[Illustration]
In China the gradations of the social fabric as generally accepted are
First.--The _literati_; for mind is superior to matter.
Second.--The agriculturist; for he produces from the soil.
Third.--The artisan; for he is a creator from the raw
material.
Fourth.--The merchant; for he is a distributor.
Fifth.--The soldier; for he is but a destroyer.
However superficially logical this division is, the Chinese have
failed to realize that the army is an insurance and protection,
wanting which all other classes may be destroyed; but the fallacy has
had an unfortunate influence upon China, for until within a few years
the various so-called armies were simply hordes of undisciplined men,
whose officers were, as I have before said, sometimes robbers
reprieved on account of supposed courage and given command of
so-called soldiers. But this is now changed, and such armies as those
of Yuan Shi Kai and Chang Chi Tung (viceroy at Hankow) are well
disciplined and officered. This viceroy adopted an effective method of
combating the contempt with which the army was regarded by the
_literati_. He established a naval and agricultural college, and
colleges for the teaching of geography, history, and mathematics, and
formed all the students into a cadet corps. When I was in Hankow the
viceroy invited me to see his army of eight thousand men, who were
then on manoeuvres in the neighbourhood, and on my arrival I was
received by a guard of honour of one hundred of these cadets, whose
smart turn-out and soldierly appearance impressed me very favourably.
They were well clothed and well armed, as indeed were all the troops,
whom I had an opportunity of inspecting during the manoeuvres under
the guidance of a German captain in the viceroy's service, who was
told off to accompany me. I have no doubt that many of those cadets
are now officers, and will tend to raise the character of the army.
The importance of agriculture is emphasized by the annual ceremony of
ploughing three furrows by the Emperor at the Temple of Agriculture in
the presence of all the princes and high officials of Peking. Furrows
are afterwards ploughed by the princes and the high officers of the
Crown. Agriculture is the business of probably nine-tenths of the
population, and in no country in the world is the fertility of the
soil preserved more thoroughly. In the portions of China visited by me
no idle land was to be seen, but everywhere the country smiled with
great fields of grain or rape or vegetables, alternating with
pollarded mulberry trees in the silk-producing districts, while
extensive tracts of the beautiful pink or white lotuses are grown, the
seeds of which as well as the tuberous roots are used for food and the
large leaves for wrappers. Nothing in the shape of manure is lost in
city, town, or village; everything goes at once back to the fields,
and nowhere in China is a river polluted by the wasted wealth of city
sewers. On the banks of the canals the cultivators even dredge up the
mud and distribute it over their fields by various ingenious devices.
The rural population is arranged in village communities, each village
having its own head-man and elders, to whom great respect is shown.
Sometimes there is a feud between two villages over disputed
boundaries or smaller matters, in which case, if the elders cannot
arrange matters, the quarrel may develop into a fight in which many
lives are lost. Nobody interferes and the matter is settled _vi et
armis_.
[Illustration]
But this absence of local government control has its drawbacks; for
as sugar attracts ants, so unprotected wealth attracts robbers, and
gang robberies are frequent, generally by armed men, who do not
hesitate to add murder to robbery. Nor are these attacks confined to
distant rural districts. Only a few months ago an attack was made upon
a strongly built and fortified country house belonging to one of the
wealthiest silk merchants in Canton, who had specially designed and
built the house to resist attack, and had armed his retainers with
repeating rifles. Twenty-five boats, containing about three hundred
men, came up the river, and an attack was made at six p.m. that lasted
for seven hours. At length the fortified door was blown in by dynamite
and the house taken. Eighty thousand dollars' worth of valuables was
carried off, and the owner and his two sons were carried away for
ransom. Several of the retainers were killed and thirteen of the
robbers.
