided  Avith  an  extensive  brick- 
work cooking-range,  where  most  elaborate  dinners  are  cooked  ; 
these  are  served  on  board  of  floating  dining-halls  euphoniously 
called  "  flower  boats,"  which  are  most  luxuriously  fitted  up  and 
highly  ornamental,  resplendent  with  a  wealth  of  beautiful  wood- 
carving,  often  brightly  coloured  and  heavily  gilt,  and  always  brill- 
iantly illuminated.  These  are  hired  by  wealthy  citizens  who  wish 
to  give  their  friends  dinner-parties,  as  it  is  not  customary  to  do  so 
at  their  own  homes  except  on  great  family  festivals;  such  dinner- 
parties are  enlivened  by  the  presence  of  richly  attired  singing- 
women.  Poorer  people  find  one  end  of  the  floating  kitchen  fitted 
up  as  a  cheap  restaurant  or  tea-house. 

There  are  also  floating  hotels,  which  are  chiefly  for  the  accom- 
modation of  persons  arriving  after  the  gates  of  the  city  are  closed, 
or  who  merely  wish  to  trans-ship  from  one  vessel  to  another.  Simi- 
lar house-boats  are  hired  by  wealthy  Chinamen  as  cool  summer- 
quarters,  or  for  going  expeditions.  For  pleasure  excursions  there 
are  Hong  boats  answering  to  Venetian  gondolas,  with  large  com- 
fortable saloons  adorned  with  much  carving  and  gilding,  but  so 
arranged  as  to  be  able  to  hoist  a  mast  and  sail. 

In  striking  contrast  with  these  gay  boats  are  the  dull  unattrac- 
tive ones  which  we  may  term  floating  biers,  as  they  are  used  only 
for  conveying  the  dead  to  their  place  of  rest.  For  though  the 
dwellers  on  the  land  allow  the  boat  people  no  homes  ashore  during 
their  lifetime,  they  dare  not  refuse  the  dead  a  resting-place  in  the 
bosom  of  the  earth. 

Far  sadder  than  these  biers,  for  those  whose  weary  life-struggle 
is  ended,  are  the  leper  boats,  tenanted  by  such  of  the  boat-folk  as 
are  afflicted  with  leprosy,  that  most  terrible  of  diseases,  and  wh> 
are  therefore  outcasts,  forced  to  live  apart  from  their  fellows,  and 
only  allowed  to  solicit  alms  by  stretching  out  a  long  bamboo  pole, 
from  the  end  of  which  is  suspended  a  small  bag  (just  as  was  done 
in  medieval  days  by  the  lepers  in  Holland,  as  described  in  Evelyn  s 


GO  A    VERY    STKANGE    CITY. 

Diary,  a.i>.  1 041,  when  he  noted  "divers  leprous  poor  creatines 
dwelling  in  solitary  huts  on  the  Drink  of  the  water,"  who  asked 
alms  of  passengers  on  the  canals  hy  casting  out  a  floating  hox  to 
receive  their  gifts).  Of  coarse  these  boats  are  deemed  as  wholly 
unclean  as  their  inmates.  Hence,  when  in  1847  six  young  English 
merchants  had  been  brutally  murdered  at  a  village  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Canton,  the  crowning  insult  to  the  hated  foreigners 
was  to  return  the  mangled  corpses  to  Canton  in  a  common  leper 
boat. 

Then  there  are  ecclesiastical  boats, — for  though  each  dwelling- 
boat  has  its  domestic  altar,  the  public  service  of  the  gods  is  by  no 
means  omitted.  So  a  large  number  of  Taouist  priests  have  station- 
ary boat-houses  for  themselves  and  their  families,  the  chief  saloon 
being  dedicated  to  sundry  Taouist  idols.  These  priests  are  liable 
at  any  moment  to  be  summoned  on  board  other  boats  to  perform 
religious  ceremonies  on  behalf  of  the  sick,  especially  such  as  are 
supposed  to  be  possessed  of  evil  spirits.  They  also  officiate  in 
floating  temples,  in  which  elaborate  services  are  performed  on  be- 
half of  the  souls  of  drowned  persons,  or  of  such  beggar-spirits  as 
have  been  neglected  by  their  descendants. 

During  these  "  masses  for  the  dead  "  the  floating  shrine  is  decor- 
ated with  many  white  and  blue  banners,  flags,  and  draperies,  to 
indicate  mourning.  At  other  times  the  flags  and  decorations  are 
of  the  gayest,  and  a  band  of  musicians  with  shrill  pipes  and  drums 
produce  deafening  sounds,  all  of  which  tell  that  the  temple  has 
been  engaged  by  two  families  of  the  boat  community  for  the  sol- 
emnisation of  a  wedding, — for  in  their  marriage,  as  in  all  else,  these 
people  live  wholly  apart  from  those  who  dwell  on  land,  and 
although  the  women  are  a  much  nicer,  healthier-looking  lot  than 
those  we  see  ashore,  such  a  thing  as  intermarriage  is  unknown,  the 
boat  population  being  greatly  despised. 

But  of  all  the  multitudinous  boats,  perhaps  the  strangest  are  the 
duck  and  geese  boats,  some  of  which  shelter  as  many  as  two  thou- 
sand birds,  which  are  purchased  wholesale  at  the  great  duck  and 
geese  farms,  and  reared  for  the  market.  After  seeing  these  boats, 
I  no  longer  wondered  at  the  multitude  of  these  birds  in  the  pro- 
vision markets,  where  they  form  one  of  the  staple  foods  of  the 
people. 

Beyond  the  first  expense  of  buying  the  half-grown  birds,  the 
owner  of  the  boat  incurs  none  in  rearing  them,  as  he  simply  turns 
them  out  twice  a-day  to  forage  for  themselves  along  the  mud-shores 
and  the  neighbouring  fields,  where  they  find  abundance  of  dainty 


ARTIFICIAL    DUCK-HATCHING.  Gl 

little  laud-crabs,  frogs,  and  worms,  snails,  slugs,  and  maggots. 
They  are  allowed  a  couple  of  hours  for  feeding,  and  are  then  called 
back,  when  they  obey  with  an  alacrity  which  is  truly  surprising, 
the  pursuit  of  even  the  most  tempting  frog  being  abandoned  in 
their  hurry  to  waddle  on  board.  Xever  was  there  so  obedient  a 
school,  and  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  believe  that  this  extraordinai v 
punctuality  is  really  attained  by  the  fear  of  the  sharp  stroke  of  a 
bamboo,  which  is  invariably  administered  to  the  last  bird. 

This  afternoon  we  went  a  most  interesting  expedition  up  the 
river,  and  then  turned  aside  into  one  of  the  many  creeks  to  the 
village  of  Faa-tee,  ami  thence  onward  in  search  of  the  great  duck- 
hatching  establishment,  where  multitudinous  eggs  are  artificially 
hatched.  The  first  we  came  to  was  closed,  but  the  boatmen  told 
us  of  another  farther  on,  so  we  landed  and  walked  along  narrow 
ridges  between  large  flooded  fields  in  which  lotus  and  water-chest- 
nuts are  grown  for  the  sake  of  their  edible  roots.  Both  are  nice 
when  cooked,  but  the  collecting  of  these,  in  this  deep  mud,  must 
be  truly  detestable  for  the  poor  women  engaged  in  it. 

Passing  by  amazing  heaps  of  old  egg-shells  (for  which  even  the 
Chinese  seem  to  have  as  yet  found  no  use),  we  reached  the  hatch- 
ing-house, in  which  many  thousands  of  eggs  are  being  gradually 
warmed  in  great  baskets  filled  up  with  heated  chaff  and  placed  on 
shelves  of  very  open  basket-work  which  are  arranged  in  tiers  all 
round  the  Avails,  while  on  the  ground  are  placed  earthenware  stoves 
full  of  1  mining  charcoal.  Here  the  eggs  are  kept  for  a  whole  day 
and  night,  the  position  of  the  baskets  with  reference  to  the  stoves 
being  continually  changed  by  attendants  who  reserve  their  apparel 
for  use  in  a  cooler  atmosphere. 

After  this  preliminary  heating,  the  eggs  are  removed  to  other 
baskets  in  another  heated  room,  to  which  they  are  dexterously 
carried  in  cloths,  each  containing  about  fifty  eggs — no  one  but  a 
neat-handed  Chinaman  could  carry  such  a  burden  without  a  break- 
age !  Here  the  eggs  remain  for  about  a  fortnight,  each  egg  being 
frequently  moved  from  place  to  place,  to  equalise  their  share  of 
heating.  After  this  they  are  taken  to  a  third  room,  where  they 
are  spread  over  wide  shelves,  and  covered  with  sheets  of  thick 
warm  cotton.  At  the  end  of  another  fortnight,  hundreds  of  little 
ducklings  simultaneously  break  their  shells,  and  by  evening  perhaps 
a  couple  of  thousand  fluffy  little  beauties  are  launched  into  life, 
and  are  forthwith  fed  with  rice-water. 

Duck-farmers  (who  know  precisely  when  each  great  hatching  is 
due)  are  in  attendance  to  buy  so  many  hundred   of  these  pretty 


02  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

infants,  whom  they  at  once  carry  off  to  their  respective  farms, 
where  there  are  already  an  immense  number  of  ducks  and  geese  of 
different  ages,  all  in  separate  lots.  The  geese,  by  the  way,  are  nol 
hatched  artificially,  owing  to  the  thickness  of  their  shells,  conse- 
quently they  are  not  so  very  numerous  as  ducks :  still  flocks  num- 
bering six  or  eight  hundred  are  reared,  and  are  provided  with 
wattle  shelves  on  which  to  roost,  as  damp  ground  is  considered 
injurious  to  the  young  birds.  A  very  large  goose-market  is  held 
every  morning  in  Canton,  which  is  supplied  by  geese-boats,  each  of 
which  brings  two  or  three  hundred  birds. 

As  to  the  baby  ducks,  they  are  fed  on  boiled  rice,  and  after  a 
while  are  promoted  to  bran,  maggots,  and  other  delicacies,  till  the 
day  comes  when  the  owners  of  the  duck-boats  come  to  purchase  the 
half-grown  birds,  and  commence  the  process  of  letting  them  fatten 
themselves  as  aforesaid.  This  continues  till  they  are  ready  for  the 
market,  and  are  either  sold  for  immediate  consumption,  or  bought 
wholesale  by  the  provision  dealers,  who  split,  salt,  and  then  dry 
them  in  the  sun.  The  heart,  gizzard,  and  entrails  are  also  dried  and 
sold  separately,  and  the  bills,  tongues,  and  feet  are  pickled  in  brine. 

I  do  not  know  whether  there  is  always  a  relay  of  ducklings  at 
hatching-point,  or  whether  we  were  especially  fortunate  in  the 
moment  of  our  visit,  but  we  certainly  witnessed  a  large  increase  of 
this  odd  family.  It  was  so  very  amusing  to  watch  scores  of  little 
beaks  breaking  their  own  shells  and  struggling  out,  only  to  be  un- 
ceremoniously deposited  in  a  basket  of  new-born  infants,  that  we 
were  tempted  to  linger  long  in  this  strange  nursery.  At  last,  how- 
ever, we  summoned  resolution  to  leave  the  fluffy  little  darlings, 
and  retraced  our  way  to  Faa-tee,  where  Ave  again  landed  in  order 
to  see  some  of  the  gardens  for  which  it  is  so  justly  celebrated. 
There  are  private  gardens  of  wealthy  citizens,  and  market-gardens, 
all  in  the  quaint  style  peculiar  to  this  country.  "We  went  to  see 
specimens  of  each,  with  lovely  camellias,  roses,  chrysanthemums, 
daphnes,  and  narcissus;  all  these  plants  are  in  ornamental  pots, 
arranged  in  rows  along  the  paths,  but  not  planted  out  as  in  our 
gardens.  The  narcissus,  which, "par  excellence,  are  called  "the  New- 
Year  Flowers,"  are  grown  in  saucers  filled  with  gravel  and  water. 
The  great  pride  of  a  Chinese  gardener  is  to  grow  many  spikes  from 
one  bulb,  and  the  more  flowers  that  bloom  thereon,  the  greater  is 
his  prospect  of  success  in  the  coming  year.  Even  branches  of 
fruit-trees  are  being  cut  for  the  market,  to  supply  the  much-prized 
blossoms  for  the  fast-approaching  New  Year. 

But  the  predominant  feature  of  these  gardens  lies  in  the  gro- 


FANCIFUL    GARDENING.  63 

tesqueness  of  the  figures  produced  by  training  certain  shrubs  over 
a  framework  of  wire,  so  as  exactly  to  take  its  form  ;  and  still  more 
wonderful  is  the  revelation  of  amazing  patience  which  must  have 
been  expended  in  order  to  train  each  tiny  twig,  each  separate  leaf, 
into  its  proper  place,  so  as  to  form  a  perfectly  even  surface,  repre- 
senting garments,  or  whatever  else  is  to  be  indicated. 

Evergreen  dragons,  frisky  fishes,  dolphins  with  huge  eyes  of 
china,  and  human  figures  with  china  or  wooden  hands,  heads,  and 
feet,  are  among  the  favourite  forms  represented.  We  also  saw  a 
very  fine  vegetable  stag,  with  Avell-developed  antlers ;  also  a  long 
rattan  trained  into  the  likeness  of  a  serpent.  Different  shrubs 
assume  the  forms  of  junks,  bridges,  and  houses,  flower-baskets,  fans, 
or  birds,  and  tall  evergreen  pagodas  are  adorned  with  little  china 
bells  hanging  round  each  storey. 

We  also  saw  a  very  large  number  of  grotescpuely  distorted  and 
dwarfed  shrubs  and  trees,  the  Chinese  being  wellnigh  as  expert  as 
the  Japanese  in  this  strange  sort  of  gardening.  Though  no  one 
really  knows  what  is  the  true  secret,  I  am  told  that  a  very  effectual 
method  of  dwarfing  trees  is  to  give  the  plant  no  rest,  continually 
to  disturb  its  roots  and  expose  them  to  the  air,  and  by  every 
means  cramp  its  vitality  and  luxuriant  growth.  Certainly  the 
result  produced  is  extraordinary.  For  these  tiny  miniatures  have 
every  characteristic  of  the  full-grown — indeed,  of  the  aged  tree,  with 
gnarled  and  twisted  roots  and  branches,  although  the  total  height 
is  often  only  a  few  inches,  and  the  quaint  little  dwarf  stands  in  a 
beautiful  china  vase.  Some  of  the  most  successful  dwarfs  are  pear- 
trees  and  fir-trees.  The  older  they  are,  the  more  perfect  is  their 
grotesqueness,  so  that  such  plants  as  these  are  bequeathed  from 
generation  to  generation. 

After  a  long  walk  through  a  New-Year's  fair  for  very  poor 
people,  where  the  attractions  consisted  chiefly  of  gilt-paper  (towers, 
and  scrolls  with  lucky  mottoes  in  Chinese  characters,  we  returned 
to  the  boat  and  rowed  across  the  river  to  the  Monastery  of  the 
Ocean  Banner,  or,  as  it  is  commonly  called  by  foreigners,  the 
Honam  Temple,  which  is  by  far  the  finest  thing  1  have  as  yet 
seen  in  China. 

The  great,  gateway  is  guarded  by  indescribably  hideous  demi- 
gods, but  the  temple  itself  is  really  imposing.  But  in  saying  this, 
I  must  remind  you,  once  for  all,  that  neither  in  China  nor  Japan 
need  you  look  for  beauty  of  architecture  in  the  sense  we  generally 
imply.  These  temples  are  one  and  all  of  the  same  type,  which  is 
simply  that  of  the  one-storied  Indian  bungalow,  with  verandah 


04  A   VERY   STRANGE    CITY. 

and  heavy  roof.  Nevertheless,  sonic  of  the  Larger  temples  have  a 
certain  solemnity  and  a  wealth  of  rich  colour.  In  this  Honam 
Temple  the  interest  centres  in  three  colossal  figures  in  a  sitting 
posture,  carved  in  wood  and  gilded.  These  represent  the  three 
Euddhas  of  the  Past,  the  Present,  and  the  Future.  Before  each 
hangs  an  ever-burning  lamp.  Before  each  also  stands  a  gilded  altar, 
on  which  are  very  large  altar  vases  and  incense-burners  of  zinc. 
On  either  side  of  the  temple  arc  ranged  small  gilded  images,  to 
represent  the  sixteen  most  holy  disciples  of  Buddha,  and  before 
each  burns  an  incense  brazier.  All  the  minor  adjuncts  of  lanterns, 
draperies,  and  temple  furnishings  are  handsome  and  harmonious. 

The  afternoon  service  had  just  commenced,  and  though  we  Avere 
told  that  it  was  much  less  fully  attended  than  that  of  early  morn- 
ing, it  was  unquestionably  an  impressive  scene.  Only  about  sixty 
monks  and  priests  were  present,  instead  of  the  full  complement  of 
two  hundred.  Of  these  some  were  robed  in  yellow,  others  wore 
grey  skirts  and  yellow  hoods.  But  what  specially  struck  me  was, 
that  instead  of  leaving  one  shoulder  bare,  and  the  yellow  robe 
covering  the  other,  as  in  Ceylon,  and  as  in  the  Cingalese  images  of 
Buddha,  these  men  cover  both  shoulders,  having  a  grey  under- 
garment beneath  the  sacerdotal  yellow. 

The  abbot  wore  a  purple  robe  with  a  mantle  of  crimson  silk, 
purposely  made  of  patched  pieces  to  suggest  the  vow  of  poverty. 
He  and  some  of  the  priests  carried  rosaries  of  polished  black 
beads. 

Some  of  the  chanting  was  rather  fine,  but  the  orchestral  accom- 
paniment was  anything  but  solemn,  shrill  pipes,  flutes,  and  wooden 
drums  combining  to  produce  a  hideous  noise,  which  to  my  unedu- 
cated ears  was  suggestive  only  of  pandemonium — anything  but 
devotional.  However,  one  can  never  tell  what  effect  anything  pro- 
duces on  other  folk,  and  it  does  not  do  to  judge  hastily.  Bemern- 
ber  that  enlightened  Persian  who  found  his  way  to  London,  and 
wandered  into  Westminster  Abbey,  and  then  graphically  related 
to  his  countrymen  the  overpowering  terror  which  had  overwhelmed 
him  when,  as  he  approached  the  huge  idol  (whose  form  he  was 
unable  to  describe),  it  had  opened  its  mouth  and  roared  so  loud 
that,  overcome  with  fear,  he  had  fled  from  the  great  temple  !  And 
yet  we  have  an  impression  that  grand  organ  music  is  solemnising  ! 

Here,  the  ritual,  which  is  all  in  the  ancient  sacred  Pali  language, 
of  which  most  of  the  monks  are  wholly  ignorant,  seemed  chiefly  to 
consist  of  rapid  recitation  by  all  the  brethren  in  unison,  accom- 
panied  by   many  genuflexions   and   prostrations.     Then   they  all 


CREMATION    OF    BUDDHIST    PRIESTS.  65 

made  three  processional  turns,  sunwise,  round  the  inner  shrine, 
and  then  they  turned  to  the  north  and  prostrated  themselves. 

The  service  was  lengthy,  and  we  could  not  stay  till  the  end, 
having  hut  a  limited  time  to  spare,  and  I  was  anxious  to  see  the 
cremation-ground,  where  those  who  embrace  the  religious  life  are 
cremated,  following  the  example  of  their  leader.  The  crematory 
is  a  low  tower  of  brick  ;  within  are  four  raised  stones  on  which  to 
rest  the  bamboo  chair  wherein  (with  the  monastic  cowl  drawn 
over  his  head,  and  hands  placed  palm  to  palm  before  his  breast,  as 
if  in  prayer)  sits  the  dead  monk,  who,  within  twelve  hours  of  his 
death,  must  be  carried  hither  by  lay  brothers.  He  is  followed  to 
the  funeral  pyre  by  all  the  brethren,  walking  two  and  two,  clothed 
in  sackcloth,  and  having  a  white  cloth  bound  round  the  head  in 
token  of  woe.  They  have  previously  held  solemn  service  in  the 
temple  for  the  repose  of  the  dead,  and  as  the  procession  slowly 
advances  they  chant  funeral  hymns. 

Through  the  narrow  door  of  the  crematory  the  chair  is  carried 
— fagots  are  placed  beneath  and  all  around  it,  and  the  chief 
priest  kindles  the  flame,  all  the  mourners  falling  prostrate,  with 
their  faces  to  the  ground,  while  commending  tie-  mortal  body  to 
the  ethereal  fire.1  While  the  body  is  being  cremated,  small  pieces 
of  fragrant  sandal-wood  are  from  time  to  time  thrown  into  the 
flames.  Considering  the  intense  anxiety  of  the  whole  Chinese 
nation  to  secure  good  burial  for  their  unmanned  bodies,  it  is  very 
remarkable  to  find  their  religious  teachers  adopting  a  custom  so 
essentially  Aryan. 

When  the  tire  has  done  its  work,  and  only  a  few  charred  bones 
and  ashes  remain,  these  are  collected  in  a  stone  jar  and  placed 
beside  similar  jars  in  a  sepulchral  storediouse,  where  they  remain 
till  a  certain  day  of  the  year  (the  ninth  day  of  the  ninth  month), 
when  each  jar  is  emptied  into  a  bag  of  red  cloth.  These  are  sewn 
up,  and  are  then  thrown  through  a  small  sort  of  window  into 
a  great  solid  granite  mausoleum.  There  are  two  of  these  buildings 
in  the  temple  grounds;  one  of  them,  however,  may  no  longer  be 
used,  not  for  lack  of  room,  but  because  it  already  contains  4948 
sacks  of  ashes,  and  Buddhist  law  forbids  the  storing  of  a  larger 
number  in  one  place. 

The  Ossuary  now  in  use  is  divided  into  two  compartments,  one 
of  which  is  assigned  to  the  ashes  of  Buddhist  nuns. 

1  See  the  ancient  A ryan  Cremation  hymn,  which  doubtless  was  chanted  al  the 
pyre  of  Buddha,  bhe  Aryan  Prince.  'In  the  Bimalayas  and  on  the  [ndian 
Plains,'  p.  134.     By  C.  F.  Gordon  Cumming.     Chatto  &  Windus. 

E 


GG  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

It  appears  that  there  are  exceptional  instances  when  cremation 
is  dispensed  with,  and  ordinary  hurial  in  ponderous  coffins  is 
lawful  even  for  a  priest.  Such  cases,  though  rare,  have  occurred 
in  comparatively  recent  years,  and  some  very  old  horse-shoe  tombs 
in  the  temple  grounds  prove  that  such  burials  were  permitted  long 
ago.  At  present,  however,  they  are  being  "  renewed  "  in  a  most 
literal  sense,  as  the  ancient  inscriptions  are  being  copied  on  to 
brand-new  stones  ! 

Leaving  the  cremation  ground,  we  made  our  way  to  the  hall 
where,  in  a  handsome  dagoba  of  white  marble,  is  stored  the  most 
precious  possession  of  the  monastery — the  relic  of  Buddha ! 

We  turned  aside,  however,  to  take  a  warning  on  the  hideous 
results  of  indolence  and  gluttony,  as  displayed  in  the  forms  of 
about  a  dozen  monstrously  fat  sacred  pigs,  luxuriating  in  a  most 
comfortable  stye,  abundance  of  good  food,  and  happy  security  from 
all  danger  of  having  their  natural  lives  curtailed. 

Then  we  looked  into  the  great  refectory,  where  eight  long  narrow 
tables  extend  from  end  to  end,  four  on  each  side,  with  benches  on 
one  side  only,  so  placed  that  all  the  brethren  shall  face  the  centre 
of  the  hall,  at  one  end  of  which  sits  the  abbot,  at  the  other  there 
is  an  altar  to  some  food-god.  All  round  the  walls  hang  boards,  on 
which  are  inscribed  wise  maxims  from  the  classics,  whereon  the 
brethren  may  ponder  while  silently  consuming  their  simple  meal 
of  vegetables.  It  struck  us  that  mind  must  indeed  have  triumphed 
over  matter,  when  hungry  Chinamen  could  pamper  pigs  and  fowls 
without  occasionally  dedicating  one  to  the  service  of  the  kitchen 
god  (whose  shrine,  by  the  way,  occupies  a  conspicuous  place  in  the 
monastic  kitchen).  In  point  of  fact,  it  is  said  that  fat  pork  is 
a  delicacy  which,  though  positively  prohibited,  is  by  no  means  un- 
known even  at  the  table  of  the  abbot! 

Jan.  -20th. 

To-day  we  have  had  a  most  lovely  expedition  to  the  "White 
Cloud  Mountains.  After  an  early  breakfast,  we  started  luxuriously 
in  chairs,  and,  skirting  the  western  suburbs,  we  entered  the  city  by 
the  west  gate,  and  struck  right  across  the  city  to  the  north-east 
gate — a  great  double  gateway,  with  a  large  red  guard-house,  be- 
yond which,  just  outside  the  city  wall,  lies  the  burial-ground  where 
were  laid  such  of  our  British  soldiers  as  died  during  the  four  years' 
occupation  of  Canton  by  the  Allies.  The  ground  is  planted  with 
feathery  bamboos,  which  are  visible  from  afar. 

The  country  beyond   is  one  vast   expanse   of    barren   hills,  all 


THE    CITY    OF    THE    DEAD.  67 

honeycombed  with  horse-shoe-shaped  tombs,  and  with  the  myriad 
nameless  graves  of  the  poor  of  countless  generations.  But  ere 
these  are  laid  to  rest  in  the  grave,  they  have  to  wait  awhile  at  an 
intermediate  resting-place  known  as  "The  City  of  the  Dead,"  near 
to  which  we  passed  this  morning, — a  very  extraordinary  place  it  is. 
I  came  to  see  it  at  leisure  one  day  last  week. 

We  passed  by  a  small  lake  shaded  by  dark  trees,  wherein  a 
multitude  of  white  storks  roost  and  build.  They  are  deemed  sacred 
birds,  and  are  in  a  manner  guardians  of  the  Silent  City,  which  lies 
within  a  walled  enclosure.  At  the  entrance  is  a  small  temple,  with 
gilded  images,  and  here  lives  a  Buddhist  priest  who  has  charge  of 
the  place,  and  lives  alone  with  this  ghostly  community.  The  city 
is  laid  out  like  a  miniature  city  of  the  living,  in  streets  of  small 
houses  built  of  stone.  They  are  of  varying  sizes,  some  only  just 
large  enough  to  contain  one  ponderous  coffin,  with  the  invariable 
altar  and  some  other  adjuncts.  Others  contain  the  unburied  dead 
of  a  whole  clan,  numbering  perhaps  eight  or  ten  persons,  for  whom 
tlir  lucky  day  of  burial  has  not  yet  been  announced  by  the  wily 
geomancers,  who  prolong  its  arrival  indefinitely  so  long  as  there  is 
a  chance  of  extracting  coin  from  the  survivors. 

There  are  altogether  nearly  two  hundred  houses  in  this  ghostly 
city,  without  counting  what  I  may  describe  as  suburbs  of  wretched 
outhouses,  where  poor  neglected  coffins  are  placed.  These  tell  of 
relatives  who,  weary  of  paying  house-rent  for  years  at  the  bidding 
of  the  priests,  have  at  last  stopped  payment,  so  the  coffins  have 
been  removed  to  these  sheds,  here  to  await  permission  from  the 
authorities  for  burial  at  some  spot  on  the  surrounding  hills. 

But  the  well-cared-for  dead  in  the  actual  city  are  surrounded  by 
cardboard  models  of  all  manner  of  comforts,  including  life-sized 
servants,  fans,  pipes,  umbrellas,  and  in  many  cases  a  light  is  kept 
ever  burning  above  the  altar.  Some  also  are  guarded  by  a  living 
white  cock,  whose  crowing  is  supposed  to  be  specially  attractive  to 
the  soul  which  has  to  remain  with  the  body.1 

I  am  told  that  a  very  curious  ceremony  is  enacted  in  this  Silenl 
City  about  the  end  of  July,  where  all  mourners  who  have  here  laid 
their  dead  within  a  twelvemonth,  and  especially  all  widows  (though 
their  husbands  may  have  been  waiting  here  for  years),  come  to 
spend  a  long  and  weary  day  in  loud  and  bitter  lamentation.  They 
all  come  in  plain  cotton-dresses — no  silks,  no  artificial  flowers,  no 
rouge  may  be  worn  on  this  day.      Each  family  erects  a  temporary 

1  One  of  three  souls,  possessed  by  every  human  being.     I  shall  have  occasion  in 

a  future  chapter  to  speak  more  fully  on  all  matters  relating  to  the  dead. 


68  A    VERY    STRANGE    CITY. 

altar  in  the  temple  for  its  own  use,  and  thereon  lays  the  offerings 
for  its  mvii  dead,  including  letters  to  the  spirits  wrapped  in  crimson 
paper  for  good-luck.  These  are  duly  burnt  with  the  other  offer- 
ings, the  altar-flame  being  the  celestial  post-office.  As  this  par- 
ticular  service  occurs  at  the  very  height  of  burning  midsummer, 
these  poor  women  have  a  very  severe  day's  work  ! 

There  is  one  detail  connected  with  funerals  on  these  barren  hills 
which  is  beyond  measure  revolting — namely,  that  the  miserable 
and  loathsome  lepers  who  are  driven  out  from  the  city  and  live 
apart  in  a  village  (which  is,  in  fact,  an  asylum  for  lepers)  on  the 
edge  of  this  great  wilderness  of  graves,  have  a  prescriptive  right  to 
lie  in  wait  for  funerals  and  extort  large  alms  from  the  mourners. 
The  latter  dare  not  refuse,  even  when  the  demands  are  extortion- 
ate, as  it  is  believed  that  in  that  case  their  relative  would  be 
persecuted  by  lepers  in  the  spirit-world  ! 

These  luckless  Ishmaelites,  knowing  that  every  man's  hand  is 
against  them,  combine  against  the  rest  of  the  world,  simply  to  ex- 
tort the  wherewithal  to  obtain  the  necessaries  of  life.  So  they 
calculate  from  the  general  pomp  of  a  funeral,  how  large  a  sum  they 
may  venture  to  demand.  Should  their  claim  be  deemed  overmuch, 
they  sometimes  leap  into  the  grave,  and  refuse  to  allow  the  coffin 
to  be  lowered  till  at  least  a  promise  of  payment  has  been  made. 
Such  a  promise  is  of  course  inviolable,  but  should  any  hitch  occur, 
the  lepers  unscrupulously  dig  up  the  coffin  and  hold  it  as  a  hostage 
till  payment  is  received.  (This  is  doubly  curious,  inasmuch  as  the 
presence  of  a  corpse  in  a  house  renders  it  creditor-proof !  Thus 
dutiful  children  sometimes  retain  their  father's  coffin  in  their 
dwelling-house  for  many  years.  "While  they  do  so,  they  have  the 
satisfaction  of  knowing  that  even  if  they  are  unable  to  pay  rent, 
their  landlord  dares  not  turn  them  out !) 

In  the  allowance  for  funeral  expenses  here,  a  certain  sum  is 
always  included  as  the  leper's  fee,  but  occasionally,  in  order  to 
avoid  unseemly  disputes  at  the  grave,  the  funeral  party  agree  to 
denude  their  procession  of  all  its  magnificence  as  they  leave  the 
city,  so  that  the  lepers  may  be  deceived  into  supposing  that  the 
deceased  was  a  poor  man. 

The  aforesaid  village-asylum  provides  shelter  for  about  five  hun- 
dred lepers,  and  the  paternal  Government  makes  an  allowance  for 
the  most  helpless.  The  others,  however,  are  expected  to  earn  their 
own  living  by  making  ropes  of  cocoa-nut  fibre.  Such,  of  the 
women  as  are  least  outwardly  afflicted  are  allowed  to  carry  these 
goods  for  sale  to  a  special  rope-market.     Considering  how  much 


LEPERS   AT   GRAVES.  69 

rope  must  be  handled,  both  in  making  and  in  using,  it  certainly  is 
strange  that  these  should  be  the  objects  selected  by  Government  as 
the  special  industry  for  the  victims  of  a  disease  which  is  generally 
acknowledged  to  be  so  fearfully  infectious. 

The  form  of  leprosy  which  is  here  prevalent  is  that  known  as 
"  tubercular  elephantiasis,"  which  is  identical  with  the  disease 
which  in  medieval  ages  filled  the  leper  hospitals  of  Britain  and 
Europe.1  Its  victims  are  anything  but  "  white  as  snow,"  for  the 
skin  becomes  covered  with  1  turning  red  blotches,  and  sometimes 
a  few  hard  blue  spots  indicate  the  mischief  which  is  brewing 
within.  Gradually  the  smooth  skin  becomes  bloated  and  shining, 
the  eyes  are  bloodshot,  the  features  distorted,  the  voice  becomes 
rough  and  rasping.  Then  comes  the  last  awful  stage,  when  the 
fell  disease  eats  away  flesh  and  bones,  and  one  by  one  fingers  and 
toes,  nose,  hands,  and  feet  drop  off,  and  the  miserable  leper  liter- 
ally dies  piecemeal — revolting  to  himself  and  to  all  around  him. 
This  stage  may  be  reached  in  quite  early  youth — and  young  girls 
are  sometimes  seen  who  have  lost  both  hands  and  feet ! 

For  this  awful  disease  no  cure  is  known,-  only  there  is  a  ghastly 
superstition  that  a  draught  of  warm  human  blood  is  beneficial 
Bence  some  terrible  murders  have  been  committed  by  Chinese 
Lepers — a  matter  which  acquires  interest  from  the  fact  that  even  in 
Scotland  a  kindred  superstition  found  place.  "It  ought  to  be 
known,"  said  old  Michael  Scott,  the  Fifeshire  wizard,  "  that  the 
blood  of  dogs  and  of  infants  two  years  old  and  under,  when  dif- 
fused through  a  bath  of  heated  water,  dispels  the  leprosy  without 
a  doubt ! " 

1  We  scarcely  seem  to  realise  that  four  hundred  years  ago  litis  terrible  scourge 
was  so  common  in  our  British  Isles,  that  upwards  of  six  hundred  hospitals  for  lepers 
were  scattered  over  the  land,  from  the  southern  coast  to  the  far  north.  We  have 
records  of  upwards  of  a  hundred  of  these  which  were  well  endowed  and  tended  by 
the  knights  of  St  Lazarus,  an  order  of  knighthood  specially  instituted  for  this  ser- 
vice. But  in  addition  to  the  great  lazar-houses,  it  was  enacted  by  the  Parliament 
held  at  Perth  in  a.d.  1427,  that  every  burgh  in  the  kingdom  of  Scotland  must  haw 
one  of  its  own.  In  France,  a.d.  1226,  Louis  VIII.  promulgated  special  laws  for 
the  regulation  of  two  thousand  leper  hospitals  in  his  kingdom  .' — a  number  which 
quently  increa  ed. 

Like  these  miserable  lepers  of  Canton,  those  of  Britain  were  in  a.i>.  128 
bidden  to  enter  "within  tne  portesofthe  burgh,"  but  it  was  ordered  that  refuges 
should  be  provided  for  them  outside  the  gates.  Nevertheless  (like  those  in  the 
wilderness  of  tombs)  they  continued  to  haunt  the  "  kirk-yairdis,"  there  in  misery 
and  nakedness  to  implore  alms  from  all  who  came  to  worship.  Bence,  in  1528, 
the  sub-Dean  of  Glasgow  ordered  that  twelve  pennies  should  be  distributed  on  the 
anniversary  of  his  death  to  the  lepers  who  should  appear  in  the  churchyard  of  the 
Lady  College  to  say  orisons  for  his  soul. 

-  The  Hawaiians  believe  that  some  cure,  have  been  effected  at  their  Leper  Settle- 
ment on  the  island  of  Molokai.     See  'Fire-Fountains  of  Hawaii.'  by  < '.  F.  Gordon 

dimming.     Blackwood  &  Sons. 


70  A    VERY   STRANGE    CITY. 

(If  only  those  Chinese  lepers  would  be  satisfied  with  the  blood 
of  female  babies,  they  would  have  no  reason  to  complain  of  the 
supply,  for  so  many  poor  little  girls  in  all  ranks  are  here  put  to 
death  by  their  own  mothers,  with  the  full  sanction  of  public 
opinion,  that  occasionally  thoughtful  men  of  the  literary  classes 
endeavour  to  stir  up  some  feeling  on  the  subject.  One  of  their 
efforts  took  the  form  of  pasting  up  illustrated  placards,  with  repre- 
sentations of  a  cruel  mother  calling  her  slave  to  prepare  a  wine- 
bath  in  which  to  drown  the  baby.  Then  comes  a  picture  of  the 
mother  herself  in  the  act  of  drowning  the  child.  This  is  followed 
by  successive  pictures  of  her  condemnation  after  death,  concluding 
with  a  gruesome  picture  of  a  terrible  baby-headed  serpent,  about 
to  devour  the  ruthless  mother.) 

In  Britain,  rigid  laws  regarding  the  separation  of  the  sexes 
marked  the  care  taken  to  prevent  the  hereditary  transmission  of 
leprosy.  Thus  from  an  account  of  the  old  manners  of  the  Scotch 
in  the  fifteenth  century,  we  learn  that  if  a  woman  who  was  a  leper 
should  by  chance  be  found  to  be  with  child,  "both  scho  and  Mr 
bame  war  buryit  quick"  (that  is  to  say,  she  and  her  child  were 
buried  alive),  a  rough-and-ready  mode  of  stamping  out  disease,  to 
have  been  practised  by  our  own  ancestors  ! 

Here  there  is  no  such  precaution,  for  though  lepers  in  this  pro- 
vince are  banished  from  all  contact  with  other  folk,  there  is  no 
attempt  to  check  their  intermarriage  one  with  another,  so  that 
miserable  offspring  are  born  to  this  heritage  of  unutterable  lifelong 
woe,  which  sometimes  reveals  itself  most  distressingly,  even  in 
little  children ;  and  Chinese  superstition  carries  its  curse  beyond 
the  grave,  for  it  is  believed  that  he  who  has  been  a  leper  on  earth 
must  continue  such  in  Hades,  where  he  wanders  a  loathed 
outcast.  As  the  lepers  of  Canton  are  estimated  at  upwards  of 
three  thousand,  and  there  is  only  accommodation  for  about  five 
hundred  in  this  village-asylum  in  the  banyan  grove,  others  are 
provided  for  in  various  places.  A  certain  number  are  housed  in 
neat  huts  erected  by  some  benevolent  soul  on  one  of  the  hills  near 
the  City  of  the  Dead. 

Others  betake  them  to  the  rivers,  and  take  up  their  quarters  in 
leper-boats,  and  so  are  nominally  stationed  at  one  of  the  leper 
anchorages.  Nevertheless,  in  order  to  collect  alms,  these  leper- 
boats  start  in  large  parties,  one  man  in  each  boat,  and  row  about 
as  lusty  beggars  who  will  not  be  refused.  They  have  so  few  possi- 
bilities of  earning  a  livelihood,  that  we  need  scarcely  marvel  that 
some  of  their  methods  are  horrible.     One  is  to  start  in  pursuit  of 


"  WEE    SHOES.  71 

floating  corpses,  not  only  for  the  sake  of  reward  from  relatives  who 
may  be  anxious  to  recover  the  body,  but  also  for  the  sake  of  such 
clothes  or  other  property  as  they  may  be  able  to  annex. 

I  suppose  that  the  geomancers  must  have  discovered  that  to-day 
was  not  Likely  to  prove  lucky  for  funerals,  for  we  saw  neither 
funerals  nor  lepers  as  we  crossed  the  vast  cemetery  of  undulating 
ground  marked  by  so  many  thousand  horse-shoe-shaped  graves, 
varying  in  size  and  material,  and  such  an  incalculable  multitude  of 
nameless  mounds. 

From  the  Green  Isle  of  Shameen  to  the  upper  monastery  on  the 
White  Cloud  Mountains,  is  considered  a  three  hours'  expedition  in 
chairs.  We  abandoned  ours  when  we  reached  the  base  of  the 
mountains,  and  walked  up  a  pretty  ravine  overshadowed  by  grace- 
ful bamboos,  and  presently  came  to  a  picturesque  double-roofed 
temple,  to  which  is  attached  a  Buddhist  monastery.  Still  ascend- 
ing the  ravine,  we  came  to  a  second  monastery.  Of  these  there 
are  thirteen,  scattered  over  the  sides  of  these  hills,  each  most  hap- 
pily placed,  proving  their  founders  to  have  had  a  good  eye  for  a 
site.  The  monks  are  very  friendly  to  foreigners,  and  at  certain 
monasteries  rooms  are  placed  at  the  disposal  of  such  as  come  here 
from  Canton  for  the  day.  Even  one  day  in  such  clear  exhilar- 
ating air  is  a  delightful  change,  and  the  bright  sunshine  and 
cloudless  blue  sky  are  a  joy  in  themselves. 

We  walked  almost  to  the  summit  of  the  ridge,  part  of  the 
ascent  being  by  very  steep  stone  steps.  The  view  looking  back 
over  the  plain  is  vast  and  very  fine.  There  is  the  near  view  of 
the  wonderful  unlimited  burial-ground — some  hills  literally  crowded 
with  horse-shoe  graves,  while  others,  doubtless  pronounced  unlucky 
sites,  are  wellnigh  deserted.  Beyond  these  lies  the  great  walled 
city,  with  its  tall  pagodas,  and  then  the  winding  river  with  all  its 
tributary  creeks  and  canals. 

When  Ave  came  down  from  our  high  level,  we  found  an  excel- 
lent picnic-luncheon  awaiting  us  in  a  neat  guest-room  at  one  of  the 
monasteries,  after  which  we  started  on  our  return  trip. 

On  reaching  the  city  we  halted  at  the  Tain-gak-min,  a  very  fine 
triple  temple,  shrine  within  shrine.  It  is  adorned  witli  much  line 
carving  and  gilding,  and  well-sculptured  idols,  and  many  images  of 
divers  sorts,  including  a  stately  goddess  whose  shrine  is  literally 
buried  in  the  heaps  of  little  wee  shoes  presented  by  ladies  as  votive 
offerings.  The  great  hanging  lamps  were  being  lighted,  and  a  few 
devout  worshippers  were  burning  "joss-paper"  at  a  handsome 
brazier.     Altogether  the   whole  scene  was   very  striking. 


72  CHINESE    NEW   YEAR. 

Thence  wo  came  out  into  tlie  dark  crowded  streets,  and  noted 
how  every  house  had  lighted  two  little  red  tapers  and  some  incense- 
sticks  before  a  little  niche  at  the  side  of  the  door  containing  a 
tablet  to  the  honour  of  the  Earth  God.  Many  were  burning  paper 
money  as  an  offering  to  hungry  spirits,  and  firing  red  crackers  to 
frighten  away  all  devils.  Then  we  passed  through  brilliantly 
illuminated  streets  of  shops,  more  crowded  than  ever  by  reason  of 
many  street  stalls,  preparing  for  to-morrow's  great  night  fair — the 
Chinese  New- Year's  eve. 


CHAPTER  IV. 


CHINESE     NEW     YEAR. 


Old  Style — Preparations  for  New  Year— The  midnight  fair — My  china  lions 
— Offerings  and  worship  at  the  New  Year — Toy -market  for  children — 
Feast  of  lanterns — The  ladies'  festival. 

New-Tear's  Day,  Jan.  22d. 

The  great  festival  is  now  fairly  ushered  in,  and  certainly  there  has 
been  noise  enough  to  secure  a  very  lucky  year,  if  noise  will  do  it ! 

It  does  seem  so  strange  to  write  New- Year's  day  against  the 
2  2d  January,  though  the  fact  of  so  many  old  folk  and  old  customs 
in  Scotland,  still  dating  from  "  Old  Style,"  and  keeping  their  New- 
Year  festival  on  January  12th,  might  make  it  seem  less  odd  to  me 
than  to  some  people.  Here  the  Chinese  reckon  a  year  by  twelve 
lunar  months,  inserting  an  extra  month  into  every  fourth  year,  to 
square  the  calendar.  Consequently  New- Year's  day  is  a  very 
movable  feast,  varying  from  this  2  2d  January  to  February  20th. 
The  date  is  regulated  by  that  of  the  new  moon  nearest  to  the  day 
when  the  sun  has  reached  the  15°  of  Aquarius. 

The  festival  is  kept  up  for  about  a  fortnight,  during  which  there 
is  much  play  and  little  work.  In  fact,  all  who  can  afford  it 
devote  a  whole  month  to  feasting  and  recreation  and  theatrical 
exhibitions.  Public  and  private  business  are  alike  set  aside  as  far 
as  possible,  and  relaxation  from  all  cares  is  the  one  thing  aimed  at. 

The  Seal  of  Office  belonging  to  every  mandarin  is  formally  sealed 
up  on  the  20th  day  of  the  twelfth  month,  and  so  remains  for  one 
month,  a  few  blank  sheets  having  been  stamped  ready  for  use  in 


THE    NEW- YEAR    FESTIVAL.  73 

case  of  any  sudden  emergency,  and  marked  with  four  characters  in 
red  ink,  to  prove  that  they  actually  were  stamped  before  the  festive 
day,  when  the  seal  was  laid  by — a  day  which  is  always  observed 
with  much  feasting  and  rejoicing.  In  short,  it  is  the  beginning  of 
the  holidays. 

Every  house  and  temple  in  the  city  has  undergone  a  regular 
house-cleaning;  floors  have  been  scoured,  walls  washed,  and  it  is 
considered  an  especially  lucky  omen  to  sweep  the  house  with  a 
broom  made  of  bamboo  shoots.  In  rich  men's  houses  carpets  are 
laid  down;  the  beautiful  blackwood  furniture  is  covered  with 
crimson  embroidered  cloth  ;  gorgeous  gold  and  artificial  flower  or- 
naments, banners,  scrolls,  charmed  words  and  characters,  are  hung  up 
in  the  reception-rooms,  which  are  also  decorated  with  fragrant  plants. 

Last  night  all  people,  of  whatsoever  social  degree,  presented  offer- 
ings and  gave  thanks  at  their  domestic  and  ancestral  altars  for  care 
vouchsafed  during  the  year;  joss-sticks  were  burnt,  lamps  and 
candles  were  kept  burning  brightly,  and  offerings  laid  before  the 
Bhrines;  gongs  were  beaten,  and  an  incessant  discharge  of  fire- 
crackers  kept  up.  These  consist  of  red  tubes  containing  gunpowder, 
resembling  miniature  cartridges,  and  fastened  together  in  rows, 
which,  being  thrown  on  the  ground,  go  oft'  with  a  sharp  report;  or 
if  one  is  fired,  all  the  others  go  ofi'  in  rapid  succession,  making 
much  noise  but  little  show.  Being  let  off  at  intervals  before  every 
door  to  frighten  away  bad  spirits,  they  produce  an  almost  incessant 
and  deafening  noise,  and  fill  the  air  with  smoke  and  smell  of  gun- 
powder. If  only  the  evil  spirits  have  ears,  they  must  surely  suffer 
as  much  as  we,  the  unsympathetic  white  "barbarians,"  and  flee  any- 
where to  get  beyond  its  reach  ! 

Yesterday  all  who  could  afford  it  had  a  great  family  banquet, 
prolonged  for  many  hours  (the  multitude  of  small  dishes  and  weari- 
some succession  of  courses  forming  the  great  feature  at  a  Chinese 
feast).  Just  before  midnight  fresh  offerings  are  laid  before  the 
ancestral  tablets,  bonfires  are  lighted,  presents  made  to  servants  and 
children,  and  those  who  possess  new  clothes  put  them  on.  All  en- 
deavour, at  least,  to  have  clean  clothes  for  this  occasion. 

To  foreigners  the  interest  of  the  New-Tear  festival  begins  and 
ends  on  its  eve,  when  the  streets  are  thronged  with  people  all  buy- 
ing and  selling,  every  one  hoping  to  profit  by  his  neighbour's  ne- 
cessities to  drive  hard  bargains  even  in  the  purchase  of  flowers  for 
the  domestic  altar!  The  street  known  as  Curio  Street  is  lined  from 
end  to  end  with  a  double  row  of  stint  stalls,  where  much  trash, 
and  occasionally  some  good  things,  are  offered  for  sale. 


74  CHINESE    NEW    YEAR. 

Having  spent  the  greater  part  of  the  day  in  wandering  about  the 
city,  to  see  as  much  as  possible  of  the  Celestial  manners  and  cus- 
toms, we  returned  at  night  to  see  the  great  fair.  Of  course  there 
was  a  dense  crowd,  but  by  distributing  our  party  in  couples,  we  got 
through  it  very  well.  I  had  the  good  fortune  to  be  pioneered  by 
a  son  of  Dr  Chalmers,  whose  perfect  knowledge  of  the  lang 
proved  of  considerable  advantage,  as  we  wandered  through  the 
strange  lantern-lighted  streets,  where  the  gorgeous  sign-posts  are 
made  more  attractive  by  decorations  of  scarlet  cloth  and  gold 
flowers.  We  wandered  about  for  a  couple  of  hours,  in  and  out  of 
the  temples  and  gardens  and  strange  little  shops,  buying  all  manner 
of  odd  treasures,  which  we  stored  in  a  basket  which  we  had  been 
recommended  to  bring  for  this  purpose,  as  of  course  on  such  a  night 
the  purchaser  must  himself  carry  away  his  goods. 

The  really  attractive  objects,  however,  proved  fewer  than  I  had 
expected;  and  as  the  evening  wore  on,  I  expressed  some  regret 
that  I  had  not  secured  two  delightfully  odd  white  china  lions, 
which  Ave  had  noted  at  a  distant  stall.  My  companion  most 
nobly  volunteered  to  go  back  and  get  them,  but  as  I  did  not  wish 
to  face  the  crowd  again,  he  asked  a  Chinaman  to  let  me  Avait  a  feAV 
minutes  in  his  shop,  but  this  he  positively  refused  from  the  fear  of 
attracting  a  crowd,  under  cover  of  which  his  shop  might  be  robbed. 
He  then  asked  several  others  if  they  would  at  least  keep  our  some- 
what weighty  basket  of  odd  purchases,  while  we  both  returned. 
Even  this  was  refused,  on  the  ground  of  not  venturing  to  risk 
robbery.  So  we  had  to  crush  on  for  fully  half  a  mile,  till  we 
neared  the  foreign  settlement,  and  reached  a  shop  with  which 
Europeans  habitually  deal. 

There  I  was  allowed  to  wait,  but  wre  had  now  left  the  coveted 
lions  so  far  behind  that  it  Avas  a  good  half-hour  ere  Mr  Chalmers 
rejoined  me,  having  fortunately  found  them  still  "  to  the  fore." 
Meanwhile  I  had  at  least  gained  a  new  experience,  as  I  sat  there 
alone,  with  a  crowd  of  Chinese  shop-keepers  who  were  sitting  there 
Avaiting  for  midnight,  and  evidently  having  an  angry  discussion 
over  the  settlement  of  their  New-Year's  eA'e  accounts. 

"We  got  home  just  before  midnight,  but  even  from  the  quiet  of 
the  Shameen  Ave  could  hear  the  roar  of  fire-crackers  from  the  river 
and  the  city,  and  it  continued  for  some  hours.  Indeed  there  can 
be  little  time  for  rest,  for  long  before  dawn  worship  must  be 
offered  to  the  Gods  of  Earth  and  Heaven,  and  sacrifices  prepared, 
which  are  laid  on  a  temporary  altar  in  an  outer  room.  These  con- 
sist generally  of  five  or  ten  small  cups  of  tea,  the  same  of  wine, 


NEW-YEARS    EVE.  75 

also  of  divers  vegetables,  a  bowl  of  rice  with  ten  pairs  of  chop- 
sticks, an  almanack  of  the  New  Year  tied  with  red  string  for  luck, 
two  or  more  ornamental  red  candles,  and  a  pile  of  loose-skim  ted 
mandarin  oranges,  which,  from  their  name  (ke7c,  meaning  also 
"  auspicious "),  are  considered  a  lucky  emblem,  and,  as  such,  are 
given  to  all  visitors. 

After  a  salvo  of  noisy  crackers  to  frighten  evil  spirits,  the  head 
of  the  household  adores  Heaven  and  Earth  in  the  name  of  the 
assembled  family,  giving  thanks  for  past  protection,  and  craving 
blessings  for  the  coming  year.  This  act  of  adoration  is  followed 
by  another  feu  de  joie  and  the  burning  of  much  joss-paper  and 
mock  paper-money. 

Worship  must  next  be  rendered  to  the  Domestic  Gods.  An- 
other set  of  offerings  must  be  prepared, — small  cups  of  tea  and 
wine,  tiny  bowls  of  rice  and  vegetables,  lighted  candles  and  incense, 
burning  of  mock  money.  Xo  animal  food  is  offered  on  this  day, 
and  many  families  abstain  from  eating  it,  from  reverence  to  the 
Spirits  of  Heaven  and  Earth. 

The  Deceased  Ancestors  of  the  family  are  then  worshipped,  and 
a  third  set  of  offerings,  similar  to  those  already  given  to  the  gods, 
must  be  laid  before  the  ancestral  tablets,  which  are  generally  kept 
in  an  inner  room. 

Much  feasting  ensues,  and  then  a  round  of  full-dressed  visits 
must  be  paid;  richly-dressed  mandarins  and  ladies  are  carried 
along  in  their  closely-shut  sedan-chairs,  and  friends  on  meeting 
stand  still  and  bow  repeatedly,  while  affectionately  shaking  their 
own  clenched  fists.  Sometimes  sugar-canes  are  fastened  on  to  a 
lady's  chair  as  a  symbol  of  goodwill  to  the  friend  she  visits.  As 
the  gift  is  purely  ceremonial,  the  sugar-cane  is  rarely  detached,  so 
it  does  for  all  her  friends,  and  combines  economy  with  courtesy ! 
The  visits  are  most  ceremonious,  involving  reverential  homage  to 
all  elders  and  superiors,  from  juniors  and  inferiors. 

Relatives  of  a  family  coming  to  call  are  led  to  the  domestic 
altar,  where  they  worship  the  ancestral  tablets.  Then  sweetmeats 
and  cakes  are  handed  round,  and  tea,  with  either  an  olive  or  an 
almond  in  each  cup,  for  luck.  Copper  cash  are  strung  on  red 
twine  to  give  away  on  New-Year's  morning,  a  red  silk  thread  is 
plaited  in  the  children's  hair,  and  small  packets  of  cash  or  (if  melon 
seeds  are  tied  up  in  rod  paper  to  give  to  friends.  Presents  of 
eatables  are  sent  to  friends;  baskets  of  the  lucky  loose-skinned 
orange,  and  cakes  of  cocoa-nut,  small  seeds,  and  sugar  fried  in  oil, 
made  up  into  brown  balls.      These  were  given  to  us  at  the  house 


76  CHINESE   NEW   YEAR. 

of  a  wealthy  noble,  whose  very  kindly  wife  and  daughters,  seeing 
that  we  thought  them  nice,  not  only  insisted  on  filling  our  mouths 
with  very  large  pieces,  but  sent  a  large  basketful  home  with  us. 
We  saw  innumerable  roast-pigs  and  fowls  being  carried  along  the 
streets,  either  as  gifts  to  the  living,  or  offerings  to  the  dead  or  to 
the  gods. 

About  noon  we  went  for  a  walk  through  the  streets,  usually  so 
busy,  but  they  seemed  as  if  under  a  spell,  all  asleep.  After  the 
noise  and  hubbub  of  last  night,  this  stillness  was  the  more  remark- 
able :  it  almost  seemed  as  if  my  memories  of  the  bewildering 
throngs  in  the  midnight  fair  had  all  been  a  strange  dream ! 
Almost  every  shop  was  shut,  for  it  is  considered  an  unlucky  omen 
to  buy  or  sell  on  the  New  Year,  and  poor  indeed  must  be  the  man 
who  will  do  so.  Certainly  we  did  see  some  very  respectable 
clothes-shops  open,  and  others  selling  sweetmeats  and  other  food ; 
still  these  are  very  exceptional,  and  most  shops  remain  closed  for 
several  days.  Indeed  the  longer  they  can  afford  to  do  so  the  more 
highly  are  they  esteemed  by  their  neighbours,  for  this  is  a  sure 
proof  of  prosperity. 

The  deserted  streets  are  all  red  with  the  remains  of  the  paper 
fire-crackers  let  off  last  night ;  and  as  to  certain  temples  we  visited, 
their  floors  are  literally  strewn  ankle-deep  with  the  relics  of  the 
midnight  battle  fought  with  the  devils !  Y\Te  went  in  and  out  of 
various  fine  buildings  to  see  their  decorations.  One  large  estab- 
lishment is  a  sort  of  dispensary  for  giving  medical  advice  gratis  to 
the  poor — such  funny  medical  advice  !  Its  rooms  are  separated  by 
very  handsome  open-work  wood-carving.  A  little  farther  we  came 
to  a  merchant's  guild,  and  found  its  grand  hall  so  decorated  as  to 
resemble  a  temple — with  images  and  a  temporary  altar  covered 
with  imitation  fruit,  and  little  parcels  of  cash  tied  up  in  red  paper 
as  luck-pennies.  The  altar  was  decorated  with  huge  bunches  of 
gold  flowers,  and  beside  it  stood  a  splendid  state  umbrella  of  crim- 
son satin  embroidered  in  gold.  In  short,  everything  suggested 
festivity ;  but  as  to  the  human  beings,  they  were  apparently  all 
asleep  after  the  fatigues  of  night  and  morning. 

This  afternoon  Ave  strolled  as  far  as  the  Bund,  but  even  the 
boating  population  seemed  to  be  all  sleeping,  and  no  wonder ! 

Jan.  2ith. 

This  is  my  last  day  in  this  most  quaintly  fascinating  city.  I 
have  been  for  a  farewell  look  at  some  of  its  most  remarkable  tem- 
ples, and  most  characteristic  streets.     Especially  we  have  visited 


FEAST    OF    LANTERNS.  77 

the  great  sight  of  the  Jay — namely,  the  New- Year  toy-market  for 
children,  gay  with  images  floating  on  silver  clouds,  paper  and  gold 
flowers,  and  all  manner  of  cheap  playthings — a  perfect  paradise 
for  the  little  ones,  who  mustered  strong  in  their  gayest  clothes. 
The  tiny  ones  look  so  funny  with  their  odd  little  embryo  plaits, 
sticking  out  like  small  horns  on  cither  side  of  the  head. 

There  are  also  markets  in  the  open  street  for  the  sale  of  paper 
lanterns  of  every  conceivable  form ;  flowers  and  fruits,  butterflies 
and  dragon-flies,  birds,  fishes,  and  animals,  dragons,  pigs,  horses, 
crabs,  monstrous  human  heads,  &c.  One  very  pretty  form  is  that 
of  five  butterflies  so  arranged  as  to  form  a  square  lamp.  In  somi 
quaint  processions  of  figures  are  made  to  move  round  and  round  by 
the  action  of  heated  air. 

This  feast  of  lanterns  continues  for  a  fortnight.  Parents  who 
have  been  blessed  with  offspring  in  the  past  year,  buy  lamps  and 
present  them  as  thank-offerings  at  the  neighbouring  temples.  Those 
who  crave  additions  to  their  family  also  buy  lanterns,  to  which 
they  attach  their  names.  They  present  them  to  one  of  the 
temples,  where  they  are  lighted  from  the  sacred  fire  of  the  altar- 
lamps  and  suspended  for  some  days,  after  which  they  are  sent 
back  to  the  house  of  the  suppliant,  to  be  suspended  before  his 
domestic  shrine,  above  which  are  placed  small  waxen  images  of  the 
gods  of  rank,  happiness,  and  long  life. 

There  are  at  this  time  all  manner  of  processions  in  the  streets 
at  night,  when  men  and  women  are  dressed  to  represent  characters 
in  ancient  Chinese  stories ;  sometimes  a  monstrous  dragon  is  re- 
presented, but  he  more  resembles  a  centipede,  the  legs  of  the  men 
who  move  him  being  plainly  visible  !  These,  with  torch-  and 
lantern-bearers  to  swell  the  show,  are  among  the  amusements  of 
the  evening,  which  must  really  be  exceedingly  attractive,  as  the 
narrow  streets  are  all  illuminated  with  gay  lamps  suspended  from 
beams  which  go  right  across  from  roof  to  roof,  and  are  decorated 
with  draperies  of  bright-coloured  stuff's,  hung  in  festoons. 

On  some  of  these  festivals  there  are  very  remarkable  fireworks, 
in  which  dragons  are  shown  vomiting  flames,  rockets  burst  to 
descend  in  a  shower  of  pagodas,  amid  wondrous  coruscations  of 
gold  and  silver  fire — in  short,  the  scenic  effects  are  said  to  be  as 
varied  as  they  are  effective. 

But  I  might   linger  here  for   months  without   exhausting   the 
interests  of  this  strange  city,  and  now  I  must  devote  a  few  days 
to  the  old  Portuguese  settlement  of  Macao.1 
1  Macao,  with  its  old -world  religions  life,  was  to  me  most  fascinating.     Like 


78  FROM    HONG-KONG   TO   AMOY. 

CHAPTER   V. 

FROM    HONG-KONG    TO    AMOY. 

Bishop  Burdon— Pioneer  work  in  Hang-Chow  and  Peking— Meeting  in  far 
countries  —  Hong-Kong  races  —  Grand  stands  and  mortuary  chapels — 
Fire-alarm— Swatow  and  Kak  Chio— Amoy  and  Ku-lang-su — Boulder- 
covered  hills— The  Citadel— On  the  walls— Artificial  flowers — Bamboo 
oysters — Oyster-shell  windows — The  Thousand-headed  Goddess — Green 
beetles. 

St  Paul's  College,  Hong-Koso, 
Sunday,  9th  Feb. 

I  have  been  back  in  Hong-Kong  for  ten  days,  and  am  more  and 
more  impressed  with  its  beauty  and  general  fascination.  I  can 
scarcely  imagine  the  possibility  of  finding  pleasanter  winter- 
quarters,  or  a  more  charming  general  society. 

From  Macao  I  returned  to  the  same  kind  friends  from  whose 
delightful  home  I  had  started,  and  a  week  slipped  quickly  by,  the 
days  devoted  to  sketching  expeditions,  alone  or  with  congenial 
companions,  and  the  evenings  bringing  their  various  phases  of 
pleasant  social  life,  all  of  which  gain  an  additional  charm  from  the 
beauty  of  the  moonlight  or  starlight,  as  seen  from  our  chairs  (mine, 
at  any  rate,  being  always  uncovered). 

Now  I  am  on  a  visit  to  the  Bishop  and  Mrs  Burdon,  a  little 
lower  down  the  same  glen, — another  pleasant  home,  and  a  glimpse 
of  another  phase  of  the  working  life  of  the  city.  And  such 
glimpses  have  the  charm  of  being  by  no  means  confined  to  any  one 
section  of  Christians,  for  the  hospitality  of  this  house  is  large- 
hearted,  and  is  extended  to  the  workers  of  other  denominations. 
At  the  present  moment  one  of  the  bishop's  guests  is  Dr  Graves  of 
the  Baptist  Medical  Mission  at  Canton,  who  came  thence  in  order 
to  baptise  eight  converts — adult  Chinamen — a  ceremony  which 
took  place  at  5  a.m.  this  morning,  by  immersion  in  the  sea. 

There  are  few  men  in  China  who  have  been  engaged  in  mission- 
work  longer  than  Bishop  Burdon,  and  probably  none  whose  field 
of  work  has  been  so  varied.  He  joined  the  Shanghai  Mission  in 
1853,  and  six  years  later  he  started  as  a  pioneer  to  see  whether 

some  old  English  cathedral  towns,  it  is  suggestive  of  a  still  back-water  on  life's 
rushing  river.  But  space  is  limited — China  is  a  vast  subject,  and  Macao  is  so  es- 
sentially nn-Chinese,  that  I  have  decided  to  omit  the  letters  referring  to  it. 


I  I 
I- 

<"S 

ec    z 

O 

I-    UJ 

9.  i 

>  v- 

*k  ^ 
o  o 


BISHOP   BUKDON.  79 

there  was  any  possibility  of  commencing  a  mission  at  Hang-Chow. 
For  two  months  he  lived  in  a  boat  outside  the  city,  making  daily 
visits  within  the  wall  to  feel  his  way.  Then  Mr  Nevius  of  the 
American  Presbyterian  Mission  joined  him,  and  both  succeeded  in 
renting  small  rooms  at  a  Buddhist  monastery  on  one  of  the  hills 
within  the  city. 

Just  then,  the  news  of  the  repulse  of  the  British  fleet  off  the 
Taku  Forts  led  to  such  excitement  that  it  became  necessary  for 
the  pioneers  to  retire,  and  seven  years  elapsed  ere  it  became 
possible  for  Mr  Burdon  to  return  thither.  In  1861  he  again 
started  as  a  pioneer,  and  established  himself  in  the  great  city 
of  Shaou-hing,  a  hundred  miles  to  the  west  of  Ningpo,  assisted 
only  by  one  of  the  Xingpo  catechists,  but  with  no  foreign  com- 
panionship  save  an  occasional  visit  from  Mr  Fleming,  a  brother 
missionary.  From  this  advance-post  he  was,  at  the  end  of  nine 
months,  fairly  driven  back  by  the  advance  of  the  Tai-ping  in- 
surgents, and,  rejoining  the  mission  at  Ningpo,  shared  with  his 
brethren  there  in  all  the  anxieties  of  that   terrible  time. 

In  the  early  spring  of  the  following  year  (1862)  he  accompanied 
Bishop  Smith  to  Peking  to  judge  whether  it  would  be  possible  for 
the  Church  Mission  Society  to  commence  work  in  the  northern 
capital,  where  Dr  Lockhart  of  the  London  Mission  had  been  the 
first  to  enter  and  commence  medical-mission  work.  From  that  be- 
ginning dates  the  commencement  of  the  work  of  these  two  Societies 
in  Peking.1 

From  the  far  north,  Mr  Burdon  was  called  to  be  the  Bishop  of 
Southern  China,  and  now  his  anxiety  is  to  commence  a  medical 
mission  at  Pakhoi,  the  south- westernmost  port  opened  to  foreign 
commerce.  He  says  that  at  present,  in  this  great  province  of 
Kwang-tung,  which  is  double  the  size  of  England,  and  has  a  pop- 
ulation of  nineteen  millions,  there  are  only  two  ordained  mission- 
aries of  the  Episcopal  Church — one  at  Canton  and  the  other  at 
Hong-Kong — and  that  the  western  half  of  this  province  has  not  a 

1  The  Church  Mission  Society  continued  to  work  in  Peking  till  1880,  when  the 
appointment  of  Bishop  Scott  of  the  S.P.G.  to  the  Bishopric  of  North  China, 
ami  his  residence  at  Che-foo,  suggested  the  wisdom  of  resigning  thai  field  to  the 
Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel. 

China  south  of  hit.  '_'*''  is  under  the  episcopal  jurisdiction  of  the  Bishop  of  Vie- 
toria,  Bong-Kong.  The  first  Bishop  was  Dr  (J.  Smith;  the  second,  Dr  Alford; 
the  third,  Dr  Burdon. 

In  1872,  Dr  Russell  was  consecrated  first  Bishop  of  the  Empire  to  the  north  of 
lat.  28°;  but  after  his  death  in  1880,  this  huge  northern  diocese  was  divided  into 
North  China  and  Mid  China— Dr  G.  E.  Moule  succeeding  Bishop  Russell al  Ningpo, 
and  Bishop  Scott  being  appointed  to  the  northern  diocese. 


80  FROM    HONG-KONG   TO    AMOY. 

single  Protestant  missionary,  although  Canton,  the  capital  of  the 
province,  has  been  commercially  connected  with  England  longer 
than  any  part  of  China. 

Saturday,  15th. 

The  bishop  sails  to-night  for  Foo-Chow,  accompanied  by  Mr 
Barry,  a  ^clerical  friend  from  Calcutta.  Mrs  Burdon  had  at  first 
intruded  to  go  with  them,  and  had  kindly  invited  me  to  join  the 
party,  saying  that  the  boat  expedition  up  the  Min  river  is  one  of 
the  loveliest  things  in  all  China.  But  as  she  was  not  prepared  for 
such  a  sudden  start,  it  is  now  decided  that  she  and  I  are  to  follow 
a  few  days  later. 

I  am  glad  of  the  delay,  as  Mrs  Coxon,  a  friend  of  olden  days, 
wishes  me  to  stay  with  her  for  the  races  next  week,  which  are  the 
great  event  of  the  Hong-Kong  year,  so  that  it  really  would  be  a 
pity  to  miss  seeing  them.  They  last  three  days,  and  the  race- 
horses are  all  Chinese  ponies,  ridden  by  gentlemen. 

Wedmsday,  19th  Feb. 

Hong-Kong  certainly  has  good  reason  to  appreciate  its  own  race- 
course, for  a  prettier  scene  could  not  possibly  be  imagined.  This 
is  the  evening  of  the  third  day.  Mrs  Coxon  being  one  of  the  very 
few  people  here  who  cares  for  the  exertion  of  driving  a  pony 
instead  of  being  carried  by  men,  drove  me  out  cheerily  early  each 
morning  in  her  little  pony-carriage,  which,  I  think,  was  the  only 
wheeled  vehicle  in  that  vast  assemblage.  Every  one  else  went  in 
chairs,  borne  by  two,  three,  or  four  men,  as  the  case  might  be 
(Chinese  law  does  not  allow  a  Chhiaman  to  have  more  than  two 
bearers,  unless  he  holds  certain  official  rank,  but  foreigners  gen- 
erally think  it  necessary  to  have  their  chair  with  full  complement 
of  bearers,  if  they  have  occasion  to  go  a  hundred  yards  !) 

Each  morning  the  whole  two  miles  to  the  race-course  was  one 
densely-packed  crowd  of  human  beings,  one-half  of  the  road  being 
absorbed  by  a  double  row  of  chairs  and  Chinese  bearers,  and 
the  other  half  crowded  with  Chinamen,  soldiers,  sadors,  native 
police,  &c,  all  pouring  along  intent  on  this  grand  ploy — such  a 
quaint-looking  throng,  yet  all  so  perfectly  orderly,  they  might  be 
going  to  church  or  coming  from  it :  and  yet  these  Chinamen, 
with  their  impassive  faces,  are  the  most  inveterate  gamblers, 
and  many  a  heavy  stake  has  been  lost  and  won  in  these  three  days. 
That  two-mile-long  procession  of  chairs  in  double  fde  was  a  sight 
in  itself.      The  road  is  a  very  pretty  one ;  even  the  streets  being 


HONG-KONG    RACES.  81 

partly  overshadowed  by  large  trees,  and  then  the  way  lies  along  the 
bright  blue  sea.  Indeed  blue  is  the  predominant  colour  every- 
where, for  by  far  the  greater  part  of  the  crowd  are  dressed  in  blue, 
indigo-dye  being  so  cheap,  and  large  blue  cotton  umbrellas  find 
great  favour  with  the  Chinamen  of  this  foreign  colony. 

The  race-course  itself  is  admirably  situated,  being  a  dead  level 
embosomed  in  wooded  hills,  with  a  broad  stream  flowing  to  the 
blue  sea,  and  the  distant  hills  of  the  mainland  seen  through  a  gap. 
On  either  side  of  the  Grand  Stand  are  built  a  series  of  large,  com- 
fortable, thatched  stands,  which  are  the  permanent  property  of  the 
governor,  the  stewards  of  the  races,  and  the  different  great  mercan- 
tile houses,  combining  a  luxurious  dining-room  on  the  ground-floor 
with  a  comfortable  open  drawing-room  up-stairs,  furnished  with 
any  number  of  arm-chairs.  The  finest  stand  of  all,  with  flat- 
terraced  roof,  is  the  property  of  the  Parsees.  The  programme  is, 
that  each  morning  "society"  meets  in  the  Grand  Stand,  and  there 
remains  till  the  pause  allowed  for  luncheon,  when  all  disperse  to 
the  various  great  luncheon-parties  in  the  private  stands,  and  then 
spend  the  afternoon  in  the  drawing-rooms  aforesaid,  where  there  is 
an  abundant  supply  of  coffee  and  ices. 

I  followed  out  this  pleasant  programme  for  two  days,  and  was 
vastly  amused,  but  this  morning  I  determined  to  devote  the  day  to 
sketching  the  scene,  so  I  resolutely  forsook  the  many  kind  friends, 
ami  went  oil'  by  myself  to  a  hill  in  the  "  Happy  Valley,"  the  peace- 
ful cemetery  for  all  nations  and  sects,  whence  I  could  overlook  t  In- 
whole  scene;  and  truly  it  was  a  pretty  sight,  with  the  amazing 
crowd  of  Europeans  and  Chinamen  seeming  no  bigger  than  ants — 
blue  ants — and  such  a  swarm  of  them  ! 

From  this  high  post  I  saw  the  races  to  perfection,  and  especially 
enjoyed  the  excellent  music  of  the  74th  band  and  of  their  sev<  n 
pipers,  headed  by  Mackinnon,  a  Speyside  man.  The  music  gained 
vastly  as  it  floated  up  to  me,  every  note  clear,  instead  of  the  ear 
being  distracted  by  all  the  jarring  sounds  of  the  race-course. 
(Apart  from  these,  what  a  strange  and  aggravating  phase  of  "enter- 
tainment "it  is  that  so  continually  provides  excellent  music,  and 
yet  deems  it  necessary  to  add  thereto  the  strain  of  conversation  !) 
So  this  morning  I  had  full  enjoyment  of  "The  Pibroch  o'  Donald 
Dhu,"  "  Tullochgorum,"  and  ever  so  many  more  beloved  old  melo- 
dies, which  were  echoed  by  the  hills  around,  and  floated  away 
through  fir-woods  which  might  have  clothed  a  Scotch  hillside.  I 
never  heard  anything  sound  better  than  a  bugle  piece  by  Mac- 
kinnon's  son,  its  notes  just   mellowed  by  distance. 

F 


82  FROM    HONG-KONG    TO    AMOY. 

I '.ut,  truly,  looking  down  from  tlii.s  point,  it  is  a  strange  com- 
bination to  see  the  semicircle  of  cemeteries  ami  mortuary  chapels, 
just  enfolding  the  race-course,  and,  as  it  were,  repeating  the  semi- 
circle formed  by  the  Grand  Stands! 

Two  days  ago  I  chanced  to  wander  into  this  silent  God's  Acre, 
just  in  time  to  witness  a  most  lonely  funeral.  It  was  that  of  a 
European  who  had  died  unknown  at  the  hospital.  Four  Chinese 
coolies  carried  his  coffin,  and  the  only  other  persons  present  were 
the  parson  and  the  sexton,  neither  of  whom  had  known  the  poor 
fellow  in  life.  It  was  the  funeral  of  "  somebody's  darling,"  but 
not  one  mourner  was  near. 

To-morrow  night  there  is  to  be  the  usual  great  race  ball,  but  ere 
then  I  expect  to  be  far  away  at  sea,  as  I  embark  for  Foo-Chow 
early  in  the  morning. 

On  Board  the  s.s.  "Samoa," 
Feb.  20th. 

At  2  p.m.  this  morning  we  were  aroused  by  the  wild  clanging  of 
the  fire-alarm — a  sound  which  I  have  happily  not  heard  since  the 
first  night  of  my  arrival,  when  it  impressed  itself  so  awfully  on 
our  senses.  Strange  that  my  first  and  last  night  in  Hong-Kong 
should  be  marked  by  such  haunting  memories  !  The  house  stands 
so  high  that  it  commands  a  wide  view  of  the  town,  and  looking 
out,  we  saw  the  flames  rising  from  a  point  near  the  naval  yard. 
Fortunately  it  did  not  turn  out  to  be  very  serious,  but  Mr  Coxon 
had  to  start  instantly  to  join  the  fire-brigade  (of  which  I  think  he 
is  captain).  Curiously  enough  he  was  introduced  to  me,  sitting  on 
his  fire-engine,  the  morning  of  that  awful  Christmas  night,  and 
this  morning  he  came  straight  from  his  engine  to  the  steamer  to 
say  good-bye  ! 

Various  other  friends  also  came  to  speed  their  parting  guest,  for 
in  the  East  the  world  is  early  astir,  and  wondrously  warm-hearted. 
So  my  last  memories  of  Hong-Kong  were  as  pleasant  as  all  the 
rest,  and  it  was  with  true  regret  that  I  looked  my  last  on  that 
beautiful  scene,  bathed  in  soft  morning  light. 

Ox  Board  the  "Xamoa," 
Feb.  21st 

"We  reached  Swatow  early  this  morning.  It  is  a  large  trading 
town  on  a  dull  mud-fiat — truly  a  most  uninteresting  spot,  but  one 
of  great  commercial  importance  by  reason  of  the  excellence  of  its 
harbour,  on  which  account  it  is  the  port  for  the  eastern  half  of  the 
province  of  Kwang-tung.     It  also  derives  much  importance  from 


SWATOW.  83 

its  great  fishing  interests.  Both  sea  and  river  yield  vast  harvests 
to  the  fishermen,  and  the  fiat  mud  shores  are  all  alive  with  cockles, 
oysters,  and  all  manner  of  shell-fish. 

This  being  one  of  the  treaty  ports,  a  special  district  is  assigned 
to  foreigners  as  a  foreign  settlement,  and  this  happily  is  on  a  high 
rocky  island,  lying  at  some  little  distance  from  the  muddy  penin- 
sula on  which  stands  the  native  city.  The  general  outline  of  Kak 
Chio,  as  the  isle  is  called,  rather  reminds  me  of  the  mountains  at 
Aden :  the  coast  is  bleak  and  sun-scorched,  studded  with  huge 
madder-coloured  boulders  and  rock-masses ;  and  I  can  well  believe 
how  pitilessly  the  sun  blazes  on  these  parched  yellow  hills  during 
the  long  summer  months. 

Just  now,  however,  the  island  is  comparatively  green :  the 
pleasant  homes  of  the  European  residents  each  have  their  garden, 
and  there  are  clumps  of  feathery  bamboo  in  every  ravine,  and 
patches  of  fir-wood  scattered  all  over  the  hills,  as  if  to  contrast 
with  the  dark-red  borders ;  and  here  and  there  a  patch  of  vivid 
green  shows  where  diligent  husbandmen  have  laid  out  a  whole 
series  of  terraced  rice-fields. 

Now  we  are  approaching  the  Fuh-kien  province,  fully  expecting 
to  find  ourselves  at  Amoy  at  daybreak. 

Feh.  'z:;.i. 

Which  expectations  were  realised,  and  we  straightway  went 
ashore,  to  make  the  most  of  one  long  day — for  the  very  first  glimpse 
of  the  place  filled  me  Avith  regret  that  I  had  not  known  beforehand 
how  much  of  beauty  and  of  interest  are  here  to  be  seen.  It  is  a 
delightfully  picturesque  city,  lying  in  very  irregular  streets  all  along 
the  boulder-strewn  shores  of  the  high  rocky  island,  with  considerable 
intermixture  of  foliage,  and  a  harbour  alive  with  quaint  junks. 

Here,  as  at  Swatow,  the  foreign  residences  are  all  on  an  island, 
just  separated  from  the  city  by  a  narrow  strait,  which  men  must 
cross  whenever  their  business  calls  them  to  the  city.  I  think  this 
island  of  Ku-lang-su  is  as  attractive  as  the  city  itself.  Its  large 
luxurious  foreign  houses  are  scattered  in  the  most  tasteful  manner 
among  the  great  rocks  and  foliage. 

In  the  most  beautifully  situated  of  all,  breakfast  awaited  us,  and, 
thanks  to  the  very  thoughtful  arrangements  of  two  sets  of  friends, 
I  was  enabled  to  see  a  very  great  deal  with  the  greatest  possible 
economy  of  time.  Having  rapidly  secured  a  general  sketch  of  the 
town  from  the  foreign  settlement,  our  friends  took  me  across  to 
visit  a  Buddhist  monastery,  which  is  perched  among  the  great  mad- 
der-coloured boulders  which  have  fallen  SO  as  to  make  covered  eaves. 


84  FROM    EONG-KONG   TO   AMOY. 

On  landing  I  found  a  chair  and  bearers  all  ready  to  carry  me  up 
the  steep  paths.  We  passed  by  some  picturesque  old  junks  which 
lay  stranded  on  the  shore,  some  interesting  graves  and  \<iy  fine 
old  trees,  and  quaint  shrines  and  temples,  some  of  which  are  built 
in  the  boulder-caves.  In  these  also  are  stone  seats  and  tables  all 
ready  for  Chinamen's  picnics.  In  one  huge  projecting  rock  there 
is  a  strange  cleft  known  as  the  Tiger's  Mouth.  Hound  it  is  con- 
structed a  stone  gallery,  which  gives  the  appearance  of  teeth.  In 
this  strange  resting-place  we  sat  and  watched  a  funeral  procession 
winding  up  the  steep  path  below — the  mourners  dressed,  some  in 
white  and  some  in  sackcloth.  As  the  procession  approached  the 
hill  it  looked  very  gay,  with  a  rich  crimson  pall  covering  the  coffin, 
and  a  small  square  pall  covering  the  tablet  of  the  dead.  But  at  the 
foot  of  the  hill  the  party  halted,  and,  removing  these  gay  super- 
fluities,1 bore  only  the  solid  wooden  coffin  up  the  steep  path  to 
some  lucky  spot  on  the  hill. 

Nowhere  have  I  ever  seen  such  innumerable  and  gigantic  boul- 
ders as  are  here  strewn  broadcast  all  over  the  hills.  As  far  as  the 
eye  can  reach,  these  ranges  of  parched  barren  dust  are  all  alike 
studded  with  these  huge  dark  rocks,  which  seem  as  if  they  could 
only  have  dropped  from  the  clouds.  Here  and  there,  however, 
they  crop  up  as  the  backbone  of  the  hills,  and  the  town  itself  is 
divided  by  a  rocky  ridge  crested  with  fortifications  and  cannon, 
which  command  the  estuary,  where  lie  so  many  trading  vessels ;  for 
Amoy,  having  long  been  one  of  the  open  ports,  is  the  centre  of  a 
large  foreign  trade,  and  is,  moreover,  the  principal  point  of  com- 
munication with  the  island  of  Formosa. 

It  is  a  vast  busy  crowded  city,  with  a  population  reckoned  at  a 
hundred  thousand,  an  estimate  which  is  capable  of  large  increase  if 
it  be  made  to  include  the  surrounding  country,  for  it  seems  that 
Amoy  is  not  only  a  city  but  an  island,  about  ten  miles  in  diameter, 
whereon  about  a  hundred  villages  and  townlets  contrive  to  exist. 
Hence  it  has  been  a  great  centre  for  mission  work,  as  would  appear 
from  the  fact  that  thirty  years  ago  there  were  only  twenty  Chris- 
tian converts  connected  with  the  Amoy  missions,  whereas  now 
there  are  upwards  of  three  thousand  communicants  in  connection 
with  three  of  the  missions,  and  doubtless  the  other  Churches  have 
adherents  in  proportion.2 

We   wandered   for   some   time  among    the    boulder  -  caves   and 

1  Probably  to  deceive  importunate  beggars  :  see  page  68. 

-  These  three  are  the  London  Mission,  883  ;  the  English  Presbyterian,  655  ;  Amer- 
ican Methodist-Episcopal,  1669. 


FLOWERS    ON    IMPERIAL    GRAVES.  85 

shrines,  and  ruinous  but  picturesque  graves,  here  and  there  finding 
some  overshadowed  by  wide-spreading  trees,  or  guarded  by  stately 
aloes,  which  seem  to  flourish  in  this  soil  of  decomposing  granite. 

Then  Ave  turned  to  the  old  city  and  walked  for  some  distance  on 
its  walls,  whence  we  had  an  excellent  view  looking  down  into  the 
town.  The  walls  are  much  smaller  than  those  of  Canton.  I  saw  no 
tall  pagodas,  nor  great  square  keeps,  such  as  those  which  in  <  Jantou 
and  Macao  look  so  important,  though  they  are  only  pawn-shops  ! 

We  went  to  the  citadel,  and  there  saw  a  considerable  body  of 
Chinese  soldiers,  delightfully  quaint  to  look  upon,  and  suggestive 
of  pantomimes  and  burlesques,  hut  not  very  alarming  in  Avar,  1 
should  imagine.  Some  were  armed  with  spears,  some  with  bows 
and  arroAvs,  many  apparently  carried  only  a  little  ornamental  ban- 
ner on  a  tall  flagstaff.  The  most  dangerous-looking  Avarriors  were 
armed  with  rifles  of  preternatural  length,  very  much  taller  than 
themselves,  while  others  had  old  flintlock  guns,  suggestive  of 
medieval  Europe. 

Then  we  wandered  through  endless  crowded  dirty  streets  and 
markets,  Avhich  are  an  ever-ncAV  source  of  beAvilderment  and  de- 
light to  me.  One  of  the  special  industries  of  Amoy  is  the  manu- 
facture of  artificial  floAvers  for  the  adornment  of  ladies'  heads — 
not  realistic  tlowers  such  as  find  favour  with  us,  but  very  pretty 
fanciful  objects  in  silk  crape.  Here,  too,  artificial  floAvers  are  made 
specially  as  offerings  to  the  Imperial  dead.  Strange  to  say,  the 
simple  custom  of  scattering  floAvers  on  graves  is  here  a  royal  mon- 
opoly. Commoners  may  decorate  the  tombs  of  their  dead  with 
ornaments  of  Avhite  and  red  paper,  but  none,  except  they  be  of  the 
blood-royal,  dare  to  use  flowers,  ami  artificial  HoAvers  are  preferred 
to  natural  ones. 

Passing  through  the  busy  .streets,  I  observed  that  all  the  food- 
shops  Avere  diligently  preparing  red  cakes,  which  we  were  told 
were  "spring  cakes,"  and  huge  white  Avafer-cakes,  to  be  ottered  to 
the  sun.  These  are  made  by  dabbing  a  mass  of  paste  on  to  a  hot 
iron  plate,  to  which  enough  adheres  to  form  one  thin  scone,  which 
can  be  lifted  in  about  four  seconds. 

My  attention  was  specially  called  to  the  stalls  of  the  fish- 
mongers, Avho  not  only  have  river  and  sea  fish,  salt  and  fresh,  in 
great  abundance,  but  an  excellent  store  of  bamboo  oysters;  and  if 
you  wonder  what  they  are,  perhaps  I  may  as  avcII  explain  that 
artificial  oyster-culture  is  largely  practised  on  this  coast,  and  a 
bamboo  oyster-lield  is  prepared  far  more  carefully  than  a  Kentish 
hop-garden. 


86  FROM    HONG-KONG    TO    AMOY. 

Holes  are  bored  in  old  oyster-shells,  and  these  are  stuck  into 
and  on  to  pieces  of  split  bamboo,  about  two  feet  in  length,  which 
are  then  planted  quite  close  together,  on  mud-flats  between  high 
and  low  water  mark,  but  subject  to  strong  tidal  currents.  This  is 
supposed  to  bring  the  oyster  spat,  which  adheres  to  the  old  shells, 
and  shortly  develops  into  tiny  oysters.  Then  the  bamboos  are 
transplanted,  and  set  some  inches  apart,  and  within  six  months  of 
the  first  planting  they  are  found  to  be  covered  with  well-grown 
oysters,  which  are  then  collected  for  the  market.  Cockles  are  like- 
wise in  great  request,  and  I  am  told  that  they  are  also  artificially 
cultivated  on  the  muddy  flats  at  the  mouths  of  certain  rivers. 

The  oyster-shells  are  turned  to  very  good  account,  being  scraped 
down  till  they  are  as  thin  as  average  glass,  when  they  are  neatly 
fitted  together  so  as  to  form  ornamental  windows,  such  as  Ave  see 
in  the  inner  courts  of  wealthy  homes.1 

Of  course  we  went  into  various  temples,  in  one  of  which  I  was 
struck  by  an  image  of  Kwan-yin,  the  thousand-armed  Goddess  of 
Mercy,  in  which  this  attribute  is  depicted  by  the  fact  that  the 
golden  halo  within  which  she  stands  is  formed  of  a  thousand 
golden  hands. 

It  was  really  tantalising  not  to  be  able  to  explore  farther,  but 
as  time  and  steamers  wait  for-  no  man,  I  had  to  console  myself 
with  carrying  off  a  prize  of  exquisite  large  green  beetles  as  a 
memento  of  so  interesting  a  city. 

Note. — On  the  21st  November  1887,  on  a  calm  sunny  afternoon, 
the  peaceful  residents  on  Ku-lang-su  were  suddenly  startled  by  a 
deafening  roar,  the  isle  rocked  as  if  shaken  by  an  earthquake,  and 
almost  every  house  was  more  or  less  damaged ;  some  fell  in  ruins, 
and  few  escaped  shattered  doors  and  windows.  This  was  the  first 
intimation  which  residents  in  the  foreign  concession  received  of  the 
fact  that  since  the  scare  consequent  on  the  bombardment  of  Foo- 
Chow  by  the  French,  the  Chinese  had  established  a  powder-maga- 

1  We,  who  have  been  all  our  lives  accustomed  to  the  luxury  of  large  glass  win- 
dows, wonder  that  the  inventive  Chinaman  should  so  long  have  been  content  with 
the  dim  light  that  reaches  him  through  carved  wooden  lattice-work,  or,  at  best, 
through  tiny  panes  of  opaque  oyster-shells.  Yet  scarcely  three  centuries  have 
elapsed  since  glass  windows  were  in  Britain  deemed  so  precious  as  to  be  reserved 
for  churches,  and  rarely  found  a  place  even  in  the  homes  of  the  wealthy.  When 
they  did  so,  they  were  carefully  removed  whenever  the  family  was  absent,  and  were 
laid  up  in  store  till  their  return  !  But  ordinary  dwelling-houses  were  provided 
with  windows  of  lattice-work,  either  made  of  wicker  or  of  fine  rifts  of  oak  set 
check-wise  ;  while  delicate  persons,  who  feared  draughts,  indulged  in  the  luxury 
of  panels  of  horn  set  in  wooden  frames. 


EXPLOSION    AT    AMOY.  87 

zine  on  the  opposite  shore,  in  the  heart  of  a  populous  suhurh  of 
Amoy,  and  had  there  stored  400  tons  of  gunpowder  and  a  vast 
accumulation  of  ammunition  ! 

The  explosion  was  attributed  to  the  culpable  recklessness  of  the 
mandarin  in  charge,  who  was  in  the  habit  of  smoking  even  while 
on  duty  in  the  magazine.  On  the  day  in  question,  his  men  \vi  re- 
engaged in  drying  damp  gunpowder,  and  it  was  affirmed  that  even 
then  his  pipe  was  alight.  As  the  400  tons  of  gunpowder  ex- 
ploded, he  and  his  forty-eight  soldiers  were  so  effectually  blown  to 
pieces  that  coolies  had  to  be  employed  to  go  about  with  baskets, 
collecting  their  arms,  legs,  and  other  fragments.  Hundreds  of  the 
townspeople  were  seriously  injured,  either  by  the  concussion,  the 
falling  of  houses,  or  the  bursting  of  shells,  filled  with  four-pronged 
spikes  of  iron,  destined  for  invaders :  these  inflicted  horrible  lacer- 
ation. 

As  usual,  one  catastrophe  leads  to  another,  and  the  houses  in 
falling  scattered  fire,  which,  fanned  by  a  sharp  breeze,  spread 
rapidly,  resulting  in  the  destruction  of  fully  one-fourth  of  the 
city. 


CHAPTER    VI. 

OX     T  H  E     M  IX     HIVE  R. 

Amoy  to  Foo-Chow — Pagoda  Anchorage — Isle  of  Nantai — Foo-Chow — Bridge 
of  Ten  Thousand  Ages — Start  on  a  cruise — Life  in  a  house-boat — Ruined 
bridge  at  Kung-Kow — Orange-groves — On  the  Yuen-foo  river — The  mon- 
astery in  the  cave — Use  of  opera-glasses — Hot  springs — Magpies — China- 
man's Sing-Song — Ladies  in  a  Chinese  country-house — The  Yuen-ke  river 
—  The  island  joss-house — Cormorant-fishing — Fishing  with  otters — Cor- 
morants iu  England. 

United  states  Consulate, 
On  the  Green  I>li:  o»  Xantai,  Foo-Chow. 

I  left  Amoy  with  extreme  regret  that,  in  total  ignorance  of  its 
many  points  of  beauty  and  interest,  I  had  not  arranged  to  make  it 
a  halting-point,  and  thence  visit  the  beautiful  isle  of  Formosa, 
which  is  only  six  hours  distant,  and  all  plain  sailing.  I  had  nol 
realised  that  the  latter  was  so  near,  or  the  expedition  so  easy ;  and 
so,  though  I  was  most  hospitably  invited  to  stay  some  time  ai 
Amoy,  my  presence  of  mind  was  not  equal  to  so  sudden  an  altera- 


88  ON    THE    MIN    RIVER. 

tion  of  the  route  sketched  out  for  me.  I  try  to  console  myself  l»y 
thinking  thai  one  really  cannot  see  everything!  and,  indeed,  the 
beauty  of  this  district  is  most  satisfying. 

We  had  a  wry  lovely  passage  through  the  Hat  an  Straits, 
threading  our  course  between  numerous  rocky  islets  and  great  lum- 
bering junks,  which  sorely  try  the  patience  of  civilised  ships  by 
invariably  steering  just  the  way  they  should  not. 

Then  we  entered  the  Min  river,  and  had  a  beautiful  twenty- 
four  miles'  sail  from  the  sea  to  the  point  known  us  "The  Anchor- 
age,'-' passing  between  picturesque  islands  and  fine  crags,  with  a 
background  of  mountains  towering  to  a  height  of  about  4000  feet 
(the  sacred  Mount  Kushan  is  3900  feet),  and  to-night  all  were 
flushed  with  the  rosy  light  of  a  lovely  sunset. 

After  threading  one  last  narrow  channel  we  arrived  at  the  cele- 
brated Pagoda  Island,  above  which  lies  a  fertile  valley  about  ten 
miles  broad,  through  which  the  stream  flows  more  sluggishly  among 
sandy  shallows.  Therefore  all  vessels  of  large  tonnage  must  lie 
at  the  Anchorage,  about  twelve  miles  below  the  city — a  distance 
which,  from  accidents  of  wind  and  tide,  often  proves  a  serious  in- 
convenience to  the  little  colony  of  foreign  residents  who  are  here 
established,  consisting  chiefly  of  families  in  some  way  connected 
with  the  Arsenal  or  the  Naval  Training  College.  Certainly  the 
pleasures  of  social  life  are  dearly  bought  when  they  involve  such 
weary  hours  of  night  travel  by  chair  and  boat,  and  it  is  not  always 
possible  to  make  arrangements  for  sleeping  in  Foo-Chow,  or  rather 
on  Xantai,  which  is  the  island  suburb  on  which  foreigners  are  al- 
lowed to  live. 

A  steam-launch  had  been  sent  to  meet  us  at  the  Anchorage,  so 
Ave  were  happily  independent  of  capricious  breezes,  and  a  couple  of 
hours  brought  us  to  JXantai,  where  the  bishop  was  waiting  to  re- 
ceive Mrs  Burdon,  and  for  me  there  was  a  note  of  kindest  welcome 
from  Mrs  De  Lano,  wife  of  the  American  Consul,  who  had  sent 
her  own  chair  to  bring  me  to  the  U.S.  Consulate,  where  I  am  now 
most  comfortably  established. 

Thursday,  27tft  Feb. 

Nowhere  in  all  the  East  have  I  found  a  pleasanter  and  more 
genial  community  than  on  this  green  isle,  where  English  and  Scotch, 
German  and  American  residents  combine  to  form  such  a  kindly, 
cheery  society.  What  with  pleasant  visits  by  day.  and  dinner- 
parties and  private  theatricals  in  the  evenings,  I  think  I  must  al- 
ready have  made  acquaintance  with  a  very  large  portion  of  the 
community,  mercantile,   diplomatic,  and  missionary. 


PUNISHMENT    FOR   THEFT.  89 

I  have  not  yet  been  into  Foo-Chow  itself,  the  "  happy  city,"  as 
there  is  much  of  purely  Chinese  interest  to  be  seen  on  this  isle, 
and  the  city  lies  on  the  mainland,  on  the  left  bank  of  the  river. 
The  two  are  connected  by  a  wonderful  bridge,  rejoicing  in  the  name 
of  Wan-show-Keaou,  "the  Bridge  of  Ten  Thousand  Ages."  It  is 
about  a  third  of  a  mile  in  length,  a  distance  only  divided  by  one 
small  islet,  on  which  are  clustered  picturesque  houses.  The  bridge 
consists  of  a  solid  roadway  fourteen  feet  wide  of  enormous  slabs  of 
grey  granite,  some  of  which  are  forty-five  feet  in  length,  and  three 
feet  square.  They  rest  on  a  series  of  forty-nine  ponderous  piers, 
shaped  like  a  wedge  at  either  end.  These  also  are  built  of  huge 
granite  blocks,  which  fill  one  with  amazement  as  to  how  they  could 
possibly  have  been  hewn  and  transported  here  from  some  far-dis- 
tant mountain  quarry.  Forty  piers  support  the  main  bridge  be- 
tween the  mainland  and  the  islet.  The  other  nine  connect  the 
with  NantaL  Already  this  massive  bridge  has  resisted  the 
rushing  timber-laden  floods  of  nine  hundred  years,  and  still  it 
stands  firm  as  of  yore — no  sign  of  any  weak  point  in  that  wonder- 
ful structure,  unless  I  must  note,  as  such,  the  growth  of  several 
picturesque  self-sown  trees  which  have  been  suffered  to  take  root 
on  the  buttresses. 

A  high  stone  parapet  on  either  side  protects  the  crowds  who 
are  for  ever  crossing  and  recrossing  this  venerable  bridge.  As  if 
its  natural  traffic  were  not  sufficient,  a  number  of  street  stalls  are 
daily  established  on  one  side,  for  the  sale  of  curious  pipe-bowls, 
cakes,  and  cheap  objects  of  various  sorts.  Sometimes  a  more 
ghastly  object  is  here  exhibited,  namely,  the  head  of  some  decapi- 
tated criminal;  and,  not  long  ago,  a  wretched  thief,  having  been 
condemned  to  die  of  starvation  as  a  mild  sort  of  punishment  for 
stealing  part  of  a  head-dress  belonging  to  the  wife  of  a  wealthy 
mandarin,  was  here  exposed  in  an  upright  cage  with  only  his  head 
protruding,  and  so  nicely  calculated  as  to  height  that  he  literally 
hung  by  his  head,  only  his  toes  touching  the  ground.  On  his  cage 
was  fastened  a  paper  recounting  his  crime  and  his  sentence  ;  and 
idle  crowds  gathered  round  to  read  it,  and  to  watch  his  lingering 
hours  of  torture,  slowly  dying  beneath  the  fierce  blazing  sun,  which 
beat  so  pitilessly  on  his  shaven  head.  Women  and  children,  to 
whom  pity  or  horror  were  apparently  alike  unknown,  stood  staring 
curiously  at  the  poor  wretch,  till  merciful  death  came  to  his  relief. 

The  ceaseless  surging  tide  of  busy  life  moves  as  restlessly  be- 
neath the  bridge  as  above  it,  for  not  even  at  Canton  itself  have  I 
seen  a  greater  multitude  of  boats  of  all  shapes  and  Bizes.     Jusl 


90  ON    THE   MIN    RIVER. 

below  the  bridge  lie  a  multitude  of  extraordinarily  picturesque 

junks,  alike  startling  in  form  and  colour,  -while  above  the  bridge 
the  river  is  literally  covered  with  thousands  of  sampans,  and  all 
sorts  of  boats,  rafts,  barges  of  every  size,  and  with  every  sort  of 
cargo,  forming  a  fascinating  foreground  to  lovely  scenery. 

All  the  country  about  here  is  most  beautiful ;  but  I  am  told 
that  the  farther  one  goes  up  the  river,  the  more  attractive  it  be- 
comes, so  my  kind  hostess  has  arranged  a  delightful  ploy  for  me. 
Another  good  friend  has  placed  his  house-boat  and  crew  entirely  at 
our  disposal,  and  we  two  are  to  start  off  by  ourselves,  to-morrow  if 
possible,  and  see  all  we  can  !  I  consider  myself  singularly  fortun- 
ate in  my  companion,  for  though  she  has  lived  in  China  for  about 
twelve  years,  her  interest  in  all  things  peculiar  to  the  country  La 
just  as  keen  as  it  was  at  the  very  first,  so  she  is  full  of  sympathy 
with  all  my  sight-seeing  inquisitiveness  ! 

She  is  already  familiar  with  the  scenery  of  all  the  rivers  here- 
abouts, and  foresees  so  many  temptations  for  my  pencil  that  she 
has  armed  herself  with  a  whole  library  to  secure  her  against  im- 
patience !  Moreover,  she  knows  exactly  what  we  shall  require  in 
the  way  of  commissariat,  and  her  husband  being  absent  on  busi- 
ness, she  takes  her  own  excellent  Chinese  "  boy  "  and  cook,  both  of 
whom  understand  some  English ;  so  everything  will  be  comfortable 
for  our  trip. 

In  a  House-boat  on  the  Yuen-Foo  River, 
March  1st. 

We  are  fairly  started  on  what  promises  to  be  a  most  delightful 
expedition  for  about  a  hundred  miles  up  the  Min  river.  We  have 
rather  hurried  our  departure,  knowing  that  after  so  prolonged  a 
spell  of  lovely  weather  there  is  every  reason  to  expect  a  heavy  rain- 
fall ;  and  when  yesterday  morning  a  clear  yellow  sunrise,  which 
bathed  the  hills  in  the  loveliest  rosy  light,  was  followed  by  dark 
threatening  clouds,  we  began  to  fear  that  we  might  not  get  away  at 
all.  However,  there  is  nothing  like  making  a  start,  and  getting 
resolutely  under  way. 

Our  floating  home  is  one  of  those  luxurious  house-boats  which 
are  among  the  pleasantest  possessions  of  the  great  mercantile 
houses — the  Chinese  equivalent  of  a  good  four-in-hand,  which,  if 
less  exhilarating,  is  certainly  a  more  soothing  and  restful  mode  of 
locomotion  in  a  hot  climate.  Besides,  we  are  now  in  a  part  of  the 
world  where  carriages,  horses,  and  roads  are  unknown. 

These  house-boats  are  just  an  improved  version  of  the  regular 
flat-bottomed  boat  of  the  country,  but  they  are  fitted  up  with  a 


THE    FRENCH    AT    FOO-CHOW.  91 

good-sized  cabin,  with  windows  at  both  sides,  so  that  you  can  sit 
under  cover,  or  on  the  roof,  as  you  may  prefer.  There  is  also  a 
sleeping-cabin,  a  kitchen,  servants'  quarters,  and  cunningly  devised 
drawers  and  cupboards,  so  that  life  on  board  may  be  exceedingly 
comfortable.  I  need  scarcely  say  that  the  commissariat  has  not 
been  neglected.  Our  sole  escort  consists  of  sixteen  Chinamen — 
boatmen,  chair-coolies,  and  house-servants.  Our  chairs,  which  are 
comfortable  arm-chairs  of  bamboo-work  slung  on  bamboo  poles, 
are  hoisted  on  the  roof,  ready  for  use  whenever  we  choose  to  go 
ashore  for  any  lengthy  excursion.  The  bearers  are  strong  cheery 
lads,  all  dressed  in  dark-blue  blouses  and  wide  trousers,  with  enor- 
mous hats  of  plaited  bamboo,  and  most  serviceable  rain-coats  and 
capes  of  some  grass  fibre  dyed  of  a  rich  madder  colour.  Of  course, 
they  all  have  long  black  plaits  reaching  very  nearly  down  to  their 
bare  feet.  These  are  our  human  ponies,  ready  to  carry  us  any- 
where at  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night,  and  to  run  messages 
between  whiles,  or  hold  a  sketching  umbrella,  or  whatever  other 
service  may  be  required  of  them.  "We  each  have  two  permanently, 
and  engage  others  for  the  day  if  we  chance  to  be  going  far. 

"We  embarked  yesterday  afternoon,  and  dropped  down  the  river 
about  twelve  miles  to  the  Pagoda  Anchorage,  where  we  spent  a 
pleasant  social  evening  with  many  friends — Scotch,  French,  and 
Norwegian 1 — returning  to  sleep  on  board.      That  was  not  pleasant ! 

i  The  kindly  colony  of  foreign  residents  lived  peacefully  at  the  Anchorag 
the  Arsenal  till  the  22d  August  1884,  when  the  French  under  Admiral  C'ourbet 
having,  without  any  declaration  of  war,  sailed  up  the  Min  river  with  a  squadron  of 
nine  heavily  armed  vessels,  suddenly  proceeded  to  bombard  the  Arsenal,  nominally 
to  avenge  what  they  declared  to  be  a  deed  of  treachery  in  the  war  at  Bac  Le. 

Tin' Chinese  fleet,  which  consisted  of  eleven  light  gunboats  and  transports,  was 
shelled,  and  maintained  a  desultory  fire  for  about  fifteen  minutes,  when  the  sur- 
vivors of  tin-  crews  leapt  overboard,  but  the  combat  was  practically  finished  in 
seven  minutes.  The  '  Times  '  stated  that  the  superior  artillery  of  the  French  made 
the  contest,  after  the  disabling  of  the  Chinese  vessels,  no  fight — it  was  a  massacre. 
No  surrender  was  allowed  to  the  disabled  and  sinking  vessels ;  they  were  shelled 
for  hours  after  the  guns  had  been  silenced.  The  firing  was  also  continued  upon 
the  Arsenal,  and  the  neighbouring  buildings,  forts,  barracks,  and  even  villages,  for 
more  than  two  hours  after  the  shore  batteries  had  ceased  to  offer  any  resistance. 
Burning  gunboats  and  blazing  fire-junks  floated  down  the  stream,  as  did  al80 
frightful  number  of  dead  and  wounded. 

Subsequent  private  letters  from  Foo-Chow  gave  the  native  estimate  of  the  Chinese 
massacred  on  that  day  at  yoiK),  while  by  the  destruction  of  the  Arsenal  1800  work- 
men were  deprived  of  the  means  of  living.  Small  wonder  that  the  enraged  BoldierS 
should  have  looted  the  houses  and  destroyed  the  furniture  of  the  foreign  residents 
at  the  Anchorage,  and  that  all  dwellers  on  Nantai  should  have  continued  for  a 
while  in  fear  of  their  lives,  not  knowing  at  what  moment  they  might  all  have  been 
the  victims  of  what  might  well  have  seemed  most  just  vengeance  in  the  ey< 
populace  who  so  rarely  see  a  Frenchman  that  they  could  scarcely  be  expected  to 
recognise  differences  of  nationality.  For  though  Frenchmen  were  employed  by  the 
Chinese  Government  at  the  Arsenal,  France  actually  has  nut  a  single  mercantile 
house  at  Foo-Chow,  so  that  her  interests  there  are  nil  as  compared  with  those  of  the 


92  ON    THE    .MIX    RIVER. 

We  had  a  weary  night,  shaken  l»y  wind  and  rain.     Several  Chinese 

gunboats  lay  near,  gaily  decked  -with  streamers  and  bright  red  ban- 
ners in  honour  of  some  native  festival.  It  does  look  so  odd  to 
see  Chinese  blue-jackets  in  correct  nautical  costume,  but  adorned 
with  full-length  black  plaits — and  yet  our  own  sailors  of  the  last 
generation  had  not  only  to  wear  queues,  but,  moreover,  to  keep 
them  powdered ! 

March  has  come  in,  true  to  its  boisterous  reputation,  very  cold 
and  very  grey,  but  with  a  wind  which  sent  us  flying  up  the  Yuen- 
foo  branch  of  the  river — you  understand  that  some  miles  above 
Foo-Chow  this  great  river  Min  separates  into  two  streams,  and 
the  divided  waters  unite  again  fifteen  miles  lower  down,  thus  form- 
ing the  island  of  Nantai.  Pagoda  Island  and  the  Anchorage  are 
at  the  junction  of  the  streams. 

Sight-seeing  and  sketching  being  our  sole  objects,  we  halted  off 
the  village  of  Luichow  (famous  for  its  great  orange-groves)  to 
sketch  the  magnificent  group  of  mountains  known  as  "  The  Five 
Tigers  " — the  curly-roofed  houses  peeping  from  the  dark  foliage  of 
the  orange-groves,  forming  a  charming  foreground  to  the  majestic 
crags  which  crest  these  hills,  which  to-day  were  enfolded  in  solemn 
gloom.  The  scenery  about  here  is  lovely :  there  are  deep  gorges 
and  picturesque  little  tumbling  streams,  quaint  temples  perched  on 
steep  cliffs,  horse-shoe-shaped  graves,  here,  there,  and  everywhere 
in  the  prettiest  situations,  cultivated  valleys  where  populous  vil- 
lages lie  hidden  amid  clumps  of  fruit-bearing  trees,  such  as  mul- 
berry, walnut,  loquot,  and  peach-trees  —  and  withal,  there  is  an 
ever-varying  background  of  mountains,  rising  to  a  height  of  about 
3000  feet. 

"We  called  a  second  halt  off  the  village  of  Kung-kow,  to  sketch 
some  fine  old  trees,  together  with  the  very  remarkable  ruins  of  a 
great  stone  bridge  of  similar  construction  to  that  which,  crossing 
the  main  river,  connects  the  isle  of  Nantai  with  the  city  of  Foo- 

nations  whose  larger  commercial  relations  she  has  imperilled  ;  indeed  at  Hong-Kong 
she  owns  only  one  mercantile  house,  at  Canton  two,  and  at  Shanghai  five,  whereas 
Germany  had  62,  and  England  had  289  till  the  steady  decrease  of  Chinese  trade 
with  foreign  countries  reduced  this  number  to  about  220.  It  is  worthy  of  note  that 
of  23,863  ships  which  entered  Chinese  ports  in  1883,  ujnvards  of  14,200  were 
English,  1610  German,  and  only  177  French. 

So  nothing  could  have  been  more  natural  than  that  the  literati  (a  class  notorious 
for  their  abhorrence  of  foreigners)  should  have  stirred  up  the  mob  to  an  indiscrimi- 
nate crusade  against  the  whole  lot  of  "  Red-Headed  Devils." 

As  it  was,  so  great  was  the  excitement  of  the  people  against  all  foreigners,  that 
at  the  close  of  the  year  it  was  still  dangerous  tor  any  to  enter  the  city  ;  and  even 
the  British  Consul,  whose  well-known  Chinese  sympathies  and  long  residence  in 
the  heart  of  the  city  have  made  him  so  familiar  to  the  people,  was  compelled  one 
night  to  escape  thence  disguised  as  a  Chinaman,  his  life  being  in  danger. 


CHINESE    BRIDGE-BUILDING.  93 

Chow  ;  but  whereas  that  is  only  about  a  third  of  a  mile  in  length, 
this  must  have  been  considerably  longer — truly  a  marvellous  under- 
taking, where  (the  building  of  arches  having  apparently  been  a 
science  unknown  to  the  original  constructors)  gigantic  slabs  of 
granite,  some  of  which  are  forty  feet  in  length,  have  been  trans- 
ported and  laid  across  the  piers.  As  a  Chinaman  cannot  conceive 
the  possibility  of  any  improvement  on  the  traditions  of  his  ances- 
tors, he  still  religiously  adheres  to  their  method  of  bridge-building 
as  regards  these  great  rivers,  though  there  are  wonderfully  arched 
bridges  across  the  canals. 

A  friend  of  mind  had  the  luck  to  witness  the  mode  of  placing 
one  of  these  monster  slabs  when  it  was  necessary  to  repair  the 
damage  done  by  a  great  flood.  It  was  a  granite  slab,  28  feet  in 
length  by  about  6  in  width  and  3  in  depth.  The  boat  on  which 
the  huge  stone  had  been  floated  down  stream  was  raised  above  the 
water-level  by  the  insertion  below  her  of  layers  of  barrels.  The 
builders  had  exactly  calculated  the  height  of  a  certain  high  tide, 
and  when  the  right  moment  came,  the  boat  slipped  between  the 
two  newly  repaired  piers,  slid  the  stone  into  its  place,  and  passed 
on  in  safety,  minus  its  cargo  ! 

At  Kung-kow  we  diverged  from  the  main  river,  that  we  might 
ascend  the  Yuen-foo  for  some  distance,  and  now  we  are  anchored 
for  the  night  off  a  beautiful  rocky  glen,  where  among  huge  boul- 
ders of  red  rock  there  stands  a  very  home-like  watermill  with  a 
very  large  wheel.  In  the  glen  there  is  a  pretty  waterfall,  and 
familiar  ferns  and  brambles  mingle  with  tall  flowering-grasses,  and 
thickets  of  jessamine  and  bright  scarlet  dwarf  azaleas.  We  had 
just  time  for  a  run  ashore  at  sunset,  while  the  nun  were  enjoying 
their  mountains  of  rice  and  dried  fish. 

March  5th. 

On  the  whole,  we  may  certainly  congratulate  ourselves  on  the 
weather  so  far,  as,  instead  of  the  incessant  rain  prophesied  by  our 
friends,  we  have  only  had  passing  showers,  with  occasional  storm- 
clouds  and  shadows,  which  just  enable  us  to  judge  how  much 
grander  these  glens  and  peaks  appear  in  gloom  than  when  seen  in 
cloudless  sunlight.  Two  nights  ago  we  anchored  at  the  mouth  of 
a  dark  gorge,  where,  on  a  high  crag,  stands  an  old  pirate's  fort — 
a  very  eerie  nest  for  tin;  bird  of  prey!  Each  turn  of  the  river  i- 
lovely,  fringed  here  and  their  with  clumps  of  feathery  bamboo. 
Picturesque  fir-trees  stand  out  singly  or  in  clusters  on  prominent 
headlands;  the  quaintesl  of  temples  and  pagodas  are  perched  on 


94  ON    THE    MIN    RIVER. 

perpendicular  dills;  shapely  peaks  rise  above  the  floating  mists, 
tier  above  tier,  in  beautiful  groups,  and  the  whole  is  reflected  in  the 
glassy  stream,  whereon  float  quaint  native  boats,  with  their  arched 
sliding  covers,  great  brown  sails,  bamboo-ribbed,  and  Bteered  by  a 
gigantic  oar  astern.  The  crews  are  particularly  picturesque  in 
stormy  weather,  when  they  wear  greatcoats  of  long  grass,  with 
capes  of  the  same,  and  strong  bamboo  hats,  so  that  each  man  is 
not  only  thatched  but  is  a  moving  pillar  of  grass,  supported  by 
two  bare  legs ! 

Last  night  we  reached  a  point  where  the  river  rushes  down  in 
such  impetuous  rapids  that  no  ordinary  boat,  much  less  a  house- 
boat, can  ascend.  As  we  were  anxious  to  visit  an  interesting 
Buddhist  monastery  some  miles  up  the  stream,  we  were  obliged  to 
transfer  ourselves  from  our  floating  home  to  a  flat-bottomed  boat 
specially  constructed  for  this  work,  and  a  dozen  men  worked  hard 
for  three  hours,  rowing  us  up  this  difficult  part  of  the  stream.  We 
halted  for  a  while  that  I  might  sketch  an  exceedingly  picturescpie 
village  with  unusually  curly  roofs,  then  on  once  more  through  lovely 
scenery  till  we  reached  another  pretty  village,  with  a  fine  banyan- 
tree  in  the  street,  overshadowing  the  temple.  Here  we  and  our 
chairs  were  landed,  and  carried  about  three  miles  along  narrow 
paths,  between  swampy  rice-fields  and  other  crops,  all  exquisitely 
green,  while  the  brilliant  yellow  blossom  of  the  rape  shone  like 
sunlight.  (Butter  being  an  unknown  or  unappreciated  luxury, 
large  crops  of  rape  are  grown  to  supply  oil  for  cooking.) 

Rice,  by  the  way,  is  not  sown  broadcast,  but  every  here  and 
there  one  field  is  thickly  sown  to  serve  as  a  nursery.  "When  this 
sprouts  it  forms  a  patch  of  most  marvellously  vivid  green,  and  the 
young  rice  is  then  transplanted  in  basket-loads,  and  dibbled  by 
hand  into  the  neighbouring  fields  of  wet  mud. 

On  reaching  the  foot  of  the  mountains,  we  left  our  chairs  and 
walked  up  a  richly-wooded  dell  with  luxuriant  vegetation,  here 
and  there  enlivened  by  a  patch  of  the  beautiful  dwarf  scarlet  azalea 
or  the  white  stars  of  fragrant  jessamine.  I  am  told  that  in  autumn 
this  glen  is  gorgeous  with  crimson  lilies  and  gloxinias,  also  that  the 
single  gardenia  flowers  here  abundantly. 

A  steep  ascent  brought  us  to  the  Yuen-foo  Buddhist  monastery, 
the  first  glimpse  of  which  is  singularly  picturesque,  though  it 
somehow  suggested  to  me  the  idea  of  a  hermit-crab  looking  out  of 
its  borrowed  shell,  with  all  its  long  sharp  claws  extended.  For  it 
consists  of  a  cluster  of  wooden  buildings,  just  like  Swiss  chalets. 
nestling  into  a  cave  on  the  face  of  a  crag,  and  partly  resting  on 


BUDDHIST    MONASTERY   AT    YUEN-FOO.  95 

slender  piles  ;  and  I  suspect  that,  just  as  a  wandering  crab  out- 
grows its  shell,  so  here  probably  some  saintly  hermit  first  found 
a  retreat,  to  which  his  sanctity  may  have  attracted  others  for 
whom  the  cave  proved  too  small,  for  the  new-comers  had  to  sup- 
port their  outermost  buildings  on  a  light  scaffolding  of  tall  poles 
of  very  irregular  length,  resting  wherever  a  jutting  angle  of 
rock  aifords  a  vantage-point,  and  giving  the  whole  a  most  singular 
effect. 

From  the  summit  of  the  crag  falls  a  stream,  which,  lightly  veil- 
ing this  curious  cave-dwelling,  vanishes  among  feathery  clumps 
of  tall  bamboo,  and  rushes  impetuously  down  the  beautiful  glen. 

The  yellow-robed  brethren  received  us  most  courteously,  and 
not  only  gave  us  the  invariable  tea  but  also  a  taste  of  the  Water 
of  Life  (or,  at  least,  of  Longevity),  which  drips  from  one  of  the 
many  stalactites  which  fringe  the  roof  of  the  cave,  forming  a 
sparkling  pool  before  the  rock  shrine  of  Buddha  and  the  Goddess 
of  Mercy.  In  order  to  derive  full  benefit  from  this  magic  water, 
it  is  necessary  to  stand  open-mouthed  beneath  the  drip  and  catch 
the  drops  as  they  fall.  For  culinary  purposes  the  monks  have 
devised  a  most  ingenious  water-supply,  by  simply  leading  a  rope 
from  a  bamboo  trough  at  the  kitchen-door  to  that  point  of  the 
overhanging  crag  whence  the  bright  streamlet  leaps  from  its  upper 
channel,  falling  in  glittering  spray  into  the  gorge  below. 

There  is  nothing  remarkable  about  the  shrine,  which  is  chiefly 
interesting  for  its  situation,  but  the  view  from  the  monastery  is 
magnificent.  The  priests  were  much  interested  in  my  sketching, 
and  especially  delighted  with  my  opera-glasses,  which,  though 
small,  are  very  powerful :  they  are  the  trusty  companions  of  many 
wanderings,  and  have  proved  a  never-failing  means  of  fraternising 
with  individuals  or  with  crowds,  in  whatever  country  I  have 
chanced  to  be.  I  sometimes  think  with  wonder  how  many 
thousand  eyes  of  many  nationalities  have  had  their  first — probably 
their  only — experience  of  opera-glasses  in  this  little  pair  ! 

Nowhere  have  they  been  more  appreciated  than  in  this  country, 
for  though  the  Chinese  have  such  extraordinary  reverence  for 
everything  of  the  nature  of  writing  or  drawing  that  the  use  of 
pencil  and  paper  seems  at  once  to  secure  their  respect,  I  always 
find  that  the  crowd  become  doubly  polite  so  soon  as  the  precious 
glasses  begin  to  circulate.  Then  they  are  pleased  and  astonished, 
and  the  glasses  are  carefully  handed  all  round.  I  confess  a  qualm 
has  sometimes  crossed  my  mind  when  1  have  altogether  lost  sight 
of  them  for  some  time,  but  they  have  always  been  returned  safely 


90  ON    THE    MIN    RIVER. 

with  expressions  of  keen  delight,  and  I  am  sure  the  people  are  all 
the  more  friendly  for  being  trusted. 

"We  had  to  retrace  our  steps  pretty  soon  in  order  to  get  down 
the  rapids  by  daylight.  This,  of  course,  was  very  much  easier 
work  than  the  ascent  had  heen,  and  we  found  ourselves  safe  on 
board  this  cosy  floating  home  soon  after  sunset. 

On  the  Yuen-Foci  River,  March'. 

Yesterday,  as  we  dropped  slowly  down  stream,  I  secured 
sketches  of  several  lovely  comhinations  of  temples  on  crags,  vil- 
lages, graves,  and  bamboos,  with  ever-changing  visions  of  dark 
mountain-ridges  and  lofty  peaks  revealing  themselves  dreamily 
from  amid  the  floating  mists. 

To-day  we  halted  at  a  village  known  as  "  The  Hot  Springs," 
which,  as  seen  from  the  river,  with  a  background  of  fine  wooded 
hills,  is  extremely  pretty.  All  along  the  shore  a  series  of  flights 
of  rude  stone  stairs  lead  up  the  steep  broken  bank,  where  pictur- 
esque yellow  or  red  houses,  with  very  eccentric  curly  grey  roofs, 
peep  out,  beneath  fine  old  banyan-trees,  with  gnarled  white  stems, 
far-reaching  boughs,  fringed  with  brown  filaments  and  great  con- 
torted roots  entwined  like  huge  serpents,  and  reaching  far  down 
the  broken  banks.  But  the  village  itself  is  very  dull,  each  house 
being  enclosed  by  a  high  wall  to  secure  seclusion. 

Mrs  De  Lano  being  tired,  I  went  ashore  with  the  excellent  skip- 
per "  Sam  "  (I  believe  Sam  is  the  generic  name  of  all  house-boat 
skippers  !)  in  order  to  visit  the  three  boiling  springs  which  give 
the  village  its  name.  They  are  distant  about  a  mile,  rising  in  a 
small  plain  beside  a  cold  river,  and  you  can  scald  one  side  of  your 
hand  and  freeze  the  other  where  these  waters  meet.  !Never  before 
have  I  seen  such  a  multitude  of  magpies — I  actually  counted  a 
flock  of  forty ! 

A  great  festival  is  being  held  here  in  honour  of  the  full  moon, 
and  the  village  is  crowded  with  people  in  holiday  attire.  There 
has  been  a  Sing-Song  going  on  all  day  at  the  temple — i.e.,  a  play 
in  honour  of  the  goddess.  As  the  Moon  typifies  the  female  prin- 
ciple in  nature  (the  Sun,  represented  by  fire,  symbolising  the  male 
principle),  there  was  a  most  unusual  attendance  of  women,  fully 
half  the  spectators  being  of  the  fair  sex.  They  do  not  mix  with 
the  men — that  would  be  most  indecorous — but  each  occupies  one- 
half  of  the  house.  Each  woman  carries  a  wooden  stool  to  enable 
her   to  sit  through  the  livelong  day  and  most  of  the  night.     By 


HAIR-DEESSING.  97 

way  of  refreshment-stalls,  men  were  stationed  outside  the  temple 
selling  "  sweeties,"  consisting  chiefly  of  a  sort  of  almond  hard-bake 
made  of  pea-nuts  and  sugar. 

On  the  men's  side,  all,  without  exception,  were  dressed  alike, 
forming  one  compact  mass  of  blue.  On  the  women's  side  there 
was  some  variety  of  colour,  though  not  very  much.  Though  all 
present  were  apparently  poor  peasants,  they  were  neatly  clothed 
and  very  clean ;  their  glossy  black  hair  most  elaborately  dressed, 
and  decorated  not  only  with  the  usual  artificial  flowers  of  silk  and 
ornamental  pins,  but  also  with  a  quaint  horn  of  silver  or  lead, 
rising  upright  from  the  back  hair  and  curving  forward  to  some 
height  above  the  brow.  Some  wore  pretty  ornaments  of  real 
silver,  some  of  most  fascinating  many-coloured  enamel,  but  the 
majority  had  decorations  of  exquisite  blue  or  green  kingfishers' 
feathers  daintily  set  in  silver,  or  on  some  metal  representing  gold. 
There  seems  to  be  no  end  to  the  varieties  of  feminine  hair- 
dressing  in  China,  and  each  district  has  its  own  peculiar  style. 
That  of  Foo-Chow  is  wholly  unlike  that  of  Canton,  and  this  again 
is  dissimilar  to  either.  As  it  is  not  considered  correct  for  a  woman 
to  wear  any  sort  of  head-covering,  there  is  every  opportunity  for 
noting  these  distinct  fashions. 

The  frightfully  discordant  sounds  of  Chinese  music,  of  course, 
attracted  me  towards  the  temple,  and  Sam  decided  that  I  must 
certainly  see  the  Chinamen's  Sing-Song;  but  he  begged  that  I 
would  take  my  hat  off,  as  in  such  a  rural  district,  where  foreign 
eccentricities  were  not  understood,  the  ladies  present  Avould  be 
sure  to  make  uncivil  remarks  !  Of  course  I  meekly  complied,  and 
for  some  time  watched  a  very  amusing  scene.  It  is  a  large  troupe, 
consisting  exclusively  of  men  and  boys,  the  latter  acting  the  femi- 
nine characters  to  perfection,  with  the  aid  of  paint  and  masks  and 
beautiful  dresses.  We  saw  kings  and  courtiers,  cutting  off  of 
heads,  and  a  battle  scene,  with  most  realistic  fighting  and  flashing 
of  gunpowder.  (Do  you  know  that  the  Chinese  are  supposed  1" 
have  discovered  gunpowder  long  before  it  was  known  in  Europe?) 
I  could  not  stand  the  crowd  and  the  noise  for  very  long,  so 
returned  on  board;  and  now  the  servants  and  most  of  the  boatmen 
are  having  an  evening  ashore,  and  from  the  roar  of  voices  and 
hideous  discords  of  all  sorts,  we  suppose  that  they  are  holding 
high  revels  in  honour  of  the  Queen  of  Heaven.  We  think  we  do 
her  more  honour,  and  certainly  have  more  enjoyment  of  her  calm 
beauty,  sitting  peacefully  on  deck,  and  drinking  in  the  lovelim 
the  still  night. 

G 


98  ON    THE    MIX    RIVER. 

March  Sth. 

Judging  from  oui  national  impressions  of  "Jack  ashore,"  we 
were  half  afraid  that  the  crew  would  have  returned  somewhat  the 
worse  for  their  evening  revel,  hut  this  happily  was  not  the  case, 
and  there  was  no  delay  in  our  start  this  morning.  "We  got  under 
way  at  5  a.m.  in  the  lovely  dawn,  while  light  mists  floated  about 
the  hills.  We  were  anxious  to  reach  the  village  of  Yuen-kee,  on 
the  island  of  Nantai,  in  order  to  send  the  coolies  three  miles  across 
the  island  to  fetch  our  letters,  and  rejoin  us  to-morrow  with  a 
fresh  stock  of  provisions,  ere  we  proceed  up  the  main  stream  of  the 
Min  river. 

Our  boatmen  profited  by  the  halt  to  get  well  shaved  and 
scraped  (i.e.,  the  front  half  of  their  heads),  and  devoted  the  after- 
noon to  combing  and  plaiting  the  splendid  long  black  back- hair 
which  forms  what  we  vulgarly  term  their  pig-tail,  but  which  cer- 
tainly more  resembles  a  well-developed  cow's  tail ! 

I  went  ashore  with  one  man  as  escort,  and  Avandered  over  fir- 
clad  hills,  all  dotted  over  with  thousands  of  horse-shoe-shaped 
graves  cut  into  the  hill  and  built  of  stone :  some  are  very  large 
and  handsome,  and  guarded  by  curious  stone  animals.  I  inspected 
some  artificial  fish-tanks,  the  lowest  of  which  is  periodically  drained 
by  means  of  an  endless  chain  of  buckets,  worked  by  a  treadmill. 
This  is  a  method  of  moving  Avater  very  commonly  used  for  pur- 
poses of  irrigation,  and  the  oddest  thing  about  it  is  that  the  owners 
carry  home  all  their  buckets  and  chains  every  night,  lest  their 
neighbours  should  steal  them  ! 

Near  the  village  stands  an  exceedingly  old  tumble-down  temple, 
with  a  multitude  of  halls,  shrines,  and  altars,  but  all  were  deserted 
save  by  one  very  old  priest,  who  offered  me  the  only  luxury  he 
possessed,  in  the  form  of  cigarettes.  I  ventured  to  offer  him  a 
coin  of  the  value  of  a  shilling,  and  he  seemed  quite  delighted.  He 
seems  to  do  all  the  praying  for  the  village,  and  always  keeps  the 
lamps  burning  before  the  great  altar.  But  the  gods,  which  are 
many  and  hideous,  are  all  coated  with  the  accumulated  dust  and 
dirt  of  many  years,  apparently  beyond  his  powers  of  cleansing,  and 
by  no  means  suggestive  of  popular  reverence. 

The  people,  numbering  many  hundreds,  were  all  on  the  shore, 
dredging  sand  from  the  river-bed.  Of  course  they  were  all  dressed 
in  blue,  for  in  China  only  the  exceptionally  extravagant  few  in- 
dulge in  more  expensive  dyes ;  and  what  with  the  many  shades  of 
blue  crowds,  blue  mountains,  and  blue  river  sands,  the  colouring 
was  singularly  harmonious  and  agreeable. 


AGRICULTURAL    LIFE.  99 

"When  the  barbers  had  finished  their  work,  and  the  crew  had 
enjoyed  a  gossip  with  some  of  their  friends,  they  poled  us  to  the 
mouth  of  the  river,  whence  the  night  tide  took  us  up  to  the  village 
of  Kung-kow  (where  we  had  halted  on  the  first  day  to  sketch  the 
ruined  bridge),  and  where  we  are  now  anchored  for  the  night. 


I  woke  to  see  a  red  moon  set  behind  purple  hills  to  westward, 
while  the  red  sun  rose  from  behind  the  eastern  range.  It  was  a 
very  grand  scene.  In  order  to  profit  by  the  lovely  morning,  we 
took  the  gig  and  rowed  up  a  small  stream  to  a  mandarin's  house, 
which  Sam  thoughl  we  ought  to  visit.  Fortunately  the  great  man 
was  absent,  so  his  women-folk  had  no  scruples  about  being  seen ; 
and  we  were  most  hospitably  entertained  by  his  old  mother,  his 
wives,  and  a  crowd  of  other  women,  who  gave  us  tea,  and  examined 
us  and  our  clothes  with  a  minute  interest  which  was  quite  recip- 
rocal, for  while  they  were  much  amused  by  our  grey  and  scarlet 
knitted  under-petticoats,  Ave  were  equally  occupied  in  admiring 
their  pretty  white  trousers  daintily  embroidered  in  colour.  I  think 
they  are  peculiar  to  this  district,  but  am  not  sure,  not  having  pre- 
viously ventured  on  prosecuting  my  researches  further  than  the 
exquisitely  embroidered  plaited  skirts  and  bright-coloured  under- 
petticoats,  also  plaited  and  embroidered. 

Having  taken  leave  most  ceremoniously,  we  left  the  boat  to 
return  empty,  while  we  made  our  way  back  to  the  village  by  nar- 
row paths  between  swampy  rice -fields,  which  patient  men  and 
buffaloes  were  ploughing  knee-deep  in  mud  with  wooden  ploughs. 
Equally  uninviting  seemed  to  me  the  toil  of  the  women  engaged  in 
grubbing  for  water- chestnuts,  which  also  involves  working  knee- 
deep  in  mud — a  hateful  task,  and  very  ill  remunerated,  five  cents 
being  a  full  day's  wage.  "We  explored  another  deserted  old  temple 
with  many  dusty  shrines  and  dilapidated  idols. 

At  every  group  of  houses  we  passed,  people  came  out  to  inter- 
view- us  and  invite  us  to  enter;  all  were  most  civil.  Everywhere 
we  noticed  that  they  were  weaving  grass-cloth.  It  proved  rather 
a  tedious  walk,  and  we  were  glad  when  we  got  back  to  the  great 
banyan-trees,  where  I  stood  on  stepping-stones  in  the  mud  t" 
secure  a  last  sketch,  which  Sam  protected  with  a  large  paper 
umbrella,  as  it  had  begun  to  rain,  which  caused  our  numerous 
blue-clothed  followers  to  cower  among  the  great  wide-spreading 
roots — and  very  picturesque  they  looked.     We  also  had  a  lovely 


100  ON    THE    MIX    RIVER. 

view  of  Hi"  Ponding  Peaks,  heaped  up  one  above  the  other,  range 
beyond  range  Moreover,  all  along  these  .shores  there  are  immense 
orange  and  other  orchards,  so  that  from  every  hillock  you  look 
down  on  rich  fruit  or  corn  land.  The  said  hillocks  are  generally 
crowned  wilh  line  old  fir-trees. 

Sonic  fishers,  both  men  and  -women,  were  drawing  a  seine-net 
very  near  us,  so  we  hailed  them  and  bought  a  quantity  of  delicate 
little  fish  like  transparent  eels,  which  proved  a  dainty  breakfast. 

Presently  the  servant  and  coolies,  wdio  had  been  sent  to  the 
Consulate  for  our  letters  and  fresh  supplies,  arrived  well  laden,  and 
we  then  returned  to  the  point  whence  we  started  yesterday,  and 
where  the  sand-dredgers  were  still  working  like  a  busy  ant-hill. 
Then  Ave  sailed  a  little  way  up  the  Yuen-ke  river,  and  anchored 
beside  a  small  rocky  isle,  on  which  is  perched  a  very  pretty  temple, 
coloured  crimson,  with  grey  curved  roofs  and  wide  overhanging 
balconies  ;  also  a  tall,  many-storeyed  yellow  pagoda.  A  couple  of 
fine  old  trees  have  contrived  to  root  themselves  in  the  crevices  of 
the  rock,  their  dark  foliage  and  white  stems  completing  a  charming 
picture,  which  is  faithfully  mirrored  in  the  still  waters.  Add  to 
this  a  background  of  steep  river-banks  crested  with  old  banyans 
and  other  timber,  steep  stone  steps  leading  up  to  quaint  houses, 
and  beyond  these  fir-crowned  hills  all  dotted  with  horse-shoe  graves. 
And  far  up  the  river  lie  the  beautiful  blue  mountains. 

As  for  foreground,  wherever  we  halt  there  is  an  ever-varying 
combination  of  most  sketchable  boats  of  all  sorts,  with  odd,  mov- 
able roofs,  great  sails  of  grass  or  bamboo,  and  passengers  in  huge 
hats  and  large  paper  umbrellas. 

"We  landed  on  the  rocky  isle,  and  were  welcomed  by  a  very 
courteous  old  priest,  who  did  the  honours  of  the  cleanest  temple  I 
have  seen  in  China.  Everything  about  it  is  pretty,  both  inside 
and  out.  The  principal  shrine  is  to  the  Goddess  of  Mercy,  with 
the  young  child  in  her  arms,  flowers  and  lights  on  the  altar,  and 
rosaries  for  the  use  of  worshippers.  I  did  covet  a  charming  image 
of  the  goddess  in  white  porcelain,  and  especially  a  picture  in 
colours  with  halo  of  gold,  exactly  like  a  fine  medieval  saint.  I 
observe,  however,  that  Buddhist  saints  are  generally  represented 
with  each  foot  resting  on  a  water-lily,  instead  of  carrying  a  lily  in 
the  hand. 

The  priest  gave  us  tea,  and  when  we  had  returned  to  our  boat 
he  sent  me  a  present  of  two  very  quaint  prints  of  mythological 
subjects.  We  had  no  suitable  gifts  to  offer  him,  so  ventured  to 
send  a  dollar  as  a  "  kumsha,"  which  was  graciously  accepted. 


CORMORANT    FISHING.  101 

Here,  and  at  various  other  places,  I  have  been  much  amused  1  iy 
watching  carefully -trained  cormorants  fishing  at  the  bidding  of 
their  masters.  They  are  here  called  Lu-tze  or  Yu-ying — i.e.,  fish- 
hawk.  The  simplest  form  of  fishery  is  when  a  poor  fisherman  has 
constructed  for  himself  a  raft  consisting  only  of  from  four  to  eight 
bamboos  lashed  together.  On  this  he  sits  poised  (crowned  with  a 
large  straw  hat),  and  before  him  are  perched  half-a-dozen  of  these 
odd  uncanny-looking  black  birds  waiting  Ids  command.  The  cage 
in  which  they  live  and  the  basket  in  which  he  stores  his  fish  com- 
plete his  slender  stock-in-trade.  The  marvel  is  how  he  contrives 
to  avoid  overturning  his  frail  raft. 

Sometimes  several  fishers  form  partnership,  and  start  a  co-oper- 
ative business.  They  invest  in  a  shallow  punt,  and  a  regiment  of 
perhaps  twenty  or  more  of  these  solemn  sombre  birds  sit  on 
perches  at  either  end  of  the  punt,  each  having  a  lumpen  cord 
fastened  round  the  throat  just  below  the  pouch,  to  prevent  its 
swallowing  any  fish  it  may  catch.  Then,  at  a  given  signal,  all  the 
cormorants  glide  into  the  water,  apparently  well  aware  of  the 
disadvantage  of  scaring  their  prey. 

Their  movements  below  the  surface  are  very  swift  and  graceful 
as  they  dart  in  pursuit  of  a  fish  or  an  eel,  and  giving  it  a  nip 
with  their  strong  hooked  beak,  swallow  it,  and  continue  hunting. 
Sometimes  they  do  not  return  to  the  surface  till  they  have  secured 
several  fish,  and  their  capacious  pouch  is  quite  distended,  and 
sometimes  the  tail  of  a  fish  protrudes  from  their  gaping  bill.  Then 
they  return  to  the  surface,  and  at  the  bidding  of  their  keepers  dis- 
gorge their  prey,  one  by  one,  till  the  pouch  is  empty,  when  they 
again  receive  the  signal  to  dive,  and  resume  their  pursuit. 

Some  birds  are  far  more  expert  than  others,  and  randy  fail  to 
secure  their  prize;  but  sometimes  they  catch  a  fish,  or  more  often 
an  eel,  so  awkwardly  that  they  cannot  contrive  to  swallow  it,  and 
in  the  effort  to  arrange  this  difficulty  the  victim  manages  to  escape. 
If  one  bird  catches  a  large  and  troublesome  fish,  two  or  three  of 
its  friends  occasionally  go  to  the  aid  of  their  comrade,  and  help 
him  to  despatch  it.  Such  brotherly  kindness  is,  however,  by  no 
means  invariable,  and  sometimes,  when  a  foolish  young  bird  has 
captured  a  fish,  the  old  hands  pursue  and  rob  him  of  his  prize. 
At  other  times  a  bird  fails  in  its  trick,  and  after  staying  under 
water  for  a  very  long  period,  comes  up  rpuite  crestfallen  without 
a  fish. 

When  the  birds  are  tired  the  strap  is  removed  from  their  throat, 
and  they  are  rewarded  with  a  share  of  the  fish,  which  they  catch 


102  OX    THE    MIN    RIVER. 

as  it  is  thrown  to  them.  It  is  reckoned  a  good  day's  fishing  if 
eighteen  or  twenty  cormorants  capture  a  dollar's  worth  of  fish  ; 
and  as  so  many  birds  represent  ahout  half-a-dozen  owners,  it  is 
evidently   not  a  very  lucrative  business. 

The  birds  are  <juite  domestic,  having  all  been  reared  in  cap- 
tivity. Curiously  enough,  the  mothers  are  so  careless  that  they 
cannot  be  trusted  to  rear  their  own  young ;  and  furthermore,  the 
said  young  are  so  sensitive  to  cold  weather  that  only  the  four  or 
live  eggs  laid  in  early  spring  are  considered  worth  hatching,  as 
only  these  can  be  reared  in  the  warm  summer.  They  are  taken 
from  the  cormorant  and  given  to  a  hen,  who  apparently  must  be 
colour-blind,  as  she  calmly  accepts  these  green  eggs  in  lieu  of  her 
own.  She  is  not,  however,  subjected  to  the  misery  of  seeing  her 
nurslings  take  to  the  water,  as  they  are  at  once  removed  from  her 
care  when,  after  a  month's  incubation,  the  poor  little  fledglings 
make  their  appearance.  They  are  then  transferred  to  baskets 
which  are  kept  in  a  warm  corner,  the  young  birds  being  buried  in 
cotton  wool  and  fed  with  pellets  of  raw  fish  and  bean-curd. 

When  they  are  two  months  old  their  nursery  days  are  over,  and 
the  sorrows  of  education  must  begin.  They  are  therefore  offered 
for  sale,  a  female  bird  being  valued  at  from  3s.  to  5s.,  and  a  male 
bird  at  double  the  price.  This  difference  is  due  to  the  superior 
strength  of  the  latter,  which  enables  it  to  capture  larger  fish. 
Thenceforth  the  professional  trainer  takes  them  in  hand;  and  fas- 
tening a  string  to  one  leg,  he  drives  them  into  the  water  and 
throws  small  live  fishes,  which  they  are  expected  to  catch.  They 
are  taught  to  go  and  return  subject  to  different  calls  on  a  whistle, 
obedience  being  enforced  by  the  persuasive  strokes  of  a  bamboo — 
the  great  educational  factor  in  China  !  When  thoroughly  trained, 
a  male  bird  is  valued  at  from  20s.  to  30s.,  and  its  fishing  career 
is  expected  to  continue  for  five  years,  after  which  it  will  probably 
become  old  and  sickly.1 

1  We  are  so  accustomed  to  think  of  fishing  with  cormorants  as  a  purely  Chinese 
occupation,  that  it  is  somewhat  startling  to  learn  that  this  was  one  of  the  sports 
in  high  favour  both  in  France  and  England  in  the  seventeenth  century,  and  that 
consequently  those  who  now  practise  it  in  Britain  are  merely  reviving  a  forgotten 
art  of  their  forefathers. 

Amongst  the  items  of  expenditure  for  King  James  I.  mention  is  made  of  £30 
which  in  a.d.  1611  was  paid  to  John  Wood,  Master  of  the  Cormorants,  for  his 
trouble  in  bringing  up  and  training  of  certain  fowls  called  cormorants,  and  making 
of  them  tit  for  the  use  of  fishing. 

In  the  following  year  a  second  sum  of  £30  was  assigned  him,  "to  travel  into 
some  of  the  farther  parts  of  this  realm  for  young  cormorants,  which  afterwards  are 
to  be  made  fit  for  his  Majesty's  sport  and  recreation." 

Six  years  later,  his  Majesty  rented  a  portion  of  the  vine-garden  near  Westminster 
Abbey,  and  there  caused  nine  lish-ponds  to  be  dug  and  stocked  with  roach,  dace, 


DIVERS    FISHERS.  103 

I  am  told  that  cormorants  are  not  the  only  creatures  whose 
natural  fishing  propensities  have  been  turned  to  good  account  by 
the  Chinese  (who  seem  fully  to  recognise  that  a  keen  poacher  may 
be  transformed  into  a  good  gamekeeper!)  Far  up  the  great  Yang- 
tze river,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Tchang,  the  fishers  train  real 
otters  to  work  for  them,  which  they  are  said  to  do  with  surprising 
obedience  and  intelligence.  I  have  not,  however,  heard  of  this 
use  of  otters  in  any  other  part  of  the  country. 

As  for  the  cormorants,  they  seem  to  be  common  to  all  the  great 
rivers  and  canals,  and  are  only  one  of  a  thousand  methods  whereby 
the  swarming  fish-legions  are  captured,  for  every  known  species 
of  net  is  here  ceaselessly  at  work — hand-nets  and  casting-nets, 
bag-nets  and  trawls,  ground-nets  and  pushing-nets,  fish-spears, 
hooks  and  lines  of  every  description  for  fresh-water  and  for  deep- 
sea  fishing. 


CHAPTER   VII. 


LIFE     ON      Till:      RIVER. 


<  Ihinese  inns  ! — Missions  in  their  infancy — Eccentric  house-building — A  typical 
village— Kindly  people— Dubious  people — Flight! — The  Bohea  tea-country 
— A  thunderstorm — A  spate — Wood-pirates — Return  to  Foo-Chow. 

On  the  Min  River, 
March  lOtA. 

To-day  we  have  been  travelling  with  quite  a  fleet.  About  thirty 
large  boats  and  a  great  company  of  small  ones  are  all  working  up 
the  main  river,  so  we  all  rowed  and  poled  in  company,  till  a  sharp 
breeze  sprang  up,  and  we  How  up  stream,  till  the  darkness  has 
compelled  us  to  anchor  for  the  night. 

March  nth. 
With  the  earliest  glimmer  of  dawn  we  were  once  more  on  our 
way,  and  about  sunrise  we  met  another  foreign  house-boat  coming 
down  stream.  The  crews  of  such  boats  are  always  on  the  alert, 
justly  assuming  that  their  respective  owners  may  wish  to  exchange 
ideas.     In  the  present  instance  the  foreigners  proved  to  be  Bishop 

tench,  carp,  and  barbel.  A  brick  building  was  erected  here  as  the  cormorants' 
house,  and  liere  the  King  came  t<>  Bee  the  birds  fish.  Be  also  established  cor 
morant-fishing  near  Thetford,  in  Norfolk,  and  at  Theobalds,  in  Hertfordshire, 
which  was  his  favourite  hunting-seat. 


104  LIFE    ON    THE    RIVER. 

Burdon  and  two  clerical  friends,  who  in  the  course  of  their  journey 
have  had  a  somewhat  unpleasant  little  adventure,  a  thief  having 

cut  his  way  in  through  the  wall  of  the  native  house  in  which  they 
were  sleeping,  and  contrived  to  abstract  not  only  their  food,  hut 

also  the  clothes  and  watch  of  one  of  the  gentlemen.  Fortunately 
the  bishop  had  a  spare  suit,  which  was  not  abstracted,  so  he  was 
able  to  clothe  his  chaplain,  and  we  were  able  to  replenish  their 
commissariat  for  the  day. 

Travellers  in  China  must  put  up  with  queer  lodgings  when  once 
they  have  to  leave;  their  boats,  and  very  odd  food  into  the  bargain. 
I  have  heard  of  one  inn  in  the  Ningpo  district  where  the  only 
food  to  be  obtained  was  cold  rice,  considerably  singed,  and  snakes 
fried  in  lamp-oil !  As  there  was  nothing  else  to  be  had,  and 
as  the  traveller,  being  disguised  as  a  Chinaman,  did  not  wish  to 
betray  his  nationality  by  over-fastidiousness,  he  was  compelled  to 
try  and  swallow  this  noxious  preparation  ! 

Very  often  the  only  sleeping-room  of  the  village  hotel  is  a  loft, 
to  which  access  is  obtained  by  a  rickety  ladder.  It  is  so  low  in 
the  roof  that  an  average-sized  man  cannot  stand  upright.  Here 
are  arranged  half-a-dozen  or  more  beds,  which  consist  only  of 
wooden  boards  raised  on  rude  trestles  to  a  couple  of  feet  above 
the  ground,  and  on  which  is  spread  a  coarse  rush-mat !  If  the 
weather  is  cold,  a  filthy  wadded  cotton  quilt  is  added,  that  the 
sleeper  may  therein  wrap  himself  up.  The  weary  wayfarer  climbs 
up  to  this  horrid  attic,  and  if  he  is  not  knocked  back  by  the 
stifling  atmosphere,  he  can  pick  his  way  by  the  light  of  a  dim  oil- 
lamp  (the  lamp  is  probably  a  joint  of  bamboo)  till  he  finds  a 
vacant  bed,  and  can  thereon  rest — with  all  his  clothes  on,  how- 
ever, for  it  would  be  a  risky  matter  to  put  off  any  article  of 
dress,  lest  it  should  vanish  in  the  night.  Xo  pillow  being  pro- 
vided, an  umbrella  sometimes  does  duty  instead. 

Too  often  even  weariness  brings  no  rest,  by  reason  of  the  mul- 
titude of  fleas  and  other  vermin,  while  probably  in  the  kitchen 
below  men  are  cooking  at  a  wood-fire  (the  stinging  smoke  of  which 
finds  its  way  into  the  sleeping-room),  while  others  are  snoring  or 
smoking  opium,  and  dogs  outside  are  barking  continuously. 

Then,  even  where  curiosity  is  quite  kindly,  it  is  generally  ex- 
cessive :  every  corner  from  which  a  glimpse  of  the  foreigner  can 
be  obtained  is  eagerly  secured,  and  every  detail  of  washing,  dress- 
ing, praying,  eating,  is  a  subject  of  keen  interest  to  the  spectators, 
however  hateful  to  the  objects  of  their  curiosity. 

The  crowd  thus  drawn  together  may  partly  be  the  reason  why 


CONSISTENT    CHRISTIANS.  105 

private  houses  so  rarely  offer  a  traveller  a  night's  shelter.  Some- 
times, however,  when  the  village  inn  is  too  atrocious,  a  kindly 
Buddhist  priest  agrees  to  let  strangers  sleep  in  the  temple — a 
strange  lodging  indeed,  especially  when,  as  sometimes  happens, 
an  ecclesiastical  house-cleaning  is  going  on,  and  the  whole  multi- 
tude of  idols  of  all  sizes  are  standing  about,  here,  there,  and  every- 
where, in  process  of  being  cleaned  or  repaired — a  proof  of  fed  ill- 
ness which  often  leads  to  a  suggestive  talk  with  their  guardian 
(and  truly  I  know  of  no  sight  more  disillusionising  than  that  of  a 
company  of  dilapidated  gods  undergoing  repair !)  You  can  quite 
understand  thai  such  descriptions  of  Chinese  village  inns  do  not 
make  me  particularly  eager  to  attempt  much  inland  travel ! 

The  bishop  and  his  friends  have  been  visiting  an  exceedingly 
interesting  group  of  verv  small  native  congregations  which  have 
sprung  up  in  a  great  many  remote  villages  on  the  north  side  of  the 
river.  Many  of  these  are  especially  interesting  from  the  manner 
in  which  they  have  evolved  themselves  from  infinitesimal  germs. 
Perhaps  one  man  has  chanced  to  visit  some  other  town  or  village 
where  a  foreign  preacher  or  native  catechist  was  addressing  the 
people,  or  perhaps  selling  Christian  books,  of  which  the  traveller 
bought  one  just  for  curiosity,  and  the  word  spoken  or  read  has 
taken  such  root  that  he  lias  again  started  on  his  travels  and  gone 
to  some  place  where  he  knows  that  there  are  Christians  who  can 
tell  him  more  of  this  new  doctrine. 

So  he  stays  a  while  for  instruction,  and  buys  more  books,  and 
then  goes  back  to  his  village ;  and  though  friends  and  relations 
deem  him  mad,  and  beat  him  on  the  face  and  boycott  him  because 
he  will  not  subscribe  to  idol  feasts,  nevertheless  he  holds  on  stead- 
fastly, never  ceasing  to  tell  them  of  One  Avhose  service  he  has 
found  to  be  far  better  than  that  of  the  idols ;  and  he  perseveres  in 
prayer  for  them  all.  At  last,  when  he  has  stood  utterly  alone 
for  perhaps  seven  or  eight  years,  a  reaction  commences,  and  many 
regret  that  they  have  been  so  cruel  to  one  who  has  only  tried  to 
do  them  good.  Then  half-a-dozen  decide  that  they  will  be  Chris- 
tians, and  a  few  months  later  half-a-dozen  more;  and  within  four 
or  five  years  there  are  perhaps  sixty  or  a  hundred  Christians  in 
that  village — real  earnest  men,  whom  no  amount  of  persecution, 
social  or  official,  can  turn  from  their  quiet  consistent  Christian  Uvea 

Then  comes  such  a  curious  incident  as  occurred  at  the  village  of 
Hai-yew,  where,  more  than  half  the  inhabitants  having  become 
Christians,  the  ancestral  hall  was  amicably  divided  between  the 
two  parties:   the  Christians,   being  the  more  numerous,  occupied 


106  LIFE    ON    THE    KIVER. 

the  centre  and  one  side,  while  the  heathen,  with  their  poor  gods 
deposed  from  the  place  of  honour,  retained  the  other  side,  but  had 
to  do  without  the  accustomed  idol  processions,  being  too  few  to 
raise  the  necessary  funds. 

In  such  a  village  the  houses  of  the  Christians  are  distinguished 
at  a  glance  on  entering,  the  one  having  the  invariable  incense 
burning  before  the  ancestral  tablets  or  the  favourite  god,  whereas 
the  others  have  simply  scrolls  bearing  Christian  mottoes. 

From  time  to  time  a  messenger  arrives  from  some  village  which 
has  thus  been  feeling  its  own  way  to  the  Light,  to  request  that  it 
may  be  provided  with  a  catechist  of  its  own ;  and  now  the  chief 
difficulty  is  to  provide  a  supply  of  suitable  trained  men. 

The  Church  of  England  Mission  now  reckons  about  one  thou- 
sand adherents  in  these  scattered  villages,  each  tiny  flock  being  in 
charge  of  a  native  catechist,  while  several  such  congregations  form 
a  pastorate,  in  charge  of  an  ordained  Chinese  clergyman. 

The  majority  of  this  particular  group  of  villages  lie  scattered 
among  the  head-waters  of  that  river  which  joins  the  Min  at  Tchui- 
kow,  the  village  where  we  turned  back.  But  both  the  Church  of 
England  and  the  American  Missions  have  stations  much  farther  up 
the  Min  itself. 

A  special  interest  seems  to  me  to  attach  to  the  work  of  one  of 
the  native  catechists,  who  has  devoted  himself  to  the  care  of  a 
leper  village  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  city  of  Ku-cheng,  where 
all  who  suffer  from  that  dread  disease  are  compelled  to  live  apart 
from  their  fellow-creatures — an  outcast  colony  of  most  miserable 
sufferers.  To  these  has  been  carried  that  message  of  mercy  which 
gladdened  the  lepers  of  Judea,  and  some  have  received  it  gladly, 
and  have  claimed  their  right  to  admission  into  the  Christian 
Church. 

The  scenery  is  becoming  more  beautiful  as  we  advance,  and  the 
villages  more  picturesque.  Some  are  like  chalets  built  on  piles ; 
others  like  English  farm-houses  of  the  old  Sussex  type,  with  cross- 
beams of  blackwood,  fitted  in  with  white  plaster.  It  does  seem 
so  odd  to  watch  men  building  a  house  in  this  country — putting  a 
heavy  roof  on  to  a  mere  skeleton  framework  of  timber.  But  this 
is  done  throughout  China,  the  walls  having  no  share  whatever  in 
the  support  of  the  roof.  They  are  filled  in  afterwards  at  the 
pleasure  of  the  owner  with  whatever  material  he  can  most  readily 
command,  whether  brick  and  mortar,  lath  and  plaster,  shingles  or 
stone.  In  erecting  the  wooden  framework,  it  is  considered  rather 
artistic  to  use  a  crooked  tree  as  a  main  pillar — a  tree  which  may 


A    PICTURESQUE    HOME.  107 

perhaps  have  had  the  bark  removed,  but  has  not  been  otherwise 
"  improved  "  by  any  carpenter. 

Again  this  morning  a  keen  breeze  (which  on  this  river  is  some- 
what rare  luck)  sent  us  flying  up  stream,  and  we  anchored  at  about 
5  p.m.  at  Tchui-kow,  a  most  interesting  village,  about  seventy 
miles  from  Foo-Chow.  The  backs  of  its  very  picturesque,  tall, 
narrow,  crowded  houses  (with  curly  roofs  and  wide  verandahs)  are 
built  on  piles  overhanging  the  river,  while  the  front  of  the  said 
houses,  facing  the  street,  is  founded  on  the  rock.  All  up  the  hill 
these  houses  cluster  in  groups,  each  group  enclosed  by  a  strong 
lire-proof  wall. 

The  main  street  is  strangely  characteristic,  with  the  blue-clad 
crowd  thronging  its  open-air  stalls  and  shops,  where  all  manner 
of  food  is  displayed  in  huge  tubs,  especially  preparations  of  fish, 
pink,  grey,  and  silvery,  but  all  alike  smelly.  Multitudinous  pigs, 
chickens,  and  dogs  mingle  with  the  crowd ;  and,  strange  to  say,  the 
dogs  were  as  civil  as  their  masters — not  one  of  them  barked  at  the 
foreign  women.  I  suppose  they  had  taken  stock  of  Sam,  and  con- 
sidered his  respectability  a  sufficient  guarantee  for  ours. 

As  I  was  gazing  up  at  one  of  the  long  flights  of  little  narrow 
stairs  leading  up  the  face  of  the  rock  between  the  houses,  the  by- 
standers signed  to  me  to  go  up,  which  I  accordingly  did  (Mrs  De 
Lano,  being  tired,  remained  below,  but  the  faithful  Sam  escorted 
me).  Presently  we  came  to  a  little  door,  which  was  locked,  but 
was  immediately  opened  by  a  small  boy,  who  led  us  up  another 
long  flight  of  very  narrow  stairs  cut  in  the  rock,  till  at  last  we 
found  ourselves  in  a  dwelling-house,  with  a  very  pretty  shrine 
to  the  Goddess  of  Mercy,  strangely  resembling  a  Roman  Catholic 
chapel.  The  image  of  the  mother  with  the  young  child  is  strik- 
ingly graceful,  and  the  altar-vases  of  old  grey  crackling  are  filled 
with  pink  China  roses,  like  the  monthly  roses  so  familiar  to  us  all 
at  home. 

Though  my  sudden  apparition  must  certainly  have  been  startling, 
the  young  man  of  the  house  received  me  with  the  utmost  courtesy, 
and  immediately  produced  tea.  It  is  a  quaintly  pretty  house, 
with  carved  blackwood  furniture  and  little  dwarf  trees  growing  in 
handsome  China  vases.  The  view,  seen  from  the  "lucky"  circular 
windows,  is  most  fascinating,  looking  up  the  river  to  the  sharp 
mountain-peaks,  which,  as  the  sun  sank,  were  bathed  in  a  trans- 
parent rose-coloured  haze.  My  host  evidently  delighted  in  its 
beauty,  and  offered  to  lead  me  up  more  flights  of  steps  to  other 
buildings   on   the   rock,   which   I   would   fain    have    explored,   bul 


108  LIFE   ON    THE    RIVER. 

judged  it  prudent  to  return  to  the  boat,  where  we  found  the  crew 
much  elated  at  having  purchased  very  strong  Luge  paper  umbrellae 
for  twenty-five  cents,  their  value  at  Foo-Chow  being  about  double 
that  sum. 

Speaking  of  stout  paper  manufactures,  I  find  that,  in  addition  to 
all  the  other  merits  of  the  beautiful  lotus  (whose  seeds  and  root 
are  as  good  for  food  as  the  flowers  are  delightful  to  the  eye),  a 
good  strong  paper  is  prepared  from  its  leaves.  Also,  as  a  substi- 
tute for  brown  paper,  a  capital  sort  of  strong  tough  packing-]  taper 
is  prepared  from  the  bark  of  the  keo-tree,  which,  having  been 
mixed  Avith  lime  and  well  steamed  over  boiling  water,  is  then 
crushed  with  a  stone  hammer,  and  left  in  a  pit  to  steep.  Eventu- 
ally  it  is  reduced  to  pulp,  and  then  a  small  quantity  at  a  time  is 
lifted  out  on  a  flat  mould  made  of  split  bamboo,  and  having  been 
made  to  overspread  it  smoothly,  is  left  to  stiffen.  Thus  sheet  after 
sheet  of  "  leather  paper  "  is  produced,  and  a  very  good  serviceable 
material  it  is. 

Wed.,  12th. 

A  clear,  beautiful  dawn,  so  I  mercilessly  roused  King-Song  to 
give  me  breakfast,  and  then  rowed  ashore,  escorted  by  Sam,  and 
ascended  to  a  very  good  sketching-point,  overlooking  town,  river, 
and  mountains.  There  I  was  able  to  work  in  comfort  till  noon, 
being  so  happily  placed  that  the  admiring  crowd  could  not  disturb 
me.  They  were  exceedingly  polite,  and,  as  usual,  greatly  delighted 
with  my  opera-glasses. 

Eeturning  boatward  by  a  new  route,  we  passed  through  some 
queer  little  courts,  where  I  was  welcomed  by  various  very  clean, 
nice-looking,  neatly  dressed  women,  with  glossy  hair,  and  wearing 
pretty  silver  ornaments  in  the  shape  of  butterflies  or  dragon-flies 
marked  with  lucky  symbols,  the  colour  being  given  by  bright  blue 
and  green  enamel.  These  are  made  in  much  the  same  manner  as 
copper  enamel  vases.  The  divisions  of  the  pattern  are  marked  out 
on  the  groundwork  of  silver  with  silver-gilt  wires,  which  are  sol- 
dered in  their  place,  and  the  cell  thus  formed  is  covered  with 
borax.  The  enamel,  which  is  prepared  in  a  fine  paste  of  various 
colours,  is  then  applied,  mixed  with  borax  and  water,  and  the 
flame  of  a  blow-pipe  is  applied  to  melt  it  to  a  beautifully  smooth 
surface. 

One  nice  old  lady  who  had  sat  close  beside  me  on  the  hill  while 
1  was  sketching  insisted  on  my  going  into  her  house  to  tea.  At 
the  same  time  others  craved  the  opera-glasses,  and  I  own  I  felt 


CHINESE    HOMES.  109 

nervous  as  I  saw  them  vanish  in  the  crowd,  while  I,  not  knowing 
a  word  of  Chinese,  was  carried  off  up-stairs,  to  see  another  family, 
etiquette  forbidding  the  faithful  Sam  to  follow. 

I  was  welcomed  by  a  fine  old  couple — a  blind  mother  and  half- 
blind  father — and  several  pretty,  gentle  girls.  Here,  as  usual,  the 
family  altar  and  ancestral  tablets  occupied  the  prominent  place  of 
honour  in  the  principal  room.  Just  as  I  was  beginning  to  feel 
somewhat  uneasy  about  the  prolonged  absence  of  my  dear  glasses, 
they  were  brought  back  and  returned  with  many  expressions  of 
gratitude.  Sam  said  they  had  been  carried  off  for  exhibition  to 
some  one  at  the  other  end  of  the  town  !  I  need  scarcely  say  that 
on  these  occasions  I  always  find  some  good  pretext  for  giving 
them  a  severe  rubbing  ere  taking  them  into  use  myself! 

Many  other  women  urged  me  to  visit  their  homes,  but  as  time 
was  speeding  on  I  was  obliged,  very  reluctantly,  to  decline,  merely 
glancing  into  some,  in  all  of  which  I  noticed  the  gaily-decked 
household  altar  with  the  domestic  gods.  Feeling,  however,  that 
the  opportunity  was  unique,  I  went  into  one  other  house.  The 
lower  storey  was  a  joss-house  of  some  sort,  and  up-stairs  a  very 
gaudy  altar,  images,  and  carving,  in  addition  to  the  ancestral 
tablets.  Tea  was  brought  as  usual,  but  I  had  foolishly  told  Sam 
to  follow  me  up-stairs,  whereupon  all  the  women  immediately  re- 
tired;  so  we  proceeded  on  our  way,  only  halting  to  admire  the 
Avonderfully  delicate  refinement  of  the  wood-carving  on  a  very 
fine  old  temple,  now  in  process  of  restoration.  All  round  the 
raised  platform  of  the  temple-theatre  are  excellent  carvings,  in 
miniature,  of  men  and  horses.  The  freshness  of  their  bright  new 
gilding  seemed  strangely  in  contrast  with  the  broken  pavement, 
where  a  careless  step  would  have  landed  us  ankle-deep  in  foulest 
mud.  That,  however,  is  truly  characteristic  of  a  Chinese  town, 
even   in  official  halls  and  courtyards. 

I  felt  quite  sorry  to  leave  so  interesting  a  place  and  such 
pleasant,  kindly  people,  especially  as  we  had  decided  that  this  was 
to  be  our  farthest  point ;  but  I  was  anxious  to  see  something  of 
Ahn-ing-kay,  an  exceedingly  picturesque  village  which  had  at- 
tracted our  notice  on  the  way  up  by  its  many-gabled  houses,  bearing 
so  strange  a  resemblance  to  old  houses  in  Chester.  There  are  the 
same  crossbeams  of  blackwood, filled  in  with  white  stone  or  plaster. 
but  the  grey  tiled  roofs  assumed  curves  undreamt  of  by  English 
builders,  ■whether  ancient  or  modern.  These  houses,  which  are- 
two  and  three  storeys  high,  stand  elevated  along  the  river's  broken 
bank,  which  here,  as  at  many  other  villages,  is  crowned  with  noble 


110  LIFE   ON   THE    RIVER. 

old  banyan-trees,  with  great  twisted  stems  and  far-spreading  roots. 
II ere,  once  for  all,  I  must  mention  a  very  unromantic  feature  in 
all  these  river-side  villages — namely,  that  beneath  the  shadow  of 
these  great  banyans  are  ranged  enormous  and  most  unfragrant  vats, 
standing  sometimes  singly,  sometimes  in  groups  of  from  ten  to 
twenty-five.  These  are  the  receptacles  for  all  the  sewage  of  the 
village — very  valuable  property,  most  carefully  stored  for  agricul- 
tural use.  This  is  not  a  nice  subject;  but  the  great  vats  occupy 
such  very  conspicuous  positions  that  a  realistic  draughtsman  can- 
not possibly  omit  them  from  his  sketches,  their  introduction 
being  always  particularly  interesting  to  the  very  accurate  Chinese 
spectators  ! 

Our  crew  being  ravenous,  we  left  them  all  to  feed,  while  Mrs 
De  Lano  and  I  went  ashore  by  ourselves.  We  found  at  once  that 
the  people  were  a  very  inferior  lot  to  those  we  had  just  left,  being 
of  a  far  rougher  and  more  boisterous  type,  and  inclined  to  crowd 
us  disagreeably.  They  became  more  respectful,  however,  as  soon 
as  I  stopped  to  sketch  a  curious  rice-pounding  implement;  and 
when  I  ventured  to  produce  the  opera-glasses  the  effect  was  mag- 
ical— in  fact  they  produced  quite  a  furore,  and  every  one  eagerly 
craved  a  turn. 

They  were  now  quite  friendly,  and  Ave  wandered  on,  sketching- 
various  objects  of  interest.  We  explored  a  rough  path,  over  huge 
masses  of  red  rock,  till  we  reached  a  ridge  looking  down  on  another 
village  in  another  valley.  There  I  left  Mrs  De  Lano  to  rest,  while 
a  select  party  of  the  crowd  led  me  up  long  flights  of  rock-cut 
steps  to  a  hill-top,  whence  the  view  was  splendid.  On  my  return 
I  found  that  Mrs  De  Lano  had  been  much  worried  by  the  impor- 
tunity of  some  of  the  women,  who  tried  to  insist  on  her  going 
down  to  the  other  village.  (Had  she  done  so,  I  have  little  doubt 
she  would  have  been  robbed.)  As  it  was,  so  dense  a  crowd  had 
assembled,  that,  even  with  the  aid  of  my  select  body-guard,  our 
walk  back  was  not  very  pleasant. 

Supposing  we  were  to  spend  the  night  here,  we  only  returned 
to  the  boat  at  dusk,  but  found  the  boatmen  in  a  fever  of  impa- 
tience, begging  us  to  let  them  start  at  once,  as  this  village  bears 
such  an  evil  reputation  that  no  boat  dares  stay  there  after  dusk  ! 
They  affirm  that  the  inmates  of  three  hundred  houses  in  this  and 
the  neighbouring  villages  are  known  to  be  simply  pirates  ;  in  short, 
they  insisted  on  starting  instantly,  which  we  accordingl}-  did.  The 
men  rowed  and  poled  for  a  couple  of  hours  in  the  starlight,  and 
then  anchored  in  a  quiet  backwater   at  Min-ching,  where  many 


ROCK    MONASTERIES.  Ill 

other  boats  had  already  congregated  for  the  night,  and  where  we 
know  we  may  now  sleep  securely. 

(We  learnt  afterwards  that  the  alarm  had  not  been  groundless, 
for  that  at  this  very  village  Dr  Osgood's  boat  was  attacked  and 
robbed — he  himself  was  speared  in  the  foot,  and  only  escaped  by 
leaping  overboard  and  swimming.  A  lady  of  the  party  was  shot  in 
the  shoulder.  Truly  I  am  thankful  to  have  had  no  such  misadven- 
ture to  chronicle  !) 

This  is  our  first  stage  of  retrogression  on  the  return  journey, 
and  I  confess  I  am  exceedingly  sorry  to  be  unable  to  extend  our 
wanderings  into  the  far-famed  Eohea  tea-country,  which  we  have 
almost  reached. 

Judging  not  only  from  the  enthusiastic  descriptions  of  men  who 
have  been  all  over  it,  but  from  the  more  reliable  ocular  proofs  of 
admirable  photographs  by  an  enterprising  German,  the  scenery 
must  be  marvellously  grand  and  unique.  The  mountains  tower  to 
a  height  of  from  G000  to  8000  feet,  and  the  river  winds  amid 
majestic  crags,  all  broken  up  into  amazingly  fantastic  forms — gigan- 
tic towers,  cyclopean  columns,  and  ramparts. 

The  principal  cultivators  of  the  Bohea  tea  are  Buddhist  monks, 
whose  very  numerous  monasteries  nestle  in  the  most  picturesque 
fashion  among  the  huge  rocks,  many  being  perched  on  summits  of 
perpendicular  precipices,  which,  seen  from  the  river,  appear  to  be 
wholly  inaccessible. 

The  tea-fields  where  these  agricultural  brethren  toil  so  diligently 
are  most  irregular  patches  of  ground,  of  every  size  and  shape, 
scattered  here,  there,  and  everywhere  among  these  rocky  moun- 
tains; but,  like  all  Chinese  gardening,  the  tea-cultivation  is  ex- 
quisitely neat,  and  the  multitude  of  carefully  clipped  little  bushes 
have  a  curiously  formal  appearance,  in  contrast  with  the  reckless 
manner  in  which  Nature  has  tossed  about  the  fragments  of  her 
shattered  mountains. 

I  need  scarcely  say  that  I  long  to  see  all  thai  wonderful  district, 
and  it  is  tantalising  to  have  to  turn  back  when  we  are  so  near;  but 
it  would  involve  a  good  deal  of  land  travel,  and  even  on  the  river 
we  could  only  go  in  a  native  boat,  all  of  which  lias  been  voted  un- 
safe for  ladies  without  an  escort.  At  first  one  of  our  friends  who 
knows  the  district  well  had  arranged  to  accompany  us,  but  his 
wife's  illness  unfortunately  prevented  his  doing  so;  so  there  is 
nothing  for  it  but  resolutely,  though  reluctantly,  to  turn  away  ami 
solace  ourselves  with  the  tamer  beauty  of  this  lower  river. 

Speaking  of  tea,  my  impressions  of  ''  the  fragrant  leaf"  as  being 


112  LIFE    ON    THE    RIVER. 

the  natural  heritage  of  every  Chinaman  have  been  rudely  dispelled 

by  learning  that  although  in  this  district  tea  may  well  be  the 
luxury  of  the  poorest,  since  the  Bohea  tea-growers  receive  only  the 
modest  sum  of  a  penny  per  lb.,1  this  is  by  no  means  the  case 
throughout  China.  In  the  south-western  provinces  of  Kwang-si  and 
Yun-nan,  and  also  in  the  northern  provinces  of  Shan-tung,  Shan-si, 
and  Honan,  it  ranks  as  a  luxury,  and  the  mass  of  the  peasantry 
solace  themselves  by  sipping  small  cups  of  simple  boiling  water 
and  trying  hard  to  imagine  it  tea ! 

U.S.  Consulate,  March  15th. 

From  our  anchorage  in  the  still  waters  at  Min-ching  we  started 
at  sunrise,  when  all  the  hills  were  glorified  by  soft  hazy  effects  of 
light.'  Soon  after,  we  met  friends  (Mr  and  Mrs  Odell)  in  their 
own  house-boat,  and  they  recommended  us  to  explore  a  tributary 
stream  called  Tchu-kee-kow — advice  on  which  we  fortunately  acted. 
It  is  a  narrow,  very  winding  stream,  with  pretty  villages,  and  be- 
yond lies  a  range  of  magnificent  peaks,  which,  as  we  saw  them, 
were  intensely  blue. 

We  landed  for  a  lovely  walk  along  a  fir-crested  ridge,  where  we 
gathered  brilliant  scarlet  dwarf  azalea,  which  is  now  in  bloom  all 
over  the  hills.  Each  flower  is  the  size  of  a  halfpenny,  but  the  stem 
only  ranges  from  four  to  ten  inches  in  height. 

A  most  lovely  pink  sunset,  with  heavy  grey  clouds,  was  suc- 
ceeded by  a  magnificent  thunderstorm,  with  intensely  vivid  light- 
ning, which  seemed  to  streak  the  sky  with  bars  of  white  light. 
We  hastened  back  to  the  boats,  where  the  men  had  made  all  secure 
in  preparation  for  a  storm ;  and  well  for  us  that  they  had  done  so, 
for  in  a  few  moments  down  came  the  rain  with  terrific  violence, 
just  as  though  a  waterspout  had  burst  over  our  devoted  heads. 

In  half  an  hour  the  rain  had  ceased,  but  the  river  was  in  flood. 
It  was  evident  that  every  mountain  torrent  had  come  raging  down 
every  gully  in  the  mountain  forests,  and  sweeping  down  quantities 
of  cut  logs  all  ready  for  the  market.  Such  valuable  firewood  was 
a  prize  most  precious  to  the  boatmen,  who  were  wild  with  excite- 
ment, and  they  spent  the  evening  rowing  about  in  the  gig,  which 
they  filled  again  and  again,  till  they  had  rescued  such  a  quantity 
that  every  corner  of  the  boat  was  crammed  and  the  decks  were 
piled  up  with  this  precious  salvage.     As  we  hoped  to  reach  Foo- 

1  Ere  that  lb.  can  be  delivered  in  England,  it  must  bear  not  only  expenses  of 
freight,  but  also  a  duty  of  2|d.  in  China  and  6d.  in  London. 


RIVER    LIFE.  113 

("how  on  the  following  day,  the  inconvenience  to  us  was  small 
compared  with  the  value  of  the  prize  to  the  crew. 

The  capture  was  so  exciting  that  we  helped  them  hy  holding 
lanterns  and  candles,  with  a  plate  held  over  the  glass  shade  to 
prevent  their  blowing  out.  We  saw  lights  moving  all  along  the 
shore,  and  asked  the  head  boatman  what  they  were.  "  Men  steal- 
ing wood,"  he  replied,  and  we  forbore  comment.  It  certainly 
was  better  that  the  crew  should  get  what  they  could  than  that 
the  wood  should  float  seaward ;  its  rightful  owners  could  never 
recover  it. 

But  next  day  we  saw  a  good  deal  of  genuine  theft.  We  awoke 
to  find  the  whole  plain  flooded.  The  green  fields  on  which  yester- 
day Ave  had  looked  with  such  pleasure  Avere  now  a  dreary  expanse 
of  grey  mud,  and  poor  villagers  dressed  in  grass  rain-cloaks  and 
huge  bamboo  hats  were  floundering  about  in  search  of  fireAvood. 
The  mountains,  which  had  at  sunset  been  so  gloriously  blue,  were 
now  dim  grey  ghosts,  scarcely  visible  through  the  mist.  "Wood- 
rafts  wire  taking  advantage  of  the  flood  to  effect  a  rapid  journey 
down  the  9tream,  whereon  .still  floated  many  logs,  so  our  men  went 
on  collecting  treasure  all  the  way. 

About  noon  Ave  reached  an  immense  stone  bridge,  similar  to  that 
Avhieh  connects  the  island  suburb  of  Foo-C1ioav  Avith  the  capital. 
This  has  twenty-four  massive  stone  piers,  each  connected  by  one 
huge  granite  slab  about  thirty  feet  long !  A  stone  balustrade  on 
either  side  protects  the  blue-clothed  croAvds  which  for  ever  cross 
and  recross,  and  which  to-day  Avere  gazing  with  unusual  interest  at 
the  wood-rafts  in  their  perilous  endeavours  to  shoot  past  the  bridge, 
towards  which  they  Avere  carried  with  frightful  rapidity  and  force. 
Many  came  to  grief,  and  those  which  did  get  through  in  safety 
became  helplessly  blocked  in  the  crowd  below.  The  method  of 
passing  under  these  bridges  in  going  down  stream  strikes  the  un- 
initiated as  peculiar,  as  the  helmsman  always  steers  directly  for  the 
pier,  and  just  when  the  impending  crash  seems  inevitable,  he  gives 
a  sharp  turn,  which  shoots  the  boat  into  mid-stream.  So  strong  is 
the  current,  even  at  average  times,  that  Avere  he  to  aim  at  mid- 
stream he  would   inevitably  hit  the  pier. 

Seeing  that  Ave  had  no  chance  of  getting  on,  we  gave  up  the 
attempt,  and  lay  still,  watching  the  systematic  way  in  which  pir- 
atical sampans  lay  moored  to  the  bridge,  ready  to  slip  out  in  a 
second,  should  a  raft  get  into  difficulties — not  to  help  but  to  steal. 
Indeed  they  contrived  to  abstract  logs  from  most  of  the  rafts,  by 
watching  for  the  moment  when  any  cause  induced  the  raftsmen  all 

II 


114  LIKE    ON    THE    RIVER. 

to  look  in  one  direction,  [t  was  the  most  barefaced  piracy;  and 
all  the  women  stationed  along  the  banks  were  on  the  watch  to  help 
their  relations  by  hauling  the  stolen  wood  ashore.  Th'-rc  was  no 
shame  or  concealment  in  the  matter. 

I  am  told  that  this  is  always  the  way,  ami  that,  so  far  from  help- 
ing in  any  trouble  or  accident,  these  people  are  always  on  the  watch 
to  steal,  and  the  owners  are  left  to  drown.  One  reason  for  this 
callous  conduct  is,  that  if  a  Chinaman  does  save  a  man's  life  he  is 
obliged  by  law  to  support  him,  or  should  he  die  on  his  hands  he 
must  defray  his  funeral  expenses  ! 

Three  years  ago,  in  the  summer  of  1876,  there  was  the  most 
appalling  flood  on  record  in  this  district.  Rain  fell  continuously 
for  two  days,  and  every  mountain  stream  came  down  in  such  tor- 
rents that  the  river  not  only  overflowed  the  whole  country  round 
for  many  miles,  but  swept  right  over  the  top  of  the  great  bridge 
with  a  most  appalling  roar  like  that  of  continuous  thunder-peals, 
it  appeared  almost  miraculous  that  any  bridge  could  have  resisted 
the  tremendous  pressure  of  such  a  volume  of  water.  [Marvellous 
to  relate,  when  the  flood  subsided  it  was  found  that  the  only 
damage  sustained  by  this  grand  bridge  was  the  loss  of  a  small 
portion  of  its  parapet ! 

But  of  the  loss  of  life  and  property  among  the  boat  population 
and  the  inhabitants  of  the  low-lying  parts  of  the  city  it  is  impos- 
sible to  form  any  estimate.  jSIbt  only  were  numerous  wood-rafts 
broken  up,  which,  in  sweeping  down  the  stream,  swamped  and 
smashed  innumerable  boats,  but  many  houses  farther  up  the 
country  were  washed  away,  and  one  floated  down  bodily,  with  all 
its  inhabitants.  A  man  who  was  standing  on  the  roof  contrived 
to  catch  the  overhanging  bough  of  a  tree,  but  all  the  others 
vainly  cried  for  help,  till  their  floating  home  came  with  a  crash 
against  the  piers  of  the  bridge,  where  it  was  of  course  dashed  to 
pieces. 

Above  the  roar  of  the  raging  waters  rose  the  pitiful  shrieks  of 
the  drowning,  and  of  those  who  were  killed  by  collisions  of  boats 
and  falling  timber.  The  whole  scene  was  truly  appalling  to  those 
who,  from  their  homes  overlooking  the  river,  had  to  watch  its  fear- 
ful incidents,  while  wholly  powerless  to  help,  and  seeing  whole 
families  of  the  drowned  and  drowning  swept  past  them.  But 
their  pity  was  mingled  with  indignation  as  they  watched  ruany 
who  might  have  saved  the  lives  of  these  poor  victims  intent  only 
on  purloining  timber  and  floating  property.  Indeed  the  city 
thieves  deemed  this  an  excellent  opportunity  for  plunder.      Some, 


FIRE    AND    TEMPEST.  115 

however,  found  themselves  in  the  wrong,  for  the  energetic  governor 
of  the  province — the  great  Ting  (who  for  three  days  and  three 
nights  never  rested  in  his  efforts  to  relieve  the  awful  distress) — 
made  short  work  of  all  thieves  whom  he  succeeded  in  capturing, 
and  no  less  than  seventeen  persons  were  summarily  deprived  of 
their  heads  as  the  just  penalty  of  being  caught  looting. 

When  the  waters  subsided  the  usually  fertile  plain  presented  a 
lamentable  scene  of  widespread  desolation.  All  the  young  rice- 
crops,  which  on  the  eve  of  the  flood  had  promised  so  rich  a  har- 
vest, were  destroyed,  and  in  place  of  their  lovely  green  there  re- 
mained only  a  dreary  expanse  of  mud.1 

That  was  a  year  of  terrible  calamity  for  this  beautiful  city,  for 
ere  the  inhabitants  had  well  recovered  breath  after  this  grievous 
plague  of  waters,  the  wind  claimed  its  innings,  and  a  terrific 
typhoon  overswept  the  plain,  tearing  up  great  trees  by  the  roots, 
destroying  houses,  ami  causing  frightful  disasters  among  the 
shipping. 

Then,  as  if  jealous  of  the  devastation  wroughl  by  wind  and 
stream,  fire  claimed  its  turn.  A  spark  from  an  old  woman's  oven 
lighted  on  some  inflammable  matter  and  set  fire  to  a  narrow  street 
of  wooden  houses,  whence  the  flames  spread  so  rapidly  that,  not- 
withstanding the  calmness  of  the  weather,  the  conflagration  very 
quickly  covered  a  space  two  miles  in  length,  presenting  a  spectacle 
of  awful  beauty  as  seen  from  the  foreign  settlement  of  Nantai. 
There  are  cases  in  which  man's  extremity  is  his  brother  man's 
opportunity,  and  an  enterprising  photographer  secured  a  very  fine 
photograph  of  the  scene,  with  the  dark  smoke-clouds  as  the  back- 
ground for  the  river  crowded  with  junks. 

To  return  to  time  present.  Our  masts  having  been  lowered  to 
enable  us  to  pass  beneath  the  upper  bridge,  we  were  at  last  able  to 
conclude  our  voyage.  The  boatmen  were  in  the  wildest  spirits,  re- 
joicing in  returning  home  so  well  laden.  We  have  found  them  a 
most  pleasant  lot  of  civil  men,  always  on  the  look-out  to  do  us  any 
little  service  they  could  think  of. 

1  In  the  month  of  June  1S85  still  more  awful  floods  desolated  the  country  round 
Canton;  rivers  and  canals  burst  their  embankments,  whole  villages  were  Bwept 
away,  thousands  of  persons  drowned,  and  the  rice  and  silk  crops  totally  destroyed. 
Pitiful  are  the  details  which  tell  how  despairing  parents  climbed  to  the  topmost 
branches  of  trees,  and  there  securely  fastened  their  children,  deeming  thai  the] 
must  be  safe  ;it  such  a  height  But  the  Hoods  surged  onward  in  increasing  might, 
uprooting  and  engulfing  the  very  trees,  and  sweeping  them  away  with  their  living 

freight.  Pitiful,  too,  the  sutferings  of  the  starving  population  thus  deluged  by  tin' 
rains,  for  which,  through  long  years  of  drought,  the  northern  provinces  have  so 
vainly  prayed. 


116  FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION. 

Now  that  we  are  safely  housed,  the  weather  seems  tired  of  its 

long  spell  of  good  behaviour,  for  this  morning  is  grey,  and  cold, 
and  rainy. 


CHAPTER    VIII. 

FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION. 

American  medical  ladies — American  feet — Native  remedies — Preparation  of 
snakes — Human  blood — Future  punishment  of  quacks — Chinese  alms- 
houses. 

U.S.  Consulate. 

In  the  last  few  days  I  have  been  greatly  interested  by  a  glimpse 
of  the  working  of  the  American  Medical  Mission  among  the  women 
of  Foo-Chow.  It  has  always  seemed  to  me  that  of  the  various 
means  whereby  the  Red  Barbarians  strive  to  bridge  over  the 
chasm  which  separates  them  from  the  Chinese  population,  none  is 
so  full  of  promise  of  ever-increasing  usefulness  as  this  Mission, 
which  so  unmistakably  proves  to  the  people  the  kindly  intentions 
of  those  who  devote  their  lives  to  this  labour  of  love. 

But  I  had  not  before  fully  realised  how  very  important  a  part 
in  this  good  work  must  of  necessity  be  performed  by  women,  as 
they  alone  can  be  admitted  to  the  sick-room  of  their  Chinese 
sisters.  Curiously  enough,  this  fact  has  as  yet  been  practically 
recognised  only  by  America,  which  has  established  fully  qualified 
lady  doctors  at  several  of  its  principal  mission-stations  in  China, 
where  they  are  doing  right  good  service.  Hitherto  I  believe  no 
English  ladies  have  followed  suit,  but  it  is  much  to  be  hoped  that 
they  will  do  so  ere  long,  for  in  no  other  way  can  they  hope  to  gain 
such  influence  in  Chinese  homes. 

Not  having  heard  much  on  this  subject,  I  confess  to  having 
been  slightly  astonished  one  morning  when,  hearing  that  Dr  Trask 
and  Dr  Sparr  had  come  by  invitation  to  breakfast,  I  found  that 
these  professional  titles  described  two  pleasant,  kindly  American 
ladies,  one  being  a  bright  young  woman  barely  twenty-five  years 
of  age  !  With  true  kindness  to  the  stranger,  they  hail  brought 
me  a  lovely  and  most  fragrant  branch  of  the  richest  pumelo  (which 
is  a  kind  of  very  large  orange  blossom)  as  a  specimen  of  Foo-Chow 
cultivation.  The  elder  lady  is  already  a  proficient  in  Chinese,  and  is 
able  to  visit  her  patients  in  their  own  homes.     Her  companion  is 


women's  medical  missions.  117 

doing  brave  battle  with  the  agonies  of  this  excruciating  language, 
and  until  it  is  mastered  she  has  to  confine  her  care  to  the  charge 
of  the  dispensary  and  to  nursing  in  the  hospital 

She  has,  however,  had  extra  work  of  late,  for  there  have  been 
several  serious  cases  of  small-pox  in  the  foreign  settlement,  which 
for  some  reason  the  regular  doctors  were  unable  to  attend ;  so  the 
friends  of  the  patients  sent  to  entreat  the  medical  aid  of  this  lady 
(rather  a  delicate  matter,  as  the  members  of  the  Mission  are  not 
allowed  to  take  professional  fees  from  any  patient  except  the 
wealthier  Chinese). 

The  brave  lady  consented  to  attend  the  sufferers,  who  happily 
have  rewarded  her  care  by  making  excellent  recoveries.  Her  safe- 
guards were  simple.  Every  morning  she  clothed  herself  in  an 
india-rubber  suit,  to  wear  while  in  the  infected  houses,  returning 
home  to  bathe,  applysundry  disinfectants,  and  dress  in  clean  calico 
ere  going  to  her  regular  work  in  the  dispensary.  At  nights  she 
tooi  turns  with  her  medical  companion  to  sit  up,  when  necessary, 
watching  any  anxious  case  in  their  hospital  for  Chinese  women.1 

Within  the  last  few  months  the  senior  doctor  lias  had  to  per- 
form about  sixty  surgical  operations,  some  of  which  have  been 
very  difficult  cases.  She  invited  us  to  go  and  see  the  said  hos- 
pital, which  is  a  large,  clean,  airy  room,  where  every  possible  care 
is  taken  for  the  comfort  of  the  inmates.  I  -was  much  struck  by 
the  bright  intelligent  faces  of  some  of  these,  albeit  worn  with 
suffering;  all  seemed  so  truly  grateful  for  the  loving  care  bestowed 
on  them. 

There  is  one  peculiarly  distressing  case,  namely,  that  of  a  poor 

1  The  advantages  of  sending  out  carefully  trained  medical  women  in  connection 
with  Christian  missions  have  been  fully  proved.  For  women  endowed  with  the 
talents  and  capacities  for  such  work  (and  it  is  one  which  calls  lor  very  varied  tal- 
ents of  a  really  high  order),  it  would  be  difficult  to  conceive  a  more  nolile  career. 
A  Bociety  has  recently  been  formed,  in  connection  with  the  Women's  Missionary 
institute,  Claphara  Road,  S.W.,  which  provides  a  house  of  residence  for  mission- 
ary students  at  the  London  School  of  Medicine  for  Women  during  a  tour 
course  of  training  in  medicine,  surgery,  and  midwifery,  after  which  tney  an-  drafted 
to  mission  stations  in  all  parts  of  the  world,  in  connection  with  the  Churches  to 
which  they  respectively  belong.  Ladies  who  are  inclined  to  take  part  in  such 
work,  and  wish   for  particulars  of  admission,  l'i  re   requested  to  refer  to 

tin  Meredith,  Women's  .Medical  .Mission  House,  143Clapham  Road,  London, S.W. 

