HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE.--FIRST SIGHTS AND SCENES IN ANAM.
The boys made a division of labor in looking up information about the
country. Frank was to find what he could concerning its natural features
and extent, while Fred undertook to learn something about the French
occupation, and the reasons that led to it. When they were ready, the
essays were read to the Doctor for his approval or rejection; and there
was a brief discussion to determine who should be first to read, or
rather last, as each preferred not to be the beginner. The Doctor
settled the question by deciding that the natural features of the
country existed before the French came there, and, therefore, it was the
duty of Frank to open the subject.
Thus assured, Frank produced his note-book, and read:
"The countries of Birmah, Siam, and Anam are known to geographers as
'Indo-China,' for the reason that they lie between India and China, and
have some of the characteristics of both. The empire of Anam is the one
we are now considering, and we will leave the others until we get to
them in the course of our travels. It is erroneously called Cochin
China, from a province of that name which is included in the empire. The
proper divisions of Anam are Cambodia, Tonquin, Tsiampa, and Cochin
China, and more than three-fourths of its boundaries are washed by the
sea. It is about nine hundred miles long, and its width varies a great
deal, owing to the indentations of the coast. Cochin China proper is
only some ninety miles long by twenty broad, and it is really the
smallest of the provinces. Cambodia is the largest and most populous,
and the soil is said to be more productive than that of the other parts
of the empire. The number of inhabitants is not known, but it is
generally thought to be from twelve to fifteen millions.
[Illustration: NATIVE GENTLEMAN AT SAIGON.]
"The people resemble the Malays and Chinese, and are sometimes called
the connecting link between the two. They are smaller than the Chinese,
but not so dark as the Malays; their dress resembles the Chinese, but
they do not shave their heads as the latter do. They are not very
ingenious, and have comparatively few manufactures; their chief
employments are in agriculture, and they raise a great deal of rice,
which is exported to China and other countries. They also export sugar,
raw silk, cinnamon, dye-stuff, elephants' hides and bones, together with
a good many gums and spices. The dye known as gamboge comes from
Cambodia, and the name of the country is said to be derived from this
article. On the coast the people engage in fishing, and all through the
country the food of the people consists of fish and rice. The natives
will eat a great deal when they have the opportunity, but they are able
to live on a very small allowance of food when necessity compels them.
Buddhism is the prevailing religion, but they are not very earnest in
it; they have great respect for the dead, and resemble the Chinese in
their veneration for their ancestors.
"The country near the coast is generally flat, but farther inland it
becomes mountainous. There are tribes in the interior that are more than
half savage in their character; they live mostly on wild fruits, and are
widely scattered. Some sleep in the trees, and some build small huts,
but they rarely have permanent villages, and never get together in great
numbers. Sometimes the Cambodians make war on these hill-tribes, and
those that they capture are sold as slaves.
"The principal river is the Mekong, and it is one of the largest streams
in South-eastern Asia. It rises in China, and has a general course of
about one thousand seven hundred miles to the south, and it falls into
the sea by several mouths between the ninth and tenth degrees of north
latitude. There are many villages and towns along its banks, and in its
lower course the river is navigable for the largest ships."
Frank paused, and said that was all he had been able to obtain about
Anam, but he hoped to have more by-and-by. The Doctor pronounced his
essay an excellent one, as it gave a good general description of the
country, and contained the information that every traveller and reader
ought to have.
Now it was Fred's turn to read. He had been uneasily twisting his
note-book between his fingers, evidently dreading the ordeal of
delivery; but as soon as he was through with the first line, his
embarrassment vanished, and his voice was as firm as ever.
"Nearly a hundred years ago," said Fred, "France opened relations with
Anam, and arranged to give the latter country certain assistance against
its enemies in return for commercial and missionary privileges. It was
about the time of the famous French Revolution. Only a small part of the
promised assistance was given by France, and she was too busy with
affairs at home to demand all that had been agreed upon on the part of
Anam. The French missionaries were protected in the exercise of their
religious duties, and a small trade was carried on until about the year
1831. The old king died, and a new one went on the throne; he was
opposed to the French and Spanish missionaries, and endeavored to drive
them out of the country. Many of them were killed, and the native
Christians were persecuted, so that Christianity threatened to
disappear.
"Things went on in this way for twenty years. In 1851 the French
determined to interfere, both for the protection of the missionaries and
to demand the concessions that were promised when relations were first
opened with Anam. Shortly before they came, an order had been issued
that all missionaries should be drowned in the river, and any native who
concealed, or in any way assisted a missionary, was to be cut in two.