The country people are very superstitious and dislike extremely any
building or work that overlooks the villages, as they say that it has
an unlucky effect upon their _fung sui_, a term that means literally
wind and water, but may be translated freely as elemental forces. This
superstitious feeling sometimes creates difficulty with engineers and
others laying out railways or other works. The feeling is kept alive
by the geomancers, whose mysterious business it is to discover and
point out lucky positions for family graves, a body of an important
person sometimes remaining unburied for years pending definite advice
from the geomancer as to the best position for the grave, which is
always made on a hill-side. They also arrange the lucky days for
marriages, etc. When the telegraph was being laid between Hong Kong
and Canton, the villagers at one point protested loudly against the
erection of a pole in a particular position, as they were informed
that it would interfere with the _fung sui_ of the village. The
engineer in charge, who fortunately knew his Chinese, did not attempt
to oppose them; but taking out his binoculars he looked closely at the
ground and said, "You are right; I am glad the geomancer pointed that
out. It is not a favourable place." Then again apparently using the
glasses, he examined long and carefully various points at which he had
no intention of placing the pole. At length he came to a spot about
twenty yards away, which suited him as well as the first, when after a
lengthened examination he said, with an audible sigh of deep relief,
"I am glad to find that this place is all right," and the pole was
erected without further objection.
While gang robberies are frequent, there is not much petty theft, as
in small towns the people appoint a local policeman, who is employed
under a guarantee that if anything is stolen he pays the damage. In
small matters this is effective.
[Illustration]
The necessity for making villages secure against ordinary attack is
palpable, and many villages in country districts are surrounded by
high walls that secure them from such attack. In some, guns of ancient
pattern are mounted on the walls.
The prosperity of a town is shown by the number of pawnshops, which
are always high towers solidly built and strongly fortified. The
Chinese pawnshop differs from those of Western nations, as it is not
merely a place for the advance of money upon goods deposited, but also
the receptacle for all spare valuables. Few Chinese keep their winter
clothing at home during summer, or vice versa. When the season changes
the appropriate clothing is released, and that to be put by pawned in
its place. This arrangement secures safe keeping, and if any balance
remains in hand it is turned over commercially before the recurring
season demands its use for the release of the pawned attire. Sometimes
very valuable pieces of jewellery or porcelain remain on the hands of
the pawnshop keeper, and interesting objects may from time to time be
procurable from his store.
Next to agriculture in general importance is the fishing industry, in
which many millions of the population are engaged, the river boat
population forming a class apart, whose home is exclusively upon their
boats. To describe the variety of boats of all kinds found in Chinese
waters would require a volume. The tens of thousands of junks engaged
in the coasting trade and on the great rivers vary from five to five
hundred tons capacity, while every town upon ocean river or canal has
its house boats, flower boats, or floating restaurants and music
halls, passenger boats, fishing boats, trading boats, etc. On these
boats the family lives from the cradle to the grave, and while the
mother is working the infant may be seen sprawling about the boat, to
which it is attached by a strong cord, while a gourd is tied to its
back, so that if it goes overboard it may be kept afloat until
retrieved by the anchoring cord. In Hong Kong, where it is computed
that there are about thirty thousand boat people in the harbour, the
infant is strapped to the mother's back while she sculls the boat, the
child's head--unprotected in the blazing sun--wagging from side to
side until one wonders that it does not fly off.
[Illustration]
The large junks, with their great high sterns and bold curves, and
with the setting sun glinting on their yellow sails of matting, are a
sight to stir the soul of an artist. Many of these carry guns, as the
dangers of gang robberies on shore are equalled by that of piracy on
sea or river, the West River having the most evil reputation in this
respect. The unwillingness of junks to carry lights at night, lest
their position should invite piratical attack, adds to the dangers of
collision, and necessitates extreme caution after sunset in navigating
the southern coasts of China. These junks convey all the cargo from
the coast and riverside towns to the treaty ports, through which all
trade between China and foreign nations is exchanged. The high square
stern affords accommodation for the crew, but no man dares to
desecrate the bow by sitting down there. On one occasion when we went
by canal to Hangchow we stopped at Haining to observe the incoming of
the great bore that at the vernal equinox sweeps up the river from the
bay, and affords one of the most striking sights in the world. While
preparing to measure the height of the wave by fixing a marked pole to
the bow of a junk lying high and dry alongside, which was most civilly
permitted by the junkowner, one of the gentlemen sat down on the bow,
upon which the junkowner tore him away in a fury of passion and made
violent signs to him to leave the ship. Our interpreter coming up at
the moment heard from the irate junkman what had occurred. He pointed
out that the bow was sacred to his guardian deity, and such an insult
as sitting down on the place where his incense sticks were daily burnt
was sure to bring bad luck, if not destruction. Explanations and
apologies on the score of ignorance followed, and a coin completed the
reconciliation. The origin of touching the cap to the quarter-deck on
our ships originated in the same idea, the crucifix being carried at
the stem in the brave days of old.
