"Oh, he's got his head screwed on his shoulders the right way," they
said. "One of the best."
When the hat was passed round for some charitable object he could
always be counted on to give as much as anyone else, and he was always
ready to go in for a golf competition or a billiards tournament. He was
a bachelor.
"Marriage is no use to a man who lives in China," he said. "He has to
send his wife away every summer and then when the kids are beginning to
be interesting they have to go home. It costs a deuce of a lot of money
and you get nothing out of it."
But he was always willing to do a good turn to any woman in the
community. He was number one at Jardine's, and he often had the power
to make himself useful. He had been in China for thirty years, and he
prided himself on not speaking a word of Chinese. He never went into
the Chinese city. His compradore was Chinese, and some of the clerks,
his boys of course, and the chair coolies; but they were the only
Chinese he had anything to do with, and quite enough too.
"I hate the country, I hate the people," he said. "As soon as I've
saved enough money I mean to clear out."
He laughed.
"Do you know, last time I was home I found everyone cracked over
Chinese junk, pictures and porcelain, and stuff. Don't talk to me about
Chinese things, I said to 'em. I never want to see anything Chinese as
long as I live."
He turned to me.
"I'll tell you what, I don't believe I've got a single Chinese thing in
my house."
But if you wanted him to talk to you about London he was prepared to do
so by the hour. He knew all the musical comedies that had been played
for twenty years and at the distance of nine thousand miles he was able
to keep up with the doings of Miss Lily Elsie and Miss Elsie Janis.
He played the piano and he had a pleasing voice; it required little
persuasion to induce him to sit down and sing you the popular ditties
he had heard when last he was at home. It was quite singular to me, the
unfathomable frivolity of this grey-haired man; it was even a little
uncanny. But people applauded him loudly when he finished.
"He's priceless, isn't he?" they said. "Oh, one of the best."
LIII
THE SEA-DOG
Ships' captains for the most part are very dull men. Their conversation
is of freights and cargoes. They have seen little more in the ports
they visit than their agent's office, the bar which their kind
frequents, and the bawdy houses. They owe the glamour of romance which
their connection with the sea has cast over them to the imagination of
the landsman. To them the sea is a means of livelihood and they know
it, as an engine-driver knows his engine, from a standpoint which is
aridly practical. They are men, working men, of a narrow outlook, with
small education for the most part and little culture; they are all of a
piece, and they have neither subtlety nor imagination. Straightforward,
courageous, honest, and reliable, they stand four-square on the
immutability of the obvious; and they are definite: they are placed in
their surroundings like the objects in a stereoscopic photograph so
that you seem to see all round them. They offer themselves to you with
salient traits.
But no one could have adhered less to type than Captain Boots. He was
the master of a little Chinese steamer on the Upper Yangtze and because
I was his only passenger we spent a good deal of time in one another's
company. But though he was fluent of speech, garrulous even, I see him
shadowly; and he remains in my mind indistinctly. I suppose it is on
account of his elusiveness that he engages my imagination. There was
certainly nothing elusive in his appearance. He was a big man, six
foot two, powerfully built, with large features and a red, friendly
face. When he laughed he showed a row of handsome gold teeth. He was
very bald, and clean-shaven; but he had the most bushy, abundant, and
aggressive eyebrows that I have ever seen, and under them mild blue
eyes. He was a Dutchman and though he had left Holland when he was
eight, he still spoke with an accent. He could not pronounce th, but
always made it d. His father, a fisherman who sailed his own schooner
on the Zuyder Zee, hearing that fishing was good in Newfoundland, had
set out with his wife and his two sons across the broad Atlantic.
After some years there and in Hudson's Bay--all this was hard on half
a century ago--they had sailed round the Horn for the Behring Straits.
They hunted seal until the law stepped in to save the beasts they were
exterminating, and then Boots, a man now and a brave one, God knows,
sailed here and there, as third, then as second mate, on sailing
vessels. He had been almost all his life in sail and now on a steamer
could not make himself at home.
