forward on his chest and his yellow face became grey; he appeared to
be on the point of fainting. Another knife was taken out and read:
“Through the shoulder,” and it was thrown in the most marvellous way,
just catching the skin on the shoulder. The grey face became livid, but
not a sound.
The executioner lifted up the third knife and read: “Through the
heart,” and whirling round drove it through the heart of his victim.
There was a roar of hatred and rage from the crowd, who evidently
expected that the pleasant performance would be prolonged.
“I told you so,” said Shimonski. “I heard the executioner had been
paid; that is the proof; otherwise he would have shown off his skill,
using every knife to the end, and the man would have been squealing
before the tenth, like a rat whose legs have been cut off.”
I left the ground while the executioner was still trying to tell the
mob that he had simply to take the knife that came first; that he could
not say what was on the label: in fact he was trying to justify himself
as if he had been an Anglo-Saxon politician or profiteer.
“And can judges also be bought in China?” I asked Shimonski.
“Of course,” he said; “but the price for judges is higher, and they are
usually bought from above by the governors or the State.”
“And for the three hundred and fifty millions of Chinamen,” I said,
“there is no justice and no law?”
“None,” Shimonski answered. “But for the hundred and fifty thousand
or so who can make some money and live independently China is the
best country in the world. You can buy whatever you want in it and
everything is very cheap. Did you ever get such good service before?
Isn’t the food excellent? the fish and chickens wonderful? the climate
healthy? perfect freedom? What more can a man want?”
“The whole thing is a horror to me,” I said. “What is there for the
soul here?”
“Ah!” said Shimonski, “that is another question. You will find greater
paintings in China than anywhere in the world--an art that grew
and blossomed through two thousand years. Every school of painting
imaginable can be found in China. Have you heard of the painter who
said that it was no object of the artist to represent life or even to
give you the effect life produced on you, which is the object of the
modern European schools, but that the true aim of the great artist
should be to represent the rhythm of life itself--not progress, that
doesn’t exist; but the ebb and flow, the movement and rhythm of life?
“In the same way our poets always try to give us new emotions, and the
moderns want to catch the most evanescent feelings, the fancies that
break through language and escape.
“Our vases and cups are the finest in the world: common household
things with a glaze on them of priceless beauty. Carpets, too, we have
which make all other carpets look like rags.”
“I know,” I cried. “I have admired turquoise blues and camel-hair
effects. I think them wonderful.”
“You will never know what a carpet is till you see an old Chinese
carpet two or three hundred years old, for, unlike all other carpets,
its beauty increases with age; as it gets worn down a gloss comes
upon it that can only be compared to the bloom on a peach or grape.
I could show you carpets three hundred years old that are as lovely
as any picture--beautified, indeed, by the patine of the years, the
unimaginable touch of Time.”
“But the religion?” I asked. “Can there be any religion in a people
where justice is bought and sold and cruelty is a passion?”
“Oh yes,” replied Shimonski. “Man is a complex animal; he unites in
myself many contradictions. The religion of China is the highest and
most abstract in the world.”
* * * * *
My memories of Shimonski are becoming unduly voluminous; I must bring
them to an end.
I have dwelt on his delight in cruelty and on his originality of
thought, for those were the qualities in him which excited my curiosity
and admiration; naturally he possessed dozens of other virtues and
vices, but these two in eminent degree. It was especially his epicurean
pleasure in cruelty, his savouring it as a titbit and dainty, that
intrigued me, for after some months of acquaintanceship I found that
the Chinese girl whom he sent to me as a messenger was an orphan whom
he had picked up, educated and cared for. He had another girl in his
house who looked after his clothes and books, though she was blind of
one eye, and an old woman who cooked for them, and all three he had
rescued out of pure pity, and they all adored him as a sort of god.
As I got to know and like him he grew more communicative. We went up
country together that summer to see some old porcelain and on the
journey he gave me the key of his strange nature. I’ll try to tell the
story as he told it, but without the interruptions and wanderings of
his narrative.
One thing was peculiar in his confession. He never tried to justify
himself or to moralise his conduct in any degree. He was certainly
above good and evil, in his own opinion at least.