[Illustration: ON THE WAY TO MARKET.]
The great wave or bore that I have just mentioned formed about six
miles out in the bay, and we heard the roar and saw the advancing wall
of water ten minutes before it arrived. The curling wave in front was
about ten feet high and swept past at the rate of fourteen miles an
hour, but the vast mass of swirling sea that rose behind the advancing
wall was a sight more grand than the rapids above Niagara. I measured
accurately its velocity and height. In one minute the tide rose nine
feet nine inches on the sea wall that runs northward from Haining for
a hundred miles. It is seventeen feet high, splendidly built with cut
stone, and with the heavy stones on top (four feet by one foot)
dovetailed to each other by iron clamps, similar to those I afterwards
saw at the end of the great wall of China, where it abuts on the sea
at Shan-hai-kwan.
[Illustration]
If the land is thoroughly cultivated the same may be said of the
waters, for in sea, river, lake, or pond, wherever water rests or
flows, there is no device that ingenuity can conceive that is not used
for the capture of fish, which enters largely into the food of the
people; and no cultivation is more intensive than pisciculture, a
fishpond being more valuable than ten times its area of cultivated
land. Sometimes the pond belongs to a village, and nothing comes amiss
that may serve to feed the fish, from the grass round the borders of
the pond to the droppings of the silkworms in silk-producing
districts. In such cases the village latrine is generally built over
the pond; it may, therefore, be understood that Europeans generally
eschew the coarse pond fish and prefer fresh or salt sea fish. These
pond fish grow very rapidly, and are taken by nets of all shapes and
sizes. Sometimes a net forty feet square is suspended from bamboo
shears and worked by ropes and pulleys, the net being lowered and
after a short time, during which fish may be driven towards it, slowly
raised, the fish remaining in the net, the edges of which leave the
waters first. In ponds of large area forty or fifty men may be seen,
each with a net twelve to fifteen feet square suspended from a bamboo
pole, all fishing at the same time. The entire pond is gone over, and
as the fish are kept on the move large numbers are thus taken. They
are then if near a river placed in well boats and sent alive to
market. During the summer months the bays around the coast are covered
by thousands of these large square nets. A net sometimes eighty feet
square is fastened at each corner to poles, long in proportion to the
depth of the water, the other ends of which are anchored by heavy
weights. The men who work the nets live in a hut built upon long poles
similarly weighted, and securely stayed by cables anchored at the four
cardinal points of the compass. From the hut platform the net is
manipulated by a bridle rope worked by a windlass. When the net is
raised the fish fall into a purse in the centre, from which they are
removed by men who row under the now suspended net and allow the fish
to drop from the purse into the boat. These nets are set up sometimes
in nine to ten fathoms. I have never seen them used in any other bays
than those on the coast of China, where, it may be observed
incidentally, there is hardly any perceptible growth of seaweed, and
one never perceives the smell of the sea or feels the smack of salt
upon the lips, as we do on our coasts.
[Illustration]
I have said that the devices for the capture of fish are endless, from
the large nets just described to the small fish trap set in every
trench or gap through which water flows. But they do not end here, for
about Ichang, on the Yangtze, otters are trained to drive fish into
the nets; and on the lakes and canals a not unusual sight is a boat or
raft with eight cormorants, who at the word of command go overboard
and dive in pursuit of the fish. Sometimes the bird is recalcitrant,
but a few smart strokes on the water close beside it with a long
bamboo sends the bird under at once. When a fish is caught and
swallowed the cormorant is taken on board and being held over a basket
the lower mandible is drawn down, when out pops the fish uninjured,
the cormorant being prevented from swallowing its prey by a cord tied
round the lower part of the neck.