"It's only in a sailing boat you get comfort," he said. "Dere's no
comfort anywhere when you got steam."
He had been all along the coast of South America after nitrates, then
to the west coast of Africa, then again, fishing cod off the coast of
Maine, to America; and after that with cargoes of salt fish to Spain
and Portugal. A tavern acquaintance in Manila suggested that he should
try the Chinese Customs. He went to Hong-Kong, where he was taken on as
a tide-waiter, and presently was put in command of a steam launch. He
spent three years, chasing the opium smugglers, and then, having saved
a little money, built himself a forty-five ton schooner with which he
determined to go to the Behring Straits and try his luck again with the
seal fishery.
"But I guess my crew got scared," he said. "When I got to Shanghai they
deserted and I couldn't get no oder, so I had to sell de boat and I
shipped on a vessel what was going to Vancouver."
It was then he first left the sea. He met a man who was pushing a
patent hay-fork and this he agreed to take round the States. It was a
queer occupation for a sailor-man, and it was not a successful one, for
at Salt Lake City, the firm that employed him having gone bankrupt, he
found himself stranded. Somehow or other he got back to Vancouver, but
he was taken with the idea of life ashore, and he found work with an
estate-agent. It was his duty to take the purchasers of land to their
plots and if they were not satisfied persuade them that they need not
regret their bargain.
"We sold one fellow a farm on de side of a mountain," he said, his
blue eyes twinkling at the recollection, "an' it was so steep dat de
chickens had one leg longer dan de oder."
After five years he had the idea that he would like to go back to
China. He had no difficulty in getting a job as mate of a ship sailing
west and soon he was at the old life once more. Since then he had been
on most of the China runs, from Vladivostok to Shanghai, from Amoy
to Manila, and on all the big rivers; on steamers now, rising from
second to first mate, and at last, on Chinese owned ships, to master.
He talked willingly of his plans for the future. He had been in China
long enough, and he hankered after a farm on the Fraser River. He would
build himself a boat and do a bit of fishing, salmon and halibut.
"It's time I settled down," he said. "Fifty-dree years I've been to
sea. An' I shouldn't wonder but what I did a bit of boat building too.
I'm not one to stick to one ding."
There he was right and this restlessness of his translated itself into
a curious indecision of character. There was something fluid about him
so that you did not know where to take hold of him. He reminded you of
a scene of mist and rain in a Japanese print where the design, barely
suggested, almost escapes you. He had a peculiar gentleness which was
somewhat unexpected in the rough old salt.
"I don't want to offend anyone," he said. "Treat 'em kindly, dat's
what I try to do. If people won't do what you want talk to 'em nicely,
persuade 'em. Dere's no need to be nasty. Try what coaxing'll do."
It was a principle which it was unusual to find used with the Chinese,
and I do not know that it answered very well, for after some difficulty
he would come into the cabin, wave his hands, and say:
"I can do noding wid dem. Dey won't listen to reason."
And then his moderation looked very like weakness. But he was no fool.
He had a sense of humour. At one place we were drawing over seven feet
and since the river at its shallowest was barely that and the course
was dangerous the harbour authorities would not give us our papers till
part of the cargo was unloaded. It was the ship's last trip and she was
carrying the pay of regiments stationed several days down stream. The
military governor refused to let the ship start unless the bullion was
taken.
"I guess I got to do what you tell me," said Captain Boots to the
harbour master.
"You don't get your papers till I see the five foot mark above the
water," answered the harbour master.
"I'll tell the compradore to take out some of dat silver."
He took the harbour master up to the Customs' Club and stood him
drinks while this was being done. He drank with him for four hours,
and when he returned he walked as steadily as when he went. But the
harbour-master was drunk.
"Ah, I see dey've got it down two foot," said Captain Boots. "Dat's all
right den."
The harbour-master looked at the numbers on the ship's side and sure
enough the five foot mark was at the water's edge.
"That's good," he said. "And now you can go."
"I'll be off right away," said the captain.
Not a pound of cargo had been removed, but an astute Chinaman had
neatly repainted the numbers.
