this most marvellous work is Wan-Li-Cha̔ng-Che̔ng—literally the
myriad-li-long wall. Calculating the li at a third of a mile, this
name would give it a length of nearly 3400 miles, but the English
books estimate it at 1250 miles. It was built by the Emperor Shih
of the Chi̔n dynasty about 230 years b.c. as a barrier against the
northern tribes, or more probably as an evidence of power. He was the
same Emperor who burnt the books of the sages, thus rendering himself
famous by two works—one of construction, the other of destruction. The
wall near Ku-Pei-Ko̔u is for the most part in very good repair, but in
other places it is little more than a heap of rubbish; where we saw
it, it is built of large blocks of granite, huge bricks and cement,
and the centre filled in with rubble and concrete. It is some fifteen
feet broad and twenty feet high; at regular intervals are quadrilateral
towers about forty feet high, built of granite with embrasures—some
of these are quite perfect, others in ruin; wild vines, asparagus,
bluebells, low shrubs, and other plants grow in profusion among the
débris, and the towers are covered with silver-backed ferns and
mosses. For miles and miles as far as our eyes could stretch, up hill
and down dale, up precipices almost perpendicular, and over the highest
peaks, we traced the course of the wall; when we thought we had fairly
lost sight of it our glasses would light on some distant crag carrying
it on still farther. How so much material could have been got together
in such wild and inaccessible spots is a marvel.
Even without the attraction of the Great Wall, the height on which we
stood would have been well worth visiting. Range above range of hills
rose all round us; on one side were the wilds of Mongolia, on the other
the plains of China. At our feet lay the little town with its absurd
fortification and ditches and cannon, and the river flowing past it.
The mountain view was only bounded by the limits of our sight.
We lingered long on the wall, looking and wondering at the beauty of
the scene. We gathered some ferns and mosses, of which I send you
some, and by dint of hardish work, for it was no light weight to carry
under a broiling sun, I managed to bring off a trophy in the shape of
one of the big bricks. I have got it safe in my room here, after many
vicissitudes, for it was often nearly left behind, and some day I hope
to take it home.
We left Ku-Pei-Ko̔u the next morning, going our several ways—Saurin and
Frater to Mongolia, Murray and I to the Tombs of the Mings, which I
must tell you about in another letter.
[Illustration: The symbol of Yang and Yin]
As you interest yourself about Chinese curiosities and antiquities, I
will add a few words about the Yang and Yin, to which I alluded in the
early part of my letter.
You may have noticed on old porcelain and other ornaments this device.
It is the symbol of Yang and Yin, the universal male and female
principle of creation to which everything is referred. The celestial
principle is male, the terrestrial female; even plants are male and
female, without reference, of course, to the sexual system of Linnæus;
odd numbers are male, even numbers female. Day and the sun male, night
and the moon female. Parts of the body, the lungs, the heart, the
liver, etc., each have a sex. Sir John Davis compares with this the
Egyptian and Brahmin mythologies (_The Chinese_, vol. ii. p. 67).
LETTER XIV
PEKING, _25th Sept. 1865_.
In my last letter I told you how we went to Ku-Pei-Ko̔u. We turned
homewards (that I should talk of Peking as home!) on the 29th of
August. I began my backward journey unluckily. My horse had a sore
back, which no nostrum in the pharmacopœia of a dirty old Chinese
veterinary surgeon could heal in time for me to ride him, so I had to
go in a cart. Our first day’s journey was back over the road by which
we had arrived as far as Mi-Yün-Hsien, a distance of five-and-thirty
miles—no great things, to be sure; but the average pace was three miles
an hour; the road was full of deep ruts, and rendered doubly uneven
by rocky passages and big stones. The carts have no springs; at every
jolt I was banged up against the hard sides, and by the evening my
back was as sore as my horse’s. After ten hours of a Chinese cart
a man is fit for little else than to be sold at an old rag and bone
shop. Misfortunes never come single; when I arrived at Mi-Yün-Hsien,
jaded and aching in every bone, the inns refused to take us in; this
was of very small account, for persuasion and threats soon brought the
people to reason. The only cause they had to give for their reluctance
to house us, was that last year some foreigners had stayed there, and
instead of paying for their night’s lodging had beaten the landlord
when he asked for his money; such are some of the travellers who come
to these parts, and who defeat all our efforts to conciliate the
people. However, we convinced the host that we neither wished to cheat
nor to beat him, and he, when he felt safe on both scores, was willing
enough to be civil. But during the altercation, which had attracted a
great crowd, my pocket-book was picked out of my pocket, which was a
serious loss, for it contained a heap of notes, rough sketches, and
plans, that I had made on different excursions, and our passport. We
offered a reward for its recovery, and sent to the Chih-hsien, or
governor of the town, to ask his help, which he sent in the shape of
two officers, who came and knelt before us very humbly, but offered no
suggestions for getting back my book, which I shall now certainly never
see again.
