MISSIONARY YARNS—CHEAP LIVING—ON THE YELLOW RIVER AGAIN—CASH.
The room we occupied in our inn, which was the only one available,
could not have been more than twelve feet by eight feet, and half this
space was occupied by the indispensable k'ang. Not having, as yet,
acquired the Chinese art of squatting cross-legged on the k'ang, and
eating off a little stool about eight inches high, we were obliged to
squash ourselves into the remaining space, which just enabled Esau to
bring our dinner to the door and hand it in to one of us—there was no
room for him inside till one of us went out. Nevertheless we managed to
enjoy ourselves immensely, Lumberg forming a pleasant addition to our
party. He and Rijnhart managed to keep us very much amused with stories
of the mistakes they and others had made in talking Chinese, soon after
landing in the country—mistakes that are rendered even more common by
the numerous differences of dialect met with in the different districts.
On one occasion Rijnhart, when preaching in the streets, was exhorting
his audience "to taste our religion, and see if it is good," saying,
"If you see a pear, and want to know whether it is good or not, you
bite it, and taste it, and then, if you find it good, you eat it." He
had been going on in this strain for a short time, when he was suddenly
interrupted by a bystander, who said, "But, teacher, you people don't
eat dogs, do you?" Rijnhart having, unfortunately, used the Chinese for
dog instead of that for pear.
There is another story of a famous missionary, who, owing to differences
in dialect in a district he had not previously visited, addressed
the devil, instead of the Lord, at a public prayer meeting. Similar
mistakes are very common, and are bound to be so in a language where the
slightest inflection of the voice gives a totally different meaning to
the words.
It was quite late that night before we went to bed, but as we had
nothing to do the next day, it was a good opportunity for sitting up,
talking and hearing about the Chinese people, from men who knew as much
about them as our two missionary friends did. We had learnt from our own
short experience that living in China was not by any means expensive,
but it surprised us not a little to hear that Lumberg and his servant
managed on one hundred cash a day (rather under twopence each). I do not
suppose there is another country in the world where this could be done.
Next morning we went early into the city to see the market—a very busy
scene, as people come in every morning from the country, bringing meat
and vegetables, and the streets are crowded; quite different from the
previous evening, when they had presented an almost deserted appearance,
until the people got suddenly suspicious about Shahzad Mir. Besides
this daily market, Chong Wei has another peculiarity. Like every town of
importance, it is surrounded by a high wall, but unlike any other place
we saw, it has only three gates, for instead of a north gate, a temple
has been built, which guards the town from evil spirits, who, as every
one knows, always come from the north. We had to lay in stores for our
boat journey down the river, and as Mr. Forbes's agent asked us to be
sure to have everything ready in ample time, we thought that there was
no doubt that we would soon be on our way down the Yellow River. Most
of our buying was done by Lumberg's servant, a Christian convert from
Ning-Shia-Fu, the cleanest and nicest Chinaman we met on our travels,
who saved us an enormous amount of trouble, and got everything much
cheaper than we could have done.
By night we were quite ready for departure, and had been assured that
we should start by midday at the very latest. Accordingly, next morning,
we were on board by 11 A.M., when we heard for the first time that there
was no chance of leaving till the next morning, and that we should have
to make an eight days' journey across the desert from Shih-Tsui-Tsi
to Pao T'eo, as no boats could go so far down the river so late in
the year. A pleasant prospect this, with hard frost every night, and
no arrangements for camping! Altogether, we did not feel very amiably
disposed towards the gentleman who had told us that we must be ready
to start by midday. However, remonstrances were useless, and we had to
make the best of it.
Next morning our inquiries were always met by the invariable answer
that we were going to start at once, but the bill of lading had been
incorrectly made out, and had to be rectified. Other delays cropped up,
and it was just on 2 P.M. when the skipper appeared and we pushed off
into the stream. However, the delay was acceptable in one way, for it
enabled Lumberg to come down and see us again, with the welcome news
that he had been able to arrange to get rooms in a new inn in the east
suburb, and his troubles on that score were at an end.
Once under weigh, we travelled pretty fast. The stream was strong
and carried us down grandly, but, after going a couple of hours, the
skipper insisted on tying up for the night, saying that there was a
nasty place ahead which they could not possibly pass in the dusk; a very
feeble excuse, the real reason being that some of the crew lived in
a village close by. We had been in hopes of travelling all night, and
had certainly been led to believe that we should do so, but nothing,
apparently, was further from the intentions of the skipper and his
crew. There was nothing for it but to set to work to make ourselves as
comfortable as we could in the boat.
[Illustration: OUR WOOL BOAT ON THE YELLOW RIVER.]
These wool-boats on the Yellow River are flat-bottomed, and very
clumsily, though strongly built. They are from thirty to forty feet
long, and ten or twelve feet wide. The ends are decked over for about
nine feet, the remainder of the boat being divided off by partitions.
