HANKOW TO ICHANG
I left Hankow, without seeing a gleam of sunshine upon it, by the
deck-over-deck, American-built, stern-wheel steamer _Chang-wo_. She had
some hundreds of Chinese and two China Inland missionaries on board
below, and her very limited saloon accommodation was taken up by four
Canadian missionaries returning to SZE CHUAN, and the inevitable baby.
They had fled nearly a year before, after the destruction of their
houses in the riots. I was greatly indebted to two of them. I had a
cabin directly over the boiler. The floor was very hot, and even with
the window open I could not get the temperature below 74°, and they gave
me their cool room in exchange.
The captain was kind and genial. He let me tone unlimited photographic
prints in the saloon, ignoring the dishes and buckets involved in the
process, and the engineer provided an unlimited supply of condensed
water, free both from Yangtze mud and from the alum used to precipitate
it. But he had a unique affluence of bad language, which neither the
presence of clergy nor women sufficed to check, and which was brought
out with slow, thrilling, and emphatically damnatory deliberation on the
many occasions on which we ran on shoals.
I had abundant occupation in writing, printing and toning photographs,
learning a little from Mr. Endacott of the region for which I was
finally bound, taking walks below past the Chinese cabins, where the
inmates were reclining in the bliss of opium smoking, the faint, sickly
smell of the drug drifting out at the open doors, or on the upper deck
to watch the fleets of strange junks through which the _Chang-wo_
steamed, howling and bellowing. Lumbering, unhandy craft they look, but
they are handled with consummate skill.
The Great River was at its lowest winter level, and its shores, so far
as one could see them under these circumstances, were most monotonous,
and then it was midwinter. We steamed for hours between high, grey
mud-banks, ceaselessly eaten away by the rush of the current, gaining
little beyond an idea of the vastness of the level country, the depth of
the grey alluvium, and the extent of the commerce of which the Yangtze
is the highway. To get deep water we were often close under the right
bank, and had the _divertissement_ of being pelted with mud and with
such names as “foreign devils” and “foreign dogs,” an amusement which
one would have supposed would have palled upon the peasants in the years
during which these steamers have been running.
Our progress was not rapid, owing to shoals and changes in the channel,
and the _Chang-wo_ anchored at night. Then, during the day, there was
the frequent grinding sound of running on gravel, or the thud of
touching a bank, or the buzz of a whirlpool created by ourselves in
steering clear of a junk. All day long resounded the melancholy note of
the Chinese leadsman calling out the soundings, varied by the sharp
“Hard a-port!” or “Hard a-starboard!” of a European officer as some
peril presented itself, or the low and terrible maledictions of the
captain on all and sundry, as far back as the builders of the ship. The
grounding was exasperating, losing us two hours at times. Quick as
thought at every touch on shoal or mud-bank down clattered the anchor,
and various skilled operations followed, which invariably resulted
successfully, but at one time the navigation was so intricate, and the
water shoaled for such a long distance, that, after getting off a bank
after two hours’ tedious work, the steam launch was lowered to sound
ahead, and direct us by signal flags.
Still it was hard to get up any excitement over these mishaps, even
though the captain enlarged on the risk of losing the wheel or the
rudder. Very little diversified the monotony of the winter voyage, but
when I returned in summer, and could look over the banks, a vast
population and innumerable industries were to be seen.
Yo-chow, a fortified monastery on a high promontory, once a place of
considerable domination, and Yo-chow Fu, a large city near the junction
of the Tungting Lake with the Yangtze, are the chief features of the
featurelessness. This lake, a vast but imperfectly known sheet of water,
surrounded by towns and villages, is of very great importance to the
trade of the rich HUNAN province.
The farther route lies among embanked watercourses, great flats of muddy
land receiving alluvial accretions from each summer’s floods, and
shallow meres with a wealth of wild fowl I never saw equalled, and
abounding in fish, both fish and fowl being snared in great numbers by
the nearly amphibious inhabitants, by many ingenious devices born of
Chinese poverty.