An  older  institution  for  precisely  the  same  purpose  is  the  Zenana  MSDICAl 
College  &nd  Eome,  at  58  St  George's  Road  (near  Victoria  station).  I. on. Ion.  s.  \\  . 
Here  only  a  two  years' course  of  study  is  required.  Both  these  medical  missions 
are  able  to  tell  of  extensive  good  work  done  by  those  whom  they  have  sent  forth. 
inn  both  state  that,  owing  to  lack  of  funds,  they  have  reluctantly  been  compelled 
to  refuse  admission  to  many  suitable  candidates,  anxious  to  be  trained  as  m 
missionaries,  but  who  were  unable  to  pay  the  fifty  guineas  per  annum,  which  in- 
cludes board,  residence,  and  medical  instruction.  They  therefore  crave  subscrip- 
tions from  such  as  are  willing  thus  to  aid  in  this  eood  work. 


118  FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION. 

girl  so  wasted  with  disease  that  it  has  been  necessary  to  amputate 

both  her  feet.  lint  the  good  doctors  look  on  her  with  especial 
satisfaction.  They  hope  soon  to  supply  her  with  American  feet, 
which  will  be  far  more  serviceable  than  the  tottering  "lily  feet" 
of  the  noblest  lady  in  the  city.  Moreover,  they  have  good  hopes 
that  she  will  join  the  Mission  and  become  a  teacher.1 

In  proportion  to  the  incalculable  multitude  of  girls  whose  feet 
are  distorted  in  compliance  with  the  extraordinary  requirements  of 
Chinese  custom,  it  is  only  wonderful  that  cases  of  diseased  ankle- 
bones  and  mortification  of  the  foot  are  not  very  much  more  com- 
mon. As  it  is,  though  the  process  of  bandaging  involves  years  of 
torture  (commencing  at  the  age  of  six  or  nine  years,  till  which 
time  the  feet  are  the  natural  size,  and  generally  very  neat  and 
small),  the  victims  rarely  find  their  way  to  the  hospitals  directly 
on  this  account,  though  they  are  subject  to  frequent  accidents  from 
tumbles  as  they  totter  along  on  their  poor  big  toes,  which,  with 
the  tip  of  the  heel-bone,  is  all  that  is  admitted  into  the  shoe,  the 
other  toes  being  folded  under  the  instep. 

Then-  is  a  regular  class  of  "  foot-binders  " — women  whose  pro- 
fession it  is  to  produce  this  horrible  distortion,  with  the  aid  of  long 
bandages  of  cotton  cloth ;  and  in  the  hands  of  an  unskilful  binder 
the  process  of  torture  is  indefinitely  prolonged.  In  any  case  there 
is  generally  great  swelling  of  the  foot  and  leg,  and  torturing  corns 
and  other  forms  of  disease.  Yet  such  is  the  force  of  distorted 
public  opinion  and  the  iron  rule  of  fashion,  that  sometimes  when 
in  Christian  schools  the  teacher  (filled  with  compassion  for  a  girl 
who  Cannot  work  by  reason  of  the  pain  she  is  enduring)  ventures 
to  remove  the  bandages,  then  the  tears  flow  still  faster,  for  to 
remove  these  destroys  her  prospects  in  life — her  value  in  the 
marriage  market,  where  she  woidd  be  despised  as  a  large-footed 
plebeian  !  The  lily-foot  is  thus  "  the  guinea  stamp,"  and,  more- 
over, is  a  standard  of  artificial  beauty  as  decided  (though  by  no 
means  so  injurious)  as  tight-lacing  in  some  countries  nearer  home. 
Though  the  custom  is  known  to  have  been  in  force  for  fully  a 
thousand  years,  no  one  knows  which  of  the  legends  referring  to  its 
origin  is  authentic.  One  thing  only  is  certain,  namely,  that  even 
Chinese  men  cannot  really  put  a  stop  to  it.  The  only  possible 
reform  must  be  made  by  inducing  Chinese  mothers  to  spare  their 
own  young  daughters  from  this  torture,  and  to  choose  large-footed 
daughters-in-law. 

1  By  the  latest  accounts  I  hear  that  these  hopes  have  heen  in  a  great  measure 
realised,  and  that  she  lias  recently  made  a  very  happy  marriage. 


STRA2JGE    MEDICINES.  119 

"Well  may  the  Chinese  appreciate,  as  they  undoubtedly  do,  the 
work  of  this  and  all  other  Medical  Missions,  which  bring  to  theii 
aid  the  skill  and  tenderness  of  European  or  American  trained 
nurses  and  doctors. 

I  must  say,  that  bright  clean  rooms  and  orderly  dispensaries  are 
in  striking  contrast  to  such  glimpses  as  Ave  have  obtained  of  the 
native  charities  which  exist  in  all  large  Chinese  cities,  and  which, 
however  will  designed  in  the  first  instance,  certainly  fall  very  far 
short  of  practical  usefulness,  and  are,  without  exception,  chiefly 
noted  for  their  dirt  and  mismanagement.  There  are  homes  for  old 
women  and  homes  for  old  men,  which  are  the  dreariest  of  alms- 
houses— rows  of  dismal  cells  being  arranged  in  the  form  of  a 
quadrangle,  divided  into  streets,  and  enclosed  by  a  high  Avail. 
Here  persons  Avho  have  attained  extreme  old  age  are  provided  with 
food  and  a  roof — an  altar  before  which  to  offer  worship  to  the 
guardian  idol,  and  some  sort  of  medical  care. 

Of  the  medicines  administered  avc  formed  some  notion  on  being 
informed  that  one  of  the  industries  of  the  Foo-C1ioav  beggars  is  the 
rearing  of  snakes,  which  are  purchased  by  the  druggists  and  boiled 
down  for  medicinal  use,  just  as  in  the  old  Gaelic  legends.1  Snake 
wine  (which  is  a  preparation  of  wine  and  water  in  which  snakes 
have  been  boiled  to  a  jelly)  is  deemed  a  famous  febrifuge;  snake's 
flesh  is  also  considered  excellent  diet  for  invalids.  The  snake  is 
treated  as  Ave  treat  eels  :  its  head  is  cut  off  and  its  skin  removed  ; 
the  flesh  is  then  fried  or  boiled,  but  instead  of  being  eaten  plain, 
it  must  be  mixed  with  minced  chicken. 

Here  and  there,  among  the  numerous  odd  varieties  of  street- 
stall,  we  see  a  quack  doctor,  Avho,  seated  beneath  a  great  umbrella, 
offers  infallible  remedies  for  every  evil  that  flesh  is  heir  to.  Ee 
deals  largely  in  acupuncture  and  cupping  with  wooden  cups.  As 
regards  internal  medicines,  he  proves  his  stores  genuine  by  display- 
ing the  skulls,  paws,  horns,  skins,  and  skeletons  of  divers  animals 
— such  as  bears,  bats,  crocodiles,  tigers — bits  of  bark  and  roots, 
bunches  of  herbs,  &c. 

For  a  child  stricken  with  fever  these  Avise  physicians  prescribe 
a  decoction  of  three  scorpions,  while  dysentery  is  treated  by  acu- 
puncture of  the  tongue!  Pigeons'  dung  is  the  approved  medicine 
for  Avomen  during  pregnancy  !  and  water  in  which  cockles  have 
been  boiled  is  considered  the  best  remedy  for  skin-diseases,  especi- 
ally for  persons  recovering  from  Bmall-pox. 

The  flesh  of  rats,  dried  and  salted,  is  deemed  an  excellent  hair- 
1  See  'In  the  Hebrides,'  p.  5i.     By  C.  P.  Gordon  Camming.     Chatto  &  Windus. 


120  FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION. 

restorer,  and  is  eaten  by  women  who  detect  any  symptom  of  incipi- 
ent baldness.  A  nicer  preventive  is  the  use  of  tea-oil,  which  is 
extracted  from  pounded  tea-seed,  from  which  also  are  prepared 
tablets  of  soap  greatly  in  favour  with   Chinese  ladies. 

A  remedy  peculiarly  repulsive  to  our  ideas,  but  which  here 
is  much  appreciated  by  aged  persons,  is  human  milk,  which  is  sold 
in  small  cupiuls.  The  story  of  the  Grecian  daughter  who  thus 
saved  the  life  of  her  father  has  here  its  counterpart  in  the  dutiful 
daughter-in-law  who  deprived  her  baby  of  his  supplies  that  she 
might  sustain  her  husband's  toothless  old  mother ! — an  act  im- 
mensely applauded  in  popular  story  and  illustrated  in  art. 

As  an  antidote  for  the  acute  inflammation  of  the  skin  caused  by 
the  poisonous  sap  of  the  chi'-shu  or  varnish  tree,  which  is  used  by 
the  lacquer-workers,  a  crab's  liver  is  administered  in  a  strong  de- 
coction of  pine-shavings.  The  latter  is  especially  worthy  of  note, 
now  that  we  too  have  discovered  so  many  excellent  properties  in 
pine-resin. 

But  of  course  there  are  some  genuine  medicines  in  use.  Fore- 
most among  these  is  a  tonic  of  the  nature  of  gentian  root,  to  which 
almost  supernatural  virtues  are  attributed.  This  is  the  famous 
ginseng,  which  is  the  dried  root  of  a  wild  herb,  the  Panax 
quinquefolia,  of  which  considerable  quantities  are  imported  from 
Corea,  Tartary,  and  the  United  States,  but  that  which  is  found  in 
the  Chinese  Empire  is  the  most  highly  prized  of  all.  It  is  an 
imperial  monopoly,  and  is  sold  to  the  ginseng  dealers  for  its  weight 
in  gold.  In  their  hands,  however,  its  value  increases  in  an  even 
more  startling  manner  than  does  the  price  of  drugs  in  the  hands  of 
the  British  chemist,  for  though  ginseng  of  inferior  quality  is  sold 
at  25s.  to  50s.  an  ounce,  the  more  valuable  pieces  fetch  from  300 
to  400  dollars  per  ounce !  Such  precious  roots  are  stored  in 
silken  wrappings,  within  dainty  boxes  with  silken  covers,  stowed 
within  large  air-tight  boxes — for  a  root  so  precious  is  worthy  of  all 
care. 

But  to  counterbalance  one  real  tonic  the  Celestials  have  a 
score  of  eccentric  medicines.  Thus  in  a  list  of  78  animal,  50 
mineral,  and  314  vegetable  medicines  enumerated  in  one  of  the 
standard  Chinese  medical  works  translated  by  Dr  Hobson  of  the 
London  Medical  Mission,  I  find  such  curious  items  as  dried  "  red- 
spotted  lizard,  silkworm  moth,  parasite  of  mulberry-trees,  asses' 
glue,  tops  of  hartshorn,  birds'  nests,  beef  and  mutton,  black-lead, 
white-lead,  stalactite,  asbestos,  tortoise-shell,  human  milk,  stags' 
horns  and  bones,  dogs'  flesh,  and  ferns,"  all  recommended  as  tonics. 


CANNIBAL    MEDICINE.  121 

Burnt  straw,  oyster-shell,  gold  and  silver  leaf,  iron  filings,  and  the 
bones  and  tusks  of  dragons,  are  stated  to  be  astringent. 

The  so-called  dragons'  bones,  by  the  way,  are  the  fossil  remains 
of  the  megatherium  and  other  extinct  animals  which  are  found  in 
Sze-Chuen  and  elsewhere,  both  in  Asia  and  Europe,  and  which 
our  own  Anglo-Saxon  ancestors  esteemed  so  highly  for  medicinal 
purposes;  indeed,  any  one  acquainted  with  the  leechdoms  of  our 
own  forefathers  might  suppose  in  glancing  over  these  Chinese  pre- 
scriptions that  he  was  reading  the  medical  lore  of  Britain  until  tin- 
eighteenth  century !  There  is  the  identical  use  of  ingredients 
selected  apparently  solely  on  account  of  their  loathsomeness,  such 
as  the  ordure  of  divers  animals,  from  man  down  to  goats,  rabbits, 
and  silkworms ;  there  are  preparations  of  fossil  shells,  of  red  marble, 
of  old  copper  cash,  of  wormwood  and  saffron,  dragons'  blood  and 
dried  leeches,  human  bones  and  human  blood,  flowers,  metals  and 
minerals,  dried  toads,  scorpions,  cicadas,  centipedes,  spotted  snakes, 
black  snakes,  shed  skins  of  snakes,  the  bones,  sinews,  and  dried 
blood  of  tigers,  rhinoceros-horn  shavings,  various  insects, — these, 
and  innumerable  kindred  horrors,  hold  a  conspicuous  place  in  the 
( 'hinese  pharmacopoeia 

Nor  are  these  the  worst.  There  are  certain  diseases  which  the 
physicians  declare  to  be  incurable,  save  by  a  decoction  of  which 
the  principal  ingredient  is  warm  human  flesh,  cut  from  the  arm  >  ir 
thigh  of  a  living  son  or  daughter  of  the  patient!  To  supply  this 
piece  of  flesh  is  (naturally!)  esteemed  one  of  the  noblest  acts  of 
filial  devotion,  and  there  are  numerous  instances  on  record  in  c|uite 
recent  years  in  which  this  generous  offering  has  been  made  to  save 
the  life  of  a  parent,  and  even  of  a  mother-in-law  !  A  case  which 
was  held  up  for  special  commendation  in  the  '  Official  Gazette '  of 
Peking  for  July  5,  1870,  was  that  of  a  young  girl  who  had  actu- 
ally tried  herself  to  cut  the  flesh  from  her  thigh  to  save  the  life  of 
her  mother,  but  finding  her  courage  fail,  she  had  cut  off  two  joints 
of  her  finger,  and  dropped  the  flesh  into  the  medicine,  which  hap- 
pily proved  equally  efficacious — for,  says  the  '  Official  Gazette,'  "  this 
act  of  filial  piety  op  course  had  its  reward,  in  the  immediate  re- 
covery of  the  mother."  This  case  called  forth  "  boundless  lauda- 
tions "  from  the  Governor-General  of  the  province  of  Kiang-si, 
who  begged  that  the  Emperor  would  bestow  some  exemplary  re- 
ward on  the  child,  such  as  the  erection  of  a  great  triumphal  arch 
of  carved  stone,  to  commemorate  the  act. 

In  less  serious  cases  a  medicine  compounded  of  the  eves  and 
vitals  of  the  dead  is  believed  to  be  efficacious,  and  it  is  sup; 


122  FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION. 

that  children  are  sometimes  kidnapped  and  murdered  to  supply 
these  ingredients.  It  is  even  helieved  that  leprosy  may  he  cured 
hy  drinking  the  blood  <>f  a  healthy  infant,  and  it  is  said  thai  Lepers 
have  frequently  been  known  to  attack  grown-up  persons  with  mosl 
literally  bloodthirsty  intent. 

Another  horrid  form  of  these  truly  cannibal  prescriptions  re- 
quires the  blood  of  a  criminal  secured  at  the  moment  of  decapita- 
tion. Dr  Macarthy  and  Staff-Surgeon  Eennie,  happening  to  be 
present  at  an  execution  at  Peking,  observed  that  the  instant  the 
head  was  severed,  and  ere  the  kneeling  body  fell  over,  the  execu- 
tioner produced  a  chaplet  of  five  pith  balls,  of  a  sort  of  edible  pith, 
each  about  the  size  of  an  orange,  and  these  he  soaked  in  the  blood, 
which  continued  to  spout  in  jets  from  the  severed  vessels.  When 
thoroughly  saturated  the  balls  were  hung  up  to  dry  in  the  sun, 
when  they  were  sold  to  the  druggists  under  the  name  of  "  shue- 
man-tou  "  (blood-bread),  to  be  administered  in  small  doses  as  the 
last  hope  in  a  disease  called  "chong-cheng,"  which  Dr  Eennie 
assumed  to  mean  pulmonary  consumption. 

This  being  the  class  of  medicine  which  is  administered  to  patients 
in  the  native  hospitals,  it  is  evident  that  the  occasional  cures  must 
be  attributed  rather  to  accident  than  to  scientific  skill,  more  especi- 
ally as,  even  in  the  administration  of  drugs  which  may  really  be 
valuable,  there  is  no  recognised  system.  Strange  to  say,  in  this 
country,  where  crucial  examinations  attend  each  step  in  a  literary 
career,  no  certificate  or  diploma  of  any  kind  is  required  in  order  to 
practise  medicine,  so  that  the  majority  of  medical  practitioners 
(such,  at  least,  as  are  not  out-and-out  quacks)  are  men  who  have 
failed  in  the  scholastic  line  ! 

Apparently  the  only  check  on  quackery  is  the  dread  of  future 
punishment,  as  a  special  place  in  the  second  hell  is  assigned  to  ig- 
norant physicians  who  persist  in  prescribing  for  the  sick.  In  the 
fourth  hell  are  found  physicians  who  have  administered  medicines 
of  inferior  quality,  and  in  the  seventh  hell  are  those  who  have  ap- 
propriated human  bones  from  neglected  graveyards,  thereof  to  make 
medicine.  All  of  these  are  condemned  to  centuries  of  torture  (the 
latter  being  repeatedly  boiled  in  oil),  and  are  eventually  sent  back 
to  earth  in  the  form  of  loathsome  reptiles.  But  the  lowest  depths 
of  the  lowest  hell  are  reserved  for  the  physicians  who  misapply 
their  skill  to  criminal  purposes.  These  are  subjected  to  the  most 
ignominious  punishment  of  all,  being  ceaselessly  gored  by  sows  ! 
It  must  be  some  consolation  to  the  sick  to  know  that  their  interests 
are  thus  guarded  in  the  spirit- world. 


SUFFERING  ACCOUNTED  JUST  RETRIBUTION.    123 

As  to  surgery,  it  is  so  little  understood  as  to  be  scarcely 
attempted,  and  only  in  most  trivial  cases.  Consequently  fche 
physicians  who  attempt  the  cure  of  external  disease  hold  a  lower 
rank  than  those  who  attack  internal  maladies.  These  have  the 
wisdom  to  subdivide;  their  labour,  so  that  while  one  man  is  dis- 
tinguished in  his  successful  treatment  of  children's  diseases,  another 
is  noted  for  skill  in  fevers,  and  a  third  for  the  treatment  of  women. 

But  in  truth  the  Chinese  have  little  sympathy  with  bodily 
anguish,  and  are  by  no  means  sure  how  far  the  care  of  such 
sufferers,  and  the  endeavour  to  alleviate  their  pain,  may  he  pleasing 
to  the  gods,  or  accounted  an  act  of  merit.  For,  like  the  Jews, 
who  asked,  "  Did  this  man  sin  or  his  parents,  that  he  was  born 
blind  1 "  they  look  upon  all  grievous  bodily  or  mental  affliction  as 
the  just  punishment  of  some  heinous  offence  committed  in  a 
previous  state  of  existence. 

So  even  blindness,  which  is  fearfully  common,  receives  small 
meed  of  pity.  There  is,  indeed,  an  asylum  provided  for  a  certain 
number  of  sufferers,  but  the  dole  of  food  which  accompanies  the 
right  to  a  wretched  roof  is  so  very  small  that  it  is  absolutely 
necessary  to  supplement  it  by  begging ;  consequently,  the  inmates 
go  about  in  companies  of  half-a-dozen  or  so,  walking  single  file, 
each  man  guided  by  the  man  in  front  of  him,  while  the  leader 
feels  his  way  along  the  street  with  his  stick.  It  is  a  most  literal 
case  of  the  blind  leading  the  blind.  Occasionally  they  stop  and 
yell  frightful  songs  in  chorus,  beating  small  gongs,  or  clacking 
wooden  clappers  as  an  accompaniment.  Of  course  the  deafened 
bystanders  soon  contribute  infinitesimal  coin  to  induce  them  to 
pass  on,  but  the  shopkeepers  wait  a  while,  knowing  that  the  sooner 
one  lot  depart  the  sooner  will  their  successors  arrive. 

As  regards  the  healing  of  the  sick,  supernatural  aid  is  often 
sought  in  preference  to  administering  dings,  especially  at  the  time 
of  the  feast  of  the  nativity  of  the  god  Shing  Wong,  which  is  cele- 
brated at  midnight.  Kind  relations  bring  the  garments  of  their 
sick  friends  to  be  stamped  with  the  great  seal  of  the  god — who,  by 
the  way,  has  two  seals,  one  of  copper  and  one  of  jade,  and  a  higher 
price  is  charged  for  an  impression  of  the  jade  seal.  The  raiment 
thus  consecrated  is  carried  hack  to  the  sick,  who,  being  therein 
clothed,  and  endowed  with  great  faith,  sometimes  do  recover ! 

Somewhat  akin  to  this  is  the  only  recognised  cure  for  carpenters 
who  are  afflicted  with  ulcers.  "Within  the  walls  of  a  monastery  in 
<  'anton  stands  the  venerable  Flowery  Pagoda,  which  was  built  in 
the  sixth  century  by   Loo  Pan,   the  great  architect  of  the    era. 


124  FEMALE    MEDICAL    MISSION. 

After  death  lie  was  deified,  and  is  now  worshipped  by  all  devout 
carpenters.  When  suffering  from  ulcera  they  visit  his  pagoda,  pick 
out  a  morsel  of  ancient  cement  from  between  the  bricks,  powder  it 
and  swallow  it,  with  a  large  admixture  of  faith  !  * 

It  appears  then  that,  however  well  meant,  the  native  dispensary 
cannot  be  regarded  as  a  very  valuable  institution.  As  to  other 
forms  of  Chinese  charity,  I  hear  of  clothing  clubs,  soup-kitchens, 
distributions  of  rice,  and  caldrons  of  tea  bestowed  gratis  on  all 
thirsty  souls ;  but  the  most  characteristic  form  of  benevolence  con- 
sists in  presenting  coffins  to  the  temples,  to  be  awarded  by  the 
priests  to  the  most  deserving  poor.  This  last  is  a  very  favourite  way 
of  accumulating  merit,  and  is  one  which  is  immensely  appreciated,  as 
there  is  an  assured  respectability  in  the  possession  of  a  good  coffin, 
and  to  watch  the  seasoning  of  such  an  one  is  a  delightful  occupa- 
tion for  the  leisure  of  declining  years. 

Though  such  almshouses  as  I  have  seen  are  assuredly  most 
uninviting  refuges  for  old  age,  I  am  told  that  in  some  cases  they 
are  really  quite  comfortable  :  such,  for  example,  is  a  Widows' 
Home  for  ladies  of  good  quality  who  by  some  sad  chance  are  left 
homeless.  It  is  called  the  "  Hall  of  Rest  for  Pure  Widows,"  under 
which  title  are  included  not  only  the  faithful  widows  who  do  not 
incline  to  a  second  marriage,  but  also  those  true-hearted  maidens 
who,  having  been  betrothed  in  early  youth,  have  vowed  on  the 
death  of  their  affianced  spouse  to  remain  faithful  to  his  memory. 
So  great  is  this  virtue  esteemed  in  the  Celestial  Empire,  that  in 
various  parts  of  the  country  I  have  seen  really  magnificent  triple 
triumphal  arches  of  the  finest  carved  stone-work  erected  in  honour 
of  such  unwedded  brides  or  faithful  widows  ! 

Strange  to  say,  the  survivor  of  such  betrothed  pairs  (whether 
man  or  maid)  occasionally  goes  through  the  whole  solemn  cere- 
monial of  a  Chinese  wedding,  with  the  funeral  tablet  which  repre- 
sents the  dear  (unknown)  deceased.  Thus  a  living  man  confers 
honours  on  his  dead  bride,  which  consoles  her  in  the  spirit-world. 
On  the  other  hand,  a  living  maid  thus  wedded  to  the  tablet  of  her 
dead  lord  forsakes  her  own  family  and  is  entitled  to  the  position 
of  a  daughter-in-law  in  the  house  of  her  husband's  mother.  Truly 
it  must  be  conceded  that  these  are  very  odd  people. 

1  How  strangely  the  superstitious  of  East  and  West  correspond  !  In  the 
autumn  of  18S5  the  daily  papers  record  how  at  the  Chapel  of  Knock  in  Ireland, 
said  to  have  been  recently  honoured  by  an  apparition  of  the  Blessed  Virgin,  and 
now  a  favourite  place  of  pilgrimage,  thousands  of  devotees  are  picking  out  frag- 
ments of  cement  from  the  chapel  wall,  which  cement,  being  reduced  to  powder  and 
swallowed  medicinally,  is  credited  with  many  miraculous  cure-  ! 


I? 


o  z 

O    uJ 


IN    FOO-CHOW    CITY.  125 


CHAPTER    IX. 

IN     POO- CHOW    CITY. 

Within  the  walled  city  of  Foo-Chow — Street  life — Fire-walls — Woo-Shih-Shan 
and  other  hills — The  two  American  missions — Temple  of  Confucius — 
Taouist  temples  —  Soapstone  figures  —  Foo-Chow  lacquer — Kingfishers' 
feathers. 

U.S.  Consulate,  March  \9th. 

We  .started  early  this  morning  by  tryst  to  spend  the  day  with  Mr 
and  Mrs  C.  C.  Baldwin,  the  veteran  missionaries  of  the  American 
Presbyterian  Church.  They  live  in  the  heart  of  the  walled  city, 
so  this  was  an  excellent  opportunity  for  seeing  "  the  Happy  City," 
alias  "the  Banyan  City" — for  I  am  told  that  Foo-Chow  bears 
both  these  meanings,  and  perhaps  the  last  is  the  most  appropriate, 
on  account  of  the  numerous  trees  which  have  contrived  to  secure 
crevices  in  the  rocks  and  walls,  there  to  grow  and  flourish. 

Really  it  seemed  like  the  sudden  change  from  humdrum  daily 
life  into  some  strange,  bewildering  dream  to  pass  from  these  very 
peaceful  green  hills  down  to  the  busy  life  on  both  shores  of  the 
river  (for  there  is  a  large  Chinese  population  on  the  low  ground  of 
this  island).  Then  crossing  the  Bridge  of  Ten  Thousand  Ages, 
with  a  pause  to  admire  the  river,  the  odd  gaily  coloured  junks,  the 
picturesque  town  to  right  and  left,  and  the  beautiful  blue  moun- 
tains, we  sped  onward  through  the  busy  bustling  blue  crowd, 
which,  however,  always  most  politely  made  way  for  our  chairs.  I 
may  mention  that,  contrary  to  all  custom,  which  assumes  that 
women  must  wish  to  be  secluded  from  public  gaze,  I  always  insist 
on  having  an  uncovered  chair,  so  as  to  see  all  round,  so  far  as  one 
pair  of  eyes  can  manage  it.  Most  foreign  ladies  accept  the  dull 
dignity  of  closed  sedan-chairs. 

"We  halted  at  one  of  the  booths  on  the  great  bridge,  that  1 
might  invest  in  a  number  of  highly  ornamental  china  howls  for 
tobacco-pipes.  They  are  globular,  and  fit  on  to  reeds  about  three 
feet  long,  which  can  be  used  as  walking-sticks  when  not  required 

for  smoking,  the  bowl  being  movable.     These  are  used   by  i c 

people  for  smoking  coarse  tobacco  grown  by  themselves.  Others 
use  pipes  of  white  metal,  with  a  very  small  bowl.  Wealthy  folk 
smoke  highly  scented  powdered  tobacco  in  water-pipes,  also  with  a 
big  howl. 


126  IN    FOO-CHOW    CITY. 

On  the  farther  side  of  the  river  our  route  lay  along  a  densely 
crowded  street,  three  miles  in  length,  ere  we  reached  the  gate  by 
which  Ave  were  to  enter  the  city.  Though  certainly  not  "  A  Street 
of  Fragrant  Breezes,"  it  was  all  full  of  interest — such  quaint 
groups  assembled  round  the  portable  stoves  and  clay  ovens,  such 
eager  Chinamen  gambling  for  red  eggs,  such  gorgeous  scarlet-and- 
gold  street  signs  and  attractive  shops  all  open  to  the  street,  such 
strange  objects  for  use  in  the  temples,  or  for  burning  in  honour  of 
the  dead. 

We  passed  beneath  one  or  two  of  those  strangely  ornamental 
structures  which  commemorate  good  citizens,  and  also  beneath  the 
arched  gateways  of  strong  walls,  supposed  to  be  fireproof,  or  at  all 
events  intended  to  divide  the  city  into  separate  fire  sections. 
These  gateways  across  the  crowded  street  are  always  ornamental, 
with  a  good  deal  of  gay  colour  and  several  tiers  of  curly  roofs. 

At  last  we  found  ourselves  at  the  great  gateway  of  the  city — 
that  is  to  say,  it  is  one  of  seven  gateways  lying  on  the  four  sides 
of  the  city.  Like  the  walls,  these  great  buildings  are  of  brick  on 
a  foundation  of  granite.  The  walls  themselves  are  about  30  feet 
high,  and  12  feet  wide  on  the  summit,  and  their  circuit  is  nearly 
eight  miles. 

"Within  this  compass  dwells  a  population  of  about  600,000 
persons,  crowded  together  in  dirty  narrow  streets,  while  a  good 
deal  of  the  space  is  occupied  by  very  picturesque  rocky  hills,  on 
which  are  clustered  temples  and  pagodas,  shaded  by  banyan-trees. 
One  of  these  hills  is  Wu-Shih-Shan,  alias  U-Shio-Sang,  "  the  hill 
of  the  Black  Stone."  Here,  on  an  excellent  airy  situation,  over- 
looking the  densely  peopled  city,  are  clustered  the  buildings  of  the 
Church  Mission  Society,  the  most  prominent  of  which — the  Theo- 
logical College — is  now,  alas  !  a  picture  of  desolation  and  ruin, 
having  been  deliberately  burnt  in  a  riot  got  up  a  few  months  ago 
by  the  literati,  whose  influence  is  always  anti-foreign,  and  especi- 
ally anti-Christian. 

On  the  same  hill,  shaded  by  fine  trees,  stands  a  picturesque  old 
temple,  which  has  for  many  years  been  "  the  town-house  "  of  the 
British  Consul.  There  is  a  British  Consulate  on  the  foreign 
settlement,  but  this  is  a  more  attractive  home,  and  secures  a  right 
of  residence  in  the  city. 

On  another  pleasant  hill  in  the  neighbourhood,  near  to  another 
tall  pagoda,  is  the  American  Presbyterian  Mission,  which  was  our 
first  destination  this  morning,  the  home  of  the  C.  C.  Baldwins, 
who,  I  believe,  were  the  first  to  begin  work  at  Foo-Chow.     They 


AMERICAN    PRESBYTERIAN    MISSION.  127 

have  stuck  to  their  post  for  thirty  years,  many  of  which  were 
apparently  spent  in  fruitless  labour,  "  toiling  in  rowing,  and  the 
wind  contrary."  Eut  now,  like  all  the  other  Christian  workers  of 
various  denominations  in  this  province,  they  have  the  gladness  of 
having  gathered  a  very  large  number  of  devoted  adherents,  several 
of  whom  have  already  proved  their  faith  by  unflinchingly  endur- 
ing persecution,  even  to  death. 

I  believe  my  other  American  friends,  the  Stephen  Baldwins, 
who  live  on  Nantai,  represent  the  American  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church ;  but  all  the  Christian  regiments  here  work  in  happy  har- 
mony, and  these  two  American  missions  have  enrolled  about  three 
thousand  converts.  They  have  now  many  out-stations  scattered 
over  the  province,  where  each  native  teacher  forms  a  centre  from 
which  spreads  a  knowledge  of  the  Christian  faith.  I  let  ween  them 
they  have  about  a  hundred  and  fifty  of  such  Chinese  agents — 
zealous  and  earnest  men ;  in  truth,  none  but  such  would  devote 
their  lives  to  a  service  replete  with  (lander,  and  which  brings  them 
only  contumely,  so  far  as  this  world's  honour  is  concerned. 

Each  of  these  missions  also  has  excellent  and  nourishing  schools. 
The  Stephen  Baldwins  on  Nantai  have  a  high  school  for  boys,  a 
theological  school,  a  female  training  institution,  a  hospital,  ami  a 
mission  press.  Their  namesakes  in  the  city  have  also  kindred 
institutions,  and  personally  they  have  facilitated  the  labours  of  all 
future  workers  in  Foo-Chow  by  compiling  a  dictionary  of  its  pe- 
culiar dialect  and  id  it  mis,  and  by  other  literary  work. 

When  we  arrived  Mrs  Baldwin  Avas  teaching  a  class  of  M ide- 
awake-looking  boys,  for  whose  edification  she  made  me  trace  my 
various  wanderings  on  the  great  school-map,  apparently  in  the  hope 
of  making  them  realise  that  there  are  other  countries  besides 
China  ! 

When  the  class  was  dismissed  we  started  to  do  a  little  sight- 
seeing in  the,  city  for  my  benefit.  Our  first  object  was  to  visit  the 
great  temple  dedicated  to  the  memory  of  Confucius,  that  wearisome 
sage  whose  fossilised  wisdom  has  petrified  all  original  though! 
throughout  the  vast  Empire  ever  since  the  sixth  century  before 
Christ.  What  he  said  and  what  he  taught  has  from  that  time 
to  the  present  been  accepted  as  the  sole  rule  of  perfection,  making 
all  progress  impossible,  and  all  life,  one  long  retrogression. 

Confucius,  as  we  commonly  write  the  name,  is  only  a  Latinised 
form  of  Koong-foo-tsze,  whose  temples  are  lweivnred  in  <\<t\  city 
of  the  Empire,  and  whose  symbol  is  hung  up  in  every  schoolroom, 
that  all  the  scholars   may   prostrate  themselves    before  it    every 


128  IX    POO-CHOW    CITY. 

morning  ere  commencing  the  Btudy  of  his  writings,  which  are  the 
foundation  of  all  education,  and  on  which  the  whole  system  of 
government   is  based. 

<  )n  reaching  the  temple  we  found  it  closed,  but  were  taken  in 
by  a  circuitous  way  through  tumble-down  rooms  and  conn-. 
finally  reaching  the  temple  itself,  which  is  a  fine  old  building  and 
in  good  repair,  but,  like  all  Confucian  temples,  chillingly  bare  and 
cold  and  solemn.  They  are,  in  fact,  simply  ancestral  halls  conse- 
crated to  the  dead,  and  even  the  presence  of  an  image  of  Confucius 
himself  is  an  exceptional  and  quite  a  modern  innovation,  and  one 
which  is  very  distasteful  to  his  strict  followers. 

This  temple,  being  truly  orthodox,  contains  simply  his  memorial 
tablet,  and  those  of  the  seventy-two  most  eminent  of  his  three 
thousand  disciples.  The  said  tablets  are  simply  the  invariable 
tall,  narrow,  flat  strips  of  wood,  rounded  at  the  top,  supported  by 
a  stand  of  handsomely  carved  wood,  and  inscribed  with  the  name 
of  the  dead.  That  of  "  the  most  holy  ancient  sage "  of  course 
occupies  the  central  place,  and  is  inscribed  as  the  "  Seat  of  the 
soul  of  the  most  renowned  teacher  of  antiquity."  Those  of  the 
seventy-two  most  eminent  disciples  are  ranged  on  either  side  of 
their  great  master,  each  in  his  appointed  order — the  first  holding 
the  place  of  honour  on  the  left  hand,  the  second  on  the  right,  the 
third  on  the  left,  and  so  on ;  while  tablets  to  minor  sages  are 
ranged  round  the  Avails. 

In  addition  to  these  pre-Christian  sages,  there  are  tablets  to 
many  more  modern  individuals  who  have  been  distinguished  either 
for  filial  piety,  or  loyalty  in  official  capacities,  or  public  beneficence, 
but  chiefly  for  remarkable  learning  (of  course  in  the  wisdom  of 
Confucius).  Special  honour  is  also  paid  to  women  of  distinguished 
virtue  or  filial  piety.  Their  tablets  are  placed  together  in  a 
separate  hall,  and  incense  is  burnt  before  each. 

Here  everything  is  so  chilling  that  even  the  great  incense- 
burner,  candlesticks,  and  vases  are  of  solid  granite,  on  a  granite 
altar,  and  ponderous  pillars  of  granite  support  the  heavy  roof. 
The  worshippers  who  daily  do  homage  to  the  sage  prostrate  them- 
selves in  mute  veneration,  no  words  of  prayer  or  definite  expression 
of  thought  being  required  save  on  special  occasions.  There  are 
fortnightly  services  in  the  temple,  but  those  of  chief  interest  occur 
in  the  middle  of  spring  and  of  autumn,  when  solemn  services  are 
held  here  at  dead  of  night,  or  rather  towards  the  eerie  hour  of 
about  •">  a.m.,  when  all  the  mandarins,  the  civil  and  military 
officials  of  the  city,  and  the  literary  classes  assemble  to  do  homage 


CONFUCIAN    SACRIFICES.  129 

to  the  learned  dead.  All  wear  their  official  dress  and  hat,  for,  like 
the  Jews,  they  deem  it  reverent  to  cover  the  head  during  any  act 
of  worship.  (Even  in  social  life  a  gentleman  calling  on  any  person 
to  whom  honour  is  due  must  keep  his  hat  on  until  politely  urged 
to  remove  it — an  invitation  which  an  ignorant  foreigner  might 
naturally  he  afraid  to  hazard  [)  As  only  the  Viceroy  and  tin- 
Tartar  General  (civil  and  military  representatives  of  the  Emperor) 
may  approach  the  shrine,  all  the  congregation  remain  in  the  outer 
court,  which  is  lighted  by  blazing  torches  wrapped  in  scarlet  cloth, 
and  placed  on  high  poles — the  civil  mandarins  are  placed  on  the 
left  side,  which  is  the  most  honourable,  and  the  military  mandarins 
on.  the  right. 

For  this  same  reason  the  Viceroy  approaches  the  shrine  by  the 
steps  on  the  left-hand  side,  and  takes  his  place  to  the  left  of  the 
altar,  and  the  Tartar  General  (who  takes  a  secondary  position  in 
the  worship)  ascends  by  the  right-hand  steps,  and  takes  up  his 
position  to  the  right  of  the  altar.  Only  the  Emperor  in  person 
may  approach  the  Confucian  shrine  direct  by  the  central  steps. 

All  these  gentlemen  are  supposed  to  have  fasted  for  two  days 
previously,  so  they  are  fully  prepared  to  do  justice  to  the  funeral 
banquet  which  follows.  At  these  great  festivals  the  offering  laid 
before  the  altar  includes  every  available  animal  commonly  used  for 
food — i.e.,  a  whole  cow  or  bullock,  several  pigs,  goats,  sheep,  fowls, 
ducks,  &c.  These  creatures  are  driven  to  the  temple  on  the  pre- 
vious day,  escorted  by  a  State  official ;  also  by  musicians  and  men 
bearing  strange  banners  Avith  suitable  inscriptions  (in  those,  quaint 
Chinese  characters  which  are  so  much  more  decorative  in  a  proces- 
sion than  any  flag  with  plain  English  words  !) 

These  animals  are  made  to  pass  before  the  altar,  while  incense 
is  duly  offered;  they  then  pass  on  to  the  slaughter-house,  when- 
each  is  carefully  shaved  and  scraped  till  it  is  as  hairless  as  a 
Chinaman's  face.  The  hair,  wool,  and  blood  are  all  buried,  and 
the  carcasses  are  laid  in  order  before  the  altar,  which  is  brilliant lv 
illuminated. 

The  other  offerings  include  3  kinds  of  wine,  3  sorts  of  fruit,  ."> 
varieties  of  flowers,  and  9  differenl  materials  manufactured  from 
silk,  all  of  which  must  be  white,  marking  the  funereal  character  of 
the  sacrifice.  The  Chinese  reverence  for  certain  symbolic  numbers 
is  here  apparent  in  the  prevalence  of  multiples  of  3  and  9.  I" 
begin  with,  the  invariable  approach  to  a  Confucian  temple  is 
through  a  triple  gateway;  30  acolytes  in  four  groups  of  9  I 
bearing  a  plume  of  Argus  feathers)  wait  on  the   greal    official  who, 

I 


130  IN    FOO-CHOW    CITY. 

representing  the  Emperor,  officiates  as  priest.  These  lads  must  be 
sons  of  men  who  have  taken  the  literary  degree  answering  to  our 
B.A.,  and  arc  dressed  in  its  peculiar  blue  silk  tunic,  richly 
embroidered  tippet,  and  strangely  decorated  hat. 

As  a  preliminary  to  the  service,  the  Imperial  representative 
must  wash  his  hands  ceremonially  and  offer  incense — "  the  frag- 
rance of  an  hour,"  as  the  incense-stick  is  called — elevating  it  high 
above  his  head  ere  it  is  deposited  in  the  great  incense-burner. 
In  the  course  of  the  ceremonial  he  must  go  up  to  the  altar  9  times, 
presenting  different  offerings,  each  of  which  he  elevates  above  his 
head  before  presenting  it.  On  each  of  these  9  occasions  he  per- 
forms the  Kow-tow,  prostrating  himself  three  times,  and  knocking 
his  head  on  the  ground  9  times.  His  example  is  followed  by  all 
the  company,  who  kneel  each  on  his  appointed  square  of  the  stone 
pavement  in  the  outer  court. 

How  their  heads  must  ache  before  the  close  of  this  very 
apoplectic  devotional  exercise  ! 

The  company  of  musicians  (numbering,  I  think,  8  times  9)  are 
robed  in  ancient  academic  dress — long  blue  robes  edged  with  black. 
Many  carry  instruments  of  music  supposed  to  date  from  the  Con- 
fucian era !  There  are  divers  stringed  instruments  and  wind  in- 
struments, and  very  ancient  bells,  suspended  from  a  wooden  beam, 
and  huge  drums.  But  as  these  Confucian  "  fifes,  sackbuts,  and 
dulcimers "  are  now  obsolete,  and  no  one  knows  how  to  play 
them,  the  musicians  merely  feign  to  touch  them,  and  are  content 
with  striking  the  bells  and  the  great  drums  at  intervals  between 
their  shrill  vocal  anthems.  These,  however,  are  accompanied  by  a 
full  orchestra  of  all  manner  of  dreadful  modern  instruments. 

As  a  matter  of  course,  the  Chinese  trace  back  their  knowledge 
of  music  to  a  remote  antiquity.  They  maintain  that  they  dis- 
covered the  division  of  the  octave  into  twelve  semitones  B.C.  3000, 
and  that  these  were  accurately  rendered  upon  twelve  bamboo  tubes. 
Under  the  patronage  of  the  Emperor  Huangti,  b.c.  2700,  music 
rose  to  such  importance  that  the  office  of  music-master  to  the 
Imperial  family  was  deemed  the  highest  in  the  realm. 

Music  enjoys  the  privilege  of  having  been  highly  commended 
by  the  great  sage  himself,  who  pronounced  it  to  be  the  best  medium 
for  governing  the  passions  of  mankind.  It  is  to  be  feared,  how- 
ever, that  we  poor  moderns  cannot  be  soothed  by  the  identical 
melodies  which  calmed  the  Confucian  contemporaries,  and  which 
the  Chinese  assert  to  have  been  eminently  sweet  and  harmonious, 
though  how  they  know  anything  about  it  is  hard  to  tell,  as  in  B.C. 


CONFUCIAN    AGNOSTICISM.  131 

246  an  iconoclastic  Emperor,  Tsin-Shih-Huangti,  ordered  the  de- 
struction of  all  books,  music-books,  and  musical  instruments,  so 
that  the  Chinese  music  of  the  present  day  must  date  from  a  sub- 
sequent period. 

A  letter  addressed  to  Confucius,  and  written  on  yellow  paper,  is 
presented  by  the  Viceroy,  who  prostrates  himself  before  the  altar, 
while  a  herald  reads  the  letter  aloud  amid  the  most  death-like 
silence.  He  then  lays  it  on  the  altar,  whence,  at  the  close  of  the 
service,  the  same  official  reverently  raises  it  in  both  hands  high 
above  his  head,  and  carries  it  to  the  sacred  brazier  in  the  outer 
court,  and  therein  consigns  it  to  the  flames,  which  are  the  sole 
authorised  medium  for  transmitting  messages  from  the  living  to 
those  in  the  world   of  spirits. 

Offerings  of  cakes  and  of  wine  in  ancient  brazen  vessels  are  then 
presented  and  laid  upon  the  altar. 

I  have  already  noted  that  on  these  occasions  all  the  literati  are 
supposed  to  be  present,  for  even  the  most  advanced  thinkers,  who 
despise  all  the  foolish  ceremonial  and  idolatries  of  the  Buddhist 
and  Taouist  religions,  profess  the  deepest  veneration  for  the  wis- 
dom of  Confucius ;  so  they  condescend  to  eat  their  share  of  the 
offerings  as  at  a  funeral  feast ;  and,  in  truth,  the  reverence  accorded 
to  Confucius  is  simply  a  development  of  the  ancestral  worship  which 
was  the  aboriginal  religion  of  the  land,  and  is  the  one  real  religion 
of  China  at  the  present  day — the  one  all-pervading  influence  ac- 
knowledged by  all,  to  whatever  other  religious  body  they  may 
nominally  belong. 

His  teaching  concerned  man's  moral  duty  to  his  neighbour  in 
the  practice  of  politeness,  benevolence,  and  wisdom — but  as  for 
his  relation  to  the  spiritual  world,  that  was  a  subject  on  which  he 
abstained  from  comment.  Consequently  his  followers,  finding  no 
instructions  on  the  worship  of  any  god,  consider  that  none  is  essen- 
tial, and  so  the  pure  Confucian  is  a  true  Agnostic.  The  majority, 
however,  combine  reverence  for  his  teaching  with  a  nominal  ad- 
herence to  that  of  either  Buddha  or  Laou-tsoo.  The  latter  was  the 
contemporary  of  Confucius,  but  more  imaginative,  and  his  system 
has  developed  into  the  Taouist,  whose  temples  and  hideous  idols 
we  see  in  all  directions. 

I  confess  that  the  said  temples,  with  all  their  extraordinary 
images  and  wealth  of  colour,  have  for  me  a  fascination  which  is 
wholly  lacking  in  the  severely  solemn  temples  <>f  this  excellenl 
moral  teacher.  These  hold  much  the  same  relation  to  other  temples 
of  China  as  the  bare  Shinto  temples  of  Japan  do  to  its  gorgeous 


132  IN     KOO-CHOW    CITY. 

Buddhisl  Bhrines.      Tiny  may  appeal  to  the  intellect,  but  certainly 
not  to  the  artistic  eye. 

We  wandered  on  from  one  temple  to  another,  some  picturesquely 
niched  among  grey  rock  boulders,  and  some  in  the  crowded  city,  till 
I  had  a  bewildering  general  impression  of  endless  stone-paved  court- 
yards, wherein  strange  buildings,  consisting  of  eccentric  roofs  sup- 
ported by  one  Avail,  and  many  elaborately  sculptured  dragon-pillars, 
are  guarded  by  gruesome  great  beasts,  carved  in  marble  or  cast  in 
bronze,  and  approached  by  fantastic  bridges  and  sculptured  stairs  ; 
While  legions  of  fascinating  china  figures  (representing  whole  legends 
of  mythology)  cluster,  thick  as  locusts,  all  over  intricate  tiled  roofs, 
all  turned  up  at  the  corners,  and  ending  off  with  elaborate  ara- 
besques, as  if  infected  by  the  frolicsome  dolphins  and  curly  dragons 
of  bright  green  crockery  which  disport  themselves  on  the  ridge- 
pole—  their  bright  glare  reflecting  the  sunlight,  and  the  whole 
gaining  brilliancy  from  the  background  of  clear  blue  sky. 

As  to  the  interiors,  it  is  useless  to  attempt  to  describe  them, 
for  though  the  eye  detects  endless  variety,  to  the  ear  there  must  be 
a  wearisome  sameness  in  the  oft-told  tale  of  strange  images  and 
their  votaries — images  colossal  or  dwarf,  gaudy  or  sombre,  painted 
or  gilded — shaven  priests  in  grey  or  yellow  robes — hirsute  priests 
in  satin  vestments  of  dazzling  colour,  braziers,  incense,  votive  tab- 
lets, coloured  and  silk-fringed  lamps,  gorgeous  canopies  and  huge 
umbrellas,  and  all  the  thousand  other  items  which  to  me  are  a 
source  of  such  never-ending  interest.  When  satiated  with  temples, 
there  still  remained  the  interest  of  the  fascinating  little  shops. 

The  special  industries  of  Foo-Chow  are  the  quaintest  little  fat 
figures  carved  in  soapstone,  and  a  very  beautiful  sort  of  lacquer  of 
which  the  manufacture  is  a  secret  known  only  to  one  family  here, 
and  most  jealously  guarded.  It  is  smooth  as  satin,  and  the  colours 
used  are  chiefly  dull  red  and  olive  green.  Beautiful  large  boxes 
are  made  of  it,  and  table  ornaments.  Of  these,  one  of  the  most 
fascinating  designs  is  a  lotus  blossom  resting  on  its  own  beautifully 
modelled  leaves.  Being  a  secret,  and  therefore  a  monopoly,  each 
piece  produced  commands  a  high  price,  immensely  in  excess  of  that 
of  other  beautiful  lacquers  generally  accounted  precious. 

But  of  all  fascinating  manufactures  none  is  more  attractive  than 
the  dainty  and  dazzling  jewellery  made  of  the  exquisite  metallic 
feathers  of  the  blue  and  green  kingfisher  and  blue  jay,  so  worked 
into  a  setting  of  silver  or  gold  as  to  resemble  most  beautiful  enamel, 
yet  with  a  silk-like  gloss  most  puzzling  on  first  inspection.  This 
is  the  favourite  style  of  jewellery  here,  and  while  great  ladies  wear 


KINGFISHERS'-FEATHER   WORK.  133 

it  in  the  form  of  artificial  butterflies,  flowers,  and  leaves  of  the 
most  refined  work,  very  effective  ornaments  are  made  for  their 
humbler  sisters  on  a  groundwork  of  base  metal.  As  to  the  gor- 
geousness  of  theatrical  decorations  thus  produced,  words  fail  to 
describe  it — such  crowns  and  such  splendid  head-dresses  of  all 
sorts  ! 

They  are  beautiful,  but  it  is  quite  grievous  to  think  of  the 
wholesale  slaughter  of  these  lovely  birds  involved  by  such  a  de- 
mand, and  extending  over  so  enormous  a  district,  for  it  is  not  here 
only  that  these  lovely  feathers  are  so  highly  prized.  I  saw  an 
immense  deal  of  the  same  sort  of  work  at  Canton,  not  in  the  form 
of  such  delicately  inlaid  jewellery  as  that  made  here,  but  for  the 
very  showy  marriage-crowns,  which  are  generally  made  of  imitation 
gold.  This  is,  however,  merely  the  foundation  on  which  to  pile 
artificial  flowers  and  other  ornaments  made  of  these  lovely  feathers, 
though  considerably  vulgarised  by  the  free  admixture  of  imitation 
pearls. 

The  gilded  sedan-chair  in  which  the  bride  is  carried  is  also 
richly  decorated  with  a  multitude  of  tiny  wooden  figures  appar- 
ently enamelled,  but  really  covered  with  morsels  of  these  feathers. 
Fortunately  it  is  not  incumbent  on  a  young  couple  to  invest  in  one 
of  these  gorgeous  crowns  and  chairs,  as  they  are  hired  for  the  oc- 
casion. At  Canton  I  also  saw  most  exquisite  hand-screens  and 
large  folding-screens,  in  which  the  feathers  were  applied  to  produce 
very  effective  designs  (sometimes  whole  landscapes)  on  a  golden 
background.  Multitudes  of  quaint  wooden  figures,  which  appear  at 
certain  festivals  in  honour  of  the  great  Dragon,  are  also  so  closely 
coated  with  this  glossy  feather  as  to  resemble  fine  porcelain. 

The  process  of  manufacture  involves  most  delicate  manipulation. 
Suppose  a  head-dress  is  to  be  made  on  a  silver-gilt  ground.  The 
general  pattern  is  marked  out  by  strips  of  fine  silver-gilt  wire, 
which  are  soldered  to  the  groundwork.  The  working  jeweller  Bits 
at  a  table  on  which  are  arranged  his  tools  and  materials.  These 
consist  of  strips  of  bright  plume  cut  away  from  the  rib,  ami  neatly 
laid  on  a  sheet  of  paper;  beside  them  lie  several  small  very  sharp 
chisels.  On  a  tiny  charcoal  brazier  stands  a  cup  of  strong  glue 
dissolved  in  spirit,  and  beside  it  lie  some  very  fine  paint-brushes. 
Holding  the  ornament  in  his  left  hand,  with  his  right  he  dexter- 
ously cuts  an  atom  of  feather  just  the  right  size  ami  shape  for 
some  piece  of  his  pattern.  Then,  with  a  fine  brush,  he  applies 
the  glue  to  the  metal,  and  thereon  with  the  same  brush  lifts  and 
deposits   the   morsel   of    feather,    which    he    presses    home    with    a 


134  FEMALE    INFANTICIDE. 

smooth  horn  needle.  From  long  practice,  he  works  with  a  rapidity 
and  dexterity  wonderful  to  hehold,  and,  moreover,  is  apparently 
quite  undisturbed  hy  the  presence  of  admiring  spectators,  who  are 
not  shut  out  by  any  window,  for  every  shop  is  open  to  the  street, 
and  you  can  watch  all  processes  of  manufacture  ere  buying  your 
goods  ! 

I  was  so  fascinated  in  watching  one  of  these  patient  neat-handed 
jewellers  making  a  gorgeous  bridal  head-dress  that  I  could  hardly 
tear  myself  away.  But  the  lowering  sun  warned  me  not  to  delay 
too  long,  for  at  6.30  p.m.  sharp,  after  some  minutes  of  preliminary 
shouting  and  measured  gong-beating,  the  gates  of  the  city  are 
closed,  and  the  keys  are  sent  to  a  head  official,  after  which  neither 
ingress  nor  egress  is  possible.  So  it  is  necessary  ere  then  to  be  on 
Avhichever  side  of  the  wall  you  wish  to  sleep  ! 


CHAPTER    X. 


FEMALE      INFANTICIDE. 


Foundling  Hospital — A  young  wife — Paying  mothers  to  nurse  their  own 
children— The  Sunday  difficulty — Commencement  of  the  mission  in  Foo- 
Chow — The  Term  Question — The  Rev.  Wong  Kiu-taik — Sorely-tried  con- 
verts— Steady  increase — Census  of  foreign  missionaries. 

Amongst  the  native  charities  which  we  have  visited  is  a  Foundling 
Hospital,  where  unwelcome  infants  (chiefly  girls)  who  have  been 
abandoned  by  their  unnatural  mothers  are  carried,  should  they  be 
found  alive,  and  sometimes  they  are  brought  here  and  handed  in 
anonymously  by  their  own  mothers.  So  far  from  being  deemed  a 
crime,  infanticide  is  not  even  blamed  by  public  opinion,  neverthe- 
less foreign  influence  has  so  far  modified  the  views  of  the  upper 
classes  that  various  semi-official  proclamations  have  been  issued 
strongly  condemning  the  practice,  and  pointing  out  that,  as  the 
destruction  of  girls  must  be  displeasing  to  the  gods,  it  must  tend 
to  defeat  the  object  in  view — namely,  obtaining  the  Heaven-granted 
gift  of  sons  to  perform  the  rites  of  ancestral  sacrifice  and  worship. 

The  Foundling  Hospitals  are  built  on  the  same  plan  as  the  others 
— rows  of  mean,  dirty,  damp  cells,  where,  without  a  pretence  to 
cleanliness  or  comfort,  wretchedly  poor  women  are  established  as 


FOUNDLING    HOSPITALS.  135 

wet-nurses  on  a  monthly  wage  of  about  four  shillings,  with  a 
trifling  additional  allowance  for  getting  the  baby's  head  shaved  ! 
Each  receives  charge  of  a  couple  of  the  poor  starved  babies — some 
indeed  are  expected  to  take  charge  of  three ;  and  although  such  arc 
allowed  a  dole  of  flour  and  water,  to  supplement  the  deficient 
supply  of  nourishment,  it  is  needless  to  say  that  the  miserable 
children  are  horribly  neglected,  and  the  sound  of  their  ceaseless 
pitiful  wailing  is  heard  even  before  we  enter  this  abode  of  infant 
misery.  Oh !  what  a  contrast  to  the  happy  and  well-beloved 
babies  of  Japan. 

Here  the  death-rate  is  of  course  enormous,  and  about  a  coolie- 
load  per  diem  of  dead  babies  is  carried  out  of  the  hospital  to 
receive  uncoffined  and  unrecognised  burial.  Never  was  there  a 
more  practical  illustration  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest!  Such 
babies  as  survive  ten  months  of  this  treatment  acquire  a  definite 
value,  like  puppies  which  have  had  distemper,  and  they  are  pur- 
chased by  childless  couples  who  want  to  rear  a  servant  to  tend 
their  old  age,  or  else  by  provident  parents  who  thus  cheaply  pro- 
vide secondary  wives  for  their  sons — at  least  such  are  the  osten- 
sible reasons  assigned  to  make  the  purchase  legitimate.  Even 
supernumerary  sons  are  occasionally  consigned  to  this  hospital, 
whence  they  are  probably  removed  by  sonless  couples  who  want  to 
adopt  an  heir  to  offer  sacrifice  after  their  death.  As  to  the  doubly 
rejected  children  who  have  no  promise  of  future  beauty  and  whom 
no  one  wants,  they  are  generally  diseased,  deformed,  idiotic,  or  blind, 
and  so  are  eventually  sent  forth  to  swell  the  ranks  of  wretched 
street-beggars. 

There  is  little  fear  that  the  girls  who  are  thus  purchased  as 
future  daughters-in-law  will  turn  out  unsatisfactory,  as  they  are  too 
much  in  dread  of  the  alternative — namely,  being  reduced  to  tin; 
rank  of  servants,  who  are  virtually  slaves.  Bui  child-wives  are 
sometimes  provided  just  as  cheaply  by  direct  purchase  from  tie- 
parents,  or  by  exchange.  The  other  day,  a  lady  was  visiting  a 
tiny  Christian  school  in  a  village  near  here;  she  was  particularly 
attracted  by  a  bright  little  fellow,  about  eight  years  of  age,  who  for 
some  months  had  refused  to  worship  the  village  idols,  and  who 
repeated  various  Christian  hymns  with  much  feeling. 

The  little  chap  carried  in  his  arms  a  wee  baby  girl,  and  the  lady 
naturally  asked  if  it  was  his  sister,  whereupon  lie  looked  shy.  and 
did  not  answer,  hut  his  brother  volunteered  the  information,  "  She 
is  his  wife  !"  On  further  inquiry  as  to  why  so  young  a  baby  had 
been  taken  from  its  own  mother,  the  boy's  mother  explained  thai 


136  FEMALE    INFANTICIDE. 

bad  slic  purchased  an  older  child,  she  would  have  required  to  pay 
a  higher  price,  whereas,  having  a  girl  of  her  own  of  the  same  age, 
she  had  exchanged  with  a  neighbour,  who  also  had  a  son  to  marry, 
hut  as  this  baby  was  larger  and  fatter  than  her  own,  she  had 
thrown  in  a  dollar  and  some  cakes  to  equalise  the  exchange  ! 

I  am  told  that  the  proportion  of  female  infanticide  varies  greatly 
in  different  provinces.  Throughout  the  province  of  Fuh-Kien  it  is 
unusually  high  ;  in  fact,  there  are  some  districts  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  Amoy  where  30  per  cent  of  all  the  girls  horn  are  put  to 
death — strangled,  or  else  drowned  like  so  many  puppies.  Here 
in  Foo-(  !how,  it  is  quite  a  common  thing  for  a  mother  to  mention 
that  she  has  made  away  with  three  or  four  girls  !  But  I  am  told 
that  throughout  the  empire  the  numerical  disparity  of  female 
children  is  always  a  painfully  suggestive  characteristic.  Chinese 
students  of  Bible  history  find  it  almost  impossible  to  accept  the 
first  chapter  of  Exodus  as  an  accurate  translation.  It  seems  to 
them  so  preposterous  to  assert  that  Pharaoh  could  have  commanded 
that  the  hoys  should  all  he  drowned,  and  the  girls  saved  alive  ! 

One  simple  detail  will  illustrate  the  different  estimate  in  which 
sons  and  daughters  are  held,  even  in  families  which  have  no  wish 
to  destroy  the  latter.  In  certain  districts  of  Northern  China  (and 
probably  elsewhere),  the  medical  charge  for  vaccinating  a  boy  is 
800  cash,  which  is  equal  to  about  ninepence.  The  charge  for 
vaccinating  a  girl  is  only  400  cash,  as  it  is  found  that  the  people 
would  rather  run  the  risk  of  their  daughter's  beauty  being  de- 
stroyed, than  pay  for  her  at  the  same  rate  as  for  a  son  ! 

Probably,  however,  a  more  remarkable  proof  is  one  which  has 
just  come  under  my  notice  in  this  town.  Prominent  among  the 
Chinamen  who  are  truly  friendly  to  foreigners  is  Mr  Ahok,  a  mer- 
chant who,  having  begun  life  with  little  of  the  world's  gear,  has 
prospered  so  greatly  that  he  now  owns  large  stores  all  over  the 
city.  His  history  reminds  me  of  the  biography  of  "  A  Successful 
Merchant "  in  London  town,  for,  like  him,  he  has  ever  made  a  rule 
of  most  liberal  almsgiving,  increasing  in  proportion  to  the  increase 
of  his  business,  and  truly  it  seems  that  a  blessing  has  rested  on  all 
he  has  taken  in  hand. 

Though  not  by  birth  of  high  estate,  he  has  been  created  a  man- 
darin in  recognition  of  his  many  and  far-reaching  good  deeds,  one 
of  which  has  been  the  salvage  of  innumerable  girl-babies  by  the 
simple  announcement  that  he  would  give  an  allowance  of  rice  for 
a  certain  time  to  every  mother  who,  purposing  to  destroy  her  un- 
welcome female  infant,  would  abstain  from  so  doing.      It  is  found 


SAVING    FEMALE    BABIES.  137 

that  when  a  woman  has  taken  the  trouble  of  rearing  her  babe 
through  its  early  stages  of  existence,  she  grows  fond  of  it,  and 
rarely  destroys  it  wilfully.  The  number  of  Mr  Ahok's  pensioners 
varies  considerably  in  years  of  plenty  or  years  of  famine.  During 
the  recent  bad  years  he  has  actually  allowed  rice  to  five  hundred 
mothers  to  induce  them  to  spare  the  lives  of  the  innocents  !  Last 
year,  I  am  told,  the  number  was  reduced  to  three  hundred,  but 
this  number  is  now  steadily  increasing.  Of  course  it  is  only  the 
poorest  of  the  people  whom  he  can  reach  by  this  means.  As 
regards  the  well-to-do  parents,  who  simply  cannot  be  bothered 
rearing  useless  girls,  who  can  never  repay  the  cost  of  their  keep, 
the  only  chance  of  influencing  them  is  by  means  of  a  little  body 
of  native  reformers  who  are  now  endeavouring  to  create  a  healthy 
public  opinion  on  the  subject.  Of  course  the  spread  of  Christi- 
anity is  the  only  effectual  safeguard — the  only  real  antidote  for  a 
custom  so  widely  established,  and  which,  apart  from  its  own  ini- 
quity, is  held  responsible  for  much  of  the  immorality  of  this 
land. 

As  regards  Mr  Ahok's  good  work,  it  is  virtually  the  act  of  a 
( 'hristian,  for,  although  he  has  not  yet  formally  been  admitted  to 
their  number,  he  has  long  been  a  regular  attendant  at  the  services 
of  the  American  Mission,  and  never  fails,  by  every  means  in  his 
power,  to  help  and  honour  all  persons  connected  with  Christian 
missions,  which  is  a  good  ileal  more  than  can  be  said  for  many 
foreigners  Avho,  by  virtue  of  their  nationality,  rank  as  unquestioned 
Christians. 

The  difficulty  in  Mr  Ahok's  case  is  not  merely  the  usual  ques- 
tion of  the  barbarous  cruelty  and  personal  danger  of  abstaining 
from  the  accustomed  offerings  on  behalf  of  the  dead,  which  is  a 
far  more  real  test  than  most  Europeans  could  believe,  but  also  the 
injustice  which  he  may  do  to  others  by  a  total  cessation  from  all 
Sunday  trade,  which  is  always  insisted  upon  as  an  absolutely 
necessary  preliminary  to  Christian  baptism.1 

1  This  question  proved  a  matter  for  long  and  most  anxious  consideration.  _  Al- 
though for  a  while  these  apparently  insuperable  difficulties  seemed  to  necessitate 
the  continuance  of  Sunday  work,  Mr  Ahok  made  his  house  and  his  great  stores 
centres  for  Christian  meetings  on  certain  days  of  every  week  and  month,  and  at 
length  the  very  natural  objections  of  his  partners  were  so  far  overcome  that  it  was 
deeided  to  elose  all  places  of  business  on  Sun. lay — not  suddenly,  but  after  due 
notice,  and  the  issue  to  all  old  customers  of  an  almanack  to  show  on  what  days  of 
the  Chinese  year  the  Sundays  would  fall,  and  an   intimation  that  on  those  days  110 

business  could  be  transacted.    Mr  Ahok  further  resolved  that  all  persi 
in  his  service  should  receive  their  full  seven  days' wages,  but  made  it  a  condition 
of  remaining  in  his  employment,  thai  in  place-  of  serving  him  a1  their  usual  posts 
on  the  seventh  day,  they  should  all  be  present  at  a  Christian  meeting,  and  might 


138  FEMALE    INFANTICIDE. 

Hi;  has  in  his  employment  fully  a  thousand  heathen  Chinamen, 
to  all  of  whom  a  compulsory  day  of  idleness  would  he  a  serious 
loss,  especially  as  many  have  wives  and  children.  But  to  engagi 
to  pay  them  wages  for  no  work,  hy  the  same  act  which  knocks  off 
the  profit  of  one  day  in  seven,  would  he  indeed  a  serious  sacrifice, 
especially  as  it  is  one  which  is  not  made  hy  even  foreign  merchants 
(foreign,  hence  at  least  nominal  Christians),  and  which  of  course 
would  thus  place  him  and  his  Chinese  partners  at  a  terrible  disad- 
vantage among  their  competitors. 

I  do  not  mean  by  this  to  imply  that  foreigners'  shops  or  mer- 
cantile houses  are  actually  open  on  Sunday,  hut  throughout  the 
East  an  immense  amount  of  business  is  transacted  on  the  day  of 
nominal  rest.  Not  only  do  the  heavy  requirements  of  "  mail-day" 
oppress  the  principals,  but  gangs  of  weary  workers  pour  out  from 
the  tea-hongs  and  other  factories  on  every  day  alike,  the  argument 
of  the  employers  being  that  which  I  have  already  stated,  namely, 
that  the  observance  of  a  compulsory  holiday  would  be  anything 
but  a  privilege  to  those  to  whom  it  is  no  holy  day.  Therefore  it  is 
simply  a  question  of  how  far  the  employment  of  "  the  stranger 
that  is  within  thy  gates  "  is  legitimate. 

Of  course  the  native  convert  in  India,  China,  or  Japan,  notes 
with  wonder  that  the  Sabbatical  observance  which  is  made  an 
indispensable  condition  of  his  admission  to  the  Church,  sits  very 
lightly  on  those  already  within  its  pale. 

This  little  province  of  Fuh.-Ki.en,  although  about  the  smallest  of 
the  eighteen  provinces  of  China  Proper  (being  only  just  about  the 
size  of  England,  and  with  a  population  of  only  twenty  millions, 
out  of  the  total  of  four  hundred  millions),  is  nevertheless  one  of 
the  most  interesting  centres  of  mission  work  in  the  Empire. 

Nowhere  has  good  seed  been  sown  in  ground  apparently  more 
barren  than  this,  which  for  many  years  proved  so  terribly  dis- 
couraging to  the  few  earnest  men  who  first  attempted  to  kindle 
one  ray  of  Christian  light  in  the  dense  darkness  of  a  land  so  wholly 
given  to  idolatry. 

The  first  effort  was  made  by  Americans  in  1846 — i.e.,  two  years 

thus  have  full  opportunity  of  learning  the  tenets  of  the  faith  lie  had  himself 
adopted. 

It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  this  great  test-experiment  should  have  been  tried 
at  a  season  of  such  grievous  commercial  depression,  that  the  results  so  far  have  not 
commended  the  movement  to  the  non-Christian  partners. 

On  a  smaller  scale,  the  strict  observance  of  the  Sabbath  by  individual  converts  in 
various  parts  of  the  country,  and  especially  the  extraordinary  fact  of  abstinence 
from  money-making  work,  has  so  astonished  their  neighbours  as  to  attract  great 
attention  and  provoke  inquiry,  which  has  resulted  in  numerous  conversions. 


NOTE    ON    ESTIMATED    POPULATION.  139 

after  the  port  of  loo-Chow  was  opened  to  foreign  trade.  They 
were  followed  in  1850  by  two  clergymen  of  the  English  Church 
Missionary  Society,  one  of  whom  was  skilled  in  medicine,  an 
agency  whose  value  had  already  been  proved  at  Amoy,  in  this 
same  province.  Hitherto  the  Americans  had  only  been  suffered 
to  live  at  the  suburb  of  Nantai  It  was  therefore  deemed  a  great 
concession  when  quarters  were  assigned  to  the  medical  Britons  in 
an  old  temple  on  the  "Wu-Shih-Shan  hill,  in  the  heart  of  the  walled 
city. 

Within  two  years,  one  of  the  clergymen  was  removed  to  another 
district,  as  if  a  parish  of  600,000  souls  was  not  a  large  enough 
sphere  for  two  men.  But  there  lies  the  great  difficulty  of  mission 
work  in  China — the  problem  of  how  one  man  is  to  teach  one  mil- 
lion. This  is  not  a  figure  of  speech — it  is  the  actual  proportion 
of  the  total  number  of  Protestant  missionaries  sent  out  by  up- 
wards of  thirty  different  societies,  to  work  among  the  400,000,0001 
of  China. 

For  three  years  Mr  Welton  toiled  alone,  acquiring  great  personal 
influence  by  his  ministrations  among  the  sick  poor,  about  three 
thousand  cases  annually  seeking  his  healing  skill,  and  during  all 
this  time  he  ceaselessly  strove  to  make  known  to  them  the  love  of 
the  Great  Physician.  At  length  two  other  clergymen  were  sent  to 
his  aid,  but  his  own  health  had  broken  down  through  overwork, 
and  he  only  returned  home  to  die. 

The  two  new-comers  had  scarcely  mastered  the  difficulties  of 
the  language  ere  one  died  of  fever  (having  previously  buried  his 
Avife),  and  the  other  was  compelled  by  the  illness  of  his  wife  to 
leave  so  isolated  a  post.  Thus  a  fifth  clergyman,  the  Rev.  G. 
Smith,  who  had  in  the  meantime  arrived,  and  was  still  in  the  firsi 
agonies  of  battling  with  the  language,  was  left  utterly  alone ;  and 
it'  any  man  or  woman  in  Europe  imagines  that  he  or  she  has  real- 
ised the  pain  of  loneliness,  just  let  them  imagine  what  it  would  be 
to  be  alone  among  millions  of  contemptuous  idolaters,  not  one  of 

1  It  is  supposed  that  this  was  a  fair  estimate  of  the  population  thirty  years  aLr<>, 
but  since  then  many  causes  have  tended  greatly  to  thin  these  legions — floods, 
famines,  pestilences,  and  the  frightful  prolonged  civil  war,  besides  the  rapid  increase 
of  excessive  opium-smoking,  which  tells  so  fatally  bo1  li  on  the  Dumber  and  the  vital- 
ity of  the  smoker's  children.  A  tier  the  great  famine,  the  bunion  Kelief  Committee, 
sanctioned  by  Sir  Thomas  Wade,  British  ambassador  at  Peking,  accepted  the  esti- 
mate of  320,000,000.  But  in  order  to  keep  thoroughly  within  the  mark,  the  Rev. 
J.  Hudson  Taylor  bases  all  his  calculations  on  the  assumption  thai  the  population 
of  China  Proper  has  dwindled  to  227,000,000,  while  Manchuria,  Mongolia,  Sungaria, 

and  Thibet   furnish   about    ''/■'.. 1,0 ioiv.    malum:  a   total   <»l    250, - 

the  wonderfully  forcible  details  in  '  China's  spiritual  Nee. I  and  Claims,'  bj  the  K' 
.1.  Hudson  Taylor,  published  by  Messrs  Morgan  &  Scott. 


140  FEMALE    INFANTICIDE. 

win  mi  had  one  grain  of  sympathy  for  the  foreign  barbarian  who 

could  not  even  make  himself  understood  ! 

This  was  the  state  of  the  CM. 8.  Mission  here  at  the  end  of  its 
tenth  year.  Not  one  convert,  or  the  smallest  prospect  of  one,  had 
ivw.-ifdcd  this  effort,  which  had  cost  three  valuahle  lives,  hesides 
invaliding  others.  It  now  became  a  serious  question  whether  it 
might  not  be  wiser  to  commence  operations  elsewhere.  Mr  Smith, 
however,  pleaded  hard  to  be  allowed  to  remain  in  Foo-Chow,  as 
there  were  three  inquirers  whom  he  deemed  hopeful.  It  was  a 
faint  spark  to  result  from  such  prolonged  effort,  but  his  petition 
was  granted,  and  he  was  left  to  fan  this  feeble  germ  of  life.  In 
the  course  of  the  following  year  he  had  the  satisfaction  of  baptis- 
ing four  converts  ;  within  the  next  two  years  this  number  was 
increased  to  thirteen.  But  he  was  only  destined  to  see  the  com- 
mencement of  the  harvest,  and  then  he  too  was  called  to  his  rest. 

Ere  his  death,  in  1863,  he  was  joined  by  the  Eev.  J.  It.  Wolfe, 
who  thus,  within  a  year  of  his  arrival,  was  left  in  sole  charge  of 
the  Mission.  "Within  two  months,  he  likewise  was  brought  to  the 
verge  of  the  grave,  and  had  to  retire  to  Hong-Kong  for  medical 
aid.  Thus  the  infant  Church  was  left  without  any  foreign  pastor. 
Happily  in  this  extremity,  a  Chinese  catechist,  by  name  Wong 
Kiu-taik,  was  found  competent  to  act  as  evangelist  of  the  native 
Church,  and  thenceforth  hundreds  of  his  countrymen  daily  attended 
his  preaching  at  two  chapels  in  different  parts  of  the  crowded  city. 
He  was  subsequently  admitted  to  holy  orders  by  Bishop  Alford, 
and  has  proved  a  most  earnest  and  able  clergyman — the  first 
Chinese  pastor  of  Fuh-Kien. 

His  own  simple  story  is  most  touching.  He  was  a  young  land- 
scape-painter, and  was  persuaded  by  his  special  friend  (also  a 
young  artist)  to  attend  the  services  of  the  American  Episcopal 
Mission.  What  he  there  heard  convinced  him  that  the  foreign 
religion  was  true.  The  despair  and  indignation  of  his  mother, 
when  she  realised  his  conversion,  were  unbounded.  She  drove  him 
from  the  house  with  the  most  terrible  of  Chinese  curses,  forbidding 
his  presence  at  her  funeral.  But  though  sorely  troubled,  the 
young  man's  constancy  was  nowise  shaken ;  on  the  contrary,  he 
only  became  the  more  earnest  and  zealous. 

One  day  he  received  a  message  from  his  mother  commanding 
him  to  come  to  her.  He  fully  expected  to  find  some  plot  for  his 
destruction,  and  obeyed  her  behest  with  many  an  anxious  prayer. 
8he  asked  him  if  he  was  still  determined  to  be  a  Christian,  and  it 
needed  all  his  courage   to  reply  that   such  was  indeed  the   case. 


THE  MOST  HOLY  NAME.  141 

Judge  of  his  thankful  joy  when  she  replied  that  if  that  was  really 
his  determination  she  would  no  longer  oppose  him,  but  he  might 
live  at  home  and  be  a  Christian.  He  was  baptised  soon  after- 
wards, at  the  age  of  twenty-three,  assuming  the  name  of  Kiu-taik, 
"  Seeker  of  Virtue." 

For  a  while  he  worked  as  an  evangelist  in  the  service  of  the 
American  Mission,  but  resigned  his  post  in  consequence  of  a  diffi- 
culty which  has  sorely  troubled  the  Christians  of  China — a  diffi- 
culty known  as  "  The  Term  Question,"  which  is,  in  fact,  a  very 
painful  dispute  as  to  the  Chinese  word  to  be  adopted  as  the  best 
equivalent  for  the  name  of  God.  The  decision  of  the  American 
Mission  was  in  favour  of  a  term  which  Wong  could  not  conscien- 
tiously use,  as  to  his  mind  it  conveyed  an  idolatrous  meaning.  He 
therefore  left  the  Americans,  and  with  their  fullest  recommendation 
joined  the  English  Mission,  in  which  he  has  done  such  good  service. 

The  "Term  Question  "  has  been  the  source  of  much  painful  dis- 
cussion among  all  sections  of  the  Christian  Church,  and  is  one  on 
which  the  ablest  men  and  best  of  friends  have  carried  on  hot 
contentions,  most  unedifying  to  the  Chinese  whom  they  desire  to 
instruct.  The  controversy,  which  has  raged  on  the  claims  of  three 
Chinese  titles,  has  given  birth  to  a  dozen  learned  pamphlets.  The 
first  is  Shaxg-ti,  "  The  Supreme  God ; "  the  second  is  T'iex-Choo, 
"  The  Lord  of  Heaven  ; "  the  third  is  Shin,  "  Spirit." 

The  first  of  these  terms  appears  the  most  rational,  but  its  op- 
ponents say  that  the  Chinese  will  naturally  identify  it  with  the 
Supreme  Being  whom  they  worship  in  the  Temple  of  Heaven,  and 
perhaps  in  so  doing  they  might  not  be  far  wrung.1  But  the  result 
of  the  dispute  is  that  the  first  term  is  in  use  throughout  the  Fuh- 
Kien  and  Hang-Chow  Missions,  and  is  also  used  by  the  missionaries 
in  Hong-Kong,  though  both  in  his  preaching  and  in  his  translation 
of  the  Bible  and  Prayer-book,  their  bishop  (Bishop  Burdon)  adheres 
to  the  term  T'ien-Choo,  which  is  that  adopted  by  the  <  hurch  of 
Borne.  On  the  other  hand,  the  term  Shin  is  that  sanctioned  by 
Bishop  Bussell,  and  generally  used  in  the  Kingpo  district  and  at 
Shanghai,  as  also  by  the  American  missionaries.  Consequently  the 
travelled  Chinaman  has  a  general  impression  that  three  sets  of  for- 
eign teachers  are  advocating  the  worship  of  three  Gods  ! 

This  then  was  the  question  which  gave  to  the  Church  of  England 
in  Foo-Chow  her  first  ordained  native  clergyman,  and.  as  1  have 
said,  his  earnest  preaching  has  led  many  of  his  countrymen  to  adopt 
the  faith  which  he  so  powerfully  advocates. 

1  "Whom  therefore  ye  ignorantly  worship,  Him  declare  I  onto  yon." 


142  FEMALE    INFANTICIDE. 

In  the  following  year,  some  undefined  cause  aroused  the  fury  of 
the  mob  against  Christians  in  general,  and  a  savage  persecution  en- 
sued, in  which  chapel,  schools,  mission  library,  and  teachers' houses 
were  destroyed,  and  many  of  the  converts  were  cruelly  maltreated. 
Then,  as  in  a  multitude  of  more  recent  cases,  the  Chinese  Christians 
"ave  proof  of  an  intense  reality  of  faith,  ready  to  endure  the  loss 
of  all  things,  even  unto  death. 

I  often  wish,  when  I  hear  men  lightly  quoting  from  one  another 
the  stock  phrases  which  are  accepted  as  conclusive  evidence  of  the 
uselessness  of  mission  work,  and  of  the  hypocrisy  which  it  is  sup- 
posed to  foster  in  its  converts  (all  of  whom  are  supposed  to  be 
merely  nominal,  or  attracted  by  gain),  that  the  speakers  would  just 
take  the  trouble  to  inquire  for  themselves  as  to  the  truth  of  their 
statements.  They  would  learn  a  very  different  story  from  the  lips 
of  men  who  really  know  what  they  are  speaking  about,  and  who 
would  gladly  give  them  a  thousand  details  of  individuals  who 
have  proved  the  intensity  of  their  convictions  by  voluntarily  re- 
signing lucrative  posts  in  connection  with  idol  worship,  or  involv- 
ing Sunday  work ;  by  enduring  bitter  persecutions  from  their  own 
nearest  and  dearest  relations,  deliberately  giving  up  all  ease  and 
comfort  in  life,  and  accepting  a  lot  of  assured  poverty  and  suffer- 
ing, all  in  the  one  great  effort  to  live  worthy  of  the  Light  and  Love 
which  has  filled  their  hearts — a  Light  which  in  many  cases  has  long 
been  steadily  and  bitterly  resisted,  ere  it  has  thus  triumphed. 

In  the  case  of  this  first  general  persecution  at  Foo-Chow,  it  led 
to  the  usual  result  of  calling  much  attention  to  the  new  doctrine, 
and  greatly  enlarging  the  number  of  genuine  inquirers,  from  which, 
one  by  one,  arose  individuals  desiring  baptism.  Several  European 
merchants  were  so  much  impressed  by  the  constancy  of  these  native 
Christians  under  such  serious  persecution,  that  they  subscribed 
£1000  to  build  a  church  for  their  use  in  the  heart  of  the  city. 
This  was  opened  in  1865,  the  bell  which  summoned  the  congre- 
gation to  worship  being  that  rescued  from  the  forecastle  of  H.M.S. 
Childers,  which  had  recently  been  wrecked  on  this  coast. 

It  has  been  said  by  one  of  England's  greatest  preachers,  that 
"  The  faith  which  does  not  seek  to  communicate  itself  to  others, 
soon  shrivels  up."  Here  we  find  the  converse  most  practically 
illustrated,  for  the  most  remarkable  feature  of  the  growth  of  this 
native  Church  has  been  that,  notwithstanding  the  persecution  which 
such  a  course  is  almost  certain  to  awaken,  each  man  or  woman  who 
has  grasped  some  idea  of  Christian  truth  invariably  tries  to  con- 
vince friends  and  neighbours,  so  that  all  over  the  country  individ- 


STEADFAST    CHRISTIAN    CONVERTS.  143 

uals  are  doing  evangelists'  work  on  their  own  account,  and  thus  a 
multitude  of  tiny  Christian  centres  are  formed  whence  the  light  is 
certain  ere  long  to  radiate  further  and  further. 

As  an  example  of  how  much  one  earnest  man  may  effect,  and 
also  of  how  good  seed  lying  fallow  for  years  may  yet  come  to  light, 
Mr  S.  L.  Baldwin  tells  of  one  of  his  converts  here,  by  name  Ching- 
Ting,  a  devoted  Christian,  who  went  about  from  village  to  village 
preaching  the  Gospel.  At  various  places  he  was  stoned,  and 
finally  was  arrested  and  thrown  into  the  common  prison  on  some 
totally  false  charge,  for  which,  nevertheless,  he  was  condemned  to 
receive  seven  hundred  lashes  with  a  triple  leather  thong,  making 
the  punishment  equal  to  over  two  thousand  cuts.  Being  so  lacer- 
ated as  to  be  incapable  of  walking,  he  was  carried  back  to  Foo- 
Chow,  where  a  foreign  physician  stated  that  so  severe  a  case  of 
scourging  had  never  come  to  his  knowledge.  But  though  in  such 
intense  agony  that  he  could  not  repress  his  groans,  he  never  ceased 
to  plead  with  all  around  him  to  turn  to  the  Saviour,  who  could 
give  the  soul  such  perfect  peace,  though  the  body  was  racked  with 
pain.1 

1  Very  touching  is  the  simple  confidence  with  which  these  fine  frank  nature-  ac- 
cept and  realise  their  newly  found  privilege  of  what  St  John  (1  John  i.  3)  calls  "our 
fellowship"  with  God.  One  young  man,  a  candidate  for  baptism,  was  asked 
whether  he  felt  that  he  truly  loved  the  Saviour?  Humbly  but  very  earnestly  came 
the  answer:  "  I  do.  1  cling  to  Him  ;  I  am  very,  very  close  to  Him."  And  this  has 
been  the  testimony,  proven  by  consistent  lives,  of  thousands  in  China,  and  in  many 
instances  sealed  by  martyrdom. 

From  the  south  of  China  to  the  far  north,  all  the  converts,  whether  Catholic  or 
Protestant,  know  very  well  that  in  embracing  Christianity  they  render  themselves 
liable  to  persecution  in  every  form. 

Thus  at  Christmas  time  1879,  there  was  a  fearful  persecution  in  a  district  within 
a  hundred  miles  of  Canton,  where  a  wealthy  Christian  convert,  having  determined 
to  build  a  church  in  his  village,  was  seized  and  tortured,  to  make  him  forswear 
Christ.  On  his  remaining  steadfast,  he  was  bound  to  a  cross  and  swathed  in  cotton- 
wool  saturated  with  oil,  and  so  was  burnt  alive.  Four  of  his  fellow-Christians  were 
also  fearfully  tortured  and  mutilated,  and  then  they  likewise  (since  they  could  not 
^  induced  to  recant)  were  tied  to  crosses  and  burnt. 

Fire  and  frost  are  alike  enlisted  in  this  cruel  work.  From  I-cho,  a  village  • 
miles  from  Peking,  conies  a  story  of  prolonged  torture,  as  the  penalty  for  helping  t<> 
commence  a  mission  there.  A  friendly  Chinaman  negotiated  the  rental  of  a  suitable 
house,  for  which  a  year's  rent  was  paid  in  advance.  But  when  the  truants  came  t>> 
take  possession,  they  were  oflicially  informed  by  the  mandarins  that  no  fore 
could  be  allowed  to  live  so  near  the  Imperial  Tombs,  as  the  good  influences  of  the 
place  would  be  destroyed. 

The  unhappy  Chinaman  who  had  hired  the  house  was  barbarously  beaten,  receiv- 
ing a  hundred  blows  from  a  strip  of  bamboo  three  inches  wide,  and  twenty  blows 
on  his  face  with  an  inch-wide  leather.  Disabled  bj  this  brutal  treatment,  tl 
wretch  was  then  chained  to  a  stone  platform,  and  there  left  for  seventeen  days  with- 
out tire,  in  the  bitter  cold  of  a  northern  winter  (where  for  month  together  the  ice 
on  the  river  is  a  foot  in  depth).  His  undressed  wounds  had  putrefied,  and  his  con- 
dition was  altogether  horrible,  when,  on  payment  of  a  heavy  fine,  he  was  released, 
to  act  as  a  living  warning  to  all  who  should  in  any  way  countenam  e  tl 
So  far,  however,  from  this  result  being  attained,  the  people  seem  to  have  been  im- 


144  IKMALE    INFANTICIDE. 

As  soon  as  he  was  able  to  walk,  he  resumed  his  pleaching  work 

on  the  identical  round  where  he  had  heen  so  cruelly  persecuted ; 
and  so  greatly  lias  his  word  been  blessed,  that  ere  many  months 
had  elapsed,  four  hundred  of  his  countrymen  looked  upon  him  as 
the  instrument  of  their  conversion. 

In  the  course  of  his  wanderings  he  went  to  the  Isle  of  Lamyit, 
and  there  was  astonished  to  be  greeted  by  friendly  people,  who 
said,  "  Oh,  we  know  about  this  doctrine, — it  is  not  new  to  us  ;  "  and 
then  they  told  him  that  thirty  years  previously  Mr  Medhurst  had 
come  up  the  coast,  scattering  Christian  books  broadcast.  They 
had  received  the  Gospels  of  St  Matthew  and  St  John  and  other 
books,  and  had  studied  them,  always  hoping  that  some  one  would 
come  and  tell  them  more.  So  about  sixty  persons  were  quite  pre- 
pared to  become  Christians. 

As  another  instance  of  the  spread  of  Christianity  by  purely 
native  agency,  I  may  quote  that  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Lo- 
Nguong  (a  town  immediately  to  the  north  of  Foo-Chow,  where 
a  great  awakening  commenced  some  years  ago),  on  the  very  first 
occasion  that  an  English  clergyman,  the  Eev.  T.  E.  Wolfe,  visited 
one  of  the  neighbouring  villages,  he  was  invited  to  a  native  house, 
where,  in  the  great  hall,  usually  devoted  to  idols,  he  found  that 
these  had  been  banished,  and  replaced  by  tables  on  which  lay 
Chinese  copies  of  the  Bible  and  the  Prayer-book.  He  learnt  that 
the  whole  family  were  in  the  habit  of  assembling  here  regularly 
for  morning  and  evening  prayer,  which  was  conducted  by  the 
elder  brother.  Within  a  radius  of  nine  miles  from  the  central 
town  there  were  ninety  candidates  for  baptism,  besides  a  great 
number  of  inquirers,  and  at  the  village  aforesaid  about  one  hun- 
dred persons  had  assembled,  bringing  their  own  rice,  that  they 
might  be  able  to  remain  all  day. 

As  a  matter  of  course,  such  a  movement  was  quickly  followed 
by  an  outbreak  of  violent  persecution,  in  which  the  Christians 
suffered  terribly  ;  but  nevertheless,  almost  without  exception  they 
stood  firm,  and  quite  recently  small  congregations  have  come  into 
existence  at  new  villages  in  the  neighbourhood.  To  one  of  these 
(the  village  of  long-Tung)  the  Gospel  was  brought  by  one  villager 
who  had  happened  to  attend  a  preaching  in  the  village  of  A-chaia. 
He  at  once  told  all  he  had  heard  to  his  own  neighbours,  and  very 
soon  himself  embraced  the  faith.  His  neighbours  one  and  all 
joined  together  against  him  in  cruel  persecution,  but  he  continued 

pressed  by  the  injustice  of  the  case,  and,  so  far  as  they  dared,  proved  friendly 
and  respectful. 


MODERN    PARALLELS   TO    OLD    STORIES.  145 

faithful  unto  death.  No  sooner  was  he  dead  than  the  head-man 
of  the  village,  who  had  heen  the  leader  of  the  opposition,  became 
convinced  that  his  persecuted  neighbour  was  right,  and  so,  putting 
away  idols,  he  opened  his  reception-hall  for  Christian  worship. 

This  exasperated  his  people,  who  proceeded  to  destroy  his  tea 
plantations,  attacked  his  house,  and  drove  him  and  his  family  from 
the  village.  After  a  while,  however,  their  minds  were  changed 
towards  him.  He  was  invited  to  return,  and  his  most  violent 
antagonists  were  among  the  first  members  of  a  now  flourishing 
congregation. 

Another  village  in  the  same  group  has  furnished  a  most  re- 
markable parallel  to  the  story  of  the  Philippian  jailer  of  a.d.  53. 
In  place  of  Paul  and  Silas  at  Philippi,  we  have  two  Chinese  con- 
verts at  Lau-Iong.  They  were  imprisoned  on  charges  which  the 
mandarins  themselves  admitted  to  be  false,  but  were  detained  in 
consequence  of  bribes  from  the  anti-Christian  party.  But  such 
was  their  influence  for  good,  that  first  the  jailer  himself  and  then 
a  fellow-prisoner  openly  declared  themselves  Christians,  and  soon 
after  were  admitted  to  baptism.  The  two  prisoners  were  placed 
in  offices  of  trust  in  the  jail,  and  were  allowed  to  hold  Christian 
services  every  Sunday,  for  the  benefit  of  their  miserable  fellow 
prisoners,  so  there  is  good  reason  to  hope  that  some  of  these  have 
also  been  influenced  for  good,  in  which  case  they  are  quite  certain 
themselves  to  become  light-bearers  in  the  dark  places  where  their 
lot  is  cast. 

From  Peking  comes  a  very  remarkable  Chinese  version  of  the 
story  of  Cornelius,  the  devout  centurion.  His  counterpart  is  a 
respectable  farmer,  who,  while  yet  a  heathen,  has  been  noted  for 
his  devotion,  his  liberal  almsgiving  to  the  poor,  and  his  large 
offerings  to  the  temples.  Several  years  ago  he  became  possessed 
of  a  copy  of  the  Xew  Testament,  some  portions  of  which  greatly 
impressed  him  as  he  read  them  over  and  over  by  himself.  At 
Length  he  dreamt  that  a  messenger  from  heaven  had  appeared  to 
him,  bidding  him  spend  no  more  money  on  idol  temples,  and 
promising  that  on  the  23d  day  of  the  7th  moon  lie  would  meel 
a  man  who  would  tell  him  what  he  ought  to  do. 

It  so  happened  that  in  the  7th  moon  one  of  the  native  col- 
porteurs was  sent  to  that  district  to  sell  Christian  hooks.  The 
man,  who  is  a  simple-minded  earnest  Christian,  also  had  a  dream, 
which  visibly  impressed  him  with  the  belief  thai  he  was  being 
called  there  for  special  work.  ( >n  the  very  day  indicated,  he  met 
the  farmer,  who  invited  him  to  his  house,  where  he  tarried  for 


14G  FEMALK    INFANTICIDE. 

three  days,  expounding  "  the  old,  old  story"  to  eager  ears.     I  need 
scarcely  add  that  the  farmer  believed  and  was  baptised. 

Sucli  parallels  to  the  conversions  of  apostolic  days  are  by  no 
means  uncommon  here.  Another  which  recently  occurred  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  Ningpo,  was  that  of  a  man  whose  sole  means  of 
gaining  his  living  was  by  fortune-telling.  This  man,  having  be- 
come convinced  of  the  truth,  earnestly  desired  baptism,  but  his 
profession  rendered  it  impossible  to  receive  him.  Again  and  again 
he  returned,  declaring  his  faith  and  his  true  desire  to  become  a 
Christian,  but  saying  that  he  could  not  see  his  way  to  give  up  his 
fortune-telling,  as  he  could  find  no  other  means  of  support. 

This  continued  for  some  time  :  at  length  one  morning  when 
several  candidates  were  to  be  baptised,  they  saw  this  man  approach 
with  a  large  bundle,  which  contained  the  whole  of  his  fortune- 
telling  gear,  his  books,  his  tablets,  charms,  and  numbered  slips  of 
bamboo,  and  kindling  a  fire  in  the  courtyard,  he  proceeded  (like 
the  sorcerers  of  old)  l  to  burn  them  all  in  the  presence  of  the  con- 
gregation, and  then,  while  the  smoke  of  this  burnt-sacrifice  still 
floated  heavenward,  he  joyfully  took  his  place  among  the  candi- 
dates, fully  resolved  to  find  some  legitimate  means  of  earning  his 
daily  rice. 

Thus  gradually  does  the  leaven  work.  Now2  the  Church  Mis- 
sionary Society  alone  can  reckon  5871  converts  in  this  province 
of  Fuh-Kien.  Of  these,  3106  have  been  admitted  to  baptism,  and 
1803  are  regular  communicants,  and  moreover,  communicants  to 
whom  church- membership  is  no  matter  of  course — no  mere  in- 
heritance, but  the  result  of  an  intense  individual  conviction,  and 
one  which  all  are  aware  may  any  day  lead  not  only  to  the  destruc- 
tion of  all  their  worldly  property,  but  also  to  the  infliction  of  the 
most  barbarous  personal  suffering,  and  persecution  literally  to  the 
death. 

Such  persecution  comes  not  only  from  outsiders,  for,  in  the 
words  of  the  Master,  "  A  man's  foes  are  they  of  his  own  house- 
hold," and  many  have  been  driven  to  choose  between  professing 
their  adherence  to  Christ,  and  giving  up  father,  mother,  brethren, 
wife,  and  children.  Many  wives,  hitherto  dutiful  and  loving, 
have  refused  to  remain  with  husbands  who  would  not  worship  at 
the  ancestral  altars ;  and  on  the  other  hand,  women  have  been 
barbarously  beaten  by  their  husbands  and  mothers-in-law,  to  make 
them  abjure  their  faith  in  Christ. 

In  the  few  instances  in  which  learned  literary  men  have  joined 
1  Acts  xix.  19.  "  I  have  given  the  statistics  for  1S84. 


LIBERALITY    OF    THE    CONVERTS.  147 

the  Christians,  they  have  heen  deprived  of  their  much-prized  and 
hardly  earned  literary  degrees,  which  implies  the  sacritice  of  all 
worldly  honour,  or  hope  of  official  employment;  and  those  who 
have  hitherto  been  employed  as  tutors  or  schoolmasters  for  sons  of 
the  wealthy  gentry,  know  that  all  their  pupils  will  be  taken  from 
them.  Moreover,  so  far  from  any  pecuniary  gain  accruing  to  the 
converts,  as  is  often  so  unblushingly  asserted,  these  people  (by 
nature  so  money-grasping)  become  specially  distinguished  by  tin- 
liberal  and  systematic  efforts  they  make — often  out  of  their  own 
poverty — to  contribute  to  church  expenses,  and  to  aid  those  still 
poorer  than  themselves. 

The  liberality  of  the  native  Christians  has  become  proverbial 
among  their  heathen  brethren.  Thus  in  the  case  of  one  of  the 
recent  converts  at  Peking,  who  for  conscience'  sake  had  given  up 
a  lucrative  post  in  connection  with  a  Buddhist  temple.  For  three 
years  he  continued  in  extreme  penury,  gaining  a  scanty  living  as  a 
cobbler.  At  last,  much  to  his  surprise,  and  without  any  solicita- 
tion on  his  part,  he  was  appointed  paymaster  to  his  "  banner,"  a 
post  which,  in  the  hands  of  a  Chinaman  of  average  honesty,  proves 
highly  lucrative,  owing  to  sundry  customary  perquisites  squeezed 
off  the  pay  of  the  bannermen. 

When  to  their  amazement  they  not  only  received  their  pay  in 
full,  without  deduction,  but  were  actually  credited  with  a  small  gain 
on  the  exchange,  some  set  him  down  as  a  fool,  but  others  main- 
tained that  "certainly  he  must  belong  to  the  religion  of  Jesus." 
He  had  not  then  openly  professed  his  faith,  but  such  generosity 
was  deemed  conclusive  evidence. 

As  an  example  of  voluntary  loss  for  Christ's  sake,  I  may  instance 
one  man  (by  no  means  a  solitary  example)  who  had  a  flourishing 
business  as  a  seller  of  opium  (the  accursed  drug  which,  of  their 
own  free  will,  all  the  Christians  wholly  abjure).  In  order  to  be- 
come a  Christian,  Sing  gave  up  his  opium  den,  an  open  profession 
of  his  faith  which  made  him  fair  game  for  the  enemy.  Again  and 
again  he  was  beaten  and  half  killed,  and  robbed  righl  and  left  by 
the  servants  of  officials.  Now  he  earns  a  scanty  livelihood  by  sell- 
ing salt  and  straw  sandals;  but,  notwithstanding  all  his  troubles, 
he  La  a  happy-looking,  venerable  man,  whose  neighbours  find  they 
cannot  help  respecting  him  and  his  faith. 

As  regards  the  opium-selling,  even  the  heathen  would  reaped 
the  man  who  gave  that  up,  for  of  all  the  millions  who  within  the 
last  century  have  become  victims  to  the  use  of  the  drug,  there 
is  not  one  who  does  not  heartily  abhor  the  weakness  which   tirst 


148  KKMAI.K    INFANTICIDE. 

induced  him  individually  to  touch  it,  and  who  does  not  bemoan 
that  such  a  temptation  should  ever  have  heen  put  in  his  way.  No 
Chinaman  ever  speaks  in  defence  of  it,  or  as  if  "moderate  smoking" 
were  permissible.  All  acknowledge  it  to  be  a  baneful  vice,  but  one 
against  which  they  have  not  strength  to  contend.  They  say  "  it  is 
not  the  man  that  cats  the  opium,  but  the  opium  that  eats  the  man." 

There  is  any  amount  of  tobacco-smoking — that  they  consider  all 
right,  and  they  have  other  stimulants  (amongst  which  must  be 
reckoned  much  tea),  and  those  who  choose  drink  bad  spirits ; 
drunkenness  from  this  cause  is,  however,  almost  unknown.  But 
even  the  native  Christians,  who  allow  tobacco-smoking  in  their 
chapels  and  meeting-houses  during  week-day  meetings,  all  agree  to 
the  necessity  of  rigidly  excluding  any  opium-smoker  from  Church- 
membership. 

One  thing  worthy  of  note  is,  that  in  some  cases  the  reason  as- 
signed for  the  persecution  of  Chinese  Christians  is  precisely  that 
which  Avas  urged  by  the  Jews  against  the  early  Christians.  "  If 
we  let  them  alone,"  said  the  Jews,  "  all  the  world  will  go  after 
them."  At  Ku-Cheng,  where  within  three  years  there  were  added 
to  the  Church  120  most  devoted  Christians,  the  Chinese  raised  a 
riot,  and  tore  up  the  foundation  of  their  church — for,  said  they,  "  if 
we  let  them  build  this  house,  the  whole  neighbourhood  will  em- 
brace their  vile  religion."  There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that 
their  fears  are  most  just,  for  though  the  Chinese  nature  is  to  oppose 
everything  new,  once  the  new  thing  has  succeeded  in  taking  root, 
it  is  generally  accepted  as  inevitable. 

Concluding  Note. — Though  the  total  number  of  Chinese  Chris- 
tians forms  a  very  minute  fraction  of  the  total  population  of  this 
vast  empire,  it  is  by  no  means  insignificant  compared  with  the  very 
small  band  of  preachers  who  have  as  yet  devoted  their  energies  to 
work  in  this  gigantic  field. 

We  must  bear  in  mind  that  it  is  not  yet  seventy  years  since  the 
very  first  missionary  of  the  Eeformed  Faith  set  foot  in  China. 
Talk  of  a  needle  in  a  bundle  of  hay  ! — a  needle  in  an  overgrown 
haystack  would  be  but  a  poor  comparison  for  one  Christian  com- 
mencing work  alone  among  these  four  hundred  millions.  It  was 
no  wonder  that  six  years  elapsed  ere  in  1814  Tsai  Ako,  the  first 
convert,  was  baptised.1 

i  Robert  Morrison,  the  first  Protestant  missionary  in  China,  was  a  Scotchman, 
though  born  at  Morpeth,  in  Northumberland.  In  1807  he  was  sent  by  the  London 
Mission  to  endeavour  to  commence  a  mission  in  China.     But  in  those  days  the 


A    LITTLE    LEAVEN.  149 

For  twenty- seven  years  Dr  Robert*  Morrison  toiled  unceasingly, 
preparing  the  way  for  those  who  should  follow,  hut  during  all  those 
years  only  three  fellow-workers  came  to  his  help.  Until  1842  the 
actual  mission  work  had  scarcely  hegun.  After  this  it  became  evi- 
dent that  the  new  religion  was  beginning  to  take  root  (a  feehle 
plant  in  its  infancy,  but  one  which  nevertheless  may  yet  over- 
shadow the  whole  vast  empire). 

By  1853  the  Protestant  Missions  numbered  350  Chinese  com- 
municants. In  1863  these  had  augmented  to  2000.  Ten  years 
later  showed  a  further  increase  to  8000,  and  now  22,000  well- 
proven  converts  kneel  at  the  Christian  altar,  while  about  100,000 
regularly  attend  Christian  services — not  as  a  matter  of  form  or  of 
habit,  but  from  determination  to  learn  the  truth,  at  whatever  cost. 

From  this  number  have  been  selected  about.  1100  earnest  and 
devout  men  who  work  as  catechists,  and  a  handful  of  the  most  able 
and  eloquent  have  been  ordained  to  the  ministry.  Yet  even  these, 
added  to  the  500  foreigners  now  working  in  various  parts  of  the 
Great  Empire,  are  but  as  a  grain  of  salt  to  a  barrel  of  lulling,  as 
compared  with  the  multitudes  lying  utterly  beyond  reach  of  their 
influence. 

If  you  consider  the  mere  size  of  China — that  it  is  101  times  as 
large  as  England,  170  times  as  large  as  Scotland,  44  times  the  size 
of  the  United  Kingdom — and  then  consider  that  Scotland  alone 
claims  the  Avhole  services  of  3845  ministers,  while  Great  Britain 
absorbs  35,000,  each  of  whom  finds  work  enough  in  his  own  sphere, 
it  is  evident  that  1600  Chinese  and  foreign  Christian  teachers  can 
only  reach  a  very  small  proportion  even  of  the  people  of  China 
Proper,  to  say  nothing  of  the  vast  outlying  regions  beyond. 

I  here  subjoin  a  tolerably  accurate  numerical  table  of  the  repre- 
sentatives of  thirty -nine  Protestant  missionary  societies  who  at 
present  form  the  mission-staff  of  China. 

route  to  tli e  East  practically  lay  in  the  hands  of  the  merchants  forming  th  E  I 
India  Company,  by  whom  such  difficulties  had  been  thrown  in  the  way  of  mission- 
aries proceeding  to  India,  that  it  was  deemed  wiser  for  Mr  Morrison  not  to  apply 
to  them  1'or  a  passage,  but  to  adopt  the  then  difficult  route  vid  America.  Thus  he 
reached  Canton  in  1808.  Once  there,  the  Company  were  glad  to  enlist  his  great 
linguistic  talent,  and  he  was  appointed  translator  to  their  factory  at  Canton,  and 
1  bus  at  their  expense,  at  a  cost  of  £15,000,  was  published  his  great  <  ihinese  diction- 
ary. This,  however,  was  not  ready  till  1s*2l'.  He  had  previously  published  com- 
plete translations  of  the  New  and  the  <»ld  Testaments.  He  also  established  an 
Anglo-Chinese  College  at  Malacca  for  English  and  Chinese  literature,  with  a  view 
to  the  propagation  of  Christianity.  Be  daedal  Canton,  in  1884,  bu1  ins  bodywaa 
carried  for  burial  to  the  Christian  cemetery  at  Macao,  where  also  lie  bis  wife  and 
son.  These  neglected  graves  lie  just  beyond  the  garden  where  the  exiled  Portuguese 
poel  Camoens  composed  his  famous  '  Lusiad,'  but  few  who  visit  thai  garden  bestow 
a  glance  on  the  grass-grown  burial-ground. 


150 


KKMALK    [NFAXTKIDK. 


Summary  of  Protestant  Missions  in  China,  Dkcemukk  lssr;.1 


1807 
1843 
1844 
1845 
1847 
1852 
1860 
1864 
1865 
1865 
1868 
1868 
1869 
1874 
1878 
1885 
1886 

1886 


1830 

1834 
1835 
1838 
1847 
1847 
1847 
1817 
1847 
1848 
1850 
1858 
1859 
1868 
1871 
1876 
1882 
1884 
18S5 

lS.Mi 


British. 


London  Missionary  Society, 
British  and  Foreign  Bible  Society, 
Church  .Missionary  Society, 

English  Baptist, 

English  Presbyterian,  .... 

Wesleyan  Missionary  Society, 

Methodist  New  Connection, 

Society  for  Promotion  of  Female  Education 

United  Presbyterian  (Scotland),  . 

China  Inland  Mission, 

National  Bible  Society,  Scotland, 

United  Methodist  Free  Church,  . 

Irish  Presbyterian,       .... 

Society  for  Propagation  of  the  Gospel, 

Established  Church,  Scotland,     . 

Friends  Foreign  Missionary  Association, 

Book  ami  Tract  Society, 

Independent  Workers, 

Foreign  Christian  Missionary  Society, 


American  and  Continental. 

American  Board  of  Foreign  Missions  (Con 

gregational),    . 
American  Baptist  (North),  . 
American  Protestant  Episcopal, 
American  Presbyterian  (North), 
Methodist  Episcopal  (North), 
Seventh-Day  Baptist,  . 
American  Baptist  (South),   . 
Basel  Mission, 
Rhenish  Missi  m, 
Methodist  Episcopal  (South), 
Berlin  Foundling  Hospital, 
American  Reformed  (Dutch), 
Women's  Union  Mission, 
American  Presbyterian  (South), 
( Canadian  Presbyterian, 
American  Bible  Society, 
Berlin  Mission,     . 

General  Protestant  Evangelical  Societ 
Bible  Christians, 
Disciples  of  Christ, 


a 

Fob 

ETON 

A 

UlSSIOMABDES. 

9 

./ 

H 

1 

a 

«  ~   g 
Ml  £  S 

a 

a 

55 

5 
0 

CS 

.> 

24 

23 

74 

3052 

11 

5 

82 

24 

23 

190 

2724 

18 

15 

17 

994 

22 

24 

126 

3312 

22 

12 

28 

679 

7 

5 

54 

1186 

"i 

6 

17 

306 

117 

128 

114 

1314 

3 

2 

40 

3 

3 

10 

297 

3 

3 

6 

3 

3 

2 

"3 

"30 

1 

2 

4 

"2 

3 

24 

37 

80 

1175 

9 

14 

80 

1433 

11 

12 

30 

384 

44 

46 

30 

4368 

32 

36 

205(?) 

2408 

1 

2 

8 

18 

11 

13 

547 

19 

19 

53 

1611 

3 

3 

6 

60 

8 

15 

10 

146 

1 

5 

5 

7 
4 

23 

784 

"s 

10 

io 

"44 

2 

2 

8 

4 

40 

5 
o 

5 

27 

119 

4 

"i 

3 

1  Chiefly  taken  from  the  table  in  '  China's  Spiritual  Need,'  by  the  Rev.  J.  Hudson  Taylor. 


SOLDIERS    OF    THE    GRAND    ARMY.  1  5  1 

From  the  above  table  it  is  evidently  impossible  to  form  any 
accurate  estimate  of  the  progress  of  Christianity  in  China  from  the 
reports  of  any  one  missionary  society.  All  the  regiments  of  the 
Grand  Army  are  at  work,  each  doing  their  part,  however  feebly  (and 
assuredly  some  are  still  strangely  neglectful  of  this  greal  recruiting- 
ground!);  but  one  and  all  are  surely  undermining  the  old  idola- 
tries, and  training  a  multitude  of  Soldiers  of  the  Cross,  many  of 
whom  will,  in  their  turn,  become  successful  recruiting-sergeant-. 
It  must  also  be  remembered  that  mission  influence  extends  far 
beyond  the  circle  of  actual  adherents — that  prejudices  have  been 
modified,  and  confidence  won  from  multitudes  who  as  yet  give  no 
sign  of  any  personal  leaning  to  the  foreign  faith. 


rilAITKl;     XI. 


A     CHINESE     DINNER-PABTV. 


Homes — Rich  and  poor — The  ladies — An  adopted  son — The  place  of  honour — 
Chinese  dishes  —  Beef  prohibited — Whale  in  Old  England — "Summei 
grass  " — Birds'-uest  soup. 

U.S.  Consii.atk,  March  20th. 

The  climate  here  at  this  season  is  wonderfully  delicious — Buch 
clear  pure  air,  and  so  soft  and  balmy.  What  a  contrast  to  our 
British  March  ! 

This  morning  the  bright  sunshine  was  irresistible  for  sketching, 
so  I  went  out  with  only  one  coolie  and  selected  a  very  picturesque 
corner  of  one  of  the  steep  streets  between  this  and  the  river.  I 
found  standing-room  in  the  projecting  shop  of  a  civil  young  barber, 
who  went  on  calmly  shaving  his  customers,  unheeding  the  crowd 
which  immediately  formed  and  pressed  around.  They  were  all 
perfectly  civil,  ami  deeply  interested  in  watching  the  reproduction 
of  each  detail. 

Returned  here  in  time  to  start  for  a  great  Chinese  dinner-party, 
which  Mr  Ahok  most  kindly  gave  in  my  honour,  that  I  might 
taste  all  the  national  dishes.  Having  been  warned  that  gay  Rai- 
ments would  be  appreciated,  we  donned  our  most  effective  evening- 
dresses,  and  such  jewels  as  we  had  with  us,  and,  thus  adorned, 
took  our  places  in  the  usual  wicker  arm-chairs,  slung  on  baml 8, 


lf,2  A    CHINE8E    DINNER-PARTY. 

each  carried  by  four  strong  Chinamen  clothed  in  tin.-  invariahle 
purplish-blue  cloth,  and  wearing  large  straw  huts.  Mr  Ahok's 
home  is  on  this  green  isle  of  Nantai,  and  our  way  to  it  lay  through 
the  poor  streets  which  lie  along  the  river  banks — very  wretched 
slums,  inhabited  by  the  poorest  of  the  working  population,  densely 
crowded,  and  painfully  dirty  and  un fragrant.  There  seemed  no 
end  to  the  long  narrow  streets  of  dingy  little  shops ;  and  I  was 
beginning  to  wonder  when  we  should  reach  the  beautiful  house  of 
which  I  had  heard  so  much,  when  suddenly  our  chair-bearers 
stopped  before  a  gate  in  a  dead  wall  in  the  street.  We  entered, 
and  all  within  was  like  a  scene  in  some  other  world  !  Passing 
through  the  great  portal,  we  found  ourselves  in  a  large  courtyard, 
leading  into  a  succession  of  open  courts  and  airy  halls,  lavishly 
decorated  with  fine  carved  wood  and  much  gilding,  and  furnished 
with  handsome  blackwood  carving  from  Canton — which  is  infinitely 
handsomer  and  more  solid  than  the  fine  blackwood  furniture  of 
Bombay — beautiful  scarlet  draperies  embroidered  with  gold,  and 
lamps  of  fine  coloured  glass  adorned  with  silken  tassels.  In  the 
great  hall  a  conspicuous  place  is  occupied  by  the  domestic  altar,  at 
which  the  ladies  of  the  family  daily  offer  the  ancestral  worship. 
Although  the  master  of  the  house  has  not  yet  been  baptised,  he  is 
himself  a  most  devout  and  practical  Christian,  but  he  wisely  deems 
it  best  to  allow  his  women-folk  perfect  liberty  of  conscience.1 

The  ladies  have  already  got  over  the  national  prejudice  in 
favour  of  the  total  seclusion  of  women,  and  though  custom  would 
probably  have  forbidden  their  appearing  in  presence  of  Chinese 
men,  they  made  no  objection  to  our  being  accompanied  by  Euro- 
pean gentlemen,  and  our  pretty  hostess  came  forward  to  greet  us 
with  the  utmost  courtesy  and  heartiness,  accompanied  by  her  little 
adopted  son  (adopted  according  to  common  Chinese  custom,  when 
there  seems  no  probability  of  a  woman  having  sons  of  her  own,  to 
perform  ancestral  rites  on  the  death  of  the  parents).  In  the  pres- 
ent instance,  the  one  bitter  drop  in  this  otherwise  happy  life-cup 
was  that  no  son  had  blessed  the  marriage.  So  after  the  lapse  of 
twelve  years,  Mrs  Ahok  made  up  her  mind  to  adopt  this  "  baby  " 
boy,  then  six  weeks  old.  He  is  now  a  fine  little  fellow,  and  a 
great  favourite  in  the  house,  though  he  is  by  no  means  the  only 
child  about  the  place. 

After  the  preliminary  greetings,  in  accordance  with  Chinese 
custom,  Ave  exchanged  particulars  as  to  our  "  honourable  ages,"  and 

i  A  wisdom  which  ere  long  resulted  in  their  following  in  his  footsteps.     See 
chap.  xi. 


HOME    OF    A    WEALTHY    BURGHER.  L53 

we  were  assured  that  our  pretty  hostess  was  upwards  of  forty- 
three.  I  felt  inclined  to  say,  as  I  truly  thought,  that  she  looked 
younger,  but  that  would  have  been  uncivil,  as  in  China  advanced 
years  are  honourable,  and  youth  is  of  no  account  But  I  still 
suspect  that  perhaps  as  some  English  ladies  like  to  clip  oil'  a  year  or 
two,  perhaps  Chinese  ladies  may  tack  on  a  few  ! 

Our  host  next  introduced  us  to  his  grown-up  sons  by  a  previous 
marriage,  and  to  their  young  wives.  All  were  exquisitely  dressed 
in  robes  of  the  richest  silk,  stiff  with  the  very  finest  embroidery 
in  silken  needle-work — the  elaborately  embroidered  skirts  being 
arranged  in  deep  kilt -plaits.  Several  of  these  silken  skirts  of 
different  colours  are  worn  one  above  the  other. 

By  the  usual  course  of  prolonged  torture,  all  their  poor  little 
feet  have  been  reduced  to  such  proportion  that  none  of  their  dainty 
little  embroidered  silken  shoes  exceed  three  inches  in  length.  Bu1 
those  of  our  hostess,  who  is  a  lady  of  high  birth,  and  emphatically 
"  lily-footed,"  are  literally  only  two  inches  long,  which  is  considered 
a  superlative  beauty.  I  ventured  to  ask  my  host  to  give  me  a  pair 
of  these  miniatures  which  had  actually  been  worn,  as  otherwise  Q0 
one  in  England  would  believe  that  they  were  genuine.  He  not 
only  most  kindly  complied  with  my  request,  but  has  sent  me  a 
whole  assortment  of  new  shoes  belonging  to  each  lady  in  the  house, 
together  with  exquisitely  embroidered  wrapping-cloths,  which  take 
the  place  of  stockings. 

It  is  always  a  source  of  wonder  to  see  how  much  ground  is 
covered  by  the  home  of  a  wealthy  Chinaman,  with  its  various 
halls,  chiefly  consisting  of  roofs  and  pillars,  with  hanging-lamps 
and  other  decorations.  Then  there  arc  all  the  separate  quarters  of 
the  very  numerous  branches  of  the  family,  who  live  together  in 
patriarchal  style. 

They  conducted  us  through  their  several  suites  of  pretty  rooms, 
including  all  the  bedrooms  of  the  family,  comfortably  carpeted, 
which  I  fancy  is  a  modern  innovation.  Piles  of  soft  handsome 
quilts  lay  folded,  ready  for  use,  beside  each  beautifully  carved 
four-post  bedstead.  These  really  are  so  fine  that  it  seemed  like 
gilding  the  lily  to  drape  them  with  richly  embroidered  hangings. 

Passing  through  various  handsome  reception-rooms  for  Chinese 
guests,  we  were  conducted  to  one  prepared  for  foreigners,  which 
was  so  purely  British  that  we  were  glad  when  "tiffin."  was  an- 
nounced, and  Ave  were  conducted  to  a  luxurious  dining-room,  and 
sat  down,  a  party  of  twenty,  to  what  proved  an  excellenl  bul  some- 
what lengthy  dinner,  in   twenty-live   courses!      This,  however,  was 


154  A    CHINESE    DINNER-PARTY. 

nothing  remarkable,  as  a  really  elaborate  dinner  Bometimes  con 
of  forty  courses  and  a  hundred  dishes,  and  lasts  for  about  four 
hours,  the  guests  being  expected  to  taste  every  dish  as  it  is  handed 
round,  washing  it.  down  with  innumerable  cups  of  hot  rice-wine 

(which  is  often  scented  and  fragrant),  and  concluding  with  a  large 
howl  of  plain  hoiled  rice,  just  to  correct  any  previous  indiscretion 
in  tlic  way  of  rich  soups  and  incongruous  mixtures. 

The  main  feature  of  a  Chinese  feast  seems  to  lie  in  the  prepon- 
derance of  gelatinous  food — e.g.,  sharks'  fins,  beche-de-mer,  sea-weed, 
isinglass  in  the  form  of  birds'-nest  soup ;  fat  pork  and  fat  duck 
are  also  favourite  food.  How  these  people  would  enjoy  calves'- 
head  !  but  that,  of  course,  is  a  forbidden  luxury,  being  included  in 
the  Confucian  prohibition  (on  utilitarian  grounds)  of  beef. 

On  the  present  occasion  everything  was  exquisitely  refined,  and 
of  such  unquestionable  cleanliness,  that  the  curiosity  of  tasting 
new  dishes  might  be  indulged  without  alloy.  My  host  (who  had 
placed  me  on  his  left  hand,  which  he  carefully  explained  to  be  the 
Chinese  post  of  honour)  had  desired  that,  as  each  dish  was  brought 
in,  an  attendant  should  provide  me  with  a  neat  little  red  ticket 
whereon  was  inscribed  its  name  both  in  English  and  Chinese,  and 
he  himself  kindly  explained  the  nature  of  the  multifarious  dishes 
as  each  was  offered,  so  I  was  able  duly  and  intelligently  to  study 
the  respective  merits  of  birds'-nest  soup  with  doves'  eggs,  sharks'- 
fin  soup,  mushroom,  turtle,  and  duck  soups,  in  which  last  floated 
delicate  small  pieces  of  bamboo,  somewhat  resembling  asparagus. 
Then  came  soup  of  beche-de-mer,  alias  sea-slugs,  which  does  not 
sound  nice,  but  is  really  like  gelatinous  calves'-head.  Portions  of 
all  these  were  brought  to  each  guest  in  small  bowls  of  delicate 
porcelain.  I  may  safely  say  that  I  tasted  everything  uncommon, 
and  indeed  I  thought  all  the  special  dishes  very  good. 

Then  came  soup  of  lotus-seeds,  and  of  ducks'  tongues,  and  vari- 
ous sweet  soups,  after  which  followed  small  stews  and  ragouts  of 
every  conceivable  meat  except  beef,  which  is  never  seen  at  a 
Chinese  table,  oxen  and  cows  capable  of  working  the  plough  being 
accounted  too  valuable  to  the  farmer  to  be  consigned  to  the  butcher. 
Very  severe  penalties  are  attached  to  the  slaughter  of  such  animals. 
The  punishment  for  a  first  offence  is  a  hundred  strokes  with  a 
bamboo,  and  then  two  months  in  the  wooden  collar.  Should 
love  of  beef,  or  desire  of  gain,  induce  a  repetition  of  the  crime, 
a  second  judicial  flogging  is  followed  by  exile  for  life  from  the 
province.1 

1  I  suspect,  however,  that  this  statement  does  not  apply  to  North  China,  as  I 


DAINTY    DISHES.  155 

Neither  fresh  milk,  butter,  nor  cheese  are  used  by  the  Chi 
but  a  preparation  of  milk   and  sugar,  curdled  with  vinegar,  is  bo 
much  appreciated,  that   in   South   China  there  are  "  cows' -milk 
saloons  "  where,  on  warm  summer  evenings,  epicures  may  indulge 
in  this  luxury. 

As  to  cat,  rat,  and  dog,  those  who  are  curious  in  such  matters 
may  procure  them  at  restaurants  in  the  city,  but  I  understand  thai 
they  do  not  grace  the  festivals  of  Chinese  gentry.  But  what  with 
roofs  of  the  mouths  of  pigs,  dragon's  beard,  vegetables,  long-life 
fairy  rice,  Chinese  macaroni,  smoked  duck  and  cucumber,  salted 
shrimps,  shrimps  with  leeks  and  sweet  pickle,  a  very  oily  stew  of 
sharks'  fins,  whales'  sinews,1  pigeons'  eggs,  fish-brains,  crabs,  roast 
ducks  and  mushrooms,  stewed  crab,  fish  with  pickled  fir-tree  cones, 
pickled  chicken  with  bamboo  sprouts,  ham  stewed  in  honey,  soles 
of  pigeons'  feet,  "bellies  of  fat  fish,"  sucking  pig  served  whole, 
fried  egg-plant,  sliced  lily  bulbs,  &c,  &c,  we  found  an  ample  suc- 
cession of  gastronomic  interests.  Then  came  peaches,  pears  sliced 
in  honey,  crab-apples  and  chestnuts  preserved  in  honey  and  dried, 
loquots  and  cumquots  floating  in  rich  syrup,  bitter  almonds,  wal- 
nuts, almonds  with  bean-curd,  date-cake,  radish-cake,  and  Bweet- 
meats  innumerable  and  indescribable,  for  which  the  Chinese 
appetite  seems  insatiable. 

The  only  thing  conspicuous  by  its  absence  was  bread,  which  is 
never  eaten  at  dinner.  All  manner  of  delicate  little  dishes  of 
preserved  fruits  and  pickles,  such  as  water-chestnuts,2  lotus  seeds 
and  lotus  root,  melon  seeds  and  apricot  kernels,  were  scattered 
about  the  table  for  the  guests  to  play  with  between  courses,  and 
each  was  provided  with  a  tiny  silver  plate  for  mustard,  soy,  or  any 
other  condiment. 

was  told  in  Peking,  where  tlie  number  of  foreign  residents  is  very  limited,  that  3d. 
and  4il.  the  lb.  was  the  regular  market  price  for  beef  and  mutton. 

I  find,  moreover,  that  in  a  standard  work  on  Chinese  native  medicines,  beef  is 
classed  with  mutton,  Mesh  of  fowls,  honey,  .vc,  as  a  strengthening  tonic.  At  Foo- 
C'how  also,  foreigners  purchase  beef  at  about  4d.  the  lb.,  but  mutton  is  much  dearer. 

1  As  regards  whale  and  similar  articles  of  Chinese  diet,  it  is  interesting  to  re- 
member that  when  in  olden  days  whales  habitually  visited  European  shores,  their 
flesh  was  sold  in  slices  at  the  seaporl  towns,  and  OUT  own  ancestors  deemed  whale's 
tail  and  tongue  choice  delicacies,  either  roasted  or  served  with  peas. 

Thus  whale  figures  in  the  bill  of  fare  of  a  London  civic  feasl  in  a.i>.  1 4-J." ;  and  in 
Princess  Eleanor  de  Montfort's  book  of  Household  Expenses,  A..D.  1266,  one  entry 
is  "  Two  hundred  pieces  of  Whale,  :54s." 

Of  other  dainties  which  we  no  longer  recognise  as  such,  we  find  notes  of  the  feasts 
provided  for  the  Judges  of  Assize  in  \.i>.  lo96,  and  Learn  that  at  Winchester  thi  y 
were  regaled  with  razor-fish,  whelks,  gulls,  puffins,  and  kite-sparrows.  At  Dor- 
chester they  had  dolphin;  at  Launceston  porpoise  served  with  furmenty,  almond- 
milk,  sugar,  and  saffron. 

-  Water  caltrops. 


156  A   CHINESE    DENNER-PABTY. 

In  deference  to  our  possible  difficulties  with  chop-sticks,  we  were 
each  supplied  with  lovely  silver  spoons  of  the  regular  Chinese  form, 
very  short,  with  thick  handles.  Perhaps  I  may  as  well  mention 
that  chop-sticks  are  very  like  a  pair  of  stout  knitting-pins.  They 
are  either  made  of  ivory,  silver-tipped,  or  of  polished  wood,  and 
both  are  held  in  the  right  hand.  If  you  will  thus  hold  two  knit- 
ting-needles and  try  therewith  to  pick  up  grains  of  rice,  you  may 
judge  of  the  difficulty  of  thus  obtaining  a  satisfying  meal !  One 
set  does  duty  for  the  whole  meal — soups,  savouries,  and  sweets. 

Sham-shu — i.e.,  hot  rice-wine — was  freely  served  in  beautiful 
little  silver  cups,  engraven  with  characters  signifying  good  luck. 
Hot  almond-tea,  peach-tea,  and  various  other  innocent  drinks  of 
the  nature  of  cowslip  wine,  were  also  passed  round,  so  that  ere  the 
close  of  the  entertainment  we  had  tasted  a  most  wonderful  variety 
of  things  new  and  old. 

Among  the  greatest  delicacies  provided  for  us  were  ducks'  eggs 
of  a  verjr  dark  colour,  and  of  incalculable  age — antediluvian,  per- 
haps, as  nothing  is  considered  respectably  old  in  China  unless  it 
dates  back  some  thousand  years  !  But,  joking  apart,  the  Chinese 
method  of  dealing  with  eggs  is  very  curious.  The  charm  of  a 
lightly  boiled  fresh  egg  is  quite  unknown  to  the  Celestial  palate, 
which  only  recognises  eggs  when  hard  boiled,  and  much  prefers 
them  in  advanced  age. 

For  ordinary  use,  especially  as  a  light  diet  for  invalids,  eggs  are 
simply  preserved  by  being  steeped  in  salt  water  mixed  with  either 
soot  or  red  clay,  in  which  they  are  baked  when  required.  But  the 
truly  refined  process  is  to  prepare  a  solution  of  wood-ashes,  lime, 
and  salt,  mixed  with  water  in  which  some  aromatic  plant  has  been 
boiled.  This  paste  is  run  into  a  tub,  and  the  newly-laid  eggs  are 
therein  embedded  in  layers.  The  tub  is  hermetically  sealed,  and 
at  the  end  of  forty  days  the  eggs  are  considered  fit  for  use,  but  at 
the  end  of  forty  years  they  will  be  still  better !  They  become 
black  throughout,  owing,  I  suppose,  to  the  action  of  the  lime.  But 
the  white  becomes  gelatinous,  and  the  whole  tastes  rather  like  a 
plover's  egg  hard  boiled.  As  the  value  of  this  dainty  increases 
with  age,  the  Chinese  epicure  discriminates  between  the  eggs  of 
successive  decades,  treating  his  most  honoured  guests  to  the  oldest 
and  most  costly,  just  as  the  owner  of  a  good  cellar  in  Britain  brings 
forth  his  choicest  old  wines. 

A  very  strange  delicacy,  which  is  prized  not  only  as  pleasant 
food  but  also  as  a  wholesome  tonic,  is  a  curious  fungus  1  which 
1  Cordyceps  sinensis. 


SWALLOWS     NESTS.  1  5  7 

attacks  certain  caterpillars  while  living,  and  after  the  larva  has 
huried  itself  in  the  ground  to  prepare  for  its  winter  sleep,  the 
fungus  begins  to  sprout,  kills  the  chrysalis,  and  a  long  stem  ap- 
pears above  ground.  This  "  summer  grass  of  the  winter  worm  " 
is  collected,  with  the  dead  caterpillar  attached,  and  is  carefully 
dried  in  a  combination  of  vegetable  and  animal  food,  which  finds 
great  favour. 

So  also  does  another  dainty  dish  of  the  same  class,  which  con- 
sists of  silk-worms  in  the  chrysalis  stage  which  have  been  left 
homeless  by  the  unwinding  of  their  silken  cocoon.  They  are 
boiled  and  served  with  hot  chillies.  How  Confucius  came  to 
overlook  such  wicked  waste  of  the  precious  silk-worm  I  cannot 
imagine.  The  dish,  however,  lias  the  credit  of  being  a  cure  for 
dyspepsia. 

To-day's  dinner  had  for  me  all  the  charm  of  novelty,  even  to 
the  birds'-nest  soup,  which  people  in  Britain  suppose  to  be  an  or- 
dinary article  of  diet,  but  which  really  is  a  very  expensive  luxury, 
as  it  takes  about  ten  shillings'  worth  of  nests  to  make  an  extremely 
moderate  bowl  of  soup,  of  the  strength  of  rather  weak  beef-tea. 
Indeed  I  suspect  it  is  the  belief  in  the  iniquitous  waste  of  using 
beef  which  has  given  such  high  value  to  this  nutritive  substance, 
whatever  it  may  be — isinglass  or  swallows'  saliva  ! 

Mr  Ahok  has  given  me  several  nests  as  a  curiosity.  They  are 
about  the  size  of  an  average  oyster-shell,  and  look  as  if  they  were 
made  of  pure  isinglass.  Of  course,  all  the  feathers,  grass,  and  sea- 
weed have  been  carefully  removed  before  the  nests  come  into  the 
market.  In  point  of  fact,  I  believe  that  this  pretty  little  white 
object  is  really  a  sort  of  bracket  which  the  swallow  builds  out  from 
the  rock,  as  a  support  for  the  actual  nest. 

The  supply  must  be  something  amazing,  for  I  am  told  that 
Canton  alone  imports  upwards  of  eight  million  nests  annually  ! 
Those  chiefly  prized  are  the  nests  of  a  small  swallow  with  a  dark 
back  and  ashen-grey  underside,1  but  the  nests  of  some  other  swal- 
lows are  also  serviceable.  Myriads  of  these  birds  haunt  the  rocky 
seaboard  of  many  isles  in  the  Eastern  Archipelago,  where  their 
nests  cluster  in  thousands.  On  the  coast  of  Java  there  are  five 
caves  which  each  yield  one  million  nests  annually.  They  are  col- 
lected three  times  a-year,  after  the  young  are  Hedged,  the  fowlers 
being  let  down  the  rocks  by  ropes,  or  else  climbing  up  with  the 
aid  of  ladders. 

I  am  informed  that  some  of  these  caves  are  fanned  by  individual 
i  Coll  valid  esculi  nta. 


158  A    FIELD    FOR    WOMAN  S    WOKK. 

merchants;  and  a  story  La  told  of  how  a  spiteful  skipper,  who  had 
quarrelled  with  one  of  these  swallow  fanners,  revenged  himself  by 
turning  out  a  whole  colony  of  bird-loving  cats  in  the  cave,  where 
they  took  up  their  abode,  and  waged  ceaseless  war  on  the  swallows. 

When  the  nests  reach  China,  they  are  sold  on  the  sea-coast  for 
their  weight  in  silver,  but  their  value  rises  considerably  in  tin- 
interior,  varying  from  £2  to  £7  per  lb.,  the  weight  of  an  average 
nest  being  half  an  ounce. 

What,  a  line  thing  it  would  be  for  Scotland  if  only  the  swallows 
of  our  Western  Isles  would  take  to  feeding  on  the  "  Iceland  moss  " 
which  grows  so  abundantly  on  the  rocks,  and  there  build  brackets 
for  their  nests !  What  a  new  industry  they  might  start  for  their 
country ! 1 

(  Hit  of  consideration  for  European  impatience  of  prolonged  meals, 
this  "  luncheon  "  had  been  purposely  reduced  to  the  shortest  limits 
of  which  custom  admitted;  nevertheless,  the  afternoon  was  well 
advanced  ere  we  took  our  final  leave  of  this  truly  hospitable  and 
most  friendly  family,  and  returned  here  to  receive  sundry  European 
friends. 


CHAPTER    XII. 

A    FIELD    FOR    WOMAN'S    WORK. 

Some  notes  on  a  family  history — The  "Christian  doctrine"  child — Work  for 
women — "  Possessed  of  devils  " — "  Answers  to  prayer." 

After  this  first  introduction,  I  had  many  pleasant  meetings  with 
the  various  members  of  this  family,  and  some  details  in  their  sub- 
sequent history  have  proved  so  interesting  that  I  think  I  may  ven- 
ture to  recount  them  here. 

For  one  thing,  various  circumstances  have  combined  to  place  Mr 
Ahok  in  the  light  of  a  public  character — his  wealth,  his  philan- 

1  The  marvel  is  to  see  so  excellent  a  food-supply  wholly  unheeded.  To  see  (as 
on  the  shores  of  Lismore  and  Port  Appin)  rocks  fringed  with  a  rich  crop  of  the 
golden  weed,  which,  when  sun-dried  and  bleached,  is  so  valuable  and  so  nutritive  ; 
yet  while  men  toil  early  and  late  to  grow  a  scanty  crop  of  oats,  this  self-grown 
harvest  of  the  sea  is  as  utterly  ignored  as  the  fungus-crop  of  the  land!  I  have 
only  seen  one  woman  take  the  trouble  to  collect  any,  and  she  only  gathered  a  small 
quantity,  though  it  grew  before  her  door,  and  she  pronounced  it  equal  to  good 
corn-flour. 


BLESSINGS    IN    DISGUISE.  159 

thropy,  his  unvarying  support  of  foreigners  even  when  in  antagon- 
ism to  his  own  countrymen.  It  matters  not  what  denomination  of 
Christians  need  aid  in  the  support  of  schools  and  hospitals,  his 
purse  is  ever  the  first  to  open.  Amongst  other  deeds  of  true 
generosity  has  been  the  purchase  of  a  house  in  a  healthy  situation 
in  the  country,  which  he  furnished  with  a  view  to  its  becoming  a 
recruiting  home  for  any  over-wearied  mission  workers. 

As  I  mentioned  in  a  previous  chapter,  not  many  months  after 
my  departure  from  China  I  received  tidings  that  he  had  cut  the 
Oordian  knot  regarding  the  difficulties  of  obedience  to  the  Fourth 
Commandment,  and  had  consequently  been  admitted  to  baptism  by 
the  American  "Episcopal  Methodist "  Church.  Few  in  England 
can  estimate  the  moral  courage  requisite  for  such  an  act,  even  after 
the  sacrifice  of  business  interests  had  been  decided  upnn.  The 
revilings  of  his  own  countrymen  had  already  expended  themselves, 
but  the  undisguised  scoffing  of  some  members  of  the  foreign  com- 
munity might  well  have  been  spared. 

In  his  own  family  he  stood  alone,  for  no  other  member  dared  to 
face  the  wrath  of  the  living  and  of  the  dead. 

About  this  time  Mrs  Ahok  expressed  a  wish  to  learn  English, 
that  she  might  be  able  to  dispense  with  the  services  of  an  inter- 
preter when  entertaining  foreigners.  She  therefore  persuaded  a 
lady  of  the  English  Church  Mission  who  had  charge  of  a  flourish- 
ing school  for  Chinese  girls,  to  allow  her  to  come  thrice  a-week  to 
receive  a  lesson  in  English.  Thus  a  real  friendship  was  established 
between  these  two  ladies. 

After  a  lapse  of  some  months,  sickness  entered  this  loving  home. 
A  little  nephew  and  the  darling  little  adopted  son  were  both  dan- 
gerously ill.  The  Chinese  doctor  could  do  nothing  in  the  case,  and 
the  little  nephew  died.  At  last  Mrs  Ahok  consented  that  her 
husband  should  consult  the  foreign  doctor.  The  latter  positively 
refused  to  prescribe  unless  a  responsible  English  woman  could  he 
found  who  would  stay  in  the  house  and  watch  the  patient,  and.  in 
short,  undertake  to  see  that  his  directions  were  exactly  carried  out. 

Of  course  the  most  natural  friend  to  apply  to  was  the  Knglish 
lady  aforesaid,  and  it  SO  happened  that  at  this  moment  tin'  u'irls  at 
the  Mission  School  had  all  been  dismissed  for  their  holidays,  bo  she 
was  free  for  some  weeks,  and  quite  willing  to  accept  the  anxious 
task,  and  was  soon  duly  installed  in  charge  of  the  sick-room.  It 
proved  a  long  illness,  and  one  calling  for  much  patient  care,  which 
was  at  length  rewarded  by  the  complete  recovery  of  the  boy. 

This  was  perhaps  the  first   time  on  record  that  an  English  lady 


160  A    FIELD    FOR    WOMAN  S    WORK. 

has  actually  lived  in  the  home  of  a  Chinese  lady,  and  you  can 
understand  with  what  intense  curiosity  her  every  movement  was 
watched. 

Not  a  detail  of  her  toilet  was  to  he  missed ;  hut  what  she  felt 
extremely  trying  was  the  great  interest  bestowed  on  her  when 
she  knelt  in  prayer,  or  sought  a  quiet  time  for  Scripture  reading. 
At  last  she  felt  this  so  oppressive  that  she  rose  one  morning  very 
much  earlier  than  usual  to  secure  the  blessing  of  an  hour  alone. 
At  the  accustomed  time  came  the  inquisitive  old  mother  (who  all 
the  time  was  doubly  attentive  to  her  own  devotions  before  the 
ancestral  altar).  As  usual  she  stood  about  on  watch,  but  when 
noon  came  she  could  stand  it  no  longer.     "  You  have  never  prayed 

to-day,"  she  said.     "Oh  yes,"  said  Miss  F ;  "but  I  got  up 

early  that  I  might  be  alone."     "  Why,"  said  the  old  lady,  "  surely 

you  do  not  mind  being  looked  at  when  you  pray  1 "     Miss  F 

explained  that  she  would  certainly  prefer  solitude,  greatly  to  the 
astonishment  of  her  watchful  guardian. 

Of  course  she  did  not  lose  so  excellent  an  opportunity  of  work- 
ing in  the  Master's  cause ;  but  she  did  feel  perplexed  when  one 
morning,  after  they  had  been  reading  the  story  of  Hannah's  prayer  * 
and  the  birth  of  Samuel,  the  wife  came  to  her  and  said,  "  You  say 
that  your  God  hears  prayer,  and  gives  you  what  you  ask  Him  for. 

If  you  ask  Him  to  give  me  a  son,  will  He  do  so  1 "     Miss  F 

replied  that  undoubtedly  He  could  do  so  should  He  see  fit,  but  that 
it  might  not  be  for  her  good  that  He  should  grant  such  a  prayer: 
adding,  "  If  He  should  give  you  a  son,  would  you  become  a  Chris- 
tian 1 "     This  she  would  not  promise,  but  replied  that  certainly  the 

son  should  be  one ;  and  finally  made  Miss  F promise  that 

every  day  while  she  was  there  she  should  kneel  beside  her  and  pray 
for  this  great  blessing — her  one  heart's  desire. 

The  adopted  son  recovered.  The  English  lady  left  Foo-Chow 
for  a  while,  and  several  months  elapsed  ere  she  returned  to  her 
work  in  that  city.  On  doing  so,  she  issued  invitations  to  several 
of  her  Chinese  friends  to  come  and  see  her.  Many  responded,  but 
her  chief  friend  was  conspicuous  by  her  absence.  "Wondering  at 
this,  she  soon  found  an  opportunity  to  visit  her  at  her  own  house, 
and  asked  her  why  she  had  not  come  to  welcome  her.  "  Why, 
how  could  I  come  1 "  she  replied ;  "  have  you  forgotten  what  you 
prayed  for?"  In  truth,  that  prayer,  like  many  another  offered  in 
half  faith,  had  indeed  wellnigh  passed  from  a  memory  crowded 
with  the  busy  events  of  every  day's  work.  So  it  was  in  hesitat- 
i  1  Samuel  i.  11. 


ANSWERS    TO    PRAYER.  161 

ing  unbelief  that  the   lady   replied,   "  No,  I  have  not  forgotten. 

But ?"     "  Well,  your  prayer  has  been  granted,  and  very  soon 

I  shall  have  a  son  ! " 

So  spake  the  heathen  mother.  But  the  Christian  Inly  (like 
those  early  Christians  who  prayed  without  ceasing  for  the  libera- 
tion of  St  Peter,  yet  who  greeted  the  messenger  who  announced 
that  their  prayer  had  been  granted  with  the  exclamation,  "Thou 
art  mad!"1)  could  not  believe  the  winds  spoken  by  the  woman. 
nor  was  it  till  her  own  hands  received  this  specially  God-given  son 
that  she  fully  believed  that  her  doubting  prayer  had  received  bo 
gracious  an  answer. 

Before  the  birth  of  this  Chinese  "Samuel"  all  idols  were 
banished  from  the  house,  and  so  soon  as  the  infant  was  born,  tin- 
thankful  mother,  true  to  her  word,  desired  that  he  should  im- 
mediately receive  Christian  baptism.  I  am  not  sure  what  bap- 
tismal name  was  selected,  but  from  the  hour  of  his  birth  the  poor 
little  innocent  has  been  saddled  with  a  tremendous  Chinese  name. 
"  Hung-kau-nic-kiang,"  which  means  literally  "The  Christian  doc- 
trine child." 

Some  months,  however,  elapsed  ere  the  mother  found  courag 
quite  give  up  the  worship  of  her  youth,  more  especially  that  of  the 
poor  ancestors.     Ere   long,   however,   a   letter   from   her  husband 
announced  the  glad  tidings   that  his  wife  and   mother,  and  some 
other  members  of  the  family,  had  all  joined  the  Christian  Church. 

I  cannot  forbear  quoting  a  few  words  from  this  good  man's  own 
letter,  written  in  English:  "  I  am  happy  to  tell  you  that  on  the 
18th  June  [1882]  my  mother  and  wife,  and  my  brother  and  his 
wife,  were  baptised.  I  hope  they  will  carry  on  Christian  work, 
and  be  able  to  live  as  true  and  earnest  Christians. 

"A  few  days  later,  my  brother's  wife  gave  birth  to  a  baby  hoy. 
The  mother  and  baby  are  both  doing  well.  I  think  it  is  a  special 
gift  from  Cod,  and  I  hope  the  babe  may  grow  up  to  be  the  means 
of  doing  God's  work,  and  be  a  comfort  to  his  parents." 

The  letter  goes  on  to  say  that  he  now  has  two  Christian  meet- 
ings every  week  at  his  store,  and  a  monthly  one  at  his  house.  Be 
speaks  of  family  difficulties  arising  from  the  fact  of  one  of  his 
daughters  being  betrothed  to  the  son  of  a  heathen  family,  who, 
though  she  is  living  in  her  father's  house,  have  the  right  to  con- 
trol her  actions,  and  will  not  allow  her  to  go  to  school  01  to 
church,  but  constantly  speak  evil  of  the  Christians. 

Four  years  later,  in   October    ISSti,    Mrs  Stewart,  writing   from 
1  A'  ts  xii.  5,  15. 
L 


162  A    FIELD    FOR   WOMAN'S   WORK. 

Foo-Chow,  says:  "You  would  be  rejoiced  if  you  could  see  Mrs 
Ahok  now — she  is  such  a  decided,  bright  Christian.  A  short  time 
ago  there  were  meetings  for  women  only  at  the  Methodist  Confer- 
ence, and  at  one  of  these  Mrs  Ahok  was  asked  to  tell  about  her 
visiting  Chinese  ladies  in  the  city.  I  was  quite  delighted  with 
the  way  she  spoke — so  simply  and  yet  so  well  and  clearly. 

"  She  told  us  first  of  her  own  conversion  :  how  she  was  worship- 
ping idols  and  knew  nothing  about  God,  and  did  not  even  wish  to 
know  Him,  but  in  His  mercy  He  had  sent  one  of  His  servants  to  her 
to  show  her  the  Light.  She  said  that  at  first  she  felt  much  puzzled 
at  all  she  heard,  but  that  at  last  the  Light  dawned,  and  she  learned 
to  know  Christ  as  her  Saviour.  Then  she  felt  so  afraid  and 
ashamed  to  confess  that  she  was  a  Christian,  but  that  now  God 
had  taken  all  that  away,  and  she  never  feels  either  fear  or  shame, 
but  loves  to  tell  others  about  the  Lord  Jesus. 

"  Then  she  went  on  to  tell  of  her  going  about  in  the  city  with  the 
ladies  of  the  Mission,  to  twelve  different  houses,  and  of  the  wil- 
lingness of  her  countrywomen  to  listen.  It  was  deeply  interesting 
to  hear  her  tell  it  all,  and  to  see  her  strong  desire  for  the  conver- 
sion of  others.  It  seemed  such  an  answer  to  the  many  who  ask, 
'  Do  the  Chinese  become  real  Christians  1 '  How  few  of  our 
own  country  men  or  women  feel  it  necessary  after  their  conversion 
to  tell  others  of  God's  love.  But  the  Chinese  consider  this  to  be 
their  bounden  duty." 

While  Miss  F was  living  in  Mr  Ahok's  house,  she  made 

acquaintance  with  several  other  wealthy  families,  who  came  to 
condole  over  the  child's  illness.  To  her  amazement  she  was  cor- 
dially invited  to  visit  them  also  in  their  own  homes  ;  and,  though 
perfectly  aware  that  her  primary  object  was  to  teach  Christian  faith 
and  practice,  several  mandarins  (themselves  heathen)  urged  her  to 
come  and  instruct  their  poor  ignorant  wives. 

To  her  astonishment,  the  more  she  went  about,  the  more  was  she 
convinced  that  this  invitation  was  no  empty  form,  but  the  true 
wish  of  both  the  ladies  themselves  and  their  husbands.  In 
one  house  after  another  the  ladies  thronged  around  her,  entreating 
her  to  stay  with  them  and  to  teach  them  to  read.  Unfortunately  it 
was  quite  impossible  for  her  to  avail  herself  of  these  invitations,  as 
she  already  had  her  hands  over-full  of  work,  and  was,  moreover, 
conscious  of  failing  health,  which  soon  afterwards  resulted  in  the 
doctors  ordering  her  to  leave  China. 

I  have  no  doubt  that  a  personally  winning  and  attractive  man- 
ner weighed  largely  in  evoking  such  cordiality  from  these  Chinese 


A    FIELD    FOR   WOMAN'S    WORK.  163 

ladies,  but  the  fact  of  such  invitations  having  been  earnestly  made, 
points  unmistakably  to  the  fact  that  here  lies  a  vast  held  for 
Christian  workers,  which  can  only  be  undertaken  by  women — and. 
moreover,  women  very  specially  endowed  with  the  peculiar  talents 
requisite  for  a  very  difficult  task.  Probably  very  few  English 
women  are  capable  of  doing  successful  work  in  Chinese  zenanas, 
for  its  conditions  are  altogether  unique.  It  is  not  enough  that 
there  should  be  "  a  willing  mind,"  and  a  zealous  love  for  tbe 
Master — there  must  also  be  a  power  of  influencing  others,  a  clear 
judgment,  a  loving  heart,  unbounded  patience,  and  that  rare  talent. 
the  power  of  teaching. 

The  physical  strength  of  the  zenana  worker  is  a  serious  consid- 
eration ;  and  whether  she  can  stand  the  climate,  which,  to  some 
constitutions,  is  found  so  trying,  she  must  have  a  talent  for  lan- 
guages, to  enable  her  to  master  the  most  difficult  of  all  tongues,  to 
speak  it  gracefully,  and  to  read  it  in  its  own  puzzling  characters. 

One  of  her  most  important  studies  must  be  that  of  the  weari- 
some etiquette,  on  which  no  nation  lays  so  great  stress  as  do  the 
Chinese.  The  formulas  of  speech,  the  civilities  to  be  observed  on 
entering  or  leaving  a  house,  on  welcoming  guests  or  bidding  them 
farewell,  where  and  when  to  sit  and  when  to  stand,  how  to  behave 
at  table  and  on  every  other  conceivable  occasion — all  these  are 
among  the  topics  that  must  be  thoroughly  mastered  by  the  English 
lady  who  desires  to  produce  so  good  an  impression  on  a  Chinese 
household  as  to  make  her  presence  and   her  teaching  aeeeptaMe. 

Even  a  servant  at  a  roadside  inn  is  entitled  to  feel  injured  by 
such  want  of  respect  as  might  be  shown  by  a  customer  taking  the 
cup  of  tea  which  is  brought  to  him  in  a  careless  manner,  instead 
of  courteously  placing  both  hands  beneath  the  cup!  How  endless 
then  maybe  the  causes  of  unintentional  offence  !  which,  however, 
are  readily  forgiven  if  the  visitor  is  sufficiently  alive  to  the  dnnger. 
to  offer  some  word  of  apology  for  his  possible  ignorance  of  Chinese 
custom. 

Already  a  few  workers  have  come  forward  who  seem  to  fulld 
these  requirements,  and  who  are  ready  to  devote  their  lives  to  this 
labour  of  love.  More  are  urgently  needed,  for  truly  the  harvest  is 
plenteous  and  the  labourers  few.  There  are  multitudes  of  homes 
to  which  admission  may  shortly  be  obtained,  in  which  wives  and 
mothers  are  now  carefully  training  their  sons  to  must  devout 
ancestral  worship — that  mainspring  of  Antichrisl  which  lies  a1  the 
root  of  all  evil  in  China,  and  which  forms  the  one  insuperable  bar 
to  all  progress.     "Win   the  mothers,  and  the  sons  will  follow  suit. 


164  A    FIELD    FOR    WOMAN'S    WORK. 

This  is,  indeed,  laying  the  axe  to  the  root  of  the  wide-spreading 
tree  of  <  Shinese  heathenism. 

Picture  to  yourselves  such  a  field  for  women's  work  as  is  here 
offered  to  those  able  and  willing  to  undertake  it.  As  a  sample,  I 
will  speak  of  one  home.  It  is  a  large  house  with  eighty  inhabit- 
ants— five  generations  there  live  together  in  patriarchal  style.  Many 
of  these  ladies  have  not  been  out  of  the  house  for  years.  And  what 
have  they  to  occupy  them  indoors1?  Embroidery — dress — pos- 
sibly  children  to  play  with — making  cakes  and  other  things  as 
temple-offerings,  and  the  never-failing  worship  of  the  dead. 

To  this  house  there  enters  an  English  lady,  and  the  inmates  of 
the  big  house  crowd  around  her,  and  plead,  "  Do  stay  and  teach 
us  ;  "  but  she  has  other  work  to  attend  to,  and  is  compelled  to 
leave  them.  Must  they  be  left  1  Has  not  Britain  daughters  who 
are  fitted  for  this  work  1  educated  Christian  women  who  find  no 
special  scope  for  their  talents  in  this  crowded  land,  but  who  there 
would  find  an  ample  field,  rich  in  human  interest — among  women 
who,  whatever  may  be  their  nature  as  heathen,  become  warm- 
hearted and  affectionate  so  soon  as  a  ray  of  Christian  love  strikes 
home  to  them. 

Many,  also,  are  capable  of  great  intellectual  development,  and 
are,  moreover,  possessed  of  wonderful  memories,  so  that,  apart  from 
the  deeper  joy  of  striving  to  bring  the  Divine  Light  individually 
home  to  these  dull  hearts,  there  is  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that 
whatever  they  learn  is  sure  to  be  treasured,  and  passed  on  to  others, 
and  then  again  to  others — 

"  Like  circles  widening  round  upon  a  clear  blue  river." 

As  an  instance  of  how  earnestly  some  Chinese  women  crave 
instruction,  I  may  mention  that  the  first  pupil  of  the  London 
Mission  Girls'  School  at  Peking  was  a  lassie  who  had  actually  dis- 
guised herself  as  a  boy  in  order  to  attend  school.  Great  was  the 
excitement  and  indignation  of  the  masters  when  this  was  detected. 
Happily  a  foreign  lad)'  came  to  the  rescue  and  started  a  school  for 
girls.  It  appears  that  in  Northern  China  female  education  is 
utterly  neglected,  and  few  women,  even  of  high  rank,  can  read.  In 
the  south,  however,  it  is  different ;  and  there  are  not  only  many 
schools  for  girls  of  good  position,  but  some  are  instructed  at  home 
by  private  tutors,  who  find  in  them  such  apt  pupils  that  China  is 
by  no  means  exempt  from  blue-stockings,  learned  in  Confucian 
classics,  and,  moreover,  holds  in  high  honour  the  memory  of  sundry 
ladies  who  in  successive  ages  have  thus  distinguished  themselves. 


CHINESE    WOMEN    OF    MARK.  165 

There  have  even  been  instances  in  which  ladies  have  found 
opportunity  to  display  quite  masculine  talents.  To  say  nothing  of 
the  two  Tartar  Empresses  who  have  so  long  ruled  the  Empire  from 
the  seclusion  of  the  Imperial  palace,  there  is  the  case  of  a  <  Jhinese 
Joan  of  Arc  who  distinguished  herself  as  a  leader  of  the  Triad 
forces  in  1855.  She  assumed  this  position  in  order  to  avenge  the 
death  of  her  father,  who  had  been  captured  and  cruelly  tortured 
by  the  Imperial  troops.  She  repeatedly  led  the  Triad  army  to  the 
attack,  when  she  fought  like  a  fury,  but  was  eventually  captured 
and  executed. 

All  these  cases  go  to  prove  what  good  strong  material  there  is  to 
work  upon,  now  lying  fallow  in  these  overcrowded  houses. 

Hitherto  the  contact  between  Chinese  ladies  and  foreigners  has 
been  almost  nil.  As  regards  their  humbler  sisters,  a  great  advance 
was  effected  when  it  was  found  possible  to  train  middle-aged 
Chinese  women,  and  send  them  as  Bible-women  to  teach  their 
neighbours.  In  some  places  they  are  sent  out,  two  and  tun,  in 
order  to  teach  wherever  they  can  find  opportunity  ;  and  as  a  <  'hina- 
man  greatly  venerates  an  educated  woman,  it  is  found  that  in  seek- 
ing to  win  the  women,  they  very  frequently  inilnenee  the  men  also, 
and  lead  them  to  forsake  idolatry. 

But  the  case  in  point  is  how  to  carry  the  Light  into  the  dull 
homes  of  ladies  whose  social  status  now  holds  them  prisoner.  Even 
supposing  that  some  rumour  of  a  brighter  life  has  penetrated  into 
one  of  these  dull  homes,  how  apparently  hopeless  a  barrier  is  the 
feeling  of  its  being  a  breach  of  propriety  for  a  woman  to  come  out 
of  her  seclusion,  especially  to  speak  to  a  man — and  yet  probably 
the  Christian  catechist  of  some  neighbouring  village  is  the  only 
person  who  could  give  the  desired  teaching.  Hence  arise  such 
pathetic  incidents  as  one  recently  discovered  at  the  village  of 
Tong-A,  where,  day  by  day,  the  women  assembled  to  learn  from 
the  lips  of  a  little  girl  only  five  years  of  age,  who,  with  the  mar- 
vellous memory  of  her  race,  could  already  repeat  the  Creed,  the 
commandments,  the  Lord's  Prayer,  some  hymns,  and  many  pas- 
sages of  Scripture.  Truly  a  touching  illustration  of  the  words  of 
the  Hebrew  prophet,  "  A  little  child  shall  lead  them." 

Another  difficulty  in  the  way  of  Chinese  ladies  seeking  instruc- 
tion for  themselves,  lies  in  the  barrier  of  their  poor  deformed  little 
hoofs.  There  are  indeed  some  instances  in  which  even  small- 
footed  women  have  contrived,  Sunday  after  Sunday,  for  years,  to 
hobble  a  distance  of  several  miles  to  and  from  a  Christian  Bervice 
(just  as  in  Scotland  I  have  known  a   poor  cripple  who  through  a 


166  A    FIELD    FOB    WOMAN'S    WORK. 

long  life  rarely  failed  to  drag  himself  many  miles  every  Sunday  to 
attend  the  ministrations  of  hi.s  favourite  preacher),  but  such  cases 
are  exceptional,  and  the  mass  of  Chinese  small-footed  women  are 
virtually  prisoners,  wholly  dependent  on  the  services  of  their  large- 
footed  attendants. 

It  is  to  minister  to  these,  and  to  win  from  idolatry  the  mothers 
of  the  next  generation,  that  English  ladies  are  needed — ladies  so 
truly  in  earnest  that  they  can  he  content  to  win  the  sympathy  and 
respect  of  their  sisters,  not  merely  by  attention  to  essentials,  but 
also  to  wearisome  external  ceremonies.  Those  who  bring  warm 
hearts  to  such  work,  will  very  soon  awaken  such  abundant  personal 
affection  that  they  will  find  no  cause  to  complain  that  their  labour 
is  unsatisfying.1 

One  thing  which,  to  all  Christian  workers  among  the  Chinese, 
proves  a  very  great  charm,  is  the  whole-hearted,  resolute  way  in 
which  they  stand  by  their  faith  when  once  they  have  resolved  to 
accept  it.  They  are  so  intensely  conservative  that  they  are  very 
slow  to  give  up  the  worship  of  their  ancestral  idols,  but  when  they 
do  so  they  transfer  to  the  new  service  more  than  the  old  zeal,  and 
withal  bring  with  them  a  simplicity  of  faith  which  looks  for  the 
working  of  miracles  in  answer  to  prayer,  and  so  practically  obtains 
them. 

For  truly  I  know  not  how  else  to  describe  some  (out  of  many) 
incidents,  which  nevertheless  cannot  be  gainsaid.  The  strangest 
of  these  have  reference  to  a  class  of  sufferers  whom  the  Chinese 
themselves  always  describe  as  being  "possessed  of  devils."  They 
have  distinctive  names  for  true  insanity,  and  for  hysteria,  cata- 
lepsy, and  various  forms  of  mental  disease,  and  they  draw  the  line 
quite  distinctly  between  these  and  this  "  spiritual  possession/'  as  it 
is  invariably  called,  both  by  heathens  and  Christians. 

The  symptoms  are  so  precisely  those  which  were  thus  described 
in  Biblical  days,  that  foreigners,  after  vainly  seeking  for  some 
medical  term  to  express  the  condition  of  the  victim,  are  fain  to 
accept  the  Chinese  solution.  They  find  a  being  apparently  mad, 
foaming  at  the  month,  tearing  off  every  shred  of  raiment,  and 
wildly  appealing  to  God  to  let  her  (or  him)  alone.      These  par- 

1  In  case  these  pages  should  fall  into  the  hands  of  any  lady  who  has  any  inclina- 
tion for  such  work,  I  would  venture  to  suggest  that  she  should  communicate  with 
James  Stuart,  Esq.,  Church  of  England  Zenana  Mission,  9  Salisbury  Square, 
London,  E.C.,  or  else  with  Miss  Webb,  267  Vauxhall  Bridge  Road,  London,  who 
represents  the  Society  for  Promoting  Female  Education  in  the  East,  by  whom  also 
subscriptions  will  gladly  be  received  from  any  who,  unable  to  help  in  person,  are 
willing  to  aid  in  sending  others. 


CASTING    OUT    DEVILS.  167 

oxysms  return  at  short  intervals,  and  the  Taouist  and  Buddhisl 
priests  are  called  in  to  perform  costly  and  prolonged  ceremonies  of 
exorcism,  which  are  continued  till  the  paroxysm  is  over,  and  are 
renewed  on  its  next  return.  One  of  these  exorcisms  consists  in 
sacrificing  a  goat  and  anointing  the  hrow  of  the  sufferer  with  its 
hlood.  At  other  times  goat's  hlood  is  administered  internally, 
as  being  a  powerful  emetic;  but  in  this  case,  instead  of  causing 
sickness,  it  is  expected  to  counteract  this  devil-sickness. 

In  a  considerable  number  of  cases  such  as  these,  the,  native 
Christians  have  been  appealed  to  by  their  heathen  neighbours  to  see 
■whether  they  could  do  anything  to  help  them;  and  these,  remem- 
bering how  of  old  those  who  had  faith  in  the  Master  were  enabled 
to  "cast  out  the  spirits  by  His  Word,  and  to  heal  all  that  were 
sick,"  have  sought  to  follow  in  their  wake,  and  taking  up  their 
position  beside  "  him  that  was  grievously  tormented  with  a  devil," 
have  there  wrestled  in  prayer  witli  passionate  earnestness,  pleading 
that  the  true  God  would  reveal  His  power  in  the  presence  of  the 
heathen,  and  concluding  with  the  apostolic  words,  "  In  the  name 
of  Jesus  Christ  I  command  thee  to  come  out."  Again  and  again 
their  prayer  has  been  granted;  the  wild  tempest  has  been  allayed, 
and  the  sufferer  lulled  to  a  condition  of  deep  peace,  whence,  after 
a  while,  he  has  arisen  to  go  forth  "  clothed  and  in  his  right  mind 
to  tell  his  heathen  brethren  of  the  marvellous  way  in  which  lie  has 
been  cured,  and,  in  short,  to  become  from  that  hour  a  faithful 
worker  in  the  Master's  cause. 

It  really  appears  as  if  some  of  the  miraculous  "signs  and  won- 
ders" which  prepared  the  way  in  the  earliest  days  of  the  Church 
in  Judea,  were  in  some  little  measure  permitted  to  the  infant 
Church  in  China.  Take  the  case  of  the  man  out  of  whom  Jesus 
cast  the  legion  of  devils,  who  when  he  was  "in  his  right  mind 
prayed  Him  that  he  might  be  with  Him,  but  was  commanded  to 
go  home  to  his  friends  and  tell  them  what  great  things  the  Lord 
had  done  for  him.  So  the  man  obeyed,  and  the  result  was  that 
when  Jesus  returned  thither,  the  whole  multitude  came  out  to 
meet  Him,  bringing  all  their  sick  to  be  healed.1 

This  is  precisely  the  story  of  at  least  one  of  the  Bible-women 
near  Foo-Chow.  She  had  long  been  known  to  her  neighbours  as 
being  "  possessed  of  devils,"  and  when  the  Christians  found  her, 
she  was  foaming  at  the  mouth,  wildly  tearing  oil'  her  clothes  and 
struggling  against  one  whom  she  addressed  as  '"the  Boly  One  (a 
title  she  could  never  have  heard  used  in  the  sense  it  conveys  to 
1  .Maik  v.  IS  20  :  Matthew  xv.  -j-2-31. 


168  A     FIELD    FOR    WOMAN'S    WORK. 

us).  The  simple  earnest  prayers  that  were  offered  on  her  behalf 
prevailed  :  she  not  only  was  "healed,"  but  came  to  seek  instruc- 
tion nl  the  Mission,  and  to  pray  that  she  might  be  baptised.  She 
there  remained  till  she  had  succeeded  in  learning  to  read,  and  then 
would  stay  no  longer,  for  she  said  she  must  return  to  teach  in  her 
own  village.  Though  very  poor,  she  refused  to  accept  of  any  salary 
as  a  Bible-woman,  for  she  said,  '"The  people  will  listen  and  believe 
when  they  see  that  I  do  not  do  it  for  gain." 

So  the  next  time  that  this  remote  district  was  visited  by  a 
clergyman  of  the  Church  of  England  Mission  (the  Rev.  R.  W. 
Stewart),  he  found  that  not  only  had  this  woman  already  induced 
several  of  her  relations,  who  hitherto  had  been  bitter  opponents  of 
Christianity,  to  give  up  their  idols  and  worship  God,  but  that  a 
good  many  more  had  commenced  to  attend  the  Christian  service 
and  to  wish  to  learn  about  it.  In  China  such  a  beginning  as  this 
one  year,  means  that  five  years  hence  there  will  be  a  large  congre- 
gation in  that  place  ! 

Another  case  of  what  the  Chinese  call  being  possessed  by  devils, 
is  that  of  a  girl  eighteen  years  of  age,  who  for  years  had  been  thus 
tormented,  notwithstanding  all  the  efforts  of  the  exorcists.  At 
last  she  begged  her  parents  to  apply  to  the  catechist  for  help,  as 
she  had  heard  that  the  Christian's  God  had  cured  persons  who 
like  herself  were  grievously  afflicted.  Her  parents  rejected  the 
idea  as  being  quite  too  absurd.  If  any  one  could  help,  of  course 
it  was  the  idols,  and  they  were  able  and  willing  to  present  offer- 
ings and  pay  for  temple  services.  So  they  renewed  their  costly 
exorcisms  without  the  smallest  avail.  At  length  the  entreaties  of 
the  poor  sufferer  prevailed,  and  the  father  went  to  the  little  Chris- 
tian chapel  and  told  his  sad  story  to  the  catechist,  who  told  him 
that  if  he  wished  God  to  cure  his  daughter  he  must  first  put  away 
all  his  idols,  and  resolve  to  worship  the  Lord  Jesus,  and  that  then 
the  Christians  would  pray  for  his  daughter,  and  if  it  seemed  well 
to  God  He  would  answer  their  prayer.  The  man  was  in  a  great 
strait,  for  he  reverenced  his  idols,  yet  he  loved  his  daughter,  and 
she  was  in  sore  distress.  So  he  resolved  to  give  up  the  idols. 
and  then  several  of  the  native  Christians,  full  of  childlike  faith, 
went  to  the  house,  and  for  two  long  nights  they  earnestly  prayed 
that  God  in  His  great  mercy  would  bid  the  evil  spirit  depart. 
That  their  prayer  was  heard  and  answered,  they  had  most  practical 
reason  to  believe,  for  on  the  morrow  the  sufferer  was  well — not  a 
trace  of  illness  remained,  except  extreme  weakness,  which  passed 
away  in  a  day  or  two,  and  the  girl,   now  bright  and  intelligent, 


POSSESSED    OF   DEVILS.  169 

learnt  "  Our  Father  "  as  her  first  words  of  prayer  from  the  lips  of 
Patience,  the  catechist's  wife. 

Another  woman  was  present  who  had  been  healed  in  just  the 
same  manner  by  "the  prayers  of  faith."  "Wonderful  is  the 
great  power  of  God,"  said  Patience,  as  she  related  the  woman's 
history. 

I  will  quote  only  one  more  instance  of  the  cure  of  this  peculiar 
phase  of  suffering,  which,  like  those  I  have  already  mentioned, 
occurred  in  one  of  the  country  districts  in  the  Fuh-Kien  province 
(of  which  Foo-Chow  is  the  capital).  A  poor  woman,  said  to  have 
been  for  long  "possessed  with  a  devil,"  became  worse  and  worse; 
her  friends,  grieved  to  see  her  thus  tormented,  called  in  a  sooth- 
sayer, who  ordered  the  usual  offerings  at  idol  shrines.  At  last  the 
family  began  to  suspect  that  this  man  was  simply  extorting  money 
from  them,  and  it  occurred  to  them  to  consult  the  catechist,  and 
ask  him  to  pray  for  her.  This  is  in  a  district  far  away  from  those 
I  have  previously  spoken  of;  but  here,  too,  the  prayer  of  simple 
faith  availed,  and  the  woman  and  her  husband  have  ever  since 
been  regular  attendants  at  Christian  Church  services. 

These  are  but  a  few  of  the  cases  reported  in  this  immediate 
neighbourhood.  But  a  long  list  of  very  remarkable  cases  of  the 
same  sort  has  been  recorded  by  Dr  Nevius,  of  Che-foo,  in  North 
China,  as  having  come  under  his  special  observation,  or  that  of  his 
assistants.  The  reverend  doctor  has  been  described  to  me  by  a 
medical  man,  who  is  himself  distinguished  for  singular  strength  of 
character,  as  being  "the  most  hard-headed,  matter-of-fact  man  1 
ever  met."  Yet  so  firmly  is  he  convinced  of  the  spiritual  char- 
acter of  these  physical  aillictions,  and  of  their  supernatural  cure, 
that  he  purposes  ere  long  publishing  his  voluminous  notes  on  this 
subject.1 

Possession. — This  subject  is  so  very  remarkable,  that  1  think  it 
is  well  to  quote  the  medical  testimony  of  so  competent  an  author- 
ity as  Dr  J.  Dudgeon,  as  given  in  his  official  report  of  his  hospital 
at  Peking.  He  says,  "  The  Chinese  believe  in  possession  by  evil 
or  depraved  spirits,  which  may  inhabit  the  individual  disguised  as 
foxes,  hedgehogs,  weasels,  or  snakes.  In  the  country  then-  ai>- 
small  houses  everywhere  for  the  worship  of  these  animals.  '  ('I  his 
is   on   the   same   principle   as   the  worship  of   the    thirteen    medical 

1  I  had  hoped  to  have  received  from  Dr  Nevius  some  details  from  lii*  persona] 
observations,  but  regret  that  they  have  failed  to  reach  me  in  time  for  Insertion 
here. 


170  A    FIELD    FOE    WOMAN'S    WORK. 

goddesses,  most  of  whom,  such  as  the  Goddess  of  Small-pox,  repre- 
sent divers  diseases.)  "The  colours  belonging  to  these  are  black, 
grey,  yellow,  and  white  respectively.  The  worship  of  the  fox  has 
been  particularly  prominent  at  Peking  of  late  years,  and  so  gnat 
were  the  crowds  of  people  that  ilocked  to  its  shrine,  soliciting  the 
cure  of  all  manner  of  diseases,  that  the  officials  have  lately  had  to 
order  its  removal  to  a  temple."  "  The  persons  supposed  to  be 
'  possessed '  seem  to  be  in  ordinary  health,  but  on  close  inspection 
something  odd  and  queer,  especially  about  the  eye  and  speech, 
may  be  detected.  They  seem  to  be  beyond  their  own  powers  of 
will.  What  they  do  is  done  unwillingly ;  they  feel  compelled  to 
act  the  way  they  do." 

Dr  Dudgeon  goes  on  to  cite  certain  cases  which  came  under  his 
notice,  but  to  which  his  medical  skill  seemed  wholly  inapplicable, 
and  all  attempts  at  cure  futile.  One  was  that  of  a  man  who,  con- 
vinced that  he  was  "  possessed  "  by  a  fox-spirit,  had  partly  opened 
his  windpipe  to  give  it  exit.  Though  he  had  no  pain,  he  frequently 
beat  his  breast,  shoulder,  and  head  violently.  The  more  the  doctor 
tried  to  reason  him  out  of  his  phantasy,  the  more  he  belaboured 
his  poor  body ;  and  though  the  wound  in  the  throat  received  medi- 
cal treatment,  these  constant  flagellations  effectually  prevented  its 
healing. 

He  gives  in  detail  the  history  of  a  whole  family  of  whom  the 
majority  believed  themselves  to  be  possessed  by  snake -spirits. 
They  live  in  Manchuria,  forty  days'  journey  from  Peking ;  and 
after  enduring  terrible  miseries  from  these  hallucinations  (if  such 
they  be),  the  father,  Mr  Hsii,  travelled  to  Peking  to  report  the  case 
to  the  official  who  is  imperially  appointed  to  the  care  of  this  branch 
of  corporal  and  spiritual  affliction.  Apparently  the  spirits  were 
running  riot  in  the  district,  for,  in  the  same  village,  in  one  family 
of  the  name  of  Hwang,  consisting  of  seven  persons,  five  had  died 
from  the  persecution  of  spirits.  In  the  family  of  Hsia,  out  of  seven 
persons,  five  had  died  from  the  same  cause ;  in  the  family  of  Lan, 
out  of  nine  persons,  seven  had  died,  and  so  on,  through  half-a-dozen 
other  families. 

Mr  Hsii  came  to  the  hospital  to  see  whether  the  foreign  doctor 
knew  any  special  way  of  treating  spirits,  where  priestly  exorcism 
had  failed.  He  came  several  times  and  repeated  his  story  without 
any  variation.  He  said  that  his  family  consisted  of  himself,  his 
wife,  five  sons,  and  two  daughters. 

First  of  all,  a  snake  entered  the  body  of  his  fourth  son,  who 
died.     The  corpse  was   carried  to  the  mountains  to  be  cremated, 


THE    DEMON    SXAKE.  1  V  1 

but  when  all  the  fuel  was  burned,  there  lay  the  body  intact.  A 
second  time  was  cremation  attempted,  with  the  like  result.  So  the 
body  was  left  on  the  hills,  and  a  white  fox  came  and  devoured  it. 

On  the  same  day  a  snake  coiled  round  the  leg  of  his  second 
daughter  and  entered  into  her  body.  Her  colour  changed,  she 
could  not  straighten  her  limbs,  and  eventually  she  died,  and  was 
carried  to  the  mountains  and  there  was  duly  cremated. 

In  the  following  year  the  snake  took  possession  of  the  remainii),^ 
seven  members  of  the  family,  who  all  became  unconscious,  mid 
were  unaware  of  what  was  going  on  around  them,  or  of  their  own 
actions.  "When  apparently  nearly  dead,  they  all  gradually  re- 
covered. After  a  while,  however,  the  eldest  daughter,  aged  eleven 
years,  was  again  possessed  by  the  snake-spirit,  and  also  by  that  of 
a  weasel,  which  sprang  on  to  her  head  from  the  top  of  a  wall.  At 
first  her  arms  and  legs  quivered  and  moved  in  all  directions ;  pre- 
sently, however,  she  could  only  move  her  hands  and  feet,  and  grad- 
ually became  quite  helpless  and  died.  Then  her  father,  who  him- 
self was  under  the  control  of  the  snake,  carried  her  to  the  mountains 
and  burnt  her  body. 

Five  months  later  his  wife,  aged  thirty-nine,  was  also  killed  by 
the  snake.  As  she  was  being  placed  in  her  coffin,  two  clouds,  one 
white  and  the  other  blue,  descended  ami  covered  the  courtyard 
with  so  dense  a  mist  that  people  could  not  recognise  one  another. 
After  the  coffining  the  clouds  disappeared,  but  they  returned  in 
the  evening  and  hovered  over  the  coffin  until  midnight,  emitting  a 
yellow  light  as  brilliant  as  that  of  day.     At  midnight  they  vanished. 

When  Mr  Hsii  himself  fell  a  victim  to  the  snake-demon,  he 
went  to  pray  to  "the  Lord  of  Heaven,"  when  straightway  the 
heavens  were  rent  by  lightning  and  thunder,  but  still  there  was 
no  deliverance.  Then  he  resolved  to  come  to  Peking  "to  lodge  a 
complaint,"  and  as  he  left  his  door  again  two  brilliant  clouds,  one 
green  and  the  other  purple,  each  some  twenty  feet  in  height, 
descended  and  stood  by  the  house  for  the  space  of  half  an  hour. 

Such  was  the  story  earnestly  related  by  this  poor  man,  and 
which  does  not  seem  to  have  struck  his  Chinese  hearers  as  by  any 
means  incredible;  in  fact,  it  appears  to  have  exactly  accorded 
with  their  own  belief  of  spirit-possessions. 

The  English  doctor,  however,  seeing  that  any  attempt  to  reason 
with  the  man  (in  order  to  convince  him  that  this  was  all  a  hal- 
lucination) would  lie  utterly  futile,  thought  that  possibly  a  harmless 
deception  might  be  of  use.  So  as  the  man  firmly  believed  in  tic 
possibility  of  driving  out  the  evil  spirit  which  took  the  form 


172  A    FIELD    FOR    WOMAN'S    WORK. 

snake,  the  doctor  solemnly  blindfolded  him,  and  with  much  cere- 
mony pretended  to  go  through  an  operation  for  the  extraction  of 
the  snake,  so  working  on  the  man's  imagination  that  he  struggled 
convulsively  at  the  moment  when  the  snake-demon  was  supposed 
to  be  cast  out.  The  bandages  were  then  removed  from  his  eyes,  just 
in  time  to  let  him  catch  a  glimpse  of  a  large  white  snake  drowned  in 
a  basin  of  water,  which  he  was  of  course  led  to  suppose  was  truly 
his  tormentor.  The  man  did  believe  this,  and  for  the  moment 
seemed  relieved;  but  his  familiar  spirit  was  by  no  means  to  be 
got  rid  of  by  any  such  foolish  device,  and  a  few  days  afterwards 
the  doctor  found  "  him  that  was  possessed  of  devils  "  at  the  Bud- 
dhist Lamasery  imploring  the  priests  to  chant  prayers  to  drive 
out  the  evil  spirit. 

Of  this  hsieh  ping,  "  disease  of  evil  spirits,"  Dr  Dudgeon  re- 
marks that  it  is  sometimes  accompanied  by  abdominal  distension, 
and  sometimes  the  disease  goes  to  the  head  and  the  afflicted  person 
turns  black.  With  reference  to  the  case  which  I  have  just  quoted, 
he  says,  "  This  was  evidently  not  epilepsy,  nor  hysteria,  nor  ecstasy, 
nor  delirium  like  D.T. ;  nor  catalepsy,  nor  insanity,  nor  chorea. 
What  was  it  1  His  outward  symptoms  when  he  presented  himself 
suggested  the  latter  affection.  Every  minute  or  two  he  cried  out, 
and  his  body,  but  especially  his  head,  was  shaken  convulsively. 
We  tried  the  effect  of  nervine  sedatives,  but  with  no  benefit.  As 
the  man  knew  nothing  about  the  religion  of  Jesus,  we  did  not  at- 
tempt the  Biblical  method  of  casting  out  devils.  Had  we  sucb  a 
case  again,  I  should  feel  inclined,  from  the  success  reported  by  the 
Bev.  Dr  JSTevius  of  Che-foo,  to  try  the  Scriptural  plan.  As  it  was, 
we  were  poor  exorcists." 

While  I  am  speaking  of  these  subjects,  I  will  tell  you  of  one 
more  prayer  which  certainly  was  honoured  by  a  most  direct  and 
immediate  answer  in  the  sight  of  the  heathen. 

In  the  village  of  O-Iong  lives  a  noble  old  man  of  the  very  un- 
musical name  of  Chung-Te.  He  was  the  first  to  embrace  Christi- 
anity in  that  district,  and  as  a  matter  of  course  has  had  much  to 
endure  for  the  Name  he  loves.  For  the  first  six  months  after  his 
baptism  he  walked  eighteen  miles  every  Sunday  to  a  village  where 
a  Christian  service  was  held.  After  that,  a  catechist  tried  to  settle 
in  O-Iong,  but  when  three  houses  in  succession  had  been  pulled 
down  about  his  head,  he  judged  it  prudent  to  retire.  His  place, 
however,  was  filled  by  another  zealous  convert,  who  now  walked 
thirteen  miles  every  Sunday  to  meet  Chung-Te  in  his  own  village 
and  endeavour  to  form  a  consn'esation. 


OLD    "  PRAISE-THE-LORD."  173 

But  still  Chung-Te  was  the  sole  Christian  resident,  and  for  Long 
he  stood  utterly  alone,  except  for  the  sympathy  of  a  dearly-loved 
wife,  Avho  shared  in  his  persecutions.  She  died,  and  not  one 
neighbour  would  come  near  to  help  the  worshipper  of  Jesus  in 
rendering  the  last  offices  to  the  dying  and  the  dead.  Local  cus- 
tom there  requires  that  when  one  has  died,  the  body  must  he 
fastened  to  a  chair  in  the  reception-room  in  a  sitting  position,  as 
if  awaiting  guests.  All  this  he  had  to  do  alone,  though  no  guests 
would  come;  and  when  it  came  to  his  insisting  on  a  Christian 
funeral,  with  no  idolatrous  ceremonies,  there  was  a  frightful  up- 
roar, and  he  was  seized  and  cruelly  beaten,  ami  the  mob  would 
have  torn  down  his  house  had  not  the  town  magistrate  happily 
interfered.  lie  had  one  little  daughter,  who,  child  as  she  was. 
inherited  her  mother's  devotedness.  She  was  her  father's  only 
human  comfort,  hut  she  had  been  betrothed  in  infancy  to  a  heathen, 
who  claimed  his  child-bride,  and  custom  compelled  the  father  t<> 
let  her  go. 

But  the  brave-hearted  Christian  remained  true  to  his  colours, 
and  never  ceased  striving  to  persuade  others  to  become  followers 
of  his  Master,  so  that  he  has  come  to  he  known  throughout  the 
district  by  the  nickname  of  "  Praise-the-Lord."  Hut  the  name  is 
no  longer  one  of  contempt.  Such  has  been  the  intluence  for  good 
of  this  solitary  servant  of  the  Cross,  that  not  only  has  a  Christian 
congregation  been  gathered  together  in  his  own  town,  hut  several 
smaller  ones  have  formed  themselves  in  the  surrounding  hamlets. 

The  incident  to  which  I  alluded  occurred  at  a  recent  fire  which 
broke  out  in  one  of  the  streets  of  O-Iong.  There  was  at  first  no 
apprehension  of  its  spreading  to  that  part  of  the  town  in  which 
old  Praise-the-Lord  has  his  humble  home. 

Gradually,  however,  the  liames  swept  nearer  and  nearer,  and 
soon  it  was  evident  that  the  street  was  doomed.  In  this  extremity, 
tin'  heathen  called  upon  their  gods,  and  bringing  out  all  their  idols, 
they  placed  them  in  rows,  hoping  to  check  the  advance  of  the 
liames. 

This  was  too  much  for  the  zealous  old  Christian.  Denouncing 
the  folly  of  his  mighhours  in  looking  for  protection  to  senseless 
gods  of  wood  and  clay,  he  seized  the  heavy  mattock  with  which 
he  works  in  the  fields,  and  proceeded  to  belabour  the  pour  idols 
till  they  lay  in  fragments.  Then,  in  presence  "l  the  already  wildly 
excited  mob,  he  raised  his  hands  to  heaven,  calling  upon  "the 
great  Creator — the  true  God,  his  heavenly  Father,"  t"  save  him 
and  his  neighbours  from  the  approaching  liames. 


174  A    MANDARIN    AT    HOME. 

It  was  not  the  first  time  that  he  had  proven  the  promise, 
"  While  they  are  yet  speaking,  I  will  hear,"  and  now  he  looked 
for  an  immediate  answer,  which  should  show  to  the  heathen  that 
the  God  who  could  stay  the  lire  was  the  true  God.  Noi  wras  In- 
disappointed;  almost  before  they  could  note  any  physical  reason 
for  the  change,  the  flames  seemed  blown  back  upon  themselves — 
the  wind  had  suddenly  veered  round,  and  though  many  of  the 
houses  close  by  had  been  seriously  scorched,  those  of  the  old  man 
and  his  neighbours  escaped  unharmed,  and  the  marvelling  crowd 
saw  the  conflagration  recede  as  swiftly  as  it  had  approached.1 


CHAPTER   XIII. 


A     MANDARIN     AT     HOME. 


A  wealthy  home — Melon  seeds — Dull  lives — Fine  clothes — Street  scenes — 
Street  cookery. 

This  afternoon  we  went  by  special  invitation  to  the  house  of  a 
very  wealthy  mandarin,  who,  being  also  a  merchant,  has  mixed  a 
good  deal  with  the  foreign  community,  and  so  has  got  over  the 
national  prejudice  against  outer  barbarians.  His  women -folk, 
however,  have  as  yet  had  little  or  no  intercourse  with  foreigners, 
and  he  wished  us  to  see  one  another. 

Their  home  is  in  the  heart  of  the  great  city,  so,  leaving  this 
island  in  our  wicker  chairs,  we  crossed  the  river  by  the  great 
bridge,  and  were  carried  for  more  than  an  hour  through  the  densely 
crowded  town  which  forms  the  suburbs  of  the  great  walled  city. 
There  seemed  no  end  to  the  twists  and  turns  of  the  long  and  foully 
dirty  streets,  where  the  extraordinary  variety  of  bad  smells  makes 
the  possession  of  a  nose  a  serious  drawback.  At  last  we  reached 
a  high  blank  Avail,  forming  one  side  of  a  dingy  street,  and  on 
being  admitted  within  its  ponderous  wooden  gates,  we  found 
ourselves  in  the  courtyard  of  a  purely  Chinese  house. 

The  sudden  change  from  the  dirt  and  squalor  and  dense  popula- 

1  Though  this  incident  is  on  so  tiny  a  scale  compared  with  the  other,  I  could  not 
hear  it  without  recalling  those  thrilling  deliverances  from  the  great  Hawaiian  Fire- 
River,  of  the  city  which  again  and  again  has  seemed  to  he  on  the  very  verge  of 
destruction.  See  '  Fire  Fountains  of  Hawaii."  chaps,  xi.  and  xxiii.  By  C.  F.  Gor- 
don Cummins?.     Blackwood  &  Sons. 


NIBBLING    MELON    SEEDS.  1  7  5 

tion  of  the  streets,  to  the  large  enclosure  with  luxurious  houses 
and  pleasure-grounds,  which  form  a  sort  of  patriarchal  encampment 
for  the  family  of  a  wealthy  great  man,  is  most  startling.  Our 
host,  robed  in  rich  dark-blue  satin,  came  to  receive  us  in  the  outer 
court,  where,  after  many  bows  and  much  shaking  of  our  own  hands, 
pressing  together  our  clenched  fists,  we  left  our  chairs  and  coolies, 
and  then  passed  the  kitchen,  and  crossed  another  court,  when  we 
reached  the  great  reception-hall,  decorated  with  much  beautifully 
carved  very  open  woodwork,  and  furnished  with  the  usual  hand- 
some small  tables  and  ponderous  chairs  of  polished  blackwood, 
with  slabs  of  marble  forming  the  seat  and  back.  In  honour  of 
our  expected  visit,  seats,  divans,  tables,  and  walls  were  decorated 
with  the  richly  embroidered  scarlet-cloth  covers,  which  are  always 
produced  on  ceremonious  occasions. 

The  weather  being  hot,  Ave  fully  appreciated  the  cool  shade  of 
a  small  dark  room,  in  which  we  were  invited  to  sit  a  while  ere 
being  conducted  to  the  presence  of  the  ladies.  Tea  was  of  course 
brought  in,  in  the  usual  small  cups  without  saucers,  but  with 
covers  resembling  saucers  fitting  loosely  into  each  cup — the  use  of 
the  cover  being  to  prevent  the  leaves  from  entering  the  mouth 
when  drinking  (for  the  correct  way  to  make  tea  is  to  put  a  pinch 
of  leaves  in  each  cup,  and  thereon  pour  boiling  water,  every  cup 
being  thus  made  separately :  of  course  sugar  or  milk  is  never 
used). 

On  the  little  tables  were  set  the  invariable  plates  of  sweetmeats 
and  small  cakes.  But  the  quaintest  addition  to  these  are  the  little 
plates  of  water-melon  seeds,  which  all  the  Chinese  delight  in  pick- 
ing open  and  nibbling,  in  accordance  with  a  Chinese  proverb  which 
expresses  the  satisfaction  of  always  having  something  in  the 
mouth.  In  this  respect  the  whole  race  are  like  squirrels,  for  in 
every  idle  moment  the  entire  population,  rich  and  poor,  find  solace 
in  cracking  melon  seeds  with  their  teeth,  picking  out  the  seeds 
witli  the  tongue,  and  spitting  out  the  empty  shell.  As  they  walk 
along  the  street,  or  at  the  social  chat,  to  beguile  the  tedium  of  a 
journey,  or  to  lighten  the  cares  of  business,  the  infallible  remedy 
is  melon  seeds.  Even  at  the  theatres  the  spectators  are  provided 
with  little  plates,  and  an  attendant  walks  about  with  a  large 
basket  to  replenish  them  again  and  again,  so  that  the  sound  of  tie1 
cracking  seeds  is  heard  incessantly,  and  the  floor  is  invariably 
strewn   with   them. 

They  are  otfered  for  sale  everywhere.  In  the  districts  where 
melons  grow  abundantly,  the  refreshing  fruits  are  freely  offered  t<> 


176  A    MANDARIN    AT    HOME. 

all  comers  on  condition  of  their  saving  and  restoring  the  seeds. 
These  are  collected  in  great  bales  as  articles  of  commerce,  and  form 
the  chief  cargo  of  many  junks  on  the  rivers.  Small  children,  busy 
merchants,  great  mandarins,  alike,  delight  in  them.  At  the  New 
War  friends  bestow  on  one  another  complimentary  packets  of 
mi  Ion  seeds  folded  in  red  paper  ;  and  even  the  poorest  coolie  gene- 
rally contrives  to  spare  a  few  cash  for  the  purchase  of  this  luxury. 
1  am  told  that  this  curious  passion  for  melon  seeds  prevails 
throughout  the  Empire,  and  that  the  four  hundred  millions  of 
Chinamen  are  all  insatiable  for  these  dainties  ! 