We had been away about a fortnight and had stopped for the night in a
walled town, three hundred miles from Shanghai. He had been explaining
to me how curiously free and independent these towns are in China. The
Imperial Government, it appeared, sent down annually a requisition
setting forth what amount the town would have to contribute in taxes to
the Imperial revenue; but the method of taxation was left to the town
itself.
I told him that the same municipal power existed all over Germany,
and was one of the chief reasons why Germans could stand an extreme
Imperial despotism, because in their village and town affairs they were
their own masters.
He shrugged his shoulders indifferently. He had no great liking for
the Teutonic races, he said; the Germans and English, and even the
Americans, were all tarred with the same brush--a self-sufficient
greed varnished with hypocritical righteousness or sentimentality
which he thought ridiculous. He preferred the Latins to the Teutons,
but reserved his special admiration for the Slavs and the Chinese.
In China, he said, we have had the “general strike” for a thousand
years now which you are only beginning to think of as a protest. If
the Government does something we don’t like, we all strike and the
Government soon gives in. Despotism, like democracy, is only a word....
It was a beautiful morning in early summer and a beautiful scene. The
river ran through an ever-narrowing valley; the banks were thickly
wooded and the trees were all blushing in the light, warm air of May.
Rounding one turn we came upon a strange procession--coolies in
front carrying clothes and provisions, two or three palanquins, and
more servants bringing up the rear. We asked what it was, or rather
Shimonski asked, and was told that it was a girl being brought down to
be wedded to a Chinese general in the town we had just left.
“My fate came to me like that,” Shimonski remarked.
“Tell me about it,” I said.
“It is ten years ago now,” he began. “It was far up country I met just
such a procession. A handsome youth was in charge of the bride, his
sister; he told me he was taking her, as the loveliest girl in the
whole province, to be wedded to the Governor of Szechuan, then the most
powerful of provincial rulers. I was mildly interested and a little
curious, so I told him where he ought to stop next and gave him various
pieces of information he wanted; then I praised his looks and bearing
just to get his confidence, so that when I said I’d like to see his
sister, he took me to the palanquin at once and drew the curtain. Never
have I seen anything so wonderful! Her eyes held me and fascinated
me, and it was some time before I could throw off the enchantment
enough to realise the different traits that constituted her exquisite
loveliness.
“Oh, the flower face! Well was she named the Morning Glory. Her face
had only enough of the Chinese type to give it a strangeness that
enthralled. At first glance she might have passed for a Russian, only
no Russian was ever so beautiful. How shall I describe her? When I have
said her eyes were very large, a dark hazel in colour, lit and warmed
by golden points; when I’ve told of a straight nose and perfect oval of
face and rose-leaf skin, and lips a little too full and ripe, I’ve said
nothing. Other girls have these. But her eyes, besides being beautiful,
were nobly serious, with a brooding expression that came from depth
of feeling; there was a question in them and an appeal and trust that
enlightened the face to a smile; and then I saw the slender arm and the
dimples at the elbow and the budding breasts, and my mouth grew dry as
in a parching wind.
“Do you realise at length that in China we know more about beauty than
any other people; we have studied it more curiously, more intimately
than any other race. Have you ever noticed that our hawthorn jars
are moulded after the curves of a woman’s hips, and that the magical
powder-blue vases are copies of the lines of some slight girl’s
body? The glaze itself has the smooth gloss of a child’s flesh and
the radiance on it is of our wonderment. I have shown you marvels in
material things; you must just trust me when I tell you that this girl
was perfection perfected, her body a rhythm, her face a flower....
“I turned and went with them--made myself a guide and protector. Both
the brother and sister trusted and liked me, and I did all I knew to
increase their liking. I told them all sorts of strange stories: tales
of heroes and fightings for the youth and of romantic love and despair
for the girl. I ransacked my memories of Russian and Polish and German
and French history, and I used to love to have their eyes fixed on me
and feel her breath catch....
“The halts for the midday meal grew longer and longer and our daily
journeyings shorter, while they listened enthralled to my stories. I
told of sinner and saint, of St. Elizabeth of Hungary and of Ninon
d’Enclos of Paris, and she drank in everything I said.