Among the many varieties of boats are pairs of large _sampans_, lashed
together, and at once kept apart and connected by platforms, on which
reeds are piled to the height of a haystack, the lowest part of the
centre of the load being recessed and shored up for a sleeping and
cooking place. These reeds, which are a speciality of the Yangtze for
900 miles from its mouth, and attain a height of fifteen feet and over,
are as invaluable to the people of this region as are the vast reed-beds
of the Liao to those of Southern Manchuria, furnishing them with
building, roofing, and fencing material, as well as with fuel. Quite a
large part of the internal freighting business of this low-lying level
is the transport of these reeds on sledges over the marshy ground, on
four-wheeled wooden trucks, which might be called “trollies” if they had
rails to run on, some dragged by men, and others by the quaint,
appropriate water buffalo, as well as loaded on coupled boats.
In the late afternoon of the third day from Hankow we anchored in the
rushing mid-stream of the Yangtze, abreast of the treaty port of
Sha-shih (Sand Market), opened by the treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895,
and, as was fitting, first occupied by the Japanese. I was not
prepossessed with the city either on the upward or downward journey.
Communication with the shore is tedious, difficult, and not free from
risk. Several of the boats which attempted to reach us were unable to
“catch on,” and even a lighter, failing to make fast, was carried far
astern and did not work her way back till the next morning.
At low water Wan-cheng Ti, the great dyke, averaging 150 feet in width
at the bottom, and twenty-five at the top, twenty feet high on the river
side, and forty on the land side, which follows the Yangtze for
twenty-five miles to the west of Sha-shih and thirty to the east,
effectually conceals the town from view, only a seven-storeyed pagoda
and the curved roofs of temples and _yamens_ appearing above the heads
of the crowds which throng the roadway on the dyke-top.
China must have been a greater country when this great public work was
constructed than she is now, for this dyke where it protects Sha-shih is
a noble, three-tiered, stone-faced construction, on the top of which are
remnants of a stone balustrade; and broad, stately flights of stairs are
let into the stonework at intervals, each tier of stairs being about
twelve feet high. It must have been fully as impressive as the superb
walls on the Chia-ling at Paoning Fu, which still remain a thing of
grandeur and beauty.
Sha-shih is pre-eminently and abominably dirty; and on this fine
embankment dirt is in the ascendant, and dirt and bad smells assail the
traveller on landing. Much of the refuse of the crowded city at the back
is thrown over the river wall, accumulating in heaps which at low water
conceal half of it. Steep steps lead up these vile mounds, and appear to
be preferred to the stone stairs covered with slippery, black ooze.
Below the heaps lie from one to two thousand junks with crews on an
average of ten men each, and frequently the junkman’s wife and family in
addition, giving an average floating population of 10,000.
Beggars’ huts encroach on the top of the embankment; and when I write
that hosts of gaunt, sore-eyed, mangy dogs, and black pigs each with a
row of bristles standing up along his lean, curved back, and beggars,
one mass of dirt and sores, are always routing and delving in the heaps,
the reader will not be surprised that I did not find Sha-shih
prepossessing. It has always had the reputation of being hostile to
foreigners, which hostility expressed itself unpleasantly in a riot in
May, 1898, when the China merchant’s, S. N. Co.’s premises ashore and
afloat, the new buildings of the Imperial Customs, and the Japanese
Consulate were destroyed. The three steamship agencies in 1898
practically withdrew their agencies from the port, the British Consulate
was withdrawn, Japan has taken no steps towards occupying her
concession, foreign trade and passenger traffic have fallen off
materially, and so far the port must be pronounced a failure.
