UP THE MIN RIVER
_Y. B. A._
Three days after leaving Shanghai we arrived at Pagoda Anchorage at the
mouth of the Min River, twelve miles from Foochow.
We boarded a launch which threaded its way through a fleet of
picturesque fishing vessels, each one of which had a round black and
white eye painted on its crescent-shaped bow. When asked the reason for
this decoration a Chinese on the launch looked at us rather pityingly
for a moment and then said: "No have eye. No can see." How simple and
how entirely satisfactory!
The instant the launch touched the shore dozens of coolies swarmed like
flies over it, fighting madly for our luggage. One seized a trunk,
the other end of which had been appropriated by another man and, in
the argument which ensued, each endeavored to deafen the other by his
screams. The habit of yelling to enforce command is inherent with the
Chinese and appears to be ineradicable. To expostulate in an ordinary
tone of voice, pausing to listen to his opponent's reply, seems a
psychological impossibility.
There had been a mistake about the date of our arrival at Foochow, and
we were two days earlier than we had been expected, so that Mr. C. R.
Kellogg, of the Anglo-Chinese College, with whom we were to stay,
was not on the jetty to meet us. We were at a loss to know where to
turn amidst the chaos and confusion until a customs officer took us in
charge and, judiciously selecting a competent looking woman from among
the screaming multitude, told her to get two sedan chairs and coolies
to carry our luggage. She disappeared and ten minutes later the chairs
arrived. Dashing about among the crowd in front of us, she chose the
baggage for such men as met with her approval and after the usual
amount of argument the loads were taken.
We mounted our chairs and started off with apparently all Foochow
following us. As far as we could see down the narrow street were the
heads and shoulders of our porters. We felt as if we were heading an
invading army as, with our thirty-three coolies and sixteen hundred
pounds of luggage, we descended upon the homes of people whom we did
not know and who were not expecting us. But our sudden arrival did
not disturb the Kelloggs and our welcome was typical of the warm
hospitality one always finds in the Far East.
No matter how long one has lived in China one remains in a condition
of mental suspense unable to decide which is the filthiest city of the
Republic. The residents of Foochow boast that for offensiveness to the
senses no town can compare with theirs, and although Amoy and several
other places dispute this questionable title, we were inclined to
grant it unreservedly to Foochow. It is like a medieval city with its
narrow, ill-paved streets wandering aimlessly in a hopeless maze. They
are usually roofed over so that by no accident can a ray of purifying
sun penetrate their dark comers. With no ventilation whatsoever the
oppressive air reeks with the odors that rise from the streets and the
steaming houses.
In Foochow, as in other cities of China, the narrow alleys are
literally choked with every form of industrial obstruction. Countless
workmen plant themselves in the tiny passageways with the pigs,
children, and dogs, and women bring their quilts to spread upon the
stones. There is a common saying that the Chinese do little which is
not at some time done on the street.
The foreign residents, including consuls of all nationalities,
missionaries, and merchants, live well out of the city on a hilltop.
Their houses are built with very high ceilings and bare interiors, and
as the occupants seldom go into the city except in a sedan chair and
have "punkahs" waving day and night, life is made possible during the
intense heat of summer.
A telegram was awaiting us from the Reverend Harry Caldwell, with whom
we were to hunt, asking us to come to his station two hundred miles up
the river, and we passed two sweltering days repacking our outfit while
Mr. Kellogg scoured the country for an English-speaking cook.
One middle-aged gentleman presented himself, but when he learned that
we were going "up country," he shook his head with an assumption of
great filial devotion and said that he did not think his mother would
let him go. Another was afraid the sun might be too hot. Finally on the
eve of our departure we engaged a stuttering Chinese who assured us
that he was a remarkable cook and exceptionally honest
If you have never heard a Chinaman stutter you have something to live
for, and although we discovered that our cook was a shameless rascal
he was worth all he extracted in "squeeze," for whenever he attempted
to utter a word we became almost hysterical. He sounded exactly like
a worn-out phonograph record buzzing on a single note, and when he
finally did manage to articulate, his "pidgin" English in itself was
screamingly funny.
One day he came to the _sampan_ proudly displaying a piece of beef and,
after a series of vocal gymnastics, eventually succeeded in shouting:
"Missie, this meat no belong die-cow. Die-cow not so handsome." Which
meant that this particular piece of beef was not from an animal which
had died from disease.
The first stage of our trip began before daylight. We rode in four-man
sedan chairs, followed by a long procession of heavily laden coolies
with our cameras, duffle-sacks, and pack baskets. The road lay through
green rice fields between terraced mountains, and we jogged along first
on the crest of a hill, then in the valley, passing dilapidated temples
with the paint flaking off and picturesque little huts half hidden in
the reeds of the winding river. It was a relief to get into the country
again after passing down the narrow village streets and to breathe
fresh air perfumed with honeysuckle.