“And always the youth wanted to learn and the girl to feel; but I think
she grew even more quickly than he did. I remember telling him once of
the great Chinese Emperor Shi Hwang-ti. Do you know the story? He came
to the throne at thirteen and while still young abolished the feudal
system, divided China into provinces, built roads, canals, and at
length the Great Wall. The feudal princes revolted; writers and pedants
held up to the admiration of the people the heroes of feudal times, and
the advantages of the old, worn-out system. To break once and for all
with the past, the great emperor ordered the destruction of all books
having reference to the past history of the empire, and many scholars
were put to death for disobedience to the ‘edict.’
“I can still hear her sighing: ‘What a pity a great man could kill
innocent people! Is no great man at once strong and wise and gentle?’
The divine sweet spirit of her!
“You don’t know how wonderful our Chinese girls can be,” Shimonski went
on, “but at least you realise now that Chinese art is the finest in the
world, and soon you will be able to see that our old Chinese religion,
too, is the highest at once and most rational ever held by man. And
when you acknowledge this you may be ready to understand that Chinese
men and women are the noblest human creatures of whom Time holds any
record.
“At any rate I would like you to believe that it is not the blindness
of passion makes me put this simple Manchu girl higher than any other
human being I have ever met. If I am not utterly depraved it is because
of her; whatever good there is in me comes from her; my soul is merely
an emanation of her divine passion and pity....
“But I must get on with my story. I had been with them nearly a
fortnight when one day the brother went away to see a famous temple
and I told the sister the story of Jeanne d’Arc. It had a tremendous
effect on her, an effect I never anticipated. She grew paler and paler,
and tears fell from her eyes. When I told her of Jeanne’s martyrdom I
expected her to break down weeping, but it had the contrary effect
on her; her whole face was transfigured; and when I told how Jeanne
acknowledged that she had lost her ‘voices’ through her own selfishness
and her woman’s wish to do what her king desired, my girl’s eyes glowed
with enthusiasm and she exclaimed: ‘What a great end! What a noble
girl!’
“She fell silent while I told how the Catholic Church, centuries later,
canonised Jeanne as a saint, and how she was loved and revered now
wherever her story was known.
“Glory, as I called her always, got up from her couch and suddenly
leaning forward took my head in her hands and kissed me on the lips.
“‘Thank you, thank you,’ she cried, ‘for the great story; it will be a
part of my soul for ever.’
“It was not passion with which I kissed her, for a great reverence was
upon me and I was enthralled by her emotion; but afterwards passion
woke in me, for I had held the round firm figure against my body, and
the supple grace and litheness of it got into my blood and the desire
of her shook me like a fever.
“What a day of days it was! Fate is sometimes good to us. The brother
did not return and we spent the evening together, and when she rose
to retire I kissed her hands, one after the other, for she was sacred
to me; but she drew me to her and offered her lips and I put my arms
around her. I kissed her and kissed till she pushed my head back
gently, saying: ‘Dear, you take my breath’; but really she had flushed
crimson for the first time, I think. Conscious of her body, she had
yielded for a moment to a man’s passion.
“The days after went by on wings; her brother liked me so much that for
a fortnight he did not notice the intimate terms we were on. But one
evening he had said ‘Good-night,’ and gone, but returned quickly and
found me kissing her. She said simply: ‘I love Shi,’ and put her hand
on his shoulder with a caress and left us.
“‘How will it end?’ was all he said after a pause, and then: ‘I must
leave it to you both. You,’ he went on to me, ‘will, I’m sure, think of
her safety.’
“And I answered him that I would and told him the truth, that our
caressings had all been innocent and I would not engage the future
lightly; but even while reassuring him I knew that I had come to
the extreme verge and uttermost limit of control, and was ripe for
anything, with no more self-mastery than a child.
“Women, I often think, are far braver in such matters than men. Next
day Glory wanted to know what we had decided, and walking beside her
palanquin I told her we had arranged nothing; but he had left it to us.
She nodded and said nothing.
“That day her brother did not stay with us after the midday meal, but
made some excuse and went out, leaving us together, and at once, I
don’t know why, I took her in my arms and began kissing and caressing
her. And she yielded to me; but in a moment her lips grew hot and she
drew away.
“‘Have you really decided--at last?’ she asked, and there was a
challenge in that added ‘at last’ which stung me.
“‘For myself--yes,’ I replied; ‘but for you--how can I decide to bring
you and him into danger?’