And later when mutinous regiments with an eye on the silver we carried
sought to prevent us from leaving one of the riverside cities he showed
an agreeable firmness. His equable temper was tried and he said:
"No one's going to make me stay where I don't want to. I'm de master of
dis ship and I'm de man what gives de orders. I'm going."
The agitated compradore said the military would fire if we attempted to
move. An officer uttered a command and the soldiers, going down on one
knee, levelled their rifles. Captain Boots looked at them.
"Put down de bullet proof screen," he said. "I tell you I'm going and
de Chinese army can go to hell."
He gave his orders to raise the anchor and at the same time the officer
gave the order to fire. Captain Boots stood on his bridge, a somewhat
grotesque figure, for in his old blue jersey, with his red face and
burly frame, he looked the very image of those ancient fishermen that
you see lounging about Grimsby docks, and he rang his bell. We steamed
out slowly to the spatter of rifle shots.
LIV
THE QUESTION
They took me to the temple. It stood on the side of a hill with a
semi-circle of tawny mountains behind it, staging it, as it were, with
a formal grandeur; and they pointed out to me with what exquisite art
the series of buildings climbed the hill till you reached the final
edifice, a jewel of white marble encircled by the trees; for the
Chinese architect sought to make his creation an ornament to nature
and he used the accidents of the landscape to complete his decorative
scheme. They pointed out to me how cunningly the trees were planted
to contrast with the marble of a gateway, to give an agreeable shadow
here, or there to serve as a background; and they made me remark the
admirable proportion of those great roofs, rising one beyond the other,
in rich profusion, with the grace of flowers; and they showed me that
the yellow tiles were of different hues so that the sensibility was not
offended by an expanse of colour but amused and pleased by a subtle
variety of tone. They showed me how the elaborate carving of a gateway
was contrasted with a surface without adornment so that the eye was
not wearied. All this they showed me as we walked through elegant
courtyards, over bridges which were a miracle of grace, through temples
with strange gods, dark and gesticulating; but when I asked them what
was the spiritual state which had caused all this mass of building to
be made, they could not tell me.
LV
THE SINOLOGUE
He is a tall man, rather stout, flabby as though he does not take
enough exercise, with a red, clean-shaven, broad face and grey hair.
He talks very quickly, in a nervous manner, with a voice not quite
big enough for his body. He lives in a temple just outside the city
gate, inhabiting the guest chambers, and three Buddhist priests, with
a tiny acolyte, tend the temple and conduct the rites. There is a
little Chinese furniture in the rooms and a vast number of books, but
no comfort. It is cold and the study in which we sit is insufficiently
warmed by a petroleum stove.
He knows more Chinese than any man in China. He has been working
for ten years on a dictionary which will supersede that of a noted
scholar whom for a quarter of a century he has personally disliked.
He is thus benefiting sinological studies and satisfying a private
grudge. He has all the manner of a don and you feel that eventually
he will be professor of Chinese at the University of Oxford and then
at last exactly in his place. He is a man of wider culture than most
sinologues, who may know Chinese, and this you must take on trust, but
who, it is lamentably obvious, know nothing else; and his conversation
upon Chinese thought and literature has in consequence a fullness and
a variety which you do not often find among students of the language.
Because he has immersed himself in his particular pursuits and has
cared nothing for racing and shooting the Europeans think him queer.
They look upon him with the suspicion and awe with which human beings
always regard those who do not share their tastes. They suggest that
he is not quite sane and some accuse him of smoking opium. It is the
charge which is always brought against the white man who has sought to
familiarise himself with the civilisation in which he is to pass the
greater part of his career. You have only to spend a little while in
that apartment bare of the most common luxury to know that this is a
man who leads a life wholly of the spirit.
But it is a specialised life. Art and beauty seem not to touch him,
and as I listen to him talk so sympathetically of the Chinese poets I
cannot help asking myself if the best things have not after all slipped
through his fingers. Here is a man who has touched reality only through
the printed page. The tragic splendour of the lotus moves him only when
its loveliness is enshrined in the verse of Li Po and the laughter
of demure Chinese girls stirs his blood but in the perfection of an
exquisitely chiselled quatrain.
