Life and sport in China Part 14

Take the matter of foot-binding.

Laws have been pa.s.sed, and are still extant, expressly forbidding this cruel and senseless habit, and the ruling race, the Manchus, have never practised it, still the Chinese, and the women more than the men, cling to it with fanatical stubbornness for the sole reason that it is old custom, and that if girls' feet were not bandaged it would outrage the universal sense of propriety.

I have frequently talked the subject over with Chinamen, who readily acknowledge that it is useless, besides being extremely painful to young children, but they say if their daughters had natural feet they would most probably fail to get husbands, as no man wishes his wife to be in any way extraordinary or different from other women. "In any case," they frequently retort, "we do not know that foot-binding gives much more pain than do the tight-laced stays of foreign women, and certainly it is not so ugly or prejudicial to the health."

The Chinese, contrary to ourselves, look back to the past for inspiration and guidance, and to concern oneself about novelty or change appears to them as savouring strongly of shiftiness and want of tone.

A curious instance of how quickly precedent can be established, and of its binding force, came to my notice some years ago at Peking.

At a certain point the now shallow waters of the moat encircling the city wall had for long years been spanned by a foot-bridge, but which, having become rotten and weak, duly crumbled away.

With Oriental dilatoriness no attempt was made to rebuild it for some months, and it was then found that two men, who during the interval had been earning a livelihood by wading to and fro carrying pedestrians between the opposite banks, strongly objected to a new bridge on the ground that it would take away their occupation now fairly established. Backed by numerous relatives and by public opinion, these two miserable coolies had successfully resisted the proposed reconstruction when I left the capital, and it is highly probable that they or their sons still monopolise pa.s.senger traffic at the ford.

To many even in this country, and to far more on the Continent, where Christmas is observed solely as a religious festival, the New Year with its train of bills, gifts, junketings and holidays is a period of abomination, when all business is dislocated and servants run mad.

At such places in the East as Hankow, where a considerable Russian colony exists, there are three New Years of progressive virulence. The first of January is observed by all Europeans as a general holiday, when the ladies stay at home to preside over elaborate teas, at which all gentlemen of their acquaintance are expected to appear if only for a few minutes, while the men, both married and single, taking a large supply of cards, sally forth to call at the house of each lady in turn to wish her a Happy New Year, a proceeding which takes up several hours and necessitates a surprising amount of endurance. Dinners, dances, complimentary visits from Chinese friends, and other social functions help to swell the list of New Year obligations.

Things have scarcely settled down again when the Russian New Year is at hand, for in the dominions of the White Czar time is still reckoned by the old style, and as Russians are particularly keen and very p.r.o.nounced in their observance of anniversaries and _fetes_, the place is again turned topsy-turvy for several days beneath floods of excellent sweet champagne.

The Chinese calendar marches coeval with the moons, which fact generally places their New Year some time in February, the exact date fluctuating from year to year to the extent of three or four weeks.

The last few days of the old year is a great time of reckoning, when all outstanding debts must be paid so as to commence the New Year with a clean slate, and woe to the man who fails to meet his obligations.

From faces clouded with anxiety during this trying period there is a sudden revulsion on the stroke of midnight to countenances wreathed in smiles, as for weal or woe the New Year is ushered in with deafening fusillades of fire-crackers and a great beating of gongs. In the morning all China is astir betimes, dressed in gala attire and interchanging congratulatory visits. Business is entirely suspended for several days, it being the one great annual holiday, and it is extremely difficult to get even your own servants to pay so much as a minimum of attention to their household duties; in fact, I yearly register a mental vow not to lose my temper with them on any account during New Year week, for besides being useless it would probably entail the additional discomfort of having to engage and train new hands.

At this season native officials as well as merchants are in the habit of making presents indicative of good-will to those foreigners with whom they have business relations.

Your boy brings in a bright red visiting-card eight inches by three, coming from an official who begs you will deign to accept his best wishes for the New Year, together with a few trifling presents.

Immediately three or four coolies arrive, groaning as loudly as possible beneath the weight of hams, boxes of cigars, jars of dried fruits, boxes of tea, oranges and champagne. You inspect the presents with exclamations of appreciation and then privately consult the boy as to what you should retain, it being the general practice to return the greater part. A box of tea, a jar or two of dried fruits, some oranges and perhaps a box of cigars are selected, while a few dollars are presented to the coolies, by whom you forward in return your own Chinese card to the official with seasonable wishes and thanks for his thoughtful kindness.

As I was reading by my fire one afternoon in Shanghai the door was quietly opened, two hands gently pushed an enormous live turkey into the room and the door was again closed. The turkey commenced to stalk about with an occasional gobble. After watching the intruder for a few seconds I started to catch him, but found it was no easy matter. He flew on to the sideboard, from there to the mantelpiece and then to the window-sill, scattering knick-knacks and photographs far and wide.

He ran under the sofa and table, finally escaping into my bedroom, where, with a desperate effort, I caught him by his legs under the bed. While dragging him out he beat his wings with great force, and as the bed had evidently not been swept under for months, drove forth such a cloud of dust and fluff as to almost choke me, while filling the whole room.