“The deep eyes held me, and without a word she put both her hands on my
shoulders and studied me.
“‘Your Jeanne d’Arc,’ she said after a moment, ‘gave her life for her
king. Do you think I am afraid? To lose you would make me afraid; with
you I fear nothing in the world. I am proud you want me, happy you
have chosen me, my man of men; with you I am content and my heart’s at
peace,’ she added like a child, and gave her mouth.
“‘I want to have a talk with your brother first,’ I said. ‘We must get
rid of all the servants and I must arrange to get you and myself to one
of the treaty towns, where we shall be safe. But the risk is appalling
and the chances of success small, for the Governor is as powerful as a
god and the news of your beauty will have reached him.’
“‘Do men want beauty so much?’ she asked. ‘You know he has never seen
me; he can’t care much if he loses what he doesn’t know.’
“‘You are wrong, you dear,’ I cried. ‘Men desire beauty more than
anything, and you are so wonderful that he will have heard about you
and be inordinately curious to see and possess you. Then for a strong
man with power to miss something he desires, to lose it to an inferior
is very bitter, and I’m afraid he’ll do his uttermost against us.’
“‘Then take me,’ she said, ‘as long as I am yours and you are mine--me
I mean,’ she corrected, nestling to me; ‘I am content, happy.’
“Ah! the sacred boldness of her whose law was love.
“There’s one verse of your English poetry comes into my head when I
think of her, and only one:
‘Teach me, only teach, Love;
As I ought
I will speak thy speech, Love;
Think thy thought--
Meet, if thou require it,
Both demands,
Laying flesh and spirit
In thy hands!’
“It was Glory who showed me the heights of Chinese thought. Till I met
her I believed that the practical teachings of Confucius and his rules
of conduct constituted the religion of China. She introduced me to his
master, Lao-tse, whom he called ‘the old philosopher.’ Confucius was a
mere moralist, but Lao-tse was the deepest thinker who has yet arisen
among men, and his religion is the earliest known to the Chinese as
Buddhism is the latest.
“Lao-tse wrote his _Tâo-Teh-King_ in the sixth century +B.C.+ The title
even is almost untranslatable, but may be called the _Way of Virtue_.
No foreigner has ever yet grasped what the _Tâo_ means, and even
students are put off by apparent differences. Glory, however, was the
daughter of a great thinker and she made the _Tâo_ clear to me.
“Lao-tse went far beyond a belief in God or in man; the childish
dualism of body and spirit, this world and the next, the Devil and God
were ridiculous to him; both flesh and spirit seemed to him equally
unimportant. What he saw was the unfolding of life, the mingling of
life and death; the Becoming; and this perpetual Becoming is the
rhythm of Life itself--the rhythm, mark you, and not the progress
or development, the world of thought and deed and Being as it is in
constant unfolding. That is the _Tâo_, and a study of it shows how to
live in harmony with it. Glory had all the master’s best sayings by
heart and she taught me many of them.
“‘Those who are skilled in the _Tâo_ do not dispute,’ she said; ‘but
they know some things. They know “there is nothing softer than water,”
as Lao-tse said, “and yet nothing can resist it.” They know that “he
who inflicts death is as one who cuts wood; soon or late he cuts his
own hands.” They know that “trees and plants and men at birth are soft
and easily bent, and at death hard and firm, and the sage therefore
keeps the innocent softness of the child.” They know that “when a
people does not fear what it ought to fear, its great dread shall come
upon it.” They know that “the Sacred Way I call the _Tâo_, unlike the
way of foolish men, diminishes where there is abundance and increases
where there is deficiency.’”
“Somehow or other her spirituality intensified my passion and gave me
the sense that what was so far above ordinary life or ordinary thought
must be enduring. But every now and then facts broke in and disturbed
my dreaming.
“One day her brother said to me: ‘We are within a fortnight’s journey
of the capital, you know, and though we may take a month over it,
still--the Viceroy may send to meet us. And your passion is being
talked of by the coolies. Even the _Tâo_ prescribes foresight....’ and
he smiled.