A noisy and dirty rabble follows a stranger; mud is thrown—and, as is
the fashion of mud, some of it sticks—bad names are bandied about
freely; the foreigner is conscious of a ferment which may or may not
result in more active annoyance, and, after being nearly suffocated by
the ill-mannered and malodorous crowd in a fruitless attempt to see the
lions of the city, he retreats not reluctantly to his steamer, which, in
my case, was detained by heavy fog until noon of the next day.
[Illustration: CHINESE SOLDIERS.]
(_From a Chinese Drawing._)
But Sha-shih, though unprepossessing and unlikely to fulfil the
expectations formed of it as a treaty port, is one of the most important
cities on the Yangtze; nor is its importance a thing of yesterday. Two
miles above it lies the _Fu_, or prefecture, of Ching-chou, of which it
may be regarded as the trading suburb. All around are the remains of
fortresses and cities, mounds, earthworks, and look-out terraces,
ancient in the days when our fathers were painted savages, marking the
sites of the strongholds and capital of the powerful kings of Ch’u in
the early days of Chinese authentic history.
[Illustration: MILITARY OFFICER.]
(_From a Chinese Drawing._)
Ching-chou Fu is grandly fortified, and is surrounded by a wide canal of
great depth. It is the seat of a _taotai_, or intendant of a circuit,
which includes Ichang, eighty miles off, and though not a provincial
capital, is of such importance that it has a Manchu garrison of 12,000
men(?), the largest Manchu force south of Peking, the Manchu military
colony numbering 40,000 souls. The whole organisation of this colony is
military, and it is kept separate from the civil population. Otherwise
it has no interest, except that the women have unbound feet and wear
long outer dresses, and that the men look lazy and demoralised. Besides
this large garrison there are river and lake police, and a small body of
militia under the command of a provincial general, and a thousand HUNAN
“braves” trained in the rudiments of drill under a brigade-general.
“Braves” are fighting mobile troops, whose superior qualities command
superior pay. They receive four or five taels a month, while the common
provincial soldier only gets one tael fifty cents. Now, as formerly,
Ching-chou is regarded as one of the most important strategical
positions in China.
It has an estimated Chinese and Manchu population of 100,000, and
Sha-shih an estimated population of 80,000, a temporary one averaging
8000, and a boating one (as mentioned before) of, at the very least,
10,000, nearly 200,000 in all. The distance to Ichang is 80 miles by
land and 100 by water. To Hankow, with which the great trade of Sha-shih
is done, it is 300 miles by water, and would be 135 by land, if there
were land! No land carriage is possible, except in seasons of drought,
much of that which poses as _terra firma_ on the maps being meres,
relapsed agricultural lands, morasses, shallow lakes, fens,
watercourses, and reed swamps, most productive wherever areas are
drained and embanked.
Among the interesting features of Sha-shih are a ninth century
seven-storeyed pagoda, with eight faces, each face recessed on each
storey, and containing a stone image of Buddha, and a dark and foul
staircase, leading to a remarkable view from the top, and the imposing
halls of the trade guilds, of which I failed to see the superb
interiors, owing to the clamour and pressure of the rabble. In Sha-shih,
as everywhere else, these guildhalls serve the purposes of banqueting
halls, temples, and even theatres at times. They number thirteen, named
from the provinces or cities of which their members are natives, and
each has its patron deity. There are several charitable institutions,
including two orphanages, one of which receives 220 orphans annually,
and boards them out until the age of sixteen.
Benevolence was considerably strained in the winter of 1896–97, when
thousands of refugees flying from famine in SZE CHUAN received
unwholesome and insanitary shelter in mat sheds outside Sha-shih, where
a terrible and uninvestigated epidemic broke out, and was carried into
the city and neighbourhood, so that during the spring and summer it was
estimated that 17,000 perished in the city only. Nearly all the
refugees, after being kept alive chiefly by the charitable, died, and
were decently buried by those societies which in every Chinese city
undertake this sacred duty for the bodies of strangers, and for those of
the very poor. I am always glad to call attention to Chinese charities,
for the continual reiteration of facts on the other side only tends to
produce an unfair and one-sided impression of the Chinese character.