We had two days’ journey from Mi-Yün-Hsien to Chang-Ping-Chou. As the
road lay on one side of the highway, the villages were smaller, poorer,
and more insignificant than any we had come to yet. By the richness of
their crops, the people here ought to be among the most prosperous, but
they are so taxed by the Government, and bled by the mandarins, small
and great, that they have no chance. Wherever we went the people were
complaining of their hard lot; nor was this mere talk, for since our
return to Peking there has been a serious outbreak not far from the
part of the country that we had travelled over. The insurrection, if it
deserved the name, has been happily quelled, but not before the rioters
had done great damage, making themselves masters of two small towns;
and it was even said that they had killed the governor of one town, but
this was afterwards contradicted. The affair was merely an additional
proof of the tyranny of the petty rulers, and the hatred with which the
people regard them. “A town priest and a country mandarin” are the
types of good luck, says the proverb; for the one is the darling of the
women, the other can feather his nest handsomely.
It is very curious in this country to come upon roadside shrines just
like those one sees in the “pious Tyrol” and other Roman Catholic
countries. Those which are erected in honour of the goddess of
mercy, Kwang-Yin, with a babe in her arms, or the Queen of Heaven,
Ti̔en-Hou, are the very counterpart of the effigies of the Madonna and
Bambino. The majority of these shrines are faced by a low whitewashed
blank wall. This often is covered by an allegorical design of great
quaintness, in which the dragon plays a prominent part. The dragon
is the principle of good, and he is engaged in constant warfare with
the serpent or the tiger, who represent the principle of evil. These
battles are a common subject for the decoration of the blank walls of
shrines. Apropos of the dragon and serpent, the Chinese have a quaint
superstition. They believe that thunderstorms are created by the dragon
pursuing the tiger or serpent through the air, hurling bolts and fiery
darts at him. It is very dangerous to stand at open windows or in an
exposed place during a thunderstorm, for the serpent and tiger are very
crafty, and have cunning ways of dodging the dragon’s shots, which thus
fall on an innocent head. The tiger, who is drawn as a vicious-looking
cat, with his back up, lives to a great age; when he has attained his
thousandth birthday, he throws off his teeth and puts on a pair of
horns. The existence of such fables is not to be wondered at, for there
are old women’s tales everywhere; what is delightful here is that some
of the educated men really believe in them.
Chang-Ping-Chou was the scene of the great tragedy of 1860, the death
of the English prisoners from the effects of the barbarities of their
captors. It is a singular fact that the only one of the mandarins
connected with those murders who is still alive has been disgraced and
banished. The others have died miserably; one was executed in gaol
for contumely to the Empress, on the very day on which, expecting his
pardon, he had invited his wives and family to go to the prison and
fetch him away; another was killed, as it is said, by his own soldiers.
The retribution has been complete. The Sikh soldiers who survived the
cruelties to which they were subjected, and who gave the account of
what had happened, described Chang-Ping-Chou as a walled city as big
as Tientsing; but this is a mistake; it is a small walled city, very
prettily situated with hills on three sides of it; on the top of one of
these is a temple which the Sikhs mistook for a fort, as they easily
might. The little town looks prosperous enough, and appeared to be
doing a brisk trade in coffins (I never saw so many in any one place in
my life) and the water-tight wicker-work buckets, which are to my mind
the most ingenious production of North China.