One  entertainment  here  provided  for  us  was  a  musical  box 
made  in  Hong-Kong,  which  played  all  the  favourite  purely  Chinese 
airs,  and  Ave  were  astonished  to  find  that  several  struck  us  as 
really  pretty.  As  a  general  rule  Chinese  music  is  so  terribly  loud, 
and  is  played  by  so  many  utterly  discordant  instruments  of  various 
sorts,  that  the  name  suggests  only  ear  torture,  castanets  and  drums 
utterly  drowning  whatever  melody  may  be  produced  by  guitars, 
flutes,  and  violins,  which  are  supposed  to  play  in  unison  with  shrill 
human  voices  ;  but  as  neither  voices  nor  instruments  are  ever 
strictly  in  tune,  the  combination  is  never  harmonious,  whether 
heard  in  theatres  or  temples,  or  shrieked  by  street  musicians. 
Therefore,  to  have  a  real  Chinese  air  rendered  on  a  musical  box, 
with  no  such  additions,  was  a  most  unusual  treat. 

AYhen  we  had  sat  the  orthodox  time  in  the  cool  recess  off  the 
great  hall,  Ave  Avere  taken  into  another  room,  Avhere  Ave  found  our 
host's  tAvo  sons  studying  Avith  their  Chinese  tutor.  They  are  nice, 
Avell-mannered  lads,  with  some  knoAvledge  of  English.  The  oldest, 
Avho  looked  about  sixteen,  Avas  married,  and  Ave  found  his  young 
bride  with  her  mother-in-laAv  Avhen  at  length  our  host  conducted 
us  to  the  ladies'  quarters.  Both  Avere  painfully  shy,  and  shrank 
back  awkwardly  into  a  dark  corner,  not  attempting  to  greet  us 
with  the  ordinary  elaborate  forms  required  by  Chinese  courtesy. 
They  just  kneAV  enough  of  English  custom  to  be  aAvare  that  for- 
eigners dispense  Avith  such,  and  so  they  did  not  know  Iioav  to  act. 

At  the  bidding  of  the  husband  Ave  Avere  obliged  to  do  the  correct 
thing,  and  examine  their  wonderfully  dressed  and  jeAvelled  hair, 
their  exquisitely  embroidered  clothes,  and  the  dainty  shoes,  liter- 
ally only  two  inches  long,  Avhich  covered  the  poor  little  deformities 
which  are  forced  to  do  duty  as  feet.  Throughout  this  process  the 
ladies  stood  utterly  irresponsive,  like  mute  automatons.  Unfor- 
tunately we  were  not  accompanied  by  a  female  interpreter,  and  our 
host,  Avho  spoke  excellent  English,  positively  declined  to  assume 


NO    INTERPRETER.  177 

that  duty,  and  soon  retired,  leaving  us  alone  with  the  ladies,  whom 
we  then  persuaded  to  sit  down  beside  us.  Being  Canton  women, 
both  were  highly  rouged,  the  paint  being  carried  right  above  the 
eyes.  The  younger  lady  was  very  brightly  coloured,  but  the  elder 
had  subdued  the  paint  with  powder.  Attendants  (whose  larger 
feet  enable  them  not  only  to  walk  naturally  themselves,  but  also 
to  carry  their  helpless  tottering  mistresses)  brought  for  our  inspec- 
tion a  tray  whereon  were  displayed  the  family  jewels,  consisting 
chiefly  of  small  pieces  of  bright-green  jade  and  very  good  pearls, 
also  dainty  ornaments  and  gorgeous  head-gear  of  brilliant  king- 
fishers' feathers,  so  set  in  gold  as  to  resemble  the  brightest  and 
most  costly  enamel. 

Of  course  we  admired  everything,  but  the  position  was  oppres- 
sively dull,  and  as  soon  as  we  could  venture,  we  took  leave  with 
all  possible  courtesy,  and  rejoined  the  gentlemen.  Our  host  then 
exhibited  piles  of  the  ladies'  dresses — dresses  of  silk  and  of  satin, 
of  every  shade  of  texture  for  hot  weather  or  cold,  all  plaited  in 
kilt  folds,  and  all  most  elaborately  embroidered.  He  told  us  the 
price  he  had  paid  for  each  article,  and  also  how  vast  a  sum  he  had 
expended  on  his  son's  marriage-feast,  and  what  an  immense  num- 
ber of  tables  had  then  been  spread.  With  special  delight  he 
related  how,  when  he  had  left  China  on  a  visit  to  some  foreign 
country,  the  custom-house  officers  would  not  believe  that  his  multi- 
tudinous changes  of  raiment  could  all  be  his  own  wardrobe,  and 
were  not  intended  for  sale. 

Somewhat  overpowered  by  all  this  gorgeous  apparel,  we  made 
our  ceremonious  farewells,  our  host  escorting  us  to  our  chairs  at 
the  outer  court,  when  we  again  shook  our  own  clenched  fists  up 
and  clown  most  vehemently,  with  lowly  bows.  I  see  really  polite 
people  raise  the  said  fists  to  touch  their  bent  foreheads  in  a 
devotional  attitude,  which,  I  believe,  is  the  correct  form  of  chin- 
chinning  ! 

The  great  doors  closed  behind  us,  and  we  passed  from  tin' 
presence  of  Dives  to  that  of  Lazarus.  Once  more  we  were  in  the 
filthy  streets,  and  surrounded  by  wretchedly  poor  people  and 
beggars  clamouring  for  infinitesimal  coin.  Yet,  as  we  were  carried 
along,  we  caught  glimpses  of  strangely  picturesque  scenes,  and  civ 
we  neared  the  river,  tin;  shades  of  evening  were  closing  in,  the 
wayfarers  had  lighted  the  paper  lanterns  which  tiny  carry  sus- 
pended from  a  wooden  handle,  and  the  shops  had  hung  up  their 
quaint  lamps  of  transparent  horn,  or  painted  glass,  or  oiled  paper, 
some  octagonal,  some  oval,  others  globular, — lamps  of  all   colours, 

M 


178  THE    KUSHAN    MONASTERY. 

with   a   predominance   of  crimson   or  yellow.     These,  suspended 

from  tl verhanging  balconies,  shone  on  the  tall  scarlet  or  green 

Bignboards  with  their  strange  gilt  characters.  Then  were  revealed 
scenes  of  religious  or  domestic  life  in  dimly  lighted  interiors — here 
;i  supper-party,  busy  with  their  chop-sticks,  devouring  bowls  of 
rice  with  savoury  accompaniments  ;  there  the  house-master,  re- 
newing the  offerings  of  food  and  (lowers  on  the  famil}r  altar,  and 
lighting  the  tapers  and  the  incense-sticks  for  the  evening  sacrifice. 
A  man  greatly  in  favour  is  the  street  cook,  who,  with  his  loco- 
motive oven  and  a  whole  array  of  pots  and  pans,  prepares  savoury 
stews,  which  the  wayfarers  devour  there  and  then  with  infinite 
relish.  Those  who  wish  for  an  hour's  rest,  or  for  a  quiet  talk  with 
a  Friend,  can  secure  both  by  entering  one  of  the  large  tea-drinking 
halls,  where  covered  cups  are  at  once  brought  to  them,  each  con- 
taining a  measure  of  tea,  whereon  the  waiter  dexterously  pours 
boiling  water  from  a  large  kettle.  Probably  they  will  call  for 
melon  seeds  and  tobacco,  possibly  also  for  some  sweetmeats ;  and 
ere  they  go  their  way  they  will  have  a  second  cup  of  tea  for  the 
good  of  the  house,  for  all  which  entertainment  they  will  each  pay 
about  six  cash,  equal  to  about  a  halfpenny ;  or  if  they  have  been 
very  extravagant  in  the  matter  of  sweet  cake,  their  liabilities  may 
have  run  up  to  a  penny  a  head  ! l 


CHAPTER    XIV. 


THE     KUSHAN     MONASTERY. 


Paved  footpaths — Up  the  mountain — Ancient  and  modern  disciples  of  Buddha 
— Printing-press — Dormitories — One  hundred  and  eight  vows — Opium- 
smoking — Votive  pigs  and  fish — Refectory — Offerings  to  small  gods — The 
temple  on  the  stream — Rock  inscriptions — Bell  tolled  by  water — Buddha's 
tooth — The  great  temple. 

March  21st. 

There  is  one  disadvantage  in  spring-time  connected  with  expedi- 
tions by  land  in   the  neighbourhood  of  Foo-Chow — namely,  that 

1  T  conf.ss  that  when,  on  returning  to  England,  I  have  looked  round  on  the 
squalid  wretchedness  and  dirt  of  the  densely  crowded  quarters  in  which  our  poor 
are  huddled  together,  and  have  seen  the  hungry  loungers  gazing  longingly  through 
dingy  windows  at  terrible  slices  of  cold  roly-poly,  pies  of  leaden  pastry,  with  an 
infinitesimal  fragment  of  unknown  meat,  unsavoury  sausages,  sickening  heaps  of 


THE    HOLY    MOUNT.  179 

■whenever  we  emerge  from  the  densely  packed  streets  of  the  old 
city,  Ave  find  ourselves  in  the  midst  of  that  most  hateful  form  of 
agriculture,  paddy-fields,  where  the  fresh  young  rice  is  growing  in 
deep  mud,  with  a  shallow  surface  of  water.  In  and  out  among 
these  flooded  fields  wind  narrow  stone  paths,  barely  two  feet  in 
width,  but  often  raised  to  a  height  of  from  four  to  six  feet  above 
these  little  lagoons  of  liquid  mud ;  and  when  (as  is  frequently  the 
case)  we  meet  a  train  of  heavily  burdened  coolies,  or  some  foreigner 
or  great  mandarin  being  carried  in  his  chair,  there  comes  an  anxious 
moment  as  to  whether  we  or  they  are  most  likely  to  be  deposited 
ignominiously  in  a  very  undesirable  mud  bath  ! 

Beyond  the  paddy-fields  we  find  regular  paved  roads  leading  up 
to  various  points  of  interest  in  the  Fading  hills,  such  as  monas- 
teries or  tea-plantations,  and  at  every  turn  of  the  road  we  have 
fine  views  looking  down  on  the  valley,  where  the  great  Min  river 
winds  like  a  silvery  ribbon  through  the  labyrinth  of  small  green 
fields. 

A  very  favourite  expedition  (and  one,  moreover,  which  has  the 
advantage  that  the  greater  part  of  the  distance  is  done  by  luxuri- 
ously floating  down  the  river  in  a  comfortable  house-boat)  is  to  a 
famous  Buddhist  monastery,  which  nestles  in  a  sheltered  spot  half- 
way up  the  Kushan,  or  Drum  Mountain,  right  above  the  Arsenal. 

The  mountain  is  3900  feet  in  height,  and  the  monastery  is 
about  2000  feet  above  the  river — a  pleasant  cool  refuge  in  hot 
weather,  and  one  to  which  the  courteous  monks  frequently  welcome 
foreigners  requiring  change  of  air.  Here,  in  exceptionally  cold 
winters,  snow  has  been  known  to  lie  for  a  few  hours. 

This  morning  being  clear  and  lovely,  we  were  early  astir,  and  by 
7  a.m.  our  good  chair-coolies  had  shouldered  their  living  burdens 
and  were  trotting  us  down  to  the  river,  where  the  house-boat  lay 
in  readiness.  An  hour's  pull  brought  us  down  to  the  Kushan 
anchorage,  a  distance  of  about  eight  miles,  but  the  tide  was  so  low 
that  we  had  to  row  some  distance  in  the  small  boat,  and  then  brave 
the  dangers  of  a  long  plank  and  stepping-stones  across  deep  mud, 
through  which  the  poor  coolies  had  to  plunge,  and  then  they  car- 
ried us  for  half  an  hour  along  a  narrow  tortuous  path  between 
flooded  paddy-fields,  where  patient  buffaloes  and  Chinamen  were 
ploughing  knee-deep  in  mud. 

ready-shelled  whelks,  and  other  unpleasant-looking  shell-fish  -luxuries  in  which 
they  could  not  afford  to  indulge,— my  thoughts  have  travelled  bach  to  t;..-  Chinese 
street  cooks  with  positive  veneration.  And  as  to  the  luxurious  halfpenny  tea-hall, 
which  takes  the  place  of  England's  gin-palace,  tin-re  indeed  China  does  excel  the 
barbarians  of  the  West. 


L80  TIIK    KISIIAN    MONASTERY. 

Thus  we  arrived  at  the  base  of  the  mountain,  and  then  com- 
menced Hie  Long  and  toilsome  ascent  of  a  great  stairway  of  fifteen 
hundred  granite  steps,  reminding  me  painfully  of  the  ascent  to 
similar  Buddhist  monasteries  and  shrines  in  Ceylon.  Here,  as 
there,  I  believe  that  many  of  these  mountain  stairs  have  been 
fashioned  as  acts  of  merit  or  of  penance  by  wealthy  devotees. 
Probably  to  the  same  cause  may  be  ascribed  the  ornamental  rest- 
houses,  live  of  which  invite  the  pilgrim  to  repose  on  his  journey  to 

Kushaii. 

Above  the  long  flight  of  stairs  we  found  a  well-constructed 
causeway  of  granite  slabs,  by  which  we  p>assed  along  levels  through 
the  forest,  past  curious  ancient  tombs,  and  then  still  on  and  on  by 
paved  levels  till  Ave  reached  the  monastery — a  delightfully  secluded 
spot  in  a  snug  green  valley.  It  is  a  large  but  not  very  picturesque 
group  of  venerable  buildings,  eight  hundred  years  old. 

Three  large  buildings,  with  deep  thatched  roofs,  widely  over- 
hanging, are  arranged  one  behind  the  other,  and  enclosed  by  a 
great  general  court. 

All  monasteries  that  I  have  visited  are  constructed  on  the  same 
principle.  The  outer  gateway  is  invariably  guarded  by  two  huge 
and  monstrously  ugly  figures,  while  four  others  equally  hideous, 
ami  representing  the  incarnation  of  the  genius  of  ^sorth,  South, 
East,  and  West,  occupy  a  second  building,  which  is  the  hall  of  the 
gods.  These  are  supposed  to  be  the  ministers  of  Buddha's  will 
and  pleasure.  I  cannot  say  he  has  displayed  much  taste  in  the 
selection  ! 

Then  Ave  come  to  the  Great  Temple,  which  is  a  detached  build- 
ing in  the  middle  of  a  great  court,  around  Avhicb  are  cloisters, 
apartments  for  the  abbot  and  for  the  monks,  dormitories,  a  library, 
reception-room  for  guests,  halls  consecrated  to  many  Hindoo  gods 
(all  of  Avhom  are  supposed  to  do  homage  to  Buddha),  the  great 
refectory  and  the  kitchen,  where  of  course  vegetables  only  are 
supposed  to  find  admission,  neither  fish,  flesh,  nor  fowl — not  even 
milk,  butter,  or  eggs  being  tolerated  by  the  sumptuary  laws  of  the 
founder:  as  regards  butter,  it  is  in  no  case  recognised  by  the 
Chinese  as  fit  for  food,  and  milk  is  so  only  when  curdled  and 
sweetened.  Hnt  this  vegetarian  rule  is  nut  so  hard  as  mighl  at 
first  sight  appear,  the  majority  of  the  brethren  being  men  of  low 
estate,  and  the  fare  of  the  Avorking  classes  consists  almost  entirely 
of  vegetables,  with  perhaps  a  square  inch  of  pork  once  a  fortnight. 

These  various  departments  are  each  under  the  care  of  some 
divine  guardian,  to  Avhom  is  dedicated  a  more  or  less  ornamental 


THE    HOLY    MOUNT.  181 

shrine.  Those  of  two  gods,  respectively  named  "Weito  ami  Kwan- 
tai,  lie  to  right  and  left  of  the  main  quadrangle,  these  gods  being 
considered  the  special  guardians  of  monasteries.  Kwan-tai,  being 
the  God  of  "War,  must,  I  suppose,  be  reckoned  as  the  Defender  of 
the  Faith. 

In  the  dormitories  a  watchful  god  protects  the  sleepers,  while  in 
the  monastic  kitchen  (as  in  that  of  every  well-regulated  family  in 
China)  the  kitchen  god  receives  devout  daily  worship. 

But  the  great  centre  of  all  worship  is,  of  course,  the  colossal 
image  of  Buddha,  who  sits  enthroned  on  a  gigantic  lotus  blossom. 
In  some  temples  he  sits  solitary,  in  others  he  is  represented  by 
three  images  all  exactly  alike,  representing  the  Past,  the  Present, 
and  the  Future — while  another  variety  (more  common  in  pictures 
than  in  images)  shows  him  seated  between  two  figures,  equally 
cyclopean,  apparently  of  beautiful  women,  but  really  represent- 
ing two  beloved  Indian  disciples,  named  Kashiapa  and  Ananda. 
These  great  central  images  are  frequently  very  fine,  and  convey 
a  feeling  of  intense  calm  and  repose  strangely  in  contrast  with  all 
the  bewildering  variety  of  extraneous  gods,  whose  noisy  worship 
is  so  diametrically  opposed  to  the  whole  teaching  of  the  founder ; 
and  yet  in  every  monastery  there  are  numerous  idols  of  all  sizes, 
some  of  wood  and  some  of  copper,  some  of  porcelain,  some  of  stone, 
and  some  of  clay — some  gaudily  painted,  some  lacquered,  and 
many  gilt.  Some  monasteries  are  adorned  with  life-sized  statues 
of  the  five  hundred  most  saintly  of  Buddha's  original  disciples. 

The  shrine  of  the  Goddess  of  Mercy  is  invariably  conspicuous, 
and  seems  to  rank  next  to  that  of  Buddha.  In  some  monasteries 
she  has  a  separate  temple. 

Of  course  every  monastery  of  any  note  prides  itself  on  the  pos- 
session of  some  relic  of  Buddha,  whose  fragments,  rescued  from 
the  funeral  pyre,  must  indeed  have  been  multiplied  miraculously! 
This  is  preserved  in  a  bell-shaped  dagoba,  frequently  made  of 
white  marble,  resembling,  on  a  very  small  scale,  the  cyclopean 
dagobas  of  the  ancient  cities  in  Ceylon.  These  in  China  are 
generally  kept  within  a  special  hall,  but  sometimes  in  pagodas, 
whose  seven  or  nine  storeys  are  apparently  designed  to  suggest 
multiplied  canopies  of  honour,  overshadowing  the  precious  treasure 
below,  just  as  in  Burmah  the  Great  State  Umbrellas  consist  of 
from  three  to  seven  canopies  piled  one  above  the  other  on  the 
same  stick.1 

1  That  this  was  the  true  origin  of  'he  Pagoda  I  have  no  doubt,  the  use  of  the 
Umbrella  as  au  honorific  symbol  being  most  curiously  exemplified  on  Bome  of  the 


182  THE   KUSHAN    MONASTERY. 

In  si mic  monasteries  there  are  shrines  of  honour  of  the  founder 
of  thai  particular  institution,  as  also  of  the  most  noted  abbots  who 
have  therein  ruled.  As  this  office  is  only  held  for  three  years,  an 
abbot  must  be  a  man  of  rare  sanctity  or  ability  to  make  much 
mark  in  so  limited  a  period.  Re-election  for  a  second  term  is, 
however,  not  infrequent,  but  it  does  not  follow  that  the  most 
saintly  abbots  are  the  most  popular !  The  election  lies  entirely 
in  the  bauds  of  the  senior  priests. 

Some  monasteries  have  a  private  printing  -  press,  where  are 
printed  devotional  books  of  the  Buddhist  offices  and  broadsheets 
in  honour  of  the  Goddess  of  Mercy  or  other  deities.  I  have 
several  such,  which  were  given  me  in  various  monasteries.  The 
method  of  printing  is  that  which  has  here  been  in  use  for  many 
centuries  ;  it  has  the  advantage  of  extreme  simplicity.  The  matter 
to  be  printed  is  cut  on  a  block  in  high  relief.  Indian  ink  is  then 
applied  to  the  block,  upon  which  a  sheet  of  paper  is  pressed,  and 
that  is  all.  Where  the  demand  is  moderate  and  no  one  is  in  a 
hurry,  this  seems  to  answer  very  well. 

This  is  a  general  summary  of  the  chief  features  of  such  monas- 
teries as  I  have  seen,  and  I  am  told  they  are  all  on  the  same  sys- 
tem, only  varying  in  size  and  detail.  Here,  at  Kushan,  provision 
is  made  for  the  accommodation  of  about  three  hundred  priests  and 
monks,  that  being  the  number  who  claim  Kushan  as  their  head- 
quarters, but  rarely  are  more  than  half  that  number  on  the  spot. 
The  rest  are  sent  on  ecclesiastical  or  begging  work  all  over  the 
country,  to  raise  funds  for  the  repair  of  temples,  or  to  perform 
noisy  and  costly  religious  services  in  every  house  where  a  death 
has  occurred,  or  where  the  mysterious  illness  of  any  inmate  leads 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  sufferer  is  "  possessed  of  devils,"  who 
must  be  duly  exorcised. 

We  were  allowed  a  peep  into  the  dormitories,  which  have  small 
compartments  curtained  off  on  each  side,  the  slumbers  of  the  in- 
mates being  consecrated  by  an  altar  at  one  end  of  each  room.  The 
privacy  thus  secured  is,  of  course,  designed  to  encourage  meditation 

oldest  Buddhist  sculptures  in  India,  where  relic  -  shrines  are  represented  over- 
shadowed by  from  one  to  fourteen  most  realistic  umbrellas,  sometimes  set  side  by 
side,  sometimes  arranged  pyramidally.  In  one  of  these  sculptures  on  the  Am- 
ravati  tope,  a  forest  of  no  less  than  fifty  lot  us-leaf  umbrellas  is  shown  thus  jnled  all 
over  the  summit  of  a  dagoba.  A  cast  of  this  curious  sculpture  is  exhibited  on  the 
Grand  Staircase  of  the  British  Museum  (No.  39). 

In  two  papers  published  in  the  '  English  Illustrated  Magazine '  for  June  and 
duly  Isss,  I  have  grouped  many  interesting  details  on  the  development  both  of 
Pacouas  and  Avukoi.es  from  the  honorific  use  of  the  Umbrella,  as  also  to  show 
how  very  recently  the  latter  has  come  into  general  use. 


THE    HUNDRED    AND    EIGHT    VOWS.  183 

and  prayer,  as  it  doubtless  does  in  many  cases,  for  amongst  the 
brethren  there  must  be  some  of  all  sorts,  as  we  readily  inferred 
from  the  very  varied  types  of  countenance — some  so  calm  and 
reflective,  but  many  debased  and  sensual,  fully  justifying  the  con- 
tempt with  which  the  majority  of  these  shaven  brethren  are  re- 
garded by  the  secular  community. 

Of  the  former,  we  were  told  that  some  subject  themselves  to 
agonising  penances  in  their  zealous  determination  to  triumph  over 
the  poor  flesh,  and  that,  not  content  with  fastings  and  flagellations, 
they  voluntarily  submit  to  having  their  flesh  seared  with  a  sharp- 
pointed  red-hot  iron,  one  such  scar  denoting  each  monastic  vow. 
The  number  of  these  varies  in  different  parts  of  the  Empire,  nine 
or  twelve  being  the  most  common.  But  some  devout  souls  make 
a  hundred  and  eight  vows,  and  endure  a  hundred  and  eight  burn- 
ings to  imprint  them  on  their  memory.  These  fiery  reminders  are 
generally  made  on  the  forearm,  but  some  proclaim  their  devotion 
to  all  beholders  by  thus  scarring  their  forehead,  which,  of  course, 
gives  them  the  appearance  of  having  Buffered  from  smallpox. 
Others  burn  off  a  finger  as  a  self-imposed  penance.  Some  have 
been  known  to  burn  off  a  whole  hand,  and  practise  other  forms  of 
self-torture,  quite  ignoring  the  fact  that  all  such  actions  were 
prohibited  by  Buddha. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  well  known  that  a  very  large  pro- 
portion of  these  men  assume  the  yellow  robe  late  in  life  to  secure 
an  easy-going  idle  sort  of  livelihood,  while  some  herein  seek  an 
asylum  from  the  legal  punishment  for  divers  crimes.  The  law, 
however,  does  not  recognise  any  right  of  sanctuary  for  murderers. 
Of  course  the  vows  of  these  unworthy  brothers  are  continually 
broken,  and  not  only  are  prohibited  meats  freely  brought  in  for 
private  consumption,  but  further,  the  cubicles  designed  for  silent 
meditation  become  sanctuaries  of  the  opium-pipe,  indulgence  in 
which  is  acknowledged,  by  every  Chinaman  without  exception,  to 
be  an  unmitigated  evil,  though  so  few  who  have  once  yielded  t<> 
it  have  the  courage  to  endure  the  physical  and  mental  misery 
which  invariably  attends  giving  it  up.  But  so  many  priests  of  all 
ranks  are  the  slaves  of  this  most  insidious  of  vices,  that  there 
appears  to  be  a  mutual  agreement  to  ignore  its  practice  in  the 
monasteries. 

"We  passed  on  to  inspect  a  court  wherein  sundry  fat  pigs,  fowls, 
and  other  live  stock,  which  have  been  brought  to  the  temple  as 
"  offerings,"  are  allowed  to  live  in  peace,  and  die  of  old  age,  It 
is  an  act  of  merit  thus  to  secure  them  from  all  danger  of  being  put 


184  THE   KUSHAN    MONASTERY. 

to  death,  and  a  handsome  sum  is  of  course  paid  down  for  their 
permanent  maintenance.  The  monks  are  supposed  to  be  such  very 
strict  vegetarians  that  should  the  hens  chance  to  lay  eggs,  they 
(the  eggs)  forthwith  receive  decent  burial!  Another  form  in 
which  the  same  class  of  merit  is  acquired  is  by  the  purchase  and 
release  of  pigeons,  or  small  caged  birds,  which  are  captured  for 
this  express  purpose  by  special  bird-catchers,  who  herein  find  a 
fairly  lucrative  profession.  Others  again  bring  fine  carp  and  other 
fresh-water  fish,  which  have  been  purchased  alive  from  the  fish- 
mongers, and  which  are  set  free  in  the  great  temple-tank,  there  to 
live  merrily  ever  after,  being  fed  at  stated  hours.  The  tank  at 
the  Monastery  of  the  Flowery  Forest  at  Canton  swarms  with 
tortoises  which  have  been  thus  rescued. 

We  entered  the  refectory  just  as  the  brethren  were  assembling, 
in  answer  to  the  beating  of  a  large  wooden  drum,  shaped  like  a 
nondescript  animal.  All  had  assumed  their  cowls  as  the  monas- 
tic form  of  dressing  for  dinner.  Tables  are  arranged  round  the 
hall,  and  all  the  monks  sit  with  their  backs  to  the  wall,  so  that 
each  one  may  face  the  abbot.  The  laying  of  the  table  is  not 
elaborate,  only  two  empty  bowls  and  a  pair  of  chop-sticks  being 
placed  for  each  person. 

"When  all  had  taken  their  places,  at  a  given  signal  they  rose, 
placing  the  palms  of  the  hands  together  in  a  devotional  attitude, 
while  one  of  the  number  beat  a  small  prayer-drum,  and  the  abbot 
recited  a  long  prayer,  after  which  one  of  the  monks  went  outside 
and  placed  a  small  heap  of  cooked  rice  on  a  red  pillar  (red  being 
the  colour  of  good  luck,  and  hateful  to  evil  spirits)  as  an  offering 
to  all  the  minor  gods  who  might  have  been  inadvertently  over- 
looked in  the  general  worship.  Having  done  this,  he  snapped  his 
fingers  thrice,  and  the  small  gods  came  in  the  form  of  birds  and 
accepted  the  offering.  Then  followed  a  long  grace,  during  which 
an  attendant  went  round,  filling  each  man's  bowls  with  rice  and 
green  vegetables,  which  all  proceeded  to  devour  hungrily  in  total 
silence. 

Leaving  the  brethren  to  the  enjoyment  of  this  frugal  fare,  we 
found  a  pleasant  spot  outside  of  the  monastic  courts  where  we 
might  indulge  in  a  non-vegetarian  luncheon  without  risk  of  shock- 
ing the  stricter  brethren ;  not  that  any  objection  is  made  at  this 
monastery  to  their  visitors  publicly  feasting  on  prohibited  flesh, 
consequently  picnic-parties  from  Foo-Chow  or  the  Anchorage  occa- 
sionally select  the  main  court  for  very  elaborate  luncheons,  a  pro- 
ceeding which  scarcely  seems  in  good  taste. 


PRAISE    BELL   TOLLED    BY   WATER.  185 

Following  a  tempting  path  along  the  hillside,  we  came  to  a 
very  pretty  temple  of  carved  wood  painted  deep  red,  with  curved 
roofs  of  grey  tiles.  It  is  built  right  over  a  very  narrow  cleft  in 
the  rock,  from  beneath  which  there  formerly  flowed  a  rushing  tor- 
rent, but  its  noise  was  so  distressing  to  a  very  holy  old  saint  who 
formerly  lived  here  that  it  hindered  his  devotions,  and  so  he  prayed 
that  it  might  be  silenced,  and  ever  since  then  the  stream  has  been 
wellnigh  dried  up,  and  only  a  low  soothing  murmur  tells  of  the 
rippling  waters  low  in  the  gully.1 

The  rocks  hereabouts  are  all  covered  with  large  inscriptions 
deeply  engraven,  and  filled  with  red  paint.  Many  of  these  are 
in  the  old  seal  character,  and  even  the  most  modern  are  in  the 
regular  Chinese  character,  which,  to  the  uninitiated,  always  looks 
so  very  mysterious.  It  is  really  distressing  to  learn  that  though 
many  of  these  imperishable  inscriptions  are  really  poetic  aspirations, 
a  considerable  number  merely  record  the  visits  of  certain  notable 
pilgrims  to  the  monastery,  and  are  in  fact  only  an  elaborated  ver- 
sion of  Smith  or  Jones'  scribbles  on  the  Pyramids  or  elsewhere  ! 

A  little  farther  we  came  to  a  very  pretty  kiosque,  consisting 
only  of  pillars  supporting  a  highly  fantastic  roof.  This  over- 
shadows a  rock,  on  which  are  engraven  and  gilded  a  multitude  of 
tiny  gods.  I  believe  that  these  represent  the  five  hundred  Lohans 
(which  in  Old  Sanscrit  hymns  are  called  Arhans), — spiritual  beings, 
never  seen  of  men,  but  whose  voices  are  sometimes  heard  in  these 
shady  groves  at  early  dawn,  chanting  the  praises  of  Buddha. 

From  a  water-spring  beneath  this  rock-altar  flows  a  streamlet, 
which,  being  led  through  the  mouth  of  a  stone  dragon,  thence  falls 
so  as  to  turn  a  wheel  which  acts  on  cogs ;  these  in  their  turn  jerk 
a  rope,  which  swings  a  small  beam  of  wood  suspended  horizontally 
from  the  roof.  At  every  rebound  this  beam  strikes  the  outside  of 
a  large  bronze  bell,  producing  a  very  deep-toned  melodious  boom, 
which  is  heard  afar  up  on  the  mountain.  Thus  by  the  action  of 
the  Dragon-Fountain  the  waters  have  continued  throughout  the 
long  ages  to  pay  their  ceaseless  tribute  of  praise  to  Buddha.  It  is 
a  very  pretty  scene;  but  in  order  to  realise  it,  you  must  mentally 
fill  in  a  thousand  details  of  Chinese  fancy — odd  bits  of  grey  stone 

1  How  strange  a  parallel  is  the  legend  of  this  Buddhist  hermil  to  that  of  St 
Francis  of  Assisi,  as  related  by  his  successor  at  the  Convenl  Delle  I  larceri  on  the 
Monte  Subasio  I  Here  a  tiny  chapel  on  the  brink  of  a  deep  rocky  ravine  com- 
memorates how,  when  St  Francis  here  sought  peace  for  meditation,  the  noise  of 
the  running  waters  so  distracted  him  (how  1  do  sympathise  with  these  silence-loving 
saints  1)  that  he  rebuked  the  mountain  torrent.  And  the  reverent  stream  obeyed, 
ami  from  that  hour  until  this  present  day  it  has  hushed  its  turmoil,  and  no  matter 
how  fiercely  the  rain-storms  sweep  the  mountain,  it  (lows  in  hushed  stillness. 


186  THE    Ki'SHAX    MONASTERY. 

and  redwood  carving,  ornamental  stone  bridges,  bright  flowers,  and 
rich  foliage,  sunlight  and  warm  deep  shadows,  and,  over  all,  the 
great  mountain  towering  to  the  hlue  heaven. 

Returning  to  the  monastery,  we  were  taken  to  see  one  of 
Buddha's  holy  teeth,  which  is  kept  in  a  dull  crystal  casket  in  a 
securely  locked  shrine.  An  elephant's  tooth  lies  before  it,  as  an 
appropriate  votive  offering.  The  Buddhists  of  China  have  a  good 
many  such  relics  of  their  great  leader.  I  confess  that,  having  long 
ago  done  homage  in  Ceylon  to  the  lineal  descendant  of  the  only 
genuine  article,  I  looked  on  these  with  distrust,  and  not  without 
good  reason.1 

Far  more  interesting  than  the  spurious  relic  of  a  dead  past  was 
the  afternoon  service  in  the  great  temple,  in  presence  of  the  Three 
Pure  Ones — i.e.,  three  gigantic  gilded  images  of  Buddha,  which, 
although  symbolising  the  Perfect  Buddha  of  the  Past,  the  Present, 
and  the  Future,  are  all  exactly  alike,  and  are  each  overshadowed 
by  a  gilded  canopy.  Large  gilt  statues  of  the  disciples  of  Buddha 
are  ranged  on  each  side  of  the  temple.  Three  very  handsome  altars 
of  black  lacquer,  with  gold  and  crimson  decorations,  red  candles, 
and  altar  vessels  of  pewter,  are  dedicated  to  three  different  groups 
of  idols,  and  one  large  central  altar  stands  in  advance  of  these  three. 
The  usual  handsome  banners  and  richly  coloured  lamps  light  up 
the  sombre  shadows  of  the  roof. 

The  great  service  of  the  day  is  held  at  4  a.m.  every  morning, 
when  all  the  inmates  of  the  monastery  must  be  present ;  many  are 
necessarily  absent  from  the  afternoon  service,  having  work  to  at- 
tend to.  Nevertheless  there  was  a  large  muster,  and  we  had  a 
good  opportunity  of  noting  the  variations  in  the  dress  of  divers 
ranks.  The  majority  wear  the  orthodox  yellow  robe,  but  some 
have  a  yellow  cowl,  some  a  rose-coloured  or  lilac  ecclesiastical 
hood,  while  others  wear  a  grey  robe.  Even  the  best-dressed  priests 
all  have  their  robes  made  of  many  pieces  patched  together  to 
keep  up  the  semblance  of  the  tattered  raiment  of  poverty.  Some 
hold  in  their  hands  rosaries  of  large  black  beads,  and  some  of  small 
beads,  but  I  did  not  notice  whether  all  had  these.  Of  course  all 
heads  are  closely  shaven  —  bald  as  billiard-balls  of  pale  yellow 
ivory ! 

1  Captain  Gill  has  told  us  how  in  Northern  China  he  was  taken  to  see  "  The 
Tooth  of  Heaven,"  which  he  found  to  be  merely  a  bit  of  red  sandstone  shaped  like 
a  tooth  !  Tlie  worshippers  must  certainly  have  supposed  that  Buddha  was  addicted 
to  chewing  betel  and  areca  nut !  The  relic  occupied  a  small  temple,  the  roof  of 
which,  however,  did  not  cover  the  stone  itself,  the  Chinese  believing  that  were  this 
done,  the  god  of  thunder  would  devastate  the  town. 


TEMPLE    THEATRES.  187 

The  ritual  was  very  elaborate,  accompanied  by  many  prostrations 
and  genuflexions,  and  at  one  point  in  the  service  the  whole  con- 
gregation, who  had  been  standing  sideways  to  right  and  left,  veered 
round  to  the  altar,  recited  some  formula,  and  made  a  low  bow. 

Time  and  tide  bade  us  hurry  away,  so  Ave  could  only  look 
hastily  into  the  side  chapels,  in  one  of  which  are  numerous  images 
of  the  thousand-armed  Goddess  of  Mercy.  On  one  of  these  minor 
altars  I  observed  a  vulgar  black  bottle  doing  duty  as  a  flower- vase ! 
— a  strangely  incongruous  object  in  the  midst  of  so  much  gilding 
and  colour,  and  such  beautiful  pieces  of  fine  old  china. 

Retracing  our  way  through  the  forest,  along  the  stone  pavement, 
and  down  the  long  stairs,  we  reached  the  paddy-fields  at  sunset, 
and  found  the  patient  men  and  beasts  still  ploughing.  The  house- 
boat was  now  able  to  come  alongside,  so  we  were  spared  the  horrors 
of  recrossing  the  mud,  and  an  hour  later  we  reached  the  green  isle 
in  time  for  a  pleasant  non-vegetarian  dinner-party. 


CHAPTEE    XV. 


TEMPLE    THEATRES. 


Ecclesiastical  pla}'s — Entertainment  for  gods — A  blue  crowd — Hunting  scene 
— Ballet — American  Mission — A  fine  view. 

March  2WA. 

I  have  been  very  much  amused  to-day  by  a  great  "  Sing-Song  "  at 
the  Ningpo  Joss-house,  or,  I  should  rather  say,  the  great  guild  of 
the  Xingpo  merchants  in  Foo-Chow,  for  the  place  is  really  their 
club ;  and  in  China  a  temple,  with  its  attendant  theatre,  forms  a 
necessary  feature  in  every  well-regulated  club. 

I  must  say  that  of  all  the  odd  methods  ever  devised  by  any 
nation  for  combining  amusement  with  religion,  I  know  of  none  so 
quaint  as  the  theatrical  entertainments  provided  by  wealthy  China- 
men for  the  edification  of  their  gods.  In  Europe  we  have  bad 
miracle-plays,  such  as  still  attract  crowds  to  Ober-Ammergau  ;  but 
the  intention  of  these  is  emphatically  to  convey  deep  religious  im- 
pressions to  the  minds  of  the  people,  whereas  the  temple-plays  in 
China  are  solely  intended  to  amuse  and  propitiate  the  idols,  who 
are  supposed,  in  common  with  their  worshippers,  to  have  a  passion 


188  TEMPLE   THEATRES. 

for  the  drama,  and  to  share  their  wonderful  power  of  endurance  as 
regards  the  Length  of  their  plays,  some  of  which  are  dragged  on  for 
three  whole  days,  from  'lawn  to  sunset. 

"Lingering  sweetness  long  drawn  out"  exactly  describes  a 
Chinaman's  ideal  "  Sing-Song,"  but  to  foreign  ears  the  sweetness 
which  so  entrances  the  Mongolian  is  a  torture  of  shrieking  discord, 
which  very  soon  becomes  intolerable.  One  great  advantage,  how- 
ever, is  that  those  plays  are  all  in  the  open  air.  Moreover,  they 
are  generally  acted  in  full  light  of  day,  as  in  the  province  of  Fuh- 
Kien,  of  which  Foo-Chow  is  the  capital,  theatrical  performances  in 
temples  at  night  are  forbidden,  except  on  very  special  occasions,  as 
are  also  illuminations,  on  account  of  the  danger  of  fire.1 

At  these  temple-plays  no  seats  are  provided,  and  there  is  no 
payment:  they  are  the  great  and  gratis  entertainments  of  the 
people,  who  attend  in  crowds.  It  is  a  strange  sight  to  look  down 
upon  that  densely  packed  yet  ever-restless  throng,  almost  all  dressed 
in  blue — that  sea  of  flat  faces  and  shaven  heads  which  fills  every 
available  corner  of  the  temple  court,  and  of  the  steps  leading  up 
to  the  altars,  above  which  the  idols  sit  enthroned.  The  stage  is 
always  a  separate  building  facing  the  temple — a  sort  of  kioscpie, 
open  on  three  sides — its  beautifully  carved,  curly  roof  being  sup- 
ported on  carved  pillars.  The  court  is  enclosed  by  open  corridors 
with  galleries,  in  which  seats  are  provided  for  the  mandarins  and 
principal  citizens. 

In  the  lower  corridors  many  barbers  ply  their  trade  diligently, 
for  skull-scraping  and  hair-plaiting  is  a  business  which  must  not  be 
neglected,  and  which  can  be  successfully  combined  with  the  enjoy- 
ment of  the  play.  Vendors  of  refreshments  find  a  good  market  for 
their  wares. 

Regular  playgoers  soon  learn  to  discriminate  between  the  differ- 
ent troupes  who  travel  about  the  country  just  as  theatrical  com- 
panies do  in  Europe,  and  whenever  a  very  wealthy  mandarin  wishes 

1  In  some  great  cities  there  are  regular  theatres  conducted  on  the  same  business 
system  as  our  own,  with  a  regular  tariff  for  admission.  My  experience  of  theatres 
of  tins  class  was  limited  to  two— one  in  Shanghai,  and  one  in  San  Francisco,  and  1 
inly  remark  of  these,  that  they  were  two  too  many;  although  on  each  occa- 
sion foreigners  had  been  specially  invited  by  Chinese  gentlemen,  on  the  under- 
standing that  the  plays  selected  should  be  irreproachable. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  rarely  missed  the  opportunity  of  attending  a  temple-play, 
and  though,  of  course,  I  could  not  understand  what  was  said,  I  have  no  reason  to 
suppose  that  these  were  objectionable  :  in  fact,  as  the  lives  of  the  Chinese  gods  and 
goddesses  are  chiefly  remarkable  for  their  strict  morality  (as  contrasted  with  the 
mythology  of  Rome,  Greece,  Egypt,  or  India),  it  follows  that  the  plays  most  pleas- 
ing to  them  are  such  as  inculcate  virtue  and  show  the  penalties  due  to  vice. 
Certainly,  as  scenic  effects,  these  were  almost  invariably  quaint  and  attractive. 


ANCIENT  TARTAR  PLAY.  189 

to  gain  popularity  with  the  gods  and  with  his  fellow-citizens,  he 
engages  a  first-rate  troupe  with  magnificent  properties,  and  the 
performance  is  admirable.  But  sounds  of  theatrical  music  may- 
attract  you  a  few  days  later  to  the  same  temple,  and  you  may  find 
a  wretched  company  of  the  veriest  sticks,  clad  in  shabbiest  rai- 
ment, having  been  engaged  by  some  poorer  merchant.  Then,  in 
place  of  a  dense  crowd  of  most  respectable  citizens,  the  audience  is 
composed  of  a  limited  number  of  the  lowest  of  the  people. 

As  a  matter  of  course,  the  very  best  troupes  are  engaged  by  the 
great  mercantile  guilds  for  their  magnificent  temple-theatres,  and 
these  are  always  worth  visiting. 

On  the  present  occasion,  having  gone  to  the  Xingpo  Guild  with 
Mrs  De  Lano,  we  first  obtained  a  tantalising  glimpse  of  the  scene 
from  the  roof  of  a  neighbouring  house,  where  one  of  our  Chinese 
friends  was  sitting  with  his  sons.  "Wishing  for  a  nearer  view,  but 
not  caring  to  face  the  dense  crowd,  Ave  entered  the  guild  (which  is 
practically  a  club)  by  a  side  door,  which  took  us  right  into  the 
actual  temple,  where  the  kindly  priests  put  us  into  a  good  place 
just  in  front  of  the  great  altar,  whence  of  course  we  had  a  perfect 
view,  and  a  stranger  scene  I  never  beheld — the  temple,  the  theatre, 
and  the  side  courts  one  mass  of  richest  carving  in  wood  and  stone, 
crimson  and  gold,  with  the  grey,  curiously  carved  roofs  harmonising 
with  a  brilliant  blue  sky.  The  pillars  supporting  both  the  theatre 
and  the  temple  are  powerfully  sculptured  stone  dragons. 

The  vivid  sunlight  gave  intensity  to  the  dark  shadows,  and 
brilliancy  to  the  gorgeous  dresses  of  the  actors.  Hound  the  gal- 
leries sat  mandarins  and  merchants  drinking  tea  and  cracking 
melon  seeds,  and  the  court  below  presented  a  closely  packed  sea 
of  blue  shoulders,  and  heads  either  visibly  shaven  or  covered  with 
the  orthodox  small  black  satin  cap. 

We  were  told  that  the  play  which  was  being  acted  was  in  old 
Manchu.  To  our  unaccustomed  ears  the  difference  in  sound  frum 
modern  Chinese  was  unappreciable ;  but  Ave  noted  the  absence  of 
"  pig-tails,"  and  the  prevalence  of  immensely  long  black  mous- 
taches, Avhich  are  a  thing  unknown  in  this  land  of  clean-shaven 
faces,  Avhere  the  right  to  weal  a  thin  straggling  grey  beard  and 
moustache  is  a  privilege  of  advanced  age. 

Having  no  interpreter,  we  failed  to  gather  the  plot,  but  the  loss 
Avas  probably  not  serious,  all  Ave  cared  about  being  the  scenic  effect : 
and  avc  gazed  till  we  were  weary  at  ancient  Emperors  and  Em- 
presses, mandarins,  and  courtiers,  clothed  in  silk  and  .-at in,  and 
most  exquisite  embroidery  in  gold  and  bright-coloured  silks.    Such 


190  TEMPLE   THEATRES. 

gorgeous  gold-dragon  embroidery!  how  we  wished  we  could  have 
broughl  it.  home  for  decorative  hangings!  There  is  no  theatrical 
sham  about  it — it  is  all  bond  fide  genuine  hand-work,  very  hand- 
some and  costly.  Some  of  the  mandarins'  head-dresses  were  very 
quaint,  those  of  governors  of  provinces  heing  adorned  with  the 
two  immensely  long  tail-feathers  of  the  Reeves  pheasant,  which 
are  fully  six  feet  in  length.  These  great  men  are  further  distin- 
guished by  the  funniest  little  flags  floating  from  each  shoulder 
like  wings:  these,  with  the  long  feathers,  suggest  a  likeness  to 
some  gigantic  insect. 

The  faces  of  the  actors  are  coarsely  painted,  some  heing  of  a 
ruddy  brown,  laid  on  so  thick  as  to  shine.  The  service  of  the 
play  is  all  done  by  men  in  the  commonest  blue  coolie  dress!  It 
is  so  odd  to  see  them  moving  about  among  the  gorgeously  arrayed 
principal  actors.  There  is  no  attempt  at  stage  illusion — no  curtain, 
no  shifting  of  scenes,  beyond  the  most  primitive  alterations  in  the 
stage  furniture.  If  a  culprit  is  to  be  killed  by  fire  from  heaven, 
you  see  a  coolie  climb  up  and  scatter  an  inflammable  powder,  to 
which  he  sets  fire.  The  victim,  of  course,  falls  dead ;  but  a 
moment  afterwards  he  gets  up  and  walks  (or  at  least  crawls)  off 
the  stage. 

Some  of  the  women's  dresses  are  exquisite  as  specimens  of  rich 
embroidery,  and  it  really  is  almost  impossible  to  believe  that  these 
dainty  little  ladies  are  really  all  men  :  no  woman  is  ever  allowed  to 
appear  on  the  Chinese  stage.  How  the  actors  contrive  to  be  such 
perfect  actresses  passes  my  comprehension,  but  even  the  small  feet 
are  perfectly  simulated,  and  the  uncertain  mincing  gait,  as  also  the 
shrill  feminine  voice,  which  is  produced  by  a  high  ear-piercing 
falsetto,  which  after  a  while  becomes  most  irritating  to  the  listener, 
and  makes  us  hope  that  Chinese  ladies  do  not  really  talk  like  that 
at  home.1 

I  was  told  that  these  male  prima  donnas  command  very  high 
salaries.  One  whom  we  saw  in  San  Francisco  had  been  imported 
from  Peking  on  a  salary  of  10,000  dollars  a-year. 

The  orchestra  is  barbaric  in  the  extreme,  the  accompaniment  to 
sentimental  or  sorrowful  scenes  being  a  squeak  produced  by  a  horse- 
hair bow  on  a  fiddle  with  one  horse-hair  string.  The  more  ener- 
getic passages,  which   are  delivered  in  resonant  tones,  are  empha- 

1  I  remember  once  as  a  great  treat  Bending  an  unsophisticated  Scotch  maid  to 
the  Italian  Opera  in  London,  she  was,  however,  much  disgusted,  tor,  said  she, 
••  I  am  sure  that  no  real  leddies  and  gentlemen  would  go  skirling  and  throwing 
themselves  about  in  that  fashion"  ! 


ANCIENT  TARTAR  PLAY.  191 

sised  by  a  thundering  clamour  on  a  brass  gong  heightened  by  the 
clashing  of  large  cymbals,  and  rattling  on  metal  and  wooden  drums  : 
after  this  deafening  noise  the  ping  of  small  banjos,  or  even  a  soli- 
tary trumpet-blast,  is  quite  a  relief.  Happily  in  these  temple-plays 
the  orchestra  is  not  so  powerful  as  at  a  regular  theatre,  where 
the  tremendous  din  continues  throughout  the  play — pantomime, 
speeches,  and  battles  each  having  appropriate  accompaniment. 

But  the  plays  themselves  are  all  sound  and  fury,  with  a  most 
exhausting  turmoil  of  bluster,  bellowing,  braggadocio,  rant,  and 
display  of  demoniacal  rage  and  ferocity.  The  marvel  is  how  such 
frowns  and  such  contortions  can  be  kept  up,  especially  as  one 
marked  feature  is  that  of  eyes  "  bursting  from  their  sockets,"  as 
the  saying  is. 

Now  and  then  it  is  evident  that  an  actor  is  really  full  of  quiet 
humour,  and  that  he  contrives  to  infuse  some  gleams  of  fun  into 
his  heavy  part,  much  to  the  pleasure  of  an  appreciative  audience. 

After  various  episodes  in  Imperial  life,  we  were  favoured  with 
some  most  exciting  hunting-scenes,  in  one  of  which  an  Amazon 
queen  shot  a  tiger  with  bow  and  arrow.  It  was  a  noble  Chinese 
tiger,  with  beautiful  fur,  much  handsomer  than  the  hairy  tiger  of 
India,  and  it  had  fierce  green  eyes.  It  rolled  over  quite  dead,  and 
the  attendants  tied  its  legs  to  a  bamboo  and  carried  it  off  in 
triumph.  The  illusion  was  not  improved  by  the  very  patent  fact 
that  it  wore  large  white-soled  Chinese  shoes  on  its  hind  paws  I1 

Then  followed  a  sort  of  ballet,  alternating  with  really  excellent 
acrobatic  feats.  Poles  and  horizontal  bars  were  erected,  and  clowns 
and  tumblers,  all  carrying  fans,  favoured  us  with  various  gymnastic 
performances,  a  good  deal  like  those  of  our  own  athletes  ;  but  a 
special  character  was  given  to  the  whole  by  the  extraordinary 
figures  of  the  corps  de  ballet,  who  rushed  in  between  each  gym- 
nastic feat,  while  the  singers  and  musicians  screeched  and  yelled, 
and  vied  one  with  another  which  could  produce  the  most  deafen- 
ing noise.  The  effect  of  the  whole  was  that  of  a  most  hideous  and 
perplexing  nightmare  ;  and  the  long-sustained  shrill  falsetto,  with- 
out any  change  of  tone,  in  which  these  male  actors  converse  in 
their  feminine  characters,  fairly  gets  on  one's  nerves  after  a  while. 

1  The  acting  of  this  troupe  was  excellent,  ami  I  was  much  amused  a  few  weeks 
later,  when  visiting  tin-  Foo-I  'li<>\\  (iuild  at  Ningpo,  to  find  the  identical  company 
acting  this  identical  piece  !     Rather  an  odd  coincidence. 


L92  THE    OFFERINGS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

CHAPTER   XVI. 

THE    OFFERINGS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

The  hill  <>f  graves — Foo-Chow  Arsenal — Potted  ancestors — A  picturesque 
funeral — Longevity  boards — Chinese  All-Souls'  festival — The  Ten-Year 
festival — Ancestor  worship  the  key  to  Chinese  life — Service  at  the  Temple 
of  Imperial  Ancestors  at  Peking — Compulsory  mourning  seclusion — Influ- 
ence on  judicial  decisions — The  great  bar  to  Christianity — The  three 
souls — The  City  of  the  Dead — Spirits  in  prison — Release  from  purgatory 
— Offerings  to  beggar  spirits — Enormous  annual  expenditure. 

Foo-Chow,  April. 

Straxge  to  say,  the  place  which  was  made  over  by  the  Chinese 
authorities  to  the  British,  as  the  site  for  this  foreign  settlement,  is 
a  cluster  of  green  hills  which  are  all  clotted  over  with  ancestral 
graves.  How  the  dead  have  been  induced  to  tolerate  our  presence 
and  our  buildings  it  is  impossible  to  say ;  doubtless  the  officials 
have  made  additional  offerings,  and  have  duly  explained  to  the 
dead  that  they  really  could  not  help  themselves,  and  only  yielded 
to  the  brute  force  of  the  barbarians  ! 

This  Avas  done  in  the  most  literal  manner  when  the  authorities 
determined  on  establishing  the  Arsenal  at  Pagoda  Anchorage,  for, 
as  a  matter  of  course,  many  graves  were  dotted  over  the  land 
required  for  the  immense  workshops.  So  a  great  feast,  lasting 
four  days,  was  held  to  appease  the  wrath  of  the  dead  thus  disturbed 
for  their  country's  good,  and  they  were  humbly  besought  to  take 
up  their  quarters  at  a  temple  which  was  then  built  for  their  special 
benefit  high  on  the  hillside,  above  all  the  foreign  houses.1 

The  whole  country  is  strewn  with  graves  ;  the  dead  are  buried 
here,  there,  and  everywhere,  wherever  the  astrologers  declare  that 
they  have  found  a  lucky  site ;  and  though  certain  sunny  hillsides 
are  pretty  closely  covered  with  picturesque  horse -shoe -shaped 
tombs,  the  graves  are  never  crowded  together  as  in  cemeteries. 

So  in  this  foreign  settlement,  while  the  grassy  hills  are  crowned 
by  luxurious  foreign  bungalows,  the  slopes  are  marked  by  a  free 
sprinkling  of  these  homes  of  the  dead,  some  of  which,  judiciously 
placed  beneath  the  shadow  of  fine  old  gnarled  fir-trees,  are  really 

1  We  may  be  very  sure  that  the  truly  conservative  Chinese  have  not  failed  to 
recognise  the  retributive  vengeance  of  tile  spirits  in  the  lamentable  destruction  of 
this  offending  Arsenal  ! 


"all  souls"  festivals.  193 

very  ornamental  and  in  good  taste.     Some  are  shaped  like  a  £ 
tic  trefoil,  formed  l>y  the  combination  of  three  horse-shoes,  show- 
ing where  three  honoured  members  of  some  great  family  have  been 
buried  in  one  group,  and  some  are  embellished  by  handsome  scroll- 
work, and  guard  cm  I  by  weird  stone  animals. 

Some  very  old  graves  are  neglected  and  broken,  revealing  their 
hid  treasures,  which  in  this  case  are  not  the  accustomed  ponderous 
coffin,  but  red  earthen  jars,  in  which  are  stored  the  bones  and  dust 
of  some  poor  wanderer  who  has  died  far  from  home,  but  whose 
remains  have  been  charitably  brought  by  some  friendly  fellow- 
workman  to  be  laid  with  kindred  dust,  in  order  that  the  spirit  of 
the  dead  may  share  in  the  annual  offerings  of  the  family.  These 
are  familiarly  known  as  "  the  potted  ancestors"  ! 

From  the  verandah  where  I  frequently  sit,  I  command  an  ex- 
cellent view  of  all  the  near  grassy  hills  sloping  down  to  that 
strange  "City  of  the  I>ead,"  where  hundreds  of  coffins  lie,  each  in 
its  hired  house,  awaiting  the  lucky  hour  for  burial — for  in  death,  as 
in  life,  every  detail  must  be  regulated  in  obedience  to  geomancers 
and  fortune-tellers.1  I  need  scarcely  say  with  what  keen  interest 
I  watch  the  various  processions  and  ceremonies  connected  with  the 
funerals,  and  with  the  worship  of  the  dead,  which  are  constantly 
passing  before  us. 

These  three  first  weeks  in  April  are  specially  devoted  to  thi 
service  of  the  dead — they  are  a  prolonged  "  All  Souls'"  festival, 
here  called  Ch'ing-Ming.  During  its  continuance,  the  whole  pop- 
ulation seems  to  be  in  a  state  of  movement,  for  every  one  who  can 
possibly  manage  to  do  so  visits  the  graves  of  his  family  in  person ; 
and  as  men,  women,  and  children  all  go  forth  in  troops,  the  cere- 
mony partakes  rather  of  the  nature  of  a  cheerful  picnic.  Family 
parties  arrange  for  a  day's  "outing,"  and  start  from  the  crowded 
cities  on  a  holiday  excursion,  combining  duty  with  pleasure.     Thej 

1  Besides  the  edicts  of  the  stars  affecting  individuals,  they  are  supposed  to  influ- 
ence almost  every  day  of  the  year,  rendering  these  specially  lucky  or  unluckj  Foi 
specilie  actions.  There  are  certain  days  on  which  no  man  in  his  senses  would 
shave,  lest  he  be  afflicted  with  boils;  others  on  whicb  no  farmer  would  sow,  else  a 

bad  harvest   would  follow.     There  arc  days  mi  winch  no  man  would  buy  or  sell 

property  ;  others  when  to  dig  a  well  will  insure  finding  only  bitter  water.     T 

a  jraiiary  on  certain  days  would  lie  to  admit   mice  and  mildew.      To  begin  roofing  a 

house  on  a  given  day  betokens  having  soon  to  sell  it.  There  is  one  day  on 
no  householder  would  repair  his  kitchen  fireplace,  as  his  house  would  inevitable 
ere  long  be  burnt.  Another  day  is  shunned  by  match-makers,  as  insuring  ill-luck 
to  the  wedded  pair.  One  day  is  especially  dreaded  by  shipbuilders,  for  to  com- 
mence building  a  ship,  or  to  allow  one  to  sail  thereon,  is  to  court  shipwreck.  So 
in  the  rearing  of  cattle,  the  care  of  silk-worms,  in  travelling  or  in  staying  at  home. 
days  of  luck  or  ill-luck  must  he  specially  observed,  lest  the  stars  in  their 
should  fight  against  the  presumptuous  mortal  who  ignores  them. 

N 


194        THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

have  perhaps  to  walk  many  miles  over  hill  and  dale,  bearing  the 

stores  of  g 1  things,  which  their  ancestors  happily  only  care  to 

smell,  so  that  thej  themselves  may  count  on  an  excellent  feast  on 
their  return  home. 

The  offerings,  which  are  so  pleasing  both  to  the  dead  and  to  the 
living,  are  carried  on  trays,  or  else  in  large  flat  baskets  of  split 
bamboo,  slung  from  the  ends  of  long  bamboos  which  arc  balanced 
on  the  men's  shoulders.  They  include  a  variety  of  cakes,  roast 
ducks,  fowls,  fish,  and  sometimes  a  pig  roasted  whole,  or  perhaps 
only  a  pig's  head  with  his  tail  in  his  mouth,  which  is  symbolic  of 
the  whole  animal.  Of  course  the  value  of  the  offerings  varies  with 
the  wealth  or  poverty  of  the  family,  but  the  poorest  must  provide 
some  food  and  some  paper  money,  and  many  invocations  on  yellow 
paper. 

In  each  family  party,  one  member  is  told  off  to  carry  the  hoe 
with  which  to  weed  the  grave.  From  it  hang  suspended  many 
strings  of  paper  cash  and  paper  sycee  (the  block  money,  like  little 
silver  shoes  or  boats),  representing  fabulous  sums  of  Celestial  coin. 
Others  carry  samshu — i.e.,  sweet  rice-wine — in  joints  of  bamboo, 
which  form  nature-made  bottles ;  and  others  again  bear  the  paper 
semblance  of  all  manner  of  useful  objects,  such  as  clothing,  trunks 
with  separate  great  locks  for  external  application,  writing  materials, 
opium-pipes,  sedan-chairs,  houses,  horses,  and  even  attendants,  all 
made  of  pasteboard  or  paper,  not  forgetting  incense  and  candles, 
for  the  dead  are  in  the  Dark  World  and  require  light. 

As  in  duty  bound,  on  reaching  the  graves  some  of  the  women 
Aveep  and  wail  piteously,  but  they  soon  commence  helping  in  the 
task  of  weeding  and  tidying  the  ground,  and  spreading  the  feast. 
All  the  good  things  are  arranged  on  little  dishes  before  the  tomb, 
which  is  covered  with  the  invocations  on  yellow  paper.  The 
incense  is  lighted,  the  ancestral  spirits  are  summoned  by  ear-split- 
ting beating  of  brass  gongs  or  cymbals.  Then  the  leader  of  the 
party  puts  on  a  long  blue  robe,  and  an  official  hat  with  a  red  tassel, 
such  as  is  worn  by  the  literary  class,  and  proceeds  to  read  the 
special  liturgy  appointed  for  this  occasion,  entreating  the  dead  to 
guard  and  bless  the  living,  to  protect  them  from  evil  spirits,  to  send 
them  good  things  of  all  sorts. 

Then  all  the  paper  offerings  are  burnt,  and  the  flame  is  fed  by  a 
moderate  libation  of  rice-wine,  which  thus  becomes  invisible  and 
available  for  spirit  use ;  all  the  paper  gifts  are  in  like  manner  trans- 
mitted to  the  unseen  world,  there  to  become  tangible  and  very  use- 
ful to  the  recipients.     "While  the  flames  ascend  heavenward  all  the 


FUNERALS.  195 

family  prostrate  themselves,  and  strike  their  heads  on  the  ground 
nine  times.  The  ancestors  having  meanwhile  absorbed  the  essence 
of  the  good  meats,  the  hungry  human  beings  are  at  liberty  to  pack 
up  the  otherwise  untouched  dainties,  and  carry  them  away  to  be 
consumed  at  the  family  feast. 

One  day  last  week  1  watched  a  very  grand  funeral,  at  which  the 
chief  mourners  were  women  who  wore  loose  white  dresses  in  token 
of  the  deepest  woe;  the  men  wore  a  rough  sort  of  blouse  of  sack- 
cloth, with  a  white  sash  round  the  waist.  Every  one  present  wore 
some  piece  of  white,  in  lieu  of  our  crape.  First  came  the  bearers 
of  large  white  paper  lanterns — always  picturesque  objects.  Then  a 
band  of  musicians  dressed  in  white,  and  making  a  horribly  dis- 
cordant noise  with  drums  and  gongs  to  drive  away  evil  spirits. 
Then  came  men  carrying  trays  of  cakes  and  other  good  things  for 
the  funeral  feast.  These  were  followed  by  more  musicians  appar- 
ently trying  to  drown  the  noise  of  the  first  lot.  These  wore  com- 
mon blue  clothes.  After  them  came  coolies  carrying  pigs  ro 
whole,  kids,  and  various  other  savoury  meats  set  out  on  trays. 

Then  followed  a  highly  decorated  sedan-chair,  in  which  was 
carried  the  tablet  of  the  deceased,  with  tapers  burning  before  it. 
Behind  the  tablet  came  a  group  of  men  dressed  in  red,  carrying  a 
large  red  flag  with  inscription  in  golden  characters.  Next  came 
the  coffin — very  handsome  and  solid,  formed  of  four  large  boards 
rounded  on  the  upper  side,  and  about  four  inches  thick.  They  are 
called  longevity  boards,  and  their  value  is  a  matter  of  great  interest 
and  importance.  They  are  invariably  bought  unpainted,  that  the 
purchaser  may  select  the  grain  of  wood  he  prefers. 

When  the  procession  reached  the  lucky  spot  selected  for  the 
grave,  the  coffin  was  deposited  on  the  ground,  whereon  the  mourners 
beat  their  heads,  wailing  bitterly ;  while  two  yellow-robed  priests 
performed  some  office  of  religion,  incense  was  burnt,  and  a  multi- 
tude of  crackers  fired  to  terrify  the  demons.  Then  the  coffin  was 
laid  in  its  place,  and  wailing  and  cries  of  lamentation  rent  the  air. 
When  the  grave  was  filled  in,  more  crackers  were  fired  by  delighted 
small  boys  with  shaven  scalps  and  long  pig-tails — joss-sticks  were 
lighted  and  stuck  in  bamboos,  and  so  planted  round  the  grave. 
The  feast  was  spread  and  left  for  a  while,  that  the  hungry  dead 
might  feast  on  its  essence.  Then  the  survivors  carried  oil'  the 
gross  substance  for  their  own  use,  and  marched  off  pretty  cheerily, 
while  all  the  musicians  combined  their  efforts  to  drown  Borrow 
by  such  a  din  that  must  surely  have  driven  away  the  affrighted 
devils. 


10G  THE    OFFERINGS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

Far  more  pathetic  than  this  rich  noisy  funeral  was  one  which  I 
saw  yesterday  jusl  below  this  house,  and  which  touched  me  greatly 
from  its  simplicity.  It  was  that  of  a  very  poor  woman,  and  with 
the  exception  of  the  men  who  carried  the  body  and  dug  the  grave, 
the  only  mourner  presenl  was  a  fair-faced  child,  perhaps  six  years 
of  age,  in  white  funeral  dress.  When  the  men  had  finished  digging 
the  jiave,  some  one  came  and  apparently  told  them  that  they  had 
mistaken  the  "  Lucky  Site,"  for  after  a  prolonged  altercation  they 
sit  to  work  to  dig  another  a  little  farther  off,  leaving  the  little 
child  alone  beside  the  bier,  whereon  lay  the  dead  mother  beneath 
the  shahby  piece  of  thin  red  cloth  which  served  as  a  pall.  It  was 
a  most  pathetic  scene  in  real  life,  and  made  one  long  to  comfort  the 
little  desolate  creature,  whose  very  foreign  features  and  complexion 
too  plainly  suggested  the  poor  woman's  sad  history. 

AYhen  the  second  grave  was  finished,  and  the  dead  laid  therein, 
the  child  was  instructed  to  light  the  incense-sticks  and  burn  some 
paper  money  and  yellow  paper  prayers,  and  then  all  was  over,  and 
only  a  few  scraps  of  half-burnt  yellow  paper  strewn  on  the  newly 
turned  sod  marked  where  lay  one  more  "  ancestor,"  to  whom  that 
little  child  must  continue  to  do  homage  to  the  last  hour  of  his 
life. 

On  the  edge  of  the  fir-wood  just  beyond  this  house  there  is  one 
grave  in  which  I  take  a  special  interest,  for  the  sake  of  the  poor 
widow  whose  proceedings  I  watch  day  after  day  with  never-ceasing 
wonder.  She  always  arrives  about  the  same  hour,  and,  sitting 
down  on  the  grave,  commences  a  low  pitiful  wailing.  Though  the 
ceremony  is  somewhat  theatrical,  this  voice  of  mourning  is  inex- 
pressibly sad.  Gradually  she  wTorks  herself  up  to  a  pitch  of  ap- 
parent agony,  and  throws  herself  prone  on  the  grave,  weeping  and 
wailing,  and  calling  on  the  dead  by  every  endearing  name.  Her 
cries  re-echo  from  hill  to  hill,  like  the  coronach  of  the  Celts ;  they 
certainly  are  most  distressing  to  us,  the  unwilling  hearers  !  By  the 
time  when  one  might  suppose  her  to  be  stupefied  with  crying,  and 
her  head  splitting  with  pain,  a  neat  young  woman  always  comes  to 
fetch  her.  She  at  once  arises,  tidies  her  dress,  and  then  the  two 
walk  off  together  chatting  quite  cheerily  ! 

Many  mourners  bring  letters  to  the  dead,  which  they  leave  on 
the  upright  tombstone,  laying  a  stone  on  the  paper  to  prevent  its 
being  blown  away.  Others,  of  a  utilitarian  turn  of  mind,  spread 
some  vegetable  (I  think  it  must  be  tobacco)  to  dnr  on  the  sunny 
horse-shoe  wall ! 

In  order  to  be  truly  acceptable,  the  offerings  to  the  dead  should 


ANCESTRAL    WORSHIP.  197 

be  presented  by  the  nearest  male  relative,  who  should  be  either  the 
eldest  son  or  his  heir.  Should  the  eldest  son  die  without  issue 
and  his  brothers  have  sons,  one  of  their  sons  is  appointed  his  heir, 
and  succeeds  both  to  his  estates  and  to  his  filial  duties.  He  may 
be  a  mere  infant  in  arms,  but  at  the  sacred  rites  of  Ancestral 
"Worship  he  must  be  present  as  Master  of  Ceremonies.  The  main 
duties  which  thus  devolve  upon  him  are — oft-repeated  acts  of  wor- 
ship at  the  tombs,  and  also  before  the  ancestral  tablets,  winch 
represent  the  dead  of  many  generations,  and  which  are  gathered 
together  in  a  great  hall.  Sometimes  he  has  duplicate  tablets  in 
his  own  home.  At  each  of  these  he  must  make  offerings  of  mate- 
rial objects,  to  be  spiritualised  by  fire,  for  the  use  and  comfort  of 
the  dead. 

Every  man  is  supposed  to  have  three  souls,  one  of  which  at 
death  goes  forth  into  the  world  of  darkness  to  undergo  trial  and 
punishment  at  the  hands  of  the  judicial  gods  of  Purgatory.  The 
second  soul  remains  with  the  corpse  in  the  tomb,  while  the  third 
■watches  over  the  tablet  which  bears  its  name  in  the  Ancestral 
Hall.  Every  large  family  has  its  own  Ancestral  Hall,  quite  apart 
from  the  family  tombs.  All  round  this  hall  are  ranged  shelves,  on 
which  stand  rows  of  these  tablets,  representing  many  departed 
generations.  They  are  all  much  alike,  from  the  tablet  of  the 
Emperor  to  that  of  the  poor  student,  consisting  simply  of  a  narrow 
upright  wooden  slab,  on  which  are  inscribed  the  name  and  the 
honourable  titles  of  the  dead — the  said  slab  being  mounted  in  a 
richly  carved  stand. 

Friends  who  desire  to  comfort  their  dead  must  therefore  make 
separate  offerings  on  behalf  of  each  of  his  three  souls — so  they 
must  by  turns  visit  the  grave,  the  Ancestral  Hall,  and  the  temple 
of  Cheng  Hwang,  the  deity  into  whose  jurisdiction  the  soul  has 
passed. 

Xo  one  can  be  long  in  China  before  he  discovers  that  Ancestral 
Worship  is  the  keystone  of  all  existence  in  the  Celestial  Empire. 
It  permeates  all  life,  affecting  even  the  most  trivial  details  of  every- 
day existence,  and  is  an  influence  tenfold  more  potent  for  keeping 
the  people  in  the  bondage  of  gross  superstition  than  all  the  count- 
less idols  of  the  land,  inasmuch  as  it  compels  every  man  to  be  for 
ever  looking  backward  instead  of  forward,  in  fear  lesl  he  should 
by  any  action  offend  his  very  exacting  ancestral  spirits.  In  short, 
from  his  birth  to  his  grave,  the  chief  aim  and  end  of  every  China- 
man is  this  constant  propitiation  of  the  dead. 

It  has  been  well  described  as  a  most  degrading  slavery — the 


198         THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

slavery  of  the  living  to  the  dead — a  system  of  worship  and  sacri- 
fices which  must  be  offered  ceaselessly,  not  necessarily  from  love 
to  the  departed,  but  in  order  to  avert  calamity  should  their  dis- 
pleasure be  incurred  by  any  neglect  or  departure  from  ancient 
custom.  It  is  a  system  of  fear  which  controls  every  act  of  life 
ami  all  social  organisation,  affecting  alike  the  Imperial  throne  and 
the  meanest  coolie — in  short,  it  is  this  system  which  has  fossilised 
this  vast  empire,  and  holds  all  China's  millions  frozen  in  its  icy 
grasp. 

Nn  matter  what  other  religion  he  professes — Buddhist,  Taouist, 
Confucian — every  Chinaman's  first  duty  is  the  care  of  sacrificing 
to  his  ancestors.  This  was  the  primitive  religion  of  the  land,  and 
from  it  were  derived  the  systems  both  of  Taou  and  Confucius. 
Sacrifices  were  offered  to  deceased  sages  and  shades  of  ancestors 
in  pre-Confucian  times,  and  the  great  philosopher  himself  taught 
that  the  dead  must  thus  be  honoured  as  though  actually  living. 
So  it  was  only  natural  that  the  year  after  Confucius  died,  a  funeral 
temple  should  have  been  erected  to  his  honour,  in  which  were 
buried  his  musical  instruments,  his  boots,  and  articles  of  dress 
which  he  had  worn. 

By  Imperial  command  sacrifices  were  offered  to  him,  as  they 
continue  to  be  to  this  present  day,  in  temples  without  number.  I 
have  already  noted x  that  the  most  distinguished  sages  of  the 
Celestial  Empire  are  honoured  by  having  their  monumental  tablets 
ranged  on  either  side  of  that  of  their  Great  Master,  and  receive  a 
due  share  of  reverence.  But  I  doubt  whether  the  term  monu- 
mental correctly  describes  these  tablets,  for  their  name,  "  Shinwei," 
means  "  the  place  of  the  soul,"  suggesting  the  actual  presence  of 
one  of  the  three  souls.  Considering  that  every  city  in  China 
has  a  Confucian  temple,  the  souls  must  be  capable  of  infinite 
multiplication  ! 

The  great  sage  inculcated  filial  reverence  as  the  primary  obliga- 
tion of  mankind,  and  rigidly  do  the  majority  of  his  disciples  obey 
his  teaching,  though  others  seem  to  consider  that  the  practice  of 
filial  duty  is  only  required  after  parents  are  dead.  But  no  matter 
how  bad  a  son  may  have  been  from  his  boyhood  till  the  hour  when 
his  parents  die — from  that  time  forth  his  whole  anxiety  centres  in 
appeasing  their  anger  by  such  prayers  and  offerings  as  shall  ensure 
their  comfortable  reception  in  the  Spirit- "World — not  for  their  sakes, 
but  for  his  own,  lest  by  any  means  they  should  return  to  torment 
him,  accompanied  by  a  multitude  of  spirits  more  vicious  than  theni- 

1  See  chap.  ix. 


THE    KEYSTONE    OF    ALL    ACTIOX.  199 

selves.     For  the  dead  are  mighty,  and  will  jealously  avenge  the 

smallest  omission  in  the  accustomed  ritual  in  their  honour.  Thus 
the  undutiful  son  is  at  once  transformed  into  a  most  punctilious 
observer  of  every  religious  form  required  in  ancestral  worship. 

For  this  reason,  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  every  China- 
man to  leave  a  son,  whose  duty  it  shall  be  to  offer  the  oft-repeated 
sacrifices  which  ensure  his  comfort  in  the  Spirit-World.  Sooner 
than  leave  no  son  to  fulfil  this  obligation,  he  will,  if  possible, 
adopt  one ;  otherwise  his  hungry  spirit  will  be  dependent  on 
getting  a  share  of  the  offerings  which,  three  times  a  year,  are 
made  by  the  charitable  public  for  the  benefit  of  the  destitute  dead. 
It  is,  of  course,  necessary  that  the  person  thus  adopted  to  perform 
the  filial  rites  should  be  younger  than  the  supposed  father,  and 
even  where  the  interests  of  the  Empire  are  jeopardised  by  a  slavish 
obedience  to  this  rule,  it  is  none  the  less  rigidly  adhered  to. 

This  was  strikingly  exemplified  when,  on  the  early  death  of 
Tung  Chi,  the  late  Emperor  of  China,  who  died  without  issue, 
it  became  necessary  to  select  his  successor  to  the  vacant  throne. 
In  the  interests  of  the  Empire  it  would  have  appeared  desirable 
that  this  honour  should  be  conferred  on  some  experienced  and 
able  statesman,  selected  from  the  numerous  adult  princes.  To 
this  course,  however,  there  was  one  insuperable  objection,  fully 
recognised  by  all  concerned,  namely,  that  the  new  Emperor  must 
necessarily  be  junior  to  the  deceased,  as  otherwise  he  could  not 
have  offered  the  necessary  ancestral  worship. 

The  only  person  capable  of  fulfiling  this  condition  was  a  boy 
under  four  years  of  age,  who  was  accordingly  solemnly  crowned 
Emperor,  under  the  title  of  Kwang  Sii,  and  the  affairs  of  the  Em- 
pire were  once  more  committed  to  the  care  of  the  two  Empress 
I  dowagers,  during  a  second  long  minority.  But  it  was  not  enough 
thus  to  secure  tranquillity  for  the  soul  of  Tung  Chi.  His  death 
without  issue  had  left  his  father,  Hien  Fung,  without  an  heir  on 
earth  to  provide  for  his  necessities.  In  order  to  avert  the  terrible 
consequences  that  might  ensue  were  the  father's  interests  neglected, 
the  infant  Emperor  was  officially  constituted  heir  to  Hien  Fun.:. 
with  the  promise  to  the  spirits  that  his  first-born  son  should  be 
the  especial  heir  of  Tung  Chi — a  decided  case  of  counting  un- 
hatched  chickens ! 

I  doubt  whether  the  whole  record  of  earthly  worship  can  pro- 
duce a  more  remarkable  scene  than  that  when,  oil  his  accession 
to  the  Imperial  throne,  a  newly  crowned  Kinperor — the  Son  of 
Heaven — goes  in  solemn  state  to  the   rootless  Temple  of  Heaven 


200  THE  oitki: I n<;s  OF  the  dead. 

,,t  Peking,  there  to  offer  sacrifice  in  hie  character  of  High  Priest, 
.nnl  formally  to  announce  to  the  Celestial  Rulers  the  new  titles 
.iinl  dignities  assumed  hy  him,  as  their  Filial  Descendant.  The 
announcement  thus  made  to  heaven  is  also  conveyed  to  the  de- 
ceased Emperors,  who  (besides  receiving  worship  and  offerings  in 
other  temples  specially  dedicated  to  them)  are  even  here  exalted 
to  a  position  <nilv  second  to  that  of  the  Supreme  Being.  As  the 
idea  of  sacrifice  is  that  of  a  banquet,  and  a  banquet  involves  the 
presence  of  honoured  guests,  the  Emperors  formally  invite  their 
imperial  ancestors  to  come  and  share  the  feast  with  Shang-te,  the 
Almighty,  who  thus  receives  honour  by  the  act  of  filial  piety, 
which   pays  the  highest  conceivable  homage  to  parents.1 

Equally  remarkable  are  the  ceremonials  of  the  Imperial  worship 
in  the  Tri-meaouor  "  Great  Temple  "  at  Peking,  known  to  foreigners 
as  the  Temple  of  the  Imperial  Ancestors,  which  lies  on  the  south- 
east of  the  principal  gate  of  the  Emperor's  palace — that  is  to  say, 
in  the  most  honourable  situation  possible.  In  its  chief  hall  are 
ranged  the  Imperial  tablets  of  the  last  ten  generations,  Emperors 
and  Fmpresses  being  arranged  in  pairs,  all  facing  the  south.  In 
secondary  halls  are  stored  the  tablets  of  numerous  persons  of  such 
distinguished  merit  as  to  entitle  them  to  be  spiritual  guests  at  the 
sacrificial  banquets.  Imperial  relatives  occupy  the  eastern  hall, 
and  loyal  officers  the  western.  As  the  tablets  face  the  south,  the 
east  lies  on  the  left  hand,  which  is  the  post  of  highest  honour. 

A  complete  set  of  offerings  are  presented  before  each  Imperial 
pair.  Husband  and  wife  each  receive  three  cups  of  wine,  two 
bowls  of  soup,  and  a  table  and  stool  on  "which  are  laid  suitable 
clothing.  The  Emperor,  however,  receives  two  pieces  of  silk,  and 
the  poor  Empress  gets  none.  She,  however,  receives  an  equal  share 
in  some  other  pieces  of  silk,  which  are  laid  together  with  incense 
and  lighted  candles,  the  carcass  of  a  pig,  a  cow,  and  a  sheep,  and 
twenty-eight  dishes,  all  of  which  are  duly  set  in  rows  before  the 
tablets  of  each  Imperial  couple.  Hence  there  is  apparently  no 
objection  to  a  wife  sharing  her  husband's  meal  in  the  spirit-land, 
though  she  could  not  possibly  do  so  on  earth. 

Then  the  Emperor  on  his  knees  addresses  prayer  by  name  to 
each  of  these,  his  deceased  predecessors,  both  Emperors  and  Em- 
presses (whose  titles  in  each  case  number  from  twelve  to  twenty 
words),  craving  their  acceptance  of  these  expressions  of  unforget- 

1   1  am  greatly  indebted  for  details  respecting  Ancestral  Worship  to  Dr  M.  T. 
.  of  the  Southern  American  Baptist  Mission,  and  for  these  concerning  Im- 
perial Worship  to  Dr  Edkins,  of  Peking. 


OFFERINGS    TO    IMPERIAL    ANCESTORS.  201 

ting  thoughtfulness  on  the  part  of  "  their  filial  descendant,  the 
Emperor."  This  prayer  is  inscribed  on  a  yellow  tablet.  The 
musicians  and  choir  then  chant  songs  of  praise,  while  the  Emperor 
presents  the  pieces  of  silk  for  the  adornment  of  his  ancestors. 
The  silk  and  the  prayer-tablet  are  burnt  together  in  a  brazier  in 
the  eastern  court  of  the  temple.  The  silk  and  other  offerings  to 
meritorious  officers  are  burnt  in  the  western  court. 

Then  follows  a  very  remarkable  sacramental  service  which  ap- 
pears to  be  a  distinguishing  feature  of  all  the  great  ceremonials  at 
which  the  Emperor  is  himself  the  High  Priest — namely,  the  solemn 
receiving,  on  low  bended  knee,  of  "the  Cup  of  Blessing,"  and 
"  the  Meat  of  Blessing."  On  this  occasion,  after  the  Emperor  and 
his  nobles  have  partaken  of  the  sacred  elements,  the  officer  in  charge 
of  "  the  Blessed  Wine "  places  a  cup  before  each  of  the  tablets, 
representing  the  Imperial  ancestors,  both  untie  and  female,  that  all 
may  share  in  this  communion  of  the  'lead. 

In  the  course  of  this  solemn  service  the  Emperor  is  required  to 
kneel  sixteen  times,  and  to  knock  his  forehead  on  the  ground  no 
less  than  thirty-six  times/  All  his  nobles  are  required  to  do  like- 
wise. This  is  intended  to  show  the  exceeding  importance  of  every 
act  of  filial  piety,  and  to  prove  that  the  Emperor  is  indeed  an 
example  of  virtue  to  all  his  people. 

Besides  this  great  National  Temple,  there  is  another  Imperial 
Ancestral  Temple  within  the  precincts  of  the  palace  at  Peking,  and 
also  a  temple  at  the  tomb  of  each  Emperor.  But  every  family 
of  any  importance  has  its  own  ancestral  hall,  wherein  are  stored 
the  tablets  commemorating  all  their  dead ;  and  the  whole  country 
is  thickly  strewn  with  temples  to  the  honour  of  sages,  saints,  or 
heroes,  all  of  whom  are  honoured  in  much  the  same  way. 

The  most  casual  visitor  to  China  cannot  fail  to  note  the  multi- 
tude of  temples  of  this  class,  even  should  he  pass  unawares  by  the 
"  family  mausoleums."  But  those  who  dwell  in  the  land  very 
quickly  become  aware  how  mighty  and  real  an  intluence  this 
ancestral  worship  exerts  in  every  direction. 

However  Chinamen  may  differ  on  other  matters,  such  as  systems 
of  religion,  social  position,  dialect,  &c,  this  is  the  one  point  on 
which  all  the  four  hundred  millions  are  agreed — it  is  the  one  faith 
which  all  alike  hold  in  awe  and  reverence,  and  which  is  indelibly 
impressed  on  their  minds  from  their  earliest  infancy.  It  takes 
precedence  of  everything.  The  man  who  holds  the  most  important 
Government  office  is  not  only  excused  for  its  neglect,  if  he  can 
show  that  he  was  engaged  in  some  ceremonial  connected  with  his 


202  TIIF    OFFF KINGS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

ancestral  duties,  bul   should  one  of  his  parents  die  while  he  is  in 

office,  he  is  actually  obliged  to  retire  from  public  life  for  a  period 
of  many  months — no  matter  how  critical  may  be  tlie  public  inter- 
ests thus  sacrificed  to  an  iron  custom  ! 

Tims  a  man  holding  office  in  the  extreme  south  of  China,  having 
left  an  aged  grandmother  in  the  extreme  north  of  the  Empire,  is 
liable  at  any  moment  to  receive  tidings  of  her  death,  accompanied 
by  the  Imperial  order  to  attend  her  obsequies,  and  to  remain 
mourning  in  seclusion  for  a  hundred  days.  Should  he  be  a  man 
whose  dignity  requires  the  attendance  of  a  large  retinue,  the  mere 
item  of  his  travelling  expenses  is  apt  to  be  serious.  A  Viceroy  of 
Canton  who  was  thus  summoned  to  Peking  to  mourn  for  his 
grandmother,  chartered  a  special  steamer  at  a  cost  of  10,000  dollars 
to  convey  him  and  his  suite  to  Taku.  He  suffered  so  terribly  from 
sea-sickness,  however,  ere  reaching  Shanghai,  that  he  actually  dis- 
embarked there,  and  performed  the  journey  by  land,  sending  only 
his  baggage  by  the  specially  chartered  steamer.  It  is  to  be  hoped 
the  grandmother  appreciated  the  honour  done  to  her ! 

But  so  great  is  the  difference  between  the  ceremonial  mourning 
required  by  an  ancestor  or  a  descendant,  that  the  man  who  must 
go  to  all  this  trouble  on  the  death  of  his  grandmother,  need  not 
even  wear  mourning  for  his  daughter  (certainly  not  if  she  was 
married),  nor  does  he  in  any  way  interrupt  his  official  work.  I 
have  been  told  of  a  Government  official  whose  married  daughter 
died  in  his  house,  but  he  attended  his  Yamun  the  same  day  just 
as  usual ! 

So  entirely  is  the  duty  of  the  living  to  previous  generations 
recognised  as  a  national  interest,  that  even  judicial  decisions  are 
controlled  by  this  strange  faith.  When  a  man  is  found  guilty  of 
a  crime  worthy  of  severe  punishment,  the  magistrate,  ere  passing 
sentence,  inquires  whether  the  parents  of  the  culprit  are  living — 
how  long  it  is  since  they  died — whether  he  has  any  brothers,  and 
if  so,  whether  he  is  an  elder  or  a  younger  son.  Shoidd  it  be  found 
that  he  is  an  elder  or  only  son,  and  that  either  parent  has  died 
recently,  his  sentence  will  be  very  much  lighter  than  it  would  other- 
wise be,  as  no  magistrate  would  willingly  incur  the  responsibility  of 
subjecting  a  man  to  such  imprisonment  as  would  compel  him  to 
neglect  these  sacred  duties. 

The  judge  whose  duty  it  is  to  pass  sentence  of  death  on  a  crim- 
inal, must  nerve  himself  to  face  whatever  evil  may  be  stirred  up 
by  his  vengeful  spirit  (probably  he  will  make  large  offerings  and 
apologies  to  the  dead).     But  the  fact  of  his  having  held  this  office 


NECESSITY    OF    LEAVING    A    SOX.  203 

precludes  him  from  all  chance  of  ever  being  raised  to  the  high 
dignity  of  Prime  Minister,  as  it  is  deemed  unsafe  to  intrust  such 
an  office  to  one  against  whom  any  in  the  spirit-world  may  be 
supposed  to  desire  vengeance,  which  might  be  accomplished  by 
bringing  calamity  on  his  public  work. 

As  even  the  highest  lines  of  political  life  are  thus  influenced  by 
the  belief  in  this  all-pervading  presence  of  the  malignant  dead, 
still  more  largely  does  it  affect  every  individual  existence.  Mosl 
of  the  sorrows  of  domestic  life  in  China  are  traced  to  this  source. 
The  selfish  anxiety  to  secure  ministering  descendants  as  early  as 
possible  leads  to  betrothals  in  extreme  youth,  which  constantly 
result  in  lifelong  misery.  The  little  bride  may  prove  childless, 
and  the  necessity  of  securing  male  heirs  leads  to  polygamy,  the 
fruitful  source  of  domestic  heart-burnings  and  quarrels. 

Sometimes,  however,  it  is  the  sonless  wife  who,  like  Sarah  of 
old,  claims  her  right  to  obtain  a  son  by  her  handmaid,  or,  at  I 
by  a  secondary  wife.  This  Chinese  custom  is  occasionally  tin- 
source  of  trouble  among  the  converts,  in  the  case  where  a  man  has 
declared  himself  a  Christian,  and  his  wife  continues  heathen. 
He  himself  may  be  the  essence  of  fidelity,  hut  when  his  wife  per- 
sistently urges  her  claim  to  the  services  of  Hagar,  the  husband  is 
apt  to  concede  the  point,  and  then  realises  too  late  that  ( ihiistianity 
admits  of  no  Ishmaels,  and  that  the  modern  Abraham  is  excom- 
municated as  a  bigamist. 

To  the  claims  of  ancestral  worship  is  also  due  the  lamentation 
which  too  often  greets  the  birth  of  a  baby  girl,  whereas  the  birth 
of  a  son  is  the  occasion  of  the  utmost  rejoicing.  Thus  it  is  that 
ancestor-worship  lies  at  the  root  of  the  appalling  female  infanticide 
of  China,  a  practice  about  which  there  is  no  concealment,  being 
fully  sanctioned  by  public  opinion.  (I>ut  even  a  male  child  which 
dies  from  natural  causes  at  a  very  early  age  is  not  considered 
worth  propitiating  by  funeral  expenses,  so  the  poor  little  body  i- 
disposed  of  with  scanty  reverence.  Its  parents  do  not  follow  it  to 
the  grave — at  least  not  in  North  China — lest  this  should  prove  a 
bad  precedent,  and  others  should  also  die.  For  the  same  reason 
the  body  must  not  be  carried  out  by  the  door,  but  must  be  handed 
over  the  wall  to  a  coolie,  who  undertakes  to  carry  it  to  one  of  the 
baby-towers  which  arc  built  as  receptacles  for  such  corpses,  outside 
the  city  wall:  he  is  accompanied  by  a  servant,  who  goes  to  Bee  that 
he  does  not  dispose  of  his  burden  in  the  first  open  drain  !) 

As  a  matter  of  course,  this  whole  system  is  the  greatest  bar  thai 
could  by  any   possibility   be   devised   to   check    the    adoption    of 


204  THE    OFFERINGS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

Christianity.  The  Chinaman  who  confesses  himself  a  Christian, 
and  refuses  to  perform  the  accustomed  acts  of  ancestral  worship, 
thereby  consigns  all  his  ancestors  for  the  five  previous  generations1 
to  a  state  ill  perpetual  beggary.  He  brings  on  himself  the  curse, 
not  only  of  all  the  living — i.e.,  all  his  kinsmen,  friends,  and  neigh- 
bours— but  of  all  the  omnipotent  dead  whom  he  is  most  bound  to 
revere  and  to  provide  for,  and  whose  curse  it  must  be  terrible  indeed 
to  incur. 

Perhaps  he  himself  may  have  so  far  realised  the  teaching  of 
Christianity  as  to  be  convinced  that  his  dead  ancestors  require  no 
aid  from  him;  still  it  is  hard  to  say  so,  to  be  misjudged  and 
scouted  by  all  his  fellows,  condemned  by  all  his  superiors,  and, 
worst  of  all,  subject  to  the  blame,  the  entreaties,  the  tears  of  all 
his  women-folk — his  mother  and  his  wives — to  say  nothing  of  his 
"  sisters,  and  his  cousins,  and  his  aunts,"  all  with  one  accord 
pleading  for  the  unhappy  dead. 

Worse  still,  there  are  not  lacking  instances  in  which  parents 
have  come  to  a  son  whom  they  knew  to  be  halting  between  two 
opinions,  and  have  deliberately  informed  him  that,  should  he  so 
disgrace  the  family  as  to  become  a  Christian,  they  would  at  once 
commit  suicide.  You  see,  by  becoming  a  Christian  he  would  unfit 
himself  for  the  performance  of  his  duties  as  their  heir,  and  become 
practically  as  useless  as  if  he  had  been  a  girl.  Consequently,  as 
his  life  was  not  worth  preserving,  they  would  at  least  take  their 
vengeance  ;  and,  according  to  Chinese  law,  the  man  who  by  his 
misdeeds  drives  his  parents  to  kill  themselves,  is  a  malefactor 
worthy  of  the  worst  form  of  death — namely,  decapitation,  which  is 
not  only  the  direst  disgrace  which  can  be  inflicted  on  a  man  in 
presence  of  his  fellows,  but  also  ensures  his  signal  punishment  in 
the  next  world,  where  headless  spirits  receive  very  small  pity,  for 
their  appearing  there  in  such  a  plight  is  a  certain  proof  that  the 
newly  deceased  has  been  ignominiously  despatched  from  earth,  and 
is  consequently  quite  unworthy  of  respect  in  his  new  state.  Thus 
are  the  ancestors  avenged  on  their  unworthy  descendant ! 

This  belief  in  the  far-reaching  consequences  of  decapitation  was 

1  It  is  at  least  fortunate  for  the  living  that  the  requisite  provision  for  ancestors 
is  limited  to  five  generations,  inasmuch  as  the  law  of  geometrical  progression,  when 
applied  to  genealogy,  shows  that  as  every  person  now  living  must  about  one  hun- 
dred years  ago  have  possessed  eight  great-grandparents,  he  has  only  to  carry  back 
his  calculation  for  eight  hundred  years  to  discover  that  he  is  the  lineal  descendant 
of  sixteen  million  ancestors!  It  is  supposed  that  all  the  Saxons,  Normans,  Danes, 
Frisians,  and  Celts  inhabiting  England,  France,  and  Scandinavia  in  the  time  of 
William  the  Conqueror,  scarcely  exceeded  this  figure.  Under  these  circumstances, 
our  individual  pride  of  blue  blood  and  pure  race  seems  somewhat  of  a  farce ! 


DECAPITATION THE    DIREST    DISGRACE.  205 

curiously  exemplified  during  the  Chinese  rebellion,  when  wealthy 
men,  whose  friends  had  been  thus  executed,  craved  permission  to 
purchase  their  heads,  that  they  might  stitch  them  on  to  the  dead 
bodies,  hoping  thus  to  deceive  the  officials  in  the  spirit-world. 
Sums  of  upwards  of  six  hundred  dollars  were  thus  paid  by  officers 
of  the  Imperial  army  for  the  recovery  of  a  single  head.  But  while 
thus  careful  for  the  welfare  of  their  own  dead,  the  same  belief 
enabled  these  barbarians  to  intensify  the  horrors  of  defeat,  and 
carry  their  vengeance  into  the  future  life,  by  decapitating  every 
rebel  corpse,  even  breaking  open  tbe  coffins  of  their  dead  in  order 
thus  to  insult  the  poor  skeletons,  whose  solid  "  longevity  boards 
were  then  utilised  in  repairing  the  wooden  pavement  of  the  sia 

So  terrible  is  the  suffering  thus  entailed  on  the  poor  disem- 
bodied spirit  that  there  have  been  cases  in  which  officials,  eh 
with  the  execution  of  this  sentence  on  some  person  of  rank,  have 
been  so  far  moved  to  mercy  as  to  connive  at  his  suicide  by  inhaling 
gold-leaf,  or  some  such  strictly  respectable  method  of  entering  the 
world  of  spirits. 

I  am  not  sure  if  the  benefits  of  propitiating  ancestors  ever  rise 
above  a  negative  prevention  of  evil,  the  object  being  to  avert  tin- 
ill-will  which  they  are  supposed  to  bear  to  the  descendants  who 
in  any  way  fail  to  provide  for  them.  Consequently  should  one  of 
the  family  fall  ill,  the  relations  immediately  offer  sacrifice  and 
worship  before  the  tablets  of  their  ancestors,  deeming  it  probable 
that  the  illness  is  the  punishment  for  some  omission  of  duty. 
Should  the  sufferer  fail  to  recover  cpiickly,  a  wise  woman  or  spirit- 
medium  is  summoned  to  tell  them  whether  the  offended  spirit  is 
one  of  their  own  ancestors,  or  some  poor  beggar-spirit  which,  having 
been  neglected  in  the  distribution  of  general  charity,  takes  this 
means  of  compelling  attention  to  its  necessities. 

Should  the  spirit's  interpreter  trace  the  illness  to  the  displeasure 
of  a  family  ancestor,  large  quantities  of  paper  money  are  immedi- 
ately burnt  before  the  ancestral  tablets.  But  if  the  mischief  has 
been  caused  by  a  discontented  beggar-spirit,  the  offering  is  burnt  out- 
side the  door.  Should  this  fail  to  bring  relief  to  the  sufferer,  the 
priests  are  called  in  to  exorcise  the  spirits  and  guard  the  doors  thai 
they  may  not  enter  again.  If  the  sick  man  becomes  delirious,  it 
is  supposed  that  a  demon-spirit  has  carried  off  one  of  his  souls. 
whereupon  some  member  of  the  family  goes  out,  carrying  a  lantern 
to  light  the  spirit  back,  and  luring  it  to  return  by  a  peculiar 
anxious  cry. 

When  a  person  is  lying  at  the  point  of  death,  his  (oi  her)  very 


20G        THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

best  clothes  are  laid  out  on  the  bed,  and  after  his  friends  have 
washed  him  with  warm  water  in  which  aromatic  leaves  have  boon 
boiled,  he  is  dressed  from  head  to  foot,  in  order  that  he  may  appear 
in  the  spirit-world  to  the  very  best  advantage.  Should  he  unfor- 
tunately die  before  being  thus  dressed,  it  is  necessary  to  call  in  the 
aid  of  a  very  low  caste  called  the  Ng  'Tsock,  whose  position  is  SO 
degraded  that  they  are  prohibited  from  worshipping  in  public 
temples,  and  who  cannot  be  made  more  unclean  even  by  touching 
a  corpse.  These,  therefore,  are  summoned  to  wash  and  dress  the 
dead,  while  the  relations  kneel  around. 

Of  the  importance  attached  to  this  last  change  of  raiment,  we 
have  touching  proof  in  a  letter  addressed,  just  before  his  death,  by 
the  Viceroy  of  Kwang-si  to  the  Emperor,  giving  up  the  seals  of 
office.  He  bemoans  that  having  commanded  his  Majesty's  forces 
for  several  months,  he  had  failed  to  subdue  the  Taiping  rebellion. 
This  failure,  he  says,  "  shows  my  want  of  fidelity :  my  not  being 
able  to  support  my  aged  mother  shows  my  want  of  filial  piety. 
After  that  I  your  servant  am  dead,  I  have  ordered  my  son  Kae  to 
bury  me  in  common  clothes  as  an  indication  of  my  fault." 

The  dressing  having  been  accomplished,  certain  things  are  placed 
in  the  mouth  of  the  corpse :  these  vary  with  his  rank.  A  man- 
darin of  the  highest  grade  is  provided  with  a  piece  of  gold,  a  piece 
of  silver,  a  bit  of  jade,  a  pearl,  and  a  precious  stone — a  very  good 
mouthful !  On  the  next  four  ranks  are  bestowed  small  jade  orna- 
ments and  a  bit  of  gold ;  still  descending  in  the  scale,  the  jade  is 
omitted,  and  small  pieces  of  gold  and  silver  suffice.  Still  smaller 
folk  are  entitled  to  three  bits  of  silver,  one  bit  of  silver,  down  to 
three  copper  cash  or  three  sorts  of  grain. 

When  a  man  dies,  the  first  care  of  his  friends  is  to  place  at  the 
door  of  the  house  a  cup  of  cold  water — a  custom  for  which  no  satis- 
factory reason  is  assigned.  Then  a  suit  of  really  good  clothes  must 
be  burnt,  together  with  most  of  the  dead  man's  wardrobe — his  boots 
and  shoes,  bed  and  bedding,  horses  and  houses,  sedan-chair,  opium- 
pipe,  melon  seeds,  and  any  other  luxuries  or  necessaries  which  he 
appreciated  in  this  world,  for  all  these  things  will  be  equally  neces- 
sary in  the  spirit-world,  where  they  cannot  be  obtained,  though 
they  can  so  easily  be  transmitted  thither  by  the  simple  process  of 
burning  thorn.  So  the  newly-arrived  dead  is  absolutely  dependent 
on  his  male  heir  for  all  these  things;  and  his  reception  in  the 
spirit-world  will  be  considerably  better  if  he  arrives  well  clothed, 
than  it  would  be  should  ho  appear  in  beggarly  want. 

Many  and  groat  are  the  expenses  to  which  a  family  is  subjected 


PLEASURE    OF    OWNING    A    FINE    COFFIN.  207 

through  the  death  of  one  member.  Xot  only,  as  we  have  seen, 
must  they  immediately  burn  all  his  best  clothes  (as  it  is  understood 
that  genuine  articles  should  be  sacrificed  for  his  original  outfit, 
though  paper  representations  are  equally  efficacious  later),  but  it  is 
deemed  important  that  all  funeral  arrangements  should  be  t lie  very 
best  that  can  be  provided,  and  the  survivors  often  impoverish  them- 
selves for  years  to  provide  what  is  considered  a  decent  burial.  The 
corpse  must  be  arrayed  in  new  clothes,  with  a  cap  and  satin  boots 
(such  a  dress  as  the  deceased  would  have  hired  for  the  day  had  he 
been  going  to  attend  a  feast). 

As  to  the  coffin,  the  price  of  which  may  range  from  £5  to  £500, 
it  is  essential  that  it  should  be  as  solid  and  expensive  as  possible. 
But  these  are  often  provided  beforehand,  for  dutiful  sons  will  stint 
themselves  for  years  in  order  to  present  their  parents  on  their  sixty- 
first  birthday  with  really  handsome  coffins — cheerful  1  nil  Inlay  pres- 
ents, which  thenceforth  form  part  of  the  household  furniture;  and 
should  the  family  have  occasion  to  "flit,"  the  ponderous  boards  are 
carried  with  them,  no  matter  at  what  inconvenience. 

In  the  hill  districts  you  may  chance  to  unit  -Mine  great  official 
on  the  march.  The  ladies  of  his  zenana  are  carefully  stowed  away 
in  covered  chairs,  and  this  domestic  procession  is  completed  by  a 
small  caravan  of  mules  laden  with  "  longevity  boards,"  ready  for 
all  emergencies  !  So  essential  is  the  provision  of  a  good  coffin,  that 
the  Chinese  form  of  insurance,  instead  of  having  reference  to  the 
comfort  of  old  age,  goes  to  entitle  the  subscriber  to  a  coffin  ami 
grave-clothes.  To  secure  this  he  must  for  sixteen  years  be,  a  mem- 
ber of  a  "  Long  Life  Loan  Company,"  his  annual  subscription  being 
something  less  than  a  shilling.  Benevolent  persons  present  coffins 
to  the  temples  for  the  use  of  the  very  poor. 

The  adoption  of  Christianity  nowise  lessens  the  pleasure  of  being 
well  provided  in  this  respect,  any  more  than  it  lessens  the  satisfac- 
tion of  a  good  Scotch  housewife  of  the  old  school  in  the  winding- 
sheets  so  carefully  stored  for  her  own  last  sleep  and  that  of  her 
gudeman.  There  is  at  this  moment  a  dear  old  Chinese  grannie 
living  in  refuge  at  the  English  Mission  here,  having  been  rejected 
by  all  her  kindred,  save  one  daughter,  on  account  of  her  earnest 
acceptance  of  Christ.  The  daughter  earns  three  dollars  a-week, 
which  keeps  them  both,  and  the  old  lady  is  quite  happy  in  the 
possession  of  a  good  coilin  wherein  to  leave  her  poor  old  soul-ease 
when  the  glad  summons  "Home"  shall  come  at  last. 

Of  course  in  this,  as  in  all  other  tropical  or  semi-tropical  coun- 
tries, funeral  arrangements  have  to  be  made  pretty  rapidly  when 


208  THE    OFFERINGS   OF   THE   DEAD. 

the  momenl  of  death  does  come,  so  it  is  well  to  be  prepared.  With- 
in the  coffin  is  placed  a  layer  of  lime  on  which  the  head  is  laid, 
and  above  liim  is  -|>n  nl  a  shroud  of  white  silk.  Supposing  him 
to  be  a  wealthy  person,  several  coverings  are  added,  which,  although 
each  lined  wit h  white  silk  in  token  of  mourning,  are  of  brilliant 
colours,  varying  with  the  rank  of  the  deceased,  bright  red  betoken- 
ing the  three  hi-hest  grades,  dark  red,  green,  purple,  ash-colour, 
and   white   denoting  the  descending  scale. 

Noblemen  of  the  five  highest  grades  are  entitled  to  have  their 
coffins  coated  with  red  lacquer,  and  the  highest  of  all,  answering 
to  our  dukes,  may  further  decorate  them  with  a  pattern  of  golden 
flowers.  Similar  sumptuary  laws  regulate  every  detail  of  funeral, 
as  of  all  other  ceremonial  customs. 

The  precise  number  of  sheep  to  be  sacrificed,  of  tables  of  offer- 
ings to  be  spread,  and  the  sums  of  sham  money  to  be  burnt,  are 
eli  arly  laid  down  for  persons  of  every  shade  of  rank.  So  also  is 
the  precise  amount  of  land  which  each  may  cover  with  his  monu- 
ment, and  the  height  and  thickness  of  stone  slabs  to  be  used  (all 
of  which  are  calculated  by  multiples  of  9).  The  tomb  of  a  great 
man  may  cover  a  radius  of  90  feet  from  a  given  point;  a  small 
man  may  not  exceed  a  radius  of  9.  A  ducal  slab  is  36  inches 
wide  and  90  inches  high.  The  stone  figures  and  stone  animals 
which  guard  the  approach  are  also  strictly  apportioned  to  such  only 
as  are  entitled  to  such  honour. 

The  absence  of  ill-omened  black  from  a  Chinese  funeral,  with 
the  exception  of  the  coating  of  black  lacquer  on  the  coffins  of  minor 
mandarins,  takes  from  it  all  the  sombre  gloom  which  we  associate 
with  such.  Sometimes  the  hearse  or  bier  is  canopied  with  scarlet 
silk,  and  decorated  with  much  gilding,  while  the  men  who  bear  it 
(often  a  large  company)  are  perhaps  dressed  in  green,  with  spots  of 
bright  colours.  In  the  house  of  the  deceased  a  streamer  of  dark 
crimson,  floating  from  a  bamboo,  is  placed  near  the  tablet  of  the 
deceased,  and  on  it  his  various  titles  are  written  in  letters  of  gold. 
Friends  send  gifts  of  blue  or  white  satin  banners,  with  adulatory 
sentences  concerning  the  dead,  also  in  golden  characters.  In  the 
case  of  wealthy  folk  all  these  banners  are  very  large  and  handsome, 
and,  being  ranged  round  the  walls,  produce  quite  a  gaily  decorative 
effect. 

In  the  first  agonies  of  grief,  visiting-cards  of  plain  white  paper 
are  used  in  place  of  the  ordinary  large  crimson  cards.  After  a 
while  salmon-coloured  cards  are  substituted,  on  which  the  mourner 
is  described  as  "  the  man  in  dutiful  grief."     When  he  enters  on 


FUNERAL    OBSERVANCES.  209 

the  third  year  of  filial  mourning  the  red  cards  are  resumed,  hut 
marked  with  a  character  descriptive  of  mitigated  affliction.  Any 
letters  "written  during  this  period  must  he  upon  white  paper,  in 
token  of  mourning,  the  envelope  being  enfolded  in  a  strip  of  pale 
pink  or  huff-coloured  paper. 

Amongst  other  symptoms  of  mourning,  a  mandarin  removes  the 
button  from  his  hat  (or  if  he  chance  to  be  an  Imperial  prince  he 
removes  his  crimson  silken  knot),  no  decoration  of  any  sort  being 
worn  except  the  tassel,  and  the  ordinary  red  tassel  is  replaced  by  a 
white  one.     If  he  is  a  rider,  he  covers  his  saddle  with  white. 

The  front  of  the  head  is  left  unshorn,  producing  a  very  untidy 
appearance.  In  the  case  of  mourning  for  the  Emperor,  no  head- 
shaving  is  allowed  for  a  hundred  days — only  the  combing  and 
plaiting  of  tails.  In  truth,  the  death  of  an  Emperor  weighs  seri- 
ously on  the  domestic  arrangements  of  the  people.  For  one  thing, 
no  marriage  may  be  contracted  for  twenty-seven  months  from  the 
ill-fated  day,  the  penalty  for  disobedience  being  decapitation — the 
most  ignominious  of  all  forms  of  execution  in  Chinese  estimation. 

Ere  the  deceased  is  concealed  from  the  sight  of  his  friends,  he 
lies  in  state  with  a  fan  in  one  hand,  and  in  the  other  a  strip  of 
paper  with  a  prayer  inscribed  on  it.  Thus  he  remains  for  several 
days,  during  which  the  relations  feast  and  mourn  by  turns,  musi- 
cians play  shrill  music  on  discordant  pipes,  and  the  priests  do 
"joss-pigeon,"  the  low  class  Ng  'Tsock  having  previously  scared 
all  evil  spirits  from  the  room  by  violently  beating  the  floor  at  each 
corner  with  a  large  hammer. 

Beneath  the  coffin,  which  stands  on  trestles,  is  set  a  lamp,  which 
is  kept  burning  day  and  night  to  give  light  to  the  soul  (one  of  the 
three)  which  remains  beside  the  corpse.  The  oil  in  the  lamp  is 
constantly  replenished  by  the  chief  mourner.  If  the  deceased  has 
a  wife  and  family,  all  absent  members  are  summoned  to  the  house, 
where  they  must  on  arriving  creep  about  on  all  fours.  Chairs  and 
beds  are  prohibited  luxuries  for  the  first  seven  days.  The  family 
must  sit  on  the  floor,  and  sleep  on  mats  spread  near  the  coffin. 
No  cooking  may  be  done  in  the  house,  so  the  mourners  are  de- 
pendent on  the  voluntary  contributions  of  their  neighbours,  and 
whatever  is  sent  to  them  must  be  eaten  with  their  fingers,  as  the 
intensity  of  their  grief  does  not  allow  of  using  chop-sticks. 

The  amount  of  merely  physical  distress  involved  by  the  death  of 
a  parent  is  truly  serious.  Thus  a  great  man  announces  the  death 
of  his  father,  by  sending  to  each  of  his  friends  an  enormous  card 
(really  a  sheet   of  paper)  about  a  yard  and   a  half  long  and  broad 

O 


210        THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

in  proportion,  whereon  he  states  that  he  and  all  his  relatives  and 
descendants  are  on  their  knees  before  the  coffin,  heating  their  heads 
upon  the  ground  and  weeping  tears  of  blood;  smaller  people  send 
out  similar  invitations  on  light-brown  paper,  in  an  envelope  of  the 
same;  certain  days  are  named  on  which  (on  presentation  of  this 
caul)  friends  who  wish  to  mourn  (i.e.,  to  pay  a  visit  of  condol' 
will  be  admitted.  They  are  received  by  the  unfortunate  chief 
mourner  crouching  on  his  hands  and  knees,  sobbing,  weeping,  and 
groaning,  and  then  relapsing  into  howls.  This  sort  of  thing  is 
resumed  as  often  as  any  friend  happens  to  call  in  the  course  of  the 
hundred  days  of  filial  mourning  ! 

When  it  becomes  positively  necessary  to  close  the  coffin,  its 
edges  are  closely  cemented  with  mortar,  and,  unless  the  funeral  is 
to  occur  immediately,  the  coffin  is  varnished  and  deposited  in  a 
place  of  honour,  either  in  the  home  itself  or  in  one  of  the  small 
houses  built  for  this  purpose  near  the  cemeteries.  Thus  it  may  lie 
for  years  awaiting  a  lucky  hour  for  burial,  and  night  and  morning 
dutiful  hands  must  burn  incense  to  the  spirit  of  the  dead ;  and  at 
all  festivals,  paper  money  and  clothes  must  also  be  burnt,  and  the 
priests  must  receive  large  offerings,  in  order  that  by  the  fervour  of 
their  prayers  the  soul  may  be  delivered  from  the  Buddhist  Purga- 
tory and  enter  the  rest  of  Paradise. 

At  the  end  of  the  aforesaid  hundred  days,  the  tablet  of  the  dead 
is  placed  upon  the  ancestral  altar,  and  the  dutiful  son  reasons  with 
his  parent,  and  points  out  that  as  the  body  which  he  formerly 
inhabited  has  now  been  dead  for  one  hundred  days,  it  is  full  time 
that  he  should  take  his  place  amongst  the  other  ancestors.  Then  all 
present  do  homage  to  the  tablet,  and  make  a  sacred  bonfire  of  their 
deep  mourning  clothes.  They  now  assume  blue  instead  of  white — 
clothes,  shoes,  and  hair-ties  being  all  blue. 

A  provident  Chinaman  is  not  content  with  superintending  the 
making  of  his  own  coffin.  He  also  endeavours  during  his  lifetime 
to  secure  a  last  resting-place  for  himself  and  each  member  of  his 
family.  So  a  geomancer  is  employed  at  a  high  rate  of  pay  to  fix 
upon  a  lucky  site  for  the  grave,  or  as  a  Chinaman  would  say,  to 
ascertain  at  what  spot  the  feng-shui  is  most  favourable.  When 
this  has  been  decided,  the  piece  of  land  is  bought,  vaults  are  pre- 
pared, and  a  mound  in  the  shape  of  a  horse-shoe  is  erected  above 
each  grave.  Hence  many  of  those  which  we  see  await  persons  who 
are  still  living.  It  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  secure  a  spot 
well  shielded  from  the  baneful,  blighting  influences  of  the  north, 
but  fully  exposed  to  all  sweet  influences  from  the  south.     Such  a 


THE    CITY    OF    THE    DEAD.  211 

grave  is  so  well  pleasing  to  the  dead,  that  the  prosperity  of  the  liv- 
ing holding  such  ground  is  almost  assured. 

But  it  does  not  follow  that  the  dead  will  at  once  he  carried  to 
his  rest  in  this  nicely  prepared  grave.  The  priests  and  the  /-  ng- 
shui  professors  do  not  allow  their  prey  to  escape  so  easily.  The 
professor,  whose  long  experience  cannot  be  questioned,  declares  that 
the  influences  of  air  and  water  are  unfavourable,  so  the  coffin  must 
he  temporarily  deposited  in  the  nearest  City  of  the  1  >ead — strange 
resting-places,  which,  I  believe,  have  a  place  in  all  Chinese  towns. 

At  Canton  I  spent  a  long  day  in  the  City  of  the  Dead,  wander- 
ing in  the  great  wilderness  of  nameless  graves.1  Here,  in  Foo- 
Chow,  there  is  a  similar  city,  though  on  somewhat  a  smaller  scale. 
It  lies  in  the  grassy  valley  at  the  foot  of  this  green  hill.  In  each 
case  I  entered  a  walled  enclosure,  and,  passing  by  a  temple  with 
gilded  images  at  the  gate,  found  myself  in  a  labyrinth  of  streets, 
arranged  just  as  in  a  city  of  the  living — streets  of  small  houses,  in 
each  of  which  from  one  to  three  ponderous  coffins  are  deposited, 
there  to  wait  for  months — perhaps  for  many  years — till  the  geo- 
mancers  declare  the  feng-shui  to  be  favourable. 

A  large  screen  is  set  between  the  coffins  and  the  door,  doubtless 
to  check  the  travelling  propensities  of  the  dead,  who,  as  we  have 
seen,  are  supposed  to  have  a  fancy  for  moving  in  straight  lines,  and 
object  to  going  round  a  corner. 

For  all  these  houses  a  monthly  rent  is  paid.  Sometimes,  after 
this'has  continued  for  many  years,  and  still  the  feng-shui  professor 
forbids  burial,  the  survivors  grow  weary,  and  stop  payment.  Then 
the  coffins  are  removed  to  a  suburb  of  Avretched  outhouses,  there  to 
await  permission  from  the  authorities  for  burial  somewhere  on  the 
barren  hills  which  form  the  vast  cemetery,  all  dotted  with  count- 
less graves  of  the  nameless  dead.  Even  these  wretched  huts,  to 
which  the  unremunerative  coffins  are  banished,  are  precious  to  some 
of  the  living — miserable  beggars  who  creep  here  at  night  to  lind 
sleeping  quarters  beside  the  dead. 

In  the  City  of  the  Dead  each  little  house  contains  an  altar,  with 
very  cheap  altar-vases  of  the  coarsest  green  pottery.  Large  silk  or 
paper  fruits  and  lanterns  hang  from  the  roof,  and  life-sized  paper 
figures  guard  the  four  corners  of  each  room.  In  some  there  are 
really  gorgeous  scarlet  and  gold  state  umbrellas,  but  all  are  of 
pasteboard,  so  that  there  is  nothing  to  tempi  thieves  to  break  into 
this  Silent  City,  or  to  molest  the  fine  old  Buddhist  priest  who 
remains  in  charge  of  the  place. 

1  See  chap.  iii. 


212        THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

Ere  the  coffin  is  carried  to  this  place  of  waiting,  the  priests  com'', 
tn  perform  a  funeral  service  in  the  house  of  the  deceased,  which 

(in  the  case  of  ;i  wealthy  man)  is  all  draped  with  unbleached  cot- 
ton— curtains  of  the  same  hanging  before  the  doors.  The  widows 
and  ut liir  chief  mourners  wear  sackcloth,  with  a  head-dress  of  the 
same,  whilst,  other  relatives  wear  unbleached  cotton,  white  cloth 
shoes,  and  the  men  have  their  plaits  tied  with  white  cotton  braid. 
( >n  the  coffin  rests  an  ornamental  shrine  containing  the  tablets  of 
the  deceased.  In  front  of  the  coffin  is  placed  a  screen  similar  to 
those  iii  the  houses  in  the  Cities  of  the  Dead,  which  are  supposed 
tn  check  roving  spirits.  Before  this  is  set  a  long  table  laden  with 
lighted  candles,  incense-sticks,  offerings  of  food,  dishes  of  sweet- 
meats and  preserved  fruits,  heaped  in  pyramids.  On  other  tables 
are  arranged  perhaps  thirty  bowls  of  all  manner  of  meats  and  an 
incense-burner. 

Half-a-dozen  priests,  some  in  yellow  and  some  in  black  robes, 
chant  prayers,  while  one  periodically  rings  a  small  bell,  and  another 
incessantly  beats  a  skull-shaped  drum.  Meanwhile  a  company  of 
musicians  keep  up  an  intolerable  din  on  divers  unmusical  instru- 
ments, and  the  women  wail  at  intervals.  The  mourners  make 
obeisance  to  the  ancestral  tablet,  and  burn  incense-sticks  before  it. 

If  the  dead  has  been  of  such  rank  as  to  entitle  him  to  such 
honour  in  the  world  to  come,  a  whole  company  of  life-sized  figures, 
representing  mandarin  attendants,  are  ranged  in  the  outer  court, 
some  bearing  the  large  scarlet  umbrellas  which  invariably  figure  in 
the  processions  of  great  men.  A  cardboard  horse  and  a  fine  model 
of  a  house  are  probably  among  the  useful  objects  which  swell  the 
bonfire,  whose  flames  waft  both  attendants  and  goods  to  the  land 
whither  the  dead  has  passed.  Such  a  house  may  be  about  10  feet 
in  height,  and  has  a  frontage  of  12  feet  or  more.  It  contains 
reception-rooms,  sleeping-rooms,  and  halls,  and  is  furnished  with 
pasteboard  tables  and  chairs,  whereon  are  seated  pasteboard  models 
of  the  dead  and  his  attendants.  His  boat  and  boatmen,  his  sedan- 
chair  and  bearers,  are  all  ranged  round  this  house,  which  would  be 
a  source  of  endless  delight  to  English  children  as  the  perfection  of 
a  doll-house.  The  priests  sprinkle  rice  and  wheat  on  the  roof,  and 
then  with  much  bell-ringing  and  ceremony  they  set  fire  to  the 
whole  concern. 

For  forty-nine  days  the  mourning  continues,  and  on  every 
seventh  day  the  women  of  the  family  assemble  to  wail  piteously, 
while  they  rehearse  all  the  merits  of  the  deceased.  About  a  fort- 
night after  death  the  spirit  is  supposed  to  return  to  his  old  house; 


PROPITIATION    OF    THE    DEAD.  213 

but  instead  of  coming  quietly,  just  to  visit  his  relations  in  a  peace- 
able fashion,  he"  is  invariably  escorted  by  a  host  of  other  spirits, 
who  are  exceedingly  unwelcome  to  the  living.  Of  course  the 
priests — either  Taouist  or  Buddhist — are  called  in  to  exorcise  the 
dead  man's  new  friends  and  drive  them  from  the  house.  So  for 
three  days  and  three  nights  a  grand  ceremonial  is  kept  up. 

The  principal  room  in  the  house  is  stripped  of  its  ordinary  fur- 
niture, and  is  decorated  with  rich  ecclesiastical  hangings,  embroid- 
ered with  various  symbols,  of  which  the  spirits  are  supposed  to 
stand  greatly  in  awe.  In  the  centre  of  this  room  the  ancestral 
tablet  is  placed  on  a  raised  table,  and  all  the  relatives  and  friends 
of  the  family  assemble  to  worship  before  it,  seeking  by  most  humble 
confession  and  humiliation  to  appease  any  anger  which  the  deceased 
may  feel  towards  them,  and  promising  every  sort  of  good  deed  in 
time  to  come. 

Meanwhile  five,  seven,  or  nine  priests,  in  gorgeous  vestments, 
march  round  the  prostrate  worshippers,  chanting  and  bowing,  and 
ringing  their  small  bells. 

In  a  vacant  room  a  table  is  set,  loaded  with  good  things,  and 
with  chop-sticks  placed  all  round  it.  When  the  family  party  are 
about  to  feed,  the  chief  priest  enters  this  room,  and  waving  his 
staff  of  office,  pronounces  an  incantation,  and  invites  the  spirits  to 
come  and  eat,  but  desires  them  to  do  no  mischief.  "When,  on  the 
third  day,  the  ceremonies  are  concluded,  he  repeats  his  incanta- 
tions, and  pointing  to  the  north,  south,  east,  and  west,  commands 
all  the  spirits  to  depart,  and  on  no  account  to  presume  to  disturb 
the  peace  of  the  family.  As  this  injunction  is  accompanied  by 
much  beating  of  gongs  and  a  grand  discharge  of  fire-crackers,  the 
spirit-guests  are  so  much  alarmed  that  they  forthwith  take  flight, 
and  the  grateful  family  have  to  pay  a  very  large  bill  for  this 
priestly  deliverance  from  their  unseen  foes.  These  days  of  mourn- 
ing often  involve  an  expenditure  of  many  thousands  of  dollars  ! 

But  their  expenses  are  by  no  means  to  end  with  the  seven  times 
seven  days.  On  the  contrary,  so  long  as  there  is  a  chance  of 
extorting  money  from  the  survivors,  so  long  will  the  well-known 
oriental  custom  of  "squeeze"  be  carried  on,  therefore  the  power  of 
mitigating  purgatorial  pains  is  next  brought  into  play. 

It  is  supposed  that  life  in  the  invisible  World  of  Darkness  is  a 
counterpart  of  that  in  this  earthly  "World  of  Light.  Every  condi- 
tion of  life  on  earth  is  there  reproduced.  From  the  Emperor  down 
to  the  smallest  official  each  grade  is  represented,  and  the  man  who 
dies  while  holding  any  Government  rank  receives  similar  standing 


214  THE    OFI'KIIIXCS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

in  the  spirit-world.  J I  is  wife  also  retains  her  honoured  position. 
Hi'iicc,  on  the  death  of  such  an  one,  all  the  municipal  authorities 
must  of  necessity  go  to  worship  at  her  tomb  on  certain  days.  The 
Learned  man  who  holds  a  literary  degree  is  credited  with  the  same 
in  his  new  abode,  and  is  entitled  to  the  same  relative  respect  as 
would  be  due  to  his  rank  on  earth.  (Considering  that  many 
Btudents  go  np  for  examination  again  and  again,  year  after  year, 
till  they  die  of  sheer  old  age  and  hard  mental  work,  it  is  satisfac- 
tory to  know  that  their  hardly-earned  honours  do  not  end  with 
this  short  life  !) 

These  are  the  happy  and  distinguished  few.  The  mass  of  men 
pass  away  to  become  "  spirits  in  prison,"  subject  to  all  the  pains 
and  persecutions  which  the  Chinese  have  such  good  cause  to  as- 
sociate with  confinement  in  their  own  most  horrible  prisons.  From 
the  moment  of  death  the  spirit  is  supposed  to  be  at  the  mercy  of 
beings  answering  to  the  very  venal  police  and  prison  authorities  of 
earth.  These  accordingly  must  be  bribed  freely  to  induce  them  to 
show  mercy  to  the  captives,  and  they  include  a  whole  army  of  de- 
tectives, attendants,  door-keepers,  messengers,  and  executioners. 

The  latter  carry  out  the  decrees  of  the  gods,  and  the  punish- 
ments awarded  to  evil-doers  are  only  intensified  editions  of  the  tor- 
tures practised  on  the  living  in  Chinese  courts  of  justice.  In 
several  Chinese  temples  I  have  seen  a  hall  set  apart  to  represent 
the  torments  of  the  ten  Buddhist  hells,  and  more  repulsive  cham- 
bers of  horror  could  not  possibly  be  conceived.  The  penalties 
assigned  for  every  form  of  sin  are  there  exemplified  by  groups  of 
dolls  supposed  to  be  human  culprits  undergoing  every  form  of 
torture  which  the  ingenuity  of  devils  could  devise.  Some  are 
being  sawn  asunder,  having  first  been  bound  between  two  planks 
— others  are  thrown  into  a  rice-pounding  mill  and  crushed,  men 
are  crucified,  women  torn  to  pieces  by  devils.  Some  are  devoured 
by  hideous  and  repulsive  reptiles,  others  are  thrown  into  caldrons 
of  boiling  oil. 

There  is  no  known  crime  for  which  a  special  torture  has  not 
been  here  devised.  Priests  who  have  decoyed  boys  from  their 
homes  to  bring  them  up  as  monks,  are  frozen  in  ice-ponds.  Sui- 
cides are  tormented  with  unquenchable  thirst  and  gnawing  hunger, 
and  an  ever-recurring  consciousness  of  the  agony  of  mind  which 
led  to  their  self-destruction  (and  yet  some  suicides  are  greatly 
honoured !)  Fraudulent  trustees  are  suffocated  in  black  sand- 
clouds.  Unfaithful  wives,  undutiful  children,  false  soothsayers, 
scribes  who  have  undertaken  to  write  letters  for  the  ignorant  and 


THE  BUDDHIST  PURGATORY.  215 

have  deceived  them,  persons  who  have  failed  to  make  way  in  the 
street  for  the  blind  or  the  aged,  sacrilegious  thieves  who  have 
scraped  the  gilding  off  idols,  men  who  have  printed  bad  books  or 
painted  wicked  pictures,  men  who  have  sown  discord  in  families — 
these  and  a  thousand  other  evil-doers  have  their  exact  penalty 
duly  apportioned. 

From  the  summit  of  a  high  pagoda  they  are  compelled  ("as 
Sorrow's  Crown  of  Sorrow  ")  to  look  back  at  the  happy  scenes  of 
their  early  innocence,  and  there  behold  in  a  mirror  the  semblance 
of  the  loathsome  reptiles  whose  forms  they  must  assume  on  return- 
ing to  earth  after  long  ages  of  torment,  such  as  being  incessantly 
devoured  by  wild  beasts,  torn  by  red-hot  pincers,  plunged  in  pools 
of  blood,  having  their  tongues  torn  out,  and  any  other  pleasant 
pastime  which  can  be  devised  by  malevolent  imps.  There  are 
devils  with  pitchforks  to  encourage  such  as  shrink  from  the  very 
material  sea  of  fire,  and  the  whole  hideous  scene  is  overlooked  by 
a  gigantic  and  most  repulsive  image,  with  blood  streaming  from 
eyes  and  nostrils,  who  is  ever  on  the  watch  to  seize  the  souls  of 
the  dying. 

Knowing,  as  Ave  do,  how  many  a  poor  Irish  family  will  starve 
themselves  sooner  than  fail  to  pay  for  the  Masses  whereby  the 
priests  promise  to  obtain  the  liberation  from  Purgatory  of  some 
loved  friend,  we  need  scarcely  wonder  that  with  such  represen- 
tations as  these  to  stimulate  the  sympathies  of  the  living,  the 
Chinese  priests,  whether  Taouist  or  Buddhist,  herein  lind  a  most 
profitable  source  of  revenue.  For  though  it  is  considered  to  be 
almost  a  matter  of  course  that  the  dead  should  have  to  undergo  a 
considerable  period  of  purification  in  Purgatory,  their  pains  may 
be  greatly  modified  and  shortened  by  the  generous  offerings  of 
their  descendants ;  and  well  do  the  priests  know  that  should  the 
male  relations  incline  to  economy  in  this  matter,  they  can  extract 
large  monies  by  working  on  the  sympathy  and  affection  of  the 
women. 

Consequently  it  is  on  the  influence  of  the  wives  and  mothers  of 
China  that  the  priests  chiefly  rely  for  the  maintenance  of  their 
lucrative  trade  in  purgatorial  pains,  and  until  foreign  ladies  can 
acquire  such  influence  with  Chinese  ladies  as  shall  emancipate 
their  minds  from  this  priestly  thraldom,  the  work  of  spreading 
Christianity  in  China  will  necessarily  be  slow,  and  its  difficulties 
wellnigh  insuperable. 

Naturally  this  heartless  trade,  is  most  successfully  plied  while 
the  family  are  still  in  the  first  depths  of  woe.      Probably  ere  Long 


21G        THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

it  will  be  revealed  to  some  priest  (who  from  his  well-known 
spirituality  is  certainly  deep  in  the  counsels  of  the  purgatorial 
gods)  that  Hi"  poor  dead  man  is  in  sore  tribulation,  ami   indirect 

means  are  found  to  convey  to  the  widows  or  mother  of  the  dead 
the  pitiful  tidings  that  their  dead  deceased  is  in  a  deplorable  con- 
dition in  the  dark  spirit-world,  and  is  likely  ere  long  to  be  made 
still  more  miserable. 

The  family,  greatly  moved  by  this  sad  revelation,  send  for  the 
priest,  and  beg  him  to  investigate  the  matter,  and  see  what  can  be 
done.  In  due  time  his  reverence  reports  that  undoubtedly  the 
poor  man  must  have  been  a  greater  sinner  than  they  supposed, 
and  that  he  lies  bound  in  a  place  of  torment.  The  only  thing  to 
be  done  for  his  relief  will  be  to  hold  another  three  days'  course  of 
meritorious  service,  on  a  more  magnificent  scale  than  before,  and 
at  a  heavier  cost. 

The  family  anxiously  inquire  for  what  sum  they  can  obtain  such 
a  service.  The  priest  having  carefully  calculated  the  largest  sum 
he  can  possibly  hope  to  extract,  fixes  the  sum  at  (let  us  say)  a 
thousand  tael  (the  value  of  the  tael  fluctuates  with  the  price  of 
silver ;  it  used  to  be  equivalent  to  about  6s.  8d.,  now  it  is  only 
worth  about  4s.)  The  wretched  family  declare  that  it  is  impos- 
sible for  them  to  raise  such  a  sum.  The  priest  regrets  their  in- 
ability to  do  so,  but  reminds  them  of  the  sufferings  of  their  rela- 
tion. After  a  family  conference  they  offer  him  half  the  sum. 
This  is  peremptorily  refused.  Presently  they  raise  the  offer  to 
two-thirds.  After  much  hesitation  he  agrees  to  undertake  the 
work  for  that  sum,  though  he  states  that  it  will  be  far  more 
difficult  to  accomplish  it. 

Again  the  chief  room  in  the  house  is  stripped  and  decorated 
with  temple  hangings.  The  monumental  tablet  of  the  sufferer  is 
placed  in  the  centre  of  the  hall,  surrounded  by  little  idols.  Day 
and  night  a  company  of  priests  march  slowly  and  solemnly  round 
and  round  the  tablet,  chanting  their  litanies  to  an  accompaniment 
of  ecclesiastical  drums  and  gongs.  Meanwhile  many  anxious 
friends  assemble,  and  they  and  the  priests  must  all  be  well  enter- 
tained for  several  days  at  the  expense  of  the  mourners. 

Probably  about  the  evening  of  the  second  day,  the  principal 
priest  present  sadly  and  solemnly  announces  to  all  present  that, 
after  these  endeavours,  their  poor  kinsman  is  still  in  the  same  sad 
plight,  and  the  authorities  in  the  spirit-world  will  on  no  account 
release  him  for  so  small  a  sum ;  so  that,  unless  the  balance  can  be 
raised,  all   that  has  been  done  has  been  in  vain.     The  afflicted 


PURCHASING    RELEASE    FROM    PURGATORY.  217 

family  again  hold  conclave.  The  women  are  always  tender-hearted 
to  the  suffering  dead,  and  social  custom  and  fear  of  the  vengeance 
of  the  dead  compel  the  men  to  give  in,  so  if  there  really  is  no  more 
money  in  the  house,  they  go  forth  to  borrow  the  needful  sum,  and 
on  their  return  hand  it  to  the  chuckling  priests.  The  incantations 
are  then  renewed  with  far  greater  energy  than  before — the  bell 
rings  more  frequently,  the  drums  are  struck  incessantly,  the  weeping 
family  are  wrought  to  a  pitch  of  the  highest  excitement. 

This  continues  till  the  third  day,  when  again  the  abbot,  or  the 
chief  priest  present,  inquires  of  the  spirits  what  causes  the  delay, 
and  so  he  ascertains  that  the  poor  sufferer  has  been  uplifted  to  the 
very  brink  of  the  pit,  but  cannot  get  out — that  he  is  clinging  to 
the  brink  in  imminent  danger,  fully  discharged  by  the  real  judicial 
authorities,  but  detained  by  the  officials  in  charge,  who  will  not  let 
him  go  till  they  receive  a  bribe.  This  information  fully  appeals  to 
those  who  know  the  customs  of  Chinese  prisons,  so  the  family  never 
doubt  its  truth,  but  in  frantic  grief  collect  whatever  jewels  or  other 
treasures  they  possess,  and  carrying  them  to  the  pawnbroker,  con- 
trive to  raise  the  sum  required,  whereupon  the  priests  once  more 
set  to  work,  and  about  nightfall  announce  that  the  spirit  has  been 
released,  whereupon  a  volley  of  fire-crackers  is  discharged  and  gongs 
are  beaten  frantically  to  warn  the  spirit  to  flee  far  away  from  the 
horrible  prison. 

For  a  while  the  family  are  left  in  peace,  but  they  have  no  assur- 
ance that,  should  they  increase  in  wealth  and  become  worth  a  second 
plucking,  they  will  not  be  subjected  to  another  revelation  from  the 
spirit-world,  which  custom  and  public  opinion  would  not  suffer 
them  to  ignore. 

For  the  dead  have  no  Haven  of  Eest  to  which  they  may  attain 
to  be  free  from  danger.  There  is  no  Lord  of  Justice  and  Mercy 
in  the  world  beyond  the  grave.  Theoretically  the  Buddhist  may 
attain  to  a  blissful  Nirvana,  but  the  four  hundred  millions  of  China 
believe  practically  that  the  departed  roam  at  large  in  a  realm  where 
devils  and  demons  rule,  and  where  they  are  as  entirely  dependent 
on  the  gifts  of  their  friends  as  are  the  captives  in  a  Chinese  prison. 
Hence  the  obligation  of  ancestor-worship. 

Certainly  a  man  endowed  with  much  forethought  can  make  some 
provision  for  his  own  future  comfort.  The  priests  have  consider- 
ately organised  a  bank  for  the  spirit-world.  To  this  the  provident 
may  remit  large  sums  during  their  lifetime,  and  can  draw  on  tin- 
hank  as  soon  as  they  reach  the  Dark  Country.  The  priests  period- 
ically announce  their  intention  of  remitting  money  on  a  certain  day. 


218        THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

and   invite  all  who  have  any  to  deposit  or  bring  it.     All  who  feel 

doubtful  of  the  generosity  of  their  next  heirs,  accordingly  come  and 
buy  from  the  priests,  as  much  as  they  can  afford,  of  the  tinfoil  paper 
money  which  is  current  among  the  spirits.  It  is  an  excellent  in- 
vestment, as  for  a  handful  of  brass  cash,  altogether  worth  about 
one  penny,  they  will  receive  sycee — i.e.,  the  boat-shaped  blocks  of 
silvery-looking  tinfoil,  bearing  a  spiritual  value  of  about  thirty 
dollars  !  Paper  houses,  furniture,  and  clothes  may  in  like  manner 
be  purchased  and  stored  beforehand,  in  the  happy  security  that 
neither  moth  nor  rust  shall  corrupt  them,  neither  shall  thieves 
break   through  and  steal. 

"When  the  depositor  (probably  a  poor  coolie  or  an  aged  beggar) 
has  invested  his  little  savings  in  this  precious  rubbish  in  the  eccle- 
siastical bazaar,  he  delivers  it  to  the  priest,  together  with  a  sum  of 
real  money,  as  commission.  For  this  the  priest  gives  a  written  re- 
ceipt. All  this  din  is  thrown  into  a  large  boat.  (It  is  a  frame- 
work of  reeds,  with  bamboo  mast,  and  its  sails  and  planking  are  of 
paper.)  When  all  the  depositors  have  made  their  payments,  the 
priests  walk  several  times  round  the  boat,  chanting  some  incanta- 
tion, then  simultaneously  set  fire  to  both  ends,  and  the  paper  fabric 
vanishes  in  a  flash  of  flame. 

The  priests  bid  the  depositors  keep  their  certificates  with  all 
care,  and  give  them  to  some  trustworthy  person  to  burn  after  their 
decease,  whereupon  the  said  certificates  will  reach  them  safely  in 
the  Dark  World,  and  they  can  draw  their  money  as  required.  All 
this  seems  to  be  implicitly  believed  by  these  people,  who  in  all 
other  respects  are  probably  the  most  astute  business  race  in  the  whole 
world  !     Such  is  the  strange  power  of  a  grovelling  superstition. 

Notwithstanding  all  precautions,  the  spirit-world  does  include 
an  incalculable  host  of  miserable  beggar-spirits,  who  have  either 
died  in  war,  or  in  far  countries,  or  at  sea,  or  of  famine,  and  whose 
bodies  have  not  been  recovered,  or  who  have  left  no  relations  to 
sacrifice  to  them,  or  who,  having  relatives,  are  nevertheless  neglected. 
All  these  are  wholly  dependent  on  the  doles  of  the  charitable,  who, 
three  times  a-year,  contribute  large  sums,  which  they  invest  in  din 
— i.e.,  paper  imitations  of  coins  of  divers  value,  especially  of  sycee 
(the  large  boat-shaped  blocks  of  silver  money),  which  are  formed 
for  spirit  use  in  paper  models  covered  with  tinfoil. 

Very  curious,  indeed,  are  these  oft-recurring  propitiatory  sacrifices, 
which  are  offered  in  every  provincial  city  throughout  the  vast  em- 
pire. Every  family  in  every  city  must  contribute  to  the  fund 
which,  by  appeasing  the  spirits,  shall  secure  the  public  good.     The 


CONSOLATIONS    FOR   BEGGAR    SPIRITS.  210 

idols  of  the  city  are  brought  out  in  highly  decorated  sedan-chairs, 
and  attended  by  a  mounted  body-guard  and  a  host  of  officials,  and 
followed  by  coolies  laden  with  the  offerings  of  the  faithful,  and  by 
a  crowd  of  penitents — women  with  dishevelled  hair,  and  men 
chained  and  manacled  in  self-inflicted  punishment.  These  are 
people  who,  suffering  from  some  calamity,  attribute  it  to  the  in- 
fluence of  some  unknown  spirit,  and  thus  plead  for  the  interposition 
of  the  gods. 

For  several  successive  nights,  priests  from  all  the  temples  parade 
the  streets  with  torches  and  lanterns,  displaying  the  paper  money 
and  other  offerings  suspended  from  bamboos,  and  beating  gongs 
with  maddening  noise,  to  attract  the  attention  of  all  the  unfed 
spirits  who  may  be  wandering  at  large  in  the  city,  and  for  whose 
use  a  portion  of  the  general  offerings  are  burnt  at  every  street 
crossing,  every  road  and  alley,  all  along  the  banks  of  the  rivers  or 
canal,  and  especially  at  all  the  bridges,  where  rows  of  lucky  red 
candles  are  lighted.  But  the  most  picturesque  feature  of  this  w<  >r- 
ship  is  the  nocturnal  procession  of  fire-boats  on  the  rivers.  At 
Canton,  where  this  festival  is  held  towards  the  end  of  August, 
certain  boats  are  set  apart  for  this  service,  and  the  wealthy  citizen 
who  desires  to  appease  the  spirits  of  drowned  men,  hires  a  boat 
and  a  whole  company  of  priests.  Every  line  of  the  boat,  every 
rope  and  mast,  is  decked  with  paper  lanterns,  producing  a 
fairy-like  effect.  "While  the  priests  chant  their  prayers  for  the 
dead,  they  throw  blazing  paper  money  and  paper  clothes  into  the 
river,  beating  gongs  to  attract  the  spirits.  All  around  the  great 
boat  float  lesser  ones,  each  with  a  blazing  fire,  to  give  light  to  the 
spirits,  that  they  may  not  fail  to  see  the  offerings.  Moreover,  small 
earthenware  saucers,  containing  a  little  oil  and  a  lighted  wick,  are 
set  floating  on  the  stream  in  the  wake  of  the  large  boat,  and  add 
their  glimmering  rays  to  the  thousand  points  of  reflected  light 
which  combine  to  produce  so  strange  a  scene. 

Once  in  ten  years  a  great  festival  is  held  in  this  city  for  the 
consolation  of  the  dead.  The  principal  temples  are  fitted  up  with 
rows  of  booths  for  the  sale  of  every  sort  of  thing  which  the  dead 
can  be  supposed  to  require — hats  and  garments,  boots  and  shoes, 
spectacles  and  fans,  horses  and  houses,  sugar-plums,  furniture,  and 
gold  and  silver  money;  but  above  all,  opium,  with  pipes  all  ready 
for  smoking — these,  and  many  more,  all  made  of  paper  and  card- 
board, are  devoutly  offered  to  the  dead.  Amongst  these  numerous 
shops,  even  the  pawnbroker  and  the  money-changer  are  duly  repre- 
sented.    In  the  temple  courtyard  is  placed  a  terrible  image  of  the 


220         THE  OFFERINGS  OF  THE  DEAD. 

Lord  of  Hell,  and  groups  of  his  victims  arc  represented  in  the  act 
of  receiving  gifts  from  the  living. 

The  festival  continues  seven  consecutive  days,  during  which  all 
manner  of  religious  processions  parade  the  streets,  and  the  tall 
pagodas  are  illuminated  every  night.  The  Buddhists  and  Taouists 
mute  their  forces  to  make  a  more  showy  procession,  and  the  images 
of  Buddha 'and  Laoutsoo,  the  founders  of  the  two  faiths,  are  carried 
in  highly-decorated  chairs,  escorted  by  their  respective  priests — 
the  Buddhists  in  their  yellow  robes,  scarlet  mantles,  and  shaven 
heads;  the  Taouists  in  robes  of  gold-brocaded  green  satin,  with 
their  hair  plaited  and  rolled  up,  and  fastened  with  a  peculiar 
tortoise-shell  comb. 

At  the  close  of  the  festival,  all  the  pasteboard  shops  and  their 
miscellaneous  contents  are  heaped  together  to  form  a  vast  bonfire, 
the  smoke  of  which  finds  its  way  through  the  gates  of  Hell,  or 
rather  of  Purgatory;  and  there,  I  suppose,  all  the  acceptable 
offerings  of  the  pious  donors  assume  a  spiritual  form,  suited  to 
the  requirements  of  the  spirit-world. 

In  connection  with  these  offerings  to  propitiate  the  dead,  a 
very  remarkable  survival  of  the  primitive  Horse-Sacrifice  is  oc- 
casionally practised  in  divers  provinces.  Instead,  however,  of 
being  a  sacrifice  to  the  Sun,  this  is  a  ceremony  for  the  propitia- 
tion of  Water-Demons,  who  are  supposed,  at  the  bidding  of  the 
neglected  dead,  to  have  vented  their  malice  on  the  living ;  there- 
fore if  several  cases  of  drowning  have  occurred  in  a  district,  it 
is  supposed  that  the  "Water-Demons  must  be  soothed.  So  a  white 
horse  is  led  to  the  brink  of  a  link  or  river  (probably  he  is  gar- 
landed with  flowers,  and  is  laden  with  a  sack  of  charms  written 
on  yellow  paper,  which  are  eagerly  bought  by  the  multitude,  as 
amulets  for  the  protection  of  their  homes). 

On  reaching  the  river  bank  the  poor  white  horse  is  thrown  to 
the  ground,  and  its  head  is  cut  off.  The  blood  is  collected  in  an 
earthenware  vessel,  and  some  of  it  is  sprinkled  over  the  paper 
charms  to  make  them  more  effective,  while  the  rest  is  mingled 
with  sand,  and  placed  in  a  boat,  together  with  the  head  and  legs 
of  the  horse.  This  boat  heads  a  procession  of  gaily  carved  and 
gilded  beats,  wherein  are  priests,  both  Taouist  and  Buddhist,  and 
villagers  armed  with  matchlocks,  which  they  discharge  to  terrify 
the  demons,  while  some  one  in  the  foremost  boat  sprinkles  the 
blood-stained  sand  on  the  waters.  On  reaching  the  boundary  of 
the  district,  the  horse's  head  is  placed  in  the  earthenware  jars  and 
is  buried  in  the  hed  of  the  stream. 


THE    EVER-PRESENT   DEAD.  221 

Thus  the  "Water-Demons  are  appeased ;  and  as  large  offerings  of 
pasteboard  property  are  burnt  for  the  use  of  the  neglected  dead, 
and  several  days  and  nights  are  devoted  to  religious  services 
on  their  behalf,  it  is  supposed  that  they  likewise  ought  to  be 
content. 

Archdeacon  Gray  has  chanced  to  be  present  on  the  occasions 
when  this  remarkable  sacrifice  has  been  offered  in  the  immediate 
neighbourhood  of  Canton,  and  describes  how  on  one  occasion  it 
formed  a  feature  in  an  immense  funeral  Bervice  which  was  held 
in  a  great  cemetery,  where  multitudes  of  friendless  poor  were  buried. 

Several  persons  had  recently  been  drowned  in  the  neighbour!] I. 

and  it  was  supposed  that  the  uncared-for  dead  were  in  league  with 
the  Water-Demons  to  punish  the  living  for  their  neglect.  So  forty 
thousand  persons  assembled,  and  for  three  days  and  nights  there 
were  religious  services  on  behalf  of  their  spirits.  Among  the 
general  offerings  were  upwards  of  two  hundred  arm-chairs  of 
bamboo  wicker-work  which  were  burnt,  with  a  full  complement 
of  life-sized  attendants.  There  were  fine  dramatic  entertainments 
at  the  temporary  theatre,  and  brilliant  processions  of  dragon-boats 
decorated  with  gorgeous  banners  of  most  costly  silk. 

The  decapitation  of  a  white  horse  was  the  crowning  feature  of 
this  Holy  Fair,  but  so  ungracious  were  the  Water-Spirits  that  ere 
the  day  was  done  there  was  a  collision  of  boats,  in  which  half-a- 
dozen  women  were  drowned  ! 

Besides  these  public  offerings  many  persons  burn  large  offi 
at  their  own  doors  to  ensure  the  spirits  giving  them  full  credil  for 
their  alms,  and  so  refraining  from  molesting  them.  Ami  while 
all  this  lamentable  waste  of  substance  is  going  on,  the  starving 
beggars  find  it  hard  to  extract  the  smallest  copper  coin  wherewith 
to  purchase  a  handful  of  rice  to  appease  their  hunger — for  fear, 
not  charity,  is  the  ruling  motive  in  all  this  display:  and  often 
must  these  miserable  beggars  long  for  the  hour  of  death,  which 
shall  raise  them  to  the  dignity  of  becoming  objects  of  dread  to  the 
living.  Then  will  they  never  cry  in  vain,  for  superstition  has 
sharp  ears,  and  the  slightest  unusual  sound  disturbing  the  silence 
of  night  is  interpreted  as  the  call  of  a  hungry  spirit — it  may  be 
only  the  rattling  of  a  thin  oyster-shell,  too  loosely  set  in  the 
window-frame,  and  shaken  by  the  wind,  but  it  is  enough  to 
arouse  the  sleepers,  who  go  outside  the  house  t"  burn  an  offering 
of  paper  money.  Within  the  house  are  placed  all  manner  "t 
charms  to  prevent  the  entrance  of  such  unwelcome  visitors,  and 
a  sword-shaped   ornament   made   of  hundreds  of  copper  cash  tied 


222  THE    OPPE RINGS    OF    THE    DEAD. 

together  with  red  thread  is  often  suspended  over  the  bed,  as  the 
surest  of  all  charms  for  this  purpose. 

When  1  speafc  of  all  these  offerings  as  "  lamentable  waste,"  it  is 
because,  although  the  Larger  portion  are  only  made  of  paper,  these 
represent  considerable  national  loss  from  an  industrial  point  of 
view,  owing  to  the  immense  number  of  men  and  women  who, 
instead  of  being  employed  on  work  useful  to  the  living,  are  solely 
engaged  in  manufacturing  every  conceivable  paper  object  which 
may  thus  be  transmitted  to  the  dead,  in  the  course  of  these  oft- 
cecurring  offerings. 

( )f  course  this  is  a  subject  on  which  it  is  extremely  difficult  to 
obtain  anything  like  accurate  statistics,  but  enough  is  known  to 
prove  that  the  sums  annually  expended  throughout  the  Empire  in 
connection  with  these  offerings  to  the  dead  are  altogether  amazing. 
In  the  first  place,  it  is  estimated  that  in  every  Hsien  or  county, 
the  average  annual  expenditure,  at  the  three  annual  feasts  on 
behalf  of  the  destitute  dead,  is  about  eighteen  thousand  dollars. 
jS"ow  the  eighteen  provinces  of  the  Empire  are  divided  into  1620 
Hsien.  Thus  we  obtain  an  annual  average  of  thirty  million  dol- 
lars (£6,000,000)  expended  on  this  one  branch  of  the  worship. 

Secondly,  the  population  of  four  hundred  million  persons  may 
be  said  to  represent  eighty  million  families,  each  of  which  annually 
expends  on  its  own  ancestors  an  average  of  a  dollar  and  a  half, 
making  a  total  of  120,000,000  dollars.  (Of  course  multitudes  of 
the  very  poor  can  only  give  much  smaller  sums,  but  the  wealthy 
give  immense  offerings  in  this  manner  in  payment  to  the  priests, 
for  oft-repeated  Masses  for  the  repose  of  the  dead.) 

Further  calculations  of  the  sums  expended  in  each  province  for 
the  propitiation  throughout  the  Empire  of  the  Hsien-deities  and 
the  Foo-deities  —  all  on  behalf  of  the  dead — run  up  a  grand 
annual  total  of  a  hundred  and  fifty  million  dollars,  or  £32,000,000 
English ! 

It  must  be  allowed  that  these  Offerings  of  the  Dead — this  never- 
ceasing  burden  of  propitiating  insatiable  spirits — is  in  truth  a  heavy 
item  in  the  annual  expenditure  of  the  Celestial  Empire. 


THE    CANTON    GUILD    AT    FOO-CHCAV.  223 

CHAPTEE    XVII. 

A    SINGULAR    ENTERTAINMENT. 

Sing-Song  at  the  Canton  Guild — Afternoon  at  the  play — Summons  to  dinner 
in  the  mandarins'  gallery  —  Selection  of  the  evening  play!  —  Imperial 
palace — Visit  to  the  gates  of  hell — Pantomime. 

I  really  am  becoming  quite  a  connaisscur  in  temple  theatres  ! 
They  are  so  unique  and  so  very  characteristic,  that  whenever  I  find 
myself  near  a  temple  whence  unwonted  discords  proclaim  a  Sing- 
Song,  I  make  a  point  of  halting  and  going  in,  if  only  for  a  few 
minutes.  Some  arc  very  shabby,  and  one  glance  suffices ;  hut 
others  are  really  most  fascinating,  and  enable  one  to  form  a  very 
good  notion  of  old  Court  dress  and  similar  details. 

To-day  we  went  by  special  invitation  to  a  most  gorgeous  enter- 
tainment at  the  Canton  Guild,  which  is  to  continue  for  three  days 
at  the  expense  of  two  wealthy  Chinese  tea  -  merchants  and  the 
compradors1  of  the  city,  continuing  daily  from  sunrise  till  long 
after  midnight,  this  being  one  of  the  special  occasions  when  the 
prohibition  of  nocturnal  entertainments  is  rescinded. 

As  the  guests  of  one  of  the  aforesaid  wealthy  merchants,  Mr  Ah 
Lum  met  us,  and  conducted  us  to  an  excellent  place  in  the  man- 
darins' gallery,  where  comfortable  chairs  are  placed  in  groups  round 
many  tiny  tables.  Though  somewhat  less  striking  in  point  of 
scenic  effect  than  the  Ningpo  Guild,  this  also  is  an  exceedingly 
handsome  building,  with  fine  curved  roofs,  very  rich  in  detail, 
supported  on  pillars,  another  roof  on  pillars  affording  3ome  shelter 
to  the  crowd  of  spectators  from  the  pitiless  rain  which  has  poured 
all  the  afternoon  and  most  of  the  evening.  In  honour  of  this 
festive  occasion  the  whole  place  was  decorated  with  scarlet  cloth, 
and  beautiful  flowers  and  shrubs  in  porcelain  vases. 

Not  wishing  to  spend  a  whole  day  there,  we  though!  it  best  to 
go  immediately  after  luncheon,  but  as  soon  as  we  were  e 
bowls  of  excellent  birds'-nest  soup,  with  fine  macaroni,  were 
brought  to  us,  with  the  correct  chop-sticks,  which  at  the  bidding 
of  our  host  were  mercifully  exchanged  for  dampy  little  china 
spoons.  Afterwards  covered  cups  of  tea  were  broughl  in.  and 
whether  we  drank  them  or  not,  relays  of  hot  cups  were  placed 
beside  us  every  half  hour. 

Managers  of  business-houses. 


224  A    SINGULAR    ENTERTAINMENT. 

We  came  in  for  the  end  of  some  long  piece  in  which  the  hero 
was  a  magician  wearing  a  hideous  red  mask  and  a  long  black  beard. 
Ee  was  armed  with  a  magic  wand,  and  long  peacocks'  feathers 
droopi'il  Erom  bia  head-dress.  He  wore  a  richly  embroidered  blue 
satin  robe  with  white  sleeves,  and  four  flags  of  crimson  silk  with 
golden  fringe  fluttered  from  his  shoulders  to  represent  wings. 
This  ugly  monster  had  carried  off  a  beautiful  small-footed  woman. 
Of  course  we  knew  that  she  was  a  man,  as  no  woman  ever  appears 
on  tin'  Chinese  stage,  but  her  acting  was  so  very  natural  and  so 
essentially  feminine  that  we  could  scarcely  realise  this  fact,  which 
was  often  impressed  upon  us.  How  the  effect  of  the  small  feet 
was  produced,  was  the  most  puzzling  thing  of  all;  but  the  lady 
tottered  about  in  the  most  natural  style,  carefully  displaying  the 
little  deformed  "golden  lily  feet,"  and  bestowing  upon  us  most 
bewitching  glances  from  behind  her  fan,  as  if  craving  our  sympathy, 
while  pouring  forth  her  tale  of  sorrow  in  a  shrill  high  treble — a 
most  singular  falsetto,  which  all  these  masculine  actresses  seem 
able  to  assume.  The  father  of  this  beautiful  lady  and  another 
man  each  aspired  to  being  made  Emperor.  The  other  man  showed 
his  ambition  by  painting  his  face  of  a  glossy  brown  like  a  mask. 
All  the  Court  dresses  were  splendid,  and  the  solemnities  were 
relieved  by  the  buffooneries  of  a  very  funny  Court  fool,  who  wore 
a  queer  sort  of  straw  bonnet ! 

The  magician  argued  and  scolded  in  a  more  manly  sing-sing, 
quite  as  wearisome  to  the  ear,  and  gesticulated  and  whirled  himself 
wildly  about,  Avhile  the  dreadful  orchestra  banged  vigorously  on 
gongs  and  kettle-drums,  beat  wooden  clappers,  clanged  cymbals, 
and  produced  dismal  wails  from  various  stringed  instruments,  the 
whole  resulting  in  a  never-ceasing  series  of  most  excruciating  dis- 
cords. Then  another  couple  appeared  upon  the  scene,  but  evidently 
their  wooing  was  not  sanctioned  by  the  gods,  for  suddenly,  amid 
flashing  flames,  a  magnificent  joss,  clothed  in  black  satin  em- 
broidered with  golden  dragons,  appeared  on  a  high  pedestal.  The 
culprits  fell  at  his  feet  as  if  dead.  Eising  and  trembling,  the  man, 
after  a  long  struggle,  obeyed  the  command  of  the  god,  and  cut  off 
the  woman's  head.  Her  blood  spurted  all  over  him — a  horrible 
sight ;  but,  to  prevent  its  being  too  realistic,  the  corpse  quickly 
rose  and  tottered  out,  while  the  hero  caught  up  a  sham  head  which 
had  been  rolled  to  his  feet ! 

Then  the  scene  changed.  The  Empress  of  China  (also  a  man  !) 
appeared  in  most  gorgeous  apparel.  She  was  a  really  pretty 
woman,  with  clear  pale  complexion  and  aquiline  nose.     By  means 


DINNER    AT    THE    GUILD.  225 

of  careful  painting,  the  eyes  attain  to  something  of  the  oblique 
angle  which  is  considered  so  very  high-class,  but  which  really  is 
not  very  common. 

We  now  had  to  return  home  to  receive  another  mandarin,  who 
was  bringing  his  wife  to  tea  with  us,  but  our  friend  kindly  in 
on  our  returning  to  dine  with  him  at  the  Canton  Guild  at  G  p.m., 
which  we  accordingly  did,  being  summoned  in  due  form  by  a  ser- 
vant bringing  us  his  master's  enormous  red  visiting-card,  which 
signified  " Come,  for  all  things  are  now  ready."  It  appears  that 
the  sending  of  this  intimation  is  >/<■  rigueur.  The  omission  would 
imply  that  the  original  invitation  had  been  a  mere  formality,  not 
meant  to  be  accepted,  so  the  unceremonious  guest  who  should  pre- 
sent himself  ere  receiving  tins  final  summons,  might  possibly  find 
that  no  feast  had  been  prepared  ! 

We  found  all  the  little  tables  in  the  mandarins'  gallery  spread 
for  a  Chinese  feast,  with  all  manner  of  odd  and  end  dishes  to  In- 
nibbled  and  tasted  in  the  intervals  of  the  real  courses,  which  were 
brought  in,  one  bowl  at  a  time,  whence  our  host  and  his  friend 
helped  us  all  with  their  own  chop-sticks.  The  cooking  was  first- 
class,  and  we  thought  many  of  the  dishes  excellent,  Buch  as  sharks'- 
fin  soup,  pigeons'-egg  soup,  ducks'  tongues,  samlin  fish,  bamboo 
shoots,  fishes'  brains,  stewed  ducks'  feet,  sinews  of  whale,  si 
pigeon  and  mushrooms,  roast  sucking-pig  and  fungus,  water-chest- 
nuts, biche-de-mer,  little  balls  of  meat  in  dough,  and  a  multitude 
of  other  good  things.  It  was  a  very  prolonged  feast,  and  all  the 
time  the  play  was  going  on  for  our  entertainment. 

Our  host  being  one  of  the  principal  persons  present,  several  of 
the  boy  actresses  waited  on  us,  and  kept  our  tiny  wine-cups  con- 
stantly filled  with  hot  samshu,  or  suee-chow,  a  weak  rice  wine, 
feeble  cider,  perry,  or  other  decoctions  of  fruit,  plum  wine,  rich 
and  rare,  or  ethereal  draughts  of  rose-Avater,  evidently  deeming  it 
the  height  of  hospitality  to  hold  the  said  wee  cups  to  the  lips  of 
our  English  gentlemen,  compelling  them  to  drain  the  cup  cadi 
time,  which,  considering  that  they  only  hold  a  thimbleful  of  the 
feeblest  wine,  very  like  the  cowslip-wine  of  our  childhood,  was  not 
a  serious  trial  of  their  drinking  capacities!  But  the  pretty  ladies 
kept  up  their  feminine  character  quite  gracefully,  and  allowed  us 
a  close  inspection  of  their  tiny  feet,  which  left  us  more  puzzled 
than  ever  as  to  how  they  could  walk,  and  what  they  could  have 
done  with  their  own  large  feet ! 

Presently,  at  the  bidding  of  Mr  Ah    I. inn,  the  prima   d 
brought  me  two  long  tablets  of   polished   ivory,   on   which   were 

l> 


226  A    SINGULAR    ENTERTAINMENT. 

inscribed  is  Chinese  characters  the  names  of  about  twenty  plays, 
and  I  was  asked  to  select  whichever  I  pleased.  This  I  mighl 
really  have  done  (with  the  assistance  of  my  more  Learned  com- 
panions), as  the  company  were  prepared  to  act  anyone  of  them 
Avith  equal  readiness,  their  memory  and  powers  of  endurance  being 
alike  marvellous. 

Of  course  none  of  us  were  so  rash  as  to  comply,  so  I  handed 
the  tablets  to  our  host,  who  selected  a  play  which  he  thoughl 
would  interest  us,  and  certainly  nothing  more  extraordinary  could 
be  conceived  !  There  was  a  Chinese  Emperor  with  a  long  white 
heard,  and  a  pretty  Empress  with  delicate  features  and  aquiline 
nose.  Both  wore  wonderfully  jewelled  head-dresses,  and  rich 
robes  embroidered  with  dragons.  They  sat  together  beneath  a 
huge  State  umbrella.  Around  them  stood  nobles  in  gorgeous 
apparel,  and  a  gigantic  magician  with  beard  reaching  to  his  knees. 
One  hand  played  with  his  beard,  the  other  waved  a  fan,  on  his 
head  was  a  jeAvelled  helmet.  He  was  attended  by  a  dwarf,  old 
and  bearded.  He,  too,  was  gorgeously  arrayed,  and  he  bore  a 
sword  and  a  standard,  which  last  was  simply  a  dragon  impaled  on 
a  spear.  In  the  background  were  more  magicians,  soldiers,  and 
musicians,  each  fearful  and  Avonderful  to  behold  and  to  hear ! 

Then  there  Avas  a  boat  scene,  and  a  free  fight  on  board,  which 
was  a  wonderful  display  of  agile  fencing,  and  leaping,  and  tum- 
bling, and  all  manner  of  acrobatic  feats. 

Presently  the  magician  carried  off  the  lover  of  a  beautiful  lady 
— a  great  mandarin — and  consigned  him  to  the  care  of  a  company 
of  Buddhist  priests,  in  the  richest  of  vestments.  These  persuaded 
him  to  join  their  order,  and  to  say  the  mystic  Avords  O-mi-to-fu,  so 
when  next  he  met  his  lady-love  he  was  voAved  to  celibacy. 

Then  the  Emperor,  much  impressed  AA'ith  the  power  of  the  ma- 
gician, prayed  to  be  allowed  a  glimpse  of  life  AATithin  the  gates  of 
hell.  Thither  accordingly  he  and  his  counsellor  were  transported. 
and  they  (and  we)  looked  in,  and  beheld  all  the  tortures  which  in 
the  Canton  and  other  temples  are  so  vividly  exemplified  of  images, 
being  realistically  acted  !  AVretched  men  Avith  iron  chains  round 
their  necks,  and  struggling  horribly,  were  dragged  in  by  hideous 
devils,  with  fire  flashing  around  them.  One  was  sawn  in  tAA-o  across 
the  chest ;  another  across  the  skull,  the  ends  of  the  saw  moving 
on  each  side,  and  the  blood  streaming — a  most  sickening  sight ! 

Then  a  small-footed  woman  Avas  dragged  in  and  turned  head 
downwards  into  a  mill,  into  which  the  small  feet  Avere  slowly 
dragged.     A  man  A\*as  throAvn  into  a  rice-pounding  machine.      A 


GLIMPSES    OF    HELL.  22*7 

woman  (in  effigy)  was  carried  in,  ami  flaming  devils  tore  her  limb 
from  limb.  We  were  told  afterwards  that  we  might  consider  our- 
selves fortunate  in  not  having  been  compelled  to  witness  a  cruci- 
fixion, which  is  so  common  a  punishment  in  China! 

Some  of  the  punishments  awarded  strike  straight  home  to  the 
crimes  committed.  The  man  who  had  stolen  a  mule  was  repre- 
sented as  having  been  swallowed  by  a  gigantic  fiery  horse,  and  the 
head  of  the  culprit  protruded  from  a  hole  in  its  chest!  Priests 
who  had  received  money  for  Masses  which  they  neglected  to  Bay 
were  condemned  to  read  aloud  for  ever  from  very  small  print  by 
the  light  of  a  very  dim  lamp.  Thieves  had  their  fingers  cruelly 
crushed;  murderers  wen-  devoured  by  a  burning  thirst,  and  though 
surrounded  by  water  cannot  obtain  a  draught.  Mandarins  who 
have  proved  tyrants  are  imprisoned  in  cages,  wherein  they  cannol 
stand  upright.  Bad  nuns  are  made  to  ascend  a  high  tower  whence 
they  may  look  back  to  the  scenes  of  innocent  childhood,  and  for- 
ward to  a  menagerie  of  loathsome  reptiles  whose  forms  they  are 
condemned  successively  to  wear. 

Fraudulent  trustees  are  suffocated  in  dark  sand-clouds  ;  ami,  as 
I  have  already  had  occasion  to  observe,1  physicians  who  have  col- 
lected bones  from  old  -raves  to  make  medicine-  are  boiled  in  oil; 
sacrilegious  robbers  who  have  scraped  the  gilding  off  idols  or 
shrines  are  hung  up  and  disembowelled  :  backbiters  and  slanderers 
are  transformed  into  reptiles;  men  who  have  destroyed  good  books 
are  hung  up  by  the  feet  and  flayed  alive.  Those  who  have  been 
cruel  to  their  parents  are  trampled  on  by  wild  horses,  and  so  on 
ad  infinitum. 

The  executioners  of  these  luckless  victims  wore  hideous  i 
and  eccentric  raiment,  and  were  attended  by  troops  of  satanic  imps. 

The  scene  changed  and  showed  a  bridge,  over  which  the  good 
walked  safely,  but  the  wicked  fell  into  the  river,  to  be  devoured 
by  hideous  and  repulsive  reptiles.  Then  we  ware  shown  a 
stone  gateway  with  only  a  circular  opening,  through  which  multi- 
tudes of  people  passed  to  symbolise  a  new  birth,  while  devil-  lay 
in  wait  outside  seeking  to  capture  thus.-  who  had  been  wicked  when 
on  earth. 

1  Pages  122  and  214. 

2  This  is  not  the  only  illegal  use  to  which  the  bones  of  the  dead  are  applied. 
Amongst  many  other  forms  of  witchcraft  practised  by  Chinese  dabblers  in  the 
Mark  art,  it  seems  that  one  class  of  witches  are  the  special  avengers  of  ill-treated 
wives,  at  whose  request  they  colled  the  bones  of  infants,  and  (while  invoking  the 
aid  of  the  evil  genii  of  these  little  om-s)  they  reduce  the  bones  to  fine  powder, 
which  the  vengeful  wife  is  instructed  day  by  day  to  administer  to  her  husband  in 
divers  drinks,  hoping  thereby  to  effect  his  death. 


228  A    SINGULAR    ENTERTAINMENT. 

After  this  we  had  some  delightfully  grotesque  scenes.  The 
stage  was  covered  with  all  manner  of  zoological  specimens — frogs, 
lizards,  turtles,  pigs,  crawling  reptiles,  and  a  very  tall  ostrich. 
Then  fairies  appeared,  and  a  fairy  in  a  huge  shell  snapped  up  a 
turtle,  and  otherwise  molested  the  animals,  but  they  in  their  turn 
were  harried  by  a,  huge  bird.  A  troop  of  monkeys  next  appeared, 
and  were  attacked  by  men,  who  got  the  worst  of  the  fight;  hut  a 
multitude  of  insects  came  to  their  rescue — beetles,  grasshoppers, 
and  butterflies, — these  fought  with  the  great  big  monkeys  and 
overcame  them.  These  actors  were  tiny  Chinese  children,  adorned 
with  wings. 

It  was  exceedingly  amusing  to  see  the  matter-of-fact  way  in 
which  the  various  actors  calmly  slipped  off  their  animal  or 
insect  skins  and  masks,  and  revealed  themselves  in  their  ordinary 
working  clothes  while  still  in  full  view  of  the  audience!  After 
awhile  a  gigantic  red  cock  stalked  in,  in  a  feather  coat,  strutting 
and  crowing,  and  pretending  to  eat  the  insects,  who  crawled 
beneath  him  and  disappeared ! 

Again  the  scene  changed  to  the  Imperial  Palace  at  Peking.  I 
do  not  mean  to  imply  that  there  was  any  scenery,  for  there  is 
never  anything  of  the  sort,  the  Imperial  throne  and  its  surround- 
ings being  very  simply  suggested ;  but  the  magnificent  five-clawed 
dragons,  embroidered  in  gold  on  raiment  and  on  banners,  tell  their 
tale  unmistakably,  inasmuch  as  terrible  penalties  attend  the  use  by 
any  subject  of  this  Imperial  symbol. 

The  present  scene  showed  the  Emperor  in  great  boddy  suffering, 
and  his  son  praying  for  his  recovery.  Crowds  of  anxious  courtiers 
grouped  around.  Another  son  had  been  falsely  accused  of  some 
crime ;  but  a  stately  old  mandarin  pleaded  for  his  life  with  impas- 
sioned fervour — really  a  fine  piece  of  acting.  Then  the  finding  of 
the  son's  girdle  enabled  him  to  prove  an  alibi,  and  all  ended 
happily. 

It  was  now  10.30,  and  we  thought  we  had  seen  enough,  so  we 
took  leave  of  the  hospitable  host  avIio  had  provided  for  us  so 
unique  an  accompaniment  to  a  feast ! 


FEXG-SHUL  229 


CHAPTER    XVIII. 

FENG-SHUL 

An  anti-fire  charm — The  rain  dragon — Taken  for  a  convict! — The  dragon 
stone — A  Taouist  temple — Goddess  of  sight — Modes  of  divination—  S 
tical  proclamations — Of  divers  superstitions  —  Feng-shui — Excua 
burning  the  C.M.S.  college — The  riot — Question  of  compensation — Eng- 
lish and  American  treaty  rights — Incongruous  chain-. 

U.S.  Consulate,  Naktai. 

My  first  pleasant  day  with  Mrs  Baldwin  in  the  heart  of  the  city 
only  made  me  eager  to  see  more  under  the  same  kind  auspices; 
accordingly  good  human  ponies  shouldered  me  and  the  wicker 
chair  once  more,  and  trotted  off  hither.  Passing  the  Ningpo 
Guild,  where  the  throng  of  blue-clad  Chinamen,  and  the  unmis- 
takable sounds  of  a  theatrical  orchestra,  announced  that  a  Sing- 
Song  was  going  on  at  the  temple  theatre,  I  went  in  for  a  few 
minutes,  and  saw  some  really  pretty  acting  by  a  first-rate  troupe 
of  gorgeously-apparelled  actors.  The  officials  oilered  me  a  good 
seat,  but  being  already  rather  behind  time,  and  having  about  three 
miles  to  go  across  the  busy  city,  I  had  to  hurry  on. 

Halting  at  the  American  Mission  only  long  enough  for  an  ever- 
welcome  cup  of  Europeanised  tea,  we  straightway  started  through 
shimmy  streets  to  the  venerable  walls  of  the  city,  along  whose 
ramparts  we  travelled  till  we  reached  the  Great  North  Gate,  a 
ponderous  two-storeyed  building,  commanding  a  splendid,  wide- 
spread view  of  the  city,  the  plain,  the  windings  of  the  river,  and 
the  great  range  of  encircling  mountains. 

Close  by  the  gate  stand  seven  water-jars  of  stone,  each  enclosed 
by  a  stone  railing.  It  is  believed  that  so  long  as  there  is  water 
in  these  jars  there  will  be  no  fires  in  the  city  of  Foo-(  !how,  there- 
fore it  is  the  duty  of  a  special  official  to  see  that  in  the  driest 
summer  the  water  is  never  allowed  to  dry  up. 

Certainly  the  Great  Dragon,  who  regulates  all  matters  relating 
to  fire  and  water,  is  very  strangely  influenced.  In  Canton,  some 
years  ago,  there  was  a  terrible  drought  which  defied  all  effort 
priests  and  soothsayers.  Prayers  and  fasting,  public  humiliation 
and  prolonged  religious  services  were  all  in  vain,  till  at  length  a 
magician  revealed  to  the  officials  that  the  one  action  which  would 
ensure  the  favour  of  the  Dragon-King,  was  that  the  Great  South 


230  FENG-SHUL 

Gate  of  the  city  Bhould  be  closed,  and  that  water-tuba  filled  to  the 
brim  Bhould  be  placed  in  the  gateway.  In  these  tubs  frogs  were 
to  be  placed,  and  the  geomancer  promised  that  rain  should  be 
granted  in  answer  to  their  croaking.  The  said  croaking  was  con- 
siderably intensified  by  the  amount  of  annoyance  to  which  the 
luckless  frogs  were  subjected  by  the  small  boys  of  the  city,  and  by 
a  singular  coincidence  the  much-desired  rain  soon  followed  ! 

I  >uring  our  exclusion  this  morning  I  had  an  amusing  illustration 
of  how  different  may  be  the  effect  of  any  given  subject  on  different 
minds.  I  had  already  discovered  that  my  favourite  large  black  fan, 
which  in  England  was  the  height  of  fashion,  was  quite  incorrect 
here, — that  only  a  coolie  would  carry  a  black  fan,  and  that  its 
broad  folds  were  essentially  masculine — at  least  twice  the  correct 
width  for  a  lady's  use  !  This  morning  the  rock  of  offence  was  my 
india-rubber  chain,  which  I  flattered  myself  could  not  be  distin- 
guished from  jet,  and  which  has  the  merit  of  being  certainly  less 
brittle  !  "Well,  when  we  were  being  carried  in  our  chairs  on  the  city 
walls,  this  caught  the  eye  of  a  party  of  Tartar  soldiers,  one  of  whom 
explained  the  situation  to  his  comrades.  "Look  at  that  woman's  iron 
chain,"  he  said.  "  Undoubtedly  she  is  a  convict  who  has  been 
banished  for  some  offence,  and  now  they  are  carrying  her  away. ' 
("  They,"  meaning  Mrs  Baldwin  and  the  chair-coolies  !) 

Profiting  by  the  hint,  I  hid  the  obnoxious  chain,  and  we  de- 
scended into  the  Tartar  city,  where  we  saw  a  wedding-party,  and 
noted  that  the  women  wore  three  rings  in  each  ear,  and  that  their 
hair  was  strangely  dressed  and  covered  with  jewellery,  consisting 
chiefly  of  flowers  made  of  small  pearls  and  bright  kingfishers' 
feathers.  We  saw  the  roofs  of  the  Great  Hall  where  candidates 
for  literary  honours  undergo  the  terribly  exhausting  examinations 
which  cost  so  many  lives.  It  seemed  to  be  the  counterpart  of  that 
which  Ave  had  already  seen  at  Canton.1 

Then  we  visited  sundry  temples  where  priests  of  divers  creeds 
all  received  us  courteously,  and  did  the  honours  of  their  very  curi- 
ous, but  by  no  means  cleanly,  shrines.  In  one,  on  the  same  hill  as 
the  American  Mission,  a  civil  young  priest  took  us  into  an  inner 
shrine  to  see  a  great  block  of  polished  black  limestone,  twelve  feet 
in  height  by  five  in  width,  and  one  and  a  half  in  thickness,  which 
is  covered  all  over  with  beautifully  carved  dragons.  It  is  raised  on 
a  great  pedestal. 

Another  point  of  interest  was  a  fine  Taouist  temple,  the  roof  of 
which   is   supported   by  about   thirty   huge   monolithic  pillars  of 
1  And  of  another  which  I  subsequently  visited  at  Peking. 


MODES    OF    DIVINATION.  231 

granite,  where  (in  singular  contrast  to  the  calm  smooth-faced 
shaven  gilt  images  in  Buddha's  temples,  or  to  his  own,  with  the 
invariable  curiously  curly  hair)  there  are  huge  images  with  straight 
hair  and  very  long  black  moustaches;  and  in  the  side-court,  a  series 
of  gilt  images  like  Tartar  mandarins  mounted  on  gilt  horses,  and 
escorted  by  gilt  servants.  This  is  one  of  the  great  military  temples 
for  the  Tartar  soldiery ;  its  chief  priests  were  arrayed  in  robes  of 
green  satin,  and  their  long  hair  was  plaited  and  rolled  up,  and 
surmounted  by  a  small  peculiarly  shaped  comb  of  yellow  tortoise- 
shell.  The  Buddhist  priests  are,  of  course,  well  shaven,  and  their 
yellow  robes  are  sometimes  enlivened  by  a  rose-coloured  stole,  while 
the  inferior  orders  appear  robed  in  grey. 

We  are  becoming  quite  connaisst  urs  in  vestments  and  images! 

In  one  of  the  side  chapels  of  the  great  Taouist  temple,  we  noticed 
a  goddess  who  apparently  is  the  guardian  of  sight;  and  a  very  care- 
less one  she  must  be,  judging  from  the  amount  of  blindness  we  see, 
due  to  neglected  ophthalmia.  But  none  the  less  do  her  votaries 
bring  to  her  shrine  votive  offerings  of  spectacles — small  paper  spec- 
tacles  from  the  very  poor,  and  enormous  ones  of  calico  from  richer 
sufferers,  Chinese  spectacles  being  at  all  times  large  and  cumbersome 
objects.  Another  of  these  side  chapels  is  occupied  by  the  Goddess 
Kum-Fa,  the  patroness  of  mothers,  devoutly  worshipped  by  all 
women  and  girls.  She  is  surrounded  by  a  great  array  of  <  lelestial 
nurses,  each  tending  a  young  baity,  and  to  each  is  assigned  some 
special  function  in  the  care  of  every  infant,  either  before  or  after 
its  birth.  All  these  must  be  propitiated  by  women  who  hope  to 
become  mothers,  while  those  whose  little  ones  are  sick  may  buy 
packets  of  tea  in  the  temple,  and  offer  them  to  the  goddess,  who 
graciously  permits  the  mother  to  take  back  the  said  tea,  mingling 
it  with  ashes  from  the  sacred  incense,  and  thence  preparing  a  con- 
secrated and  healing  drink  to  be  given  to  the  sick  child. 

There  is  a  very  favourite  method  of  ascertaining  the  will  of  the 
gods,  which  I  constantly  see  practised  in  the  temples.  It  is  called 
divination  by  the  Ka-pue,  which  is  a  wooden  object  the  Bize  of 
your  two  hands,  shaped  like  an  acorn,  but  mad'  in  two  halves — 
one  convex,  the  other  flat.  The  person  who  wishes  to  consult  the 
oracle  kneels  reverently  before  the  image  of  the  god  01  goddess 
whose  counsel  he  craves,  and  having  explained  the  subject  on 
which  he  wants  advice,  he  takes  the  Ka-pue  from  off  the  altar, 
is  it  through  the  smoke  of  the  incense,  and  then  throws  it  up- 
ward before  the  idol.  According  to  the  manner  in  which  the  two 
halves  fall,  so  he  reads  his  answer.      It'  both  fall  on  the  flat  Bide, 


232  PENG-SHUL 

he  knows  that  hie  prayer  is  refused,  or  that  he  had  better  give  up 
his  project.  If  both  fall  on  the  rounded  side,  it  would  appear  that 
the  god  really  has  no  opinion  to  offer;  but  when  one  falls  flat,  and 
the  other  falls  round,  the  omen  is  excellent. 

Another  very  common  mode  of  inquiring  into  the  future  is  by 
means  of  a  number  of  strips  of  split  bamboo,  each  numbered. 
These  are  placed  upright  in  a  bamboo  stand,  which  the  inquirer 
takes  from  off  the  altar,  and  gently  shakes  till  one  falls  out;  this 
he  hands  to  the  priest,  who  compares  its  number  with  a  correspond- 
ing number  in  a  book,  from  which  lie  reads  an  oracular  reply.  An 
amiable  priest  at  Canton  was  good  enough  thus  to  favour  me  with 
some  details  of  futurity,  but  I  cannot  say  the  information  vouch- 
safed was  very  remarkable. 

A  curious  glimpse  into  one  class  of  superstition  was  recently 
afforded  by  a  proclamation  issued  by  the  governor-general  of  this 
province,  whereby  incantations  to  bring  about  the  death  of  others 
are  declared  to  be  illegal  and  hateful  offences.  The  subject  is 
chiefly  interesting  from  its  close  affinity  to  a  form  of  witchcraft 
which  is  still  occasionally  practised  in  Britain.1  "  You  are  for- 
bidden," says  Governor  Wang,  "if  you  have  a  grudge  against  any 
one,  to  practise  the  magic  called  '  Striking  the  Bull's  Head ' — that 
is  to  say,  writing  a  man's  name  and  age  on  a  scrap  of  paper,  and 
laying  it  before  the  bull-headed  idol,  and  then  buying  an  iron 
stamp,  and  piercing  small  holes  in  this  paper,  and  finally  throwing 
it  at  the  man  on  the  sly  with  the  intention  of  compassing  his 
death." 

"Where  such  superstitious  practices  as  these  are  common,  we  need 
not  wonder  at  the  facility  Avith  which  the  learned  gentry  contrive 
to  rouse  the  fanaticism  of  the  people  to  a  very  dangerous  pitch,  by 
circulating  the  most  puerile  rumours,  which  are  generally  directed 
against  the  Christians.  Such  was  the  widespread  rumour  that 
those  initiated  into  Christian  mysteries  were  required  to  swallow 
a  medicine  composed  of  the  eyes  of  corpses,  and  to  destroy  their 
ancestral  tablets ! 

One  of  the  most  serious  of  these  scares  was  the  Shan-sin-fan  or 
"genii  powder-plot,"  when  emissaries  were  employed  throughout 
all  the  Southern  Provinces  to  distribute  small  powders,  which  they 

1  So  recently  as  December  1S83  a  case  was  tried  at  the  Inverness  Police  Court, 
in  which  tin-  cause  of  offence  was  the  discovery  of  a  clay  image  with  pins  stuck 
through  it,  in  order  to  compass  the  death  of  a  neighbour,  a  discovery  which  resulted 
in  an  assault.  Many  similar  cases  have  been  discovered  both  in  England  and  Scot- 
land. See  '  In  the  Hebrides,'  pp.  269-265.  By  C.  F.  Gordon  dimming.  Chatto 
&  YVindus. 


CHOLERA    POWDER.  233 

assured  the  people  would  prevent  calamity  and  disease.  Of  < 
these  were  eagerly  sought  after,  when  suddenly,  as  if  hy  magic, 
placards  appeared  in  every  direction,  warning  the  people  that  the 
powder  was  "a  subtle  poison  issued  with  sly  venom  by  the  foreign 
devils,"  with  the  intent  that  within  twenty  days  the  victims  should 
he  attacked  hy  a  terrible  disease  which  none  save  the  foreign  mis- 
sionaries could  cure,  and  that  they  would  only  do  so  on  condition 
of  the  sufferers  becoming  Christians,  and  practising  all  manner  of 
vile  crimes. 

So  intense  was  the  excitement  thus  aroused,  that  a  general  per- 
secution ensued — the  native  Christians  were  beaten  and  half-killed, 
their  houses  and  chapels  destroyed,  and  for  some  time  a  foreigner 
hardly  dared  to  set  foot  in  the  city  of  Foo-Chow,  far  less  in  the 
villages. 

Of  course,  before  very  long,  the  people  realised  that  they  had 
been  befooled,  and  had  attacked  theil  peaceful  neighbours  without 
cause  ;  so  then,  of  course,  they  were  rather  ashamed,  and  more 
inclined  to  think  well  of  the  faith  to  which  these  had  proved 
so  steadfast,  and  which  had  taught  them  to  be  so  strangely  for- 
giving. 

Nevertheless  there  are  still  two  superstitions  so  deeply  rooted 
in  the  national  mind  that  an  allusion  to  these  is  at  any  time  suf- 
ficient to  arouse  the  mob.1  These  two  ruling  forces  are  Feak  AND 
Reverence  for  the  Dead,  and  the  mysterious,  undefmable  Feng- 
Shui  ;  and  truly  it  seems  impossible  for  any  one  who  has  not  had 
long  experience  of  this  extraordinary  and  incomprehensible  race  to 
realise  the  extent  to  which  all  social  and  domestic  life  is  influ- 
enced by  these  twin  forces,  which  an;  so  inextricably  blended  ami 
seem  to  permeate  all  things — even  such  as  at  first  sight  would  seem 
to  have  no  sort  of  connection  with  either. 

The  literal  interpretation  of  fengshui  is  "Wind  and  Water, 
but  what  idea  the  term  conveys  to  a  Chinaman's  mind  no  one 
seems  able  to  define,  beyond  that  it  has  to  do  with  the  good  and 
genial  influences  which  are  ever  moving  gently  from  the  south, 
and  also  with  the  baneful  influences  which  come  from  the  north, 
and  which  may  possibly  be  disturbed  by  any  alteration  of  existing 

1  Again  I  must  say,  Europe  need  not  scoff  at  Chinese  Buperstition.  While  tin- 
cholera  was  raging  at  Naples  in  September  1884,  it  was  currently  believed  by  the 
peasants  that  they  were  being  poisoned -with  "cholera  powder'  scattered  by  the 
doctors  ami  police,  by  onlcr  * > t  Government  !  An  English  physician,  who  was  col- 
lecting geological  .specimens  on  the  volcanic  isle  of  Ponza,  was  compelled  to  leave 
the  island  because  the  inhabitants  could  not  be  convinced  that  be  was  not  manu- 
facturing this  dreaded  cholera  powder  I 


234  FENG-SHUI. 

physical  surroundings.  It  seems  almost  impossible  for  a  foreigner 
to  arrive  al  any  exacl  understanding  of  this  great  overruling  belief 
of  the  millions  of  Chinamen,  yet  no  one  can  be  many  hours  in 
China  ere  the  term  becomes  so  familiar  as  to  make  its  solution  a 
matte]'  much  desired.  Apparently  it  has  especial  reference  to  the 
repose  of  the  dead,  and  the  influence  of  tbe  mighty  bost  of  disem- 
bodied  spirits  upon  the  welfare  or  adversity  of  their  living  human 
successors  on  this  earth. 

It  is  something  intangible  and  indescribable,  yet  omnipotent — 
a  vague,  shadowy  spirit  of  evil,  which  stands  in  tbe  way,  and 
effectually  bars  every  effort  in  favour  of  progress  and  civilisation. 

It  is  the  mainspring  of  that  ultra-conservatism  which,  like  a 
mightily  resistant  breakwater,  so  stoutly  wards  off  the  inflowing 
tide  of  all  modern  inventions,  practically  declaring  the  only  safe 
condition  of  existence  to  be  one  of  utter  inertia,  in  which  nothing 
old  shall  be  disturbed,  and  nothing  new  attempted. 

In  short,  a  whisper  of  feng-shui  raised  by  the  literati,  and 
passed  on  to  tbe  populace,  suffices  at  any  moment  to  inflame  their 
deadliest  superstitions  and  incite  them  to  all  manner  of  mischief. 
Each  man  takes  it  personally,  and  as  a  warning  cry  that  something 
is  being  done  which  may  annoy  his  dead  ancestors,  in  which  case 
they  will  inevitably  begin  by  taking  vengeance  on  him. 

Why  does  a  Chinaman  object  to  his  neighbour  building  a  top 
storey  to  his  house?  Because  his  doing  so  may  disturb  the  feng- 
shui — those  gracious  influences  which  now  come  straight  over  the 
city  to  the  hall  of  his  ancestral  tablets,  or  to  tbe  graves  where  his 
dead  are  laid. 

"Why  does  he  object  to  the  making  of  a  railway?  Because  tbe 
whole  country  is  dotted  with  ancestral  graves,  each  of  which  has 
been  dug  on  a  site  selected  after  long  consideration,  and  repeated 
payments  to  a  soothsayer  deeply  versed  in  the  mysteries  of  feng- 
shui — a  spot  selected  as  that  of  all  others  most  certain  to  attract 
those  gentle  southern  influences,  and  well  shielded  from  all  bane- 
ful blasts  from  tbe  chill  north.  So  to  make  a  railway  would  stir 
up  tbe  spirits  of  countless  past  generations,  and  let  loose  on  the 
country  a  whole  army  of  unquiet  and  malevolent  ghosts.1 

1  As  standing  examples  of  the  reality  of  this  opponent  to  material  jirogress  we 
have  the  history  of  the  railway  from  Woo-Shing  to  Shanghai,  which,  after  it  was  in 
full  working  order,  was  bought  up  by  the  Chinese  Government  at  a  great  cost,  only 
to  be  torn  np  on  this  account,  and  all  its  plant  safely  deported  to  Formosa,  where 
it  was  deposited,  and  left  to  rust  upon  the  beach. 