But the most curious device for the capture of fish is practised on
the Pearl and West Rivers, where one sees poor lepers seated in the
stern of a long narrow canoe along the side of which is a hinged board
painted white. This they turn over the side at an angle during the
night, and the fish jumping on to it are dexterously jerked into the
boat. In the Norwegian fjords, baskets are sometimes hung or nets
fastened under the splashes of whitewash marking the position of rings
let into the rocky cliff where the yachts may tie up in an adverse
wind. The fish jumping at the white mark, which possibly they mistake
for a waterfall, are caught in the net or basket suspended below.
[Illustration]
The boat population of the inland waters are liable to the same
dangers from armed robbery as are their brothers on land, for the
river pirates are a constant source of trouble. Even the large river
steamers of the American pattern plying on the West River under the
command of European officers are not always safe, though great
precautions are taken, as the robbers sometimes embark as passengers
if they know of any specie or valuables being on board, and at a
given point produce revolvers and hold up the captain and crew,
carrying off their booty in a confederate boat. On this account
launches are not permitted to tow lighters with passengers alongside
lest they should step on board, and in all large steamers the lower
deck used by Chinese is separated from the upper by a companion-way
with iron railings and locked door, or with an armed sentry standing
beside it. About six years ago two stern-wheel passenger boats left
Hong Kong for the West River one evening, to enter which the course
was usedly laid north of Lintin, an island in the estuary of the Pearl
River. The leading boat number one for some reason took a course to
the south of Lintin, whereupon the captain of number two came to the
conclusion that she was being pirated, so changing his course and
blowing his whistle loudly he pressed on with a full head of steam and
opened fire upon number one with rifles. Number one returned the fire,
assuming that number two had been pirated and was attacking him. He
steered back to Hong Kong and made a running fight, a hot fire being
maintained until the boats had actually entered the harbour, when they
were met by a police launch and the mistake was discovered. Over three
hundred shots were fired, but happily nobody was hit. It is not a year
since a train of seven or eight house-boats, full of passengers and
towed by a steam launch that plies between Hangchow and Suchow on the
Grand Canal, was held up by river pirates, who rifled the train as
American trains are now and again held up in the Western States of
America. These evidences of lawlessness are only the natural
consequences of the neglect of the primary duty of a government to
make effective police arrangements for the due protection of life and
property, for Chinese under proper control are naturally law-abiding
and peaceable. The Chinese system does not contemplate any police
arrangements outside the principal cities. The small village
communities arrange their own police, but there is no official means
of combating the more serious offences short of a military expedition.
The salutary principle of prevention is ignored and the fitful efforts
of government devoted to punishment. This system doubtless acts as a
deterrent when the punishment follows the crime so frequently as to
impress upon evildoers the sense of its probability. Therefore it is
that a strong viceroy makes a quiet province. When pointing out to Li
Hung Chang the advisability of controlling a town well known as a
headquarters of pirates, his Excellency answered quietly, "We will
exterminate them." He ruled the province of the two Kwangs with a rod
of iron, and left Canton to the profound regret of every man who had
property exposed to attack.
[Illustration]
Li Hung Chang was the most able of the many able officials of China.
He was supposed to have had strong Russian sympathies, but had he been
in Tientsin or Peking instead of Canton when the Boxer trouble was
brewing, it is probable that the dangerous conspiracy would never have
been allowed to come to a head. The viceroys at Nanking and Hankow
maintained peace in their provinces, though the "big knife" movement
had its origin in their districts, and Li Hung Chang was as strong a
man as either, or stronger. When he left Canton to try to reach Peking
it was too late, and the issue had been joined between the Chinese
Court and the foreign Powers. He would have done better had he
remained in the turbulent southern province that he had ruled so
sternly and efficiently. Dangerous as was the Boxer movement, it
showed clearly the want of cohesion between the different portions of
the Chinese empire. When the trouble broke out in the north, there
were a large number of Cantonese students at Tientsin College, whose
lives were as unsafe as if they were foreigners. Some Chinese
gentlemen waited upon me on the subject. They were in great distress,
as they had no means of getting their sons away. They begged me to
endeavour to get the young men sent down by the British Consul, and
undertook to pay any amount up to ten thousand dollars for the expense
of chartering a ship. I telegraphed, guaranteeing the amount, to the
British Consul, who kindly chartered a ship for the transit of the
young men. The bill of over nine thousand dollars was at once paid by
the Chinese gentlemen who had requested my good offices.