As a rule, they trust to the stream to carry them down, the steering
being done with a long sweep, but occasionally they use two other long
sweeps to row. Up stream they are obliged to tow. The decked portion
in the bows was left free of cargo for our accommodation, while that
in the stem was allotted to the crew and to our servants, and in it all
the cooking was done. Matters were a good deal simplified by our men and
the boatmen all being Mohammedans, with the exception of Esau, who had
no religious objection to eating with any one, believer or unbeliever.
Besides ourselves, there were three or four Chinese passengers going to
different places down the river, their passage-money being the skipper's
perquisite. All the remaining available space was piled up with wool,
piled up as high as was safe, till the gunwale was only a few inches
above the water. But for the danger of sticking on mud banks—a by no
means infrequent occurrence—I fancy they would have been loaded even
more deeply.
In addition to our own, there were four more boats going down stream
in company with us, a circumstance we had reason to regret before very
long, as on the very next day, the 6th November, just as we were making
most satisfactory progress, one of these boats stuck about half-past
three in the afternoon, and we had to wait till she got off. As she was
still ashore at sunset, we made no more progress that day, and several
valuable hours were lost. Next morning six men went to the other boat
and began unloading the wool—a very tedious process—but, about 10.30
A.M., they got her off, and she came down towards us.
[Illustration: HALTING FOR THE NIGHT ON THE YELLOW RIVER.]
While waiting here, we had managed to pass the time watching a ferry
plying just below the spot where we were tied up. Mongols, Chinese,
camels, sheep, and bullocks, all were piled in promiscuously, and taken
across from one side to the other, being washed down a very considerable
distance in the transit. All of a sudden a tremendous row started
between the parties, apparently as to which had the right to be taken
over first. They were fairly evenly divided and equally determined.
Abuse was plentiful, and a free fight seemed imminent, when, somewhat
to our disappointment, we were called upon to renew our journey, thus
being robbed of the one possible compensation for our hours of delay.
[Illustration: A FERRY ACROSS THE HUANG HO.]
About 4 P.M. that day we had to pass the customs-house at the border
of the Ning-Shia district, and here our skipper was detected smuggling
ten bales of pears; the officials wanted to stop us all night, but a
few words from Rijnhart pacified them, and on we went. Unfortunately
the pears were not yet ripe, or we would have exacted heavy toll in
return for our good offices. We had only managed another ten li, before
we stopped for the night, at a small village on the right bank of the
river, from which the skipper started off to walk twenty li to his own
home. We were sick of the constant delays and stoppages, and as there
were several boats tied up along the shore, we landed and tried to find
the owners, in hopes of being able to buy or hire a boat for ourselves,
to go as far down the river as possible.
After some time we were successful, for a young and enterprising
Mohammedan agreed to take us all the way to Pao T'eo, without stopping
day or night, for the sum of Ts.70 (somewhere about £13). The price
was high, but we returned to the wool-boat with a happy feeling of
independence, which was increased when we heard that we should not be
able to start the next morning until the other boats came down from
the customs-house. We had, at first, been asked Ts.120 for the boat,
and told we should have to wait a day, but we insisted on starting the
following morning, and having knocked down the price to nearly one half,
felt that we had not done badly.
As with riding mules and carts, so with the boat, an agreement was
necessary, and this the village schoolmaster drew up for us; but by
this time our skipper had returned, and was furious at finding that
such a grand opportunity of squeezing the foreigner had slipped through
his fingers. He did his best to frighten our new friend into backing
out of his bargain, but did not quite succeed, and eventually went off
down stream in a towering rage. We still had one more difficulty to
overcome, a somewhat serious one, and one we did not quite understand,
but eventually it transpired that our new skipper was trying to buy an
old boat, not wanting to take his own to Pao T'eo and perhaps get her
frozen in there. The owner of the old boat saw his opportunity, and was
not slow to take advantage of it, as he would not take less than Ts.30,
about three times its value under ordinary circumstances.
At last everything was settled, and about 11 A.M. we started, soon
passing the wool-boats, which were tied up as usual. We found our craft
pretty leaky, but by laying down a flooring of boughs and straw, and
keeping up constant baling, we kept her very comfortable, and after all
our chief anxiety was to travel rapidly. Part of our agreement was that
we were to stop at Shih-Tsui-Tsi to take in fresh supplies, but that
for every unnecessary delay the boatmen were to be fined one tael.
[Illustration:
Shun chih. 1644–1662 K'ang hsi: 1662–1723
Yungchêng. 1723–1736 K'(ch)'ien lung. 1736–1796
K(ch)iak'(ch)'ing 1796–1821 Tao kuang 1821–1851
Hsienfêng 1851–1862 T'ung chih . 1862–1878
ALL THE "CASH" ISSUED FROM THE FIRST OF THE EMPERORS OF THE TS'ING
OR MANCHU DYNASTY.]
The stream was very strong, and, as the weather was cold, we used to
row with the long sweeps to keep ourselves warm during the day, and the
boatmen, of whom there were four, including the owner, rowed at night
to keep themselves awake. This boat was built exactly the same as the
other, but as there was no cargo we had plenty of room, and stood on the
partitions to row; another advantage of having no cargo was that we drew
very little water, and scarcely ever touched the bottom. The country on
either shore was very flat and uninteresting, while the river, sometimes
about two miles in width, was a succession of mud banks and shallows.