Then,  too  (when  Li  Hung  Chang,  the  great  advocate  of  progress,  had  succeeded 
in  forming  the  Kai-ping  Coal  .Mining  Company  with  a  view  to  developing  the  vast 
mineral  resources  of  his  country),  after  four  years  had  been  spent  in  boring  and 


THE    GREAT    BARRIER    TO    PROGRESS.  235 

Is  it  desirable  to  sink  a  mine,  or  to  erect  a  windmill  or  a  water- 
mill  ?  Great  consultation  is  requisite  before  perpetrating  a  deed 
which  may  so  greatly  disturb  the  influences  of  air  and  water. 

Do  I  wish  to  build  a  high  wall  on  my  own  honestly  purchased 
land1?  My  neighbour  may  object  that,  by  so  doing,  I  turn  asi<le 
the  course  of  the  spirits,  who  always  come  from  that  particular 
quarter  to  do  him  good.  So  if  I  persist  in  building  my  wall,  the 
chances  are  that  he  will  raise  a  mob  and  come  to  pull  it  down,  and 
neither  the  Chinese  nor  the  British  authorities  will  move  a  finger 
to  obtain  redress  for  me.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  I  venture  to  pull 
down  an  olil  wall  on  my  own  land,  my  neighbour  may  lie  equally 
annoyed,  as  I  thereby  open  a  straight  course,  by  which  malevolenl 
spirits  may  reach  him  from  an  unlucky  quarter. 

As  good  a  definition  of  tin-  undefinable  as  can  well  be  obtained 
was  given  to  me  by  Monsignor  Gentili,  the  Roman  Catholic  Bishop 
of  Ningpo,  who  described  the  fengshui  as  being  the  path  of  the 
Great  Dragon,  who  rushes  through  the  air  just  above  the  houses, 
spouting  blessings  in  showers  from  his  nostrils.  He  flies  straight 
forward,  unless  by  evil  chance  he  should  strike  against  some  high 
building,  in  winch  case  he  turns  aside  at  an  angle,  and  so  the 
houses  beyond  lose  their  share  of  his  blessing.  Hence  the  jealous 
care  of  Chinese  house-builders  lest  any  one  should  build  a  house 
higher  than  his  neighbour,  and  the  singular  uniformity  of  domestic 
architecture  as  seen  from  any  high  ground  in  the  cities. 

Hence,  too,  the  mystic  adoration  of  the  shadowy,  indefinite 
Dragon  which  figures  so  largely  in  all  Chinese  art,  literature,  and 
religion,  recurring  in  a  thousand  forms.  His  image,  carved  and 
gilt,  is  twisted  round  the  ridge-pole  of  the  temple,  and  peeps  from 
beneath  the  eaves.  On  the  Imperial  banner  he  reigns  supreme, 
distinguished  by  an  extra  claw;  and  even  in  domestic  art  he  is 
represented  in  gorgeous  embroideries  of  silk  and  gold,  and  some- 
times is  dimly  revealed  on  the  silken  hangings  on  the  wall — most 
masterly  paintings  in  Indian  ink,  but  so  shadowy  thai  not  till  we 
have  gazed  for  a  while  do  we  clearly  discern  the  dimly  delineated 

shaft-sinking,  the  reactionary  party  raised  theft  ng-skui  spectre,  asserting  that  the 
sickness  prevailing  in  the  Imperial  Palace  al  Peking  was  dm-  to  the  disturbance 
caused  to  the  spirit  of  the  Empress  Dowager  hy  all  this  tunnelling  within  sixty 
miles  of  her  tomb  !  So  by  Imperial  edict  the  work  bo  displeasing  to  the  dead  was 
arrested. 

Happily,  however,  after  a  while  wiser  counsels  prevailed,  and  the  north  ports 
and  steamers  are  now  supplied  with  cheap  and  excellent  coal,  broughl  from  the 
mines  by  the  Kai-ping  railway,  which  has  now  Keen  working  for  four  years  so  suc- 
cessfully as  to  overcome  all  spiritual  scruples,  resulting  in  an  Imperial  edict  for  its 
extension. 


23G  FKXG-SHUI. 

monster,  half  veiled  by  misty  clouds,  flames,  or  waves,  all  of  which 
indicate  those  natural  forces  which  he  controls. 

The  same  law  which  compels  the  Dragon  to  move  in  straight 
lines  regulates  the  movements  of  all  spirits,  to  whom  anythir 
the  nature  of  a  zigzag  is  peculiarly  puzzling.  For  this  reason  those 
who  have  assisted  in  the  murder  of  a  female  bahy  are  very  particu- 
lar to  carry  it  to  the  grave  by  a  path  of  this  description,  so  that 
the  baby  spiril  may  fail  in  its  endeavours  to  return,  should  it  seek 
to  avenge  itself  on  its  unnatural  parents. 

This,  too,  is  the  reason  why  in  Chinese  houses  the  doors  and 
windows  are  all  placed  irregularly,  never  facing  one  another,  and 
especially  why  we  often  sec  a  meaningless-looking  bit  of  wall  placed 
just  outside  the  outer  gate,  and  a  little  larger  than  the  entrance. 
It  serves  the  same  purpose  as  the  screen  which  is  placed  between 
the  door  and  the  coffin  in  the  house  of  the  dead.  The  spirits  in 
their  flight  will  strike  this  wall,  and  instead  of  rushing  into  the 
house  by  the  open  doorway  will  be  turned  aside.  It  never  occurs 
to  them  to  double  round  the  wall,  and  so  find  their  way  in  ! 

Thus  do  fear  and  reverence  for  the  dead  combine  with  the  mys- 
terious feng-sliui  to  form  the  ruling  principle  of  all  existence  in 
China.  They  are  the  twin  giants  whose  power  all  acknowledge, 
and  against  whom  all  resistance  seems  useless. 

This  may  appear  rather  a  tedious  digression  on  a  very  nonsensi- 
cal subject,  but  unfortunately  it  is  one  which  throughout  this  em- 
pire is  a  living  reality,  and  one  which  is  not  only  a  bar  to  all 
scientific  and  material  progress,  but  also  often  involves  real  danger 
and  persecution  to  the  promoters  of  Christian  work — as  we  most 
fully  realised  this  morning  when  looking  upon  the  blackened  ruins 
of  the  Theological  College  of  the  Church  Missionary  Society,  which 
was  burnt  last  August  by  a  mob  stirred  up  by  the  literati  on  this 
very  ground.  The  Mission  had  for  twenty-eight  years  remained  in 
fairly  peaceful  possession  of  this  site,  which  very  soon  after  their 
arrival  in  1849  was  offered  to  them  by  these  very  literati  in  ex- 
change for  that  which  had  previously  been  assigned  to  them  at  the 
foot  of  the  hill. 

The  inmates  of  the  Mission  were  on  the  best  of  terms  with  the 
townspeople  around  them,  and  with  the  priests  of  the  temples  on 
the  said  hill.  But  as  the  number  of  converts  increased,  so  did 
that  of  men  desiring  special  training  to  fit  them  for  the  work  of 
catechists. 

In  1877  there  were  forty-five  resident  students,  and  it  became 
positively  necessary  to  provide  quarters  for  them  in  a  proper  college. 


FALSE   ACCUSATIONS.  237 

Negotiations  were  accordingly  commenced  for  the  purchase  of  a 
piece  of  land  close  by  the  Mission  premises.  Here  a  Bingle-storeyed 
house  could  have  been  advantageously  erected,  and  the  owners  of 
the  land  were  most  willing  to  sell  it.  But  the  mandarins  (jealous 
of  the  increasing  influence  of  the  Mission,  and  greatly  encour- 
aged in  their  hostility  by  the  fact  that  various  outrages  against 
Christians  in  different  parts  of  this  province  had  been  allowed 
to  pass  over  unpunished  and  unredressed)  positively  forbade  the 
sale. 

The  members  of  the  Mission  were  therefore  compelled  to  : 
the  most  of  their  own  resources,  and  on  re-examining  their  own 
ground,  they  found  that  by  much  ingenuity  they  could  contrive  to 
erect  a  very  good  building  on  a  small  foundation  within  their  own 
enclosure,  which  hitherto  had  been  used  as  a  rubbish-heap.  By 
planning  a  second  storey,  larger  than  the  base,  and  a  third,  which 
should  overlap  both,  the  whole  being  built  up  against  the  hillside, 
a  house  was  designed  which  should  supply  forty-eight  tiny  rooms 
for  students,  a  large  dining-room  and  lecture-room,  and  a  study  and 
lecture-room  for  the  European  in  charge. 

In  China  it  is  necessary  to  act  warily  in  all  things,  and  to  make 
sure  of  official  sanction  in  all  details,  so  these  plans  were  submitted 
to  the  British  Consul,  who  personally  inspected  the  site,  and 
his  written  consent  to  the  erection  of  the  college.  Builders  were 
engaged,  and  soon  the  work  was  in  full  progress,  without  any 
objection  being  made  from  any  quarter. 

In  the  course  of  the  summei  it  was  completed,  and  the  students 
had  just  got  comfortably  settled,  when  Lin-Ying-Lin,  a  notorious 
leader  of  the  anti-foreign  party,  who  had  been  absent  at  Canton, 
returned  to  Foo-Chow,  and  Immediately  afterwards  several  friendly 
heathen  came  and  warned  the  missionaries  that  this  man  was  stir- 
ring up  mischief,  and  that  unless  he  were  apprehended  there  would 
be  a  riot.  They  added  that  the  Viceroy  had  sanctioned  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  college.  This  was  duly  reported  to  the  British  ( Jonsul, 
to  whom  also  the  Chinese  authorities  now  presented  a  formal  com- 
plaint that  the  Mission  had  encroached  upon  land  nol  belonging  to 
it.  This  was  positively  untrue  (as  was  easily  proven,  an  old  photo- 
graph coming  in  very  useful  as  a  witness  which  could  n<  >t  lie),  but 
it  furnished  the  desired  excuse. 

It  was  then  agreed  that  the  official  mandarins  should  inert  the 
clergy  on  the  Mission  ground  to  examine  the  boundaries  amicably, 
and  see  whether,  as  was  averred,  the  boundary  wall  had  been 
moved.     Meanwhile,  however,  the  literati  had  raised  the  cry  of 


238  FENG -SHU  I. 

"  Feng-Shui  !"  to  rouse  the  ignorant  people.  Tiny  now  declared 
thai  the  building  of  foreign  houses  on  the  hill  would  destroy  the 
fengshui  of  the  city;  thai  to  this  cause  were  due  various  fires  in 
the  city,  the  death  of  several  distinguished  men  in  distant  parts  of 
the  country,  and  sundry  other  disasters. 

So  on  the  day  of  the  official  visit  of  the  four  mandarins,  they 
were  escorted  not  only  by  their  own  fifty  followers,  but  by  at  least 
as  many  more  unruly  men  not  belonging  to  the  town,  but  hired 
from  native  villages,  and  wild  with  excitement,  having  been  freely 
supplied  with  wine  at  the  neighbouring  temple  (to  which  the  wine 
had  been  brought  for  this  purpose  on  the  previous  day). 

After  some  delay  the  English  Consul  arrived,  followed  soon  after 
by  ten  mandarins  with  a  party  of  unarmed  soldiers.  The  mob 
began  throwing  stones  at  the  college,  and  the  Consul  asked  the 
mandarins  to  i:iterfere.  They  refused,  saying  "  it  was  only  boys' 
play  !  "  and,  moreover,  in  a  very  uncourteous  manner  bade  him  "  hold 
his  peace."  So  he  actually  was  obliged  to  stand  by,  while  the 
mandarins  sat  calmly  down  in  their  sedan-chairs  literally  superin- 
tending the  destruction  that  ensued. 

The  mob  having  broken  into  the  college,  amused  themselves  by 
dragging  out  the  furniture,  and  all  the  students'  clothes  and  books, 
of  which  they  made  a  bonfire.  Then  the  new  college  was  set  on 
fire,  and  finally  the  other  school  was  torn  down.  All  night  the 
mob  stayed  about  the  Mission  premises,  tearing  up  the  garden,  and 
yelling  out  fearful  insults  to  the  inmates — a  terrible  night  indeed 
for  these  English  clergymen,  with  their  wives,  and  the  English 
ladies  in  charge  of  the  Chinese  Girls'  Boarding-school. 

On  the  following  morning  the  hired  mob  returned,  and  tried  to 
break  into  the  Mission-house  and  the  school,  but  happily  the 
ladies,  with  all  their  fine  family  of  Chinese  girls,  were  able  to 
escape  by  a  back  door,  whence  they  made  their  way  down  the 
rock  into  the  street,  where  the  real  inhabitants  of  the  city,  wdio  are 
most  friendly  to  both  the  English  and  American  Missions,  crowded 
round  them,  expressing  their  shame  and  grief  at  the  outrage,  saying 
they  would  gladly  have  come  to  the  rescue  had  they  dared,  but 
that  they  knew  that  interference  would  only  result  in  the  destruc- 
tion of  their  own  houses.  They  at  once  gave  the  names  of  the  few 
gentry  who  had  instigated  the  whole  riot — a  handful  of  petty  land- 
owners— the  big  gentry  having  kept  quite  aloof  in  all  this  matter. 

This  four-mile  flight  across  the  city,  through  densely  crowded 
streets,  was  no  easy  task  for  such  a  company,  including  small- 
footed  girls,  to   whom  walking  is  a   terrible   difficulty;  but  they 


FRIENDLY    CITIZENS.  239 

received  no   annoyance   whatever    from    the    people,   and    at    Last 
reached  the  foreign  settlement  in  safety. 

After  the  ladies  had  escaped,  the  clergy  who  stayed  to  defend 
the  Mission-house  were  hotly  besieged.     That  siege  furnished  one 

characteristic  incident  which  is  pleasant  to  record.  All  doors 
and  windows  had  been  barricaded,  save  one,  which  could  not  be 
fastened  in  any  way.  When  the  besieged  heard  the  rioti  i 
semble  at  this  point,  they  gave  up  all  for  lost.  To  their  amaze- 
ment, however,  they  saw  the  handle  being  turned  backwards  and 
forwards  without  any  result,  and  once  or  twice  it  opened  a  little 
bit,  hut  instantly  closed  again,  and  at  last  they  discovered  tie- 
secret,  which  was,  that  two  strong  men,  who  were  kindly  disposed 
to  the  missionaries,  had  mingled  in  the  crowd  on  purpose  to  pro- 
tect them,  and  from  morning  till  night  they  held  possession  of 
this  door,  pretending  to  he  using  their  utmost  strength  to  open  it, 
hut  in  reality  preventing  any  one  from  approaching  ! 

This  being  a  case  of  aggression  too  serious  to  he  slurred 
the  i  lonsul  made  a  formal  complaint,  requiring  the  Chinese  officials 
to  make  restitution,  agreeably  to  certain  clauses  in  the  treaty  of 
Tien-tsin.  Accordingly,  in  due  course  of  time,  orders  came  from 
i  'eking  to  the  Viceroy  here,  desiring  that  the  college  should  be 
rebuilt,  compensation  made,  the  literati  warned,  and  rioters 
punished.  This  satisfactory  edict  was  duly  proclaimed,  but  there 
apparently  the  matter  rested  for  about  four  months,  when  the 
Viceroy  sent  Lahoo,  the  naval  commander,  to  Bubmit  to  the 
members  of  the  Mission — the  Rev.  J.  If.  Wolfe,  the  Rev.  L. 
Lloyd,  and  the  Rev.  If.  W.  Stewart,  three  clergymen  of  the 
Church  of  England  —  the  written  draft  of  a  most  equitable 
offer  of  compensation,  including  the  granting  of  a  new  Lease  of 
the  same  ground,  the  rebuilding  of  the  college  on  the  adjoining 
site,  and  various  other  items. 

This  was  the  Viceroy's  own  proposition,  and  it  was  submitted 
on  two  separate  occasions  to  the  member-  of  the  Mission,  who 
were  perfectly  satisfied )  but  notwithstanding  all  their  entreaties 
and  expostulations,  the  British  Consul  positively  refused  to  accepl 
the  terms,  affirming  his  resolution  to  have  a  much  larger  indem- 
nity for  the  outrage.  Unfortunately  the  claims  which  he  made 
(and  which  have  been  detailed  by  the  I  Ihinese  to  several  foreigl 
were  of  such  a  nature  that  the  Viceroy  could  not  entertain  them, 
so  the  good  opportunity  was  lost,  and  at  the  end  of  January  the 
tide  turned  again,  a  new  official,  the  greal  Ting  (formerly  Governoi 
of  this  province),  having   appeared  on   the  scene   to  inveal 


240  KKNC-Slll'I. 

matters  as  [mperial  Commissioner.  80  now  nothing  more  is 
heard  of  the  Viceroy's  offer;  which,  indeed,  he  now  denies  having 
ever  made — for  in  this  country  men  swear  backwards  or  forwards, 
in  any  way  which  suits  the  powers  that  be  ! 

This  lirw  man  has  turned  the  whole  question  against  the 
.Mission,  on  the  ground  of  their  encroaching  (though  that  has 
been  entirely  disproved),  and  for  the  last  three  months  nothing 
has  been  done  openly,  though  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  time 
lias  allowed  for  ample  coaching  of  native  witnesses. 

After  Sir  Thomas  Wade x  arrived  here,  about  three  weeks  ago, 
the  authorities  pretended  that  in  accordance  with  the  treaty  they 
had  brought  the  ringleaders  to  justice,  and  they  published  a  list  of 
the  principal  culprits  and  their  sentences.  It  is  well  known  that, 
with  the  exception  of  Lin-Ying-Lin,  whose  licence  to  teach  was 
nominally  suspended  for  a  short  time,  not  one  of  these  men  was  in 
any  way  concerned  with  the  riot !  They  are  known  to  be  simply 
a  set  of  wretched  jail-birds,  taken  from  prison,  and  promised 
exemption  from  worse  penalties  if  they  would  confess  to  having 
led  the  Wu-Shih-Shan  riot,  which,  of  course,  they  are  thankful  to 
do.  The  only  item  suggested  as  compensation  for  the  Mission  is 
a  ridiculously  small  sum,  simply  nominal,  to  cover  the  whole  loss 
of  college,  school,  &c,  and  a  small  sum  to  the  students  to  replace 
their  burnt  clothes.2 

So  now  the  great  Wu  -  Shih  -  Shan  case  has  reached  a  most 
extraordinary  stage  altogether  unprecedented  in  history.  The 
Chinese  have  placed  their  case  in  the  hands  of  a  clever  English 
lawyer  —  a  Q.C.,  under  whose  auspices  these  incendiaries,  with 
hands  uncleansed  from  the  guilt  of  arson,  are  to  be  allowed  to 
appear  as  plaintiffs  against  the  missionaries  in  an  English  court  of 

1  H.B.M.  Minister  for  China. 

-  That  such  things  are  done  in  China  is  well  authenticated.  After  the  Tien-tsin 
in:i-.-suTe,  it  was  stated  that  of  the  sixteen  men  supposed  to  have  been  the  true 
murderers,  only  six  were  executed;  the  other  ten  were  allowed  to  escape,  and  ten 
persons  were  substituted,  who  were  known  on  all  hands  to  be  innocent.  So  far 
from  being  abhorred  as  murderers,  they  were  looked  upon  as  martyrs  to  a  holy 
cause.  Five  hundred  taels  were  paid  for  each  victim  to  his  surviving  relatives, 
one  hundred  taels  being  paid  in  advance  for  the  purchase  of  handsome  coffins  and 
silk  grave-clothes.    The  balance  was  paid  with  much  ceremony  after  the  execution. 

The  heads  of  the  victims,  instead  of  being  exposed  in  a  wooden  cage  on  the  city 
walls  in  the  usual  manner,  were  sewed  on  again,  to  secure  for  the  dead  an  honour- 
able entry  into  the  world  of  spirits,  and  the  bodies  were  then  restored  to  their 
friends  to  be  laid  out  iu  state,  preparatory  to  a  public  funeral. 

So  perfectly  was  this  substitution  of  victims  understood,  that  the  Russian 
Consul-General  entered  his  protest  against  this  second  Tien-tsin  massacre,  but 
the  representatives  of  the  other  foreign  Powers  deemed  it  expedient  to  let  it  pass 
unquestioned. 


ENGLISH    TREATY    EIGHTS    IGNORED.  241 

law,  these  being  thus  dragged  into  law  expenses  as  defendants  ! 
The  anti-foreign  party  are  now  exultant,  and  openly  express  their 
hopes  that  their  new  leader  will  succeed  in  dislodging  the  Mission 
from  the  city. 

On  the  other  hand,  all  the  native  Christians  in  town  and  country 
are  in  despair.  Every  day  deputations  arrive  at  the  Mission  from 
all  parts  of  the  country,  praying  thai  no  concessions  may  be  made, 
as  any  such  would  endanger  all  their  lives.  As  it  is,  their  position 
is  at  best  a  most  unenviable  one,  owing  to  the  well-founded  con- 
viction of  their  own  officials,  that  they  need  not  hope  for  protec- 
tion from  the  British  authorities,  notwithstanding  the  clause  in 
Lord  Elgin's  treaty  of  Tien-tsin,  which  stipulates  that  "  all  persons 
teaching  or  professing  the  Christian  Faith,  whethex  Protestant  or 
Roman  Catholic,  shall  alike  be  entitled  to  the  protection  of  the 
Chinese  authorities — nor  shall  any  such,  peaceably  pursuing  their 
calling,  and  not  offending  against  the  laws,  be  persecuted  01  in- 
terfered with." 

The  same  treaty  entitles  British  subjects  to  hold  land  in  the 
interior  of  the  country  in  their  own  names — a  concession  which  is 
likewise  granted  to  Russian,  French,  German,  and  American  sub- 
jects, whose  right  to  do  so  is  not  only  freely  acknowledged,  but 
whenever,  in  any  riot,  their  property  is  injured,  or  chapels  de- 
stroyed, reparation  is  made  without  delay  or  hesitation.  As  regards 
British  subjects,  however,  their  rights  under  this  clause  are  so 
wholly  ignored  that  the  Church  of  England  Mission  is  compelled 
to  hold  all  its  out-stations  in  the  name  of  Chinese  converts  ! 

The  very  practical  result  is,  that  although  the  Church  of  England 
has  upwards  of  one  hundred  out-stations1  in  this  province,  each 
under  the  care  of  a  native  catechist,  the  land  is  in  every  ease  held 
in  the  name  of  native  Christians,  and  so  when  English  mission 
property  is  destroyed  by  rioters,  the  real  owners  are  simply  told 
that  they  have  no  business  to  be  there  !  And  as  to  the  protection 
secured  for  native  Christians,  it  is  a  dead  letter,  so  Ion-  as  they 
are  connected  with  the  English  Church.  One  outrage  after  another 
passes  unnoticed. 

For  instance,  about  three  years  ago,  in  the  city  of  Kieng-Ming- 
Foo,  a  paid  gang  of  ruffians  seized  both  teachers  and  students, 
stripped  them  and  hung  them  up  naked  on  trees,  heaping  every 
conceivable  insult  upon  them — forcing  such  filth  into  theirmouths 
that  some  of  them   fainted.      Finally,  they   were   inarched   naked 

1  These  have  now  been  increased  to  130. 
Q 


242  FENG-SHUI. 

through  the  streets,  and  subjected  to  such  indignities  that  the 
teacher,  the  Rev.  Mr  Ling,  a  good  and  faithful  native  clergyman, 
died  from  the  effects  of  their  maltreatment.  But  the  outrage  was 
allowed  to  pass  unpunished. 

Again,  only  two  months  before  I  came  here,  a  riot  was  stirred 
up  at  Tik-kau  in  the  same  district,  when  the  literati  issued  pro- 
clamations demanding  the  expulsion  of  all  Christians  from  the 
district;  considerable  damage  was  done  to  mission  property,  and 
the  converts  were  grossly  insulted.  The  Mission  here  was  much 
censured  for  reporting  so  trivial  a  matter  at  the  British  Consulate, 
and  the  matter  was  ignored.  Consequently  last  week  we  had  a 
postscript  from  the  same  district,  the  four  native  teachers  having 
been  carried  in  here  all  but  dead.  Two  are  dying;  indeed,  the 
mob  left  them  for  dead  on  the  street,  after  kicking  and  battering 
them  all  over,  and  finally  set  fire  to  their  clothes.  The  other  two 
escaped,  thanks  to  their  having  been  thrown  into  the  river  under 
the  impression  that  they  were  already  dead,  but  though  bruised 
and  maimed  they  survive. 

These  men  had  assembled  from  their  several  villages  at  the 
bidding  of  the  mandarins,  on  the  pretext  of  a  judicial  examination 
into  the  previous  riot,  but  it  was  the  beating  of  the  official  gong  at 
night  that  summoned  the  mob  which  dragged  them  from  their  beds 
and  beat  them  till  they  were  left  for  dead  !  Then  the  mandarins 
appeared  on  the  scene  in  the  guise  of  sympathetic  protectors,  and 
sent  them  down  here. 

But  for  these  and  numerous  other  aggressions,  there  appears  no 
prospect  whatever  of  redress — on  the  contrary,  men  of  unassailable 
character  have  been  thrown  into  loathsome  Chinese  prisons,  and 
there  left  to  languish  for  months,  on  no  other  ground  than  their 
friendliness  to  the  Christians. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  anything  of  the  sort  occurs  to  the 
American  Mission  stations,  the  U.S.  Consul  insists  on  the  Chinese 
at  once  rebuilding  the  churches  and  paying  compensation  for 
damage  done ;  and  so  well  do  the  mandarins  know  this,  that  they 
frequently  volunteer  repairs  and  compensation  without  even  wait- 
ing to  be  asked.  For  instance,  within  the  last  few  days  news  has 
come  of  a  serious  attack  by  an  armed  mob  on  an  American  chapel. 
In  this  case,  the  Chinese  magistrates  immediately  interfered,  com- 
pelled the  rioters  to  pay  all  the  expenses  of  rebuilding  the  church, 
medical  attendance  for  the  wounded,  to  find  six  months'  security 
for  the  safety  of  the  persons  who  had  been  assaulted,  and,  more- 
over, to  pay  a  fine  as  compensation  to  the  sufferers — which,  how- 


CHRISTIAN    THEORY    VERSUS   PRACTICR  243 

ever,  these  (albeit  Chinamen,  and  very  poor  nun)  declined  to  receive, 
lest  the  purity  of  their  motives  should  be  suspected! 

One  singular  feature  in  the  present  difficulty  is  the  very  arbi- 
trary distinction  which  is  drawn  by  the  British  authorities  between 
the  protection  due  to  Mission  and  mercantile  property — as  if,  as 
some  one  once  remarked,  the  British  subject  who  sells  Bibles  is  not 
entitled  to  exactly  the  same  protection  under  treaty  rights  as  the 
man  who  sells  opium  or  any  other  foreign  merchandise  !  The  fact 
that  the  one  hopes  to  benefit  the  Chinese,  and  the  other  seeks  only 
his  own  profit,  of  course  does  not  weigh  in  this  balance — all  that 
is  asked  is  fair -play.  Certainly,  as  regards  the  concession  to 
Chinese  prejudice,  which  is  deemed  so  essential  in  the  present 
instance,  it  must  be  admitted  that  all  the  opposition  which  has 
ever  been  stirred  up  against  Missions  and  Bible-sellers  is  as  noth- 
ing compared  with  the  vigorous  and  prolonged  efforts  which  were 
made  by  the  Chinese  for  the  exclusion  of  opium,  but  in  thai 
matter  their  most  just  remonstrances  were  silenced  by  the  roar  of 
artillery ! 

But  there  is  no  gainsaying  the  fact,  that  many  persons  look 
upon  missionaries  and  their  work  as  altogether  a  mistake — an 
annoying  effort  to  bring  about  undesirable  and  unprofitable 
changes.  What  a  pity  it  must  seem  to  such  thinkers  that  Si 
Columba  or  St  Patrick  ever  took  the  trouble  to  come  to  Britain,  or 
indeed  that  a  handful  of  low-born  Jews  should  have  presumed  to 
preach  in  Greece  or  Borne — to  say  nothing  of  their  little  troubles 
with  the  literati  of  Judea.  As  regards  obedience  to  The  Mastki; 
whose  last  Commandment  these  troublesome  missionaries  are  try- 
ing to  carry  out,  that  may  be  all  very  well  in  theory,  but  nol  in 
practice  ;  and  as  to  a  Chinese  St  Stephen,  they  have  neither  in- 
terest in  nor  sympathy  with  any  such,  even  when  his  martyrdom 
is  enacted  almost  at  their  doors  ! 

To  an  unbiassed  stranger  like  myself,  continually  receiving  kind- 
ness from  all  ranks  and  conditions  of  my  fellow-countrymen,  few 
things  are  more  remarkable  than  the  singular  indifference  of  the 
majority  of  the  mercantile  community  in  oriental  countries  to  all 
missionary  matters,  their  attitude  both  towards  missionaries  and 
native  Christians  being  generally  that  of  cold  neutrality.  Indeed 
it  seems  a  marvel  how  the  two  streams  can  flow,  side  by  side,  in  ;i 
far  country,  with  so  wondrously  little  social  blending — a  curious 
position  for  the  two  great  sections  of  a  Christian  community. 

In  the  present  instance,  however,  a  very  real  interesl  ha-  from 
the  beginning  been  aroused,  from  the  fact  that    the  tenure  of  the 


244  PENG-SHUI. 

Mission  lands  iii  the  city  is  precisely  similar  to  that  by  which  all 
the  foreign  community  bold  their  ground  on  this  hill  of  Xantai, 
overlooking  the  native  streets;  so  if  this  sort  of  thing  is  to  be 
allowed  to  go  unpunished,  the  literati  may  any  day  bring  hired 
mobs  to  prove  that  these  large  foreign  houses  disturb  the  fen;/ - 
shui  of  the  multitudinous  dead  whose  graves  lie  all  around  us.  If 
this  idiotic  plea  is  admitted  as  a  sufficient  reason  to  compel  a 
British  subject  to  leave  a  home  occupied  for  twenty-nine  years,  it 
may  be  raised  about  any  spot.  Here  there  is  no  concession  (i.e., 
ground  made  over  to  foreigners,  as  at  other  ports) — only  individual 
houses,  most  of  which  were  built  under  pressure  of  the  newly  made 
(and  then  enforced)  treaty.  The  very  hill  on  which  they  stand  is 
said  by  the  Chinese  to  be  the  backbone  of  the  Great  Dragon,  so 
there  is  no  reason  why  the  same  cry  should  not  be  raised  here 
any  day. 

"When  the  United  States  Consul  erected  his  flagstaff  at  this 
Consulate,  a  demand  was  made  for  its  immediate  removal  on  feng- 
shui  grounds ;  but  as  he  simply  refused  to  listen  to  such  rubbish, 
the  people  contented  themselves  with  making  an  image  of  a  little 
devil  firing  at  the  flagstaff.  This  still  remains  on  a  ridge-pole  near 
here,  and  is  supposed  to  neutralise  the  evil ! 

So  well  do  the  foreign  residents  here  realise  the  danger  of  yield- 
ing to  these  outcries,  that  soon  after  the  Wu-Shih-Shan  outrage 
(aware  that  such  matters  are  apt  to  be  slurred  over)  they  deemed 
it  necessary  to  take  personal  action  in  the  matter,  by  sending  a 
memorial  on  the  subject,  signed  by  all  the  leading  merchants  of 
Foo-Chow,  to  the  Secretary  of  State  for  Foreign  Affairs,1  expressing 
their  sense  of  the  gravity  of  this  premeditated  outrage,  their  know- 
ledge of  its  having  been  connived  at  by  the  Chinese  officials,  their 
conviction  of  the  validity  of  the  Church  Mission  title-deeds,  and 
their  hope  that  in  obtaining  ample  redress  for  the  injuries  inflicted 
on  the  Church  Missionary  Society,  steps  might  be  taken  to  con- 
vince the  Chinese  authorities  of  Foo-Chow  that  the  treaty  rights 
of  her  Majesty's  subjects  cannot  be  violated  with  impunity. 

So  far,  however,  from  any  redress  having  been  obtained,  the  case 
has  now  assumed  the  phenomenal  form  of  this  extraordinary  law- 
suit, whereby  an  unprincipled  gang  of  anti-foreign  conspirators  are 
suffered  to  invoke  English  law  in  justification  of  felony,  and  the 
aggrieved  missionaries,  having  first  been  burnt  out  of  their  house, 
are  now  required  to  secure  legal  counsel  for  their  defence  !  Of 
course  every  merchant  on  Xantai  knows  that  this  precedent  of 
1  Lord  Salisbury. 


THE    RACE-COURSE     I'KRSCS    THE    MISSION.  245 

submission  to  fengshui-ite  mob-law  applies  with  equal  force  to 

every  foreigner  holding  land  or  house  property,  so  day  by  day  each 
move  of  either  side — the  Mission  or  the  Chinese — is  watched  with 
keen  interest,  for  this  is  regarded  as  a  great  test  case,  and  every  one 
is  anxious  to  see  how  it  will  end. 

The  Chinese  officials  have  unfortunately  a  Btrong  and  well- 
founded  impression  that  the  members  of  this  Mission  need  nol 
hope  for  support  from  their  own  Consul,  who  in  fact  has  repeatedly 
and  openly  expressed  both  to  English  and  American  residents  bis 
hope  that  they  will  be  compelled  to  abandon  their  premises  in  the 
city,  and  furthermore,  by  a  singularly  incongruous  combination  of 
ideas,  suggests  the  probability  that  the  Chinese  authorities  may 
testify  their  joy  at  the  expulsion  of  the  Mission  by  presenting  to 
the  foreign  community  a  piece  of  land  suitable  for  a  Race-Go 
— a  form  of  barter  which  some  of  the  most  secular  members  of  the 
community  declare  would  really  be  "obtaining  the  much-di 
Race-Course  at  too  great  a  price  "  ! ! 

That  the  question  of  the  Race-Course  has  actually  been  mixed 
up  in  the  terms  of  compensation  demanded  for  the  outrage,  has 
been  distinctly  stated  both  to  Englishmen  and  Americans  here  and 
in  Shanghai  by  wondering  Chinese  officials  !  Certainly  this  is 
rather  a  singular  way  to  deal  with  the  interests  of  a  great  English 
company,  even  if  it  is  only  Ecclesiastical  !  ! 


CHAPTEK    XIX. 

AN"     EXTRAORDINARY     TRIAL. 

A  calm  Sunday — Visits  to  Wu-Shih-Shan— Choice  selection    of   sitee     N<  u 
interpretation  of  old  laws  of  custom — Acquisition  of  the  Ra  <   '  loui  e 
injustice  leads  to  others — Persecutions — Better  days — Good  out  of  evil 

With  MB8  Pi  rHB  Ki\  i  b, 

I'M      -      - 

Palm-Sunday!  A  hot,  still,  very  oriental  day.  We  have  enjoyed 
the  greater  part  of  it  sitting  on  the  verandah  watching  tin-  shipping 
and  wondrously  clear  reflections,  for  it  i>  a  great  calm. 

In  the  forenoon  we  went  to  the  English  chapel  for  foreign  resi- 
dents on  the  isle,  which  is  quite  independent  of  the  Missions,  but 


246  AN    EXTRAORDINARY   TRIAL. 

there  were  so  very  few  people  present  that  the  chaplain  announced 
that  the  sermon  lie  had  intended  to  preach  would  be  unsuitable,  so 
he  dismissed  the  congregation!1  This  being  the  only  service  of 
the  day,  we  have  hud  ample  leisure  to  enjoy  the  river. 

Oh  how  lovely  this  evening  has  been  !  Mount  Kushan  looming 
grand  through  the  warm  sunset  haze,  and  then  dreamy  moon- 
light pictures — great  curiously-shaped  junks  floating  past  with  the 
tide — swiftly  and  silently,  like  spirits,  or  like  a  scene  in  some 
strange  pantomime.  A  number  of  sampans  lie  moored  along  the 
shore,  right  under  our  windows,  but  all  their  people  are  asleep,  and 
perfect  silence  reigns. 

Would  that  all  life  might  be  equally  peaceful !  Unfortunately 
that  seems  too  good  a  boon  for  this  world,  and  many  of  my  best 
friends  here — those  of  all  others  who  most  desire  peace — are  at 
present  forced  into  a  daily  strife  which  is  terribly  hard  upon  them. 
I  mean,  of  course,  all  the  members  of  the  English  Church  Mission, 
who,  day  by  day,  are  being  worried  almost  past  endurance  by  the 
various  moves  of  all  their  antagonists. 

I  have  been  several  times  to  visit  them  in  their  home  on  the 
"VVu-Shih-Shan  hill — such  a  pleasant  home,  and  commanding  such 
a  beautiful  view  of  the  city  and  all  the  country  beyond — cprite  an 
ideal  spot  for  their  work,  well  raised  above  the  filthy  town  (wherein 
most  of  them  work  all  day,  but  have  the  unspeakable  boon  of  com- 
ing home  at  night  to  a  clean  atmosphere,  right  in  the  pathway  of 
every  breeze).  Such  surroundings  of  grey  rock,  grassy  hill,  and 
shady  trees  must  be  an  unspeakable  boon  in  the  heart  of  a  great 
city,  and  their  advantages  are  plainly  shown  by  the  fresh  healthy 
look  of  all  the  nice  Chinese  girls  in  the  boarding-school  of  the 
Female  Education  Society.  I  have  never  in  any  country  seen  a 
more  satisfactory,  happy-looking  lot.  It  is  also  the  centre  of  work 
of  the  English  Medical  Mission. 

It  does  seem  hard,  indeed,  that  these  useful  societies  should  be 
subjected  to  so  much  annoyance  and  persecution.  The  mere  notion 
of  the  lawsuit  is  bad  enough,  but  they  have  secured  a  loyal  defender 
in   Mr  Nicholas  Hannen,   the   Crown  Advocate,   brother  of    Sir 

1  This  very  easy-going  system  of  non-attendance  at  even  one  service  a-week 
cannot  impress  the  Chinese  mind  with  a  deep  sense  of  European  appreciation  of 
Church  privileges  !  Hence  such  an  incident  as  I  noticed  last  Sunday  morning, 
when  a  large  garden  near  the  church  swarmed  with  the  rather  picturesque  but  ex- 
ceedingly shabby  retainers  of  a  big  Chinese  official,  who  (well  knowing  the  import- 
ance supposed  to  attach  among  Christians  to  Sunday  observance)  had  appointed  the 
hour  of  service  as  that  in  which  to  meet  European  gentlemen  for  the  discussion  of 
business  relating  to  the  Great  Trial. 


DELIGHTFUL    ALTERNATIVES  !  247 

James1 — and  as  every  one  here  agrees  in  the  conviction  that  hy  no 
possibility  could  the  case  go  against  the  Mission  in  a  fair  trial,  it 
seems  that  the  best  thing  to  do  would  be  just  to  let  it  go  on,  and 
thus  the  Society's  rightful  possession  of  their  ground  will  In- 
established  beyond  question. 

This,  however,  is  by  no  means  the  view  taken  by  the  Chinese, 
who  are  confident  that  in  the  hands  of  their  English  counsel,  their 
unrighteous  cause  is  secured.  Every  delay  and  every  concession 
has  made  the  literati  and  small  gentry  more  determined  U>  <>u>: 
the  Mission  from  the  city,  and  day  by  day  they  wax  more  insolent. 

Ever  since  Sir  Thomas  Wade  arrived  at  the  Consulate  here,  he 
has  been  most  anxious  to  effect  a  compromise,  by  inducing  the 
Mission  to  resign  all  their  rights  to  the  excellent  Bite  on  the  breezy 
hill  which  they  have  held  since  1850,  in  exchange  for  such  a  site 
as  the  Chinese  may  be  disposed  to  offer.  As  the  representatives 
of  the  C.M.S.  cannot  possibly  abandon  their  right  to  remain  in  tie- 
city,  the  alternative  offered  is  a  home  in  the  foul,  overcrowded 
streets.  "What  that  means,  at  its  very  best,  can  scarcely  be  realised 
by  any  one  not  personally  acquainted  with  the  horrors  of  a  Chinese 
city.  The  site  they  now  have  is  the  best  and  airiest  in  the  city  ; 
nevertheless,  for  peace'  sake,  and  in  compliance  with  the  strongly 
urged  wishes  of  the  British  Minister  (who  considers  St  Paul  s 
adherence  to  his  rights  as  a  Roman  citizen  wholly  inapplicable  to 
the  case  of  a  British  subject !),  the  members  of  the  Mission  ag 
to  exchange  their  site  for  one  on  any  other  hill,  or  even  rising 
ground,  within  the  walls. 

But  the  Chinese  are  not  nice  people  to  deal  with  when  they 
once  detect  a  tendency  to  undue  compliance,  which  invariably  pro- 
duces  corresponding  arrogance,  and  I  am  told  by  an  unbiassed 
English  merchant  (whose  very  unusual  tastes  have  made  him 
familiar  with  the  native  town)  that  the  sites  which  have  been 
offered  have  simply  been  a  succession  of  insults,  each  being  more 
impossible  than  the  last.  The  first  was  on  the  edge  of  a  foul 
stagnant  canal,  which  receives  the  drainage  of  the  whole  dense 
mass  of  native  houses  all  around — a  canal  which  all  through  the 
burning  summer  sends  up  a  sickening  miasma  of  poisonous  ( Ihinese 
stench.  (Foreigners,  if  compelled  even  to  pass  near  such  places, 
hurry  on,  with  handkerchief  covering  mouth  and  nose  !)  This  site 
was  highly  recommended,  because  the  canal  would  afford  Buch 
excellent  facilities  for  drainage! 

1  Another  brother,  Mr  Charles  Hannen,  holds  a  high  position  here,  and 
Imperial  Government,  in  the  Chinese  Customs  Service. 


248  AN    EXTRAORDINARY    TRIAL. 

As  it  was  manifestly  impossible  for  the  Mission  to  agree  to  this 
exchange,  they  were,  a  few  days  later,  summoned  to  consider  the 
merits  of  another  still  fouler  spot  in  the  heart  of  the  city,  which  is 
simply  a  collection  of  the  most  revolting  pools  of  sewerage — in  fact, 
for  ages  has  been  nothing  else — and  all  through  the  rainy  season 
the  whole  neighbourhood  is  covered  with  water.  To  this  choice 
spot  the  harassed  and  disheartened  clergymen  were  led,  with  the 
assurance  that  the  Chinese  officials  would  fill  up  these  pools  and 
make  quite  a  nice  site  of  it ! 

As  the  victims  could  not  see  it  quite  in  that  light,  another 
delightful  site  was  offered,  and  next  day  they  were  led  to  the  hank 
of  a  stagnant  pool,  300  feet  long  by  70  broad,  which  receives 
all  the  drainage  of  another  dense  mass  of  Chinese  houses  in  the 
very  heart  of  the  city.  Nothing  short  of  practical  experience 
can  convey  any  notion  of  the  foul  filth  of  these  crowded  streets, 
and  their  endless  successions  of  fearful  smells,  of  which  one 
never-failing  supply  is  diffused  by  the  economical  customs  of 
the  Chinese  with  regard  to  night-soil,  which  at  all  hours  of  the 
day  is  carried  through  the  streets  in  uncovered  buckets  (slung 
from  bamboos  on  men's  shoulders)  to  be  spread  over  the  neigh- 
bouring fields. 

The  foreign  residents  who  are  not  missionaries,  think  it  bad 
enough  if  business  compels  them  occasionally  to  be  carried  through 
the  streets  in  a  chair,  and  few  of  the  ladies  here  have  ever  been  inside 
the  city  gates  /  With  regard  to  these  peculiarly  loathsome  spots 
which  are  offered  as  suitable  homes  for  English  ladies  and  children, 
with  the  flourishing  schools  of  healthy  Chinese  country  girls,  the 
doctors  affirm,  and  common-sense  certifies,  that  it  would  be  fatal 
for  foreigners  to  attempt  to  live  on  any  one  of  them — one  pleasing 
item  to  be  considered  being  the  fact  that  these  streets  are  never 
free  from  smallpox  ! 

It  was,  of  course,  impossible  for  the  representatives  of  the  C.M.S. 
to  accept  of  such  an  exchange  on  behalf  of  the  Society.  After 
this  the  small  gentry  waxed  insolent,  and  refused  to  hear  of  any 
compromise  short  of  the  expulsion  of  the  Mission  from  the  city, 
and  now  placards  have  been  stuck  all  over  the  town  stirring  up  the 
people  to  destruction  of  all  churches,  and  expulsion  of  all  foreign- 
ers, declaring  their  own  mandarins  to  be  a  set  of  children,  and  that 
neither  they  nor  the  soldiers  are  to  be  feared.  In  fact,  the  Wu- 
Shih-Shan  outrage  is  but  one  proof  of  the  hatred  of  all  foreign 
influence  by  this  faction,  which,  gaining  nothing  by  trade,  fears 
only  the  loss  of  its  own  power. 


AN    AMAZING   VERDICT.  240 

Further  negotiations  being  now  impossible,  the  lawsuit  is  to 
take  its  course. 

This  final  crisis  has  developed  rapidly,  for  the  friendly  Chinese, 
who  know  every  turn  of  affairs  in  the  city,  maintain  that  only  last 
month,  when  the  Viceroy  and  great  mandarins  heard  that  the 
British  Minister  was  coming  in  person,  they  were  fully  prepared 
to  concede  such  terms  of  restitution  as  they  supposed  he  would 
certainly  demand. 

I  need  scarcely  say  that  all  these  details  are  matters  of  intense 
interest  to  every  one  here,  of  whatever  nationality,  so  extraordinary 
is  the  position  of  a  great  British  society  thus  compelled  to  defend 
itself  before  an  English  judge  against  the  accusation  of  red-handed 
incendiaries,  acting  on  the  directions  of  an  eminent  English 
lawyer ! 

Note. — Ere  this  trial  came  off  I  had  left  Foo-Chow,  and  was  at 
Nmgpo  on  a  visit  to  Bishop  Russell,  when  tidings  reached  him  of 
the  end  of  "The  Great  Wn-Shih-Shan  Case" — tidings  of  great 
surprise  and  sorrow. 

I  also  received  various  letters  from  friends  at  Foo-Chow,  all  of 
whom  had  watched  the  trial  with  keen  interest.  As  these  Letters 
exactly  coincided  in  all  their  details  with  those  received  from  other 
persons  by  Bishop  Russell,  I  may  assume  that  they  were  accurate, 
and  I  shall  therefore  quote  some  extracts  from  that  of  a  totally 
unbiassed  American. 

"The  trial  is  over,  and  though  the  verdict  is  noi  yet  formally 
given,  the  judge  has  left  us  no  room  to  doubt  that  his  decision  will 
result  in  the  expulsion  of  the  missionaries  from  the  city.  We  are 
all  amazed  at  a  verdict  which  lias  only  been  made  possible  by 
allowing  technicalities  of  English  law,  never  previously  heard  of 
in  China,  to  be  dragged  into  the  question  in  a  mosl  extraordinary 
and  utterly  unprecedented  manner,  so  as  to  hear  in  direct  opposi- 
tion to  the  Chinese  custom  regarding  all  land  leases. 

"The  ground  on  which  the  trial  Avas  at  liist  based  was  the 
charge  of  encroachment,  but  that  accusation  broke  down  utterly 
and  was  abandoned,  so  the  question  was  then  shifted  to  the 
legality  of  the  lease — which  lease  was  signed  by  two  directors  of 
the  temple,  for,  and  in  the  presence  of,  the  whole  hody  of  directors, 
and  is  worded  precisely  as  Chinese  liases  always  are.  Strange  t<> 
say,  though  the  month  and  year  are  always  entered,  a  blani  is 
invariably  left  where  the  day  <>f   occupation   would   naturally   he 


250  AN    EXTRAORDINARY    TRIAL. 

I'lilcivil.1  This  is  the  invariable  custom,  nevertheless  the  judge 
announced  in  court  that  he  would  declare  the  lease  void  on  this 
ground  ! 

"There  was  no  jury,  so  the  verdict  rests  entirely  in  the  hands 
of  the  judge,2  who,  as  you  are  aware,  only  arrived  in  China  a  few 
months  ago,  after  long  residence  in  Sierra  Leone,  consequently  he 
can  know  little  of  Chinese  custom.  During  the  trial  he  resided  at 
the  Consulate,  and  it  can  he  no  breach  of  charity  to  say  that  the 
tone  of  feeling  there  is  not  favourable  to  the  missionaries. 

"  From  the  very  beginning  of  the  trial  the  judge  showed  a 
decided  bias  against  them,  and  indulged  in  most  uncalled-for  re- 
marks, implying  that  the  statements  upon  oath  of  these  highly 
respected  clergy  of  the  Church  of  England  were  not  to  be  relied 
upon. 

"  In  the  same  strain  the  English  counsel  for  the  Chinese,  having 
taken  the  deposition  of  a  Buddhist  priest  (who  was  proved  to  have 
absconded  with  500  dollars — paid  in  advance  by  Mr  "Wolfe  to  the 
temple,  for  land — and  to  have  become  a  Taouist  priest  in  order  to 
escape  the  Buddhists,  and  who  did  not  scruple  what  lies  he  told 
to  cover  this  transaction),  declared  that  in  the  statements  of  the 
two  ministers  of  religion  it  was  clear  that  the  truth  lay  with  the 
Buddhist !     Much  more  was  added  of  the  same  nature. 

"  In  short,  the  manner  in  which  these  British  gentlemen  have 
been  addressed  in  presence  of  the  Chinese  (while  these  have  all 
along  been  treated  with  most  marked  consideration),  has  made  all 
who  value  even-handed  justice  indignant,  and  you  know  how 
readily  the  Chinese  mark  and  interpret  the  smallest  symptoms 
of  official  discourtesy  as  a  proof  that  they  may  readily  adopt 
the  same  course. 

"  It  certainly  has  been  a  remarkable  experience  to  find  British 
ingenuity  devising  and  teaching  the  Chinese  new  lessons  in  the  art 
of  amalgamating  English  and  Chinese  law  for  the  oppression  of  the 
Church  of  England  Mission  !  "     .     .     . 

Extract  from  another  letter  from  an  American : — 

"  April.  4,  1S80. 

"  The  English  Mission  is  now  entirely  dislodged  from 
"Wu-Shih-Shan.     Its  houses  there  are  almost  pulled  down,  and  the 

i  It  is  so  in  all  the  leases  held  by  Bishop  Russell  in  North  China,  and  in  those 
of  all  other  persons  whom  I  have  heard  speak  on  the  subject. 

'-'  Mr  French,  Chief  Judge  of  Her  Majesty's  Supreme  Court  in  China. 


THE    RACE-COURSE    SECURED.  251 

ground   is   undergoing  purification  by   the  continual    burning  of 
candles  and  joss-paper ! 

"  Simultaneously  with  the  ousting  of  the  missionaries,  the 

LONG-COVETED  EaCE-COURSE    HAS    BEEN   SECURED,  as    YOU  will  see  bv 

the  enclosed  clipping  from  the  Foo-Chow  paper  !  " 

For  upwards  of  two  years  more  the  Church  of  England  con- 
tinued subject  to  much  persecution,  and  the  workers  were  nearly 
worn  out  with  ceaseless  harassing  anxieties.  They  deemed  them- 
selves fortunate,  however,  in  being  allowed  to  retain  their  three 
churches  in  the  city,  and  in  being  suffered  to  go  thither  unmolested 
to  aid  the  native  clergy  and  catechists  in  ministering  to  their  op- 
pressed flocks,  but  all  other  property  in  the  city  was  taken  from 
them. 

For  a  while  they  were  compelled  to  disband  their  theological 
students,  having  no  place  in  which  to  accommodate  them.  So  soon, 
however,  as  it  was  possible,  a  native  house  was  secured  for  their 
use  near  to  the  temporary  quarters  in  which  the  refugees  first  found 
a  resting-place  after  their  compulsory  removal  to  Nantai  These 
were  very  inconvenient,  but  endless  difficulties  were  thrown  in  the 
way  of  any  better  site  being  obtained. 

Better  days  were,  however,  in  store.  In  18S3  Sir  Harry  Earkes 
was  appointed  H.B.M.  Minister  at  Eeking,  and  very  shortly  after- 
wards a  marked  changed  was  evident  in  the  attitude  of  the  Chinese 
officials  at  Foo-Chow.1  Various  provincial  difficulties  of  long 
standing  were  rectified,  and  confiscated  churches  restored.  More- 
over, an  excellent  site  in  a  very  good  and  healthy  situation  in 
the  open  country  was  offered  to  the  Mission  in  exchange  for  thai 
which  they  had  purchased.  Eecuniary  gifts  from  sympathetic 
friends  supplemented  the  small  sum  which  had  been  paid  by  the 
Chinese  officials  as  compensation  for  the  burnt  college,  and  by  tie- 
close  of  the  year  an  excellent  building  was  completed,  with  accom- 
modation for  fifty  students,  each  provided  with  a  separate  small 
room.  To  the  college  is  attached  a  chapel,  seated  for  250  persons, 
and  the  very  first  service  herein  held  was  the  ordination  to  priest's 
orders  of  the  Eev.  Ngoi-kai-ki,  an  excellent  clergyman,  and,  more- 
over, an  Honorary  Mandarin  of  the  fifth  Military  degree  (I  note 
this,  because,  as  yet,  so  few  men  of  any  social  standing  have  joined 

1  Alas!  for  all  British  interests  in  China,  but  doubly  grievous  for  the  cause  of 
Christian  Missions,  was  the  bitter  news  received  in  London  on  Sunday, 22d  March 
1885,  announcing  that  Sir  Harry  Parkes  had  that  morning  died  at  Peking  from 

rapid  typhus  fever. 


252  AN    EXTRAORDINARY   TRIAL. 

the  Christians).  It  is  the  old  story  here  as  in  Judea,  "Have  any 
of  tiii:  rulers  of  the  people  believed?"     Mr  Ngoi  has  had  to  face 

many  a  trouble  on  arcount  of  his  Christian  faith,  not  tlie  least  to 
a  Chinaman  being  the  official  annulling  of  his  hard-earned  liter- 
ary B.A.  degree.  Moreover,  for  many  years  his  wife  was  a  hitter 
opponent  of  the  Christians,  and  her  unkindness  made  his  home 
very  miserable.  Gradually,  however,  she  quite  changed,  became  a 
most  devout  Christian,  and  she  and  her  three  children  were  baptised 
together. 

Mr  Ngoi,  who  has  hitherto  heen  in  charge  of  a  country  parish, 
has  now  been  appointed  Native  Principal  of  the  new  hoarding- 
school  for  boys,  which  has  been  built  near  the  college,  also  on  an 
excellent  site,  with  accommodation  for  sixty  boys,  a  first-rate  play- 
ground, and  comfortable  quarters  for  masters.  An  admirable  feature 
of  this  school  is  the  opening  of  an  industrial  school  in  connection 
with  it ;  so  that  the  boys,  having  devoted  half  of  each  day  to  study, 
may  in  the  other  half  be  instructed  in  useful  trades.  Thus  when 
their  school  days  are  over,  they  will  he  fitted  to  start  in  life  as  ahle 
Christian  tradesmen.  Such  of  the  elder  boys  as  show  a  distinct 
talent  or  inclination  for  work  as  teachers,  are  allowed  to  give  up 
attending  these  industrial  classes,  that  they  may  devote  their  full 
time  to  study. 

The  Girls'  Boarding-school  shares  in  the  general  comfort  of 
ample  space,  and  forty  hoarders  give  good  promise  of  future  in- 
fluence in  many  homes. 

A  commodious  new  house  has  also  heen  built  for  women  who 
come  to  study  with  a  view  to  retiring  to  their  own  villages  as 
Bible-women — a  class  greatly  needed,  and  of  extreme  usefulness. 
Of  course  in  China  women  can  only  be  reached  by  women,  more 
especially  women  of  the  upper  and  middle  classes.  Hence  the 
somewhat  unusual  feature  of  finding  that  the  converts  number  con- 
siderably mure  men  than  women.  The  baptisms  in  the  Fuh-Kien 
districts  for  the  year  1882  show  a  return  of  two  hundred  and  two 
men  and  only  sixty-two  women.  It  is  hoped  that  the  work  of  the 
Bible-women  in  Chinese  homes  will  soon  show  a  very  different 
return.  Twenty-four  such  women  are  now  under  instruction  by 
the  wives  of  the  clergy. 

Now  that  all  the  prolonged  vexations  of  the  persecutions  and 
the  Unjust  Trial  are  well  passed,  those  most  deeply  concerned  are 
able  to  believe  that  all  has  been  over-ruled  for  good,  and  that  in 
some  respects  (notwithstanding  the  extra  fatigue  entailed  on  the 
clergy  by  the  long  daily   walks   to   their  work  in  the  city)  the 


EVIL  OVERRULED  FOR  GOOD.  253 

position  of  the  Mission  has  actually  heen  benefited,     it  is  found 
that  the  students — men,  boys,  and  girls — work  better  in  the  p 
atmosphere,  and  there  is  space  for  further  overflow  should  numbers 
increase. 

Moreover,  proximity  to  the  foreign  settlement  has  distinct  ad- 
vantages in  bringing  the  subject  home  to  the  notice  of  many  who 
formerly  scarcely  realised  what  work  was  actually  going  on,  who 
probably  had  never  in  their  lives  entered  a  Chinese  school  or 
chapel,  and  whose  sole  ideas  of  native  Christians  were  derived 
from  having  once  had  some  very  dishonest  servant  who  called  him- 
self a  Christian.  Now  that  the  Mission  is  so  well  established  in 
the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  the  foreign  community,  its  exist- 
ence is  self-evident,  and  creates  an  interest  which  finds  expression 
in  such  kindly  acts  as  occasional  treats  to  the  children,  and  largely 
increased  sympathy  with  the  long-tried  members  of  the  Mission. 

The  same  happy  change  is  also  very  apparent  throughout  tic- 
province.  At  numerous  villages  (where  till  very  recently  a  foreign 
teacher  had  to  face  the  probabilities  of  insult  and  riot,  and  where, 
for  perhaps  a  number  of  years,  one  solitary  converl  alone  held  his 
ground  in  spite  of  all  persecution)  there  are  now  flourishing  con- 
gregations of  from  fifty  to  a  hundred  persons.  And  whereas  five 
years  ago  there  were  only  half-a-dozen  little  country  village  schools, 
there  are  now  upwards  of  forty,  with  a  prospect  of  considerable 
increase  of  the  number  of  scholars,  of  whom  fully  one-half  are 
children  of  entirely  heathen  families,  hut  are  nevertheless  committed 
by  their  parents  to  the  careful  training  of  the  hitherto  hated  and 
despised  Christians  ! 

As  a  matter  of  course,  the  bombardment  of  the  Arsenal  by  the 
French  at  once  raised  a  fresh  storm  of  persecution,  which,  however, 
the  mandarins  did  their  utmost  to  allay.  It  was  deemed  expedienl 
to  recall  all  foreign  teachers  within  the  limits  of  the  Treaty  Ports, 
but  the  converts  thus  left  to  themselves  held  their  ground  bravely, 
and  (notwithstanding  the  bitter  taunts  and  contempt  of  their  heathen 
neighbours,  who  declared  them  traitors  to  their  country,  whom  it 
would  be  well  to  exterminate)  they  went  calmly  on  their  usual 
way,  all  Church  services  being  held  with  accustomed  regularity, 
and  well  attended. 

It  may  be  that  in  years  to  come,  when  China  has  taken  her  'place 

as  THE   GREATEST   CHRISTIAN    NATION    IN    THE   WORLD,  BU<jh   troubles 

as  these  will  be  remembered,  as  we  in  Britain  remember  the  perse- 
cutions of  the  earliest  Christians  by  our  pagan  ancestors. 

But  meanwhile,  as  regards  the  present  position  of  the  Church  in 


254  AN    EXTRAORDINARY    TRIAL. 

this  province,  it  would  appeal  that  here,  as  elsewhere,  the  darkest 
hour  preceded  the  dawn — 

Post  Tenebras,  Lux  ! 

Moreover,  seeing  that  the  surest  test  of  vitality  in  any 
branch  of  the  Christian  Church  is  the  readiness  with  which  it 
obeys  the  Master's  last  Commandment,  to  carry  His  Gospel  to 
further  lands  (an  obligation  which  Britain  was  so  slow  to  realise, 
that  until  the  beginning  of  the  present  century  her  mission  work 
was  almost  nil),  it  is  specially  interesting  to  learn  that  this  young 
]Srative  Church  of  Foo-Chow  has  already  made  her  first  effort  in 
this  direction.  Xo  sooner  was  the  possibility  of  access  to  Corea 
made  known,  than  the  Chinese  Christians  of  Foo-Chow  solemnly 
set  apart  two  of  their  number  to  commence  a  mission  to  the 
Hermit  Land.  Apparently  the  men  selected  were  not  the  fittest 
for  the  work,  for  one  has  already  returned  disheartened.  But  it 
is  much  that  the  duty  has  been  so  fully  recognised  and  the  first 
effort  made. 

Note. — Since  the  above  was  penned,  the  Chinese  Government 
has  taken  a  step  of  the  utmost  importance — namely,  the  proclama- 
tion, first  in  the  spring,  and  again  in  the  autumn  of  1886,  of  an 
edict  of  full  toleration  for  Christianity,  informing  the  people  that 
the  sole  purpose  of  preaching  and  establishing  Mission  chapels  is 
to  exhort  men  to  do  right,  and  that  they  who  embrace  Christianity 
do  not  cease  to  be  Chinese  subjects,  but  are  entitled  to  claim  full 
protection  from  the  laws  of  their  own  land.  This  Imperial  edict 
has  been  so  extensively  proclaimed,  that  it  is  understood  that  special 
instructions  to  that  effect  were  despatched  to  every  governor  in  the 
eighteen  provinces. 

The  statement  that  converts  do  not  relinquish  their  nationality, 
points  to  the  gravest  of  all  causes  of  persecution  —  as  usual,  a 
purely  political  motive  —  namely,  that  France,  making  mission 
work  a  cloak  for  political  aggression,  claimed  that  all  Roman 
Catholic  converts  should  be  under  French  protection,  and  exempt 
from  local  jurisdiction  and  taxation !  Hence,  at  the  outbreak 
of  the  Franco-Chinese  war  in  188-4  (see  footnote,  chap,  vi.),  the 
lives  of  Christians  in  all  parts  of  the  Empire  were  embittered  by 
the  people  who,  not  being  able  to  discriminate  between  foreigners 
of  divers  nationality,  assumed  all  Christians  to  be  adherents  of 
France,  and  traitors  to  their  own  country.  This  was  the  true 
cause  of  the  terrible  persecution  at  Canton,  and  of  the  frightful 


EDICT    OF    RELIGIOUS    TOLERATION.  255 

massacres  in  Armani  in  October  1885,  when  upwards  of  35,000 
persons  were  put  to  death,  churches,  schools,  hospitals,  and  asylums 
pillaged  and  burnt  to  the  ground,  the  Eoman  Catholic  Mission, 
which  it  had  taken  so  many  years  to  create,  being  thus  utterly 
crushed.  Of  the  entire  Christian  population  only  G000  escaped, 
and  were  conveyed  to  safe  quarters  at  Saigon. 

The  perfect  toleration  enjoyed  in  China  by  men  of  all  manner  of 
creeds — Buddhist,  Mohammedan,  Confucian,  and  Taouist — clearly 
proves  that  the  spirit  of  the  nation  is  in  favour  of  liberty  of  con- 
science in  matters  of  religion.  Hence  the  firm  resolution  evinced 
to  sever  the  political  connection  between  the  Eoman  Catholic  Mis- 
sions and  France,  and  then  afford  full  protection  to  the  converts 
themselves.  Xo  sooner,  therefore,  had  the  Pope  established  his 
own  representative  at  the  Court  of  Peking,  and  disclaimed  all 
right  to  French  protection  for  his  spiritual  children,  than  this 
edict  has  been  proclaimed. 

In  some  provinces  it  is  given  at  greater  length  and  with  more 
detail  than  in  others,  but  all  agree  in  the  main  points,  as  pro- 
claimed at  Shanghai,  where  the  Governor,  Kung,  explains  that 
"  under  the  Treaties,  missionaries  have  the  right  to  lease  ground 
and  houses,  and  to  travel  about  and  preach,  their  sole  aim  being 
the  inculcation  of  the  practice  of  virtue.  Such  of  the  subjects  of 
China  as  wish  to  become  converts  may  lawfully  do  so,  and  so  long 
as  they  abstain  from  evil-doing,  there  is  no  law  prescribing  in- 
quisition into  or  prohibition  of  their  action.  By  Imperial  edict 
all  missionary  chapels  are  to  be  sedulously  protected.''  "  Bear  in 
mind  that  when  missionaries  live  in  the  midst  of  your  villages, 
you  and  they  are  mutually  in  the  relation  of  host  and  guest. 
Under  ordinary  circumstances  it  is  your  foremost  duty  to  act 
towards  them  with  courtesy  and  forbearance.  From  the  date  of 
this  proclamation  any  lawless  vagabonds  who  make  trouble  or  stir 
up  strife  without  a  cause,  shall  be  punished  with  the  utmost  rigoui 
of  the  law;  no  mercy  will  be  shown.      So  Beware  !  " 


25G  JUNKS    AND    SAMPANS. 

CHAPTER    XX. 

JUNKS     AND     SAMPAN'S. 

Trade  on  the  Bund — Rowing  junks — Odd  vessels — Religious  services — A  gay 
funeral  barge — Sampan  life — Contrast  English  canal-boats — The  Roman 
Catholic  Mission — Easter  morning — High  Mass — Easter  Psalms — Among 
the  junks — Temple-theatre. 

Chez  Mrs  Fred.  Fry, 

Beside  the  River  Min, 

Aj/ril  7,  1879. 

Being  on  the  very  brink  of  the  water,  this  is  a  most  delightful 
house  from  which  to  watch  all  the  endless  combinations  of  pictur- 
esque boat  and  quay  life.  The  latter  includes  a  good  deal  of  street 
trade — many  girls  with  boxes  of  pretty  silken  artificial  flowers 
come  to  tempt  the  sampan  women,  and  barbers  carrying  their  stock- 
in-trade  in  two  ornamental  red  cases,  wait  for  skulls  to  scrape.  I 
observe  that  they  use  no  soap! 

But  the  eye  does  not  linger  long  on  the  shore,  for  the  attractions 
of  the  river  are  manifold.  At  certain  states  of  the  tide  the  stream 
is  literally  covered  with  native  vessels  of  all  shapes  and  sizes, 
silently  gliding  up  stream  or  down,  as  the  case  may  be.  It  is  so 
extraordinary  to  watch  large  junks  coming  down  the  river,  mid- 
stream, propelled  only  by  two  gigantic  sculls,  one  on  each  side  of 
the  ship,  and  each  worked  by  about  a  dozen  men.  The  end  of  this 
huge  oar  is  attached  to  the  junk  by  a  strong  leathern  thong,  and 
the  scull  works  round  and  round,  somewhat  on  the  principle  of 
a  screw. 

All  the  time  the  men  are  at  this,  or  any  other  work  involving 
combined  labour — such  as  rowing,  or  dragging  a  heavy  cart — they 
keep  up  a  ceaseless  chorus.  One  chants  a  long  story,  probably 
describing  the  events  of  the  day,  and  at  regular  intervals  all  join  in 
a  shout  of  "  Hei-yei !  "  occasionally  varied  by  a  shower  of  "  Yoi 
haie  ai  ah  !  "  It  sounds  as  if  the  song  must  be  a  serious  additional 
labour,  but,  like  the  cheery  choruses  of  Jack  Tar,  it  appears  really 
to  assist  work. 

There  are  generally  a  multitude  of  singularly  picturesque  junks 
lying  at  anchor  just  below  the  great  Bridge  of  Ten  Thousand  Ages 
— the  Wan-Show-Keaou — and  I  have  several  times  spent  hours  of 
delight  rowing  about  among  these  to  select  the  most  striking  group ; 
and  then,  the  house-boat  being  securely  moored  at  the  point  thus 


CARGO    EXTERNALLY    FLOATED  257 

chosen,  I  have  been  able  to  sketch  in  perfect  peace,  undisturbed  by 
even  the  most  friendly  crowds. 

But  no  brush — certaiidy  not  mine — could  convey  any  correct  im- 
pression of  these  strange  scenes — these  extraordinary  combinations 
of  form  and  colour.  Here  we  have  a  whole  flotilla  moored  Bide  by 
side,  and  we  look  up  at  the  extraordinary  high  sterns,  bo  fantastic 
in  shape,  and  covered  with  brilliant  pictures  of  huge  birds  and 
gruesome  dragons,  or  groups  of  mythological  scenes.  Emerald 
green,  scarlet  and  crimson,  white  and  gold,  sienna  and  madder,  and 
prussian  blue,  are  so  freely  used,  that  even  the  gorgeous  and  very 
varied  banners  can  scarcely  excel  the  brilliancy  of  the  vessel.  But 
the  overhanging  stern  and  huge  unwieldy  rudder  cast  deep  sIuuIoavs 
which  are  carried  down  in  the  reflections,  and  the  grey  granite 
bridge,  and  grey  and  white  clouds  softening  the  blue  sky  and  the 
distant  hills,  harmonise  the  whole.  The  great  rudder  (whose  size 
atones  in  some  measure  for  the  exceedingly  small  keel)  is  perforated, 
so  as  to  offer  less  resistance  to  the  water. 

The  prow  of  these  vessels  is  shaped  and  painted  to  represent  the 
face  of  a  gigantic  and  most  gaudy  fish,  with  huge  staring  eves,  and 
the  heavy  anchor  hangs  from  its  mouth.  Very  quaint,  too, are  the 
huge  sails  of  brown  or  yellow  matting,  or  white  cotton,  supported 
by  cross-ribs  of  bamboo.  After  a  wet  night,  all  the  Bails  are  run 
up  to  dry  at  early  morning,  and  when  half-furled,  the  bamboo  rib- 
bing is  singularly  suggestive  of  the  wing  of  the  flying-fish,  from 
which  doubtless  the  idea  was  first  taken.  The  great  masts  are  of 
one  solid  piece  of  wood — no  attempt  at  scientific  mast-building! 
As  nothing  in  China  is  left  to  individual  taste  or  caprice,  even  the 
very  varied  colouring  of  the  junks  is  all  regulated  by  law.  those  of 
different  provinces  being  distinguished  by  a  red,  green,  or  white 
border,  on  a  black  ground,  round  the  bulwarks.  Those  belonging 
to  this  province  are  green-bordered.  The  hull  is  generally  white, 
affording  a  good  surface  for  the  emblematic  phoenix  winch  is  in- 
variably represented  as  standing  on  a  rock  surrounded  by  tempestu- 
ous waves,  thus  symbolising  safety.  It  is  incumbenl  on  all  ship- 
owners to  repair  their  vessels  every  second  year — rather  a  serioua 
business,  considering  how  elaborate  is  their  decoration. 

Noav  we  may  change  our  position,  so  as  to  watch  the  great 
timber-junks  taking  on  their  cargo.  I  say  <<//  advisedly,  for  it  is 
all  tied  on  outside,  and  only  the  stem  and  stern  of  a  laden  vessel 
are  visible,  so  great  is  the  bulk  of  timber  fastened  to  her  on  either 
side:  of  course  she  thus  becomes  exceedingly  buoyant,  for  the  cargo 
is  self-supporting,  floating  on  its  own  account. 

i; 


258  JUNKS   AND   SAMPANS. 

What  a  pity  it  is  thai  words  should  be  so  utterly  powerless  to 
convey  any  idea  of  form  and  colour  !  Though  I  have  done  my 
hist  to  give  you  some  notion  of  the  strange  river  scenes  which  so 
fascinate  me,  I  know  that  it  is  quite  impossible  for  you  really  to 
form  any  conception  of  their  brilliancy  and  quaintness. 

Especially  attractive  as  scenic  effects,  though  wellnigh  madden- 
ing to  the  ear,  are  the  frightfully  noisy  religious  services  whereby 
the  crew  commend  themselves  to  the  Sea  Dragon  and  to  the  god- 
dess  Tien-how,  or  else  to  Loong-moo,  the  Dragon's  mother,  when  a 
laden  junk  is  on  the  eve  of  sailing.  The  crew  assemble  sometimes 
(in  the  bows,  sometimes  on  the  very  high  stern  of  the  vessel,  which 
is  a  wonderful  arrangement  of  carving  and  colour.  A  temporary 
altar  is  erected,  on  which  are  spread  all  manner  of  offerings,  and 
beside  it  kneels  the  leader  of  the  ceremonies,  probably  the  skipper 
himself,  while  one  stands  forward  uplifting  a  sort  of  brazier  full  of 
blazing  joss-paper,  which  he  holds  up  towards  the  sun,  while  others 
produce  an  ear-splitting  din  on  gongs  and  cymbals. 

During  the  service  the  whole  vessel,  but  especially  the  stern, 
is  decorated  with  banners  of  every  shape  and  every  conceivable 
device.  Finally,  the  offerings  are  taken  from  off  the  altar  and  are 
cast  into  the  sea  to  propitiate  the  Sea  Dragon,  whose  protection  hav- 
ing been  thus  invoked,  the  junk  starts  on  its  seaward  journey.  One 
notable  feature  in  the  sacrifice  is  the  slaughter  of  a  fowl ;  part  of  its 
blood  is  sprinkled  on  the  deck,  and  part  on  pieces  of  "  joss-paper," 
which  are  then  affixed  to  the  door-posts  and  lintels  of  the  cabin. 

These  Chinese  sailors  do  their  best  to  disprove  the  European 
proverb,  "  The  clanger  past,  and  God  forgotten,"  for  on  reaching 
their  destination,  their  first  care  is  to  proceed  to  the  temple  of 
Tien-how  on  land,  and  there  give  thanks,  and  present  thank-offer- 
ings, which  include  samples  of  the  cargo.  Thus  on  some  of  the 
isles  of  this  coast,  where  fish-curing  is  carried  on,  it  is  customary 
for  the  sailors  to  present  small  red  bags  full  of  salt,  each  bag  bear- 
ing the  name  of  the  donor.  These  are  heaped  upon  the  altar  of 
the  goddess. 

These  sailors,  like  those  of  other  lands,  have  their  special  pet 
superstitions.  They  are  sorely  afraid  of  evil  spirits,  whom  they 
believe  to  flit  about  on  the  waters  and  on  the  breezes.  "When  be- 
calmed, they  whistle  for  the  wind,  just  like  European  sailors ;  and 
they  have  notions  of  luck  concerning  ravens,  which  sometimes 
alight  on  the  rigging,  exactly  corresponding  with  the  ordinary 
respect  for  the  albatross.  To  shoot  a  raven  would  be  deemed  a 
heinous  nautical  offence. 


ALL    MANNER    OF    BOATS.  259 

Besides  the  great  three-masted  junks,  which  are  the  giants  of 
the  river,  a  thousand  lesser  craft  ply  to  and  fro,  giving  life  to  the 
whole  scene.  Here  come  floating  down  boats  laden  with  red 
crockery  jars — jars  like  those  in  which  are  stored  ancestral  ImiK's 
when  brought  from  afar.  There  are  fishing-boats  with  what  ap- 
pears in  the  distance  to  be  a  most  picturesque  triangular  brown 
awning,  but  which  turns  out  to  be  nets  spread  so  as  to  dry.  Just 
beyond  lie  several  cormorant  boats,  with  the  demoniacal-looking 
birds  perched  like  the  familiar  spirits  of  the  curious-looking  object 
beneath  the  huge  bamboo  hat. 

Xow  more  timber-rafts  approach,  bringing  fresh  stores  from  the 
mountain  forests  to  be  here  consigned  to  the  great  junks ;  and 
house-boats,  each  with  its  pleasant  company  of  holiday-makers. 

And  now  a  very  picturesque  boat  floats  silently  by,  laden  with 
many  blue-clothed  people,  and  a  large  object  draped  with  Bcarlet, 
and  ornamented  with  green  boughs.  It  is  a  pleasant  bit  of  rich 
colour,  and  its  reflections  mingle  with  those  of  the  bright  blue  sky 
and  hills,  so  there  is  nothing  about  it  to  suggest  that  it  is  really  a 
funeral  party. 

Ere  long  another  funeral  floats  by,  but  of  this  the  mourners  are 
all  clothed  in  white,  and  some  wear  sackcloth.  Here,  too,  the 
coffin  is  covered  with  a  scarlet  pall,  and  from  the  stern  droop 
green  branches,  festooned  with  scarlet  cloth,  and  beautiful  white 
banners  embroidered  with  green  dragons. 

Here,  there,  and  everywhere  lie  the  pretty  little  sampans,  Borne 
moored  to  the  shore,  others  busily  plying  to  and  fro  across  the 
river,  earning  small  coin  by  carrying  passengers.  This  boat  life  is 
to  me  a  source  of  endless  interest. 

In  no  other  condition  of  life  have  I  seen  such  practical  proof  of 
the  old  truism,  that  "man  wants  but  little  here  below."  Bere  the 
"  little  "  is  a  small  boat  about  the  size  of  two  four-post  bed 
end  to  end,  and  covered  in  at  night  by  a  series  of  telescopic  sliding- 
roofs  of  bamboo  matting.  In  these  very  close  quarters  a  whole 
family  stow  themselves  away,  and  contrive  to  live  in  marvellous 
harmony — not  only  a  man  and  his  wife,  and  their  children,  but 
frequently  the  grandparents  also,  for  here  they  are  born,  they 
marry,  and  they  die;  it  is  the  only  home  they  know,  and  though 
the  men  may  go  away  to  work  on  the  junks,  this  Lb  the  "  home, 
sweet  home,"  to  which  they  long  to  return. 

Here  they  all  cook  and  sleep  and  worship — for  no  matter  how- 
tiny  the  boat,  the  family  altar  is  never  crowded  out.  It  occupies 
the  place  of  honour  in  the  stern  of  the  boat,  and  through  the  day 


2 GO  JUNKS    AND    SAMPANS. 

it  is  protected  by  a  little  sliding-door,  which  is  drawn  aside  at  the 
hours  of  worship,  revealing  the  household  gods  and  miniature 
ancestral  tablets,  which  are  coloured  red,  the  names  of  the  dead 
being  inscribed  in  gilt  characters.  Though  these  people  are  so 
poor  that  it  is  all  they  can  do  to  earn  their  daily  rice,  the  very 
poorest  contrive  to  lay  aside  a  few  cash  to  buy  a  handful  of  flowers 
to  lay  before  the  little  image  of  either  Tien-how,  the  Queen  of 
Heaven,  or  the  Goddess  of  Mercy  with  the  young  Child,  and  a 
few  sticks  of  incense  to  burn,  when  at  sunrise  and  at  sunset  the 
family  commend  themselves  specially  to  her  care.  In  the  evening 
some  hang  up  a  paper-lantern  on  which  the  name  of  one  of  the 
gods  is  inscribed  in  large  characters — not  a  costly  offering,  but  in 
their  case  quite  in  the  proportion  of  "the  two  mites." 

You  would  naturally  imagine  that  the  crowded  boats  must  be 
dirty  and  perhaps  full  of  fleas.  On  the  contrary,  their  cleanliness 
is  simply  incredible.  There  is  never  a  dirty  corner  in  a  sampan. 
Every  crevice  is  alike  kept  scoured,  so  that  not  a  speck  of  dirt  is 
to  be  seen ;  and  what  with  paint,  oil,  varnish,  and  "  elbow-grease," 
these  little  homes  are  as  spick  and  span  in  their  way  as  a  Japanese 
tea-house;  and  these  sampan  children  are  just  as  clean,  and  as 
quaint,  and  as  preternaturally  good,  as  the  delightful  children  of 
Japan.  The  youngest  treasure  of  the  family  is  generally  strapped 
on  to  its  mother's  back  while  she  sculls  the  boat,  and  the  "  deposed 
king  "  is  secured  from  drowning  by  a  long  cord  fastened  round  his 
waist,  and  a  small  buoy  attached  to  his  back,  so  that  if  he  should 
happen  to  tumble  overboard,  he  can  easily  be  fished  up  again. 

So  the  foreigner  who  has  a  sampan  to  take  him  across  the  river, 
or  to  some  of  its  countless  points  of  interest,  is  scarcely  conscious 
that  while  he  sits  in  state  beneath  the  principal  bamboo  awning, 
half-a-dozen  grave  little  persons,  with  curiously  shaven  heads,  are 
stowed  away  beneath  a  smaller  awning  astern,  beside  the  long 
steer-oar,  which  is  probably  worked  by  their  tidy  mother,  in  the 
neatest  "  Bloomer  "  dress  of  indigo-coloured  stuff — a  comfortable 
blouse  and  short  wide  trousers  reaching  to  a  little  below  the  knee 
— and  bare  feet — her  glossy  black  hair  always  neatly  dressed  and 
ornamented  by  some  fancy  pin  or  bright  artificial  flower. 

These  sampan  women  look  the  very  picture  of  ruddy  health  and 
good-temper,  and  their  little  ones  take  after  their  parents.  If  their 
wardrobes  are  not  over  well  supplied,  they  certainly  are  clean,  and 
kept  well  aired,  long  bamboos  acting  as  drying-posts,  from  which, 
banner-like,  flutter  the  blue  household  garments.  There  is  also 
a  corner  of  the  roof  reserved  for  a  few  flower-pots,  for  even  in 


ENGLISH    VERSUS   CHINESE    BOAT-HOMES.  261 

these  floating  homes  the  Chinaman's  love  for  plants  and  talent  for 
gardening  assert  themselves. 

What  astonishes  me  most  of  all  is  the  multitude  of  these  I 
which  literally  seem  to  be  as  the  sands  of  the  sea.  Wherever  I 
have  yet  heen  there  is  the  same  swarm,  and  I  am  told  it  is  the 
same  at  every  town  on  every  great  river  throughout  this  vast 
Empire.  At  Canton  I  was  told  that  there  alum,  the  sampan 
population  is  estimated  at  three  hundred  thousand  persons — i.e., 
just  thrice  as  many  as  the  whole  canal  population  of  Britain.1 

I  suppose  that  till  Mr  George  Smith  told  us  about  these  last, 
few  of  us  realised  that  we  even  owned  such  an  item  as  l'.VU'hi 
house-boats  (or  barges),  nor  even  that  Britain  possessed  1800 
miles  of  river  and  canal  as  the  water-way  on  which  they  ply  :  but 
one  thing  patent  to  the  most  careless  glance  is  the  squalid  misery 
and  dirt  and  degradation  of  life  on  board  of  such  boats,  and  all  1 
have  known  or  read  concerning  the  canal-boats  of  Britain  comes  back 
to  my  mind  in  most  sad  contrast  when  looking  on  these  bright 
happy  families.2  And  yet  the  wages  of  the  former  would  appear 
boundless  wealth  to  the  latter,  who  toil  all  day  so  cheerily  for  the 
very  minimum  of  life's  necessaries.  Monsignor  <  rentili,  the  Roman 
Catholic  bishop,  who  is  intimately  acquainted  with  the  sampan 
people,  many  of  whom  are  members  of  his  flock,  tells  me  that  often 
the  whole  earnings  of  a  family  by  a  day's  fishing  do  not  amounl 
to  more  than  twopence;  and  though  the  equivalent,  tony  cash,  will 
certainly  go  farther  than  our  twopence,  we  need  -eaveely  wonder 
that  after  each  meal  the  family  purse  is  generally  empty  1 

1  See  page  57. 

-  Humiliating  indeed  is  the  contrast  between  the  canal  population  of  Christian 
England  and  that  of  heathen  China,  as  revealed  by  the  few  philanthropists  who 
have  so  far  gone  out  of  their  way  as  to  attempl  to  humanise  the  former.  Oi 
they  have  found  some  bright  exceptions,  but  the  majority  were  ignorant  of  the  very 
first  elements  of  Christianity,  and  indeed  of  humanity-  more  brutally  degraded 
than  the  most  untutored  of  savages.  It  is  not  very  long  since  a  canal  boatman  was 
proved  to  have  wilfully  turned  away  from  the  cries  of  a  drowning  man  because  then- 
was  no  certainty  of  reward  for  saving  life,  whereas  he  could  surely  claim  a  reward 
of  rive  shillings  for  every  dead  body  recovered  from  the  canal ! 

In  the  dingy  cabins  of  these  dark,  dirty  barges,  in  an  atmosphere  redolent  of 
blasphemy  and  immorality,  there  were  found  Btowed  away  about  60,000  British 
children,  poor  untaught  little  ones — over-worked,   beaten,  cursed  I 
training  consisted  in  the  ready  blows  and  the  foul  words  bo  freely  Bhowi  n  d  upon 
them.     No  domestic  altar  nor  morning  and  evening  worship  for  these 
heathen  Chinese."    "Children  in  canal  boats  don'1  say  prayers,"  said  one  ol  these 
poor  little  ones  to  a  friend  who  fain  would  have  taught  her.     And  this  «  is 
the  condition  of  100,000  of  our  own  fellow-countrymen  until,  in  the  year  lss-.  Mr 
George  Smith  (the  deliverer  of  unnumbered  thousands  of  British  children  from  the 
slavery  of  the  brickfields  and  these  canal-boats)  succeeded,  with  infinite  difficulty, 
in  getting  his  "Emancipation"  and  '•  Education"  Acta  not  only  passed,  but  into 
working  order. 


2G2  JUNKS    AND    SAMPANS. 

The  bishop  gave  me  various  other  interesting  particulars  about 
the  Roman  Catholic  Mission  in  China. 

Long  before  China  had  begun  to  dream  of  making  concessions 
to  foreigners,  devoted  Jesuit  missionaries  continued  to  effect  an 
entrance  in  the  guise  of  Chinamen:  some  secured  a  footing  by 
reason  of  their  scientific  attainments,  and  in  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  centuries  their  converts  became  exceedingly  numerous, 
including  a  considerable  number  of  men  holding  high  official  rank. 
One  thing  which  gave  these  early  teachers  an  immense  advantage 
over  those  of  later  days  is  the  fact  that  they  were  untrammelled 
by  the  heavy  weight  which  now  attaches  to  all  English  teachers, 
on  account  of  their  national  connection  with  the  opium  trade. 

Those  early  Catholic  missionaries  were  as  free  to  preach  as  had 
been  those  Indian  missionaries  who  came  here,  B.c.  250,  to  spread 
the  doctrines  of  Buddha,  which  were  equally  "  foreign  "  to  China, 
and,  nevertheless,  soon  effectually  took  root  in  the  Empire. 

Nfor  were  the  Mohammedan  preachers  less  "  foreign  "  when  they 
arrived  here  in  the  seventh  century,  and  uncompromisingly  declared 
the  unity  of  God  and  the  iniquity  of  idolatry.  They  too  have 
overspread  the  Empire  from  Peking  to  Canton,  having  mosques 
everywhere,  and  rigidly  adhering  to  their  own  faith.  So  numerous 
are  they,  that  in  some  parts  of  the  northern  and  western  provinces 
no  less  than  one-third  of  the  inhabitants  profess  this  creed,  while 
the  total  number  of  Chinese  Mohammedans  is  estimated  at  thirty 
millions. 

The  Jesuits  made  such  good  progress,  that  they  might  very  well 
have  secured  a  permanent  and  important  position.  But  the  usual 
rash  blending  of  things  temporal  with  spiritual  seems  to  have  first 
roused  violent  opposition,  and  terrible  persecutions  ensued,  in  which 
seventy  French  priests  and  many  more  of  other  nationalities  were 
martyred. 

Still,  notwithstanding  every  edict  and  every  attempt  to  suppress 
and  expel  them,  they  have  bravely  held  their  ground,  and  after 
the  signing  of  the  treaties  they  resumed  the  attack  in  good  earnest. 
Now  they  reckon  their  native  converts  at  upwards  of  one  million,1 

1  A  number  so  enormously  in  excess  of  the  converts  of  all  other  Christian  deno- 
minations may  at  first  sight  seem  startling,  even  in  view  of  nearly  three  centuries  of 
work,  and  the  larger  number  of  workers.  It  must,  however,  be  borne  in  mind  that 
(although  St  Frauds  Xavier's  wholesale  baptisms,  by  sprinkling  the  gaping  crowds 
on  the  banks  of  the  Indian  rivers,  could  scarcely  count  in  the  present  day)  the 
change  from  Buddhism  to  Catholicism  is  very  much  simpler  than  to  unadorned 
Christianity. 

For  instance,  how  easy  is  the  transition  from  the  worship  of  either  Tien-how- 
shing-moo,  "  the  Holy  Mother,  Queen  of  Heaven,"  or  that  of  the  Goddess  of  Mercy 


FROM    BUDDHISM    TO    ROME.  263 

while  their  working  staff  consists  of  41  bishops,  664  European 
priests,  559  native  priests,  34  colleges,  34  convents — the  latter 
representing  both  European  and  Chinese  sisters.  It  is  unfortunate 
that  their  very  hostile  attitude  towards  Christian  teachers  of  all 
other  denominations,  and  the  consequent  anti-Protestant  instruc- 
tions which  they  disseminate,  verbally  and  in  print,  make  it  dilfi- 
cult  for  these  to  recognise  them  as  true  fellow- workers. 

Easter  Day. 

The  sampan  people  continue  to  afford  me  infinite  interest,  for  so 
many  boats  lie  moored  close  under  our  windows  that  we  cannot 
avoid  seeing  them.  The  last  thing  at  night,  as  I  look  out  into  the 
clear  beautiful  moonlight,  they  are  for  the  most  part  calmly  sleep- 
ing, though  some  few  are  always  astir ;  and  no  matter  how  early 
I  may  awaken  in  the  lovely  dawn,  they  are  all  astir.  Babies  of 
all  sizes  are  being  washed,  and  dressed,  and  fed, — and  they  always 
look  happy  and  bright, — and  then  the  boats  are  scrubbed  and 
made  beautifully  clean. 

with  the  young  Child,  and  the  lilies  and  the  dragon  (sometimes  serpent)  under  her 
feet,  to  that  of  the  Holy  Mother  with  the  infant  Saviour  standing  on  the  serpent's 
head.  As  to  the  whole  company  of  Buddhist  saints,  with  the  golden  glory  encir- 
cling every  head,  they  are  scarcely  to  be  distinguished  from  those  of  Christendom. 
The  total  suppression  of  the  second  commandment  in  the  Roman  Decalogue  does 
away  with  all  difficulties  regarding  the  use  of  "  graven  images,"  and  as  the  Ca  I 
have  never  published  any  Chinese  translation  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  their  converts 
are  in  no  danger  of  discovering  too  much  on  this  or  any  other  subject. 

All  that  custom  has  endeared  to  the  outward  senses  of  the  Buddhist  he  may  re- 
tain in  the  Church  of  Rome.  Use  of  images,  rosaries,  incense,  holy  water,  ringing 
of  consecrated  bells,  prostrations,  fasting  multiplied,  reiteration  of  short  prayers, 
a  gorgeously  vested  and  shaven  priesthood,  monasteries  and  convents,  belief  in 
Purgatory,  intensely  realistic  pictures  of  the  tortures  of  a  material  Hell — above  all 
(that  which  is  by  far  the  most  difficult  for  a  convert  to  give  up),  ancestral  worship 
in  the  form  of  Masses  for  the  Dead,  in  services  scarcely  to  be  distinguished  from 
those  which  he  has  ever  believed  to  he  the  highest  act  of  worship. 

Moreover,  the  rule  of  life  on  various  points  is  very  much  less  strict  than  that  re- 
quired by  Protestant  teachers,  and  faute  de  mieux,  obedience  to  Church  rule  is,  in 
a  multitude  of  cases,  allowed  to  pass  in  place  of  intelligent  worship.  Especially  as 
regards  observance  of  Sunday  is  the  law  relaxed,  the  jioor  being  allowed,  by  special 
papal  dispensation,  to  work  in  their  fields  or  their  shops,  after  being  present  at 
Mass. 

That  a  large  proportion  of  the  aforesaid  million  converts  were  really  so  only  in 
name  has  been  clearly  proven  by  the  fact  that,  during  the  late  war  with  France, 
although  many  have  nobly  endured  persecution  even  unto  death,  a  multitude  of  the 
half-hearted  have  relapsed  to  idolatry,  so  that  these  numbers  have  shrunk  to  less 
than  one-half.  The  Roman  Catholic  Church  in  China  has  paid  dearly  for  the  pro- 
tection which  France  (while  persecuting  the  Church  in  Europe)  so  zealously  extends 
to  all  persons  professing  the  faith  in  foreign  lands,  chiefly,  it  is  to  be  feared,  as  a 
cloak  for  political  intrigue.     Consequently  their  interests  are  identified. 

Now,  however,  a  papal  Legate  has  been  sent  to  Peking,  and  there  well  received, 
the  authorities  declaring  their  willingness  to  recognise  the  Roman  Catholic  a£  an 
authorised  religion,  provided  it  is  independent  of  French  protection. 


264  JUNKS    AND    SAMPANS. 

I  had  intended  to  .attend  their  special  Good  Friday  service  at 
dawn  in  the  Roman  Catholic  chapel,  but  was  deterred  by  heavy 
rain  and  bitter  cold.  This  morning,  however,  I  was  awakened  ere 
daybreak  by  the  noise  of  crackers  being  let  off  in  token  of  rejoin 
ing  on  board  the  sampans.  I  had  heard  these  in  honour  of  lords 
many  and  of  gods  many,  but  as  a  sign  of  Christian  gladness  it  was 
certainly  a  novelty  ! 

I  got  up  and  watched  the  river  in  the  grey  early  light.  All  the 
boats  and  junk  population  were  awakening,  and  the  Christians 
dressing  for  early  Mass.  I  have  already  described  the  regular 
costume  of  all  the  sampan  women  and  girls.  Those  who  can  afford 
"  a  Sunday  dress  "  treat  themselves  to  a  brighter  blue,  with  white 
sleeves,  when  they  look  even  cleaner  and  nicer  than  usual,  as  do 
also  their  charming  little  children,  many  of  whom  are  the  happy 
owners  of  a  rosary,  with  a  little  crucifix,  or  a  medallion  of  the 
Elessed  Virgin. 

I  lingered  so  long  watching  the  boats  that  all  the  most  devout 
inmates  went  off  to  early  Mass  ere  I  was  dressed,  but  I  attended 
High  Mass  at  8.30,  where  there  were  about  500  of  the  sampan 
women  on  one  side  of  the  church,  and  500  men  on  the  other. 
A  wooden  partition  down  the  middle  of  the  church  divides  the 
women  from  the  men,  agreeably  to  the  Chinese  custom  in  this 
matter — a  custom  which  is  adhered  to  in  some  Protestant  churches, 
but  not  in  all.  Here  and  there  I  observed  a  woman  telling  her 
beads  very  devoutly,  but  the  majority  were  so  busy  chatting  and 
soothing  their  babies,  that  the  murmur  of  their  voices  wellnigh 
drowned  the  chanting  of  the  Italian  bishop  and  a  staff  of  about 
ten  priests,  most  of  whom  were  Chinese.  As  to  the  congregation, 
they  had  evidently  been  taught  that  their  presence  was  all  that 
was  required. 

In  the  forenoon  we  went  to  the  English  Church  in  the  foreign 
settlement.  It  is  charmingly  decorated  all  in  white  and  green, 
with  some  irresistible  touches  of  wistaria.  Some  parts  of  the 
beautiful  service  for  the  day,  more  especially  the  first  and  second 
Psalms  for  the  day,1  seemed  as  though  they  had  been  written  to 
describe  just  such  a  season  of  trouble  as  the  Mission  Church  here 
is  now  passing  through — a  Cry  of  Perplexity,  changing  to  a  Song 
of  Deliverance.  Numerically  the  congregation  was  scarcely  sug- 
gestive of  Easter,  and  the  emptiness  of  the  church  at  the  Celebra- 
tion was  chilling. 

i  Ps.  ii.;  Ps.  Mi. 


"JOSS-PIGEON."  265 

Easter  MoiU 

I  cannot  learn  what  particular  native  festival  is  being  celebrated 
just  at  present,  but  to-day  there  is  great  "joss-pigeon"  (which, 
in  the  atrocious  compound  known  as  pigeon-English,  means  "  ( rod's 
business ").  All  the  junks  are  adorned  with  huge  flags  and 
streamers,  and  green  dragons  are  floating  in  every  direction.  We 
went  for  a  most  interesting  row  in  and  out  among  the  shipping, 
and  watched  the  picturesque  though  deafening  worship  on  board 
the  junks.  Then  Ave  started  to  explore  some  of  the  Guilds,  which 
we  have  not  yet  visited,  and  which  are  indicated  by  very  tall  red 
poles. 

At  one  we  found  a  very  gorgeous  Sing-Song  going  on,  and  a 
dense  crowd,  but  a  friendly  old  man  (a  stranger)  gave  us  excellent 
seats  in  the  mandarins'  gallery.  The  play  was  extremely  pic- 
turesque, as  was  also  the  whole  scene,  but  very  much  what  I  have 
already  described. 


CHAPTER   XXI. 


SHANGHAI. 


Native  description  of  country  round  Shanghai  —  The  foreign  settlement  — 
Boats  and  wheelbarrows — The  canguc — The  Bubbling  "Well — The  native 
city — St  Simon  Stylites — Consecration  of  a  Roman  Catholic  bishop — 
Roman  Catholic  Orphanage  at  Siccaway — Foundling  Hospital. 

Oriental  Bank,  Shanghai, 
Monday,  26tfk  April. 

Last  week  I  bade  adieu  with  much  regret  to  beautiful  Foo-Chow 
and  the  many  kind  friends  there,  several  of  whom  accompanied  me 
to  the  Anchorage,  where  others  met  us,  and  we  had  a  last  most 
pleasant  evening,  after  which  my  host  (Mr  Fry)  escorted  me  on 
board  the  Europe,  commending  me  to  the  special  care  of  Mon- 
signor  Gentili,  Eveque  de  Dionyse,  Yicaire  Apostolique  de  Fokien, 
who  proved  very  good  company. 

Twenty-four  hours'  steady  steam  brought  us  to  the  bar  of  the 
yellow  Yang-tze-Kiang,  which  can  only  be  crossed  at  high  tide, 
the  bottom  being  too  near  the  top,  as  our  skipper  remarked.  So 
here  we  waited  impatiently,  finding  small  attraction  in  the  hideous 
river  and  its  dead-level  shores,  and  rejoiced  when  at  length  we 
were  able  to  steam  on  through  the  crowd  of  quaint  junk.-,  and 


266  SHANGHAI. 

large  ships  and  steamers  of  all  nations,  till  we  reached  the  great 
semicircle  of  handsome  foreign  houses,  in  one  of  which  such  hos- 
pitable welcome  awaited  me.  Here  already  a  week  has  slipped 
away,  while  many  friends  have  so  enfolded  me  in  kindness  as 
t'il'cctually  to  dispel  my  first  dreary  impressions  of  this  great  city. 
Of  course  nothing  can  make  its  dead-flat  surroundings  other  than 
dismally  hideous,  and  the  contrast  with  the  lovely  country  I  have 
just  left  is  marked  indeed.  In  point  of  fact  (as  we  may  gather 
from  its  name,  Shanghai  signifying  "  upon  the  sea,"  from  which  it 
is  now  twenty-five  miles  distant),  it  is  all  a  very  recent  alluvial 
deposit  —  formed  by  the  ceaseless  accumulation  of  mud  washed 
down  by  the  Great  River  and  its  tributaries.  This  level  plain  is 
intersected  in  every  direction  by  a  network  of  natural  and  artificial 
water-ways,  whereon  ply  boats  innumerable. 

However  useful  for  traffic  may  be  these  numerous  creeks  and 
canals,  they  are  certainly  not  attractive  in  other  respects,  even  in 
the  estimation  of  the  Chinese  themselves — as  shown  in  a  native 
appeal  to  the  charitable  of  Shanghai  for  funds  in  aid  of  "  An 
establishment  for  gratuitous  medical  relief."  The  appeal  remarks 
that  the  neighbouring  country  is  very  damp,  and  that  portion  of 
it  which  lies  near  the  sea  is  salt,  and  even  more  damp  than  the 
interior. 

It  goes  on  to  state  that  "  In  the  Hwang-pu  and  "Woo-sung  rivers 
there  are  the  day  and  night  tides,  but  in  the  brooks  and  streams 
which  join  them,  there  being  no  ebb  and  flow  of  the  tide,  the 
water  is  still  and  stagnant,  and  acquires  a  greenish  colour  and  a 
brackish  taste ;  the  water  of  the  wells  is  also  affected  in  a  similar 
manner,  and,  as  regards  the  people  who  live  in  these  regions,  the 
dampness  moistens  them,  the  wind  shrivels  them,  the  stagnant 
water  soaks  them,  and  they  are  thus  rendered  liable  to  disease." 

In  point  of  temperature  it  is  very  much  warmer  than  when  I 
touched  here  at  Christmas,  and  I  am  told  that  during  the  five  sum- 
mer months  the  heat  is  most  oppressive,  and  that  even  Chinese 
coolies  are  sometimes  sun-struck.  My  naval  friends  say  that  on 
no  other  station  have  they  suffered  so  severely  as  in  this  steaming 
atmosphere,  where  the  thermometer  sometimes  marks  100°  under 
shade  of  the  awning. 

The  foreign  settlement  is  as  fine  as  handsome  houses  can  make 
it.  It  is  composed  of  three  great  districts — the  English,  the 
French,  and  the  American.  There  is  a  solid,  business-like  look  of 
wealth  about  this  great  gas-lighted  river  frontage  of  palaces  which 
makes  it  a  genuine  relief  to  the  artistic  eye  to  find  that  it  may 


SHANGHAI   BOATS    AND    WHEEL-BARROWS.  267 

look  down,  even  from  these  luxurious  verandahs,  on  some  items  of 
purely  native  interest.  First  and  foremost  there  is  a  class  of 
brilliantly  painted  boats,  wholly  unlike  any  which  I  have  seen 
elsewhere,  and  these  are  ceaselessly  plying  on  the  stream.  And  as 
if  the  road  would  not  be  outdone  by  the  river,  it  has  devised  oddi- 
ties peculiar  to  itself,  and  most  attractive  to  the  observer. 

I  have  seen  a  wonderful  variety  of  picturesque  and  grotesque 
vehicles  in  many  lands,  and  I  certainly  thought  that  nothing 
could  exceed  the  quaintness  of  some  of  the  pony  and  bullock  car- 
riages of  India.  But  there  is  a  one-wheeled  conveyance  greatly  in 
favour  with  the  Chinese  of  Shanghai  to  which,  I  think,  the  palm 
must  be  awarded.  The  one  large  wooden  wheel  is  the  centre, 
on  which  the  superstructure  is  built  up — namely,  a  wooden  frame- 
work on  which  it  is  just  possible  for  two  persons  to  sit,  one  on 
each  side  of  the  wheel,  with  the  feet  resting  on  a  bar  in  front,  and 
the  arm  on  a  support  above  the  wheel.  I  have  seen  gorgeously 
dressed  small-footed  women,  with  jewels  and  fans,  perched  on  this 
uncomfortable  contrivance,  and  have  tried  it  myself,  but  very 
quickly  resigned  my  position  as  untenable ! 

The  motive  power  is  a  Chinaman  dressed  in  the  ordinary  blue 
blouse  and  short  loose  blue  trousers.  He  propels  the  carriage  by 
means  of  two  handles,  and  balance  is  secured  by  a  strong  band 
which  is  passed  over  his  neck  and  fastened  to  the  ends  of  the 
handles.  The  fare  must  be  infinitesimal,  for  half  the  coolies  and 
servants  who  are  sent  on  errands  treat  themselves  to  a  hurl  on 
this  wheelbarrow,  and  you  occasionally  see  a  man  going  to  market, 
sitting  quietly  smoking  on  one  side  of  the  wheel  under  the  shadow 
of  a  large  paper  umbrella,  while  his  pig  is  slung  to  the  other  side 
with  its  feet  in  the  air,  in  the  most  cruelly  apoplectic  manner — or 
else  his  fowls  and  his  vegetables  are  thus  carried  in  large  baskets. 
There  are  about  fifteen  hundred  of  these  quaint  vehicles  ceaselessly 
at  work  in  the  settlement,  so  there  are  generally  some  of  them  to 
be  seen. 

Another  essentially  Chinese  object  which  I  have  here  seen  for 
the  first  time,  and  which  certainly  cannot  be  classed  as  attractive, 
is  a  luckless  thief  undergoing  the  punishment  of  the  cangue,  which 
is  a  heavy  square  of  wood  worn  as  a  collar,  which  divides  so  as  to 
allow  the  head  to  enter,  and  is  then  padlocked  officially.  The 
name  and  offence  of  the  culprit  are  inscribed  on  the  board,  and 
then  the  poor  wretch  is  left  all  day  chained  to  some  public  place, 
hungry  and  thirsty,  while  the  idlers  gather  round  and  smoke  (but 
never  offer  him   a  whiff!)     Very  often  the  Chinese  gamin  take 


2G8  SHANGHAI. 

advantage  of  his  helpless  state  to  chaff  him,  and  tickle  his  poor 
ears  with  a  straw,  knowing  that  his  hands  are  useless  for  all 
scratching  purposes,  and  the  crowd  look  on  and  laugh.  One  poor 
wretch  was  on  show  near  here  for  some  hours.  Another  day  I 
saw  a  whole  gang  thus  adorned  with  the  dreadful  collar,  all  chained 
up  near  the  police-station. 

We  have  done  the  regulation  afternoon  drive  to  the  Bubbling 
"Well,  the  chief  interest  of  which  seems  to  he  that  it  is  the  turning- 
point  in  a  sort  of  Kotten  Row  drive,  utterly  devoid  of  heauty,  even 
the  fine  trees  which  once  clothed  the  country  round  having  all  been 
cut  for  firewood  by  the  Triad  army  during  its  eighteen  months' 
occupation  of  Shanghai  in  1854-55. 

To  their  destructive  presence  is  also  due  the  lack  of  buildings  of 
special  interest  within  the  city,  for  at  the  time  when  they  were 
dislodged  by  the  Imperial  troops,  each  party  amused  themselves 
by  setting  fire  to  various  buildings  in  different  parts  of  the  town, 
the  whole  resulting  in  a  terrible  conflagration  and  a  general  looting. 
After  this  the  Imperialist  executioners  had  cheerful  orgies,  result- 
ing in  the  decapitation  of  about  two  thousand  of  their  prisoners, 
whose  heads  were  carried  in  basket-loads  to  the  city,  and  there 
fixed  on  poles,  and  so  stuck  up  all  round  the  walls,  pour  encourager 
les  aatres  / 

The  city  again  suffered  severely  some  years  later,  when  it  was 
attacked  by  the  Taiping  rebels,  and  the  French  deliberately  set  fire 
to  a  large  district  of  the  best  Chinese  houses,  in  case  they  should 
afford  cover  to  the  enemy. 

Though  my  first  impressions  of  the  old  city  were  not  much  in 
its  favour,  I  have  again  been  drawn  thither  in  search  of  objects  of 
interest ;  but  though  I  have  enlarged  my  experience  since  my  first 
visit  here  before  Christmas,  I  still  think  that  the  native  city  of 
Shanghai  may  claim  the  palm  for  dirt  and  bad  smells  in  excess  of 
those  of  any  other  city  I  have  yet  explored.  However,  under  the 
excellent  guidance  of  "  a  brither  Scot,"  I  ventured  into  the  laby- 
rinth of  narrow  filthy  streets,  and  we  found  our  way  to  a  so-called 
tea-garden,  where  a  house  with  roofs  insanely  curled  up  at  the 
corners  stands  in  the  middle  of  a  dirty  pool,  amid  various  odd  long 
bridges.  It  seemed  the  regular  lounge  for  crowds  of  idlers,  who 
were  gambling  or  watching  conjurors  and  other  catch-cash.  As  to 
gambling,  it  is  an  inborn  passion  with  all  this  race  :  when  other 
subjects  fail,  the  number  of  pips  in  an  orange  will  furnish  matter 
for  an  exciting  bet. 

Then  we  went  to  see  a  place  where  great  mandarins  go  and  dine 


CHINESE    DEVOTEES.  269 

in  large  halls,  the  grounds  around  being  laid  out  in  a  labyrinth  of 
rockwork.  We  entered  the  city  by  one  great  gateway,  and  then 
passed  out  by  another,  walking  outside  the  old  wall  till  we  came 
to  a  cemetery  where  six  hundred  English  soldiers  were  buried,  who 
died  here  on  their  return  from  Peking — the  mortality  being  attri- 
buted to  bad  quarters  here. 

There  is  one  object  of  interest  of  which  I  did  wish  to  see  a 
specimen,  but  we  failed  to  discover  one.  These  are  the  Chinese 
representatives  of  St  Simon  Stylites.  I  am  told  that  quite  recently 
there  were  no  less  than  four  of  these  religious  mendicants  posted 
in  various  parts  of  Shanghai.  Each  of  these  had  packed  himself 
into  a  cage  about  5  feet  high  by  3  feet  square,  the  cage  being 
then  hoisted  up  by  ropes  and  pulleys  on  to  a  light  scaffolding  of 
bamboos  and  tall  poles.  One  of  these  erections  was  40  feet  high, 
and  in  it  the  wretched  devotee  had  remained  seven  days  and 
nights  without  food  or  drink,  to  excite  all  beholders  to  give  alms. 
His  object  was  to  raise  2000  taels  towards  building  a  temple  at 
Hang-Chow. 

Probably  he  has  collected  his  coin  and  taken  himself  off,  for 
this  method  of  soliciting  the  alms  of  the  pious  is  very  efficacious, 
especially  when  the  collector  shuts  himself  up  in  a  kennel  stuck  full 
of  long  nails  with  the  points  turned  inwards  to  prevent  his  getting 
any  rest.  Night  and  day  he  tolls  a  wearisome  bell,  that  its  wail 
may  induce  the  passers-by  to  give  him  such  a  sum  as  may  allow  of 
one  nail  being  withdrawn,  thus  purchasing  for  him  a  speedier  hope 
of  release  ! 1 

We  looked  into  some  temples,  but  I  confess  that  I  here  find 
heathenism  shorn  of  all  its  usual  interests.  The  picturesque  ele- 
ments are  utterly  wanting,  and  filth  is  rampant. 

On  the  other  hand,  our  own  Church  is  here  represented  with  a 
charm  such  as  I  have  found  nowhere  else  in  the  East;  but  I  have 
already  alluded  to  this  very  attractive  feature  of  Shanghai. 

Yesterday  morning,  however,  I  strayed  to  further  pastures,  being 
anxious  to  witness  the  consecration  of  the  new  Roman  Catholic 
Bishop  of  Hong-Kong  (Monseignenr  Gamier),  in  the  great  cathe- 
dral at  Tongkadoo,  which  is  a  suburb  of  Shanghai.  I  am  told  that 
about  80,000  of  the  310,000  inhabitants  of  the  city  are  adherents 
of  the  Romish  Church,  so  the  ceremony  was  one  certain  to  excite 
great  interest,  and  certainly  it  was  most  imposing — nothing  being 

1  A  self-elevated  saint  of  this  class  at  Allahabad  devoted  half  a  century  to  thus 

accumulating  merit !  Vide 'In  the  Himalayas  and  Indian  Plains,' ]>.  88.  By  C. 
F.  Gordon  Gumming.     Chatto  iV  Windus. 


270  SHANGHAI. 

omitted  which  could  tend  t<>  impress  the  outward  senses  and 
attract  a  people  accustomed  to  the  elaborate  ritual  and  ecclesiastical 
display  of  Buddhism. 

A  friend  having  kindly  offered  to  escort  me,  we  started  in  a 
steam-launch  at  about  7  a.m.,  and  proceeded  by  river  to  Tongka- 
doo ;  then,  leaving  our  boat,  ten  minutes'  walk  through  a  very  low 
squalid  district  of  the  Chinese  town  brought  us  to  the  cathedral, 
round  which  immense  crowds  had  assembled  to  see  what  they 
could  of  the  great  ceremonial.  Already  the  interior  was  densely 
packed  with  about  two  thousand  Chinese,  all  the  men  seated  on 
one  side  and  the  women  on  the  other.  The  middle  aisle  was 
guarded  by  about  sixty  Chinese  soldiers,  armed ;  others  were 
ranged  about  the  building,  both  within  and  without,  carrying  ban- 
ners. There  were  many  French  officers  present,  all  in  full  uniform 
— in  short,  nothing  was  neglected  which  could  heighten  the  scenic 
effect.  The  whole  cathedral  was  brilliantly  decorated  with  rich 
embroideries,  gay  banners,  flaunting  Chinese  flags  bearing  Christian 
mottoes,  many  gaily  decked  altars  and  pictures,  and  a  canopy  of 
the  richest  embroidery  above  the  bishop's  throne. 

The  great  organ  is  considered  a  very  wonderful  instrument ;  we 
were  informed  that  it  was  made  entirely  of  bamboo  pipes.1  On 
the  present  occasion,  however,  the  music  was  conducted  by  the  St 
Cecilian  Society  of  Portuguese  singers,  with  their  own  band,  and 
was  excellent. 

Though  the  church  appeared  crowded  to  overflowing,  a  word 
from  the  French  Consul  to  one  of  the  priests  secured  us  excellent 
places.  My  companion  was  taken  to  a  small  side-gallery  over- 
looking the  altar,  reserved  for  French  gentlemen,  and  a  seat  was 
found  for  me  with  the  French  Hospital  Sisters — pleasant-looking 
women,  dressed  in  black,  with  large  white  JSbrmandy  caps.  "We 
were  admirably  placed  for  seeing  the  whole  ceremonial. 

Four  bishops  were  present — namely,  the  new  Bishop  of  Hong- 
Kong,  Bishop  Guierry  of  Ningpo,  the  Bishop  of  Dionisia  (whose 
great  diocese,  Hupeh,  which  is  about  the  central  province  of  China, 
also  includes  Foo-Chow),  and  the  Bishop  of  Titopolis.  The  two 
last  named  bear  titles  of  ancient  bishoprics,  as  is  customary  in 
partibus  infidelium. 

1  We  often  little  dream  to  what  source  we  are  primarily  indebted  for  the  enjoy- 
ments of  our  ordinary  life.  It  appears  that  the  use  of  the  reed,  which  forms  so 
essential  a  part  of  the  harmonium,  was  taught  to  a  Frenchman  by  a  Russian,  who 
had  learnt  it  from  a  Chinaman  in  the  beginning  of  this  century.  Thus  this  appli- 
cation of  the  bamboo,  which  is  virtually  a  gigantic  reed,  is  but  a  development  of  an 
ancient  Chinese  invention. 


ROMAN  CATHOLIC  CATHEDRAL.         271 

They  entered  in  solemn  procession,  with  about  fifty  priests,  be- 
sides a  multitude  of  acolytes.  The  display  of  gorgeous  vestm 
was  dazzling — the  gold-embroidered  copes  and  mitres.  While 
Mass  was  being  sung  there  was  the  usual  symbolic  putting  oh  and 
on  of  vestments,  which  is  so  very  distracting  to  the  uninitiated 
and  unsympathetic.  On  this  occasion,  however,  the  meaning  was 
obvious.  The  new  bishop  put  off  the  cope,  and  put  on  the  sym- 
bolic sandals,  the  tunic,  dalmatica,  chasuble,  and  maniple,  and 
assumed  the  pastoral  staff. 

During  the  Litany  he  lay  prone  on  the  altar  steps.  The  Bishop 
of  Xingpo  as  consecrator,  and  the  other  two  bishops,  laid  hands 
upon  him,  and  placed  the  Gospels  on  his  head  and  shoulders.  The 
choir  sang  Vent  Crexdor  Spiritus,  while  they  anointed  his  head 
and  hands.  The  Bishop  of  Xingpo  then  blessed  the  crozier  and 
presented  it ;  next  he  bestowed  the  episcopal  amethyst  ring,  and  a 
finely-bound  copy  of  the  Gospels.  Finally,  all  the  three  bishops 
gave  him  the  kiss  of  peace. 

After  the  offertory,  the  new  bishop  offered  two  wax-candles,  two 
loaves  of  bread,  and  two  tiny  casks  of  wine.  Then  the  Celebration 
of  the  Mass  was  continued,  the  new  bishop  and  the  Bishop  of 
Xingpo  communicating. 

After  the  blessing  the  Bishop  of  Xingpo  blessed  the  mitre,  and 
put  it  on  the  new  bishop — also  the  episcopal  gloves,  lie  then  led 
him  to  the  throne  under  the  canopy,  where  he  seated  himself, 
crozier  in  hand.  Then  all  stood  before  the  high  altar,  and  the 
Bishop  of  Xingpo  intoned  the  Te  D>')nn,  while  the  new  bishop 
walked  down  the  church   and  blessed  the  kneeling  crowds. 

Returning  to  the  altar,  he  thanked  the  three  bishops,  knelt  down 
three  times,  pronounced  the  Benediction,  after  which  all  the  bishops 
unrobed.  Then  the  whole  procession,  escorted  by  the  Chinese 
soldiers  and  the  banners,  walked  round  the  cathedral  grounds. 
heralded  by  trumpeters  and  a  company  of  ten  drummers. 

We  thought  the  crowds  appeared  to  be  considerably  impressed 
by  the  ceremonial,  and  we  felt  inclined  to  wish  that  the  poverty  of 
our  own  Missions  did  not  necessitate  such  exceedingly  ugly  simpli- 
city as  that  of  the  very  bare  chapels  which  are  the  best  that  ran 
be  provided  by  the  majority  of  the  native  converts.  These,  however, 
are,  as  we  have  already  seen,  staunch  men  and  true,  indued  with 
the  stern  determination  and  conviction  which  enables  them  to  face 
the  most  cruel  persecution,  and  in  many  cases  has  preserved  them 
faithful  unto  death.  Such  converts  as  these  are  not  much  influenced 
by  ecclesiastical  ornament,  and  only  desire  a  haven  of  rest  where  they 


272  SHANGHAI. 

may  meet  to  worship,  if  possible,  without  molestation.  The  rest 
may  all  come  in  time;  nevertheless,  there  is  dee])  signification  in 
the  old  saying  that  "  When  the  crozier  became  golden,  the  bishops 
became  wooden,"  so  perhaps  those  who  most  hope  to  see  the  spread 
of  Christ's  kingdom  in  China  may  be  consoled  for  the  lack  of 
outward  beauty. 

Another  thing  here  in  connection  with  the  Church  of  Rome  which 
has  greatly  interested  me  is  the  Orphanage  at  Siccaway,  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  this  city,  where  there  are  at  present  upwards  of  one 
hundred  and  sixty  baby -girls.  We  drove  there  one  afternoon,  and 
were  most  courteously  received  by  the  Mother  Superior  and  the 
kind  Sisters,  all  robed  in  black,  with  simple  black  frilled  bonnets. 
Pitiful  were  the  stories  they  had  to  tell  of  these,  their  adopted 
children,  poor  little  atoms,  voluntarily  cast  away  by  their  own 
parents — not,  as  is  too  often  the  case  in  other  lands,  because  they 
are  the  children  born  to  a  heritage  of  shame  (for  the  morality  of 
Chinese  women  in  general  stands  very  high),  but  solely  because 
they  had  the  misfortune  to  be  girls  instead  of  boys — a  subject  on 
which  I  have  already  had  occasion  to  speak.1 

Moved  with  pity  for  the  innocent  lives  thus  doomed  to  destruc- 
tion, and  moreover  seeing  in  their  rescue  an  opportunity  of  at  least 
securing  for  these  poor  little  outcasts  the  privilege  of  Christian 
baptism,  and  furthermore  a  possibility  of  rearing  them  in  the  Chris- 
tian faith  so  as  to  grow  up  and  become  useful  working  members  of 
the  Catholic  Church,  the  Sisters  at  Siccaway  announced  their  will- 
ingness to  receive  and  tend  all  castaways  who  might  be  brought  to 
their  house.  It  is  to  be  feared  that  multitudes  of  mothers  still 
suffer  their  little  ones  to  perish  rather  than  take  the  small  trouble 
involved  in  conveying  them  to  the  home  thus  ready  to  welcome 
them. 

In  some  parts  of  China  a  similar  work  of  mercy  has  led  to  the 
popular  belief  that  the  foreign  women  want  to  get  the  Chinese 
babies  because  their  eyes  are  necessary  to  complete  the  loathsome 
ingredients  of  some  witch's  broth.  This  was  the  cry  raised  which 
led  to  the  horrible  massacre  at  Tien-tsin  in  1871,  in  which  no  less 
than  thirteen  Sisters  and  two  priests  perished,  and  the  cathedral 
was  burnt.  Several  other  Europeans,  including  the  French  Consul, 
were  also  murdered  by  the  populace,  goaded  on  by  the  fanatical 
literati.  Since  that  time  it  has  been  deemed  prudent  to  carry  on 
the  charge  of  Orphanages  and  other  Church  work  in  the  interior  of 
China,  chiefly  by  means  of  native  Sisters,  "  Vierges  de  la  Sainte 
1  See  p.  203  on  Ancestor-worship. 


ORPHANAGE    AT    SICCA  WAY.  273 

Enfance,"  who  are  found  to  acquit  themselves  well  in  their  difficult 
task. 

Happily,  near  Shanghai,  long  contact  with  foreigners  has  taught 
the  people  to  form  a  wiser  judgment  of  their  motives,  and  a  good 
many  women,  who  have  not  altogether  crushed  their  maternal  in- 
stincts, would  he  willing  to  hand  over  their  infant  daughters  to  the 
Sisters,  provided  that  so  doing  cost  them  neither  money  nor  trouble. 

Of  the  babies  which  do  reach  this  haven  of  rest,  many  arrive  at 
the  very  point  of  death,  and  all  are  in  the  last  stage  of  inanition. 
Many  have  evidently  been  systematically  neglected  from  the  mo- 
ment of  their  hirth — starved  by  their  unnatural  mothers ;  hut  even 
those  which  have  received  fair  care  for  a  little  while,  are  often 
almost  dying  ere  they  are  delivered  to  their  new  mothers. 

For  often  a  Chinese  woman  living  some  distance  from  the  town, 
wearies  of  taking  care  of  a  baby  so  very  unwelcome  to  its  father 
and  all  its  relations,  and  so,  hearing  of  the  extraordinary  fancy  of 
the  white  women  for  rearing  other  people's  babies,  she  commits  her 
little  one  to  some  boatman  going  down  one  of  the  canals  or  down 
the  river,  and  charges  him  to  deliver  it  to  the  Sisters.  Very  likely 
two  whole  days  may  elapse  from  the  hour  when  the  unnatural 
mother  gives  her  nursling  to  this  rough  care  ere  it  reaches  its 
destination,  and  during  all  those  long  hours  the  wailing  baby  is  Left 
unnoticed  and  without  food.  Then  when  the  boatman  reaches 
Siccaway,  without  further  ceremony  he  hands  this  poor  morsel  of 
humanity  to  the  Sister  at  the  gate.  These  babies  are  generally 
quite  naked — and  if  perchance  they  have  been  wrapped  in  a  bit  of 
coarse  cloth,  the  messenger  invariably  reclaims  the  cloth  when  he 
delivers  up  the  baby. 

The  famished  creature  is,  in  many  cases,  committed  to  a  hired 
wet-nurse,  who  receives  good  wages  from  the  Orphanage — but  so 
many  of  these  women  prove  unfaithful  to  their  trust,  that  the 
Sisters  find  that  the  babies  they  themselves  rear  by  the  bottle 
make  far  more  rapid  progress  than  those  committed  to  Chinese 
nurses.  We  were  taken  round  one  large  room,  surrounded  by  mat 
comfortable  cribs,  in  each  of  which  lay  what  seemed  to  us  to  be  a 
dying  baby.  Some  of  these  were,  however,  pronounced  by  their 
tender  new  nurses  to  be  promising  cases — but  others  had  not 
reached  them  till  all  hope  was  just. 

There  was  one  poor  little  creature  which  haunted  my  memory 
for  many  days.  Its  little  wizened  face  was  like  the  "death's 
head"  of  what  had  been  an  old  man,  only  that  its  sad  pitiful  ey<  - 
looked   at    us   with    a    wistful    expression.      Its    small    shrivelled 

S 


274  SHANGHAI. 

neck  and  attenuated  arms  were  positively  sickening  to  behold. 
Yet  this  poor  little  creature  had  been  reduced  to  this  terrible  con- 
dition by  the  neglect  of  a  paid  wet-nurse. 

Have  you  ever  looked  at  an  unhappy  unfledged  young  bird  that 
had  fallen  from  its  nest  and  lay  helpless  on  the  ground — a  poor 
thing  of  skin  and  bone,  with  its  bald  head  moving  uneasily  on  a 
long  lean  neck,  its  eyes  disproportionately  large,  and  its  hungry 
mouth  gaping  incessantly  for  the  long-expected  supplies  1  Then 
imagine  a  whole  nursery  full  of  cribs  and  just  such  a  creature 
lying  in  each,  only  that  the  creatures  are  all  human  beings,  and 
the  majority  are  being  brought  up  by  hand,  and  so  have  the  com- 
fortable companionship  of  a  feeding-bottle. 

It  was  beautiful  to  see  the  tender  compassion  of  the  kind  Sisters 
for  these  abandoned  nestlings,  and  the  satisfaction  with  which  they 
joyed  over  those  in  whom  they  discerned  symptoms  of  a  vitality 
which  should  reward  their  care. 

With  true  motherly  pride  and  interest  they  led  us  through  suc- 
cessive rooms  in  which  were  the  babies  which  had  passed  the  first 
most  critical  stage.  Some  seemed  to  have  rallied,  and  looked 
healthy  and  bright,  but  the  majority  retained  pitiful  traces  of  early 
neglect. 

In  the  more  advanced  rooms  were  little  creatures  just  learning 
to  walk,  happy  in  this  at  least,  that  for  them  there  Avas  no  pros- 
pect of  having  their  bones  broken,  and  feet  crushed  and  tortured 
through  long  years,  till  they  were  transformed  from  the  likeness  of 
shapely  human  feet  to  that  of  calves'  hoofs  (such  is  very  much  the 
form  of  the  "  lily  feet "  which  are  the  approved  standard  of  beauty 
for  all  Chinese  women  of  any  social  position). 

A  nice  Chinese  baby  is  a  very  attractive  object,  and  some  of 
these  little  toddles  were  particularly  so  in  their  quaintly  picturesouie 
native  dress.  We  could  not  wonder  that  some  seemed  to  have  won 
special  love  from  the  motherly  Sisters,  who  looked  cpuite  fondly  on 
the  trustful  little  creatures  that  trotted  about  after  them,  clinging 
lamb -like  to  the  soft  folds  of  their  black  robes. 

Leaving  the  actual  nurseries  we  came  to  a  play-room,  where  a 
considerable  number  of  bigger  children  were  rejoicing  in  a  good 
healthy  romp.  I  confess  I  thought  their  noise  must  be  more  try- 
ing to  the  nerves  of  the  Sister  in  charge  than  even  the  wailing  of 
the  sick  babies,  but  she  seemed  well  pleased  to  see  her  flock  so 
happy,  and  was  thankful  to  have  a  share  in  rearing  so  many  Chris- 
tian women,  each  of  whom  may  perhaps  prove  an  influence  for 
good  hereafter — a  faithful  worker  among  her  own  people. 


STARVED    BABIES.  275 

Already  the  French  Catholic  Sisters  have  made  great  way  in 
establishing  schools  and  hospitals.  They  have  also  trained  a  large 
number  of  Chinese  Lay  Sisters  to  aid  in  various  good  works,  and 
nice-looking  women  these  are.  The  costume  they  adopt  is  a  slight 
modification  of  their  own  national  dress.  The  peculiar  form  is 
retained,  but  it  is  made  of  black  material,  the  sleeves  lined  with 
blue.  A  close  black  head-dress  partly  covers  the  neatly  dressed 
glossy  hair,  which  is  fastened  with  firm  silvery  pins. 

Of  the  children  thus  rescued  a  small  number  are  boys,  superfluous 
sons  of  families  already  well  provided  in  this  respect,  who,  though 
they  would  shrink  from  killing  a  boy,  are  very  well  pleased  to  pro- 
vide for  him  so  cheaply.1  Others  have  been  offered  for  sale  in  the 
open  market,  and  have  been  purchased  and  brought  here  by  some 
good  Christian.  Others  are  true  orphans,  whose  parents  have  died 
in  Avar  or  famine.  Thus  from  one  cause  or  another  the  Orphanage 
includes  a  considerable  number  of  boys,  who,  besides  their  religious 
education,  receive  a  sound  industrial  training  in  all  useful  branches 
of  trade,  under  supervision  of  the  Brothers,  so  that  those  who  may 
not  prove  to  have  a  vocation  for  Church  work,  may  be  fitted  for 
secular  life.  So  there  are  shoemakers  and  tailors,  carpenters, 
masons,  locksmiths,  and  wood-carvers,  and  painters.  One  cannot 
but  regret  that  one  of  the  industries  here  taught  is  the  modelling  of 
images  of  the  saints  for  country  chapels,  just  as  the  heathen  around 
are  taught  to  manufacture  images  of  their  countless  gods,  all  of 
which  must  tend  to  confusion  of  ideas. 

One  thing  worthy  of  note  at  the  Jesuit  College  at  Siccaway  is 
the  Observatory,  which  is  in  charge  of  a  very  able  meteorologist. 

In  this  town,  as  in  others,  there  has  long  been  a  native  Foundling 
Hospital,  much  like  one  I  have  already  described.  It  was  designed 
by  some  benevolent  Chinamen  as  a  check  on  infanticide,  but  it 
really  is  principally  a  place  for  babies  to  die  in,  as  they  generally 
arrive  in  an  almost  hopeless  state,  and  die  within  about  four  days. 
Those  who  survive  this  period  are  committed  to  the  care  of  strong 
healthy  wet-nurses,  either  in  the  hospital  or  at  their  own  homes. 
Near  the  front  gate  of  this  establishment  there  is  a  sliding  drawer 
in  the  wall.  In  this  the  new  arrivals  are  deposited  by  their  kindred 
(who  if  "  more  than  kin"  are  surely  "less  than  kind!"  and  cer- 
tainly illustrate  the  proverb  that  "Better  kind  fremit  nor  fremil 

'  Which  reminds  me  of  a  speech  made  by  a  dear  eld  relative  of  my  own,  when 
some  one  called  to  condole  with  her  on  the  death  of  one  of  her  fax  too  atu 
grandchildren.     "Oh,  my  dear  1  don't  condole  with  meJ    T/iere'sfar 

it  in  Jieaven  than  in  my  house  I " 


27  G  CITY    OF    NINO  PC 

kin"1).  The  rattling  of  a  bamboo  drum  warns  the  gatekeeper  to 
pull  in  tin-  drawer  from  his  post  inside  the  wall,  and  thus  the 
unloved  baby  is  transferred  from  its  unnatural  mother  to  the  care 

of  the  matron. 


CHAPTER      XXII. 


CITY    OF    NIXGPO. 


The  Yung  river — Graves — Ice-houses — Ningpo — Wood-carving — The  Church 
mission -house  and  schools — Chinese  clergymen — Ningpo  hair-dressing — 
The  seal  of  the  god — Pagoda — Street  scenes — Cuttle-fish — Carved-wood 
furniture — Roman  Catholic  Orphanage. 

Chez  Bisuop  Russell,  Nixgpo, 

April  27th. 

In  answer  to  a  letter  of  cordial  welcome  from  Bishop  Russell  of 
the  diocese  of  Xingpo,  I  started  for  this  city  yesterday  afternoon, 
driving  along  the  broad  handsome  quays  of  Shanghai  as  far  as  the 
China  Merchant  Company's  wharf,  where  lay  the  Kiang  Teen, 
just  about  to  sail.  She  is  a  splendid  American  steamer,  with 
capital  accommodation  for  first-class  passengers,  and  abundant  space 
for  an  unlimited  number  of  Chinamen,  to  whom  close  packing  is  no 
objection,  provided  the  fares  are  sufficiently  low. 

I  found  myself  in  possession  of  a  cabin  like  a  comfortable  room, 
but  with  the  first  glimmer  of  dawn  I  was  astir,  and  gladly  accepted 
an  invitation  from  the  genial  captain  to  share  his  early  chocolate 
and  take  possession  of  a  snug  corner  on  the  bridge,  commanding 
a  perfect  view  of  the  Yung  river,  which  we  entered  at  daybreak, 
passing  Chin-hae,  a  city  about  three  miles  in  circumference,  with 
castellated  walls.  Its  most  conspicuous  feature  is  a  picturesque  old 
castle  crowning  a  small  but  precipitous  hill  overlooking  the  sea,  so 
we  saw  it  with  a  foreground  of  quaint  junks.  This  citadel  was 
captured  in  1811  by  the  British,  who  therein  seized  about  150 
pieces  of  artillery. - 

From  this  point  Ave  steamed  slowly  up  the  stream  for  about 
twelve  miles,  the  morning  mists  rising  dreamily  from  the  river, 

1  "  Better  kind  strangers  than  estranged  kindred." 

-  On  the  2d  of  March  1885  this  fort  was  bombarded  by  the  French  under  Admiral 
Courbet,  and  the  approach  to  Ningpo  by  the  river  was  blockaded. 


ICE-HOUSES.  277 

and  from  the  low  damp  rice-lands  and  canals,  and  giving  strange 
relief  to  multitudinous  hillocks — green  mounds  of  varying  height 
and  form,  which  here  mark  ancestral  graves,  groups  of  which,  in 
tens,  twenties,  hundreds,  lie  thickly  strewn  in  every  direction. 

They  must  certainly  number  tens  of  thousands,  and  usurp  a  most 
unfair  proportion  of  the  flat  alluvial  land,  which  yields  such  rich 
green  crops  wherever  the  farmer  ventures  to  cultivate.  Through- 
out this  district  nearly  all  graves  are  marked  by  simple  mounds, 
the  picturesque  horse-shoe  form  so  common  in  Southern  China 
being  here  unknown,  though  there  are  some  ugly  square  brick 
buildings. 

As  we  approached  this  line  old  walled  city,  the  principal  objects 
which  revealed  themselves  were  buildings  much  larger  than  ordi- 
nary dwelling-houses,  and  having  very  high-pitched,  thatched  roofs. 
Of  these  we  counted  380,  and  I  learnt  that  they  are  ice-houses,  in 
which,  during  the  winter  months,  the  ice  is  stored  for  the  fishers, 
whose  work  forms  one  of  the  most  important  industries  here.  The 
necessity  of  a  large  supply  is  evident,  on  account  of  the  great  heal 
in  summer ;  and  as  even  the  winters  are  often  so  mild  as  to  yield 
no  ice,  a  special  law  requires  the  owners  of  these  ice-housrs  always 
to  keep  up  a  three-years'  supply,  in  order  to  meet  such  emergencies. 

The  construction  of  the  houses  is  simple,  and  is  found  to  answer 
excellently.  Each  is  simply  a  large  reservoir  consisting  of  four 
solid  stone  walls  thickly  coated  with  clay,  and  with  gutters  in  the 
stone  pavement  to  allow  of  drainage  from  the  ice.  These  walls  are 
about  twenty  feet  in  height.  On  them  rests  the  bamboo  frame- 
work of  a  high-pitched  roof,  which  is  thatched  with  straw.  The 
coating  of  clay  makes  the  building  alike  water-proof  and  heat- 
proof. 

The  entrance  to  the  house  is  by  a  flight  of  steps  leading  up  to  a 
door  cut  in  the  roof,  and  shielded  by  a  heavy  straw  mat.  The  ice 
is  removed  by  another  door  on  the  level  of  the  ground.  Each 
house  stands  by  itself  on  a  flat  rice-field  of  clay  loam,  which  can 
readily  be  flooded.  So  soon  as  there  is  any  chance  of  a  light  frost, 
the  water  is  turned  on,  and  in  the  morning  the  thin  layers  are 
carefully  collected,  pounded  into  a  solid  mass,  and  stored  between 
layers  of  matting.      Thus  it  can  be  preserved  for  years. 

From  these  ice-houses  it  is  carried  out  to  the  fishing-fleets  at 
sea  in  specially  constructed  ice-boats  with  wooden  roofs.  They 
carry  the  ice  packed  with  alternate  layers  of  straw  matting,  which, 
on  reaching  the  fleet,  are  removed,  and  layers  of  fish  are  substituted, 
which  thus  reach  the  city  in  perfect  condition. 


278  CITY    OF    NINGPO. 

Another    industry    here,    in    connection    with    the    fisheries, 

is  the  evaporation  of  salt  in  salt-pans  for  the  use  of  the  fish- 
curers. 

As  we  neared  the  city,  great  timber-yards,  docks,  and  temples 
successively  appeared,  and  about  7  a.m.  the  large  steamer  was 
moored  alongside  the  wharf,  and  Captain  Steele  took  me  ashore  to 
inspect  the  shops  of  the  famous  Ningpo  wood-carvers,  which  are 
all  in  that  quarter  of  the  town.  The  finest  of  this  work,  consisting 
of  intricate  figure  scenes,  is  most  wonderfully  delicate,  and  com- 
mands a  price  which  even  in  Europe  or  America  would  be  con- 
sidered high ;  but  the  second-class  carvings,  many  of  which  are 
excellent  free  rendering  of  bamboo  or  other  light  foliage,  are  ex- 
ceedingly cheap.  Picture  or  mirror  frames  and  brackets  seem  to 
be  the  favourite  objects  of  manufacture.  We  were  specially  called 
upon  to  admire  a  large  cabinet,  on  which  incalculable  patient  skill 
must  have  been  lavished.  To  my  eyes,  however,  accustomed  to 
the  rich  tone  of  Canton  blackwood  furniture,  this  pale  wood  is 
rather  an  unpleasant  material.  Here,  of  course,  it  is  greatly  in 
favour,  being  the  special  industry  of  this  city. 

Ere  this  tour  of  inspection  Avas  finished,  Miss  Laurence  came  to 
meet  me  and  escort  me  to  this — the  English  Church  Mission. 
Captain  Steele  lent  us  his  own  open  chairs  of  wicker-work,  as 
being  infinitely  preferable  to  the  closely  covered  upright  ones 
which  are  commonly  used;  so,  having  secured  bearers,  we  were 
carried  about  two  miles  through  the  city,  crossing  the  river  by  a 
ferry,  and  at  last  arriving  here,  where  the  bishop  and  Mrs  Bussell 
received  me  with  most  hospitable  kindness. 

Here  in  the  heart  of  the  heathen  city,  on  a  site  which,  but  a  few 
years  ago,  was  devoted  to  accumulations  of  foulest  rubbish,  now 
stands  the  pleasant  home  with  its  bright  little  garden,  fragrant  with 
roses  and  orange-blossoms,  and  enlivened  by  a  charming  group  of 
tiny  Chinese  children  with  partially  shaven  heads  and  in  their 
pretty  native  dresses  of  every  vivid  hue.  These  are  children  of 
some  of  the  native  clergy  and  teachers,  whose  very  small  salary 
makes  it  a  real  boon  when  one  of  their  little  ones  here  finds  a 
temporary  home  and  wise  and  loving  care.  Mrs  Eussell's  special 
pet  is  a  delicious  wee  baby-girl  who  can  just  toddle,  and  asserts 
her  privilege  of  climbing  on  to  the  bishop's  knee,  where  she  sits 
supremely  happy.  Miss  Laurence  has  a  pet  wee  boy  to  match, 
who  is  the  plaything  of  her  girls'  school.  The  heads  of  these 
little  creatures  are  delightfully  quaint,  being  plaited  on  each  side 
in  two   ridiculous   small  tails  like  horns.      These  will  gradually 


CHRISTIANITY    NOT    FOREIGN.  279 

lengthen  into  two  great  plaits,  and  finally  combine  into  one  large 
long  plait,  eked  out  with  silk. 

On  either  side  of  the  bishop's  house  are  his  schools.  Miss 
Laurence  with  her  Chinese  assistants  has  charge  of  the  girls,  and 
also  of  a  boarding-school  for  young  boys ;  while  the  Eev.  J.  C.  Hoare 
has  the  care  of  the  schools  for  older  boys  and  the  training-college 
for  young  men,  most  of  whom  are  preparing  for  work  as  catechists 
or  as  school  teachers. 

Facing  the  house  is  a  neat  church,  where  on  several  days  of  the 
week  one  of  the  native  clergy  sits  for  hours  instructing  such  of 
his  heathen  countrymen  as  care  to  come  quietly  to  hear  his  mes- 
sage, while  the  regular  services  are  attended  by  a  large  and  most 
reverent  congregation.  "When  we  looked  in  this  afternoon,  we 
found  the  father  of  the  little  pet  baby — a  very  fine  stalwart  man 
— addressing  a  large  group  of  men  who  had  assembled  as  inquirers 
concerning  the  foreign  doctrine — which,  however,  they  are  in- 
structed not  to  call  "  foreign "  any  more  than  they  call  the  sun 
foreign,  which  shines  alike  on  England   and  on   China. 

There  are  at  present  four  Chinese  clergymen  in  priests'  orders 
attached  to  the  English  Church  Mission  here ;  their  names  sound 
strange  to  my  ears — the  Eev.  Sing  Eng-teh,  the  Eev.  'O-kwong-yiao, 
the  Eev.  Dzing  Ts-sing,  and  the  Eev.  Wong  Yiu-kwong.  There  are 
also  four  ordained  Chinese  clergy  in  the  Fuh-Eien  province,  and 
two  at  Hong-Kong.  Some  others  have  already  passed  to  their 
rest.  These  have  all  been  most  carefully  selected,  as  being  not 
only  intellectual,  and  also  men  of  eminently  spiritual  lives,  but 
further,  as  men  truly  fitted  for  evangelistic  work  among  their 
countrymen.  They  have  given  invaluable  aid  in  the  translation 
of  the  Scriptures  and  other  works  into  the  colloquial  dialects  of 
their  respective  provinces,  thus  enabling  the  most  unlearned  (to 
whom  the  classic  mandarin,  which  is  the  lingua  franca  of  the 
educated,  would  be  unintelligible)  to  read  the  sacred  books  in  their 
own  tongue. 

"We  spent  a  pleasant  morning  in  this  sweet  home,  and  Miss 
Laurence  took  me  to  her  house  next  door  to  see  all  her  nice 
Chinese  girls.  They  are  a  bright,  happy-looking  flock,  numbering 
about  two  dozen  of  all  ages;  and  all  live  here  entirely,  so  as  to 
be  wholly  separate  from  heathen  influence,  for  it  is  Imped  that 
in  after-years  much  good  will  radiate  from  this  little  centre.  We 
found  them  busily  at  work,  some  reading,  some  writing — others 
with  large  picturesque  wheels  winding  the  silk  spun  by  their  own 
silk-worms,  which  are  fed  on  the  mulberry-leaves  grown  in  the 


280  CITY    OF    NINGPO. 

garden.  This  province  is  one  of  the  chief  silk-producing  districts 
of  China,  and  there  are  mulberry -groves  in  every  direction  for 
their  support.  All  these  girls  look  intelligent,  and  strikingly  clean 
and  tidy,  their  neatly  dressed  glossy  black  hair  reflecting  the  sun- 
light. 

The  style  of  hair-dressing  fashionable  in  Ningpo  is  not  encour- 
aged among  the  schoolgirls,  and  it  is  certainly  very  peculiar,  and, 
so  far  as  I  can  learn,  curiously  unlike  that  of  any  other  district  in 
China.  A  woman  having  rolled  up  her  own  hair  quite  simply, 
purchases  two  enormous  Avings  of  black  hair  made  up  on  wire,  and 
these  she  attaches  to  the  back  of  her  head,  whence  they  project 
fully  fifteen  inches  !  She  also  purchases  a  small  neat  fold  of  hair 
with  which  she  conceals  the  fastening.  There  is  no  attempt  at 
deception  in  the  wearing  of  this  false  hair ;  it  is  simply  a  head- 
dress, which  could  not  possibly  be  made  of  growing  hair. 

After  luncheon  the  bishop  most  kindly  undertook  to  show  us 
some  of  the  city  lions,  so  we  once  more  betook  us  to  our  chairs,  he 
escorting  us  on  his  pony.  Our  first  visit  was  to  the  Temple  of  the 
City  Defenders,  a  large  national  temple,  where  the  municipal 
authorities  offer  solemn  worship  at  stated  festivals.  Here,  as  in 
most  of  the  military  temples  I  have  seen,  the  objects  of  adoration 
are  several  huge  idols  of  the  Tartar  type,  with  very  long  black 
moustaches.  The  temple  is  adorned  with  numerous  festoons  of 
yellow  cloth,  covered  with  inscriptions  in  black  characters.  These 
are  votive  offerings  of  a  very  decorative  type.  On  the  altar  lies 
the  box  tied  up  in  silken  cloths  which  has  so  often  excited  my 
curiosity  in  the  temples.  I  now  learn  that  it  contains  the  *ea?  of 
the  god,  which  is  duly  stamped  on  paper  charms  or  clothes,  for  the 
healing  of  the  sick  or  the  exorcising  of  devils. 

We  went  next  to  the  great  pagoda,  built  1100  years  ago  in 
honour  of  the  goddess  Ma-Tsu-pa.  Till  the  middle  of  the  pres- 
ent century  it  retained  its  seven  tiers  of  ornamental  roofs  and 
verandahs  decorated  with  dragons  and  fishes,  but  these  have  been 
swept  away  by  fire,  and  there  now  remains  only  a  very  tall  but 
poor  and  naked-looking  white  tower.  It  is  actually  fourteen 
storeys  high,  though  there  are  only  seven  tiers  of  windows.  Miss 
Laurence  and  I  climbed  to  the  top,  and  had  an  extensive  view  of 
the  city,  which  is  flat  and  wanting  in  distinct  features — a  flat 
country  all  around,  with  hills  in  the  far  distance. 

Descending  thence,  Ave  continued  our  journey  through  the  city, 
passing  innumerable  objects  of  artistic  interest,  combined  with  an 
indescribable   amount  of   dirt.      There   is  the  usual  succession  of 


CUTTLE-FISH    SEASON.  :281 

wonderfully  narrow  streets  thronged  with  a  crowd  which,  albeit 
chiefly  composed  of  men,  is  nevertheless  picturesque,  and  not  lack- 
ing in  some  variety  of  colour ;  for  though  all  the  poor  are  dressed 
in  blue,  generally  calico,  the  silken  garments  of  the  prosperous  folk 
are  often  very  gay.  Of  course  every  one,  rich  or  poor,  carries  a  fan, 
and  works  it  ceaselessly  in  a  quiet  mechanical  fashion. 

From  every  house  hang  pretty  Chinese  lanterns,  and  all  manner 
of  realistic  signs  hang  from  the  open  shops,  or  else  tall,  very  narrow 
sign-boards,  from  fifteen  to  eighteen  feet  high,  all  carved  and 
gilded,  and  gorgeously  coloured,  rest  on  carved  stands  beside  the 
entrance;  and  as  few  shops  have  a  frontage  of  more  than  ten  feet, 
these  form  a  very  conspicuous  feature  in  the  scene. 

Among  the  street-hawkers  I  noticed  some  selling  very  pretty 
artificial  flowers  made  of  fluffy  silk,  others  selling  paper  umbrellas; 
some  had  ornaments  of  imitation  jade,  whicli  might  deceive  even  a 
fairly  practised  eye.  Among  the  remarkable  figures  are  the  shoe 
merchants,  whose  stock  of  shoes  of  all  sizes  is  slung  from  the  ends 
of  a  bamboo,  covering  two  pyramidal  light  wooden  frames,  which 
form  stands  wherever  the  pedlar  sees  fit  to  halt.  Others  in  the 
same  way  carry  great  stands  of  pipes,  and  others  flowers,  cakes, 
sugar-plums,  or  fish.  Here  are  barbers  hard  at  work — there  fortune- 
tellers. 

The  itinerant  fishmongers  sell  cuttle-fish  large  and  small,  and 
other  creatures  repulsive  in  our  eyes,  but  all  are  generally  cut  up 
into  small  portions  suited  to  purses  whose  investments  rarely  exceed 
half  a  farthing.  I  noticed  that  there  was  an  extensive  demand  for 
large  flat  eels,  so  silvery-white  as  to  resemble  polished  swords. 
This  is  just  the  height  of  cuttle-fish  season  here — it  begins  in 
March  and  continues  till  the  end  of  August,  and  is  as  important 
to  the  fishers  of  Mngpo  as  are  herring  to  our  own  men.  Special 
boats  are  set  apart  for  this  fishery,  which  continues  day  and  night, 
a  fire  being  lighted  on  deck  at  night  that  its  glare  may  attract  the 
cuttle-fish.  Besides  the  very  large  consumption  in  the  daily  market, 
an  enormous  quantity  are  dried  for  export.  They  are  also  largely 
used  for  bait  Avhen  cockroaches  are  not  to  be  caught.  These, 
however,  answer  the  purpose  just  as  well. 

As  a  general  rule,  it  is  only  in  wet  weather  that  fresh  cuttle-fish 
come  into  the  market,  for  so  long  as  the  weather  is  line  the  boats 
do  not  care  to  return  to  the  city,  but  prefer  to  remain  on  the  scene 
of  action  and  prepare  the  cuttle-fish  for  winter  store.  They  are 
merely  split  open  and  cleaned,  and  are  then  spread  on  mats  which 
are  laid  all  over  certain  rocky  isles;  there  they  are  left  to  dry  in 


282  CITY   OF   NINGPO. 

the  sun,  after  which  they  are  packed  in  wooden  tubs  and  compressed 
by  the  trampling  of  human  feet. 

We  passed  street-bakers  baking  appetising  biscuits  in  neat  little 
portable  ovens,  and,  for  less  than  a  farthing,  serving  out  large 
bowls  of  savoury  soup  or  stew  to  appreciative  customers,  who, 
holding  the  bowl  in  one  hand,  and  with  the  other  working  the  two 
chop-sticks,  quickly  disposed  thereof.  I  think  I  have  already 
mentioned  that  at  these  cheap  fruit-stalls,  oranges  ready  peeled  are 
offered  for  a  smaller  sum  than  those  in  their  skins — the  skin  being 
a  distinct  article  of  commerce,  used,  I  believe,  in  medicine,  though 
marmalade  does  not  appear  to  be  a  recognised  luxury. 

As  we  hurried  along  we  noted  quaint  bits  of  carving,  odd  stone 
beasts,  fanciful  bridges,  men  busy  tailoring  and  coopering,  ivory- 
carving,  watchmaking,  and  fan-making,  shops  full  of  brazen  vessels 
for  temples,  or  handsome  coffins  for  dutiful  sons  to  present  to  their 
parents.  Smooth-shaven  men  in  garments  of  amazing  cleanliness, 
and  with  huge  bare  foreheads,  and  glossy  black  plaits  down  to  their 
heels,  welcomed  us  to  curio-shops,  where  strange  treasures  tempt 
one  in  a  way  that  the  identical  object  seen  in  England  could  never 
do.  The  simplest  shopping  expedition  (to  me  so  wearisome  in 
other  lands)  here  becomes  a  delight,  the  shop  itself  with  its  gor- 
geously decked  domestic  shrine,  and  sometimes  glimpses  of  every- 
day life  in  the  inner  court,  all  combining  to  produce  scenes  attrac- 
tive to  the  artistic  eye.  Only  the  too  rapid  succession  of  such 
subjects  is  bewildering. 

And  then  there  is  such  never-failing  interest  in  a  show-room 
which  is  also  the  workshop  wherein  each  skilful  workman  deftly 
manufactures  his  wares,  apparently  undisturbed  by  our  curious 
gaze.  Is'ow  Ave  pause  to  watch  an  old  man  in  enormous  spectacles 
producing  exquisitely  fine  ivory  carving;  then  we  come  to  another 
group  whose  swift  needles  are  tracing  gorgeous  dragons  and  myth- 
ical birds  on  a  groundwork  of  rich  silk ;  others  making  prepos- 
terous masks  for  the  use  of  the  theatres,  or  imitation  ingots  of 
silver  wherewith  to  propitiate  the  dead. 

"We  halted  for  some  time  in  a  street  wholly  devoted  to  the  sale 
of  carved-wood  furniture,  of  the  same  pale  colour  as  that  we  had 
seen  in  the  morning.  "We  entered  a  very  large  shop,  like  a  ware- 
house, where  the  good  bishop,  as  is  his  wont,  soon  engaged  a  group 
of  shopmen  in  a  very  earnest  conversation.  They  all  seemed  really 
glad  to  see  him,  and  to  have  a  chance  of  a  word  with  him.  He 
has  such  a  genial  manner  that  it  attracts  every  one,  and  I  am  told 
he  has  a  singular  aptness  for  bringing  in  some  quotation  from  Con- 


ELABORATELY    CARVED    BEDSTEADS.  283 

fucius,  or  some  unanswerable  Chinese  proverb,  to  back  his  own 
argument,  and  turn  the  tables  against  whoever  seeks  to  gainsay  his 
words ;  and  such  quotations  from  their  own  sages  delight  his 
audience,  and  many  are  thus  first  attracted  to  come  to  the  chapels 
for  further  conversation  with  him  or  his  catechists. 

While  he  was  thus  engaged  I  had  full  leisure  to  explore  the 
innermost  recesses  of  the  shop,  and  examine  the  beautiful  carv- 
ings, especially  some  curious  large  bedsteads,  which  answer  all  the 
purposes  of  a  dressing-room,  having  drawers  beneath  the  bed,  and 
on  either  hand  all  necessary  arrangements  for  washing,  elaborate 
hair-dressing,  and  the  application  of  cosm&tiques,  so  arranged  as 
to  be  shut  in  by  an  outer  enclosure  of  beautifully  carved  screen- 
work.  These,  when  in  use,  are  further  adorned  with  rich  hangings 
of  coloured  silk  and  embroidery. 

We  next  visited  the  great  Fuh-Kien  temple,  which  is  the  Guild 
of  merchants  from  that  province  residing  here.  It  bears  a  striking 
resemblance  to  the  Guild  of  the  Ningpo  merchants  living  at  Foo- 
Chow.  This  has  the  advantage  of  a  large  number  of  beautifully 
carved  dragon  stone  pillars ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  at  present 
much  less  clean  and  brilliant.  We  found  it  densely  thronged  with 
a  blue  crowd  in  all  the  absorbing  delight  of  a  grand  Sing-Song, 
wherein  I  so  fully  sympathise  that  of  course  I  looked  curiously  to 
see  what  was  going  on.  By  a  very  singular  coincidence  I  recog- 
nised the  identical  troupe  of  actors  whom  I  had  last  seen  at  Foo- 
Chow,  acting  the  identical  play — a  gorgeous  mythological  subject. 

Thence  we  passed  on  to  the  Roman  Catholic  Mission,  where  we 
were  very  kindly  received  by  a  pleasant  French  priest,  who  showed 
us  the  large  fine  church  (where  a  special  altar  was  being  decked  in 
honour  of  the  Blessed  Virgin,  in  preparation  for  the  special  fes- 
tivals of  the  coming  month  of  May,  especially  dedicated  to  her 
worship). 

From  the  church  we  passed  to  the  Sisters'  house,  to  which  we 
were  admitted  by  a  povtiire,  who  has  held  her  post  for  thirty 
years.  Here  twelve  French  and  several  Chinese  Sisters,  all  robed 
in  black  serge,  and  wearing  large  white  caps  of  dazzling  cleanness, 
devote  their  lives  to  the  care  of  foundlings,  or  of  any  other  chil- 
dren whose  parents  agree  to  give  them  up  entirely  (which  many 
are  delighted  to  do).  In  order  to  avoid  all  contact  between  the 
children  and  heathen  teachers,  the  Sisters  themselves  acquire  the 
difficult  arts  of  reading  and  writing  Chinese  character,  and  them- 
selves instruct  their  little  ones,  most  of  whom  they  have  rescued 
from  an  untimely  grave. 


284  IN    A    BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

A  pleasant  Sister,  who  has  been  there  for  ten  years,  took  us 
round  the  large  establishment,  with  its  nice  fresh  dormitories,  airy 
school-rooms,  and  large  playground,  all  within  high  walls,  which 
is  quite  according  to  Chinese  ideas  of  proper  seclusion  (certainly 
this  large  young  family  does  credit  to  the  care  bestowed  upon  its 
members  by  both  the  French  and  Chinese  Sisters).  Their  loving 
care  is  extended  to  the  sick  poor,  for  whose  benefit  they  have  a 
free  dispensary. 

In  a  quiet  corner  of  the  garden  is  the  little  cemetery,  where  rest 
those  Sisters  who  have  died  here  at  their  post — for  the  work  they 
undertake  is  lifelong,  and  no  yearnings  for  a  return  to  their  be- 
loved France  may  ever  be  indulged  by  those  whose  lives  have  been 
devoted  to  this  work. 

From  this  home  of  the  little  ones  we  returned,  to  find  that  some 
friends  had  just  arrived  from  an  expedition  to  the  hills,  and  could 
find  no  words  to  express  their  rapturous  delight  at  the  gorgeous 
display  of  scarlet  and  gold  azaleas,  which  blossom  in  wonderful 
masses,  covering  the  mountain-sides  with  such  dense  thickets  as  to 
produce  strong  local  colouring,  making  the  term  rainbow-tinted  the 
simple  expression  of  a  fact. 

I  had  understood  that  this  was  the  exact  season  at  which  to 
visit  these  azalea-clothed  hills,  but  so  short  is  the  duration  of  their 
glory,  that  it  now  seems  scarcely  possible  for  me  to  get  there  till 
their  first  magnificence  is  past.  However,  various  plans  are  on 
foot,  and  something  pleasant  is  certain  to  be  developed  ere  long. 


CHAPTEE    XXIII. 


IN     A     BUDDHIST     MONASTERY. 


A  "haul -over" — Commemorative  arches — Canals — May -day  on  the  azalea 
hills — A  venerable  monastery — A  Buddhist  dinner — Costly  services  for 
the  dead — The  eastern  lake — Cash,  their  value — An  infant  congregation — 
A  staring  crowd — Good  ground  of  hope  for  missions. 

'  28ft. 

To  my  great  delight  the  bishop  has  decided  that  Miss  Laurence 
positively  requires  a  few  days'  rest,  and  a  breath  of  bracing  moun- 
tain air,  and  he  has  most  kindly  arranged  that  I  shall  accompany 


MEMORABLE    MAY-DAYS.  285 

her  on  an  expedition  to  Tien-Dong,  the  Buddhist  "  Monastery  of 
the  Heavenly  Boy,"  which  lies  about  twenty  miles  from  Xingpo, 
in  one  of  the  richest  azalea  districts.  This  will  be  quite  an  ideal 
trip,  as  Miss  Laurence's  wonderful  knowledge  of  the  Chinese  lan- 
guage, both  colloquial  and  classic,  is  a  source  of  never-ending 
amazement  to  the  people,  so  that  we  are  quite  sure  to  get  on  all 
right. 

at  the  Monastery  ok  Ties-Dong— 

...  "the  Heavenly  Boy," 

May-day. 

Of  all  the  strange  and  lovely  places  where  I  have  spent  succes- 
sive May-days,  this  has  perhaps  been  the  most  remarkable.  One 
was  spent  in  the  Himalayas,  where  the  familiar  notes  of  cuckoos 
without  number  mingled  with  the  chattering  of  troops  of  monkeys, 
who  pelted  us  with  blossoms  of  scarlet  rhododendron  trees  !  An- 
other on  a  lonely  but  most  lovely  Fijian  isle,  among  palms  and 
tree-ferns.  Last  year  I  was  in  the  glorious  Yosemite  Valley,  rev- 
elling in  the  beauty  of  its  wonderful  waterfalls,  and  the  fragrance 
of  its  delicious  azaleas.  But  I  think  this  has  been  strangest  of  all, 
for  here  are  we,  two  foreign  ladies,  without  a  countryman  within 
twenty  miles  of  us,  staying  quite  alone  in  an  old  Buddhist  mon- 
astery, with  upwards  of  a  hundred  Chinese  priests  and  monks,  all 
of  whom  are  as  kind  to  us  as  kind  can  be.  They  could  not  have 
welcomed  us  more  hospitably  had  we  come  to  crave  the  performance 
of  costly  services  on  behalf  of  our  deceased  ancestors,  which  is  the 
object  for  which  three  wealthy  Chinese  families  are  now  boarding 
at  the  monastery.  I  must  confess  that  these  holy  brethren  are 
rather  a  mixed-looking  lot ;  some  are  really  intellectual-looking 
men,  others  are  just  bright  and  pleasant,  but  some  are  of  a  very  low 
type,  and  quite  look  as  if  they  really  were  refugees  from  justice. 

Yesterday  afternoon  the  bishop  accompanied  us  to  the  river, 
and  started  us  in  the  Mission  house-boat — quite  a  different  thing 
from  the  luxurious  house-boats  of  the  mercantile  community,  being 
simply  a  common  boat  of  the  country,  so  arranged  as  to  allow  of 
sleeping  and  cooking  on  board.  Like  all  the  other  boats,  it  is  pro- 
vided with  an  arched  roof  made  in  sections,  on  a  telescopic  prin- 
ciple, so  that  by  day  they  all  slide  back  one  beneath  the  other,  and 
at  night  can  be  drawn  forward  so  as  to  furnish  a  strong  rain-proof 
cover. 

For  a  short  distance  our  route  lay  up  the  great  river ;  then  it 
was  necessary  to  enter  one  of  the  canal-  which  here  intersect  the 
country  in  every  direction,  flowing  at  a  level  considerably  higher 


286  IN    A    BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

than  that  of  the  river,  and  as  canal  locks  were  not  invented  in  the 
days  of  Confucius,  they  do  not  exist  in  the  China  of  to-day,  their 
equivalent  being  a  process  known  as  a  "haul-over,"  whereby  boats 
are  raised  or  lowered,  as  the  case  may  be,  by  an  enormous  expendi- 
ture of  labour — human  or  bovine.  From  the  river-level  to  that  of 
the  canal  the  bank  is  sloped  and  built  up  with  solid  masonry,  which 
is  overlaid  with  slippery  clay.  On  the  massive  stone  embankment 
on  either  side  are  placed  capstans,  which,  being  turned  simul- 
taneously, draw  up  strong  hawsers  made  of  split  and  twisted 
bamboo,  which  are  passed  round  the  stem  or  the  prow  of  the  boat, 
which  is  thus  raised  to  the  summit  of  the  dividing  incline,  and 
after  an  immense  amount  of  exertion  and  noisy  talk,  the  boat  at 
last  glides  into  its  new  channel.  As  hundreds  of  boats  sometimes 
pass  to  and  fro  in  a  day,  the  amount  of  physical  labour  involved 
must  be  immense.  The  sheer  dragging-power  of  two  teams  of 
buffaloes  is,  however,  occasionally  enlisted,  in  lieu  of  the  united 
force  of  many  men  with  the  windlasses. 

Thus  we  were  raised  to  our  higher  level,  and  glided  on  for  some 
hours  through  richly  cultivated  level  country,  which  is  irrigated  by 
so  many  minor  canals  as  to  form  a  network  of  waters,  all  crossed 
by  high-pitched  stone  bridges,  constructed  so  as  to  allow  free  pas- 
sage of  boats. 

Here  and  there  we  passed  great  pai-lows  or  triumphal  arches  of 
brick,  granite,  or  marble,  as  the  case  may  be,  the  groundwork  of 
solid  masonry  being  enriched  with  most  elaborate  carving,  erected 
in  honour  of  some  deed  which  has  commended  itself  to  the  Chinese 
notion  of  merit.  It  may  be  to  a  benevolent  citizen,  or  to  one  who 
has  conferred  great  credit  on  the  place  of  his  birth,  by  obtaining 
a  very  high  degree  at  the  examination  in  Confucian  classics.  Or 
it  may  commemorate  the  intense  filial  piety  of  a  daughter  who  has 
given  a  piece  of  her  own  flesh  to  make  medicine  to  save  a  parent's 
life,  or  the  constancy  of  a  widow  or  widower  who,  having  been 
early  deprived  of  his  or  her  mate,  has  through  long  years  of  secular 
life  continued  faithful  to  the  memory  of  the  departed.  Or  perhaps 
the  inscription  on  the  great  stone  arch  tells  how  a  maiden  whose 
betrothed  died  ere  they  were  wedded,  came  (as  in  duty  bound) 
to  fill  her  position  of  daughter-in-law  in  his  parents'  house,  and 
there  dutifully  continued  in  virgin  widowhood  till  she  attained 
her  sixty-first  year,  when  her  friends  and  connections  obtained  the 
imperial  sanction  (which  includes  an  imperial  contribution)  to  com- 
memorate her  life  of  solitary  virtue  by  the  erection  of  a  pai-low. 

Strange   to   say,    many   of   these   solid   marks   of    popular   and 


COMMEMOEATIVE    ARCHES.  287 

imperial  approbation  commemorate  suicides  for  causes  which  are 
deemed  honourable — as,  for  instance,  when  a  woman  prefers  death 
to  dishonour,  or  when  a  betrothed  maiden  (very  naturally  dreading 
her  lifelong  drudgery  in  the  house  of  her  mother-in-law)  resolves 
to  follow  her  bridegroom-elect  into  the  spirit-world.  Honourable 
suicides  amongst  men  are  also  in  some  cases  thus  commemorated. 
(Apparently  Chinese  notions  regarding  suicide  are  as  lax  as  on  the 
subject  of  infanticide,  and  a  considerable  number  of  women  put  an 
end  to  their  lives  in  the  calmest  manner,  either  by  taking  opium  or 
drowning,  some  through  jealous  misery  in  the  zenana,  others  to 
avoid  a  marriage  which  has  been  arranged  for  them.) 

In  some  cases  these  great  arches  commemorate  nothing  more 
remarkable  than  the  fact  that  some  worthy  old  gentleman  has 
attained  his  eighty-first  year.  Others,  of  more  interest,  record  that 
some  venerable  grandfather  or  grandmother  has  completed  a  cen- 
tury, or  passed  a  literary  examination. 

The  people  in  this  province  seem  to  delight  in  doing  honour  to 
such  notabilities,  and  so  these  curious  triple  erections  are  scattered 
all  over  the  country  in  the  most  promiscuous  way  and  the  most 
unexpected  situations,  without  any  obvious  connection  witli  any- 
thing. Though  I  have  used  the  term  "  archway  "  for  lack  of  a 
better,  these  essentially  Chinese  commemorative  structures  are  not 
arches — on  the  contrary,  they  consist  of  three  square-topped  por- 
tals, above  which  is  piled  a  heterogeneous  mass,  perhaps  forty  feet 
in  height,  of  most  intricate  construction,  consisting  of  exquisitely 
carved  stone  figures,  animals,  Chinese  characters,  and  fretwork — 
all  these  are  sculptured  right  through  the  stone,  so  as  to  be  quite 
open-work,  showing  the  blue  sky  beyond.  Many  are  really  beau- 
tiful objects,  which  have  been  erected  at  great  expense,  and  in 
every  case  by  special  permission  of  the  Emperor. 

In  delicious  and  wonderful  silence  we  glided  up  the  canal,  the 
boat  being  sometimes  pulled  and  sometimes  towed  by  our  excellent 
pig-tailed  crew.  All  the  land  on  either  side  is  under  cultivation 
(save,  indeed,  where  hillocks,  apparently  scattered  quite  at  random, 
mark  the  site  of  graves,  and  these  are  legion).  The  rice-fields  are 
now  of  a  lovely  green,  as  are  also  the  fields  of  wheat  and  barley. 
Tall  sugar-cane  and  maize  and  various  other  crops  vary  the  scene, 
and  now  and  again  a  heavenly  fragrance  tells  us  that  we  are  pass 
ing  a  field  of  blossoming  beans.  It  is  only  fair  that  we  should 
sometimes  be  thus  rejoiced,  for  our  poor  noses  are  often  severely 
afflicted  in  China,  where  the  dreadful  sewerage  of  the  cities  is  so 
openly  transferred  to  the  agricultural  districts  ! 


288  IN    A    BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

Ending  our  voyage  by  clear  moonlight,  we  anchored  at  Sioh 
Bah,  at  the  foot  of  the  hills,  ami  tin-re  slept  on  hoard,  awakening 
this  morning  at  earliest  dawn  to  greet  as  lovely  a  May-day  as 
heart  could  desire — a  morning  made  musical  by  the  warbling  of 
innumerable  birds.  True  to  traditions  of  home,  we  washed  our 
faces  in  the  May  dew  which  lay  so  abundantly  on  fields  of  the 
richest  pink  clover,  and  banks  of  golden  buttercups  and  celandine. 
It  was  a  bright  clear  morning,  and  the  air  crisp  and  exhilarating. 

After  an  early  breakfast  we  secured  coolies  to  carry  the  bamboo 
arm-chairs  which  we  had  brought  with  us,  and  started  on  the  five- 
mile  ascent  to  this  monastery,  by  a  most  lovely  path  winding  up 
and  down  among  hills  all  clothed  in  the  freshest  green,  and  through 
a  paradise  of  most  heavenly  flowers.  In  many  places  the  path  is 
overshadowed  by  tall  tallow-trees — not  an  attractive  name,  I  con- 
fess, but  a  very  ornamental  tree,  loaded  with  blossom.  Its  seeds, 
when  crushed  and  boiled,  yield  the  vegetable  tallow  of  which  are 
made  most  of  the  candles  which  are  burnt  before  idol  shrines  in 
the  temples.  To  obtain  the  requisite  hardness,  it  is  mixed  with  a 
small  quantity  of  pure  white  wax,  which  is  deposited  by  legions  of 
minute  insects  on  the  branches  of  a  stunted  tree  of  the  sumach 
family,1  which  is  said  to  be  peculiar  to  certain  districts  in  the  great 
western  province  of  Szu-chuan. 

Other  trees  are  festooned  by  richest  clusters  of  large  white  dog- 
roses  and  lilac  wistaria.  Here  and  there  we  come  to  thickets  of 
most  gorgeous  golden  azaleas,  scenting  the  whole  air  with  their 
delicious  perfume.  I  never  saw  such  glorious  azaleas  as  these, 
except  under  most  careful  cultivation ;  these  are  quite  different 
from  the  Californian  azalea,  which  so  enchanted  me  last  spring. 
The   fragrance  of  these   is   perhaps   scarcely  so  ethereal,  but  the 

1  Rhus  succeclaneum  ?    The  insect  is  said  to  be  Coccus  sinensis. 

These  wax  insects,  and  the  fruit  of  their  laboxirs,  are  for  several  reasons  specially 
interesting  to  naturalists.  In  the  first  place,  they  come  into  existence  in  galls  on  a 
totally  different  plant  from  that  on  which  they  are  to  deposit  their  wax,  the  first  an 
evergreen  shrub  which  grows  in  the  western  districts  on  a  different  soil,  and  in  a 
different  climate  from  the  wax-tree,  to  which,  about  the  beginning  of  June,  the  wax- 
layers  are  conveyed  by  their  nurses  !  Unlike  our  busy  bees,  these  tiny  creatures  do 
not  appear  to  collect  the  materials  for  the  manufacture  of  their  wax,  but  seem  to 
evolve  it  in  extraordinary  quantities,  and  by  the  end  of  August  all  the  branches  on 
which  they  have  settled  are  thickly  coated  with  pure  white  wax  to  the  depth  of 
perhaps  a  quarter  of  an  inch.  This  is  scraped  off,  melted  in  boiling  water,  strained 
through  cloth,  and  is  thus  prepared  for  commerce,  a  certain  amount  being  even  ex- 
ported to  Britain.  As  to  the  poor  little  insects  which  have  so  generotislv  yielded 
their  store,  they  receive  small  mercy  at  the  hands  of  the  ruthless  wax-collectors, 
who  finally  *weep  them  all  into  boilers,  and  having  expressed  the  last  particle  of 
their  wax,  throw  them  out  to  feed  the  pigs. 

I  am  told  that  the  French  have  introduced  this  wax  insect  from  China  into 
Algiers. 


THICKETS    OF   GORGEOUS    AZALEAS.  289 

blossom  is  very  much  larger,  producing  a  glorious  mass  of  colour. 
On  many  heads  I  have  counted  from  forty  to  fifty  large  blos- 
soms, forming  clusters  ranging  from  eight  to  fifteen  inches  in 
circumference. 

Only  last  week  these  hills  were  still  blood-red  from  the  abun- 
dance of  vividly  crimson  azaleas.  Of  these  the  prime  glory  has 
already  faded,  to  be  replaced  by  these  golden  beauties,  which  on 
the  lower  hills  now  reign  supreme;  but  here  and  there,  on  higher 
levels,  we  found  delicate  lilac  and  rose  coloured  varieties,  also  a 
lovely  and  very  fragrant  shrub  with  masses  of  waxdike  lilac  blos- 
som and  small  smooth  leaves,  not  hairy  like  those  of  the  azalea ;  I 
think  it  must  be  some  relation  to  a  kalmia.  I  am  told  that  in 
some  of  these  mountain  districts  the  azalea  shrubs  grow  to  a  height 
of  from  fifteen  to  twenty  feet,  covered  with  one  gorgeous  mass  of 
blossom,  and  also  that  magnificent  peonies  grow  wild.  We  have, 
however,  seen  none  of  the  latter. 

Here  and  there  we  passed  graves — no  longer  the  ornamental 
horse-shoe  graves  of  the  Fuh-Kien  province,  but  ugly  little  brick 
houses,  some  of  which  are  encased  in  straw.  Sometimes  our  path 
led  us  through  clumps  of  graceful  bamboo,  sometimes  through 
avenues  of  fine  old  fir-trees,  beneath  which,  here  and  there,  are 
pleasant  rest-houses — pleasant  also  to  the  eye,  the  walls  being  col- 
oured of  a  harmonious  red,  whde  the  roof  is  pearly  grey.  The 
road  from  the  water-level  to  the  monastery  is  a  fine  paved  cause- 
way, and  near  the  monastery  every  twenty-ninth  stone  is  embel- 
lished with  a  carved  lotus-blossom.  Everything  about  this  place  is 
venerable  and  harmonious,  especially  the  colouring  of  the  building, 
the  walls  of  which,  like  those  of  the  rest-houses,  are  of  a  rich  but 
faded  red,  with  weather-beaten  grey  roofs,  a  background  of  richly 
wooded  hills,  and  a  quiet  pool  in  the  foreground.  It  is  a  very 
large  and  handsome  old  monastery,  as  fine  an  example  as  we  could 
wish  to  see. 

And  here  we  two  ladies  arrived  (escorted  only  by  a  table-ser- 
vant), and  were  most  hospitably  welcomed  by  the  brethren,  and  an 
excellent  room  was  assigned  to  us  in  the  guests'  quarters,  where  we 
are  now  sitting  comfortably  established,  with  our  own  bedding 
spread  on  two  neat  bedsteads.  "Would  that  I  could  send  you  the 
exquisite  nosegay  of  gorgeous  blossoms  and  brightly  coloured  young 
leaves  which  I  gathered  this  afternoon,  and  which  scents  the  whole 
room  ! 

Passing  through  a  large  outer  temple  containing  an  immense 
image  of  the  fat  laughing  God  of  Wealth,  we  entered  an  inner 

T 


290  IN    A    BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

court,  where  a  flight  of  steps  led  us  to  the  great  temple,  which  is 
very  fine  indeed.  It  is  a  large  solemn  hall,  with  heavy  roof  sup- 
ported on  great  red  pillars.  As  you  enter  you  face  three  immense 
gilded  images  of  Buddha — all  three  exactly  alike,  and  all  looking 
down  on  the  worshippers  with  an  expression  of  supreme  benevo- 
lence. I  think  that  the  singvdarly  calm  beauty  of  these  three  mo  I 
worshipful  images  accounts  for  the  very  unusually  impressive  feel- 
ing of  this  temple.  These  images  are  each  about  forty  feet  in 
height,  and  their  lotus  thrones  are  raised  on  a  platform  which  gives 
them  an  elevation  of  ten  feet  more,  and  each  is  overshadowed  by  a 
great  gilt  canopy  retaining  the  form  (though  detail  and  symbolism 
are  apparently  forgotten)  of  the  seven-headed  cobra  of  India  and 
Ceylon.  Here  the  canopy  is  made  to  suggest  clouds.  As  usual, 
there  are  a  multitude  of  other  images  in  the  temple — shrines  to 
the  Queen  of  Heaven  and  to  the  Gods  of  Heaven  and  Earth,  and 
large  gilt  images  of  Buddha's  favoured  disciples. 

When  we  arrived  at  about  9  a.m.  a  full  service  was  going  on — 
not  the  true  morning  service,  for  that  was  over  hours  before,  but 
litanies  were  being  solemnly  chanted  and  the  Buddhist  ritual  read. 
When  engaged  in  the  services  of  the  temple,  all  the  priests,  whether 
robed  in  grey  or  yellow,  wear  crimson  mantles,  made  of  small  bits 
sewed  together,  to  look  as  if  they  were  a  patchwork  of  rags.  This 
is  done  even  in  the  robe  of  an  abbot,  which  may  be  of  the  very 
richest  material,  but  must  thus  seem  to  agree  with  his  vow  of 
poverty.  The  mantle  is  fastened  on  the  right  breast  by  a  large 
hook  of  imitation  jade  catching  a  large  ring  of  the  same  material. 

Immediately  after  service,  followed  breakfast  in  the  refectory. 
The  venerable  abbot,  though  too  old  to  attend  the  public  services, 
presides  at  meals,  sitting  at  a  small  table  apart.  Just  behind  his 
chair,  hanging  on  a  nail,  is  a  wooden  object  like  a  salad  fork  and 
spoon  united,  representing  two  hands.  A  servitor  brings  this  to 
the  abbot  after  the  first  grace,  and  the  old  man  places  thereon  a 
few  grains  of  rice  from  his  own  bowl.  These  the  young  monk  de- 
posits on  a  pillar  outside,  as  an  offering  to  the  small  gods.  After 
the  second  grace  all  commence  eating  in  perfect  silence. 

Having  arrived  some  time  before  the  coolies  who  were  burdened 
with  our  food  and  bedding,  we  decided  on  asking  for  dinner,  know- 
ing that  where  there  were  so  many  Chinese  guests,  our  doing  so 
could  not  be  inconvenient.  A  bright,  pleasant  -  looking  young 
priest  at  once  led  us  to  a  comfortable  guest-room,  where  an  excel- 
lent dinner  was  speedily  brought  to  us  in  courses,  served  by  a 
remarkably  pretty  small  boy.     First  came  a  tray  of  cakes,  sweet- 


A    VEGETARIAN    DIXXER.  291 

meats,  and  pea-nuts,  then  a  great  lacquer-bowl  of  steaming  rice  to 
accompany  successive  bowls  of  three  different  soups  and  nine  other 
dishes,  including  young  bamboo  shoots,  stewed,  which  were  partic- 
ularly good,  rather  like  asparagus.  Of  course  the  whole  was  en- 
tirely vegetable,  though  some  preparations  of  corn-husk  and  other 
things  tasted  so  very  much  like  meat  and  preserved  fish  that  we 
found  it  difficult  to  persuade  ourselves  that  such  was  not  the  case. 

For  beverages  Ave  had  rice-wine  and  tea,  and  when,  having 
thoroughly  enjoyed  our  meal,  we  called  for  the  reckoning,  we 
were  told  that  the  charge  for  the  whole  table,  supposing  a  party 
of  six  persons  had  dined,  would  naturally  have  been  200  cash — 
i.e.,  20  cents,  or  about  lOd. !  We  paid  8d.,  which  was  evidently 
considered  quite  satisfactory,  and  the  pretty  boy  who  waited  on  us 
grinned  with  delight  when  I  gave  him  five  cents.  Can  I  give  you 
a  better  proof  that  we  have  reached  a  spot  where  foreigners  are 
almost  unknown? 

A  charge  of  such  extraordinary  moderation  struck  us  as  being 
singularly  in  contrast  with  the  ecclesiastical  fees  required  for  the 
performance  of  priestly  offices.  The  three  families  who  are  board- 
ing here  tell  us  that  they  each  pay  sixty  dollars  (£12)  a-day  for 
such,  besides  the  regular  charge  for  their  board  and  lodging ;  and 
as  one  of  these  families  has  already  been  here  for  upwards  of  a 
week,  the  priests  appear  to  be  driving  a  very  good  business.  But 
I  am  bound  to  say  they  work  pretty  hard  for  their  money,  as  ser- 
vices go  on  day  and  night  without  intermission  at  one  or  other  of 
the  many  shrines. 

These  much-fleeced  relations  have  just  one  corner  of  satisfaction 
in  knowing  that  the  Celestial  Powers  see  that  they  get  fair-play  in 
the  matter  of  their  dearly  purchased  prayers.  In  the  Buddhist 
hells  a  specially  gloomy  tower  is  tenanted  by  dishonest  monks  and 
nuns,  who  having  received  money  beforehand  for  a  given  number 
of  masses  for  the  dead,  have  faded  to  perform  them.  Therefore 
they  are  condemned  through  long  ages  to  read  aloud  from  service- 
books  printed  in  the  very  smallest  type,  and  by  the  dim  light  of 
one  lantern  hanging  from  the  roof ! 

After  a  general  inspection  of  the  place,  and  of  the  preaching- 
hall,  and  numerous  minor  shrines,  we  went  out  to  explore  the 
surroundings  and  to  revel  in  scent  and  colour  on  the  azalea- 
covered  hills.  We  found  our  way  to  the  cave-home  of  a  genuine 
old  hermit,  whom  we  had  seen  at  the  temple,  wearing  a  curiously 
shaped  silver  band  round  his  head;  he  had  allowed  all  his  hair  to 
grow  quite  long — of  course  in  fulfilment  of  a  vow.     He  ia  the 


292  TN    A    BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

very  first  Chinaman  I  have  seen  who  has  not  shaved  the  front 
half  of  his  head  !  I  am  told  that  a  considerable  number  of  as- 
cetics live  thus  in  solitude,  in  caves  or  huts  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  various  monasteries,  from  which  their  food  is  daily  brought  to 
them,  so  that  they  have  the  privilege  of  existing  year  after  year 
without  a  care.  The  monastic  life  in  all  forms  seems  to  be  greatly 
in  favour  in  this  part  of  the  empire.  There  are  innumerable 
monasteries  all  over  the  province  of  Cheh-kiang,  and  here  within 
a  radius  of  fifty  miles  from  Ningpo  the  monks  are  estimated  at 
several  thousands. 

On  our  way  back  we  visited  a  row  of  very  ornamental  and  very 
curiously  shaped  receptacles  for  the  ashes  of  cremated  priests,  to 
which,  I  think,  is  added  the  ash  of  the  incense  daily  burnt  in  the 
temple. 

As  I  was  anxious  to  secure  a  sketch  of  the  interior  of  the 
temple,  and  especially  of  the  three  great  Buddhas  as  seen  en  pro- 
file, we  returned  thither,  but  again  service  was  going  on,  and  about 
a  hundred  brethren  were  present.  I  naturally  feared  that  the 
priests  might  object  to  my  sketching  during  service,  but  I  found 
that,  on  the  contrary,  they  were  greatly  interested,  and  anxious  to 
make  me  comfortable.  One  fine  old  man,  however,  asked  regret- 
fully what  was  the  good,  and  what  merit  could  there  be  in  my 
doing  all  this,  if  I  did  not  really  reverence  the  Poossas  1 x  He 
admitted,  however,  that  very  few  even  of  his  own  fraternity  do 
so  !  But  this  idea  of  accumulating  merit  is  the  keynote  to  every 
act  in  the  life  of  a  Buddhist. 

The  idea  of  keeping  a  debtor-and-creditor  account  with  heaven 
is  one  which  finds  great  favour  with  the  business-like  Chinese 
mind.  In  their  books  for  daily  guidance  in  self-examination, 
tables  of  merit  and  demerit  are  given,  in  which  various  good  and 
evil  actions  are  assessed  at  their  spiritual  value.  By  the  daily 
balancing  of  such  an  account,  a  careful  man  may  calculate  how  he 
stands  with  heaven,  and  year  by  year  he  can  wind  up  his  own 
affairs,  and  carry  over  a  balance  of  good  or  evil  deeds  towards  the 
next  year's  reckoning. 

But  the  man  who  is  greedy  of  good  works  thinks  he  can  best 
eschew  temptation  to  sin  by  living  a  hermit  life  apart  in  some 
anchorite  cell,  so  that  a  very  large  number  of  the  "  religious  "  of 

1  The  old  priest  seemed  to  mean  the  images,  but  the  Poossa  appears  to  be  the 
title  of  a  class  of  exalted  disciples  of  Buddha,  who,  though  they  have  uot  yet  at- 
tained to  the  rank  of  Buddha,  are  nevertheless  able  to  help  mankind,  and  are 
much  more  inclined  to  benevolence  and  sympathy  than  the  coldlv  perfect  Fuh  or 
Buddha. 


A    SOLEMN    NIGHT-SERVICE.  293 

China  retire  even  from  the  monasteries  and  spend  their  days  and 
nights  in  almost  ceaseless  reiteration  of  the  formula  of  praise — 0 
mi  to  Fo!  0  mi  to  Fo!  or  else  Namu  Amida  Butzu!  Namu 
Amida  Butzu!  (The  latter  is  the  Mongolian  title  of  Buddha,  and 
the  former  the  Chinese  corruption  of  the  same.) 

One  thing  which  struck  me  as  very  strange  was  that  many  of 
the  visitors  gathered  round  Miss  Laurence,  asking  her  to  tell  them 
about  "  the  doctrine  " — meaning  Christianity.  I  ventured  to  sug- 
gest that  the  priests  would  surely  object  to  all  this  talk  in  the 
temple  during  a  service,  but  the  bystanders  scouted  the  idea,  in  a 
tone  expressive  of  anything  but  reverence  for  their  spiritual  pastors, 
and  then  the  principal  women  asked  Miss  Laurence  to  go  to  their 
room  to  talk  to  them  at  leisure.  Yet  these  are  the  very  people 
who  are  paying  for  all  these  services  on  behalf  of  their  ancestors, 
and  avIio  have  been  doing  so  for  years  past  at  an  annual  cost  of 
340  dollars! 

Ox  the  House-boat,  gliding  down  the  Caxai., 
May  3rf. 

I  must  take  up  my  parable  where  I  left  off  on  May-day.  That 
was  a  night  much  to  be  remembered — the  venerable  monastery  on 
the  azalea-covered  hills,  and  the  quiet  up-stairs  room  where  we  sat  so 
peacefully  in  the  clear  moonlight,  overlooking  the  grey  roofs  of  the 
monastic  buildings  and  the  beautiful  valley,  while  ever  ami  anon 
the  stillness  was  broken  by  some  temple  sound  of  chant  or  bell. 
At  8  p.m.  the  loveliness  of  the  night  tempted  us  forth  again,  and 
attracted  by  the  deep  tones  of  the  great  temple  gong,  we  threaded 
our  way  through  long  passages,  and  past  the  monks'  dormitories, 
till  we  reached  the  great  temple,  where  an  ancestral  sacrifice  was 
being  offered,  all  manner  of  food  and  paper  clothes,  imitation 
ingots  of  silver,  and  other  useful  articles  being  placed  before  tall, 
carved  wood  tablets,  whereon  were  inscribed  the  names  of  the  dead. 

The  great  central  Buddha  was  partly  veiled  by  a  yellow  curtain 
embroidered  with  blue  dragons.  Before  him,  on  a  raised  platform, 
sat  six  priests  and  a  superior  (not  the  very  old  abbot),  who  wore  a 
sort  of  mitre  like  a  crown  with  eight  or  nine  points,  having  an 
image  painted  on  each.  As  a  scenic  effect,  I  have  never  seen  any- 
thing more  striking  than  this,  as  seen  by  the  subdued  light  of 
cpiaintly  shaped  hanging-lamps,  mostly  of  oiled  paper,  but  some  of 
coloured  glass  with  silken  fringe, — a  light  which  scarcely  touched 
the  solemn  gloom  of  tin-  surrounding  temple,  or  tin-  Intense  shadows 
of  the  dark  heavy  roof,  but  was  wholly  concentrated  on  the  central 


294  IN    A    BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

group,  and  especially  on  the  great  golden  images  which,  solemn  and 
calm,  looked  down  on  their  worshippers  through  the  filmy  clouds 
of  fragrant  incense  which  floated  upward  to  lose  themselves  in  the 
darkness. 

While  the  priests  were  chanting  a  prolonged  litany,  we  passed 
into  another  chapel,  where  an  exactly  similar  service  was  being 
performed  in  presence  of  tablets  bearing  the  same  names.  Here 
we  found  all  the  relations — pleasant  and  very  superior  men  and 
women.  They  told  us  a  good  deal  about  themselves,  and  at  once 
requested  Miss  Laurence  to  tell  them  more  about  Christian  doctrine. 

After  a  while  we  went  to  bed,  but  not  to  much  sleep — for  all 
night  long,  sounds  of  temple  bells  and  gongs  kept  awakening  us  ; 
and  about  2  a.m.,  roused  by  the  solemn  booming  of  the  great  gong 
in  the  temple  (which  seemed  to  startle  the  stillness  of  the  hills, 
and  awaken  ghostly  echoes),  we  once  more  stole  forth,  feeling  our 
way  along  the  dark  corridors,  when  happily  our  special  friend,  the 
pleasant  young  priest,  overtook  us  as  he  was  hurrying  along,  obe- 
dient to  the  summons,  and  gave  us  the  benefit  of  his  lantern. 

This  time  we  found  another  family  about  to  perform  ancestral 
worship.  I  suspect  these  were  not  well  pleased  at  our  arrival,  but 
we  ignored  their  broad  hint  that  the  great  service  would  not  be  till 
dawn,  and  waited  to  see  what  would  happen.  Presently  twenty- 
four  priests  came  in  wearing  the  crimson  mantle,  and  intoned  a 
long  service.  Two  men  and  two  women  of  the  family  went 
through  many  prostrations,  and  each  separately  lighted  joss-sticks 
and  lamps  all  over  the  place,  and  laid  twenty-four  little  parcels  of 
money  on  the  altar.  Presently  another  priest  came  in,  followed  by 
a  young  acolyte  bearing  a  tray  on  which  were  twenty-four  little 
parcels  each  containing  36  cash,  equal  in  value  to  about  2d.  One 
of  these  was  presented  to  each  officiating  priest.  Afterwards,  how- 
ever, the  larger  parcels  were  distributed. 