The fact is that between different provinces, speaking different
patois, there exists in many cases a settled antipathy that has been
handed down from the feuds and wars of bygone centuries. To this day
the junks from Swatow land their cargoes in Hong Kong at a wharf where
Swatow coolies are employed; did they land it at a wharf worked by
Cantonese, there would certainly be disorder, and possibly fighting,
before the discharge of the cargo.
The traveller in China is impressed with the vastness of its extent,
the fertility of its various countries, the grandeur of its rivers,
the beauty and boldness of its bridges, the strength of its city
walls, the contrast of wealth and squalor in the cities, the untiring
industry of the people. A more detailed knowledge compels admiration
for their proficiency in arts and crafts.
[Illustration: A GRANDFATHER.]
A journey up the West River leads through the gorges, which gives one
an idea of the teeming life of the Chinese water world. The West River
is, next to the Yangtze, the one most often coming under the notice of
foreigners, for the river is the principal scene of piratical attacks.
Indeed, no native boat known to have valuable property on board was,
some years ago, safe from attack if it did not pay blackmail, and
carry a small flag indicating that it had done so. Perhaps the most
curious craft on the river is the stern-wheel boats, worked by man
power. Sixteen coolies work the wheel after the manner of a treadmill,
four more standing by as a relief. The work is very hard, and coolies
engaged in this occupation do not live long; but in China that is a
consideration that does not count, either with workman or master.
Rafts float slowly down the yellow waters of the broad river-rafts
three to four hundred yards long, with the "navigators" comfortably
encamped; great junks, with their most picturesque fan-shaped sails;
at every town a crowd of "slipper" boats, as sampans are called, which
have a movable hood over the forepart, under which passengers sit. At
Sam-shui, the principal station of the Imperial Customs in the river,
a dragon-boat shoots out with twelve men. In it are carried a large
red umbrella and a green flag, the umbrella being a symbol of honour,
while around the sides are painted the honorific titles of the owner
or person to whom it is dedicated. From here comes the matting made at
Taiking that is sold by retail at ten dollars for a roll of forty
yards.
Beyond Kwongli Island the gorges begin, through which the West River
debouches on the plains on its journey to the sea. From the island one
hundred and fifty acute sugar-loaf summits can be counted, and the
tortuous gorges wind past a succession of steep valleys that must have
been scored out when the mountain range was upheaved at a period of
very great torrential rains.
Above the gorges the old town of Sui-hing is rather featureless, but
is a landing-place for the Buddhist monasteries, built at various
elevations on the precipitous sides of seven masses of white marble
rising from the plain and called the Seven Stars. These old
monasteries here and elsewhere are marvellously picturesque, perched
as they usually are in situations that can only be reached by steep
climbing. The temple is at the base of the cliff, and contains fine
bronze figures of Kunyam, the goddess of mercy, with two guardians in
bronze at her side. The figures are about ten feet high, and are
supposed to be over one thousand years old. There is also a bronze
bell said to be of still older date.
Through a great cave and up marble steps the marble temple is
approached in which is a seated figure of the Queen of Heaven. The
sculptured figure, like the temple itself, is hewn from the solid
rock, the statue of the Queen of Heaven being in a shrine close by an
opening through which the light strikes upon the well carved statue
and drapery of white marble with a fine effect. The country round the
Seven Stars is perfectly flat, and devoted to the growth of rice,
fish, and lotus plants. In a large pond beneath the temple a water
buffalo is feeding on the floating leaves of lilies, while its calf
calmly swims beside the mother, now and again resting its head upon
her quarter. One realizes how large a part the water buffalo plays in
Chinese economy, for without it the cultivation of rice would be
seriously curtailed. The buffalo ploughs the inundated field, wading
in the mud literally up to its belly, when no other animal could draw
the primitive plough through the deep mud. In the town of Sui-hing
excellent pewter work is made, and here also are fashioned various
articles from the white marble of the Seven Stars, the carving of
which shows excellent workmanship.