The Shih-san-Ling, or thirteen tombs of the Ming dynasty, are about
five miles distant from Chang-Ping-Chou. It was the burial-place of
those emperors of the dynasty who reigned after the removal of the
seat of the Empire from Nanking to Peking. The first sign that we were
approaching something remarkable was a magnificent stone gateway, built
of enormous blocks of stone and standing isolated in the midst of the
plain. This gateway is the finest specimen of Chinese architecture
that I have seen. Some way beyond this is a second gateway of brick,
roofed with the imperial tiles, also very handsome, and this leads
to a large square granite building, cruciform inside, containing a
colossal marble tortoise, from whose back springs a marble tablet of
great height, bearing an inscription on both sides, the one relating
how the tombs were built by the Ming dynasty, the other how they were
restored in the reign of Chien-Lung. This building is surrounded by
four triumphal columns. Next follows an avenue of colossal figures in
marble,—grim sentries over the approach to the sepulchres. The figures
come in the following order:—Two lions sitting, two lions standing;
two chi-lings (a fabulous beast which appears once in ten thousand
years, and was last seen at the birth of Confucius. Chi-ling is the
same as kylin, which we in England misapply to designate the porcelain
and bronze lions with curly manes which are imported; these latter are
called by the Chinese shih-tszŭ; as you have a pair, I thought this
might interest you), two chi-lings sitting; two camels sitting, two
camels standing; two elephants sitting, two elephants standing; two
scaled beasts with wings and wreathed in flames sitting, two of the
same standing; two horses standing, two horses resting; two warriors
in full armour, prepared for battle, with breastplates that reminded
one of Medusa’s head, and carrying swords and maces; two warriors in
repose, their swords sheathed and their hands crossed on their breasts;
four councillors in their caps and robes of office; four chamberlains.
We passed through this mysterious assemblage, which was very terrifying
to our horses, and then had about a mile and a half to go along a
ruined stone road, with decayed stone and marble bridges, before we
got to the tombs. Each tomb is of itself a palace. The thirteen stand
in an amphitheatre of hills among groves of cypresses and persimmon
trees. The tombs are about three-quarters of a mile apart. The plain
is cultivated now, but evidently it was originally intended that the
whole place should be silent, solitary, and secluded. Nothing can be
more beautiful than the situation. As I told you once before, in this
country the fairest spots are chosen for burying the dead, and you may
suppose that the emperors of the magnificent Ming dynasty would not be
behind their people in this.
The tomb which is generally visited by strangers, and which I saw,
is that of the Emperor Yung-Lo; it is the oldest and _par excellence_
“the Great Tomb.” The Emperor Tae-Tsung, who reigned under the style
of Yung-Lo, was the third of his dynasty; he reigned during the first
quarter of the fifteenth century. It was he who moved the capital
from Nanking to Peking. Of the thirteen emperors of his dynasty who
succeeded him, twelve are buried round him; the thirteenth, who, when
Peking was taken by the rebels, committed suicide in his harem after
killing his wives and children, with the exception of one daughter, is
missing.
The Tomb-Palace is, of course, surrounded by a high red wall tiled with
yellow, the imperial colours. A broad and handsome entrance gate leads
into a large courtyard; on the right is a pavilion containing a marble
tortoise carrying a high marble slab with a commemorative inscription.
Past this court is a vast entrance hall. Two flights of steps lead up
to the hall, and between them is a slant of marble richly carved and
ornamented; I believe that this centre path is for the good spirits to
walk along. A second courtyard contains two beautiful little yellow
shrines, both empty. A triple terrace of marble, with steps and slants
as before, precedes the grand hall, a most imposing chamber. It is 81
paces long by 36 broad, and very lofty. The floor is of black marble,
the walls a dull yellow; the roof, which is fretted and painted like
cloisonné enamel with dragons and other emblems, is supported by
thirty-six huge masts of wood, smoothed but unpolished, and all of
equal size. They are marvellously handsome, and in this country (where
wood is so precious that an empty house is not safe for a night from
thieves, who will strip it of roof, doors, and windows) must have
cost something prodigious. In the centre of the hall is rather a mean
shrine in honour of “our ancestor canonised under the name of Wên.”