[Illustration: A FISHERMAN AND PLUNGE NET.]
(_From a Chinese Drawing._)
Superstition had its say regarding this baleful epidemic, which
unfortunately never came under skilled observation. It was attributed to
a malignant black bird, of vast size, which was said to hover over the
city. It had ten heads, but one had been cut off, and the severed neck
bled profusely and continuously, and wherever the blood fell disease and
death followed. A day was set apart for the propitiation of this
malignant fowl, and fire crackers were burned before the door of every
house.[21]
The fish market is an excellent, though an uncleanly one, nets, angling,
cormorants, lines with hooks, and great frame nets lowered and raised by
pulleys, all being employed. Sturgeon, weighing from 500 to 700 pounds,
are caught off the port. There are no unusual articles of diet to be
seen, except Japanese seaweed, which is largely consumed in the belief
that it counteracts the bad effects of the sulphur fumes proceeding from
coal fires!
The Roman Catholics and three Protestant missions hold property in the
town, but mission work has to be conducted very cautiously owing to the
strongly anti-foreign feeling. There are seventeen foreigners, including
the Japanese consul, but not one foreign merchant, though two or three
foreign firms have agencies.
Foreign articles, few of which find any place in the customs returns,
are to be bought in the shops. Very many of them are Japanese, owing to
the energy or, as our merchants call it, the peddling and huckstering
instincts of the Japanese traders, who through their trained
Chinese-speaking agents find out what the people want and supply it to
them. The cotton gins largely used in the neighbourhood are of Japanese
make, and cheap clocks, kerosene lamps, towels, handkerchiefs, cotton
umbrellas, cheap hardware, soaps, fancy articles of all descriptions,
and cotton goods are poured into Sha-shih by that alert empire. Among
English goods are rugs, blankets, and preserves and tinned milk and
fruits. Most of the dealers in “assorted notions” are Cantonese.
Cotton cloth, raw cotton, silk fabrics, and hides are the staple export
of Sha-shih. There are few local industries besides the weaving of
cotton. Pewter, “hubble bubbles,” household pewter ware, long bamboo
pipes, not fashionable “down the river,” coarse silk twist for plaiting
into the ends of queues, boiling salt out of old salt bags, a smoky and
smelly process carried on owing to the monstrous price of Government
salt, brick and tile making, and furniture-making, specially of carved
and gilded bedsteads and cabinets, showy but somewhat trashy, I think
exhaust the list. The annual export of raw cotton is estimated at
9,000,000 pounds. Enormous quantities of it arrive to be woven at
Sha-shih into a strong, durable, white cloth, fifteen and twelve inches
wide, which I saw all over SZE CHUAN, and of which at least 20,000,000
pounds are annually exported. Samples of this make and of English
cottons were frequently shown to me by the women in SZE CHUAN villages,
with a scornful laugh at the expense of the latter.
Sha-shih is called “The Manchester of China.” In it this comparatively
indestructible cloth is graded, packed, and shipped away, the adjacent
country being the greatest centre of weaving in the empire. There are
110 dealers in raw cotton in the city, and 114 shops deal in native
cotton cloth, and there is a daily market for its sale in the early
mornings. Silks, both plain and figured, are also produced in great
quantities, and satin bed-covers, which are used all over China. Rich
satins are also woven for altar cloths, bed and door hangings, and
cushions.
