HERE AND THERE
Of the three routes to China:
1. The overland, by rail through Europe and Siberia;
2. The westerly, across the Atlantic, North America and the
Pacific;
3. The easterly, _via_ the Mediterranean, Suez Canal, Red Sea
and Indian Ocean,
the last is perhaps the most interesting and in many ways the most
comfortable, for it is possible to take a magnificent mail steamer at
an English port and remain on board, surrounded by as much comfort and
luxury as is to be found in a first-class hotel, until you land in
either Hongkong or Shanghai.
The finest of these vessels are veritable floating palaces, the
saloons of which are gilded and decorated regardless of expense,
richly carpeted, illuminated with electric light, cooled by electric
fans, and where meals are served which would not demean any restaurant
in London or Paris. Music-room, library, smoking-room and bar,
laundry, barber's shop and delightful marble baths all find place.
On the crack German boats a band plays at frequent intervals, while I
have actually seen cold stoves in some of the cabins, so that when
passing through great heat in the Red Sea or elsewhere you could close
your cabin door, draw up your chair and have a good cool.
I am not sure how these stoves are worked, but believe they are
connected in some way with the refrigerator, which makes ice for use
on board and provides cold storage for meat and fruits, and that a
current of ether or cold air is pumped through them.
In appearance they resemble a French porcelain furnace, abutting on
one side of the cabin, and by means of a regulator you are able to
reduce the temperature almost to freezing point. Although undoubtedly
very pleasant during intense heat, and invaluable for hospital
purposes, I question if they will come into anything like general use,
for it seems to me that instantaneous changes from a temperature of
perhaps one hundred degrees on deck to say sixty degrees in the cabin
cannot fail to produce bad effects on the health.
Travelling by the easterly route you meet the sun, which causes each
day to be shortened. By the westerly route you go with the sun, which
causes each day to be lengthened.
During the journey round the world the aggregate of these shortenings
or lengthenings will amount to twenty-four hours, so that on arriving
again in England by the easterly route you will have gained a day, and
instead of its being Wednesday, as you might think, it would be
Tuesday, wherefore you would be obliged to have two Wednesdays in one
week. By the westerly route, on the contrary, you would lose a day, so
that returning on a Wednesday by your reckoning you would find
everyone else calling it Thursday, and the following morning you would
be obliged to recognise as Friday.
To avoid such confusion the date is always regulated when crossing the
Pacific.
Going east, the captain notifies that there will be two consecutive
Mondays, or two Thursdays, as the case be, in order to use up the
extra day.
Going west, on the other hand, one of the days in a week must be
omitted, there being no time for it if you are to arrive in port on
the proper date.
A common story told in this connection is that on a certain voyage
from Vancouver to Hongkong some missionary passengers settled to hold
service in the saloon at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, and posted up a notice
to that effect in the usual place at the head of the saloon stairs,
but omitted to previously consult the captain or ask his permission.
The captain, having no desire to be ignored, even unintentionally,
aboard his own ship, quietly regulated dates, the passengers next
morning finding an official notice posted up immediately over that of
the missionaries, saying that it would be Sunday until 10 a.m., after
which it would be Monday, so that missionaries, Sunday and divine
service were all simultaneously suppressed.
The most comfortable and the most restful travelling in the world that
I know of is on board the large river steamers running up the Yangtse
for six hundred miles from Shanghai to Hankow, and then transhipping
to somewhat smaller vessels, for the additional four hundred miles to
Ichang.
Scrupulously clean, good table, jovial captains, excellent Chinese
stewards, electric light, luxurious saloons, state-rooms double the
size of cabins on even the finest ocean liners, few passengers, no
noise and no sea-sickness, you glide on day and night over calm waters
in a dream-like peace, broken only for a short time every few hours by
the necessary stopping at ports of call to work cargo, and at
riverside stations for Chinese passengers, who, however, do not mingle
with the Europeans, but have saloons set apart for their own exclusive
use. Some of these boats were built in the golden days of the early
sixties, upon American models, and were fitted up on a scale
considerably reduced in newer vessels.