Every emperor passes through three names. First he has his own name,
which, after he ascends the throne, is never used nor borne again, for
he then assumes the style of his reign, and at his death is canonised
under a third. So this Emperor’s name was Tai-Tsung; he reigned under
the style of Yung-Lo, and was finally canonised as Wên. After this
grand hall come two more courtyards; in one of these stands a great
sacrificial altar of stone and marble. The top block of marble is eight
paces long; on this altar are placed the five gifts—an incense-burner,
two candlesticks, and two pots of fruits. Inside the altar is a tank of
fresh water, which is got at by passing a stick with a piece of linen
attached to it as a sponge through a hole in the side. This water is
a specific for certain complaints. The last building is a high tower,
with a vaulted passage springing off into two directions. I never heard
such an echo as this produced; we two, as we walked along, made a noise
like that of a regiment. From the top of the tower, which contains a
large perpendicular slab of marble painted red, there is a beautiful
view over the country, with the thirteen palaces of the dead each in
its niche in the hills; it is really a scene of rare and striking
beauty. Just behind the tower is an artificial mound covered with trees
and verdure; this, I believe, is where the body lies—a few old bones to
all this magnificence. There is a Chinese proverb which says, “Better
be a living beggar covered with sores than a dead emperor.”
As we were sitting over our dinner at the inn we both agreed that as
it was a lovely moonlight night we would go back at any rate as far
as the avenue of colossal statues. I never saw anything so weird as
the big beasts and warriors looked; they almost seemed to move in the
moonlight—one half expected one of them to come down from his pedestal,
like the Commendatore in _Don Giovanni_, and punish us for the
intrusion. It is impossible to imagine a wilder or more lonely spot; it
is really the solitude of the tomb.
The next morning at daybreak we rode into Peking, about 25 miles. I
have seen nothing so interesting since I have been in China as the
scenes of which I have tried to give you an idea.
LETTER XV
PEKING, _25th October 1865_.
I who so lately wrote to you about blazing sun and scorching heat am
now glad to nestle into the chimney-corner and watch the “pictures in
the fire.” Outside, the rain is falling fitfully and the wind blowing
a hurricane; it moans and howls dismally through the courts and cranky
buildings of the Legation, piercing its way into all sorts of odd
nooks, and routing out old bells that jangle in a harsh and discordant
way from the quaint eaves, as if they were angry at being disturbed
in their dusty dens. Doors are creaking and timbers groaning in every
direction, and the windows threaten to burst in, but the stout Corean
paper holds good, though it gets stretched and flaps unpleasantly like
loose sails in a calm, and on the whole I confess I prefer glass. Every
now and then, as the storm abates for a while, I hear the tap, tap,
tap, of the watchman’s bamboo as he goes his rounds, and can’t help
grunting with Lucretian satisfaction as I look at my fire and think of
how cold he must be. In short, we are working gradually into winter. In
another fortnight the trees will all be bare, and Peking, throwing off
the green clothes which it puts on in summer, in order to delude stray
visitors into the idea that it is a pretty place, will stand naked,
dirty, and ashamed. The last month has been very pleasant—neither too
hot nor too cold; and the early morning rides, before wind or dust has
arisen, and when the evil smells of the town, which are beaten down by
the night dews, have not had time to assert themselves again, put fresh
life into us after the great heats. I have got a new horse. The first
one which I bought in the spring turned out to be possessed of every
vice to which horse-flesh is heir; so I sold him at a loss, after he
had bored my life out for four months, and am now well mounted on a
first-rate Mongol cob.
Talking of horses leads me to dogs. I have had a sad loss in my little
dog Nou-nou, of whom I was very fond. I told you what a little Turk he
was, always getting himself into scrapes about his amours. Well, the
other day he had some words with a big dog belonging to the sergeant of
our escort, which ended in his getting a bite in the back that broke
his spine and killed him. Everybody in the Legation regrets him, poor
little beast; he had been at Peking ever since the foreign Legations
first came here, and was quite a character about the place. I was very
much grieved at his death.
We have been interested lately in the steps taken by the Russian
Government to establish a telegraph from Kiachta to Peking and
Tientsing. The Russians wish that it should be a Chinese enterprise,
but that they, the Russians, should set it up and help in working
it. Accordingly, they have sent an officer of engineers here with a
complete apparatus to show the Chinese Government. It is set up in
the gardens of the Russian Legation. Some four years ago, when Baron
Gros returned to Europe, he sent out to the Prince of Kung a present
of an electric telegraphic apparatus. Such was the horror which the
Chinese then had of innovations, that the Prince not only refused to
accept it, but even to see it. Now, however, the Government is more
ripe for taking impressions from abroad. The members of the Foreign
Office, and afterwards the Prince, have been to see the machine work,
although the Prince took good care not to allow that his visit had any
special purpose, and with that view went the round of all the Legations
the same day. He watched the working of the telegraph without showing
any great astonishment or perception of what was going on; but a few
days afterwards M. Vlangaly, the Russian Minister, who had drawn up
for the Prince a paper upon the subject of the international utility
of telegraphs, received a very satisfactory despatch from the Foreign
Office to the effect that one visit was not enough to enable the
Ministers to appreciate so wonderful an invention, and that they hoped
to be allowed to see it again. M. Vlangaly has had the happy idea of
having some intelligent Chinese lads taught to work the telegraph, so
next time the Prince comes he will see that his own people can learn to
send off and take down messages. This is all a great step in advance.