The war was a slow one, and the invaders were several times held back by
fortifications that had been built by the French engineers who came here
in 1795. The persecutions were partially stopped, and in 1857 the French
went away.
"New orders against the missionaries were then issued, and more of them
were killed. In August, 1858, there was a combined French and Spanish
expedition against Anam, which captured the chief seaport and several
important places. The war was kept up till 1862, when there was a treaty
of peace. This treaty compelled Anam to pay five million dollars to
France as compensation for the war, and to promise that every native
should be free to adopt any religion that he liked. The missionaries
were not to be disturbed, and the principal cities were to be open to
French merchants to trade in whatever they chose to buy and sell. A
French Protectorate was established over the province of Cochin China,
and afterwards over other provinces, and--"
[Illustration: VIEW OF THE FRENCH QUARTER OF SAIGON.]
"Stop a moment," said the Doctor; "you had better explain what a
protectorate is."
Fred was evidently prepared for the question, as he answered promptly,
"A protector is one who defends or shields from injury. In government
matters a protector is a person who has the care of a kingdom during the
minority or illness of the king; or it may mean a cardinal or other high
official who looks after the interests of a religious body. A
protectorate is a government by a protector, or it may be the authority
assumed by a superior power over a weaker or a dependent one.
"The case of France and Anam is that the treaty provided that the French
should take the management of the affairs of the conquered country, and
that the governor-general they sent here should be really the highest
officer in the land. The Anamese can do nothing in the way of making and
enforcing laws without the consent of the French; in fact, they are
exactly in the condition of a colony, and the country where we now are
is called the French Colony of Eastern Asia."
"Quite right," said the Doctor, when Fred had concluded. "Now we will
hear what the French have done in the way of colonization."
"They have followed their old policy of making no interference with the
local laws, except with such as had a character of oppression or
cruelty. They required the native authorities to swear to be loyal to
France, and when they did so they sustained them until there were
complaints that they did not manage affairs properly. In such cases they
have investigated the complaints, and done what they thought right in
the matter, either by removing or sustaining the official. They have
lowered the taxes and established regulations regarding civil marriages,
and, on the whole, their presence has been a benefit to the people of
Anam. In the matter of marriages they have followed the rule that they
long ago adopted in Algeria; a native may be married under the native
laws if he likes, and can divorce his wife at a moment's notice, and
without giving any reason; but if he marries her in a French court, he
is under French laws, and must abide by them. A great many of the
natives of the better class insist upon having their daughters married
in the French courts, as they know they will be better treated than
under the old system.
"Several times there have been insurrections against the French, and
some of them have cost a great deal of money and fighting. But they have
always resulted in victories for the French, and in the addition of new
provinces to the territory under their control. At present they have a
protectorate over more than half of the peninsula; some of the smaller
provinces in the North are nominally independent, while in some portions
of the country held by the French the natives do very little more for
the foreign government than pay a small tax to it every year.
"The population of the country under the French protectorate is said to
be not far from four millions. There is an army of ten or twelve
thousand men, of whom nearly if not quite half are natives. The natives
are said to make good soldiers, particularly in the artillery. A great
part of the garrison duty in the forts on the coast and in the interior
is performed by the native troops, and they are said to get along very
well with the French. In Cambodia many of the soldiers are from Manilla,
as they are considered more warlike, and besides the king says it is
cheaper to hire them from other countries than to use his own people.
The army of Cambodia is smaller in proportion than that of the other
parts of the country, and the French allow the king to do pretty much as
he likes."
Fred had reached the end of his chapter, and consequently came to a
pause. The Doctor complimented him on his excellent account of the
invasion and occupation of Anam, and after a little general talk on the
subject, the party broke up.
[Illustration: NATIVE SOLDIERS AT SAIGON.]
As they were naturally interested in the subject of native troops in the
French service, Frank took the first opportunity to make a sketch of a
couple of them that he saw on duty. He found that they wore a blue
blouse with white trousers--or, rather, that the trousers had been white
at some former date--and their heads were protected from the heat of
the sun by flat hats made of pith or cork, while their feet were bare.
The men that he saw were armed with breech-loading rifles of French
manufacture, and they carried their cartridges at the waist-belt, after
the European fashion.