The large bathrooms on these older boats are a great feature of
comfort, and so numerous as to be almost bewildering to strangers; in
fact, I have heard that a nervous young man fresh from home was the
victim of an untoward mishap by mistaking the captain's bathroom for
the one belonging to his own cabin, when on dashing in, the door
having evidently been insecurely fastened on the inside, he found
himself face to face with the captain's wife in her bath. Retreat was
naturally instantaneous, but the position was so serious that his only
course was to at once seek the captain and explain. This awkward task
he started to perform, though in considerable trepidation, and found
the husband reading in his cabin, and who, after listening calmly to a
recital of the details, laconically remarked, "Ah, she has a beautiful
figure, has she not?"
And the incident was closed.
The compass has been known for many centuries to the Chinese, but in
accordance with their strange habit of doing so many things in an
exactly contrary manner to Europeans, they "box" it the reverse way to
ourselves, speaking of an east-north or a west-south breeze, and so
on.
The expressions "to the right" and "to the left" I have never heard,
for it is the custom to say "go to the east-south" or to the
"west-north," as the case may be. Even in cities, when asking your
way, the natives will direct you by the points of the compass rather
than by the names of the streets.
Chinese screws turn from right to left, which is the opposite way to
our own, and of this I had a practical demonstration when, on
returning one morning from the mountains, a chair-coolie
surreptitiously abstracted my flask from the tiffin-basket and tried
to unscrew the stopper to get at the whisky, but being ignorant of the
different method, he in reality screwed it on tighter, till at last it
broke off, and when some hours later, on board the steamer, I
discovered my ruined flask, an array of teeth-marks deeply imbedded in
the metal plainly told the guilty tale.
At Peking, when studying Chinese, my teacher would often come after
dinner during the long winter evenings, when seated by a roaring fire
we discussed for practice in talking any subjects of interest. Amongst
many curious things which I thus heard the following has always
puzzled me with the conjecture, "Can there possibly be any truth in
it?"
I had that day purchased some fur rugs of no particular value, and not
being sure whether they were of dog-skin or goat-skin, asked the
teacher his opinion. What his reply was I do not remember, but the
conversation having turned on the subject of furs in general, he told
me that some rare wolf-skins were exceedingly costly from the fact
that the wolves, after being caught by Mongol hunters, had been
skinned alive and the skins dressed in a particular manner. Rugs made
of these, he declared, on the approach to the house of wild animals,
robbers or of any threatening danger, would bristle up as if still on
the back of the live animal when angered, and so give timely warning
to the inmates; for which reason they were so highly valued.
I have never seen what purposed to be such a skin, but repeat the
story if only for its Oriental weirdness.
Water buffaloes are a striking feature in Chinese rural life, more
especially in the central and southern provinces. With a carcase almost
as large and devoid of hair as that of an elephant, they have very
short legs, and are consequently but little taller than the ordinary
ox. Carrying on their heavy skulls enormous, semi-circular horns, they
have a ferocious aspect, but strangely enough are exceedingly timid and
docile. In summer, for the sake of coolness and to avoid mosquitoes,
they plunge into streams or mud-holes, and lie there for hours with
only their muzzles and eyes above water. It is rather a pleasing sight
to see one of these unwieldy, dangerous-looking brutes being led
quietly along, by means of a thin string attached to its nose, by a wee
native girl, who, when tired of walking, stops the animal, draws its
head down by the string, places her tiny foot on the massive horn and
is slowly raised from the ground by the buffalo and placed gently on
his back, which is so broad that she can kneel and play about on it
while her charge is grazing. These buffaloes are chiefly employed in
the cultivation of rice, and as the flesh of oxen is but rarely eaten
by the Chinese, they usually die of old age.
On one occasion I saw a large family of natives returning mournfully
to their village from a neighbouring meadow, and on making inquiries
was told that they had been to bury their water buffalo, which had
just died after a faithful service of more than twenty years.
When on a shooting trip far up the River Han I saw a large buffalo
with four boys on his back, grazing by the side of a water-ditch,
which lay between him and a steep bank some ten feet high. The grass
being very soft, my close approach was unobserved, until a hare
getting up I fired off my gun. Instantly the buffalo dashed through
the ditch and up the bank, when the boys, having nothing to hold on to
except one another, were shot off backwards into the water, where they
formed a perfect heap of struggling arms and legs, to my great
amusement.
Chinese farm-houses are very different from the substantial,
comfortable dwellings obtaining in this country, being primitive clay
hovels with no upper storeys, having tile roofs, windows of oiled
paper, and mud floors, while the furniture is home-made and of the
roughest description. No walks or gardens surround the house, which
stands in the centre of the farm-yard, outbuildings and cesspools,
with the threshing-floor, as a rule, immediately outside the front
door. Pigs, dogs, fowls and goats roam at will through the dwelling
and about the premises, while the two or three buffaloes and oxen used
for ploughing and threshing are tethered to neighbouring trees.
