A cycle of Cathay William Alexander Parsons Martin * i f ' set K *. \* i NI.' '. . -.. ii.. r\ ' V'-. 3 v A CYCLE OF CATHAY OR CHINA, SOUTH AND NORTH WITH PERSONAL REMINISCENCES W. A! P/MARTIN, D. D., LL D. PRESIDENT EMERITUS OF THE IMPERIAL TUNGWEN COLLEGE MEMBRE DE L'lNSTITUT DE DROIT INTERNATIONAL MEM. COR. DE LA SOCIETE DE LA LEGISLATION COMPAREE, ETC. * WITH ILLUSTRATIONS AND MAP SECOND EDITION % Edinburgh and London OLIPHANT ANDERSON AND FERRIER 1897 I&1 Copyright, 1896, By Fleming H. Revell Company. Entered at Stationers' Hall. All rights reserved. THE CAXTHN' I'RESS, NEW YORK. TO MY GRANDCHILDREN, AND TO THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES, YOUNG AND OLD, I DEDICATE THIS VOLUME, IN THE HOPE OF INTERESTING THEM IN THE FUTURE OF A GREAT NATION, WITH WHICH OUR RELATIONS MUST EVER BECOME CLOSER AND MORE IMPORTANT. 3 "On s 'oublie en parlant de soi." Prosper Merimee. "Schreiben Sie aus dem Gedächtniss auf, was Sie sich besinnen—nicht aus der Phantasie." W. von Humboldt. 4 PREFACE FROM the prelude to China's first war with England to the present date is, roughly speaking, about sixty years—the length of a Chinese cycle, though for all I know Tennyson may have thought of it as a thousand years. To this period the following pages principally relate. During three fourths of it I was domiciled in China, dividing my life between South and North, and adding to the experiences of a missionary those of an employee of the Chinese government. For two years I served my own country at a critical epoch, when the treaties were negotiated which led to the opening of Peking. My position in a college closely connected with the Board of Foreign Affairs gave me exceptional opportunities for ob- serving the course of diplomacy in the Chinese capital for nearly thirty years. Yet my object is not so much to write a history of events as to exhibit the Chinese as I have seen them, in their social and political life. To some the personal element will add interest; to all, I would fain hope, it will add confidence. Should the volume fall into the hands of any of my old students, they will, I trust, find in it the same sympathetic appreciation of their country and the same candor of criticism which, I am sure, they have learned to expect. W. A. P. M. Audubon Park, New York City. 5 The Cycle of Cathay. The Chinese Cycle consists of sixty years, each with a separate name. Their names are here ranged in the outer circle, and read from the top towards the left hand. The present year (1896) is the j2d of the 76th Cycle from the beginning of the Cyclic era. The figures in the inner space are the dual forces, Yin and Yang, symbolized by darkness and light, which form the starting point of Chinese philosophy. CONTENTS PART I LIFE IN SOUTH CHINA PAGE CHAP. I. First Glimpses of China: Policy of seclusion—Opium war—Hong Kong—Canton—Foot-binding—Macao—The coolie- trade—The " term question" 17 CHAP. II. Voyage up the Coast: Amoy—Opening of a new church — Fuchau— Buddhism — Civil-service examinations — Fungshui, or geomancy—Missions—A glance at the map 36 CHAP. III. Learning the Language: Two forms and many dialects—Musical tones—Reducing a dialect to writing—Clas- sical studies—"Pidgin-English" 51 CHAP. IV. Scenes in Ningpo: The new church—Natives seeking a lost soul—Well-disposed; why?—Study of Mandarin—Tried converts—Chapel preaching—Casting out a devil—Idol proces- sions—Theatricals for the gods—The Chinese drama—Eyeless deities—Releasing a prisoner—Military antics 65 CHAP. V. Scenes and Incidents: A liberal Buddhist—Cunning beggars—Invocation of devils—Imprecations and curses—Curi- ous commemorations—Women at a temple—Avatar of rain-god —Chasing the flood-fiend—Evils of opium 77 CHAP. VI. Scenes and Incidents {Continued): A model riot- Portuguese violence and Chinese revenge—Bull fights—Passion for gambling—Mixed marriages—The palace of ceremony- Honors to a laureate—An earthquake, and its effects—Taoist and Taoism. ... 91 7 8 CONTENTS PAGE CHAP. VII. Excursions in the Province: A fair valley and a foul crime—The baby-tower—Preaching in Examination Hall- Brownsville and exogamy—A stage for a pulpit—Country hos- pitality — Village feuds — The provincial capital — A Chinese Venice—Tomb of an emperor—The flood in China—Stupid models—Clever lawyers 107 CHAP. VIII. Visits to the Islands: Chusan—Queer ways of fishing—Puto—Priests, temples, and human sacrifices—Pirates — Experience as a prisoner 117 CHAP. IX. The Taiping Rebellion: On the Great River—A modern Mohammed—Mixed Christianity—Foreign opposition — A questionable policy 127 CHAP. X. The "Arrow" War: Expedition to the North- Fruitless negotiations—Capture of Taku 143 CHAP. XI. Tientsin and the Treaties: Tartar plenipotentiaries — Pourparlers and signature—Episodes, tragic and comic—The whole a mirage 165 CHAP. XII. The War Renewed: Repulse of Allies at Taku— Mr. Ward's visit to Peking—Reception by the viceroy—Journey overland—Ascent of Peiho—Scurvy treatment—Refusal of koto —Expulsion from the capital—Exchange of treaty—A strange presentiment 190 CHAP. XIII. Last Views of NiNgro: A Chinese steamer and its owner—A steamer short of coal—Actors before the curtain.. 