The French, who are always on the look-out to find that other Powers
are extending their “influence,” as they call it, and in this case
have the additional motive for jealousy in the refusal of Baron Gros’
present, look upon this move of the Russians with great distrust and
dislike. We, on the contrary, are all for supporting any Power who will
help the Chinese to move forwards. The superstitions of the people
would be a great difficulty in the way of carrying out telegraphs,
railroads, or any great engineering project in China. They would view
with the utmost horror anything which might disturb places deemed
sacred, lucky, or unlucky. They have a regular system for determining
propitious places, manners of building, and the like. This they call
“Fêng Shui,” the wind and water system, and it is universally believed
in. No Chinaman, however educated, would inhabit a new house without
ascertaining that it fulfilled all the requirements laid down in the
books which treat of “Fêng Shui.” Some time ago one of our men was
ill; our chief teacher, a man of great learning as Chinamen go, said
quietly to Wade that it must be owing to a new chimney which had been
built opposite to the sick man’s room, but about a hundred and fifty
yards off. Any work which might be undertaken here must be carried out
with all respect to the “Fêng Shui,” or it would run the risk of being
destroyed. Graves and other sacred places must also not be interfered
with. In carrying any engineering project into execution, the best
plan would be for the engineer to lay down his line and employ Chinese
experts in such matters to see how nearly it could be followed.
I have rather a good story to tell you. One of our subjects of
complaint at the Chinese Foreign Office has been our being insulted
in the streets of Peking by the riffraff of the place. Their means of
annoyance is to howl out “Kwei-tzŭ” (devils) after us when our backs
are turned, and then, of course, to look as if they had not done it.
Well, the other day M. de Mas, the Spanish Minister, being about to
leave Peking, exchanged compliments p.p.c. with all the members of the
Foreign Board. Amongst them all Hêng-Chi distinguished himself by his
_empressement_, sending M. de Mas a magnificent dinner _à la Chinoise_.
M. de Mas went to thank him, and after the two old gentlemen had
exchanged banalities to their hearts’ content, the Spaniard knowing
that Hêng-Chi had a little son, the child of his old age, of whom he
was inordinately proud, thought it would be a very pretty compliment if
he asked to see the little boy, who was accordingly produced, sucking
his thumb after the manner of his years. Him his father ordered to
pay his respects to M. de Mas—that is to say, shake his united fists
at him in token of salutation, instead of which the child, after long
silence and much urging, taking his thumb deliberately out of his
mouth, roared out “Kwei-tzŭ” at the top of his voice and fled. Imagine
the consternation of the two old twaddles! Hêng-Chi was horrified, for
after all his protestations of friendship to us, which by the bye took
nobody in, it bored him not a little that we should find out that his
child was brought up in the privacy of his harem to look upon us as
devils.
A French missionary has been murdered in the province of Ssŭ-Chuan,
in the extreme west. It is said that there are 800,000 Christians in
the province. There have been persecutions and disturbances on their
account of late, and the Government of Peking will have to take very
active steps in the matter, or the French will be down upon them. The
central Government are always slow in punishing their provincial
authorities, whom they fear; and in this instance they will be the more
reluctant, as the governor of the province is a man who has done them
good service as an administrator.
We hear rumours of reforms in China. If the present dynasty is to be
preserved and China to remain independent, they must be brought about
quickly, for the moment is critical. Nothing can be more rotten and
corrupt than every branch of the administration, nothing can be more
faithless than the conduct of the Chinese towards foreigners. With
misery and discontent at home, and angry reclamations for breaches of
treaty from abroad, the Government are beginning to tremble for their
existence. If the remedy does not come soon it will be too late.
LETTER XVI
PEKING, _5th November 1865_.