[Illustration: A TYPICAL FARM-HOUSE.
_To face page 177._]
Although wheat, maize, barley and millet are largely cultivated in the
north, rice is the principal crop wherever it can be grown, much water
being necessary. It is first sown in quite a small, dry patch, to be
subsequently transplanted, and comes up as thick as grass and of a
most brilliant green. The fields, which rarely exceed half an acre,
and are generally very much less, are now tilled. First, they are
flooded by a careful system of irrigation to a depth of three or four
inches, and when sufficiently soft turned over with a primitive,
wooden plough, shod with a small iron blade or tip, and drawn by one
water buffalo. After this they are harrowed, the farmer standing on
the harrow and driving the buffalo as it wades along, until they are
masses of rich, liquid mud. The young plants are now pricked out by
hand, about six inches apart, and the fields kept just flooded by a
constant stream of running water. When ripe the crop stands about two
and a half feet in height, and the water having been cut off some
time previously, reaping commences with the sickle.
Into the harvest-field is often brought a large wooden tub about four
feet in diameter by three feet high, and the reaper, having cut an
armful of rice, takes it by the straw end and threshes the ears five
or six times with great force over the side, so that the grain falls
into the tub, which, when thus filled, is replaced by an empty one and
taken to the threshing-floor, where the contents are thrown up by
shovels-full into the air, the breeze blowing the chaff to one side
and the winnowed rice falling in a heap by itself. When the crop is
not thus threshed in the harvest-field it is stacked at the farm, and
sometimes in the low forks of large trees to remove it from the danger
of possible floods, subsequently to be trodden out by oxen on the
threshing-floor or beaten out by the farmer and his family with light
basket-work flails on bamboo shafts.
In villages and small towns where many houses adjoin, it is a common
practice to paint or dye young chickens as soon as they are hatched,
so that each housewife may know her own. One woman will colour hers a
bright red, another will use blue, another green, and so on, the
appearance of these strikingly-coloured little creatures intermingled
in the streets being exceedingly droll and novel to Europeans.
Amongst all classes of Chinese, from beggars to Academicians, belief
in ghosts, dreams and the supernatural generally is absolute and
unshakable.
If you express doubt or scepticism they will readily agree with you
from a certain nervousness of being thought ridiculous, as well as
from a feeling of the futility of any attempt to persuade Europeans of
the soundness of such convictions.
In the autumn of 1899, when at Shasi, which is an unthriving town nine
hundred miles up the Yangtse, and where another Englishman and I were
the then only Europeans residing amongst a dense, hostile population,
which only a few weeks previously had burnt down all foreign houses
and forced the inmates to flee for their lives in small boats, two of
the most remarkable cases of this universal superstition came directly
under my notice.
At that time one of those rebellions which are a chronic feature of
Chinese Society was in full bloom in the neighbouring province of
Szechwan, where an individual named Yue Man-tze was heading a crusade
against Christians and foreign influence, when at least one French
father was slain and another held in prolonged captivity, despite all
efforts of the local officials to effect his release.
The doings of this redoubtable brigand were naturally our chief topic
of daily conversation, and a very intelligent and highly-educated
Chinese gentleman, who kept me informed of local events, said that the
natives generally credited him with mystic powers. "Of course," he
added, eyeing me suspiciously, "it cannot be true, still, it is
current gossip in all the tea-shops."
After a short pause I informed him confidentially that whatever other
foreigners might or might not believe, I personally had considerable
doubts as to the non-existence of supernatural agencies.
Without looking up I could feel that his eyes were critically scanning
my face in search of ridicule or sarcasm, but I managed to preserve a
stolid demeanour, and purposely dropping further discussion of the
matter, went in search of cigars and stimulants to help us while away
the afternoon. At length he again broached the subject, which I could
see was of great interest to him, and warming to his theme under the
influence of a sympathetic listener and good cheer, he finally told me
in a burst of confidence and with low, excited voice, the following
_fact_ relative to Yue Man-tze.