Sha-shih was the first point on my journey at which I encountered the
money difficulties which press so severely on the traveller in China. My
broken silver was of little use, and my dollars of none, copper _cash_
and _cash_ notes forming the entire currency of the port. The merchants
and shopkeepers calculate silver in Sha-shih taels, which vary from 6 to
11 per cent. from the standard Haikwan, Hankow, and Shanghai taels, and
the exchange between _cash_ and silver varies daily. There are about 130
_cash_ shops in the town, nearly all of them issuing notes. Notes for
1000 _cash_ abound, mostly issued by small Manchu shops in Ching-chou,
for which change can hardly be obtained in Ching-chou itself. The _cash_
shops issue notes for 1000, 5000, and 10,000 _cash_, but though those
issued by the banks and pawnshops are current for thirty miles round,
they are worthless at Ichang, as I found to my inconvenience. Each
hundred _cash_ being strung separately on a wisp of straw or paper, and
every string having to be counted over and examined for small or
spurious _cash_, the purchase of 10,000, or about 23_s._ 3_d._, is a
weighty matter in various senses, and is apt to take from two to three
hours, including the time spent in bargaining about “the touch” of sycee
silver procured at Hankow.
I have dwelt so long, albeit so superficially, on Sha-shih because it is
the most important of the treaty ports opened since the war, and because
nothing is known of it by the general reader. Certainly the _couleur de
rose_ expectations of an outburst of foreign trade have not been
realised, nor, I think, are likely to be, unless the methods of commerce
on the Yangtze undergo a radical change. The total trade for 1898 was
only £24,444 in value, against £47,509 in 1897, but these figures only
apply to the exports and imports passing through the Imperial Maritime
Customs. For Sha-shih has not only one, but several, “back doors”
through which her enormous commerce is poured, the principal one being a
canal to Hankow, called at its western end the Pien-Ho, and which is not
only free from the risks of the river, but is from sixty to seventy
miles shorter. Altogether several routes to Hankow are practicable,
either wholly by canal and lake, or partly by road and partly by canal,
the water route being available during the whole year.
The Chinese are rigid conservatives. Junks are always obtainable, and
wait the convenience of their hirers, and their freight and passenger
charges are much lower than those of the steamers. Certainly if I had
not been hurried I should have preferred a junk! The canals pass through
towns which offer facilities for both trading and dawdling, so that,
although there are two _likin_ stations on the canal route to Hankow,
the native trader finds that the junk has many advantages over the
steamer. _Likin_ is charged on all goods landed at Sha-shih, and the
Imperial Customs duty is, in fact, only an additional tax levied on
goods conveyed by steamer. These inland routes are of the greatest
commercial importance.
Besides the canal and lake routes to Hankow, the great delta between the
Yangtze and the Han is spotted with lakes connected by waterways, and in
other directions there are available roads connecting Sha-shih with
important trading cities. Among these are the great southern highway
from SZE CHUAN, and the great north road leading by the Han and over the
mountains to the capital of SHENSI, from which mule carts and mule
litters, conveyances hardly known in Central China, descend into the
Yangtze plain.
All that region lies below the summer level of its rivers, and it is a
problem on which no light is likely to be shed why a country so oddly
circumstanced should have become a populous and powerful kingdom at a
very early date, and why its chief city has continued to be one of the
most important of military positions and of commercial centres in the
Chinese Empire.
Returning to the river voyage, after passing Yungtze, the western
mountains appeared for the first time. The scenery changed rapidly. The
river narrowed; some of its promontories were boulder-strewn; low,
wooded knolls appeared above pleasant agricultural country, green with
young wheat; and hills of conglomerate and limestone replaced the grey
alluvium through which we had been steaming for nearly 1000 miles.
Although much detained by fogs, we reached the Tiger Teeth gorge, ten
miles below Ichang, in the early afternoon of the fifth day from Hankow.
This gorge, which hardly deserves so thrilling a name, is a channel two
miles long and about 700 yards wide, in the easternmost of those ranges
through which the Yangtze has forced itself on its way to create the
Great Plain. This range, rising to a height of 2600 feet, is broken up
into peaks, one of which is crowned by an inaccessible-looking Buddhist
monastery, this building, a fine pagoda, and great masses of
conglomerate being the only noteworthy features until we reached Ichang
in the glorifying light of a late afternoon sun.