LVI
THE VICE-CONSUL
His bearers set down his chair in the yamen and unfastened the apron
which protected him from the pouring rain. He put out his head, like a
bird looking out of its nest, and then his long thin body and finally
his thin long legs. He stood for a moment as if he did not quite know
what to do with himself. He was a very young man and his long limbs
with their ungainliness somehow added to the callowness of his air.
His round face (his head looked too small for the length of his body)
with its fresh complexion was quite boyish, and his pleasant brown eyes
were ingenuous and candid. The sense of importance which his official
position gave him (it was not long since he had been no more than a
student-interpreter) struggled with his native shyness. He gave his
card to the judge's secretary and was led by him into an inner court
and asked to sit down. It was cold and draughty and the vice-consul
was glad of his heavy waterproof. A ragged attendant brought tea and
cigarettes. The secretary, an emaciated youth in a very shabby black
gown, had been a student at Harvard and was glad to show off his fluent
English.
Then the judge came in, and the vice-consul stood up. The judge was
a portly gentleman in heavily wadded clothes, with a large smiling
face and gold-rimmed spectacles. They sat down and sipped their tea
and smoked American cigarettes. They chatted affably. The judge spoke
no English, but the vice-consul's Chinese was fresh in his mind and
he could not help thinking that he acquitted himself creditably.
Presently an attendant appeared and said a few words to the judge, and
the judge very courteously asked the vice-consul if he was ready for
the business which had brought him. The door into the outer court was
thrown open and the judge, walking through, took his place on a large
seat at a table that stood at the top of the steps. He did not smile
now. He had assumed instinctively the gravity proper to his office
and in his walk, notwithstanding his obesity, there was an impressive
dignity. The vice-consul, obeying a polite gesture, took a seat by
his side. The secretary stood at the end of the table. Then the outer
gateway was flung wide (it seemed to the vice-consul that there was
nothing so dramatic as the opening of a door) and quickly, with an
odd sort of flurry, the criminal walked in. He walked to the centre
of the courtyard and stood still, facing his judge. On each side of
him walked a soldier in khaki. He was a young man and the vice-consul
thought that he could be no older than himself. He wore only a pair of
cotton trousers and a cotton singlet. They were faded but clean. He
was bare-headed and bare-foot. He looked no different from any of the
thousands of coolies in their monotonous blue that you passed every
day in the crowded streets of the city. The judge and the criminal
faced one another in silence. The vice-consul looked at the criminal's
face, but then he looked down quickly: he did not want to see what was
there to be seen so plainly. He felt suddenly embarrassed. And looking
down he noticed how small the man's feet were, shapely and slender;
his hands were tied behind his back. He was slightly built, of the
middle height, a lissome creature that suggested the wild animal, and
standing on those beautiful feet of his there was in his carriage a
peculiar grace. But the vice-consul's eyes were drawn back unwillingly
to the oval, smooth, and unlined face. It was livid. The vice-consul
had often read of faces that were green with terror and he had thought
it but a fanciful expression, and here he saw it. It startled him. It
made him feel ashamed. And in the eyes too, eyes that did not slant as
the Chinese eye is wrongly supposed always to do, but were straight,
in the eyes that seemed unnaturally large and bright, fixed on those
of the judge, was a terror that was horrible to see. But when the
judge put him a question--trial and sentence were over and he had been
brought there that morning only for purposes of identification--he
answered in a loud plain voice, boldly. However his body might betray
him he was still master of his will. The judge gave a brief order, and,
flanked by his two soldiers, the man marched out. The judge and the
vice-consul rose and walked to the gateway, where their chairs awaited
them. Here stood the criminal with his guard. Notwithstanding his
tied hands he smoked a cigarette. A squad of little soldiers had been
sheltering themselves under the overhanging roof, and on the appearance
of the judge the officer in charge made them form up. The judge and
the vice-consul settled themselves in their chairs. The officer gave
an order and the squad stepped out. A couple of yards behind them
walked the criminal. Then came the judge in his chair and finally the
vice-consul.