At the outset of his lawless career this supernaturally gifted
desperado, having collected a band of followers, fastened round their
ankles such heavy weights that they were at first totally unable to
move; but, as the fruit of continual exertions, they by-and-by managed
to creep a few paces, later on they were able to walk easily, and
finally even to run with their loaded feet.
The time for action having come, Yue Man-tze removed the weights, when
his disciples were so buoyant that they could all _fly_, and so were
able to pass rapidly between places far apart, and to successfully
avoid all attempts at capture.
For those unacquainted with the East it is doubtless well-nigh
impossible to credit that such rubbish as this could be implicitly
believed by any considerable number of people, yet such was the case,
and the fact that the Chinese government eventually bribed Yue Man-tze
with official rank and a large sum of money to desist from his evil
ways by no means tended to diminish the illusion.
For several weeks we were continually threatened with a visitation
from some predatory band of Yue Man-tze's followers, so that when one
stormy night two large fires simultaneously broke out in different
parts of the town we thought trouble was at hand. Our anticipations,
however, were happily unfulfilled, the storm having prevented the
rebels from descending the river as intended, though the fires, which
evidently had been previously planned and timed, were ignited.
Next morning my compatriot brought in word that he had visited the
scenes of the conflagrations, and that three victims, who had been
fearfully burnt, were lying in the street covered with straw mats, but
still alive. Being without medical comforts of any description I was
powerless to render assistance, so refrained from even quitting the
house.
An hour later my countryman again rushed in, followed by two or three
Chinese, to say that relatives of the sufferers had brought them to a
piece of waste ground hard by, had heaped wood round them, had poured
petroleum over them, and were now burning them as a sacrifice to the
god of fire, he having already established his claim over them.
What could be done in the face of such horrifying circumstances?
Nothing, for the poor wretches were already beyond any human aid, and
to have interfered would have brought on us instant vengeance from the
excited mob, but never, to the end of my days, shall I forget that
sickening feeling of enforced inaction.
I especially record this incident as it is the only one of so extreme
a nature that I have ever heard of as taking place amongst the
Chinese, although it is a matter of common knowledge that they
frequently refuse to rescue drowning persons for fear of displeasing
the river god.
We subsequently learnt with much satisfaction that the rebels, to the
number of two or three hundred, on being turned aside by the storm,
crossed the border into the province of Hunan, and there, after
murdering an official, his women-folk and some servants, were
surrounded in a swamp on the shores of the Tongting lake by Government
troops and butchered to a man.
Native breeds of swine are very coarse and always coal black, so that
when a French friend of mine imported for the first time into Peking
two white, foreign-bred pigs, they were objects of immense curiosity
to the local Chinese, who thought them exceedingly uncanny, and
considered it far from improbable that the departed spirits of former
friends might well have migrated into forms so passing fair.
After they had been carefully fattened, a kiddier was sent for to give
them the happy dispatch, but no sooner had he set eyes on his quarry
than he scuttled off in alarm, and nothing would induce him to return,
nor could any other butcher be prevailed upon to officiate, so that,
my friend declared, he was obliged to roll up his sleeves and perform
the gruesome, though necessary operation himself.
"Old custom" is almost a religion with the celestials, to subvert
which requires great caution, persistency and strength. If anything
can be justified by old custom, or even precedent, it is considered to
be unassailable, no matter how harmful or irrational it may be.
Take the matter of foot-binding.
Laws have been passed, and are still extant, expressly forbidding this
cruel and senseless habit, and the ruling race, the Manchus, have
never practised it, still the Chinese, and the women more than the
men, cling to it with fanatical stubbornness for the sole reason that
it is old custom, and that if girls' feet were not bandaged it would
outrage the universal sense of propriety.
I have frequently talked the subject over with Chinamen, who readily
acknowledge that it is useless, besides being extremely painful to
young children, but they say if their daughters had natural feet they
would most probably fail to get husbands, as no man wishes his wife to
be in any way extraordinary or different from other women. "In any
case," they frequently retort, "we do not know that foot-binding gives
much more pain than do the tight-laced stays of foreign women, and
certainly it is not so ugly or prejudicial to the health."
The Chinese, contrary to ourselves, look back to the past for
inspiration and guidance, and to concern oneself about novelty or
change appears to them as savouring strongly of shiftiness and want of
tone.
A curious instance of how quickly precedent can be established, and of
its binding force, came to my notice some years ago at Peking.
At a certain point the now shallow waters of the moat encircling the
city wall had for long years been spanned by a foot-bridge, but which,
having become rotten and weak, duly crumbled away.