Being  very  sleepy,  and  finding  the  continuous  droning  in  semi- 
obscurity  exceedingly  soporific,  we  slipped  out,  and  as  we  passed 
one  of  the  lesser  chapels  we  saw  a  fine  array  of  pasteboard  horses, 
houses,  servants,  boxes  of  paper  clothes,  and  quantities  of  silvered 
paper  ingots,  ready  to  be  burnt  for  the  use  of  the  dead.  I  should 
have  liked  to  see  this  noble  bonfire,  and  the  ceremonial  con- 
nected therewith,  but  we  failed  to  ascertain  when  it  was  to  take 
place,  and  being  fairly  tired  out,  we  returned  to  bed  and  rested  till 
6  a.m.,  when,  wishing  k)  see  what  Avas  going  on,  I  once  more  re- 
traced the  now  familiar  way  to  the  great  temple,  and  found  sepa- 
rate services  going  on  at  each  of  the  principal  shrines,  before  the 


cash.  295 

colossal  Buddhas  and  in  presence  of  the  Goddess  of  Mercy.  After 
one  day  more,  replete  with  memories  of  deep  interest,  we  bade 
adieu  to  this  kindly  fraternity,  and  again  enjoyed  a  lovely  walk 
over  the  green  hills  and  among  the  azalea  thickets,  where  the  joy- 
ous birds  were  singing  in  full  chorus,  and  so  we  returned  to  the 
boat  laden  with  golden  blossoms. 

It  was  bright  moonlight  ere  we  reached  the  river,  and  we  decided 
to  start  at  once  for  the  eastern  lake,  Tongwoo,  thinking  that  we 
should  not  only  save  time,  but  enjoy  the  freshness  of  the  night. 
We  were  both,  however,  so  utterly  weary,  that  we  crept  into  our 
berths,  and  slept  peacefully  till  midnight,  when  we  reached  the 
entrance  to  the  lake,  into  which  boats  must  be  raised  by  windlass 
up  a  very  steep  "  haul-over." 

We  found  the  village  silent  as  death,  and  great  was  the  wrath 
of  the  locksmen  at  being  disturbed,  and  no  wonder !  They  turned 
out  growling  hideously,  but  a  present  of  70  cash  beyond  the  80 
cash  due  to  them  (the  whole  sum  being  equal  to  about  a  shilling) 
restored  them  to  beaming  good-humour ! 

The  said  cash  are  the  only  coins  in  general  use  here,  for  few 
transactions  of  daily  life  are  on  so  large  a  .scale  as  to  necessitate 
the  use  of  silver.  In  the  shops  almost  any  silver  coin  of  any 
nation  will  pass,  its  value  being  determined  by  its  weight.  Dollars 
are  broken  up  into  small  pieces  and  weighed,  fragments  being 
added  or  removed  till  the  accurate  weight  is  attained — a  most 
troublesome  mode  of  payment.  Cash  involve  trouble  of  another 
sort.  You  wish  to  pay  a  man  sixpence — its  ecpiivalent  is  130  or 
140  cash,  and  these  must  be  counted,  and  he  must  make  sure  that 
they  are  of  the  right  sort,  and  that  no  debased  iron  cash  have 
slipped  in.  Of  the  correct  cash  a  good  many  varieties  are  in  circu- 
lation— in  copper,  bronze,  and  brass.  They  are  about  the  size  of  a 
very  thin  farthing,  with  inscription  in  Chinese  character,  and  a 
large  square  hole  in  the  centre,  through  which  is  passed  a  string 
on  which  to  thread  a  few  hundred.  On  each  string  you  will  find 
quite  a  variety  of  coinage.  The  value  of  cash  of  different  quality 
varies  so  much  that  it  is  quite  impossible  to  say  how  many  an;  really 
equivalent  to  a  dollar — i.e.,  4s. — but  certainly  considerably  over  a 
thousand ;  so  you  can  understand  that  this  is  not  a  coin  to  carry  in 
your  purse,  but  rather  one  which  entails  the  escort  of  an  attendant. 

Once  afloat  on  the  lake,  we  were  able  to  hoist  sail  and  speed  "ii 
our  way  toward  a  village  where  we.  anchored  for  the  night,  beside 
a  row  of  very  pretty  trees  which  grew  right  out  of  the  water.  We 
were  wakened  at  daybreak  by  the  blowing  of  horns  on  passenger- 


20G  IN    A   BUDDHIST    MONASTERY. 

boats,  and  looking  forth,  wo  beheld  a  blue  crowd  at  the  village 
open-air  market,  from  which  we  got  fresh  fish  and  eggs. 

After  breakfast  we  landed,  and  ascended  a  green  hill  behind  the 
village,  commanding  a  general  view  of  the  lakes.  It  is  all  very- 
pretty  quiet  country — not  very  exciting — and  I  do  not  suppose 
that  any  part  of  this  province  is  so  beautiful  as  Fuh-Kien,  though 
the  main  range  does  rise  to  a  height  of  3000  feet  above  the  sea, 
and  is  snow-capped  in  winter. 

As  we  advanced,  a  considerable  crowd,  of  rather  an  unpleasant 
sort,  gathered  around  us,  many  of  them  reiterating  that  Miss 
Laurence  was  a  child-stealer,  and  that  we  were  both  "  red-bristled  " 
— a  common  epithet  to  describe  all  foreigners,  but  to  which  she 
replied  by  pointing  to  her  own  raven  hair.  Some  of  the  women, 
however,  were  civil,  and  asked  us  to  go  to  their  houses  to  drink  tea, 
but  we  preferred  to  climb  a  higher  hill,  passing  through  masses  of 
white  dog-roses.  A  whole  school  of  boys  chose  to  escort  us,  and 
were  a  little  inclined  to  be  troublesome,  but  the  opera-glasses  helped 
to  civilise  them.  On  our  descent  the  crowd  again  gathered  densely 
around  us,  and  some  of  the  children  threw  stones  at  us ;  so  I  was 
not  sorry  to  get  safely  back  to  the  boat. 

We  sculled  to  the  head  of  the  lake  against  the  wind — a  nasty 
sickening  motion — and  landed  at  a  large  and  unusually  filthy 
village  ;  walked  right  across  it,  escorted  by  a  very  disagreeable  mob, 
all  anxious  for  a  good  look  at  the  red  barbarians.  Finally  we 
reached  the  house  we  sought — that  of  the  native  catechist,  a  fine 
old  man,  one  of  Bishop  Russell's  converts,  who  determined  to 
devote  the  evening  of  his  days  to  endeavouring  to  spread  the  truth 
in  these  dark  places.  A  little  band  of  six  Christians  are  all  he  can 
number  as  yet,  and  now  the  old  man  has  had  a  touch  of  paralysis 
which  threatens  to  stop  his  work — but  who  can  prophesy  how 
widely  this  little  root  of  good  may  ramify  1  I  felt  special  interest 
in  this  infant  church,  remembering  that  from  just  such  apparently 
insignificant  beginnings  have  grown  the  now  flourishing  young 
churches  throughout  the  land. 

The  old  catechist,  who  was  greatly  rejoiced  to  see  us,  welcomed 
us  to  his  humble  home ;  we  sat  in  a  tiny  room  fitted  with  benches 
in  which  he  holds  his  little  meetings.  About  half-a-dozen  women 
(not  Christians)  had  the  courage  or  curiosity  to  come  in  for  a  talk 
with  Miss  Laurence,  while  I  tried  to  make  friends  with  one  or  two 
girls,  who  were  evidently  horribly  frightened  at  us,  the  propensities 
of  the  barbarian  women  for  child-stealing  being  a  favourite  theme 
of  the  people. 


A    SUCCESSFUL    APPEAL.  297 

Such  a  mob  had  followed  us  to  the  house,  that  I  felt  thankful 
that  the  bolts  of  the  door  were  secure,  and  that  the  window  was 
guarded  by  strong  iron  bars.  As  it  was,  the  light  was  darkened  by 
a  pyramid  of  hideous  faces,  which  stared  in  upon  us,  as  if  we  were 
strange  animals  in  a  cage  ! 

Our  walk  back  to  the  boat  was  not  pleasant, — the  children  howl- 
ing at  us ;  but  Miss  Laurence's  perfect  knowledge  of  the  language 
and  its  curious  idioms,  enabled  her  to  enlist  the  sympathies  of  some 
of  the  more  respectable  members  of  the  community.  She  appealed 
to  one  old  patriarch  by  the  length  of  his  beard,  which  appears 
to  be  most  expressive,  judging  by  results.  "  Sir,"  she  said,  "  your 
beard  is  of  great  length!  Can  you  not  desire  these  children 
to  cease  from  molesting  us  1"  The  appeal  was  successful,  and  we 
were  allowed  to  proceed  in  comparative  peace,  though  the  temptation 
to  send  a  shower  of  stones  as  our  boat  pushed  off  was  irresistible 
to  these  small  persons. 

This  does  not  as  yet  seem  a  promising  field  for  a  clergyman  to 
undertake;  but,  having  now  established  similar  beginnings  at  most 
of  the  villages  in  the  lake  district,  the  bishop  purposes  very  shortly 
building  a  central  church,  at  which  these  tiny  scattered  congrega- 
tions may  meet,  and  so  strengthen  each  other.  Those  who,  like 
him,  have  worked  in  faith  through  the  early  years,  when  they 
seemed  to  be  ploughing  a  soil  of  iron,  now  see  abundant  ground  for 
encouragement,  and  they  know  that  many — as  yet  antagonistic 
heathen — believe  that  "  the  foreign  religion  "  will  overspread  the 
whole  land.  Just  the  other  clay  one  of  the  Bible-women  here  was 
travelling  on  a  crowded  market-boat.  Her  presence  was  not  re- 
cognised, and  all  on  board  were  heathen  ;  their  conversation  turned 
on  the  foreign  religion,  and  she  listened  eagerly,  and  with  thankful 
joy,  when  the  chief  spokesman  summed  up  the  matter  by  saying, 
"  It  is  plain  that  our  religions  are  declining,  and  that 
this  Religion  of  Jesus  will  conquer." 

To-day  a  favouring  breeze  has  enabled  us  to  sail  all  the  way 
down  the  lake,  and  (having  again  been  windlassed  across  the  haul- 
over)  we  have  even  sailed  down  the  canals.  The  latter,  however, 
has  been  most  tedious  work,  as  Ave  have  had  to  pass  under  fifteen 
bridges,  taking  down  not  only  our  sail  but  the  heavy  mast  ev<  rj 
time,  and  as  it  occupies  the  front  part  of  the  boat,  we  are  kept  close 
prisoners  in  this  little  cabin  during  each  of  these  operations. 

All  this  has  occasioned  so  much  delay  that  the  sun  is  even  now- 
setting.     Still  we  have  every  hope  of  reaching  Ningpo  this  evening. 


298       COMMENCEMENT    OF    THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 


CHAPTER     XXIV. 

COMMENCEMENT    OF    THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

A  Chinese  clergyman — Presence  of  non-communicants  required — Commence- 
ment of  the  Mission — Miss  Aldersey — Difficulty  of  the  language — Mis- 
takes ! —  Bishop  Russell's  work  —  Printing  Chinese  in  Roman  letters — 
Adulteration  of  tea — An  ancestral  hall — On  the  walls — Baby  towers — Use 
of  dyed  or  painted  eggs  at  the  spring  festival — The  small  herb  on  the 
lintel — A  willow  bough — Mystic  virtue  of  red. 

Church  Mission  House,  Ningpo, 

Sunday,  May  4th. 

When  at  length  we  did  reach  the  Xingpo  haul-over,  we  found 
such  an  immense  crowd  of  boats  waiting  their  turn  to  be  lowered 
into  the  river,  that  we  left  ours  to  its  fate,  and  hiring  chair-bearers, 
were  carried  by  many  an  intricate  street  and  lane  right  across  the 
city,  till  at  last  we  reached  the  bishop's  hospitable  home,  where  we 
were  welcomed  and  fed,  and  had  much  to  tell. 

This  morning  (being  Sunday)  I  had  the  option  of  attending 
service  in  English  at  the  foreign  settlement,  but  I  need  scarcely 
say  I  much  preferred  remaining  here,  where  I  accompanied  Mis 
Eussell  to  the  native  service  in  the  neat  church  close  by.  In  the 
course  of  long  wanderings,  I  have  heard  our  beautiful  liturgy  recited 
in  many  strange  tongues,  to  me  unknown,  but  this  was  my  first 
experience  of  it  in  Chinese — to  my  ear  the  most  uncouth  of  all. 
A  native  clergyman  preached  with  much  earnestness,  and  apparently 
with  much  eloquence.  His  long  plait  of  black  hair  hung  over  his 
surplice  almost  to  his  feet.  (Of  course,  every  exaggerated  forehead 
in  the  congregation  has  been  well  shaven,  and  every  tail  has  like- 
wise been  extra  nicely  plaited  for  Sunday,  and  now  hangs  down 
full  length  in  token  of  respect,  for  to  appear  in  church  with  the 
plait  coiled  round  the  head,  as  is  often  done  at  other  times  for 
convenience,  would  be  considered  most  irreverent.) 

In  deference  to  Chinese  custom,  the  men  and  boys  occupy  one 
side  of  the  church,  and  the  women  the  other,  but  there  is  no 
actual  partition-line,  as  in  some  churches. 

There  was  a  full  and  very  attentive  congregation,  of  whom  about 
fifty  came  forward  at  Holy  Communion,  and  I  am  told  that  the 
attendance  at  the  other  native  churches  in  the  city  was  equally 
large.     There  are  in  this  city  two  other  chapels  in  connection  with 


PRESENCE    OF   NON-COMMUNICANTS.  299 

this  Mission,  three  connected  with  the  Americans,  and  two  other 
Protestant  Missions.  Here  there  is  no  clearing  out  of  "  The  nine  "  x 
before  the  celebration,  for  the  presence  of  non-communicants  is 
required  in  order  to  prevent  any  recurrence  of  the  vile  rumours 
which  from  time  to  time  have  been  circulated  by  the  enemy. 

As  another  example  of  necessary  prudence,  I  may  note  one  tiny 
but  significant  detail  of  the  class  of  concession  to  Chinese  pre- 
judice which  is  found  necessary.  In  our  Baptismal  Service,  the 
Kubrick  enjoins  the  priest  to  take  each  candidate  for  baptism  by 
the  right  hand  and  place  him  beside  the  font.  At  the  baptism  of 
a  Chinese  woman  this  symbolic  "  taking  by  the  hand  "  is  dispensed 
with,  as  it  would  inevitably  be  misconstrued. 

Besides  the  churches  within  the  city,  the  Church  of  England 
Mission  has  several  small  chapels  at  various  out-stations,  the  whole 
representing  a  Christian  body — small  indeed  when  compared  with 
the  vast  pagan  population2  around,  but  no  mean  nucleus  when 
viewed  as  the  growth  of  thirty  years'  work  by  so  very  small  a 
number  of  devoted  men.  One  of  these,  the  Bev.  E.  Gough,  who  is 
still  here,  arrived  only  two  years  after  Mr  Kussell  and  Mr  Cobbold, 
who  commenced  this  Mission  in  1848. 

Not  that  they  were  actually  the  first  to  break  ground  in  this 
new  field,  for  so  soon  as  the  treaty  of  Nankin  in  1842  secured  the 
admission  of  foreigners  to  Ningpo  (though  religious  toleration  was 
not  proclaimed  till  after  the  treaty  of  Tien-tsin  in  1858),  the  first 
to  enter  was  Dr  Macgowan  of  the  American  Baptist  Medical  Mis- 

i  "  Were  there  not  ten  cleansed  1    But  whkbe  are  the  nine  ?  "—Luke  xvii.  17. 

2  Although  this  proviuce  of  Cheh-kiang,  "the  Crooked  River,"  is  actually  the 
smallest  of  the  eighteen  provinces,  its  population  is  considerably  in  excess  of  that 
of  the  majority,  being  estimated  at  2(5,000,000;  whereas  the  adjoining  Fuh-Kien 
province,  which  is  larger  by  about  12,000  square  miles,  has  only  a  population  of 
about  14,000,000. 

But  whereas  the  Fuh-Kien  C.M.S.  Mission,  commenced  in  1850,  and  which 
received  its  first  convert  in  1860,  now  numbers  5800  adherents  (that  is  to  say, 
3000  persons  already  baptised,  of  whom  eighteen  hundred  are  regular  com  m  u  n  i- 
cants,  and  the  remainder  are  candidates  for  baptism) — the  C.M.S.  Mission,  com- 
menced in  the  province  of  Cheh-kiang  in  1848,  numbers  as  yet  only  864  adherents 
and  392  communicants. 

It  is  estimated  that  the  combined  converts  of  all  the  Protestant  Missions  in 
this  province  may  number  about  2000 — that  is  to  say,  one  out  of  every  ten  thou- 
sand of  the  population — not  a  very  large  proportion  certainly,  but  one  which  will 
assuredly  increase  at  a  very  different  rate  in  the  next  ten  years.  The  proportion 
of  Protestant  Christians  in  the  whole  empire  is  estimated  at  one  in  35,000. 

A  very  remarkable  proof  of  the  oft-noted  difficulties  of  creating  an  interest  in 
Christianity  in  a  great  city,  especially  one  largely  frequented  by  foreigners,  is 
afforded  by  the  very  disheartening  statistics  of  the  C.M.S.  Mission  at  Shanghai, 
commenced  in  1S45,  which,  after  the  lapse  of  forty  years,  numbers  only  33  baptise.! 
persons  1  Of  course,  however,  this  does  not  represent  the  Protestant  Christians  of 
Shanghai,  as  the  London  Mission  and  the  American  Episcopal  each  have  churches 
and  schools  in  that  city. 


300       COMMENCEMENT    OF    THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

sion,  and  a  year  later  came  Dr  M'Cartee  of  the  American  Presby- 
terian Medical  Mission,  and  these  were  followed  by  five  clergymen 
of  these  denominations. 

A  most  courageous  and  able  Englishwoman,  Miss  Aldersey,  of 
large  private  means,  had  also  established  a  footing  in  the  city,  and. 
after  patiently  overcoming  countless  difficulties,  succeeded  in  estab- 
lishing a  large  school  for  Christian  girls,  which  she  supported  at 
her  own  expense.  She  proved  herself  a  most  true  and  useful 
friend  to  her  countrymen,  and  it  was  under  her  roof  that  Bishop 
Eussell  found  the  helpmate  of  his  life,  Mrs  Eussell  having  been 
Miss  Aldersey 's  ward,  and  having  accompanied  her  here  on  her 
first  arrival.  Thus  from  the  early  age  of  fourteen  Mrs  Eussell  has 
been  familiar  with  the  Ningpo  dialect,  and  has  been  able  to  devote 
herself  heart  and  soul  to  the  work  of  the  Mission.1  Miss  Aldersey 
continued  her  good  work  here  till  1860,  when  circumstances  re- 
quired her  presence  in  Australia ;  but  her  influence  still  abides  in 
the  girls  she  trained  so  carefully — now  wives  and  mothers — and  in 
the  development  of  various  schemes  and  branch  missions  which 
originated  with  her. 

Late  in  the  afternoon,  when  Mrs  Eussell  was  occupied  with  her 
particularly  nice-looking  Bible-women,  the  bishop  took  me  for  a 
walk,  and  amongst  other  points  of  especial  interest,  showed  me  the 
ruinous  old  temple  where,  on  their  first  arrival  in  the  city,  he  and 
Mr  Cobbold  succeeded  in  obtaining  a  lodging — a  dreary  little  room 
looking  out  on  a  dark  dead  wall,  the  dulness  of  which  was  deemed 
almost  an  advantage,  inasmuch  as  it  offered  nothing  to  distract 
their  attention  from  the  hard  task  before  them — namely,  that  of 
puzzling  out  a  hitherto  unknown  Chinese  dialect, — the  language 
spoken  in  this  province   of   Cheh-kiang  differing  from   those   of 

1  As  she  continued  to  do  till  quite  the  end  of  her  days  on  earth,  seeking  by  every 
means  to  carry  out  the  great  work  to  which  her  husband  devoted  his  life.  A  very 
few  months  after  these  pages  were  penned,  this  faithful  shepherd  of  the  flock  was, 
in  the  mysterious  Providence  of  God,  called  away,  when  little  past  what  seemed 
the  prime  of  life.  Bishop  Russell  commenced  the  Mission  at  Ningpo,  May  13, 
1848  ;  was  consecrated  first  Bishop  of  North  China  in  Westminster  Abbey, 
December  15,  1872 ;  entered  into  rest,  October  5,  1879,  and  was  carried  to 
his  grave  by  four  Chinese  clergymen,  whom  he  had  himself  ordained.  Never 
was  pastor  more  sorely  mourned  than  was  this  singularly  sympathetic  foreigner, 
by  the  flock  whom  he  had  gathered  with  such  patient  care.  That  gentle  sympathy 
was  also  the  most  marked  characteristic  of  the  loving  wife,  who,  though  so  sorely 
stricken  by  her  own  great  bereavement,  remained  at  her  post  helping  and  comfort- 
ing all  round  her  till  August  1887,  when,  after  a  very  few  days'  illness,  she  passed 
peacefully  away,  bitterly  lamented  both  by  Chinese  and  foreigners. 

After  Bishop  Russell's  death  his  vast  diocese  was  divided,  and  the  Rev.  G.  E. 
Moule  was  consecrated  Bishop  of  Mid-China,  and  succeeded  Bishop  Russell  at 
Ningpo,  while  the  Rev.  C.  P.  Scott  was  consecrated  first  Bishop  of  the  newly 
created  See  of  North  China. 


DIFFICULTY    OF    ACQUIRING    CHINESE.  301 

Canton  or  of  Peking  as  "wholly  as  though  they  were  the  tongues  of 
another  race. 

The  "bishop  told  me  how  the  ludicrous  aspect  of  the  thing  helped 
him  on  at  first,  when,  finding  himself  alone  with  a  Ningpo  man 
whom  an  interpreter  had  engaged  to  be  his  teacher,  he  realised 
that  neither  could  understand  a  word  spoken  by  the  other  !  By 
degrees,  however,  and  hy  the  aid  of  many  signs,  they  taught  one 
another  the  names  of  simple  objects,  but  when  it  came  to  express- 
ing abstract  ideas,  and  mastering  those  tones  or  inflections  which 
are  the  sorest  stumbling-block  to  the  majority  of  Chinese  students, 
the  difficulties  seemed  almost  insuperable. 

Some  one  once  remarked  that  to  master  Chinese  thoroughly 
would  require  "  a  head  of  oak,  lungs  of  brass,  nerves  of  steel,  a 
constitution  of  iron,  the  patience  of  Job,  and  the  lifetime  of 
Methuselah  ! "  and  I  must  say  this  is  quite  the  impression  sug- 
gested to  my  own  mind,  for  though  my  ear  for  music  is  keen,  I 
cannot  distinguish  Chinese  sounds  any  more  than  those  of  Gaelic ; 
nor  can  I  conceive  how  any  human  eye  and  memory  can  recollect 
the  thousands  of  combinations  of  little  strokes,  dots,  and  curves 
which  must  be  mastered  as  the  equivalent  of  our  alphabet. 

I  don't  think  people  in  general  half  realise  how  great  is  this  pre- 
liminary difficulty  for  all  who  endeavour  to  teach  others  in  acquired 
tongues.  We  need  not  go  so  far  as  China  for  a  case  in  point.  One 
of  my  friends  whose  lot  was  cast  in  a  remote  district  of  our  own 
Highlands,  deemed  it  her  duty  to  learn  Gaelic  in  order  to  be  able 
to  comfort  her  sick  poor.  After  patiently  toiling  for  many  months 
she  found  she  could  read  a  chapter  of  the  Bible  pretty  fluently, 
and  at  last  she  plucked  up  courage  to  ask  her  teacher  whether  he 
thought  it  would  be  any  pleasure  to  old  Mrs  MacKay  if  she  offered 
to  read  to  her.  "  Oh,  certainly  !  "  was  the  reply.  "  Did  he  then 
really  think  that  her  reading  was  quite  intelligible  1 "  "  Oh  !  by 
no  means ;  but  the  poor  old  woman  would  be  greatly  diverted  by 
your  mistakes  ! !  " 

How  often  and  how  deeply  have  I  sympathised  with  that  poor 
young  parson  who,  after  grinding  for  months  over  break -jaw  pro- 
nunciations, found  himself  alone  one  Sunday,  and  thought  he  might 
venture  on  reading  part  of  the  service  !  As  he  read  the  Command- 
ments he  became  conscious  of  an  unmistakable  movement  of  sur- 
prise running  through  the  congregation,  but  still  he  read  on  to  the 
best  of  his  ability.  "When  at  last  he  escaped  to  the  vestry,  lie 
anxiously  summoned  an  interpreter  to  ask  whether  he  had  made 
any  serious  mistake.     "Oh  no,"  said  the  other  kindly,  "nothing 


302       COMMENCEMENT   OF   THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

serious — nothing  of  any  consequence!"  But  when  he  urged  him 
to  say  what  the  mistake  really  was,  he  learnt  that  his  trifling 
error  Avas  the  omission  of  the  word  "  not  "  all  through  the 
Commandments  ! ! 

Here  a  fruitful  source  for  very  odd  mistakes  is  the  fact  that  the 
identical  word,  with  only  a  slight  variation  in  the  inflection,  is 
often  used  to  express  very  different  ohjects.  An  amusing  instance 
of  this  occurred  when  Lord  Elgin  was  in  Peking.  Being  much 
pleased  with  the  excellence  of  the  Mongolian  potatoes,  he  requested 
his  interpreter  to  order  a  large  supply,  of  about  240  lb.  weight. 
Judge  of  the  dismay  of  the  latter  when  an  immense  cargo  of  live 
eels  arrived,  and  he  discovered  that  he  had  given  the  order  for 
potatoes  with  the  wrong  inflection  ! 

Well,  for  four  years  Mr  Eussell  toiled  incessantly,  vainly  strug- 
gling with  the  intricacies  of  this  dreadful  tongue,  and  at  the  end 
of  that  time  he  felt  that  he  had  made  so  little  progress  that  he  was 
tempted  to  despair,  and  actually  meditated  giving  up  all  further 
attempt  as  hopeless.  But  as  the  darkest  hour  is  ever  next  the 
dawning,  just  at  this  critical  moment  he  began  to  find  his  daily 
task  becoming  less  toilsome,  the  cruelly  complicated  characters  less 
difficult  to  decipher,  the  unpronounceable  tones  becoming  almost 
natural  to  ear  and  tongue,  and  from  this  turning-point  all  seemed 
steady  progress. 

Still  it  was  a  most  trying  life  of  almost  utter  loneliness  in  that 
vast  crowded  city,  and  great  was  the  faith  and  courage  requisite  to 
battle  on,  sustained  by  the  hope  that  a  day  would  come  when  in 
this  very  stronghold  of  idolatry,  and  among  the  people  who  de- 
spised him  as  an  outer  barbarian,  he  might  be  able  to  proclaim  that 
Truth,  for  love  of  which  he  was  ready  to  lay  down  his  life. 

All  this  time  the  humble  student  was  held  in  such  low  esteem 
by  his  heathen  neighbours,  that  his  own  teacher  would  on  no 
account  be  seen  walking  down  the  street  with  him.  He  noticed 
that  whenever  he  proposed  such  a  thing,  as  tending  to  their  mutual 
progress  in  conversation,  some  excuse  was  invariably  found,  and  at 
last  he  realised  the  true  reason  !  Yet  such  was  the  influence  -which 
he  subsequently  obtained,  that  when  the  Taiping  rebels  took  pos- 
session of  the  city,  it  was  to  Mr  Eussell  that  the  authorities  looked 
as  their  most  efficient  go-between,  and  the  rebel  leaders  granted 
him  free  access  at  all  times  to  their  lines,  and  free  permission  to 
carry  off  thence  any  of  his  own  flock  who  might  have  been  cap- 
tured, and  to  rescue  any  of  their  property  which  had  been  plun- 
dered.    By  degrees  he  so  thoroughly  mastered  the  language,  that 


PERPLEXING    CHINESE    WRITING.  303 

it  became  to  him  as  easy  as  his  mother-tongue,  and  as  his  natural 
courtesy  made  the  acquirement  of  elaborate  Chinese  forms  of  polite- 
ness no  difficult  task,  he  gradually  Avon  the  respect  of  the  people, 
many  of  whom  heard  him  gladly,  though  of  course  a  comparatively 
small  number  could  be  induced  to  follow  his  teaching. 

One  of  the  first  tasks  to  be  accomplished  was  that  of  reducing 
the  vernacular  of  Ningpo  to  writing,  which  had  never  before  been 
attempted.  The  idea  now  occurred  to  Mr  Russell  that  if,  in  print- 
ing Christian  books,  he  could  make  use  of  ordinary  Roman  type  to 
represent  Chinese  sounds,  instead  of  the  intricate  and  voluminous 
Chinese  characters,  it  would  greatly  facilitate  the  progress  of  his 
students. 

Chinese  writing  was  original!)'  hieroglyphic,  with  pictorial  repre- 
sentations of  every  visible  object,  and  such  combinations  of  these  as 
convey  other  ideas — e.g.,  the  sun  and  moon  together  denote  light. 
In  process  of  time,  through  careless  and  rapid  copying,  these  came 
to  be  represented  by  groups  of  symbolic  lines,  arranged  in  perpen- 
dicular columns,  which  are  read  from  the  right-hand  corner  of  what 
we  should  call  the  last  page,  and  so  backward  through  the  book. 

There  are  said  to  be  upwards  of  fifty  thousand  of  these  written 
characters,  and  a  very  learned  man  must  know  most  of  these — a 
task  alike  terrible  to  sight  and  memory.  But  a  very  large  propor- 
tion must  be  learnt  by  heart  before  it  is  possible  to  read  the  sim- 
plest book.  For  instance,  to  read  the  Bible  in  Chinese  character, 
you  must  have  a  perfect  knowledge  of  four  thousand  distinct  char- 
acters ;  of  these,  twelve  hundred  are  in  common  use,  and  the  others 
are  occasional. 

I  have  seen  estimates  (to  show  how  literary  a  race  are  the  Chinese) 
which  assume  that  on  an  average  twenty  per  cent  of  the  male  popu- 
lation in  the  country  districts  can  read,  and  perhaps  eighty  per  cenl 
in  the  cities.  Mr  Russell  came  to  the  conclusion  that  only  about  five 
per  cent  of  those  with  whom  he  came  in  contact  could  read  intelli- 
gently, therefore  it  was  evident  that  the  simpler  alphabet  must  prove 
a  boon.  So  obvious  were  the  advantages  to  be  derived  from  this 
new  system,  now  known  as  the  Romanised  colloquial,  that  it  was 
at  once  introduced  into  the  Mission  schools,  and  the  members  of  the 
American  Presbyterian  Mission,  fully  realising  its  excellence,  joined 
with  Mr  Russell  in  producing  in  this  simple  form  a  considerable 
portion  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  of  the  Church  services,  and  to 
these  they  have  added  many  other  books. 

They  found,  as  they  expected,  that  the  scholars  acquired  the  ait 
of  thus  reading  and  writing  with  amazing  facility,  and  great  was 


)504       COMMENCEMENT    OF   THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

the  delight  of  women  and  children  who  found  that  in  a  few  weeks 
they  could  read  more  fluently  than  men  who  had  bestowed  years 
of  toil  in  acquiring  the  ordinary  Chinese  characters.  Thenceforth 
all  students  seeking  instruction  from  the  Christian  teachers  in 
Ningpo  commenced  their  education  by  learning  to  read  this  simple 
type,  and  quite  poor  and  ignorant  persons  come  to  learn  the  magic 
art  which  enables  them  to  read  in  a  few  weeks  !  It  is  nevertheless 
necessary  that  all  students  continue  to  learn  the  elaborate  characters 
in  common  use,  as  any  form  of  education  which  did  not  include  a 
knowledge  of  the  Chinese  classics  would  be  considered  despicable 
indeed. 

How  strange  it  must  now  seem  to  the  bishop  to  stand  once  more 
in  the  dreary  little  room  in  the  old  temple,  and  look  back  on  all 
the  changes  he  has  witnessed  here !  He  was  most  respectfully 
received  by  the  old  priest,  who  was  then  his  landlord,  and  who 
now  has  for  his  tenant  a  Chinese  tea  merchant,  who  rents  part  of 
the  temple  from  the  gods.  We  saw  all  the  baskets,  ovens,  and 
boxes  where  a  few  days  hence  five  hundred  busy  workers  will  be 
engaged  in  firing,  packing,  and  other  processes  of  tea  preparation. 
To-day  they  were  preparing  pounded  indigo  and  gypsum  in  large 
flat  baskets,  to  give  that  "  bloom  "  which  England  and  America 
consider  so  essential,  though  it  stands  to  reason  that  no  withered 
tea-leaf  coidd  possess  such  !  I  have  watched  this  remarkable  pro- 
cess in  the  tea-firing  hongs  of  foreigners,  preparatory  to  the  tea 
being  packed  for  shipping  in  cases,  which  stood  all  ready  ticketed 
as  "pure  uncoloured  tea,"  greatly  to  the  edification  of  the  Heathen 
Chinee  (whose  own  business  transactions  are  said  to  be  remarkably 
trustworthy).  They  are,  however,  less  astonished  at  the  fraud  than 
at  the  singular  taste  which  is  said  to  necessitate  such  noxious  adul- 
teration ;  but  since  the  foreigners  insist  on  having  this  nastiness, 
they  have  no  objection  to  supplying  it  themselves,  though  they 
take  very  good  care  that  it  shall  all  be  sent  out  of  China  ! 

As  we  proceeded  on  our  walk,  we  halted  at  one  of  the  innumer- 
able ancestral  halls  which  represent  so  large  a  phase  of  the  religious 
life  of  China.  We  were  highly  favoured  by  the  nice  old  woman 
in  charge  of  the  place ;  for  after  showing  us  the  external  show  hall 
in  which  are  ranged  handsome  scarlet  and  gilded  duplicate  tablets 
of  all  the  deceased  members  of  the  family,  she  confided  to  the 
bishop  that  some  of  them  had  just  been  there  to  worship,  and  the 
key  of  the  inner  hall  happened  to  be  in  her  hands,  so  she  could 
let  him  look  in.  Accordingly  she  produced  a  curious  large  wooden 
key  and  admitted  us  to  the  Memorial  Chapel  itself,  which  is  simply 


ON   THE   CITY    WALLS.  305 

a  very  plain  counterpart  of  the  other,  with  all  the  true  tahlets  of 
every  deceased  male  member  of  the  clan,  on  plain  very  white  wood. 
These  ancestral  halls  answer  in  a  manner  to  family  mausoleums — 
not  that  any  one  is  buried  here,  but  that  only  the  tablets  of  blood- 
relations  are  admitted. 

Thence,  in  the  cool  of  the  evening,  we  strolled  on  to  the  city 
walls — the  one  point  in  every  Chinese  town  where  walking  is 
pleasant,  this  only  being  quite  unsought,  and  removed  above  the 
crowds  and  filth  of  the  densely  peopled  streets.  These  walls  of 
Xingpo  are  to  me  especially  attractive — they  are  quiet,  and  old, 
and  grey,  and  in  many  places  are  thickly  covered  with  fragrant 
jessamine  and  wild  honeysuckle. 

The  Chinese  people  do  not  seem  to  understand  what  pleasure 
can  be  derived  from  an  idle  saunter  (or,  indeed,  from  walking  at 
all,  if  they  can  afford  to  pay  any  one  else  to  carry  them),  so  today 
(as  is  usual)  we  did  not  meet  a  creature,  except  here  and  there  a 
group  of  very  untidy  Tartar  soldiers  at  their  post.  Possibly  tin- 
people  are  not  allowed  to  come  on  the  walls ;  but  the  same  thing 
has  struck  me  elsewhere — namely,  that  the  intense  appreciation  of 
beautiful  scenery  which  is  so  marked  a  feature  in  the  Japanese 
character,  appears  to  be  strangely  wanting  in  the  Chinese.  It 
looks  as  if  they  did  not  see  any  beauty  in  nature,  and  in  building 
their  houses  seem  deliberately  to  place  them  so  as  not  to  see  the 
view,  but  by  preference  look  into  some  dingy  courtyard. 

These  venerable  walls  of  grey  granite,  which  are  wide  enough 
on  the  top  to  make  a  good  carriage-drive,  are  five  miles  in  circum- 
ference, and  are  entered  by  five  gates.  AVithin  lies  the  densely 
peopled  city,  with  a  population  which  I  have  heard  estimated  at 
300,000.  Beyond  the  walls  lies  the  vast  fertile  plain  thickly 
dotted  with  villages,  and  bounded  in  the  far  distance  by  an 
amphitheatre  of  fine  hills.  Through  the  great  plain  winds  the 
Yung  river,  whose  calm  waters  give  a  name  to  this  district  of 
Ning-po-foo — i.e.,  "the  Prefecture  of  the  Peaceful  Wave." 

There  is  much  waste  ground  just  inside  of  these  walls,  and  now 
in  the  spring-time  this  is  green  and  beautiful.  The  path  reminded 
me  of  an  English  lane,  but  the  tangled  roses  and  honeysuckle  ^inn- 
more  luxuriantly  than  our  wild  flowers  are  wont  to  do.  They  veil 
some  of  the  countless  graves  (which  lure,  as  everywhere  else  in 
China,  form  so  prominent  a  feature  in  the  foreground);  but  their 
delicate  fragrance,  alas!  cannot  overpower  the  appalling  odours 
which  here  and  there  assail  us,  poisoning  the  freshness  of  the  even- 
ing breezes. 

U 


306       COMMENCEMENT    OF   THE   CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

These  arc  wafted  from  the  ]>aby  Towers,  two  of  which  we  had 
to  pass.  They  are  square  in  shape,  with  small  windows  about 
twelve  feet  from  the  ground,  somewhat  resembling  pigeon-towers. 
These  strange  dovecots  are  built  to  receive  tin;  bodies  of  such  babies 
as  die  too  young  to  have  fully  developed  souls,  and  therefore  there 
is  no  necessity  to  waste  coffins  on  them,  or  even  to  take  the  trouble 
of  burying  them  in  the  bosom  of  mother  earth ;  so  the  insignificant 
little  corpse  is  handed  over  to  a  coolie,  who,  for  the  sum  of  forty 
cash  (equal  to  about  2|d.),  carries  it  away,  ostensibly  to  throw  it 
into  one  of  these  towers,  but  if  he  should  not  choose  to  go  so  far, 
he  gets  rid  of  it  somehow, — no  questions  are  asked,  and  there  are 
plenty  of  prowling  dogs  ever  on  the  watch  seeking  what  they  may 
devour.1  To-day  several  poor  uncoffined  mites  were  lying  outside 
the  towers,  shrouded  only  in  a  morsel  of  old  matting ;  apparently 
they  had  been  brought  by  some  one  who  had  failed  to  throw  them 
in  at  the  window,  in  which,  by  the  way,  one  had  stuck  fast ! 

Some  of  these  poor  little  creatures  are  brought  here  alive  and 
left  to  die,  and  some  of  these  have  been  rescued  and  carried  to 
foundling  hospitals.  The  neighbourhood  was  so  pestiferous  that 
we  could  only  pause  a  moment  to  look  at  "  an  institution  "  which, 
although  so  horrible,  is  so  characteristic  of  this  race,  who  pay  such 
unbounded  reverence  to  the  powerful  dead  who  could  harm  them. 
Most  of  the  bodies  deposited  here  are  those  of  girl -babies  who 
have  been  intentionally  put  to  death,  but  older  children  are  often 
thrown  in ;  indeed,  I  am  told  that  even  a  boy  who  dies  under  the 
age  of  seven  years  does  not  receive  ancestor-worship,  as  it  is  sup- 
posed that  he  must  have  been  animated  by  a  soul  which  had 
escaped  from  Purgatory  before  its  time  of  expiation  was  finished, 
and  has  now  been  recaptured  by  the  officials  of  Yen-Lo-~\Yong  and 
carried  back  to  finish  its  term  !  So  there  can  be  no  child-angels  in 
the  Buddhist  heaven  ! 

Hurrying  far  from  these  towers  of  pestilence,  we  passed  out  of 
the  city  by  one  of  its  gates,  and  returned  by  a  circuitous  path 
between  the  river  and  the  base  of  the  wall,  a  walk  which  seemed 
all  too  short,  for  the  bishop  was  telling  me  some  of  his  many 
personal  memories  of  events  here — of  good  days  and  evil — of  the 
living  and  of  the  dead — and  more  especially  of  the  Taipings,  whose 
occupation  of  the  city  was  a  matter  not  soon  to  be  forgotten. 

The  evening  ended  (as  each  day  here  begins  and  ends)  with 
household  prayers,  at  which  all  the  Chinese  servants  and  "  helps," 
and  all  the  picturesque  little  Chinese  children,  are  not  only  present, 
1  See  'Ancestor-worship,'  p.  203. 


COLOURED    EGGS    FOR    THE    SPRING    FESTIVAL.       307 

but  each,  down  to  the  little  people  six  years  old,  have  their  own 
books,  and  read  verses  in  their  turn.  The  little  toddles  who  are 
too  small  to  read,  sit  still  with  an  appearance  of  superlative  good- 
ness and  supernatural  gravity. 

May  5th. 

I  have  spent  most  of  the  day  in  the  beautiful  Fuh-Kien  Temple, 
sketching  the  great  dragon  pillars,  which  are  of  very  fine  carved 
stone.  As  we  passed  through  the  city  I  noticed  that  every  one 
seems  to  be  feasting  on  hard-boiled  eggs,  which  I  am  told  is  done 
to-day  with  a  view  to  averting  headache  in  the  ensuing  twelve- 
month— an  appeal  to  luck,  akin  to  our  custom  of  eating  Christmas 
pies  with  the  same  view  towards  the  coming  year ! 

But  apart  from  this,  I  have  noticed  with  interest  that  the  prac- 
tice of  giving  and  eating  hard-boiled  dyed  eggs  (which,  albeit  a 
universal  feature  of  the  spring  festival  in  all  lands,  is  so  natu- 
rally associated  in  our  minds  with  Easter-tide)  is  fully  observed 
here. 

I  believe  that  throughout  China  this  is  done  as  a  matter  of 
family  rejoicing  when  a  child  is  born,  or  on  the  recurrence  of  its 
birthday;  but  at  this  special  season  I  have  observed  an  unusually 
large  number  of  red  eggs  offered  for  sale  in  the  streets — T  saw 
many  such  at  Foo-Chow,  and  others  elaborately  painted  with 
mythological  subjects,  but  it  did  not  occur  to  me  to  buy  any. 
Here  I  see  some  specially  artistic  ones  which  were  bought  at 
Easter,  and  I  have  tried  to  get  some  similar,  but  none  of  the  egg 
merchants  seem  disposed  to  procure  such  objects  out  of  the  proper 
season. 

I  am  told  that  another  variety  of  egg  festival  is  celebrated  dur- 
ing three  days  in  the  beginning  of  February,  when,  as  on  our  own 
Shrove-Tuesday,  everybody — rich  and  poor — is  supposed  to  eat 
pancakes. 

Amongst  the  many  minor  points  of  curious  interest  which 
arrested  my  notice,  while  slowly  wandering  on  foot  through  many 
of  the  intricate  streets  of  Foo-Chow,  there  was  one  of  which  I 
could  obtain  no  solution,  though  my  companion  was  well  versed 
in  many  details  of  Chinese  custom — namely,  that  on  the  26th 
April,  which  happened  to  be  a  fortnight  before  Easter,  a  small 
bunch  of  a  weed  which  appeared  to  me  identical  with  what  we 
call  shepherd's-purse,  was  bound  with  a  bit  of  red  rag  and  nailed 
on  to  the  upright  posts  of  every  window  and  doorway.  Here,  in 
Ningpo,  I  am  told  that  always  just  at  Easter-time  all  the  people 


308       COMMENCEMENT    OF   THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

nail  a  branch  of  willow  on  their  doors,  because  once  when  the  city- 
was  besieged,  the  General,  having  a  brother  living  there,  gave  him 
this  sign,  which  the  soldiers  were  commanded  to  respect.  The 
brother  not  caring  to  be  saved  alone,  instructed  all  his  friends 
and  kinsmen  to  adopt  this  token,  and  many  other  citizens  fol- 
lowed their  example  without  understanding  why,  and  thus  escaped 
massacre. 

Whatever  may  have  really  been  the  origin  of  this  custom,  the 
season  at  which  it  is  observed,  and  the  bit  of  red  cloth  nailed  to 
each  door-post,  can  scarcely  fail  to  suggest  that  bunch  of  hyssop 
(or  small  herb)  dipped  in  blood,1  wherewith  the  lintel  and  side- 
posts  of  every  Israelitish  door  were  to  be  stricken,  that — 

"  The  Angel  of  Death,  beholding  the  sign,  might  pass  over." 

I  do  not  myself  know  what  plant  is  recognised  as  hyssop,  but 
Archdeacon  Gray  mentions  that  in  Canton,  on  the  day  preceding  a 
funeral,  it  is  sometimes  customary  for  a  procession  of  priests,  either 
Taouist  or  Buddhist,  to  march  in  gorgeous  apparel  through  the 
streets  along  which  the  funeral  is  to  pass,  playing  on  rude  instru- 
ments of  music  in  order  to  exorcise  evil  spirits.  The  procession  is 
headed  by  a  young  man  bearing  a  small  tub  of  holy  water,  and 
carrying  in  his  right  hand  a  hunch  of  hyssop,  which  he  repeatedly 
dips  in  the  holy  water,  and  therewith  sprinkles  the  streets  and  the 
floor  of  every  shop  in  order  to  drive  thence  any  lurking  evil  spirits. 

Whatever  may  be  the  mystic  virtue  attaching  to  the  combina- 
tion of  certain  plants  with  symbolic  scarlet,  we  certainly  have  it 
in  our  own  British  isles,  where,  as  we  well  know — 

"  Rowan-tree  and  red  threid 
Gar  the  witches  tyne  their  speed  !  "  - 

Therefore  did  the  careful  Scotch  cowherd,  till  very  recent  years, 
tie  a  sprig  of  mountain-ash  with  red  twine  to  the  door  of  the  byre, 
or  to  the  left  horn  of  his  cattle,  or  else  twisted  a  red  thread  round 
the  cow's  tail.  For  the  same  reason  does  a  certain  old  horse-shoe, 
presented  to  me  on  one  of  the  Hebridean  isles  as  an  old  family 
luck-shoe,  now  hang  on  my  door  entwined  with  scarlet  braid  and 
two  twigs  of  rowan  laid  crosswise  ! 

1  The  combination  of  the  red  cloth  and  the  small  herb  also  recalls  the  curious 
Levitical  law  for  the  cleansing  of  lepers,  and  of  houses  wherein  is  leprosy — the 
scarlet  wool  and  the  hyssop,  which  were  to  be  dipped  in  the  blood  of  a  bird  that  had 
been  killed  in  an  earthenware  vessel  over  running  water,  wherewith  the  leper  or 
the  house  was  to  be  sprinkled  seven  times.     Levit.  xiv.  4-7  and  49-53. 

2  See  'In  the  Hebrides,'  pp.  197,  217.  C.  F.  Gordon  Gumming.  Chatto  & 
Windus. 


MYSTIC    VIRTUE    OF    RED.  309 

Here  in  China,  in  place  of  a  horse-shoe,  the  most  efficacious 
thing  to  keep  off  powers  of  evil  is  a  sword-shaped  toy,  made  of 
hundreds  of  copper  cash,  ingeniously  fastened  together  with  red 
thread.  Charms  written  on  red  paper  also  frighten  away  devils ; 
and  fire-crackers,  which  are  burnt  for  the  same  purpose,  are  always 
made  up  in  scarlet  covers. 

In  building  a  house,  a  careful  Chinaman  (having  first  engaged 
Taouist  priests  to  sprinkle  the  ground  with  holy  water,  in  order  to 
drive  thence  all  bad  spirits)  takes  care  to  provide  a  first-class  piece 
of  timber  for  a  ridge-beam.  Not  only  is  this  painted  red,  but  it  is 
decorated  with  festoons  of  red  cloth,  or  at  least  with  strips  of  red 
paper,  blessed  by  the  priest,  and  smeared  with  the  blood  from  the 
comb  of  a  young  cock  sacrificed  for  this  purpose.  From  this  ridge- 
pole is  sometimes  suspended  a  basket  containing  various  symbols 
of  good  fortune,  amongst  others  a  hank  of  red  thread. 

This  use  of  red  as  an  amulet  is  strangely  widespread ;  it  figures 
in  the  use  of  red  cloth  and  red  thread  by  the  wizards  of  Mongolia, 
and  also  of  certain  aboriginal  tribes  of  Hindoostan.  It  has  its 
place  in  medicine  lore  too.  Doth  in  Scotland  and  in  the  Weal 
Indies  red  flannel  worn  round  the  throat  is  supposed  to  prevent 
whooping-cough;  and  in  England  we  still  sometimes  hear  of  a  red 
ran  worn  round  the  throat  to  cure  toothache,  or  that  a  scarlet  silk 
thread  with  nine  knots,  so  worn,  will  stop  nose-bleeding. 

So  also  in  Chinese  stories,  a  peculiar  virtue  is  attributed  to  red 
pills ;  and  when  a  sick  man  is  supposed  to  be  afflicted  by  evil 
.spirits,  a  geomancer  writes  a  charm  with  a  new  vermilion  pencil  on 
yellow  paper  cut  in  the  form  of  cash.  He  bums  one  of  these 
charms,  swallows  the  ash  in  cold  water,  and  places  another  over 
his  door.  Then  the  exorcist  (who  is  generally  a  Taouist  priest, 
robed  in  red)  ministers  before  a  temporary  altar,  having  in  his 
hand  a  wooden  sword  made  from  a  lightning-stricken  tree  ;  round 
this  is  wrapped  a  strip  of  red  cloth. 

It  is  not  only  the  Taouist  priest  who  secures  the  good  influences 
of  red;  the  torches  which  illuminate  the  great  open  court  at  the 
Confucian  midnight  festival  are  wrapped  in  scarlet  cloth,  and 
fastened  on  tall  red  poles.  Red  candles  are  burnt  on  Buddhist 
altars,  and  red  dumplings  are  there  offered.  Red  eggs  are  offered 
by  women  at  certain  shrines,  and  (at  least  in  Southern  China)  the 
ashes  of  Buddhist  monks  who  have  been  cremated  are  sewn  up  in 
bags  of  red  cloth. 

In  legendary  lore,  the  mother  of  the  great  Laou-tze.  founder  of 
the  Taouist  religion,  was  fed  daily  fur  a  period  of  eighty-one  years 


310       COMMENCEMENT    OF    THE    CHEH-KIANG    MISSION. 

before  his  birth  by  a  red  cloud  which  came  down  from  heaven  ; 
and  earthly  parents  of  the  present  day  are  careful  early  to  enlist 
all  good  that  emanates  from  red  on  behalf  of  a  young  child — cer- 
tainly on  that  of  a  boy, — girls  are  of  small  account !  In  the  small 
boy  his  parents  discern  the  future  priest  of  the  ancestral  altar, 
so  when  he  is  a  month  old  he  is  clothed  in  a  bright  red  dress,  re- 
ceives his  infantile  name,  and  his  head  having  been  shaved  for  the 
first  time,  he  is  presented  with  a  cap  on  which  are  eight  small 
metal  figures  representing  the  eight  angels.  He  is  also  presented 
with  a  red  chair  and  a  red  bedstead.  As  he  grows  older  his  care- 
ful mother  will  see  that  his  pockets  are  lined  with  red ;  and  on 
any  days  when  evil  spirits  might  come  about,  a  red  silk  braid  is 
entwined  in  the  boy's  long  plait. 

At  the  solemn  betrothal  of  a  Chinese  damsel,  the  bridegroom- 
elect  sends  her  a  pair  of  bracelets  tied  together  with  red  twine, 
and  at  the  wedding  two  wine-cups  connected  by  a  red  silk  thread 
are  drained  by  the  bride  and  bridegroom.1 

At  a  wedding  in  Northern  China,  the  bride  is  carried  in  a  sedan- 
chair  covered  with  scarlet  cloth,  and  the  porters  who  carry  her 
wedding-presents  wear  conical  felt  hats,  each  with  a  red  feather 
sticking  erect  from  the  apex.  In  Southern  China  wealthy  folk 
hire  a  wedding-chair  gorgeously  gilded  and  richly  decorated  with 
little  figures  like  blue  and  green  enamel,  but  really  made  of  the 
lustrous  kingfishers'  feathers ;  in  this  case  a  red  cloth  handsomely 
fringed  is  thrown  over  the  chair.  Poor  people  have  to  be  satisfied 
with  a  rude  wooden  bridal  chair  simply  painted  red,  with  a  charm 
written  on  red  paper  suspended  above  the  door. 

The  chair,  which  is  sent  by  the  bridegroom,  is  accompanied  by 
his  friend  (or  best  man),  who  is  the  bearer  of  a  letter  written  on 
red  paper  tinged  with  gold,  entreating  the  lady  to  take  her  place 
therein.  The  bride  is  attired  in  a  scarlet  dress  ornamented  with 
gold,  and  the  wedding-veil  is  of  crimson  silk.  All  her  presents 
are  carried  in  very  showy  red  boxes  by  men  in  red  tunics.  Bearers 
similarly  attired  carry  scarlet  boards  on  which,  in  letters  of  gold,  are 
inscribed  the  names  of  the  ancestors  of  both  bride  and  bridegroom. 
Others  carry  on  long  poles  large  handsome  lanterns,  each  contain- 
ing a  fine  red  candle.  Pigs  roasted  whole  are  carried  on  scarlet 
trays,  and  occasionally  the  bridal  procession  is  headed  by  a  goat, 

1  Similarly,  at  a  Maliratta  wedding,  the  young  couple  are  tied  together  by  a  con- 
secrated scarlet  scarf.  See  '  In  the  Himalayas  ami  on  the  Indian  Plains,'  p. 
590.    C.  F.  Gordon  dimming.    Chatto  &  Windus. 


WILD    GEESE    EMBLEMS    OF    CONSTANCY.  311 

with  gilded  horns l  and  a  garland  made  of  red  paper.  Both  at 
weddings  and  funerals  small  presents  of  money  are  sometimes 
presented  to  guests  in  crimson  envelopes. 

A  wealthy  Chinese  funeral  contrives  to  symbolise  mourning  by 
the  aid  of  so  many  rich  colours  that  one  more  or  less  might  pass 
unheeded  were  we  not  aware  of  the  special  attributes  of  the  richly 
embroidered  scarlet  pall  which  covers  the  huge  coffin,  and  of  the 
tall  red  poles  to  which  are  attached  the  flags  and  lanterns  to  be 
carried  in  the  procession,  as  also  the  great  red  boards  on  which  are 
emblazoned  the  name  and  titles  of  the  dead  and  of  his  ancestors. 
A  great  scarlet  umbrella  is  a  marked  feature  in  an  official  funeral. 
On  the  coffin  itself  is  placed  a  decoration  of  red  paper,  on  which 
is  inscribed  the  character  which  denotes  happiness.  On  the  other 
hand,  during  a  season  of  national  mourning,  the  ordinary  red  tassel 
worn  on  the  hats  of  officials  is  replaced  by  a  white  one — the  red 
coverings  of  household  furniture  are  removed,  and  blue  or  white 
covers  are  substituted.  All  red  ornaments  are  taken  off  sign- 
boards, which  are  then  adorned  with  white  decorations  and 
streamers  of  blue  calico. 

]>ut  really  there  seems  no  end  to  the  occasions  when  lucky  red 
comes  into  play  !  On  New  Year's  eve,  scribes  sit  in  the  open 
street  driving  a  brisk  trade  by  inscribing  lucky  sentences  on  red 
paper,  which  are  bought  by  the  community  to  paste  on  their  doors 
on  the  morrow.     Visiting-cards  are  printed  on. bright  crimson  paper. 

At  the  great  official  ploughing-match  which  is  held  in  the 
spring-time  in  the  neighbourhood  of  every  city,  as  a  special  appeal 
to  the  God  of  Agriculture,  the  great  mandarins,  assuming  the  dress 
of  peasants,  plough  with  red  ploughs. 

In  short,  I  know  of  no  other  country  where  so  much  symbolism 
is  attached  to  different  colours,  and  red  appears  to  have  a  monopoly 
of  all  good. 

1  Among  the  numerous  symbols  which  grace  the  marriage  ceremonial  in  some 
parts  of  China,  arc  a  pair  of  wild  geese,  which  are  sent  by  the  bridegroom  to  the 
parents  of  the  bride-elect  to  typify  mutual  constancy,  as  it  is  supposed  that  these 
birds,  having  selected  one  another  in  youth,  continue  faithful  throughout  life,  and 
that  should  cither  die,  the  survivor  mourns  inconsolable  until  his  life's  end. 

As  it  is  not  always  easy,  even  in  China,  to  catch  a  wild  goose  and  gander,  tame 
ones  are  sometimes  substituted,  or  sometimes  even  wooden  or  tin  models,  which 
are  perhaps  preferable  at  a  wedding-feast,  as  the  bridegroom's  envoy  has  to  enter 
the  brides  bouse  with  a  goose  in  each  hand,  and  these  are  placed  upon  a  table, 
where  they  are  expected  to  sit  still  during  the  prolonged  ceremonies  ! 

Another  emblem  to  be  borne  in  the  procession  is  a  dwarf  orange-tree,  laden  nol 
only  with  its  own  fruit,  but  with  many  strings  of  cash,  to  typify  both  wealth  and 
bairns  ! 


312  AMONG    THE    AZALEAS. 


CHAPTEE   XXV. 

AMONG      THE      AZALEA  S. 

Gods  on  leave  of  absence — Play-actors  despised — Start  for  the  "Snowy  Valley" 
— A  strange  bridge — Lovely  nature — Interior  of  a  farmhouse — The  "Head 
of  Snow"  Monastery — A  beautiful  shrub — Tea  coolie-girls — Tea-drying 
—  Mulberry-orchards  —  Silk-worms  —  Care  in  rearing  them  —  Expectant 
mothers  not  to  approach  them  ! — The  Goddess  of  Silk-worms — Down  the 
river  on  a  raft — A  discriminating  youth  ! 

lay,  6th  May. 

The  Kiang  Teen  being  again  in  harbour,  Captain  Steele,  as  a 
sympathetic  curio-hunter,  invited  me  to  a  very  early  breakfast  on 
board,  to  be  followed  by  a  prowl  in  the  city ;  so  I  started  at  6.30 
in  the  cool  of  the  morning,  and  after  breakfast  Ave  explored  china- 
shops  and  wood-carvers — pawn-shops,  where  old  theatrical  dresses 
of  rich  silk  or  satin,  beautifully  embroidered,  lay  piled  on  the  floors, 
in  tempting  display.  I  invested  in  some  dainty  enamel  cups,  and 
a  set  of  silver  shields,  which  are  worn  by  Chinese  ladies  to  protect 
their  horribly  long  nails.  These  shields  project  fully  two  inches 
beyond  the  finger,  and  a  hand  thus  armed  is  like  the  talon  of  some 
dangerous  bird  of  prey,  capable  of  inflicting  most  cruel  scratches  ! 

Speaking  of  scratches,  I  find  that  in  the  course  of  this  morning's 
ramble  I  have  been  the  victim  of  some  inquisitive  Chinaman's 
sharp  scissors,  for  a  neat  small  square  has  been  cut  from  the  edge 
of  my  new  waterproof  cloak,  evidently  with  a  view  to  discovering 
the  secret  of  how  to  make  it.  Rather  an  annoying  mode  of 
investigation  ! 

"We  looked  into  various  temples,  including  one  which  is  under- 
going repairs,  and  very  dusty  and  unsuggestive  of  reverence  is  its 
present  condition.  But  due  provision  is  made  for  this.  I  noticed 
that  all  the  images  have  little  strips  of  pink  paper  pasted  over  their 
eyes ;  and  on  inquiry  why  this  was  done,  the  priest  explained  that 
these  are  prayers  to  the  several  gods,  telling  them  that  repairs  are 
necessary,  and  beseeching  them  kindly  to  retire  from  the  temple  till 
it  is  again  made  meet  for  their  presence.  It  is  assumed  that  these 
obliging  deities  have  complied  with  the  petition,  so  for  the  present 
the  images  are  only  images,  and  have  no  special  sanctity. 

We  also  visited  a  temple  sacred  to  the  patron  god  of  actors,  who 
are  a  very  numerous  body,  and  here  have  their  own  Guild,  which 


ACTORS    SUBJECT   TO    SPECIAL    DISABILITIES.       313 

always  combines  the  purposes  of  club,  theatre,  and  temple.  Not- 
withstanding the  delight  of  the  Chinese  (and  their  gods)  in  the- 
atrical entertainments,  the  profession  of  actors  is  sorely  despised, 
and  they  are  subject  to  most  galling  special  social  disabilities.  By 
law,  policemen,  boatmen,  play-actors,  and  slaves  are  forbidden  to 
marry  any  woman  who  is  not  of  the  grade  to  which  they  severally 
belong.  When  a  marriage  in  any  other  rank  of  life  is  being 
arranged,  the  primary  duty  of  the  "go-between  "  or  match-maker 
is  to  ascertain  beyond  all  doubt  that  neither  party  is  related  to 
play-actors,  slaves,  or  boat-people,  and  that  they  are  free  from  taint 
of  leprosy,  lunacy,  or  crime. 

These  disabilities  extend  to  their  children,  who  are  excluded 
from  the  privilege  of  competing  for  any  literary  honour,  conse- 
quently they  can  never  hold  any  official  employment.  In  the 
sumptuary  laws  which  regulate  each  item  of  the  dress  (and  its 
material)  to  be  worn  by  each  separate  class  in  the  empire,  play- 
actors (who  in  this  case  are  classed  with  slaves  and  bastards)  are 
forbidden  to  wear  dresses  made  of  true  silk,  though  they  are  per- 
mitted to  wear  a  very  coarse  silk,  which  is  obtained  from  the  large 
wild  silk-worms  which  feed  on  oak-trees,  and  which  is  known  as 
mountain  silk.  On  no  account  may  they  presume  to  wear  a  dress 
embroidered  with  gold  thread.  (That  privilege,  however,  is  denied 
to  all  the  common  people.)  In  winter  they  are  permitted  to  line 
their  robes  with  sheepskin  or  goatskin,  but  these  classes  are 
strictly  forbidden  to  make  use  of  any  other  fur. 

They  are,  moreover,  exceptions  to  that  special  privilege  which  is 
granted  to  old  age  of  every  other  degree.  The  imperial  grace  per- 
mits every  respectable  Chinaman  who  attains  the  age  of  seventy  to 
assume  the  official  dress  which  marks  an  officer  of  the  ninth  degree, 
while  at  ninety  years  of  age  he  is  promoted  to  a  still  more  honour- 
able official  dress.  But  though  an  actor  may  be  the  most  philan- 
thropic and  virtuous  of  men,  and  though  he  may  live  to  be  a 
hundred,  he  is  debarred  from  all  such  privileges. 

Returning  to  the  Mission,  I  learnt  that  the  bishop  has  most 
kindly  arranged  that  as  Miss  Laurence  must  shortly  visit  some  of 
the  outlying  villages,  she  is  to  do  so  immediately,  so  that  under 
her  wing  I  too  may  be  enabled  to  see  something  more  of  the 
neighbourhood.  "We  are  therefore  to  start  to-night  for  a  district 
known  as  the  "Snowy  Valley,"  famous  for  its  beauty,  but  chiefly 
for  its  wealth  of  azaleas.  This  time  we  shall  be  a  trio  of  foreign 
barbarians,  being  accompanied  by  a  young  lady  who  has  recently 
arrived,  and  has  yet  to  learn  her  work  and  the  dreadful  I 


314  AMONG    THE    AZALEAS. 

Is  the  Shih-doze— i.e.,  "Head  of  Snow" — 
liUDDHisT  Monastery, 
May  ~th. 

Yesterday  evening,  in  the  mellow  light  of  a  full  moon,  we 
started  for  the  river,  where  the  Mission  hoat  lay  ready  for  us. 
The  night  was  so  beautiful  that  we  sorely  grudged  being  obliged  to 
sleep,  but  having  a  long  day  before  us,  we  resolutely  turned  in 
soon  after  we  had  passed  the  Bridge  of  Boats  (one  of  which  slips 
out  to  let  us  through).  These  form  a  bridge  two  hundred  yards 
long.  "When  we  awoke  at  daybreak  we  were  about  twenty  miles 
from  Ningpo,  and  were  nearing  the  village  of  Kong-ke'o,  where  we 
anchored  just  above  an  extraordinary  bridge  supported  on  piers 
formed  by  clusters  of  separate  upright  stones.  It  is  covered  in 
with  woodwork,  and  has  a  tiled  roof  and  shops  at  either  end — 
such  an  eccentric-looking  concern  ! 

Here  we  found  the  people  extremely  civil,  thanks  to  the  human- 
ising influence  of  the  American  Mission,  which  has  had  a  station 
here  for  some  years,  and  a  neat  church. 

After  early  breakfast,  Ave  started  in  chairs,  with  two  servants 
and  six  luggage-coolies,  on  a  further  expedition  of  twenty  miles  to 
the  Snowy  Valley.  Our  route  lay  through  a  pretty  country,  chiefly 
agricultural.  The  people  were  planting  out  their  rice,  which,  being 
first  sown  in  one  thick  mass,  is  thence  transplanted,  when  a  few 
inches  high,  to  the  large  fields.  I  can  fancy  no  more  unpleasant 
task  than  rice-planting  in  all  its  stages,  as  it  involves  standing  up 
to  the  knees  in  soft  mud,  and  usually  inhaling  a  damp  miasma. 
But  to  the  mere  spectator,  the  excpaisite  green  of  growing  rice  is  a 
delight  to  the  eye  unequalled  by  any  other  crop.  Here  and  there 
fine  willow-trees  and  fragrant  "  Pride  of  India  "  mark  the  course 
of  some  stream  meandering  through  the  plain,  and  occasionally  we 
passed  an  ungainly-looking  farm-buffalo,  on  whose  shoulders  is 
generally  perched  a  tiny  boy  with  shaven  brow  and  two  young 
plaits,  but  guiltless  of  clothing.  These  small  persons  are  herd 
laddies,  whose  duty  it  is  to  prevent  the  buffaloes  from  straying 
too  far. 

As  long  as  our  route  lay  on  the  levels  near  the  river,  Ave  passed 
through  fields  of  the  loveliest  pink  clover,  golden  rape,  and  yelloAV 
buttercups,  and  clumps  of  trees  literally  emboAvered  in  clustering 
roses  and  fragrant  jessamine.  A  most  tantalising  plant  here  groAA-s 
abundantly — a  sort  of  spurious  strawberry,  of  a  rich  scarlet,  very 
inviting  to  the  eye,  but  AAdiich  tastes  just  like  a  bit  of  dry  earth. 
The  leaf,  the  blossom,  and  the   fruit  so  singularly  resemble  the 


THE    DIRT    OF    AGES.  315 

genuine  article,  that  I  was  tempted  to  taste  them  again  and  again 
before  I  could  persuade  myself  that  they  were  truly  only  shams. 

"We  halted  at  two  roadside  temples,  each  with  a  most  lavish  dis- 
play of  excellent  wood-carving.  In  one  there  are  about  fifty  most 
delicately  carved  large  panels,  each  of  which  is  a  really  artistic  pic- 
ture in  wood.  But  all  are  incrusted  with  thick  coats  of  dust,  and 
are  apparently  quite  uncared  for. 

We  were  invited  to  enter  what  seemed  a  well-to-do  farmhouse, 
which  (being  curious  in  the  matter  of  domestic  interiors)  I  was 
glad  to  do.  The  state  of  filth,  however,  was  altogether  indescrib- 
able— not  filthy  in  the  sense  of  many  a  miserable  overcrowded 
dwelling  in  our  own  cities,  for  Chinese  economy  carefully  pre- 
serves all  sewage,  but  foul  with  accumulations  of  cobwebs  and 
rubbish,  every  bit  of  woodwork  being  incrusted  with  the  dirt  of 
ages.  Eeally  handsome  wood-carving  was  so  filled  up  with  dirt 
as  to  be  almost  unnoticed.  In  one  corner  stood  a  handsome  bed- 
stead, beneath  which  lay  heaps  of  refuse;  the  walls  and  floor  were 
all  coated  with  dirt;  the  beams  supporting  the  roof  were  smoke- 
blackened.  Altogether,  my  impressions  of  this  sample  home  were 
not  pleasant. 

We  camped  for  luncheon  on  a  grassy  knoll  under  a  group  of 
pleasant  shady  trees,  but,  of  course,  a  crowd  quickly  assembled  to 
gaze  at  us — not  uncivilly,  however. 

When  we  commenced  the  ascent  of  the  valley  we  soon  found 
ourselves  in  the  azalea  belt,  and  sorely  Ave  regretted  not  haying 
been  a  fortnight  earlier;  for  though  the  thickets  of  orange  azalea 
are  beyond  measure  gorgeous,  the  crimson  is  all  faded,  and  tie- 
ground  blood-red  with  the  fallen  blossoms,  telling  what  must  have 
been  their  vanished  glory.  As  to  the  lilac  azaleas,  scarcely  a 
lingering  blossom  remains  to  tell  of  their  delicate  beauty.  But 
there  are  still  masses  of  that  other  lilac  flower  which  we  saw  at 
Tien  Dong,  and  among  the  undergrowth,  handsome  fronds  of  Solo- 
mon's-seal  greeted  us  like  old  friends.  So  too  did  rich  trails  of 
fragrant  honeysuckle,  and  the  snowy  blossoms  of  delicious  haw- 
thorn, of  two  sorts — our  own  familiar  May  and  a  Chinese  variety, 
both  blooming  in  as  rich  perfection  as  if  in  an  English  lane.  No 
wonder  that  happy  birds  here  sing  so  joyously!  and  the  cuckoo  3 
note  sounded  so  natural  as  almost  to  make  us  forget  how  far  from 
home  we  were. 

Passing  a  very  quaint  rest-house  which  is  built  on  an  arched 
bridge,  and  a  fine  waterfall  over  sheer  crags,  we  reached  the  Shih- 
doze  or  '"Head  of  .Snow"  Monastery — in  every  respect  a  very  in- 


316  AMONG    THE   AZALEAS. 

ferioi  building  to  that  at  Tien  Dong.    Externally  the  buildings  are 

of  the  same  harmonious  red  and  grey  colouring,  hut  the  temple  is 
shabby,  and  the  images  are  hideous.  The  whole  place  is  in  rather 
a  ruinous  condition,  and  we  find  it  tenanted  by  only  eight  brethren, 
who,  however,  received  us  kindly,  and  have  given  us  their  best 
guest-chamber,  of  which  I  regret  to  chronicle  that  it  is  a  rickety, 
tumble-down  old  room.  Its  furnishings  consist  of  a  shaky  table, 
two  chairs,  and  some  wooden  boards  on  trestles  to  act  as  bedsteads. 
However,  we  have  brought  our  own  bedding,  a  brass  basin,  and 
cooked  food,  and  there  is  never  any  difficulty  about  hot  kettles 
and  tea,  so  we  have  contrived  to  make  ourselves  fairly  comfortable, 
and  being  very  tired,  have  resolved  not  to  go  down  to  see  the 
night-service  in  the  ugly  temple. 

May  Sth. 

That  final  resolution  was  fated  to  be  broken,  for  we  were  awak- 
ened at  2  a.m.  by  the  deep  booming  tones  of  the  great  bell,  which 
is  struck  on  the  outside  by  the  swinging  of  a  wooden  beam.  This 
was  followed  by  the  beating  of  the  great  temple  drum.  It  sounded 
very  solemn  in  the  stillness  of  night,  and  when  the  chanting  began, 
interest  overcame  weariness,  and  Ave  found  our  way  down  the  dark 
rickety  stairs  and  through  the  long  passages,  past  the  great  empty 
kitchen  and  the  shrine  of  the  kitchen  god,  and  across  the  moonlit 
court,  till  we  reached  the  temple,  where  we  stood  silently  in  the 
shadow  of  a  great  pillar,  where  our  presence  was  not  perceived. 
The  eight  brethren  were  all  present  in  full  dress,  wearing  the  mantle 
fastened  on  the  left  breast,  with  the  green  jade  hook  and  ring — I 
have  generally  seen  this  fastening  on  the  right  side.  One  knelt 
apart,  one  beat  the  Ku-koo,  which  is  a  wooden  skull-shaped  drum, 
and  the  remaining  six  walked  round  and  round  in  sunwise  circle 
while  reiterating  some  sentence.  Then  all  knelt  and  prostrated 
themselves  again  and  again  most  devoutly.  There  was  only  one 
light  in  the  temple,  a  large  dim  lamp  which  is  kept  ever  burning 
before  the  great  altar — a  light  so  feeble  that  all  ugliness  of  detail 
was  lost,  and  there  remained  only  a  somewhat  weird  but  fine  gen- 
eral effect  of  gilded  images  and  broad  shadows. 

"We  passed  hence  into  the  clear  moonlight,  and  listened  to  the 
croaking  of  legions  of  frogs  in  the  neighbouring  rice-fields,  till  the 
monotony  suggested  a  return  to  our  pillows. 

We  woke  again  before  "  the  outgoing  of  the  sun,"  and  after 
early  breakfast  had  a  charming  excursion  further  up  the  valley, 
first  halting  at  Ingden — i.e.,  "  Shady  Dell  " — a  very  picturesque 


LOVELY    FLOWERS.  317 

waterfall  in  a  deep  rocky  gorge,  and  next  at  a  picturesque  ruined 
bridge,  literally  covered  by  a  veil  of  creeping  roses.  Here  Ave  lay 
on  cool  grass  beneath  dark  fir-trees,  with  the  river  flowing  past  us, 
and  we  enjoyed  our  luncheon  notwithstanding  the  steady  gaze  of 
many  spectators,  who  speedily  assembled  to  see  the  strange  sight  of 
three  foreign  women. 

Further  up  the  valley  we  came  to  another  very  fine  fall,  with  a 
single-arch  bridge  spanning  the  stream  just  above  it.  Everywhere 
we  found  masses  of  white  roses,  hawthorn,  golden  azalea,  and 
lingering  patches  of  scarlet  and  crimson,  but  the  lilac  azaleas  are 
all  gone.  Just  as  we  were  starting  to  return,  I  espied  in  a  thicket 
a  splendid  tree-shrub  with  glorious  spikes  of  lavender-coloured 
blossom,  like  a  glorified  foxglove,  only  set  like  the  flower  of  the 
horse-chestnut.  As  it  was  quite  new  to  me,  I  made  my  way  to 
the  spot,  and  found  what  I  can  only  describe  as  a  tree-gloxinia — 
the  leaves  large  and  velvety,  and  on  each  spike  from  twenty  to 
seventy  bell-like  blossoms,  just  like  a  gloxinia.  It  is  truly  a  mag- 
nificent shrub.  I  gathered  five  great  spikes,  which  were  as  much 
as  I  was  aide  to  carry.1 

We  met  large  parties  of  men  returning  from  the  upper  hills 
with  large  baskets  of  bamboo -shoots,  generally  about  eighteen 
inches  long  by  four  thick.  They  are  used  as  vegetables.  Some 
had  large  bundles  of  much  younger  shoots,  resembling  overgrown 
asparagus.  We  had  some  of  the  latter  for  supper,  and  found  them 
fresh  and  tender. 

I  am  greatly  struck  by  the  number  of  girls  whom  we  meel 
working  as  tea-coolies,  and  by  the  enormous  burdens  which  they 
carry  slung  from  a  bamboo  which  rests  on  their  shoulder.  Each 
girl  carries  two  bags  thus  slung,  the  weight  of  a  bag  being  half 
a  pinil,  which  is  upwards  of  60  lb.  Thus  heavily  burdened,  a 
party  of  these  bright,  pleasant-looking  young  women  march  a 
dozen  miles  or  more,  chatting  and  singing  as  they  go.  They  are 
sturdy  rosy  lassies,  all  dressed  alike,  in  the  invariable  indigo-coloured 
blouse,  short  loose  trousers,  and  bare  legs.  Many  of  them  are  really 
pretty,  and  all  have  their  glossy  hair  neatly  dressed,  and  adorned 
with  some  bright  silken  blossom. 

The  tea-plantations  are  scattered  over  the  hills,  funning  little 
dotted  patches,  of  regularly  planted  bushes.     Here  the  girls  and 

1  I  afterwards  learned  that  this  beautiful  Bhrub  is  known  to  botanist    as  /'■ 
lownia  iniperialis.     It  is  Largely  cultivated  in  Japan,  where  it  is  known  as  the 
Kiri,  ana  is  valued  on  account  of  the  hardness  of  its  wood,  whieh  is  used  for 
making  clogs.    The  flower-loving  Japanese  have  shown  their  appreciation  "t  it- 
beauty  by  adopting  it  as  the  Mikado's  house-crest. 


318  AMONG    THE    AZALEAS. 

women  are  busy  selecting  the  young  green  leaves,  which  they  pick 
and  collect  in  large  basket-work  trays  of  split  bamboo.  The  leaves 
are  then  spread  on  mats,  and  are  left  in  the  sun  till  they  are  par- 
tially dried.  After  this,  they  are  placed  in  very  large  flat  circular 
trays,  and  barefooted  coolies  proceed  to  use  their  feet  as  rollers,  and 
twirl  the  leaves  round  and  round,  till  each  has  acquired  an  indi- 
vidual curl.     This  doesn't  sound  very  nice,  does  it  ? 

Then  the  whole  process  is  repeated  a  second  time.  The  leaves 
have  another  turn  in  the  sun,  another  foot-curling,  and  a  more 
elaborate  hand-rubbing.  Then  once  more  they  are  exposed  to  the 
sun,  till  they  are  so  dried  that  no  trace  of  green  remains.  They 
are  then  packed  in  bags,  and  are  sent  off  to  the  tea  merchants  to 
be  fired  under  their  oavii  supervision  in  the  great  tea  hongs,  where 
the  hitherto  unadulterated  leaf  receives  that  coating  of  indigo  and 
gypsum  to  which  I  have  already  alluded.  Some  of  the  tea 
farmers  have  charcoal  stoves  in  their  own  houses,  where  firing  is 
done  on  a  small  scale — but  this  is  exceptional. 

Here,  in  the  court  of  the  temple,  there  are  many  large  flat 
baskets  and  mats  where  the  tea-leaves  from  the  monastic  "  glebe  " 
are  drying.  The  said  glebe  consists  of  most  rugged  little  fields,  high 
on  the  hillsides. 

On  our  return,  when  we  were  a  little  rested,  we  went  down  to 
the  temple  in  order  to  stand  beside  the  great  bell  while  it  was 
being  struck  on  the  outside  with  the  heavy  wooden  beam  which  is 
suspended  so  as  to  swing  against  the  bell,  producing  a  deep  solemn 
tone  which  reverberates  through  the  hills,  awakening  the  ghostly 
echoes. 

]S"ow  we  are  all  fairly  tired  out,  so  no  night-services  will  tempt 
us  clown  to-night ! 

KlNGFO,  Saturday,  10th. 

Here  we  are  once  more  enjoying  a  delightful  rest  in  this  most 
peaceful  home,  yesterday  having  proved  a  somewhat  long,  though 
very  interesting  day.  We  left  the  monastery  after  a  5  a.m.  break- 
fast. My  companions  decided  on  walking  the  five  miles  to  the 
river,  but  secured  coolies  to  carry  me  and  our  baggage.  The 
country  is  all  very  pretty,  though  the  mountains  are  not  nearly  so 
high  as  those  in  the  Fuh-Kien  province.  Though  this  is  part  of  a 
great  range  with  many  notable  peaks,  there  is  nothing  here  higher 
tli an  3000  feet  above  the  sea-level. 

We  passed  by  fields  of  lovely  and  fragrant  pink  clover,  and  by 
others  more  conspicuous  in  their  gay  beauty  of  blood-red  poppies ; 


OPIUM    CULTIVATION.  319 

for  alas  !  since  foreign  opium  may  no  longer  be  legally  excluded, 
the  Chinese  farmer  thinks  he  may  as  well  secure  the  profit,  and 
Government  officials  herein  seeing  a  hope  of  driving  out  the  foreign 
poison,  ignore  the  ever-increasing  and  most  grievous  extension  of 
this  cultivation,  which  is  working  such  rapidly  increasing  ruin 
throughout  the  empire ;  so  that  much  of  the  best  land  which 
hitherto  has  yielded  rich  grains,  is  now  given  over  to  this  beauti- 
ful but  baneful  crop.  Here,  in  place  of  the  snow-white  opium- 
poppy  of  India,  the  red  predominates,  although  its  produce  is 
deemed  very  inferior  to  the  white. 

On  some  of  the  more  advanced  fields,  the  poppy-heads  are 
already  ripe — that  is  to  say,  they  are  full-sized,  though  still  green. 
When  the  head  becomes  dry  the  juice  no  longer  flows,  so  it  is 
necessary  to  secure  the  opium  at  the  exact  moment  of  maturity. 
The  cultivators  pass  carefully  along  each  row  of  poppies,  and 
with  a  small  sharp  knife  make  a  slight  incision  all  round  each  seed- 
pod,  taking  care  not  to  cut  deep  lest  the  juice  should  How  inward 
and  be  lost  in  the  seed-cavity.  A  thick  milky  juice  at  once  exudes 
along  the  cut,  and  must  be  left  undisturbed  for  several  hours 
during  the  heat  of  the  day  exposed  to  the  sun's  rays,  when  it 
assumes  a  resinous  appearance,  and  is  scraped  off  with  a  knife, 
and  rolled  up  in  soft  lumps.  These  are  sprinkled  with  a  powder, 
which  prevents  their  adhering  together  in  one  solid  mass.  They 
are  rolled  up  in  poppy-leaves,  and  left  to  dry  in  the  sun,  when  the 
opium  becomes  of  a  rich  dark-brown  colour. 

A  pleasanter  industry  to  note  is  the  rearing  of  silk-worms  with- 
out number,  this  being  one  of  the  chief  silk-producing  provinces. 

A  large  proportion  of  the  inhabitants  are  employed  in  the  care 
of  "  The  Precious  Ones,"  as  they  are  called.  So  great  mulherry- 
orchards  are  cultivated  in  order  to  supply  leaves  for  the  hungry 
worms,  and  as  the  trees  are  kept  low  to  enrich  the  foliage,  men 
(and  I  have  seen  women  also)  save  time  by  climbing  the  trees, 
and  combine  pruning  with  gathering  by  cutting  off  large  branches, 
which  they  throw  down,1  and  then  the  women  and  children  pick 
off  the  leaves,  wasting  the  half-ripe  fruit  which  grows . along  the 
stem.  The  fruit,  however,  is  insipid  even  when  ripe.  The  branches 
thus  cut  are  bound  in  fagots  and  sold  as  firewood.  I  (ne  advan- 
tage in  this  season  of  drought  is  that  the  leaves  do  not  require  the 
careful  drying  which  is  necessary  »in  damper  climates  —  even  in 

1  In  this  province,  when  heathen  neighbours  wish  to  persecute  native  Christians, 
the  natural  preliminary  is  to  threaten  to  cul  their  mulberry-trees,  thusal  one  stroke 

destroying  their  whole  stock-in-trade,  by  ensuring  the  death  of  the  WC 


320  AMONG    THE    AZALEAS. 

tropical  Pacific  isles,  and  indeed  here  also,  whenever  rainy  or  even 
damp  weather  sets  in.  On  the  other  hand,  withered  leaves  must 
on  no  account  be  used. 

The  silk-worms,  which  now  look  like  great  fat  white  maggots, 
lie  in  masses  in  large  flat  baskets,  and  are  fed  incessantly.  In- 
deed their  appetite  during  this  stage  of  existence  is  something 
amazing.  "When  first  hatched  from  their  tiny  eggs  these  almost 
invisible  atoms  (which  are  like  morsels  of  black  hair)  are  supplied 
with  fresh  food  every  half-hour;  their  nurses  (ignoring  the  fact 
that  creatures  indigenous  to  Chinese  mulberry-trees  are  probably 
able  to  feed  themselves)  take  the  trouble  to  mince  the  leaves  very 
fine  before  supplying  them  to  the  precious  babies  !  "When  they  are 
past  their  first  infancy  they  are  fed  only  twenty-four  times  a-day  .' 
but  even  this  trifling  amount  of  attention  must  make  it  a  matter  of 
rejoicing  when  they  are  so  full-grown  as  only  to  require  four  meals 
a-day.  Happily,  in  the  course  of  its  hungry  life  each  worm  takes 
three  days'  sleep,  one  day  at  a  time,  at  intervals  of  a  week,  and  on 
each  occasion  it  changes  its  skin.  The  first  is  black,  the  second  amber- 
coloured,  the  third  white.  Eut  as  the  little  creatures  are  hatched 
on  different  days,  it  follows  that  they  sleep  on  different  days,  so 
there  are  always  plenty  of  hungry  waking  ones  requiring  attendance. 

Indeed,  from  first  to  last  the  care  bestowed  on  them  is  incessant, 
beginning  with  the  careful  selection  of  the  parent  moths,  only  the 
finest  being  allowed  to  survive.  Each  mother-moth  produces  about 
five  hundred  tiny  eggs,  which  are  deposited  with  the  greatest  regu- 
larity on  pieces  of  coarse  paper.  (In  the  northern  provinces,  where 
the  cold  is  greater,  they  are  supplied  with  pieces  of  cloth  instead.) 
These  sheets  of  paper  are  gently  dipped  into  fresh  water,  and  are 
then  hung  up  to  dry,  being  thus  left  suspended  to  horizontal  bam- 
boos all  through  the  autumn.  In  bleak  December  these  cloths  are 
removed  to  a  room  which  has  been  carefully  swept,  and  which  is 
subject  to  all  the  good  influences  of  light  and  aspect. 

In  February  the  eggs  are  again  washed  (sometimes  tepid  water 
is  poured  over  them  for  a  considerable  time  to  equalise  the  date  of 
their  hatching),  they  are  then  placed  on  mats,  which  are  spread  on 
shelves  extending  all  round  the  room.  It  is  considered  desirable 
that  these  shelves  should  be  made  of  bamboo,  as  being  a  scentless 
wood,  and  the  worms  are  supposed  to  be  very  sensitive  to  all 
odours.  Great  care  is  taken  to  secure  their  house  from  all  bad 
smells,  though  it  is  difficult  to  conceive  by  what  standard  this 
subtle  matter  is  decided,  as  the  whole  Chinese  nation  are  appa- 
rently altogether  devoid  of  the  sense  of  smell ! 


"the  precious  ones.  321 

The  temperature  of  the  silk-worm  house  is  also  carefully  regu- 
lated—  the  thermometer  by  which  it  is  determined  being  the 
human  body!  The  attendant  is  required  periodically  to  throw 
off  his  raiment,  and  so  enter  the  presence  of  "  The  Precious 
Ones";  should  he  thus  become  conscious  that  the  air  is  damp  or 
cool,  he  must  at  once  bring  in  a  charcoal  stove.  He  must  specially 
guard  against  any  breath  of  wind  blowing  into  the  house,  as  this 
produces  a  disease  akin  to  rheumatism.  Should  a  thunderstorm 
arise,  he  must  quickly  cover  all  the  shelves  or  trays  with  sheets  of 
very  thick  paper,  to  lessen  the  glare  of  the  lightning,  which  is  sup- 
posed to  alarm  the  worms.  Unfortunately,  the  roar  of  the  thunder 
cannot  be  shut  out,  and  these  little  creatures  are  supposed  to  be  so 
sensitive  to  noise  that  those  who  approach  them  must  be  careful 
only  to  whisper  with  bated  breath,  if  indeed  any  speech  be  neces- 
sary. (Only  think  what  blessed  peace  and  quietness  one  mighi 
secure  by  finding  summer  quarters  on  a  silk  farm,  which  is  not 
only  an  unusually  clean  brick  house,  but,  moreover,  isolated  in  the 
midst  of  its  mulberry-groves,  to  secure  silence  !) 

Ceaseless  war  is  also  waged  against  flies  which  attack  the  young 
worms,  and  try  to  deposit  their  eggs  upon  their  bodies. 

One  item  of  attention  to  the  health  of  the  young  worms  con 
in  a  judicious  change  of  diet — a  little  fine  flour  of  rice,  green  peas, 
and  black  beans  being  administered  as  an  occasional  tonic  during 
their  thirty-two  days  of  worm-life.  Then  they  commence  spinning, 
and  work  for  about  five  days,  when  the  cocoons  are  complete,  and 
the  spinners  who  have  thus  prepared  their  sarcophagi  proceed  to 
transform  themselves  into  mummy-like  chrysalids,  vainly  hoping 
to  be  allowed  to  await  their  resurrection  undisturbed.  This,  of 
course,  is  by  no  means  the  intention  of  the  silk  farmer,  who  im- 
mediately collects  the  cocoons  and  places  them  on  bamboo  shelves, 
near  a  slow  fire  of  charcoal,  the  heat  of  which  effectually  kills  the 
self-imprisoned  spinners,  who  otherwise  would,  of  course,  break 
through  the  cocoon  and  cut  the  silk. 

If  only  the  silk-worms  are  as  economical  as  their  human  masters, 
it  might  soothe  their  spirits  to  know  that  these  poor  little  mummies 
are  by  no  means  wasted,  for  when  dexterous  human  fingers  have 
unwound  the  silken  cocoons  (producing  therefrom  the  loveliest  glossy 
skeins,  some  golden,  some  of  shining  whiteness),  all  the  chrysalids  are 
carefully  collected,  boiled,  and  eaten,  being  esteemed  a  great  delicacy  ! 

There  appears  every  reason   to   believe   that  this   whole   pro 
has  continued  unchanged   from   year  to   year  for  at    least  forty-five 
centuries,  when  (about   B.C.  2700)  it  seems  to  have  occurred  t<>  the 

X 


322  AMONG    THE   AZALEAS. 

Empress  Si  Ling-Chee,  the.  wife  of  the  Emperor  Hungtai,  to  estab- 
lish sericulture  as  a  definite  industry,  wherein  she  and  the  ladies 
of  her  household  set  the  example  by  domesticating  the  worms 
which  had  hitherto  wandered  at  large  in  the  wild-mulberry  groves ; 
under  her  fostering  care  silken  fabrics  were  woven  as  offerings  to 
the  national  gods.  Of  course  the  imperial  example  was  quickly 
followed  in  all  parts  of  the  empire  where  it  was  found  that  the 
creatures  would  flourish ;  and  after  the  death  of  the  Empress  Si 
Ling-Chee,  this  benefactress  of  the  world  was  deified,  and  has 
thenceforth  been  worshipped  as  the  Goddess  of  Silk-worms. 

In.  this  province  of  Cheh-kiang  are  several  temples  dedicated  to 
her  worship,  and  I  suppose  there  are  the  same  in  other  provinces, 
as  "  The  Cocoon  Festival "  in  November  is  one  of  the  national  holy 
days  observed  by  all  good  Chinamen,  when  the  mandarins  and 
officials  are  required  to  solemnise  a  great  State  service,  therein  fol- 
lowing the  example  which  is  annually  set  by  the  Empress  and  the 
ladies  of  her  Court  at  Peking.  These  repair  in  state  to  the  temple 
of  the  lady  who  discovered  the  use  of  silk,  and  they  proceed  to 
gather  leaves  from  the  temple  mulberry-trees,  the  Empress  using 
golden  scissors,  and  her  ladies  silver  ones.  When  they  have  fed  the 
temple  silk-worms  and  offered  sacrifice  to  the  goddess,  they  pro- 
ceed, with  their  own  delicate  fingers,  to  unwind  several  cocoons,  as 
an  example  to  all  the  silk-workers.  Considering  what  a  practised 
hand  is  required  to  unwind  these  without  breaking  the  silk,  it  is 
to  be  feared  that  the  imperial  labour  may  not  prove  altogether 
remunerative  !  However,  the  intention  is  excellent,  and  like  the 
Emperor's  ploughing  at  the  Temple  of  Agriculture,  it  is  supposed 
in  a  manner  to  consecrate  a  vast  national  industry. 

Various  superstitious  ceremonies  are  enjoined  for  the  good  of  the 
worms.  In  some  parts  of  Britain  it  is  customary  to  bestow  very 
reverential  attention  on  bees,  as  it  is  supposed  that  they  will  aban- 
don a  careless  family  which  neglects  to  inform  them  of  its  births, 
deaths,  and  marriages.  Here  the  silk- worms  are  quite  as  particular 
and  far  less  sympathetic.  Whoever  visits  them,  including  their 
own  attendants,  must,  ere  crossing  the  threshold,  purify  himself  by 
dipping  a  bunch  of  mulberry-leaves  in  water,  and  therewith  sprink- 
ling himself.  In  some  districts  a  few  grains  of  sand  are  sprinkled 
on  the  head  in  lieu  of  water  (just  as  a  Mohammedan  may  sym- 
bolise his  ceremonial  ablutions  by  a  dry  rub  with  sand  when  water 
cannot  be  obtained).  The  attendants  are  also  required  to  abstain 
from  eating  certain  meats  and  vegetables  while  they  are  in  waiting 
on  "  The  Precious  Ones."     Visits  from  strangers  are  generally  un- 


PECULIAR   CUSTOMS    CONCERNING    CHILD-BIRTH.       323 

welcome,  while  sick  or  deformed  persons  are  strictly  prohibited 
from  coming  near.  On  no  account  must  any  one  mourning  for  the 
dead  approach  them  till  seven  weeks  have  elapsed — and  on  no 
consideration  whatever  may  a  woman  who  hopes  soon  to  increase 
her  family  enter  the  silk-worms'  house  ! 

(For  that  matter,  ladies  under  these  circumstances  are  subject  to 
many  very  odd  ceremonial  restrictions.  Such  an  one  may  on  no  ac- 
count approach  a  corpse,  however  near  and  dear  to  her  the  deceased 
may  have  been.  Neither  may  she  approach  ducks  who  are  sitting 
on  their  eggs  !  For  a  month  after  the  birth  of  a  child,  no  one 
except  her  nurse  may  approach  the  mother.  A  large  bunch  of 
evergreens  hung  up  at  the  door  warns  visitors  not  to  call — they 
may  not  even  leave  cards  !  Should  any  person  be  obliged  to  enter 
the  house  during  these  thirty  days,  he  becomes  subject  to  the  same 
law  of  uncleanness  as  all  the  persons  living  in  the  house,  none  of 
whom  may  enter  any  public  temple  during  this  period  !  When 
the  month  has  expired,  the  happy  father,  accompanied  by  one  of 
his  wife's  handmaids,  goes  to  return  thanks  in  one  of  the  temples, 
but  the  mother  must  not  leave  the  house  for  a  hundred  days  ! 
The  woman  who  is  so  unfortunate  as  to  die  in  her  confinement, 
finds  herself  subject  to  special  penalties  in  Purgatory,  till  she  is 
released  by  the  sacrifices  offered  on  her  behalf  in  the  temple.) 

On  reaching  the  point  of  the  river  where  we  were  to  embark, 
we  found  a  multitude  of  rafts,  each  formed  by  about  eight  or  ten 
bamboos,  fastened  together,  and  turned  up  on  one  end  so  as  to 
form  a  sort  of  prow.  The  water  here  is  so  extremely  shallow  that 
no  manner  of  boat  could  float,  so  these  frail  rafts  absorb  all  the 
traffic.  It  seems  that  most  of  the  said  traffic  travels  seaward,  so 
the  rafts  which  return  up-stream  without  a  cargo  are  often  laid  one 
upon  the  other,  three  deep,  so  as  only  to  require  the  work  of  two 
men  in  poling.  Such  rafts  as  these  are  so  raised  as  to  give  the 
passenger  a  good  dry  seat;  which  is  more  than  the  passenger 
down-stream  can  count  upon  ! 

Ere  embarking,  there  was  a  little  difficulty  with  the  coolies  who 
had  been  engaged  for  us  at  the  monastery,  and  who  struck  for 
double  pay,  which  was  of  course  refused,  as  the  precedent  would 
have  been  serious.  It  was  somewhat  unpleasant,  as  a  crowd  im- 
mediately gathered.  However,  when  the  men  found  thai  they 
could  not  extract  the  extra  coin,  they  demanded  a  passage  down 
I  lie  liver  on  our  raft.  Their  extra  weight  was  not  very  desirable, 
so  Miss  Laurence  suggested  that  she  really  wondered  how  they 
could  wish  to   travel  with   such    wicked    people,  as,  of  course,    if 


324  AMONG    THE   AZALEAS. 

after  this  they  did  anything  wrong,  their  friends  would  say  they 
had  learnt  it  from  the  red-bristled  women  !  This  little  jest  quite 
won  the  crowd,  who  chuckled  greatly,  and  the  men  proceeded  to 
embark  quite  cheerily.  They  did  not  stay  with  us  for  very  long, 
however,  as  our  progress  was  so  slow  that  they  declared  they  would 
rather  walk  ;  so  they  stepped  ashore,  but  kindly  assured  us  that 
they  parted  very  good  friends  with  us,  which  was  satisfactory  ! 

Our  raft  had  been  engaged  for  us  by  our  friends  at  the  monas- 
tery, whose  selection  was  assuredly  not  in  our  favour.  We  found 
that  two  narrow  rafts  had  been  lashed  side  by  side  to  make  one  of 
about  seven  feet  wide — of  course,  the  water  oozed  up  between  the 
two  every  time  we  made  the  smallest  movement.  "We  disposed 
the  chair  and  our  modest  store  of  baggage  so  as  to  furnish  us  with 
seats,  and  the  two  men  who  formed  our  body-guard  squatted  be- 
hind, and  handed  us  food  from  the  provision-box.  But  the  crusty 
old  boatman  had  "  chiselled  "  us  by  substituting  his  own  small 
son  for  the  second  boatman  to  whom  we  were  entitled,  so  the 
poling  was  very  slow  work,  especially  as  the  water  is  so  unusually 
low  that,  although  we  could  float  in  about  four  inches,  we  repeat- 
edly stuck,  and  had  to  be  dragged  over  the  mud,  an  amusement  in 
which  numerous  other  rafts  bore  us  company. 

Fortunately  the  scenery  is  very  beautiful — fine  views  of  the 
river  and  the  hills,  so  we  were  not  really  impatient.  It  was,  how- 
ever, late  in  the  afternoon  ere  we  reached  the  village  of  Kong-ke'o, 
where  Ave  had  left  the  Mission  house-boat.  "We  found  it  moored 
just  above  the  extraordinary  old  bridge,  of  which  I  secured  a  rapid 
sketch,  greatly  to  the  delight  of  a  small  boy,  who  watched  its 
progress  with  breathless  interest,  and  turning  to  the  crowd  as- 
sembled on  the  bank,  exclaimed,  "  Oh  !  how  clever  these  foreign 
women  are  ! :'  The  people  were  all  most  civil,  thanks,  as  I  before 
observed,  to  the  presence  here  of  an  American  Mission. 

AVe  started  as  soon  as  possible,  and  congratulated  ourselves  on 
being  under  cover,  for  a  heavy  rainstorm  came  on,  which  con- 
tinued all  the  evening ;  the  boatmen,  however,  worked  steadily, 
and  we  reached  our  moorings  near  the  north  gate  of  this  city 
before  midnight,  but  deemed  it  expedient  to  sleep  on  board  rather 
than  disturb  the  sleepers.  So  this  morning  we  awoke  to  full  en- 
joyment of  the  freshness  of  the  dawn,  the  night's  rain  having  done 
good  work  in  reviving  the  thirsty  and  drooping  flowers.  A  short 
walk  brought  us  back  here,  where  my  companions  slipped  quietly 
into  their  own  house,  and  I  into  this  pleasant  room  to  dress  com- 
fortably ere  the  family  were  astir. 


IN    THE    CITY. 
CHAPTEK     XXVI. 

WALKS    WITH    BISHOP    RUSSELL. 

Temples  to  the  Gods  of  Wealth  and  of  "War— The  Gods  of  all  Time— The  Beven 
hells — Buddhist  nuns — Taouist  nuns — A  seven-dragon  head  canopy— <  rod- 
dess  of  Mercy  on  the  serpent's  head — Chinese  illustrations  of  Scripture — 
The  seven  heavens — Fine  embossed  bell — A  group  of  monasteries — Our 
reception — Ceremonial  visiting-cards — .Monastic  interior — The  three  Bud- 
dhas — Merit  of  burning  written  paper — No  prospectuses  ! — Xo  posts — St'  ick 
Exchange — Carrier-pigeons! — Few  newspapers — The  '  Peking  Gazette.' 

Ninopo,  Ma 
The  days  slip  by,  each  marked  by  some  (to  me  most  memorable) 
walk  and  talk.  From  the  bishop's  long  residence  in  this  city,  and 
keen  interest  in  all  that  concerns  its  people,  he  has,  of  course, 
acquired  a  wonderful  knowledge  of  all  its  chief  attractions;  and 
moreover,  he  has  gained  the  confidence  and  respect  of  the  people  of 
every  degree  in  so  remarkable  a  manner  that  it  is  indeed  a  privilege 
to  accompany  him  on  his  walks. 

Last  Monday  he  took  me  to  "  The  Lakes,"  which  are  small  pools 
in  the  midst  of  many  temples.  We  explored  two  of  these — one 
military,  sacred  to  the  God  of  "War  and  to  a  deified  hero,  the  other 
to  the  God  of  Wealth.  The  latter  is  always  represented  as  a  most 
jovial  person,  seated  on  a  couch,  and  immensely  fat,  which  is  the 
Chinese  ideal  of  prosperity.  This  temple  is  in  perfect  order,  and  is 
evidently  in  high  favour.  Here  every  house  has  its  shrine  for  this 
most  popular  god,  as  also  for  the  kitchen  god  and  the  god  of  the 
door.     These  receive  daily  worship  from  every  one. 

There  have  recently  been  very  grand  theatricals  at  this  temple, 
for  the  amusement  of  the  wealth-conferring  god  ;  and  the  bishop 
having  occasion  to  pass  that  way  last  Sunday,  found  so  vast  a 
crowd  assembled,  that  he  thinks  it  cannot  have  numbered  Less  than 
twenty  thousand !  Arriving  on  the  following  day,  we  found  the 
place  utterly  deserted,  save  by  a  family  of  women,  who  were  silently, 
as  in  duty  bound,  feeding  their  fat  silk-worms  with  fresh  mulberry- 
leaves  in  the  rooms  behind  the  temple. 

On  we  went  through  intricate  streets,  crossing  most  picturesque 
canal  bridges,  with  quaint  little  shrines,  and  totally  regardless  of 
ever-changing  and  most  horrible  odours,  till  we  reached  the  temple 
which  was  the  special  object  of  our  search.     It  is  sacred  to  all  the 


326  WALKS    WITH    BISHOP    RUSSELL. 

gods  of  time — the  gods  of  the  year,  the  months,  the  days,  and 
the  hours.  All  are  represented  with  long  black  moustaches.  The 
central  one  is  seated  beneath  the  triple  scarlet  umbrella,  richly 
embroidered  in  gold  and  colours,  which  now,  as  in  ancient  days,  is 
the  highest  emblem  of  authority.  The  amount  of  detail  in  any 
one  of  these  innumerable  temples  is  wonderful — the  multitude  of 
small  carved  figures,  the  profusion  of  gilding  and  rich  colour,  the 
various  objects  used  in  the  service  of  the  temple. 

One  shrine  (I  think  that  of  the  seventh  month)  is  almost  hidden 
by  the  number  of  theatrical  crowns  hung  before  it,  while  countless 
strips  of  straw  are  tied  to  the  railing.  All  these  are  votive  offer- 
ings from  women  who  come  here  to  pray  for  additions  to  their 
families. 

The  object  we  had  come  to  see  was  a  representation  of  the 
Buddhist  hells,  which  occupies  the  side  court  on  the  left  hand.  It 
is  at  present  closed  for  repairs,  but  at  the  bishop's  request  the 
attendant  priests  kindly  opened  it,  and  we  beheld  that  strangest  of 
incongruities,  representations  of  spiritual  beings  revealing  the  lath 
and  plaster  of  which  they  are  constructed,  and  the  paint-pots  to 
Avhich  they  owe  their  splendour  ! 

It  is  one  of  the  most  striking  peculiarities  of  the  Chinese,  that  in 
their  public  buildings,  as  in  their  own  homes,  there  is  no  system  of 
keeping  things  in  repair ;  nowhere  is  the  theory  of  the  stitch  in 
time  so  wholly  ignored.  In  a  mandarin's  house,  as  in  these  temples, 
no  expense  is  spared  in  the  first  instance,  but  thenceforward  dirt  is 
allowed  to  accumulate,  and  decay  to  work  quiet  destruction,  un- 
checked for  years,  till  the  whole  is  in  a  state  of  ruin.  Then  great 
efforts  are  made  to  raise  large  funds,  and  the  whole  is  thoroughly 
repaired,  and  reappears  in  all  the  glory  of  new  carving,  with  much 
gold  and  gaudy  colouring. 

It  is  needless  to  say  that  the  chamber  of  horrors  in  which  we 
now  found  ourselves  was  in  every  respect  as  repulsive  as  might  be 
expected  from  artists  whose  ideas  of  punishment  are  derived  from 
the  tortures  commonly  used  in  Chinese  courts  of  in-justice.  The 
various  penalties  for  every  conceivable  form  of  sin  are  represented 
by  different  groups  of  figures  of  carved  wood,  coloured  and  gilt, 
supposed  to  be  human  culprits  enduring  every  form  of  torture 
which  the  ingenuity  of  devils  can  devise.  These  realms  of  anguish 
are  controlled  by  life-size  figures  of  fierce  judges  with  black  beard 
and  moustaches,  and  holding  books  of  account.  The  hideous 
jubilant  devils  with  painted  faces  do  their  bidding  as  willing  exe- 
cutioners.   Some  of  the  victims  are  laid  like  the  spokes  of  a  wheel 


VERY    MATERIAL    HELLS.  327 

between  great  flat  stones  with  only  their  heads  visible,  and  devils 
spearing  their  eyes — some  are  being  ground  in  a  mill — some  sawn 
in  two.  All  the  horrors  we  had  seen  in  the  temples  at  Canton 
and  Foo-Chow  1  are  here  reproduced.  The  whole  is  presided  over 
by  a  large  repulsive  figure  in  white,  with  blood  streaming  from 
and  nostrils,  who  is  ever  on  the  watch  to  seize  the  souls  of  the 
dying.  Her  beauty  was  being  enhanced  by  a  fresh  coat  of  paint  ! 
So  far  as  paint  can  suggest  it,  there  is  no  lack  of  material  fire  and 
devils  with  pitchforks,  and  I  thought  with  humiliation  how  nearly 
akin  to  the  atrocities  here  represented  are  the  pictures  which  I  have 
seen  displayed  by  the  largest  division  of  the  Christian  Church,  both 
here  and  in  Japan,  for  the  edification  of  its  converts. 

Strange  to  say,  there  is  apparently  no  idea  of  representing  any 
corresponding  heaven.  Xowhere  in  China  have  I  seen  such,  except 
as  representing  a  hierarchy  of  very  ugly  gods. 

Our  next  visit  was  to  the  old  Confucian  temple,  which  stands 
by  itself  in  forsaken-looking  grounds  overgrown  with  tall  grass. 
In  front  is  a  sheet  of  water  with  a  quaint  bridge.  The  temple  is 
in  the  usual  condition  of  semi- decay,  but  handsome  in  its  severe 
simplicity.  Like  all  other  orthodox  shrines  to  the  memory  of  the 
great  sage,  it  contains  no  image  of  any  sort,  the  sole  object  of 
worship  being  the  scarlet  and  gold  tablet  which  bears  his  name,  and 
those  which  record  his  most  honoured  disciples. 

At  one  of  the  temples  we  met  a  party  of  Buddhist  nuns — funny 
little  figures,  precisely  like  diminutive  monks.  Their  dress  is 
identical — the  same  long  grey  or  yellow  robe,  white  stockings,  and 
thick  shoes  like  those  worn  by  men,  and  their  poor  bare  heads  are 
equally  close  shaven,  and  somehow  look  more  unnatural.  To  this 
process  the  little  ten-year-old  novices  are  partially  subjected,  and 
it  is  completed  when,  at  the  advanced  age  of  sixteen,  the  full-Mown 
sister  takes  the  vows  of  perpetual  virginity,  of  vegetarian  diet,  and 
strict  obedience  to  the  precepts  of  Buddha. 

These  vows  are  made  in  presence  of  Kwan-Yin,  the  Goddess  of 
Mercy,  who  herself  was  a  canonised  Buddhist  nun,  and  thenceforth 
the  sole  duty  of  these  poor  girls  seems  to  lie  in  going  from  house 
to  house,  wherever  their  services  are  required  on  behalf  of  den 
women,  for  whose  benefit  they  chant  prayers  to  Kwan-Yin  the  live- 
long day.  When  this  exciting  work  is  not  required,  they  arc  said 
to  spend  their  dull  lives  in  a  state  of  utter  vacuity,  being  literally 
without  occupation,  save  that  some  of  the  younger  sisters  employ 
their  leisure  on  silk  embroidery. 

1  See  pp.  214,  226. 


:*»2S  WALKS    WITH    BISHOP    RUSSELL. 

Many  endeavour  to  become  living  prayer- wheels,  by  repeating 
some  form  of  words  so  many  thousand  times  a-day.  Those  whom 
we  met  this  morning  were  making  a  pilgrimage  to  many  shrines, 
hut  they  apparently  never  paused  for  one  moment  in  the  ceaseless 
reiteration  of  the  four-syllabled  charm — 0  mi  to  Fo/  0  mi  to 
Fo/ — except  when,  after  gazing  iixedly  at  us  with  great  interest 
and  evident  doubt,  one  who  apparently  had  not  previously  seen 
foreign  ladies,  thought  that  being  in  the  temple  we  must  necessarily 
be  some  sort  of  Poussa,  and  expressed  her  conviction  that  they 
ought  to  worship  us.  On  being  assured  that  this  was  rpiite  un- 
necessary, she  resumed  her  low  murmur — 0  mi  to  Fo/  0  mi 
tn  Fo/  Had  you  met  this  company,  you  would  probably  have 
taken  them  for  a  party  of  gibbering  idioto,  whereas  they  were  only 
devout  little  nuns,  accumulating  stores  of  celestial  merit  by  ascribing 
praise  to  Fuh,  alias  Buddha. 

I  am  told  that  though  Buddhist  convents  are  very  numerous, 
they  are  on  a  much  smaller  scale  than  the  monasteries,  rarely  ex- 
ceeding fifty  or  sixty  inmates,  while  some  only  muster  about  a  dozen. 

It  appears  that  Buddhism  has  no  monopoly  of  the  monastic 
system.  Taouist  monasteries  and  Taouist  nunneries  also  abound. . 
The  latter  have  a  decided  advantage  over  the  Buddhist  nunneries, 
in  that  shaving  the  head  is  not  enjoined ;  on  the  contrary,  the 
Taouist  sisters  wear  their  long  black  hair  fastened  on  the  top  of 
the  head  with  a  peculiar  tortoise-shell  comb  of  a  pattern  speciallj* 
designed  for  the  use  of  the  Taouist  priests.  They  also  enjoy  tin- 
privilege  so  dear  to  all  girls  of  good  family,  of  showing  that  they 
have  had  their  feet  crippled  in  childhood ;  whereas  the  Buddhist 
nuns,  with  their  great  masculine-looking  black  shoes,  might  as  well 
have  low-caste  full-sized  feet.  In  point  of  fact,  though  maidens  of 
every  degree  do  join  the  sisterhood  (often  as  the  only  means  of 
avoiding  a  distasteful  marriage),  the  majority  are  recruited  from  the 
lower  orders.  Whether  justly  or  unjustly,  the  morality  of  the  in- 
mates of  these  convents  of  both  religions  is  very  lightly  esteemed 
by  their  countrymen. 

Our  first  halt  on  the  following  day  was  at  an  old  Buddhist 
temple,  which  interested  me  particularly,  because  on  the  cloud 
canopy  of  the  great  gilt  image  of  Buddha  are  represented  seven 
dragons'  heads.  This  is  the  first  indication  I  have  seen  in  China 
suggesting  any  survival  of  that  legend  of  the  seven-headed  serpent, 
which  holds  so  conspicuous  a  place  in  the  Buddhism  of  ancient 
India  and  Ceylon,  where  it  is  generally  represented  uprearing  itself 
as  a  protecting  canopy  above  the  Buddha. 


KISANNON,    GODDIiSS    OF    MERCY,    WITH     I  III.    YXM   N<  i    CHILD, 
AND    WHITE    1  mi 

Descending  from  Heaven  on  the  Celestial   Dog.     The  Divine  Bird 
Rosary.     Below  are  adoring  spirits.  m  a  Buddhist  Monastery  in 


THE  GODDESS  OF  MERCY.  329 

At  the  back  of  this  shrine  we  found,  as  is  usual  in  this  district, 
a  great  altar  to  the  Goddess  of  Mercy,  who  is  here  represented 
standing  on  the  head  of  a  gigantic  serpent,  while  attendants  repre- 
senting Chinese  cherubs  float  around  her  on  clouds.  The  young 
child  in  her  arms,  and  the  glory  around  her  head,  and  the  presence 
of  the  mystic  bird  descending  from  heaven,  seem  so  singular  a 
counterpart  of  the  ordinary  representations  of  the  Blessed  Virgin, 
that  finding  them  here  in  Buddha's  temple  recalled  to  my  memory 
a  curious  little  chapel  I  visited  in  a  remote  district  of  Ceylon,  where 
the  semi-Catholicised  people  had  erected  an  altar  to  Buddha  on  one 
side,  and  to  the  Madonna  on  the  other ! 

The  resemblances  in  detail  are  so  extraordinary  that  it  is  scarcely 
credible  that  there  has  been  no  connection  between  the  two,  and 
though  the  matter  cannot  be  proven,  and  the  Chinese  claim  to  have 
worshipped  this  goddess  from  remotest  ages,  it  is  said  that  this 
particular  symbolism  cannot  be  traced  further  back  than  to  a  period 
when  it  might  have  been  engrafted  from  intercourse  with  the  early 
Jesuits :  especially  the  liturgies  to  Kwan-Yin — which  are  said  so 
strangely  to  resemble  the  offices  of  the  Blessed  Virgin — cannot  be 
traced  back  for  more  than  four  hundred  years.  Anyhow,  it  is  pos- 
sible that  some  of  these  analogies  may  have  been  derived  from  the 
2^estorian  Christians  who  so  early  found  their  way  to  China,  and 
who  about  a.d.  700  had  established  a  flourishing  mission,  fully  pro- 
vided with  bishops  and  archbishops. 

It  certainly  is  very  amusing  to  see  the  way  in  which  Biblical 
stories  are  transformed  when  illustrated  by  artistic  Chinese  Chris- 
tians, and  how  thoroughly  they  are  imbued  with  the  local  colour- 
ing. One  such  has  been  described  to  me,  showing  the  meeting  of 
Philip  with  the  Ethiopian  eunuch,  in  which  Philip  is  represented 
being  drawn  by  a  Chinese  coolie  in  a  jinriksha — that  being  the 
Chinese  ideal  of  a  chariot.  I  have  also  seen  some  very  quaint 
illustrations  of  the  Parables  and  of  scenes  from  '  The  Pilgrim's 
Progress,'  in  which  all  the  characters  are  Chinese  men,  women, 
and  children — men  with  shaven  brow  and  long  pigtails,  and  ladies 
tottering  on  lily-feet — with  fantastic  buildings  and  bridges,  singu- 
larly unlike  our  ideals  !  Imagine  a  Chinese  "Prodigal  Son"  being 
welcomed  by  a  gorgeous  mandarin,  and  the  "  Ten  Virgins,"  all 
small-footed,  with  hair  dressed  in  the  wings  peculiar  to  Xingpo  ! 
So  all  this  suggests  how  very  easily  some  sample  of  Christian 
medieval  art  may  have  found  its  way  here,  and  have  been  incor- 
porated by  all-embracing  liuddhism. 

Passing  onward,  we  stopped  at  a  picture-shop  to  examine  a  very 


330  WALKS    WITH    BISHOP    RUSSELL. 

curious  representation  of  the  Buddhist  Pantheon,  showing  the  seven 
heavens  with  all  the  multitudinous  gods  placed  in  their  proper 
gradation.  Strange,  indeed,  it  seems  to  find  these  many  lords  and 
gods  incorporated  with  Buddhism,  which  in  its  early  purity  so 
utterly  repudiated  them  all. 

I  forgot  to  mention  that  at  the  temple  where  the  goddess  is 
shown  bruising  the  serpent's  head,  there  is  a  very  uncommon  and 
picturesque  four-storeyed  belfry  containing  a  splendid  bronze  bell, 
at  least  eight  feet  deep,  and  all  round  it  are  embossed  the  five 
hundred  disciples  of  Buddha.  They  are  all  sitting,  and  to  each 
figure  is  only  allowed  a  space  about  four  inches  square,  but  each 
figure  is  different  from  all  the  others. 

We  next  went  to  a  group  of  great  temples  and  monasteries  just 
inside  the  South  Gate.  In  the  first  Ave  entered  we  saw  about  eighty 
priests  and  monks,  some  with  yellow  robes,  some  with  grey,  but 
all  wearing  a  yellow  mantle,  fastened  on  the  shoulder  by  a  large 
clasp  of  imitation  jade. 

In  the  absence  of  the  old  abbot,  Ave  Avere  received  by  a  very  in- 
telligent young  man,  AATith  bright  clever  eyes,  who  did  the  honours 
of  the  place  most  gracefully. 

We  were  conducted  to  a  Arery  fine  reception-room,  Avith  the 
usual  handsome  but  very  uncomfortable  high  arm-chairs  of  canred 
and  polished  blackAvood,  with  scarlet  cushions  —  a  high  small 
square  table  standing  beside  each.  At  one  end  of  the  room  is  a 
raised  dais,  reserved  for  the  most  honoured  guests,  who  lounge  on 
scarlet  cushions,  betAveen  which  stands  a  small  table  only  a  feAV 
inches  in  height.  Here  A\re  were  placed,  and  fragrant  tea  in  coA'ered 
cups  AATas  offered  to  us  Avith  the  usual  small  cakes.  Our  ecclesias- 
tical entertainers  sat  bolt-upright  on  the  extreme  edge  of  the  high 
arm-chairs,  but  turning  their  bodies  towards  us,  which  is  the 
correct  attitude  to  assume  on  the  occasion — and  in  China  special 
etiquette  rules  eA'ery  action  of  life. 

Truly  Avearisome  to  the  blunt  Anglo-Saxon  is  the  necessity  for 
conforming  Avith  the  elaborate  civility  enjoined  by  Chinese  etiquette. 
When  a  visitor  calls,  both  host  and  guest  bow  till  their  clenched 
fists,  closely  pressed  together,  almost  touch  the  earth,  then  rising, 
they  lift  these  fists  to  the  forehead,  or  else  they  approach  one 
another  bowing,  and  each  shaking  his  own  hands  (?>.,  wagging 
his  fists  up  and  down).  Then  follows  a  struggle  to  induce  the 
guest  (A\dio  at  once  takes  the  AA'orst  seat  in  the  room)  to  occupy 
the  place  of  honour ;  and  when,  after  much  ceremonious  drinking 
of  tea  and  conversation  in  well-rounded  sentences,  the  guest  rises 


ELABORATE    CIVILITY.  331 

to  go,  the  host  must  urge  him  to  stay,  or  at  least  to  "  walk  slowly," 
if  he  really  must  take  his  leave.  Then  follow  more  low  bows  and 
hand-shakings. 

One  essential  for  all  English  officials  in  this  country  is  to  have 
enormous  crimson  visiting-cards,  or  rather  slips  of  paper  averaging 
ten  inches  by  four,  on  which  the  equivalent  of  their  name  is 
inscribed  in  black  Chinese  characters.  As  there  is  no  alphabet 
whereby  exactly  to  represent  sound,  the  only  way  in  which  a 
foreign  name  can  be  written  is  by  adopting  the  character  which 
represents  a  word  with  somewhat  similar  sound.  It  may  happen 
that  this  word  would  be  very  ridiculous,  as  well  as  bearing  only  a 
faint  resemblance  to  the  actual  name,  so  most  persons  prefer  to 
adopt  a  short  Chinese  name  which  has  some  sort  of  likeness  to 
their  own,  and  by  this  they  become  known  to  their  Chinese  friends. 
These  large  cards  are  carried  in  a  small  portfolio,  and  in  paying 
a  visit  of  ceremony  a  servant  is  sent  in  advance  to  deliver  this 
warning  of  your  approach. 

The  bishop's  long  residence  in  Xingpo  (since  1848)  has  of 
course  made  him  thoroughly  familiar  with  all  the  elaborate  cour- 
tesies and  formalities  which  the  Chinese  deem  so  essential,  while 
he  has  so  thoroughly  mastered  all  the  intricacies  of  their  heart- 
breaking language,  that  he  is  even  able  therein  to  indulge  the 
ready  wit  which  flows  so  easily  from  his  lips  in  his  mother 
tongue.  Consequently,  whenever  he  gets  into  conversation  with 
the  people,  he  is  always  certain  of  a  most  attentive  audience.  On 
the  present  occasion,  all  the  brethren  came  crowding  round  to 
hear  his  talk  with  the  sub-abbot,  evidently  keenly  interested. 
We  remarked  what  very  young  men  they  all  were,  and  were  told 
that  the  older  men  retire  to  the  monasteries  in  the  mountains  to 
end  their  days  in  contemplation ;  but  the  younger  and  more  active 
men  are  kept  in  the  cities  to  go  about  performing  all  the  religious 
services  required  of  them. 

Presently  the  slow  boom  of  the  deep-toned  gong  announced  the 
hour  of  worship  in  the  Great  Temple  in  presence  of  the  Three 
Great  Buddhas,  whereupon  the  majority  of  the  brethren  regretfully 
departed,  but  the  young  principal  remained  to  do  honour  to  his 
guests,  and  took  us  to  his  own  sitting-room,  where  some  Chinese 
visitors  were  dining.  He  was  hospitably  anxious  that  we  should 
do  likewise,  failing  which,  he  led  us  to  the  great  refectory  and 
the  kitchen,  in  which  rice  can  be  cooked  for  two  thousand  per- 
sons !  also  to  the  guest-chamber,  specially  devoted  to  travelling 
priests,  of  whom  a  considerable  number  were  there  resting.     The 


332  walks   with    BISHOP   aUSSELL. 

bishop  talked  to  them  nil,  and  found  that  they  came  from  different 
provinces  all  over  the  empire.  Each  carries  a  certificate  which 
proves  him  to  be  a  true  priest  or  monk,  and  ensures  him  lodging 
for  a  reasonable  period  in  any  monastery  where  he  may  arrive. 
Doubtless  this  privilege  is  a  good  deal  abused  by  the  idlers,  one  of 
whom  told  us  one  day,  with  a  chuckle  of  delight,  that  since  he 
had  become  a  monk  he  had  no  longer  any  occasion  to  work,  for 
thai  any  "  tail-less"  (//'.,  shaven)  man  could  always  count  on  food 
and  raiment. 

In  a  small  temple  (a  sort  of  private  oratory)  we  found  several 
yellow-robed,  shaven-headed  priests  endeavouring  to  absorb  them- 
selves in  religious  meditation.  They  were  seated  on  hard  wooden 
chairs  set  against  the  wall,  with  their  legs  tucked  up  tailor- 
wise,  in  the  attitude  peculiar  to  Buddha,  like  whom  they  were 
trying  to  lose  themselves  in  a  state  of  semi-unconsciousness — a 
religious  ecstasy  which  might  result  in  a  trance.  I  fear  these 
spiritual  aspirations  must  have  been  seriously  disturbed  by  the 
natural  curiosity  to  steal  a  glance  at  such  unwonted  visitors ! 

On  the  Avails  hung  curious  rubbings  from  ancient  tablets,  and 
some  fine  pieces  of  blue  china  and  old  bronze  adorned  the  altar. 
Before  the  images  were  the  usual  brasiers  full  of  ashes  of  old  in- 
cense, in  which  each  worshipper  places  a  newly  lighted  incense- 
stick  ere  commencing  his  worship  or  his  meditation. 

In  the  library  some  students  were  droning  drearily  over  the 
religious  classics,  which  are  said  to  be  as  dull  as  they  look,  but 
which  are  the  only  literature  which  here  finds  admission. 

Seeing  that  my  attention  was  arrested  by  a  large  woodcut, 
printed  at  the  monastic  press,  showing  the  Goddess  of  Mercy  with 
the  young  child  in  her  arms,  sitting  on  clouds  with  the  dragon 
under  her  feet,  and  surrounded  by  white  water-lilies  and  Chinese 
celestial  beings,  one  of  the  priests  kindly  presented  me  with  a 
copy  of  it ;  and  a  very  curious  and  interesting  gift  I  consider  it, 
even  if  indeed  this  peculiar  symbolism  is  due  to  intercourse  with 
the  early  Jesuits  —  a  suggestion  which  the  Chinese  indignantly 
scout. 

We  looked  into  the  Great  Temple  where  the  brethren  were  chant- 
ing their  litanies  to  the  "  Three  Precious  Buddhas,"  or  "  The  Pure 
Ones,"  as  they  are  commonly  called.  Here  as  elsewhere  they  are 
represented  by  three  gigantic  gilded  images  exactly  alike,  and  with 
an  expression  of  calm  repose.  This  trinity  represents  Buddha, 
I  >harma,  and  Sanga,  who  together  are  worshipped  as  the  one 
person  Fo  or  Buddha  (just  as  in  the  Hindoo  faith  we  find  triune 


FURNACE    FOR   BURNING    PAPER.  333 

images  of  Brahma,  Vishnu,  and  Siva,  though  Brahrna  is  "worshipped 
as  supreme). 

The  meaning  of  these  three  impersonations  is  said  to  be — 

Buddha — The  intelligence  in  the  Buddhas  still  to  come. 

Dharma — The  law  revealed  in  the  "writings. 

Sanga — The  union  in  the  multitude  of  believers. 
The  simpler  explanation  is  that  they  represent  the  Buddhas  of  the 
Past,  the  Present,  and  the  Future. 

Besides  these  really  impressive  golden  gods,  there  are  the  usual 
series  of  other  idols  of  all  sorts — as  diverse  in  material  as  in  the 
characters  they  represent — also  the  usual  altars  "with  great  bronze 
vessels  for  flowers,  incense,  and  candles,  and  over  all  is  the  coating 
of  dirt  and  the  veil  of  dustdaden  cobwebs  which,  except  at  the 
great  Xew  Year  purification,  seem  so  invariable  an  adjunct  of  all 
Chinese  temples,  and  one  so  strikingly  in  contrast  with  the  exquisite 
cleanliness  of  those  in  Japan. 

Grotesque  mythological  stone  animals  guard  the  open  courtyard, 
where  stands  the  brazen  furnace  in  which  are  daily  burnt  all 
papers  collected  in  the  streets  on  which  are  written  or  printed 
characters. 

That  furnace  for  the  burning  of  all  scraps  of  paper,  points  to 
the  strange  reverence  for  learning  which  characterises  this  people. 
As  the  Mohammedan  carefully  commits  to  the  flame  any  paper  on 
which  the  name  of  the  Almighty  might  chance  to  be  inscribed, 
that  he  may  thus  save  it  from  possible  profanation,  so  the  Chinese 
honour  all  papers,  that  by  so  doing  they  may  preserve  any  quota- 
tion from  the  writings  of  Confucius,  or  other  classical  authority, 
from  being  trampled  under  foot.  It  is  therefore  an  act  of  merit 
either  to  go  in  person,  or  by  deputy,  carrying  large  baskets,  and 
therein  to  collect  every  paper  which  chance  or  house-sweeping  may 
have  deposited  in  the  streets ;  careful  housekeepers  help  in  this 
good  work  by  saving  all  such  fragments,  and  on  hearing  the  cry  of 
the  paper-collectors,  they  hurry  out  to  add  their  stores  to  his  big 
baskets.  These  are  then  carried  to  the  temple  to  be  burnt,  and  the 
correct  thing  to  do  is  to  collect  the  ashes  of  the  brasier  in  earthen- 
ware jars,  in  which  they  are  carried  to  the  nearest  river  and  are 
sprinkled  on  its  waters,  that  so  they  may  be  borne  along  to  the 
ocean  ! 

This  is  done  in  obedience  to  an  edict  of  the  great  Emperor 
Kang-hi  who  proclaimed  that  there  is  nothing  more  precious  in 
heaven  and  earth  than  written  characters,  and  who  consequently 
forbade  shopkeepers   to  traffic   in  such  when  disposing  of  waste 


:'.". 4  WALKS  WITH    BISHOP    RUSSELL. 

paper,  but  bade  them  reverently  collect  all  fragments  to  be  com- 
mitted to  the  sacred  flumes. 

If.  would,  however,  appear  from  a  memorial  to  the  throne,  pub- 
lished in  a  recent  issue  of  the  '  Peking  Gazette,'  that  this  com- 
mandment is  frequently  infringed  at  some  of  the  eighty  establish- 
ments for  the  remanufacture  of  waste  paper  which  exist  in  Peking. 
The  memorialist  prays  that  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  of  an  escaped 
criminal's  house  and  furniture  (though  they  will  not  fetch  much  !) 
should  be  devoted  to  the  purchase,  at  so  much  per  lb.,  of  such 
paper  as  bears  written  characters,  in  order  to  secure  proper  burning 
thereof. 

"We  could  scarcely  have  a  better  proof  that  Chinese  households 
are  as  yet  exempt  from  the  incessant  posts  and  showers  of  news- 
papers, letters,  telegrams,  and  prospectuses  of  every  object  under 
heaven,  which  flood  the  homes  of  peaceful  citizens  in  Britain  ! 
And  this  is  another  thing  which  strikes  one  in  this  exceedingly 
conservative  vast  empire,  as  being  in  strangely  marked  contrast 
with  the  extraordinarily  rapid  development  of  such  matters  in  the 
little  island-empire  of  Japan.  Whereas  in  the  latter  a  dozen  years 
have  sufficed  to  establish  postal  organisation,  telegraphs,  and  rail- 
ways on  a  footing  worthy  of  Europe  or  America,  China  not  only 
continues  jealously  to  exclude  railways  and  telegraphs  (the  tele- 
graph recently  established  between  Peking  and  Shanghai,  and  the 
projected  railway  from  Taku  to  Tung-Chow,  being  as  yet  the  sole 
exceptions),  but  she  actually  has  no  Government  institution  for 
the  transmission  of  posts  ! x  As  regards  the  telegraph,  when  its 
creation  at  Shanghai  was  first  sanctioned,  all  the  Chinese  merchants 
made  a  league  to  turn  out  of  their  guilds  any  who  should  be  guilty 
of  selling  by  telegraph  ! 

In  Japan,  the  rapidly  developed  system  of  newspapers  would  in 
itself  require  an  elaborate  method  of  distribution ;  whereas  China, 
which  esteems  itself  the  most  literary  of  nations  (as  shown  in  its 
reverence  for  its  dreary  classics  concerning  a  remote  past),  is  still 
practically  without  newspapers,  consequently  these  do  not  call  for 
postal  consideration. 

But  as  regards  letters,  a  considerable  proportion  of  the  four 
hundred  million  Chinamen  do  occasionally  exchange  such — those 
who  cannot  write  for  themselves  hiring  scribes  to  do  so.  These 
letters  are  consigned  to  firms  which  have  houses  in  all  the  large 

1  Since  the  above  was  written,  awakening  China  lias  constructed  telegraphs 
throughout  the  empire,  and  has  now  commenced  to  organise  a  national  postal 
system. 


POSTAL  DEFICIENCIES.  335 

towns,  whence  letters  are  forwarded  to  distant  posts,  where  they 
are  distributed  by  special  agents,  who  generally  collect  the  postage 
from  the  receiver.  An  amusing  illustration  of  postal  deficiencies 
was  afforded  when  the  British,  having  first  unlocked  the  gates  of 
Peking  with  the  sword,  had  secured  a  footing  within  the  city,  and 
of  course  immediately  established  a  regular  postal  communication 
with  Shanghai  and  Canton.  The  Chinese  authorities  proved  their 
confidence  in  the  trustworthiness  of  the  barbarians  by  requesting 
them  to  transmit  various  important  State  messages  to  officials  in 
the  far  south  of  the  empire  ! 

But  for  all  ordinary  communications,  these  placid  Celestials,  to 
whom  hurry  appears  a  form  of  vulgar  impatience,  and  to  whom 
telegraphs  have  hitherto  been  an  abomination,  are  content  that 
they  should  be  conveyed  either  by  slow  paddling  or  poling  boats, 
or  else  by  foot-runners,  who  carry  their  letter-bag  in  most  primitive 
fashion,  secured  on  their  back  by  a  cloth  knotted  across  the  chest. 
In  a  case  of  great  urgency,  however,  such  as  announcing  the  death 
of  an  emperor,  relays  of  express  messengers  have  been  known  to 
accomplish  their  journeys  at  the  rate  of  a  hundred  miles  in  twelve 
hours ;  moreover,  on  some  of  the  inland  rivers,  long  very  narrow 
boats  are  employed  as  post-bearers.  These  are  expected  to  travel 
seventy  miles  in  twelve  hours,  and  to  keep  up  this  pace  day  and 
night.  They  are  propelled  by  only  one  man,  who  sits  astern, 
and  while  steering  with  one  long  oar,  works  a  second  short  broad 
oar  with  his  feet.  This  is  pretty  hard  work,  so  we  need  not 
wonder  that  in  summer  he  finds  it  comfortable  to  dispense  with 
his  clothes ! 

Although  the  rise  and  fall  of  nations  in  the  outer  world  are 
topics  so  wholly  without  interest  to  these  millions,  there  are  some 
subjects  which  call  forth  an  eager  desire  for  information.  Fore- 
most among  these  is  the  declaration  of  the  list  of  the  successful 
candidates  for  literary  degrees  at  the  great  annual  and  triennial 
examinations,  the  publication  of  which  is  awaited  with  feverish 
anxiety  not  only  by  the  competitors  and  their  friends,  but  by  all 
China.  So  carrier-pigeons  are  much  employed,  and  travel  at  the 
rate  of  eighty  miles  in  three  hours. 

I  quote  this  distance  as  being  one  which  is  daily  traversed 
by  these  messenger-birds — namely,  that  between  Soo-Chow  and 
Shanghai — between  which  two  cities  and  that  of  Hankow,  busi- 
ness quotations  are  continually  sent  to  and  fro  by  pigeons,  the 
messages  they  bring  regulating  the  daily  value  of  the  dollar  in 
copper  cash,  which  is  a  matter  for  heavy  speculation  and  wild  6X- 


336  WALKS    WITH    BISHOP    RUSSELL. 

citemenl  at  the  dollar  auction,  which  represents  the  Chinese  Stock 
Exchange. 

Business-like  Britons,  who  look  to  their  daily  paper  for  tidings 
of  fluctuations  in  the  money-market,  may  well  wonder  that  a  great 
mercantile  nation  such  as  this  can  exist  virtually  without  news- 
papers, 1'iit  s..  it  is.  While  the  native  press  of  little  ultra-progressive 
Japan  already  produces  no  less  than  250  newspapers  (all  of  which 
circulate  freely  among  eager  purchasers,  thirsting  for  the  latest  news 
of  all  sorts),  the  vast  Chinese  empire  produces  only  twenty-two 
periodicals,  and  of  these  only  twelve  are  in  the  vernacular ;  nine 
are  in  English  and  one  is  in  French.  Even  of  these,  the  circulation 
is  so  extraordinarily  small,  that  newspapers  may  fairly  be  considered 
unknown  to  the  four  hundred  million  inhabitants  of  the  Celestial 
empire.     Liberty  of  the  press  is  altogether  a  thing  not  realised. 

With  three  exceptions,  all  China's  very  limited  list  are  published 
at  four  of  the  treaty  ports  open  to  foreigners.  Shanghai  has  given 
birth  to  fifteen — ISTingpo,  Eoo-Chow,  and  Amoy  are  answerable  for 
the  others.  Of  the  three  exceptions,  two  are  published  at  Hankow, 
700  miles  inland,  but  situated  on  the  great  river  Yang-tze-kiang — 
a  waterway  which,  by  opening  communication  with  the  seaports, 
has  perhaps  tended  to  introduce  this  wonderful  innovation.  Even 
Canton,  with  its  population  of  1,500,000  (so  near  to  the  British 
colony  of  Hong-Kong,  where  emancipated  Chinamen  attain  to 
many  enlarged  ideas,  and  which  publishes  ten  English  and  four 
Chinese  papers),  has  not  one  publication  of  any  sort  ! ! 

The  third  exception,  and  the  sole  newspaper  of  the  whole  vast 
extent  of  Xorthern  China,  is  the  '  Peking  Gazette,'  which  is  beyond 
doubt  the  oldest  newspaper  in  the  world,  and  claims  to  have  existed 
long  before  the  AVestern  barbarians  invented  printing  for  them- 
selves. There  seems  no  reason  to  doubt  that  it  was  in  circulation 
in  the  twelfth  century.  Though  said  to  be  not  positively  official,, 
it  is  under  the  strictest  Government  control,  and  beyond  imperial 
edicts  and  petitions,  contains  only  such  morsels  of  information  as 
the  paternal  ( iovernment  sees  fit  to  impart  to  its  babes.  It  is  in 
the  form  of  a  pamphlet,  seven  inches  in  length  by  four  in  breadthr 
and  stitched  into  a  yellow  paper  cover,  which  proves  it  to  be  an 
imperial  messenger. 

There  are,  however,  three  editions,  one  of  which  has  a  red  cover, 
and  another  a  white  cover,  and  I  am  not  sure  which  is  which.  I 
understand,  however,  that  the  red  one  (which  is  published  every 
other  day)  contains  only  official  information,  while  the  white  one, 
which  appears  dady,  contains  information   on   police  reports  and 


A    VAST    FIELD    FOR   JOURNALISTS.  337 

other  matters  of  local  interest.  The  third  edition  contains  the 
cream  of  the  other  two,  in  a  cheaper  form,  for  the  populace.  The 
news  thus  disseminated  is  sometimes  extraordinarily  puerile,  and 
that  which  relates  to  intercourse  with  foreigners  is  apt  to  he 
amazingly  mendacious.  But  true  or  false,  this  metropolitan  oracle 
is  despatched  daily  to  the  capital  town  of  each  province,  where  it 
is  republished  under  strict  official  supervision;  and  woe  betide  the 
luckless  publisher  or  printer  who  ventures  to  alter  one  jot  or  one 
tittle,  even  when  he  is  aware  of  the  utter  falsity  of  the  information 
he  may  be  called  upon  to  print  ! 

This  strange,  stunted  little  gazette,  which  has  thus  survived  seven 
centuries  of  dwarfed  existence,  is  a  characteristic  example  of  many 
a  Chinese  institution,  fairly  commenced  ere  the  rest  of  the  world 
had  emerged  from  barbarism,  but  then  remaining  spellbound,  never 
developing.  But  already  the  journals  printed  under  foreign  pro- 
tection have  introduced  the  thin  end  of  the  wedge,  and  when  once 
a  taste  for  such  literature  is  awakened,  vast  indeed  is  the  field  that 
will  be  thrown  open  to  the  thousands  of  educated  Chinamen  who 
vainly  pine  to  find  some  scope  for  their  energies,  such  as  will  be 
afforded  in  providing  newspapers  for  the  four  hundred  million. 


CHAPTEB    XXVII. 

ECCLESIASTICAL     BARRACKS. 

Capture  of  Ningpo  by  the  Taipings — Ecclesiastical  barracks  ! — Temple  of  the 
God  of  Thunder — Spring  festival — Sacrifice  of  a  clay  ox  or  pasteboard 
buffalo — Indian  gods — Vishnu  and  a  litter  of  pigs — Monkey-god—"  New- 
gods  for  old  !  " 

Ningpo,  May  16th. 
We  have  been  enjoying  a  pleasant  stroll  on  the  old  Avails,  scrupu- 
lously avoiding  the  "  Baby  Towers,"  and  resolved  only  to  enjoy  the 
delicious  honeysuckle,  jessamine,  and  wild  roses  which  here  and 
there  clothe  the  walls  in  such  rich  profusion. 

These  grey  ramparts,  however,  recall  many  mixed  memories  to 
the  residents — memories  of  great  danger,  when  Ningpo  was  the 
bone  of  contention  between  the  rival  parties  in  the  great  civil  war. 
Thence  was  first  descried  the  approach  of  "the  Long-haired,"  as 
the  dreaded  Taipings  were  called,  from  the  fact  that,  as  the  out- 

Y 


338  ECCLESIASTICAL    BARRACKS. 

ward  and  visible  sign  of  throwing  off  the  Tartar  yoke,  they  ab- 
stained from  shaving  their  foreheads,  which  is  not  a  Chinese 
custom,  but  is  done  in  obedience  to  the  arbitrary  decree  of  the 
conqueror. 

Great  were  the  preparations  for  the  defence  of  the  city — the 
manufacture  of  gunpowder,  the  mounting  on  the  walls  of  strange 
devices  with  ropes  and  pulleys,  whereby  to  pound  the  heads  of  the 
besiegers  with  wooden  logs  bristling  with  iron  spikes  ! 

Preparations  were  made  for  a  long  siege,  but  when  the  terrible 
foe  actually  arrived,  the  whole  business  was  settled  in  a  couple  of 
hours !  As  they  approached,  they  were  received  with  what  was 
intended  by  the  city  defenders  to  be  a  galling  fire,  but  as  the 
cannon-balls  were  much  too  small  for  the  guns,  they  rolled  out 
playfully  the  moment  these  were  depressed  to  aim  at  the  assail- 
ants !  The  latter  then  swam  the  moat,  shielding  their  heads  with 
boards  and  mattresses,  which  effectually  broke  the  blows  of  the 
spiked  logs ;  scaling-ladders  were  planted,  and  in  another  moment 
the  besiegers  stood  triumphant  on  the  walls,  whence  the  affrighted 
guard  made  good  their  escape. 

The  Taipings  held  the  city  from  this  date  (December  7,  1861) 
till  the  following  May,  when  it  was  captured  by  the  English. 

A  City  Guard  was  then  formed  of  Canton  soldiers,  drilled  and 
officered  by  Englishmen.  This  force  is  said  to  have  done  excellent 
service.  It  is  still  kept  up,  and  is  officially  supposed  to  number 
two  hundred  men,  but  (as  is  customary  in  China)  it  actually  num- 
bers only  about  a  hundred  and  fifty. 

Till  permanent  barracks  could  be  provided,  this  force  was  tem- 
porarily quartered  in  a  very  celebrated  great  temple  dedicated  to 
the  Thunder-god,  and  much  to  the  disgust  of  his  high  priest,  these 
free  quarters  have  been  found  so  convenient  that  it  has  not  been 
thought  necessary  ever  to  find  others,  so  the  luckless  priests  see 
their  Hocks  dispersed  and  their  revenues  lost,  without  receiving 
any  manner  of  compensation.  The  people,  however,  still  assemble 
here  in  immense  crowds,  on  one  day  in  each  year,  to  pray  for  the 
preservation  from  lightning  of  their  homes ;  but  as  the  temple  has 
itself  been  struck  on  more  than  one  occasion,  such  guardianship  is 
somewhat  suggestive  of  the  broken  reed  ! 

The  people,  however,  are  very  considerate  for  the  difficulties  of 
their  deities  !  It  was  in  one  of  the  minor  courts  of  this  temple 
that  Mr  Cobbold  and  the  bishop  lodged  on  first  coming  to  this 
city,  and  when  the  rebels  captured  Ningpo,  the  old  priest  fled  to 
Mr  Russell's   house  for  protection,  which   of  course  was  gladly 


GUESTS    OF    IDOLS  !  339 

given.  But,  in  his  kindly  genial  way,  the  bishop  could  not  resist 
asking  what  the  gods  were  doing  that  they  did  not  protect  their 
priest?  The  poor  old  man  replied  that  they  had  all  returned  to 
heaven  in  great  alarm  ! 

One  other  great  festival  still  attracts  crowds  to  worship  here  in 
spring,  at  the  shrine  of  the  gods  of  the  seasons,  when  a  clay  ox 
is  offered,  and  then  broken,  and  the  worshippers  scramble  for  the 
fragments,  believing  that  each  sacred  atom  has  power  to  fertilise 
the  field  into  which  it  is  cast.  I  am  told  that  in  Southern  China 
a  pasteboard  buffalo  is  substituted  for  the  clay  ox,  and  that  at  the 
spring  festival  it  is  placed  on  an  altar,  and  (in  company  with  the 
God  of  Spring)  is  carried  in  procession  through  the  streets  to  the 
office  of  the  prefect,  where  the  idol  receives  worship.  But  on  the 
following  day,  the  municipal  authorities,  having  placed  the  poor 
pasteboard  bullock  in  the  centre  of  the  court,  walk  slowly  round 
it,  armed  with  rods,  marking  each  step  by  striking  it  a  severe  blow. 
They  then  set  it  on  fire,  and  the  people  rush  forward  and  struggle 
for  the  burning  fragments,  believing  that  to  secure  these  ensures 
luck  for  the  ensuing  year. 

Is  it  not  very  strange  here  in  China  to  find  a  custom  so  closely 
akin  to  the  spring  and  summer  festivals  of  Europe,  where,  to  this 
day,  we  find  places  in  which,1  after  vespers,  the  villagers  dance 
sunwise  round  a  sacred  bonfire,  and  then  wildly  scramble  for  its 
fragments  of  charred  wood,  to  be  religiously  treasured  as  a  charm 
throughout  the  year? 

On  the  strength  of  an  invitation  from  Colonel  Cook  and  Major 
Watson,  of  the  City  Guard,  the  bishop  took  me  to  inspect  their 
temple.  Surely  never  were  there  such  unit  pie  barracks  as  these 
highly  ecclesiastical  quarters  !  The  great  image  of  the  Thunder-god 
occupies  the  central  court,  all  round  which,  without  the  slightesl 
deference  to  the  gods  or  their  priests,  are  ranged  cannon,  all  ready 
for  action.  Another  worshipful  group  represents  the  Ancestor  of 
Thunder,  supported  on  either  side  by  his  descendants,  Thunder 
and  Lightning,  the  latter  holding  symbols.  Here,  too,  are  all  the 
idols  who  rule  time — the  gods  of  the  years,  the  months,  the  weeks, 
days,  and  hours. 

The  officers'  quarters  certainly  have  the  charm  of  originality, 
for,  without  removing  the  idol  shrines,  they  have  converted  vari- 
ous chapels  into  most  comfortable  bedrooms  and  sitting-rooms, 
wherein  the  images  serve  the  purpose  of  decoration.     Thus,  a  light 

1  See  '  In  the  Hebrides,'  pp.  215,  230,  231.     C.  F.  Gordon  Camming.     Chatto  k 

Windus. 


340  ECCLESIASTICAL    BARRACKS. 

sunny  dining-room,  ■with  luxurious  arm-chairs  and  sofas,  is  pre- 
sided over  by  a  line  full-sized  Goddess  of  Mercy,  which  in  this 

case,  strange  to  say,  is  simply  an  Indian  Vishnu  with  eight  arms  ! 
The  lotus-throne  of  this  transformed  image  rests  on  wheels,  and, 
strangest  of  all,  from  beneath  this  throne  peep  out  about  a  dozen 
small  pigs,  carved  and  coloured  !  Now,  although  Vishnu  once 
came  to  earth  in  the  form  of  a  wild  boar,1  pigs  in  general  are  an 
abomination  in  the  eyes  of  his  worshippers,  and  I  have  never  seen 
anything  of  this  sort  in  India. 

But  such  are  the  extraordinary  conglomerations  of  Chinese 
mythology,  that  even  the  Monkey-god  has  a  place  in  the  Celestial 
Pantheon,  though,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  the  animal  himself  is  un- 
known in  this  empire.  Nevertheless  he  is  here  worshipped  as 
"  the  Great  Sage  of  the  Whole  Heavens."  His  image  was  pointed 
out  to  me  at  Canton,  in  the  temple  of  the  Five  Genii,  where  it  is 
annually  arrayed  in  new  silken  raiment.  Its  votaries  are  chiefly 
gamblers  and  expectant  mothers.  The  latter  occasionally  dedicate 
their  unborn  offspring  to  his  service  ! 

As  China's  chief  communication  with  India,  on  matters  of  faith, 
was  in  the  early  days  when  Buddhist  missionaries  came  here  to 
spread  a  creed  which,  in  its  purity,  was  non-idolatrous,  it  really  is 
strange  to  find  that  so  many  Indian  idols  should  have  crept  into 
honour,  even  on  the  assumption  that  they  are  merely  the  attend- 
ants of  Buddha. 

On  either  side  of  the  image  of  Vishnu,  with  the  litter  of  little 
pigs,  stand  Chinese  and  Hindoo  gods,  and  rows  of  large  gilt  statues 
are  ranged  on  each  side  of  the  room.  In  the  bath-room  is  a 
splendid  shrine  to  the  Lord  of  Heaven  and  Earth,  and  in  another 
room  stands  a  shrine  with  a  very  fine  image  of  a  goddess  with  a 
child  in  her  arms — not  the  Goddess  of  Mercy,  but  one  who  is 
worshipped  by  women  only.  Her  name,  I  think,  is  Kum-Fa,  and 
she  is  the  special  goddess  of  babies.  So,  lest  she  should  feel  out 
of  place  during  this  prolonged  military  occupation  of  her  shrine, 
it  is  partially  concealed  by  a  large  mirror ! 

This  temple  is  surrounded  by  fine  old  trees,  and  the  air  is  fra- 
grant with  the  scent  of  the  Pride  of  India,  a  tree  somewhat  like 
the  English  ash,  but  bearing  blossoms  which  in  colour  and  scent 
greatly  resemble  the  delicious  lilac  of  our  shrubberies.  In  short, 
as  we  sat  to-day  in  these  strangely  transformed  chapels,  we  thought 

1  '  In  the  Himalayas  and  on  the  Indian  Plains,'  Incarnations  of  Vishnu,  p. 
166  ;  '  Hanuman,  the  Monkey-god,'  p.  259.  C.  F.  Gordon  dimming.  Chatto  £; 
Windus. 


THE    IDOL-DESTROYERS.  341 

the  City  Guardians  were  not  likely  to  be  in  any  hurry  in  pressing 
for  permanent  barracks  ! 

Neither  need  they  feel  scrupulous  about  excluding  some  wor- 
shippers, for  these  have  an  abundant  selection  of  idols  of  every 
sort  and  kind.  Truly,  a  census  of  the  gods  of  China  would  be  a 
curious  thing  in  statistics !  And  yet  during  the  twelve  years  or 
thereabouts,  during  which  the  highly  iconoclastic  Taipings  waged 
their  war  of  extermination  against  all  idols  (and  that  movement 
extended  over  fifteen  out  of  the  eighteen  provinces  !),  millions  of 
images  were  destroyed,  and  for  a  while  it  really  seemed  as  if  there 
must  be  a  perceptible  decrease  in  idol-worship,  but  with  the  sup- 
pression of  the  Great  Rebellion  the  manufacture  of  images  as  a 
lucrative  industry  revived.  So,  from  this  point  of  view,  the  prin- 
cipal result  of  that  destruction  has  been  that  an  innumerable  host 
of  new,  cheap,  and  gaudy  images  replace  those  which  were  at  least 
venerable  from  age  and  crumbling  into  natural  decay. 


CHAPTER   XXVIII. 


NOTES  OX  VARIOUS  MATTERS. 


The  beautiful  Fuh-Kien  Temple — The  first  foreigners  in  Ningpo  in  cages — 
Numerous  pat  lows — Brutal  boys — Barbarous  executions— More  temples — 
Cheap  dentistry  —  Goddess  of  ironfouuders  —  Sacred  isle  of  Pootoo  —  0 
mi  to  Fo  !  —  Superabundant  population  —  Horses  not  required — Nor 
labour-saving  machines — The  draw-loom — Chinese  compass — Many  con- 
trarieties of  custom — "  Good  wine  needs  no  bush" — Kite-flying. 

Xingpo,  Saturday,  17fh  ' 

I  really  think  I  am  almost  satiated  with  temple  sight-seeing,  for 
the  supply  seems  inexhaustible,  and  though  there  is  always  some 
point  of  unusual  interest  which  makes  it  seem  worth  while  to  visit 
each,  truly  their  name  is  legion.  When  you  come  to  consider  that 
in  every  city  throughout  this  vast  empire  there  are  just  as  many 
temples,  and  that  in  every  temple  are  ranged  images  of  multitudes 
of  minor  deities  all  demanding  worship,  the  thought  becomes  posi- 
tively bewildering. 

I  have  several  times  found  my  way  back  to  the  beautiful  Fuh- 
Kien  Temple,  which  is  now  all  adorned  for  the  spring   festival 


342  NOTES    ON    VARIOUS    MATTERS. 

All  round  tlio  courts  are  hung  numerous  very  handsome  lamps, 
while  the  interior  of  the  temple  is  decked  with  most  gorgeous 
embroidery.  There  is  a  magnificent  new  altar-cloth,  a  great  triple 
umbrella  of  state,  and  a  gigantic  silk  fan.  Even  the  hanging 
Lamps  are  all  of  richly  emhroidered  silk  in  panels.  All  this  week 
there  has  been  a  tremendous  theatrical  entertainment  going  on  day 
and  night,  attended  by  vast  crowds.  Such  a  scene  is  always  pic- 
turesque, and  full  of  minor  incidents  worth  noticing — as,  for  in- 
stance, the  crowd  of  gamblers  who  establish  themselves  in  the 
inner  court,  playing  for  cash  on  mats  which  are  divided  into 
squares,  each  marked  with  a  Chinese  character,  either  in  scarlet 
or  white. 

I  had  wished  to  secure  a  drawing  of  this  temple,  but,  under  the 
circumstances,  it  was  impossible,  though  the  crowd  were  quite 
polite.  (How  strange  it  is  to  think  that  fifty  years  ago  the  only 
spots  in  China  where  the  presence  of  foreigners  was  tolerated  were 
Macao  and  the  factories  at  Canton,  and  even  there  they  could  only 
obtain  exercise  by  walking  to  and  fro  in  front  of  their  own  houses  ! 
And  in  those  days  no  foreign  woman  was  allowed  to  live  even 
in  these  sanctuaries  !  To  look  nearer  here,  it  is  only  just  forty 
years  since  the  first  white  woman  ever  seen  in  Ningpo  was  carried 
through  its  streets  in  a  cage,  to  be  stared  at  by  excited  mobs.  She 
was  the  wife  of  the  captain  of  a  brig  that  was  wrecked  near  the 
mouth  of  the  Yang-tze-Kiang,  and  such  of  the  crew  and  passengers 
as  reached  the  shore  were  at  once  captured  and  secured  in  cages, 
as  we  should  secure  tigers  or  suchlike  dangerous  beasts.  At  that 
same  time,  in  1840,  during  the  first  China  war  under  Lord  Gough, 
our  old  friend,  General  Philip  Anstruther,  was  engaged  on  a  survey 
near  iSImgpo,  when  he  too  was  taken  prisoner,  and  remained  in 
captivity  for  six  months,  during  most  of  which  time  he  was  kept 
in  a  cage  3  feet  by  3  !  That  cage  now  holds  a  place  in  the 
United  Service  Museum  in  London,  and  the  irons  with  which  he 
was  fettered  are  at  Airth  Castle  in  Stirlingshire,  where  many  a 
time  I  have  looked  at  them  with  awe,  though  little  dreaming  that  I 
too  should  one  day  find  myself  in  these  same  streets  of  2s~ingpo, 
and  find,  as  he  did,  that  a  ready  pencil  is  a  sure  passport  to  the 
respect  of  these  people.) 

I  have  found  a  very  peaceful  sketching-ground  near  the  old 
temple  with  the  quaint  belfry  and  beautiful  bell  (the  temple  where 
the  Goddess  of  Mercy  stands  on  the  serpent's  head).  It  is  an 
unusually  picturesque  exterior,  and  I  found  a  nice  grassy  bank 
beside  a  pool  in  which  the  scene  lay  mirrored.     Though  the  spot 


INGENUITY    IN    TORTURE.  343 

is  usually  very  quiet,  of  course  some  idlers  quickly  discovered  the 
new  attraction,  and  a  considerable  crowd  soon  assembled,  but  fchey 
were  very  civil ;  and  so  long  as  the  nature  of  the  ground  prevents 
their  standing  between  me  and  my  subject,  their  presence  does  not 
disturb  me  much,  though  it  certainly  adds  to  the  fatigue. 

From  this  point  we  went  a  long  expedition  to  the  West  Gate, 
outside  of  which,  on  the  very  brink  of  the  river,  stands  a  large 
group  of  those  curious  structures  called  pai-lows,  the  triple  arches 
commemorative  of  all  manner  of  virtue  in  man,  maid,  or  widow. 
I  have  seen  many  fine  specimens  of  these  placed  singly  all  about 
the  country,  but  here  such  a  number  are  crowded  close  together, 
that  their  pictorial  effect  is  altogether  destroyed,  though  many  are 
individually  so  exquisitely  carved  as  to  resemble  lace-work  in  stone. 
The  only  object  for  this  crowding  that  we  could  discover  is,  that 
this  is  the  point  at  which  all  officials  visiting  Ningpo  must  land, 
and  be  received  by  the  city  magnates,  so  that  the  honoured  dead 
are  the  more  certain  to  be  remembered. 

As  we  passed  along  one  of  the  shimmy  streets  near  the  river, 
we  met  a  noisy  troop  of  boys  evidently  much  delighted  with  some 
sport  tbey  had  on  hand.  On  coming  to  close  quarters,  we  discov- 
ered that  the  little  fiends  had  captured  two  live  rats,  and  had 
dipped  them  in  some  inflammable  oil,  to  which  they  had  then  set 
fire.  The  torture  of  the  wretched  rats  was  evidently  deemed 
famous  fun.  I  bethought  me  of  sundry  brutal  boys  in  Britain 
who  seem  to  find  pleasure  in  the  torture  of  their  helpless  fellow- 
creatures,  but  there  we  flatter  ourselves  that  they  soon  outgrow 
the  taste  for  such  atrocities.  Here,  on  the  contrary,  age  brings  do 
tender  compassion — hence  the  horrid  ingenuity  shown  in  the  tor- 
ture of  prisoners,  culminating  in  those  frightful  executions  reserved 
for  the  worst  of  criminals,  who  are  condemned  to  be  bound  to  a 
cross  and  then  put  to  death  by  so  many  separate  sword-cuts,  the 
scale  of  punishment  varying  with  the  heinousness  of  the  offence, 
whereby  is  regulated  whether  the  body  of  the  living  criminal  shall 
be  divided  into  eight,  twenty-four,  thirty -six,  seventy-two,  or  one 
hundred  and  twenty  pieces,  the  cuts  affecting  vital  organs  being 
deferred  almost  to  the  last. 

To-day  we  went  an  expedition  by  boat  to  explore  that  part  of 
the  town  which  lies  near  the  Bridge  of  Boats,  and  here  we  found 
more  and  more  great  temples  and  guilds.  The  first  we  visited  was 
the  very  gorgeous  guild  of  the  timber  merchants.  Thence  we  passed 
on  to  that  of  the  dried-fruit  merchants,  which  is  a  very  hand- 
some building  in  the  style  of  the  Fuh-Kien  Temple,  with  the  same 


3  I  I  NOTES    ON    VARIOUS    MATTERS. 

fine  sculptured  stone  pillars,  representing  dragons  and  phoenixes. 

Eere  a  Becond-rate  "  Sing-Song"  was  being  acted,  and  a  moderate 
crowd  was  looking  on.  We  did  not  care  to  stay  long,  so  passed  on 
till  we  came  to  another  large  temple,  and  here  also  theatrical  rep- 
resentations wen-  going  on,  but  these  were  third-rate;  it  seemed 
popular,  however,  for  the  crowd  was  dense.  Chinese  actors  never 
take  much  trouble  to  conceal  by-play,  but  it  really  was  very  funny 
here  to  see  the  actors  dressing  for  their  feminine  parts  in  an  open 
gallery,  in  full  presence  of  all  the  spectators  ! 

We  next  were  advised  to  dive  down  a  narrow  passage,  beside  a 
wine-shop,  which  we  did  not  much  fancy  exploring ;  however,  it 
eventually  landed  us  in  another  temple,  where  we  found  men 
busily  manufacturing  large  pasteboard  models  of  junks,  all  most 
gorgeously  painted.  I  really  did  wish  I  could  have  carried  off 
one  to  take  back  to  England,  but  these  are  being  prepared  to  take 
part  in  a  great  idol  procession.  In  the  open  sort  of  market-place 
in  front  of  the  wine-shop,  there  were  sundry  cheap  shows  and 
fortune-tellers,  each  attracting  crowds,  and  a  quack  dentist  loudly 
invited  all  passers-by  to  come  in  and  have  their  teeth  extracted  at 
the  rate  of  three  cash  per  tooth,  positively  without  pain ! 

Here  work  and  worship  all  go  hand  in  hand.  One  of  the 
industries  of  Xingpo  is  an  iron-foundry,  where  cast-iron  boilers 
are  made  for  cooking  purposes.  All  who  work  here  pay  devout 
adoration  to  "  the  Honourable  Lady  of  the  Heavenly  Foundry," 
who  was  the  daughter  of  an  ironmoulder  "  in  the  days  when  the 
earth  was  young."  Seeing  her  father  sorely  tried  by  difficulties  in 
the  working  of  his  furnace,  this  admirable  maiden  somehow  discov- 
ered that  to  make  a  burnt-offering  of  herself  would  ensure  his  suc- 
cess, whereupon  she  threw  herself  into  the  furnace,  a  piece  of  filial 
devotion  which  was  so  fully  recognised  by  gods  and  men,  that  the 
former  granted  the  ironmoulder  extraordinary  triumphs  in  his 
work,  and  the  latter  have  thenceforth  paid  divine  honour  to  this 
pattern  daughter. 

Amongst  the  various  odd  gods  to  whom  we  have  done  special 
homage,  one  of  the  funniest  is  the  God  of  Literature,  who  is  repre- 
sented soaring  on  one  toe.  In  another  temple  we  noted  rather  a 
fine  life-size  group  of  eighteen  saints  with  twenty-four  attendants. 

But  I  am  told  that  if  I  want  to  see  heathendom  in  all  its  glory, 
I  must  go  to  the  Sacred  Isle  of  Pootoo,  in  the  Chusan  Archipelago, 
which  is  to  Chinese  Buddhists  what  Iona  was  to  our  early  Chris- 
tians in  Scotland — a  centre  of  all  sanctity.  Like  the  unchivalrous 
saints  of  Iona,  these  holy  brethren  of  Pootoo  allow  no  women  to 


THE    SACRED    ISLE    OF    POOTOO.  345 

live  on  the  isle;  they  do  not,  however,  object  to  visitors  landing 
to  see  the  temples,  of  which  there  are  about  eighty,  and  shrines 
innumerable,  clustered  over  a  rocky  wooded  island  only  three 
miles  in  circumference.  Many  of  these  are  in  connection  with 
large  monasteries,  for  the  isle  owns  two  thousand  inhabitants,  all 
of  whom  are  employed  in  connection  with  the  service  of  the  tem- 
ples. They  are  men  of  the  usual  mixed  type  —  some  devout, 
some  worthless,  some  robed  in  grey,  and  some  in  j'ellow ;  but  here, 
as  elsewhere  in  China,  all-pervading  dirt  is  the  painfully  prevalent 
feature. 

The  temples  are  dotted  about  in  every  direction,  some  perched 
on  the  brink  of  precipitous  cliffs  overhanging  the  sea  —  others 
nestle  in  shady  dells,  rich  with  lovely  ferns  and  beautiful  shrubs, 
and  overshadowed  by  venerable  camphor-trees,  which  attain  an 
immense  size,  some  being  about  20  feet  in  girth.  The  island  is 
very  hilly,  and  what  with  crags,  rich  foliage,  and  fantastic  build- 
ings, it  must  be  exceedingly  picturescpue.  It  rises  to  a  height  of 
1500  feet,  whence  the  outlook  is  one  of  ideal  loveliness — a  wide 
expanse  of  sea  dotted  with  innumerable  isles,  several  of  which  are 
1200  feet  in  height.  These  are  partly  barren,  partly  fir-clad,  with 
terraces  of  rich  cultivation.  Far  below,  the  waves  break  in  cease- 
less melody  on  the  sandy  shores  of  the  Sacred  Isle. 

Both  the  pink  and  lemon-coloured  lotus  (the  special  emblem  of 
Buddha  and  most  lovely  of  water-lilies)  blossom  luxuriantly  on 
various  quiet  pools ;  while  on  rocks,  bells,  temples,  and  gateways 
are  inscribed  the  words  of  the  sacred  invocation,  O  mi  to  F<~> ! 
which  is  the  Chinese  version  of  the  six-syllabled  charm  of  Thibet, 
Om  mani  padme,  Houm  !  both  alike  ascribing  praise  to  Buddha 
as  "The  Jewel  on  the  Lotus."1  Here  every  devout  worshipper  of 
Fuh — i.e.,  Buddha — strives  in  the  course  of  his  life  to  reiterate 
this  formula  at  least  three  hundred  thousand  times,  so  this  con- 
tinual visible  reminder  of  the  words  is  helpful.  The  repetition  of 
this  simple  formula  is  apparently  an  all-sufficient  act  of  merit ;  but 
for  brethren  of  a  wider  range  of  intellect,  there  are  on  the  island 
extensive  collections  of  the  pearls  of  Chinese  literature,  one  temple 
library  including  upwards  of  11,000  volumes.2 

1  For  full  details  of  its  application  in  Thibet  to  rocks,  prayer-wheels,  and  ter- 
races, see  '  In  the  Himalayas  and  Indian  Plains,'  pp.  4127-429.  C.  F.  Gordon 
dimming.     Chatto  &  Winclus. 

-  In  February  1885  (at  the  same  time  that  France  electrified  tin-  civilised  world 
by  declaring  rice  carried  in  neutral  ships  to  be  contraband  <>i  war  ').  Admiral  Cour- 
bet  took  military  possession  of  this  ecclesiastical  isle,  thereby  intensifying  the  in- 
dignation of  the  Chinese  and  their  anger  against  all  foreigners.     Of  course  BUCh 


346  NOTES   ON   VARIOUS    MATTERS. 

This  exceedingly  interesting  island  lies  within  six  hours'  steam 
of  Ningpo,  and  in  the  summer-time  steamers  occasionally  make  a 
trip  there  and  back  to  give  devout  Chinamen  and  inquisitive 
foreigners  an  opportunity  of  visiting  it  in  tantalising  haste.  Un- 
fortunately there  is  no  chance  of  any  steamers  going  there  at 
present,  so  I  need  not  think  about  it ! 

Ere  returning  to  our  boat,  we  lingered  awhile  just  to  look  at  the 
crowds — the  vast  multitudes  whose  superabundant  number  makes 
one  marvel  how  they  can  all  find  food.  And  herein,  when  you 
come  to  think  of  it,  lies  the  solution  of  many  Chinese  puzzles. 
One  wonders  at  first  why  there  are  so  strangely  few  horses  in  the 
country  (certainly,  so  far  as  I  have  yet  seen,  there  are  next  to  none 
either  in  town  or  country — everything  is  done  by  human  strength). 

But  when  you  consider  the  cheapness  of  labour,  the  superabun- 
dance of  men,  and  the  difficulties  of  providing  food  for  so  many 
hungry  mouths,  you  begin  to  realise  that  these  people,  who  never 
grumble  at  any  amount  of  hard  work,  can  scarcely  look  with  favour 
on  a  great  animal  which  easily  does  the  work  of  four  men,  and 
probably  consumes  the  produce  of  as  much  land  as  would  suffice  to 
keep  a  whole  family  !  Therefore  it  is  better  for  the  many,  that 
those  who  can  afford  such  luxury  should  be  carried  in  sedan-chairs, 
than  that  they  should  ride.  For  the  same  reason  it  is  better  to 
dig  canals  which  at  once  irrigate  the  land,  and  provide  waterways 
on  which  men  can  work  cargo  and  passage  boats,  than  to  make 
roads  on  which  horses  could  drag  carts  and  carriages. 

This  great  problem  of  over-population — this  teeming  human  life 
all  craving  a  share  in  the  work  which  provides  the  daily  rice, 
sufficiently  accounts  for  the  determination  of  trades-unions  and 
guilds  to  combine  in  excluding  all  foreign  labour-saving  machinery, 
and  to  work  on  in  all  departments  of  manufactures  as  their  fore- 
fathers have  done,  with  the  most  primitive  contrivances,  which  give 
employment  to  the  largest  number  of  labourers. 

In  agricultural  work,  as  in  all  varieties  of  weaving,  paper-making, 
&c,  the  introduction  of  machines  which  would  enable  one  man  to 
do  the  work  of  ten  in  half  the  time,  would  be  accounted  a  national 
calamity,  in  intensifying  the  already  grievous  difficulty  of  feeding 
such  human  swarms — to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that  human  work 
is  so  cheap  that  machinery  actually  would  not  pay  here.     Xever- 

acts  lead  to  immediate  persecution  of  native  Christians,  and  the  above  tidings 
were  closely  followed  by  the  reported  massacre  of  several  hundred  Christians  at 
Kieou-ya-Pin,  in  Yunnan,  and  the  pillage  of  all  Christian  houses  in  that  and  other 
districts. 


CONTRARIETIES    IN    CHINESE    CUSTOM.  347 

theless  it  does  seem  very  odd  to  go  into  a  silk  shop,  there  to  buy 
so  many  yards  of  lovely  flowered  silks,  at  a  counter  alongside  of 
the  strange  draw-loom  where  they  are  being  woven  by  hand,  in 
the  most  primitive  fashion,  with  a  small  boy  sitting  up  aloft  above 
the  frame,  pulling  up  a  series  of  cords  which  rearrange  the  warp- 
threads  between  each  throw  of  the  shuttle,  thus  forming  the  pattern. 

In  the  course  of  to-day's  sight-seeing  we  looked  into  one  shop 
where  several  men  were  working  at  most  exquisitely  fine  silk 
embroidery.  The  silk  is  stretched  on  a  frame,  and  the  embroiderer 
sits  on  a  stool  with  all  his  silks  neatly  arranged  beside  him.  We 
also  went  into  a  shop  where  ornamental  ribbons  are  woven  to  wrap 
round  ladies'  poor  little  crippled  feet,  and  to  another  to  see  a  very 
large  assortment  of  gorgeous  silk  braids  for  trimming,  each  with  a 
dainty  pattern  all  hand-woven. 

Amongst  other  odd  purchases,  I  have  invested  in  an  extremely 
ornamental  Chinese  mariner's  compass — a  quaintly  pretty  jewelled 
object,  combining  a  miniature  sun-dial  and  spirit-level,  all  in  a 
silken  case.  Its  chief  interest  lies  in  the  odd  fact  that,  as  every- 
thing in  China  is  made  to  work  by  contraries,  the  needle  of  the 
compass  is  made  to  point  to  the  south  instead  of  the  north — I 
suppose  this  is  from  some  regard  to  the  good  influences  of  the 
south.  My  collection  of  oddities  now  includes  three  compasses,  all 
different,  bought  in  different  cities  ;  but  in  each  the  needle  points 
true  to  the  south.  I  am  told  that,  like  most  other  things  (includ- 
ing the  use  of  gunpowder),  the  compass  was  invented  in  China 
long  before  it  was  known  in  Europe — B.C.  2634  being  the  date 
assigned  to  it. 

It  really  is  amusing  to  note  in  how  many  things  Chinese  cus- 
toms are  diametrically  the  reverse  of  ours.  We  shake  hands  with 
our  friends ;  they  shake  their  own  hands,  or  rather  wag  their  own 
clenched  fists  !  English  women  cover  their  heads  when  they  go 
out ;  Chinese  women  consider  this  very  bad  style — in  fact,  most 
objectionable ;  so  even  when  they  do  wear  head-dresses  they  are 
open  on  the  crown.  English  gentlemen  remove  their  hats  in  pres- 
ence of  honoured  guests ;  Chinese  gentlemen  deem  it  courteous  to 
keep  the  head  covered. 

An  Englishman  of  the  present  day  likes  to  keep  his  hair  close 
cropped — a  Chinaman  lengthens  his  long  plait  artificially,  that  it 
may  touch  his  heels.  A  young  Briton  rejoices  in  the  early  stages 
of  his  beard  and  moustaches,  but  a  Celestial  knows  that  not  till  he 
is  grey-headed  may  he  indulge  in  the  growth  of  such  decorations. 
Lut  when  an   Englishman  does  shave,  he  generally  (at  least   in 


348  NOTES    ON    VARIOUS    MATTERS. 

England)  is  his  own  barber;  whereas  no  Chinaman,  however  poor, 
would  dream  of  shaving  himself,  lie  would  consider  that  he  was 
thereby  demeaning  himself.  (Of  all  contrarieties,  what  can  be 
stranger  than  to  see  a  whole  race  taking  the  greatest  pride  in  the 
said  long  plait  and  shaven  forehead,  which  are  simply  badges  of 
subjection  imposed  on  the  nation  only  two  hundred  years  ago  by 
the  Manchu  conquerors  !) 

Furthermore,  a  young  dandy  of  Europe  considers  his  walking- 
stick  an  essential — in  China  the  use  of  such  a  luxury  is  only  per- 
mitted to  aged  and  infirm  persons.  This  law,  which  was  passed 
in  a.d.  903,  replaced  a  far  more  arbitrary  ancient  law,  which  pro- 
hibited any  man  under  fifty  years  of  age  from  carrying  a  walking- 
stick,  but  permitted  persons  who  had  attained  that  age  to  use  one 
when  within  their  own  grounds.  This  then  was  a  privilege  accorded 
only  to  the  wealthy.  On  reaching  his  sixtieth  year  a  man  might 
walk  about  his  own  town  or  village  stick  in  hand,  but  not  till  he 
arrived  at  the  ripe  age  of  fourscore  was  he  at  liberty  to  support 
himself  at  all  times  with  a  trusty  staff! 

Next  to  a  wralking-stick  as  the  companion  of  an  Englishman's 
rambles  comes  his  dog,  instead  of  which  the  Chinaman  carries  his 
caged  singing-bird.  To  him  the  dog  is  the  guardian  of  the  house, 
and  is  expected  to  remain  ceaselessly  on  watch. 

In  the  matter  of  games,  British  children  play  battledore  and 
shuttlecock  with  their  hands — Chinese  boys  use  their  feet  as  the 
battledore,  and  occasionally  catch  the  shuttlecock  most  expertly  on 
their  forehead.  In  England,  when  it  was  customary  to  put  offend- 
ers in  the  stocks,  it  was  their  feet  which  were  imprisoned — the 
Chinese  equivalent  is  the  cangue,  the  huge  wooden  collar,  or  rather 
large  square  board  with  a  hole  in  the  centre,  through  which  is  thrust 
the  head  of  the  criminal. 

"We  read  our  books  from  left  to  right,  the  Chinese  from  right  to 
left.  "We  write  their  names  on  the  back,  and  arrange  our  book- 
shelves accordingly — they  write  the  names  on  the  end,  and  lay 
them  so  that  the  end  shall  be  visible.  In  riding  we  hold  the 
bridle  in  the  left  hand — a  Chinaman  holds  it  in  the  right.  We 
have  our  address  printed  on  the  face  of  a  neat  small  visiting-card. 
If  a  Chinese  visitor  deems  it  necessary  to  note  his  address,  it  is 
inscribed  on  the  back  of  the  very  large  piece  of  crimson  paper 
which  does  duty  as  a  card.  Our  doctors  are  content  with  feeling 
the  pulse  in  one  wrist — a  Chinaman  feels  both  as  a  preliminary 
to  feeling  many  more,  for  he  recognises  four  hundred  and  one  dis- 
tinct pulses  !      We  deem  the  right-hand  side  to  be  the  position  of 


MORE    CONTRARIETIES    OF    CUSTOM.  349 

highest  honour — the   Chinaman  places  his   most  honoured   guest 
on  the  left. 

"With  us  advancing  years  are  very  commonly  ignored  (especially 
hy  ladies),  but  the  Chinese  of  both  sexes  glory  in  the  age,  which 
is  the  surest  passport  to  honour,  and  the  height  of  courtesy  is  to 
assure  your  guest  that  from  his  or  her  appearance  you  would  have 
supposed  him  or  her  to  be  much  older  than  the  age  stated  !  and 
this  again  implies  a  curious  diversity  in  custom,  for  whereas  we 
should  scarcely  deem  it  courteous  to  ask  a  stranger  how  old  he  or 
she  is,  it  is  almost  the  first  question  asked  by  a  polite  Chinaman 
anxious  to  show  honour  to  his  guest. 

Then,  too,  in  the  matter  of  mourning,  white  takes  the  place  of 
our  sombre  black,  and  though  chief  mourners  wear  sackcloth,  all 
other  relations  of  the  dead  wear  white  garments,  and  form  a  long 
procession  walking  two  and  two.  The  coffin  is  ornamented  with 
bands  and  rosettes  of  white  calico,  the  chief  mourner  carries  a  staff' 
entwined  with  strips  of  white  cotton,  and  white  streamers  are 
attached  to  the  sign-board  of  the  house  of  business  of  the  dead. 
Hence  to  the  uninitiated  Chinaman  a  white  flag  of  truce  would 
suggest  a  symbol  of  death,  while  to  cover  a  dining-table  with  a 
fair  white  linen  table-cloth  would  convey  to  him  precisely  the 
same  sensation  that  we  should  experience  were  a  covering  of  black 
crape  selected  to  grace  a  wedding-feast ! 

Speaking  of  wedding-feasts,  what  contrariety  could  be  more 
startling  than  that  a  man  should  marry  a  woman  selected  for  him 
by  some  one  else,  and  should  consider  it  a  gross  outrage  on  propriety 
to  look  upon  her  face  until  the  irrevocable  wedding-vows  have 
been  uttered  !  Hence  have  arisen  some  horrible  stories  of  men 
discovering  when  too  late  that  they  had  married  hideous  women 
afflicted  with  divers  diseases,  and  even,  in  some  instances,  lepers. 
(In  the  latter  case,  however,  the  marriage  can  be  annulled.)  One 
peculiarity  of  a  Chinese  wedding-feast  is  that  the  bride  and  bride- 
groom wait  upon  their  guests,  handing  them  tea  or  other  refresh- 
ments;  and  the  bride,  assuming  the  character  of  a  servant,  waits 
at  the  banquet  provided  for  her  husband's  parents  and  distinguished 
guests. 

In  alluding  to  some  of  the  peculiar  observances  in  Chinese 
households  after  the  birth  of  a  small  addition  to  the  family.  I 
mentioned  the  custom  of  hanging  up  a  bunch  of  evergreens  as  a 
sign  to  all  comers  not  to  approach  the  house.  The  symbol  ac- 
quires interest  from  the  fact  that  other  nations  recognise  this  sign 
as  conveying  an  invitation  to  all  comers.     Our  old  English  pro- 


350  NOTES    ON    VARIOUS    MATTERS. 

verb,  "Good  wine  needs  no  bush,"  alludes  to  the  bunches  of  ever- 
green which,  suspended  from  the  sign-post  of  the  hostel,  invited 
all  to  enter  and  drink  good  liquor.  The  identical  sign — generally 
a  great  ball  of  fir-twigs — calls  the  attention  of  the  wayfarer  in 
Japan  to  the  rice- wine  shop,  where  so  hearty  a  welcome  awaits 
him. 

I  almost  think  that  to  this  catalogue  of  varying  customs  I 
might  add  the  passion  of  grown-up  men  for  kite-flying — not  that 
Chinese  boys  do  not  glory  in  their  kites,  but  that  their  seniors  are 
erpially  keen  in  this  pastime,  which  is  made  a  medium  for  keen 
betting.  The  kites  are  made  of  every  conceivable  form,  and  some- 
times of  enormous  length.  Birds  and  beasts,  butterflies  and  flower- 
baskets,  wonderful  fishes,  monstrous  centipedes  and  serpents, 
insects,  full-rigged  junks,  fierce  dragons  with  huge  rolling  eyes, 
and  tigers'  heads,  are  among  the  favourite  forms;  some  are  tail- 
less— others  are  adorned  with  floating  tassels.  Some  are  made 
to  sing  louder  than  any  humming-top,  by  having  several  small 
metallic  strings  affixed  to  the  centre,  and  through  these  the  breeze 
murmurs  as  they  fly.  Sometimes  a  very  pretty  game  is  played  by 
flying  one  gigantic  kite  shaped  like  a  hawk,  while  a  whole  flight  of 
small  kites  represent  a  crowd  of  affrighted  birds. 

Like  everything  else  in  this  country,  kite-flying  has  its  appointed 
season.  Here  it  takes  the  place  of  grouse  and  partridge  shooting, 
and  may  only  be  indulged  in  until  the  ninth  day  of  the  ninth 
moon,  which  I  believe  falls  in  Xovember.  Then  thousands  of 
people  all  over  the  empire  go  out  with  their  kites,  and  make  their 
way  to  the  nearest  hills  or  rising  ground,  where  they  have  a  day's 
jollification,  and  conclude  by  cutting  the  cords  of  their  kites  when 
high  in  mid-air.  The  kite  acts  as  a  sort  of  scapegoat,  and  sails 
away  to  the  desert  fields  of  air,  carrying  with  it  whatever  ill-luck 
11  light  else  have  been  in  store  for  the  family  which  it  represents  ! 
"Whether  a  favourite  kite  may  safely  be  retrieved,  I  fail  to  learn  ! 


CHEFOO.  351 

CHAPTER  XXIX. 

FROM    SHANGHAI    TO    TIEN-TSIX. 

Chefoo — Garden  flowers— On  the  bar  of  the  Pei-ho — The  Taku  Forts — Caged 
larks — Navigation  of  the  Pei-ho — Pyramids  of  salt — Graves — Modes  of 
irrigation — Tien-tsin— The  famine. 

Ok  Board  the  Shux-Lee, 
May  29,  1S79. 

I  have  fairly  started  en  route  for  Peking  !  "While  I  was  hesitating 
whether  I  could  face  this  much-abused  journey,  and  yet  was  told 
on  all  hands  that  I  could  form  no  right  judgment  of  China  from 
seeing  only  the  southern  half  of  the  empire,  my  way  was  made 
smooth  by  the  arrival  from  England  of  Mr  and  Mrs  Pirkis,  who, 
with  their  two  children,  are  returning  to  the  British  Legation  at 
Peking.  With  truest  kindness  they  invited  me  to  join  their  party, 
and  travel  together;  and  so  the  difficulties  have  all  vanished,  and 
now  I  am  really  on  my  way  to  see  the  famous  Temple  of  Heaven! 
This  is  our  second  day  from  Shanghai.  The  weather  is  lovely, 
a  dead  calm,  sea  without  a  ripple,  a  good  ship,  a  very  kind  captain, 
and  pleasant  companions.     What  more  could  be  desired  ? 

Aground  on  the  Bar  off  the 

Moi  in  of  the  Fei-ho, 

May  31st. 

Yesterday  morning  at  daybreak  we  reached  Chefoo — a  pleasant 
and  very  healthy  port,  quite  the  favourite  sanitary  resort  of  Euro- 
peans whose  lot  is  cast  in  China.  It  is  also  held  in  high  honour 
by  the  Chinese,  on  account  of  some  neighbouring  sulphur-springs, 
which  here  (as  elsewhere  throughout  the  world)  are  found  to  be 
efficacious  in  the  cure  of  rheumatism  and  cutaneous  diseases.  As 
regards  the  latter,  I  am  told  that  various  skin-diseases,  including 
the  itch,  are  common  among  those  people  of  clean  clothes  but  dirty 
habits. 

The  European  houses  at  Chefoo  are  scattered  over  low  rising 
ground  and  along  the  sea-beach,  with  a  fine  hilly  background.  We 
went  ashore  to  see  friends,  who  were  all  asleep,  but  very  quickly 
came  forth  to  welcome  us,  and  to  do  the  honours  of  gardens  in 
which  our  familiar  English  flowers  grow  freely;  so  we  returned  mi 
board  enriched  by  gifts  of  mignonette,  wallflowers,  ami  blue  corn- 
flowers. 


352  FROM    SHANGHAI    TO    TIEN-TSIN. 

Then  we  strained  round  the  Cliefoo  bluff,  a  bold  headland  of 
fine  cliffs,  and  later  in  the  day  passed  a  picturesque  group  of  islands 
as  Ave,  entered  the  Gulf  of  Peh-chi-li. 

We  have  been  lying  here  at  anchor  the  livelong  day,  having 
reached  this  spot  at  early  dawn,  when  an  English  pilot  came  on 
board  in  a  steam-launch,  which  immediately  returned  to  Tien-tsin 
with  the  mails  and  despatches.  We  hoped  to  follow  immediately, 
but  the  tide  being  exceptionally  low,  we  could  not  cross  the  bar  at 
the  mouth  of  the  river ;  and  having  made  the  attempt,  we  thereon 
stuck  hard  and  fast;  and  here  we  must  remain  till  9  p.m.,  when 
the  tide  will  float  us  off.  Several  other  steamers  lie  near  us,  and  a 
multitude  of  junks  and  fishing-craft. 

Eight  in  front  of  us  lie  the  famous  but  dismally  dull-looking 
Taku  Forts,  which  have  been  all  rebuilt  and  strengthened  at  an 
immense  expenditure  of  labour.  But  as  the  road  to  Eeking  by 
land  is  not  half  the  distance  of  the  journey  by  river  (and  conquer- 
ing armies  are  not  particular  about  right  of  way),  it  is  certain 
that  in  the  event  of  future  war  we  should  never  sail  up  the 
Eei-ho  ! 

But  to-day,  as  we  have  lain  on  the  bar  broiling  in  the  sun,  con- 
versation has  naturally  reverted  to  the  various  events  which  have 
made  the  name  of  these  forts  so  familiar  to  us  all  in  Britain,  in 
connection  with  our  early  efforts  to  force  open  the  Celestial  oyster 
which  strove  so  hard  to  close  its  shell  against  the  unwelcome  in- 
truder, especially  on  that  calamitous  25th  June  1859,  when  on 
this  very  bar  where  we  are  now  aground,  the  gunboats  of  the 
British  squadron  lay  helpless,  exposed  to  the  raking  fire  from  the 
forts — a  day  which  cost  England  seven  officers  and  464  men  killed 
and  wounded,  three  gunboats  sunk,  and  many  disabled. 


H.B.M.  Consulate,  Ties-tsik, 
Whitsunday. 

As  was  expected,  the  tide  did  float  us  off  and  over  the  bar  last 
night,  and  in  the  bright  moonlight  we  steamed  up  and  anchored 
just  between  the  Taku  Forts,  where  we  lay  all  night.  I  awoke  at 
5  a.m.  to  see  the  sun  rise  red  behind  the  principal  fort,  while  a 
multitude  of  blue-clad  coolies  assembled  to  toil  on  the  outworks. 
It  was  a  lovely  morning,  and  a  most  unexpected  chorus  of  sweet 
bird-music  greeted  the  dawn.  It  was  the  warbling  of  many  prisoners 
— Tien-tsin  larks,  in  cages  within  the  fort — the  companions  and 
solace  of  the  soldiers. 


IN    THE    TAKU    FORTS.  353 

As  some  hours  must  elapse  ere  the  tide  could  carry  us  further, 
Ave  landed,  and  went  to  inspect  the  interior  of  the  principal  fort. 
We  literally  stormed  the  cannon's  mouth,  for,  to  avoid  all  danger 
of  prohibition,  we  adopted  the  plan  which  in  some  cases  has  proved 
particularly  useful  in  China  and  elsewhere — of  entering  first,  and 
asking  leave  afterwards  !  In  the  present  instance  none  said  us 
nay,  and  so  we  walked  all  over  the  place.  A  number  of  soldiers 
were  lounging  about  their  sleeping  quarters,  and  seemed  only  half 
awake.  AVe  found  a  German  in  charge  of  the  signal-station,  and 
had  a  talk  with  him ;  then  we  passed  out  by  the  main  gate  un- 
challenged, and  returned  to  the  horrible  shore  of  thick  adhesive 
mud — the  shore  on  which  the  British  Naval  Brigade  and  marines 
landed  in  the  face  of  the  foe,  not  knowing  that  it  was  iinpassahle, 
and  were  shot  down  wholesale.  We  picked  up  some  shells  in 
memory  of  that  fatal  day,  and  returned  on  board. 

At  8  a.m.,  the  tide  having  risen  sufficiently,  we  started  to  steam 
up  the  Pei-ho  to  Tien-tsin,  a  distance  of  about  thirty-five  miles — 
but  oh,  what  a  journey  !  Those  who  have  stood  on  the  ramparts 
of  Stirling  Castle,  and  have  noted  the  tortuous  meanderings  of 
the  river  Forth,  may  form  some  idea  of  the  extraordinary  course  of 
this  Pei-ho,  the  Northern  river.  It  seems  to  repeat  the  letter  S 
in  never-ending  combinations,  as  it  winds  in  successive  sharp  curves 
in  and  out  between  flat  mud-banks,  so  that,  in  whatever  direction 
you  look,  your  eye  meets  the  great  sails  of  junks,  or  possibly  the 
funnel  of  a  steamer,  or  of  a  steam-tug  bringing  up  a  large  vessel, 
rising  apparently  from  the  middle  of  the  rice-fields  ! 

The  navigation  of  such  a  river  must  be  truly  exasperating  to  all 
concerned,  especially  as  the  strong  current  of  the  stream  makes 
accurate  steering  impossible,  so  that  a  large  vessel  is  perpetually 
running  aground.  Now  she  sticks  on  a  bank  mid-stream,  then  the 
current  carries  her  round,  stem  to'shore,  lying  right  across  the  river, 
and  the  sailors  have  to  take  to  the  boat  and  go  ashore  with  hawser 
and  towing-ropes — it  is  really  some  degrees  worse  than  the  Suez 
Canal,  and  very  hard  work  for  the  crew.  The  difficulties,  of  course, 
increase  every  time  we  meet  a  junk,  or  have  to  pass  one. 