A passenger launch makes the trip to Cui-kau at the beginning of the
rapids, but it leaves at two o'clock in the morning and is literally
crowded to overflowing with evil-smelling Chinese who sprawl over
every available inch of deck space, so that even the missionaries
strongly advised us against taking it. The passengers not infrequently
are pushed off into the water. One of the missionaries witnessed an
incident which illustrates in a typical way the total lack of sympathy
of the average Chinese.
A coolie on the Cui-kau launch accidentally fell overboard, and
although a friend was able to grasp his hand and hold him above the
surface, no one offered to help him; the launch continued at full
speed, and finally weakening, the poor man loosed his hold and sank.
This is by no means an isolated case. Some years ago a foreign steamer
was burned on the Yangtze River, and the crowds of watching Chinese did
little or nothing to rescue the passengers and crew. Indeed, as fast
as they made their way to shore many of them were robbed even of their
clothing and some were murdered outright.
Our first day on the Min River was the most luxurious of the entire
Expedition, for we were fortunate in obtaining the Standard Oil
Company's launch through the kindness of Mr. Livingstone, their agent.
It was large and roomy, and the trip, which would have been worse than
disagreeable on the public boat, was most delightful. The Min is one of
the most beautiful rivers of all China with its velvet green mountains
rising a thousand feet or more straight up from the water and often
terraced to the summits.
Perched on the bow of our boat was a wizened little gentleman with a
pigtail wrapped around his head, who said he was a pilot, but as he
inquired the channel of everyone who passed and ran us aground a dozen
times or more to the tremendous agitation of our captain, we felt that
his claim was not entirely justified.
The river life was a fascinating, ever-changing picture. One moment
we would pass a _sampan_ so loaded with branches that it seemed like
a small island floating down the stream. Next a huge junk with
bamboo-ribbed sails projecting at impossible angles drifted by,
followed by innumerable smaller crafts, the monotonous chant of the
boatmen coming faintly over the water to us as they passed.
When evening came we had reached Cui-kau. The _sampans_ in which we
were to spend eight days were drawn up on the beach with twenty or
thirty others. Right above us was the straggling town looking very much
like the rear view of tenement houses at home. Darkness blotted out the
filth of our surroundings but could do nothing to lessen the odors that
poured down from the village, and we ate our dinner with little relish.
Our beds were spread in the _sampans_ which we shared in common with
the four river men who formed the crew. There was only a mosquito net
to screen the end of the boat, but all our surroundings were so strange
that this was but a minor detail. As we lay in our cots we could look
up at the stars framed in the half oval of the _sampan's_ roof and
listen to the sounds of the water life grow fainter and fainter as one
by one the river men beached their boats for the night. It seemed only
a few minutes later when we were roused by a rush of water, but it
was daylight, and the boats had reached the first of the rapids which
separated us from Yen-ping, one hundred and twenty miles away.
In the late afternoon we arrived at Chang-hu-fan where Mr. Caldwell
stood on the shore waving his hat to us amidst scores of dirty little
children and the explosion of countless firecrackers. Wherever we
went crackers preceded and followed us--for when a Chinese wishes to
register extreme emotion, either of joy or sorrow, its expression
always takes the form of firecrackers.
There had been a good deal of persecution of the native Christians in
the district, and only recently a band of soldiers had strung up the
native pastor by the thumbs and beaten him senseless. He was our host
that night and seemed to be a bright, vivacious, little man but quite
deaf as a result of his cruel treatment. He never recovered and died a
few weeks later. Mr. Caldwell had come to investigate the affair, for
the missionaries are invested by the people themselves with a good deal
of authority.
We spent that night in the parish house just behind the little church,
a bare schoolroom being turned over to us for our use, and it seemed
very luxurious after we had set up our cots, tables, chairs, and bath
tub; but the house was in the center of the town and the high walls
shut out every breath of pure air. The barred windows opened on a
street hardly six feet wide, and while we were preparing for bed there
was a buzz of subdued whispers outside. We switched on a powerful
electric flashlight and there stood at least forty men, women and
children gazing at us with rapt attention, but they melted away before
the blinding glare like snow in a June sun.
That night was not a pleasant one. The heat was intense, the mosquitoes
worse, and every dog and cat in the village seemed to choose our court
yard as a dueling ground in which to settle old scores. The climax was
reached at four o'clock in the morning, when directly under our windows
there came a series of ear-splitting squeals followed by a horrible
gurgle. The neighbors had chosen that particular spot and how to kill
the family pig, and the entire process which followed of sousing it
in hot water and scraping off the hair was accompanied by unceasing
chatter. Boiling with rage we dressed and went for a walk, vowing not
to spend another night in the place but to sleep in the _sampans_.