Round his neck was tied a red label bearing New Year greetings from a Chinese merchant.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FISHING-JUNKS IN MACAO HARBOUR AT CHINESE NEW YEAR.

_To face page 189._]

The entire boating population cease work at New Year, and tying up their craft in convenient places give themselves up to such few pleasures as their primitive mode of life allows.

At Macao, hundreds of fishing-boats, which supply the market both there and at Hongkong, a.s.semble and anchor close together in orderly rows, both in the inner harbour as well as in the bay facing the Praia Grande, under strict supervision of the Portuguese authorities. Mat awnings are erected over the decks, thus forming commodious rooms, which are decorated with scrolls and lanterns, and in which feastings and family gatherings take place for several days, after which the whole fleet, gaily decked with flags, puts again to sea.

Fish of any kind is a favourite article of food, and the methods of catching them are extremely numerous. Otters, cormorants, nets, baskets and hooks without bait, all meet with due measure of success, but by far the most remarkable manner of fishing was that which I saw from the bows of a steamer made fast to the hulk at Hankow.

It was mid-winter and bitterly cold, the ground being covered with almost a foot of snow. I had been to tiffin with the captain and was just coming away when, pointing to some natives in a sampan close alongside, he said, "Have you ever seen those men dive for fish?"

I never had, and being glad of the opportunity, stopped to watch.

There were three men in the boat, of whom one worked the paddles, while the other two, stark naked, crouched on the forepart, sheltering themselves from the biting wind with an old straw mat. Having come to a suitable spot, where the depth may have been from ten to fifteen feet, the boat was stopped, and the two divers instantly plunged into the turbid water, to reappear some seconds later with a live fish in each hand, while one of them had also a third fish in his mouth. The diving was repeated several times with varying results before I took my leave, and the captain a.s.sured me that this was a common sight on the Yangtse in winter, when the fish were probably lying in the mud torpid from the cold.

When returning to Kiukiang from a fortnight's shooting trip in the neighbourhood of Ngankin, my boat was much delayed by light and contrary winds, which frequently obliged us to anchor in order to avoid being swept back by the strong current. On one of these occasions three of the crew took the jolly-boat and rowed ash.o.r.e, a distance of some hundred yards, and while smoking on deck I could see them wading along by the bank, groping in the mud and occasionally putting something into a bucket which they had taken with them.

Questioned as to what they were doing, the lowdah replied, "Fishing,"

and my astonishment was not diminished when they returned on board with the bucket half-filled with fine perch, varying from perhaps eight ounces to a pound in weight. Until then I was unaware that perch existed in Chinese waters, nor have I since seen any.

The nearest approach to this kind of fishing that I know of is down in my old home amongst the Norfolk broads, where on warm days, when lying in the weeds, tench can be tickled with the fingers and caught by a sudden nip behind the gills; but the art requires intimate knowledge of local waters, much patience and great skill.

One of the most frequent questions that I am asked at home is, "Do not Chinamen wear the finger-nails very long?" They do. Scholars perform no manual labour, in visible token of which they allow the nails of the left hand to grow an inch or an inch and a half in length, but the nails on the right hand, while also long, are short in comparison with those on the left.

To be cla.s.sed with literary or educated men is the greatest of all considerations, for which reason there is always a tendency for anyone and everyone to wear a long coat and to don huge tortoise-sh.e.l.l-rimmed spectacles, such as are affected by the _literati_, as well as to cultivate the nails of the left hand. As the use of the word _esquire_ has degenerated in this country until not to apply it to all and sundry is considered to be almost a snub, so the habit of wearing long finger-nails in China has descended through every rank of Society until it is now more often the badge of envious imitation than of any scholarly attainments. So precious to the owners are these claw-like nails that I have often seen them protected by silver sheaths, and have heard that for cases of extraordinary growth the whole of the left hand is even carried in a bag.

There is much outcry in these latter days against the newly-formed habit of cigarette smoking cultivated by ladies of the West.

Condemnation of the practice seems if anything to act as an incentive, so, yielding to the pleasant temptation of palliating faults in pretty women, I would suggest as an excuse that they are but following in the foot-steps of their sisters of the Far East, where, it may be roughly stated, the women-folk of a third of the human race smoke pipes.

I cannot say that very young girls appear to indulge much, though women of all ages do to a great extent, inhaling the smoke and puffing it through the nose in thick clouds. The pipes in general use are either small bra.s.s ones, having straight wooden stems a foot in length, with clumsy porcelain mouthpieces, or bra.s.s water-pipes, which when being smoked make an unpleasant gurgling sound. The bowl of either kind is so tiny that it will only hold a pinch or two of very fine tobacco, which three or four whiffs consume, when it has to be refilled and lighted from a slow-match held ready in the hand until the smokeress has smoked enough. The picture is neither winsome nor sweet.