Strolling by the river-bank, the boys saw three or four light gun-boats
at anchor in the stream. They learned that the government had about
twenty of these boats, which were used for transporting troops wherever
they were needed, and also for the purpose of protecting the natives
against pirates, and to enforce the laws generally.
They observed that the police were not of the same nationality as the
soldiers, and found, on inquiry, that the policemen were all Malays from
Singapore, under the supervision of French chiefs. They are said to be
very efficient, and one great advantage of employing them is that they
are not likely to be involved in any of the native conspiracies.
By the end of their second day in Saigon, it occurred to the boys that
it was about time to begin a letter to friends at home.
"We will write it as we did the letters from Kioto and Hong kong," said
Frank; "that is, provided you are willing."
Fred assented to the proposal, and so it was agreed that they would make
up a single letter, in which each should describe some of the things
they had seen, and they would so arrange it that nothing should be
described twice. They devoted all the time they could spare from
sight-seeing to the production of this letter, and here is the result:
"We have been walking and riding around Saigon, and have seen a great
many things that are new to us. This morning we started early for a walk
to Cholon, about three miles away, and had a very pleasant time on the
road. We met crowds of people coming to town with basketsful of fresh
vegetables for the market; they were nearly all women, and their dress
was much like that of the women we saw in Canton, except that they had
great hats like circular trays. Part of the way the road follows the
bank of a ditch, which the French call 'The Grand Canal;' but there is
not much grandeur about it, as it is half-choked with weeds, and when
the tide is out there is not water enough to float a boat of any size.
There has been no rain for weeks, and the dust was so thick that
sometimes we could hardly see across the road, and were in danger of
being run over.
[Illustration: THE KING OF THE BEGGARS.]
"Near the door of a house, in the edge of the city, we saw three beggars
standing, while a man with his finger raised was talking to them. Doctor
Bronson says the man who talked was their chief; and he was telling them
what to do and where to go for the day. Begging is a regular business
in China, and the beggars have their associations, like other trades.
"We met a long line of carts just after we got outside the city; each
cart was drawn by a pair of bullocks, and they had ropes through their
noses, just as we put them through the noses of bulls at home. The
foremost pair was led by a boy, and all the other bullocks were fastened
to the carts immediately in front of them. How they get on without
pulling some of their noses out, when a cart in the middle of the line
breaks down, we cannot imagine. Perhaps the cord gives way before the
nose does.
"There were lots of half-wild dogs that seemed to belong to nobody; they
barked at us, and some of them threatened to bite; but we showed tight,
and they concluded to leave us. These brutes are known as 'pariah' dogs
all through the East: 'pariah,' as applied to a man, means an outcast;
and a pariah dog is a dog that has no master and no home. They are not
so abundant here as at Constantinople or Damascus, but Doctor Bronson
says there are quite enough of them to go around, and they go around all
night and all day.
"Such a noise as the cart-wheels made you never heard in all your lives.
Grease must be scarce in Cochin China, or the people must be fond of
music; at all events, they do not try to stop the squeaking, and a
native will go to sleep in one of these carts when it is moving along
the road, just as calmly as he would in a Pullman car. Doctor Bronson
says that these carts are loaded with gamboge and other dye-stuffs, and
also with hides and horns of cattle, and perhaps with the tusks of
elephants that have been killed for the sake of their ivory.
"About half-way along the road, we came to what the French call '_La
Plaine des Tombeaux_,' which is nothing more nor less than an enormous
cemetery. It is said to cover several square miles of ground; whether it
does so or not we cannot say, but certainly it is very large, and, as
the Doctor remarked, very densely inhabited. There is nothing very
remarkable about the tombs, as they are nothing but square enclosures,
with little spires like those of the temples. In one part of the
cemetery some priests were at work laying out a place for a grave;
Doctor Bronson says that they perform a lot of ceremonies to determine
where a grave shall be made, and are very particular to bring it under
good influences, and shield it from bad ones. The same superstitions
that prevail in China are to be found here; and even the most
intelligent of the native or Chinese merchants in Saigon would not think
of undertaking any important enterprise without first consulting the
gods, and ascertaining that the 'Fung Shuey' was in their favor.
"It was an odd sight to see the telegraph-poles along the road, and
skirting the edge of this ancient cemetery. It was bringing the past and
the present close together, and from all we can see the present is
having the best of it.
[Illustration: VIEW OF CHOLON.]
