Intimate China - free ebook by Archibald Little

INTIMATE CHINA

The Chinese as I have seen them. By Mrs. Archibald Little, Author of A Marriage in China With 120 Illustrations HUTCHINSON &amp; CO. Paternoster Row, London ... 1899 PRINTED BY HAZELL, WATSON, AND VINEY, LD., LONDON AND AYLESBURY....

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DRY STATEMENTS. (TO BE CARRIED WITH THE READER, IF POSSIBLE.)

7, Park Place, St. James's, S.W. SHANGHAI FROM THE RIVER. Arriving in Shanghai.—My First Tea-season.—Inside a Chinese City.—Shanghai Gardens.—In the Romantic East at last!...

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I. Arriving in Shanghai.

It was in the merry month of May, 1887, that I first landed in China; but from the first there was nothing merry about China. It felt bitterly cold, after passing through the tropics; and in Shanghai one shivered in a warm wrap, as the wind blew direct from the North Pole straight at one's chest, till one day it suddenly turned quite hot, and all clothes felt too heavy. Every one almost knows what Shanghai is like. It has been admirably described over and over again, with its rows of fine Europe

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II. My First Tea-season.

It was dull and leaden all the six hundred miles up the great river Yangtse; and at first it poured nearly all day and every day at Hankow, and we shivered over fires. Nevertheless, in spite of absolutely leaden skies and never a glimpse of sunshine, the coolies and the twenty-years-in-China-and-don't-speak-a-word-of-the-language men wore sun-hats, and pretended to get ill from the glare, when any one fresh from England would certainly say it was the damp. The floods were all the while advancing

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III. Inside a Chinese City.

One of the most exciting moments of all my life in China was when I first found myself shut up within the walls and barred gates of Wuchang, the provincial capital of Hupeh, one of the rowdiest provinces of China. And of the three cities that meet together and almost join—Hankow and Wuchang being separated by the there three-quarter-mile wide Yangtse, and Hankow and Hanyang separated by the boat-covered Han—Wuchang has the reputation of being the most rowdy. It is there, of course, the Provincia

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IV. Shanghai Public Gardens.

To those who have just arrived off a long sea voyage, as to those who from time to time come down from some roadless, gasless, shopless, but smell-ful up-country sojourn, there is one bit of Shanghai that is exceptionally refreshing and delightsome; and that is the garden by the river. At night, when the lamps are lit and mirrored in the water in rows and garlands of light, when the sea-breeze blows in freshly, and friends gather in the gardens, I have even heard it asserted by its greatest detr

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V. In the Romantic East at Last!

Mr. Tee San's garden is one of the most fascinating spots in China, with the bright autumn sunshine glinting through the pretty bits of trellis-work on to its fantastic rocks, and zigzag bridges, and pretty pavilions, and lighting up the truly exquisite specimens of chrysanthemums sometimes on show there. There is the spiky little chrysanthemum, the tiger's moustache, and huge maroon blossoms fading off into delicate cream in the centre, and many other uncommon varieties, each in its appropriate

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CHAPTER I. ON THE UPPER YANGTSE.

Boat-travel.—Vegetation.—Trackers.—Terrace of the Sun.—Gold Diamond Mountain.—Meng Liang's Ladder.—Great Szechuan Road.—Steamer Voyage.—Chinese Hades.—Caves. Of all ways of travel, surely boat-travel is the most luxurious. For one thing, it is accounted roughing it; and that means that there is no bother about toilets: the easiest boots and gloves, the warmest and most comfortable of clothes, are the appropriate wear. But that seems to be the whole of the roughing of it. For naturally each boat-

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CHAPTER II. A LAND JOURNEY.

Large Farmsteads.—Wedding Party.—Atoning for an Insult.—Rowdy Lichuan.—Old-fashioned Inn.—Dog's Triumphal Progress.—Free Fight.—Wicked Music.—Poppy-fields.—Bamboo Stream. It is very unusual to make the journey from Ichang to Chungking by land; but one year in the spring-time the thought of the dog-roses and the honeysuckle tempted us, as also the prospect of getting to our destination a few days earlier; so we crossed the river at Ichang, and set off over the mountains, at first all white and gl

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CHAPTER III. LIFE IN A CHINESE CITY.