With Oriental dilatoriness no attempt was made to rebuild it for some
months, and it was then found that two men, who during the interval
had been earning a livelihood by wading to and fro carrying
pedestrians between the opposite banks, strongly objected to a new
bridge on the ground that it would take away their occupation now
fairly established. Backed by numerous relatives and by public
opinion, these two miserable coolies had successfully resisted the
proposed reconstruction when I left the capital, and it is highly
probable that they or their sons still monopolise passenger traffic at
the ford.
To many even in this country, and to far more on the Continent, where
Christmas is observed solely as a religious festival, the New Year
with its train of bills, gifts, junketings and holidays is a period of
abomination, when all business is dislocated and servants run mad.
At such places in the East as Hankow, where a considerable Russian
colony exists, there are three New Years of progressive virulence. The
first of January is observed by all Europeans as a general holiday,
when the ladies stay at home to preside over elaborate teas, at which
all gentlemen of their acquaintance are expected to appear if only for
a few minutes, while the men, both married and single, taking a large
supply of cards, sally forth to call at the house of each lady in turn
to wish her a Happy New Year, a proceeding which takes up several
hours and necessitates a surprising amount of endurance. Dinners,
dances, complimentary visits from Chinese friends, and other social
functions help to swell the list of New Year obligations.
Things have scarcely settled down again when the Russian New Year is
at hand, for in the dominions of the White Czar time is still reckoned
by the old style, and as Russians are particularly keen and very
pronounced in their observance of anniversaries and _fetes_, the place
is again turned topsy-turvy for several days beneath floods of
excellent sweet champagne.
The Chinese calendar marches coeval with the moons, which fact
generally places their New Year some time in February, the exact date
fluctuating from year to year to the extent of three or four weeks.
The last few days of the old year is a great time of reckoning, when
all outstanding debts must be paid so as to commence the New Year with
a clean slate, and woe to the man who fails to meet his obligations.
From faces clouded with anxiety during this trying period there is a
sudden revulsion on the stroke of midnight to countenances wreathed in
smiles, as for weal or woe the New Year is ushered in with deafening
fusillades of fire-crackers and a great beating of gongs. In the
morning all China is astir betimes, dressed in gala attire and
interchanging congratulatory visits. Business is entirely suspended
for several days, it being the one great annual holiday, and it is
extremely difficult to get even your own servants to pay so much as a
minimum of attention to their household duties; in fact, I yearly
register a mental vow not to lose my temper with them on any account
during New Year week, for besides being useless it would probably
entail the additional discomfort of having to engage and train new
hands.
At this season native officials as well as merchants are in the habit
of making presents indicative of good-will to those foreigners with
whom they have business relations.
Your boy brings in a bright red visiting-card eight inches by three,
coming from an official who begs you will deign to accept his best
wishes for the New Year, together with a few trifling presents.
Immediately three or four coolies arrive, groaning as loudly as
possible beneath the weight of hams, boxes of cigars, jars of dried
fruits, boxes of tea, oranges and champagne. You inspect the presents
with exclamations of appreciation and then privately consult the boy
as to what you should retain, it being the general practice to return
the greater part. A box of tea, a jar or two of dried fruits, some
oranges and perhaps a box of cigars are selected, while a few dollars
are presented to the coolies, by whom you forward in return your own
Chinese card to the official with seasonable wishes and thanks for his
thoughtful kindness.
As I was reading by my fire one afternoon in Shanghai the door was
quietly opened, two hands gently pushed an enormous live turkey into
the room and the door was again closed. The turkey commenced to stalk
about with an occasional gobble. After watching the intruder for a few
seconds I started to catch him, but found it was no easy matter. He
flew on to the sideboard, from there to the mantelpiece and then to
the window-sill, scattering knick-knacks and photographs far and wide.
He ran under the sofa and table, finally escaping into my bedroom,
where, with a desperate effort, I caught him by his legs under the
bed. While dragging him out he beat his wings with great force, and as
the bed had evidently not been swept under for months, drove forth
such a cloud of dust and fluff as to almost choke me, while filling
the whole room.
Round his neck was tied a red label bearing New Year greetings from a
Chinese merchant.
[Illustration: FISHING-JUNKS IN MACAO HARBOUR AT CHINESE NEW YEAR.