They went quickly through the busy streets and the shopkeepers gave
the procession an incurious stare. The wind was cold and the rain
fell steadily. The criminal in his cotton singlet must have been wet
through. He walked with a firm step, his head held high, jauntily
almost. It was some distance from the judge's yamen to the city wall
and to cover it took them nearly half an hour. Then they came to the
city gate and went through it. Four men in ragged blue--they looked
like peasants--were standing against the wall by the side of a poor
coffin, rough hewn and unpainted. The criminal gave it a glance as he
passed by. The judge and the vice-consul dismounted from their chairs
and the officer halted his soldiers. The rice fields began at the city
wall. The criminal was led to a pathway between two patches and told
to kneel down. But the officer did not think the spot suitable. He
told the man to rise. He walked a yard or two and knelt down again. A
soldier was detached from the squad and took up his position behind the
prisoner, three feet from him perhaps; he raised his gun; the officer
gave the word of command; he fired. The criminal fell forward and he
moved a little, convulsively. The officer went up to him, and seeing
that he was not quite dead emptied two barrels of his revolver into
the body. Then he formed up his soldiers once more. The judge gave
the vice-consul a smile, but it was a grimace rather than a smile; it
distorted painfully that fat good-humoured face.
They stepped into their chairs; but at the city gate their ways parted;
the judge bowed the vice-consul a courteous farewell. The vice-consul
was carried back towards the consulate through the streets, crowded
and tortuous, where life was going on just as usual. And as he went
along quickly, for the consular bearers were fine fellows, his mind
distracted a little by their constant shouts to make way, he thought
how terrible it was to make an end of life deliberately: it seemed an
immense responsibility to destroy what was the result of innumerable
generations. The human race has existed so long and each one of us is
here as the result of an infinite series of miraculous events. But
at the same time, puzzling him, he had a sense of the triviality of
life. One more or less mattered so little. But just as he reached the
consulate he looked at his watch, he had no idea it was so late, and he
told the bearers to take him to the club. It was time for a cocktail
and by heaven he could do with one. A dozen men were standing at the
bar when he went in. They knew on what errand he had been that morning.
"Well," they said, "did you see the blighter shot?"
"You bet I did," he said, in a loud and casual voice.
"Everything go off all right?"
"He wriggled a bit." He turned to the bartender. "Same as usual, John."
LVII
A CITY BUILT ON A ROCK
They say of it that the dogs bark when peradventure the sun shines
there. It is a grey and gloomy city, shrouded in mist, for it stands
upon its rock where two great rivers meet so that it is washed on all
sides but one by turbid, rushing waters. The rock is like the prow of
an ancient galley and seems, as though possessed of a strange unnatural
life, all tremulous with effort; it is as if it were ever on the point
of forging into the tumultuous stream. Rugged mountains hem the city
round about.
Outside the walls bedraggled houses are built on piles, and here, when
the river is low, a hazardous population lives on the needs of the
watermen; for at the foot of the rock a thousand junks are moored,
wedged in with one another tightly, and men's lives there have all
the turbulence of the river. A steep and tortuous stairway leads to
the great gate guarded by a temple, and up and down this all day long
go the water coolies, with their dripping buckets; and from their
splashing the stair and the street that leads from the gate are wet as
though after heavy rain. It is difficult to walk on the level for more
than a few minutes, and there are as many steps as in the hill towns
of the Italian Riviera. Because there is so little space the streets
are pressed together, narrow and dark, and they wind continuously so
that to find your way is like finding it in a labyrinth. The throng
is as thick as the throng on a pavement in London when a theatre is
emptying itself of its audience. You have to push your way through it,
stepping aside every moment as chairs come by and coolies bearing their
everlasting loads: itinerant sellers, selling almost anything that
anyone can want to buy, jostle you as you pass.