Sometimes  we  seemed  to  be  steering  straight  for  Peking,  and  the 
next  moment  we  were  going  in  exactly  the  opposite  direction  !  The 
captain  most  kindly  gave  mo  artists'  licence  and  a  seat  on  the 
bridge,  whence  I  might  the  better  understand  the  lie  of  the  land. 
Each  winding  of  the  river  has  received  a  distinctive  nautical  nick- 
name, such  as  "The  Everlasting  Bend,"  "The  Tomb  Bend," 
"  Double  Bend,"  "  Vegetable  Bend,"  &c. 

Z 


354  FltOM    SHANGHAI    TO    TIEX-TSIN. 

Certainly  the  province  of  Peh-chi-li,  so  far  as  I  have  yet  seen 
it,  baa  no  beauty  to  charm  the  eye!  In  every  direction,  so  far  as 
we  could  see,  it  is  all  a  vast  alluvial  plain — not  so  much  as  a  pebble 
to  represent  stone  all  over  the  level  land.  It  is  a  wide  expanse  of 
grey  dust,  and  the  villages  are  all  built  of  mud.  They  are  all  ex- 
actly alike,  and  all  are  hideous ;  only  some  have  dark-tiled  roofs, 
and  the  eye  rests  with  thankful  relief  where  occasional  gourds 
or  pumpkins  form  a  blessed  trail  of  green  in  the  poor  little 
gardens. 

Instead  of  the  pale  but  fully  clothed  children  of  the  south,  these 
are  really  bronzed,  and  run  about  in  troops  cpiite  naked,  or  lie 
basking  in  the  warm  wet  mud  along  the  edge  of  the  river,  shouting 
with  delight  as  they  scamper  off  to  escape  the  heavy  wash  of  the 
steamer's  wave. 

In  every  direction  I  noticed  toilsome  methods  of  irrigation  by 
hand,  and  only  where  those  are  diligently  practised  has  the  thirsty 
earth  struggled  into  greenness.  In  some  places  a  flat  wheel  is 
turned  by  one  or  more  buffaloes,  generally  driven  by  a  tiny  child 
perched  like  a  fly  on  the  back  of  one  of  these  ugly  creatures — itself 
the  oddest  little  atom  you  can  imagine,  with  shaven  head  and  little 
or  no  clothing. 

But  the  commonest  mode  of  watering  is  by  means  of  an  endless 
chain  of  small  bamboo  buckets  revolving  on  a  great  wooden  wheel 
erected  on  the  brink  of  the  river.  The  wheel  is  worked  like  a 
treadmill  by  the  feet  of  a  Chinaman,  whose  large  hat  is  in  many 
cases  his  sole  article  of  raiment !  The  water  thus  raised  pours 
itself  into  a  trough,  and  flows  thence  to  supply  the  rice-fields.  It 
is  just  the  "  Persian  wheel,"  so  familiar  in  Egypt  and  in  parts  of 
India,  and  is  accompanied  by  the  same  intolerable  noise  of  creak- 
ing, groaning,  shrieking — all  the  dismal  sounds  that  dry  wood  is 
capable  of  producing — a  form  of  ear-torture  which  seems  intensified 
by  the  stillness  of  the  scorching  atmosphere. 

Another  primitive  mode  of  irrigation,  here  as  in  Egypt,  is  for 
two  men  to  stand,  one  on  each  side  of  a  ditch,  swinging  a  bucket 
or  a  basket,  so  as  to  throw  water  from  the  lower  to  the  higher 
level.  It  is  weary  work ;  but  a  month  hence  these  men  will  see 
the  fruits  of  their  labour,  for  by  June  the  rice  and  millet  fields  will 
all  be  green,  and  in  September  tall  crops  will  wave  over  the  plain 
which  now  looks  so  unpromising. 

But  the  one  never-failing  crop  of  this  vast  plain  is  the  crop  of 
graves,  which  lie  scattered  here,  there,  and  everywhere,  in  countless 
thousands.     ^Not  picturesque  horse-shoe-shaped  graves  as  at  Foo- 


TIEN-TSIN.  355 

Chow,  but  just  the  simplest  form  of  conical  mud  mound — the  old 
primeval  tumulus,  probably  ornamented  with  a  knob  on  the  top  of 
each.  These  are  grouped  in  family  parties,  a  multitude  of  small 
mounds  clustering  round  two  or  three  larger  ones.  In  fact,  these 
mud  villages  of  the  dead  are  very  suggestive  of  the  kraals  of  cer- 
tain tribes. 

"We  passed  an  immense  number  of  huge  pyramids  of  salt,  con- 
densed from  sea-water.  The  manufacture  is  a  Government  mo- 
nopoly. 

Almost  the  only  other  variety  in  the  scene  are  the  brick-kilns, 
where  the  mud  is  baked  into  bricks  for  building  houses  of  the 
better  class.  But  there  is  nothing  on  which  the  eye  rests  with 
pleasure.  Even  the  junks  here  are  dull  and  colourless,  and  of  an 
ugly  form — strangely  unlike  the  charmingly  quaint  native  boats  of 
Foo-Chow. 

As  we  approached  Tien-tsin — i.e.,  "Heaven's  Ford" — sixty  miles 
from  the  mouth  of  the  river,  the  country  became  greener,  and  we 
saw  some  small  trees — chiefly  apricot  and  peach  orchards. 

"We  reached  the  town  about  3  p.m.,  when  Mr  Forrest,  E.B.M. 
Consul,  came  on  board,  and  most  hospitably  invited  us  all  to  the 
Consulate.  I  found  that  he  was  an  old  friend  of  my  eldest 
brother,  so  even  in  this  far  corner  I  have  not  landed  quite  among 
strangers.  After  tea,  Mrs  Pirkis  came  with  me  (one  carried  in  a 
chair,  the  other  drawn  in  a  jinriksha)  to  call  on  Mrs  Lees,  who, 
at  the  request  of  a  friend  in  Shanghai,  had  most  kindly  made  all 
necessary  arrangements  as  to  hiring  my  boat,  and  even  lending  me 
the  necessary  bedding,  and  starting  commissariat  matters.  This  is 
for  the  journey  from  here  to  Tung-Chow,  a  journey  of  about  135 
miles,  which  has  to  be  accomplished  in  small  native  boats. 

I  cannot  say  that  the  glimpse  of  Tien-tsin  we  had  this  evening 
tempts  us  to  envy  the  Europeans  whose  lot  is  cast  here.  Just  tin' 
actual  foreign  settlement  on  the  banks  of  the  river  is  pleasant 
enough,  trees  having  been  planted  for  shade  all  along  the  land, 
and  the  gardens  diligently  watered ;  but,  oh  !  the  horrors  of  the 
native  town  !  As  we  passed  through  the  dusty  streets,  each  step  of 
our  runners  stirred  up  clouds  of  dust;  and  when  we  got  beyond 
the  town,  all  we  saw  was  a  wide  parched  desert  strewn  with  in- 
numerable grave-mounds. 

I  have  been  hearing  most  terrible  details  of  the  awful  famine 
which  in  the  last  few  years  has  so  cruelly  desolated  these  northern 
provinces.  Awful  as  were  the  reports  which  reached  as  in  Eng- 
land, you  can  imagine  how  much  more  vividly  they  impress  one, 


35G  I  l;<>M    SHANGHAI    TO    TIEN-TSIX. 

when  related  on  the  spot  by  eyewitnesses.  Though  so  large  a 
part  of  the  empire  was  affected,  the  most  gruesome  depths  of 
horror  were  furnished  by  the  five  great  provinces  which  form  this 
north-eastern  corner — namely,  Shantung,  Honan,  Shensi,  Shansi, 
and  Peh-chi-li  (in  which  last  we  now  are). 

It  appeals  that,  prior  to  1875,  an  enormous  level  plain,  extend- 
ing inland  from  Tien-tsin,  was  famous  for  its  fertility,  but  in  that 
and  previous  years  a  succession  of  overwhelming  floods  utterly 
changed  the  face  of  the  country,  sweeping  away  all  trace  of  care- 
fully constructed  irrigation  works,  and  destroying  all  vegetation. 
Here  and  there  the  banks  of  the  Grand  Canal  gave  way,  and  the 
best  corn  districts  presented  the  appearance  of  great  inland  lakes. 
After  these  years,  when  the  prodigal  clouds  had  poured  out  their 
precious  rain-stores  in  such  cruel  superabundance,  came  long  years 
when  (in  Biblical  phrase)  the  heavens  were  as  brass,  which  here 
means  that  they  were  pitilessly  blue,  and  that  the  rain-bearing 
clouds  wholly  vanished  from  the  skies. 

Then  the  great  plain  became  so  burnt  and  hard  that  the  attempt 
to  cultivate  it  became  hopeless.  Vainly  did  the  farmers  sow  their 
fields  with  the  precious  grain.  Most  of  it  never  sprang  up,  and 
even  where  the  tender  green  herb  did  appear  above  the  hard 
parched  soil,  it  was  quickly  shrivelled  by  the  scorching  sun,  and 
with  it  the  wretched  people  saw  their  only  hope  wither.  For 
months  they  fed  on  seeds  of  wild  grasses,  cotton-seeds  from  which 
the  oil  had  been  expressed,  roots  and  bark,  tough  stringy  fibres 
Avhich  the  strongest  teeth  could  scarcely  masticate,  and  which  at 
best  contained  little  nourishment  to  support  even  a  Chinaman, 
most  frugal  of  all  the  human  family.  Of  course  the  cattle,  sheep, 
asses,  poultry,  all  perished — the  very  hares,  foxes,  and  ground- 
squirrels,  hitherto  so  numerous,  died  off.  In  their  despair  the 
people  pulled  up  even  the  rushes  by  the  roots,  that  nothing  might 
be  wasted.  Then  sweeping  winds  blew  over  the  soil  thus  loosened, 
and  produced  grievous  dust-storms — a  saline  dust,  fatal  to  all 
vegetation. 

Month  after  month  sped  on,  but  never  a  drop  of  rain  fell  to 
refresh  the  scorched  earth.  The  priests  called  on  all  the  people  to 
fast  and  pray,  that  the  Rain-god  might  have  pity  upon  them  (as  to 
fasting,  they  could  scarcely  avoid  that).  The  officials  went  on  foot 
to  the  temples  in  token  of  great  humility;  and,  morning,  noon,  and 
night,  the  starving  multitudes  thronged  the  temples,  beseeching 
the  gods  to  have  compassion  upon  them.  At  every  door  a  bottle 
of  water  was  placed,  as   a  silent   appeal  to  the  mercy  of   Tung 


FAMINE    AND    PESTILENCE.  357 

"Wang,  while  some  desperate  men  even  ventured  on  giving  the 
Eain-gods  a  lesson  hy  carrying  them  out  of  their  temples  and 
depositing  them  in  the  scorching  sun,  till  the  poor  idols  were  all 
cracked  and  blistered,  and  their  paint  and  gilding  fell  off — but 
still  no  rain  came.  So  things  went  on  from  bad  to  worse,  and  by 
the  close  of  1877  it  seemed  as  though  the  lowest  depths  must  have 
been  reached. 

As  Tien-tsin  was  the  port  at  which  the  grain-supplies  from 
favoured  provinces  were  landed,  thence  to  be  forwarded  to  the 
famine  districts,  a  multitude  of  miserable,  starved  wretches 
crowded  hither,  as  many  as  a  hundred  thousand  persons  finding 
shelter  in  improvised  hovels  made  of  mud  and  straw,  round 
all  the  suburbs.  In  many  of  the  famine  villages  a  virulent 
form  of  typhus  fever  broke  out,  and  fastening  on  victims  al- 
ready weakened  to  the  utmost,  found  them  such  easy  prey  thai 
from  four  to  six  hundred  deaths  in  a  night  was  no  unusual 
occurrence. 

Although  the  corn-sacks  brought  by  many  vessels  lay  piled  in 
vast  heaps  all  along  the  shore,  the  difficulties  of  transporting  these 
inland  wellnigh  baffled  the  authorities.  Wherever  it  was  possible 
to  use  water-transport,  this  was  of  course  done,  and  every  stream 
and  canal  was  crowded  with  grain-boats ;  but  where  land-transport 
was  necessary,  then  indeed  trouble  began.  Every  cart  and  every 
animal  that  could  be  found  was  impressed  into  the  service,  but 
multitudes  had  already  been  killed  for  food.  Mules  and  donkeys, 
oxen  and  camels,  Avere  all  annexed  as  Government  pack-animals, 
and  vast  caravans  were  started  across  the  plains,  and  across  moun- 
tain -  ranges  where  the  difficulties  of  transit  were  increased  by 
the  danger  of  attack  by  hill-tribes  whom  hunger  had  rendered 
desperate. 

The  idea  of  employing  these  starving  millions  on  making  or 
repairing  the  roads  never  seems  to  have  occurred  to  the  authorities, 
so  time  and  strength  were  wasted  in  almost  hopeless  efforts  to  get 
over  the  ground.  Carts  were  broken,  and  precious  stores  of  grain 
were  lost;  men  and  beasts  alike  sank  down  to  rise  no  more,  ami 
fell  an  easy  prey  to  ravenous  wolves,  wild  dogs,  and  birds  of  prey,  so 
that  the  tracks  were  soon  well  defined  by  the  multitude  of  bleach- 
ing skeletons,  varied  in  places  by  a  cheerful  exhibition  of  the  heads 
of  decapitated  murderers  and  robbers. 

As  to  the  people  for  whose  relief  these  efforts  were  being  made. 
the  account  of  their  sufferings  is  too  appalling.  In  every  direction 
the  ground  was  strewn  with  unburied  corpses,  on  which   the  once 


358  FROM    SHANGHAI    TO    TIEN-TSIX. 

domestic  dogs  subsisted,  till  they  in  their  turn  were  caught  and 
devoured. 

While  the  Chinese  officials  did  their  utmost  to  organise  systems 
of  relief  which  might  meet  even  a  portion  of  the  more  pressing 
need,  they  were  nobly  assisted  by  a  considerable  number  of 
foreigners,  who  undertook  to  see  that  the  large  sums  subscribed 
in  England  and  elsewhere  were  properly  distributed.  Thus  these 
gentlemen  were  brought  into  personal  contact  with  the  sufferers — 
nor  did  they  shrink  from  visiting  fever-stricken  districts,  where 
some  even  fell  victims  to  the  pestilence.  The  amount  of  real  hard 
self-sacrificing  work  they  accomplished,  and  this  almost  voluntary 
laying  down  their  own  lives  in  the  service  of  others,  seems  to  have 
filled  the  Chinese  with  amazement,  and,  coupled  with  the  fact  that 
the  people  of  England  should  take  sufficient  interest  in  the  suffer- 
ing of  the  Chinese  to  send  them  large  gifts  of  money,  has  appar- 
ently opened  up  quite  a  new  view  of  the  English  character,  calling 
forth  strong  expressions  of  approbation  from  various  high  officials, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  deep  gratitude  of  many  of  the  people. 

So  heart-rending  was  the  widespread  misery  witnessed  by  those 
who  went  over  the  country  to  distribute  relief,  that  much  of  their 
evidence  was  deemed  too  painful  for  publication.  Utterly  appal- 
ling were  the  sights  of  horror,  both  among  the  ghastly  dead  and 
the  naked  skeletons  who  still  retained  life  enough  to  crawl  about. 
Men,  women,  and  children,  once  prosperous,  who  in  the  four  years 
of  famine  had  sold  all  their  possessions,  now  in  the  bitter  cold  of 
winter,  clothed  in  wretched  rags,  were  subsisting  on  the  sweepings 
of  the  quay  or  the  grain-stores,  where  a  few  grains  of  millet  were 
mingled  with  the  dust;  others  mixed  the  coarse  husks  of  corn 
with  a  soft  stone  reduced  to  powder  (parents  had  literally  to  an- 
swer the  children's  cry  for  bread  by  giving  them  stone).  Many 
strove  to  stay  the  anguish  of  hunger  by  gnawing  bark  of  trees,  or 
lumps  of  adhesive  clay. 

One  man,  with  face  blackened  by  starvation  and  misery,  told 
how  he  alone  survived  from  a  family  of  sixteen.  Multitudes  of 
women  and  girls  were  sold — literally  for  a  piece  of  bread — and 
carried  off  to  other  provinces.  Pitiful  mothers  drowned  their 
children,  or  smothered  them  beneath  the  deep  snow,  and  then  put 
an  end  to  their  own  miseries.  Suicide  became  so  common  as 
scarcely  to  call  for  comment.  In  every  village  a  brooding  silence 
told  of  the  stupefied  misery  of  those  who,  still  living,  were  only 
awaiting  death  ;  while  corpses  innumerable  lay  in  every  direction, 
none  having  strength  or  energy  to  give  them  burial. 


DRIVEN    TO    CANNIBALISM.  359 

Most  terrible  of  all  -was  the  fact,  proved  beyond  all  possibility 
of  doubt,  that  (when  the  agonies  of  hunger  had  overcome  all 
scruples)  cannibalism,  which  at  first  stole  in  sub  rosa,  and  was 
practised  with  the  utmost  secrecy,  soon  gained  ground  to  such  an 
extent,  that  at  last  regular  butchers'  shops  openly  trafficked  in  this 
— the  only  available — food.  In  eleven  villages  in  one  district  it 
was  proved  that  two-fifths  of  the  dead  had  been  eaten  !  Cannibal- 
ism being  to  the  Chinaman  every  whit  as  repugnant  as  to  our- 
selves, the  wretched  survivors  were  officially  punished  with  the 
utmost  rigour. 

Terrible  details  on  this  subject  were  reported  by  various  persons 
on  the  Famine  Commission.  The  depraved  appetite  having  been 
once  awakened,  soon  ceased  to  be  content  with  feeding  on  carrion, 
and  the  craving  for  fresh  meat  led  to  appalling  murders. 

On  this  subject  Monseigneur  Tagliabue,  the  Roman  Catholic 
Bishop  of  Shansi,  wrote :  "  Jusqu'a  present  Von  se  contente  de 
manger  eeux  qui  etaient  dejd  marts,  metis  maintenant  I'ou  f>/"  aussi 
les  vivants  pour  les  manger.  Le  mart  nmnge  sa  femme,  les  par'  nts 
mangent  leurs  fils  et  lews  jilles,  et  a  lew  tow,  les  enfant*  mangent 
lews  parents,  comme  Von  entend  dire  presque  chaque  jour."  Tins 
sounds  too  awful  to  be  true,  but  subsequent  investigations  proved 
it  be  so,  and  to  have  been  carried  to  an  excess  far  beyond  what 
the  good  bishop  could  have  conceived  possible.  Among  those 
who  corroborate  this  statement  I  may  mention  Dr  Dudgeon,  who 
is  in  charge  of  the  L.M.S.  Hospital  at  Peking.  He  states  thai 
such  of  these  miserable  cannibals  as  were  detected  were  brought 
before  magistrates,  and  condemned  to  be  exposed  in  cages  and  left 
to  starve  to  death.  Others  were  naded  to  the  city  walls,  and 
some  women,  convicted  of  the  same  offence,  were  buried  alive. 

By  January  1878  the  names  of  upwards  of  eight  millions  of 
persons  were  entered  on  the  books  of  the  Belief  Committee  as 
being  absolutely  destitute.  These  were  dying  at  the  rate  of  a 
thousand  a-day.  In  May  1878,  it  was  calculated  that  five  mil- 
lions of  the  people  had  actually  died  from  starvation,  and,  in  point 
of  fact,  vast  tracts  of  country  have  literally  been  depopulated. 


3G0  IN    A    HOUSE-BOAT    ON    THE    PEI-HO. 

CHAPTER   XXX. 

IN    A    HOUSE-BOAT    ON    THE    PEI-HO. 

Tien-tain — A  dirty,  dreary  town — Clay  figures — Bonnie  Doon  ! — A  house- 
boat on  the  Pei-ho — Monotonous  shores — Tung-Chow — Thirteen-storeyed 
pagoda. 

Alone  in  my  wee  Boat  on  the  Pei-ho, 
June  4th. 

Tins  is  the  third  day  of  this  part  of  the  journey,  which  was  held 
up  to  me  as  the  chief  bugbear  of  this  expedition.  To  me  it  is  a 
delightful  time  of  rest.  There  is  nothing  to  look  at,  and  no  one 
to  talk  to,  and  the  repose  is  perfect !  Certainly  the  friends  who 
bade  me  come  to  Peking  were  wise,  for  this  transition  from  South- 
ern to  Xorthern  China  is  like  passing  from  one  world  to  another, 
and  literally,  beyond  a  family  likeness  in  the  people,  the  two 
countries  seem  to  have  no  other  resemblance. 

In  Canton  every  morsel  of  every  street  is  fascinatingly  pictur- 
esque and  unique.  The  Fuh-Kien  province  is  full  of  beauty  both 
of  art  and  nature.  Shanghai  certainly  has  no  beauty,  but  its 
neighbour,  Xingpo,  lies  within  easy  reach  of  most  lovely  country. 
Well,  here,  of  course,  I  know  that  there  is  fine  scenery  in  the 
mountains,  when  you  get  there,  but  this  vast  alluvial  plain  is  in 
itself  quite  a  world,  and  a  most  monotonous  one.  If  I  was  literally 
weary  of  beauty  before,  I  am  getting  a  good  change  now,  and 
actually  I  quite  enjoy  it ! 

On  Monday  we  explored  enough  of  Tien-tsin  to  satisfy  me  that 
I  had  no  wish  to  see  more  of  it,  though  it  is  a  very  important 
commercial  city,  being  the  port  of  Peking,  and,  moreover,  a  great 
walled  town,  with  a  population  of  about  950,000  persons.  But 
though  our  active  chair-coolies  carried  us  over  the  ground  very 
briskly,  we  saw  nothing  in  our  three  hours  of  sight-seeing,  under  a 
blazing  sun,  to  redeem  the  general  dusty  ugliness.  Everything 
seemed  alike  hideous,  and  I  have  as  yet  seen  no  town  to  compare 
with  this  for  dirt,  dust,  heat,  and  bad  smells. 

On  all  sides  open  sewers  send  up  a  steaming  miasma,  and  a  very 
large  proportion  of  tne  people  are  terribly  scarred  by  smallpox, 
which  periodically  rages  here ;  and  the  people  take  no  precautions 
against  infection,  unless  inoculating  children,  and  then  administer- 
ing a  most  disgusting  drug  as  a  sort  of  charm,  can  rank  as  such. 


THE  LEADER  OF  PROGRESS.  361 

]\Iost  of  our  way  lay  between  hot  dry  dull  walls,  which  perhaps 
enclosed  luxurious  homes  of  rich  men,  but  we  saw  only  the  dreary 
exterior,  thronged  by  wretched  beggars  in  every  stage  of  poverty 
and  disease.  The  whole  city,  as  well  as  every  village  I  have  yet 
seen  in  the  north,  is  built  of  mud,  only  varied  by  an  occasional 
house  of  grey  mud  bricks. 

The  only  point  of  relief  to  the  eye  is  that  here,  as  in  the  south, 
the  bulk  of  the  population  are  clothed  in  blue,  and,  moreover, 
here  many  women  wear  bright-coloured  clothes,  and  look  very 
clean  and  neat.  Another  feature  is  the  multitude  of  donkeys  and 
mules  which  stand  in  the  streets  ready  saddled  for  hire,  and  are 
much  patronised  by  the  sailors  of  the  numerous  foreign  ships,  both 
commercial  and  warlike,  which  are  always  stationed  at  Tien-tsin, 
just  to  remind  the  Celestials  that  the  barbarians  can  no  longer  be 
shut  out,  and  also  that  any  repetition  of  the  Tien-tsin  massacre 
would  be  unwise,  and  would  probably  result  in  the  destruction  of 
the  town. 

At  the  same  time,  the  shipping  includes  a  considerable  number 
of  Chinese  gunboats;  and  the  great  arsenal  here,  which  is  entirely 
worked  by  Chinamen  under  supervision  of  English  engineers,  is 
said  to  turn  out  first-class  war  material,  Li-Hung-Chang,  the  en- 
lightened Governor-General  of  this  province,  having  a  most  remark- 
able appreciation  of  all  such  foreign  manufactures. 

Although  a  Chinaman  of  the  purest  race,  he  won  his  laurels  as 
the  greatest  general  of  the  empire  in  crushing  the  Taiping  rebel- 
lion (that  gigantic  effort  of  a  vast  body  of  his  countrymen  to  throw 
off  the  hated  yoke  of  the  Manchu  Tartars,  and  to  break  the  spell 
by  which  that  invading  host  of  three  millions  has  for  two  cen- 
turies held  a  population  of  four  hundred  millions  in  bondage!) 
For  these  unpatriotic  services  Li-Hung-Chang  was  raised  to  the 
highest  dignities  that  could  be  conferred  by  the  Tartar  rulers,  the 
office  of  Viceroy  of  Tien-tsin,  guarding  the  approach  to  Peking, 
being  perhaps  the  most  important  post  in  their  gift. 

Now  he  is  the  recognised  leader  of  all  advance  in  China.  Thanks 
to  his  determination  and  energy,  a  telegraph  is  actually  about  to  be 
established  between  Peking  and  Shanghai,  an  amazing  concession 
from  the  Government  which  tore  up  the  railway  from  Shanghai  to 
Woosung.1     Very  soon  he  hopes  to  induce  the  Imperial  authorities 

1  The  construction  of  the  first  telegraph  from  Shanghai  to  Tien-toil]  was  sanc- 
tioned in  fear  and  trembling  as  to  what  might  lie  its  effect  on  the  occull  poi 
nature  —  the  all-pervading  feng-shui.      Finding  that  the  mysterious    Dragon    of 
Wind  and  Water  took  no  notice  of  the  perpetrators  of  this  innovation,  the  imperial 
Government  waxed  bold,  and  now  not  only  is  the  telegraph  to  Peking  in  lull  work- 


362  IN    A    HOUSE-BOAT    OX    THE   PEI-HO. 

to  sanction  u  railway  from  Taku  to  Peking,  a  still  more  amazing 
prospect,  but  one  which,  it  is  hoped,  will  prove  the  beginning  of 
a  great  railway  system,  commending  itself  to  the  official  mind 
as  a  secure  means  of  conveying  food  to  the  capital,  now  that 
so  many  of  the  great  ""inland  canals  of  olden  days  have  been 
allowed  to  fall  away  into  hopeless  disrepair,  while  rice-ships  ap- 
proaching by  sea  are  found  to  be  liable  in  case  of  war  to  be  seized 
by  any  naval  foe.  When  once  a  railway  has  been  constructed  to 
Peking  itself,  across  a  country  so  thickly  strewn  with  graves,  it 
will  be  impossible  to  raise  superstitious  objections  in  other  parts 
of  the  empire,  and  the  close  of  the  century  may  see  China  as  well 
provided  with  railways  as  in  Japan,  and  on  a  scale  so  vast  as  to 
provide  work  which  will  revive  the  whole  iron-trade  of  Britain. 

Li-Hung-Chang  further  urges  the  developing  of  his  country's 
mineral  resources,  and  the  working  of  the  coal  and  copper  mines  ; 
he  is  also  a  strong  supporter  of  the  college  at  Peking,  where  many 
young  Chinamen  now  receive  a  thorough  literary  and  scientific 
training.1 

Here  at  Tien-tsin  he  has  established  a  first-class  dispensary,  to 
be  worked  on  European  principles,  and  this  he  has  committed  to 
the  charge  of  a  medical  missionary,  though  fully  aware  that  his 
principal  object  is  to  instruct  the  patients  and  their  friends  in 
Christianity.  This  movement  originated  in  his  wife's  very  long 
and  dangerous  illness,  when  Chinese  physicians  saw  no  hope  of  her 
recovery.  Then  the  Viceroy  resolved  to  overcome  national  preju- 
dice, and  to  summon  foreign  medical  aid.  This  he  obtained  from 
the  American  Mission,  and  the  physician  who  undertook  the  case 
had  the  satisfaction  of  establishing  a  skilled  lady  doctor  in  the 
palace  to  watch  its  progress.  In  due  time  Lady  Li  recovered ; 
her  husband  set  apart  a  portion  of  the  finest  temple  in  Tien-tsin 
for  the  general  dispensary  aforesaid,  while  Lady  Li  has  at  her  own 
expense  established  one  specially  for  women,  placing  it  entirely 
in  the  hands  of  the  medical  lady  who  nursed  her  so  devotedly.2 

But  as  regards  the  narrow,  dirty,  densely  crowded,  and  most 
unfragrant  streets,  I  could  not  find  a  redeeming  feature  even  in  the 
shops,  which  to  me  are  usually  so  tempting.     All  we  saw  were 

ing  order,  but  it  has  also  been  completed  to  every  province  in  Cbina  and  Corea,  and 
branch  lines  are  being  constructed  in  all  directions. 

1  See  Note  on  recent  progress  in  liberal  education  and  the  Training  Colleges  at 
Tien-tsin  at  the  end  of  Chapter  xxxiv. 

-  In  the  beginning  of  1885  the  list  of  foreign  medical  students  in  New  York  re- 
ceived a  very  interesting  addition  in  the  arrival  of  a  young  Chinese  lady  of  noble 
birth,  by  name  Ha-King-Eng,  who  hopes  to  minister  to  her  suffering  sisters. 


OUR    BOAT    HOMES.  363 

dingy  and  unattractive,  but  we  were  told  that  the  best  are  in  the 
suburbs,  far  out  of  the  town.  "We  were  amused  to  see  men  going 
about  with  locomotive  stoves  selling  boiling  water,  either  for  re- 
plenishing teapots,  or  to  facilitate  a  simple  wayside  wash  in  tin- 
approved  Chinese  style,  with  a  bit  of  flannel  wrung  out.1  It  is 
bought  by  the  poor  who  cannot  afford  fuel  to  heat  their  own  kettles. 

A  special  industry  of  this  place  is  that  of  modelling  little  figures 
in  clay  coloured  like  life,  to  represent  Chinamen  of  every  degree, 
great  mandarins,  soldiers,  sailors,  scholars,  merchants,  boatmen, 
coolies,  farmers,  actors,  and  actresses.  They  are  really  excellent,  but 
too  heavy  and  brittle  for  transport. 

Our  boats  were  despatched  in  the  forenoon,  but  having  to  thread 
their  way  up  the  river  right  through  the  city,  through  crowded 
shipping,  great  cumbersome  junks,  and  innumerable  craft  of  every 
description,  their  progress  was  necessarily  slow.  So  it  was  ar- 
ranged that  we  shoidd  remain  in  comfortable  quarters  till  the  after- 
noon, and  then  be  carried  in  chairs  to  the  furthest  possible  point. 
Of  course  I  was  sorry  to  miss  seeing  all  the  river  life,  but  comfort 
carried  the  day;  and  then  we  had  another  run  across  the  city, 
which  nowise  improved  our  previous  impressions,  the  only  fine 
object  we  saw  being  the  pitiful  ruin  of  the  grand  Roman  Catholic 
Cathedral,  which  was  burned  in  the  disturbances  of  1870,  on  the 
day  when  the  thirteen  French  Sisters  of  Mercy,  and  a  dozen  other 
Europeans,  were  massacred. 

We  crossed  a  tributary  of  the  Pei-ho  which  rejoices  in  the  name 
of  Doun-Ho,  but  it  proved  anything  but  a  "  bonnie  Doon,"  and  its 
banks  were  neither  fresh  nor  fair — in  short,  I  was  not  sorry  when 
we  reached  the  point  where  our  little  fleet  of  four  boats  awaited 
our  arrival.  They  are  regular  native  boats,  but  quite  clean  and 
nice.  Mr  and  Mrs  Pirkis  have  one  boat,  their  two  nice  children 
and  Chinese  amah  (i.e.,  nurse)  another  ;  the  cook  and  other  servants 
follow  in  a  kitchen-boat.  Mine,  being  somewhat  larger  than  tin- 
others,  acts  as  our  dining-room,  so  when  dinner-time  comes,  the 
kitchen-boat  is  lashed  alongside  of  this,  the  others  come  on  board, 
and  we  have  a  most  cheery,  cosy  picnic,  the  dishes  being  handed 
in  to  us  as  they  are  ready.  This  arrangement  involves  no  delay  ; 
to-day,  for  instance,  we  wen-  flying  up  the  river  before  a  favouring 
breeze,  a  very  great  boon  both  to  ourselves  and  to  the  boatmen, 

1  Although  the  scanty  personal  ablutions  of  the  Chinese  form  a  remarkabl 
trast  to  the  Japanese  habits  <>f  much  washing  ami  singularly  sociable  bathing,  I  am 
told  that  there  are  baths  (for  men  only)  in  every  Chinese  city,  where  luxurious 
persons  are  steamed  and  then  refreshed  with  a  cup  of  tea,  at  the  cost  of  considerably 
less  than  one  penny. 


364  IN    A    HOUSE-BOAT    ON    THE    PEI-HO. 

wIki  have  their  full  share  of  weary  tracking,  when  they  must  put 
themselves  in  harness  and  with  infinite  toil  tow  us  up  against  wind 
and  stream. 

Dinner  is  our  only  social  meal.  For  breakfast  and  supper  the 
commissariat-boat  distributes  our  portions  to  the  various  boats. 
These  are  nf  the  simplest  construction,  being  long  fiat-bottomed 
house-boats,  with  windows  which  open  at  will.  The  crew  reserve 
about  a  third  of  the  house,  astern,"  for  their  own  use,  while  the 
passenger  has  the  lion's  share  to  the  front.  This  is  divided  into 
two  parts — the  inner  compartment,  which  occupies  the  centre  of 
the  boat,  being  a  raised  platform  of  wooden  planks.  On  this  tbe 
traveller  spreads  his  own  bedding  (in  my  case  it  is  that  so  kindly 
lent  to  me  by  Mrs  Lees,  together  witb  a  lamp  and  some  table  fur- 
nishings). I  may  note  that,  notwithstanding  the  great  heat  of  the 
day,  a  blanket  at  night  is  most  welcome.  The  said  platform  is 
about  eight  feet  square,  and  is  enclosed  by  eight  panels  of  very 
artistic  carved  wood.  It  is  separated  by  carved  doors  from  the  big 
dining-room,  which  is  ten  feet  by  eight,  and  allows  us  to  stand 
upright  with  a  foot  to  spare.  This  outer  half  is  furnished  'with  a 
table  and  chairs,  so  that  one  can  read  or  write  in  perfect  comfort, 
and  only  feel  obliged  to  look  out  when  meeting  other  craft  which 
may  prove  interesting.      Certainly  there  are  a  great  many  of  these. 

I  particularly  delight  in  some  of  the  mandarins'  boats — great 
clumsy-looking  floating  villages,  with  huge  cumbersome  sails,  either 
white  or  of  yellow  matting,  and  large  scarlet  flags.  They  are  very 
high  in  the  stern  (sometimes  three  storeys  high)  and  swarm  with 
men,  women,  and  children,  whose  heads  are  thrust  out  from  every 
port-hole  to  stare  at  me,  as  I  do  at  them.  These  are  the  families 
of  the  boatmen,  and  live  on  board.  But  several  fine  large  cabins, 
with  any  amount  of  colour  and  gilding,  are  reserved  for  the  great 
man  and  his  family.  Even  these  boats,  however,  are  less  picturesque 
than  those  of  the  south. 

The  river  itself  is  a  shallow  muddy  stream,  in  some  places  barely 
twenty  feet  wide,  in  others  broadening  to  perhaps  a  hundred  feet, 
winding  sluggishly  between  low  banks  through  flat  alluvial  land, 
with  never  a  morsel  of  rock  or  stone  to  vary  its  monotony — only 
clusters  of  dirty,  dreary-looking  huts  of  sun-dried  mud. 

"We  have  passed  many  junks  laden  with  rice  and  millet  on  their 
way  to  Peking ;  for  the  Grand  Canal,  which  was   specially  con- 
structed to  bring  the  grain- tribute  of  the  provinces  to  Peking,1 
enters  the  Pei-ho  at  Tien-tsin,  whence  the  grain -junks  travel  by 
1  Hence  its  title,  Yuen-liang-Ho — "  Grain-tribute  river."' 


STRANGE    APPROACH    TO    A    GREAT    CAPITAL.       365 

this  natural  but  circuitous  waterway,  as  far  as  Tung-Chow,  where 
they  discharge  their  cargo,  which  is  carted  some  distance  to  a  canal, 
transferred  to  boats,  and  so  carried  the  remaining  fifteen  miles  to 
the  capital. 

The  actual  direct  distance  between  Peking  and  its  seaport, 
Tien-tsin,  is  about  eighty  miles,  but  the  serpentine  windings  of 
the  river  make  it  a  hundred  and  fifty,  a  distance  which,  under 
favourable  circumstances,  such  as  our  own,  is  accomplished  at  an 
average  rate  of  three  miles  an  hour  !  If  the  river  is  low,  it  is  apt 
to  be  much  slower,  and  varied  by  constantly  sticking  in  the  mud! 

Is  not  this  an  extraordinary  mode  of  approaching  the  capital  of 
a  vast  empire,  representing  one  of  the  oldest  civilisations  of  the 
world  1  a  river,  moreover,  which  is  ice-bound  from  the  end  of 
November  till  the  end  of  March,  or  even  April,  so  that  vessels 
which  incautiously  delay  their  departure  must  remain  prisoners  ;ill 
those  months  in  the  grip  of  the  frozen  river.  During  all  that  time 
the  only  communication  with  the  outer  world  is  by  riding  or  jolting 
in  dreadful  springless  carts  over  so-called  roads,  which  in  wet 
weather  are  a  sea  of  deep  mud,  and  when  sun-dried,  form  ruts  like 
incipient  mountain-ranges  seamed  with  deep  chasms  ! 

The  boatmen  have  a  hard  time  of  it,  both  night  and  day,  for  we 
never  stop.  Sometimes  a  favourable  breeze  fills  the  sails  and  helps 
us  cheerily  on  our  way.  Then  the  crew  rejoice,  and  curl  them- 
selves up  in  their  corner  to  eat  much  rice,  and  chatter  or  sleep  as 
the  case  may  be.  But  the  river  winds  so  that  no  steady  gali 
avail  for  long,  for  what  helped  one  hour  is  in  our  teeth  the  next,  so 
then  the  men  must  return  to  their  toilsome  tracking,  and  when  we 
stick  on  mud-banks  they  have  to  jump  in  and  push  and  pull  till 
they  get  us  off  again  ; — just  imagine  the  discomfort  of  such  work 
for  men  who  have  no  change  of  raiment ! — no  wonder  that  many  of 
the  boatmen,  who  are  not  encumbered  with  passengers,  prefer  to 
leave  their  clothes  on  board,  their  sole  working  dress  consisting  of 
a  large  straw  hat  and  a  very  short  jacket ! 

Now  we  are  very  near  the  end  of  our  voyage.  It  is  a  lovely 
night,  almost  full  moon,  and  I  quite  grudge  turning  in,  notwith- 
standing the  beauty  of  the  carved  panels!  But  I  must  be  awake 
early  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  Tung-Chow,  which  is  the  true  port  >■!' 
Peking — the  river  port. 

Tdno-Chow,  Jm 

I  have  certainly  fulfilled  the  last  intention,  for  I  awoke  at 
3  a.m.,  in  time  to  see  the  moon  set  in  great  beauty,  and  found 


366  FROM    TUNG-CHOW   TO    PEKING. 

that  we  had  reached  our  destination,  and  were  moored  to  a  muddy 
bank,  in  full  sight  of  a  great  pagoda  thirteen  storeys  high,  It  is 
built  of  brick,  but  enlivened  with  a  good  deal  of  colour.  It  stands 
on  an  apparently  artificial  hillock  near  the  city  Avail,  and  has  four 
doors  facing  north,  south,  east,  and  west,  which,  strange  to  say, 
can  only  be  reached  by  long  ladders.  It  seems  to  be  rather 
dilapidated,  like  most  things  in  these  parts. 

Though  it  was  still  grey  dawn  when  I  looked  out  (and,  more- 
over, really  chilly),  there  Avere  already  many  Chinamen  astir  busy 
marketing.  Our  saying  that  "He  who  would  thrive  must  rise  at 
five,"  would  seem  to  them  downright  idleness !  They  are  always 
ready  for  the  day's  work,  and  always  go  steadily  about  it.  But 
for  the  last  half-hour  they  have  found  it  more  interesting  to  muster 
in  force  along  the  bank  and  gaze  at  us.  They  know  we  are  going 
to  breakfast,  and  the  sight  of  a  foreign  man  and  two  women  and 
two  children  eating  with  knives,  forks,  and  spoons,  and  each  pro- 
vided with  plates,  cup,  and  saucer,  instead  of  all  sharing  one  great 
bowl  of  rice  to  be  eaten  with  chop-sticks,  is  one  which  has  not  yet 
lost  the  charm  of  novelty. 

It  is  now  5.30,  and  at  6  we  are  to  start  for  Peking  in  the 
far-famed  carts,  which  are  the  only  carriages  in  the  Celestial 
capital. 


CHAPTEE    XXXI. 

FROM    TUNG-CHOW    TO    PEKING. 

A  ;1  ride  "  in  a  Peking  cart  over  Peking  roads  ! — Indifference  to  the  sun's  rays — 
In  Tung-Chow  city — The  irnjiterial  highway — Beggars — A  funeral — Canals 
— Mongolian  ponies  ■ —  Quaint  vehicles  —  Tribute-bearing  nations  —  The 
British  Legation  —  A  Chinese  palace  —  Gaudy  colours  —  The  London 
Mission. 

London  Mission  Station,  Peking, 

June  hth. 

At  last  we  are  in  the  famous  capital  of  the  Celestial  Empire  ! — 
the  dreariest  wilderness  of  dirt  and  dust  that  you  can  possibly 
conceive — a  place  in  which  it  would  surely  be  horrible  to  live, 
however  interesting  to  a  passing  visitor,  for  whom  all  is  made 
smooth  by  the  kindness  of  residents.  Much  as  I  had  heard  to  the 
disadvantage  of  Peking,  lo  !  the  half  was  not  told  me. 


te     iiL  -/ 


t  -    '* 


UJ  ^; 
I  UJ 
I-     0- 


PEKING    CARTS.  367 

To  begin  with  our  morning  journey,  in  the  only  carriages  of 
this  metropolis — the  Peking  carts  !  0  you  luxurious  people  at 
home,  gliding  along  on  C-springs,  over  roads  wellnigh  as  smooth 
as  mahogany  tables,  I  just  wish  you  could  for  once  experience  the 
extraordinary  variety  of  sensations  to  be  obtained  in  a  five  hours' 
"ride  "  from  Tung-Chow  to  Peking  ! 

The  cart  itself  is  a  small  wooden  frame  without  springs  (for  no 
springs  could  possibly  exist  on  these  roads).  It  is  poised  on  two 
exceedingly  strong  heavy  wheels,  so  large  and  solid  as  to  seem  out 
of  all  proportion  to  the  size  of  the  cart.  These  are  closely  studded 
all  round  the  rim  with  very  large-headed  iron  nails,  and  the  axle 
projects  considerably,  so  as  to  lessen  the  danger  of  upsetting. 
Overhead  is  an  arched  framework  of  wood,  covered  with  thick 
blue  calico,  and  with  no  opening  at  the  back,  so  that,  having  takes 
your  seat  in  the  seclusion  of  your  carriage,  you  are  not  only  in- 
visible to  the  world,  but  can  only  see  right  ahead  over  the  shoulder 
of  your  driver,  Avho  sits  on  the  shaft,  and  I  suspect  has  rather  the 
best  post.  To  the  passenger,  the  effect  is  just  as  if  one  were  look- 
ing out  from  the  depths  of  an  old  woman's  poke-bonnet !  This 
is  a  delightful  way  for  an  intelligent  traveller  to  see  a  new  country  !  ! 

Moreover,  as  it  is  summer,  and  the  thermometer  at  10">  in  the 
shade,  the  mule  and  driver  are  protected  by  a  light  screen  of  Uue 
calico  stretched  over  a  wooden  frame,  which  is  fastened  to  the 
front  of  the  cart,  and  is  supported  in  front  by  two  poles  fixed 
to  the  shafts.  To  the  inmate  of  this  tunnel  this  of  course  is 
as  irritating  as  driving  through  fine  scenery  with  a  carriage  full 
of  umbrellas  ! 

One  can  only  hope  that  it  really  is  a  comfort  to  man  and  beast, 
but  certainly  these  people  do  not  seem  to  mind  exposure  to  the 
most  scorching  sun,  and  instead  of  protecting  themselves  from  its 
direct  rays  by  heaping  on  thicker  head-gear,  as  we  do,  they  actually 
throw  off  the  covering  which  they  wear  in  winter,  and  the  majority 
of  the  crowd  in  the  streets  go  about  bareheaded,  with  their  clean- 
shaven skulls  shining  like  billiard-balls.  Moreover,  during  this 
very  hot  weather  a  large  proportion  of  the  poor  peopL-  entirely 
dispense  with  all  clothing  above  the  waist. 

I  am  told  that  in  hot  weather  the  whole  cart,  including  this 
calico  screen,  is  covered  with  a  stout  sort  of  oil-silk,  which  makes 
it  quite  waterproof. 

Well,  by  G  a.m.  we  were  stowed  away  in  four  of  these  extraor- 
dinary machines.  I  had  the  luck  of  a  very  superior  cart  with  a 
glass  window  nearly  a  foot  square,  so  I  contrived  to  Bee  something 


368  FROM    TUNG-CHOW    TO    PEKING. 

of  our  surroundings.  First  we  passed  through  Tung-Chow,  which 
is  one  of  the  foul  thousand  walled  cities  of  China.  The  said  walls 
are  about  forty-five  feet  in  height,  and  are  about  twenty-four  feet 
wide  at  the  top,  and  thirty  at  the  base;  but  this  does  not  imply 
solid  masonry,  but  only  a  great  earth-rampart  encased  in  an  outer 
and  inner  wall  of  brickwork.  These  walls  are  in  a  most  dilapidated 
state,  and  the  gateways  are  insignificant. 

In  the  main  streets  I  noticed  some  shops  with  very  elaborately 
carved  and  gilded  facings,  but  the  gilding  and  the  paint  are  all 
incrusted  with  dirt,  and  my  only  definite  impression  was  that  of  a 
horribly  hideous  city  built  of  mud  and  smothered  in  dust.  But 
indeed  I  had  to  devote  my  whole  attention  to  holding  on  to  the 
cart,  so  as  in  some  measure  to  lessen  the  shocks  of  incessant  bump- 
ing as  we  jerked  and  jolted  in  and  out  of  pitfalls  on  the  broad 
stone  causeway,  which  when  newly  made,  six  hundred  years  ago 
(a.d.  1260),  must  have  been  superexcellent,  the  work  of  a  master- 
mind. First,  as  a  foundation,  there  was  a  roadway  of  earth  raised 
to  a  height  of  six  feet  above  the  level  plain.  This  was  coated 
with  cement,  into  which  were  sunk  large,  accurately  fitted,  per- 
fectly smooth  pavement  stones  of  irregular  size,  some  being  nearly 
nine  feet  long  by  two  in  width,  and  this  stone  causeway,  twenty- 
five  feet  wide,  was  the  imperial  highway  to,  and  all  round,  the 
capital. 

Xow  it  is  more  execrable  than  anything  you  can  conceive.  The 
worst  cart-road  in  Britain  could  convey  no  idea  of  this  approach  to 
the  metropolis,  or  of  the  condition  of  even  the  principal  streets  ! 
The  stone  slabs  are  broken  or  tilted  over,  the  road  is  all  worn  into 
deep  ruts  like  chasms,  and  holes  from  one  to  two  feet  in  depth,  in 
and  out  of  which  the  driver  guides  the  heavy  wooden  wheels  of 
the  springless  cart,  the  chief  marvel  being  how  the  mules  escape 
broken  legs  a  hundred  times  a-day  !  In  many  places  the  road 
degenerates  into  a  mere  track  of  deep  dust,  which,  in  winter  or 
rainy  weather,  must  mean  deep  mire. 

As,  mercifully  for  us,  the  country  is  not  flooded  at  present  (very 
much  the  contrary),  we  were  able  to  get  over  a  considerable  part  of 
the  seventeen  miles  by  driving  alongside  of  the  road;  and,  all 
tilings  considered,  the  dust  was  not  quite  so  bad  as  it  might  have 
been — as,  for  instance,  it  was  two  days  ago,  when  General  and 
Mrs  U.  S.  Grant  arrived,  and  were  received  and  escorted  to  Peking 
by  civil  and  military  authorities — an  honour  which  wellnigh  re- 
sulted in  suffocation ! 

As  regards  scenery,  we  were  traversing  a  dead-level  plain  thickly 


THE  GREAT  ANCIENT  ROADS.  3 GO 

strewn  with  conical  grave-mounds,  and  at  intervals  passed  through 
mud  villages  with  open-air  eating-shops,  where  carters  and  other 
wayfarers  halted  for  refreshments  and  watered  their  thirsty  animal.-. 
All  along  the  cheerless  road  a  multitude  of  miserable,  starved-look- 
ing  beggars  and  naked  children  lay  grovelling  in  the  dust,  kneeling 
with  their  foreheads  on  the  earth  to  crave  small  coin;  and  it  is 
pitiful  to  see  the  gratitude  with  which  they  receive  coin  so  in- 
finitesimal in  value  that  you  feel  ashamed  to  oiler  it.  But  though 
I  certainly  have  never  seen  so  many  beggars  anywhere  else,  I  am 
told  that  these  are  as  nothing  compared  to  those  which  literally 
lined  this  road  last  year  during  the  famine. 

The  most  horrid  incident  of  the  day  was  meeting  the  funeral  of 
a  man  who  had  been  dead  about  two  months.  The  great  heavj 
wooden  coffin  had  not  been  properly  closed,  consequently  we  were 
nearly  poisoned  for  half  an  hour  afterwards  by  the  appalling  stench 
which  tloated  along  the  track  in  his  wake.  But  neither  the  funeral 
party  nor  the  bystanders  seemed  even  aware  of  anything  noxious. 
These  people  certainly  can  have  no  sense  of  smell ;  that  is  proved 
at  every  turn. 

Every  now  and  again  we  marked  the  approach  of  an  unusualh 
dense  dust-cloud,  through  which,  as  it  swept  towards  us,  we  could 
discern  a  party  of  men  riding  donkeys  full  tilt,  and  sitting  well 
hack,  after  the  manner  of  experience,  1  English  donkey-boys.  They 
wear  large  straw  hats  lined  with  dark  blue  of  the  same  colour  as 
their  clothes,  a  good  relief  to  the  dust-colour  all  round.  Some- 
times it  was  a  slow-moving  cloud,  and  a  musical  tinkle  of  bells 
told  of  the  approach  of  silent-footed  camels.  We  nut  Beveral  long 
strings  of  these,  laden  with  firewood,  coal,  tea,  and  limestone 
brought  from  the  mountains.  They  are  Mongolians,  and  appa- 
rently in  a  most  mangy  condition,  with  all  their  furry  hair  hanging 
in  loose  rags,  leaving  the  poor  beasts  half  naked.  Hut  as  thej 
come  from  far  north,  and  suffer  terribly  in  this  great  heat,  perhaps 
they  are  glad  to  be  rid  of  their  winter  greatcoats  ! 

We  also  met  a  large  drove  of  Mongolian  ponies,  escorted  by 
their  flat-faced  countrymen,  whose  fur  caps  and  unshaven  head- 
look  strange  now  that  I  have  grown  so  accustomed  to  bald  fore- 
heads and  pigtails.  Here  there  are  almost  as  man,-  faces  of  the 
Tartar  type  as  of  the  Chinese,  but  these  Mongol  Tartars  differ  from 
the  Manchu  Tartars  almost  as  much  as  from  the  Chinamen. 

As  for  the  ponies,  they  are  fine  sturdy  little  beasts,  said  to  be 
very  hardy;  hut  the  animals  most  in  favour  here  are  mule-,  which 
are  excellent.     1  saw  several  carts  coming   in   from  the  country 

2  A 


370  FROM    TUNG-CHOW   TO    PEKING. 

drawn  by  two  mules  driven  tandem  with  rope-reins,  and  I  am 
told  that  they  will  travel  on  an  average  thirty  miles  a-day  over 
the  roughest  tracks,  up  and  down  hill  through  heavy  sand,  or  over 
water-worn  boulders  !  No  wonder  that  carts  have  to  be  constructed 
without  springs ! 

Never  before  have  I  imagined  the  existence  of  so  many  varieties 
of  queer  one-wheeled  barrows  and  two-wheeled  carts,  and  such 
extraordinary  combinations  of  animals  in  wonderful  rope-harness 
and  rope-traces.  The  unequal  yoking  of  ox  and  ass,  forbidden  by 
the  Levitical  law,  is  here  quite  the  correct  thing,  and  the  man  who 
owns  an  ox,  a  mule,  and  an  ass,  harnesses  them  all  to  his  cart,  and 
he  and  his  wife  and  family  push  behind,  or  attempt  to  steer  the 
wheels  clear  of  the  ruts.  I  am  told  that  sometimes  one  may  even 
see  a  dog  yoked  abreast  with  a  pony  and  an  ass,  the  three  being 
harnessed  as  leaders  to  a  two-wheeled  travelling-carriage,  while  a 
saddled  ox  strides  between  the  shafts  ! 

I  think  the  quaintest  of  all  the  odd  vehicles  we  saw  to-day  was 
a  huge  wheelbarrow  with  only  one  wheel  in  the  middle.  It  carried 
four  enormous  canvas  bottles  cased  with  wicker  and  full  of  oil 
(some  of  these  great  oil -baskets  are  merely  lined  with  paper). 
Four  men  in  blue  clothes,  with  pigtails  and  wide  straw  hats, 
pushed  and  pulled,  assisted  by  two  donkeys,  while  a  solitary  mule 
led  the  way,  far  in  front.  Then  there  were  any  number  of  heavy 
stone-carts,  drawn  by  two  donkeys  in  the  shafts,  three  mules  far 
ahead,  and  a  squadron  of  coolies  in  big  straw  hats  pushing  witli 
might  and  main,  and  shouting  a  sort  of  rhythmical  chorus. 

As  I  was  suffering  from  bruised  bones,  I  especially  admired  an 
ingeniously  contrived  litter  constructed  with  shafts  both  fore  and 
aft,  which  was  thus  carried  by  two  mules ;  evidently  its  inmate 
had  realised  the  anguish  of  jolting  upon  wheels  over  a  road  like 
the  bed  of  a  river ! 

But  here  as  elsewhere  use  must  be  second  nature,  for  my  kindly 
simple  carter,  who  certainly  was  guileless  of  all  intentional  sarcasm, 
repeatedly  turned  to  address  me  in  a  sentence  -which  I  found  ex- 
pressed a  hope  that  the  foreign  lady  was  "  enjoying  her  ride  ! ! " 

After  four  hours  of  this  purgatorial  progress,  just  after  a  spell 
of  extra-terrific  bumping,  the  driver  called  my  attention  to  some- 
thing ahead,  and  there,  faintly  looming  through  the  dust-elou,ds,  I 
discerned  the  crenelated  walls  and  buttresses  of  a  mighty  citadel 
and  a  grand  gateway  tower,  and  I  knew  that  at  last  we  were 
drawing  near  to  the  far-famed  city;  and  soon  afterward  we  reached 
the   huge  gateway,   and    I   realised   that,   however   neglected   and 


THE    FOREIGN    LEGATIONS.  371 

dilapidated  most  things  here  may  be,  this  approach  at  least  is 
truly  imposing.  I  cannot,  however,  say  as  much  for  the  interior, 
for  no  sooner  have  you  passed  through  the  massive  double  tower 
( which  is  impressive  from  its  very  size,  and  raises  great  expecta- 
tions of  the  fine  city  to  be  seen  within)  than  you  realise  that 
nothing  of  the  sort  exists,  and  that  the  Peking  of  reality  is  nothing 
more  than  an  overgrown  straggling  village  of  one-storeyed  houses, 
very  dirty  and  very  "disjaskit,"  as  we  say  in  the  north.  Wher- 
ever you  turn,  in  every  direction  there  is  the  same  general  appear- 
ance of  neglect  and  decay — unswept  streets,  stagnant  sewers,  dirty 
crowds,  evil  odours.  If  any  architectural  beauty  does  exist,  it 
must  be  concealed  within  some  of  the  numerous  dull  dead  walla 
which  enclose  so  many  of  the  lanes  along  which  we  have  driven 
to-day. 

From  the  entrance  to  the  city,  about  an  hour's  jolting  brought 
us  to  the  British  Legation,  a  fine  old  palace  (of  the  bungalow  type), 
once  an  imperial  residence,  which  about  a  hundred  and  sixty  years 
ago  was  bestowed  by  the  Emperor  Kang-hsi  on  one  of  bis  thirty- 
three  sons,  whose  descendants  bear  a  title  equivalent  to  Dukes  of 
Leang,  and  their  palace  is  the  Leang-koong-foo.  This  palace,  and 
that  of  the  Duke  of  Tsin,  the  Tsin-koong-foo,  happened  to  lie  so 
remarkably  near  to  the  quarters  assigned  to  the  "Tribute-bearing 
Nations,"  that  it  at  once  occurred  to  the  authorities  that  if  the 
foreign  Legations  could  be  here  established,  it  would  appear  to  the 
ignorant  public  as  if  these  great  nations  were  simply  new  vassals 
of  the  Celestial  Empire. 

So  the  Leang-koong-foo  was  made  over  to  Britain  in  perpetuity 
at  an  annual  rent  of  fifteen  hundred  taels  (  =  £500),  and  has  come 
to  be  known  as  the  Ta-Ying-koo-foo,  or  Great-England-Country- 
Palace,  Yinghili  being  the  nearest  approach  to  "England"  that 
Chinese  pronunciation  can  manage.  The  Tsin-koong-foo  was  in 
like  manner  assigned  to  France,  and  sites  for  the  Russian,  Prussian, 
and  American  embassies  were  eventually  found  in  the  same  quar- 
ter, so  that  while  the  Chinese  authorities  thus  made  the  best  of 
necessity,  the  foreigners  have  the  great  advantage  of  being  n>  al- 
together, and  forming  a  pleasant  little  society  of  their  own — a 
privilege  in  this  horrid  land  of  exile,  which  fully  compensates  for 
being  apparently  classed  as  tribute-bearers  ! 

And  truly  the  necessity  of  admitting  barbarians  to  dwell  within 
this  jealously  guarded  city  must  have  been  a  hitter  pill  t<>  the 
Chinese  authorities.  Do  you  remember  the  accounts  "t'  how,  in 
the  year   1859,  only  twelve   years  before   these   embassies   were 


372  FROM    TUNG-CHOW    TO    PEKING. 

ceded,  Mr  Ward,  the  American  envoy,  was  conveys  1  to  Peking? 
Ee  had  ascended  one  of  the  branches  of  the  Pei-ho  as  far  as  the 
port  of  Ning-Ho-Eou  in  an  American  corvette.  Arrived  there,  he 
and  the  members  of  the  Legation  were  duly  received  by  a  great 
mandarin,  and  escorted  to  the  raft  which  was  to  convey  them  to 
the  gate  of  the  capital.  On  the  raft  was  placed  a  travelling  cham- 
ber, fitted  up  with  all  needful  comfort,  but  quite  closed  on  all 
sides,  to  prevent  them  from  seeing  the  country.  Air  was  admitted 
from  above.  In  this  box  they  were  conveyed  up  the  canals  to 
the  gates  of  Peking,  when  the  box  was  placed  on  a  large  truck 
drawn  by  oxen,  and  thus  the  Minister  of  the  United  States  and 
his  party  were  conveyed  into  the  courtyard  of  the  large  house 
assigned  for  the  use  of  the  embassy.  Here  they  were  kept  in 
honourable  captivity,  awaiting  the  hour  when  it  should  please  the 
Celestial  Emperor  to  grant  them  an  audience  ;  after  which  they 
were  removed  in  the  same  manner  as  they  had  arrived,  without 
being  allowed  one  glimpse  of  the  famous  city  !  Even  the  Peking- 
cart,  with  all  its  disadvantages,  is  a  decided  improvement  on  Mr 
Ward's  travelling-case  ! 

The  grounds  of  the  British  Legation,  which  cover  about  three 
acres,  are  enclosed  by  a  high  wall,  according  to  Chinese  ideas  of 
seclusion,  and  greatly  to  the  comfort  of  the  inmates.  Part  of  this 
is  laid  out  as  a  garden,  and  the  buildings  are  in  separate  blocks  and 
courts.  The  state-rooms  are  distinguished  by  being  roofed  with 
green  glazed  tiles.  They  are  supported  by  heavy  wooden  columns, 
and  the  windows  and  doors  are  panelled  with  lattice-work  of  carved 
wood.  The  whole  is  considered  a  good  specimen  of  Chinese  official 
architecture,  and  it  has  recently  been  restored  both  inside  and 
outside  at  considerable  cost  of  gaudy  paint  and  gold,  in  the  Chinese 
style,  of  very  intricate  lines  and  patterns  of  the  very  crudest  and 
most  uncompromising  colours — pure  scarlet  pillars,  &c,  jarring 
with  the  brightest  emerald  green  and  Albert-blue  lavishly  laid  on. 
To  eyes  that  have  recently  rejoiced  in  the  subdued  crimsons  and 
gveen-ish,  blue-/s/i  tones,  and  soft  pearly  greys,  and  delicate  touches 
of  gold  of  harmonious  Japanese  decorations,  there  is  a  fascination 
of  positive  pain  in  these  screaming  colours. 

Up  to  this  moment  I  had  been  in  some  anxiet}-  regarding  my 
destination  on  reaching  Peking,  where  travellers  are  as  yet  so  scarce, 
that  nothing  of  the  nature  of  a  hotel  for  foreigners  exists,  conse- 
quently the  new-comer  is  wholly  dependent  on  the  hospitality  of 
the  residents.  It  was  therefore  with  much  relief  and  great  pleasure 
that  I  found  a  most  kind  letter  from  Dr  and  Mrs  Dudgeon,  of  the 


A    WELCOME    FOR   THE   LONDON    MISSION.  373 

London  Medical  Mission,  awaiting  me  at  the  Legation,  and  invit- 
ing me  to  their  home  (the  house  of  all  others  which  is  to  me 
the  most  attractive,  as  the  centre  of  many  special  interests).  I 
am  indebted  for  this  introduction  to  the  same  kind  friend  who 
provided  so  well  for  my  comfort  on  the  river  voyage,  and  whose 
thoughtful  care  had  extended  to  writing  beforehand  to  commend 
a  stranger,  then  unknown  even  to  herself,  to  the  kindness  of  hei 
friends  in  the  capital.     This  truly  is  most  genuine  hospitality. 

So,  after  a  halt  at  the  Legation,  my  baggage  and  I  were  once 
more  stowed  in  the  depths  of  the  blue-covered  cart,  which  carried 
me  across  the  Tartar  city  through  blinding  dust-clouds,  till  1 
reached  this  most  interesting  spot — once  a  Chinese  home  adjoining 
a  heathen  temple,  now  the  chief  centre  of  Christian  work  in  this 
city — the  Temple  of  the  God  of  Fire  being  now  the  hospital 
wherein  many  thousand  sufferers  have  been  healed  of  divers 
diseases,  and  have  first  learnt  something  of  Christian   Love. 

Here  the  kindest  of  welcomes  very  quickly  made  me  feel  at 
home  with  all  the  party,  which  I  am  delighted  to  find  includes  the 
Rev.  J.  Edkins,  D.I).,  who  is  not  only  a  noted  Chinese  scholar,  hut 
also  the  great  authority  on  all  matters  of  archaeological  interest  in 
this  place.  It  was  his  account  of  the  worship  conducted  by  the 
Imperial  High  Priest  at  the  Temple  of  Heaven,  combined  with  Mr 
Simpson's  pictures  and  descriptions  of  the  same,  which  inspired  me 
with  so  great  a  desire  to  see  the  place  with  my  own  eyes.1 

This  is  by  no  means  an  easy  matter,  as  the  officials  are  jealous 
of  admitting  foreigners ;  but  as  it  has  been  done  before,  and  is  one 
of  my  chief  reasons  for  coming  here,  I  need  scarcely  say  that  1 
have  every  intention  of  accomplishing  it,  and  if  any  one  in  Peking 
can  help  me,  it  is  Dr  Edkins.  So  finding  that  he  is  disengaged 
to-morrow  morning,  and  knowing  that  I  shall  enjoy  nothing  else 
till  I  have  seen  this,  I  have  persuaded  him  to  start  with  me  at 
daybreak  to  try  our  luck. 

1  'Religion  in  China,'  by  Joseph  Eilkins,  D.D.  (Tr'ubner  &  Co.,  London);  and 
'Meeting  the  Sun,'  by  William  Simpson,  F.R.G.S.  (Longmans,  Green,  &  Co.) 


374  THE    TEMPLE    OF    HEAVEN. 

CHAPTER    XXXII. 

THE     TEMPLE     OF     HEAVEN. 

Advantage  of  early  rising!— A  lucky  day — General  plan  of  Peking — the  Em- 
peror's  palace — Special  temple  where  the  Emperor  acts  as  High  Priest — 
The  Temple  of  Heaven — Fortune  favours  the  brave ! — The  Hall  of  Fasting 
— The  copper  image — The  triple  blue-roofed  temple  on  the  North  Altar — 
The  Imperial  tablets — The  sis  stone  boulders — The  cypress-grove — The 
green  porcelain  furnace — The  South  Altar — The  Imperial  worship — The 
Cup  of  Blessing — Burning  the  banquet — Reading  the  list  of  criminals — 
Symbolism — Multiples  of  three  and  nine — Temple  of  the  Earth — Offerings 
buried — Temple  of  Land  and  Grain  —  Temple  of  Agriculture  —  God  of 
Medicine — Two  funerals. 

London  Mission  Station, 
June  6th. 

This  chief  aim  and  end  of  my  pilgrimage  to  Peking  lias  been  most 
satisfactorily  accomplished,  thanks  in  great  measure  to  the  train  of 
good  fortune  which  led  to  my  meeting  Dr  Edkins  so  soon  after  my 
arrival,  and  to  the  happy  inspiration  which  made  me  so  earnestly 
claim  his  escort  for  the  very  next  morning  ! 

It  appears  that  General  Grant  and  his  party  had  also  decided  on 
visiting  the  Heavenly  Temple  this  morning,  and  the  American 
Minister  had  contrived  to  stir  up  the  Celestial  officials  to  authorise 
their  visit,  and  even  to  escort  them  thither.  But  as,  of  course, 
such  a  concession  could  not  be  made  without  some  proviso,  just  to 
keep  up  the  tradition  of  mystery  and  difficulty  of  access,  it  was 
stipulated  that  no  ladies  sbould  accompany  the  General,  conse- 
quently Mrs  Grant,  much  to  her  disgust,  had  to  stay  at  the 
Legation  ! 

But  the  attendants  in  charge  of  this  jealously  guarded  spot  knew 
only  that  on  this  day  many  barbarians  were  to  be  admitted  to  the 
sacred  precincts,  so  when  we  reached  the  gate  about  three  hours 
before  the  American  party,  we  were  admitted  without  any  question 
or  difficulty  whatever,  and  were  able  to  go  leisurely  over  every 
corner  of  the  grounds  and  sacred  buildings,  concerning  which,  and 
all  ceremonies  connected  with  them,  Dr  Edkins  is  a  mine  of 
information. 

When  the  subject  was  first  mooted  last  night,  several  of  the 
home  party  resolved  to  share  the  adventure,  and  face  whatever 
difficulties  it  might  involve  in  the  way  of  scrambling  over  dilapi- 


EARLY    BIRDS.  6  \  0 

dated  Avails,  and  shirking  or  bribing  officials  ;  for  truly  of  this  ter- 
restrial heaven  it  may  be  said  that  it  suffereth  violence,  for  few 
except  the  violent  who  take  it  by  force  ever  enter  within  its  gates. 
So  carts  were  ordered  to  be  ready  at  peep  of  day,  and  we  were  all 
astir  soon  after  3  a.m.  The  early  dawn  was  most  lovely,  clear  and 
comparatively  cool — i.e.,  the  thermometer  fell  to  about  80"  from  the 
noonday  temperature  of  106°  in  the  shade.  I  am  told  it  sometimes 
rises  to  113°,  when  the  very  birds  sit  gasping. 

To  make  you  understand  this  morning's  expedition,  I  must  try 
to  sketch  a  bird's-eye  view  of  this  great  city,  which  covers  a  Bpace 
of  about  sixteen  square  miles.  To  begin  with,  the  Tartar  city  and 
Chinese  city  are  totally  distinct — the  former  being  a  great  square 
city,  and  the  latter  forming  a  long  oblong  immediately  to  the  south. 
Each  city  is  enclosed  by  a  mighty  wall,  but  the  south  wall  of  the 
Tartar  city  forms  the  north  wall  of  the  Chinese  city.  The  two 
together  form  twenty-five  miles  of  this  masonry  for  giants  !  Tin- 
Tartar  city  has  nine  gates — two  to  the  north,  two  to  the  east,  two 
to  the  west,  three  to  the  south.  These  three  last  consequently  op  □ 
into  the  Chinese  town,  which  has  seven  gates  of  its  own  besides — 
not  gates  such  as  Ave  understand  in  Britain,  but  stupendous  m 
of  masonry,  like  some  fine  old  Border  keep  greatly  magnified, 

Within  the  Tartar  city  lies  another  great  walled  square.  This 
is  the  Imperial  city,  in  the  heart  of  which  (as  a  jewel  in  its  setting  ) 
another  great  square  district  is  enclosed,  within  very  high  pale-pink 
walls. 

This  inner  space  is  the  Forbidden  City — in  other  words,  the 
private  grounds  around  the  palace,  wherein,  guarded  even  from  the 
reverential  gaze  of  his  people,  dwells  the  Imperial  Son  of  Heaven. 
To  this  palace  the  city  owes  its  name,  Pe-king  (or,  as  the  Chinese 
pronounce  it,  Pai-ching),  meaning  literally  "  North  Palace,"  just  as 
Nan-king  was  the  southern  palace. 

Within  these  sacred  precincts  no  foreigners  have  ever  been  al- 
lowed to  set  foot,  though  they  may  gaze  from  beyond  a  wide  canal 
at  the  very  ornamental  archways,  and  the  double  and  triple  curved 
roofs  of  many  buildings,  rising  above  the  masses  of  cool  dark  foli- 
age. Every  one  of  these  archways  and  buildings  is  roofed  with 
brilliant  golden  -  yellow  tiles  of  porcelain,  which  are  positively 
dazzling  in  the  sunlight.  The  tall  buildings  on  the  opposite  side 
of  the  canal  are  similarly  roofed,  denoting  that  they  too  are  speci- 
ally Imperial  property  (yellow  emphatically  being  the  Imperial 
colour,  the  use  of  which  is  prohibited  to  all  save  Buddhist  priests, 
who  not  only  wear  the  yellow  robe,  but  are  privileged  to  roof  their 


.;76  THE   TEMPLE   OF    HEAVEN. 

temples  with  the  yellow  tiles,  stamped  with  the  Imperial  dragon. 
I  speak  especially  of  the  Laiua  temples). 

Within  the  Tartar  city,  immediately  to  the  south  of  the  Imperial 
city,  lies  the  district  assigned  to  the  tributary  nations  and  foreign 
Legations,  while  this  London  Mission  Station  lies  nearer  to  the 
south-east  gate.  Various  temples  of  the  three  religions  which  we 
have  met  all  over  China — Buddhist,  Taouist,  and  Confucian — and 
of  their  various  subordinate  sects,  are  scattered  about  both  cities, 
each  enclosed  by  its  own  high  wall,  so  as  effectually  to  prevent  its 
adding  any  feature  to  the  appearance  of  the  city. 

But  here  at  Peking  there  are  several  temples,  each  unique  of  its 
kind,  where  the  Emperor,  assuming  the  character  of  High  Priest, 
himself  offers  to  the  Rulers  of  the  Universe  the  worship  of  his 
people. 

Of  these  exceptional  temples  the  most  important  are  the  Temple 
of  Heaven  and  the  Temple  of  Agriculture,  each  occupying  a  large 
walled  enclosure  within  the  walls  of  the  Chinese  city.  The  Temple, 
or  rather  Altar  to  the  Earth,  lies  on  the  north  side  of  the  Tartar 
city  ;  that  to  the  Sun  also  lies  outside  the  walls,  in  a  shady  grove 
on  the  north-east  side  of  the  Tartar  city  near  the  Gate  of  the  Rising 
Sun — and  that  of  the  Moon  outside  its  Western  Gate.  At  each  of 
these,  and  also  at  the  Imperial  Temple  of  Ancestors,  the  Emperor 
in  person,  attended  by  all  his  nobles,  must  at  stated  seasons  offer 
most  solemn  sacrifice  and  prayer  on  behalf  of  his  people  ;  and  truly 
it  would  be  difficult  to  conceive  any  national  act  of  worship  more 
imposing  than  the  whole  ceremonial  attending  those  Imperial  min- 
istrations, which  seem  to  recall  the  patriarchal  times  of  Melchizedek, 
King  and  High  Priest. 

This  is  most  especially  true  of  the  services  at  the  Temple  of 
Heaven,  where,  prostrate  on  an  elevated  and  roofless  platform  of 
pure  white  marble,  the  EmjDeror  kneels  in  lowliest  adoration  of 
Shang-te,  the  Supreme  Lord  of  Heaven — his  courtiers  and  nobles 
kneeling  reverently  around,  on  lower  terraces  of  the  same  platform 
(or  rather  marble  mound),  an  open-air  temple  whose  only  roof  is 
the  starry  canopy  of  the  midnight  heaven. 

In  none  of  these  temples  is  there  any  image  to  suggest  idolatry, 
the  celestial  and  terrestrial  powers  being  alike  represented  only 
by  simple  wooden  tablets,  placed  upright  in  stands  of  carved  and 
gilded  wood,  precisely  similar  to  those  which  bear  the  names  of  the 
honoured  dead  in  every  ancestral  hall  throughout  the  empire.  In 
fact,  the  one  "  heathenish  "  touch  in  this  very  grand  worship  of  the 
Lord  of  Heaven,  is  that  the  tablets  of  the  deceased  Emperors  are 


THE    IMPERIAL    HIGH    PRIEST.  377 

ranged  on   either   side   of   the    tablet  symbolising   Shang-te    the 

Supreme,  and  that  to  them  is  rendered  homage  and  sacrifice  only 
secondary  to  his  own. 

But  the  true  meaning  <>f  this  seems  to  be.  that  the  offerings  are 
not  intended  as  atonements  for  sin,  but  as  a  spiritual  banquel  to 
which  it  is  necessary  to  invite  other  guests  to  do  honour  to  the 
principal  guest;  and  as  the  deceased  Emperors  are  held  in  such 
reverence  as  to  rank  above  all  other  spirits  in  the  hierarchy  of 
heaven,  it  follows  that  they  are  the  only  guests  who  can  be  invited 
to  share  his  banquet.1 

The  reigning  Emperor,  while  thus  adoring  the  unseen  Powers 
with  lowliest  humility,  nevertheless  fills  the  position  of  one  who  is 
the  earthly  vicegerent  of  Shang-te,  and  who  at  the  moment  of 
death  will  mount  the  Great  Dragon  which  will  bear  him  to  take 
his  place  in  that  worshipful  company. 

Well,  to  return  to  our  expedition  this  lovely  early  morning. 
Our  route  from  here  lay  in  a  perfectly  straight  line  along  a  broad 
street  (so  wide  that  an  extemporary  rag-fair  of  booths  occupies  the 
centre  all  the  way  !)  till  we  came  to  the  great  Ha-ta-nmn,  the  south- 
east gate,  and  so  passed  into  the  Chinese  city,  and  through  densely 
crowded  streets,  till  we  reached  such  countrified  Buburbs  that  it 
was  difficult  to  believe  that  we  were  still  within  the  walls  of  the 
city.  When  we  had  almost  reached  the  central  South  (late,  we 
came  to  a  large  space  with  great  walled  enclosures  on  either  aide. 
That  to  the  west  is  the  park  of  the  Sian-nun-tian,  known  to  foreign- 
ers as  the  Temple  of  Agriculture.  That  to  the  east  is  the  park  of 
Tian-tian,  or  the  Temple  of  Heaven.  These  high  red  walls  are 
roofed  with  yellow  china  tiles,  each  of  which  ends  in  a  circular. 
tablet  bearing  the  Imperial  dragon. 

There  is  nothing  imposing  about  the  approach — rather  the  con- 
trary ;  we  halted  at  a  dilapidated  gateway,  where,  as  I  before  said. 
instead  of  slamming  the  door  in  our  faces  and  bargaining  for  much 
coin  (which  is  the  usual  manner  of  receiving  visitors  at  this  Celes- 
tial Temple),  the  attendants  passed  us  in  with  the  utmost  courtesy, 
and  we  found  ourselves  in  a  large  grassy  park,  shaded  by  line  n.  B8, 
This  is  a  walled  park,  three  miles  in  circumference,  forming  the 
pleasant  pastures  wherein  the  bullocks,  sheep,  and  other  animals 
destined  for  sacrifice  graze  till  their  last  hour  draws  mar.  without 
a  thought  of  the  slaughter-house  which  lies  hidden    in  a  grove  at 

1  I  have  already  liad  occasion  to  allude  to  this  curious  Bubject,  with 
Ancestral  Worship  and  to  the  [mperial  ministrations  in  the  Ten 

See  pp.  200,  201. 


378  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

the  north-east  corner.  I  found  it  difficult  to  realise  that  this  cool 
green  shady  park  was  actually  within  the  walls  of  a  city  where 
human  beings  cluster  in  throngs  as  dense  as  hees  on  a  swarming 
day  ! 

The  first  building  we  came  to  is  "The  Hall  of  Fasting,"  in  which 
the  Emperor  spends  some  hours  in  silence  and  solitude,  in  prepa- 
ration of  spirit,  ere  assuming  his  office  as  High  Priest.  Besides 
"  occasional  services  "  marking  such  events  as  the  accession  of  a 
new  Emperor,  or  some  extraordinary  national  event,  there  are  three 
set  days  in  the  year  when  these  usually  deserted  grounds  are 
thronged  hy  all  the  nobles  of  the  land — namely,  the  summer  and 
winter  solstice  (when  the  great  religious  solemnities  are  performed 
at  midnight  at  the  roofless  Southern  Altar),  and  the  festival  which 
marks  the  beginning  of  spring,  where  the  sacrifices  are  offered  at 
the  earliest  glimmer  of  dawn  at  the  ^Northern  Altar — on  which  is 
erected  a  perfectly  circular  wooden  temple,  in  three  storeys,  forming 
a  sort  of  telescopic  pagoda,  of  which  each  storey  is  smaller  than  the 
one  below  it,  and  is  roofed  with  the  loveliest  bright  blue  encaustic 
tiles,  the  topmost  roof  rising  to  a  small  peak.  This  temple  is 
called  the  Che-nien-tien,  "  Temple  of  prayers  for  a  fruitful  year," 
which  name  is  inscribed  on  a  large  tablet  beneath  the  eaves  of  the 
topmost  roof. 

The  name  of  Xorth  and  South  Altar  is  here  applied  to  two 
immense  circular  platforms  or  hillocks  formed  by  three  terraces  of 
beautifully  sculptured  white  marble,  piled  one  above  the  other. 
The  Southern  Altar  is  distinguished  as  the  Yuen-kew  or  round 
hillock. 

On  each  occasion  the  Emperor  leaves  his  palace  at  sunset  in  a 
car  drawn  by  an  elephant  (the  only  elephant  of  whose  existence  I 
have  heard  in  these  parts),1  and  escorted  by  a  train  of  about  two 
thousand  courtiers  and  attendants.  A  perfectly  straight  street  runs 
from  his  palace  to  the  gate  of  the  temple,  passing  through  the  Chien- 
Mun,  which  is  the  central  South  Gate  of  the  Tartar  city,  never 

1  Elephants  are  imported  solely  to  grace  certain  State  festivals.  The  Emperor 
Hien-fung  owned  thirty-eight  elephants,  but  apparently  the  very  variable  climate 
does  not  suit  them,  for  at  the  time  of  his  death  in  1861  only  one  survived,  and  it 
became  necessary  to  import  new  ones.  Of  these,  only  two  now  survive.  A  third 
died  two  years  ago.  and  his  body  was  thrown  into  the  city  moat,  there  to  putrefy 
at  leisure  beneath  the  midsummer  sun,  poisoning  the  atmosphere  for  weeks  !  Pieces 
of  its  thick  hide  were  preserved  for  sale  to  persons  visiting  the  Imperial  elephant 
stables.  These  are  situated  near  the  South  Wall  of  the  Tartar  city,  and  have  ac- 
commodation for  forty-eight  elephants,  each  in  a  separate  stable,  solidly  built  with 
brick  walls  six  feet  thick.  These  cover  a  large  extent  of  ground,  where  the  ele- 
phants (w'le°  there  are  any  !)  are  exercised.  The  whole  is,  however,  in  a  very 
neglected  condition. 


APPROACH    TO    THE    TEMPLE.  379 

opened  on  any  other  occasion  save  these,  or  for  any  person  except 
the  Emperor  or  one  of  the  Imperial  tablets  ! 

(For  that  matter,  it  is  not  only  in  Peking  that  there  is  an  ob- 
jection to  opening  the  South  Gate  of  a  city.  In  times  of  drought 
especially,  the  South  Gate  is  kept  closed,  because  the  Chinese  sup- 
pose that  as  the  sun's  rays  reach  them  from  the  south,  so  may  tin- 
Fire  God  enter  thence,  and  especially  in  the  burning  summer  may 
produce  a  conflagration  which,  in  a  town  chiefly  built  of  wood, 
would  be  a  matter  too  serious  to  risk  !) 

On  reaching  the  temple  grounds,  the  Emperor  proceeds  first  to 
inspect  all  the  animals  for  sacrifice,  which  are  stabled  in  the  outer 
park.  He  then  retires  to  the  Penitential  Hall,  where  he  is  left 
alone,  and  to  assist  his  meditations  a  small  copper  image  of  a 
Taouist  priest,  which  had  been  carried  before  him  in  the  procession, 
is  placed  on  his  right  hand.  The  image  bears  in  one  hand  a  tablel 
on  which  is  inscribed  "  Fast  for  three  days,"  while  the  other  hand, 
with  three  fingers  raised  to  the  lips,  inculcates  silence,  the  idea 
being  that  unless  the  mind  is  filled  with  holy  thoughts  the  righteous 
spirits  will  not  attend  the  sacrifice.  This  image,  which  is  only 
fifteen  inches  in  height,  was  cast  in  the  year  a.d.  1380  by  order 
of  Choo-tai-tsoo,  the  founder  of  the  Ming  dynasty,  in  order  to 
remind  him  of  the  duty  of  solemn  meditation  as  a  preparation  for 
his  priestly  duties. 

When  the  appointed  hour  arrives,  the  Emperor  proceeds  to  a 
robing  tent,  where  he  washes  his  hands  ceremonially,  and  assumes 
the  blue  sacrificial  robes,  which  denote  his  office  as  High  Priest  of 
Heaven.  Then  escorted  by  234  musicians,  also  robed  in  Heaven  s 
blue,  and  an  equal  number  of  dancers,  who  perform  slow  ami 
solemn  religious  dances,  and  followed  by  all  his  princes  and 
nobles,  the  Imperial  High  Priest  passes  on  to  the  altars  of 
sacrifice. 

To  these  we  now  made  our  way,  and  presently  came  to  another 
wall  completely  enclosing  all  the  sacred  buildings.  Here  also  we 
found  an  open  gate,  and  passed  in  unchidden.  We  were  now  on 
green  turf,  and  before  us  towered  the  triple  roof  of  the  three- 
storeyed  temple  on  the  great  Northern  Altar — three  roofs  rising 
one  above  the  other  pyramidally,  ami  covered  with  brilliant  Albert- 
bine  tiles,  dazzlingly  bright  in  the  early  Bunlight.  But  this  also 
is  enclosed  by  a  square  wall  coloured  pale  pink,  and  roofed  with 
tiles  of  a  lovely  aquamarine  colour — about  the  tint  of  a  thrush  > 

Here  again  the  door  was  open  and  we  passed  in,  ami  found  our- 


380  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

selves  on  a  square  platform  at  the  base  of  the  great  circular  triple 
platform  of  white  marble,  on  which  stands  the  aforesaid  temple. 
Eight  triple  flights  of  nine  steps  each  lead  to  the  upper  platform. 
These  somehow  represent  a  mystic  figure  known  as  the  Eight 
Diagrams,  the  symbolism  of  which  none  but  a  born  Chinaman  can 
fully  grasp  ! 

Our  crowning  point  of  good  fortune  lay  in  the  fact  that  this 
temple  itself,  which  is  usually  so  rigidly  closed  as  to  defy  all 
bribery,  to-day  opened  wide  all  its  portals,  so  we  were  able  to 
examine  the  interior  at  our  leisure.  There  is  no  ceiling,  so  you 
look  right  up  into  the  pointed  roof,  the  interior  of  which  is  richly 
gilded.  The  highest  roof  is  supported  by  four  very  tall  round 
pillars,  the  second  roof  rests  on  twelve  medium  columns,  and  the 
lowest  roof  on  twelve  shorter  ones — all  of  wood,  and  elaborately 
coloured  and  gilded.  On  the  north  side,  facing  the  door,  is  an 
altar,  on  which  stands  the  simple  wooden  tablet  inscribed  with  the 
name  of  Shang-te,  the  Supreme  Lord,  and  Master  of  Heaven  and 
Earth  and  all  things.  On  either  side  are  ranged  shrines  for  the 
tablets  of  the  eight  deceased  Emperors,  each  upheld  by  a  hand- 
somely carved  wooden  stand,  representing  dragons.  Except  that 
these  are  coloured  scarlet  and  gold,  there  is  nothing  to  relieve  the 
severe  simplicity  of  this  interior,  which  is  precisely  on  the  principle 
of  all  ancestral  temples. 

On  the  same  principle  (the  real,  very  plain  ancestral  tablets 
being  kept  in  an  inner  wall,  and  show  ones  in  the  great  hall  of 
family  ancestral  temples l),  I  am  told  that  the  real  tablets  of 
Shang-te  and  the  Emperors  are  kept  in  the  most  sacred  seclusion 
in  a  smaller  square  building  called  "  Imperial  Heaven's  Temple," 
lying  immediately  at  the  back  of  this  triple-roofed  temple,  whence 
they  are  only  brought  forth  at  the  great  festivals. 

Standing  on  the  marble  platform  at  the  door  of  the  temple  (on 
the  very  spot  where  the  Emperor  kneels  alone  when  worship  is 
here  offered),  we  looked  due  south  along  the  paved  road  leading  to 
the  Great  South  Altar,  which  lies  at  a  considerable  distance. 

Halfway  between  the  two  there  is  another  circular  tower,  with  a 
splendid  single-peaked  roof  of  the  same  intensely  rich  blue  tiles. 
In  lids  temple  are  stored  a  duplicate  set  of  tic  tablets  of  Shang-te 
'ii/d.  of  the  Emperors.  These  are  used  whenever  sacrifice  is  offered 
on  the  South  Altar,  whereas  those  we  saw  in  the  triple- roofed 
temple  only  appear  when  the  service  is  on  the  North  Altar.  This 
tablet  temple  is  surrounded  by  a  circular  wall  of  a  pink  salmon 
1  As  described  at  p.  '294. 


KING-MAKING    STONES.  381 

colour,  roofed  with  lovely  pale-green  dragon  tiles,  and  its  three 
great  gateways  have  handsome  curved  roofs  of  the  brightest  yellow 
tiles  edged  with  a  row  of  the  brightest  green  dragon  tiles.  All 
this  colouring  has  special  symbolic  signification.  Blue  roofs  in- 
dicate buildings  for  the  worship  of  Shang-te  only  ;  yellow  or  brown 
have  reference  to  earth  ;  while  green,  combining  both,  is  deemed 
suitable  for  such  buildings  as  the  Hall  of  Fasting,  and  the  building 
in  which  the  musicians  practise  their  choral  anthems.  Here,  of 
course,  the  distinctive  colour  is  celestial  azure.  Even  the  sunlight 
acquires  a  blue  tint  as  it  strikes  through  an  arrangement  of  blue 
glass  rods,  which  form  a  substitute  for  stained-glass  windows. 
The  carved  wooden  cases  wherein  are  stored  sacred  tablets  also 
have  a  covering  of  blue  cloth. 

At  a  considerable  distance  beyond  the  central  blue-roofed  build- 
ing lies  the  great  triple  terrace  of  white  marble,  which  is  the  South 
Altar,  generally  distinguished  as  "The  Altar  of  Heaven,"  the  ap- 
proach to  which  is  beautified  by  two  sets  of  three  white  marble 
/mi-lows — i.e.,  the  square-shaped  triumphal  arch  facing  each  of  the 
four  sets  of  stairs. 

Before  proceeding  thither  we  turned  aside  into  the  dense  grove 
of  very  large  old  cypress-trees  which  form  a  broad  bell  <>f  dark- 
green  foliage  on  either  side  of  this  long  roadway,  and  of  these 
grand  altars.  They  are  noble  old  trees,  and  their  cool  deep  shade 
was  doubly  delightful,  as  the  slanting  rays  of  the  morning  sun 
were  already  striking  with  extreme  heat. 

The  objects  of  special  interest  which  we  sought  in  the  depths  of 
this  arbor-vitae  grove  were  what  to  us  appeared  to  be  seven  great 
unhewn  stone  boulders,  which,  however,  are  said  to  be  meteoric 
stones,  and  to  have  been  venerated  from  prehistoric  times,  as  the 
heaven  -  sent  guardians  of  the  Imperial  throne.  (Strange  how 
widespread  are  the  survivals  of  primitive  stone-worship  !  Britain, 
too,  has  her  king-making  stone,  which  is  securely  housed  beneath 
the  Coronation  Chair  in  her  Temple  of  Heaven,  commonly  called 
Westminster  Abbey  !  a  rude  water-worn  stone  which  holds  its 
time-honoured  place  in  the  stateliest  ceremonial  of  the  British 
Empire  !) 

A  little  further  we  came  to  a  spring  of  deliciously  cold  water; 
then  continuing  our  walk  through  grassy  glades,  beneath  the  old 
cypresses  and  laburnum-trees,  we  passed  a  Btore-house  in  which 
are  kept  the  musical  instruments,  the  banners,  and  the 
triple  umbrellas  which  figure  in  the  State  ceremonies.  Then  find- 
ing a  gateway  which  admitted  as  within  another  Bquare  pink  wall, 


382  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

roofed  with  yellow  and  edged  with  ^rreen  tiles,  we  found  ourselves 
standing  at  the  base  of  the  magnificent  white  marble  circular  triple 
platforms,  the  summit  of  which  is  the  Altar  of  Heaven,  and  here 
it  is  that  the  grand  midnight  services  are  held  at  midsummer  and 
midwinter. 

Here  (as  at  the  great  Xorth  Altar),  in  a  corner  of  the  outer 
square  wall  at  the  hase  of  the  circular  terraces,  are  the  furnace  of 
green  porcelain  (9  feet  high  hy  7  wide),  and  eight  great  cup-shaped 
braziers  of  ornamental  cast  iron.  These  are  the  altars  of  burnt- 
offering  in  which  the  various  sacrifices  are  burnt ;  the  green  porce- 
lain furnace  consuming  the  bullock,  the  silks,  the  incense,  and 
other  things  offered  to  Shang-te,  while  the  eight  iron  brasiers  con- 
sume the  sacrifices  to  deceased  Emperors.  The  hair  and  skins  of 
the  beasts  offered  are  buried  in  pits  a  little  further  off.  The  ani- 
mals sacrificed  may  be  of  all  sorts  which  are  used  for  human  food, 
which  in  China  is  a  tolerably  comprehensive  list,  including,  besides 
sheep  and  cattle,  hares,  deer,  and  pigs.  In  ancient  days  horses 
were  included — a  survival  of  the  primitive  great  horse-sacrifice ; 
but  they  are  now  omitted,  not  being  legitimate  food  for  the 
banquet. 

Here  four  triple  flights  of  nine  steps  each,  instead  of  eight  as  at 
the  North  Altar,  lead  to  the  summit.  Each  terrace  is  surrounded 
by  a  very  handsome  balustrade,  and  by  great  marble  knobs  sculp- 
tured to  suggest  clouds  and  other  emblems  of  heaven.  On  the 
lower  terrace  these  are  all  curly  clouds.  On  the  middle  terrace 
there  are  phoenixes  (the  celestial  birds  which,  with  the  dragon, 
form  the  Imperial  heraldic  bearings),  and  the  dragon  himself 
appears  in  multiplied  form  round  the  upper  terrace. 

Ascending  thither  we  found  ourselves  on  a  great  circular  plat- 
form of  white  marble,  on  which  the  only  permanent  objects  are 
five  large  altar  vessels  of  white  marble  placed  a  little  north  of  the 
central  stone  on  which  the  Emperor  kneels.  At  intervals  all  round 
there  are  marble  boulders  with  handles,  shaped  just  like  large  curl- 
ling-stones.  These  are  the  weights  to  which  are  attached  the 
ropes  of  the  yellow  silken  tent,  or  rather  canopy,  which  is  here 
erected  at  the  great  festivals,  to  overshadow  the  sacred  tablets  of 
Shang-te  and  the  deceased  Emperors,  which  are  then  brought  to 
this  spot,  and  before  each  are  spread  costly  offerings,  of  the  same 
sort  as  those  which  are  invariably  sacrificed  to  deceased  ancestors, 
only  in  this  case  the  genuine  article  is  offered,  and  actually  burnt, 
involving  a  most  tantalising  destruction  of  fine  silk. 

Xo  fewer  than  twelve  pieces  of  beautiful  blue  silk  are  burnt  in 


! 


A    CELESTIAL    BANQUET. 

honour  of  Shang-te,  and  three  pieces  of  white  silk  in  honour  of 
the  Emperors — while  seventeen  pieces  of  red,  yellow,  blue,  black, 
and  white  silk  are  hurnt  in  honour  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  whose 
tablets  are  arranged  on  cither  side  of  the  second  terrace  On  the 
east  side  are  set  the  tablets  of  the  sun,  the  Great  Lear,  the  five 
planets,  the  twenty-eight  constellations,  and  one  for  all  the 
The  tablet  of  the  moon  is  placed  on  tin-  west  side,  together  with 
those  of  wind  and  rain,  cloud  and  thunder. 

Before  every  one  of  these  tablets  are  set  ample  but  slightly 
varied  feasts ;  thus  the  stars  above  receive  a  full-grown  bullock, 
a  sheep,  and  a  pig — while  to  Shang-te  is  offered  a  heifer  which  is 
laid  between  two  brasiers,  in  front  of  the  five  marble  altar  vessels. 

Before  each  tablet  are  placed  lights  and  incense,  with  abundant 
offerings  of  food,  and  three  cups  of  rice-wine.  Twenty-eighl 
dishes  of  divers  meats,  fruits,  and  vegetables  are  arranged  in  eight 
rows.  These  dishes  consist  of  soups,  with  slices  of  beef  and  pork 
floating  therein,  pickled  pork  and  vermicelli,  slices  of  pickled  hare 
and  venison,  salt  fish,  pickled  fish,  pickled  onions,  parsley  and 
celery,  bamboo  shoots,  boiled  rice  and  millet,  sweet  cakes  of  wheat 
or  buckwheat,  flour  and  sugar,  chestnuts,  water-chestnuts,  plums 
and  walnuts. 

Nor  are  seasonings  forgotten  for  these  Imperial  feasts  of  the 
spirits — pepper  and  salt,  sesamum  -  oil  and  anise-seed,  soy  and 
onions  are  provided. 

All  these  things  having  been  duly  arranged,  the  Emperor  ap- 
proaches from  the  Hall  of  Fasting,  arrayed  in  his  sacrificial  vest- 
ments, and  mounts  the  altar,  while  all  his  courtiers  and  nobles 
take  their  places  on  the  lower  terraces,  or  round  their  base.  He 
kneels  and  burns  incense  before  the  tablet  of  each  Emperor,  and 
then  thrice  prostrates  himself  before  the  tablet  of  Shang-te,  knock- 
ing the  ground  nine  times  with  his  head.  Each  action  musl  he 
exactly  repeated  by  every  worshipper  present. 

All  this  time  the  234  blue-robed  musicians  have  been  making 
melody.  Now  there  is  a  hushed  silence,  while  the  Emperor,  kneel- 
ing, offers  the  pieces  of  blue  silk,  and  a  lovely  large  cylindrical 
piece  of  blue  jade,  which  is  the  special  symbol  of  heaven.  Then  a 
chorister  chants  an  anthem  describing  the  presentation  of  the  food- 
offerings,  during  which  attendants  bring  bowls  of  hot  broth,  which 
they  sprinkle  over  the  body  of  the  heifer. 

The  Emperor  then  reads  aloud  a  prayer  which  is  inscribed  on  a 
blue  wooden  tablet,  and  will  presently  be  burnt.  In  it  the  praises 
of  the  deceased  Emperors  are  curiously  interwoven  with  the  Bolenm 


384  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

petitions  addressed  to  the  Supreme  Lord.  He  then  offers  separ- 
ately three  cups  of  wine.  Every  detail  in  all  this  elaborate  ritual 
is  ordained  according  to  the  strictest  ceremonial  law. 

Now  the  234  musicians  chant  "hymns  of  harmonious  peace," 
with  accompaniments  of  stringed  instruments,  while  a  great  com- 
pany of  dancers  move  slowly  through  sacred  figures. 

After  this  there  is  a  great  stillness,  and  then  follows  a  most,  re- 
markable sacramental  mystery.  A  single  voice  is  heard  chanting 
the  words l — "  Give  the  Cup  of  Blessing  and  the  Meat  of 
Blessing;"  whereupon  officers  appointed  for  this  honour  present  the 
Cup  of  Blessing  and  the  Meat  of  Blessing  to  the  Emperor,  who  j»ir- 
takes  of  each,  and  again  prostrates  himself  and  knocks  his  forehead 
three  times  against  the  ground,  and  then  nine  times  more  to  sym- 
bolise his  thankful  reception  of  these  gifts.  All  the  princes  and 
nobles  present  exactly  follow  the  example  of  the  Emperor. 

Then  the  choir  bursts  forth  into  a  "song  of  glorious  peace," 
while  the  tablets  are  solemnly  carried  back  to  their  accustomed 
place  in  their  blue-roofed  chapel. 

The  written  prayer,  the  incense,  the  silk,  the  viands,  and  the 
heifer,  which  were  offered  to  Shang-te,  are  then  carried  to  the 
great  furnace,  or  altar  of  green  porcelain,  and  the  offerings  to  the 
ancestral  Emperors — the  silk,  incense,  and  meats — are  carried  to 
the  brasiers,  and  all  are  solemnly  burned,  the  glare  of  this  costly 
burnt-sacrifice  glowing  red  in  the  cold  starlight,  while  the  Emperor 
and  all  the  princes  and  nobles  stand  facing  this  sacred  flame.  The 
emblematic  piece  of  blue  jade-stone  is  replaced  in  its  carved  and 
gilded  chair,  and  is  carried  back  to  its  place  in  the  temple. 

Then  the  Emperor  returns  to  his  palace,  and  soon  all  trace  of 
this  grand  ceremonial  is  swept  away,  and  the  great  marble  altar  is 
deserted  till  the  next  solemn  occasion  of  Imperial  worship. 

One  such  occasion  is  especially  worthy  of  note.  It  is  that  on 
which,  once  every  year,  the  Emperor  lays  aside  his  Imperial  robes, 
and  assuming  penitential  garments,  walks  from  the  Hall  of  Fasting 
to  the  Altar  of  Heaven,  and  there  reads  a  list  of  all  criminals  who 
have  been  executed  within  the  last  year,  praying  that  if  any  have 
been  unjustly  punished,  they  may  not  suffer  in  the  spirit- world,  on 

1  In  a  very  interesting  monograph  on  this  subject,  published  in  Shanghai,  by  the 
Rev.  A.  P.  Happer,  D.D.,  he  points  out  the  remarkable  coincidence  between  this 
Cup  of  Blessing  and  the  cup  so  named  at  the  Jewish  Paschal  sacrifice ;  and  taking 
this  in  connection  with  other  points  of  similarity  in  the  elaborate  ritual,  the  gor- 
geous vestments,  the  large  choir  and  orchestra,  and  all  the  strictly  regulated  details 
of  burnt-sacrifice  and  libations,  he  suggests  the  probability  that  these  are  all  sur- 
vivals of  the  religious  ceremonies  observed  by  the  common  ancestors  of  the  races 
before  the  dispersion  of  mankind  from  the  Tower  of  Babel. 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  THE  EARTH.         385 

account  of  the  ignominy  with  which  they  were  dismissed  from  this 
(the  idea  being,  that  a  criminal  who  has  been  decapitated  i 
tain  of  hard  lines  in  the  unseen  -world  !  the  fact  of  arriving  with- 
out a  head  proving  him  quite  unworthy  of  respect !) 

One  of  the  many  interesting  points  to  which  Dr  Edkins  called 
my  attention  is  the  constant  recurrence  of  multiples  of  3  and  9  in 
all  the  structures  of  this  unique  place  of  worship.  To  begin  with. 
each  of  the  3  terraces  is  ascended  by  9  steps.  In  the  centre  of 
the  North  Altar,  3  concentric  circles  form  a  raised  base  of  3  steps, 
leading  up  to  the  3-storeyed  wooden  temple,  the  height  of  which 
is  99  Chinese  feet ;  the  midnight  sacrifice  is  illuminated  by  •"> 
great  lights  suspended  from   3  tall  poles. 

All  this  is  part  of  a  Chinese  symbolism  which  expresses  abstracl 
ideas  by  definite  forms,  colours,  and  numbers.  First  there  is  the 
mysterious  Yin-yang,  or  symbolism  of  the  dual  principle  in  nature.1 
The  Yin  or  feminine,  which  represents  the  Earth,  is  symbolised  by 
a  square  figure  and  even  numbers,  2,  4,  6,  8,  10.  Whereas  the 
Yang  or  male  principle,  representing  Heaven,  is  symbolised  by 
circular  forms  and  odd  numbers,  1,  3,  5,  7,  9.  Therefore  these 
threefold  circular  Altars  to  Heaven  rest  on  a  square  base,  and  tin- 
upper  platform  of  the  greal  Southern  Altar  is  paved  with  9 
circles  of  marble  slabs  (including  the  central  circular  -tone  on 
which  the  Emperor  kneels).  These  circles  are  respectively  laid  in 
9  slabs,  18  slabs,  27  slabs,  and  so  on  up  to  9  times  9. 

On  the  other  hand,  at  the  Temple  of  the  Earth,  to  the  north  of 
Peking,  the  great  altar  is  square,  and  each  terrace  is  r,  feel  in 
height,  and  the  paving-bricks  are  laid  in  multiples  of  G  and  .s, 
because  here  even  numbers  must  prevail.  The  altar  is  6<> 
square,  and  is  surrounded  by  a  ditch  6  feet  wide,  and  a  wall  6 
feet  high. 

"When  this  (Temple  of  Heaven)  park  was  first  set  apart  for  this 
Imperial  worship,  a.d.  1421,  by  the  third  Emperor  of  the  filing 
dynasty,  Earth  and  Heaven  were  here  worshipped  together  at  the 
Northern  Altar,  and  instead  of  the  three  roofs  being  all  blue,  they 
were  then  blue,  red,  and  yellow.  In  1531  the  ecclesiastical  author- 
ities decided  that  the  Altar  of  the  Earth  should  lie  outside  the 
walls  on  the  north  side  of  the  Tartar  city,  where  aboul  300  acres 
are  encircled  by  double  walls,  coloured  red,  and  roofed  with  bright 

1  In  common  with  many  other  matters  in  China,  the  Ko-tow,  or  form  "• 
ance  in  presence  of  the  Emperor,  is  thus  regulated,  and  consists  in  thrice  ki 

on  all  tours,  ami  knocking  the  forehead  on  the  ground  nine  times    <.■■.  I 
each  prostration. 

2  B 


386  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

green  tiles.  The  principal  temple  is  roofed  with  yellow  tiles,  and 
all  the  subordinate  buildings  with  green,  yellow  being  symbolic  of 
Earth,  as  blue  is  of  Heaven.  For  this  reason  the  234  musicians 
are  robed  in  black  and  gold,  and  some  of  tbe  musical  instruments 
are  gilt,  to  represent  yellow.  The  tent  which  is  set  up  on  the 
platform  to  act  as  a  vast  canopy  is  also  of  yellow  cloth,  and  the 
Emperor  appears  in  yellow  robes.  Here  the  especial  symbol  of 
Earth  is  a  square  piece  of  yellow  jade,  the  equivalent  of  the  cylin- 
drical blue  piece,  which  represents  Heaven.  The  prayer  is  written 
on  a  yellow  tablet,  and,  in  common  with  the  silk,  the  various  ani- 
mals, and  the  cooked  food,  it  is  buried  instead  of  being  burnt,  the 
idea  being  that  the  offerings  to  the  Earth-spirit  must  descend,  even 
as  those  to  Heaven  must  ascend. 

The  ritual  here  observed  is  much  the  same  as  that  at  the  Altar 
of  Heaven,  as  is  also  the  appointed  hour — two  hours  before  sun- 
rise. Instead  of  sacrificing  before  the  tablets  of  Sun,  Moon,  and 
Stars,  the  Imperial  worship  at  the  Earth-temple  honours  the 
spirit  of  the  four  great  Seas  and  the  four  greatest  Eivers  China ; 
also  of  the  fourteen  greatest  and  most  sacred  Mountains  of  China 
and  Manchuria.  Each  of  these  is  represented  by  its  tablet.  The 
tablets  of  the  deceased  Emperors  are  also  present,  and  receive 
offerings,  which,  however,  are  burnt,  not  buried. 

Yet  another  temple  in  which  the  Emperor  officiates  as  High 
Priest,  and  where  the  ceremonial  is  almost  identical  with  that  of 
the  Earth-worship,  is  that  which  is  dedicated  to  the  Gods  of  Land 
and  Grain.  This  lies  in  the  Imperial  city,  on  the  right  hand  of 
the  palace  gate.  Here  the  altar  consists  of  two  terraces,  each 
ascended  by  flights  of  three  steps.  The  upper  terrace  is  covered 
with  earth  of  five  colours — blue  to  the  east,  white  to  the  west, 
black  to  the  north,  red  to  the  south,  and  yellow  in  the  middle. 
On  these  terraces  are  placed  the  tablets  of  these  two  guardian 
spirits,  both  facing  the  north,  and  the  tablets  of  two  eminent 
Chinese  agriculturists  are  placed  on  the  right  and  left  hand  to 
occupy  the  honoured  position  of  guests  at  the  sacrificial  banquets. 
These  are  offered  in  the  middle  of  spring  and  autumn  and  on  some 
other  occasions,  and  by  an  odd  combination  of  ideas,  the  animals 
offered  are  buried,  but  the  silk  and  jade  are  burned. 

Here,  as  at  the  temples  of  Earth  and  of  Heaven,  special  precious 
stones  are  reverenced  as  emblematic — so  the  Land-god  is  symbol- 
ised by  a  square  piece  of  yellow  jade,  and  the  Grain-god  by  a  light- 
green  piece. 

"While  the  worship  of  Heaven  and  of  Earth  is  thus  solemnly 


GODS  OF  LAND  AND  GRAIN,  SUN  AND  MOON.   387 

celebrated  in  temples  to  the  north  and  south  of  the  city,  two 
worthy  survivals  of  the  primitive  Nature- worship  are  the  Temple 
of  the  Sun  on  the  eastern  side  of  the  Tartar  city,  and  thai  of  the 
Moon  on  the  western  side.  That  of  the  Sun  consists  of  a  square 
terrace  only  one  storey  in  height,  and  ascended  by  four  flights  of 
steps  from  the  four  sides  of  the  compass.  It  stands  in  a  square 
walled  enclosure  of  about  the  same  size  as  is  devoted  to  the  Earth 
Temple — namely,  300  acres. 

At  the  great  annual  Spring  Festival,  solemn  service  is  held  two 
hours  before  sunrise,  when  the  Emperor  ascends  the  Altar  from  the 
west,  so  as  to  face  the  tablet  of  tin-  Sun,  and  the  east.  At  this 
temple  the  Sun  alone  is  worshipped,  and  is  symbolised  by  a  circular 
red  stone.  The  walls  are  roofed  with  reddish  tiles,  the  tablet  of 
the  Sun  is  placed  beneath  a  red  canopy,  and  the  Imperial  Eigh 
Priest  wears  red  robes. 

The  Moon,  on  the  other  hand,  is  symbolised  by  a  white  stone 
(?  crystal);  the  walls  are  roofed  with  white  tiles.  The  Emperor 
Avears  white  robes,  and  a  white  canopy  overshadows  the  tablets  of 
the  .Moon,  the  twenty-eight  constellations,  and  all  the  other  stars. 
The  form  of  the  temple,  and  the  ritual,  are  almost  identical  with 
those  of  the  Sun  Temple;  but  the  tablet  of  the  Moon  faci 
east, land  those  of  the  Stars  face  the  south. 

There  is  just  one  temple  in  the  heart  of  the  Imperial  city,  im- 
mediately to  the  north  of  the  palace,  which  would  seem  to  be  a 
sort  of  adaptation  of  Heaven's  Temple.  It  is  called  the  Kwang- 
ming-tien  or  Temple  of  Light.  Here  are  two  marble  terraces,  one 
above  the  other,  each  ascended  by  six  flights  of  twelve  steps  each 
(making  a  total  of  144  steps).  On  the  platform  at  the  summit 
stands  a  circular  wooden  temple  roofed  with  brilliant  light-blue 
tiles;  within  this  building  an  image  of  the  Taouist  God  of  Hea\eii 
sits  enthroned  above  an  altar  supported  by  beautifully  earved 
dragons.  This  pagoda,  with  its  marble  terraces,  is  in  connection 
with  a  Taouist  temple  of  the  ordinary  type 

L'y  the  time  we  had  gone  leisurely  all  over  the  ground,  examin- 
ing everything  in  detail,  and  I  had  secured  sketches  from  several 
different  points,  the  Grant  party  overtook  us,  and,  in  the  innocence 
of  my  heart,  I  advanced  pleasantly  to  renew  acquaintance  with  the 
General,  but  was  wholly  at  a  loss  to  account  for  the  remarkable 
combination  of  expressions  which  were  plainly  depicted  on  the 
countenances  of  his  official  entertainers  and  suites,  both  Chinese 
and  American  !  These  were  really  a  study  for  a  physio 
Like  certain  Pharisaical  Christians,  they  seemed  to  think  that  the 


u88  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

gates  of  heaven  should  open  to  them  alone,  and  that  the  admission 
of  others  was  an  injury  to  themselves!  I  only  congratulated  my- 
self the  more  on  the  advantages  of  early  rising,  which  had  not 
only  secured  an  unchallenged  entrance,  but  a  peaceful  occupation 
of  a  spot  so  replete  with  interest  and  suggestive  of  so  much  matter 
for  thought. 

We  now  recrossed  the  outer  park,  intending,  according  to  our 
morning  programme,  to  visit  the  great  Temple  of  Agriculture  which 
lies  so  near  that  of  Heaven;  but  the  sun  being  already  high,  and 
the  heat  overpowering,  I  contented  myself  with  a  look  at  its  outer 
wall  (which,  like  that  of  Heaven,  enclosed  about  300  acres),  while 
Dr  Edkins  described  how,  at  the  beginning  of  spring  (about  the 
5th  of  March),  the  Emperor  and  his  great  nobles  come  in  state  to 
this  "Eminence  of  Venerable  Agriculturists"  (the  Sien-nong-tan), 
and  there  offer  a  sacrificial  banquet  to  Shin-Xung,  the  God  of 
Husbandry. 

The  banquet  includes  a  sheep,  a  pig,  and  nine  kinds  of  grain 
and  vegetables.  In  presenting  these,  the  Emperor  and  his  courtiers 
prostrate  themselves  and  knock  their  heads  nine  times  on  the  earth. 
Having  read  aloud  a  written  prayer  for  prosperity  in  the  ploughing 
and  sowing,  the  nine  head-knockings  are  again  repeated.  Then  the 
Emperor  and  the  Imperial  Princes  put  off  their  official  dress  and 
assume  that  of  peasants,  and  thus  arrayed,  they  adjourn  to  a  field 
ready  for  ploughing,  where  each  takes  his  place  in  charge  of  an 
Imperial  -  yellow  plough  to  which  is  yoked  a  buffalo  led  by  a 
peasant,  who  (in  honour  of  the  occasion)  is  clothed  in  yellow. 
Each  noble  ploughman  must  plough  nine  furrows,  and  each  is 
followed  by  an  official  whose  duty  is  to  sow  the  grain  in  the  newly 
turned  earth,  A\diile  two  companies  of  choristers,  robed  in  festive 
attire,  and  stationed  to  east  and  west  of  the  field,  chant  anthems  in 
praise  of  agriculture.  On  the  north  side  stand  a  crowd  of  literary 
men,  and  on  the  south  a  company  of  aged  peasants  in  festal  attire. 

This  remarkable  ceremony  is  said  to  have  been  instituted  by  the 
Emperor  Shun,  who  reigned  about  b.c.  2200,  and  was  himself  a 
keen  practical  farmer.  The  example  thus  set  by  the  Emperor  is 
followed  by  the  great  officials  in  every  city  throughout  the  empire, 
and  the  farmers  are  then  at  liberty  to  commence  work  in  earnest.1 

Within  these  grounds  are  four  great  altars,  respectively  dedicated 

1  In  proof  that  this  festival  was  not  anciently  peculiar  to  China,  Mr  Simpson 
quotes  the  'Siamese  Life  of  Buddha,'  which  tells  how  Suddhodana,  King  of 
Kapila  and  father  of  Buddha,  celebrated  the  commencement  of  sowing  time  with 
Brahmins  and  nobles  and  799  ploughs,  with  which  they  broke  the  earth,  and  then 
sowed  the  first  seeds. 


GORGEOUS    FUNERALS.  ."J  8  9 

to  the  celestial  and  terrestrial  gods,  the  God  of  the  Year,  and  the 
Teacher  of  Husbandry.  They  are  covered  with  sculpture  to  repre- 
sent wind  and  waves,  clouds,  dragons,  and  mountains;  and  there 
are  special  tablets  to  mountains  and  hills,  thunder-gods,  wind,  rain, 
and  cloud-gods.     Also  to  special  rivers. 

When  the  Emperor  is  about  to  travel,  he  conns  here  in  person 
to  offer  sacrifices  to  the  tutelary  gods  of  the  mountains  streams, 
and  hills  of  the  district  to  which  he  is  going.  Hero,  too,  special 
prayers  are  offered  for  abundant  rain  and  snow,  and  here  thanks 
are  returned  when  these  mercies  have  been  vouchsafed, 

"We  had  ample  time  to  contemplate  the  outer  wall  of  this  famous 
temple,  while  waiting  for  the  return  of  the  driver,  who  had  gone 
off  to  indulge  in  an  opium-pipe.  At  last,  weary  of  loitering  in  the 
grilling  sun,  we  started  to  meet  him — the  Doctor  himself  leading 
the  cart.  Presently  we  came  to  the  temple  of  the  God  of  Medicine, 
and  there  halted,  hoping  to  see  the  statues  of  all  the  most  celebrated 
Chinese  doctors.  The  temple,  however,  was  securely  locked  up, 
and  we  had  to  be  satisfied  with  inspecting  its  very  gaudy  "joss- 
theatre,"  the  decorations  of  which  are  not  nearly  so  artistic  as  those 
of  Southern  China. 

As  we  neared  the  huge  Avails  of  the  Tartar  cit}-,  we  succes- 
sively met  two  great  funeral  processions,  which  formed  striking 
foregrounds  to  the  venerable  grey  walls  and  stupendous  many- 
storeyed  gateway.  A  funeral  here  does  not  imply  sombre  black, 
but  a  wealth  of  rich  positive  colour.  Xor  is  there  any  conven- 
tional excess  of  rigid  obedience  to  undertakers  and  milliners,  for 
most  picturesque  tatterdemalions  are  allowed  a  place  in  the  funeral 
processions  of  even  wealthy  citizens  such  as  these. 

In  the  present  instance  a  company  of  such  headed  the  first 
procession,  carrying  scarlet  objects  stuck  on  long  poles,  like  ad- 
vertisement boards,  with  Chinese  characters  inscribed  in  gold. 
These  are  the  titles  of  the  deceased  and  his  ancestors.  Various 
other  symbolic  insignia  were  also  carried  on  tall  poles.  Then  came 
a  troop  of  musicians  beating  gongs,  drums,  and  copper  cymbals, 
and  blowing  trumpets  with  deafening  noise,  as  an  accompanimenl 
to  the  lugubrious  howls  of  hired  mourners.  These  were  all  clothed 
in  dark  blue.  Then  came  a  gorgeous  erection  of  huge  Bcarlet-and- 
gold  beams  and  cross-beams,  the  use  of  which  1  failed  to  learn. 
Then  in  a  fine  gilded  sedan-chair  came  the  tablet  of  the  deceased, 
and  above  it  floated  a  crimson  satin  banner  bearing  his  name  in 
letters  of  gold.  Another  company  of  men  in  everyday  dress  fol- 
lowed, each  bearing  a  long  stick  with  a  gilt  top.     After  these  came 


390  THE  TEMPLE  OF  HEAVEN. 

a  procession  of  half-a-dozen  brilliant  scarlet  ecclesiastical  umbrellas 
— triple  umbrellas,  one  above  the  other  (like  the  triple  roof  of 
Heaven's  Temple). 

These  were  followed  by  Taouist  priests,  robed  in  blue  satin ; 
and  then  came  the  funeral  car — an  immense  catafalque,  with  a 
canopy  and  drapery  of  the  richest  blue  satin,  embroidered  with 
golden  dragons.  This  most  cumbersome  bier  was  carried  by  a  very 
large  number  of  bearers  dressed  in  green,  and  having  red  feathers 
in  their  hats  ;  there  must  have  been  about  fifty  of  these.  Then 
followed  the  chief  mourners  on  foot,  some  dressed  in  white  and 
some  in  sackcloth ;  then  a  long  string  of  the  ordinary  blue  Peking 
carts  (which  represent  mourning  and  private  carriages)  containing 
more  white-robed  mourners.  Among  these  were  some  sedan-chairs, 
with  four  bearers.  Then  came  more  state  umbrellas,  more  scarlet 
boards  and  banners,  more  noisy  musicians,  and  then  an  immense 
crowd  of  rag-tag,  attracted  by  the  brave  spectacle.1 

Scarcely  had  the  last  of  these  passed  us  when,  just  as  we  came 
to  the  great  gateway,  a  renewed  burst  of  dismal  music  warned  us  to 
stand  aside,  and  a  second  long  funeral  train  came  forth.  This  was 
that  of  a  woman,  apparently  of  some  standing,  for  the  procession 
was  in  most  respects  very  similar  to  the  first,  only  in  place  of  the 
extraordinary  structure  of  scarlet-and-gold  beams,  there  was  a  sort 
of  ark  closely  covered  with  yellow  embroidered  cloth,  and  the 
funeral  car  was  heavily  draped  with  dark-purple  silk,  embroidered 
with  large  luck-conferring  fishes. 

"With  the  addition  of  many  camels  crouching  in  the  hot  dust 
outside  the  great  grey  walls,  and  the  mixed  crowd  of  Mongolians, 
Tartars,  and  long-tailed  Chinamen,  the  scene  was  all  exceedingly 
picturesque,  and  I  crept  out  of  my  secluded  cart  in  order  to  see  it 
better.  But  what  with  the  grilling  heat,  the  clouds  of  stifling  dust, 
and  the  powerful  and  most  unfragrant  bouquet  de  peuple,  I  was 
not  sorry  when  the  procession  had  cleared  the  great  double  gate- 

1  Amongst  the  details  of  a  recent  funeral  (that  of  Prince  Lau-Fu)  we  are  told  that 
the  procession  was  headed  by  thirty-six  men  clothed  in  bright  green.  These  were 
followed  by  a  hundred  clad  in  crimson,  and  bearing  tablets  recording  the  titles  and 
honours  of  the  dead.  Then  came  twenty  attendants,  leading  the  Prince's  hounds — 
a  pack  numbering  two  hundred  and  forty.  Afterwards  came  his  horses,  camels, 
mules,  sedan-chairs,  and  his  private  carnage  drawn  by  a  mule,  also  a  chair  of  state, 
covered  with  a  tiger-skin,  and  borne  by  sixteen  men  dressed  in  green  silk.  Then 
followed  a  regiment  of  cavalry  and  a  body  of  infantry.  A;  company  of  thirty-two 
priests  and  the  temple  musicians  immediately  preceded  the  coffin,  which  was  covered 
with  a  silken  pall,  and  carried  by  eighty  men.  Six  empty  carriages  represented  the 
Emperor,  and  were  followed  by  many  great  mandarins  on  foot.  It  is  stated  that 
the  Prince's  clothes,  carriages,  tents,  and  arms  were  all  burned,  that  their  owner 
might  have  the  use  of  them  in  the  spirit-world  ! 


SHEEP    AND    SNUFF-BOTTLES.  391 

way,  and  we  were  able  to  pass  into  the  Tartar  city,  and  jolt  and 
Lump  down  the  main  street,  till  we  joyfully  reached  the  shelter  of 
this  most  hospitable  roof. 

You  might  think  we  had  seen  enough  for  one  day,  but  this 
afternoon,  when  food  and  rest  had  done  their  blessed  work,  I 
started  once  more  with  Dr  and  Mrs  Dudgeon  in  one  of  the  dread- 
ful carts,  and  we  bumped  along  to  the  United  States  Legation, 
there  to  call  on  Mrs  Grant,  who  sorely  envied  as  our  morning's 
expedition!  As  we  stopped  at  the  gate,  a  flock  of  large  sheep 
dashed  past  us,  and  one  getting  frightened,  leaped  clean  over  tin- 
back  of  our  mule,  which  so  alarmed  it  that  it  kicked  viol 
when  I  was  climbing  out.  "When  we  left  tin-  Legation  and  tried 
to  get  in  again,  the  nervous  creature  became  so  restive  that  I  had 
fairly  to  spring  in,  thinking  it  would  then  go  on,  and  expend  its 
energies  on  the  cart -ruts  and  pitfalls  of  the  road,  instead  of  which, 
it  waxed  so  violent  that  we  dared  not  go  on,  so  it  was  blindfolded 
to  enable  me  to  get  out  again. 

Being  thus  independent  of  wheels,  it  seemed  a  favourable  oppor- 
tunity for  a  walk  on  the  walls,  so  as  to  get  a  bird's-eye  view  of 
the  city.     We  accordingly  walked   some    distance    to    the 
South  Gate,  and  there  to  our  intense  aggravation  found  that  the 
small  gate  which  gives  access  to  the  ramparts  was   lurked  in 
sequence  of  a  Government  order  issued  a  few  days  ago.      Half  an 
hour  was  expended  in  vain  expostulation,  bul  without  avail,  bo  we 
consoled  ourselves  by  exploring  the  quaintest  very  narrow 
of  tiny  curio-shops,  running  round  the  curtain  of  the  great  wall. 
It  was  a  very  odd,  amusing  place,  and  I  bought  some  strange  little 
knick-knacks  as  memorials. 

I  was  much  tempted  by  most  fascinating  snuff-bottles,  which 
are  a  specialty  of  Peking,  but  the  most  attractive  proved  far  be- 
yond the  limits  of  my  purse,  and  I  had  to  be  satisfied  with  some 
very  simple  specimens,  one  of  very  thick  dull-given   glass,  and  one 
of  white  glass  incrusted  with  pink  flowers.     The  more  costly  ones 
are  of  a  sort  of  scarlet  and  yellow  slag,  or  of  jade  of  various  tint-, 
or  pebble  cut  so  as  to  show  a  raised  pattern  in  a  different  i 
from  the  groundwork.     They  arc  the  size  of  a  flattened  egg,  and  the 
snuff  is  taken  out  on  a  minute,  wooden  spoon  which  is  attached  to 
the  stopper.    Chinese  gentlemen  wear  these  snuff-bottles  suspended 
from  the  girdle,  as  are  also  their  watch,  their  purse,  the  richly 
embroidered  case   in   which    they    deposil    their   fan    on    th< 
occasions  when  it  is  not  in  use,  the  case  containing  then 
chop-sticks,  the  embroidered  pouch  containing  their  keys,  thi 


392  THE  GREAT  LAMA  TEMPLE. 

containing  their  huge  spectacles,  and  any  other  trifles  they  may 
wish  to  carry  about  with  them  !  This  comes  of  not  having  pockets 
in  which  to  stow  away  such  articles. 

From  tliis  quaint  street  we  made  our  way  hack  on  foot — a  long 
and  very  dusty  walk,  yet  better  than  undergoing  the  anguish  of 
being  battered  in  the  springless  cart ! 


CHAPTER   XXXIII. 


THE     GREAT     LAMA     TEMPLE. 


The  Great  Lama  Temple — "The  Living  Buddha" — Obnoxious  monks — In  the 
Great  Temple — All-Saints'  Praise-Wheel — Variations  in  ecclesiastical  dress 
— Temple  of  Confucius — The  porcelain  pai-low — Antique  stone  drums — 
Confucian  books  engraved  in  marble — Stone  books  of  Burmah — Hall  of 
the  Classics — An  Imperial  lecture — Chinese  libraries — The  Bamboo  Book. 

June  7th. 

This  morning,  soon  after  5  a.m.,  Dr  Dudgeon  took  me  to  see  the 
Yung-ho-kung,  a  very  fine  old  Lama  temple,  just  within  the  wall, 
at  the  north-east  corner  of  the  Tartar  city.  It  contains  about  1300 
monks  of  all  ages  down  to  small  boys  six  years  old,  under  the 
headship  of  a  Lama,  who  assumes  the  title  of  "  The  Living 
Buddha." 

These  monks  are  Mongol  Tartars  of  a  very  bad  type,  dirty  and 
greedy  of  gain ;  and,  moreover,  are  known  to  be  grossly  immoral. 
They  are  generally  offensively  insolent  to  all  foreigners,  many  of 
whom  have  vainly  endeavoured  to  obtain  access  to  the  monastery, 
— even  the  silver  key,  which  is  usually  so  powerful  in  China, 
often  failing  to  unlock  the  inhospitable  gates. 

That  I  had  the  privilege  of  entrance  was  solely  due  to  the  per- 
sonal influence  of  Dr  Dudgeon,  whose  medical  skill  has  happily 
proved  so  beneficial  to  "  The  Living  Buddha,"  and  several  of  the 
priests,  as  to  ensure  him  a  welcome  from  these.  It  was  not,  how- 
ever, an  easy  task  to  get  at  these  men,  as  a  particularly  insolent 
monk  was  acting  as  doorkeeper,  and  attempted  forcibly  to  prevent 
our  entrance.  That,  however,  was  effected  by  the  judicious  pres- 
sure of  a  powerful  shoulder,   and  after  a  stormy  argument,   the 


EARTHLY    HONOURS    FOR   CELESTIAL    BEINGS.       393 

wretch  was  at  length  overawed,  and  finally  reduced  to  abject 
humility  by  threats  to  report  his  rudeness  to  the  head  Lama. 

At  long  last,  after  wearisome  expostulation  and  altercation, 
every  door  was  thrown  open  to  us,  but  the  priest  in  charge  of 
each  carefully  locked  it  after  us,  lest  we  should  avoid  giving  him 
an  individual  tip,  or  Jeumsha,  as  it  is  here  called.  Happily  1  had 
a  large  supply  of  five  and  ten  cent  silver  pieces,  which  the  doctor's 
knowledge  of  Chinese  custom  compelled  our  extortioners  to  accept. 
At  the  same  time,  neither  of  us  could  avoid  a  qualm  as  each  suc- 
cessive door  was  securely  locked,  and  a  vision  presented  itself  of 
possible  traps  into  which  we  might  be  decoyed. 

Every  corner  of  the  great  building  is  full  of  interest,  from  the 
brilliant  yellow  china  tiles  of  the  roof  to  the  yellow  carpet  in  the 
temple.  The  entrance  is  adorned  with  stone  carvings  of  animals, 
and  the  interior  is  covered  with  a  thousand  fantastic  figures  carved 
in  wood — birds,  beasts,  and  serpents,  flowers  and  monstrous  human 
heads,  mingle  in  grotesque  confusion.  It  is  rich  in  silken  hangings, 
gold  embroidery,  huge  picturesque  paper  lanterns  of  quaint  form, 
covered  with  Chinese  characters  and  grotesque  idols,  canopied  by 
very  ornamental  baldachinos. 

Conspicuous  amongst  these  idols  is  Kwang-te,  who  was  a  distin- 
guished warrior  at  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  era,  and  who 
about  eight  hundred  years  later  was  deified  as  the  God  of  War, 
and  State  temples  were  erected  in  his  honour  in  every  city  of  the 
empire.  So  his  shrine  is  adorned  with  all  manner  of  armour, 
especially  bows  and  arrows — doubtless  votive  offerings.  He  is  a 
very  fierce-looking  god,  and  is  attended  by  two  colossal  compan- 
ions, robed  in  the  richest  gold-embroidered  silk.  Another  gigantic 
image  is  that  of  a  fully  armed  warrior  leading  a  horse.  1  believe 
he  is  Kwang-te's  armour-bearer.  In  various  parts  of  the  temple 
hang  trophies  of  arms  and  military  standards,  which  are  singular 
decorations  for  a  temple  wherein  Buddha  is  tin  object  of  supreme 
worship. 

But  the  fact  is,  that  though  Kwang-te  is  the  God  of  War,  he  is 
also  emphatically  "  Protector  of  the  Peace,"  and  his  aid  is  invoked  in 
all  manner  of  difficulties,  domestic  or  national.  For  instance,  when 
the  great  salt-wells  in  the  province  of  Shansi  dried  up.  the  sorely 
perplexed  Emperor  was  recommended  by  the  Taouisl  High  Priest 
to  lay  the  case  before  Kwang-te.  The  Emperor  therefore  wrote  an 
official  despatch  on  the  subject,  which  was  solemnly  burnt,  and 
thus  conveyed  to  the  spirit-world,  when  lo !  in  answer  to  tie'  Son 
of  Heaven,  the  Warrior-god  straightway  appeared   in   lie'  clouds, 


394  iiii-:  great  lama  temple. 

mounted  on  his  rod  war-horse,  and  directed  the  Emperor  to  erect 
a  temple  in  his  honour.  This  was  done,  and  the  salt-springs  flowed 
as  before. 

Kwang-te  again  appeared  in  1855,  during  the  Taiping  rebellion, 
to  aid  the  Imperial  troops  near  Nankin,  for  which  hind  interposi- 
tion Hien-feng,  the  reigning  Emperor  (whose  honour-conferring 
power  extends  to  the  spirit-world),  promoted  him  to  an  equal  rank 
with  Confucius  !  So  here  we  find  him  reverenced  alike  by  Taouists 
and  Buddhists  I1 

All  the  altar-vases  in  this  temple  are  of  the  finest  Peking  enamel 
— vases,  candlesticks,  and  incense-burners,  from  Avhich  filmy  clouds 
of  fragrant  incense  float  upward  to  a  ceiling  panelled  with  green 
and  gold.  Fine  large  scroll  paintings  tempted  me  to  linger  at 
every  turn,  and  the  walls  are  incrusted  with  thousands  of  small 
porcelain  images  of  Buddha. 

In  the  main  temple,  which  is  called  the  Foo-koo  or  Hall  of 
Buddha,  stands  a  cyclopean  image  of  Matreya,  the  Buddha  of 
Futurity.  It  is  seventy  feet  in  height,  and  is  said  to  be  carved 
from  one  solid  block  of  wood,  but  it  is  coloured  to  look  like  bronze. 
Ascending  a  long  flight  of  steps,  we  reached  a  gallery  running 
round  the  temple  about  the  level  of  his  shoulders.  I  found  that 
this  gallery  led  into  two  circular  buildings,  one  on  each  side,  con- 
structed for  the  support  of  two  immense  rotating  cylinders,  about 
seventy  feet  in  height,  full  of  niches,  each  niche  containing  the 
image  of  a  Buddhist  saint. 

They  are  rickety  old  things,  and  thickly  coated  with  dust,  but 
on  certain  days  worshippers  come  and  stick  on  strips  of  paper, 
bearing  prayers.  To  turn  these  cylinders  is  apparently  an  act  of 
homage  to  the  whole  saintly  family,  and  enlists  the  goodwill  of 
the  whole  lot.  Some  Lama  monasteries  deal  thus  with  their  128 
sacred  books  and  220  volumes  of  commentary,  placing  them  in  a 
huge  cylindrical  bookcase,  which  they  turn   bodily,  to  save  the 

1  This  is  by  no  means  a  unique  instance  of  the  Imperial  favour  being  thus  shown 
to  (doubtless  appreciative)  spirits.  Iu  17"2f>  the  Emperor  Yung  Ching  bestowed 
divers  honours  aud  new  titles  on  the  four  great  dragons  who  dwell  iu  the  four  seas. 
Again,  in  the  '  Peking  Gazette '  for  July  2S,  1861,  was  published  the  petition  of  the 
Director  -  General  of  Grain  Transport,  praying  the  Emperor  to  reward  the  god 
Kwang-te  for  his  interposition  on  the  11th  of  March,  whereby  two  cities  were  saved 
from  the  rebels.  He  states  that  such  was  the  anxiety  evinced  by  this  guardian 
god,  that  his  worshippers  saw  the  perspiration  trickle  from  his  image  in  the  temple. 
The  Emperor  duly  acknowledged  these  good  services,  aud  desired  that  a  tablet 
should  be  erected  in  memory  thereof.  And  so  recently  as  1877  and  1878  the  Em- 
peror officially  intimated  that  whereas  the  empire  had  been  sorely  afflicted  with 
drought,  and  now  sufficient  rain  had  fallen  through  the  intervention  of  the  Dragon- 
spirit  of  Han  Tan  Hien,  in  token  of  national  gratitude,  the  said  spirit  should  hence- 
forth be  invested  with  the  title  of  "  Dragon  Spirit  of  the  Sacred  Well." 


"  CIRCULATING    LIBRARIES  !  "  395 

trouble  of  turning  individual  pages — the   understanding  having 
apparently  small  play  in  either  case. 

Dr  Edkins  saw  one  of  these  in  the  Ling-yin  Monastery  at  Hang- 
Chow,  and  another  of  octagonal  form,  and  sixty  feet  in  height,  at 
the  Poo-sa-ting  pagoda  in  the  Wootai  Valley  (a  district  in  which 
there  are  perhaps  two  thousand  Mongol  Lamas).  At  the  same 
monastery  where  he  saw  this  revolving  library,  there  were  three 
hundred  revolving  prayer  or  praise  wheels,  and  at  another  he  ob- 
served a  most  ingenious  arrangement,  whereby  the  steam  ascending 
from  the  great  monastic  kettle  (which  is  kept  ever  boiling  to  sup- 
ply the  ceaseless  demand  for  tea)  does  further  duty  by  turning  a 
praise-wheel  which  is  suspended  from  the  ceiling!  I  myself  have 
seen  many  revolving  libraries  at  Buddhist  temples  in  Japan,  but 
this  is  the  first  thing  of  the  same  character  that  I  have  seen  in 
China. 

It  was  nearly  6  a.m.  ere  we  reached  the  Lama  temple,  so  that 
we  were  too  late  to  see  the  grand  morning  service,  as  that  com- 
mences at  4  a.m.,  when  upwards  of  a  hundred  mats  are  spread  in 
the  temple,  on  each  of  which  kneel  ten  of  the  subordinate  Lamas, 
all  wearing  their  yellow  robes  and  a  sort  of  classical  helmet  of 
yellow  felt,  with  a  very  high  crest  like  that  worn  by  Britannia. 
They  possess  red  felt  boots,  but  can  only  enter  the  temple  hare- 
footed.  The  Great  Lama  wears  a  violet-coloured  robe  and  a  yellow 
mitre.  He  bears  a  sort  of  crosier,  and  occupies  a  gilded  throne 
before  the  altar  :  a  cushion  is  provided  for  him  to  kneel  upon.  The 
whole  temple  is  in  darkness  or  dim  twilight,  save  the  altar,  which 
is  ablaze  with  many  tapers. 

When  the  great  copper  gong  sounds  its  summons  to  worship. 
they  chant  litanies  in  monotone,  one  of  the  priests  reading  prayers 
from  a  silken  scroll,  and  all  joining  in  a  low  murmur,  while  clouds 
of  incense  fill  the  temple.  A  peculiarity  of  this  chant  is,  that 
while  a  certain  number  of  the  brethren  recite  the  words,  the  others 
sing  a  continuous  deep  bass  accompaniment.  Again  the  gong 
marks  the  change  from  prayer  to  sacred  chants,  and  after  these 
comes  a  terrible  din  of  instrumental  music — a  clatter  of  gongs, 
hells,  conch-shells,  tambourines,  and  all  manner  of  ear-splitting 
abominations.  Then  follows  a  silence  which  may  be  felt,  BO  otter 
is  the  stillness  and  so  intense  the  rrlief. 

With  regard  to  dress,  this  seems  to  vary  in  different  regions, 
and  perhaps  may  denote  different  sects.  Eere  and  throughout 
Mongolia  (where  monasticism  is  in  such  repute  that  every  family 
which  possesses  more  than  one  son  is  obliged  to  devote  one  to  the 


.'59G  THE   GREAT    LAMA    TEMPLE. 

monastic  life)  every  Lama  wears  the  long  yellow  robe,  with  yellow 
mantle  and  yellow  helmet — the  last  two  items  being  always  worn 
during  the  services  in  the  temple ;  whereas  in  Ceylon,  though  the 
priests  are  robed  in  yellow,  all  are  bareheaded.  On  the  other  hand, 
those  we  saw  in  the  Northern  Himalayas  wore  scarlet  clothing  and 
scarlet  caps  shaped  like  a  crown.1 

( 1  Sy  the  way,  speaking  of  ecclesiastical  head-gear,  I  am  told  that 
throughout  Thibet,  Queen  Victoria's  effigy  (current  on  the  British 
[ndian  rupee)  is  familiarly  known  as  that  of  a  "wandering  Lama  " 
(Lama  tob-du) — her  regal  crown  being  supposed  to  represent  the 
head-dress  of  a  religious  mendicant ! !) 

I  would  fain  have  spent  hours  in  looking  through  the  man}7 
interesting  details  of  this  place,  and  the  priests,  when  once  assured 
that  they  could  extract  nothing  larger  than  ten-cent  pieces,  became 
so  eager  to  multiply  these,  that  they  volunteered  to  show  us  every 
nook  and  corner.  But  so  much  time  had  been  wasted  at  first,  and 
Ave  were  so  disconcerted  by  the  annoyance  to  which  they  had  sub- 
jected us,  that  we  were  fairly  tired  out,  and  finally  were  compelled 
to  decline  further  inspection.  Of  course  now  I  regret  that  we 
did  not  further  improve  the  unique  occasion,  and  see  everything 
we  possibly  could.  But  truly,  in  the  matter  of  sight-seeing,  flesh 
is  sometimes  weak  ! 

Besides,  as  we  had  come  such  a  long  distance,  it  was  well  to 
secure  this  opportunity  of  seeing  the  Wen-Miao,  the  great  Con- 
fucian temple,  which  is  very  near.  I  have  now  seen  a  great  many 
of  these  temples  to  the  honour  of  Confucius,  and  practically  they 
are  all  alike,  the  impression  they  convey  being  that  of  great 
mausoleums.  They  are,  in  fact,  ancestral  halls,  containing  only 
ornamental  tablets  bearing  the  names  of  noted  saints.  This,  how- 
ever, is  an  unusually  fine  specimen.  It  stands  in  shady  silent 
grounds,  and  the  funereal  character  of  the  place  is  happily  sug- 
gested by  groves  of  fine  old  cypress-trees,  said  to  be  five  hundred 
years  old,  and  by  numerous  large  stone  tablets  resting  on  the 
backs  of  huge  stone  tortoises.  Some  of  these  stones  occupy  small 
shrines  roofed  with  yellow  porcelain  tiles,  and  commemorate  various 
learned  men. 

But  the  objects  of  chief  interest  connected  with  this  temple  are 
some  relics  of  a  remote  past,  which  in  Chinese  estimation  are  of 
inestimable  value. 

Chief  among  these  are  ten  large  cylindrical  stones,  shaped  like 

1  See  '  In  the  Himalayas  and  on  Indian  Plains,'  p.  437.    C.  F.  Gordon  Cumming. 
Chatto  &  Windus. 


VENERATED    STONES.  :!07 

gigantic  cheeses,  which  for  lack  of  a  better  name  arc  called  S 
Drums.  The  Chinese  believe  them  to  have  been  respectively 
engraven  in  the  days  of  Yaou  and  Shun,  who  lived  B.o.  2357  and 
B.C.  2255.  Reference  is  made  to  them,  as  objects  worthy  of 
reverence,  in  a  classic  bearing  date  about  b.o.  500.  Certain  it  is 
that  such  interest  has  ever  attached  to  them,  that  whenever  the 
Emperors  of  China  have  changed  their  capital,  these  stone  drums 
have  also  been  removed.  The  story  of  their  wanderings  is  as 
curious  as  the  legendary  history  of  our  own  much-venerated  I 
nation  Stone  in  "Westminster  Abbey.1  (Put  the  fortunes  of  tic- 
present  dynasty  are  specially  connected  with  the  six  unhewn 
stones  in  the  cypress-grove  at  the  Temple  of  Heaven.)  Appa- 
rently these  also  were  rude  water  -  worn  boulders,  which  were 
shaped  and  inscribed  to  commemorate  certain  Imperial  hunting 
expeditions.  "When  the  fame  of  Confucius  caused  all  In 
interests  to  cluster  around  his  name,  they  were  deposited  in  one  of 
his  temples,  where  they  were  preserved  for  upwards  of  a  thousand 
years. 

Then  came  a  period  of  wars  and  troubles,  during  which  the 
great  stones  disappeared.  They  were,  however,  recovered  a.i>. 
1052,  and  placed  in  the  gateway  of  the  Imperial  College.  Then 
the  Tartars  invaded  Northern  China,  and  the  Imperial  Courl  Bed 
to  Pien-Ching,  in  the  province  of  llonan,  carrying  with  them  these 
cumbersome  great  stones.  In  A.D.  1108  a  decree-  was  passed  that 
the  inscriptions  should  be  filled  in  with  gold  in  order  to  pr» 
them.  In  a.d.  1126  another  Tartar  tribe  captured  the  city  of 
Pien-Ching,  and  carried  the  ten  stones  back  to  Peking,  where  foi 
a  while  even  they  shared  the  fate  of  all  things  in  this  city.  They 
were  allowed  to  fall  into  neglect,  and  sacrilegious  hands  removed 
the  gold.  Worse  still,  some  Vandal  (of  a  class  not  peculiar  to 
China!)  carried  off  one  of  the  stones,  and  ruthlessly  converted  it 
into  a  drinking-trough  for  cattle!  After  many  years,  when  anti- 
quarian interest  was  reawakened,  it  was  found  to  be  missing,  and 
after  long  search  its  mutilated  remains  were  discovered  in  a  farm- 
yard and  brought  back  to  be  deposited  with  the  others  (a.i».  1307) 
in  their  present  post  of  honour. 

The  stones  derive  additional   interest  from   the   fact  that    tic- 
character  in  which  the  poetic  stanzas  arc  inscribed  is  now  obsolete. 
To  avoid  all  clanger  of  their  ever  again  being  lost,  a  sel  <>i  i 
copies  have  been  made  by  Imperial  command. 

1  For  legend  of  the  Coronation  Stone,    see   'In  the  Hebrides,'  p.   88.     <  '•    I  • 
Gordon  Cuininiim.     Chatto  &  Windas. 


398  THE  GREAT  LAMA  TEMPLE. 

Less  venerable,  but  certainly  more  imposing  to  the  outward  eye, 
is  another  memorial  in  stone,  which  is  stored  in  the  corridors 
encircling  the  court  of  the  Peking  University,  which  adjoins  the 
Confucian  Temple.  This  is  a  series  of  no  fewer  than  200  noble 
slabs  of  black  marble,  like  upright  gravestones,  12  feet  in  height, 
Avhereon  are  engraved  the  whole  of  the  thirteen  books  of  Con- 
fucius. It  appears  that  by  some  extraordinary  accident  there  was 
once  upon  a  time  (b.0.  212)  an  Emperor  of  China,  by  name  Shi 
Hwang-ti,  of  the  Ts'in  dynasty,  so  depraved  as  to  endeavour  to 
destroy  every  existing  copy  of  this  source  of  all  wisdom !  I  have 
no  doubt  that  his  early  years  had  been  embittered  by  the  story  of 
those  wearisome  volumes,  and  when,  on  his  accession  to  the  throne, 
he  was  expected  to  expound  their  doctrine  to  all  his  officials  and 
mandarins,  his  soul  was  filled  with  a  wild  desire  to  commit  them 
once  for  all  to  the  flames ! 

The  ostensible  reason,  however,  for  his  wholesale  raid  on  the 
wise  books  was  one  of  political  expediency.  He  was  a  strong- 
handed  ruler — the  builder  of  the  Great  "Wall  of  China — a  man 
not  easily  turned  from  his  purpose.  At  that  time  literary  contests 
between  the  followers  of  Confucius  and  those  of  Laou-tsze  ran 
high,  and  were  doubtless  blended  with  political  intrigue.  Conse- 
quently Li  Sze,  the  Prime  Minister  of  the  day,  urged  his  Imperial 
master  to  secure  his  own  position  by  utterly  crushing  these  literary 
factions  and  destroying  an  immense  number  of  books  which  tended 
to  keep  up  discussions  ;  for,  whereas  implicit  obedience  to  the 
Emperor  was  the  one  thing  needful,  these  numerous  scholars 
"  deemed  it  fine  to  have  extraordinary  views  of  their  own,"  even 
presuming  to  talk  of  them  in  the  streets  ! 

It  was  therefore  decreed  that  all  national  records  should  at 
once  be  burnt,  save  those  only  which  related  to  the  Imperial 
House  of  Ts'in,  and  that  all  scholars  possessing  copies  of  the  '  Book 
of  History,'  the  '  Book  of  Odes,'  and  other  proscribed  works,  should 
bring  them  to  the  public  officers  to  be  burnt.  That  failing  to  do  so 
within  thirty  days,  they  should  be  branded  and  sent  to  labour  for 
four  years  in  the  Great  Wall ;  that  persons  presuming  to  meet  for 
discussion  concerning  these  books  should  be  put  to  death,  and  their 
bodies  exposed  in  the  market-place — the  like  fate  being  allotted  to 
whosoever  should  venture  to  draw  invidious  contrasts  between  the 
good  old  times  and  the  present.  And  not  only  was  this  penalty 
to  attach  to  the  actual  offenders,  but  to  all  their  relatives,  extend- 
ing even  to  Government  officials,  who,  knowing  of  such  offenders, 
failed  to  report  their  crime. 


THE   HEROD    OF    CONFUCIAN    LITERATURE.  399 

Of  course  many  scholars  endeavoured  to  evade  compliance  with 
this  arbitrary  decree  of  ruthless  vandalism,  and  some  succeeded  in 
saving  both  their  books  and  their  lives.  It  is,  however,  recorded, 
that  upwards  of  460  were  detected  in  this  offence,  and  were  buried 
alive  as  a  warning  to  whosoever  should  presume  to  disobey  the 
Imperial  mandate. 

The  only  books  spared  in  this  general  destruction  were  such  as 
related  to  divination,  husbandry,  and  medicine;  while  all  those 
bearing  on  science,  art,  or  history,  all  records  of  primitive  ages,  and 
all  manuscripts  written  in  the  earliest  characters  (which  would  now 
be  of  such  priceless  value),  were  ruthlessly  destroyed. 

Possibly,  had  Shi  Hwang-ti  succeeded  in  thus  exterminating  the 
Confucian  books,  he  might  have  delivered  his  country  from  its 
mental  bondage  to  "  The  Example  and  Teacher  of  all  Ages."  He 
failed,  however,  for  many  men  survived  who  were  so  deeply  im- 
bued with  the  letter  of  the  classics,  that  the  whole  were  soon  fault- 
lessly reproduced. 

The  way  it  came  about  was  this : — 

A  very  few  years  elapsed  ere  the  Ts'in  dynasty  was  overthrown 
by  that  of  Han,  and  for  the  space  of  three  months,  fighting  and 
fire  devastated  the  land,  and  especially  the  capital.  When  peace 
was  restored,  the  new  Emperor  called  upon  all  scholars  to  aid  him 
in  reconstructing  the  national  libraries,  and  straightway  from  all 
manner  of  strange  hiding-places  the  literary  treasures  were  brought 
forth.  From  mountain-caves,  from  niches  and  hollow  places  in 
old  walls,  from  the  depths  of  the  forest,  the  carefully  concealed 
volumes  were  produced,  while  some  engraven  on  bamboo  slips  and 
wooden  tablets  were  rescued  even  from  the  beds  of  rivers,  where 
they  had  been  safely  hidden. 

From  the  lips  of  old  men  and  of  learned  women  portions  of  the 
missing  books  were  rewritten.  A  blind  man  was  found  to  be  able 
to  repeat  a  large  portion  of  the  condemned  '  Book  of  History,' 
and  his  words  were  taken  down  by  scribes;  and  a  young  girl, 
blessed  with  a  marvellous  memory,  was  able  to  supply  another 
portion. 

So  effectually  was  this  literary  restoration  accomplished,  that  the 
most  learned  scholars  were  satisfied  with  its  accuracy.  But  in  case 
such  another  Herod  should  ever  arise,  it  was  decided  that  these 
words  of  wisdom  should  be  preserved  on  imperishable  marble, 
which,  moreover,  should  for  ever  ensure  the  Chinese  character  in 
which  they  were  inscribed,  against  any  change.  So,  round  a  _n.it 
court,  known   as  the   Hall  of  the  Classics,  are  ranged  these   tall. 


400  THE  GREAT  LAMA  TEMPLE. 

Bolemn  marble  tablets1  —embodiments  of  the  dead-weight  where- 
with the  Present  is  hampered  with  the  Past;  and  here  once  a-year 
the  Emperor  is  obliged  to  give  that  lecture,  the  very  thought  of 
which  I  assume  to  have  so  distracted  his  ancestor! 

The  approach  to  this  hall  is  by  a  triple  gateway  of  the  peculiar 
pai-low  form,  most  beautifully  decorated  with  green  and  yellow 
porcelain  tiles,  so  that  the  whole  appears  to  be  made  of  china.  A 
very  ornamental  pavilion,  decorated  with  gold  dragons  on  a  green 
ground,  stands  in  the  centre  of  an  ornamental  tank,  and  is  ap- 
proached by  several  beautiful  marble  bridges. 

Our  sight-seeing  capacities  were  now  so  thoroughly  exhausted 
that  we  were  thankful  once  more  to  get  curled  up  in  the  terrible 
Peking  cab,  and  to  know  that  each  jolt  brought  us  nearer  to  the 
Mission-House  and  to  a  welcome  breakfast. 

Note. — It  may  be  interesting  before  going  further  just  to  glance 
at  a  few  details  concerning  Chinese  literature. 

It  would  seem  to  require  a  life's  study  to  master  the  vast  array 
of  complicated  characters  which  form  the  Chinese  equivalent  of 
our  simple  alphabet.  Yet  these  are  comparatively  easy  compared 
with  the  far  more  complex  systems  used  by  scholars  in  the  earlier 
ages  of  Chinese  literature,  and  it  was  a  herculean  task  which  was 
taken  by  the  great  Confucius  (about  the  year  B.C.  600),  when,  as 
Keeper  of  the  Archives  in  the  Eoyal  State  of  Chow,  he  resolved  to 
inspect  and  classify  the  heterogeneous  mass  of  manuscripts  com- 
mitted to  his  care,  and  dating  from  remotest  ages.  The  earliest  of 
these  records  were  inscribed  in  a  sort  of  hieroglyphic  generally 
described  as  "  the  tadpole  character."  Of  later  date  was  "  the  seal 
character,"  still  used  for  certain  classes  of  writing.  The  invention 
of  the  characters  now  in  general  use  is  attributed  to  the  Emperor 
Fuh-hi,  who  lived  B.C.  2852,  so  they  possess  whatever  merit 
attaches  to  the  antiquity  of  having  existed  for  four  thousand 
years ! 

Many  of  the  documents  examined  and  digested  by  Confucius 
had  reference  to  early  Chinese  history,  religious  ceremonies,  and 
scientific  discoveries.     Bitterly  do  learned  men  regret  the  strong 

1  This  method  of  honouring  sacred  books  has  recently  been  imitated  by  the  King 
of  Burmah,  who  has  had  the  sacred  books  of  the  "  Beetigal "  thus  engraven  on  72S 
slabs  of  alabaster,  each  about  five  feet  in  height  by  three  feet  six  in  width,  and  four 
inches  thick.  The  slabs  are  engraven  on  both  sides,  and  over  each  is  erected  a  min- 
iature dome-shaped  dagoba,  surmounted  by  the  golden  symbol  of  the  honorific 
umbrella.  Hitherto  the  Burmese  sacred  books  have  been  inscribed  only  on  palm- 
leaves,  therefore  the  king  takes  this  means  of  preserving  them,  ami  of  acquiring 
personal  merit,  at  a  cost  of  about  £36,400,  each  slab  costing  about  500  rupees. 


SKETCH    OF    CHINESE    LITERATURE.  401 

national  pride  and  prejudice  which  led  Confucius  to  reject  utterly, 
as  unworthy  of  recognition,  about  three  hundred  manuscripts  which 
seem  to  have  had  relation  to  barbarous  States  beyond  tbc  charmed 
circle  of  China  proper,  or  rather  of  those  north-eastern  States  which 
alone  were  recognised  by  the  great  philosopher. 

From  these  ancient  materials  he  compiled  a  hundred  books,  and 
whatever  further  knowledge  he  deemed  worthy  of  preservation 
was  incorporated  with  his  own  voluminous  writings,  which  have 
ever  since  been  recognised  as  the  most  sacred  heritage  of  every 
Chinaman. 

Many  of  these  early  records  were  inscribed  on  bamboo  tablets, 
of  which  a  very  large  number  were  deposited  in  the  tomb  of  the 
Emperor  Kiang  Siang.  The  tomb  was  broken  open  by  robbers 
about  a.d.  250,  and  in  order  to  obtain  light  to  guide  their  plunder- 
ing, they  burnt  a  considerable  number  of  these  precious  relics  of 
the  past.  The  others  were  rescued  and  committed  to  the  most 
learned  antiquaries  of  the  empire  to  be  deciphered.  They  were 
found  to  be  treatises  on  history,  divination,  &c,  &c,  and  are  now 
known  as  the  Bamboo  Book. 

Of  course,  in  a  country  where  literary  distinction  was  the  certain 
road  to  honour,  books  on  every  conceivable  subject  multiplied  with 
incredible  velocity,  as  we  may  judge  from  the  records  of  those 
which  on  different  occasions  have  been  destroyed,  either  by  acci- 
dent or  by  the  deeds  of  ruthless  men.  Indeed,  but  for  these 
periodical  catastrophes,  it  might  well  seem  as  if  "  the  world  itself 
could  not  contain  the  books  that  had  been  written." 

Thus  within  two  centuries  of  the  wholesale  raid  perpetrated  by 
Shi  Hwang-ti,  the  State  libraries  had  recovered  upwards  of  3000 
works  on  the  classics,  2700  on  philosophy,  2500  on  mathematics, 
1300  on  poetry,  700  on  military  matters,  and  800  on  medicine. 

Ere  many  years  had  elapsed,  the  Han  dynasty  passed  away,  and 
was  succeeded  by  that  of  Wei,  under  whose  auspices  the  catalogue 
of  the  Imperial  library  soon  numbered  30,000  volumes,  all  of  which 
were  destroyed  by  fire  in  the  course  of  a  popular  revolution,  when 
the  Wei  dynasty  was  overthrown,  to  be  succeeded  by  that  of  Lian-. 
Again,  with  much  care  and  toil,  successive  emperors  accumulated 
a  new  library,  but  this  too  was  burnt  towards  the  close  of  the  fifth 
century.  Phcenix-likc,  from  the  ashes  of  this  conflagration  arose 
yet  another  great  collection  of  33,000  bonks,  in  addition  to  many 
works  on  Buddhism.  Ere  fifty  years  had  elapsed,  these  also  were 
burnt,  in  the  course  of  another  great  rebellion. 

About  the  year  a.d.  CIS  the  T'ang  dynasty  was  established,  and 

2  C 


402  THE  GREAT  LAMA  TEMPLE. 

the  land  had  rest  from  its  Long  internal  wars.  Under  the  peaceful 
sway  of  this  Imperial  house,  a  new  library  of  80,000  books  was 
collected — and  rightly  to  appreciate  this  statement  it  is  necessary 
to  remember  that,  though  the  art  of  making  paper  from  the  inner 
bark  of  trees,  fishing-nets,  and  old  rags,  had  been  discovered  by 
the  Marquis  Ts'ai  about  a  hundred  years  before  the  Christian  era, 
that  of  printing  was  not  known,  or  at  least  not  generally  adopted, 
till  about  the  year  a.d.  1000,  under  the  patronage  of  the  emperors 
of  the  Sung  dynasty. 

From  that  time  to  the  present,  each  successive  dynasty  has  done 
its  part  to  encourage  literature — none  more  heartily  than  the  Tartar 
race  who  now  reign. 

The  Emperor  Yunglo,  of  the  Ming  dynasty,  who  ascended  the 
throne  in  a.d.  1403,  resolved  to  have  a  vast  encyclopedia  compiled 
which  should  embrace  all  desirable  knowledge.  For  this  purpose 
he  appointed  no  less  than  2000  commissioners,  who,  after  toiling 
for  four  years,  presented  the  Emperor  with  a  nice  handy  book  of 
reference  in  twenty-two  thousand  nine  hundred  and  thirty- 
seven  volumes  ! !  However  valuable  this  work  might  have  proved, 
it  was  decided  that  it  was  rather  too  voluminous  for  the  printers ; 
so  the  fruit  of  so  much  toil  was  stored  in  manuscript,  in  the 
Imperial  Palace  at  Peking,  where  its  remains  are  still  treasured. 

The  idea  thus  suggested  was  carried  out  300  years  later  by  the 
Manchu  Emperor  K'ang-hi,  who  commissioned  the  wise  men  of 
the  empire  to  illustrate  upwards  of  6000  subjects,  by  collecting  all 
allusions  to  them  which  might  be  scattered  among  existing  books. 
This  encyclopedia  of  extracts  was  published  in  a.d.  1726,  and  con- 
sists of  upwards  of  5000  volumes,  containing  the  cream  of  Chinese 
literature. 

A  complete  copy  of  this  very  comprehensive  and  valuable  work 
has  recently  been  secured  for  the  British  Museum,  whose  own 
amazing  catalogue  scarcely  eclipses  that  of  the  Imperial  library, 
published  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  enumerating 
upwards  of  173,000  volumes  on  all  branches  of  literature,  without 
including  works  of  fiction,  dramas,  or  any  books  relating  to  the 
Taouist  or  Buddhist  religions.  It  is,  however,  necessary  to  add 
thai  the  majority  of  the  books  are  little  more  than  mere  commen- 
taries, by  intellectual  pigmies  of  modern  days,  on  the  writings  of 
men  possessed  of  a  far  wider  range  of  thought  and  freer  imagination 
than  these,  their  cramped  descendants. 


THE    EXAMINATION    HALL.  403 


CHAPTER    XXXIV. 

COMPETITIVE     EXAMINATIONS. 

The  Examination  Hall — Classical  studies — Venerable  students — Literary  de- 
grees— Official  honours — The  Observatory — Astronomical  instruments. 

June  ~th. 

In  the  afternoon  Dr  Edkins  took  me  to  see  the  fax-famed  Ex- 
amination Hall,  where  once  in  three  years  all  the  students  who 
have  succeeded  in  taking  degrees  at  the  great  examinations  in  the 
provincial  cities,  assemble  to  try  and  pass  the  higher  standard 
which  admits  them  to  the  much-coveted  rank  of  Tsin-sze — i.e., 
"  advanced  scholars." 

Anything  more  dismally  dreary  and  dilapidated  than  this  great 
theatre  of  national  learning  could  not  be  imagined.  At  its  best  it 
seems  specially  designed  for  discomfort,  but  as  the  examinations 
are  only  held  here  triennially,  the  place  is  allowed  between  whiles 
to  fall  into  utter  decay,  and  a  fine  crop  of  nettles,  coarse  weeds, 
and  broken  pottery  gives  the  crowning  touches  of  dreariness  to  the 
whole  place. 

Tins  so-called  "Hall"  is  the  facsimile  of  the  Examination  Hall 
winch  we  went  to  see  at  Canton,  and  of  one  at  Foo-Chow,  of 
which  I  only  cared  to  inspect  the  roofs,  as  seen  from  the  city  wall 
(I  believe  there  are  similar  places  in  every  provincial  capital). 
The  name  "  Hall "  is  altogether  misleading.  It  is  simply  a  very 
large  walled  enclosure,  in  the  centre  of  which  stands  the  house 
wherein  lodge  the  ten  Provincial  Examiners  and  the  two  Imperial 
Examiners.  Of  this  latter,  two  are  despatched  from  Peking  to 
each  of  the  eighteen  provinces,  where  they  are  received  with  extra- 
ordinary honour. 

With  the  exception  of  the  broad  central  road,  the  whole  remain- 
ing space  is  filled  with  rows  and  rows  of  tiny  cells,  each  about 
three  feet  square.  Each  row  has  its  distinctive  name,  and  each 
cell  is  numbered,  so  th  ,t  any  man  could  be  summoned  if  requisite. 
I  cannot  call  these  rows  streets,  because  they  all  face  the  same 
way,  each  looking  on  to  the  blank  back  of  the  next  cell,  so  that 
there  may  be  nothing  to  distract  the  attention  of  the  candidates. 
The  cells  have  no  doors,  so  that  the  whole  front  is  open,  and  special 
officers  are  always  on  the  watch  to  prevent  any  sort  of  communica- 


404  COMPETITIVE    EXAMINATIONS. 

tion  between  the  men;  other  watchmen  are  posted  on  the  central 
building,  and  in  towers  at  the  corners  of  the  wall,  to  see  that  no 
one  from  outside  attempts  to  assist,  these  within. 

In  each  of  the  three  Examination  Halls  which  I  happen  to  have 
seen,  I  was  told  that  there  are  ten  thousand  of  these  cells,  and  one 
might  suppose  that  these  would  surely  accommodate  all  the  com- 
petitors. This,  however,  is  by  no  means  the  case.  They  occasion- 
ally overflow  their  limits,  and  have  to  be  provided  for  after  the 
manner  in  which  vergers  accommodate  the  extra  members  of  a 
1  lumper  congregation — with  seats  in  the  aisle  !  Thus,  on  at  least 
one  occasion,  at  the  triennial  examination  at  Hang-Chow  (where 
there  are  cells  for  13,000  students),  no  less  than  15,000  presented 
themselves,  so  2000  sedan-chairs  were  brought  in,  and  ranged  in 
the  passages  which  intersect  the  blocks  of  cells.  In  like  manner, 
though  Canton  provides  cells  for  10,000  students,  upwards  of 
13,000  sometimes  arrive,  although  they  know  that  only  ninety 
degrees  can  possibly  be  conferred !  The  number  of  degrees  to  be 
bestowed  varies  in  different  provinces,  doubtless  bearing  some  pro- 
portion to  population. 

There  certainly  is  not  much  attention  paid  to  the  bodily  comfort 
of  the  students — mind  being  required  entirely  to  triumph  over 
matter  !  The  cells,  which  might  justly  be  described  as  pigsties,  are 
only  three  feet  eight  in  width,  and  five  feet  six  inches  in  length. 
Each  is  built  with  two  grooves  running  round  the  wall,  to  allow 
for  the  insertion  of  two  wooden  boards,  one  of  which  acts  as  a 
very  hard  seat,  the  other  (which  is  slipped  into  its  place  after  the 
student  is  seated)  forms  the  table  on  which  he  is  to  work.  At 
night  he  transfers  his  table  into  the  lower  groove,  on  a  level  with 
the  seat,  and  so  secures  a  hard  but  level  bed. 

These  two  boards  and  a  large  earthenware  water-jar  are  the  sole 
furnishings  of  the  cell,  which  is  so  small  that  a  stout  man  clothed 
in  the  usual  wadded  garments  must  find  it  almost  impossible  even 
to  turn  round,  and  his  only  rest  at  night  is  such  as  he  can  obtain 
on  the  hard  wooden  boards,  without  so  much  as  one  wadded  quilt 
to  save  his  poor  bones  ! 

A  perfect  regiment  of  cooks  and  of  waiters  attend  to  the  com- 
missariat, one  of  each  being  told  off  to  every  twenty  cells.  They 
are  bound  by  oath  to  hold  no  communication  with  the  prisoners ! 

This  vast  multitude  of  students  (only  imagine  the  number  repre- 
sented by  all  provincial  towns  throughout  the  empire  ! — one  for 
each  of  the  eighteen  provinces,  one  for  the  island  of  Formosa,  and 
the  other  city  examinations  besides  !)  are  the  guests  of  the  Emperor 


POETRY    ESSENTIAL    FOR    OFFICIAL    CANDIDATES.       405 

during  the  term  of  examination,  the  rations  allowed  for  each  man 
being  a  given  weight  of  salt  fish,  of  pork,  and  of  ham ;  a  full 
quantity  of  rice,  four  cakes,  some  pickled  vegetables,  one  preserved 
egg,  and  hot  tea,  and  congee  water  ad  lib. 

On  no  consideration  may  the  student  leave  his  cell  from  the 
beginning  of  each  examination  to  its  close.  Happily  it  is  divided 
into  three  distinct  parts,  each  of  which  lasts  for  three  days  and 
three  nights,  one  clear  day's  interval  being  allowed  between  each 
section. 

From  first  to  last  it  is  all  a  tremendous  effort  of  memory,  each 
student  as  he  enters  his  cell  being  searched  to  make  sure  that  he 
has  not  concealed  any  scrap  of  paper  on  which  he  might  have 
jotted  helpful  notes,  or,  worse  than  all,  a  miniature  edition  of  any 
part  of  the  classics,  an  offence  which  would  be  punished  by  expul- 
sion, after  having  been  compelled  to  kneel  ignoniiniously  at  the 
gates.  Each  man  must  bring  his  own  Indian  ink  and  brushes,  but 
he  must  bring  no  paper. 

To  prevent  all  possibility  of  fraud,  he  must  at  the  last  moment 
purchase  paper  which  has  been  stamped  with  the  official  Beal. 
Provided  with  this,  he  enters  the  cell,  and  then  only  is  the  subject 
of  examination  announced.  The  said  subjects  are  all  themes  from 
the  fossdised  Confucian  classics,  or  essays  on  the  history  of  China. 
its  laws,  its  rites,  and  ceremonies.  At  one  of  the  examinations 
each  man  is  required  to  write  a  poem  of  twelve  lines,  attaining  a 
certain  standard  of  excellence.  This  is  compulsory,  and  the  man 
who  fails  in  his  rhymes  is  deemed  incapable  of  governing  a  prison 
or  a  province,  or  of  holding  any  other  State  office ! 

Happily  for  the  examiners,  the  length  of  the  essays  is  limited, 
720  characters  being  the  maximum,  and  360  the  minimum.  To 
allow  for  necessary  corrections,  100  characters  may  be  marked  on. 
the  margin. 

The  greatest  stress  is  laid  upon  excellent  handwriting,  and  as 
a  highly  educated  Chinaman  is  expected  to  be  familiar  with  six 
different  styles  of  writing,  he  has  a  somewhat  perplexing  choice. 
He  may  adopt  the  ancient  stiff  characters,  or  the  ordinary  freehand 
characters  used  in  business,  or  those  which  are  preferred  for  gen- 
eral correspondence,  or  the  regular  characters  used  in  printing. 
The  literary  man,  however,  selects  one  known  as  Baai-shoo,  which 
is  considered  the  most  elegant. 

I  scarcely  know  which  to  pity  most — the  students,  or  the  exam- 
iners who  have  to  wade  through  such  mountains  of  dry  <  lonfucian 
wisdom.     On  the  whole,  I  think  the  examiners  have  the  worst  of 


406  COMPETITIVE    EXAMINATIONS. 

it;  for  though  a  student  is  occasionally  found  dead  in  his  cell,  ho 
has  only  one  set  of  essays  to  produce,  and  he  is  always  huoyed  up 
hy  hope  of  success  and  ambitious  dreams — whereas  the  luckless 
examiners  have  to  wade  through,  and  carefully  weigh  the  merits 
of,  perhaps  8000  of  these  dreary  sets  of  papers,  with  no  ambition 
to  gratify,  and  the  certainty  of  causing  grievous  disappointment 
to  upwards  of  7900  students,  besides  all  their  parents,  and  rela- 
tives, and  friends,  a  multitude  of  whom  invariably  take  this 
opportunity  for  a  visit  to  the  city,  and  so  combine  a  little  pleasure 
with  this  literary  interest.  It  is,  however,  to  be  feared  that  their 
visit  is  not  always  attended  with  much  pleasure,  as  it  is  found 
that  epidemics  of  smallpox  in  Peking  generally  occur  in  the  ex- 
amination year,  and  these  are  attributed  to  the  influx  of  at  least 
40,000  strangers  ! 

To  get  through  the  papers,  the  examiners  have  to  work  for 
several  days  and  nights  almost  without  intermission.  No  wonder 
that  many  utterly  break  down  in  mind  and  body,  and  are  rendered 
useless  for  life  from  divers  affections  of  the  brain,  thus  produced  ! 
Several  examiners  of  the  very  highest  rank  have  at  different  times 
been  brought  to  the  Medical  Mission  for  treatment,  having  been 
seized  with  paralysis  in  the  course  of  the  examinations,  entirely  in 
consequence  of  the  prolonged  strain  which  left  them  utterly  pros- 
trate, and  so  their  work  has  remained  unfinished. 

The  same  thing  happens  to  many  of  the  students  (to  whom,  of 
course,  this  examination  is  only  the  conclusion  of  a  long  course  of 
cramming,  and  that  of  the  class  which  is  said  to  be  the  most 
physically  exhausting — namely,  an  intense  strain  on  the  memory). 

One  would  naturally  suppose  that  no  one  who  could  avoid  it 
would  subject  himself  to  such  misery,  but  this  extraordinary  nation 
recognises  no  possibility  of  official  promotion  by  any  other  channel 
than  this  (the  only  form  of  literary  success),  without  which  even 
the  most  noble  birth  avails  nothing,  consequently  many  of  the 
men  who  fail  return  undaunted  to  the  charge  year  after  year,1 
till  either  their  efforts  are  crowned  with  success,  or  they  finally 
break  down.  Some,  as  I  have  said,  literally  die  in  harness,  in 
which  case  a  hole  is  broken  in  the  outer  wall  of  the  enclosure,  and 
the  corpse  is  thrust  out — for  a  stringent  regulation  prohibits  open- 
ing the  gate  while  the  men  are  in  their  cells,  and  traditional  custom 
must  be  maintained  in  the  presence  of  Death  himself. 

On  the  other  hand,  some  men  of  indomitable  resolution  perse- 

1  The  population  of  China  is  divided  into  four  recognised  classes — namely,  Shi, 
Nung,  Kuug,  Sliang  ;  in  other  words,  Scholars,  Farmers,  Artisans,  and  Merchants. 


PHYSICAL    AND    MENTAL    BREAK-DOWN.  407 

vere  in  their  pursuit  of  literary  honour  till  they  attain  to  extreme 
old  age,  and  it  is  no  uncommon  thing  to  see  venerable  grey-bearded 
students  of  from  seventy  to  eighty  years  of  age  taking  their  place 
in  these  dismal  cells  !  Such  perseverance  is  at  least  sure  of  hon- 
orary recognition  by  the  Emperor,  who  bestows  a  special  title  on 
men  who  have  vainly  continued  their  literary  efforts  to  the  age 
of  fourscore  years.  In  the  province  of  Shangtung,  a  great  arch 
of  very  elaborately  sculptured  granite  commemorates  the  literary 
triumph  of  a  noted  scholar  who  in  his  eighty-third  year  took  the 
very  highest  honours  at  the  examination  for  the  highest  degree 
(the  Han-lin  or  Doctor  of  Laws).  The  inscription  on  the  arch 
records  that  the  learned  son  of  this  learned  father  had,  three  years 
previously,  attained  to  the  self-same  eminence  ! 

Here  then  we  see  the  system  of  Civil  Service  competitive  ex- 
aminations carried  out  to  the  bitter  end,  a  system  which  for  more 
than  a  thousand  years  has  been  the  sole  passport  to  all  official 
employment,  and  no  amount  of  experience  in  damaged  brains  and 
mental  collapse  brings  one  iota  of  relief  to  these  many  thousand 
victims.  With  us  such  competitions  and  such  educational  high 
pressure  are  comparatively  a  thing  of  yesterday,  and  yet  we  already 
know  too  much  of  the  crying  evil  of  overtaxed  brains  and  prodigal 
waste  of  mental  energy. 

China  has  long  anticipated  the  work  of  the  school  board,  and 
at  six  years  of  age  boys  of  all  ranks  are  supposed  to  attend  school, 
and  prepare  for  their  lifelong  bondage  to  Confucius,  by  beginning 
their  dreary  struggle  to  master  the  characters  Avhich  take  the  place 
of  our  alphabet,  multiplied  a  thousandfold.  They  are  taught  to 
"write  each  character  separately  on  squares  of  lucky  red  paper,  and 
by  slow  degrees  they  learn  to  pronounce  each,  while  their  little 
fingers  learn  to  fashion  the  elaborate  crabbed  strokes. 

Though  these  small  students  are  just  as  merry  and  full  of  life  as 
our  schoolboys,  they  seem  to  take  very  kindly  to  the  studies  which 
they  see  their  elders  value  so  highly,  nevertheless  the  cane  is  a 
fully  recognised  institution  in  every  school,  and  is  applied  unspar- 
ingly, without  respect  of  sex  !  As  you  pass  outside  of  such  a 
school  (which  is  probably  held  within  the  precincts  of  some  mer- 
chants' guild)  you  hear  the  hum  of  many  voices  all  repeating 
lessons  aloud,  and  if  you  look  in  you  see  a  troop  of  quaint  little 
shaven-headed  chaps,  with  their  long  black  plaits  and  blue  clothes, 
sitting  at  small  ornamental  tables,  very  different  from  our  school 
desks  and  benches,  and  suggesting  a  remarkable  absence  of  the  de- 
structive element  in  these  small  Chinamen  !    Of  course  a  conspicuous 


408  COMPETITIVE    EXAMINATIONS. 

feature  in  the  school  is  the  shrine  of  the  tablet  hearing  the  name 
of  Confucius,  to  which  each  scholar  must  do  daily  homage. 

Very  probably  another  noteworthy  object  may  be  the  school- 
master's greatest  treasure,  his  handsome  coffin,  the  possession  of 
which  is  so  great  a  solace  to  his  mind.  He  himself  is  probably 
one  of  the  men  who  has  passed  in  the  lower  examinations,  but  has 
failed  in  the  higher  ones.  Each  small  boy  in  turn  stands  before 
him  to  repeat  his  allotted  task  of  diluted  classics  (turning  his  back 
so  as  to  avoid  the  possibility  of  peeping),  and  thenceforth  until  his 
life's  end  his  dreams  of  ambition  all  flow  in  one  channel — classics, 
classics,  classics  !  In  a  Chinaman's  catechism  there  could  be  but 
one  answer  to  the  question,  "  What  is  the  chief  end  of  man  ? " 
The  oidy  possible  reply  would  be,  "  To  attain  to  a  perfect  know- 
ledge of  Confucian  classics." 

The  whole  race  are  so  entirely  convinced  that  the  highest  pin- 
nacle of  perfection  was  attained  by  Confucius  six  hundred  years 
before  the  Christian  era,  that  from  that  time  to  the  present  every 
Chinaman  has  striven  only  to  cherish  that  light  of  the  past,  and 
the  idea  of  originating  anything  new  is  deemed  worse  than  useless 
— it  is  sacrilegious  !  whatever  is  new  is  full  of  danger,  and  only 
things  ancient  are  deemed  worthy  of  reverence.  Even  where  cer- 
tain passages  in  the  dry  old  classics  are  capable  of  double  reading, 
only  the  orthodox  interpretation  is  admissible,  and  the  free-think- 
ing student  who  should  presume  to  suggest  a  possible  meaning 
other  than  that  of  ancient  commentators  would  come  to  utter 
grief. 

So  when  small  boys  have  mastered  the  requisite  '  Thousand- 
character  Classic '  and  the  '  Book  of  Odes,'  and  other  petrifac- 
tions, they  are  handed  over  to  more  advanced  tutors,  and  attend 
courses  of  university  lectures  on  the  works  of  Mencius  and  other 
ancient  Confucian  sages,  and  in  due  course  of  time  they  are  ex- 
pected to  pass  in  two  local  examinations. 

Having  succeeded  in  these,  their  names  are  then  enrolled  for  a 
third — namely,  the  first  of  the  great  national  examinations.  These 
are  held  twice  in  three  years,  at  every  prefectoral  city,  and  the 
degree  which  is  conferred  is  called  Sew-tsae,  "  adorned  talent,"  and 
answers  to  that  of  B.A.  at  Oxford  or  Cambridge.  Before  being 
allowed  to  enter  his  name  on  the  list,  each  candidate  must  produce 
a  certificate  to  prove  that  he  is  a  free-born  subject  of  the  realm, 
and  of  respectable  parentage,  a  limit  which  arbitrarily  excludes  not 
only  the  whole  boating  population,  hat  also  the  children  of  the  police, 
and  all  play-actors  and  slaves. 


VENERABLE    APPEARANCE    OF    STUDENTS.  409 

To  obtain  this  first  degree  is  an  honour  immensely  coveted  even 
by  men  who  do  not  aspire  to  further  literary  honours.  In  the 
first  place,  from  the  moment  a  man  becomes  a  Sew-tsae,  he  is  ex- 
empt from  corporal  punishment,  which,  in  China,  is  no  small  ad- 
vantage. Moreover,  he  can  command  the  attention  of  any  magis- 
trate; and,  in  short,  has  an  assured  social  position.  So  every  one 
who  possibly  can  do  so,  goes  up  for  this  examination,  and  although 
it  is  known  that  only  sixty  candidates  can  pass  at  a  time,  as  many 
as  six  thousand  names  are  sometimes  entered  for  one  province. 

These  numbers  are,  however,  thinned  by  a  preliminary  exam- 
ination, which  occupies  the  first  day.  Three  days  are  devoted  to 
considering  the  six  thousand  papers,  and  only  the  men  whose 
essays  are  approved  are  allowed  to  compete  at  the  further  exam- 
inations, which  are  then  held  at  the  prefect's  official  residence. 

Just  conceive  what  an  impression  of  learning  and  exaggerated 
intellect  must  be  produced  by  the  appearance  of  such  an  assem- 
blage of  venerable-looking  bald  heads — the  closely  shaven  forehead 
extending  over  half  the  skull !  The  majority  of  these  faces  are 
intellectual ;  many  have  delicate  features ;  all  are  pale,  beardless, 
and  hairless.  A  very  large  proportion  have  strained  their  eyes 
with  over-study  of  crabbed  Chinese  characters,  so  they  wear  enor- 
mous spectacles  with  very  broad  rims  of  tortoise-shell,  which  add 
greatly  to  their  appearance  of  wisdom.  "We  associate  bald  heads 
with  old  age,  but  this  vast  multitude  ranges  from  eighteen  to 
eighty  years  !  Each  successive  examination  thins  the  list  of  com- 
petitors, till  at  length  there  remain  only  about  a  hundred  for  the 
final  effort. 

The  moment  that  the  list  of  successful  candidates  is  published, 
hawkers  start  in  every  direction  with  printed  lists  for  sale,  and 
.swift,  lightly  built  boats,  each  manned  by  half-a-dozen  strong 
rowers,  start  off  at  full  speed  along  every  river  and  creek  in  the 
neighbourhood,  to  convey  the  news  to  anxious  relations  and  fellow- 
citizens. 

Here  carrier-pigeons  take  the  place  of  telegraphs ;  many  of  the 
students  make  their  agreement  long  beforehand  with  the  owners 
of  the  birds,  so  as  to  ensure  their  being  trained  at  the  right  place, 
and  brought  thence  in  baskets  by  special  messengers.  (The 
Chinese  are  very  kind  to  all  birds,  and  these  pigeons  receive 
the  greatest  care,  and  are  trained  as  special  pets.)  On  the  pub- 
lication of  the  fortunate  names,  the  lists  are  at  once  forwarded  bo 
these  men,  who  inscribe  the  messages  on  slips  of  thin  still  paper  j 
these  they  attach  to  the  legs  of  the  pigeons,  who  straightway  start 


410  COMPETITIVE    EXAMINATIONS. 

on  their  homeward  journey  at  the  rate  of  about  twenty-seven  miles 
an  hour,  bearing  the  glad  tidings  to  proud  parents,  and  the  towns 
which  have  given  them  birth  rejoice  exceedingly  over  the  honour 
thus  acquired.  So  when  the  newly  made  graduate  returns  home, 
he  is  received  with  enthusiasm,  and  is  borne  along  in  triumph  to 
worship  at  the  ancestral  hall,  and  gladden  his  ancesters  with  tin: 
information  of  his  success.  But  ere  leaving  the  city  the  happy 
sixty  (or  ninety,  as  the  case  may  be)  assemble  at  the  Court  of  the 
Literary  Chancellor,  there  to  be  invested  with  the  symbols  of  their 
new  dignity.  They  are  dressed  in  long  tunics  of  bright  blue, 
trimmed  with  black ;  these,  being  supplied  at  the  cost  of  the 
student,  are  of  silk  or  cotton,  as  may  best  suit  his  purse.  All 
wear  long  black  satin  boots.  The  symbols  of  honour  are  wide 
bands  of  light  red  silk,  worn  across  the  back  and  chest,  and 
hanging  down  in  front  in  long  ends.  These  are  decorated  with 
large  red  silk  rosettes.  A  bright  blue  tippet  richly  embroidered 
with  gold,  and  two  sprays  of  gold  and  silver  leaves,  with  little 
balls  of  red  floss  silk,  to  be  worn  on  the  extreme  apex  of  the 
pointed  hat,  are  the  special  gift  of  the  Emperor.  Therefore  a 
very  important  feature  of  assuming  the  dress  is,  that  all  the  can- 
didates, headed  by  the  Literary  Chancellor,  prostrate  themselves, 
and  perform  the  orthodox  nine  head-knockings  before  the  Imperial 
tablet. 

Many  men  having  attained  this  honour  are  content,  but  those 
who  aspire  to  obtain  official  employment  must  now  prepare  for  the 
next  degree,  which  is  that  of  Keu-jin,  "  promoted  man,"  and 
answers  to  our  M.A.  This  examination  is  held  only  once  in  three 
years,  in  each  provincial  capital,  in  a  great  square  enclosure,  similar 
to  the  one  I  have  described. 

A  whole  month  of  dire  anxiety  must  elapse  ere  the  publication 
of  the  list,  which  is  awaited  with  feverish  anxiety  not  only  by  the 
relations  of  the  competitors,  but  by  all  classes.  The  badge  of 
honour  now  conferred  is  a  more  gorgeous  tippet  and  a  more 
beautiful  golden  flower,  and  the  fortunate  possessor  of  these  is 
feasted  and  congratulated  by  all  the  authorities.  "When  he  returns 
home,  the  magistrates  go  forth  in  state  to  welcome  him,  presents 
(including  sums  of  money)  are  showered  upon  him,  rolls  of  per- 
fumed paper  are  sent  with  a  request  that  he  will  thereon  inscribe 
a  few  words  and  his  honourable  autograph  (in  return  for  which 
further  gifts  are  bestowed  upon  him),  a  name  so  creditable  is 
inscribed  on  an  ornamental  board,  and  with  much  ceremony  is 
hung  up  in  the  ancestral  hall ;  moreover,  his  parents  receive  public 


THE    SOLE    ROAD    TO    OFFICE.  411 

thanks  from  the   civic   authorities  for  having  given  birth  to   so 
talented  a  son. 

Many  are  now  content  to  rest  on  their  oars,  but  those  who  seek 
further  literary  renown  must  come  to  Peking  in  the  following  year 
to  be  examined  for  the  Tsin-sze  or  "  advanced  scholar  "  degree, 
which  seems  to  answer  to  our  LL.D.  This  is  the  examination 
held  in  the  enclosure  which  we  visited,  and  is  conducted  by  the 
greatest  scholars  of  the  empire,  including  the  Prime  Minister  and 
a  prince  of  the  Imperial  race,  otherwise  it  is  much  the  same  as  the 
last.  But  the  successful  competitors  are  presented  to  the  Emperor, 
and  many  honours  are  heaped  upon  them ;  and  their  names,  in- 
scribed on  gilded  tablets,  are  sent  in  chairs  of  state,  together  with 
many  offerings,  to  the  blissful  parents. 

The  men  themselves  remain  at  Peking  to  compete  for  the  highest 
possible  literary  degree — namely,  that  of  Han-Lin,  which  is  de- 
scribed as  Literary  Chancellor.  It  is  held  in  the  Imperial  Palace, 
in  the  hall  where  the  Emperor  himself  is  supposed  to  expound  the 
Confucian  classics  to  his  ministers.  The  Emperor  presides  on  the 
present  occasion,  and  the  successful  competitors  are  invited  to  dine 
with  his  Imperial  Majesty,  than  which  no  higher  honour  can  be 
conferred  by  earth  or  heaven.  Curiously  enough,  each  guest  has 
a  table  to  himself.  From  this  happy  company  are  selected  all  the 
highest  officials  of  the  empire,  and  also  the  examiners  for  all  the 
provincial  and  minor  examinations — truly  a  dreary  life- work  ! 

As  we  wandered  round  the  dismal  city  of  cells,  the  man  in 
charge  showed  us  one,  just  the  same  as  all  the  others,  which  he 
told  us  had  been  occupied  by  one  of  the  young  Emperors  when 
taking  his  degree.  As  the  names  of  the  writers  of  the  papers  are 
carefully  concealed,  we  wondered  by  what  means  the  examiners 
are  ensured  against  such  a  terrible  accident  as  failing  to  perceive 
the  excellence  of  the  Imperial  essay !  And  yet  the  lucklrss 
examiner  who  is  detected  in  showing  favour  to  any  man,  or  in 
receiving  a  bribe,  is  ignominiously  put  to  death  in  the  very  un- 
dignified fashion  winch  Jack  the  Giant-killer  induced  his  giant 
to  adopt ! 

We  ascended  to  the  summit  of  the  three-storeyed  building  in 
the  centre,  whence  we  had  a  fine  view  of  the  city ;  and  my  atten- 
tion was  arrested  by  some  extraordinary-looking  objects  erected  on 
the  City  Wall.  By  the  aid  of  my  glasses  I  could  discern  dia 
and  hollow  circles  towering  against  the  sky.  These,  Dr  Edkins 
informed  me,  were  the  gigantic  astronomical  instruments  of  a  great 
Observatory  which  was  erected  at  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 


412  COMPETITIVE    EXAMINATIONS. 

turybya  party  of  very  learned  Jesuit  Fathers,  who  were  sent  with 
a  letter  <>f  special  commendation  from  Louis  XIV.  of  France  to 
instruct  his  Imperial  Celestial  brother,  the  Emperor  Kang-hsi,  in 
the  sciences  of  mathematics  and  astronomy.  This  scientific  em- 
bassy was  received  with  all  possible  honour  by  the  Son  of  Heaven 
and  the  astronomical  and  astrological  fraternity,  by  whose  reading 
of  the  stars  all  matters  of  Chinese  or  domestic  life  are  regulated. 

Strange  to  say,  the  Emperor  so  entirely  recognised  the  superi- 
ority of  the  Western  scientific  instruments,  that  he  discarded  those 
in  use,  and  bade  the  foreigners  construct  new  ones  on  their  own 
system.  So  they  combined  scientific  use  with  Chinese  decoration, 
and  beautifully  cast  bronze  dragons  to  support  great  astrolabes, 
armillary  spheres,  trigonometers,  quadrants,  astronomical  circles, 
and  other  instruments,  all  of  bronze.  Amongst  other  objects  is  a 
huge  celestial  globe,  the  bronze  surface  of  which  is  incrusted  with 
golden  stars  to  mark  the  constellations.  All  these  are  raised  on  a 
stone  platform,  higher  than  the  wall,  and  enclosed  by  a  strong  iron 
railing. 

Wishing  for  a  nearer  view,  we  made  our  way  thither,  but  to  our 
extreme  disgust,  on  arriving  at  the  gate  by  which  we  should  have 
ascended  on  to  the  wall,  we  found  it  locked,  and  the  man  in  charge 
dared  not  open  it,  having  recently  received  strict  official  orders  to 
the  contrary.  There  was  no  doubt  that  he  was  speaking  the  truth, 
as  he  thereby  lost  his  "  tip,"  but  the  capricious  prohibition  was  the 
more  aggravating,  as  this  gate  is  generally  open. 