Arrangement of a Chinese House.—Crowd in Streets.—My First Walk in Chungking City.—Presents.—Cats, Rats, and Eggs.—Paying a Call.—Ladies Affectionate.—Shocked at European Indecency.—Cost of Freight.—Distance by Post.—Children's Pleasures.—Precautions during Drought.—Guild Gardens.—Pretty Environs.—Opium Flowers, and Smokers.—Babble of Schools.—Chinese Girlchild. Chungking has been so fully described in my husband's volume Through the Yangtse Gorges , I will not here enter upon a description of i

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CHAPTER IV. HINDRANCES AND ANNOYANCES.

Sulphur Bath.—Rowdy Behaviour.—Fight in Boat.—Imprisonment for letting to Foreigners.—Book-keeper in Foreign Employ beaten.—Customs Regulations.—Kimberley Legacy.—Happy Consul.—Unjust Likin Charges.—Foreigners massacred.—Official Responsibility. As an illustration of the position of Europeans up-country, I will relate very briefly the trivial events of two days. First I must say that nearly every woman in the place was ill—some very seriously so; and as I thought I was not well either, on hearin

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CHAPTER V. CURRENT COIN IN CHINA.

Taels.—Dollars.—Exchange.—Silver Shoes.—Foreign Mints. She was not long out from England, and a comprador order was as yet an unnatural phenomenon to her. She supposed it was something like a cheque upon a bank, or a circular note, with which Continental travel had made her intimately acquainted. "What is the value of a dollar in English money?" she had asked before starting on her tour from Shanghai. "Oh yes, I understand it depends upon the exchange. I used always to keep myself in gloves on w

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CHAPTER VI. FOOTBINDING.

Not a Mark of Rank.—Golden Lilies.—Hinds' Feet.—Bandages drawn tighter.—Breaking the Bones.—A Cleft in which to hide Half a Crown.—Mothers sleep with Sticks beside them.—How many die.—How many have all their Toes.—Feet drop off.—Pain till Death.—Typical Cases.—Eczema, Ulceration, Mortification.—General Health affected. It is a popular error in England to suppose that binding the feet is a mark of rank in China. In the west of China women sit by the roadside begging with their feet bound. In the

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CHAPTER VII. ANTI-FOOTBINDING.

Church Mission's Action.—American Mission's Action.—T`ien Tsu Hui.—Chinese Ladies' Drawing-room Meeting.—Suifu Appeal.—Kang, the Modern Sage.—Duke Kung.—Appeal to the Chinese People. To turn to a cheerfuller subject. Although the Roman Catholics, the American Episcopal Church, and some other missionary bodies have in former days thought it wiser to conform to Chinese custom in the matter of binding, there have been other missionary bodies, that have for twenty years or more refused to countenanc

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CHAPTER VIII. THE POSITION OF WOMEN.

Official Honours to Women.—Modesty.—Conjugal Relations.—Business Knowledge.—Opium-smoking.—Typical Women. A man once quaintly said to me, "Whenever I want to know what men really are, I consider what they have made of their women." We may also learn something by considering what men say they admire in women. And for this purpose a few extracts from the Peking Gazette , the oldest newspaper in the world, and to this day the official organ of China, will go farther than a hundred pages of hearsays

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CHAPTER IX. BIRTHS, DEATHS, AND MARRIAGES.

Missing Bride.—Wedding Reception.—Proxy Marriage.—Servants' Weddings.—Love for Wives.—Killing a Husband.—Wifely Affection.—Chinese Babies.—Securing a Funeral. In China a bride usually rides in a richly embroidered red sedan-chair, decorated with flowers, and hired for the occasion. Not long ago in Canton city a man hired a chair to carry his bride to his homestead in the suburbs. The distance was great, and the hour late. When the four chair-coolies and the lantern-bearers arrived at their desti

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CHAPTER X. CHINESE MORALS.