On the whole our river men were nice fellows but they had the love of
companionship characteristic of all Chinese and the inherent desire to
huddle together as closely as possible wherever they were. On the way
up the river to Yuchi every evening they insisted on stopping at some
foul-smelling village, and it was difficult to induce them to spend the
night away from a town. Moreover, at our stops for luncheon they would
invariably ignore a shady spot and choose a sand bank where the sun
beat down like a blast furnace.
The Chinese never appear to be affected by the sun and go bareheaded at
all seasons of the year, shading their eyes with one hand or a partly
opened fan. A fan is the prime requisite, and it is not uncommon to see
coolies almost devoid of clothing, dragging a heavy load and with the
perspiration streaming from their naked bodies, energetically fanning
themselves meanwhile.
Mr. Caldwell was _en route_ to Yuchi, one of his mission stations
far up a branch of the Min River, and as there was a vague report of
tiger in that vicinity we joined him instead of proceeding directly to
Yen-ping. The tiger story was found to be merely a myth, but our trip
was made interesting by meeting Miss Mabel Hartford, the only foreign
resident of the place. She has lived in Yuchi for two years and at one
time did not see a white person for eight months with the exception of
Mr. Caldwell who was in the vicinity for three days. It requires four
weeks to obtain supplies from Foochow, there is no telegraph, and mails
are very irregular, but she enjoys the isolation and is passionately
fond of her work.
She has had an interesting life and one not devoid of danger. In 1895
she was wounded and barely escaped death in the Hwa Shan (Flower
Mountain) massacre in which ten women and one man were brutally
murdered by a mob of fanatic natives known as "Vegetarians." The
Chinese Government was required to pay a considerable indemnity to Miss
Hartford, which she accepted only under protest and characteristically
devoted to missionary work in Kucheng where the massacre occurred.
Conditions at Yuchi when we arrived were most unsettled and for some
months there had been a veritable "reign of terror." A large band of
brigands was established in the hills not far from the city, and we
were warned by the mandarin not to attempt to go farther up the river.
A few months earlier several companies of soldiers had been sent from
Foochow, and the result of turning loose these ruffians upon the town
was to make "the remedy worse than the disease."
The soldiers were continually arresting innocent peasants, accusing
them of being brigands or aiding the bandits, and shooting them without
a hearing. At one time accurate information concerning the camp of the
robbers was received and the soldiers set bravely off, but when within
a short distance of the brigands the commanders began to quarrel among
themselves, guns were fired, and the bandits escaped. A Chinaman must
always "save his face," however, and when they returned to Yuchi they
arrested dozens of people on mere suspicion and executed them without
the vestige of a trial. Finally conditions became so intolerable that
no one was safe, and after repeated complaints by the missionaries, a
new mandarin of a somewhat better type was sent to Yuchi.
As it was impossible to do any collecting farther up the river because
of the bandits, we left for Yen-ping two days after arriving at Yuchi.
Yen-ping is a wonderfully picturesque old city, situated on a hill at
a fork of the river and surrounded by high stone walls pierced and
loopholed for rifle fire. Such walls, while of little use against
artillery, nevertheless offer a formidable obstacle to anything less
than field guns as we ourselves were destined to discover.
The Methodist mission compound encloses a considerable area on the
very summit of the hill, backed by the city wall, and besides the
four dwelling houses, comprises two large schools for boys and girls.
Mr. Caldwell's residence commands a wonderful view down the river and
in the late afternoon sunlight when the hills are bathed in pink and
lavender and purple a more beautiful spot can hardly be imagined.
But the delights of Yen-ping are somewhat tempered by the abominable
weather. In summer the heat is almost unbearable and the air is so
nearly saturated from continual rain that it is impossible to dry
anything except over a fire. From all reports winter must be almost as
bad in the opposite extreme for the cold is damp and penetrating; but
the early fall is said to be delightful.
The larger part of Fukien, like many other provinces in China, has
been denuded of forests, and the groves of pine which remain have
all been planted. This deforestation consequently has driven out the
game, and except for tigers, leopards, wolves, wild pigs, serows and
gorals, none of the large species is left. However, the dense growth
of sword grass and the thorny bushes which clothe the hills and choke
the ravines give cover to muntjac, or barking deer, and many species of
small cats, civets, and other Viverines. These animals come to the rice
paddys, which fill every valley, to hunt for frogs and fish, but it is
difficult to catch them because of the Chinese who are continually at
work in the fields.
We spent a week trapping about Yen-ping and although we caught a
good many animals they were almost always stolen together with the
traps. We had this same difficulty in Yün-nan as well as in Fukien.
None of us had ever seen natives in any part of the world who were
such unmitigated thieves as the Chinese of these two provinces. The
small mammals are hardly more abundant than the larger ones for the
natives wage an unceasing war on those about the rice paddys and have
exterminated nearly all but a few widely distributed forms.