As  we  were  going  away  somewhat  irritated,  I  discovered  in  a 
shady,  sheltered  spot  beneath  some  pretty  trees,  two  exceedingly 
curious  groups  of  gigantic,  purely  native  Chinese  instruments  of 
bronze  in  very  fine  bold  casting,  far  more  ancient  and  more  inter- 
esting than  those  of  the  Jesuits,  probably  those  which  were  dis- 
carded in  favour  of  theirs.  These  were  more  fascinating,  and  I 
quickly  settled  down  to  sketch  a  magnificent  astrolabe,  which  is  a 
cluster  of  numerous  gigantic  circles,  forming  a  sort  of  hollow  ball, 
resting  on  a  central  pillar,  and  supported  at  the  four  corners  by 
dragons  rampant — a  most  picturesque  object.  While  I  was  thus 
employed,  Dr  Edkins  found  occupation  in  measuring  the  other 
group  and  studying  the  degrees.  Of  course  a  little  group  soon 
assembled,  but  they  were  most  respectful  and  kindly,  and  greatly 
interested  by  some  small  sketches  of  Ningpo  which  I  chanced  to 
have  with  me.      So  our  afternoon  ended  most  pleasantly. 


RECOGNITION    OF    WESTERN    SCIENCE.  413 

Note — Progress  in  China. —  Since  these  pages  were  penned,  a 
new  era  has  dawned  for  the  great  army  of  students  in  China.  In 
the  summer  of  1887  the  empire  was  electrified  by  the  Imperial 
decision  that  henceforth  the  leading  features  of  Western  science 
shall  be  included  in  the  list  of  subjects  which  candidates  are  re- 
quired to  master  for  the  competitive  examinations.  Philosophy, 
mathematics,  mechanics,  engineering,  naval  and  military  tactics, 
marine  artillery,  torpedoes,  international  law  and  history,  are  now 
requisite,  in  addition  to  the  former  standard  of  literary  proficiency ; 
for  it  is  expressly  stated  that  no  candidate  can  be  selected  unless 
he  is  a  thorough  master  of  literary  composition.  Apparently, 
therefore,  no  jot  of  the  old  Confucian  learning  may  be  omitted. 

To  take  the  edge  off  the  innovation,  the  proclamation  reminds 
the  people  that  mathematics  have  been  cultivated  in  China  since 
B.C.  1120  ;  that  in  after-times  the  sovereigns  of  successive  dynasties 
have  availed  themselves  of  the  help  of  mathematics  from  the  "West, 
and  largely  accepted  Western  science,  and  that  consequently,  in 
adding  these  subjects  to  their  examination  papers,  they  are  only 
following  out  the  traditions  of  their  nation. 

All  this  is  true,  seeing  that  they  adopted  the  astronomical  know- 
ledge of  Indian  Buddhists,  the  mathematics  introduced  by  Arabian 
Mohammedans,  and  the  varied  sciences  taught  by  the  Jesuit  mis- 
sionaries. At  present  there  is  a  general  craving  for  fresh  know- 
ledge, and  a  newly  awakened  recognition  of  the  inadequacy  of  their 
own  literature  to  enable  the  Chinese  to  meet  other  nations  on 
equal  terms.  In  its  determination  to  overcome  this  deficiency, 
the  Chinese  Government  has  now  established  companies  of  trans- 
lators in  different  parts  of  the  empire,  and  each  new  book  pub- 
lished in  the  Chinese  language  is  eagerly  devoured. 

The  new  features  in  the  competitive  examinations  will  create 
an  enormous  demand  for  European  books  on  all  these  subjects, 
which  thus  suddenly  become  a  necessity  for  every  aspirant  to  office 
in  the  empire. 

Happily  about  four  years  ago  (December  1884)  a  society  was 
formed  in  Glasgow1  which  (recognising  that  the  surest  way  to  dis- 
arm the  antagonism  of  the  literati  is  the  distribution  of  our  best 
books  on  geography,  history,  and  science)  has  actually  been  pre- 
paring for  this  very  emergency,  at  the  same  time  that  it  aims  ;it 
the  wide  circulation  of  such  Christian  literature  as  may  neutralise 
the  poison  of  infidel  books  which  have  been  so  industriously  cir- 
1  Book  and  Tract  Society  of  China,  58  Bath  Street,  (Has  :<>w. 


414  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

culatcd  in  India  and  Japan,  and  will  doubtless  ere  long  appear  in 
China  also. 

Another  very  remarkable  step  in  the  direction  of  progress  is  the 
recent  establishment  at  Tien-tsin  of  five  Training  Colleges  for  the 
various  departments  of  official  work.  These  are — 1,  The  Military 
College;  2,  The  Naval;  3,  The  Engineering;  4,  The  Electrical; 
and  5,  The  Medical  College.  All  of  these  are  under  foreign  super- 
intendence; the  text-books  are  in  English,  and  the  teaching  is 
imparted  in  English. 

A  large  preparatory  school,  capable  of  accommodating  three  hun- 
dred boarders,  is  also  being  built  at  Tien-tsin,  in  order  to  impart 
the  rudiments  of  science  and  the  elements  of  English  to  the 
students  ere  they  are  promoted  to  the  higher  colleges. 

Furthermore,  the  Imperial  Government  has  set  aside  a  sum 
equal  to  £9000  a-year,  in  order  to  defray  the  travelling  expenses 
of  able  men  who  are  to  be  sent  forth  to  study  everything  that  may 
seem  useful  or  important  in  every  corner  of  the  civilised  world ; 
each  of  these  official  travellers  will  be  allowed  about  £45  a-month, 
besides  the  expenses  of  an  interpreter.  They  are  to  draw  up  care- 
ful reports  of  all  they  see  and  learn. 


CHAPTER    XXXV. 


BLIND     MEN     AND     COLPORTEURS. 


An  earnest  student — Preparation  of  books  for  the  blind — Apt  pupils — Further 

progress — Work  among  the  blind  in  Japan — Colportage  in  Peking  and 

elsewhere— Bookselling  under  difficulties. 

June  Sth. 

Last  night  I  had  a  most  interesting  glimpse  of  the  very  newest 
experiment  among  the  many  benevolent  efforts  which  are  being 
made  by  good  Christians  all  over  this  country  for  various  classes 
of  the  neglected  poor.  This  is  one  which  has  never  before  been 
attempted,  or,  I  should  say,  even  dreamt  of,  in  China — namely, 
teaching  the  blind  to  read  and  write. 

Considering  the  frightful  difficulty  of  acquiring  these  arts  for 
men  with  full  use  of  their  eyes,  the  notion  of  initiating  the  blind 
into  these  mysteries  might  well  stagger  the  most  hopeful.  Yet  it 
has  been  accomplished   and   reduced   to   a  system  of  marvellous 


MISSION    TO    THE    BLIND.  415 

simplicity  by  Mr  W.  H.  Murray,  who  last  night  introduced  me  to 
his  first  group  of  what  I  may  term  salvage  from  the  slums  of 
Peking. 

We  found  them  sitting  together  in  a  dark  room,  reading  aloud, 
with  unmistakable  delight  in  their  newly  acquired  talent. 

It  struck  me  as  intensely  pathetic  (as  we  stood  at  the  threshold 
of  that  dark  room  where,  till  a  light  was  brought,  I  could  dis- 
tinguish nothing)  to  hear  words  which  I  knew  to  be  those  of  the 
Chinese  version  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  read  by  men  and  lads  who, 
less  than  four  months  ago,  sat  begging  in  the  streets  in  misery  and 
rags,  on  the  verge  of  starvation.  Thence  they  were  rescued  by  Mr 
Murray  as  suitable  subjects  for  his  first  effort  in  aid  of  the  great 
sightless  legions  of  China,  and  already  they  have  mastered  the  arts 
which  in  this  land  ensure  the  respect  of  all  classes.  To-night  they 
read  passages  from  both  Old  and  New  Testament  with  perfect 
facility,  and  a  young  lad  wrote  out  for  me  a  Avhole  page  of  a  Chinese 
classic,  which  to  my  eye  and  coarse  touch,  only  presents  groups  of 
the  neatest  dots,  wholly  undistinguishable  one  from  another,  but 
which  to  the  sensitive  fingers  of  the  blind  seems  to  be  as  clear  as  a 
page  of  ordinary  type  would  be  to  me. 

But  before  I  speak  of  the  blind  pupils,  I  must  just  tell  you 
something  of  Mr  Murray  himself,  for  he  is  a  '•  brither  Scot  "  of  the 
true  type,  which  brings  his  country's  name  into  good  repute — a  son 
whom  the  old  country  has  good  reason  to  hold  in  honour.  As  a 
specimen  of  what  good  can  be  accomplished  by  a  resolute  spirit 
resolved  to  conquer  all  difficulties,  I  think  Mr  Murray's  career  is  as 
fine  an  example  as  any  I  have  ever  heard  of. 

William  Murray  (who  was  born  at  Port-Dundas,  near  Glasgow, 
the  only  son  in  a  family  of  ten  children)  would,  in  the  natural 
course  of  events,  have  adopted  the  profession  of  a  saw-miller,  but  for 
an  accident  by  which,  when  about  nine  years,  he  lost  his  left  arm, 
while  too  fearlessly  examining  the  machinery,  and  was  thus  dis- 
abled— an  apparent  calamity  which  was  the  first  link  in  that  chain 
of  events  leading  up  to  a  discovery  which,  if  properly  developed, 
may  prove  an  incalculable  boon  to  millions  yet  unborn  in  the  Celes- 
tial Empire. 

So  soon  as  the  lad  was  able  to  work  for  his  living,  he  obtained 
•employment  as  a  rural  letter-carrier  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Glas- 
gow. In  this,  however,  the  subject  of  Sunday  work  proved  a 
serious  difficulty,  which  he  solved  by  giving  up  two  shillings 
a-week  of  his  scanty  wages  in  order  to  be  freed  from  an  obligation 
against  which  his  conscience  revolted.  His  sacrifice,  however,  bore 
good  fruit,  for  the  earnest  remonstrances  of  this  young  postman 


41 G  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

proved  the  commencement  of  that  widespread  movement  which 
has  secured  so  large  a  measure  of  Sabbatical  rest  for  his  comrades 
in  the  service  of  the  Post-Office. 

His  own  bulging  was  to  obtain  employment  in  some  form  of 
mission  work,  and  again  and  again  he  applied  to  the  National 
Bible  Society  of  Scotland.  But  though  greatly  attracted  by  the 
lad,  the  secretary  feared  that  one  apparently  so  very  simple  and 
unassuming  would  fail  to  prove  a  successful  colporteur,  and  having 
given  up  the  secure  service  of  the  Post-Office,  might  be  thrown, 
literally  single-handed,  on  the  world. 

But  as  the  same  secretary  now  says,  "  What  could  he  do  against 
a  man  who  was  praying  himself  into  the  service  of  the  Society  ?  " 
For  (though  he  himself  knew  nothing  of  this  at  that  time)  the 
young  postman  confided  to  him  later  how  he  divided  his  long  daily 
walk  into  three  parts,  and  as  he  tramped  along  the  monotonous 
road,  he  beguiled  a  third  of  the  distance  by  the  study  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures  in  the  original  Hebrew ;  the  second  beat  was  devoted  to 
the  Greek  Testament ;  while  the  last  section  was  reserved  for  daily 
prayer  that  God  would  vouchsafe  to  employ  him  in  direct  mission- 
ary work,  and  that  he  might  be  sent  as  a  messenger  of  the  Great 
King  to  carry  His  glad  tidings  to  some  far-distant  heathen  land. 

At  last,  when  in  1864  he  renewed  his  application  to  the  Bible 
Society,  his  services  were  accepted,  and  he  was  commissioned  to 
commence  work  among  the  ships  congregated  on  the  Clyde,  and 
very  soon  the  Society  discovered  that  "  it  had  never  had  such  a 
colporteur "  as  the  gentle  being  who  made  his  way  among  the 
sailors  of  all  nations,  readily  acquiring  such  scraps  of  divers  tongues 
as  enabled  him  to  effect  more  sales  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  in  foreign 
languages  than  had  been  accomplished  by  any  of  his  predecessors. 
And  yet  (like  another,  who,  more  than  three  thousand  years  ago, 
was  called  from  the  care  of  his  father-in-law's  flock  to  accomplish  a 
great  work)  in  his  own  mother  tongue  he  is  "  not  eloquent,  but 
slow  of  speech." 

This  work  amongst  sailors  was  reserved  for  the  winter  months. 
In  summer  he  was  sent  round  wild  districts  in  the  Scottish  High- 
lands, pushing  his  Bible-cart  along  many  a  lonely  track  of  bleak 
moorland — a  task  which,  on  hilly  roads,  must  often  have  needed 
all  the  strength  of  this  willing  but  only  one-armed  colporteur,  who 
all  the  time  was  longing  to  be  employed  in  carrying  the  Word  of 
Life  to  those  to  whom  it  was  yet  unknown. 

Ere  long,  Murray's  remarkable  aptitude  for  languages  attracted 
the  notice  of  some  of  the  directors  of  his  Society.     He  was  accord- 


A    DILIGENT    STUDENT.  417 

ingly  permitted  to  attend  classes  at  the  Old  College  in  the  High 
Street  (a  friend  helping  him  to  pay  his  fees),  provided  his  studies 
nowise  interfered  with  his  regular  work.  All  day  long,  therefore, 
through  the  gloomy  Glasgow  winters,  he  stood  in  the  streets  be- 
side his  Bible-waggon,  hurrying  back  to  his  lodgings  for  a  hasty 
supper ;  then  studying  till  bedtime  at  9  p.m.,  and  rising  daily  on 
the  chill  wintry  mornings  at  3  a.m.  (only  think  of  the  physical 
misery  involved  in  turning  out  regularly  at  such  an  hour !)  in 
order  to  prepare  for  his  classes  at  college  from  8  till  10  a.m.,  at 
which  hour  he  began  a  new  day's  work  of  street-bookselling. 

At  length  his  seven  years'  apprenticeship  as  a  home  colporteur 
were  fulfilled,  and  in  1871  he  obtained  his  heart's  desire,  and 
sailed  for  China,  where  it  was  arranged  that  he  should  remain  six 
months  at  Chefoo,  engaged  in  the  bewildering  task  of  learning  to 
recognise  at  sight  the  4000  intricate  characters  by  which  the 
Chinese  language  is  represented  on  paper. 

The  same  aptitude  for  mastering  crabbed  symbols  which  had 
facilitated  his  study  of  Greek  and  Hebrew,  enabled  this  diligent 
student  to  acquire  about  2000  Chinese  characters  in  four  months, 
when  he  started  on  his  first  pioneer  journey  to  visit  a  city  about 
250  miles  in  the  interior  of  the  province  of  Shangtu.  He  invented 
a  rude  litter  slung  between  four  mules  as  the  most  convenient 
method  of  carrying  his  books,  and  thus  made  his  way  safely  along 
precipitous  mountain-roads,  facing  bitter  cold  and  many  difficul- 
ties, but  sustained  through  all  discouragements  by  occasional 
gleams  of  great  promise. 

Some  of  the  incidents  of  travel  were  certainly  rather  startling 
just  at  first, — as,  for  instance,  when,  on  reaching  a  miserable  rest- 
house,  wherein  men  and  mules  together  sought  shelter  from  the 
pitiless  storm,  he  was  guided  through  the  dense  smoke  to  the  only 
"  reserved  "  sleeping  berth — the  post  of  honour — which  proved  to 
be  the  coffin  which  the  host  was  cherishing  for  his  own  eventual 
use, — the  filial  and  most  acceptable  gift  of  his  dutiful  sons  ! 

One  of  the  first  things  which  deeply  impressed  him  (as  it  must 
impress  every  traveller  who  looks  around  him  in  the  densely 
tlironged  streets  of  Chinese  cities),  was  the  extraordinary  number 
of  blind  men  who  mingle  in  every  crowd,  frequently  in  companies 
of  eight  or  ten,  clamouring  for  alms,  each  guided  by  the  man  in 
front  of  him,  the  foremost  feeling  his  way  with  a  long  stick — 
"  blind  leader  of  the  blind." 

This  very  large  proportion  of  blindness1  is  due  to  several  causes, 

1  I  think  that  we— the  greatly  blessed  "sighted  people,"  as  the  blind  call  us — 

2  D 


418  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

such  as  leprosy,  smallpox,  neglected  ophthalmia,  and  general  dirt,  to 
which,  in  great  tracts  of  North  China,  we  must  add  the  stifling 
dust  and  penetrative  smoke  caused  by  the  necessity  of  using  turf- 
sods  and  sun-dried  grass  to  heat  the  ovens,  owing  to  the  lack  of 
better  fuel. 

For  unnumbered  centuries  these  blind  legions  have  dragged 
through  their  darkened  dreary  lives,  a  burden  to  themselves  and 
to  all  around  them.  As  a  class,  they  are  the  most  disreputable  of 
the  community — so  bad  that  even  a  hopeful  soul  like  their  friend 
Mr  Murray  is  compelled  to  admit  that  the  majority  appear  incor- 
rigible ;  indeed  the  night-refuge,  where  they  chiefly  congregate  in 
Peking,  bears  so  vile  a  character  that  he  himself  has  never  ven- 
tured to  cross  its  threshold.  All  his  hopes,  therefore,  rest  on 
training  young  lads,  and,  so  far  as  possible,  isolating  them  from 
their  seniors. 

Of  course,  in  this  sweeping  classification  of  the  adult  blind, 
there  is  room  for  many  bright  exceptions ;  and  indeed  the  first 
thing  which  suggested  to  Mr  Murray  his  present  work  was  the 
fact  that  amongst  the  crowds  who,  with  true  Chinese  reverence  for 
all  written  characters,  pressed  forward  to  purchase  the  copies  or 
portions  of  Holy  Scripture  which  he  offered  for  sale  at  a  very  cheap 
rate,  many  blind  men  came  desiring  to  purchase  '  The  Christian 
Classics  ' ;  and  when  he  asked  why  they  wanted  a  book  which  they 
could  not  see  to  read,  they  replied  that  they  would  keep  it,  and 
that  perhaps  friends  who  could  read  would  sometimes  let  them 
hear  it.  Then  he  would  tell  them  how  in  Europe  the  blind  are 
taught  to  read  and  even  to  write  ;  but  this  they  never  coidd  be- 
lieve, so  utterly  incredible  did  it  appear  that  any  one  should  learn 
to  read  with  his  fingers.     Of  course,  no  amount  of  embossing  could 

scarcely  realise  how  terribly  numerous  a  proportion  of  mankind  are  not  thus  gifted. 
If  in  favoured  England,  where  there  are  no  circumstances  adverse  to  sight,  there 
are  between  thirty  and  forty  thousand  persons  positively  blind,  to  say  nothing  of 
the  multitude  whose  sight  is  seriously  defective — what  must  be  the  sum  of  blind- 
ness in  the  whole  world  !  In  England,  although  not  more  than  three  thousand  are 
provided  for  in  asylums,  a  blind  person  is  a  comparatively  rare  object — in  Egypt  or 
China  you  meet  him  at  every  turn.  If,  then,  you  consider  that  England  is  just 
about  as  large  as  the  smallest  of  the  eighteen  provinces  of  China,  you  may  obtain 
some  notion  of  the  uncared-for  multitude  who  there  walk  in  most  literal  darkness. 

There  is,  however,  reason  to  hope,  that  since  the  Chinese  have  taken  up  vaccina- 
tion so  systematically,  the  very  large  number  whose  blindness  is  due  to  the  ravages 
of  smallpox  will  be  seriously  diminished.  We  know  that  in  France,  prior  to  the 
introduction  of  vaccination,  35  per  cent  of  the  total  blindness  was  due  to  this 
cause.  A  few  years  later  this  proportion  was  reduced  to  7  per  cent.  In  China, 
however,  neglected  ophthalmia  is  responsible  for  a  very  great  share  of  national 
blindness. 

Curiously  enough,  colour-blindness,  so  common  amongst  ourselves,  seems  to  be 
here  unknown. 


A    PERPLEXING    PROBLEM.  419 

make  the  frightfully  complicated  Chinese  character  comprehensible 
to  the  most  sensitive  fingers,  but  Mr  Murray  soon  saw  that  some- 
thing simpler  might  be  devised,  and  this  thought  became  ever 
present  to  his  mind. 

When  he  spoke  to  other  Europeans  of  his  longing  to  do  some- 
thing to  cheer  these  darkened  lives,  they  very  naturally  replied, 
"  The  Christian  missionaries  of  all  Protestant  denominations  put 
together  are  in  the  proportion  of  one  to  one  million  of  the  popu- 
lation. How  can  we  undertake  any  additional  work  1 "  Failing 
to  awaken  human  sympathy,  his  soul  was  the  more  ceaselessly 
absorbed  in  prayer  that  some  means  might  be  revealed  to  him 
whereby  he  might  help  these  poor  neglected  sufferers. 

Ere  leaving  Scotland,  he  had  mastered  Professor  Melville  Bell's 
system  of  visible  speech  for  the  instruction  of  the  deaf.  This  he 
found  so  greatly  facilitated  his  own  study  of  this  very  difficult  lan- 
guage, that  he  has  prepared  a  pamphlet  on  the  subject,  for  the  use 
of  all  foreign  students.  His  first  care  was  to  note  down  the  value 
of  every  sound  he  mastered,  and  he  had  the  satisfaction  of  proving 
that  these  do  not  exceed  about  408  (a  very  fair  number,  we  must 
allow  !)  It  now  occurred  to  him  that  all  these  might  be  reduced 
to  symbolic  forms  for  the  use  of  the  blind,  and  he  went  so  far  as 
to  have  these  made  in  clay  and  baked,  so  that  they  could  be 
handled.  From  these  some  blind  pupils  actually  learnt  to  read. 
But  this  system  was  cumbersome  and  unsatisfactory — all  the  more 
so  as  it  occurred  to  the  teacher  that  as  the  Chinese  adore  their 
own  written  hieroglyphic  characters,  they  would  probably  render 
divine  honour  to  these  clay  symbols  ! 

Moreover,  during  his  residence  in  Glasgow,  his  interest  had  been 
so  deeply  aroused  by  seeing  blind  persons  coming  to  purchase  books 
prepared  for  their  use,  that  he  had  set  himself  to  master  both 
Moon's  system  of  embossed  alphabetic  symbols  and  also  Braille's 
system  of  embossed  dots.  Never  was  there  a  better  proof  of  the 
advantage  of  acquiring  any  sort  of  useful  knowledge  even  when 
there  seems  no  present  reason  for  doing  so.  Now  Mr  Murray 
ceaselessly  revolved  in  his  own  mind  whether  it  might  be  possible 
to  adapt  one  or  other  of  these  to  the  bewildering  intricacies  of  the 
Chinese  language,  with  all  its  perplexing  "  tones,"  which,  by  an 
almost  inappreciable  difference  of  pronunciation,  cause  one  word  to 
convey  a  dozen  different  meanings. 

Such  was  the  perplexing  problem  with  which  this  would-be 
benefactor  of  the  blind  wrestled,  apparently  without  result,  till  one 
day,  wearied  with  a  long   morning's  work  of  bookselling    in  the 


420  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTKI  l:s. 

crowded  street,  lie  had  lain  down  to  rest  awhile  during  the  noon- 
day heat,  with  closed  eyes,  as  if  asleep,  when  suddenly,  as  clearly 
as  he  now  sees  one  of  his  own  stereotyped  hooks,  he  saw  outspread 
before  him  the  whole,  system  which  he  has  since  then  so  patiently 
and  ingeniously  worked  out;  and  moreover,  at  once  perceived  with 
thankful  joy,  that  by  this  system  Chinese  sounds  could  be  ren- 
dered so  accurately,  that  whereas  to  a  sighted  person  learning  to 
read  or  Avritc  Chinese  by  the  ordinary  method,  it  is  the  most 
bewildering  of  all  languages,  it  would  by  this  means  become  one  of 
the  easiest  to  acquire. 

In  this  vision  (or  revelation,  as  he  believes  it  to  have  been — 
an  opinion  which  I  think  few  Christians  will  gainsay)  he  per- 
ceived that,  as  the  Chinese  know  nothing  of  alphabetic  symbols, 
he  must  discard  all  attempts  to  produce  any  alphabetic  system,  but 
must  make  use  of  numerals  by  which  to  represent  the  408  distinct 
syllables  which  he  found  sufficient  to  replace  the  4000  characters 
used  in  ordinary  Chinese  type.  To  represent  these  numerals,  he 
decided  that  instead  of  using  figures,  he  must  substitute  mnemonic 
letters — e.g.,  T  or  D  for  1,  K  to  represent  2,  M  for  3,  E  for  4, 
L  for  5,  Sh  for  6,  K  for  7,  F  or  V  for  8,  B  or  P  for  9,  S  for  0. 

Furthermore,  he  contrived  that  every  Chinese  word,  no  matter 
what  its  length,  should  be  represented  by  only  three  symbols — 
units,  tens,  and  hundreds — and  for  these  he  has  arranged  embossed 
dots  grouped  on  Braille's  system,  which  he  adopted  in  preference 
to  Moon's  alphabetic  system,  the  latter  not  being  adapted  to 
writing,  or  to  represent  music,  which  is  one  of  the  most  marked 
features  in  Mr  Murray's  system  of  training. 

If  all  this  sounds  to  you  utterly  incomprehensible,  I  can  only  say 
that  it  is  equally  so  to  myself ;  but  daily  experience  now  proves  it 
to  be  so  extraordinarily  simple  to  the  Chinese  intellect,  that  any 
blind  lad  of  average  intelligence  can  thoroughly  acquire  the  arts  of 
both  reading  and  writing  within  two  months,  and  a  sharp  lad  can 
do  this  in  six  weeks  ! 

It  must  not  be  inferred  that  Mr  Murray's  vision  at  once  brought 
him  to  the  desired  haven  in  regard  to  its  practical  application. 
But  the  inspiration  thus  received  was  as  a  chart  by  which  he  was 
enabled  carefully  to  work  his  way  through  a  thousand  perplexities, 
a  labour  of  love  to  which  he  devoted  every  hour  that  he  could 
steal  from  sleep  or  rest,  through  eight  long  years.  For,  deeming 
himself  bound  to  devote  every  moment  of  the  day  to  direct  work 
for  the  Bible  Society,  it  was  only  after  "  business  hours  "  that  he 
allowed  himself  to  work  out  the  details  of  this,  his  special  interest. 


FIRST    BLIND    PUPILS.  421 

Yet  there  was  good  even  in  this  delay,  for  bad  he  not  so 
thoroughly  won  the  confidence  of  the  people  by  his  constant  inter- 
course with  them  while  Bible-selling  in  the  streets,  they  would 
assuredly  have  attributed  the  whole  work  to  magic,  and  thus  irrep- 
arable harm  would  have  been  done.  As  it  was,  many  even  of  the 
adult  Christians  find  this  reading  with  finger-tips  so  incomprehen- 
sible, that  they  can  scarcely  believe  that  it  is  not  accomplished  by 
clever  jugglery — a  sort  of  sleight  of  hand. 

At  last  Mr  Murray  had  so  far  arranged  his  system  that  he 
determined  to  try  whether  it  could  beacquired  by  a  poor  old  blind 
man,  "  Mr  "Wang,"  who  was  crippled  with  rheumatism,  and  like  to 
die  of  want.  He  provided  the  old  man  with  such  creature-com- 
forts as  ensured  a  quiet  mind,  and  then,  with  the  aid  of  a  native 
colporteur,  commenced  teaching  him,  and  soon,  to  the  unspeakable 
joy  of  both  pupil  and  teacher,  the  poor  rheumatic  fingers  learned 
to  discriminate  the  dots,  and  the  blind  man  was  able  to  read  the 
Holy  Word  for  himself. 

Just  then  another  blind  man,  upwards  of  forty  years  of  age,  was 
brought  to  Dr  Dudgeon,  having  been  severely  kicked  by  a  mule 
which  he  had  inadvertently  approached,  his  long  guiding- stick 
passing  between  its  legs.  This  man  was  induced  to  beguile  the 
hours  of  suffering  by  this  new  study.  He  proved  an  apt  pupil, 
and  though  his  finger-tips  were  roughened  by  age  and  work,  he 
could  read  well  within  two  months. 

The  next  pupil  was  a  poor  lad  who  had  become  blind,  and  who, 
having  no  one  to  provide  for  him,  had  literally  been  thrown  into  a 
dung-heap  and  there  left  to  die.  He  was  found  by  a  man  who  had 
known  his  father,  and  said  he  was  a  good  man,  and  that  it  was  a 
pity  to  leave  the  lad  to  perish ;  so  having  heard  of  the  foreign 
bookseller's  extraordinary  care  for  the  blind,  he  actually  resolved 
to  risk  the  expense  of  hiring  a  cart,  and  brought  the  poor  starving 
boy  to  Mr  Murray's  lodgings,  begging  him  to  try  and  save  him. 
Three  months  of  careful  nursing,  with  good  food  and  needful  drugs, 
restored  him  to  health,  and  he  soon  was  overjoyed  by  finding  him- 
self able  to  acquire  the  honoured  arts  of  reading  and  writing. 

Mr  Murray  next  selected  a  little  orphan  blind  beggar,  whom  he 
often  observed  lying  almost  naked  in  the  streets  in  the  bitter  cold 
of  winter,  without  any  relations  to  take  care  of  him.  He  was 
attracted  by  the  boy's  cheerful  contentment  in  his  loneliness  and 
poverty,  and  by  the  fact  that  he  was  free  from  the  taint  of  leprosy, 
which  is  terribly  prevalent  among  the  miserable  beggar  population. 
So  he  took  this  lad  in  hand,  washed  and  clothed  him,  and  under- 


422  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

took  to  feed  and  lodge  him,  provided  lie  would  apply  himself  in 
canicst  to  mastering  this  new  learning.  Considering  the  honour 
which  in  China  attaches  to  all  literary  pursuits,  the  hoy  was  de- 
lighted, as  well  he  might  he.  But  only  conceive  his  ecstasy,  and 
the  thankful  gladness  of  his  master,  when,  within  six  weeks, he  was 
ahle  not  only  to  read  fluently,  hut  to  write  with  remarkable  accu- 
racy. Moreover,  this  simpler  writing  is  much  more  rapid  than 
that  in  ordinary  use,  and  these  blind  students  can  write  on  an 
average  twenty-two  words  per  minute. 

"When  you  consider  that  a  man  with  the  full  use  of  all  his 
faculties  takes  years — in  some  cases  as  much  as  twenty  years — of 
hard  study  to  acquire  a  similar  mastery  of  the  ordinary  Chinese 
characters,  you  cannot  wonder  that  those  who  knew  this  wretched 
beggar  lad  two  months  ago  can  scarcely  be  persuaded  that  this 
result  is  not  supernatural.  One  of  these  men,  who  is  already  a 
Christian,  hopes  to  become  useful  as  an  assistant  colporteur  by 
attracting  the  interest  of  the  crowds ;  but  even  the  others,  who  are 
not  Christians,  are  so  delighted  with  their  new  power  that  they 
lose  no  chance  of  reading  the  Scriptures  to  whoever  will  listen  to 
them, — so  evidently  the  knowledge  of  Christian  truth  might  be 
widely  spread  by  the  agency  of  a  multitude  of  blind  readers. 

Note. — By  a  very  singular  coincidence  (considering  for  how 
many  centuries  the  blind  of  China  and  Japan  have  been  left  un- 
cared  for),  a  very  similar  effort  for  their  weal  was  commenced  in 
Japan  in  1876,  by  Mr  Goble,  an  American,  himself  a  sufferer  from 
defective  sight,  who,  though  he  had  never  seen  or  touched  a  book 
printed  for  the  use  of  the  blind,  worked  out  for  himself  a  method 
of  printing  on  wooden  blocks,  in  Roman  letters — a  system  convey- 
ing an  impression  of  all  the  sounds  in  the  Japanese  language  spelt 
phonetically.  In  this  he  printed  a  small  book  for  the  use  of  his 
fellow-sufferers,  and  found  to  his  joy  that  blind  boys  could  learn 
to  read  it  with  far  less  trouble  and  toil  than  their  seeing  brethren 
could  learn  to  read  the  difficult  Chinese  character  in  which  Japanese 
books  are  printed.  One  of  his  pupils  was  a  lad  of  eighteen,  who 
had  been  blind  since  he  was  three  years  old.  Within  two  weeks 
from  the  day  when  he  received  the  phonetic  alphabet,  he  had 
mastered  the  whole  book ! 

This  process  of  printing  was,  however,  so  cumbersome,  that  Mr 
Goble  appealed  to  all  European  institutions  for  the  blind  to  help 
him  in  improving  it,  that  he  might  be  able  to  scatter  educational 
books  among  the  blind  all  over  Japan.     It  is  needless  to  say  that 


WORK    FOR   THE    BLIND    IN   JAPAN    AND    CHINA.       423 

such  a  suggestion  was  not  unheeded,  and  after  some  study  Mr 
Lilley  and  Dr  Faulds  devised  a  system  which  is  found  to  work 
admirably.  The  Gospel  of  St  Mark  was  first  prepared  in  raised 
letters,  and  the  labour  of  printing  was  facilitated  by  the  gift  of  an 
"  Ullniar  embossing-press  "  from  a  sympathetic  citizen  of  Paisley. 
Now,  classes  for  teaching  the  blind  have  been  formed  at  Yokohama 
and  Mishima,  and  the  ease  with  which  they  acquire  the  art  of  read- 
ing surpasses  all  expectation. 

"With  regard  to  Mr  Murray's  effort  on  behalf  of  the  blind  in 
Peking,  for  eight  more  years  he  continued  to  work  on,  almost 
unknown,  elaborating  the  details  of  his  system,  and  training  as 
many  pupils  as  he  could  feed  and  teach.  The  development  of  his 
scheme  has,  however,  been  seriously  impeded  by  lack  both  of  time 
and  of  funds.  Not  only  did  he  deem  himself  bound  to  devote  all 
his  hours  of  recognised  work  to  street-preaching  and  bookselling, 
but  his  pecuniary  resources  were  limited  to  his  own  slender  salary, 
which  has  all  along  been  taxed  to  the  uttermost  in  order  to  provide 
board,  lodging,  and  raiment  for  his  indigent  blind  students.  (For 
even  a  frugal  Chinaman  cannot  be  respectably  clothed  and  fed  for 
less  than  £10  a-year.)  And  yet,  when  one  poor  helpless  waif  after 
another  seemed  thrown  upon  his  hands,  he  felt  that  it  was  impos- 
sible to  reject  those  so  manifestly  intrusted  to  his  care,  and  so  the 
modest  income  supposed  to  suffice  for  one  man  has  been  made  to 
feed  and  clothe  a  dozen. 

Most  of  these  pupils  have  turned  out  highly  satisfactory,  but  of 
course  there  are  some  disappointments.  Sad  to  say,  Sheng,  the 
first  boy  taught,  whose  prospects  seemed  so  hopeful,  was  tempted, 
just  for  one  day,  to  rejoin  his  former  associates,  that  he  might  dis- 
play his  various  attainments.  Yielding  to  the  temptations  held 
out  by  a  wandering  blind  minstrel,  he  absented  himself  for  some 
time,  and  when  at  length  he  returned,  expressing  much  contrition, 
he  was  found  to  have  suffered  such  complete  moral  shipwreck,  that 
for  the  sake  of  the  others  his  expulsion  became  necessary — a  very 
bitter  sorrow  to  the  patient  friend  who  had  so  rejoiced  over  his 
early  promise. 

On  the  other  hand,  Mr  Murray  has  had  the  joy  of  seeing  several 
successive  sets  of  blind  students  not  only  rejoicing  in  their  own 
precious  gifts,  but  becoming  really  valuable  mission -workers  as 
readers,  preachers,  and  organists  in  various  chapels.  One  was 
found  to  be  endowed  with  talents  which  seemed  so  specially  to  tit 
him  for  the  ministry,  that  he  was  transferred  to  a  training-college 


424  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

at  Tien-tsin,  where  candidates  are  prepared  for  holy  orders ;  and  it 
is  probable  that  another,  who  has  recently  arrived  from  Manchuria, 
will  follow  suit.  Of  course,  tidings  of  the  wonderful  gift  thus 
offered  to  the  blind  has  brought  some  who,  being  able  to  maintain 
themselves,  have  come  as  self-supporting  pupils.  Two  or  three 
have  travelled  several  hundred  miles  to  place  themselves  under  Mr 
Murray's  tuition. 

He  finds  that  the  majority  of  his  pupils  are  endowed  with  a 
marked  faculty  for  music;  and  though  when  left  to  themselves 
they  naturally  indulge  in  the  horrible  caterwauling  which  passes 
for  music  in  the  Celestial  Empire,  they  very  easily  acquire  Euro- 
pean tunes,  and  not  only  pick  up  a  new  air  very  rapidly,  but 
remember  it  accurately — a  very  important  qualification  for  all 
engaged  in  pioneer  mission-work,  in  which  the  value  of  singing,  as 
the  handmaid  of  preaching,  is  being  more  and  more  fully  recognised 
in  all  parts  of  the  world. 

Now  here  is  another  marked  advantage  of  Mr  Murray's  ingenious 
adaptation  of  Braille's  system.  So  marvellously  does  it  lend  itself 
to  the  representation  of  sound,  that  he  has  found  no  difficulty  in 
thereby  expressing  all  musical  notes  and  terms  in  the  study  of 
harmony  (which  indeed  had  already  been  done  in  Europe,  where  a 
considerable  musical  literature  has  therein  been  prepared  for  the 
blind  of  various  nations). 

The  students  in  the  humble  school  at  Peking  now  write  out 
musical  scores  from  dictation  with  wonderful  accuracy.  In  about 
fifteen  minutes  they  produce  a  perfect  score — perhaps  one  of 
Sankey's  hymns  with  all  its  parts.  Then  with  great  pleasure  to 
themselves  they  pick  out  the  tunes  on  the  piano,  harmonium,  or 
American  organ — beginners  being  taught  by  having  the  embossed 
symbol  pasted  on  to  each  note,  so  then  each  student  reads  the  written 
score  with  one  hand,  while  with  the  other  he  finds  out  the  notes. 

Having  thus  mastered  the  tunes,  the  blind  organist  and  choir 
sing  their  Christian  lyrics  in  the  chapel,  which  is  open  to  all 
comers ;  and  when  a  good  congregation  has  assembled,  attracted  by 
the  music,  one  of  the  students,  who  is  a  very  gifted  scholar, 
addresses  the  people,  and  at  the  close  of  his  exhortation,  recom- 
mends all  present  to  purchase  copies  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  that 
they  may  study  it  for  themselves,  and  at  the  close  of  the  day  the 
sales  by  this  blind  lad  are  often  found  to  have  been  larger  than  those 
by  Mr  Murray  himself.  Indeed,  the  latter  says  that  it  is  largely 
owing  to  this  lad's  preaching  and  singing  that  it  has  been  found 
necessary  to  pull  down  the  old  chapel  and  build  a  much  larger  one. 


CHINESE    BOOKS    FOR   THE    BLIND.  425 

One  of  the  blind  men  who  was  first  trained,  was  sent  out  to 
accompany  a  native  colporteur,  and  to  read  the  Scriptures  aloud 
while  his  companion  sold  his  books.  One  day  he  had  the  satis- 
faction of  bringing  to  Mr  Murray  a  letter  from  one  of  the  Imperial 
princes  praising  the  good  work  done  by  the  Bible  Society,  and 
requesting  that  a  copy  of  every  book  they  had  to  sell  should  be 
sent  to  him,  and  that  Mr  Murray  should  come  in  person  to  explain 
them.  The  books  proved  a  good  donkey-load,  but  all  were  received 
with  thanks  and  paid  for,  and  some  are  known  t<>  have  gained 
admission  within  the  Palace  itself.  Two  sets  have  been  purchased 
by  a  eunuch  of  the  Emperor's  household,  that  he  and  a  friend 
might  read  them  aloud  in  company. 

Another  of  the  early  students  was  a  very  intelligent  young  man 
who  retained  his  sight  till  he  was  twenty.  He  rapidly  acquired 
the  blind  system  of  reading  and  writing,  and  then  set  to  work  to 
stereotype  an  embossed  Gospel  of  St  Matthew  in  classical  .Mandarin 
Chinese,  which  is  the  lingua  franca  understood  by  all  educated 
men  throughout  the  empire. 

But  the  colloquial  language  of  the  illiterate  people  varies  in 
every  province,  and  the  dialects  spoken  between  Canton  and 
Peking  are  so  different  as  to  necessitate  the  publication  of  at  least 
eight  different  translations  of  the  Bible  for  the  use  of  sighted 
persons.  Hence  it  is  evident  that  all  these  must  be  reduced  to 
the  dot  system  ere  the  blind  beggars  of  the  central  and  southern 
provinces  can  share  the  privilege  already  open  to  those  of  North 
China,  which  now  possesses  five  Books  of  the  Bible  and  some 
small  books  on  sacred  subjects;  also  a  considerable  number  of 
music-books. 

The  Peking  school  also  possesses  many  other  embossed  books  in 
manuscript;  and  both  these,  and  those  stereotyped  for  the  use  of 
all  fellow-sufferers,  will  rapidly  increase,  for  Mr  Murray  has  taught 
his  pupils  to  do  every  part  of  the  preparation  of  books  for  the 
blind,  even  to  the  embossed  stereotyping,  which,  by  a  very  in- 
genious mechanical  contrivance  of  his  own  invention,  they  are  able 
to  do  so  rapidly,  and  with  such  accuracy,  that  any  one  of  these 
lads  can  with  ease  prepare  considerably  more  work  than  three  men 
in  England  will  turn  out  in  the  same  time,  and  will  also  do  it 
more  accurately  and  at  a  far  cheaper  rate.  A  London  workman 
endowed  with  sight  considers  three  pages  of  stereotyping  to  be  a 
good  day's  work;  a  Chinese  lad  will  easily  produce  ten  pages 
a-day. 

So  now  the  blind  of  China,  who  have  hitherto  been  a  class  of 


426  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

cruelly  neglected  outcasts,  an:  learning  that  a  door  of  hope  is  open 
to  them,  and  that  a  course  of  true  usefulness  may  he  theirs.  From 
the  singular  reverence  of  the  Chinese  for  all  written  characters, 
and  for  those  who  can  read  them,  it  is  evident  that  a  Wind  reader 
there  occupies  a  very  different  position  from  that  of  the  men  whom 
we  are  accustomed  to  see  in  our  streets.  I  know  of  no  agency 
which  is  more  surely  destined  to  work  among  the  masses,  as  an 
ever-spreading  leaven  of  all  good,  than  this  training  of  hlind 
Scripture-readers,  who  year  by  year  may  be  sent  forth  from  this 
school  to  read  the  Sacred  Message  in  the  streets  of  Peking  and 
other  great  centres  of  heathenism,  holding  forth  to  others  the 
Light  which  has  gladdened  their  own  lives. 

This  new  Mission  will  certainly  appeal,  as  no  other  has  yet 
done,  to  two  of  the  strongest  characteristics  of  China's  millions — 
namely,  their  reverence  for  pure  benevolence,  and  their  veneration 
for  the  power  of  reading.  To  see  foreigners  undertaking  such  a 
work  of  love  for  the  destitute  blind,  Avill  go  far  towards  dispelling 
prejudice  against  Christians  and  their  Master,  and  will  prepare  the 
way  for  the  workers  of  all  Christian  Missions. 

It  is  much  to  be  desired  that  these  should  send  agents — either 
Europeans  or  carefully  selected  Chinese  converts — to  be  trained  by 
Mr  Murray,  that  they  may  carry  his  system  to  every  existing 
mission-station.  One  such  sighted  head-teacher  in  each  district 
could  there  found  a  Blind  School  and  train  Chinese  Scripture- 
readers,  and  thus  the  work  may  be  ceaselessly  extended  in  every 
direction,  till  it  overspreads  the  whole  vast  empire  like  a  network. 

Probably  the  very  strongest  point  in  favour  of  this  Mission  to 
the  blind,  is  its  bearing  on  the  admission  of  Christian  influence 
into  the  dreary  homes  wherein  about  150,000,000  Chinese  women 
of  all  ages  live  their  monotonous  lives  in  strict  seclusion.  Some 
of  these  patriarchal  households  number  from  sixty  to  a  hundred 
women.  Of  course,  with  the  exception  of  the  very  few  foreign 
ladies  who  have  been  able  to  make  themselves  acceptable  to  their 
Chinese  sisters,  no  direct  missionary  influence  has  been  allowed  to 
find  entrance  within  these  jealously  guarded  homes. 

Now  it  is  evident  that  each  blind  woman  who  can  be  taught  to 
read  the  Holy  Scriptures,  will  readily  obtain  access  to  some  of 
these  secluded  homes,  where  she  will  certainly  be  a  centre  of 
unbounded  interest,  and  may  become  a  living  power.  Sooner  or 
later,  her  words  will  impress  many,  and  thus  the  truth  will  make 
its  way  insensibly  amongst  the  mothers,  who  exercise  such  life- 
long influence  over  their  sons — an  influence  now  bitterly  antagon- 


WHO    WILL    HELP    US?  427 

istic  to  Christianity,  on  account  of  its  enmity  to  that  worship  and 
propitiation  of  the  dead  which  is  the  main  principle  of  Chinese 
life.  Ancestral  worship  is  a  big  and  powerful  giant;  but  as  weak 
things  of  the  earth  are  so  often  chosen  to  confound  the  mighty, 
there  is  good  reason  to  believe  that  these  humble  blind  readers  are 
destined  to  prove  powerful  agents  in  the  fight,  and  in  undermining 
this  citadel. 

Owing  to  Chinese  prejudice  on  this  subject,  Mr  Murray  was 
effectually  debarred  from  teaching  blind  women,  with  one  exception 
— namely,  that  of  a  handsome  young  married  woman  who  lost  her 
sight  shortly  before  her  wedding.  Both  bride  and  bridegroom  are 
Christians,  and  received  their  education  at  the  American  Mission. 
Hence  the  husband's  consent  to  his  wife  being  taught.  In  a  few 
months,  to  her  great  joy,  she  mastered  the  mysteries  of  reacting, 
writing,  and  music. 

It  is  pleasant  to  learn  that  when,  after  a  brief  visit  to  Scotland, 
Mr  Murray  returned  to  China  as  a  married  man,  this  blind  woman, 
with  full  consent  of  her  husband  and  his  mother,  came  to  crave 
further  training,  to  fit  her  for  regular  evangelistic  work  amongst  her 
countrywomen.  It  is  hoped  that  her  example  may  be  followed  by 
European  and  American  ladies,  and  that  these  may  be  induced  to 
study  the  system  which  would  enable  them  to  bring  such  blessing 
to  their  sisters  who  so  literally  "  sit  in  darkness." 

Now,  may  I  venture  to  add  that  practical  evidence  of  sympathy, 
in  the  form  of  donations  in  aid  of  this  very  promising  young 
Mission,  will  be  gladly  welcomed  by  Messrs  Honeyman  &  Drum- 
mond,  Chartered  Accountants,  58  Bath  Street,  Glasgow.  I  would 
cordially  entreat  all  who  have  already  helped  it,  not  to  allow  their 
interest  in  the  subject  to  flag,  but  on  the  contrary,  to  do  all  in 
their  power  to  awaken  that  of  others ;  for  though  I  am  fully  con- 
vinced that  this  Blind  Agency  is  destined  to  do  a  very  great  work 
in  China,  it  is  as  yet  only  a  baby-giant,  and  stands  greatly  in 
need  of  the  care  of  as  many  nursing-mothers  as  possible  (in  the 
way  of  collectors). 

Mr  Murray's  work  has  oidy  just  come  to  the  surface  sufficiently 
to  claim  public  recognition.  Hitherto  the  little  acorn  which  he 
has  planted  has  been  quietly  germinating  in  the  heart  of  the 
Chinese  capital,  known  only  to  a  handful  of  poor  blind  men, 
and  scarcely  recognised  even  by  the  little  group  of  foreign  resi- 
dents in  that  great  city;  and  though  there  is  every  prospect  that 
it  will  assuredly  develop  into  a  wide-spreading  tree  of  healing  and 
of  knowledge,  destined  to  overshadow   the  whole   land  with   its 


428  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

beneficent  influence,  it  is  as  yet  but  a  feeble  sapling,  whose 
growth,  humanly  speaking,  depends  upon  the  fostering  care  of  the 
Christian  public. 

Surely  such  a  story  as  this  may  well  incite  many  to  prove 
their  interest  by  some  act  of  self-dexial  which  may  enable 
them  to  help  so  earnest  a  worker.  (For  we  all  know  how  very 
apt  we  are  to  limit  our  giving  power  to  such  a  sum  as  we  can 
spare  without  seriously  missing  it!) 

Would  that  some  who  read  these  lines  would  consider  for  a 
moment  what  life  would  be  to  themselves  were  they  deprived  of 
gifts  so  precious  as  Sight  and  Light,  and  would  each  resolve  to 
present  for  this  branch  of  God's  work  such  a  sum  as  he  shall 
really  miss — as  a  special  thank-offering  for  these  precious  gifts, — 
a  portion  of  that  money-talent  which  we  know  we  only  hold  in 
trust,  as  we  so  often  need  to  remind  ourselves  when  we  say,  "  Both 
riches  and  honour  come  of  Thee,  and  of  Thine  own  do  we  give 
Thee  " ! 

I  cannot  conclude  this  reference  to  Mr  Murray's  voluntary  work 
among  the  blind  without  a  few  words  concerning  the  main  object 
of  his  official  work.  He  is,  as  I  have  said,  one  of  the  colporteurs 
sent  out  by  the  National  Bible  Society  of  Scotland  to  endeavour 
to  circulate  the  Scriptures  among  China's  millions. 

The  effort,  which  at  first  was  attended  with  manifold  discourage- 
ments, has  gradually  gained  ground,  and  thanks  to  a  happy  com- 
bination of  patient  gentleness  with  most  resolute  determination, 
Mr  Murray  and  his  pony-cart  are  now  ranked  among  the  recog- 
nised "  institutions  "  of  the  capital.  Wherever  there  is  a  chance 
of  effecting  a  sale,  there  he  takes  up  his  post,  no  matter  at  what 
inconvenience.  At  the  gate  of  the  Examination  Hall  he  stands, 
while  the  students  from  every  corner  of  the  empire  come  forth 
after  their  labours,  and  thus  in  one  day  about  700  volumes,  each 
containing  a  gospel  and  four  epistles,  are  disposed  of.  Another 
day  he  takes  his  stand  on  the  bridge  at  the  entrance  to  the  Im- 
perial city — the  busiest  place  in  Peking,  where  "  all  under  heaven  " 
pass  and  repass.  Here  in  one  day  he  sells  upwards  of  a  hundred 
books,  and  knows  that  they  will  travel  thence  to  Corea,  Mongolia, 
and  the  remotest  parts  of  China. 

Not  that  sales  are  always  so  frequent.  On  one  bitterly  cold 
day,  with  a  blinding  dust-storm  blowing  so  that  he  could  scarcely 
stand,  he  stood  for  hours,  waiting  on  the  chance  of  one  customer. 
But  at  last  there  came  a  Mongol  chief,  followed  by  a  servant  carry- 
ing strings  of  money  over  his  arm.     He  bought  a  copy  of  every 


TAUGHT    BY    WASTE-PAPER.  429 

Mongolian  book  in  stock,  and  the  patient  seller  was  well  satisfied 
with  that  day's  work.  Another  day  there  came  a  Lama  in  gor- 
geous vestments,  who  bought  a  copy  of  the  Christian  Testament,  an 
example  which  was  at  once  followed  by  some  Corean  bystanders, 
— so  those  books  were  destined  to  travel  far  afield. 

But  a  really  remarkable  thing  is,  that  the  priests  of  the  largest 
Imperial  Lama  temple  in  Peking  have  actually  allowed  him,  on 
payment  of  a  trifling  sum,  to  rent  space  for  a  bookstall  within  the 
temple ! !  He  could  scarcely  at  first  believe  that  they  were  in 
earnest,  yet  so  it  proved ;  and  now  on  several  days  in  the  week 
Christian  books  are  freely  sold  in  the  Lama  temple  ! 

Mr  Murray  has  further  extended  his  "  connection  "  by  a  Bible- 
selling  journey  through  Mongolia.  Hiring  a  large  Mongolian  cart, 
drawn  by  a  horse  and  an  ox,  he  discovered  that  his  driver  was  a 
Lama  priest,  who  thus  became  instrumental  in  carrying  the  new 
doctrine  into  his  own  camp.  One  of  the  earliest  customers  was 
another  Lama,  who  came  desiring  to  purchase  "  the  whole  classic  of 
Jesus  "  ;  and  having  obtained  it,  he  hurried  off  to  his  tent,  there  to 
commence  his  studies  without  delay,  while  to  the  bringer  of  good 
tidings  he  sent  a  patriarchial  gift — a  dish  of  milk,  a  large  bowl  of 
cream,  and  a  cheese. 

Arriving  at  Dolonov,  the  Mecca  of  the  Lamas,  just  at  the  most 
sacred  season  of  pilgrimage,  bookselling  became  a  most  flourishing 
business,  and  in  three  days  2000  Chinese  Gospels  and  more  than 
a  hundredweight  of  the  Scriptures  in  Mongolian  were  disposed  of 
to  Chinamen,  Mongols,  and  Mohammedans,  thus  securing  their 
distribution  over  vast  tracts  of  country. 

Even  where  the  book  sold  fails  to  interest  the  purchasers,  it  by 
no  means  follows  that  it  is  lost.  For  instance,  among  the  men 
who  have  come  to  crave  further  teaching  concerning  "  the  way  of 
life,"  one  was  questioned  as  to  how  he  had  obtained  his  Christian 
books.  He  replied  that  he  had  bought  them  from  an  old  woman 
who  was  selling  them  as  waste-paper !  Some  men  buy  every  book 
that  is  published,  and  study  theni  all.  One  such  bought  no  less 
than  ninety  books  and  tracts  from  Dr  Edkins,  and  by  the  time  he 
had  got  through  them  all,  he  was  so  thoroughly  convinced  of  the 
folly  of  idol-worship  that  he  pronounced  sentence  of  death  on  the 
whole  regiment  of  his  domestic  idols,  numbering  nearly  a  hundred, 
and  representing  a  ton-weight  of  copper ! 

That  the  books  are  not  only  bought,  but  also  read,  is  a  certainty 
of  which  there  have  been  innumerable  practical  proofs,  from  the 
number  of  isolated  cases  in  which   men   have  conic  from  re-mote 


430  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

districts  (or  have  there  been  found  by  itinerant  missionaries),  hav- 
ing actually  given  up  idolatry  and  become  practical  Christians, 
without  having  come  in  contact  with  any  human  teacher.  Some 
have  even  gone  further,  and  have  dared  to  declare  to  friends  and 
neighbours  the  truths  that  have  dawned  on  their  own  minds.  As 
one  instance  among  many,  I  may  cite  one  village  in  the  province 
of  Hunan,  in  which  ten  men,  including  an  old  "  literary "  man 
(usually  the  most  bigoted),  had  given  up  idolatry  and  were  anx- 
ious to  receive  baptism,  their  sole  teaching  having  been  from  the 
written  page. 

To  this  last  cause  is  due  a  recent  important  step  in  Mr  Murray's 
career.  In  the  course  of  some  of  his  Bible-selling  expeditions  in 
remote  districts,  he  has  on  several  occasions  been  visited  by  un- 
mistakably genuine  converts,  who  had  become  so  solely  from  read- 
ing the  written  Word,  perhaps  accompanied  by  some  teaching  from 
another  convert.  They  have  come  to  him  asking  for  Christian 
baptism,  although  fully  realising  all  the  persecution  that  would 
probably  ensue.  It  was  most  painful  to  have  to  explain  to  such 
earnest  seekers  that  he  was  not  qualified  to  bestow  the  gift  they 
desired,  especially  as  it  was  more  than  probable  that  they  might 
never  again  come  in  contact  with  any  foreign  missionary.  Mr 
Murray  therefore  resolved  that  on  his  return  to  Scotland  he  would 
ascertain  whether  any  branch  of  the  Christian  Church  could  dis- 
pense with  the  usual  lengthy  course  of  theological  training,  and 
grant  him  ordination  after  less  than  a  year  of  special  study.  Find- 
ing that  the  United  Presbyterian  College  in  Edinburgh  might 
possibly  do  so  under  the  circumstances,  he  entered  himself  as  a 
Divinity  student,  and  absorbed  himself  in  the  close  study  of 
theology,  Greek,  and  Hebrew,  as  a  pleasant  relaxation  from  the 
various  Chinese  and  Tartar  dialects  in  which  he  had  been  steeped 
for  the  previous  sixteen  years. 

It  is  pleasant  to  learn  that  the  merits  of  this  earnest  student 
were  so  fully  recognised  that,  probably  for  the  first  time,  eminent 
representatives  of  the  three  battalions  of  the  Presbyterian  Regiment 
of  the  Grand  Army  took  part  in  his  ordination — the  venerable  Dr 
Andrew  Bonar  of  the  Free  Church,  and  the  Eev.  Dr  J.  Elder 
Cumming  of  the  Established  Church,  having  gladly  accepted  the 
invitation  of  the  United  Presbyterian  Synod  to  assist  in  the  ser- 
vice, which  was  held  in  the  Berkeley  Street  Church,  Glasgow,  on 
the  evening  of  the  23d  June  1887. 

On  his  return  to  Peking  as  the  Eev.  W.  H.  Murray,  arrange- 
ments were  made  to  enable  him  henceforth  to  devote  half  his  time 


VARIED    EXPERIENCES.  431 

exclusively  to  preparing  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  other  hooks  for 
the  use  of  the  hlind,  and  otherwise  developing  his  system.  By  his 
own  wish,  however,  the  other  half  of  his  time  must,  as  heretofore, 
he  devoted  to  street-preaching  and  bookselling,  in  order  to  retain 
the  confidence  and  sympathy  of  the  people,  and  avert  the  very 
real  danger  of  their  attributing  his  work  to  magic. 

The  work  of  the  colporteurs  in  China  is  generally  hy  no  means 
a  rose-strewn  path,  or  at  any  rate  the  roses  are  heset  with  abun- 
dant thorns  !  Their  work  has  not  much  in  common  with  that  of 
the  British  bookseller,  nor  does  the  comfortable  Briton  who  "  sits 
at  home  at  ease,"  and  does  his  share  of  mission-work  by  occasion- 
ally writing  a  small  cheque,  often  realise  the  amount  of  physical 
and  mental  endurance  which  the  Christian  bookseller  in  China  has 
to  undergo  in  disposing  of  his  wares. 

The  country  to  be  traversed  is  so  vast,  and  the  characteristics 
of  the  people  and  of  their  surroundings  are  so  varied,  that  there  is, 
of  course,  room  for  every  conceivable  experience.  Occasionally  it 
is  smooth  sailing,  and  the  booksellers  are  the  most  popular  men 
of  the  day,  and  perhaps  within  a  few  hours  they  reach  another 
eity  from  which  they  barely  escape  with  their  lives.  Sometimes 
they  have  to  travel  or  stand  for  hours  in  a  blazing  sun  which 
might  make  them  long  for  Jonah's  gourd,  and  ere  they  return  to 
headquarters  the  land  is  all  ice-bound,  and  they  are  wellnigh 
frozen.  Sometimes  they  must  toil  along  difficult  mountain-tracts, 
•crossing  rickety  bamboo  swinging  bridges,  which  sorely  try  the 
nerves  of  heavily  laden  book  coolies.  At  other  times  the  only 
path  is  up  the  boulder-strewn  bed  of  some  mountain-torrent. 

Just  to  glance  at  one  example.  There  is  ]\Ir  Archibald,  the 
Bible  Society's  Pioneer  Agent  in  the  province  of  Hunan,  with  its 
25,000,000  inhabitants.  He  commenced  work  there  in  1879, 
following  the  course  of  three  great  rivers,  accompanied  sometimes 
by  Mr  Wood,  sometimes  by  Mr  Paton,  both  of  the  Church  of 
Scotland  Mission.  They  visited  eight  Availed  cities  and  about 
thirty  towns  in  the  southern  province;  and  notwithstanding  the 
obstructions  laid  in  their  way  by  the  mandarins,  the  hostility  of  the 
gentry  and  scholars,  the  excitement  and  tumult  of  the  people,  threats, 
imprecations,  insults,  and  annoyances  of  every  description,  they  con- 
trived to  dispose  of  about  12,000  books  and  portions  of  Scriptures, 
and  about  as  many  tracts.  Finally  they  were  mobbed,  stoned,  and 
driven  away  from  the  capital,  narrowly  escaping  with  their  lives. 

But  soon  afterwards  they  had  the  joy  of  learning  that  in  two 
villages  within  forty  miles  of  the  great  city  of  Hankow  the  shrines 


432  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

of  the  gods  had  been  abolished,  the  idols  thrown  into  the  ponds, 
houses  opened  for  Christian  worship,  and  twenty  candidates  desired 
baptism.  All  this  had  been  brought  about  by  the  agency  of  native 
Christians  who  had  come  to  visit  their  friends,  and  took  the  oppor- 
tunity of  preaching  from  house  to  house.  80  at  the  Xew  Year, 
instead  of  writing  the  customary  extracts  from  the  classics  on  the 
doorposts  and  lintels,  these  houses  were  adorned  with  verses  con- 
cerning "  Jesu's  holy  doctrine." 

Another  journey  was  to  the  famous  potteries  in  the  province  of 
Kiang-si.  This  time  Mr  Archibald  was  accompanied  by  a  clergy- 
man from  Hankow,  the  Rev.  G.  John.  Crossing  a  great  lake  and 
ascending  a  line  river,  they  reached  a  city  in  the  hills,  where  the 
smoke  of  factories  reminded  them  of  England's  midland  counties. 
Here  they  were  enthusiastically  welcomed,  and  conducted  to  the 
court  of  a  great  temple,  where  eager  crowds  pressed  around  them, 
proffering  their  money  faster  than  it  could  be  counted,  in  their 
anxiety  to  secure  books.  It  was  actually  necessary  to  limit  the 
sales,  lest  the  supply  should  be  too  soon  exhausted.  Meanwhile 
Mr  John  preached  at  intervals  from  the  temple  platform  to  a  most 
attentive  audience,  numbering  many  thousands. 

Thence  they  proceeded  across  cultivated  plains  abounding  in 
fragrant  orange-groves,  and  over  hills  covered  with  tea-plantations, 
a  journey  covering  upwards  of  a  thousand  miles,  and  whether  re- 
ceived ill  or  well,  the  travellers  contrived  to  hold  some  intercourse 
with  the  people  at  almost  every  town  and  village. 

Winter  came  on  suddenly.  They  had  to  abandon  their  inland 
expedition  with  their  wheelbarrows,  and  return  to  the  river,  down 
which  they  travelled  in  a  snowstorm  till  they  reached  the  city  of 
Siang-Tan,  on  approaching  which  they  were  mobbed  and  compelled 
to  seek  safety  by  anchoring  in  mid-stream.  Thence,  however,  they 
were  soon  dislodged.  To  quote  Mr  Archibald's  own  words,  "  We 
soon  saw  a  small  gunboat  coming  towards  us,  laden  with  suspicious- 
looking  buckets  and  ladles,  and  manned  by  a  crew  of  rowdies. 
One  of  the  most  precious  things  in  China  is  night-soil,  which,  care- 
fully collected  in  buckets,  is  sold  for  manure.  A  cargo  of  such 
ammunition  had  our  enemies  laid  in,  and  with  this  they  were  now 
coming  to  attack  us  ! !  Cursing  we  can  endure ;  brickbats  and 
stones  are  trifles ;  we  might  in  case  of  need  face  cannon-balls  and 
torpedoes — but  this  was  too  much.  We  turned  tail  and  fled 
ignominiously ! " 

At  Chang-sha  they  were  conquered  in  a  more  dignified  manner. 
Instead  of  a  "  filth-boat,"  no  less  than  six  gunboats  were  ordered 


VERY  VARIED  RECEPTIONS.  433 

out  and  ranged  along  the  shore  to  prevent  the  sellers  of  foreign 
books  from  effecting  a  landing.  It  appears  that  the  literati  of  this 
place  are  so  desperately  antagonistic  to  all  foreigners,  that  they 
have  even  boycotted  the  relations  of  Marquis  Tseng,  the  Chinese 
ambassador  to  Britain,  to  mark  their  disapproval  of  his  friendliness 
to  the  barbarians  ! 

And  yet  at  other  places  on  the  same  river,  the  welcome  to  the 
strangers  was  so  enthusiastic  as  to  become  embarrassing.  They 
were  most  literally  obeying  the  Master's  command  to  His  disci- 
ples :  "  When  they  persecute  you  in  one  city,  flee  ye  to  another."  In 
the  present  instance  they  left  the  main  river,  and  took  a  small 
boat  up  a  branch  stream  till  they  reached  a  town.  Xo  sooner  was 
their  approach  known,  than  most  of  the  inhabitants  came  out  to 
meet  them,  led  by  a  mandarin,  who  said  that  many  years  ago  he 
had  seen  the  Christian  books,  and  he  exhorted  the  people  to  buy 
them,  as  they  would  certainly  increase  their  intelligence  and  virtue. 
So  here  the  demand  exceeded  the  available  supply. 

At  another  town  x  an  immense  crowd  had  assembled  to  receive 
them,  every  man  shouting  at  the  pitch  of  his  voice,  and  as  the 
boat  touched  the  bank,  a  number  of  men  rushed  into  the  water, 
and  carried  the  whole  concern — boat,  books,  and  sellers — right 
ashore,  and  deposited  them  high  and  dry  on  the  land.  It  was 
rather  a  nervous  moment  for  the  individuals  thus  honoured,  who 
could  not  be  sure  whether  they  were  to  be  torn  in  pieces  in  anger, 
or  worshipped  as  foreign  gods  !  However,  it  proved  to  be  all  right, 
and  the  difficulty  was  to  supply  the  impatient  multitude,  all  strug- 
gling to  be  first  in  purchasing  the  coveted  books — hundreds  of 
voices  were  clamouring  at  once.  In  the  endeavour  to  lessen  the 
demand,  prices  were  suddenly  raised,  but  it  was  of  no  use — as 
long  as  a  book  was  to  be  had,  the  determined  struggle  continued, 
and  all  were  ready  to  pay  whatever  was  asked. 

"When  no  books  remained,  some  officials  invited  Mr  Archibald 
to  go  into  the  city.  He  protested  that  with  such  a  crowd  it  would 
be  impossible,  but  they  insisted,  going  slowly  to  allow  the  pedlars 
to  clear  away  their  stalls,  which  would  certainly  have  been  over- 
turned by  the  throng.  At  last  they  came  to  an  open  space  round 
the  temple  of  the  city  god,  and  there  they  halted,  listening  eagerly 
while  their  visitor  gave  them  a  summary  of  the  "  doctrine,"  talking 
till  he  could  talk  no  longer. 

A  few  such  instances  as  these  give  some  idea  of  the  risks  and 
anxieties  of  a  colporteur's  life,  to  which  must  be  added  tin    fre- 

1  Van  Shien. 

■J  1: 


434  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

quent  exposure  to  close  contact  with  cases  of  virulent  and  highly 
contagious  ophthalmia,  smallpox,  and  leprosy. 

Even  when  the  people  are  friendly,  the  actual  difficulties  of 
travel  are  sometimes  no  light  matter. 

Just  to  glance  at  the  experiences  of  one  other  willing  worker — 
Mr  Burnet.  When  in  a  remote  district,  his  boat  sprang  a  leak  in 
crossing  the  rapids,  grievously  damaging  his  stock.  Thieves  con- 
trived to  cut  their  way  through  the  planks  of  his  junk  and  rob 
him  of  all  his  clothes  and  money.  Next  he  was  caught  in  a 
typhoon,  the  junk  was  capsized,  and  all  swam  for  their  lives.  His 
native  assistant  was  dragged  out  of  the  water  by  his  pigtail — the 
boatman's  child  was  drowned,  and  the  survivors  were  left  stranded 
on  the  shore  in  the  pitiless  storm.  Naturally  this  resulted  in 
severe  fever. 

In  a  subsequent  journey  he  was  again  stricken  with  fever,  when 
near  a  town  never  before  entered  by  a  foreigner.  Of  course  in- 
quisitive crowds  assembled,  longing  to  see  him,  and  so  soon  as  he 
could  drag  himself  to  his  feet  large  sales  of  books  were  effected. 
If  you  could  realise  the  miserable  dirt  and  discomfort  of  even  an 
average  Chinese  inn,  you  might  possibly  be  able  to  imagine  the 
wretchedness  of  being  laid  up  in  such  a  place,  alone  and  untended. 

When  sufficiently  convalescent  to  start  on  the  return  journey  to 
Hankow,  winter  suddenly  set  in,  and  for  more  than  a  week  Mr 
Burnet  and  his  caravan  of  wheelbarrows  were  detained  at  a  most 
miserable  roadside  inn,  like  a  very  inferior  British  cow-byre,  where 
only  by  diligently  pacing  up  and  down  the  narrow  floor  could  he 
keep  his  blood  in  circulation,  while  the  bitter  north  wind  blew 
freely  through  doorless  and  windowless  openings. 

Even  when  at  length  it  was  possible  to  proceed,  the  barrow-men 
made  slow  progress  over  blocks  of  mud  frozen  hard  as  iron,  and 
moreover,  could  only  travel  at  all  in  the  early  mornings  before  the 
sun  had  turned  the  whole  into  a  sea  of  slush.  Two  rivers  covered 
with  floating  ice  had  to  be  crossed,  and  then  a  mountainous  district 
where  the  roads  were  worse  than  the  last,  being  seamed  with  ruts 
three  feet  deep,  filled  with  mud  and  ice.  Only  a  constitution  of 
iron  could  resist  such  exposure,  and  this  journey  resulted  in  an 
attack  of  pleurisy,  which  compelled  this  willing  messenger  to  submit 
to  a  period  of  enforced  rest. 

Not  for  long,  however;  for  in  the  spring  of  1885  he  was  again 
working  so  earnestly  as  to  arouse  the  rage  of  the  anti-foreign  party 
in  Luchow  Foo,  and  these  stirred  up  a  furious  mob,  who  at  dead 
of  night  broke  into  the  inn  where  he  lodged,  and  dragged  him 


THE    GREATEST    OF    MISSION    FIELDS.  435 

into  the  street,  where  they  beat  him  with  bamboos  so  severely  that 
he  barely  escaped  with  his  life — the  blood  streaming  from  wounds 
on  head  and  body.  His  clothes  were  stolen,  and  those  of  his 
Chinese  assistants  were  torn  off.  Finally  the  authorities  interfered, 
and  sent  an  escort  to  protect  him  beyond  the  city  walls. 

We  next  hear  of  him  as  a  victim  to  the  ever-present  danger  of 
smallpox,  from  which  he  was  laid  up  for  weeks  in  a  miserable  inn 
four  hundred  miles  from  his  home — in  short,  the  record  of  his  work 
might  be  summed  up  in  the  words  of  the  first  great  missionary  to 
the  Gentiles ;  for  twice  he  suffered  shipwreck,  he  has  been  insulted 
and  robbed,  and  beaten  again  and  again  by  those  whom  he  most 
desired  to  benefit ;  he  has  been  "  in  journeyings  often,  in  perils  of 
waters,  in  perils  of  robbers,  in  perils  of  the  heathen,  in  perils  in 
the  city,  in  perils  in  the  wilderness,  in  perils  in  the  sea,  in  weariness 
and  painfulness,  in  hunger  and  thirst." 

Finally,  his  health  broke  down  under  the  prolonged  strain,  and 
he  was  ordered  home,  accompanied  by  his  devoted  wife  and  their 
two  little  ones.  But  ere  reaching  England  this  brave  young  soldier 
of  the  Cross  was  called  to  the  Better  Land,  as  was  also  the  youngest 
child — a  sorrowful  home-coming  for  her  who  has  borne  so  full  a 
share  in  the  burden  of  the  day. 

These  are  a  fair  sample  of  the  experiences  of  the  men  who  are 
devoting  their  lives  to  the  endeavour  to  win  these  millions  from 
their  miserable  idolatry.  Probably  there  is  not  one  of  the  men 
engaged  in  the  "  Inland  Mission  "  who  could  not  tell  of  personal 
adventures  of  the  same  type. 

One  of  the  chief  difficulties  to  be  encountered  in  reaching  these 
masses,  is  that  of  mastering  the  special  dialects  of  each  great  pro- 
vince. "When  we  consider  how  sorely  puzzled  a  Scotch  peasant 
from  Mid-Lothian  or  Banffshire  would  be  by  the  dialect  of  a  pure 
Yorkshire  or  Somerset  man,  we  need  scarcely  wonder  that  the 
language  of  Canton  is  so  incomprehensible  in  Peking  (the  two 
being  1800  miles  apart),  that  men  who  have  acquired  no  language 
in  common  can  only  converse  on  paper  (just  as  a  Chinaman  can 
exchange  ideas  with  a  Japanese).  Here  then  lies  the  immense 
advantage  of  disseminating  books  which  can  be  read  by  men  of  all 
provinces,  and  which  can  be  studied  at  leisure — good  seed,  which, 
thus  scattered,  may  safely  be  trusted  to  result  sooner  or  later  in  an 
abundant  harvest. 

Of  course,  from  a  missionary  point  of  view,  China  must  be  in- 
comparably the  most  interesting  and  important  held  in  the  world. 
Xot  only  is  it  by  far  the  largest  of  all  heathen  lands  (a  land  whose 


436  BLIND    MEN    AND    COLPORTEURS. 

undeveloped  mineral  wealth  is  such  that  it  must  some  day  prove  a 
source  of  almost  boundless  power  among  the  nations  of  the  earth), 
but  the  vigour  and  intellectual  strength  of  its  people,  the  patient 
perseverance  and  determination  by  which  they  triumph  over  all 
obstacles,  the  vigour  of  a  race  which  year  by  year  multiplies  as  the 
sands  of  the  sea,  and  asserts  its  right  and  power  to  colonise  in  every 
quarter  of  the  globe — these  are  qualities  which  make  every  grain 
of  Christian  influence  which  can  be  brought  to  bear  on  the  Chinese 
doubly  important.  For  who  can  tell  how  the  little  seed  will 
multiply  in  the  hands  of  such  diligent  gardeners  1  or  to  what  far 
region  they  may  carry  it  1 

Already  this  long-secluded  race  is  colonising  Thibet,  Mongolia, 
and  Manchuria.  Tens  of  thousands  have  settled  in  the  beautiful 
Philippine  Isles — in  Borneo,  Sumatra,  Java,  Cambodia,  and  Hawaii. 
"We  find  them  in  Australia  and  New  Zealand,  and  in  every  corner 
of  the  Pacific.  And  in  how  vast  a  stream  they  have  poured  into 
California  we  very  well  know.  Everywhere  they  work  their  way 
by  gentlest  but  most  dogged  force  of  will,  by  imperturbable  good- 
nature, by  a  frugality  which  accumulates  wealth  where  other  men 
would  starve.  That  they  will  continue  more  and  more  to  overrun 
the  earth  is  certain.  A  vast  portion  of  heathen  Chinamen  carry 
with  them  the  spreading  curse  of  opium-smoking — a  vice  from 
which  the  Christian  convert  must  of  necessity  keep  himself  abso- 
lutely free.  So  from  self-interest  it  behoves  all  nations  of  the 
earth  to  help  in  this  mission-work. 

I  believe  that  at  the  present  time  all  the  Christian  agencies  in 
China  combined  are  numerically  equal  to  about  two  teachers  for  the 
whole  population  of  Scotland,  so  vast  is  the  extent  and  population 
comprised  in  the  eighteen  provinces  of  China.  In  nine  of  these, 
there  are  as  yet  no  resident  missionaries  of  any  denomination,  and 
they  have  only  been  visited  by  itinerant  preachers,  members  of  the 
China  Inland  Mission,  who,  having  adopted  Chinese  dress,  and 
learnt  hi  every  respect  to  conform  with  the  outward  customs  of 
the  people,  are  allowed  to  travel  with  only  occasional  molestation, 
and  make  the  most  of  every  possibility  of  teaching  "  the  way  of 
life." 

They  work  in  couples,  and,  like  the  earliest  preachers  of  the 
same  story,  they  go  by  twos  into  every  city,  at  least  into  as  many 
cities  as  they  can  reach,  and  generally  succeed  in  selling  large 
numbers  of  Testaments  and  simple  books  which  may  work  their 
own  way. 

A  life  which,  notwithstanding  all  its  most  real  hardships  and 


A    PURSUIT    NOBLER    THAN    THAT    OF    BIG    GAME.       437 

occasional  dangers,  yet  supplies  so  many  elements  which  appeal  1" 
adventurous  and  energetic  spirits,  should  surely  commend  itself  to 
many  a  brave  Briton,  combining  as  it  does  all  the  elements  of  most 
interesting  mission-work  amongst  a  keenly  intellectual  race,  with 
the  difficulties  and  the  charms  of  travel. 

Already  some  have  discovered  that  such  a  life  has  attractions 
and  claims  even  greater  than  the  pursuit  of  big  game,  and  many 
felt  that  a  good  step  had  been  taken,  when  in  February  1885,  a 
party  of  five  Bachelors  of  Arts  of  Cambridge,  and  two  young  offi- 
cers, late  of  the  Boyal  Artillery  and  the  Dragoon  Guards,  started 
from  London  to  devote  themselves  to  the  work  of  the  Inland 
Mission  in  China.1 

There  is  small  wonder  that  when  the  preachers  have  hitherto 
been  so  few  the  disciples  have  likewise  been  few,  especially  as 
their  own  systems  of  faith  are  deeply  rooted,  and  they  are  the 
most  conservative  race  in  the  world.  Yet  a  beginning  has  been 
made.  Fifty  years  ago  there  was  not  one  Christian  in  all  China 
connected  with  any  Protestant  Mission.  Already,  notwithstanding 
all  hindrances  and  the  fewness  of  teachers,  there  are  upwards  of 
a  hundred  thousand  recognised  members  of  different  branches 
of  the  Protestant  Church,  and  twenty-two  thousand  communi- 
cants; and  some  even  fancy  that  a  day  may  come  when  this  vast 
empire  shall  be  numbered  with  those  "  last,  who  shall  be  first "  in 
Christ's  kingdom. 

1  These  men  were  noted  athletes,  and  so  great  was  the  interest  excited  by  their 
decision,  that  a  deputation  of  forty  Cambridge  undergraduates  accompanied  the 
mission  band  to  a  farewell  meeting  held  in  Exeter  Hall  on  the  eve  of  their  depar- 
ture, when  every  corner  of  the  great  hall  was  crowded  to  overflowing. 

This  good  example  proved  infectious,  for  whereas  in  1885  the  total  number  of 
missionaries  and  associates  was  only  177,  the  working  staff  of  this  Inland  Mission 
now  numbers  about  117  European  men  and  128  women.  They  have  no  guaranteed 
income  from  the  Society,  which,  being  entirely  dependent  on  voluntary  subscrip- 
tions, pays  its  agents  according  to  its  ability.  Subscriptions  will  be  welcomed  by 
the  Secretary,  2  Pyrland  Road,  Mildmay,  N. 


438  A    GLIMPSE    OF    THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

CHAPTER   XXXVI. 

A    GLIMPSE    OF    THE    FORBIDDEN"    CITY. 

Sketch  of  the  forbidden  city — The  Imperial  Palace — The  little  Emperor — 
Recent  history — Official  garments  for  summer  and  winter — The  Imperial 
Seals — Mandarins'  buttons — Chinese  watchmakers — An  open-air  fair — 
I'ctrgars'  Bridge — Chinese  notions  of  fair  hair — Gambling  with  crickets — 
In  the  Chinese  city — Curio  streets —Picture  streets — Another  fair — The 
American  Legation. 

Monday,  9th. 

Beixg  anxious  to  secure  sketches  of  the  beautiful  grounds  of  the 
Imperial  Palace,  of  which  we  obtain  lovely  views  from  a  grand 
marble  bridge  in  the  Imperial  city,  and  from  some  other  points, 
looking  across  the  great  moat,  Mr  Murray  most  kindly  undertook 
to  escort  me  thither  at  the  first  glimmer  of  dawn,  before  even  the 
beggars  were  astir. 

Accordingly  we  started  at  about  4  a.m.,  when  the  streets  were 
wondrously  still,  and  not  a  dust-cloud  had  yet  been  stirred  up. 
We  had,  however,  the  misfortune  to  have  secured  a  particularly 
slow  cart,  and  its  bumping  seemed  more  irritating  than  usual,  as  I 
fully  realised  the  importance  of  reaching  our  destination  very  early. 
As  it  was,  before  we  got  there  the  sun  was  well  up  and  shining 
full  in  our  eyes,  and  the  population  was  also  well  awake  ;  and  as 
soon  as  I  began  to  draw,  every  passer-by  stopped  to  watch,  and 
forgot  to  go  away,  so  that,  though  happily  no  one  could  get  between 
me  and  the  view,  the  bridge  and  thoroughfare  were  soon  densely 
blocked. 

The  people,  however,  Avere  all  exceedingly  polite,  as  they  always 
are  when  any  one  produces  pencil  and  paper ;  but  when  one  ven- 
tures on  a  few  touches  in  water-colour  the  excitement  becomes 
unbounded,  and  the  anxiety  to  obtain  a  glimpse  of  the  process  is  most 
embarrassing.  I  confess  I  looked  with  longing  eyes  to  the  rich 
green  meadow  and  shady  trees  of  part  of  the  pleasure-grounds 
which  come  close  to  the  bridge,  whence  I  might  have  sketched  the 
scene  in  delightful  peace  and  comfort ;  but  that  meadow,  like  every 
other  tempting  corner  in  Peking,  is  forbidden  ground. 

Now  to  try  and  give  you  some  idea  of  the  scene  which  so  fasci- 
nated me — chiefly,  I  daresay,  by  its  contrast  with  all  the  acces- 
sible places  in  Peking.  To  begin  with  the  nine-arched  marble 
bridge  on  which  I  had  taken  up  rny  station.     It  is  600  feet  long, 


THE  IMPERIAL  PALACE.  439 

and  spans  a  pretty  lake  in  which  is  faithfully  mirrored  a  very 
pretty  richly  wooded  hill  covered  with  fanciful  buildings.  Being 
Chinese  pleasure-grounds,  it  seems  quite  a  matter  of  course  to  Lain 
that  the  lake  and  the  hill  are  alike  artificial,  and  that  the  so-called 
Golden  Mount,  "  Chin-Shan,"  though  about  150  feet  high,  is,  in 
fact,  a  huge  storehouse  of  coal,  originally  deposited  here  as  a  sup- 
ply in  case  of  siege,  and  then  covered  with  mud  dredged  from  the 
canal,  so  as  to  produce  a  good  rich  soil  in  which  to  plant  trees  and 
shrubs. 

This  Hill  of  Coal  is  crested  by  a  large,  very  peculiar,  pagoda,  or 
relic-shrine,  to  the  honour  either  of  Buddha  himself  or  of  some 
peculiarly  holy  Lama.  The  usual  bell-shaped  circular  building 
rests  on  a  series  of  circular  platforms,  and  these  on  a  great  square 
base  (the  combination  of  the  circle  and  the  square  which  we  noticed 
at  the  Temple  of  Heaven,  and  which  is  common  to  so  many  grave- 
mounds  throughout  the  empire). 

Here  and  there,  through  the  foliage,  rise  most  attractive  curved 
roofs  of  brilliant  apple-green  or  golden  -yellow  tiles,  dazzlingly 
bright  in  the  light  of  the  morning  sun,  and  bits  of  grey  crenelated 
wall,  or  of  red  wall,  peep  out  and  suggest  some  point  of  interest. 
A  charming  kiosk,  all  roof  and  pillars,  rises  from  the  water's  brink; 
a  little  creek  is  spanned  by  a  high-pitched  marble  bridge,  and  a 
wider  arm  of  the  lake  is  crossed  by  a  three-arched  marble  bridge. 
All  are  mirrored  in  the  calm  waters,  from  which,  further  to  the 
right,  rises  a  fascinating  little  summer-house,  while  beyond  the  belt 
of  water-weeds,  on  the  brink  of  the  lake,  float  lotus-blossoms,  and 
smaller  water-lilies  with  glossy  leaves.  Close  by,  on  the  right 
hand  and  on  the  left,  lies  the  tempting  meadow  aforesaid,  shaded 
by  weeping  willows. 

But  the  main  interest  centres  at  the  further  end  of  the  lake, 
where,  resplendent  with  gleaming  yellow  tiles,  lie  the  various 
buildings  of  the  Palace.  I  could  see  one  great  triple-roofed  build- 
ing, surrounded  by  a  whole  cluster  of  fanciful  minor  buildings,  the 
whole  apparently  enclosed  by  an  ornamental  Avail,  from  which  rise 
on  this  side  eight  more  of  the  fanciful  double-roofed  buildings. 
A  little  farther  lies  another  great  yellow-roofed  palace,  and  a  coni- 
cal single  roof,  surmounted  by  a  golden  ball,  which,  from  its  re- 
semblance in  form  to  the  Tablet  Chapel  at  the  Temple  of  Heaven, 
I  assume  to  be  the  private  temple  of  the  Imperial  ancestors — 
yellow,  of  course. 

From  another  point  beyond  the  moat  I  had  obtained  a  good 
sketch  of  the  further  end  of  the  Hill  of  Coal,  which  is  crowned  by 


440  A    GLIMPSE   OF    THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

a  red  temple  with  three  yellow  roofs  (one  above  the  other,  like  an 
Imperial  State  umbrella),  and  with  minor  double-roofed  yellow 
temples  at  intervals  all  round  it.  Just  within  the  wall  on  that 
side  is  a  very  fine  Imperial  temple,  or  rather  group  of  temples, 
with  most  complicated  roofs  (triple,  but  with  many  gables),  and 
this  is  approached  by  three  wondrously  gorgeous  triple  pai-lowa 
(commemorative  gateways),  all  of  dazzling  yellow  china. 

One  only  realises  how  huge  these  eccentric  gateways  really  are, 
by  noting  the  diminutive  size  of  the  blue  crowds  who  walk  past 
them  between  the  wall  and  the  moat.  I  have  been  close  up  to 
these  gateways,  and  obtained  a  near  sight  of  these  Imperial  temples, 
which,  like  the  gateways,  are  marvellous  structures,  and  faced  with 
china  of  the  most  beautiful  and  elaborate  patterns,  in  which,  of 
course,  the  dragon  and  phoenix  figure  largely,  as  does  also  on  each 
a  great  tablet  with  an  inscription  in  Chinese  character.  The  odd 
thing,  however,  is  to  see  these  grand  portals  closed  by  shabby  gates 
of  common  wooden  paling  ! ! 

But  from  the  further  side  of  the  moat,  these  buildings  are  only 
seen  appearing  above  the  long  straight  wall  which  runs  parallel  to 
the  water.  A  similar  wall  runs  along  the  opposite  bank  of  the 
moat,  obviously  enclosing  some  other  Imperial  property,  for  from 
among  the  tall  trees  which  overtop  the  wall,  rise  two  other  build- 
ings— one  with  a  double,  the  other  with  a  triple  bright-yellow  roof, 
and  such  plainly  assert  their  connection  with  the  Dragon  Throne. 
Bright-green  roofs  denote  the  dwellings  of  princes  of  the  blood- 
royal. 

Now  I  have  told  you  all  I  can  say  about  the  Emperor's  sur- 
roundings, and  there  is  not  the  smallest  chance  of  seeing  anything 
more.  Whether  due  to  distance  I  cannot  saj*,  but  the  scene 
certainly  does  not  lack  enchantment. 

While  my  numerous  art-students  were  blocking  up  the  bridge, 
a  considerable  number  of  big  mandarins,  with  large  retinues,  passed 
on  their  way  to  the  Palace  to  hold  early  interview  with  the  little 
Emperor  and  the  two  Empresses.  I  confess  I  marvelled  that  no 
objection  was  made  to  my  becoming  the  occasion  of  such  a  crowd 
on  a  great  thoroughfare,  but  I  suppose  that  even  great  men  get 
used  to  crowds  in  this  country,  and  this  crowd  was  certainly  a 
pattern  of  goodness.  For  one  thing,  they  are  well  acquainted  with 
my  companion,  and  are  very  friendly  towards  him,  and  this  great 
bridge  is  one  of  his  favourite  stations  for  bookselling. 

It  certainly  is  strange  to  look  across  the  pretty  lake  to  that  fairy- 
like palace,  with  its  roofs  of  glittering  golden  tiles,  and  to  think 


DETAILS    OF    IMPERIAL    LIFE.  441 

that  since  the  dajrs  of  Lord  Macartney,  all  efforts  of  diplomacy 
have  only  once  contrived  to  obtain  an  audience  from  its  jealously 
guarded  sovereign  (guarded  by  soldiers  armed  with  bow  and 
arrows  !)  *  To  think  that,  in  very  deed,  there  before  my  eyes  is 
the  real  home  of  the  Celestial  Emperors  of  childhood's  dreams  ! 
And  in  truth,  if  report  speaks  truly,  a  good  many  uncanny  scenes 
have  been  enacted  beneath  the  shadow  of  those  gleaming  roofs ! 

Amongst  other  rumours  of  recent  years,  it  is  currently  believed 
here  that  the  very  unexpected  death  of  Ah-Lu-Te,  the  poor  young 
widowed  Empress  of  the  Emperor  Tungchih  (which  so  quickly 
followed  that  of  her  lord),  though  generally  ascribed  to  meritorious 
suicide,  was  really  due  to  the  effects  of  a  cup  administered  quite 
in  the  Queen  Eleanor  and  Fair  Rosamond  style,  to  avert  the  prob- 
ability of  her  giving  birth  to  a  son.  Had  she  done  so,  his  suc- 
cession to  the  throne  would  have  placed  her  in  the  position  of 
Empress-mother,  instead  of  one  of  the  two  strong-minded  and 
able  old  ladies  who  have  practically  held  the  reins  of  government 
since  their  own  husband,  the  Emperor  Hien-fuug,  died  in  1861  of 
vexation,  grief,  and  humiliation,  after  the  barbarians  had  sacked 
his  Summer  Palace,  and  otherwise  insulted  the  majesty  of  the  Son 
of  Heaven.  (Taking  all  these  untoward  circumstances  into  con- 
sideration, it  does  seem  rather  hard  on  the  Court  physician  that  he 
should  have  been  degraded  and  deprived  of  his  most  precious  pos- 
session— the  honorific  button  on  the  top  of  his  cap — because  he 
failed  to  preserve  the  life  of  his  Imperial  patient,  notwithstanding 
his  having  expended  a  sum  equal  to  £250  on  the  purchase  of 
"joss-paper"  to  be  burnt  on  his  behalf!) 

The  two  Imperial  widows  (one  of  whom  was  mother  to  the 
young  Emperor)  proved  themselves  excellent  Regents  throughout 
the  whole  reign  of  the  young  man  (as  he  died  while  still  a  minor), 
and  it  was  perhaps  only  natural  that  they  could  not  brook  the 
possibility  that  the  girl  whom  they  had  selected  to  be  his  wife 
should  actually  supersede  one  of  them.  Rut  perhaps  they  are 
blamed  unjustly,  as  it  is  deemed  an  honourable  action  for  a  child- 
less wife  to  commit  suicide  on  the  death  of  her  lord,  and  moreover 
she  thus  escapes  from  a  weary  lifelong  seclusion  in  subjection  to 
her  mother-in-law. 

I  think  whoever  has  read  the  account  of  that  ill-starred  wedding 

1  That  once  was  the  audience  granted  by  the  last  Emperor  to  the  representatives 
of  the  Foreign  Powers — i.e.,  Sir  Thomas  Wade  (British),  .M.  de  Qeofrov  (French), 
]\lr  Low  (U.S.),  and  others,  Russian,  Dutch,  and  German.  But  even  these  failed 
to  obtain  admission  to  the  Palace,  the  audience  being  granted  is  a  building  beyond 

its  limits. 


442  A    GLIMPSE    OF   THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

as  told  by  Mr  Simpson  in  '  Meeting  the  Sun,'  must  have  felt  a 
personal  interest  in  the  fate  of  that  poor  girl,  so  suddenly  trans- 
lated from  her  comfortable  position  as  the  daughter  of  a  gentleman 
in  private  life,  to  the  dull  dignities  of  the  Imperial  throne. 

I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  she  was  not  of  good  birth.  On  the 
mother's  side  she  was  very  highly  connected,  she  being  a  daughter 
of  the  Prince  of  Cheng.  But  there  is  no  objection  to  a  girl  of  the 
lowest  rank  being  selected  for  this  honour,  as  all  the  most  beauti- 
ful and  talented  girls  in  the  empire,  of  whatsoever  estate,  are  as- 
sembled at  the  Palace  to  take  part  in  the  competitive  examination, 
in  which  the  successful  candidate  is  exalted  to  the  rank  of  Empress, 
and  the  flower  of  her  companions  take  second  and  third  class  posi- 
tions in  the  zenana. 

As  an  example  of  truly  oriental  fluctuations  in  social  position,  I 
may  instance  the  beautiful  mother  of  the  Emperor  Hien-fung,  who 
actually  kept  a  fruit-stall  in  the  dirty  streets  of  Peking,  till  her 
beauty  attracted  the  attention  of  the  Prime  Minister,  when  she  was 
promoted  to  a  place  in  the  Imperial  zenana  ! 

As  regards  poor  Ah-Lu-Te,  the  Dowager-Empresses  certainly 
made  very  short  work  of  her  possible  claims,  for  no  sooner  was  the 
young  Emperor  Tungchih  dead  (he  died  of  smallpox  at  Peking  in 
January  1875),  than  they  hurriedly  summoned  a  family  conclave 
of  the  Manchu  princes,  and  decided  to  proclaim  Tsaitien,  the  infant 
son  of  Prince  Ch'un,1  successor  to  the  Dragon  Throne. 

Then  and  there,  at  midnight,  the  sleepy  and  astonished  child 
was  brought  from  his  bed  to  receive  the  homage  of  his  kinsmen, 
after  which  he  was  duly  proclaimed  under  the  title  of  the  Emperor 
Kwangsu — i.e.,  "  The  Illustrious  Succession  " — and  an  address  was 
published  purporting  to  have  been  the  expression  of  the  dying  Em- 
peror nominating  Kwangsu  as  his  heir. 

According  to  "Western  notions,  supposing  there  was  really  no 
heir  to  the  throne,  the  child  of  Prince  Kung  would  probably  have 
been  selected ;  but  Chinese  etiquette  is  peculiar,  and  as  it  is  impos- 
sible for  a  father  to  do  homage  to  his  son,  the  father  of  an  Emperor 
must  necessarily  retire  from  holding  any  public  office — a  practical 
loss  to  the  State,  which  in  the  case  of  Prince  Kung  would  have 
been  impossible. 

So   this   small  prince  (born  August   15,   1871),  on  whom  no 

European  has  ever  been  privileged  to  set  eyes,  pursues  his  studies 

under  the  direction  of  two  tutors,  who  are  superintended  by  the 

Prince  Ch'un.     The  '  Peking  Gazette '  keeps  the  lieges  informed  of 

1  Prince  Ch'un  was  brother  to  Hien-fung. 


THE    EMPERORS    WHIPPING-BOY.  443 

the  details  of  the  young  student's  intellectual  training,  and  dwells 
on  the  necessity  of  allowing  "  none  but  persons  of  staid  and  a 
conduct"  to  be  in  attendance  upon  him.  jSTevertheless,  sad  to 
state,  it  is  compelled  to  intimate  that  it  has  been  found  necessary 
to  select  a  Lahachutze  or  whipping-boy — proving  that,  like  many 
of  our  own  English  kings,1  the  young  Emperor  of  China  is  thus 
punished  by  proxy  ! 

Amongst  other  curious  details  with  which  the  public  is  thus 
favoured,  is  an  apology  from  the  governor  of  a  district  in  Mongolia, 
whence  two  cases  of  some  superlative  jam  are  annually  sent,  for  the 
special  use  of  the  boy,  but  which  on  this  occasion  Avas  not  to  be 
obtained,  the  fruit  having  failed  to  ripen. 

Meanwhile  the  reins  of  government  continue  in  the  hands  of  the 
Empresses-Dowager,  and  of  Prince  Kung,  who  is  uncle  to  the  young 
Emperor.  One  of  these  ladies  is  familiarly  known  as  Tung-tai-hou 
— i.e.,  "  The  Empress  of  the  East  "  2 — but  her  correct  official  title 
is  Hiau-Hsiau-cheng-hsien-hwang-hou.  Rather  a  serious  mouthful  ! 
and  moreover  a  troublesome  signature  to  write  frecpiently  in  Chinese 
character ! 

As  to  Prince  Kung,  he  is  a  keen,  energetic,  well-awakened  man 
of  enlightened  views,  and  has  been  in  power  ever  since  the  death 
of  his  brother  in  1861.  He  is  so  great  that  he  wears  on  his  hat 
no  distinguishing  button  to  mark  his  rank,  but  only  a  small,  crown- 
shaped  knot  of  red  braid.  Sometimes  he  dresses  in  yellow,  show- 
ing his  Imperial  descent ;  and  all  his  appendages — fan,  pipe,  purse, 
&c. — are  adorned  with  yellow  fringes  and  tassels.  At  other  times 
he  appears  in  purple  silk,  trimmed  with  ermine,  with  an  outer  robe 
of  the  finest  sea-otter  skin,  and  two  long  chains  of  beads,  one  of 
coral  and  one  of  amber.  This  dress  is  worn  with  a  circular  turned- 
up  hat  of  the  regular  Tartar  form,  showing  the  lining  of  black  vel- 
vet, and  the  top  quite  covered  by  the  invariable  red  silk  tassel. 

This,  however,  is  only  worn  in  winter  or  spring,  for,  like  every- 
thing else  in  China,  matters  referring  to  dress  are  governed  by 
most  arbitrary  rules,  and  every  official  in  the  empire,  from  the 
highest  to  the  lowest,  must  assume  his  summer  or  winter  costume 
on  a  special  day,  of  which  due  notice  is  given  in  the  'Peking 
Gazette/  by  a  statement  to  the  effect  that  the  Emperoi  has  put  on 
his  summer  (or  winter)  hat.      On  this  day,  therefore,  the  fur-lined 

1  E.g.,  Edward  VI.,  Edward  VII.,  Charles  I.,  James  VI.,  and  various  ku 
France,  notably  Henry  IV.,  who  were  all  provided  with  whipping-boys,  who  should 
endure  the  pains  which  might  not  In-  inflicted  on  the  royal  pt-rson  ! 

2  The  Empress  of  the  East,  Tung-taUhou,  did  not  long  BUrvive  the  youi 
press.     She  died  in  November  1881,  aged  forty-five  years. 


444  A    GLIMPSE    OF    THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

robes  and  turned-up  black  satin  hats  lined  with  dark  cloth,  and 
the  neat  little  hand-stoves,  must  be  exchanged  for  sdken  garments 
with  satin-lined  sleeves  and  fans,  and  neat  little  conical  turned- 
down  straw  or  bamboo  hats  surmounted  by  a  red  silk  tassel,  so 
worn  as  to  cover  the  hat,  red  horse-hair  being  substituted  for  silk 
on  a  travelling  hat. 

Considering  the  difference  of  climate  between  the  country  to  the 
north  of  Peking  and  that  to  the  south  of  Canton — a  distance  of 
2000  miles  north  and  south — one  would  fancy  this  might  prove 
inconvenient,  but  such  trifles  are  not  considered  here,  where  every- 
thing is  done  by  rule.  Even  the  way  a  Peking  cart  hangs  on  the 
axle  is  decided  by  law — a  nobleman  being  allowed  to  have  the 
axle  further  back  than  ordinary  mortals,  so  as  to  secure  easier 
motion  ! 

But  however  heavy  he  may  be,  or  however  exalted  his  rank,  he 
may  on  no  account  presume  to  have  more  than  four  bearers  for  his 
sedan-chair,  unless  he  be  either  a  Governor-General,  a  Tartar  Gen- 
eral, or  the  Governor  of  a  province  !  In  Peking  even  officials  of 
these  three  exalted  grades  are  only  entitled  to  four  bearers  within 
the  city,  but  are  allowed  to  have  eight  when  outside  the  walls. 
Officers  of  lower  grade  may  only  have  two  bearers  while  in  the 
city,  but  four  are  allowed  for  country  travel.  How  fervently  their 
human  ponies  must  pray  for  the  promotion  of  heavy  men ! 

Only  certain  high-class  officials  are  allowed  to  go  through  Peking 
in  their  sedan-chairs  ;  men  of  lower  grade  are  supposed  to  ride,  and 
are  escorted  by  a  specified  number  of  equerries.  Should  a  great 
man  prefer  riding,  he  must  have  a  retinue  of  ten  such,  two  preced- 
ing and  eight  following  him.  The  descending  scale  requires  eight, 
six,  or  four  retainers,  while  men  of  lower  rank  have  but  one.  Even 
this  modest  escort  conveys  information  to  the  initiated.  Should 
this  solitary  groom  precede  his  master,  it  is  known  that  the  latter 
is  a  fourth-class  official ;  but  should  he  follow,  the  master  is  stamped 
as  quite  a  minor  mandarin  ! 

High  officials  are  further  distinguished  by  having  a  red  tassel 
suspended  from  the  martingale  of  their  pony  (I  see  nothing  but 
ponies  here). 

But  to  return  to  the  subject  of  dress,  I  am  told  that  every  tiny 
detail  is  regulated  by  a  law  .inflexible  as  that  of  the  Medes  and 
Persians.  Xo  fitful  fashions  here  distract  the  mind  of  man  or 
woman,  for  the  precise  material  and  cut  of  every  garment,  male  or 
female,  to  be  worn  in  every  grade  of  society,  is  minutely  specified 
in  some  book  of  fossil  wisdom,  from  which  no  one  dares  to  depart 


SUMPTUARY    LAWS    RESPECTING    DRESS.  445 

in  one  iota.  Therein  is  defined  the  precise  position  of  the  five 
buttons  which  fasten  the  tunic  (on  no  consideration  may  a  tailor 
so  far  indulge  his  fancy  as  to  substitute  four  or  six  for  the  regula- 
tion five  buttons  !)  Even  the  manner  in  which  the  hat-hand  must 
pass  behind  the  ears  and  under  the  chin  is  most  accurately  laid  down. 

As  to  the  pretty  embroideries  which  seem  to  us  so  fantastic, 
they  are  also  unchangeable  badges  of  rank — every  man  must  wear 
that  to  which  he  is  entitled,  embroidered  on  the  back  and  breast 
of  his  tunic.  Thus  an  "  angelic  stork,"  worked  in  gold  thread, 
denotes  a  gentleman  of  the  first  rank.  A  kam-ki,  or  beautiful 
pheasant,  denotes  the  second  rank ;  and  the  peacock,  the  wild 
goose,  the  silver  pheasant,  a  cormorant,  a  ki-chik,  a  quail,  and  a 
white  bird  mark  nine  descending  degrees  of  civil  rank.  In  every 
case  the  bird  is  represented  standing  on  a  rock  in  a  storm-tossed 
ocean,  looking  towards  the  sun  (which  I  suppose  represents  the 
Emperor). 

Military  grades  are  similarly  denoted  by  animals,  which  also 
stand  on  rocks  amid  stormy  waves  gazing  at  the  sun.  The  highest 
rank  is  marked  by  a  dragon-headed,  cloven-footed  beast,  called  a 
chelun;  and  the  descending  grades  wear  a  lion,  a  leopard,  a  tiger, 
a  bear,  a  chetah,  and  a  sea-horse. 

Noblemen  must  wear  a  four-clawed  dragon  on  back  and  breast, 
and  officers  of  different  rank  have  on  their  tunics  five,  six,  seven, 
or  eight  dragons  with  four  claws  on  each  leg,  and  in  certain  in- 
stances, as  a  special  mark  of  Imperial  favour,  a  nobleman  is  autho- 
rised to  wear  a  five-clawed  dragon.  But  woe  betide  the  rash  citi- 
zen who  should  presume  so  to  appear  in  a  garment,  however  old, 
on  which  this  Imperial  symbol  is  embroidered!  For  a  whole 
weary  month  he  would  be  condemned  to  wear  the  dreadful  wooden 
collar,  and  would  then  receive  one  hundred  blows  with  a  bamboo 
— a  form  of  flogging  not  to  be  quickly  forgotten  !  For  a  commoner 
even  to  wear  a  dress  embroidered  with  gold  thread  is  an  offence 
against  law,  and  only  certain  classes  are  privileged  to  wear  clothes 
made  of  silk.  These  sumptuary  laws  even  decide  who  may  wear 
boots  of  black  satin,  and  who  must  be  content  with  black  cloth 
shoes. 

Even  in  providing  the  equivalent  of  a  waterproof  i'<>r  rainy 
weather,  dill'erences  of  rank  must  be  made  clear.  The  highest 
officials  must  have  a  bright  red  robe.  Those  of  second  or  third 
rank,  whether  civil  or  military,  wear  a  purple  dress  with  a  red  hat. 
The  next  three  grades  have  a  red  dress  ami  hat  with  purple  border. 
Men  of  the  seventh  class  are  dressed  in  purple  from  head  U<  t""i. 


44G  A    GLIMPSE    OF    THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

■while  lower  ranks  are  distinguished  by  purple  hats  edged  with  red. 
Only  imagine  what  a  terrible  thing  it  would  be  to  be  colour-blind 
in  a  country  where  each  gradation  in  rank  calls  for  a  different 
degree  of  reverence  ! !  Fortunately  for  the  Chinese,  this  peculiarity 
is  said  to  be  unknown  here. 

Happily  one  simple  distinction  suffices  to  settle  the  question  of 
honour  due — namely,  the  colour  of  the  honorific  button  on  the 
very  top  of  the  cap.  Officials  of  the  two  highest  grades  are  dis- 
tinguished by  red  balls,  either  dark  or  bright  red.  Those  of  the 
third  and  fourth  class  wear  blue  of  two  shades.  The  fifth  class 
has  a  crystal  ball,  the  sixth  a  white  ball  of  mother-of-pearl.  Man- 
darins of  the  seventh  and  eighth  grades  wear  golden  balls,  and  those 
of  the  ninth  rank  have  balls  of  silver.  These  are  the  lowest  grade 
entitled  to  these  emblems  of  nobility.  There  is,  however,  a  further 
complication  even  in  the  reverence  due  to  these  balls  or  buttons, 
inasmuch  as  the  same  coloured  ball  marks  the  corresponding  grade, 
whether  civil  or  military.  The  former,  however,  ranks  immeasur- 
ably higher  in  public  estimation. 

Besides  these  balls  and  the  red  silk  tassel,  which  must  be  worn 
both  in  summer  and  winter,  there  is  a  distinction  in  the  feather 
which  hangs  straight  from  the  button.  Just  as  in  Scotland  a 
Highland  chief  is  distinguished  from  his  clansmen  by  wearing 
three  eagle's  feathers,  while  they  are  entitled  to  one  only  j  so  here, 
though  all  mandarins  are  entitled  to  wear  one  common  peacock's 
feather,  only  those  of  the  highest  rank  are  privileged  to  wear  a 
two-eyed  feather. 

Not  only  on  the  top  of  his  head,  but  also  on  the  top  of  his 
sedan-chair,  must  a  nobleman  proclaim  his  true  rank.  A  really 
exalted  dignitary  has  a  silver  ball  on  the  top  of  his  chair,  whereas 
a  smaller  man  may  only  have  one  of  tin  ! 

It  seems  rational  enough  that  details  of  official  uniform  should 
be  thus  minutely  regulated,  but  that  domestic  life  should  be  sub- 
ject to  the  same  mechanical  system  seems  strange  indeed.  Yet  so 
it  is.  The  same  law  which  forbids  a  woman  of  the  lower  orders 
to  dress  like  one  of  middle  class,  nor  suffers  the  latter  to  ape  the 
garments  of  her  superiors,  and  Avhich  precisely  defines  the  position 
of  persons  who  may  possess  umbrellas  made  of  silk  or  cloth  instead 
of  the  oiled  paper  used  by  the  common  herd,  also  lays  down  minute 
regulations  for  the  size,  design,  and  material  of  every  portion  of 
the  houses  which  may  lawfully  be  built  by  persons  of  various 
grade.  Certainly  in  the  sense  of  freedom  from  interference,  no 
( 'hinaman  can  say  his  house  is  his  castle  ! 


SUMPTUARY    LAWS    AFFECTING    ALL    CLASSES.       447 

The  wearisome  ceremonials  "which  have  to  be  observed  in  all 
phases  of  Chinese  life,  of  course  reach  their  highest  complication 
within  the  Palace;  so  for  fear  of  any  mistake  being  made,  the 
manner  in  which  every  detail  is  to  be  carried  out  is  minutely 
specified  in  'The  Book  of  Ceremonies' — a  handy  book  of  refer- 
ence, which  is  said  to  number  two  hundred  volumes  ! !  Therein 
are  prescribed  rules  of  action  for  every  event  which  it  is  supposed 
can  possibly  affect  Imperial  life,  from  the  hour  of  birth  till  that 
wherein  the  funeral  tablet  has  taken  its  final  place  in  the  Temple 
of  Ancestors. 

I  am  told  that  some  of  the  great  men  whom  I  saw  going  to  the 
Palace  were  the  Emperor's  Privy  Councillors,  several  of  whom  axe 
Manchu  Tartars  and  others  are  Chinese.  One  of  their  duties  is  to 
affix  the  Imperial  seals  to  every  proclamation  or  other  State  paper. 
There  are  no  less  than  twenty-live  of  these  seals.  Tiny  are  made 
of  various  kinds  of  jade,  white,  green,  blue,  yellow,  and  clouded, 
and  one  is  made  of  sandal-wood.  In  size  they  vary  from  four  to 
six  inches  square,  and  all  bear  the  impress  of  the  Imperial  dragon, 
which  is  thus  stamped  in  vermilion  on  the  documents  endowing 
them  with  omnipotent  authority. 

Although  the  crowd  were  so  very  kindly  and  civil,  their  multi- 
tude, and  the  consciousness  of  incessant  movement,  to  say  nothing 
of  the  stifling  dust  stirred  up  by  one  and  all,  and  the  pitiless 
scorching  heat  of  a  sun  already  high  in  the  heavens,  made  sketch- 
ing anything  but  a  pleasure ;  so  as  soon  as  I  had  secured  the  I 
sary  notes,  we  moved  on  from  the  Imperial  city,  and  through  the 
Tartar  city  into  the  Chinese  city,  that  I  might  there  try  to  find  a 
key  suited  to  my  watch.  This  we  did  without  much  difficulty,  as 
there  are  a  considerable  number  of  watchmakers  in  the  city,  de- 
scendants of  those  originally  taught  by  the  Jesuits,  to  which,  I 
suppose,  is  due  the  fact  that  most  of  them  are  Roman  Catholics. 
There  are  said  to  be  about  five  thousand  of  these  hereditary  <  'hris- 
tians  in  the  city,  in  addition  to  the  converts  of  more  recent  date. 

We  passed  the  Iioman  Catholic  Cathedral,  but  had  no1  time  to 
enter,  as  there  was  so  much  to  be  seen  ;  and  really  sightseeing 
under  such  conditions  of  heat,  dust,  and  noise,  becomes  quite  be- 
wildering. We  passed  through  a  great  fair  in  the  open  street. 
which  beat  all  we  have  yet  seen,  as  a  combination  of  these  three. 
It  was  a  real  rag-fair,  without  even  the  pretence  of  booths  or 
tables,  all  objects  for  sale  being  laid  out  actually  on  the  ground,  in 
the  dirt}'  dust.  The  objects  for  sale  consisted  chiefly  of  old  gar- 
ments  of  every  description — some  even  richly   embroidered,   but 


448  A    GLIMPSE    OF    THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

suggestive  of  smallpox  !  There  were  also  a  great  quantity  of  furs 
and  skins,  which  looked  tolerably  good,  but  the  rash  purchaser 
generally  discovers  to  his  cost  that  the  Avily  Mongolian  knows  of 
many  processes  by  which  inferior  and  ill-cured  skins  can  be  dressed 
so  as  to  deceive  even  a  practised  eye. 

(Really  good  robes,  of  the  loveliest  silky  white  sheepskin  or 
black  astrakhan,  are  brought  by  regular  merchants,  and  offered  for 
sale  at  all  the  Legations  and  other  European  dwellings ;  but  even 
with  these  it  is  not  always  easy  to  detect  the  difference  between 
good  curing  and  bad,  and  the  purchaser  of  the  latter  finds  his 
garment  tear  like  paper.) 

Besides  the  clothes  and  furs  and  fur-lined  robes,  all  manner  of 
cheap,  useful  things,  and  stores  of  food  are  also  outspread  upon 
the  ground,  and  become  more  and  more  thickly  coated  with  dust 
(the  dust  of  Peking  !)  as  the  ceaseless  traffic  of  the  day  moves  on. 
The  strange  market  seemed  to  extend  for  nearly  a  mile,  and  oh  ! 
the  noise,  and  oh  !  the  extraordinary  variety  of  smells,  all  evil, 
which  assailed  us  as  we  passed  the  busy  crowd  of  much-chaffering 
buyers  and  sellers. 

On  all  sides  were  merchants  shouting  out  descriptions  of  their 
wares ;  blind  musicians  wandering  about  in  companies,  making 
horrible  discords ;  jugglers  exhibiting  strange  feats  to  the  delight 
of  the  crowd ;  barbers  plying  their  razors  on  shaven  crowns  and 
faces,  and  carefully  plaiting  the  long  black  tresses  ;  while  quack 
doctors  and  mountebanks  of  all  sorts  each  added  their  share  to  the 
general  din.  Dentists  and  chiropodists  both  shout  their  invita- 
tions to  suffering  mankind  to  enter  the  booths,  where,  in  presence 
of  all  who  care  to  gaze,  they  carry  on  their  work.  The  chiropodists 
are  said  to  be  exceedingly  skilful. 

One  spot  remains  imprinted  on  my  memory  as  a  picture  of  inde- 
scribable misery.  It  is  a  very  handsome  great  bridge  adorned 
with  numerous  pillars,  each  surmounted  by  a  sculptured  mythical 
beast.  It  is  commonly  called  the  Beggars'  Bridge,  because  of  the 
terrible  number  of  these  wretched  beings  who  make  it  their  head- 
quarters, and  lie  about  in  hideous  groups,  or  crouch  in  rows  on 
either  side  of  the  highway,  appealing  to  the  passers-by  for  even 
the  tiniest  coin  to  save  them  from  death.  I  can  scarcely  say  from 
starvation,  for  they  looked  starved  already,  nearly  all  of  them  being 
mere  skeletons,  clothed  only  in  a  few  filthy  rags,  and  victims  of 
divers  diseases.  As  we  pass  along  these  streets  we  hear  one  oft- 
reiterated  prayer — Kumsha  !  Kumsha  ! — i.e.,  gift — the  Chinese 
equivalent  of  backsheesh.     I  believe  that  many  are  lepers. 


PERPLEXITY    CAUSED    BY    FAIPv    HAIR.  449 

It  is  sickening  even  to  look  upon  such  wretchedness,  and  the 
gratitude  of  the  poor  creatures  for  infinitesimal  doles  speaks  vol- 
umes. But  most  of  the  Chinese  are  so  accustomed  to  the  sight, 
and  probably  so  overpowered  by  the  multitude  of  beggars,  that 
they  seem  to  take  no  notice  whatever  of  them. 

Almost  the  only  class  whose  misery  seems  to  call  forth  - 
compassion  are  the  blind  beggars,  and,  incredible  as  it  appears, 
medical  testimony  distinctly  proves  that  in  many  cases  blindness 
has  been  deliberately  produced  by  the  wretched  sufferer  himself,  as 
being  the  only  possible  means  of  appealing  to  public  pity  !  Parents 
thus  blind  their  children  by  puncturing  the  eye  with  a  needle,  while 
men,  and  even  girls,  sometimes  deliberately  destroy  their  own  sight 
by  introducing  lime  (or  still  more  horrible,  vaccine  matter)  inside 
the  eyelid  !  In  Southern  China  blind  singing-girls  are  quite  a 
recognised  institution,  and  the  profession  is  said  to  be  lucrative. 
the  singers  being  handsomely  dressed,  and  escorted  by  female 
attendants.  They  sing  in  shrill  falsetto,  accompanying  themselves 
on  quaint  guitars  covered  with  snake-skins. 

Any  one  who  is  curious  to  prove  how  far  a  dollar  can  be  made 
to  go,  can  here  experimentalise  to  his  heart's  content ;  and  though 
I  am  hopelessly  puzzled  by  the  varying  exchange  between  taels  and 
dollars,  large  Peking  cash  and  small  brass  cash,  of  first  or  second 
quality,  I  know  that  for  a  dollar  you  receive  upwards  of  a  thousand 
cash,  one  of  which  is  as  much  as  a  beggar  may  reasonably  hope  to 
receive,  and  for  which  he  can  obtain  a  cake  of  black  bread.  Under 
these  circumstances  the  gift  of  a  Peking  cash,  which  is  about  equiv- 
alent to  a  penny,  is  quite  a  fortune,  and  its  value  seems  to  range 
from  twelve  to  twenty  small  cash.  On  the  other  hand,  there  are 
some  iron  cash  in  circulation  so  worthless  that  these  very  1"  _ 
have  been  known  to  pelt  one  another  with  them  in  .sheer  disgust  ! 

I  was  much  amused  to  learn  that  one  small  but  discriminating 
beggar,  who  persistently  claimed  alms,  was  addressing  me  as 
"Aged  Sir"  !  He  must  have  been  a  recent  arrival  from  the  pro- 
vinces, where  fair-haired  "foreign  devils  "  are  still  unknown,  the 
natural  Chinese  notion  of  fair  hair  being  that  it  must  be  the  foreign 
equivalent  of  grey.  I  remember  some  boatmen  near  Foo-Chow 
discussing  the  age  of  a  very  fair-haired  German  lady,  whom  they 
decided  to  be  truly  venerable,  when,  somewhat  to  tin-it  discom- 
fiture, she  produced  her  small  boy,  who  was  still  fairer,  and 
what  they  supposed  was  his  age? 

This  foreign  peculiarity,  of  possessing  hair  which  is  nol  ''lack, 
adds  immensely  to  the  interest  of  inspecting  foreigners.     One  of 

2  F 


450  A    GLIMPSE    OF   THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

my  friends,  a  Scot,  whose  hair  is  of  the  ruddiest  gold,  was  one  day 
travelling  in  a  remote  district  with  a  companion  of  nut-brown  hue. 
Finding  they  could  not  escape  from  the  curiosity  of  the  staring 
crowd  who  struggled  fur  a  good  sight  of  them,  they  suggested  that 
really  if  the  people  must  all  see  them,  it  was  only  fair  that  they 
should  pay  for  the  sight.  To  this  they  immediately  assented. 
"Yes!  yes!  "they  cried;  "it  is  quite  fair.  AYe  are  willing  to 
pay  so  many  cash  for  a  good  look  at  you ;  but  we  can  only  pay 
half  price  for  looking  at  the  other  man,  as  he  is  not  nearly  such  a 
good  specimen  of  a  Red-headed  Foreign  Devil ! "  The  travellers 
took  them  at  their  word,  and  collected  a  large  quantity  of  cash, 
which  they  subsequently  scattered  for  a  general  scramble,  to  the 
great  delight  of  all  present. 

AYe  halted  at  one  corner  to  watch  what  was  evidently  a 
very  exciting  form  of  gambling — namely,  a  fight  between  trained 
crickets.  I  had  seen  a  considerable  number  of  these  little  creatures 
offered  for  sale  in  tiny  bamboo  cages,  Chinamen  having  a  great 
liking  for  their  chirping  (and  there  are  no  cheery  hearths  in  this 
country  to  attract  the  crickets  by  their  genial  warmth).  But  I 
had  not  before  realised  their  position  in  the  gambling  world  ! 
Cricket-fights,  however,  seem  to  be  as  satisfactory  a  medium  for 
gambling  as  cock-fighting  or  any  kindred  sport,  so  these  poor 
little  insects  are  most  scientifically  extracted  from  their  hiding- 
places  in  the  old  walls,  and  carefully  secured  till  the  great  day  of 
battle,  when  two  ^t  a  time  are  placed  on  a  flat  tray  with  a  deep 
rim,  and  are  encouraged  to  fight,  which  they  do  with  a  hearty 
goodwill,  uttering  shrill  chirps  of  defiance  as  they  become  con- 
scious of  one  another's  presence,  and  then  seizing  one  another  and 
wrestling  in  good  earnest.  The  owner  of  the  victorious  cricket 
will  probably  clear  quite  a  handful  of  cash — possibly  a  whole 
pennyworth,  which  would  be  quite  a  fortune  for  the  day. 

But  it  seems  this  form  of  small  betting  is  by  no  means  confined 
to  the  street  beggars.  Many  rich  men  delight  in  it,  and  play  for 
heavy  sums  amounting  to  hundreds  of  dollars,  so  that  a  well- 
proven  champion  cricket  will  fetch  quite  a  large  price  in  the 
market.  I  am  told  that  many  of  the  Buddhist  priests  are  keen 
cricket-gamblers,  this  mild  sport  apparently  ranking  among  the 
legitimate  clerical  amusements  of  China,  as  the  angler's  art  does 
in  Britain. 

In  Southern  China  there  are  regular  cricket  clubs,  which  hold 
their  meetings  in  sheds  erected  for  the  purpose.  Here  the  com- 
batants are  carefully  weighed  and  measured,  the  bets  recorded,  and 


CRICKET-FIGHTS.  451 

money  deposited  and  weighed,  to  ensure  honest}-.  The  care  of 
these  little  creatures  is  quite  an  elaborate  business.  Their  diet 
and  general  health  is  most  anxiously  attended  to.  The  former 
includes  fish  of  two  sorts,  honey,  certain  insects,  and  boiled  chest- 
nuts and  rice.  But  in  case  of  illness  there  is  quite  a  variety  of 
remedies.  If  the  poor  insect  has  had  a  chill,  a  mosquito  is  ad- 
ministered ;  or  if  it  has  gluttonously  indulged  in  a  surfeit,  certain 
red  insects  are  a  suitable  corrective.  An  asthmatic  cricket  is  fed 
on  bamboo  butterflies,  while  young  shoots  of  green-pea  correct 
fever.  Bathing  is  provided  for  by  a  tiny  cup  of  water.  With  all 
this  watchful  care  the  little  prize-fighters  are  short-lived,  from 
twelve  to  fourteen  weeks  being  their  average  term  of  life.  At 
death  the  distinguished  winners  of  many  fights  are  honoured  with 
silver  coffins,  the  size  of  thimbles,  and  their  afflicted  owners  give 
these  formal  interment,  which,  however,  must  be  done  secretly,  so 

"  They  bury  them  darkly  at  dead  of  night" — 

the  object  of  secrecy  being  the  conviction  that  the  spirits  of  the 
dead  crickets  will  so  thirst  for  fresh  victims  that  in  the  following 
spring  they  will  return  to  the  place  of  their  burial,  there  to  animate 
new  crickets;  so  in  the  early  summer  cricket-hunters  again  return 
thither  secretly  by  night,  and  capture  them  by  the  light  of  their 
lanterns. 

The  crickets  are  not  the  only  creatures  whose  diet  and  medical 
care  is  attended  to  by  the  gamblers  of  China.  I  am  told  that  the 
greatest  pains  are  bestowed  on  the  quails,  pigeons,  game-cocks,  and 
other  fighting  birds  (even  the  pigeons  are  kept  for  fighting!),  and 
in  order  to  improve  their  plumage  and  make  it  glossy,  they  are 
occasionally  fed  on  cuttle-fish  which  has  been  stuffed  with  sulphur, 
and  then  dried  in  the  sun. 

In  one  broad  street  we  came  to  a  sort  of  market  with  innumer- 
able booths  for  the  sale  of  fish,  fowl,  and  vegetables.  Anion-  fish  I 
noted  not  only  a  large  number  of  eels,  as  might  naturally  be  ex- 
pected from  the  muddy  river,  but  also  a  good  supply  of  fish  that 
looked  like  whitings  and  herrings,  and  an  abundance  of  cockles. 
The  vegetable  supply  is  excellent — beans  and  lentils,  potatoes  and 
turnips,  carrots  and  onions,  all  in  good  condition. 

We  passed  through  an  endless  succession  of  streets,  more  attrac- 
tive by  far  than  those  in  the  Tartar  city.  A  good  many  "f  tin- 
shop  fronts  are  richly  carved  and  gilt,  and  have  rich  red  colouring 
about  the  upper  storey,  and  sign-boards  supported  by  dragons 
heads,   as  bringers  of  good-luck.     There  are    beautiful   objects   in 


452  A    GLIMPSE   OP   THE   FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

the  shops,  even  as  seen  from  the  street — precious  vases  of  enamelled 
copper,  basins,  incense-burners,  candlesticks,  porcelain  vases,  divers 
objects  in  jade,  agate,  and  rock-crystal,  endless  stores  of  rich  em- 
broideries, and  a  great  variety  of  bronzes  of  the  usual  stiff  patterns, 
which  seem  to  me  so  sadly  lacking  in  the  grace  of  Japanese  de- 
signs. But  in  truth  it  is  altogether  impossible  to  avoid  contrast- 
ing the  fresh  clean  shops  of  Japan,  and  their  fascinating  contents, 
with  these,  so  smothered  in  dust  that  cleanliness  is  impossible. 
It  would  break  the  heart  of  a  Japanese  to  find  himself  deposited 
in  Peking  ! 

All  these  shops  have  storehouses  at  the  back,  in  which  their 
most  precious  goods  are  stowed  away,  and  are  only  produced  when 
a  really  likely  customer  is  in  the  shop.  The  courtyard,  which  lies 
between  the  shop  and  the  store,  is  covered  with  stout  wire-netting, 
or  else  with  strong  wooden  bars  from  which  are  suspended  numer- 
ous bells,  all  of  which  give  tongue  the  moment  a  rash  robber  tries 
to  effect  an  entrance.  Some  of  the  street  names  are  very  nice. 
One  near  the  Legation  is  "  Happy  Sparrow  Street,"  for  these 
ubiquitous  little  birds  hop  about  in  Peking  as  cheerily  as  in 
London.  There  is  also  a  "  Monkey  Street,"  near  the  Observatory, 
which  is  not  so  easily  accounted  for,  as  the  monkey  tribe  do  not 
haunt  these  parts.  I  am  much  struck  by  the  Chinese  expressions 
to  describe  a  thoroughfare,  or  a  cul-de-sac.  The  former  is  said  to 
be  "  a  live  street,"  the  latter  is  "  a  dead  street."  One  street  is 
distinguished  as  the  Immeasurably  Great  Street,  another  is  the 
Stone  Tiger  Street.  There  are  Obedience  Street,  Barbarian  Street, 
and  the  noisiest  and  busiest  of  all,  thronged  with  all  manner  of 
vociferous  pedlars,  is  misnamed  "  The  Street  of  Perpetual  Eepose." 
More  to  the  point  is  the  name  of  the  Confucian  Hall,  which  is 
well  described  as  "  The  Hall  of  Intense  Mental  Exercise."  From 
such  glimpses  as  we  outsiders  can  obtain  of  the  shady  secluded 
grounds  of  the  Imperial  Palace,  there  seems  considerable  fitness  in 
naming  it  "  The  Tranquil  Palace  of  Heaven,"  while  the  Empress's 
house  is  "  The  Palace  of  Earth's  Eepose,"  and  a  certain  white 
marble  gateway  is  known  as  "  The  Gate  of  Everlasting  Peace." 
Another  is  "  The  Great  Pure  Gate,"  and  a  third  is  "  The  Gate  of 
Steadfast  Purity." 

One  of  these  streets  is  known  to  foreigners  as  Picture  Street, 
from  the  number  of  shops  it  contains  devoted  to  the  sale  of  hand- 
painted  scrolls  for  hanging  on  the  walls.  These  also  are  not  to 
compare  with  either  the  grace  or  the  quaintness  of  Japanese  paint- 
ing.    They  are  strong  and  gaudy,  but  I  did  not  see  any  that  gave 


IN    THE    CHINESE    HALF    OF    PEKING. 

me  pleasure,  though  I  bought  some  scrolls  of  flowers  because  of 
their  amazing  cheapness. 

At  last,  fairly  tired  out  with  looking  and  wondering,  but  still 
more  with  the  heat  and  dust,  we  once  more  consigned  ourselves 
to  the  torture  of  the  covered  cart  and  endured  an  agonising  hour 
of  bumps  (proving  that  streets  hitherto  unvisited  were  capable  of 
being  even  worse  than  those  we  already  knew),  and  at  last  thank- 
fully hailing  the  sight  of  the  tall  red  poles  which  mark  from  afar 
the  entrance  to  this  comparatively  cool  retreat. 

By  this  afternoon,  however,  I  had  nursed  a  fresh  store  of  courage  ; 
so  when  Dr  Edkins  offered  to  escort  me  to  a  great  fair  which  is 
being  held  in  the  grounds  of  a  temple  not  very  far  off,  I,  of  course, 
summoned  sufficient  energy  to  go  there,  and  very  amusing  it  proved. 
It  is  one  of  a  set  of  periodical  fairs  which  are  held  every  ten  days 
at  some  part  of  the  city,  every  sort  of  thing  being  there  offered  for 
sale.  There  are  stalls  for  straw  hats,  for  carved  wood,  for  food, 
sweetmeats,  savoury  dishes,  clothes,  pipes,  artificial  flowers,  caged 
birds,  live  pigeons,  precious  snuff-bottles  with  pattern  cut  out  in 
high  relief,  beads  for  rosaries  or  necklaces,  men's  shoes  and  women's 
shoes,  fans,  spoons,  and  teapots.  I  bought  several  fascinating  curio 
stands  in  many  compartments,  made  of  pear-wood,  stained  black, 
and  carved  to  resemble  knotted  bamboo  ;  also  lovely  bright  scarlet 
porcelain  cups  with  pattern  of  bamboo  foliage  in  white. 

A  special  feature  of  these  fairs  is  the  multitude  of  admirably 
modelled  clay  insects  of  all  sorts — grasshoppers,  spiders,  &c,  some 
of  which  are  suspended  from  a  coiled  wire  so  as  to  tremble  with 
lifelike  movement. 

It  was  quite  a  pretty  lively  scene,  all  the  people  having  appar- 
ently put  on  their  best  clothes,  and  it  was  a  laughing,  cheery  crowd, 
and  included  a  good  many  women — very  quietly  dressed,  however. 
with  only  little  touches  of  bright  colour,  and  a  few  silken  artificial 
flowers  and  large  pins  in  their  elaborately  dressed  hair. 

From  the  fact  of  all  Tartar  women  being  large-footed,  their 
Chinese  sisters,  tottering  on  poor  deformed  feet,  are  doubly  con- 
spicuous here.  Considering  that  from  the  Tartar  Empress  and  tin- 
ladies  of  the  Court,  down  to  the  lowliest  attendant,  every  woman 
in  the  Imperial  Palace  rejoices  in  uncramped  feet,  one  might  sup- 
pose that  this  example  would  influence  their  Chinese  sisters  ;  but 
here,  where  each  class  adheres  rigidly  to  its  own  customs,  such 
changes  are  not  effected  by  example. 

Seeing,  however,  how,  at  the  bidding  of  the  Conqueror,  this 
whole  race  adopted  the  troublesome  fashion  of  shaving  tin-  brow 


454  A   GLIMPSE   OF    THE    FORBIDDEN    CITY. 

and  wearing  a  long  plait  as  a  distinguishing  mark  of  servitude,  it 
would  seem  probable  tbat  were  the  Emperor  to  issue  an  Imperial 
mandate  to  protect  girls  from  this  torture,  it  would  be  obeyed. 
For  the  sake  of  the  women  of  China,  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  the 
advancing  tide  of  enlarged  ideas  which  is  already  rippling  even 
around  the  Imperial  Palace,  may  ere  long  induce  the  present 
Emperor  to  try  whether  he  can  effect  this  domestic  revolution. 
Unfortunately,  however,  so  far  as  foreign  influence  is  concerned, 
observant  Chinamen  are  too  much  amazed  at  the  folly  of  the  bar- 
barian women  who  compress  their  waists  and  vitals,  to  learn  from 
them  in  this  less  important  detail. 

We  have  still  to  do  another  expedition  to-night  in  the  awful 
carts  !  (don't  you  wonder  how  our  bones  contrive  to  hang  together  ?) 
"We  have  to  attend  a  farewell  reception  in  honour  of  the  U.  S. 
Grants  at  the  "  Ta-Mei-Kwo-foo,"  or  "  Great  American  Country  " 
Palace,  "  Mei  "  being  the  nearest  approach  to  America  which  the 
Chinese  tongue  can  manage.  The  said  Legation  is  at  present  en- 
livened by  a  considerable  number  of  U.S.  naval  officers  from  the 
Assuelot  and  the  Richmond.  The  former  is  the  vessel  in  which 
General  Grant  has  actually  travelled.  The  latter,  which  is  the 
flag-ship  which  was  fitted  up  in  magnificent  style  to  take  him  round 
the  world  on  his  grand  tour,  was  not  quite  ready  to  start,  so  was 
ordered  to  follow  and  catch  him  up.  It  has  fulfilled  the  first  half 
of  its  instructions  to  perfection,  for  it  has  followed  him  round 
three-fourths  of  the  world,  and  has  now  only  caught  him  up  in 
time  to  take  him  to  Japan ! ! 1 

1  To  Japan  only !  From  thence  we  happened  to  he  fellow-travellers  to  San 
Francisco  on  board  the  huge  City  of  Tokio.  Vide  '  Fire-Fountains.'  By  C. 
F.  Gordon  Camming.     Blackwood  &  Sons. 


A    BIRDS-EYE    VIEW    OF    PEKING.  455 

CHAPTER   XXXVII. 

PEKING    SEEX    FROM    THE    WALLS. 

View  from  the  city  walls — The  Emperor's  hunting-grounds — How  street-  are 
watered — Peking  dust  —  Broad  streets  and  rag-fairs  —  Sketch  from  the 
Hata-mun — "Winter  and  summer — Fuel — Street  restaurants — Oyster-shell 
windows  —  North  Chinamen  more  ruddy  than  Southerners  —  Popular 
temples — Odd  offerings — An  evening  walk  in  the  city. 

June  lOtlt. 

There  is  just  one  way  by  which  to  obtain  quite  an  illusive  im- 
pression of  Peking — namely,  by  looking  down  on  the  city  from  its 
majestic  walls.  Then  all  the  squalor,  and  dirt,  and  dust  which  are 
so  painfully  prominent  at  all  other  times  seem  to  disappear,  and,  as 
if  by  magic,  you  find  yourself  overlooking  rich  bowers  of  greenery, 
tree-tops  innumerable,  from  which  here  and  there  rise  quaint  orna- 
mental roofs  of  temples,  or  mandarins'  houses,  with  roofs  of  har- 
monious grey  tiles,  or  of  bright  glazed  porcelain,  which  gleams  in 
the  sunlight.  Then  you  realise  how  many  cool  pleasant  homes 
wealthy  citizens  contrive  to  reserve  in  the  midst  of  these  dingy, 
grey,  densely  crowded  streets,  of  which  you  only  catch  a  glimpse 
here  and  there,  just  enough  to  give  a  suggestion  of  life  to  the  whole 
scene. 

Such  a  glimpse  I  first  obtained  one  morning  at  early  dawn,  ere 
the  dust-clouds  had  begun  to  rise  with  the  day's  busy  traffic,  and 
the  peaceful  beauty  of  the  scene  struck  me  the  more  forcibly  from 
the  contrast  betwixt  the  bird's-eye  view  and  the  reality  when  seen 
on  the  level.  In  truth,  when  standing  on  the  south  wall  which 
divides  the  Tartar  city  from  the  Chinese,  it  is  scarcely  possible  to 
realise  that  one  is  looking  down  on  the  dwellings  of  about  1,300,000 
human  beings  !  Of  these,  900,000  inhabit  the  Tartar  city,  which. 
seen  from  the  walls,  is  apparently  a  beautiftd  park,  richly  wooded, 
and  now  clothed  in  its  densest  midsummer  foliage.  Only  from 
certain  points  do  you  catch  even  a  glimpse  of  a  broad  dusty  street. 
And  yet  so  effectually  do  high  walls  enclose  these  many  shady 
gardens,  that  an  enormous  majority  of  the  toiling  crowd  never  see  q 
tree — probably  scarcely  know  that  such  exist,  as  the  people  never 
dream  of  coming  on  to  the  walls,  from  which  alone  these  are 
visible. 

Looking  over  the  wall  on  the  other  side  into  the  Chinese  city 
is  certainly  more  suggestive  of  human  beings,  as  there  are  Eewei 


456  PEKING    SEEN    FROM    THE    WALLS. 

trees, — for  here  the  luxurious  folk  who  dwell  in  palaces  with  shady 
courts  are  all  Tartars,  whereas  the  Chinese  are  the  working-bees, 
and  their  poor  mud-huts  are  densely  packed  all  along  the  Grain- 
Tribute  Canal,  which  here  approaches  from  Tung-Chow,  and  is  led 
quite  round  the  square  of  the  Tartar  city,  and  almost  quite  round 
the  Chinese  city.  Happily,  from  this  height  one  does  not  discern 
the  unutterable  filth  of  its  stagnant  waters  !  But  in  the  distance 
the  houses  again  lose  themselves  in  tree-tops,  for  we  are  looking 
towards  the  great  parks  of  the  Temples  of  Agriculture  and  of 
Heaven,  and  the  lovely  blue  porcelain  roofs  of  the  latter  are  plainly 
visible. 

Beyond  these  again,  to  the  south  of  the  City  "Wall,  stretches  a 
vast  enclosure  called  the  Hai-tsz,  or  "  Great  Sea-like  Plain,"  which 
is  the  Emperor's  private  hunting-grounds,  enclosed  by  a  high  brick 
wall,  forty  miles  in  circumference.  Although  emphatically  a  deer- 
forest,  it  can  certainly  not  be  accused  of  depopulating  the  country, 
as  no  less  than  sixteen  hundred  men  are  said  to  be  employed  in 
connection  with  this  place ! 

Like  everything  else  in  China,  an  Imperial  hunt  is  (or  was) 
conducted  in  most  ceremonious  style,  the  Emperor  being  preceded 
by  a  procession  of  twenty-four  great  State  umbrellas,  which  must 
have  proved  highly  conducive  to  sport !  But  the  most  popular 
form  of  sport  is  hawking  with  carefully-trained  falcons,  and  per- 
haps they  do  not  object  to  all  the  umbrellas !  Hawking  of  a  mild 
sort  seems  greatly  in  favour  with  the  citizens  of  Peking,  who  go 
into  the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  the  city  with  a  hooded  hawk 
sitting  on  their  left  wrist.  To  one  foot  of  the  hawk  is  attached  a 
light  string  about  seventy  feet  long,  which  is  wound  on  a  wooden 
roller.  This  unrolls  as  the  bird  darts  in  pursuit  of  his  quarry,  and 
so  limits  his  flight,  and  enables  the  owner  to  recapture  the  hawk 
should  it  fail  to  strike  at  once.  There  are  none  of  the  beautiful 
flights  which  give  such  fascination  to  the  sport  in  Europe. 

Now  turning  to  the  opposite  direction,  and  looking  into  the 
Tartar  city  from  this  elevation  of  about  fifty  feet,  the  brilliant 
yellow-tiled  roofs  of  the  Imperial  Palace  are  most  conspicuous  and 
very  beautiful,  as  they  rise  above  the  masses  of  dark -green  foliage. 
A  considerable  number  of  ornamental  buildings,  all  yellow-roofed 
and  gleaming  like  burnished  gold,  are  scattered  in  every  direction 
through  the  Imperial  pleasure-grounds,  and  with  the  aid  of  good 
opera-glasses  one  can  distinguish  details  very  fairly,  but  of  course 
when  winter  has  stripped  the  trees,  the  view  must  be  far  more 
distinct. 


THE   WALLS    OF   THE    TWO    CITIES.  457 

The  green-tiled  roofs  of  the  British  Emhassy  are  also  conspicuous, 
and  some  important  grey  roofs  also  tower  above  the  trees,  and  far 
away  on  the  horizon  lie  a  range  of  distant  hills  on  whose  Blopee 
nestle  beautifully  situated  temples  and  monasteries,  some  of  which 
mercifully  open  their  doors  to  foreigners,  and  allow  them  to  rent 
summer  quarters  in  a  cooler  region  than  this. 

Of  course,  as  you  travel  right  round  the  walls,  the  view  changes 
considerably,  one  lot  of  roofs  giving  place  to  another,  so  that  you 
obtain  a  bird's-eye  view  of  the  situation  of  most  of  the  points  of 
interest  in  the  city.  It  would,  however,  take  a  really  good  walker 
to  go  the  whole  round  of  the  walls,  as  the  Tartar  city  forms  a 
square  four  miles  in  every  direction,  adjoining  the  Chinese  city, 
which  is  an  oblong,  thirteen  miles  in  circumference.  It  does  not, 
however,  follow  that  there  are  twenty-nine  miles  of  outer  wall,  as 
three  mUes  and  a  half  of  the  south  Tartar  wall  does  double  duty. 
(Is  it  not  a  strange  turning  of  the  tables  to  think  how  of  old  tin- 
Chinese  built  their  Great  Wall  to  shut  out  the  Tartars,  and  now 
the  Tartar  city  wall  excludes  the  Chinese  from  their  own  capital !) 

My  morning  walk  on  these  quiet  lonely  walls  had  been  so 
thoroughly  enjoyable  (a  very  exceptional  sensation  in  Peking),  that 
I  induced  Dr  Edkins  to  accompany  me  there  this  afternoon.  We 
gained  access  to  the  wall  by  a  little  wicket-gate  beside  the  Hata- 
mun,  which  is  the  great  casemated  gateway  at  the  end  of  the  broad 
street  which  runs  north  and  south  right  across  the  city,  passing 
close  to  this  Mission.     [Mun  means  gate.) 

Happily  the  soldier  on  guard  at  this  gate  had  not  received  any 
of  those  inconvenient  oft-changing  orders,  which  have  already  BO 
ascrravated  us  at  several  turns,  so  we  were  not  molested,  and  as- 
cending  by  an  inclined  plane,  found  ourselves  at  the  base  of  the 
huge  keep,  one  of  the  many  watch-towers  which  give  such  peculiar 
character  to  this  gigantic  wall — a  wall  which  is  about  50  feel 
wide  on  the  summit,  and  measures  88  feet  in  thickness  at  the 
base.  This  width,  however,  is  not  uniform,  the  western  wall  not 
exceeding  30  feet  on  the  summit.  Then  there  is  the  additional 
width  of  the  inner  and  outer  parapet  wall — the  latter  is  6  feel 
high. 

Imposing  as  these  castellated  walls  and  towers  appeal  when  Been 
through  the  dust-clouds,  a  closer  inspection  proves  thai  they  are 
not  built  of  stone,  but  of  large  grey  bricks  (about  20  inchea  in 
length  by  9  in  Avidth) — so  that,  after  all,  these  enormous  bastions 
are  just  the  universal  dust  in  a  baked  form  ! 

Although  for  once  we  had  reached  a  level  somewhat  above  its 


458  PEKING   SEEN    FROM    THE   WALLS. 

hateful  influence,  we  none  the  less  beheld  this  curse  of  Peking  in 
full  action,  for  while  from  the  outer  face  of  the  wall  we  looked 
clown  on  the  desert  of  dust  stretching  on  each  side  of  the  broad 
highway,  where  long  caravans  of  heavily  laden  Mongolian  camels 
trudged  to  and  fro,  or  crouched  beneath  the  shadow  of  the  walls, 
we  had  but  to  take  up  a  position  above  the  great  gateway,  in  order 
to  look  straight  up  the  broad  busy  street,  where  all  day  long  crowds 
of  men  and  beasts  had  been  stirring  up  stifling  dust-clouds  as  they 
hurried  to  and  fro  beneath  the  blazing  sun. 

Only  when  thus  seen  from  above,  is  the  actual  width  of  this  or 
any  other  main  street  of  Peking  visible.  The  street  is  really  about 
ninety  feet  wide,  and  right  down  the  centre  runs  a  slightly  raised 
causeway,  which  is  the  Imperial  highway,  all  of  which  sounds  as 
if  it  should  be  handsome,  but  this  is  by  no  means  the  fact.  The 
houses  on  either  side  are  mean-looking  one-storeyed  brick  build- 
ings, and  though  some  have  handsomely  carved  and  much-gilded 
wooden  fronts,  even  these  are  so  begrimed  with  the  mud  of  many 
winters  and  the  dust  of  many  summers,  that  they  do  little  to  enliven 
the  general  dreariness,  unless  you  are  close  to  them. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  great  width  of  the  streets  defeats  its 
own  object ;  for  the  people,  nowise  appreciating  such  magnificent 
distances,  establish  rows  of  locomotive  shops  and  booths  on  each 
side  of  the  central  causeway,  while  another  row  of  similarly  tem- 
porary booths  is  erected  facing  the  permanent  shops.  Consequently 
no  one  on  the  street  ever  sees  more  than  one  side  of  it  at  a  time. 

The  true  street  has  a  moderately  ornamental  wooden  frontage, 
and  a  close  inspection  shows  some  of  the  shops  to  be  really  highly 
decorated  with  very  elaborate  designs ;  but  though,  as  I  have  said, 
these  were  once  resplendent  with  gold  and  scarlet,  they  are  now  so 
dingy  and  dirty  as  scarcely  to  look  out  of  keeping  with  the  rag-fair 
opposite.  The  fact  is,  that  in  so  variable  a  climate  as  this,  all  gold 
quickly  tarnishes  and  wears  away,  and  it  is  rarely  renewed.  From 
these  carved  fronts  project  gigantic  poles  with  dangling  signs  repre- 
senting the  trade  of  the  owner,  and  gilded  dragons  uphold  very 
varied  sign-boards.  Of  course,  the  shops  are  all  entirely  open  to 
the  street,  glass  windoAVS  being  unknown  luxuries. 

Most  of  the  temporary  booths  are  just  a  framework  covered 
with  matting,  in  which  are  sold  all  manner  of  articles — ready-made 
clothes,  candles,  books,  fans,  but  especially  food  of  all  sorts,  and 
birds  in  cages.  On  the  ■whole  these  extemporised  side-streets  are 
rather  suggestive  of  Seven  Dials,  with  this  difference,  that  during 
this  very  hot  weather  a  large  proportion  of  the  usually  much- 


THE    INEVITABLE    FAX  !  459 

clothed  Chinese  population  wear  only  a  short  pair  of  trousers 
upheld  by  a  cloth  twisted  round  the  waist,  and  go  about  bare- 
shouldered  and  bare-headed,  their  polished  skulls  gleaming  in  tin- 
sun,  and  their  long  plaits  tied  up  in  a  knob  at  the  bark  of  the 
neck.  Many,  however,  wear  wide  straw  hats,  and  all  without  ex- 
ception carry  a  fan.  Poverty  can  scarcely  be  so  dire  as  to  compel 
a  man  to  dispense  with  this  necessary  of  life,  which,  if  he  is  other- 
wise undressed,  is  stuck  into  his  waistband.  To  whatever  grade  a 
man  may  belong,  he  must  have  his  fan.  The  bearers  of  the  sedan- 
chair  fan  themselves  as  vigorously  as  its  occupant — men  on  horse- 
back, coolies  resting  with  their  loads,  shopkeepers  waiting  for 
custom,  all  help  to  produce  a  little  stir  in  the  hot,  still  air.  All 
this  certainly  does  not  sound  much  like  Seven  Dials,  for  though  1 
have  seen  its  inhabitants  gasping  for  air  on  stifling  summer  nights, 
the  luxury  of  the  fan  has  no  place  there!  On  the  other  hand, 
many  of  the  Mongolians  and  Tartars,  unshaven  and  wearing  fur- 
trimmed  felt  caps,  quite  carry  out  that  ideal. 

The  central  roadway  is  reserved  for  cart-traffic,  which  plies 
ceaselessly,  summer  and  winter,  on  the  paved  road.  This,  being 
never  repaired  from  one  year's  end  to  another,  is  all  in  the  same 
atrocious  condition  as  the  road  from  Tung-Chow,  and  all  others, 
both  within  and  without  the  city. 

But  occasionally  it  is  announced  that  on  a  given  day  tin-  Em- 
peror will  come  forth  from  his  seclusion  and  pass  along  certain 
streets.  Then  the  whole  of  the  extemporised  shops  disappear  as  if 
by  magic.  A  squad  of  men  are  put  on — not  really  to  repair  tin- 
road,  but  just  to  shovel  all  the  dust  into  the  holes  and  ruts,  till  tin- 
whole  is  perfectly  level,  so  as  to  allow  of  one  procession  passing 
over  it  without  a  jolt  (and  till  it  has  passed,  not  a  foot  is  permitted 
to  tread  the  Imperial  carriage-road).  Then  every  shop  along  the 
streets  thus  honoured  is  closed,  and  all  access  from  side-streets  is 
carefully  barricaded.  Sometimes  even  a  high  screen  of  yellow 
cloth  is  fastened  on  poles  all  along  the  road  on  each  side,  Leal  any 
rash  subject  should  venture  to  look  upon  the  "  Son  of  Heaven," 
who  is  thus  deprived  of  the  interest  of  even  seeing  his  own  people 
in  his  own  streets. 

After  a  general  survey  of  the  surroundings,  I  took  up  a  very 
commanding  position  in  an  embrasure  at  one  of  the  projecting 
angles  of  the  wall,  from  which  I  obtained  a  capital  view  of  "in-  of 
the  principal  bastions,  and  four  of  tie-  greal  watch-towers  over- 
looking the  outer  and  inner  cut  ranee  to  the  Ha-ta-mun.  Such 
strange,  picturesque  buildings,  with  several  tiers  of  tiled  roof,  ami 


4G0  PEKING   SEEN    FROM    THE   WALLS. 

what  appear  like  four  storeys  of  square  windows,  which  really  are 
ports  for  cannon,  but  these  are  concealed  by  movable  doors,  on 
which  are  painted  black  and  red  circles  to  represent  the  muzzles  of 
big  guns.  From  this  point  one  gets  a  really  grand  impression  of 
the  walls  and  towers,  with  the  camels'  camping-ground  below,  and 
the  heavily  laden  carts  and  shouting  coolies,  and  occasional  pro- 
cessions appearing  and  disappearing  into  the  tunnel-like  archway  at 
the  base  of  the  great  wall,  which  is  the  outer  gateway. 

The  embrasure  into  which  I  had  to  squeeze  in  order  to  secure 
my  sketch  was  so  narrow  that  it  really  was  working  under  diffi- 
culties, so  I  had  to  be  satisfied  with  a  very  careful  drawing  and  but 
little  colour — in  truth,  but  for  the  relief  of  a  hazy  blue  sky,  a  few 
trees,  and  the  bright  green  tiles  edging  the  brown  roof,  the  only 
colouring  consisted  in  varieties  of  dust-tint,  with  a  sort  of  general 
mystery  derived  from  dust-clouds,  gilded  by  the  rays  of  the  setting 
sun. 

You  will  think  I  tell  you  enough  and  to  spare  concerning  Peking 
dust — but  no  wonder  ! !  Only  be  thankful  you  have  not  to  inhale 
it  by  throat  and  nostril — to  find  your  hair  and  clothes  all  powdered 
with  it !  For  it  is  no  ordinary  dust  to  be  classified  as  clean  dirt ! 
very  much  the  reverse — it  is  the  sun-dried  pulverised  filth  of  the 
whole  city,  which  day  by  day,  as  the  centuries  roll  on,  becomes 
more  and  more  unclean,  and  is  never  purified.  It  is  not  a  nice 
subject  to  touch,  but  I  cannot  give  an  adequate  idea  of  this  capital 
of  the  North  without  just  saying  that,  as  there  is  no  provision  for 
household  sewerage,  the  open  streets  are  the  receptacles  for  the  most 
horrible  filth,  and  scavengers  go  round  the  town  with  buckets  on 
their  shoulders,  carrying  small  shovels  with  which  to  collect  manure 
for  their  fields. 

I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  the  city  is  without  drainage — on  the 
contrary,  there  is  a  very  elaborate  and  complete  system  of  under- 
ground drains,  built  of  large  bricks,  and  covered  with  large  stone 
slabs.  These  are  opened  and  cleared  every  spring,  after  the  winter 
frosts  break  up,  and  before  the  violent  summer  rains  are  due,  other- 
wise the  city  would  be  flooded — and  when  once  they  are  opened, 
they  are  allowed  so  to  remain  for  weeks,  forming  a  very  unnecessary 
addition  to  the  dangers  of  locomotion  in  the  streets. 

As  the  municipal  system  of  watering  the  streets  is  on  an  exceed- 
ingly limited  scale  (namely,  the  few  buckets  of  drain-water  brought 
by  the  road-police  to  water  the  main  thoroughfare),  each  house- 
holder supplements  their  work  by  watering  that  section  which  is 
before  his  own  door  every  evening  at  sunset.     But  water  is  not  a 


WATERING    THE    STREETS.  4G1 

free  birthright  of  the  citizens  of  Peking;  for  though  the  supply, 
such  as  it  is,  is  abundant  (though  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  city  it 
is  so  brackish  that  all  who  can  afford  such  luxury  have  a  daily 
supply  of  drinking-water  brought  by  carts  from  distant  wells), 
of  the  shops  and  small  houses  are  without  any,  and  must  purchase 
what  they  require  from  water-carriers,  at  the  rate  of  about  two 
(i.e.,  about  a  farthing)  per  bucket. 

It  is  therefore  evident  that  clean  water  is  far  too  precious  to  be 
thus  wasted,  so  a  truly  dirty  economy  is  practised,  and  at  the 
moment  of  sunset  all  the  slops  are  brought  out  from  every  house 
in  buckets,  and  are  sprinkled  over  the  highway  with  long  ladles, 
If  there  is  any  stagnant  sewer,  drain,  or  pond  within  reach,  no 
matter  how  foul  its  waters,  a  few  extra  buckets  are  drawn  from 
thence,  and  the  happy  population,  who  seem  totally  devoid  of  all 
sense  of  smell,  rejoice  in  the  sudden  cessation  of  the  Buffocating 
dust.  But  in  truth  there  is  little  to  choose  between  the  two  evils, 
for  the  appalling  odours  which  pervade  the  whole  city  during  this 
process  are  not  only  sickening  at  the  time,  but  suggest  only  too 
vividly  the  nature  of  the  dust  which,  under  the  morrow's  sun,  we 
shall  again  be  compelled  to  incorporate  !  Talk  of  eating  a  pick  of 
dirt !  those  luckless  Europeans  whose  lot  is  cast  in  Peking  must 
get  a  good  deal  more  than  their  share,  for,  happily,  never  have  I 
seen  any  other  city  whose  filth  and  foul  smells  ecpualled  those  of 
this  great  capital. 

The  miracle  is  to  see  how  these  people  thrive  on  the  poisonous 
atmosphere  which  they  must  for  ever  inhale,  and  which  makes  us 
positively  sick.  In  the  narrowest,  most  crowded  streets,  where 
the  air  is  most  pestilential,  these  people  look  just  as  fat  and  healthy 
as  in  the  open  country,  even  where  there  are  foul  open  drains 
under  their  windows.  They  are  at  least  spared  the  danger  of 
subtle  dram-poison,  for  their  ugly  Giant  Stink  stalks  unrebuked  in 
open  day.  And  yet,  though  these  people  have  been  inured  to  this 
condition  of  things  since  the  hour  of  their  birth,  and  therefore  do 
not  appear  conscious  of  it,  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  prevalence  of 
sore  eyes  and  disgusting  skin-diseases,  to  say  nothing  of  smallpox 
and  typhoid  epidemics,  must  be  greatly  due  to  the  general  dirt  and 
all  the  foul  smells  which  pervade  every  corner. 

(Speaking  of  smallpox,  I  think  that   oriental  phraseology  may 
be  said  to  have  reached  its  highest  capabilities  in  the  select  ion  of  four 
characters  which  are  inscribed  on  a  board  and  hung  outside  of  every 
house  in  which  there  is  a  virulent  cast;  of  this  loathsome  dis 
"  First-class  heaven-flowers"  is  the  euphonious  description  given  '.) 


4G2  PEKING    SEEN    FROM    THE    WALLS. 

Of  course  the  dirt  which  is  so  apparent  in  the  streets  reigns 
rampant  in  the  houses,  the  habits  of  the  people  being  intrinsically 
unclean.  At  meals  they  throw  bones  and  scraps  of  food  on  the 
floor,  and  spill  grease,  but  never  dream  of  sweeping  out  the  room, 
except  perhaps  just  the  middle,  while  the  accumulated  filth  finds 
safe  ipiarters  in  the  corners  and  under  the  furniture.  Even  in  the 
houses  of  the  rich,  the  annual  cleaning  is  limited  to  rubbing  up 
dingy  furniture  and  pasting  clean  paper  over  dirty  windows.  Then 
all  through  the  long  winter,  personal  washing  is  limited  to  rubbing 
the  face  and  neck  with  a  flannel  wrung  out  in  hot  water,  but  as  to 
clothes,  they  are  never  changed  day  or  night.  A  succession  of 
thick  wadded  garments  are  heaped  on  one  above  the  other  as  the 
weather  grows  colder,  and  they  are  cast  off  one  by  one  with  the 
return  of  spring. 

The  thought  of  that  winter  is  to  me  one  of  the  strangest  prob- 
lems of  Peking.  To  see  it  now  sweltering  in  this  overpowering 
heat,  and  yet  to  know  that  only  two  months  ago  it  was  a  frozen 
land,  effectually  isolated  from  the  rest  of  the  world  by  an  ice-bound 
river,  and  that  the  people  who  to-day  "  canna  thole  their  clothes  " 
were  then  going  about  like  locomotive  pillows  of  fur  and  wadding, 
carrying  tiny  brass  stoves  folded  within  their  ample  sleeves,  to  act 
as  muffs,  and  keep  their  hands  from  freezing !  I  have  seen  these 
for  sale  in  the  shops,  but  in  this  broiling  heat  it  seems  a  grievance 
even  to  light  a  fire  for  necessary  cooking ! 

And  then  to  think  of  the  melting  snows  and  the  flooded  sewers, 
when,  in  place  of  dust,  the  streets  are  a  sea  of  black  fetid  slime, 
and  filthy  beggars  drive  a  thriving  trade  by  carrying  their  richer 
neighbours  on  their  backs  across  the  pools  which  accumulate 
wherever  a  subterranean  drain  is  choked  ! 

And  yet  the  residents  here  find  compensation  in  the  pleasant, 
though  too  short,  spring  and  autumn,  when  they  escape  to  the 
hills,  and  even  in  winter  a  skater  finds  consolation  on  the  frozen 
canals.  I  am  told  that  although  the  long  frosts  are  so  severe,  the 
snowfall  is  comparatively  moderate,  and  only  occurs  in  December 
and  January.  This  is  the  only  Heaven-sent  moisture  which  lays 
the  dust  during  the  nine  months  from  October  to  June  inclusive. 
All  the  rain  of  the  year  falls  in  July,  August,  and  September. 

Being  on  the  inside  of  the  huge  Gateway,  and  therefore  in  no 
danger  of  being  locked  out  at  sunset,  we  were  able  to  remain  on 
the  walls  till  the  street-watering  was  over,  and  so  gained  impres- 
sions of  evening  street-life  as  we  walked  home  in  the  twilight.  Of 
these,  the  most  curious  were  the  second-hand  clothes  auctions  at 


"PUNCH    AND    JUDY."  463 

the  open  booths,  where  the  stallmen  were  rapidly  taming  over 
their  wares,  and  shouting  out  their  price  at  the  top  of  their  voices 
— such  a  gabble  !  But  noise  and  din  and  incessant  chatter  are 
marked  features  of  all  street-life  here — every  one  volunteers  his 
opinion  as  to  whatever  business  his  neighbour  has  on  hand,  and  tin- 
voices  of  the  crowd  are  neither  sweet,  gentle,  nor  low  !  Very  much 
the  contrary,  especially  when,  as  is  usually  the  case,  their  loud 
shrill  wrangling  has  reference  to  some  infinitesimal  sum  of  money; 
for  here,  just  as  in  India,  a  squabble  over  a  few  farthings  seems  a 
source  of  positive  enjoyment ! 

Then  there  is  the  incessant  din  of  street-cries,  while,  as  a  deep 
bass  to  these,  comes  the  grunting  chorus  of  the  coolies  who,  in  the 
middle  road,  are  urging  on  their  heavily  laden  carts,  and  the  lighter 
rattle  of  a  never-ceasing  stream  of  the  terrible  springless  carts 
which  take  the  place  of  cabs  and  carriages  for  great  mandarins  as 
for  humbler  folk;  the  very  highest  nobles,  however,  prefer  tic- 
slower  dignity  of  sedan-chairs.  Eiders  on  mules  and  donkeys  go 
jingling  along  to  the  music  of  their  own  bells.  Clearer  and  most 
melodious  is  the  tinkling  of  the  square  bell  which  hangs  from  tin- 
neck  of  the  last  camel  in  those  long  files  which  now  and  again 
move  slowly  up  the  street,  with  soft  silent  tread  and  gliding  move- 
ment. Some  are  laden  with  tea,  others  bring  fuel  for  the  city — a 
compound  of  clay  and  coal-dust  made  up  into  halls,  which,  being 
burnt  in  common  portable  stoves  made  of  clay,  iron,  or  brass,  give 
out  much  heat.  (Would  not  these  be  a  comfort  in  our  own  homes 
when  the  dull  light  of  wintry  days  makes  us  draw  close  to  the 
window  while  craving  for  the  fire-heat  which  so  uselessly  escapes 
up  the  chimney?) 

But,  strange  to  say,  though  there  are  vast  seams  of  coal  in  the 
mountains,  within  fifty  miles  of  Peking,  it  is  so  expensive  here, 
on  account  of  the  carriage  on  camel  or  donkey  back,  that  it  is 
almost  cheaper  to  burn  coal  brought  from  England,  Australia,  or 
Japan  ! l 

As  we  slowly  made  our  way  along  the  crowded  street,  we  noticed 
various  amusing  incidents.  At  one  place  we  passed  some  mounte- 
banks whose  buffoonery  called  forth  loud  laughter;  at  another,  a 
denser  crowd  tempted  us  to  press  forward  to  see  the  object  of 
special  interest,  and  lo !  it  was  a  Chinese  "Punch  and  Judy,  of 
much  the  same  character  as  our  own.     Erom  one  street-hawker  1 

1  Thanks  to  the  progressive  energy  of  Li-Hung-Chang,  the  coal-mines  a1  Kaiping 
an-  now  in  full  working  order,  and  their  produce  ia  conveyed  by  rail  to  Tien-tain, 
whence  it  can  be  cheaply  carried  to  Peking  by  water. 


464  PEKING    SEEN    FROM    THE    WALLS. 

bought  a  number  of  fans  for  some  incredibly  small  sum — not  for 
their  beauty,  but  for  their  oddity,  some  having  printed  maps  of 
Peking,  to  me  incomprehensible,  and  other  most  intricate  illus- 
trations of  ancient  Tartar  history,  without  any  colour  —  simply 
designs. 

But  at  this  hour  the  open-air  cook-shops  plied  the  busiest  trade. 
Some  are  shaded  by  huge  umbrellas,  beneath  which  are  spread  the 
dressed  dishes,  to  which  a  thick  sprinkling  of  dust  does  duty  in 
lieu  of  pepper.  There  are  street-ovens  wherein  all  manner  of  pies 
are  baked — strange  compounds  of  unknown  animal  and  vegetable 
substances,  which  nevertheless  really  smell  rather  inviting,  —  at 
least,  they  would  do  so  were  it  not  for  the  ever-present,  all- 
pervading  fumes  of  tobacco  and  opium,  the  one  coarse,  the  other 
faint  and  sickly.  These,  mingling  with  all  the  other  smells,  do 
not  produce  an  appetising  atmosphere  ! 

Bean  -  pudding  in  a  crust  of  mashed  potatoes,  fried  in  oil, 
seemed  to  be  in  great  demand,  as  also  little  pies  of  vegetables, 
and  nicely  boiled  sweet-potatoes.  We  watched  the  owner  of  a 
portable  oven  dispensing  these  to  a  hungry  circle,  on  receipt  of 
some  absurdly  small  coin,  while  many  other  men  supplied  them 
with  hot  tea.  Various  preparations  of  Indian-corn  flour  were  also 
in  favour,  especially  when  baked  in  the  form  of  tarts,  with  a  little 
dab  of  treacle ;  there  was  also  an  enormous  consumption  of  cakes 
of  ground  millet,  and  of  flour  cakes  sprinkled  with  scorched 
sesamum  seed.  Instead  of  the  invariable  rice  of  the  Southern 
provinces,  wheat,  flour,  and  maize  are  largely  used ;  also  sorghum, 
a  grain  which  grows  to  a  height  of  ten  feet.  As  to  what  we 
understand  by  bread,  it  does  not  exist,  the  substitute  being  heavy 
dumplings  of  flour,  which  are  steamed  instead  of  being  baked. 
They  are  not  bad,  however,  when  toasted. 

But  the  favourite  food  here  is  a  cake  made  of  bean  curd. 
Common  small  beans  are  ground  between  two  granite  millstones 
like  a  hand-quern.  As  the  upper  stone  is  turned,  water  is  poured 
on,  and  a  creamy  white  fluid  oozes  out,  which  flows  into  a  tub, 
and  is  boiled  with  salt.  The  froth  is  skimmed  off,  and  the  curd 
is  tied  up  in  a  cloth,  put  under  pressure,  and  so  formed  into  square 
cakes,  which  really  taste  rather  like  our  own  curds.  They  are 
generally,  however,  fried  in  oil,  or  else  eaten  with  soy,  which  is  a 
sauce  obtained  from  the  same  bean  when  fermented.  There  is 
also  an  immense  consumption  of  macaroni,  which  is  made  by 
kneading  a  thick  dough  of  wheat-flour,  rolling  it  into  very  thin 
stiff  sheets,  and  cutting  these  into  narrow   strips,   which,  when 


PULSE   BEANS.  465 

boiled,  do  look  rather  like  macaroni.  This  is  eaten  hot  with 
chillies,  and  you  see  men  swallowing  yards  of  it,  very  much  like 
the  Neapolitan  beggars,  except  that  these  use  chop-sticks  instead 
of  fingers. 

Some  of  these  street-stalls  drive  a  roaring  trade  in  this  hot 
weather  by  the  sale  of  various  iced  drinks,  those  most  in  favour 
being  slightly  acidulated.  A  good  drink  costs  about  one  farthing, 
which  is  certainly  not  extravagant !  The  seller  invites  custom  by 
clanging  together  two  brass  saucers,  which  sound  like  castanets. 
Such  an  abundant  supply  of  ice  in  summer  is  at  least  one  point  of 
consolation  for  so  variable  a  climate  as  this. 

Every  now  and  again,  among  the  curious  vehicles  dragged  noisily 
along  the  street,  came  a  gigantic  wheelbarrow,  laden  with  wicker 
oil-jars.  It  seems  that  the  manufacture  of  oil  from  the  yellow  and 
white  pulse  bean  is  one  of  the  great  industries  of  Northern  China, 
and  thousands  of  junks  are  annually  employed  in  transporting  the 
oil  and  bean-cake  to  the  Southern  provinces.  The  beans  are  first 
crushed  in  oil-mills,  whose  revolving  stone  wheels  are  turned  by 
bullocks.  Some  mills  are  so  large  as  to  employ  about  sixty  bullocks. 
The  beans  are  then  steamed,  and  when  very  hot  are  (by  a  some- 
what elaborate  process)  subjected  to  great  pressure,  whereby  the 
oil  is  expressed.  It  is  hltered  through  a  cloth,  and  is  then  gene- 
rally poured  into  large  jar-shaped  baskets,  each  made  to  contain 
a  hundred  pounds  of  oil.  They  are  lined  with  tough  paper,  which 
is  glued  to  the  wicker-work  by  a  strong  varnish,  and  is  quite  oil- 
proof.  The  narrow  mouth  of  the  jar  is  then  covered  with  the 
same  varnish-paper,  and  no  further  packing  is  required  even  for  a 
sea  voyage.  The  oil,  which  is  clear  and  pale,  is  used  both  for 
lamps  and  for  cooking  purposes. 

The  bean-cake  which  remains  after  the  oil  has  been  expri 
is  used  as  manure  for  the  land,  but  is  never  given  to  cattle,  who. 
however,  are  largely  fed  on  the  bean  itself.  As  the  aforesaid  very 
popular  pulse  curd  and  soy  sauce  are  both  prepared  from  the  Bame 
bean,  it  must  be  allowed  that  it  holds  an  important  place  among 
the  vegetable  products  of  the  land. 

One  thing  that  certainly  impresses  one  in  going  through  a 
Peking  crowd,  is  the  fact  that  these  Northerners  are  a  very  much 
finer  and  more  stalwart  race  than  the  delicate-looking  pale  men  of 
the  South.  The  average  height  is  greater,  and  they  appear  stl 
and  more  healthy.  Instead  of  the  invariable  transparent  com- 
plexions, I  here  see  ruddy  faces  which  would  not  discredit  - 
men  on  Highland  moors.    I  am  told  that  this  difference  is  partly  due 

2  G 


466  PEKING    SEEN    FROM    THE    WALLS. 

to  climate,  South  China  being  almost  tropical,  whereas  here,  how- 
ever gnat  may  be  the  summer  heat,  there  is  always  the  reaction 
of  a  bitterly  severe  winter  with  a  thermometer  frequently  below 
zero,  which,  however  unpleasant,  doubtless  braces  up  life's  energies. 
There  is  also  a  marked  difference  in  the  feeding  of  Northerners 
and  Southerners,  rice,  fish,  and  very  weak  tea  forming  the  staple 
diet  of  the  masses  in  the  South,  while  those  farther  North  subsist 
on  more  nutritious  grains,  more  generous  drink,  and  a  much  more 
liberal  proportion  of  animal  food. 

Saturday,  liih. 

This  afternoon  Dr  Edkins  took  me  to  see  some  of  the  popular 
temples  in  the  neighbourhood.  First  we  went  to  that  of  the  God 
of  Wax,  then  to  the  healer  of  sore  eyes,  whose  shrine  is  adorned 
with  countless  pairs  of  spectacles,  all  of  the  ponderous  Chinese 
type,  but  some  are  gigantic.  As  to  the  ex-voto  tablets,  they  quite 
overflow  the  premises,  and  have  to  be  stuck  all  over  the  adjoining 
buildings.  In  one  temple  reigns  a  group  of  three  goddesses,  the 
central  goddess  clasping  a  child,  and  those  on  either  side  seated  on 
golden  lotus-blossoms.  These  are  provided  with  many  arms,  from 
which  are  suspended  scores  of  artificial  eyes  which,  like  the  huge 
spectacles,  have  all  been  presented  by  grateful  patients  as  thank- 
offerings  for  the  cure  of  ophthalmia  or  other  eye-diseases. 

Some  of  the  gods  certainly  receive  very  odd  offerings.  Xen- 
chang,  the  God  of  Literature,  who  helps  students  to  acquire  classical 
knowledge,  is  supposed  to  delight  in  onions,  and  his  altars  are  so 
freely  supplied  with  bunches  of  these  unfragrant  bulbs  as  to  lead 
one  to  suspect  that  his  priests  must  have  a  private  sauce  factory ! 

Dr  Edkins  tells  me  that  at  a  temple  which  he  visited  at  "Woo- 
tai,  in  the  mountains,  he  noticed  an  image  of  the  god  Manjoosere, 
which  was  almost  hidden  by  the  multitude  of  small  silk  handker- 
chiefs presented  by  his  worshippers.  As  this  particular  god  is 
represented  in  that  one  temple  by  ten  thousand  figures,  ranged  in 
tiers  round  the  great  building  from  the  floor  to  the  ceiling,  in  the 
endeavour  to  depict  the  multitudinous  forms  which  he  assumes  in 
his  anxiety  to  do  good  to  mankind,  it  really  is  fortunate  for  his 
worshippers  that  only  one  of  these  incarnations  claims  these  silken 
offerings  ! 

Those  mountains  literally  swarm  with  the  priests  and  temples  of 
all  manner  of  gods,  as  do  also  the  nearer  hills,  which  are  within 
four  hours'  ride  of  Peking.  One  specially  fine  group  is  known  as 
the  Monastery  of  the  Azure  Clouds,  and  in  one  of  its  many  temples 


MULTITUDINOUS    GODS.  467 

are  ranged  3200  small  gilt  images,  1600  on  each  side  of  the  great 
hall !  In  another  there  are  500  colossal  gilded  figures  of  the 
Lohans. 

But  without  going  beyond  the  walls  of  Peking  there  are  such 
innumerable  temples  to  all  conceivable  gods,  demi-gods,  heroes,  and 
spirits  of  earth,  air,  fire,  and  water,  storm  and  tempest,  mountain 
and  stream,  that  even  a  list  of  them  would  become  tedious,  and 
the  multitude  of  idols  of  wood,  stone,  clay,  porcelain,  earthenware, 
copper,  bronze,  marble,  and  every  other  available  material,  simply 
takes  one's  breath  away,  especially  when  coupled  with  the  thought 
that  each  one  receives  a  sufficient  share  of  worship  and  offerings  to 
secure  tbe  support  of  temple  and  priests !  Here,  as  at  Canton,  one 
of  Buddha's  temples  is  adorned  with  no  less  than  10,000  images 
of  that  excellent  man.  They  are  ranged  on  small  brackets  all  over 
the  walls,  and  even  on  the  beams  and  pillars  of  the  roof. 

Observing  a  crowd  at  one  point,  we  drew  near  to  see  what  was 
going  on.  "We  heard  an  improvisatore  singing  an  interminable 
song  in  a  hard  shrill  voice,  now  bass,  now  falsetto ;  he  kept  his 
head  thrown  back  and  the  mouth  very  open,  and  as  he  sat  there 
fanning  himself  vigorously,  he  certainly  looked  irresistibly  comical, 
and  evidently  his  song  was  also  very  funny,  for  he  kept  his  audi- 
ence in  convulsions  of  laughter.  He  was  accompanied  by  a  musi- 
cian playing  on  a  two-stringed  guitar,  only  capable  of  producing 
three  notes,  so  that  variety  could  only  be  produced  by  the  number 
of  times  that  each  string  was  twanged. 

Amongst  the  bystanders  I  noticed  several  very  old  men  with 
brass  balls  in  their  hands,  which  they  kept  in  continual  movement. 
I  thought  at  first  that  they  must  be  practising  some  act  of  me- 
chanical devotion,  like  turning  the  Thibetan  prayer- wheels,  but  I 
learnt  that  the  object  in  view  is  to  keep  the  fingers  supple,  and 
avert  paralysis  and  the  stiffness  which  is  attributed  as  much  to 
inactivity  as  to  old  age. 

We  purposely  prolonged  our  stroll  till  darkness  closed  in,  for  I 
always  enjoy  a  nocturnal  prowl  in  any  oriental  city.  Notwith- 
standing dirt  and  bad  smells,  and  surroundings  of  squalid  misery, 
one  gets  such  picturesque  glimpses  of  dimly  lighted  interiors  and 
characteristic  life.  Here,  however,  the  lighting  is  so  dim  as  to  be 
depressing.  The  gaudy  and  attractive  Chinese  lanterns  seem  to 
belong  to  the  richer  folk  or  to  be  reserved  for  festivals,  for  in  the 
homes  of  the  poor  a  wick  floating  in  a  dirty  bowl  of  oil  alone  sheds 
its  feeble  glimmer.  This  is  varied  by  the  dingy  light  of  a  smoky 
candle  made  of  mixed  wax  and  tallow  on  a  very  thick  wick,  which 


4G8  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

requires  continual  snuffing  (with  the  fingers!)  No  candlestick  is 
used,  these  primitive  candles  being  stuck  on  a  bit  of  wood.  They 
arc  really  made  for  use  in  the  pretty  paper  lanterns. 

Every  now  and  again  the  sickly  smell  of  opium  told  us  that  we 
were  passing  one  of  the  dens  in  which  wretched  sickly-looking 
beings  were  lying,  half  naked,  on  heated  platforms  of  hard  brick, 
seeking  or  enjoying  their  dearly  bought  temporary  delirium. 


CHAPTER     XXXVIII. 

MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

The  London  Mission  Hospital — Interior  of  the  gods — Extraordinary  precau- 
tions after  amputation — Lack  of  nurses — Artificial  eyes — Government 
College — Epidemics — Sir  Harry  Parkes — Suicides — Opium  Refuge — Medi- 
cal view  of  opium-smoking  versus  tobacco — Sketch  of  the  opium-diffi- 
culties— Portuguese  opium — Suicidal  growth  of  native  opium — Chinese 
Anti-Opium  League  —  Failing  commerce  —  Nemesis  —  Opium-smoking 
introduced  in  America— And  in  the  Colonies. 

The  heat  is  so  overpowering  that  I  am  indulging  in  a  peaceful 
day  of  rest  within  the  precincts  of  this  very  interesting  group  of 
old  Chinese  buildings,  now  so  happily  adapted  to  the  Christian 
uses  of  a  Medical  Mission  and  a  comfortable  home. 

The  house  itself  must  always  have  been  that  of  a  wealthy  citi- 
zen, as  it  is  laid  out  with  stone-paved  garden  courts,  and  the 
rooms  are  decorated  with  much  ornamental  wood-carving  and  open 
lattice-work. 

But  the  interest  centres  in  the  adjoining  building,  which  was 
previously  the  Temple  of  the  God  of  Fire,  but  was  purchased  by 
Dr  Dudgeon  as  a  suitable  building  in  which  to  establish  a  hospital 
for  the  gratuitous  healing  of  all  comers.  This  truly  merciful  work 
Avas  commenced  in  Peking  by  Dr  Lockhart  (also  of  the  London 
Mission),  who  was  admitted  to  Peking  in  1861  as  Surgeon  to  the 
British  Legation,  and  very  soon  was  able  to  establish  a  hospital  in 
a  building  adjoining  the  Legation,  thus  laying  the  foundation  of  a 
Medical  Mission. 

There  he  was  joined  in  1863  by  the  Eev.  Joseph  and  Mrs 
Edkins,  ami  in  the  following  year  by  Dr  and  Mrs  Dudgeon,  to 
whom  Dr  Lockhart  made  over  the  work.     The  building  then  in 


THE    INTESTINES    OF    THE    GODS  !  4G'.» 

use  was  required  for  the  Legation,  and  as  by  this  time  the  blessings 
of  the  foreign  hospital  were  fully  appreciated,  no  objection  was 
made  to  the  deposition  of  the  Fire  God  and  of  all  the  other  images, 
which  indeed  were  sold  with  the  temple.  So  the  wooden  and 
gilded  idols  were  disposed  of  as  saleable  curiosities,  and  the  brittle 
gods  of  mud  were  most  unceremoniously  destroyed,  revealing  in 
some  cases  that  a  pitiful  fraud  had  been  practised  by  their  makers, 
or  that  some  sacrilegious  robber  had  already  ransacked  the  poor 
gods  in  search  of  hid  treasure,  for  in  place  of  the  lump  of  silver 
which  ought  to  be  found  inside  of  an  idol,  there  was  only  a  lump 
of  pewter  and  a  few  copper  cash  ! 

I  do  not  know  whether  the  devotion  of  the  modern  Chinese 
tends  to  such  lavish  liberality  as  that  of  their  ancestors,  but  these 
certainly  gave  good  proof  that  their  offerings  were  not  made  "  to 
be  seen  of  men,"  inasmuch  as  the  innermost  recesses  of  the  ancient 
idols  were  enriched  with  priceless  gems  and  precious  metals.  This 
was  done  in  the  belief  that  as  nothing  was  hidden  from  the  gods, 
they  see  what  is  inside ;  and  to  assist  them  in  so  doing,  a  brass 
mirror  is  sometimes  placed  within,  with  an  invocation  to  Buddha 
attached  to  it  written  on  silk  in  Thibetan,  and  wound  round  a  stick. 

Dr  Dudgeon  has  given  me  a  most  curious  and  interesting  account 
of  the  contents  of  some  of  the  idols  he  has  examined  (generally 
when  in  process  of  demolition).  He  says,  "  They  all  contain  vis- 
cera "  !  He  has  found  the  various  organs  of  the  chest,  heart, 
lungs,  abdomen,  and  intestines  in  general,  all  accurately  figured 
according  to  Chinese  notions  of  anatomy.  These  were  generally 
made  of  silk  or  satin,  which,  though  probably  several  hundred 
years  old,  looked  cpiite  fresh.  The  heart  is  made  of  red  silk,  the 
veins  proceeding  from  it  being  of  variously  coloured  silk  thread. 
To  it  are  attached  the  aforesaid  mirror  and  scroll  prayer.  Some 
of  the  intestines,  though  made  of  silk,  have  an  edging  of  cotton 
stitched  round  them.  The  bowels  are  all  enveloped  in  a  large 
piece  of  silk  or  satin,  with  another  Thibetan  invocation  of  Buddha ; 
in  short,  all  internal  arrangements  are  most  carefully  represented  ! 

Now  the  platform  whereon  were  formerly  ranged  the  great  bronze 
or  gilded  images  is  transformed  to  a  table  for  hospital  uses,  where 
anatomical  knowledge  of  a  very  different  order  is  applied  to  the 
cure  of  all  comers.  Good  accommodation  is  provided  for  a  certain 
number  of  in-patients,  and  day  by  day  crowds  assemble  as  out- 
patients to  be  healed  of  all  manner  of  diseases,  which  the  doctors 
of  China  have  failed  to  conquer.  In  place  of  idols  and  of  writings 
in  their  praise,  the  walls  of  the  temple  are  now  hung  with  tablets 


470  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

and  scrolls  presented  (after  the  manner  of  the  country)  by  grateful 
patients,  who  thus  extol  the  skill  by  which  they  have  been  cured 
of  sore  diseases. 

Some  of  these  are  the  offerings  of  great  men,  who  have  begun 
by  consulting  the  foreign  doctor  secretly  by  night,  with  every  sort 
of  device  to  prevent  its  being  known  that  they  had  done  so — try- 
ing in  the  first  place  to  extract  prescriptions  by  simply  sending 
a  confidential  messenger,  instead  of  granting  an  interview.  But 
when  at  last  the  ice  is  broken,  and  confidence  is  won,  then  the 
relations  become  most  friendly,  and  the  emblazoned  tablet  which 
testifies  to  the  foreigner's  great  skill  is  sent  through  the  city  in 
solemn  procession,  with  music  and  banners,  proclaiming  to  all 
beholders  the  wonderful  recovery  of  the  patient.  In  almost  every 
case  of  this  sort,  the  most  friendly  relations  have  been  established 
between  the  family  of  the  grateful  patient  and  those  of  the  Mis- 
sion, and  thus  the  social  barriers  which  had  appeared  almost  insur- 
mountable have  melted  away,  and  many  real  friendships  have  been 
established. 

Nor  is  this  the  only  good  effected.  The  great  outer  hall,  cap- 
able of  holding  about  400  persons,  serves  at  once  as  waiting-room 
and  chapel,  wherein  the  simplest  truths  of  Christianity  are  daily 
preached,  either  by  members  of  the  Mission  or  their  native  assist- 
ants, to  the  waiting  crowds,  who  literally  besiege  the  dispensary. 
A  considerable  number  of  those  who  by  this  means  have  first 
heard  Christian  teaching  have  eventually  declared  themselves  con- 
verts, and  have  well  proved  their  determination  to  stand  by  their 
convictions. 

Considering  that  an  average  of  15,000  patients  are  treated  at 
this  dispensary  every  year,  and  that  the  majority  return  very  often, 
and  are  generally  accompanied  by  friends,  it  is  evident  that  an 
enormous  number  of  persons  must  be  reached  through  this  agency.1 
And  as  similar  hospitals  have  been  established  at  Tien-tsin,  Han- 
kow, Hangchow,  Shanghai,  !N"ingpo,  Amoy,  Swatow,  Canton,  Hong- 
Kong,  and  various  other  cities,  the  amount  of  real  good  effected  by 
their  means  is  incalculable,  thousands  of  sufferers  having  come  from 
villages  and  country  districts  far  inland,  to  be  healed  of  their 
diseases,  and  in  many  cases  have  carried  home  with  them  the  good 
words  of  comfort  which  had  cheered  their  own  hearts. 

1  The  total  number  of  dispensary  patients  treated  at  this  hospital  in  Peking 
(reckoning  each  once)  was— in  1879,  19,606,  and  63  in-patients ;  in  1880,  13,532  ; 
in  1S81,  22,578  ;  in  1S82,  10,150 ;  in  1883,  10,237.  Besides  these,  there  is  an 
annual  average  of  at  least  1800  patients  per  annum,  who,  having  been  treated 
privately  or  at  irregular  hours,  are  not  entered  iu  the  hospital  books. 


DREAD  OF  MUTILATING  THE  BODY.       471 

The  American  Methodist-Episcopal  Church  also  has  a  Medical 
Mission  here,  in  charge  of  a  Lady-Doctor,1  and  the  Eoman  Catholic 
Sisters  have  one,  which,  however,  is  also  a  refuge  for  the  destitute. 
The  patients  there  treated  are  chiefly  females. 

It  is  scarcely  possible  for  any  one  unacquainted  with  the  depths 
of  Chinese  prejudice  and  superstition,  to  understand  what  extra- 
ordinary precaution  must  be  observed  by  the  foreign  doctor  who 
hopes  to  do  good  and  win  the  confidence  of  the  people.  To  order 
even  so  simple  a  remedy  as  a  bath  for  a  sick  child  (even  a  warm 
bath)  would  be  considered  monstrous  by  these  people,  who  never 
wash  children,  but  only  give  them  a  rub  over  with  a  flannel  wrung 
out  in  hot  water.  Though  vaccination  is  now  immensely  appreciated, 
and  practised  by  specially  appointed  vaccinators,  these  would  deem 
it  madness  to  operate  in  winter. 

The  greatest  care  must  be  taken  not  to  undertake  cases  which 
are  really  hopeless,  as  the  last  doctor  consulted  is  sure  to  get  the 
credit  of  causing  the  death  of  the  patient ;  and  especial  pains  are 
taken  to  remove  dying  patients  from  the  hospital,  and  restore  them 
to  their  own  relations,  to  avoid  the  calumnies  that  would  probably 
be  circulated  as  to  the  abstraction  of  their  eyes  and  livers  as  in- 
gredients for  that  Elixir  of  Life  in  which  foreigners  are  supposed 
to  deal  so  largely,  as  also  for  photographic  purposes  ! 

Strangest  of  all  is  the  precaution  (consequent  on  this  same 
superstitious  belief)  which  restores  to  each  surgical  patient  what- 
ever limb  or  portion  of  a  limb  has  been  amputated,  that  he  may 
take  it  home,  and  either  preserve  it  for  burial  in  his  own  coffin, 
that  he  may  appear  in  the  spirit-world  with  an  intact  body,  or  else, 
to  avoid  all  danger  of  losing  the  precious  fragment,  that  he  may 
cook  and  sivalloiv  it,  that  it  may  thus  become  once  more  an  integral 
part  of  his  body  1 2  Owing  to  this  dread  of  any  mutilation  of  the 
body,  the  Chinese  have  the  greatest  horror  of  amputation,  and  will 
only  submit  to  it  in  extreme  cases.  Their  own  practitioners  have 
no  surgical  knowledge  whatever.  And  yet,  notwithstanding  this 
great  dread,  Dr  Dudgeon  has  had  several  cases  in  the  hospital,  of 
persons  who  were  suffering  from  terrible  sores,  consequent  on  hav- 
ing cut  off  pieces  of  their  own  flesh  to  provide  an  infallible  remedy 
for  parents  in  certain  special  illnesses  ! 3 

The  anxiety  to  save  fragments  extends  even  to  teeth.     "When  a 

1  Now  removed  to  Tien-tsin. 

2  I  should  scarcely  have  ventured  to  repeat  this  statement  had  I  not  found  it 
confirmed  in  the  Annual  Reports  of  the  Hospital  at  Peking. 

3  I  have  already  quoted  examples  of  this  and  other  marvellous  remedies. 
Chapter  VIII. 


472  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

tooth  has  hcen  extracted,  it  is  deemed  desirable  to  grind  it  to 
powder  and  swallow  it.  Besides  the  advantage  of  thus  incor- 
porating one's  own  ivory  (and  ivory  shavings  are  a  valuable 
antidote  to  poison),  this  is  deemed  a  sure  preventive  of  the  de- 
velopment of  worms  in  the  other  teeth,  to  which  cause  toothache 
is  generally  attributed  by  Chinese  dentists! 

Truly  wonderful  are  some  of  the  native  prescriptions  which 
occasionally  come  to  light.  For  instance,  one  patient  was  getting 
on  nicely,  but  imagined  he  would  expedite  his  recovery  by  an 
intermediate  visit  to  a  Chinese  doctor,  who  ordered  him  a  decoc- 
tion of  five  centipedes,  one  frog,  calomel,  smilax-root,  and  eight 
other  drugs  !  the  natural  result  being  a  very  serious  relapse.  The 
amount  of  calomel  and  vermilion  administered  by  these  native 
practitioners  is  startling. 

One  advantage  of  letting  patients  carry  home  such  fragments  as 
portions  of  frightfully  diseased  bone  which  have  been  safely  re- 
moved, or  long-buried  needles  successfully  extracted  after  native 
doctors  had  probed  in  vain,  is  that  the  patient  treasures  the  relic, 
and  it  becomes  the  text  of  a  thousand  discourses  on  the  skill  of 
the  foreigners,  and  thus  others  are  attracted  from  far  and  near. 
More  especially  has  this  been  the  case  since  it  became  known  that 
they  could  even  make  the  blind  to  see,  and  that  cases  of  cataract 
of  eight  and  ten  years'  standing  had  been  successfully  treated.  So 
rapidly  have  patients  poured  in,  that  it  has  become  necessary  to 
refuse  admission  to  more  than  perhaps  250  in  a  day,  from  sheer 
inability  to  attend  to  them. 