How Chinese look upon Shanghai.—A Viceroy's Expedient.—Method of raising Subscriptions.—Deserving Deities.—Trustworthiness.—Hunan-Hero.—Marrying English Girls. Missionaries generally say that the Chinese are frightfully immoral. So do the Americans and Australians, excluding them as far as they can from their respective countries. But, brought up on the English saying that "Hypocrisy is the compliment vice pays to virtue," I always think virtue must be in the ascendant in China for vice so to sl

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CHAPTER XI. SUPERSTITIONS.

Fung shui. —Devastating Eggs.—Demon Possession.—Sacred Trees.—Heavenly Silk.—Ladder of Swords.—Preserving only Children.—God of Literature on Ghosts.—God of War.—Reverence for Ancestors. Directly that, leaving behind steamers, railways, and Sundays, you step ashore at Ichang, a thousand miles up the river Yangtse, you find yourself in the land of superstition. Right opposite to Ichang, facing it from across the river, stands a pyramidal mountain six hundred feet high, in all its proportions rese

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CHAPTER XII. OUR MISSIONARIES.

European Prejudice.—French Fathers.—Italian Sisters.—Prize-giving.—Anti-Christian Tracts.—Chinese Saints and Martyrs. People can hardly fairly discuss the question of missionaries without deciding definitely first of all whether they wish the Chinese to become Christians or not. And as I do not know what may be the views of those who read this book, I think I had better here cite impressions as to the prejudice against them, written after I had only spent a few years in the East; for the prejudi

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CHAPTER XIII. UP-COUNTRY SHOPPING AND UP-COUNTRY WAYS.

Buying Curios.—Being stoned.—Chinese New Year.—Robbers.—Protesting Innocence.—Doing Penance.—Medicines. Before Chinese New Year bargains are to be picked up—in Shanghai lovely embroidered satins, exquisite transparent tortoiseshell boxes, or china of the Ming period. Up-country our buyings are of a different order—a tiger-skin thirteen feet from head to tail, with grand markings, though of course not so thick a fur as is to be had at Newchwang. Head and tail and claws are all intact; and the man

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CHAPTER XIV. SOLDIERS.

Tiger Soldiers.—Woosung Drill.—General's Gallantry.—Japanese War.—Admiral Ting.—Dominoes with a Sentry.—Viceroy's Review. At Ichang, a thousand miles up the river Yangtse, there is a regiment of soldiers dressed as tigers; but I never could persuade any of the foreign officials to escort me to see them manœuvre, the European opinion being that not even the presence of an inspecting general would awe the Tiger soldiers sufficiently to make it safe to take a foreign lady to see them. I was told th

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CHAPTER XV. CHINESE STUDENTS.

Number of Degrees.—Aged Bachelors.—Up for Examination.—Necessary Qualifications.—Crowding.—Scarcity of Posts.—Chinese Dress. Far more formidable than the soldiery are the literati of China. Soldiering is despised in China; learning is esteemed. The literati also are far more numerous; they arrive in great armies, nominally ten thousand strong or more, and each young man of any standing has his pipe-bearer and three or more servants, possibly in the case of military students a horse or two and at

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CHAPTER XVI. A FATHER'S ADVICE TO HIS SON.

Tseng Kuo Fan.—"Neither envious nor fawning."—Repose of Manner.—Cultivation of Land.—Early Rising, Diligence in Business, and Perseverance.—Dignity.—Family Worship.—Reading. Some extracts from a Chinese father's letters to his son will probably do more to explain what is thought admirable in a Chinese young man than pages of commentary. The son in this case was the late Marquis Tseng, during many years Chinese Minister in London. The writer was his father, the celebrated Tseng Kuo Fan, in whose

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CHAPTER XVII. BUDDHIST MONASTERIES.