_To face page 189._]
The entire boating population cease work at New Year, and tying up
their craft in convenient places give themselves up to such few
pleasures as their primitive mode of life allows.
At Macao, hundreds of fishing-boats, which supply the market both
there and at Hongkong, assemble and anchor close together in orderly
rows, both in the inner harbour as well as in the bay facing the Praia
Grande, under strict supervision of the Portuguese authorities. Mat
awnings are erected over the decks, thus forming commodious rooms,
which are decorated with scrolls and lanterns, and in which feastings
and family gatherings take place for several days, after which the
whole fleet, gaily decked with flags, puts again to sea.
Fish of any kind is a favourite article of food, and the methods of
catching them are extremely numerous. Otters, cormorants, nets,
baskets and hooks without bait, all meet with due measure of success,
but by far the most remarkable manner of fishing was that which I saw
from the bows of a steamer made fast to the hulk at Hankow.
It was mid-winter and bitterly cold, the ground being covered with
almost a foot of snow. I had been to tiffin with the captain and was
just coming away when, pointing to some natives in a sampan close
alongside, he said, "Have you ever seen those men dive for fish?"
I never had, and being glad of the opportunity, stopped to watch.
There were three men in the boat, of whom one worked the paddles,
while the other two, stark naked, crouched on the forepart, sheltering
themselves from the biting wind with an old straw mat. Having come to
a suitable spot, where the depth may have been from ten to fifteen
feet, the boat was stopped, and the two divers instantly plunged into
the turbid water, to reappear some seconds later with a live fish in
each hand, while one of them had also a third fish in his mouth. The
diving was repeated several times with varying results before I took
my leave, and the captain assured me that this was a common sight on
the Yangtse in winter, when the fish were probably lying in the mud
torpid from the cold.
When returning to Kiukiang from a fortnight's shooting trip in the
neighbourhood of Ngankin, my boat was much delayed by light and
contrary winds, which frequently obliged us to anchor in order to
avoid being swept back by the strong current. On one of these
occasions three of the crew took the jolly-boat and rowed ashore, a
distance of some hundred yards, and while smoking on deck I could see
them wading along by the bank, groping in the mud and occasionally
putting something into a bucket which they had taken with them.
Questioned as to what they were doing, the lowdah replied, "Fishing,"
and my astonishment was not diminished when they returned on board
with the bucket half-filled with fine perch, varying from perhaps
eight ounces to a pound in weight. Until then I was unaware that perch
existed in Chinese waters, nor have I since seen any.
The nearest approach to this kind of fishing that I know of is down in
my old home amongst the Norfolk broads, where on warm days, when lying
in the weeds, tench can be tickled with the fingers and caught by a
sudden nip behind the gills; but the art requires intimate knowledge
of local waters, much patience and great skill.
One of the most frequent questions that I am asked at home is, "Do not
Chinamen wear the finger-nails very long?" They do. Scholars perform
no manual labour, in visible token of which they allow the nails of
the left hand to grow an inch or an inch and a half in length, but the
nails on the right hand, while also long, are short in comparison with
those on the left.
To be classed with literary or educated men is the greatest of all
considerations, for which reason there is always a tendency for anyone
and everyone to wear a long coat and to don huge tortoise-shell-rimmed
spectacles, such as are affected by the _literati_, as well as to
cultivate the nails of the left hand. As the use of the word _esquire_
has degenerated in this country until not to apply it to all and
sundry is considered to be almost a snub, so the habit of wearing long
finger-nails in China has descended through every rank of Society
until it is now more often the badge of envious imitation than of any
scholarly attainments. So precious to the owners are these claw-like
nails that I have often seen them protected by silver sheaths, and
have heard that for cases of extraordinary growth the whole of the
left hand is even carried in a bag.
There is much outcry in these latter days against the newly-formed
habit of cigarette smoking cultivated by ladies of the West.
Condemnation of the practice seems if anything to act as an incentive,
so, yielding to the pleasant temptation of palliating faults in pretty
women, I would suggest as an excuse that they are but following in the
foot-steps of their sisters of the Far East, where, it may be roughly
stated, the women-folk of a third of the human race smoke pipes.