“I was struck to the heart. Should we try to escape at once: there was
no sense in drifting. I was like an opium-smoker, lost to everything
but my exquisite dream-life. And how wonderful it was can never be
told, for Glory was all sorts of women in one. At first a child, afraid
that this or that might not please me; then so filled with joy when
she found that whatever she did delighted me; shy now and now curious;
frank as a boy, and wise as only a woman’s love is wise.
“I went to her. ‘What are we to do?’ I cried. ‘I am yours. Decide!’
“‘Is there a chance of escape?’ she asked.
“‘Yes,’ I replied; ‘just a chance.’
“‘One week, one day with you is life to me,’ she said; ‘do you feel
that too?’
“‘Sure,’ I replied.
“‘Then let us try at once to escape,’ she said. ‘First of all let the
coolies return to-day; pay them in full; content them without overdoing
it: my brother will see to that. He will probably prefer to return
himself and take up my father’s business. Then you and I will go into
the--appointed--whither you will.’
“‘Are you afraid?’ I asked with shrinking heart.
“‘No, indeed,’ she replied, smiling; ‘but it is impossible, says Lao,
to live long on the heights. Yet such life, even for a day, is better
than years on low levels.’
“All was done as she had outlined.
“I planned to break to the west, for the frontier tribes there were in
partial revolt, and it would take an army to get us; but this was only
a blind. I intended to double back and get to the river, which leaves
no trace, and if possible reach the sea before the chase grew close.
Any foreign steamer, English or German, would then bring us easily to
safety and a new life. After forty-eight hours of forced marching west
and back we were on board a _sampan_ on our way to happiness.
“But happiness was with us on the boat.”
Shimonski paused: “Often I tell over to myself those golden hours, each
one filled with its own joy, a delight in living and in memory. In that
week I learned all a woman could give in passionate tenderness, and
with what treasures of gaiety and courage she could crown her love.
“The moment we went on board, Glory took up her new part. European
girls often make good wives and mothers; but she was an incomparable
lover first and at the same time a companion of infinite variety. It
was impossible to be dull or depressed in her company; she drew the
best out of me and then declared that the wisest or wittiest sayings
were all mine. She flattered me outrageously; but then who does not
love to be praised by the woman he loves? The more I studied her body
and face the more beautiful I thought her. She had no need to bind her
feet, whether to make them look smaller or to increase the obsession of
love by sedentary living; and the more I learned of her mind and spirit
the more I had to admire her. She never pretended to be well-read, but
she had been brought up by a wise father, who encouraged her to think
for herself. She was astonishingly original in thought and ingenuous
in feeling--a girl’s body and a woman’s soul. While loving me and
telling me all sorts of things about China and her own bringing up, she
managed all the time to watch the boatmen and make them her friends and
protectors.
“Thanks to her mainly we hadn’t a single hitch--no trouble with any of
the towns or villages we passed through, no sign of any pursuit. As we
neared the great harbour I allowed myself to hope, for I had planned
to reach the port in the small hours of night, and knowing the Chinese
ways I felt sure we should be able to evade even watchful eyes.
“Everything happened as I had foreseen; it was black night when we ran
alongside the German mail steamer. I had already promised the men a
large reward, so taking Glory in my arms for a long kiss I begged her
to cry out if she saw anything suspicious, then ran up the ladder to
see the German captain. He received me in bed, told me he would be
glad to take my wife and myself as passengers, and I returned, knowing
that Glory’s beauty, if there was any difficulty, would be my best
advocate.
“As I sprang on the deck of the _sampan_ I was surprised not to see
my love; but before I had time to think, I was struck down from
behind, and remember nothing more till I awoke in a Chinese house,
with Chinamen about me and a pair of Chinese eyes boring into my dull
consciousness. In a moment or two I found I was cold and wet; they had
probably thrown cold water over me to bring me to. And Glory! My hand
and feet were bound. I was caught--but Glory? Glory! Could she possibly
have escaped? If so, I’d pay for both gladly.
“I can hardly describe what followed. I soon realised that the mandarin
watching me was the Governor. I lay on a sort of couch in the middle of
a room, two men on each side, while he questioned me. He wanted to know
whether the brother was in the plot. I said ‘No. I had persuaded him I
was coming straight through.’
“The Governor told me that if I lied he would torture me so that I
should beg for death as a release. No bodily pain could have added to
my misery and remorse.