[Illustration]
West of Sui-hing lies the city of Wuchow, where the Fu-ho River joins
the West River. Once a suspension bridge existed over the Fu-ho, and
two cast-iron pillars about nine feet high and twelve inches in
diameter are still standing, and have stood for several centuries. The
pillars have both been welded at about four feet from the ground. I do
not know if cast-iron can now be welded; if not, it is a lost art that
certainly was known to the Chinese.
Below Wuchow, on the right bank of the river, is a district that will
one day attract the big game sportsman. Here the tigers are so
plentiful and so dangerous that the inhabitants do not dare to leave
their homes after four or five o'clock in the afternoon. Farther down,
on the left bank, is one of the most important Buddhist monasteries in
China--Howlick--which accommodates about two hundred monks, and can
take in an equal number of guests, who at certain seasons retire to
the monastery for rest and reflection. It is situated about two miles
from the river at an elevation of fifteen hundred feet. Approached by
a steep pathway, at the entrance of which stand or sit two grey-robed
monks armed with spears so as to be able to repel bad characters, and
which as it approaches the monastery is formed into long flights of
steps, Howlick is built upon a terraced plateau in the midst of
primeval forest and close by a most picturesque gorge. The monastery
is the resort of a large number of pilgrims, and Buddhist services
take place daily in the temple, which, unlike most temples in China,
is perfectly clean and well appointed. When I visited it the service
was being intoned in strophe and antistrophe, the chanters at each
recurrent verse kneeling and touching the ground with their foreheads.
The only accompaniment was drums and gongs, the time being marked by
tapping a wooden drum of the Buddhist shape, but all was very subdued.
One monk played two or three gongs of different sizes, one being only
about six inches in diameter. The two long tables on which the books
of the readers were placed were loaded with cakes and fruit. The
fronts were hung with rich embroideries. Such a service is paid for by
the pilgrims, who receive the food placed upon the tables and
distribute it to their friends.
I had subsequently a long conversation with the abbot, who was most
kind and hospitable. He said the monks had their own ritual, and so
far as I could see Howlick is an independent community. In the
monastery were many shrines, at each of which was a regular sale of
sticks, beads, etc., in which a roaring trade was being done by the
monks. In the lower reception room was a number of women, who
purchased prayers written by a monk while they waited. For each prayer
they paid from sixty cents to a dollar.
The difference in the level of the West River in the wet and dry
seasons is about forty feet in its narrow parts. As the waters recede
a considerable amount of land is left on the banks available for
cultivation and enriched by the deposit from the heavily laden flood
waters. These river borders are not allowed to lie idle, for as the
river recedes they are carefully cultivated, and crops of vegetables
and mulberry leaves taken off before the next rising of the waters.
The river banks are then a scene of great activity. In the district
about Kumchuk, in which sericulture is a considerable industry, the
banks of the river are all planted with mulberry, which ratoons
annually and bears three crops of leaves, at each stripping six or
seven leaves being left at the top. The worms are fed at first on
finely shredded leaves, which have to be changed at least twice daily,
the minute young worms being removed to the fresh leaves with the end
of a feather. The worms begin to spin in thirty-seven days and
continue spinning for seven days. Along the river are many apparently
wealthy towns, some showing by a perfect forest of poles like masts
with inverted pyramids near the top that a large number of the
inhabitants had successfully passed the examinations and received
degrees, which entitled them to raise these poles as an honorific
distinction before their houses. All mandarins have two such poles
erected in front of their yamens.
[Illustration]
The West River is at present the principal approach to the province
of Yunnan, from which province and from the western portions of
Kwangsi a large cattle trade is water-borne to Canton and Hong Kong.
From time to time these supplies are intercepted by the river pirates,
who sometimes meet their deserts. On one occasion the inhabitants of a
certain town, incensed at the murder of one of their people, turned
out _en masse_ and followed the piratical boat down the river, firing
upon her until every one of the robber gang was killed.
[Illustration]