The  number  of  in-patients  is  necessarily  very  limited,  and  is 
generally  confined  to  serious  surgical  cases ;  and  herein  lies  one  of 
the  greatest  drawbacks  of  the  work — namely,  the  necessity  of 
allowing  patients  to  live  in  their  own  homes,  where  there  is  no 
efficient  nursing  and  no  one  to  attend  to  the  preparation  of  suitable 
food,  nor  indeed  any  certainty  of  the  medicines  dispensed  being 
properly  used,  or  that  external  lotions  may  not  be  taken  inter- 
nally !  Here  it  is  that  the  doctor  feels  the  need  of  ladies  to  take 
charge  of  such  matters  and  do  the  work  of  Sisters  of  Mercy  in  the 
hospital. 

This  want,  coupled  with  deficiency  of  funds,  effectually  prevents 
the  offer  of  a  bed  to  many  a  patient  whose  case  it  would  be  satis- 
factory to  watch  closely. 

A  most  extraordinary  variety  of  all  the  ills  that  flesh  is  heir  to 
annually  find  their  way  to  this  great  hall  of  healing.  Among  the 
characteristics  specially  worthy  of  note,  one  is  the  very  small  pro- 


SUFFERERS  FROM  JUDICIAL  CRUELTY.     473 

portion  of  common  street  accidents,  owing  to  the  great  care  with 
which  Chinamen  avoid  jostling  one  another.  This  is  especially 
true  as  regards  all  wheeled  vehicles,  as  the  drivers  of  such  know 
that  they  will  be  held  accountable  for  any  accident  that  may 
occur. 

Another  characteristic,  early  noticed  by  Dr  Lockhart,  was  the 
very  large  number  of  cases  consequent  on  judicial  torture,  even 
when  this  took  what  sounds  like  the  comparatively  simple  form  of 
so  many  strokes  with  a  bamboo.  But  the  instrument  of  punish- 
ment is  really  a  flat  strip  of  a  bamboo  three  inches  wide  and  five 
feet  in  length,  with  both  edges  sharp.  The  prisoner  is  condemned 
to  receive  from  forty  to  one  hundred  blows  with  the  flat  bamboo, 
but  should  he  be  unable  to  bribe  his  torturers,  or  fail  to  do  so, 
they  inflict  this  terrible  bastinado  with  the  sharp  edge  with  such 
violence  that  the  thighs  are  lacerated,  and  the  agonising  pain  of 
one  hundred  blows  frequently  causes  death  even  in  a  robust  man 
who  has  previously  been  in  perfect  health.  The  flesh  is  so  cruelly 
mangled  that  gangrene  supervenes,  and  mortification  sets  in. 

Another  constant  punishment  for  most  trivial  offences  (fre- 
quently applied  to  native  Christians  to  induce  them  to  abjure 
their  faith)  is  to  beat  the  victim  on  the  face  with  a  piece  of  hard 
leather  like  the  sole  of  a  shoe.  This  frequently  results  in  breaking 
the  jaw  and  the  teeth,  and  the  face  and  neck  are  often  frightfully 
lacerated.  Various  other  judicial  punishments  result  in  paralysis, 
and  leave  the  poor  wretch  crippled  for  life. 

Among  the  peculiarities  of  illness  arising  from  natural  causes, 
are  sundry  strange  cases  of  tumour,  of  which  every  conceivable 
variety  find  their  way  here.  Dr  Dudgeon  photographed  one  old 
man  as  a  curiosity — his  whole  body  being  covered  with  thousands 
of  small  hard  tumours,  some  of  which  were  as  large  as  a  pigeon's 
etfff 

coo* 

Very  severe  cases  of  enormously  elongated  tumour  of  the  ear 
commonly  occur  among  women,  in  consequence  of  unskilful  boring 
of  the  ears  for  ear-rings  in  childhood.  Strange  to  say,  these  occur 
in  men  also,  and  point  to  a  most  extraordinary  superstition — an 
attempt  to  deceive  malignant  spirits  by  disguising  a  peculiarly 
precious  baby-boy  as  a  poor  unwelcomed  little  girl.  He  is  called 
by  a  girl's  name,  and  is  dressed  as  such,  in  the  hope  that  all  evil 
spirits  will  believe  him  to  be  "  only  a  girl,"  and  as  such,  nut  worth 
molesting ! 

Very  funny  indeed  are  some  of  the  little  symptoms  of  personal 
vanity  sometimes  revealed  by  the  owners  of  faces  which  might  be 


474  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

deemed  too  plain  to  be  worth  a  thought.  Thus  a  man  terribly 
scarred  by  the  smallpox  came  one  day  to  entreat  the  doctor  to  try 
and  obliterate  another  mark  on  his  face,  which  really  was  scarcely 
perceptible  in  the  general  chaos  ! 

As  to  the  first  man  who  was  treated  for  hare-lip,  his  delight 
knew  no  bounds.  The  fame  of  the  operation  spread  far  and  wide, 
and  the  unhappy  owners  of  such  came  from  all  cpaarters  to  be 
treated.     And  so  it  has  been  with  all  manner  of  other  diseases. 

Various  European  surgical  appliances  have  been  hailed  with 
unspeakable  satisfaction ;  but  the  aid  to  vanity  which  has  been 
Avelcomed  with  the  greatest  interest  and  wonder  is  the  glass  eye, 
which  savours  of  the  nature  of  a  novel  plaything.  Chinese  genius 
had  not  soared  above  the  manufacture  of  a  heavy  artificial  eye  of 
jade-stone — sometimes  made  from  a  species  of  jade  in  which  red 
veins  occur,  the  effect  produced  being  that  of  a  diseased  eye ! 
These  are  sold  at  a  temple  in  this  city.  But  the  foreign  glass  eye 
was  at  once  accepted  as  a  very  superior  article. 

Even  when  the  health  of  the  city  is  at  its  normal  condition,  the 
cares  of  such  a  hospital  as  this  are  serious,  and  to  me  it  is  a 
source  of  amazement  how  Dr  Dudgeon  gets  through  his  daily  work. 
To  begin  with,  he  must  personally  prescribe  for,  on  an  average, 
120  hospital  patients  every  morning,  besides  an  extensive  outside 
practice,  which  includes  several  of  the  foreign  Legations,  and  in- 
volves driving  long  distances  in  the  blazing  heat,  and  in  the  hor- 
rible springless  carts.  Two  hours  a-day  are  devoted  to  translating 
usefid  books  into  Chinese  with  his  students,  besides  the  labour  of 
preparing  and  delivering  his  lectures  at  "  The  Government  College," 
where  he  holds  the  post  of  Professor  of  Anatomy  and  Physiology.1 

The  said  college  for  150  Chinese  students  has  recently  been 
started  by  Prince  Kung,  under  the  headship  of  Dr  Martin  of  the 
American  Mission,  assisted  by  several  foreign  teachers.  Tung 
Wing,  the  Chief  Commissioner,  is  a  Christian,  and  was  educated  at 
Yale  College  in  America.  As  a  still  further  advance,  a  party  of 
thirty  students  have  been  sent  for  a  term  of  ten  years  to  Hart- 
ford College,  Connecticut,  there  to  fit  themselves  for  Govern- 
ment service.  Great  progress  is  hoped  for  when  these  men  come 
into  power — men  who,  in  place  of  being  nourished  solely  on  the 
dry  fungus  of  Confucian  classics,  are  learned  in  foreign  languages, 

1  Since  the  above  was  written  various  changes  have  occurred,  and  Dr  Edkins  and 
Dr  Dudgeon  have  both  accepted  posts  under  the  Chinese  Government,  where, 
doubtless,  their  excellent  influence  may  prove  even  more  serviceable  than  when 
directly  engaged  in  mission-work.  It  is  proposed  to  establish  a  Medical  School  in 
Peking,  in  connection  with  which  a  Government  Hospital  will  prove  indispensable. 


SIR    HARRY    PARKES.  475 

international  law,  political  economy,  physiology,  astronomy,  ana- 
tomy, mechanics,  navigation,  geology,  geography,  history,  surveying, 
and  a  thousand  other  subjects. 

In  addition  to  the  regular  run  of  hospital  work,  every  now  and 
then  an  epidemic  breaks  out,  which  adds  enormously  to  its  labour. 
Such  has  been  the  recent  terrible  prevalence  of  typhus  fever,  which 
so  closely  followed  on  the  famine,  and  which  carried  off  several  of 
the  foreigners  who  were  working  so  nobly  on  the  Relief  Fund,  and 
also  of  their  Chinese  assistants.  It  broke  out  very  severely  in  this 
city,  and  among  its  victims  were  three  members  of  the  English  and 
American  Missions.  Dr  Dudgeon  was  amongst  those  attacked  (for 
the  third  time),  and  for  some  days  his  life  was  despaired  of.1 

1  The  same  insidious  fever  has  on  several  occasions  sought  its  victims 
even  within  the  sanctuary  of  the  British  Legation,  the  deeply  to  be  de- 
plored death  of  Sir  Harry  Parkes  being  due  to  a  sharp  attack  of  typhus 
supervening  on  greatly  overtaxed  mental  energies.  It  would  be  difficult 
to  conceive  a  more  pathetic  end  to  a  nobler  life  than  the  death  of  Sir 
Harry  within  so  few  months  of  his  being  appointed  British  Minister  at 
Peking.  "  Time  brings  its  revenges,"  and  the  wheel  of  fortune  has  rarely 
turned  a  stranger  destiny  than  that  which  led  to  the  man  who,  in  1860, 
was  almost  the  first  of  his  countrymen  to  enter  the  metropolis,  and  to  do 
so  as  a  most  miserable  prisoner,  returning  thither  in  1883  as  the  revered 
representative  of  his  Sovereign.  A  man,  moreover,  whom  the  Chinese 
held  in  such  deep  respect,  that  his  most  unexpected  death  was  felt  to  be 
truly  an  irreparable  loss  to  Britain  ;  all  the  more  so,  following  so  quickly 
on  that  of  his  loved  friend  "  Chinese  Gordon,"  like  whom  he  was  endeared 
to  all  around  him  by  the  loving-kindness  and  unselfishness  of  his  nature, 
while  an  iron  will  governed  all  matters  which  he  deemed  were  for  his 
country's  honour.  Well  did  his  later  career  justify  Sir  Hope  Grant's 
estimate  of  the  young  Englishman  whom,  in  1860,  he  described  as  "a 
man  fearless,  clear-headed,  and  able,  with  all  his  wits  about  him." 
About  the  same  date  Lord  Elgin  wrote  :  "  Parkes  is  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  men  I  ever  met  ;  for  energy,  courage,  and  ability  combined, 
I  do  not  know  where  I  could  find  his  match." 

It  was  not  often  that  Sir  Harry  could  bring  himself  to  speak  of  his 
terrible  experiences  in  the  loathsome  Chinese  dungeons,  but  he  told  me 
all  about  it  one  day,  as  a  memory  of  some  awful  dream.  He  told  of  his 
first  apparently  satisfactory  meeting  with  the  Chinese  plenipotentiaries 
at  Tung-Chow,  when  he  was  sent  by  Lord  Elgin  to  negotiate  the  pre- 
liminaries of  a  truce,  and  how  on  his  return  on  the  following  day 
(escorted  by  several  friends  who  chose  to  accompany  him  on  so  inter- 
esting an  expedition),  he  had  at  once  perceived  a  change  in  the  tone  of 


476  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

An  oft-recurring  scourge  is  smallpox,  which.,  curiously  enough, 
is  here  classed  as  an  infantile  disease.  It  is  considered  so  certain 
that  every  one  must  have  it,  that  hitherto  it  has  heen  customary  to 
inoculate  all  children  when  between  four  and  five  years  of  age. 
Consequently  it  is  quite  a  rare  thing  for  a  grown-up  person  to  do 
homage  to  the  goddess  of  smallpox  by  wearing  "  The  Heavenly 

these  great  men,  who  created  so  many  delays  that  their  conference  con- 
tinued for  hours,  and  ere  Mr  Parkes  had  finished  writing  his  despatches, 
the  night  was  so  far  advanced  that,  fearing  to  oversleep  himself  if  he 
ventured  to  lie  down,  he  determined  to  employ  the  hours  before  sunrise 
in  inspecting  the  ground  on  which  it  had  been  decided  that  the  British 
troops  should  encamp — an  eerie  ride  alone  in  the  darkness,  across  the 
great  plain.  To  his  amazement,  however,  he  soon  became  conscious  of 
the  sound  of  troops  on  the  march,  and  with  the  first  glimmer  of  dawn, 
he  perceived  that  the  plain,  which  on  the  previous  evening  had  been 
utterly  deserted,  was  now  literally  covered  with  an  enormous  multitude 
of  troops.     He  estimated  their  numbers  at  40,000. 

At  once  scenting  treachery,  he  galloped  back  to  Tung-Chow,  and 
might  have  returned  in  safety  to  headquarters,  but  deemed  it  necessary 
to  follow  the  commissioners  to  demand  an  explanation,  whereupon  he 
and  his  companions  were  seized,  stripped,  beaten,  and  narrowly  escaped 
instant  execution.  Then  they  were  thrown  into  hateful  country  carts, 
with  their  arms  so  tightly  bound  that  they  turned  black,  and  being  thus 
helpless,  they  suffered  double  torture  from  every  bump  and  jolt  during 
the  long  terrible  hours,  when,  in  addition  to  the  blazing  heat  of  an  un- 
clouded sun,  they  were  wellnigh  suffocated  by  the  clouds  of  dust  stirred 
up  by  the  thronging  multitudes  who  surged  around  the  cart,  to  stare  at 
and  insult  the  captives.  Throughout  that  awful  day  they  vainly  pleaded 
for  a  drop  of  water  to  allay  their  burning  thirst ;  and  so  slow  was  their 
progress  that  it  was  near  midnight  ere,  battered  and  bruised,  they 
reached  Peking,  where  the  friends  were  separated,  and  Mr  Parkes  (whose 
nerves  had  been  on  the  rack  for  upwards  of  forty  hours  without  intermission) 
was  thrown  into  a  foul  common  prison,  into  which  were  already  crowded 
seventy-three  of  the  lowest  malefactors,  murderers,  and  robbers,  some  of 
whom  had  already  been  confined  for  years  in  this  horrible  den,  the 
stench  of  which  was  of  course  pestilential,  and  at  nights,  when  the  grat- 
ing (which  by  day  admitted  some  air)  was  blocked  up,  every  moment 
seemed  suffocation. 

So  intolerable  had  been  the  prolonged  anguish  of  the  tightly  bound 
arms,  that  it  was  literally  a  relief  when  the  cords  were  removed  and  the 
captives  were  loaded  with  chains,  one  round  the  body,  another  round 
the  neck,  one  on  each  arm  and  leg,  and  all  these  connected  by  a  main 


OPIUM   SUICIDES.  477 

Flowers."  Xow,  however,  the  advantages  of  vaccination  are  so 
highly  appreciated  that  it  is  fast  superseding  inoculation. 

Of  all  the  varieties  of  medical  work  in  this  country,  I  think  the 
most  distressing  must  be  that  of  trying  to  recover  suicides,  who 
are  a  terribly  numerous  class.  It  is  rare  for  a  week  to  pass  with- 
out one  such  case,  and  sometimes  there  are  several  within  the  week; 
and  all  for  absurdly  trivial  causes — such  as  small  domestic  quarrels. 

chain  suspended  from  a  ring  on  one  of  the  rafters.  To  this  they  were 
fastened  so  tightly  that  at  first  they  could  not  even  sit  down.  After- 
wards this  was  somewhat  lengthened.  So  wretched  was  the  food,  that 
the  miserable  fellow-prisoners  had  compassion  on  a  man  who  could  speak 
Chinese  so  well,  and  shared  with  him  their  own  poor  fare.  That  was 
the  one  redeeming  touch  in  the  whole  terrible  story.  But  by  day  or  by 
night  a  jailer  never  left  Mr  Parkes'  side  for  a  moment.  Presently  he 
was  removed  to  an  inquisitorial  chamber,  where  he  was  arraigned  before 
five  judges  surrounded  by  executioners  with  divers  instruments  of  tor- 
ture, who,  however,  were  satisfied  with  beating  him  and  pulling  out 
handfuls  of  his  hair. 

His  knowledge  of  Chinese  customs  now  proved  valuable  (from  the  age 
of  fifteen  he  had  been  assistant  to  the  Rev.  Charles  Gutzlaff,  Chinese 
Secretary  to  the  British  Legation),  for  when  his  persecutors  bade  him 
write  to  Lord  Elgin  in  Chinese  characters,  he  began  by  dating  his  letter 
from  the  Court  of  Punishment  or  Torture.  To  this  they  objected,  re- 
minding him  that  it  toas  contrary  to  Chinese  good  manners  to  speak  of  such 
places!  but  as  he  stood  firm,  and  insisted  on  dating  from  the  place  where 
he  was  actually  living,  they  yielded  after  two  days'  discussion,  and 
assigned  him  good  quarters  in  the  Kao-mee-ou  ;  and  on  his  still  refusing 
to  write  till  his  friend  Mr  Loch  was  brought  to  share  his  (punters,  this 
further  concession  was  at  last  made. 

After  the  lapse  of  many  days  of  intense  anxiety,  the  English  advanced 
almost  to  the  gates  of  Peking,  and  these  two  were  told  that  they  were  to 
be  executed  on  the  morrow.  They  were  thrown  into  a  common  cart 
and  led  to  a  spot  where  executions  frequently  took  place.  There  the 
cart  stopped,  and  they  deemed  that  their  last  hour  had  certainly  come. 
Together  they  read  the  Burial  Service  from  a  little  pocket  Church  Ser- 
vice, which  had  already  solaced  many  a  bitter  hour  of  captivity.  Then, 
while  absorbed  in  one  last  prayer,  to  their  amazement  they  were  con- 
scious that  the  cart  was  moving  on  :  it  passed  the  gate  of  the  city  and 
again  stopped,  when  they  leaped  to  the  ground  and  ran  for  their  lives. 
Just  as  they  felt  their  strength  utterly  failing,  they  were  thrilled  with 
joy  by  the  sight  of  an  English  sentry,  and  a  moment  later  were  in  safety 
in  the  British  camp. 


478  MEDICAL    MISSION- WORK. 

or  a  wish  to  spite  some  one  else  by  getting  him  into  trouble,  as 
being  by  Chinese  law  accountable  for  the  death  of  the  person  thus 
aggravated  beyond  endurance. 

Commonest  of  all  are  suicides  on  account  of  gambling  losses. 
A  few  years  ago,  suicide  by  drowning  was  the  ordinary  vulgar 
method,  and  inhaling  golddeaf  so  as  to  produce  suffocation  was 
the  refined  manner.  But  now  such  methods  are  old-fashioned, 
and  swallowing  opium  is  the  approved  remedy  for  all  unhappiness, 
and  one  which,  alas !  is  now  generally  at  hand.  The  Chinese 
believe  that  persons  who  have  thus  ended  their  lives  are  really 
only  in  a  trance,  and  may  be  resuscitated  at  any  period  within  a 
week.  Consequently  the  foreign  doctors  are  sometimes  called  in 
to  the  most  hopelessly  cold  corpses. 

A  good  many,  however,  are  saved  by  being  taken  in  time.  A 
native  doctor  who  has  been  trained  by  a  foreigner  at  Chefoo,  says 
that  in  the  course  of  ten  years  he  has  succeeded  in  recovering 
four  hundred  cases,  but  that  one  hundred  have  been  too  far  gone 
ere  he  was  called.  It  has  been  estimated  that  the  total  num- 
ber of  opium  suicides  throughout  China  now  averages  160,000 
annually ! !  It  is  worthy  of  note,  however,  that  few  of  these  are 
opium-smokers. 

Of  ordinary  victims  of  the  opium-pipe,  a  never-failing  crowd 
come  day  after  day,  entreating  medical  aid  to  break  off  the  chains 
of  the  tyrannous  habit  which  so  quickly  enthrals  every  poor  fool 
who  once  yields  to  its  seductions.  As,  beyond  supplying  applicants 
with  anti-opium  pills  to  help  the  sufferer  to  resist  the  craving,  very 
little  can  be  done  at  the  hospital,  two  Buddhist  temples  have  been 
purchased  in  different  parts  of  this  city,  and  have  been  converted 
into  Opium  Befuges,  each  of  which  is  in  charge  of  two  native 
assistants. 

Within  six  months  from  the  time  when  the  first  of  these  refuges 
was  opened,  about  350  patients  put  themselves  under  treatment, 
in  many  cases  with  good  results.  Some  have  been  known  to  con- 
tinue steadfast  for  years,  and  are  considered  the  exceptions  which 
prove  perfect  cure  to  be  possible.  Many  more  have  continued  for 
months  under  medical  care  and  profess  to  be  cured,  but  there 
always  remains  the  fear  that  they  may  again  yield  to  the  terrible 
temptation. 

Of  course,  where  such  tremendous  moral  courage  is  requisite  in 
order  to  overcome  a  physical  craving,  every  effort  is  made  to 
induce  the  patients  to  seek  spiritual  help  in  this  great  struggle, 
and  very  striking  is  the  occasional  testimony  of  the  heathen  on 


OPIUM    REFUGES.  479 

this  subject.  Sometimes,  in  some  remote  city,  opium  victims 
come  crowding  round  a  foreign  preacher,  entreating  him  to  cure 
them,  and  they  tell  him  they  have  been  to  the  nearest  opium 
refuge,  and  were  cured  for  a  while,  but  that  on  their  return  they 
were  soon  as  helpless  as  ever.  Then  the  preacher  tells  them  that 
though  they  sought  the  Christian's  medicine,  they  must  have 
neglected  to  seek  the  help  of  his  God.  One  who  was  thus 
addressed  turned  to  his  fellows  and  said,  "  That  is  quite  true,  for 
some  who  were  in  the  hospital  with  us  joined  the  Christians  in 
prayer,  and  these  men  have  stood  firm,  whereas  we  who  would  not 
do  so  have  relapsed  into  our  old  habits." * 

The  patients  at  the  Eefuges  are  treated  with  a  combination  of 
stimulants,  sedatives,  and  tonics;  these  soothe  the  terrible  gnawing 
pain  in  all  the  bones,  which  is  one  of  the  many  evil  effects  of 
opium-smoking.  Without  such  substitutes,  it  is  almost  impossible 
for  the  man  naturally  endowed  with  the  most  determined  will  to 
concpuer  the  habit  (a  habit  which,  to  begin  with,  has  enfeebled  and 
enslaved  the  will);  and  besides,  the  drug  becomes  such  a  physical 
necessity,  that  sudden  deprivation  of  it  is  literally  fatal.  Dr 
Dudgeon  says  that  large  numbers  of  men  die  annually  in  the 
prisons  from  this  cause,  dysentery  and  diarrhoea  being  the  almost 
invariable  result. 

The  habit  seems  to  be  contracted  with  fatal  facility.  A  man 
who  has  allowed  himself  to  smoke  a  couple  of  hours  daily  for  a 
fortnight  or  three  weeks,  is  already  a  helpless  slave ;  for  though  he 
is  perfectly  aware  that  he  has  started  on  a  path  of  moral  and 
probably  pecuniary  ruin,  he  is  utterly  unable  to  resist  the  fatal 
craving.  After  four  or  five  hours  he  becomes  restless,  then 
languid,   then   weak   and   powerless,  his   eyes  hollow,  a  burning 

1  These  Opium  Refuges  are  likewise  valuable  as  a  protest  against  the  odious 
traffic,  and  as  proof  positive  that  Christian  Missions  are  in  no  way  to  be  identified 
with  this  curse  of  China.  Many  such  hospitals  have  been  opened  by  native 
Christians  at  their  own  expense.  The  Rev.  J.  Hudson  Taylor  tells  of  one  con- 
gregation of  about  ninety  native  Christians,  all  of  whom  were  converted  through 
the  instrumentality  of  a  refuge  thus  opened  by  Pastor  Hsi.  Very  naturally  he 
longed  to  open  similar  refuges  in  other  towns,  but  could  not  for  lack  of  means. 
One  morning,  after  family  prayers,  his  wife  said,  "Why  are  you  always  praying 
for  Hoh-chau  ?  Why  do  you  not  go  and  open  a  refuge  there  ? "  He  replied  that 
this  was  impossible,  as  it  would  involve  an  expenditure  of  30,000  cash — i.e.,  about 
£6.  The  wife  said  nothing,  but  on  the  following  morning  she  brought  him  a 
parcel  containing  her  bracelets  and  ear-rings,  her  gold  and  silver  hair-pins,  and  the 
other  objects  of  jewellery,  as  dear  to  Chinese  as  to  all  other  oriental  women. 
These  she  bade  him  go  and  sell,  saying  that  she  could  do  without  them,  and  Iil- 
must  open  a  refuge  with  this  money,  which  he  accordingly  did.  Subsequently  a 
friend  asked  her  if  she  had  not  felt  it  very  hard  to  give  up  all  her  ornaments.  "  I  lh 
no  ! "  she  replied,  "  I  was  glad  !  I  had  taken  the  Loud  JBBUS  for  all,  and  is  He 
not  enough  to  satisfy  ariy  one's  heart  • " 


480  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

sensation  in  the  throat,  the  mouth  foamy,  and  griping  internal 
pains  commence,  which  can  only  be  relieved  by  a  fresh  dose  of  the 
poisonous  narcotic.  If  this  is  delayed,  the  eyes  water,  giddiness 
and  prostration  follow,  burning  thirst,  aching  pains  in  the  bones, 
coldness  all  over,  and  (in  the  case  of  confirmed  smokers)  diarrhoea 
which  baffles  the  skill  of  the  physician. 

The  habit  commenced  for  pleasure  must  now  be  continued  solely 
to  allay  pain  and  uneasiness,  and  to  stifle  the  unnatural  morbid 
craving.  With  the  first  breath  of  the  opium-pipe  comfort  returns 
— mental  and  physical  suffering  pass  away — the  spirits  are  exhil- 
arated, cares  forgotten,  and  the  smoker  is  in  a  dream  of  Elysium, 
from  which  he  awakens  with  renewed  craving  for  the  pipe.  Day 
after  day  the  same  struggle  is  repeated,  followed  by  the  same 
inevitable  defeat,  till  the  victim  knows  himself  to  be  utterly  power- 
less, and  yields  himself  a  passive  slave  to  the  deadly  influence. 
The  dose  is  increased  to  three  or  four  pipes  a-day — eventually  the 
craving  is  such  that  the  pipe  becomes  a  necessity  day  and  night, 
and  the  wretched  slave  (whose  nervous  system  is  shattered,  and 
digestion  irretrievably  destroyed)  becomes  daily  more  sallow  and 
emaciated,  more  hollow-eyed,  more  stupefied.  Time,  wealth,  hon- 
our, energy,  self-respect,  are  all  sacrificed ;  and  when  clothes  and 
property  have  all  been  pawned,  it  may  be  that  wife  and  children 
are  sold  to  the  highest  bidder,  and  the  wretched  smoker  perhaps 
ends  his  own  miserable  life  by  eating  the  drug  which  has  wrought 
his  ruin — this,  as  I  have  already  observed,  being  now  a  common 
form  of  suicide. 

Certainly  there  are  some  men  who  have  been  known  to  smoke 
opium  for  twenty  or  thirty  years,  without  being  apparently  much 
the  worse,  and  these  cases  are  invariably  rjuoted  by  those  interested 
in  the  opium  trade,  to  prove  that  its  effects  are  not  necessarily 
deleterious,  quite  ignoring  that  these  are  the  exceptions,  and  more- 
over men  originally  endowed  with  an  excellent  constitution,  and 
possessing  the  means  of  always  living  well. 

But  as  with  gin  in  Britain,  so  with  opium  here,  the  hungry 
poor  are  the  most  inveterate  smokers,  and  so  rapid  has  been  the 
spread  of  the  vice,  that  notwithstanding  official  edicts  for  the  sup- 
pression of  opium-dens,  they  now  exist  in  almost  every  lane  of 
this  city,  and  some  of  the  larger  lanes  have  several,  answering  to 
the  gin-palaces  of  our  great  cities,  but  far  more  deadly  in  their 
results. 

!Not  that  the  poor  have  any  monopoly  of  the  vice,  if  it  be  true, 
as  Dr  Dudgeon  was  informed  by  one  of  his  patients,  that  there  are 


OPIUM  VERSUS   TOBACCO.  481 

about  three  thousand  opium-smokers  within  the  precincts  of  the 
Imperial  Palace  !  He  estimates  that  among  minor  Government 
officials  about  forty  per  cent  smoke ;  and  that  about  eighty  per 
cent  of  the  male  attendants  on  the  families  of  mandarins,  and  a 
considerable  number  of  the  women,  are  opium-smokers.  Among 
soldiers  and  literary  men  he  reckons  about  thirty  per  cent,  and  in 
the  merchant  class  twenty  per  cent. 

Although  about  eighty  per  cent  of  the  men,  women,  and  children 
smoke  tobacco,  Dr  Dudgeon  says  he  never  has  known  them  to  do 
so  in  excess,  partly  because  the  tobacco  used  is  so  mild,  and  is 
generally  smoked  through  water.  Neither  has  he  found  any  evil 
arising  from  the  use  of  spirits.  During  his  twenty  years'  residence 
in  Peking  he  has  not  seen  half-a-dozen  people  the  worse  for  liquor. 
But  he  looks  on  the  use  of  opium  as  an  unmitigated  curse,  and  one 
which  is  spreading  with  appalling  rapidity — so  that  one-fifth  of 
the  population  of  Peking  and  Tien-tsin  are  now  its  slaves,  and 
even  high  officials,  who  a  few  years  ago  would  have  shrunk  from 
its  use  as  a  pollution,  now  smoke  openly,  and  offer  pipes  to  their 
visitors.  In  the  city  of  Soo-Chow,  for  instance,  where  thirty  years 
ago  there  were  only  five  or  six  opium-dens,  there  are  now  almost  as 
many  thousand  ! 

So  enormously  has  the  illegal  growth  of  native  opium  increased, 
that  it  is  said  it  will  soon  exceed  the  amount  imported.  And  this 
is  the  natural  development  of  that  small  beginning,  when  opium 
was  first  smuggled  into  China  in  defiance  of  all  prohibitions,  and 
then  (notwithstanding  all  remonstrances  from  the  Chinese  Govern- 
ment) legalised  by  a  treaty  enforced  by  British  guns — a  treaty 
compelling  China  by  the  persuasive  eloquence  of  the  cannon  to 
sanction  our  supplying  her  millions  with  the  poison  which  none 
dares  to  sell  in  Britain  except  it  be  marked  as  such. 

From  first  to  last  the  whole  history  of  this  traffic  is  humiliating 
to  all  who  value  humanity  and  honour.  It  has  been  an  oft-told 
tale,  but  it  assumes  the  vividness  of  a  terrible  reality,  as  I  now 
once  more  hear  it  from  the  lips  of  men  to  whose  daily  efforts  to  do 
good  it  proves  such  an  ever-present  hindrance. 

It  appears  that  a  small  amount  of  opium  for  medicinal  purposes 
had  long  been  an  article  of  legal  import  into  China ;  and  that  the 
insidious  vice  of  smoking  it  was  already  a  recognised  evil  so  early 
as  a.d.  1729,  is  shown  by  a  prohibitive  edict  issued  by  the  Em- 
peror Yung-Cheng. 

The  legal  import,  however,  continued  till  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  when  it  was  found  to  have  increased  to  one 

2  II 


482  MEDICAL   MISSION-WORK. 

thousand  chests  per  annum.  In  179G  the  Emperor  Kea-king 
awoke  to  the  danger  which  threatened  his  people,  and  determined 
at  once  to  stamp  it  out.  The  import  of  opium  was  strictly  pro- 
hibited, and  opium-smoking  was  declared  to  be  an  offence  punish- 
able by  imprisonment  or  even  death  (as  it  is  in  Japan  at  the 
present  day,  where  by  law  any  person  inciting  another  to  smoke 
opium,  or  any  person  selling  it,  is  liable  to  be  executed.  Oh  wise 
Japan  !) 

Nevertheless  the  insidious  drug  continued  to  be  smuggled  into 
the  country — a  proceeding  so  distinctly  recognised  as  being  illegal, 
that  one  of  the  charges  against  Warren  Hastings  (the  first  Governor- 
General  of  India),  in  his  celebrated  State  Trial,  was  that  of  being 
engaged  in  "  a  low  clandestine  traffic,  prohibited  by  the  laws  of  the 
country." 

But  greed  of  gain  prevailed,  and  the  smuggling  continued  till  in 
1832  a  Committee  of  the  House  of  Commons  decided  that  it  was 
not  desirable  to  abandon  a  source  of  revenue  so  important  as  the 
opium  trade.  Two  years  later  the  import  had  increased  to  34,000 
chests,  and  we  all  know  the  sequel,  and  the  story  of  the  two  utterly 
unjustifiable  wars  whereby  Christian  England  not  only  forced  un- 
willing China  to  legalise  the  import  of  the  drug  which  is  ruining 
millions  of  her  people,  but  (like  a  schoolmaster  exacting  the  price 
of  his  birch-rod)  compelled  her  to  pay  heavy  war  indemnities.  In 
short,  in  the  matter  of  the  opium  trade,  England  has  acted  precisely 
like  one  of  those  hateful  flies  which  alight  on  some  fat  and  com- 
fortable caterpillar,  and  despite  its  vain  struggles,  deposit  in  its 
luckless  body  the  eggs  whence  in  due  time  hatches  a  crop  of  vile 
maggots,  to  prey  on  its  vitals. 

The  British  official  conscience  has  lulled  itself,  Cain-like,1  with 
the  assurance  of  having  no  responsibility  in  the  destruction  of 
Chinamen,  while  gaining  a  solid  advantage  in  the  revenue  of  about 
nine  million  pounds  sterling,  which  has  annually  enriched  the 
Indian  treasury  from  this  source.  So  year  after  year  Britain  has 
turned  a  deaf  ear  to  every  remonstrance  from  luckless  China,  or 
from  those  who  seek  her  weal. 

And  yet  it  is  said  that  so  much  injury  is  clone  by  the  opium 
trade  to  the  lawful  commerce  of  China,  that  it  is  doubtful  whether 
England  does  not  really  lose  as  much  as  India  gains — a  matter 
which  was  clearly  indicated  very  early  in  the  day ;  for  whereas,  so 
far  back  as  1817,  China  paid  British  India  £2,032,000  for  cotton, 
&c,  and  only  £737,000  for  opium,  we  find  that  by  1810  these 
1  "  Am  I  my  brother's  keeper  ? " 


CHINESE   ANTI-OPIUM    SOCIETY.  483 

figures  had  changed  to  £-4,000,000  for  opium  and  only  £1,000,000 
for  all  other  goods.  By  1861  the  figure  for  opium  had  risen  to 
£9,428,000  ! 

More  grievous  still  for  poor  China  is  the  suicidal  policy  which, 
hoping  in  some  measure  to  check  the  import,  has  led  the  Govern- 
ment to  wink  at  the  enormous  and  ever-increasing  growth  of  native 
opium  in  almost  every  province  of  this  vast  empire.  The  value  of 
a  crop  of  poppies  being  double  that  of  a  similar  crop  of  wheat,  it  is 
perhaps  no  wonder  that  individual  farmers  prefer  raising  poison  to 
food,  so  the  increase  in  the  aggregate  is  truly  lamentable.  Some 
of  the  most  careful  statesmen  of  China  even  talk  of  the  expediency 
of  sanctioning  its  culture,  as  a  needful  measure  of  self-defence,  in 
order  to  undersell  the  foreign  poison  and  drive  it  from  the  field  ; 
and  some — sanguine  souls ! — say  they  believe  that  they  could  then 
grapple  with  the  domestic  evil  and  stamp  it  out. 

That  it  is  a  dire  evil  no  Chinaman  dreams  of  denying — the  most 
inveterate  smokers  expressing  the  deepest  abhorrence  of  the  vice 
which  enthrals  them.  It  is  admitted  by  all  to  be  a  moral  crime, 
which  even  the  smoker  never  attempts  to  palliate. 

In  Southern  China  a  strong  Anti-Opium  Society  has  been  formed, 
answering  to  the  Temperance  League  of  Britain.  It  very  soon  num- 
bered a  thousand  members,  all  men  in  respectable  positions,  headed 
by  the  Viceroy  of  Canton,  who  himself  was  an  opium-smoker,  but 
had  the  courage  to  cure  himself,  and  then  sent  a  tablet,  expressive 
of  his  gratitude,  to  be  hung  up  in  the  shop  of  the  druggist  whose 
medicine  had  helped  him  to  concpuer  the  craving. 

In  various  districts  round  Canton — numbering  10,000,  40,000, 
and  100,000  people — this  league  has  succeeded  in  closing  every 
opium-den.  They  circulate  thousands  of  papers  on  the  subject,  and 
declare  that  even  now,  if  England  would  prohibit  the  export  of 
Indian  opium,  they  could  prevent  its  growth  in  China,  so  strong 
and  unanimous  is  public  opinion  on  this  subject.  Whether  it 
really  would  ever  be  possible  to  stem  so  overwhelming  a  torrent  as 
that  which  now  floods  the  market  with  the  too  tempting  drug  is 
quite  another  question.  The  terrible  rapidity  with  which  this  vice 
has  spread  (its  extravagance  making  it  the  more  remarkable  in  a 
nation  generally  so  prudent  and  frugal)  shows  how  great  must  be 
its  fascination,  and  therefore  how  difficult  to  overcome. 

Those  who  seek  to  justify  Britain's  position  in  regard  to  the 
opium  trade  make  capital  of  such  statements  as  those  of  Abbe  Hue, 
who,  writing  of  a.o.  1846,  says:  "Pendant  noire  long  voyage  en 
Chine,  nous  n'avons  pas  rencontre"  un  tail  tribunal  oil  on  n<:  fumat 


484  MEDICAL    MISSION- WORK. 

/'opium  ouvertement  et  impunSment."  His  route  lay  right  across 
China  from  Mongolia  to  Macao,  so  the  inference  drawn  is  that 
of  an  extensive  native  opium  cultivation  prior  to  the  introduction 
of  Indian  opium.  Even  if  this  was  the  case  in  the  Western  and 
Central  Provinces,  it  did  not  affect  the  Eastern  States,  which  were 
the  first  to  he  invaded  hy  the  introduction  of  the  foreign  drug. 

Moreover,  everything  goes  to  prove  that  prior  to  Britain's 
"  Opium  War,"  the  domestic  cultivation  was  exceedingly  limited ; 
whereas  now,  though  still  nominally  illegal,  in  every  direction  wide 
tracks  of  the  most  rich  and  fertile  land,  which  should  naturally  be 
devoted  to  silk  and  cotton,  sugar,  rice,  and  corn,  are  given  up  to 
this  vile  culture — a  fearfully  short-sighted  greed  of  gain,  which 
has  already  resulted  in  most  grievous  suffering.  Our  Consul  at 
Shanghai  (Mr  Davenport)  says  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  dreadful 
famine  which  of  late  years  has  scourged  the  north  of  China,  may 
be  attributed,  in  great  measure,  to  the  spread  of  poppy  cultivation, 
which,  having  been  found  so  much  more  remunerative  than  that  of 
wheat  or  other  grain,  has  absorbed  a  very  large  proportion  of  the 
available  ground  in  those  districts.  Consequently  the  granaries  were 
left  unfilled,  and  no  provision  was  made  for  a  year  of  drought.1 

In  the  far  north,  in  Manchuria  and  Eastern  Mongolia,  this  cul- 
tivation has  increased  enormously,  as  it  is  found  to  pay  so  much 
better  than  growing  beans  or  grain ;  and  in  the  great  provinces  of 
Hupeh,  Kuei-chow  (which  has  been  described  as  the  Chinese 
Switzerland),  Szu-ch'uen,  and  Yunnan  (the  latter  the  south-western 
corner  of  the  empire),  tens  of  thousands  of  acres  are  now  covered 
with  sheets  of  poppy-blossom — white,  crimson,  dark  purple,  or  pink, 
white-tipped — very  lovely,  though  so  pernicious.  The  best  opium, 
and  the  largest  quantity,  is  yielded  by  the  white  poppy ;  whereas 
the  dark  red  and  purple  blossoms  produce  small  seed-pods,  and 
yield  an  inferior  juice  of  a  darker  colour.  The  seed  of  the  former 
is  white  or  yellow,  and  that  of  the  more  gorgeous  but  less  profitable 
colours  is  black  or  grey,  so  the  cidtivator  has  no  reason  to  sow  in 
ignorance  ;  but  while  the  Indian  opium-farmer  confines  his  care 
exclusively  to  the  white,  the  Chinaman  indulges  in  occasional  fields 
of  red  or  purple.  (The  quality  of  opium,  and  the  consequent 
satisfaction  afforded  to  the  smoker,  seems  to  vary  greatly  with  the 
soil  on  which  it  is  grown.  A  red  sandy  soil  is  said  to  produce 
very  superior  opium.) 

Beautiful  to  the  eye,  but  terribly  sad,  is  a  journey  in  early  spring 

1  Accordingly,  in  August  1884,  the  'Times'  once  again  had  to  report  that  up- 
wards of  a  million  of  the  agricultural  population  of  North  China  were  starring. 


UNDER-SELLING    FOREIGN    OPIUM.  485 

through  these  provinces,  where,  with  the  exception  of  the  Hooded 
lands  reserved  for  rice,  and  occasional  patches  of  other  crops, 
every  available  patch  of  ground  on  the  hillsides  or  in  the  valleys 
is  now  all  given  up  to  the  poppy,  which  lies  in  broad  sheets  of 
snowy  white  or  gorgeous  crimson.  A  recent  traveller  tells  how,  in 
April,  he  followed  up  the  course  of  one  valley  in  Kuei-chow  for  a 
distance  of  five  miles,  the  valley  being  half  a  mile  wide,  and  in  all 
that  distance  not  another  crop  was  to  be  seen  save  an  unbroken 
blaze  of  purple,  scarlet,  and  white  poppy,  which  even  crept  up  the 
hillsides  and  nestled  in  veins  of  rich  colour  in  every  vale  or  glen 
on  either  side. 

A  little  further  he  came  to  a  similar  valley — then  to  a  third,  a 
fourth,  fifth,  sixth — everywhere  the  same  story, — only  varied  by 
whether  half  the  arable  land  is  reserved  for  rice,  wheat,  beans, 
barley,  and  tobacco,  or  whether,  as  in  other  valleys,  the  whole  land 
is  devoted  to  the  deadly  poison-crop,  which  grows  only  too  luxu- 
riantly. It  is  estimated  that  in  these  provinces  six-tenths  of  the 
arable  land  is  actually  given  over  to  poppy  culture  ! ! 

The  people  affirm  that  in  these  districts  opiuni-smoking  has  only 
become  a  habit  in  the  present  generation.  Xow  nine  men  in  ten 
smoke  it,  and  the  crude  native  drug  sells  at  about  a  dollar  per  lb. 
Moreover,  this  somewhat  inferior  but  cheaper  opium  now  finds  its 
way  throughout  the  Eastern  provinces  to  the  very  seaboard,  so  that 
year  by  year  Indian  opium  will  more  and  more  become  simply  the 
luxury  of  the  wealthy ;  and  it  only  remains  for  Chinese  manufac- 
turers to  produce  some  delicate  variety  which  shall  become  "  the 
fashion,"  for  the  foreign  product  to  receive  its  death-blow. 

It  appears,  moreover,  that  Britain  will  no  longer  be  permitted 
to  monopolise  even  the  foreign  opium  market,  for  the  Portuguese, 
attracted  by  the  enormous  profits  on  the  Indian  drug,  have  estab- 
lished a  company  in  the  Zambesi  valley,  in  Africa,  for  the  express 
purpose  of  producing  opium  for  the  China  market.  It  is  known  as 
the  Mozambique  Opium  Cultivating  and  Trading  Company,  and 
commenced  with  a  capital  of  about  £200,000.  It  obtained  a  grant 
of  50,000  acres  of  land  admirably  suited  to  the  cultivation  of  the 
poppy,  of  which  selected  seed  was  imported  from  India,  with  ex- 
perienced Hindoo  opium-farmers  to  instruct  the  Africans  in  this 
new  industry.  The  State  has  conceded  to  this  company  the  ex- 
clusive right  to  export  opium  free  of  duty  for  twelve  years.  The 
first  consignment  of  six  chests  reached  Shanghai  in  a.d.  188;*),  and 
found  a  ready  sale  at  a  high  price ;  so,  ere  long,  African  opium 
may  prove  a  formidable  rival  to  the  Indian  trade,  and  a  new  pur- 


480  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

veyor  of  poison  for  the  Chinese,  and  where  once  such  a  traffic  is 
started,  who  can  tell  where  it  may  extend  ? 

So  between  foreign  and  native  competition,  there  is  every  pros- 
pect that  although  British  opium-dealers  may  continue  still  farther 
to  lower  their  prices,  this  iniquitous  source  of  revenue  will  fail,  and 
England  will  realise  too  late  that  in  compelling  China  to  legalise 
opium,  she  has  poisoned  the  goose  which  might  have  supplied 
a  never -failing  store  of  golden  eggs,  in  the  form  of  legitimate 
commerce.1 

Xote. — Another  danger  far  more  terrible  than  prospective  loss 
of  revenue  looms  in  the  possibilities  of  the  future — a  danger  lest 
perchance  the  measure  wherewith  we  have  meted  may  be  measured 
to  ourselves.  The  Chinese  are  by  no  means  a  stay-at-home  race. 
Wherever  money  is  to  be  fairly  earned  by  honest  work,  there 
Chinamen  will  find  their  way,  and  assuredly  wherever  they  go 
they  will  carry  their  vices.  Already  they  have  inoculated  thou- 
sands of  Americans  with  that  of  opium-smoking.     ]Not  only  was 

1  The  'Times'  special  correspondent  (August  8,  1884),  giving  the  result  of 
widely  extended  personal  observation  on  the  condition  of  China,  states  that — "  In 
imports,  there  has  of  late  years  been  a  remarkable  decrease  in  Indian  opium,  the 
deficit  thereon  for  the  year  1881-82  amounting  to  £2,850,000  ;  cotton  and  woollens 
showed  a  decrease  of  £1,500,000.    .    .    . 

"  The  three  northern  ports  in  one  year  show  a  loss  amounting  to  27  per  cent  of 
their  total  imports.  As  regards  opium,  the  native  drug  has  so  much  improved  tbat 
it  is  there  driving  the  foreign  article  from  the  market,  even  though  the  foreign 
prices  have  been  reduced  from  9  to  24  per  cent  from  those  of  the  previous  year. 
There  cannot  be  any  doubt  but  that  the  foreign  drug  ivill  be  driven,  slowly  perhaps, 
but  steadily,  by  native  competition  from  the  China  market." 

The  writer  goes  on  to  urge  the  expediency  of  a  voluntary  retreat  from  so  un- 
tenable and  unpopular  a  position — a  course  the  wisdom  of  which  has  apparently 
been  recognised  ;  for  in  the  spring  of  18S5  (after  prolonged  negotiations  which  have 
been  dragging  on  during  the  last  six  years)  the  British  Government  have  conceded 
to  that  of  C'h  na  the  right  of  exacting  that  the  Li-kin  dues  on  Indian  opium  shall 
henceforth  be  paid  in  a  lump  sum,  by  the  purchaser  at  the  Treaty  Ports 
to  i-eplace  the  vexatious  inland  duties  hitherto  collected  with  so  much  trouble. 
The  import  duty  paid  by  the  importer  remains,  as  heretofore,  at  30  taels,  as  fixed  by 
the  Treaty  of  Tien-tsin. 

The  concession  has  been  hailed  with  as  much  acclamation  as  if  the  whole  opium 
difficulty  had  now  been  satisfactorily  arranged,  whereas  in  point  of  fact  it  is  a 
purely  fiscal  detail,  nowise  INCREASING  the  tax  on  opium,  but  merely  affecting 
the  mode  of  collecting  the  duties,  which  hitherto  have  either  enriched  smugglers  or 
the  provincial  treasuries,  but  will  henceforth  go  direct  to  the  Central  Government, 
thus  "  robbing  Peter  to  pay  Paul." 

The  supporters  of  the  opium  traffic  are  triumphant  that  the  Imperial  Govern- 
ment should  thus  acknowledge  opium  as  a  large  and  definite  source  of  revenue,  and 
deem  this  treaty  to  betoken  a  complete  change  of  attitude  since  the  days  when  the 
noble  Emperor  Taou-Kwaug  utterly  refused  to  accept  of  a  revenue  derived  from 
the  destruction  of  his  subjects.  Those,  however,  who  know  China  best,  and  who 
are  in  a  position  to  judge  dispassionately,  affirm  that  her  views  on  the  subject  have 
not  altered  one  whit — the  old  hateful  coercion  remains  unaltered,  aud  her  rulers  are 
only  trying  to  make  the  best  of  the  evil  which  they  are  compelled  to  endure. 


USE    OF    OPIUM    IX    THE    UNITED    STATES.  487 

it  readily  adopted  by  a  large  proportion  of  the  low  population 
of  San  Francisco,  where  the  Chinese  are  so  numerous,  but  in  all 
parts  of  the  States,  and  among  all  classes,  the  habit  is  on  the  in- 
crease. Local  papers  from  different  parts  of  America  all  tell  the 
same  sad  tale. 

So  long  ago  as  1875  the  customs  return  showed  that  the  import 
of  opium  into  the  United  States  had  rapidly  increased  from  a  com- 
paratively small  figure  to  250,000  lb.  per  annum.  Of  this  not 
more  than  one-third  was  to  be  accounted  for  by  medical  prescrip- 
tions. At  the  present  time  it  is  estimated  that  not  only  are 
twenty-five  thousand  of  the  Chinese  immigrants  confirmed  opium- 
smokers,  but  also  that  twenty  thousand  white  men,  women,  and 
youths  in  all  classes  of  society  are  regular  or  occasional  opium- 
smokers.1  Sad  to  say,  not  only  does  this  census  ine^de  a  very 
large  number  of  college  students  and  literary  men  (for  the  most 
nervous  and  high-strung  temperaments  are  most  susceptible  to  the 
temptation),  but  also  an  ever-increasing  circle  of  ladies,  who  are 
described  as  "  aristocratic." 

The  Philadelphia  press  has  recently  revealed  some  details  of  a 
most  luxurious  Ladies'  Club,  in  a  fashionable  quarter  of  the  city, 
exclusively  for  the  purpose  of  opium-smoking ;  and  the  sumptuous 
furnishings  of  such  rooms  as  the  "interviewer"  was  permitted  to 
see,  proved  that  no  expense  was  spared  in  making  the  place  attrac- 
tive to  "  the  wealthiest  ladies  in  the  city,"  some  of  whom  the  "  pale 
refined-looking"  proprietrix  claimed  as  her  victims.  Of  course, 
where  such  a  club  exists  in  one  great  city,  others  will  not  be  slow 
to  follow  the  example ;  and  the  Washington  papers  have  called 
attention  to  the  recent  establishment  of  regular  resorts  for  opium- 
smoking  in  the  capital  itself. 

For  persons  of  refined  tastes,  the  drug  is  prepared  in  a  most 
insinuating  form — namely,  that  of  a  minute  cigar  only  about  an 
inch  in  length,  made  of  the  finest  tobacco,  which  has  been 
thoroughly  impregnated  with  the  fumes  of  burning  opium.  In 
this  form  the  drug  is  inhaled  even  more  effectually  than  by  the 
ordinary  process.  These  dainty  cigars,  with  a  neat  mouthpiece,  are 
sold  in  ornamental  boxes,  and  made  as  attractive  as  possible.  So 
the  mischief  is  now  fairly  started  in  the  United  States. 

These,  however,  are  by  no  means  the   only  field  for  Chinese 

labour.     To  our  own   colonies   these   diligent  workers  find  their 

way.     On  the  western  shores  of  our  Canadian  Dominion — in  that 

British   Columbia   which  ere   long  must  become  a  possession   of 

1  See  '  Opium.'    By  the  Rev.  John  Liggins.     New  York. 


488  MEDICAL    MISSION-WORK. 

such  priceless  value  to  Britain — there  the  evil  thing  has  entered. 
Already  several  of  the  Indian  tribes  have  been  infected  by  Chinese 
immigrants  with  the  love  of  the  opium-pipe,  and  are  even  more  its 
slaves  than  their  teachers.  Who  dares  to  say  that  it  will  spread 
no  further? 

Then,  too,  in  the  Southern  Hemisphere.  Thousands  of  China- 
men find  their  way  to  our  Australian  colonies,  especially  to  New 
South  Wales,  and  already  Sydney  has  to  record  the  dangerous 
spread  of  the  habit  of  opium-smoking  among  its  tvhite  population. 

Nor  is  England  herself  free  from  danger.  In  all  our  great  ship- 
ping ports — notably  in  London,  Liverpool,  Glasgow,  and  Cardiff — 
a  considerable  number  of  Chinamen  are  even  now  to  be  found 
while  the  vessels  to  which  they  are  attached  are  in  port.  On 
many  of  the  steamers  running  between  China  and  Britain  the 
entire  service  is  done  by  Chinamen,  the  crew  comprising  from 
thirty  to  forty  Chinese  as  firemen,  seamen,  stewards,  cooks,  and 
carpenters. 

Thus  it  is  estimated  that  the  Port  of  London  is  annually  visited 
by  at  least  two  thousand  Chinamen,  besides  about  sixty  actual 
residents,  the  latter  including  not  only  the  servants  of  the  Embassy 
and  the  men  attached  to  tea-shops,  but  others  who  in  various  parts 
of  Poplar,  Shadwell,  and  Limehouse  have  established  gambling- 
houses,  to  which  the  strangers  are  attracted  by  the  irresistible 
fascinations  of  fan-tan — a  game  of  dice  and  dominoes,  over  which 
the  players  become  wildly  excited,  and  often  gamble  till  they  have 
lost  the  last  cash  of  their  hardly  earned  wages. 

But  this  is  by  no  means  the  worst  evil  of  these  "  hells,"  which 
openly  advertise  in  their  street-windows,  in  Chinese  characters, 
that  "  Foreign  Opium  is  sold  within."  The  small  low  rooms 
within  are  subdivided  into  cubicles  arranged  like  ships'  berths, 
each  furnished  with  mattresses,  so  that  fifty  or  sixty  opium- 
smokers  can  be  accommodated  at  a  time.  As  we  may  well 
believe  that  the  low  population  of  the  shipping  quarters  does 
not  go  out  of  its  way  to  benefit  these  strangers  (for  whom  little — 
so  little — has  yet  been  done  by  any  philanthropic   agency l),  it 

1  Two  doors  are  open — one  which  has  for  the  last  twenty  years  proved  a  haven 
of  safety  to  from  300  to  700  Orientals  per  annum,  including  an  average  of  160 
Chinamen  ;  but  its  usefulness  is  sadly  limited  by  lack  of  funds,  and  it  is  greatly  to 
be  desired  that  a  branch  home  should  be  established  nearer  to  those  docks  most 
frequented  by  vessels  from  the  East.  Contributions  will  be  welcomed  by  J.  H. 
Fergusson,  Esq.,  treasurer,  the  Stranger's  Home  for  Orientals,  West  India  Dock 
Road,  Limehouse,  London,  E.  The  other  open  door  is  that  of  the  Rev.  George 
Piercy  of  the  Wesleyan  Mission,  who,  on  his  return  from  thirty-four  years  of 
mission- work  in  China,  found  ample  work  of  the  same  sort  awaiting  him  and  his 


London's  solace  for  the  stranger.         489 

follows  that  these  dens,  established  for  their  "  benefit "  by  hard- 
ened old  opium-smokers,  are  almost  the  sole  refuge  of  these  poor 
Chinamen  when  ashore ;  consequently  (most  grievous  to  relate) 
many  men,  previously  free  from  this  vice,  which  they  themselves 
abhor,  have  actually  first  become  its  slaves  in  London.  Not  the 
victims  alone,  but  even  the  keepers  of  these  dens  admit  the  baneful 
effects  of  the  drug. 

"  It  is  poison,"  said  one — "  poison." 

"  Then  why  do  you  use  it  1 " 

"  Can't  help — must  smoke." 

"  But  it  is  injuring  you." 

"  Killing  me,  killing  me ;  but  I  must — I  must." 

Another  said — "  It  is  cultivated  in  our  province ;  but  you 
taught  us  to  smoke.  You  brought  it  to  us  ;  you  tempted  us  ; 
now  we  love  it  and  grow  it  for  ourselves,  and  do  not  need 
Indian  opium." 

Almost  as  a  matter  of  course,  curiosity  draws  a  certain  number 
of  white  men  to  these  dens  to  try  the  charms  of  opium-smoking, 
and  we  have  seen  how  quickly  experiment  becomes  habit.  In  at 
least  five  of  these  dens  English  women  act  the  part  of  landlady, 
and  here  too  English  girls  of  the  lowest  class  have  learnt  this 
miserable  solace. 

Nor  are  these  the  only  places  where  the  little  seed  of  deadly 
evil  is  springing  up.  Though  the  subject  has  not  yet  fully  been 
inquired  into,  seven  or  eight  English  public-houses  in  different 
parts  of  London  have  already  been  discovered,  where  the  customers 
are  served  with  opium-pipes  as  readily  as  with  tobacco.  Here, 
then,  is  "  the  little  pitted  spec  in  garnered  fruit,"  and  we  all  know 
how  rapidly  it  may  spread  (a  poison  ten  times  more  insidious,  and 
a  thousand  times  more  pernicious,  than  gin  or  whisky).  A  painful 
feature  of  the  opium-smoking  evil  is  that  each  new  convert  is  said 
to  take  a  morbid  delight  in  converting  others,  so  that  fresh  recruits 
are  daily  brought  in. 

Since  the  fourteen  years  between  1868  and  1882  have  produced 
in  America  a  crop  of  twenty  thousand  opium-smokers,  how  can  we 
hope  that  Britain  will  escape  1  Already  the  increase  in  the  use  of 
opium  in  divers  forms  is  startling.     The  amount  of  raw  opium 

wife  in  London,  where,  at  92  West  India  Dock  Road,  they  have  established  mis 
sion  rooms,  which  are  visited  by  an  average  of  a  dozen  Chinamen  a-day.  They 
themselves  visit  the  ships,  the  Chinese  boarding-houses  and  opium-dens,  resolved 

that  these  visitors  to  the  land  which  sends  missionaries  to  China,  shall  not  return 
thence  without  one  loving  word  of  Christian  teaching,  and  once  at  least  hearing  the 
story  of  the  Cross. 


400  THE    SUMMER    PALACE. 

imported  for  consumption  in  Britain  and  her  colonies  in  18S1  was 
793,146  lb. — i.e.,  nearly  four  times  the  amount  consumed  in  1860. 
No  one  can  for  a  moment  suppose  that  its  legitimate  medical  use 
has  increased  in  the  same  proportion,  and  a  note  of  warning  might 
well  be  sounded  regarding  the  abuse  of  narcotics  in  all  classes  of 
society,  chiefly'  in  the  form  of  patent  medicines. 

If,  in  addition  to  this  evil,  a  taste  for  opium-smoking  should 
once  gain  a  footing  in  England,  as  it  has  already  done  in  America, 
there  may  be  reason  to  fear  lest  the  poison  which  Britain  has  so 
assiduously  cultivated  for  China,  may  eventually  find  its  market 
amongst  her  own  children — a  retribution  too  terrible  to  contem- 
plate, though  one  against  the  possibility  of  which  it  were  well  to 
sraard.1 


CHAPTEE     XXXIX. 

THE    SUMMER    PALACE. 

Review  of  the  Eight  Banners — The  Great  Bell  Temple — A  primitive  Rain 
Temple — The  Summer  Palace — Its  destruction — Effect  on  missions — 
The  bridges — Among  the  ruins — Revolving  image-wheels — A  cold  spring 
— A  Chinese  restaurant — The  Yellow  Temple — A  dust-storm — Closing 
the  gates. 

Friday,  13th. 

I  am  indulging  in  a  day  of  comparative  repose,  being  terribly 
stiff,  and  all  over  bruises,  as  you  may  well  believe  when  I  tell  you 
that  yesterday  I  underwent  eight  hours  of  anguish  in  one  of  the 
springless  carts,  in  order  to  see  the  ruins  of  the  far-famed  Summer 
Palace — the  Yuen-Ming- Yuen,  or  "  splendid  gardens."  Evidently 
riding  is  the  only  endurable  way  of  getting  about  in  these  parts  ! 

The  manifold  interests  of  the  day,  however,  far  more  than  com- 
pensated for  the  drawbacks  of  even  dust  and  bumping,  which  is 
saying  a  great  deal !  Mr  Balfour  of  the  Japanese  Legation  had 
kindly  undertaken  to  show  me  the  various  points  of  interest  to  the 
north-west  of  the  city,  and  we  agreed  to  try  and  escape  some  heat 

1  In  looking  over  the  statistics  of  opium  consumption  ix  Britain,  exclusive  of 
the  colonies,  I  fiud  that  whereas  the  consuniptiou  has  increased  vear  by  year  from 
112,195  lb.  in  1S60  to  349,061  in  1SS3,  in  1SS4  it  is  reported  as  "only  19,06S,  a  de- 
crease of  which  I  have  failed  to  obtain  any  explanation. 


THE    EIGHT   BANNERS.  491 

by  starting  at  3.30  a.m.,  at  which  hour  I  was  accordingly  ready, 
waiting  in  the  courtyard  to  open  the  gate.  It  was  a  most  lovely 
morning,  the  clear  moonlight  mingling  with  the  dawn,  and  the  air 
fresh  and  pleasant. 

I  had  full  leisure  to  enjoy  it,  for  the  carter  who  had  promised 
to  be  at  the  Japanese  Legation  by  3  a.m.  was  wrapped  in  slumber, 
and  Mr  Balfour  had  to  begin  his  day's  work  by  a  two  miles'  walk 
to  fetch  me.  Luckily,  my  carter  had  been  more  faithful,  so  we 
started  in  very  fair  time — indeed,  I  profited  by  the  delay,  for  as  we 
passed  through  the  great  northern  gate,  there,  on  the  dusty  plain, 
just  outside  the  walls,  we  came  in  for  a  grand  review  of  the  Eight 
Banners  by  Prince  Poa  of  the  Iron  Crown, — such  a  pretty  animated 
scene  !  Each  corps  carries  a  great  many  banners  all  alike,  and  all 
these  Tartar  regiments  were  galloping  about,  their  gay  standards 
flashing  through  the  smoke  of  artillery,  and  the  dust-clouds  which 
seem  to  blend  the  vast  plain  with  the  blue  distant  hills,  and  the 
great  grey  walls  and  huge  three-storeyed  keep. 

The  latter  is  that  Anting  Gate  of  which  we  heard  so  much  at 
the  time  when  it  was  given  up  to  the  British  army  after  the 
sacking  of  the  Summer  Palace — not,  however,  till  their  big  guns 
were  planted  on  the  raised  terraces  within  the  sacred  park  of  the 
Temple  of  Earth,  all  ready  to  breach  the  walls. 

Prince  Poa's  large  blue  tent  was  pitched  on  a  slightly  rising 
ground  apart  from  the  others,  and  was  constantly  surrounded  by 
gorgeous  officers  in  bright  yellow  raiment,  with  round,  flat,  black 
hats  and  long  feathers,  who  were  galloping  to  and  fro,  directing 
grand  charges  of  cavalry.  It  did  seem  so  strange  to  see  a  whole 
army  of  ponies,  for  there  are  no  horses  here  large  enough  to  de- 
serve the  name,  unless  the  foreign  residents  chance  to  import  any. 

These  Eight  Banners  are  all  Manchus  or  Mongol  Tartars,  or  at 
any  rate  are  descended  from  such,  Chinese  troops  being  ranged 
under  the  Green  Standard.  These  Eight  Banners  (which,  as  I 
have  said,  are  multiplied),  are  plain  white,  red,  blue,  and  yellow, 
and  the  same  colours  repeated  and  distinguished  by  a  white  edge 
and  white  spot.  These  companies  are  supposed  to  defend  different 
sides  of  the  city,  the  colours  having  some  mystic  relation  to  the 
points  of  the  compass,  except  that  yellow  is  in  the  middle,  where 
it  guards  the  Imperial  Palace.  Red  guards  the  south,  blue  the 
north,  and  white  the  west,  while  the  cast  is  nominally  given  up  to 
the  Green  Standard,  which,  however,  being  composed  of  Chinamen, 
is  not  admitted  to  share  in  the  honour  of  guarding  the  Forbidden 
City.      I  am  told  that  the  Banner  Army  numbers  upwards  of  a 


492  THE    SUMMER    PALACE. 

hundred  thousand  men,  who  supply  Tartar  garrisons  for  the  prin- 
cipal cities  of  the  empire. 

The  uniforms  of  the  Bannermen  are  quaint  and  pretty.  They 
all  wear  white  tunics  with  loose  sleeveless  jackets  to  match  their 
distinctive  banner.  So  there  are  dark-blue,  reel,  white,  and  yellow 
jackets,  with  trousers  or  stockings  to  match,  but  the  latter  are  not 
much  seen,  being  concealed  by  high  boots  of  black  cloth.  Each 
division  is  headed  by  one  large  banner  borne  by  a  standard-bearer, 
but  a  number  of  small  flags  are  simply  fixed  into  cases,  which  are 
strapped  to  the  backs  of  the  men  thus  honourably  distinguished. 
The  effect  of  these  flaglets  waving  over  their  shoulders  is  very  odd 
and  theatrical.  So,  too,  are  the  shields,  on  which  are  painted  most 
hideous  faces,  supposed  to  be  very  alarming  to  the  foe. 

We  got  out  of  the  cart  and  took  up  a  good  position  on  a  small 
hillock,  whence  we  had  a  capital  view.  A  number  of  Tartar 
soldiers  who  were  off  duty  gathered  round,  and  were  quite  capti- 
vated by  the  loan  of  my  opera-glasses.  Then  they  showed  us  their 
wretched  firearms  (which  certainly  did  not  look  as  if  any  European 
could  have  superintended  the  arsenal  where  they  were  manufac- 
tured), and  also  their  very  primitive  powder-belts.1 

A  picturesque  company  of  archers  rode  by  on  stout  ponies, 
holding  their  bridle  in  their  right  hand,  and  in  the  left  their  bows, 
the  arrows  being  cased  in  a  leathern  quiver  slung  across  the 
shoulders.  As  to  their  swords,  instead  of  hanging  from  the  waist, 
they  are  stuck  under  the  saddle-flap.  Each  man  is  provided  with 
a  pipe  and  a  fan,  and  his  cap  is  adorned  with  the  tails  of  two 
squirrels,  which  is  the  correct  military  decoration.  Xow,  though 
we  Scots  are  quite  ready  to  believe  that  blackcocks  were  created 

1  When  such  unserviceable  weapons  figure  at  a  Peking  review,  we  need  scarcely 
wonder  at  the  descriptions  we  receive  of  such  military  defenders  of  inland  towns  as 
foreigners  occasionally  see  called  out  to  overawe  riotous  mobs  ! 

But  that  China  is  truly  in  earnest  in  her  study  of  barbarian  arts  of  war,  with  a 
view  to  the  defence  of  her  seaboard,  is  fully  proven  by  the  establishment  of  several 
extensive  arsenals,  each  fitted  with  the  finest  English  or  American  machinery,  able 
foreigners  being  engaged  as  instructors,  while  some  young  Chinamen  have  even 
been  despatched  to  Europe,  there  to  study  in  the  foreign  arsenals.  It  is  estimated 
that  a  sum  fully  equal  to  £2,000,000  was  expended  on  the  construction  of  the 
arsenal  at  Foo-Chow,  and  that  the  arms  and  ammunition  therein  destroyed  by  the 
French  in  1884  represented  a  value  of  £7,000,000. 

Nor  has  China  stinted  herself  in  the  matter  of  ironclads,  turret-ships,  steam- 
rams  carrying  heavy  guns,  an  extensive  torpedo  establishment,  modern  breech- 
loading  guns,  rifies,  gun-cotton,  and  millions  of  cartridges  for  carbines.  The 
arsenal  at  Shanghai  is  busy  with  the  manufacture  of  heavy  guns  ;  that  at  Nanking 
has  turned  out  light  field-guns  and  Catlings  ;  while  Tk-n-tsin  modestly  limits  its 
manufacture  of  Remington  cartridges  to  S000  a-day,  though  in  case  of  need  it  could 
turn  out  20,000  a-day.  The  daily  produce  of  the  Tien-tsin  powder-works  is  from 
four  to  five  tons  of  powder,  said  to  be  first-class. 


A    GIGANTIC    BELL.  493 

for  the  express  purpose  of  bequeathing  their  tails  to  adorn  the  caps 
of  the  London  Scottish  (the  said  tails  having  very  much  the  jovial 
independent  character  of  the  bird  itself),  it  really  is  impossible  to 
see  the  fitness  of  things  in  selecting  poor  little  squgs  as  military 
emblems,  unless  to  suggest  the  wisdom  of  "  he  who  fights  and 
runs  away  !  " 

Returning  to  our  cart,  we  next  drove  to  the  Ta-tsoon-tsu,  or 
"  Temple  of  the  Great  Bell."  It  is  a  large  Buddhist  monastery ; 
the  priests,  who  occupy  separate  houses,  are  a  civil,  kindly  lot,  very 
different  from  the  Lamas  of  the  Yung-ho-kung  !  There  are  curious 
paintings  of  Buddhist  saints  in  the  halls,  but  the  great  object  of 
interest  is  the  huge  bell,  which  is  said  to  be  the  largest  hanging 
bell  in  the  world.  Anyhow,  it  is  a  wonderful  piece  of  casting, 
being  nearly  18  feet  high  and  45  feet  in  circumference,  and 
is  of  solid  bronze  4  inches  thick.  It  is  one  of  eight  great  bells 
which  were  cast  by  command  of  the  Emperor  Yung-lo,  about 
a.d.  1400,  and  this  giant  is  said  to  have  cost  the  lives  of  eight 
men,  who  were  killed  during  the  process  of  casting.  The  whole 
bell,  both  inside  and  out,  is  covered  with  an  inscription  in  em- 
bossed Chinese  characters  about  half  an  inch  long,  covering  even 
the  handle,  the  total  number  being  84,000  !  I  am  told  that  this 
is  a  whole  classic. 

This  gigantic  bell  hangs  in  a  two-storeyed  pagoda,  and  a  favour- 
ite amusement  of  Chinese  visitors  to  the  temple  is  to  ascend  to  a 
gallery  whence  they  throw  small  coins  at  the  bell  in  hopes  of  hit- 
ting it — on  the  same  principle,  I  suppose,  that  they  spit  chewed 
prayer-papers  at  certain  gods  in  the  hope  of  the  prayer  sticking. 
The  throwing  of  cash  is  certainly  more  profitable  to  the  priests,  as 
the  coins  become  temple  property. 

This  great  bell,  which  is  struck  on  the  outside  by  a  suspended 
ram  of  wood,  is  only  sounded  when,  in  times  of  drought,  the 
Emperor  in  person,  or  the  Imperial  Princes  as  his  deputies,  come 
to  this  temple  to  pray  for  rain.  Theoretically,  they  are  supposed 
not  to  rise  from  their  knees  till  the  rain  falls  in  answer  to  their 
prayers,  and  responsive  to  the  vibrations  of  the  mighty  bell. 

There  is  sore  need  of  rain  now,  so  I  suppose  the  bell  will  be 
struck  ere  long.  Apparently  it  is  reserved  as  a  last  resource,  for 
already  the  little  Emperor  and  the  Empresses-Regent  have  been 
pleading  for  rain  in  the  gorgeous  yellow-tiled  temple  at  the  entrance 
to  the  Forbidden  City ;  and  Prince  Yeh,  as  the  Emperor's  deputy, 
has  been  repeatedly  sent  to  pray  for  rain  in  a  most  strange  open- 
air  temporary  sanctuary  close  to  the  Bell  Temple. 


494  THE    SUMMER    PALACE. 

We  discovered  this  quite  by  chance.  Having  observed  a  large 
circular  enclosure  in  the  middle  of  a  field  of  standing  corn,  we 
halted,  and  went  to  see  what  it  was,  and  found  that  it  consisted 
of  eight  screens  of  the  coarsest  yellow  mats,  with  great  blue  dragons 
designed  on  them — simple  building  materials;  yet  this  primitive 
tabernacle  is  so  constructed  as  to  represent  the  mystic  square  and 
circle  which  symbolise  Earth  and  Heaven.  Four  of  the  screens 
form  a  circle,  leaving  four  gaps.  The  other  four  are  straight,  and 
are  placed  outside,  so  as  to  guard  and  conceal  these  entrances. 
In  the  centre  a  square  raised  platform  of  earth  forms  a  rude  altar, 
at  the  four  corners  of  which  are  four  vases  of  the  coarsest  pottery, 
containing  plants.  Straggling  and  much-trampled  corn  grows  up 
between  and  around  these,  as  in  the  field  outside. 

In  a  small  tent  close  by,  we  found  a  sleepy  watchman,  who  told 
us  about  the  Prince's  devotional  visits  to  this  very  primitive 
oratory,  where  he  worships  Lung  Wong,  the  Dragon  King,  whose 
service,  by  the  way,  proves  not  only  a  very  marked  respect  for 
gradations  of  rank,  but  also  curiously  illustrates  the  Chinese  prin- 
ciple of  not  bestowing  more  honour  than  is  actually  necessary, 
even  on  a  god.  In  seasons  of  drought  the  district  ruler  presides 
at  a  solemn  service  which  lasts  three  days,  when  sundry  pigs, 
sheep,  and  fowls  are  sacrificed  to  this  Dragon  of  the  great  deep. 
Should  he  fail  to  obtain  a  gracious  answer,  the  Prefect  takes  up 
the  matter  and  proclaims  a  fast,  forbidding  the  people  to  taste  fish, 
flesh,  or  fowl  till  his  prayer  is  granted. 

When  the  Prefect  has  done  his  very  best,  and  still  no  rain  falls, 
then  the  Governor-General  takes  his  turn,  clothing  himself  in 
sackcloth,  and  loaded  with  chains  and  fetters.  Escorted  by  the 
leading  men  of  the  district,  all  in  garments  of  humiliation,  he 
walks  (which  is  the  very  acme  of  humility)  to  the  temple  or  the 
open-air  altar,  where  he  offers  incense  and  burns  a  written  appeal 
to  the  great  Dragon.  Both  Buddhist  and  Taouist  priests  are 
present,  and  join  in  fervent  prayers  for  rain.  Sometimes  the 
Emperor  desires  the  Taouist  Arch-Abbot  to  procure  this  long- 
deferred  blessing,  and  if  he  fails  to  obtain  it,  he  is  mulcted  of  his 
revenues,  on  the  same  principle  that  the  Imperial  doctor  is  de- 
prived of  his  honorific  button  if  the  Emperor  should  chance 
to  die ! 

In  some  districts  the  farmers  and  peasants  march  in  procession 
to  the  temple,  crowned  with  garlands  of  weeping-willow  leaves, 
and  carrying  boughs  of  the  same.  Should  the  Dragon  still  prove 
inexorable,  it  is  thought  necessary  to  rouse  him  to  action,  so  he  is 


COERCING    THE    WATER    DRAGON.  495 

taken  from  his  throne  and  set  down  uncanopied  in  the  Mazing  sun, 
just  to  feel  how  uncomfortable  he  is  making  other  people ! 

The  Emperor's  care  is  not  confined  to  the  early  and  latter  rains. 
He  must  also  pray  for  a  good  snowfall  in  the  northern  provinces, 
that  the  earth  may  be  fully  moistened,  and  so  prepared  to  nourish 
the  precious  grain. 

From  the  present  prolonged  drought,  there  seems  reason  to  fear 
that  "  The  Dragon  Spirit  of  the  Sacred  Well "  has  not  been  suffi- 
ciently grateful  for  the  honorary  title  conferred  on  him  by  the 
Emperor  for  past  services  in  this  matter.1 

The  ceremony  whereby  the  intervention  of  the  Water  Dragon  is 
secured  is  very  curious.  When  prayers  have  been  all  in  vain,  it 
is  decided  that  pressure  must  be  put  on.  The  Emperor  therefore 
deputes  a  special  officer  to  travel  to  the  city  of  Han-tan,  in  the 
province  of  Honan,  and  bring  thence  an  iron  plate  which  is  kept 
in  a  well  outside  of  the  town,  within  the  courts  of  the  Temple  of 
the  Water  Dragon.  On  this  plate,  which  is  six  inches  long  and 
half  an  inch  thick,  is  inscribed  a  petition  for  abundance  of  re- 
freshing rain. 

When  this  iron  plate  (called  the  Tieh-pai)  arrives  in  Peking 
(a  circumstance  which  is  duly  notified  in  the  '  Gazette ! ')  it  is 
reverently  placed  on  the  altar  in  the  great  temple  of  the  national 
gods,  where  it  is  supposed  to  act  as  a  key  to  lock  the  mouth  of 
the  Dragon,  which  makes  him  so  very  uncomfortable  that  he  is 
quite  sure  to  send  rain  very  quickly,  in  order  to  get  his  trouble- 
some worshippers  to  remove  the  iron  gag. 

It  has  so  happened  that  on  several  occasions  this  ceremony  lias 
been  resorted  to  a  few  days  before  a  heavy  rainfall,  whereupon  the 
good  Dragon  gets  all  the  credit,  like  a  spoilt  child  who  has  at 
length  done  as  he  was  bid.  So  then  the  satisfactory  result  is 
officially  chronicled  in  the  '  Gazette,'  and  the  Dragon  is  rewarded 
with  a  new  title  and  the  general  repair  of  his  temple.  Thus  in 
1867  his  Avell  at  Han-Tan  was  canonised  as  "The  Holy  Well  of 
the  Dragon  God."  But  when  in  1871  he  again  procured  the  long- 
deferred  rains,  the  Imperial  edict  commanded  that  another  title 
should  be  conferred  upon  the  well,  which  should  thenceforth  be 
called  "The  Efficacious  Answering  Holy  Well  of  the  Dragon 
God." 

After  four  hours  of  intolerably  weary  jolting  in  our  dreadful 
cart,  we  arrived  at  Wan-Shu-Shan,  which  is  the  only  portion  of 
the  grounds    of   the    Summer  Palace   (the  Yuen-Ming- Yuen,  or 

1  See  p.  394. 


40 G  THE    SUMMER    PALACE. 

"  Garden  of  Gardens  ")  to  which  foreigners  are  still  admitted,  as 
they  have  there  wrought  such  hopeless  ruin  that  I  suppose  it  is 
not  thought  worth  while  to  shut  them  out ;  and  truly  it  is  sicken- 
ing, even  now,  to  look  on  such  a  scene  of  devastation.  The  park, 
which  is  now  once  more  closed  to  the  barbarians,  contains  fine 
palatial  buildings  faced  with  colonnades,  and  altogether  of  a  very 
Italian  type,  having  been  built  under  the  direction  of  the  Jesuits ; 
but  the  beautiful  pleasure-grounds,  where  we  wandered  over 
wooded  hills  all  strewn  with  beautiful  ruins,  is  purely  Chinese, 
and  as  such,  is  to  me  far  more  interesting. 

At  the  time  when  the  "  Barbarian "  army  so  ruthlessly  forced 
their  way  into  this  Chinese  paradise,  it  was  in  the  most  perfect 
order,  a  feature  by  no  means  common  in  the  homes  of  even  the 
greatest  mandarins.  Forty  small  palaces,  some  of  carved  cedar- 
wood,  brought  from  far-distant  forests,  some  faced  with  bronze 
or  porcelain,  but  each  a  marvel  of  art,  occupied  beautiful  sites 
within  the  grounds,  and  were  apportioned  to  the  great  nobles 
of  the  empire.  The  sheets  of  ornamental  water,  lakes  and  rivers, 
were  all  clean,  and  each  marble  bridge  was  a  separate  object 
of  beauty,  while  from  out  the  dense  foliage  on  the  hill,  yellow 
tiled  roofs,  curled  up  at  the  ends,  gleamed  like  gold  in  the  sun- 
light. 

Within  the  palaces  were  stored  such  treasures  of  excpiisitely 
carved  jade,  splendid  old  enamels,  bronzes,  gold  and  silver,  precious 
jewels  of  jade  and  rubies,  carved  lapis-lazuli,  priceless  furs,  and 
richest  silks,  as  could  only  have  been  accumulated  by  a  long 
dynasty  of  Celestial  rulers. 

Cruel,  indeed,  was  the  change  when  the  allied  forces  arrived. 
The  French,  taking  advantage  of  a  circuitous  approach,  at  once 
proceeded  to  sack  the  palace,  ere  the  British  guessed  their  inten- 
tion, so  when  these  were  allowed  to  join  in  the  work  of  devasta- 
tion and  indiscriminate  plunder,  all  the  most  obviously  valuable 
treasures  had  already  been  removed,  while  the  floors  were  strewn 
knee-deep  with  broken  fragments  of  priceless  china,  and  every  sort 
of  beautiful  object,  too  cumbersome  or  too  fragile  for  rough-and- 
ready  removal,  and  therefore  ruthlessly  smashed  with  the  butt-ends 
of  muskets,  to  say  nothing  of  piles  of  the  most  gorgeous  silks  and 
satins  and  gold  embroidery,  which  lay  unheeded  among  the  ruins. 

Although  waggon-loads  of  what  seemed  the  most  precious  objects 
were  removed,  these  were  as  nothing  compared  with  what  was  left 
and  destroyed,  when  a  week  later  the  order  was  given  to  commence 
the  actual  demolition  of  the  principal  buildings,  a  work  on  which 


THE    MARBLE    BRIDGE.  497 

two  regiments  were  employed  for  two  whole  days,  ere  the  hand  of 
the  destroyer  was  stayed ;  and  so,  happily,  a  few  wonderful  and 
unique  buildings  still  remain  as  a  suggestion  of  vanished  glories. 

Of  course  all  this  was  done  with  the  best  possible  intention,  by 
way  of  punishing  the  Emperor  himself  and  his  great  nobles  for  the 
official  deeds  of  treachery,  rather  than  injure  the  innocent  citizens 
of  Peking.  Yet  it  seems  that  even  these  would  have  accepted  any 
amount  of  personal  loss  and  suffering  rather  than  this  barbarous 
destruction  of  an  Imperial  glory — an  act  which  has  so  deeply  im- 
pressed the  whole  nation  with  a  conviction  that  all  foreigners  are 
barbarous  Vandals,  that  it  is  generally  coupled  with  their  deter- 
mined pushing  of  the  opium  trade,  these  two  crimes  forming  the 
double-barrelled  weapon  of  reproach  wherewith  Christian  mission- 
aries in  all  parts  of  the  empire  are  assailed,  and  their  work 
grievously  hindered. 

Our  first  halt  was  beside  a  well  whose  waters  are  so  deliciously 
crystalline  and  cold  that  they  seemed  to  our  parched  and  dusty 
throats  as  a  true  elixir.  So  famous  is  this  pure  spring,  that  the 
daily  supply  for  the  Imperial  Palace  is  brought  thence  in  barrels 
in  a  cart  flying  a  yellow  flag,  with  an  inscription  in  black  charac- 
ters, stating  that  it  travels  on  the  Emperor's  business — a  warning 
to  all  men  to  make  way  for  it.  The  water  near  the  city  is  all  bad 
and  brackish,  so  such  a  spring  as  this  is  a  priceless  boon. 

We  devoted  about  three  hours  to  exploring  these  beautiful 
grounds,  of  which  might  be  said — 

"  Was  never  scene  so  sad — so  fair  !  " 

Even  the  ornamental  timber  was  cut  for  firewood  by  the  allied 
barbarians,  though  happily  some  remains  to  beautify  the  land- 
scape. 

The  grounds  are  enclosed  by  a  handsome  wall  of  dark-red 
sandstone,  with  a  coping  of  glazed  tiles,  and  its  warm  colour 
contrasts  pleasantly  with  the  rich  greens  of  the  park  and  the 
lovely  blue  lake  with  its  reedy  shores  and  floating  lotus-blossoms. 
Into  this  lake  flow  various  rivers,  crossed  by  remarkable  bridges. 

Of  these  the  most  conspicuous  is  a  very  handsome  stone  bridge 
of  seventeen  arches,  graduated  from  quite  small  arches  at  either 
side  to  very  high  ones  in  the  centre.  It  is  commonly  called  the 
Marble  Bridge,  because  of  its  beautiful  white  marble  balustrade, 
with  about  fifty  pillars  on  either  side,  on  each  of  which  sits  a 
marble  lion.  Each  end  of  the  bridge  is  guarded  by  two  large 
lions,  also  of  marble. 

2  I 


498  THE    SUMMER    PALACE. 

It  seems  that  a  stone  or  marble  lion,  seated  on  a  pede.stal, 
ensures  good  geomantic  influences,  and  averts  calamities  from  the 
neighbourhood.  Hence  these  very  handsome,  though  decidedly 
imaginary  animals,  are  commonly  placed  in  temple  courts  and 
elsewhere.  Such  a  regiment  as  we  have  here  should  surely  have 
brought  better  luck  to  this  garden  of  palaces  ! 

This  bridge  connects  the  mainland  with  an  island  about  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  in  circumference ;  it  is  entirely  surrounded  with 
a  marble  balustrade  like  that  on  the  bridge.  In  the  centre  of  the 
isle  is  an  artificial  mound  on  which,  approached  by  flights  of  steps, 
and  enclosed  by  yet  another  marble  balustrade,  are  the  ruins  of 
what  was  once  a  palace  of  fairy-like  beauty — the  scene  of  gayest 
revels,  when  all  manner  of  pleasure-boats  floated  on  the  calm 
waters,  while  every  tree  was  illuminated  by  wonderful  lamps, 
shaped  like  fishes,  birds,  beasts,  fruit,  and  flowers,  and  on  every 
rivulet,  river,  and  lake  floated  lanterns  in  the  form  of  tiny  boats. 
Everything  that  Chinese  fancy  could  devise  to  make  the  scene 
truly  fairy-like  was  there. 

A  very  amusing  account  of  some  of  these  Imperial  festivities 
was  written  in  1743  by  Monsieur  Attiret,  a  French  missionary, 
who,  with  one  companion,  was  carried  thither  to  make  drawings 
for  the  Emperor.  They  were  conveyed  up  the  river  in  a  closely 
covered  boat,  and  thence  were  carried  in  carefully  closed  litters, 
so  that  when  they  were  turned  loose  to  sketch  in  this  garden  of 
delight,  they  naturally  deemed  themselves  in  Paradise,  and  were 
in  no  haste  to  leave  it. 

They  found  that  the  Emperor  generally  spent  about  ten  months 
every  year  in  this  delightful  retreat,  and  they  were  thus  privileged 
to  obtain  many  glimpses  of  the  Imperial  family.  Perhaps  the 
strangest  of  the  amusements  provided  for  the  Court  were  mimic 
fairs,  periodically  got  up  in  a  model  town,  which  (like  the  elaborate 
model  streets  of  Old  London  in  our  own  "  Inventories  ")  was  built 
in  the  midst  of  the  Imperial  pleasure-grounds  to  enable  the  Em- 
peror and  his  ladies  to  form  some  idea  of  the  streets  and  shojis 
which  they  might  never  behold  in  real  life. 

To  this  end,  says  M.  Attiret,  a  town  was  built  which  should  be 
a  sort  of  miniature  of  Peking.  It  was  a  mile  square,  and  had 
walls,  towers,  parapets,  battlements,  and  four  great  gates.  The 
space  within  this  enclosure  was  laid  out  in  streets,  shops,  and 
markets.  There  were  temples,  exchanges,  tribunals,  even  a  port 
of  vessels.  Here,  at  stated  times  every  year,  a  large  number  of 
the  Imperial  attendants  were  required    to    assume  the  dress   of 


MONSIEUR    ATTIRET's    DESCRIPTION.  499 

various  tradesmen,  and  enact  all  manner  of  scenes  of  ordinary  life 
— its  commerce,  marketing,  bustle,  hurry,  and  occasional  roguery. 

Real  goods  were  supplied  for  sale  by  merchants  in  Peking,  who 
counted  on  finding  many  good  customers,  as  the  Emperor  and  his 
ladies  alike  made  good  use  of  their  rare  opportunities  of  shopping. 
One  street  was  devoted  to  the  porcelain  shops,  another  to  silken 
goods,  a  third  to  pictures  and  books.  Street-sellers  were  told  oft' 
to  cry  fruits  and  refreshing  drinks ;  some  were  employed  in  driving 
wheelbarrows,  others  in  carrying  baskets.  Occasionally  there  was 
a  well-got-up  fight,  or  a  case  of  deliberate  thieving,  when  the 
public  officers  appeared  in  time  to  stop  the  quarrel  or  arrest  the 
thief,  and  the  offenders  were  promptly  carried  before  the  tribunal 
and  there  tried  in  due  form,  and  probably  condemned  to  be  bas- 
tinadoed, which  sentence  was  promptly  carried  out  for  the  amuse- 
ment of  the  Emperor,  but  much  to  the  anguish  of  the  luckless 
actor. 

Another  portion  of  the  grounds  was  set  apart  to  afford  a  prac- 
tical illustration  of  agriculture.  It  was  laid  out  in  fields  and 
meadows,  with  farm-houses,  cottages,  oxen,  ploughs,  and  all  the 
necessaries  for  husbandry.  Here,  in  due  season,  all  manner  of 
grains  were  sown  and  reaped,  and  the  Emperor  was  able  to  obtain 
some  knowledge  of  the  subject  without  danger  of  being  seen  by 
the  vulgar  herd. 

Though  the  general  feeling  now  is  one  of  desolation,  as  one 
climbs  stairways  passing  between  numberless  mounds  of  rubble, 
chiefly  composed  of  many-coloured  glazed  tiles  of  every  colour  of 
the  rainbow,  nearly  all  smashed,  there  are  nevertheless  some  isolated 
buildings  which  happily  have  quite  escaped.  Among  these  are 
several  beautiful  seven-storeyed  pagodas.  Of  one,  which  is  octa- 
gonal, the  lower  storey  is  adorned  with  finely  sculptured  Indian 
gods.  Two  others  are  entirely  faced  and  roofed  with  the  loveliest 
porcelain  tiles — yellow,  gold,  bright  emerald  green,  and  deep  blue. 
They  are  quite  intact,  even  the  tremulous  bells  suspended  from  the 
eaves  still  tinkling  with  every  breath  of  air. 

To  me  the  most  interesting  group  of  ruins  is  a  cluster  of  very 
ornamental  small  temple-buildings,  some  with  conical,  others  with 
tent-shaped  roofs,  but  all  glazed  with  the  most  brilliantly  green 
tiles,  and  all  the  pillars  and  other  woodwork  painted  deep  red. 
On  either  side  of  the  principal  building  are  two  very  ornamental 
pagoda-shaped  temples,  exactly  alike,  except  that  the  green  roof  of 
one  is  surmounted  by  a  dark-blue  china  ornament,  the  other  by 
a  similar   ornament    in  bright  vellow.      Each  is  built  to  contain 


500  THE   SUMMER    PALACE. 

A  LARGE  ROTATOBY  CYLINDER,  ON  THE  PltAYER-WHEEL  PBINOIPLB, 
WITH  NICHES  FOR  A  MULTITUDE  OF    IMAGES.       Ill  fact,  they  arc  small 

editions  of  the  two  revolving  cylinders,  with  the  five  hundred 
disciples  of  Buddha,  which  so  attracted  me  at  the  great  Lama 
Temple,  as  heing  the  first  link  to  Japanese  Scripture -wheels  <>c 
Tibetan  Prayer-wheels  which  I  have  seen  in  China,  and  the  exist- 
ence of  which  has  apparently  passed  unnoticed.  It  is  needless  to 
add  that,  of  course,  every  image  has  been  stolen,  and  only  the 
revolving  stands  now  remain,  in  a  most  rickety  condition. 

When  wo  could  no  longer  endure  the  blazing  heat,  we  descended 
past  what  appears  to  have  been  the  principal  temple,  of  which 
absolutely  nothing  remains  standing — only  a  vast  mound  of  bril- 
liant fragments  of  broken  tiles  lying  on  a  great  platform.  Steep 
zigzag  stairs  brought  us  to  the  foot  of  the  hill,  where  great  bronze 
lions  still  guard  the  forsaken  courts. 

Parched  with  thirst,  we  returned  to  the  blessed  spring  of  truly 
living  water,  and  drank  and  drank  again,  cup  after  cup,  till  the 
very  coolies  standing  by  laughed  ! 

Then  once  more  climbing  into  the  horrible  vehicle  of  torture, 
we  retraced  our  morning  route  till  we  reached  a  very  nice  clean 
restaurant,  where  we  asked  for  some  luncheon.  "We  were  shown 
into  a  pretty  little  airy  room  up-stairs,  commanding  a  fine  view  of 
the  grounds  we  had  just  left.  After  the  preliminary  tiny  cup  of  pale- 
yellow  tea,  basins  of  boiling  water  were  brought  in,  with  a  bit  of 
flannel  floating  in  each,  that  we  might  wash  off  the  dust  in  true 
Chinese  style.  The  correct  thing  is  to  wring  out  the  flannel  and 
therewith  rub  the  face  and  neck,  with  a  view  to  future  coolness. 

Luncheon  (eaten  with  chop-sticks,  wdiich  I  can  now  manage 
perfectly !)  consisted  of  the  usual  series  of  small  dishes,  little  bits 
of  cold  chicken  with  sauce,  morsels  of  pork  with  mushrooms,  frag- 
ments of  cold  duck  with  some  other  sort  of  fungus,  little  bowls  of 
watery  soup,  scraps  of  pig's  kidney  with  boiled  chestnuts,  pickled 
garlic  and  cabbage,  all  in  such  infinitesimal  portions,  that  but  for 
the  plentiful  supply  of  rice,  hungry  folk  would  find  it  hard  to 
appease  the  inner  wolf !  Tiny  cups  of  weak  rice-wine,  followed 
by  more  pale-yellow  tea,  completed  the  repast. 

"We  hurried  away  as  soon  as  possible,  being  anxious  to  visit  a 
very  famous  Lama  Temple,  the  "  Wang  Szu  "  or  Yellow  Temple. 
As  we  drove  along,  I  was  amused  to  notice  how  singularly  numer- 
ous magpies  are  hereabouts.  They  go  about  in  companies  of  six 
or  eight,  and  are  so  tame  and  saucy  that  they  scarcely  take  the 
trouble  to  hop  aside  as  we  pass. 


THE   WARNING    GONG.  501 

Though,  the  drive  seemed  very  long,  still  we  never  suspected 
anything  amiss,  till  we  suddenly  found  ourselves  near  the  gates  of 
the  city,  when  we  discovered  that  our  worthy  carter,  assuming  that 
he  knew  the  time  better  than  we  did,  and  that  we  should  be  locked 
out  of  the  city  at  sunset,  had  deliberately  taken  a  wrong  road,  and 
altogether  avoided  the  Yellow  Temple.  Reluctantly  yielding  to 
British  determination,  he  sorrowfully  turned,  and  we  had  to  endure 
a  long  extra  course  of  bumping  ere  we  reached  the  Temple,  which 
is  glazed  with  yellow  tiles  (an  Imperial  privilege  conceded  to 
Lamas). 

This  is  a  very  large  monastery  full  of  objects  of  interest,  of 
which  the  most  notable  is  a  very  fine  white  marble  monument  to 
a  Grand  Lama  who  died  here.  It  is  of  a  purely  Indian  design, 
and  all  round  it  are  scidptured  scenes  in  the  life  and  death  of 
Buddha.  Of  course,  having  lost  so  much  time,  we  had  very  little 
to  spare  here,  so  once  more  betook  us  to  the  cart,  and  jolted  back 
to  Peking. 

As  we  crossed  the  dreary  expanse  of  dusty  plain,  a  sharp  wind 
sprang  up,  and  we  had  a  moderate  taste  of  the  horrors  of  a  dust- 
storm,  and  devoutly  hope  never  to  be  subjected  to  a  real  one. 

The  dread  of  being  locked  out  is  by  no  means  unfounded. 
Punctually  at  a  quarter  to  six  one  of  the  soldiers  on  guard  strikes 
an  iron  gong  which  hangs  at  the  door,  and  continues  doing  so  for 
five  minutes  Avith  slow  regular  strokes.  Then  a  quickened  beat 
gives  notice  that  only  ten  minutes'  grace  remains ;  then  more  and 
more  rapidly  fall  the  strokes,  and  the  accustomed  ear  distinguishes 
five  varieties  of  beat,  by  which  it  is  easy  to  calculate  how  many 
minutes  remain.  From  the  first  stroke,  every  one  outside  the  gates 
hurries  towards  them,  and  carts,  foot-passengers,  and  riders  stream 
into  the  city  with  much  noise  and  turmoil.  At  six  o'clock  pre- 
cisely, the  guard  unite  in  a  prolonged  unearthly  shout,  announc- 
ing that  time  is  up ;  then  the  ponderous  gates  are  closed,  and  in 
another  moment  the  rusty  lock  creaks,  and  the  city  is  isolated  for 
the  night. 

Then  follows  the  frightful  and  unfragiant  process  of  street- 
watering,  of  which  we  had  full  benefit,  as  our  tired  mide  slowly 
dragged  us  back  to  this  haven  of  rest. 


502  FROM    PEKING    TO    CHE-FOO. 


CHAPTER    XL. 

FROM     PEKING    TO     CHE-FOO. 

Pigeon  music — Sand-flies — Summer  quarters  in  hill  temples — Preparation  for 
a  start — Prayers  for  rain — Ride  to  Tung-Chow — American  Mission — 
House-boat  on  the  Pei-ho — Stopped  by  the  rain  ! — Reach  Tien-tsin — 
Salt  manufacture. 

Saturday,  June  14. 

It  is  early  morning — the  only  enjoyable  time  of  the  clay,  before 
the  sun  rises  high — and  I  am  sitting  in  the  pleasant  verandah 
listening  to  the  pigeons  as  they  fly  overhead.  This  is  no  dove-like 
cooing,  but  a  low  melodious  whistle  like  the  sighing  of  an  yEolian 
harp,  or  the  murmur  of  telegraph  wires  thrilled  by  the  night  wind. 
It  is  produced  by  the  action  of  cylindrical  pipes,  like  two  finger- 
ends  side  by  side,  about  an  inch  and  a  half  in  length.  These  are 
made  of  very  light  wood  and  fitted  with  whistles ;  some  are  glob- 
ular in  form,  and  are  constructed  from  a  tiny  gourd.  These  little 
musical  boxes  are  attached  to  the  tail-feathers  of  the  pigeon,  in 
such  a  manner  that  as  he  flies  the  air  shall  blow  through  the 
Avhistle,  producing  the  most  plaintive  tones,  especially  as  there  are 
often  many  pigeons  flying  at  once,  some  near,  some  distant,  some 
just  overhead,  some  high  in  the  heavens.  So  the  combined  effect 
is  really  melodious.  I  believe  the  Pekingese  are  the  only  people 
who  thus  provide  themselves  with  a  dove  orchestra,  though  the  use 
of  pigeons  as  message-bearers  is  common  to  all  parts  of  the  empire. 
(The  people  of  Southern  China  have,  however,  devised  another 
method  of  producing  similar  plaintively  melodious  tones,  by  insert- 
ing several  metallic  strings  in  the  centre  of  their  kites,  so  that  as 
these  fly  on  the  breeze  they  emit  low  silvery  notes  like  the  breath 
of  an  ./Eolian  harp.) 

There  is  one  form  of  insect-life  here  which  is  a  terrible  nuisance 
— namely,  the  sand-flies,  which  swarm  in  multitudes.  They  are 
too  cruel ;  every  one  is  bitten,  and  the  irritation  is  so  excessive  that 
few  people  have  sufficient  determination  to  resist  scratching,  so  of 
course  there  is  a  most  unbecoming  prevalence  of  red  spots  sugges- 
tive of  a  murrain  of  measles  ! 

I  am  told  that  I  have  been  singularljr  unfortunate  in  the  season 
of  my  visit,  and  that  if  only  I  had  come  in  September,  I  should 
have  found  life  most  enjoyable  (I  recollect  some  of  the  residents  at 


THE    EIGHT    GREAT    TEMPLES.  503 

Aden  likewise  assuring  me  that  they  really  learnt  to  think  their 
blazing  rock  quite  pleasant !)  I  suppose  that  I  am  spoilt  by 
memories  of  green  Pacific  Isles  and  sweet  sea-breezes,  so  I  can  only 
compassionate  people  who  till  two  months  ago  were  ice-bound — 
shut  off  from  the  world  by  a  frozen  river — and  now  are  broiled 
and  stifled  ! 

Such  of  them,  however,  as  can  get  away  from  their  work  in  the 
city,  have  the  delightful  resource  of  going  to  the  hills,  and  estab- 
lishing themselves  as  lodgers  at  one  of  the  many  almost  forsaken 
temples,  where  a  few  poor  priests  are  very  glad  to  supplement  their 
small  revenues  by  a  sure  income  of  barbaric  coin.  The  Pekingese 
themselves  are  in  the  habit  of  thus  making  summer  trips  to  the 
hills,  so  many  of  the  temples  have  furnished  rooms  to  let,  with  a 
view  to  encouraging  the  combination  of  well-paid  temple  services 
with  this  pleasant  change  of  air. 

I  am  told  that  many  of  these  temples  are  charmingly  situated, 
and  have  beautifully  laid-out  grounds.  A  group  called  "  The  Eight 
Great  Temples "  is  described  as  especially  attractive.  They  are 
dotted  on  terraces  along  the  face  of  "  The  "Western  Mountains," 
about  twelve  miles  from  the  city,  and  among  their  attractions  are 
cool  pools  in  shady  grottoes  all  overgrown  with  trailing  vines  and 
bright  blossoms.  Stone  fountains,  where  numberless  gold-fish 
swim  in  crystalline  water,  which  falls  from  the  mouth  of  great 
marble  dragons — curious  inscriptions  in  Tibetan  and  Chinese  char- 
acter, deeply  engraven  on  the  rocks,  and  coloured  red — fine  groups 
of  Scotch  firs,  and  old  walnut-trees,  and  in  spring-time  I  am  told 
that  our  dear  familiar  lilac  blossoms  in  perfection.  Then  there  are 
all  manner  of  quaintly  ornamental  pagodas  and  temples,  great  and 
small,  with  innumerable  images  and  pictures,  and  silken  hangings, 
and  all  the  paraphernalia  so  attractive  to  the  artistic  eye. 

My  hostess  and  her  family  are  just  preparing  to  start  for  such  a 
temple,  which  they  rented  last  year  in  an  extremely  pretty  district. 
They  are  so  kind  as  to  invite  me  to  accompany  them  thither ;  but 
though  I  am  very  much  tempted  to  do  so,  and  to  see  for  myself 
how  the  beauty  of  mountain  scenery  in  North  China  compares 
with  that  of  the  Southern  Empire,  I  am  nevertheless  so  anxious  to 
get  back  to  Nagasaki,1  where  all  my  home  letters  have  for  some 
time  been  accumulating,  that  I  have  decided  to  take  advantage  of 
the  escort  of  the  Eev.  "W.  Collins,2  chaplain  to  the  Embassy,  who 

1  In  Japan. 

2  It  was  Mr  Collins  who,  in  1S60,  opened  a  dispensary  for  the  sick  poor  at  Foo- 
Chow,   where  the   CM. 8.  Mission  had  been  working  for  ten  years  without   any 


504  FROM    PEKING   TO    CHE-FOO. 

is  to  start  for  Che-foo  on  Monday,  and  kindly  offers  to  make  all 
my  boating  and  other  arrangements,  which  involve  a  good  deal  of 
trouble.  My  luggage,  and  such  treasures  as  I  have  acquired  in 
Peking,  are  to  start  to-day,  going  by  cart  to  the  boat  at  Tung- 
Chow,  whither  we  purpose  riding  in  the  early  morning,  and  thus 
avoiding  a  repetition  of  the  hateful  cart -journey.  Mr  Collins 
kindly  lends  me  a  pony,  and  Miss  Chowler  lends  me  her  side- 
saddle. 

Sunday,  15th. 

The  morning  services  in  connection  with  this  Mission  being  all 
in  Chinese,  one  of  the  ladies  of  the  party  accompanied  me  to  the 
British  Legation,  where  a  very  unattractive  room  is  set  apart  as  a 
chapel.  It  has  not  been  beautified  by  any  ecclesiastical  decoration, 
and  the  ordinary  table  which  does  duty  as  the  altar  is  placed  in 
front  of  a  plain  glass  window,  so  that  one's  eyes  must  necessarily 
rest  on  the  crude  and  gaudy  scarlet,  blue,  and  emerald  green  of  the 
recently  restored  Legation  buildings,  which  I  confess  is  to  me  dis- 
tracting.    The  congregation  was  of  course  very  small. 

This  evening  there  was  the  usual  very  hearty  service  here,  at 
which  there  was  quite  a  large  muster  of  Europeans,  beginning  with 
all  the  members  of  the  various  Christian  Missions  of  all  denomina- 
tions who  have  been  teaching  in  Chinese  most  of  the  day,  and  here 
assemble  to  worship  together  in  their  mother  tongue.  There  are 
at  present  altogether  about  thirty  Christian  teachers  in  Peking. 
The  form  of  service  adopted  to  suit  all  is  the  Congregational,  and 
each  missionary  within  hail  takes  an  evening  by  turn,  in  alpha- 
betical rotation.  To-night  there  were  special  prayers  for  rain,  as 
there  have  been  at  all  the  services,  English  and  Chinese,  Christian 
and  heathen,  for  the  drought  has  been  so  prolonged  in  these 
Northern  provinces,  that  now  the  fear  of  another  famine  is 
imminent.  But  much  as  we  all  hope  for  rain,  I  confess  I  would 
rather  it  didn't  come  down  till  we  reach  Tien-tsin ! 

Now  there  is  only  time  for  a  moderate  allowance  of  sleep,  as  we 
are  to  start  at  4  a.m. 

Ox  the  Pei-ho,  ox  Board  my  House-boat, 

Monday  Night. 

Once  more  afloat  on  the  Pei-ho,  and  by  no  means  sorry  to  have 

apparent  result,  as  told  in  Chapter  X.  That  dispensary  proved  the  means  of  bring- 
ing in  the  first  three  converts — first-fruits  of  the  extensive  and  flourishing  Mission 
of  the  present  day. 

Mr  Collins's  son,  the  Rev.  J.  S.  Collins,  has  been  now  sent  out  by  the  men  of 
Trinity  College,  Dublin,  as  their  own  missionary  in  this  same  province  of  Fuh-kien. 


RIDE    TO    TUNG-CHOW.  505 

seen  the  last  of  Peking,  though  I  would  not  on  any  account  have 
missed  seeing  it.  I  am  generally  sorry  to  leave  any  place  -where 
I  happen  to  be,  hut  in  this  instance  my  sole  regret  was  parting 
with  truly  kind  friends,  whom,  however,  I  hope  to  meet  again  in 
Scotland. 

Punctually  at  4  a.m.  Mr  Collins  arrived  with  the  ponies.  Dr 
and  Mrs  Dudgeon  were  both  up,  to  give  us  a  very  early  breakfast, 
and  speed  us  on  our  way.  The  morning  air  was  cool  and  pleasant, 
and  the  dust  still  lay  undisturbed,  so  my  last  impressions  of  the 
great  city  were  of  the  best,  and  there  was  no  bumping  to  mar  the 
last  view  of  the  majestic  towers  and  the  venerable  walls,  outside 
of  which  we  rode  along  the  desolated  dusty  waste,  where  the 
miserable-looking  Bactrian  camels  were  grunting  and  groaning  and 
remonstrating  with  all  their  power  against  being  reladen  for  an- 
other day's  toil.  How  picturesque  it  all  is — the  foreground  of 
riders  in  great  straw  hats,  and  the  invariable  blue  clothes  which 
harmonise  so  well  with  the  general  dust-colour ! 

We  again  met  all  manner  of  curious  vehicles  such  as  we  saw  on 
the  way  up,  and  wretched  beggars,  including  some  whose  rags  had 
literally  dropped  off,  and  had  not  been  picked  up  again  !  but  we 
were  happily  able  to  avoid  the  paved  road  with  all  its  pitfalls,  and 
in  so  doing  we  passed  patches  of  water  with  tall,  intensely  green 
reeds,  and  blessed  their  fresh  beauty.  They  are  grown  for  the 
purpose  of  making  mats.  At  all  the  roadside  villages,  an  array  of 
buckets  of  water  stand  ready  for  the  use  of  thirsting  animals  of  all 
sorts,  their  owners  paying  the  water-men  with  a  few  copper  cash. 
It  was  nearly  9  a.m.  ere  Ave  reached  the  insignificant  gateway  and 
tumble-down  walls  of  Tung-Chow.  We  passed  a  temple  thronged 
with  a  multitude  of  people  burning  incense  and  praying  for  rain — 
such  crowds  of  women  tottering  on  tiny  hoofs,  and  with  their  hair 
dressed  in  a  wonderful  fashion  with  huge  loops,  all  stiff  and 
glossy. 

We  rode  direct  to  the  American  Mission,  where  we  were  most 
hospitably  received,  washed,  and  fed.  I  was  much  amused  at 
seeing  the  two  youngest  hopes  of  the  family  (splendid  twin-boys) 
each  securely  tied  into  a  baby-jumper,  in  which  they  sat  con- 
tentedly, laughing  and  crowing  at  one  another  apparently  in 
supreme  bliss,  while  at  every  movement  the  responsive  jumper 
gave  them  a  little  toss,  such  as  babies  are  supposed  to 
delight  in  ! 

The  kind  mother  of  the  babies  had  most  thoughtfully  under- 
taken to  have  our  supply  of  meat  cooked  for  us,  so  as  to  save  us 


506  FROM    PEKING    TO    CHE-FOO. 

all  unnecessary  trouble  on  our  voyage  ;  and  as  (fortunately)  this  waa 
not  quite  ready,  I  had  time  to  see  and  hear  something  of  the  work 
of  the  Mission,  and  two  pleasant  American  ladies  took  me  to  see 
their  boys'  school,  and  other  matters  of  interest.  They  each  have 
a  school  for  Chinese  girls,  and  also  go  about  among  the  villages  to 
teach  the  women,  always  by  invitation. 

About  noon  we  started  for  the  boats,  and  as  it  is  two  miles 
across  the  city,  I  rode.  We  passed  through  very  dusty  suburbs 
and  average  streets,  and  everywhere  saw  small  unripe  apricots 
offered  for  sale — very  choleraic-looking  ! 

"We  found  the  boats  all  ready  for  us,  each  with  its  primitive 
little  cabin  for  one  European ;  and  though  mine  is  by  no  means 
so  luxurious  as  that  in  which  I  travelled  up  the  river,  I  have  made 
it  quite  comfortable,  and  now  have  time  to  look  about  me. 

My  head  boatman  is  a  study  for  an  artist,  with  his  long  black 
plait  twisted  round  the  white  handkerchief  on  his  head.  (N.B. — 
It  is  not  respectful  to  wear  his  tail  thus  coiled  up  in  my  presence, 
but  he  thinks  I  know  no  better,  and  I  sympathise  in  the  incon- 
venience of  letting  it  hang  down  !)  His  bare  back  and  arms  are 
singularly  well  bronzed  for  a  Chinaman,  and  his  sole  article  of 
raiment  consists  of  a  very  ancient  pair  of  trousers  of  yellowish 
unbleached  cotton,  patched  with  large  pieces  of  bright  blue 
calico  ! 

This  afternoon  it  really  does  look  as  if  rain  were  coming — at 
least  clouds  are  stealing  up  over  the  brazen  heavens,  and  a  few 
drops  have  actually  fallen,  as  if  to  tantalise  the  peasants,  who, 
hoping  against  hope,  are  now  hurrying  to  garner  their  very  unripe- 
looking  harvest  of  wheat  and  barley,  tearing  it  up  by  the  roots. 
This,  however,  is  the  regular  custom  here,  the  soil  being  shaken 
back  on  to  the  field,  and  the  roots  used  as  fuel.  These  are  very 
valuable  on  this  great  plain,  where  wood  is  so  scarce  that  all  fences 
are  made  of  the  reed-like  stems  of  the  millet,  "  lofty  grain  "  the 
Chinese  call  it,  and  even  the  houses  are  built  of  millet-stems 
and  mud. 

I  have  been  very  much  interested  in  watching  these  farmers 
preparing  to  carry  home  their  crops  in  great  carts,  to  which,  by 
very  long  rope-traces,  were  harnessed  various  animals.  In  one,  I 
noticed  next  the  cart  a  small  donkey ;  then  ten  feet  ahead,  two 
donkeys  and  a  mule ;  ten  feet  further,  two  mules  and  a  donkey  !  ! 
I  think  such  a  team  would  rather  astonish  the  driver  of  an  English 
harvest-wain  ! 


rain!  507 

Tuesday,  17th. 

The  welcome  much-prayed-for  rain  came  on  in  the  night  in  quite 
a  real  shower,  and  now  the  air  is  fresh  and  cool,  and  the  boatmen 
are  working  with  goodwill,  as  if  they  too  were  refreshed. 


IT.  hiesday,  ISth. 

"We  are  lying  moored  to  a  mud-bank.  Again  the  rain  came  on 
in  the  night,  and  this  time  in  such  good  earnest  that  the  crew  have 
struck  work,  so  they  have  made  all  as  snug  as  they  can,  having  shut 
up  the  house-cabin,  and  given  it  an  extra  big  thatch  of  bamboo 
matting,  and  now  they  are  indulging  in  a  good  long  sleep,  while 
the  rain  pours  in  torrents,  accompanied  by  gusty  wind.  The 
change  from  the  hitherto  oppressive  heat  is  extraordinary.  There 
is  now  the  raw  cold  feeling  of  a  bleak  Northumbrian  day  ;  it  makes 
me  feel  quite  chilly  and  inclined  to  sore  throat. 

Now  that  we  have  come  to  a  standstill,  there  is  no  saying  how 
long  we  may  be  detained  here.  I  hope  not  very  long,  as  I  might 
thereby  just  miss  the  chance  of  a  vessel  direct  from  Tien-tsin  to 
Japan,  and  I  am  most  anxious  to  avoid  the  tediously  circuitous 
route  involved  in  returning  by  mail-steamer  to  Shanghai,  thence 
to  start  afresh. 

But  if  the  rain  goes  on  at  this  rate,  the  Pei-ho  will  soon  be  in 
flood,  and  then  we  may  be  washed  away  faster  than  we  wish  ! 

As  a  general  rule,  this  boat-journey  takes  just  about  three  days. 
but  the  time  necessarily  varies  with  the  weather.  Sometimes  a 
dust-storm  comes  on  with  such  violence  that  men  cannot  work,  so 
it  is  necessary  to  lie  still  for  hours,  with  every  crevice  closed  as 
tight  as  possible. 

Our  commissariat  arrangements  are  most  amusing.  Our  boats 
are  lashed  together,  and  the  food-supplies  being  all  on  board  of 
Mr  Collins's  boat,  he  hands  me  breakfast  and  luncheon  at  the 
orthodox  hours. 

H.B.M.  Consulate,  Tien-tsin, 
Thursday,  19th, 

Yesterday  evening  the  wind  and  rain  abated,  and  we  were  able 
to  proceed,  the  men  continuing  work  till  11  p.m.  Then  heavy  rain 
came  on  again.  The  morning  was  sweet  and  balmy,  and  all  the 
willow-trees  along  the  banks  looked  fresh  and  clean.  Again  I 
noticed  with  wonder  the  enormous  supply  of  salt,  made  from  sea- 


508  FROM    CHE-FOO    TO    NAGASAKI. 

water,  and  heaped  up  in  great  pyramids.1     How  it  escapes  being 
melted  by  the  rain  passes  my  comprehension! 

About  10  a.m.  Ave  reached  the  outskirts  of  this  city,  passing 
beneath  the  ruins  of  the  Roman  Catholic  cathedral.  Then  for 
two  hours  threaded  our  way  through  innumerable  junks,  till  we 
reached  the  bund  opposite  this  Consulate,  where  we  find  the 
Forrests  in  great  anxiety  at  the  non-arrival  of  the  Shun  Lee,  with 
Sir  Thomas  Wade  and  several  other  friends  on  board.  It  was  in 
this  vessel  that  I  travelled  from  Shanghai  on  her  last  trip.  She 
is  a  splendid  vessel,  and  always  up  to  time,  so  that  any  delay  gives 
rise  to  unpleasant  surmises. 


CHAPTER    XLI. 

FROM    CHE-FOO    TO    NAGASAKI. 

Wreck  of  the  Shun  Lee — Reach  Che-foo — Difficulty  of  obtaining  a  passage- 
State  call  of  a  Chinese  official — Testimonial  boards — Straw  -  plaiting — 
Caged  birds — On  board  the  Thorkild — Coasting  Corea — The  Goto  Isle.- — 
A  dead  calm — Almost  on  the  breakers — Saved — A  gale — Reach  Nagasaki. 

Gulf  of  Peh-chi-li, 

Ox    Board   the    Taku, 

June  2dth. 

We  started  at  4.30  this  morning,  as  the  red  sun  was  just  rising. 
Captain  M'Clure  gave  me  a  comfortable  corner  on  the  bridge, 
whence  to  watch  the  windings  of  the  river,  with  all  its  aggravating 
twists  and  turns.  All  the  country  looks  beautifully  green  after  the 
rain — a  wonderful  change  since  I  came  up  last  month  in  the  poor 
Shun  Lee,  of  whose  sad  fate  there  is,  alas  !  now  no  further  doubt, 
for  as  we  passed  the  Taku  forts  we  received  the  grievous  news  that 
she  is  lying  a  total  wreck  off  a  promontory  in  this  Gulf  of  Peh- 
chi-li.  It  seems  that,  though  out  to  sea  all  lay  clear,  a  heavy 
mist  shrouded  the  land.     A  strong  and  unusual  current  drew  the 

1  Besides  the  salt  thus  distilled  from  the  sea,  there  are  salt-wells  in  various  parts 
of  the  empire,  from  which  (the  wells  beiug  deep  and  the  openings  small)  the  water 
is  drawn  up  in  long  hollow  bamboos,  which  are  let  down  by  a  long  rope  coiled 
round  a  skeleton  wheel,  which  is  worked  like  a  treadmill.  The  water  obtained  is 
emptied  into  a  large  pool,  whence  it  passes  through  a  rude  filter  into  a  lower  pool, 
and  is  then  transferred  to  great  boilers,  in  which  it  eventually  forms  very  large 
crystals  of  dazzling  whiteness. 


WRECK    OF    THE    SHUN    LEE.  509 

vessel  out  of  her  course,  and  there  was  also  some  error  in  reckon- 
ing, the  result  being  that  she  ran  right  on  to  the  rocks.  Happily 
there  was  no  great  difficulty  in  getting  ashore.  The  two  hundred 
Chinese  passengers  were  riotous,  and  insisted  on  being  landed  first, 
so  this  was  done ;  and  then  the  foreign  passengers,  numbering 
about  a  dozen,  followed.  They  were  all  obliged  to  seek  shelter  in 
a  filthy  native  hut  swarming  with  vermin,  and  with  only  a  shawl 
hung  up  as  a  partition  to  secure  a  separate  corner  for  the  ladies 
and  children.  Here  they  had  to  remain  for  about  four  days. 
Meanwhile  native  boats  were  procured,  and  all  the  luggage  and 
cargo  was  saved — a  wonderful  mitigation  of  sorrow  ! 

The  refugees  were  not  without  some  qualms  as  to  personal  safety, 
some  bad  cases  of  wrecking,  or  at  least  robberies  of  wrecked  crews, 
having  occurred  last  year  on  this  part  of  the  coast.  Happily  they 
were  seen  before  long  by  a  passing  steamer  on  her  way  to  Che- 
foo,  so  they  were  all  carried  off,  bag  and  baggage,  leaving  the  poor 
captain  to  mourn  over  the  loss  of  his  splendid  vessel.  We  had 
such  a  pleasant  voyage  in  her  last  month,  that  I  quite  feel  as  if  I 
had  lost  a  friend. 

June  21st. 

The  Taku  has  just  come  to  her  moorings  in  Che-foo  harbour, 
and  we  hear  that  there  arc  two  sailing-vessels  about  to  start  for 
Nagasaki,  so  that  there  will  be  no  difficulty  about  my  getting  a 
direct  passage.  Of  course,  every  one  marvels  at  my  caring  to  strike 
out  a  new  line  for  myself,  and  abandon  the  luxuries  of  the  regu- 
lar passenger  line  for  the  chances  of  a  trading  vessel ;  but  my  re- 
collection of  my  six  weeks'  cruise  from  Tahiti  to  San  Francisco 
in  a  small  schooner  (240  tons)  sustains  me  !  Besides,  having 
already  sailed  four  times  up  and  down  the  "Woo  Sung  river,  I 
have  no  wish  to  return  to  Shanghai  for  a  fifth  and  sixth  experience 
of  its  muddy  waters  ! 

On  Board  the  Danish  Brio  Thorkild — 105  tons  ! 
Sunday  Morning. 

Already  Che-foo  lies  far  behind  us,  and  I  rejoice  in  having  had 
sufficient  resolution  to  carry  out  this  plan,  for  besides  the  satisfac- 
tion of  taking  a  short  cut,  there  is  far  more  of  the  feeling  of  real 
travelling  in  a  little  vessel  like  this  than  it  is  possible  to  attain  to 
in  a  large  well-appointed  steamer,  where  life  moves  like  clockwork, 
and  passengers  know  no  more  of  the  real  working  of  the  ship  than 
if  they  were  in  London. 


510  FROM    CHE-FOO    TO    NAGASAKI. 

And  I  am  in  amazing  luck  too,  for  this  is  a  beautiful  little  brig, 
and  thanks  to  the  great  courtesy  of  the  kind  Danish  captain  (who 
has  resigned  his  OAvn  cabin  to  such  an  unwonted  guest),  I  could 
not  be  more  comfortable  were  I  on  a  yacht  of  my  own. 

But,  in  truth,  in  leaving  the  Taku  I  ran  a  great  risk  of  shai ing 
the  fate  of  the  dog  who  dropped  his  bone  for  a  shadow  ! 1  For, 
having  come  ashore,  bag  and  baggage,  on  the  strength  of  the  infor- 
mation first  received,  I  was  proceeding  very  leisurely  to  report 
myself  at  the  Consulate,  when  I  met  the  Consul  himself,  with  a 
note  to  tell  me  that  there  was  no  chance  of  a  direct  passage  !  This 
was  pleasant  information  !  the  Taku  being  by  this  time  far  away. 

However,  as  I  could  by  no  means  believe  that  my  luck  had  so 
entirely  failed  me,  I  proceeded  to  interview  the  shipping  agents, 
with  the  happy  result  that  though  both  vessels  refused  to  carry 
passengers,  the  Danish  agent  no  sooner  realised  that  the  applicant 
was  a  lady  who  had  sailed  in  many  waters,  and  knew  how  to  make 
light  of  difficulties,  than  he  agreed  to  make  arrangements  for  my 
reception,  and  the  good  captain  promised  to  do  all  in  his  power  to 
make  my  journey  pleasant  and  comfortable. 

It  was  accordingly  agreed  that  I  should  go  on  board  last  night, 
and  in  the  interval  I  saw  as  much  as  possible  of  Che-foo  and  its 
surroundings,  thanks  to  the  kindness  of  Mrs  Gardner,  who  invited 
me  to  luncheon  at  the  Consulate ;  immediately  after  which,  the 
Tautai  of  Che-foo  came  in  great  state  to  call  on  the  Consul,  in  a 
fine  sedan-chair  with  eight  bearers,  and  a  guard  of  soldiers  dressed 
in  scarlet.  (I  had  learnt  in  Peking  to  appreciate  the  concentrated 
essence  of  grandeur  conveyed  by  those  eight  bearers  !)  There  were 
also  a  train  of  attendants,  some  carrying  an  elaborate  smoking  ap- 
paratus, others  a  large  pewter  teapot,  and  a  great  red  box  supposed 
to  contain  ample  provisions  for  a  couple  of  days,  in  case  the  great 
man  should  at  any  moment  hear  news  which  would  necessitate  his 
going  off  to  some  distant  point.  Of  course  his  visit  had  been 
heralded  by  the  despatch  of  a  huge  Chinese  visiting-card,  which  is 
simply  a  slip  of  crimson  paper  about  fourteen  inches  by  five,  on 
which  the  name  is  inscribed  in  black  characters. 

The  Consul  showed  me  three  bright  blue-and-gold  boards  which 
have  been  sent  to  him  by  Chinese  officials,  to  be  presented  to  a 
sea-captain  who  has  saved  some  Chinamen  from  drowning.  They 
bear  in  golden  characters  an  inscription  with  very  flowery  poetic 
praises   of  his   deeds.     I   am    told  that   such  boards  as  these  are 

1  Though  I  chose  to  ignore  it,  and  trust  to  my  luck,  I  ran  a  far  greater  risk  of 
having  to  travel  with  very  undesirable  companions. 


TAME    SINGING-LARKS.  511 

presented  by  the  Emperor  to  reward  faithful  servants,  and  they  are 
suspended  from  the  roof  of  the  official  hall,  and  there  treasured  for 
generations. 

Captain  Douglas,  H.M.S.  Egeria,  and  Captain  Tudor,  H.M.S. 
Swinger,  dropped  in  to  tea.  Of  course  the  fate  of  the  poor  Shun 
Lee  and  my  own  chances  of  a  fair  voyage  were  fruitful  topics  of 
discussion.  Certainly  "  my  yacht "  is  rather  a  nutshell  in  point  of 
tonnage,  but  with  the  great  steamer  now  lying  shattered  on  the 
rocks,  it  is  very  evident  that  the  Goliaths  of  the  ocean  are  not 
always  the  most  to  be  relied  upon  ! 

Afterwards  we  started  to  call  at  the  London  Mission,  two  miles 
from  the  town,  so  we  were  carried  in  chairs  by  a  very  pretty  road, 
along  the  fields  where  the  harvesters  were  busily  at  work,  pulling 
up  wheat  by  the  roots,  and  tying  it  in  "  stooks "  like  our  own. 
Here,  as  on  the  Pei-ho,  the  roots  are  cut  off  for  fuel,  and  the  straw 
is  saved  for  plaiting,  which  is  the  great  industry  of  Che-foo,  the 
amount  of  straw-plaiting  annually  exported  from  here  to  England 
being  almost  incredible.  On  the  other  hand,  the  imports  from 
Europe  to  this  port  are  so  large,  that  immense  caravans  of  mules 
and  donkeys  laden  with  goods  start  daily  for  the  interior. 

I  have  already  repeatedly  noticed  the  friendly  way  in  which 
Chinamen  carry  out  their  pet  singing-birds,  either  tied  to  a  stick 
or  in  a  small  cage.  Here  this  custom  seems  specially  prevalent, 
for  I  saw  large  parties  of  most  respectable-looking  burghers  meeting 
at  various  resting-places  under  pleasant  shady  trees,  each  carrying 
his  cage  of  pets  for  an  afternoon's  airing  ! 

Larks  seem  to  be  the  general  favourites,  but  some  men  have  a 
kind  of  thrush  which  can  imitate  all  manner  of  sounds,  cries  of 
divers  animals,  and  notes  of  birds,  something  like  the  mocking- 
bird. They  are  tended  with  the  greatest  care,  and  their  value  in- 
creases with  their  years,  so  that  Chinese  reverence  for  old  age  is 
not  confined  to  human  beings  ! 

In  the  evening,  finding  that  the  vessel  was  not  to  sail  till  eight 
this  morning,  Mrs  Gardner  very  kindly  gave  me  a  bed  at  the  Con- 
sulate, and  a  pleasant  early  breakfast  in  a  bright  room  looking  out 
on  a  sunny  garden  fragrant  with  mignonette  and  other  familiar 
flowers,  and  with  the  blue  sea  beyond.  What  a  contrast  to  a  home 
in  Peking ! 

Then  the  Consul  brought  me  on  board  in  his  own  boat,  and 
committed  me  to  the  good  care  of  Captain  Baade,  a  blue-eyed,  fair- 
haired  Dane,  who  hails  from  Sonderburg,  just  the  man  you  would 
expect  to  own  the  Thorkild — delightful   name,  savouring  of   old 


512  FROM    CHE-FOO   TO    NAGASAKI. 

Norse  mythology  and   adventure  !  and  such  a  dear  little  vessel, 
beautifully  clean  and  well  appointed. 

"We  worked  slowly  to  the  mouth  of  the  harbour,  then  a  fresh 
light  breeze  sprang  up,  and  we  sped  on  our  way  past  rocky  isles, 
and  now  Che-foo  and  its  grand  headland  of  cliffs  lies  far  behind. 
With  favouring  gales  we  may  possibly  reach  Nagasaki  in  three 
days,  but  we  have  to  count  on  the  probability  of  a  week.  No 
great  hardship,  however,  in  such  a  nice  little  ship  ! 

Sunday,  29th. 

A  whole  week  has  slipped  by,  and  still  we  are  far  from  our 
journey's  end.  It  has  been  a  very  peaceful  quiet  week,  but  light 
head-winds  have  made  our  progress  slow  indeed,  and  sometimes 
cold  mists  have  blotted  out  all  the  wondrous  ultramarine  blue  of 
the  sea  which  we  call  "  Yellow." 

Not  one  sail  have  we  sighted  in  these  seven  days ;  but  when  the 
mist  was  most  dense,  and  a  brooding  silence  which  we  could  almost 
feel  seemed  to  rest  upon  the  waters,  a  large  skeleton  junk  floated 
noiselessly  close  past  us,  its  great  black  ribs  looking  weird  and 
spirit-like,  like  one  of  Gustave  Dore's  strange  fancies.  There  could 
be  little  doubt  that  all  her  crew  had  perished, — at  all  events,  no 
living  thing  remained  on  her.  Had  we  struck  her  in  the  night  we 
should  inevitably  have  foundered,  so  we  inferred  that  our  good 
angels  had  been  faithful  watchers. 

I  find  my  companions  chivalrously  courteous,  as  becomes  the 
family  of  the  Thorkild.  They  consist  of  the  kind-hearted  captain, 
and  a  crew  of  half-a-dozen  Danish  lads  brought  from  his  own  home 
in  Sonderburg.  The  mate  is  German,  with  a  strong  dash  of  Cali- 
fornia. Janssen,  the  boatswain,  is  a  gentle  fair-haired  Dane, 
wearing  ear-rings  after  the  manner  of  sailors. 

No  born  gentlemen  could  be  more  courteous  and  considerate 
than  these  are,  one  and  all.  It  is  quite  a  pleasure  to  have  fallen 
in  with  what  is  to  me  a  new  type ;  and  it  is  quite  refreshing  to 
hear  them  talk  of  their  homes,  their  German  and  Danish  village 
life,  so  pleasant  and  so  very  simple,  and  so  full  of  kindness  and 
music,  and  the  natural  way  in  which  it  all  seems  to  centre  round 
the  village  church  and  its  festivals. 

These  men  read  much,  and  have  been  on  the  seaboard  of  main- 
lands, and  always  keenly  observant. 

The  steward  and  cook  are  Chinamen,  and  the  food  is  abundant 
and  good  of  its  kind ;  though  I  confess  that  the  strange  sweet 
soups,  in  which  preserved  fruits  and  plums  figure  so  largely,  and 


THE    COREAX    ISLES.  513 

which  find  such  favour  with  my  companions,  are  to  me  somewhat 

trying  ! 

The  weather  has  been  so  calm  that  I  have  been  able  to  work 
(juietly  at  my  painting ;  and  my  good  captain  has  given  me  most 
useful  lessons  in  the  Danish  method  of  darning  stockings,  as  prac- 
tised by  all  the  women  of  Sonderhurg,  while  the  mate  has  painted 
all  the  waterproof  covers  of  my  portfolios. 

There  has  been  little  to  mark  the  days,  save  such  incidents  as 
catching  a  large  alhicore — a  great  fish  of  about  fifty  pounds  weight, 
and  of  a  bright  golden-green  colour.  The  bait  was  only  a  bit  of 
rag,  which  he  doubtlessly  mistook  for  a  cuttle-fish,  several  of  which 
he  had  just  swallowed  whole.  Its  flesh  proved  firm  and  good,  and 
gave  all  on  board  a  good  dinner  of  fresh  iish ;  but  I  think  its 
dying  cry  must  have  given  warning  to  all  the  finny  tribes,  for  we 
have  never  had  another  bite  from  great  fish  or  small,  though  Ave 
anxiously  set  our  baited  lines  each  morning.  The  sea-gulls  must 
be  more  expert  fishers,  for  they  never  forsake  us,  hovering  around 
on  swift  wing,  or  floating  on  the  smooth  waters,  wherever  a  school 
of  whales  are  disporting  themselves,  doubtless  sharing  in  the  feast 
which  has  attracted  these  mighty  monsters  of  the  deep. 

In  these  seven  days  we  have  only  sighted  land  once — namely, 
the  Isle  Modeste,  which  I  believe  to  be  the  most  northerly  of  the 
Corean  group.  Yesterday  we  coasted  the  north  shore  of  Quelpart, 
the  most  southerly  of  the  group.  It  is  apparently  a  great  volcanic 
cone,  richly  wooded  round  the  broken  edges  of  the  crater,  thence 
descending  to  the  sea  in  very  smooth  slopes,  and  all  under  most 
careful  cultivation.  Not  a  valley,  or  gorge,  or  watercourse  could 
we  discern,  but  many  small,  very  green,  conical  hillocks,  like  fairy 
knolls.  As  soon  as  we  got  under  lee  of  the  isle  the  breeze  failed 
us,  and  we  were  becalmed  for  the  night,  not  a  very  desirable 
position,  with  an  inhospitable  shore  on  one  side,  and  rocky  islets 
on  the  other !  We  could  distinguish  many  villages,  but  were 
nowise  tempted  to  land,  knowing  the  marked  unfriendliness  of  all 
the  Coreans  to  strangers. 

The  Thorkild  has,  however,  been  able  to  do  her  part  in  miti- 
gating this  antipathy,  having  on  her  last  voyage  picked  up  a  party 
of  fourteen  shipwrecked  Coreans  floating  helplessly  on  their  poor 
little  battered  junk  at  a  distance  of  twenty-live  miles  from  land. 
As  she  neared  them,  they  all  knelt,  as  if  craving  the  assistance  of 
which  they  stood  so  seriously  in  need;  for  here  they  had  been 
floating  for  many  days,  with  no  food  but  a  little  uncooked  rice. 
One  of  them  was  evidently  an  official  of  some  importance.     Of 

2  K 


514  FROM    CHE-FOO   TO    NAGASAKI. 

course,  they  were  treated  with  all  possible  kindness,  ami   carried 
on  to  Nagasaki,  where  an  interpreter  was  fouml  who  could     p<    ! 
Corean ;  and  thence  they  were  sent  home  with  all  honour  by  the 
Japanese  Government,  who  never  lose  a  chance  of  endeavouring  to 
conciliate  these  unfriendly  neighbours. 

Tuesday,  July  )  ■'. 

"Mair  haste,  less  speed  !"  and  "The  shortest  cut,  the  longest 
way  home,"  are  proverbs  which  very  naturally  come  unbidden  to 
my  mind.  We  certainly  are  making  a  long  trip  this  time  !  Seven- 
teen days  of  incessant  travelling  since  we  left  Peking,  ten  of  which 
we  have  been  on  board  this  wee  ship  !  And  the  poor  captain  is 
losing  money  by  every  hour's  delay. 

Last  night,  just  before  midnight,  we  sighted  the  Goto  Isles,  an 
outlying  group  of  Japan.  Here  the  Yellow  Sea  became  bluer  than 
ever.  I  can  only  compare  it  to  liquid  ultramarine,  but  clear  as 
crystal.  I  sat  on  deck  till  midnight,  and  watched  the  golden  moon 
slowly  sink  in  the  Corean  Straits.  Then  came  a  downpour  of  rain 
just  to  remind  us  that  we  were  nearing  the  green  shores  of  Japan. 


Wednesday,  2d. 

We  are  still  beating  to  and  fro  off  the  Goto  Isles,  making  long 
tacks  but  little  progress.  In  these  two  days  Ave  have  run  fuily 
two  hundred  miles,  and  have  not  made  ten,  for  the  wind  always 
heads  us  whichever  way  we  turn.  What  chiefly  impresses  me 
during  these  wearisome  long  tacks  is  the  remarkable  sameness  of 
isles  seen  from  the  sea  at  a  little  distance.  There  are  flat  isles 
and  mountainous  isles,  but  I  doubt  whether  even  a  geologist  could 
often  tell  one  group  from  another  at  a  moderate  distance.  Bute 
and  Arran,  Skye  and  Ross-shire,  Argyle  and  the  Isles,  Fiji,  Tonga, 
Samoa,  Hawaii,  Japan,  Goto,  Corea — there's  a  wonderful  resem- 
blance among  them  all ! 

These  Goto  Isles,  however,  are  unusually  beautiful,  and  to-day 
we  have  had  a  good  opportunity  of  judging,  as  we  have  been  for 
about  twelve  hours  running  very  slowly  along  the  shores  of 
Fukuye,  the  largest  southern  isle  of  the  group.  It  is  a  beautiful 
coast,  with  high  volcanic  mountains,  very  green,  covered  with  rich 
vegetation  of  the  careful  sort  so  peculiar  to  Japan,  and  intermingled 
with  scattered  woods.  All  along  the  coast  lie  groups  of  very  varied 
isles,  some  low  and  flat,  with  grassy  shores,  others  precipitous, 
crowned  with  the  picturesque  fir-trees  which  form  so  striking  a 


DRIFTING    ON    TO    THE    ROCKS.  515 

feature  in  all  parts  of  Japan.  This  morning  we  passed  a  richly 
wooded  headland  with  a  lighthouse  on  the  verge  of  a  sheer  preci- 
pice. This  evening  it  is  still  in  sight,  and  we  are  stealing  along 
with  a  very  light  breeze,  hoping  to  pass  out  before  sunset  bet  wen 
Aka  and  Ki,  two  groups  of  jagged  rocky  isles.  But  the  breeze  is 
so  light  and  so  variable  that  there's  no  saying  whether  we  can 
manage  this,  for  literally  whichever  way  we  tack,  the  wind,  such 
as  it  is,  turns  and  heads  us  ! 

Now  it  seems  inclined  to  turn  to  a  dead  calm,  in  which  case  we 
shall  drift  right  out  to  sea  again,  and  perhaps  find  ourselves  on  the 
shores  of  Manchuria  !  That  would  at  least  be  a  new  experience  ! 
But  really  it  is  too  absurd  to  think  that  we  are  only  fifty  miles 
from  Nagasaki  (and  my  budget  of  letters),  and  yet  have  no  chance 
of  getting  there  to-night. 

At  Sunset. 

The  breeze  has  failed  us  altogether  and  Ave  are  lying  helpless, 
but  we  are  not  drifting  across  to  Manchuria — Ave  only  wish  we 
Avere  !  for,  Avhile  a  high  sea  and  no  wind  render  the  ship  unmanage- 
able, Ave  are  quietly  drifting  into  a  narrow  passage  betAveen  the  tAvo 
very  dangerous  groups  of  rocky  isles  Avhich  now  lie  right  before  us 
to  right  and  left. 

The  sun  has  just  gone  doAvn  in  living  glory,  and  the  rocks  and 
mountains  are  still  bathed  in  hues  of  lilac  and  green  and  gold;  a 
faint  breath  of  air  just  stirs  our  sails  in  the  most  tantalising  way. 

The  sea,  though  calm  in  one  sense,  is  running  inshore  in  mighty 
rollers,  Avhich  dash  with  resistless  fury  on  the  outlying  rocks,  and 
Ave  are  at  the  mercy  of  their  current,  for  the  Avater  is  so  deep  as  bo 
be  unfathomable.  So  Ave  cannot  anchor,  and  even  if  the  crew 
took  the  one  Avee  boatie  and  tried  to  roAV  us  seaward,  their  puny 
strength  could  avail  nothing  against  the  might  of  the  rollers,  and 
the  powerful  attraction  of  the  land.  So  these  fine  fellows  are 
sitting  very  still  and  Avatching  anxiously  to  see  Avhat  turn  matters 
will  take. 

The  currents  are  quite  uncertain,  and  unless  Ave  can  keep  just  in 
the  middle,  the  good  little  brig  Avill  inevitably  finish  her  career  on 
one  group  or  the  other.  It  is  just  the  turn  of  a  feather  whether 
Ave  get  through  or  not,  and  the  captain  and  mate  do  not  attempl  t" 
conceal  their  anxiety. 

Luckily  there's  full  moonlight  just  hoav,  so  Ave  shall  at  leasl  Bee 
where  we  are  going  (only  that  distances  are  so  very  deceptive  in 
the  moonlight).     "Well,  if  Ave  do  get  ashore,  there's  the  comfort  of 


516  FROM    CHE-FOO    TO    NAGASAKI. 

knowing  that  the  inhabitants  are  kindly  Japanese,  and  I'll  see  an 
island  which  perhaps  no  European  has  yet  explored  !  If  we  don't, 
— why,  then,  I  am  afraid  this  letter  and  its  writer  will  find  their 
way  into  the  maw  of  some  voracious  shark,  and  1  devoutly  hope 
that  we  shall  disagree  with  him  !    .    .    . 

./»/>/  4th. 

A  lovely  clear  sunrise,  and  the  beautiful  Goto  Isles  lying  well 
behind  us  at  a  safe  distance  !  for  which  we  most  devoutly  say, 
Thank  Heaven  !  For  never  since  the  night  when  we  lay  in  the 
Hindoo  off  the  Eddystone  rocks  in  a  howling  tempest,  with  our 
rudder-gear  gone,  and  the  water  within  seven  inches  of  our  upper 
fires,1  have  I  been  in  such  imminent  peril  as  last  night,  when  in  a 
most  peaceful  calm,  and  this  good  little  ship  in  perfect  order,  with 
every  sail  set  (looking  so  white  and  pretty  in  the  brilliant  light  of 
a  full  moon),  we  were  helplessly  and  apparently  hopelessly  drifting 
straight  on  to  the  cruel  rocks,  carried  in  by  the  huge  oily  rollers, 
which  form  the  dreaded  breakers,  the  roar  of  which  still  sounds  in 
my  ear,  and  the  flash  of  their  white  spray  seems  to  glitter  before 
my  eyes. 

If  you  have  a  good  map  of  Japan,  you  can  see  exactly  where  we 
were.  Off  Fukuye  lie  the  two  little  groups  of  rocky  islets,  and 
behind  them  lies  Tawo  Bay,  closed  in  by  Euro,  a  very  high  green 
isle,  rock-girt.  Just  at  sunset  we  drifted  into  the  straits  between 
Aka  and  Ei,  and  though  a  little  breath  of  wind  encouraged  us  to 
steer  seaward,  the  great  rollers  came  on  with  such  force  that  the 
brig  could  make  no  way  at  all. 

The  full  moon  shone  gloriously,  and  the  white  sails  gleamed  as 
if  inviting  the  breeze  that  would  not  come,  and  all  the  time  we 
were  drifting  ever  nearer  and  nearer  to  inevitable  destruction.  By 
10  p.m.  we  were  close  on  Euro,  on  whose  rock-bound  shore  the 
rollers  dashed  in  heavy  breakers,  the  spray  flashing  in  dazzling 
light.  My  recollections  of  the  appalling  force  of  the  breakers  on 
Fijian  coral-reefs,  and  of  wholesale  clearance  of  wrecked  canoes  by 
sharks,  had  impressed  me  with  a  very  wholesome  reverence  for 
breakers  in  general,  especially  such  as  we  know  to  be  in  shark- 
haunted  waters ! 

It  was  a  most  lovely  night — I  had  almost  said  "  clear  as  day," 
only  that  moonlight  makes  it  impossible  to  judge  accurately  of 
distances.  But  one  thing  was  evident — namely,  that  we  were 
apparently  within  a  few  minutes  of  certain  wreck,  each  moment 

1  See  '  Via  Cornwall  to  Egypt,'  p.  25.    C.  F.  Gordon  Gumming.     Chatto  &  Windus. 


"the  wings  of  the  wind,"  517 

drifting  us  nearer  and  nearer  to  the  cruel  rocks,  while  the  thunder- 
ous roar  of  the  breakers  became  more  deafening,  and  their  gleaming 
white  light  more  vivid. 

It  was  evidently  a  mere  question  of  minutes,  so  the  captain 
decided  that  the  moment  had  come  when  he  must  abandon  his 
ship,  as  there  was  nothing  to  be  gained  by  waiting  till  she  struck 
— on  the  contrary,  it  would  be  incurring  very  unnecessary  danger. 

So  he  gave  orders  for  the  one  little  boat  to  be  made  ready,  while 
we  rapidly  stowed  our  most  precious  goods  into  the  smallest  pos- 
sible space,  the  captain  and  his  Chinese  boy  cramming  ship's  papers, 
clothes,  and  dollars  into  a  canvas  bag,  while  I  routed  the  chief 
treasures  from  the  depths  of  my  carefully  packed  boxes,  and 
thought  with  dire  regret  of  the  many  pleasant  associations  of  far- 
distant  lands,  interwoven  with  the  heterogeneous  piles  of  every 
conceivable  article  which  lay  scattered  around — so  soon  to  become 
the  sport  of  the  waves. 

This  done,  we  were  ready  to  face  the  worst,  and  returned  on 
deck,  all  the  better  for  this  little  exertion.  For  it  must  have  been 
trying  indeed  to  these  "  hardy  Norsemen,"  who  would  have  been 
in  their  element  battling  with  a  storm,  to  have  to  sit  still  on  this 
beautiful  calm  midsummer  evening,  utterly  helpless,  watching  their 
good  ship  drift  to  her  inevitable  doom.  In  the  few  moments  we 
had  been  in  the  cabin  we  had  sensibly  approached  the  land,  which 
now  loomed  high  before  us,  and  the  dull  roar  of  the  breakers 
sounded  more  ominous  than  ever. 

The  order  to  lower  the  little  boat  was  given,  and  in  another 
minute  Ave  should  have  been  on  board  of  her.  But,  as  the  old 
saying  goes,  "  Man's  extremity  is  God's  opportunity,"  and  at  the 
very  last  moment — when  we  had  drifted  so  close  to  the  white 
crests  of  the  huge  curling  green  waves,  that  it  seemed  as  if  nothing 
could  save  the  vessel  from  being  dashed  on  the  rampart  of  pitiless 
black  rocks,  and  when  the  awful  tumult  and  crash  of  falling  break- 
ing billows  sounded  full  in  our  deafened  ears  (not  a  continuous 
sound,  like  the  raging  of  a  tempest,  but  an  intermittent  booming 
like  thunder-claps,  with  momentary  intervals  of  almost  stillness, 
which  seemed  to  accentuate  the  roar  and  echo  that  followed),  sud- 
denly, when  all  possibility  of  salvation  appeared  to  bo  over,  a  faint 
little  puff  of  wind  can-lit  the  sails,  then  another  and  another,  and 
soon  a  fresh  and  blessed  breeze  sprang  up,  wafted  us  away  from 
the  beautiful  treacherous  shore,  and  in  less  than  an  hour  we  wen- 
clear  of  the  group,  and  thankfully  watched  the  receding  isles  as  we 
sat  on  deck  enjoying  the  hot  coffee  which  was  so  rapidly  produce! 


518  FROM    CHE-FOO    TO    NAGASAKI. 

by  the  cool  and  collected  Chinese  cook,  and  rejoicing  that  we  had 
not  been  compelled  to  throw  ourselves  on  the  hospitality  of  the 
kindly  inhabitants  of  Fukuye.  For  though  we  knew  how  cor- 
dially they  would  have  welcomed  us,  and  how  much  of  beauty  and 
of  interest  we  should  have  found  on  their  isle,  so  rarely  visited  by 
any  European,  we  were  content,  under  the  circumstances,  to  resign 
these  privileges !  Much  as  I  enjoy  new  experiences  in  general,  I 
am  truly  glad  to  have  been  spared  this  one  ! 

After  a  while  I  turned  in,  as  the  sailors  say,  but  the  roar  of  the 
breakers  so  haunted  my  waking  dreams  that  I  stole  on  deck  once 
more,  and  sat  in  the  soft  lovely  moonlight  watching  the  beautiful 
Goto  group  till  their  outline  became  pale  and  dim  on  the  far 
horizon.  I  was  much  gratified  by  the  hearty  and  honest  manner 
in  which  my  comrades  expressed  their  gratification  at  the  coolness 
with  which  I  had  faced  our  prospects.  I  believe  they  imagined 
that  women  under  such  circumstances  must  necessarily  be  helpless 
encumbrances,  so  it  was  pleasant  to  have  helped  to  dispel  that 
illusion.  Indeed  I  am  thankful  to  say  that  that  sort  of  physical 
fear  is  a  sensation  which  I  have  never  experienced  (except  in  the 
creepy  feeling  that  comes  over  one  sitting  up  late  at  night  in 
ghostly  old  houses  with  vague  dark  corners — or  in  any  house,  with 
the  blinds  up,  and  the  impression  that  some  one  may  be  looking 
in — possibly  a  burglar  !)  But  in  the  real  work  of  life,  I  feel  that 
it  is  all  fish  that  comes  to  the  net,  and  it  is  far  easier  to  be  cool 
than  to  get  fussed. 

At  all  events,  owning  such  family  mottoes  as  "  Courage "  and 
"  Sans  crainte,"  I  should  be  ashamed  to  disgrace  them  !  And  really 
last  night  I  doubt  if  there  would  have  been  much  danger  to  life. 

Certainly,  last  autumn,  a  fine  English  brig,  the  Star  Queen,  was 
driven  on  to  these  rocks,  and  out  of  thirty-three  persons  on  board, 
twenty-two  were  drowned.  But  that  was  on  a  dark  night,  and 
they  could  not  see  where  they  were  going.1 

But  the  perversity  of  winds  and  currents,  and  the  consequent 
danger  of  navigation  hereabouts,  has  long  been  fully  recognised  by 
Chinese  traders,  whose  unwieldy  junks  are  often  imperilled  in 
these  waters,  inspiring  certain  native  verses  to  the  effect  that — 

"  Goodly  are  the  wares  of  Nipon, 
But  the  Isles  of  Goto  are  hard  to  pass  " — 

a  statement  which  we  are  quite  able  to  indorse  ! 

1  Strange  to  say,  the  beautiful  little  schooner  Palonia,  which  brought  me  so 
safely  from  Tahiti  to  San  Francisco,  was  soon  afterwards  wrecked  in  a  precisely 
similar  manner,  having  been  drifted  on  rocks  by  heavy  rollers  in  a  sudden  calm. 


THE    DESIRED    HAVEN."  519 


II.M.B.  Consulate,  Nagasaki, 
July  5th,  Saturday. 


After  all,  my  hardy  Norsemen  did  have  a  chance  of  distinguish- 
ing themselves  in  a  real  tearing  gale.  Tuesday  morning  was  a 
dream  of  calm  loveliness.  The  beautiful  isles  of  Southern  Japan 
lay  all  around  us,  and  we  hoped  ere  sunset  to  he  safely  anchored  in 
our  desired  haven,  when  suddenly  down  swept  a  white  squall,  hiding 
all  the  isles.  Another  moment  and  we  were  enfolded  in  cold  eerie 
mist,  and  the  sea,  which  had  been  like  liquid  ultramarine,  became 
weary  and  grey — the  barometer  falling  fast.  Nothing  could  we  see 
but  a  stormy  grey  sky,  and  a  weary  expanse  of  grey  waves.  It 
rose  to  the  dignity  of  a  severe  gale,  and  all  night  our  good  little 
ship  rolled  and  tossed  like  a  nutshell,  sometimes  lying  over  at  such 
an  angle  that  it  seemed  impossible  she  could  right  again.  Towards 
morning  the  storm  abated  ;  but  grey  sheets  of  rain  poured  pitilessly, 
and  we  could  not  tell  how  far  we  might  have  drifted  in  the  night. 

Suddenly  there  came  a  break  in  the  mist,  revealing  the  island 
of  Tagoshima,  and  the  smoke  and  shafts  of  its  coal-mines,  while 
to  the  left  lay  the  lighthouse,  which  marks  the  entrance  of  Naga- 
saki harbour — a  long  narrow  bay,  with  grand  rocky  headlands, 
and  still,  clear  inlets;  isles  of  infinitely  varied  form  displaying 
every  shade  of  exquisite  green-terraced  fields,  with  rich  crops  of 
millet  or  maize,  and  the  vivid  green  of  the  young  rice;  dark 
clumps  of  most  picturesque  old  fir-trees,  or  groves  of  delicate  airy 
bamboo  with  feathery  foliage,  and  tidy  little  Japanese  villages  and 
graves  dotted  about  in  every  direction. 

Never  had  this  most  beautiful  sail  seemed  to  me  so  lovely  as 
now  in  contrast  with  the  dreary  scene  of  yesterday. 

A  light  breeze  blew  us  cheerily  up  the  harbour,  and  our  brave 
little  vessel  flew  to  her  anchorage  in  such  gallant  style  as  to  win 
special  commendation  from  the  captain  of  H.M.S.  Growler,  which 
lay  hard  by. 

A  note  to  the  Consul  announcing  my  eccentric  arrival  very 
quickly  brought  Mr  Troup  in  person  to  welcome  me  back,  and  an 
hour  later  I  was  cosily  at  rest  in  this  pleasant  English  home, 
whence  we  look  across  gay  garden  blossoms  down  through  a  frame 
of  the  greenest  and  loveliest  bamboos,  to  the  blue  harbour  below, 
where  lies  the  little  Thorkild,  which  has  brought  me  so  safely 
through   many  dangers  back   to  this  green   paradise. 


INDEX. 


Acrobats  at  temple  theatres,  191. 

Actors,  high  salaries,  190. 

subject  to  social  disabilities,  313, 

408. 
Adulteration  of  tea,  304,  318. 
Age,  arch  to  commemorate  eighty-first 

year,  287. 
indicated  by  growth  of  beard  and 

moustaches,  297. 
in  foreigners  fair  hair  respected  as 

grey,  449. 

topic  of  conversation,  349. 

Ah-Lu-Te,  young  Empress,  441,  442. 

Ahok,  Mr,  his  baby  pensioners,  137. 

Aldersley,  Miss,  300. 

All  Souls'  festival,  193. 

Amoy,  one  of  the  treaty  ports,  83. 

green  beetles,  86. 

Ancestral  offerings,  194,  210,  222. 

•  a  cause  of  polygamy.  203  et  seq. 

affects  all  official  life,  201-203. 

■ enormous  expenditure,  222. 

great  festival  every  tenth  year,  219. 

rules  the  selection  of  an  Emperor, 

199. 

tablets,  128. 

Ancestral  Worship,  192-222. 

masses  for  the  dead,  291-293. 

a  hall  for  tablets,  304. 

not  rendered  to  a  boy  under  seven, 

306. 

even  in  the  Temple  of  Heaven,  376. 

reason  why  the  reigning  Emperor 

was  selected,  442. 
Ancient    astronomical    instruments    at 

Peking,  411. 
Animals  used  for  sacrifice,  3S2. 
Anting  Gate,  491. 

Architecture,  many-gabled,  with  cross- 
beams,  like  old   English  farms,   106, 

109. 


Architecture,  doors  and  windows  placed 
to  deceive  spirits,  236. 

Arsenal  at  Foo-Chow  (the  dead  dis- 
turbed), 192. 

Arsenals,  492. 

Artificial  flowers  on  tombs  an  Imperial 
monopoly,  85. 

At  home,  151-161. 

Audience,  imperial,  to  foreign  powers, 
441. 

Azaleas,  gorgeous  thickets,  2S9,  315 

Babel,  Tower  of,  a  theory,  384. 

Babies,  male  and  female,  135,  136. 

Babv-bride,  135. 

Baby  Towers,  306. 

Bagpipes  at  Hong-Kong,  81. 

Balls  rolled  in  the  hand  to  avert  paral- 
ysis, 467. 

Bamboo  organ,  270. 

oysters,  86. 

shoots  for  dinner,  291. 

Banners,  "The  Eight,"  491. 

Baptist  Medical  Mission,  78. 

Barber's  stool,  32. 

Barbers  not  allowed  for  jirisoners,  37. 

Baths,  wayside.  363. 

Bean  cake  and  oil,  465. 

Beggar's  Bridge  at  Peking,  448. 

Beggars,  369. 

Beggar-spirits,  propitiation  of,  218. 

Bell,  embossed,  330. 

gigantic,   only  sounded  for  rain, 

493. 

Bible  stories,  Chinese  version,  329. 

Binls'-nest  soup,  whence  obtained,  157. 

Bishop  Burdon,  78-S0. 

Blind  beggars,  33,  123,  41S,  440. 

teaching  for  China,  414. 

teaching  for  Japan,  422, 

Blindness  accounted  as  retribution,  123. 


INDEX. 


.-.  1'  1 


Blue,  predominance  of,  81,  9S. 

Bohea  tea  country,  grand  scenery,  111. 

Bones  of  the  dead  used  in  medicine  and 
witchcraft,  122,  227. 

Bookselling  under  difficulties,  431-434. 

Boulders  at  Anioy,  84. 

Boys  dressed  as  girls  to  deceive  malig- 
nant spirits,  473. 

Braille's  system  applied  to  Chinese 
sound,  419. 

Bread  not  eaten  at  dinner,  155. 

Bride,  310. 

Bridge  of  Ten  Thousand  Ages,  89. 

at  Kung-kow,  92. 

above  Foo-Chow.  113. 

British  Legation,  371. 

Buddha  threefold,  three  images  alike, 
181,  186. 

footprint  of,  at  Canton,  37. 

"The  Living,"  392. 

"  Buddha's  fingers,"  a  gourd,  33. 

Buddhist  hell,  in  a  temple,  21  I.  226,  326. 

Buddhist  Monasteries,  Tien-Dong, 
285,  289. 

very  numerous,  292. 

Shih-doze  in  Snowy  Valley,  314. 

in  Ningpo,  330. 

Buddhist  nuns,  327. 

priesthood,  dress  differs  from  Cey- 
lon, 186. 

Bunch  of  evergreens  as  a  sign  of  un- 
cleanness,  323. 

as  an  invitation  to  drink,  350. 

Butcher,  Dean,  creator  of  Shanghai  Ca- 
thedral, 2. 

Buttons,  deprived  of,  441. 

honorific,  446. 

Caged  foreigners,  342. 

criminals,  359. 

birds,  348,  352,  511. 

Camels,  369. 

Ccmgue— wooden  collar,  267. 

Cannibal  prescriptions,  121,  122. 

precautions  in  medicine,  471. 

Cannibalism,  359. 
Canton,  26. 

city  wall,  40. 

divided  by  fire-proof  walls,  40. 

— —  locomotive  tradesmen,  32. 

no  carriages,  32. 

sign-boards.  29,  30. 

swept  by  a  tornado,  40. 

Carrier-pigeons,  335,  409. 
Cash  of  varying  value,  295,  449. 
Casting  out  devils,  166-172. 
Cathedrals,  Hong-Kong,  English,  S. 

Canton,  Roman  Catholic,  43. 

Shanghai,  English,  2. 

Shanghai,  at  Tong-ka-doo,  Roman 

Catholic,  269. 


Cement    of   pagoda    or    chapel    works 

miracles,  124. 
Ceremonies,  book  of,  447. 
Chair-bearers,  number  limited  by  law, 

80. 
(  barm  made  of  copper  cash,  221 . 
against  fire,  Foo-Chow.  229. 

against   demons,   sword    of  copper 

cash,  309. 

Cheap  labour,  295. 

Che-foo,  351,  509. 

( 'hild-birth,  peculiar  customs,  323. 

China,  most  important  of  mission-fields, 

435. 
"  ( 'h ilia's  sorrow,"  5. 
Chinese  dinner,  lengthy,  153. 

character,   written,   is  understood 

by  the  Japanese,  435. 

colonists,  436. 

odd  dishes,  156,  157. 

Chin-hae  castle,  276. 

( Ihoir  at  Temple  of  Heaven,  384. 

i  Ihop-sticks,  156. 

"  Christian  Doctrine  Child,"  161. 

Christians  sorely  tried,  142-144. 

■ if    literary,    are    degraded    from 

honours,  146,  147. 

liberality,  147. 

steady  increase,  14S. 

entirely  abjure  opium,  147. 

Churches  divided  to  separati    a  ses,  264. 
City  of  the  Dead,  Canton,  67. 

Foo-Chow,  193,  211. 

Civil  Service  competitive  examinations, 

407. 
Coal-mining  company,  234. 
Cobbold,  Mr,  300. 
Coffins,   Chinese  benevolence,  40,   124, 

207. 
containing  a  father's  corpse  keeps 

out  creditors,  68. 

lacquered  for  great  nobles,  208. 

Colour-blindness  unknown,  418. 
Colours  of  mystic   meaning,    red   for 

luck,  308-311. 
yellow,    Imperial     and    Buddhist, 

375,  440. 

yellow,  Earth-god,  386. 

green,  Imperial  Princes,  440. 

green,  altar  of  burnt  sacrifice,  3S2. 

deep-blue,  Heaven,  378,  380. 

white  denotes  mourning.  390. 

white,  Moon-goddess,  387. 

light-green,    Gods    of    Grain    and 

Band,  386,  3S7. 

red,  Sun-god,  387. 

light-blue,  Tempi.-  of  Light,  887. 

rank  indicated  by  colour  of  official 

button,  446. 

four  points  of  the  compass,  49]. 

( 'olporteiirs,  428- 1:11. 


522 


INDEX. 


Commandments  reversed,  301,  3<»2. 

Commemoration  Arch  or  Pai-low,  286. 

Communion  of  the  Dead,  201. 

Compass,  needle  points  to  south,  347. 

Competitive  examinations,  403. 

Confucian  worship,  Agnostic  and 
Ancestral,  181. 

temple  at  Peking,  396. 

■  classics,  408. 

Confucius,  his  temple,  and  chief  wor- 
ship, 1 27-132. 

I  lonsecration  of  a  Catholic  bishop,  269. 

Contrarieties  in  Chinese  custom,  347  ■' 
seq. 

Converts,  large  preponderance  men, 
252. 

Copper  cash,  sword  made  of,  309. 

■ fluctuating  value,  335. 

Corea,  513. 

Cormorant  fishing,  101-103. 

in  England,  102. 

Cremation  of  Buddhist  priests,  65. 

Crickets  trained  for  fighting,  450,  451. 

Cruelty,  343. 

Cuckoo,  315. 

Cup  of  Blessing,  201,  384. 

Cuttle-fish  market,  281. 

Cypress-groves  at  the  Temple  of  Heaven, 
381. 

Days  of  luck  and  ill-luck,  193. 
Death,  ceremonies  attending,  206. 
Decapitation,  most  ignoble  death,  204, 

205. 
Destruction  of  books,  398. 
Devotees,  269. 
Dirty  farm-house,  315. 

homes,  461. 

Divination,  divers  methods,  231. 
Dog-days  (dog's  fiesh,  when  eaten),  33. 
Doun-Ho  at  Tien-tsin,  363. 
Dragon  and  other  mystic  emblems, 

445. 

King,  494-496. 

Dress,  31,  32,  46,  48,  97,  99. 

of    Buddhist    priests,     290,    316, 

330. 
of  Buddhist  priests  in  Ceylon  and 

Thibet,  395. 

in  Lama  temple,  395. 

in  summer  cool  and  scanty,  367. 

of  students,  410. 

official,  443. 

sumptuary  laws,  444,  44"). 

of  boatmen,  91-93. 

of  Chinese  navy,  92. 

of  a  wealthy  family,  176,  177. 

women  must  not  cover  their  head, 

48,  97. 
Duck  boats,  60. 
hatching,  61. 


Dudgeon,  Dr,  372,  392,  468.  471. 
Dust  and  dirt  of  Peking,  460. 
Dwarfed  trees,  62. 

Earth-gods,  domestic  worship,  29,  72. 

Earth-laden  waters,  4. 

Earthly    honours    for    celestial    beings, 

394,  495,  496. 
Earthquake  at  Ku-lang-su,  86. 
Hdkins,  J.,  D.D.,  373,  168,  474. 
Eggs  eaten  to  avert  headache,  307. 
"Easter,"  hard-boiled  and  painted, 

307. 

red,  votive  offerings,  309. 

Eight  banners,  491. 

diagrams,  380. 

Elephants,  few,  378. 

Emperor  Kwangsu,  why  selected,  442. 

why  the  last  was  selected,  199. 

details  of  mourning  for  an,  209. 

Empress,  birth  rank  not  essential,  442. 

Enamel  ornaments,  108. 

Episcopal     consecration    at    Shanghai, 

Roman  Catholic,  270,  271. 
Etiquette,  wearisome,  330. 
Examination  halls,  404. 
Extraordinary  trial,  246  et  seq. 
Eyes,  artificial,  474. 

Faa-Tee,  gardens  at,  62. 

Famine  details,  355,  356. 

Fan  as  carried  bv  undressed  coolie,  458, 
459. 

Fan  with  map  of  city,  464. 

Fancy  ball  at  Canton,  56. 

Faulds,  Dr,  and  Mr  Lilley,  devise  blind- 
teaching,  423. 

Feet,  deformed,  "golden  lily."  4S. 

Female  Education  Society,  246. 

Feng-Shui,  233-236. 

Fifty  tears'  progress  :  Foreigner- 
tolerated  only  at  two  ports,  342  ;  not 
one  Protestant  Christian,  4:;7. 

Fighting  birds  for  gambling,  451. 

Fire,  punishment  for  causing  a,  40. 

Fire-crackers.  7:;. 

Fires  at  Hong-Kong,  1*17.  S2. 

Fishermen  dyeing  their  nets,  24. 

Fish-tanks,  artificial,  98. 

"Five  Tigers'"  mountains.  92, 

Flood  in  the  Fuh-Kien  province,  114. 

round  Canton,  115. 

Flowers  :  Jessamine  and  honeysuckle. 
305. 

azaleas,  2SS,  315,  317. 

clover  and  buttercups,  314. 

laburnum,  381. 

Paullovmia  imperialis  (Kiri),  317. 

poppies,  318. 

pride  of  India,  314. 

Solomon's  seal  and  hawthorn,  315. 


INDEX. 


..l'.; 


Flowers,  wild,  iu  the  Yuen-Foo  Valley, 

94,  112. 
Foo-Chow,  88. 

dirty  streets,  247. 

American  PresbyterianMission,  126. 

French  attack  on  the  arsenal,  91. 

Theological  College  burnt,  126,  236. 

Footprint  of  Buddha  at  Canton,  37. 

Forbidden  city,  438. 

Foreign  Missions  in  China,  Buddhist  and 

Mohammedan,  262. 
Formosa,  87. 
Foundling  hospital  at  Foo-Chow,  134. 

■ at  Shanghai,  native,  275. 

Francis  of  Assisi,  St,  185. 
French  aggression,  345. 
Funerals,  194-196. 

details,  208. 

gay  colours  admitted,  311,  389,  390. 

occasionally  pestilential,  369. 

Gaelic,  its  difficulties,  301. 

Gambling  with  crickets,  game-cocks,  &c, 
450,  451. 

"Garden  of  China,"  6. 

Gate-closing,  501. 

Geese,  emblems  of  constancy,  47. 

at  the  wedding-least,  311. 

not  hatched  artificially,  62. 

General  U.  S.  Grant  at  Peking,  4."4. 

Genii  powder-plot,  232. 

Ginseng,  valued  tonic,  120. 

Goble,  Mr,  devises  blind-teaching  for 
Japan,  422. 

Goddess  of  Mercy,  86,  100,  107.  See 
K  wan- Yin. 

Goto  Isles,  514. 

Grand  Canal,  356,  364. 

Grandmother,  how  honoured,  202. 

Graves,  choosing  a  lucky  site,  210. 

brick-houses,  289. 

innumerable,  Foo-Chow,  192. 

mounds  near  Ningpo,  277. 

on  the  Pei-ho,  354. 

Guests  must  be  summoned,  225. 

Guild,  Canton  Guild  at  Foo-Chow,  223, 
265. 

Guild  of  Foo-Chow  merchants  at  Ningpo, 
283. 

of  actors,  312. 

— -  of  fruit  merchants  and  timber  mer- 
chants, 343. 

Hair,  odd  use  for  a  queue,  35. 
llairdressing  at  Ningpo,  2S0. 
Handwriting,  six  styles,  405. 
Harmonium  of  Chinese  descent,  270. 
Harvest  in  Peh-chi-li,  506,  511. 
Hatan  Straits,  88. 
Haul-over,  286. 
Hell,  Buddhist,  214,  310. 


Hell  for  dishonest  priests,  291. 

on  the  stage,  226. 

place  of  bad  doctors,  122, 

Herod  of  Chinese  literature,  399. 

Hien-Fung,  Emperor,  death  of,  441. 

Hill  of  coal,  Peking,  439. 

Hoang-Ho,  4. 

Honan,  5. 

Hong-Kong,  the  Peak,  7,  23. 

cathedral,  S. 

its  granite  city,  called  Victoria,  7. 

on  fire.  9-17. 

New- Year's  Day  social  duties,  18. 

transformed  from   a    barren  rock, 

18-20. 

deficient  water-supply,  21. 

cemetery — Happy  Valley,  24,  82. 

Theological  College,  78. 

races,  80-82. 

Horse-sacritice  to  demons,  221. 
Horse-shoe-shaped  graves,  193. 
Horses,  why  so  few,  346. 
Hounds  at  a  funeral,  390. 
Hyssop,  308. 

Ice-houses  near  Ningpo,  277. 
Iceland  moss  on  Scotch  coast,  15S. 
Idol-destroying  Taipings,  341. 
Idols,  their  singular  Lnsides,  200,  201. 
Imperial  ancestors,  how  honoured,  199, 
200. 

palace,  439. 

penitential  worship,  384. 

ploughing,  388. 

worship,  376. 

"  Improvisatore,"  467. 

Infanticide,  how  viewed,  70,  134-136. 

Inland  Mission,  4?>;>- 137. 

Inns,  village,  104. 

Iron  foundry  at  Ningpo,  344. 

[rrigation,  methods  of,  354. 

Itinerant  merchants,  448. 

cooks,  464. 

Jade,  blue,  384. 

yellow,  386. 

stone  market  at  Canton,  50. 

mines  in  Turkestan,  50. 

value,  52. 

Judicial  cruelty,  death  by  starvation,  S9. 

torture,  473. 

Junks  on  the  Min  river,  256. 

Kaifung,  :". 

Kak-Chio,   treaty  port  of  Swatow,   on 

isle  of,  83. 
Kingfishers'  feather  jewellery,  132-134. 
Kites,  350. 

Kong-ke'o,  strange  bridge  at,  314,  324. 
Kotow,  nine  head-kuuekiiiLrs  in  worship. 

383,  384. 


524 


i.\m;,\. 


Kow-tow,  ceremonial  prostration,  130. 

Ku-lang-su,  island  conceded  to  foreign- 
ers at  Amoy,  83. 

Hum-fa,  Goddess  of  Babies,  340. 

Kuslian,  sacred  mountain,  88. 

Kuan-Yin,  Goddess  of  Mercy,  pictures 
of,  322. 

on  serpent's  head,  342. 

liturgies  to,  329. 

Ladies'  age,  152. 

Lama  Temple,  Peking,  392. 

admits  a  Christian  bookstall,  429. 

Language,  diverse  dialects,  435. 

Chinese,  difficulties,  300. 

easy  errors,  e.g.,  eels,  302. 

Lanterns,  feast  of,  77. 
Larks,  348,  352,  511. 

caged  favourites  carried  about,  54. 

a  congregation  at  a  temple,  54. 

Left  hand  post  of  honour,  154,  200. 
Leper  boats,  59,  70. 
Lepers  at  funerals,  privileged,  68. 
Leprosy   identical   with   that   formerly 

prevalent  in  Europe,  68-71. 

■ ■  village,  mission  to,  106. 

Li-Hung-Chang,  361. 
Literature  of  China,  400  et  seq. 
Lockhart    founds    London    Mission    at 

Peking,  468. 
Lohans,  the,  467. 
London  Mission  at  Peking— a  welcome, 

372. 
hospital,  15,000  patients  annually, 

470. 

Macao,  77. 

M'Cartee,  Dr,  300. 

MacGowan,  Dr,  299. 

Magpies,  numerous,  96. 

Manchu  play,  189. 

Mandarin  at  home,  45,  152,  174  et  seq. 

Markets,  jade,  50. 

lanterns,  77. 

sucking-pigs,  53. 

tovs,  77. 

May-Days,  285. 

May-dew,  288. 

Meat  of  Blessing,  384. 

Medical  Diploma,  None,  122. 

Medical  Mission  at  Foo-Chow,  116. 

Training  Homes  in  London,  117. 

Medical  student,  a  Chinese  lady,  362. 
Medicines,  strange,  119-122. 
Melon-seeds,    large    consumption,    175, 

176. 
Merit  of  saving  animal  life,  183,  184. 
Milk,  butter,  and  cheese  not  appreciated, 

155. 
Milk,  human,  sold  to  the  aged,  120. 
Min  river,  S8,  90. 


M  ission  details,  78  etseq.,  84, 105, 106, 

241-243. 

a  prophetic  voice,  297. 

an  infant  Church,  296. 

baptism,  necessary  prudence,  299. 

books  admitted  to  Imperial  palace, 

425. 

booksasgood  seed-bearingfruit,429. 

China,  the  most  important  mission- 
field,  435. 

China's  future,  253. 

C.M.S.  at  Ningpo,  279. 

Chinese  clergymen,  279. 

Christian  teachers,  how  few,  436. 

combined  evening  services,  504. 

commencement  at  Foo-Chow,  139. 

comparison  of  results  in  Fuh-kien 

and  Cheh-kiang,  299. 

■ few  workers,  151. 

fifty  years'  progress,  342,  437. 

■  first  Chinese  clergyman,  140. 

■  Foo-Chow  riot,  238. 

Inland  Mission,  435-437. 

London  Medical  Mission  at  Pekinsr, 

470. 

numerical  table,  150. 

• present  condition,  146,  252. 

Roman  Catholic,  262-264. 

sorely  tried  converts,  142-144. 

22,000  Chinese  communicants,  437. 

Mission-work,  how  viewed  by  many, 

243. 
Model  junks,  344. 

Modern  parallels  to  Bible  stories,  145. 
Mohammedans  in  China,  30,000,000,  262. 
Monasteries,  Buddhist,  Yuen-foo,  94. 

in  the  Bohea  tea  district,  111. 

in  Honam,  63. 

on  Mount  Kushan,  180. 

Moon-goddess,  village  festival,  96. 
Morrison,  first  missionary  in  China,  14S- 

149. 
Mourning  for  the  dead,  official,  209. 
Mulberries,  319. 
Music,  ancient,  130. 

theatrical  orchestra,  190. 

Mutilating  the  body,  dread  of,  471. 
Mystic  numbers,  385. 
colours,  385. 

Nagasaki,  519. 
Nail  protectors,  48. 

shields,  312. 

Name  of  God,  141. 

Nantai,    foreigners'    quarters    at    Foo- 

( 'how,  88. 
New  Year's  Eve  market.  74. 
New  Year's  Day  at  Hong-Konp.  1  8. 

Chinese,  at  Canton,  72. 

flowers,  34,  61. 

last  chance  of  recovering  a  debt.  53. 


INDEX. 


525 


Newspapers,  very  few,  334,  336. 
Ningpo,  white  wood  carving,  278. 

Church  Mission  House,  278,  279. 

on  its  walls,  305. 

Xu-koo,  ecclesiastical  drum,  316. 

Numbers,  mystical,  385. 

Nuns,  Buddhist  and  Taouist,  327,  328. 

O-mi-to-Fo,  293,  327,  345. 
Ocean  Banner  Monastery,  63. 
Offerings  to  the  dead,  194. 
Opera-glasses  popular,  95,  109,  110. 
Opium,    Chinese    Anti -Opium    League, 

483. 
danger  to    America   and   England, 

486-490. 
smoking  in  Japan  punishable  by 

death,  482. 

Mozambique  Opium  Co.,  485. 

poppies,  318. 

rapid  increase  in  use  of,  481. 

refuges  in  1'iking,  478,  479. 

smoking  in  the  Imperial    Palace, 

481. 

spread  of  poppv-culture,  484,  485. 

statist i.-s,  482,  486. 

totally  rejected  by  all  Christians, 

117. 
Orange-groves  near  Foo-C'how,  92. 
Oranges  sold  peeled,  282. 
Orphanage  at  Siccaway,  272. 

near  Shanghai,  272-275. 

Otters  trained  to  fish,  103. 
Over-population,  346. 
Overstrain,  mental,  406. 
Oxen,  blindfolded,  34. 
Oyster-shell  windows,  86. 
Oysters  reared  on  bamboos,  86. 

Pagoda,  one  at  Ningpo,  fourteen  storeys, 

280. 
at    Tung- Chow,   thirteen   storeys, 

366. 

Anchorage,  Foo-C'how,  83,  91. 

Pagodas,  Canton,  44. 

idea  derived  from  umbrellas,  181. 

Pai-low,  286. 

many  at  Ningpo,  343. 

of  yellow  China  tiles,  440. 

to  a  venerable  student,  407. 

Pampered  pigs   at   Honam   Monastery, 

66. 
Paper  collected  for  burning.  333. 
Parkes,  Sir  Harry,  251,  475-477. 
Pawn-towers  of  Canton,  26. 
Peh-chi-li,  Gulf  of,  352. 

province,  354. 

Pei-ho,  353. 

PEKING  Beggar's  Bridge,  448. 

cart,  367. 

combined  evening  services,  504. 


Peking  drains,  460. 

fascinating  fair,  453. 

fish-market,  451. 

food,  464-466. 

'Gazette,' 336. 

Government  College,  474. 

grand  walls,  371,  467. 

"North  Palace,"  375. 

protection  against  robbers,  452. 

"Rag  Fair,"  447,  462. 

roads  (made  a.d.  1260),  368. 

■  seasons,  462. 

system  of  watering  streets,  461. 

Tartar  and  Chinese  cities,  375. 

view  of  the  city,  456. 

wide  streets,  458. 

Persecution  of  Christians.  It. 
Pheasants'  feathers  for  sale,  35. 

their  theatrical  use,  190. 

Pigeon -fighting,  451. 

music,  502. 

Pigs  and  Vishnu,  340. 

Pirates  capture  a  large  steamer,  25. 

precautions  against,  25. 

village,  110. 

wood-rafts,  113. 

Plav-actors,  a  despised  profession,  312, 

313. 
Poetry  essential  for  official  candidates, 

405. 
Ponies,  Mongolian,  369. 
Poossa,  292. 

Pootoo,  Sacred  Isle,  344. 
Poppies,  318. 
Population,  four  classes,  406. 

of  Shanghai,  2. 

of  Hong-KoiiL.  20. 

of  Canton,  25. 

Possi  jsed  by  devils,  167,  172. 

Postal  defieiei 

"  Potted  ancestors,"  193. 

"  Praise-the-Lord,"  his  prayer  answered, 

173. 
Praise-Wheels,  395,  500. 
"  Precious  Buddhas,  Three,"  332. 
Precious  ones  (silkworms),  319. 
Printing  Chinese  in  Roman  characters, 

303. 
Private  printing-press,  182. 
Progress  in  China,  413. 
Punch  and  Judy,  463. 
Purgatory,  Buddhist,  releasing  the  dead, 
215-217. 

Queen   Victoria   mistaken  for   a  Lama 
396. 

Race-course,  Foo-Chow,  245,  251. 
Rafts  for  passengers,  "'23. 
Railway,  the  first,  destroyed — prospects, 
361. 


•  2G 


IXDKX. 


Rain,  special  prayers  for,  49 1. 
Rain-bell  struck  and  prayers  for,  493, 

494. 
Rain-gods,  S56,  494. 
Raven  protected  by  .sailors,  258. 
lied,  forlnck,  308-311. 
lied,  lucky,  75,  76. 
Red-bristled,  296. 
Bed-beaded  foreigners,  450. 
Relic  of  Buddha  greatly  valued,  181. 
Rice-planting,  314. 
River-life  at  Foo-Chow,  256-260. 
River  population  at  Canton,  57-60. 

police  regulations,  57. 

no   intermarriage   with    landsmen, 

60. 
Roman  Catholic  cathedral  at  Shanghai, 

270. 

Catholic  Mission,  262-264. 

Orphanage  at  Siccaway,  272. 

Catholic  Sisters  at  Ningpo,  283. 

Romanised  colloquial,  303. 
Rosaries,  Buddhist,  64. 
Rouge,  free  use  of,  46. 
Rubbings  from  ancient  tablets,  332. 
Russell,  Bishop,  278  et  seq.,  282. 

adapts    Roman    type    to    Chinese 

sounds,  303. 

his  lodgings,  304. 

home,  306. 

life  aud  death,  300. 

popularity,  331. 

Sacramental  offering  to  ancestors,  201. 
Sacred  stones,  five  rams  of  Canton,  37. 

footprint  at  Canton,  37. 

Salt  factory,  355. 

Salt-wells,  508. 

Sampan  population,  Canton,  56-60. 

compared  with  English  barge-life, 

261. 

-  Foo-Chow,  260. 

never  marry  landsmen,  60. 

Sand-flies,  502. 

Savings-bank  for  futurity,  218. 
Schoolboys,  407. 
Seal,  imperial,  447. 
Seals  of  the  gods,  123. 
Sedan-chairs,   number  of  bearers  regu- 
lated, 444. 
Seven-headed  serpent,  328. 
Shameen,  Canton,  26-28. 
Shanghai,  a  dirty  town,  2. 

Cathedral,  2. 

Cathedral,  Roman  Catholic,  269. 

country  round,  266. 

Orphanage  at  Siccaway,  272-275. 

wheelbarrows,  267. 

Shansi,  5. 

Sheep  at  Peking,  391. 

Shun-Lee  steamship  wrecked,  508. 


Silence-loving  saints,  185. 
Silkworms,  319. 

Silk  of  wild  silkworms  used  for  nets,  24. 
actors  may  only  wear  tnssah,  313. 

weaving,  347. 

Silkworm  chrysalis  eaten,  157. 
Slavery  in  China,  39. 
Slaves,  laws  relating  to,  313,  408. 
Small    feet    not    required    by    Tartar 

women,  453. 
Small  gods,  offerings  to,  184. 
Smallpox,  "heaven  flowers,"  461,  476. 
Snakes  fried  in  lamp  oil,  104. 

reared  for  medicine,  119. 

Snowy  Valley,  313. 

Snuff-bottles,  391. 

Souls,  three,  67,  197. 

South  gate  generally  closed,  379. 

"Spate,"  a,  112. 

Spring  festival,  339. 

Square  and  circle,  mystic,  494. 

Squirrel's  tail  in  soldier's  cap,  492. 

Stone  books  in  Burmah,  400. 

Stones,  venerated  boulders,  381. 

"stone  drums,"  397. 

"books,"  398. 

Street  names,  30,  452. 
St  Simon  Stylites,  Chinese  version,  269. 
Substitution  of  legal  victims,  240. 
Sucking-pig  market  at  Canton,  53. 

litter  anointed  with  wine,  53. 

Suicide  to  obtain  legal  vengeance,  204. 

honourable,  287. 

Suicides  very  numerous,  477. 

Summer  Palace,  495  et  seq. 

Sumptuary  laws,  chair-bearers  limited. 

80. 

■ laws  relating  to  actors,  313,  408. 

Sunday  observance,  138. 

Sun-god,  96. 

Swatow  treaty  port,  82. 

Taipings  and  Triads,  268. 

at  Ningpo,  338. 

Taipings,  idol-destroyers,  341. 

Taku  forts,  352. 

Tallow-chandler,  35. 

Tallow,  vegetable,  288. 

Taouist  nuns,  328. 

Tartar  play,  a,  189. 

Tchui-Kow,  picturesque  village,  107. 

Tea  adulterated  with  indigo,  304. 

Tea,  its  use  not  invariable  in  China,  112. 

Tea-halls  versus  gin-palaces,  178. 

Tea-plantations,  317,  318. 

Teeth  of  Buddha,  186. 

Telegraph  from  Peking  to  Shanghai,  361. 

Temple  theatre,  a  strange  feast,  225. 

theatres,  187,  223. 

theatrical  details.  190.  191. 

Temple  of  Five  Hundred  Disciples,  36. 


INDEX. 


527 


Temple  of  Agriculture,  388. 

at  Amoy,   halo    formed    by  1000 

golden  hands,  86. 

of  Confucius,  128, 

of  Five  Genii,  37. 

of  the  God  of  Slavery,  38. 

of  ETonam  a1  Canton,  63. 

of  light,  387. 

of  Longevity,  36. 

of  Medicine,  3S9. 

numberless  and  very  varied,  131, 

132. 

of  Paik-tai,  the  lark  festival,  54. 

■  of  Tain-gak-miu,  Canton,  71. 

Taouist.  at  !'Y>o-Chow,  231. 

Temple  of  Beavbn,  3]  1  - '  sea. 

of   Agriculture,   Earth,   Sun,   and 

Moon,  376. 

to  the  Earth,  385. 

Land  and  Gram,  3S6. 

Sun  and  Moon,  387. 

Thunder-God,  and  God  of  Seasons, 

338,  339. 
Temples— City  Defenders,  Ningpo,  280. 
God  of  Fire,  now  L.M.M.  Hospital, 

373,  468,  469. 

God  of  Literature,  466. 

gods  affrighted,  339. 

Gods  of  War,  Wealth,  and  Time, 

325  326. 
Gods    of  Wealth,    of    Earth,    and 

Heaven,  2S!»,  290. 

gods  on  leave  of  absence,  312. 

Goddess  of  Iron-founders,  344. 

Goddess  of  Mercy,  329. 

Goddess  of  Silkworms,  322. 

Great  Lama,  392. 

Healer  of  Sore  Eyes,  466. 

in  a  held  to  pray  for  rain,  494. 

innumerable,  467. 

Kwang-ti,  God  of  War,  393. 

Manjoosere,  466. 

midnight    services    at   Tien-Dong, 

293  295." 

Monastery  of  the  Azure  Clouds,  466. 

of  the  Great  Bell,  493. 

the  Eight  Great  Temples,  503. 

the  Yellow  Temple,  501. 

"  Term  Question,"  the,  141. 
Testimonial  boards,  510. 
Tien-tsin  Dispensary,  362. 

Heaven's  Ford,  355. 

massacre  of  R.C.  Sisters,  272,  363. 

port  of  Peking,  360,  364. 

Timber-junks  carry  cargo  externally,  257. 
Tobacco-pipes,  125. 
Toleration  in  China,  255. 
Tongkadoo,  R.C.  Cathedral  at,  269. 
Toy  market  for  children,  77. 
Training  Colleges  for  official  work,  414. 
Triads  and  Taipings,  268. 


Tribute-bearing  nations,  371. 
Tumour,  peculiar  cases,  473. 
Tung-Chow,  365,  ! 

American  Mission,  505. 

Typhus  fever  at  Peking,  475. 

Vaccinating  girls  cheaper    than    bovs, 

136. 
Vegetarian  dinner,  290. 

rule  in  monasteries,  180. 

Venerable-looking  congregation,  409. 

students,  4o7. 

Venerated  stones — footprint  of  Buddha, 

37. 
the  hill  of  the  black  stone  at  Foo- 

Chow,  126. 
Visiting-cards,  331. 
Votive  offerings  from  women,  326. 

for  sore  eyes,    166. 

ladies'  shoes,  71. 

of  onions,  466. 

of  silk  handkerchiefs,  466. 

sailors,  258. 

temple  lanterns,  77. 

Vows,  a  hundred  and  eight,  1S3. 

Wailing  for  the  dead,  196. 
Walking-stick,   a   privilege  of  old  age, 

348. 
War  stores,  492. 
Ward,   American    envoy,   conveyed    to 

Peking,  372. 

Waste-]'     ;■  ■,.-'■'' 

Watchmakers  in  Peking,  417. 

Water  of  longevity,  95. 

Water-bell  at  Kushan,  185. 

Water-chestnuts  grown    in   deep    mud, 
99. 

Water-clock  at  Canton,  38. 

Waters,  earth-laden,  4. 

Wax-insect,  -J— . 

Wedding  the  Dead  !  124. 

Weddings,  310. 

Western  science,  recognition  of,  413. 

Whale-eating  in  China  and  in  Old  Eng- 
land, 155. 

Whampoa  fortifications,  25. 

Wheelbarrows  at  Shanghai,  267._ 

at  Peking  for  oil-bottles,  370. 

Whipping-boys  at   the  Imperial  Court, 
•1 13. 

Whistle  for  wind,  258. 

White  Cloud  .Mountains,  71. 

tablecloth  a  symbol  of  woe,  349. 

Wild  geese  emblems  of  constancy,  311. 

Willow-bough  on  doors,  308. 

Windows    of   oyster-shells    and   w 1 

carving,  's,;. 

in  Britain  Of  horn  and  lattice-work, 

86. 

Witchcraft,  227,  232. 


52S  INDEX. 

Woman's  Work,  b  great  field,  163.  Yang-tze-Kiang  or  Fellow  River,  3,  4-6, 

Women  of  China,  dull  lives,  164.  2o5. 

capable,  165.  Yellow,  imperial  colour,  '■'•!■<. 

sit  apart  from  men,  96.  < Sea,  512. 

Wong-kiu-Taik,    first  ordained    clergy-     Yuen-foo    river,    our    cruise    up   the, 

man,  140.  90. 

Woo- Sung  Fort,  3.  Buddhist  monastery,  94. 

Worship,  domestic,  29.  Yuen-ming-Yuen,  495. 

New  Year,  75.  Yung  river,  276. 

Writing  in  six  styles,  405. 

Wu-Shih-Shan  trial,  240,  245  et  seq.  Zoological  pantomime,  228. 


FRINTED   BY   WILLIAM    BLACKWOOD   AND   SONS. 


UKTVERSr-  T0RN1A 

U  LES 

.;AttY 


CHINA     ahd     .IAP.VN 


UNIVERSITY  of  CALV 

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