The Chinese have very few amus.e.m.e.nts corresponding to our outdoor games, although at treaty-ports, and in those places where there are any roads, men are taking readily to cycling, albeit, from the flowing nature of their garments they generally use ladies' bicycles. Of these few pastimes archery is considered the most _distingue_, while boys attain to great skill in playing shuttlec.o.c.k with their feet, being able to keep up the feathered cork for a dozen or twenty times, and pa.s.sing it considerable distances from one to another. Judge then of my surprise when, on asking a young Chinaman at Peking how he had spent his holiday of the previous day, he replied quite naturally that he had pa.s.sed the afternoon at his cricket club.

I could hardly believe my ears, for as far as I knew a game of cricket had never been played at Peking, even by Englishmen, there being no suitable ground, and it was only by plying him with questions that I elicited it was the cricket of the hearth to which he alluded, and that his club was a gambling-house to which young men brought their crickets, there to fight grim duels in a basin for the championship, while n.o.ble owners staked considerable sums on the prowess of their diminutive gladiators and stimulated their energies by tickling them with straws.

On all the waterways of China enormous flocks of tame ducks are to be seen. These flocks generally number several thousands of birds each and are carefully herded by the duck farmer and his sons, who swim them about from place to place in search of suitable feeding-grounds.

On the Yangtse I have seen them in mid-stream floating down in compact ma.s.ses with the racing current and surrounded by their guardians in tubs, who, armed with long bamboos, smartly whack any bird which may happen to stray away from the flock until it rejoins its companions.

These ducks are apparently always of one age, be it a month, three months or full-grown, which fact had ever been a source of mild surprise to me, in view of the number of simultaneous broods which would be necessary to hatch off such swarms, until the matter was explained.

A friend of mine gave a tiffin party of four good men and true on his stern-wheel house-boat, the motive power for which was supplied by half-a-dozen coolies driving the wheel with their feet, on the same principle as the tread-mill, and we were gliding up the Taipa Channel near Macao at about four knots, when suddenly our craft came into a sea of egg-sh.e.l.ls sailing gaily before the breeze and having at a short distance much the appearance of water-lilies.

For a quarter of an hour or so we ploughed through these sh.e.l.ls, which must have numbered tens of thousands, making various conjectures as to their origin, until our host, who had been below superintending the icing of the champagne, came on deck and explained that they undoubtedly were from an incubator in which ducks had just been hatched. This was new to me, so I asked him for details, but he replied that beyond knowing of the incubators and that they were made of manure and lime in which eggs were buried until hatched, he had not been able to procure further information.

Since then I have made many inquiries, but the Chinese will reveal little beyond the fact that incubators "have always existed" for the hatching of ducks and geese.

A gentleman whose knowledge of the Chinese and their ways is unsurpa.s.sed has also kindly tried to find out, but with limited success, for, he says, it is regarded as a trade secret and the duck farmers will not divulge the process. However, he ascertained that the hatching takes place in early spring, when "a kind of primitive incubator is used. The eggs are placed in a big basket covered with straw or cotton wool, about a thousand eggs in one basket. Under this basket a charcoal fire is lit to keep the required temperature. The work is carried on in closed rooms and one man is always in attendance turning the eggs. Only eggs of ducks and geese are thus treated."

Whether these incubators are made of manure and lime in the open air, whether they are in rooms heated by charcoal fires, or whether there are both kinds, the interesting fact is established that incubators "have always existed" in China, while results, as seen in the huge flocks of ducks, proclaim them as thoroughly successful. And this, too, when it has been unreservedly believed that the incubator was a modern triumph of Western science!

Another little matter has attracted my attention. There have lately been paragraphs in several papers announcing the excellent results obtained from a new system of registering criminals by means of thumb-marks.

Thumb-marking may be new to Scotland Yard, but in China it is a very ancient practice. I have seen illiterate men smear their thumbs with ink and make impressions at the foot of doc.u.ments, such thumb-marks being accepted as in every way equivalent to full signatures.

CHAPTER IX

THE MARRIAGE TIE

In the province of Kiangsi on the banks of the River Kan, which flows almost due north to the Poyang lake and so into the Yangtsekiang, is situate the town of Kanchow, on the outskirts of which dwelt a merchant named Chin Pao-ting with his wife and infant son.

After the custom of all Chinese merchants, Mr Chin had a shop which, although used for retail purposes, was in reality the office of his not inconsiderable wholesale business. Mr Chin had some time previous to this date, the early spring of 1892, engaged a young man of the locality named w.a.n.g Foo-lin, as accountant and confidential clerk, and he had proved himself so intelligent and useful that not only did Chin regard him with feelings of friendship but even conceived the idea of subsequently taking him into partnership. What Chin's particular business was I do not know, beyond the fact that each year it took him away from home for several weeks, and sometimes months at a time, when he travelled to other provinces. This annual voyage was now at hand.

Four boats were filled with various kinds of merchandise, while a fifth and smaller craft was selected to convey Chin and his a.s.sistant, who now accompanied his master for the first time. This boat was fairly comfortable from a Chinese point of view, having benches on either side of the cabin and a kind of platform at the back, with a small, low table thereon bearing the customary incense-burner, containing fragrant joss-sticks, and also on this occasion a small _joss_ or gilt image of Buddha, which Chin always took with him on his wanderings.