I cannot say that very young girls appear to indulge much, though
women of all ages do to a great extent, inhaling the smoke and puffing
it through the nose in thick clouds. The pipes in general use are
either small brass ones, having straight wooden stems a foot in
length, with clumsy porcelain mouthpieces, or brass water-pipes, which
when being smoked make an unpleasant gurgling sound. The bowl of
either kind is so tiny that it will only hold a pinch or two of very
fine tobacco, which three or four whiffs consume, when it has to be
refilled and lighted from a slow-match held ready in the hand until
the smokeress has smoked enough. The picture is neither winsome nor
sweet.
The Chinese have very few amusements corresponding to our outdoor
games, although at treaty-ports, and in those places where there are
any roads, men are taking readily to cycling, albeit, from the flowing
nature of their garments they generally use ladies' bicycles. Of these
few pastimes archery is considered the most _distingue_, while boys
attain to great skill in playing shuttlecock with their feet, being
able to keep up the feathered cork for a dozen or twenty times, and
passing it considerable distances from one to another. Judge then of
my surprise when, on asking a young Chinaman at Peking how he had
spent his holiday of the previous day, he replied quite naturally that
he had passed the afternoon at his cricket club.
I could hardly believe my ears, for as far as I knew a game of cricket
had never been played at Peking, even by Englishmen, there being no
suitable ground, and it was only by plying him with questions that I
elicited it was the cricket of the hearth to which he alluded, and
that his club was a gambling-house to which young men brought their
crickets, there to fight grim duels in a basin for the championship,
while noble owners staked considerable sums on the prowess of their
diminutive gladiators and stimulated their energies by tickling them
with straws.
On all the waterways of China enormous flocks of tame ducks are to be
seen. These flocks generally number several thousands of birds each
and are carefully herded by the duck farmer and his sons, who swim
them about from place to place in search of suitable feeding-grounds.
On the Yangtse I have seen them in mid-stream floating down in compact
masses with the racing current and surrounded by their guardians in
tubs, who, armed with long bamboos, smartly whack any bird which may
happen to stray away from the flock until it rejoins its companions.
These ducks are apparently always of one age, be it a month, three
months or full-grown, which fact had ever been a source of mild
surprise to me, in view of the number of simultaneous broods which
would be necessary to hatch off such swarms, until the matter was
explained.
A friend of mine gave a tiffin party of four good men and true on his
stern-wheel house-boat, the motive power for which was supplied by
half-a-dozen coolies driving the wheel with their feet, on the same
principle as the tread-mill, and we were gliding up the Taipa Channel
near Macao at about four knots, when suddenly our craft came into a
sea of egg-shells sailing gaily before the breeze and having at a
short distance much the appearance of water-lilies.
For a quarter of an hour or so we ploughed through these shells, which
must have numbered tens of thousands, making various conjectures as to
their origin, until our host, who had been below superintending the
icing of the champagne, came on deck and explained that they
undoubtedly were from an incubator in which ducks had just been
hatched. This was new to me, so I asked him for details, but he
replied that beyond knowing of the incubators and that they were made
of manure and lime in which eggs were buried until hatched, he had not
been able to procure further information.
Since then I have made many inquiries, but the Chinese will reveal
little beyond the fact that incubators "have always existed" for the
hatching of ducks and geese.
A gentleman whose knowledge of the Chinese and their ways is
unsurpassed has also kindly tried to find out, but with limited
success, for, he says, it is regarded as a trade secret and the duck
farmers will not divulge the process. However, he ascertained that the
hatching takes place in early spring, when "a kind of primitive
incubator is used. The eggs are placed in a big basket covered with
straw or cotton wool, about a thousand eggs in one basket. Under this
basket a charcoal fire is lit to keep the required temperature. The
work is carried on in closed rooms and one man is always in attendance
turning the eggs. Only eggs of ducks and geese are thus treated."
Whether these incubators are made of manure and lime in the open air,
whether they are in rooms heated by charcoal fires, or whether there
are both kinds, the interesting fact is established that incubators
"have always existed" in China, while results, as seen in the huge
flocks of ducks, proclaim them as thoroughly successful. And this,
too, when it has been unreservedly believed that the incubator was a
modern triumph of Western science!
Another little matter has attracted my attention. There have lately
been paragraphs in several papers announcing the excellent results
obtained from a new system of registering criminals by means of
thumb-marks.
Thumb-marking may be new to Scotland Yard, but in China it is a very
ancient practice. I have seen illiterate men smear their thumbs with
ink and make impressions at the foot of documents, such thumb-marks
being accepted as in every way equivalent to full signatures.