"Well, we reached Cholon after a leisurely walk, and went down to the
bank of the river, where great numbers of boats were moored. There were
hundreds, and perhaps thousands of these boats, and at the place where
they are moored they are tied very close together. They are rather long
and narrow, and the best of them have a roof over the centre to protect
the occupants from the sun and rain. Some of them are hewn out of single
logs, and others are built of planks, as in other countries. Many are
permanently fastened to the bank and are occupied as houses, like some
of the boats in Canton; and altogether there is a pretty large water
population. Near the water's edge there are huts built on platforms, and
so arranged that the refuse of the kitchen falls into the river. The
owner is under no expense for drainage, and the whole cost of his
building does not exceed five dollars. Living is cheap in Cholon, if
you are willing to occupy a grass-roofed hut, six feet square, on the
bank of the river, and eat nothing more costly than boiled rice and
fish. We saw two or three huts of the kind we describe, occupied by half
a dozen persons each. They must have found the quarters rather close at
times, but probably did not mind a trifle like that. A single plank
served as the roadway to the shore, and in some instances it was so
shaky that it required a steady head and careful stepping to avoid being
thrown into the water.
[Illustration: A CHINESE FAMILY AT CHOLON.]
"More than half the people we saw were Chinese, and not the natives of
the country, and nearly all the business in the shops appeared to be
done by the former. We peeped into some of the houses where the Chinese
live, and they did not seem to care how much we looked at them. We saw
one group that was quite interesting, in spite of the poverty of the
habitation and the scarcity of furniture; there were five persons in
all, or perhaps we should say eight, as there were three cats under the
table that acted as though they were as good as anybody else. Two men
and two children were at a table, and a woman was standing up behind
them to see that everything was all right. On the table there was a
small tub that contained stewed fish and some kind of vegetables, and
there was a bowl for each one to eat from. They were better off than
some other parties we saw at breakfast, who had only one bowl for the
whole lot, and everybody helped himself with his chop-sticks.
[Illustration: A CAB FOR TWO.]
"We saw something that reminded us of Shanghai; it was nothing more nor
less than a wheelbarrow, but, unlike the Shanghai one, it had no
passengers. Wouldn't it be funny to see a wheelbarrow in America for
carrying passengers, just as we have cabs and coaches? You must come to
China for a sight like that, and also for a regular ride in a
wheelbarrow, and you can have the consolation of knowing that it is very
cheap and also very uncomfortable. The wheelbarrow has no springs, and
so you get the benefit of every jolt, however small; and as the vehicle
is somewhat weak in the joints, and the man who pushes it is far from
powerful, you feel all the time as though you were liable to be spilled
out. The wheel is large and clumsy, and the frame has a sort of rest in
the centre, where you can put your arms. Two men can occupy one of these
coaches, and they are very popular among the natives, but less so among
the foreigners.
"On our way back we wandered off into the forest of tropical plants that
stood on each side of the road in many places, and suddenly came on a
little village which was entirely concealed until we were within twenty
yards of it. The natives like to hide their residences as much as they
can, on account of the shade they get from the surrounding trees, and
also to be undisturbed by too many visitors. The dogs barked at us, and
if it had not been for some of the natives that called them off it is
quite possible we should have been bitten. There were half a dozen
children lying around in the dust, and as they were entirely naked, they
did not seem to be afraid of soiling their clothes. The men and women
were not heavily clothed, as the weather is hot, and they want to be as
comfortable as possible. In one house a man was lying on a bench just
inside the wide door-way, and a little girl was fanning him; the Doctor
says the girl was undoubtedly a slave, and that she cost her owner not
far from thirty dollars.
"Children are bought and sold here the same as in China, and a good many
of the foreigners are said to own slaves while they live in the country,
but they do not try to carry them away. Slaves prefer foreign masters to
native ones, as they are more likely to be kindly treated, and to
receive their freedom in a few years.
"Some of the houses in the village were well built, and raised a yard or
so from the ground upon pillars of brick. The interior consists of three
or four rooms, and the general appearance of the house is like a Chinese
one. There is an ornamental framework carved in wood to support the
roof, which is covered with thick tiles, and there is generally a
veranda on each side of the door, where the master sleeps in the
afternoon and lounges away a great deal of his time. We should call the
people lazy if they were in America; but it is the custom of the country
to be indolent, and perhaps they are not to blame. Very little will
support a man, as he can gather fruit from the trees, and an acre of
ground is all that he needs for maintaining a large family. The heat
that prevails all the year round does not encourage activity, and a good
many foreigners, who are very enterprising when they first come here,
become as idle as the natives by the end of their second year in the
country."