Monastery near Ichang.—For the Dead.—Near Ningpo.—Buddhist Service—T`ien Dong.—Omi Temples.—Sai King Shan.—Monastery of the Particoloured Cliff. The country round Ichang has always some special beauty, and in autumn it is the tints, shown to especial advantage on the tallow-trees. But one day we gathered by the wayside lovely anemones, still lingering on in sheltered spots; large gentians, with their edges picked out into delicate feathery streamers such as one finds in picotees, the little yell

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CHAPTER XVIII. A CHINESE ORDINATION.

Crowd.—Nuns.—Final Shaving.—Woven Paces.—Burning Heads.—Relationships.—A Living Picture. I have attended an ordination in St. John Lateran's at Rome, of which my principal recollection is how the Italian young men wriggled as they all lay flat upon the marble floor whilst something was sung over them. Was it a Te Deum ? It certainly was very long. The whole service, indeed, seemed very long drawn out. I have also a remembrance of nearly fainting from weariness at an ordination in Exeter Cathedra

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CHAPTER XIX. THE SACRED MOUNTAIN OF OMI.

Luncheon with a Chief Priest.—Tigers.—Mysterious Lights.—The View of a Lifetime.—Pilgrims.—Glory of Buddha.—Unburied Priests. It was very hot in Chungking in 1892—too hot, we feared, for us to bear, worn out as we were by the emotions and excessive heat of the river journey, entered upon too late in the summer. So, while we yet could, we secured four bearer sedan-chairs, with blue cotton awnings six yards long, after the fashion of this windless province, and, with bath-towels to bind round our

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CHAPTER XX. CHINESE SENTIMENT.

In Memory of a Dead Wife.—Of a Dear Friend.—Farewell Verses.—Æsthetic Feeling.—Drinking Song.—Music.—Justice to Rats. It is so much our habit in China to think the Chinese have no sentiment, that I have thought it might be interesting to gather together what indications I have observed during eleven years' residence among them, leaving the reader, if of a judicial frame of mind, to sum up and formulate his own conclusions. One of the most poetic events in history used to seem to me in childhood

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CHAPTER XXI. A SUMMER TRIP TO CHINESE TIBET.[2]

Drying Prayerbooks Mountain.—Boys' Paradise.—Lolo Women.—Salt-carriers.—Great Rains.—Brick-tea Carriers.—Suspension Bridge.—Granite Mountains.—Tibetan Bridge.—Lamas.—Tibetan Women.—Caravanserai at Tachienlu.—Beautiful Young Men.— Lamaserai. —Prayers?—Fierce Dogs.—Dress.—Trying for a Boat. There are many summer trips that are a joy in the remembering, but a trip to Chinese Tibet had never fallen to the lot of any European woman before. And it was the more delightful, perhaps, because we never tho

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CHAPTER XXII. ARTS AND INDUSTRIES.

Porcelain.—Bronzes.—Silver-work.—Pictures.—Architecture.—Tea.—Silk.—White Wax.—Grass cloth.—Ivory Fans.—Embroidery. Even if I had the knowledge, it would be useless to attempt to write exhaustively of Chinese porcelain in one chapter; but a few shreds of information about it may be new to the general reader. Julien's theory that it was first made between the years 185 B.C. and A.D. 87 is set aside by Dr. Hirth, the greatest living authority upon ancient Chinese porcelain. The latter believes it

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CHAPTER XXIII. A LITTLE PEKING PUG.

Enjoyment.—Anticipation.—Regret. He was only six months old when we first knew him, with long silky ears, and a little head covered with delicate yellow down, undeveloped puppy body, but a grand white chest, and black muzzle; he had fine long moustachios and long black eyelashes, from between which looked out engaging lustrous eyes of a singularly intelligent expression. He weighed just about three pounds at his utmost; and when he stretched himself to his greatest length, he was only a hand and

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Part I.—Getting to Peking.