At five o'clock on the 9th November we got to Shih-Tsui-Tsi, and
presented the letter of credit we had received from Chen-Lao-Pan. The
agent then kindly gave us a guide, who took us to various shops, where
we bought provisions, mostly bread and vegetables, for the rest of the
journey to Pao T'eo. We did not, however, succeed in getting any meat,
as there was only one sheep available, and that was not worth buying.
Having made our purchases, we returned to the office, where we found
our money ready for us; part of this was in silver and part in cash.
The latter was of very inferior quality, but, as we were getting it
out of civility, and not in the way of business, we could not well say
anything. The Chinese cash seems to have been purposely invented to
deceive and cheat the unwary; to begin with, every Emperor makes his own
cash, but these are not issued from the mint until after his death, and
many Emperors have thought fit to economize by issuing inferior coins,
which, instead of being about the size of our penny, are rather smaller
than a farthing and very roughly made; in fact a very fair estimate of
the various Emperors' characters can be drawn from the cash they have
issued.
The accompanying diagrams show the cash of all the Emperors of the
reigning Ts'ing or Manchu dynasty, but only full-sized specimens have
been chosen. These inferior cash may be accepted as current coin in one
place, while in the next no one will look at them. Cash are always done
up in strings, either of five hundred or a thousand, and look not unlike
strings of sausages, each sausage being represented by a hundred cash;
and here, again, they have devised a means of fraud, for in some places
eighty-five cash count as a hundred, in others ninety, ninety-two,
ninety-three, and so on, as the case may be, consequently whenever one
arrives at a new town, one has to enquire all about its coinage.
In Tankar they had a very peculiar way of reckoning, for prices were
frequently stated in "small cash," a coin that does not exist, but whose
value is half that of the current or "street cash." These differences
disappeared gradually as we neared Pekin, and signs of a central
government became more marked, but in and just around the capital itself
we came across a very much larger cash, almost as big as the old English
penny, but then, when dollars and cents became the currency, we were
very little troubled with these coins. Another difficulty was that, in
changing silver in different towns, the rate of exchange would vary as
much as three hundred cash for an ounce, and the correct rate always had
to be found out in a roundabout way before we presented our silver for
exchange. These are only a few of the traps into which a novice may fall
when attempting to deal in Chinese coinage. Had we been in the hands of
a native interpreter, instead of those of Mr. Rijnhart, we should have
been splendid prey for the swindlers.
They told us at Shui-Tsui-Tsi that the price of wool was four cents a
pound, but that it was not of such good quality as that which comes from
Tankar. Next to the wool business the most important occupation seemed
to be iron working, in which a very large portion of the population
was engaged. All the way from Chong Wei we had been passing through a
district which was very rich in coal, and judging from the number of
smithies in Shui-Tsui-Tsi, the district must possess very considerable
mineral wealth, which may some day be developed.
By this time it was quite dark, so we hurried back to the boat, and
started again after a halt which had lasted just three hours, to make
up for which we offered our men an extra Ts.5 if they landed us in Pao
T'eo in four days, _i.e._, by the 9th of the Chinese, or the 13th of the
English month. No time was lost in starting, and all night we floated
down the mighty stream, but how we avoided the shallows will ever be a
mystery to me; a sharp look-out was always kept, and every now and then
a shout, followed by violent rowing, would tell us that we had just
missed a bank.
Not far below Shui-Tsui-Tsi we passed a village situated in a desolate
spot on the left bank, but in spite of its dreary surroundings it was
full of life, numbers of boats were lying along the banks, all being
filled with saltpetre; everyone was in a hurry to get off before the
river should freeze, the whole scene reminding one of coolies at Port
Said coaling a ship.
On we went all night and all day floating down the broad stream, the
only break in the days being meal-times. The nights and early mornings
were very cold, and consequently we spent no inconsiderable part of
our time between the blankets, rising late and going early to bed.
At twilight numbers of water birds, of all sorts and sizes, used to
assemble on the mud banks, uttering weird cries until it was time for
them to go to rest.
One night we narrowly escaped a collision, but no damage was done,
although we managed, somehow or other, to carry off an oar belonging
to the other boat, and had to put ashore to return it. As we got near
to Pao T'eo we could see mountains on the north bank gradually closing
in towards the river, and about the same place I discovered one of the
clearest echoes I have ever heard, which was, moreover, sufficiently
distant for three or four words to come back to us across the waters,
quite distinct from our own shouts; shouting and an occasional turn at
the sweeps was our only form of exercise at this time.
Early on the morning of the 18th November we sighted Pao T'eo, but
it was not till 1 P.M. that we reached the termination of our water
journey—none too soon, as sleepless nights had quite worn out the crew.
Immediately on our arrival the boatmen entered into negotiations for
the sale of the rickety old craft which had done us such good service,
but no one seemed anxious to buy, boats being a drug in the market just
before the river freezes.