House-boat on the Peiho.—Tientsin.—Chefoo.—A Peking Cart.—Camels.—British Embassy.—Walking on the Walls.—Beautiful Perspectives. It was in 1888 we first arrived in Peking, and we felt at once convinced that, whatever wonders it might have to offer, nothing—no! nothing could surpass the wonder of the journey. And when it is considered that every high official throughout the empire had to travel this same way in order to be confirmed in each appointment, the wonder of it is enhanced. From Tientsin

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Part II.—The Sights of Peking.

Tibetan Buddhism.—Yellow Temple.—Confucian Temple.—Hall of the Classics.—Disgraceful Behaviour.—Observatory.—Roman Catholic Cathedral.—Street Sights.—British Embassy.—Bribes.—Shams.—Saviour of Society.—Sir Robert Hart. The "sights" of Peking have not been on view of late years. It seems a pity, considering how many people have travelled thither hoping to see them. And yet I am not sure that it is not a relief. It seems a duty one owes oneself to go and see those one can, and the people even at t

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CHAPTER I. THE CHINESE EMPEROR'S MAGNIFICENCE.

The Emperor at the Temple of Heaven.—Mongol Princes wrestling.—Imperial Porcelain Manufactory.—Imperial Silk Manufactory.—Maids of Honour.—Spring Sacrifices.—Court of Feasting.—Hunting Preserves.—Strikes.—Rowdies.—Young Men to be prayed for. Almost all we can know of the Emperor of China is by hearsay. He lives in his Palace inside the Forbidden City, which again is inside the Manchu City, separated from the Chinese City, where are the lovely, gilded curio shops. When he goes abroad, which he ne

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CHAPTER II. THE EMPRESS, THE EMPEROR, AND THE AUDIENCE.

A Concubine no Empress.—Sudden Deaths.—Suspicions.—Prince Ch`ün.—Emperor's Education.—His Sadness.—His Features.—Foreign Ministers' Audience.—Another Audience.—Crowding of the Rabble.—Peking's Effect on Foreign Representatives. According to Chinese usage or unwritten law, the concubine of an Emperor can never become Empress-Dowager; yet Tze Hsi, the concubine of the Emperor Hien Fêng, and mother of the late Emperor Tung Chih, has ruled over China in this capacity since 1871. For a time she nomin

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CHAPTER III. SOLIDARITY, CO-OPERATION, AND IMPERIAL FEDERATION.

Everybody Guaranteed by Somebody Else.—Buying back Office.—Family Responsibilities.—Guilds.—All Employés Partners.—Antiquity of Chinese Reforms.—To each Province so many Posts.—Laotze's Protest against Unnecessary Laws.—Experiment in Socialism.—College of Censors.—Tribunal of History.—Ideal in Theory. Possibly that state of society in which the individual is the unit is a more advanced form of civilisation; but it is impossible to understand China unless it be first realised that the individual

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CHAPTER IV. BEGINNINGS OF REFORM.

Reform Club.—Chinese Ladies' Public Dinner.—High School for Girls.—Chinese Lady Doctors insisting on Religious Liberty.—Reformers' Dinner.—The Emperor at the Head of the Reform Party.—Revising Examination Papers.—Unaware of Coming Danger.—Russian Minister's Reported Advice. On February 12th, 1896, a newspaper correspondent wrote from Peking: "The Reform Club established a few months ago, which gave such promise of good things to come, and which has been referred to frequently in the public print

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CHAPTER V. THE COUP D'ÉTAT.

Kang Yü-wei.— China Mail's Interview.—Beheading of Reformers.—Relatives sentenced to Death.—Kang's Indictment of Empress.—Empress's Reprisals.—Emperor's Attempt at Escape.—Cantonese Gratitude to Great Britain.—List of Emperor's Attempted Reforms.—Men now in Power.—Lord Salisbury's Policy in China. In considering the recent bolt from the blue, as it seemed to the outside world, at Peking, it is necessary to say a few words more about the Reform leaders. Kang Yü-wei, commonly called the Modern Sag

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