204 PART II LIFE IN NORTH CHINA CHAP. I. Removal to Peking: The capital captured—Scenes at the hills—Temples and priests 217 CHAP. II. First Years in Peking: War averted—International law introduced — A school opened — Odd notions of natural philosophy—Church and mission—Queer converts 230 CONTENTS 9 CHAP. III. The Great Wall and Sacred Places of Peking: Altar of heaven—Lama temple—Bridge in palace grounds- Mosque and pavilion—The Yellow Temple—Great Bell of Peking—Tombs of Ming emperors—Hot Springs—Grand Pass and Great Wall—Sketch of history—The empress dowager .... 242 CHAP. IV. Visit to a Colony of Jews: Rough vehicles—Primi- tive roads—Alarm-beacons—Hills and minerals—Wretched inns — People and cities—Moslems and Jews . 265 CHAP. V. Pilgrimage to the Tomb of Confucius: The Yellow River; its new course; periodic changes—Temple and sepul- cher—Outline of Confucianism—The state religion—The three creeds blended—The Grand Canal 280 CHAP. VI. The Tungwen College: Made president—School of Interpreters—Attempt to introduce the telegraph—Opposition to improvements—Ill-starred professors—An eccentric German 293 CHAP. VII. The Tungwen College {Continued): Cradle of an em- press—Our college press—Two observatories and two astronomies —Opposition to the college—Superstition in high places—Old students—Theemperor learningEnglish—Off1cial appointments — Introduction of science into examinations for civil service—Trans- lation of books — Medical class and Chinese medicine—Wedded to ceremony—General Grant's visit—Religious impressions.... 306 CHAP. VIII. Mandarins and Government—The Tsungli Yamen: Mandarins not a caste—Their grades, their training, their virtues and defects—Independence of the people—Limi- tations of monarchy—Formation and character of the Yamen— Strange recruits 328 CHAP. IX. Notable Mandarins: A prince of the blood—A Chinese statesman—A Chinese scholar—A Manchu scholar—A Manchu statesman—A Chinese diplomat—A Chinese professor 344 CHAP. X. Early Diplomatic Missions from China to the West: Pin's voyages—The Burlingame embassy—First mis- sion to France—First to England—First to Germany—Chinese students in the United States—Coolies in Cuba—Chunghau's mistakes—Marquis Tseng's successes 371 CHAP. XI. China and her Neighbors: Relations with Russia —With Great Britain—With France—Aims of Germany—The four powers 387 ro CONTENTS PAGE CHAP. XII. China and her Neighbors (Continued): Relations with Japan—Ancient hostility—Recent war—Japan's renovation —Her field for expansion—China's relations with the United States—American influence—American trade 400 CHAP. XIII. Sir Robert Hart and the Customs Service: —His influence not confined to the customs—How he made peace with France—How he has pioneered improvements in China—The service international in membership—Its high char- acter—Its influence not ephemeral—Originating in an accident, integrity has made it permanent—Sir Robert declines to be British minister—He wears the honors of many nations—His literary tastes—A reminiscence of Dr. McCosh 411 CHAP. XIV. Sir Thomas Wade and the Audience Question: His career—His scholarship—His temper—His diplomacy- Attempt at social intercourse with mandarins—The audience cere- mony—The spell only half broken 427 CHAP. XV. The Missionary Question: Retrospect—The age of persecution—Toleration by edict—Religious liberty by treaty- Right of residence in the interior—The French protectorate of Roman Catholic missions—The recent riots: their cause and cure—The outlook 439 Appendix: Tables of Population, Trade, etc 459 Index 461 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS* PAGE Chinese Women at Home Frontispiece A Cycle of Cathay 6 The Gardener at Work 3° Execution of an Opium-smuggler 35 Wheel of Fate 39 A Common Sedan 4° Irrigating Rice-fields 5° A Canal in Ningpo To face 51 The Thunder-god Hurling Death-bolts 7' A Group of Beggars 7<> The Watmilung or Bob-tailed Dragon, Fired on by Im- pious Foreigners 84 Opium-smoker's Progress—Past, Present, Future 87 A Student in his Library Smoking Opium 9° The Palace of Ceremony 99 Raising Money for a Taoist Temple 105 Thf. " Old Philosopher" 106 A Family at Breakfast m West Lake at Hangchau To face 113 * Most of these illustrations are from drawings by native artists. Their obvious de- fects, therefore, are not without merit, as illustrative of Chinese art. A few of the larger prints are borrowed by consent of the publishers (Sampson Low & Co.) from a splendid work of Mr. J. Thomson, whom, in 1871, 1 introduced to Prince Kung and the ministers of state, and whom I assisted in procuring photographs connected with the Tsungli Ya- men. The dragon on the cover is an imperial emblem, copied from a book of decrees by the Emperor Kanghi. An imperial dragon is always represented as having golden scales and five claws. The cycle on the cover is explained on page 6. — W. A. P. M. II 12 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE The Night Patrol 118 A Buddhist Monk Beating a Wooden Drum 126 The God of War 142 Chinese Portrait-painter 147 Batteries at the Mouth of the Peiho 149 Meeting of the United States Minister and the Viceroy Tan To face 150 Gunboats in the Grand Canal; TaoistTempleattheJunction 166 Joint Card of Kweiliang and Hwashana 167 Wine for the Minister 177 Kwei and Hwa Sending a Despatch to the Emperor 185 A Street in Tientsin To face 189 United States Embassy on the Peiho To face 197 The Embassy on the Road to Peking 203 A Gate of Peking (One of the sixteen double gates in the outer wall) 216 Buddhist Trinity and Worshipers To face 227 A Buddhist Abbot 228 House of the Man who had Six Wives To face 230 A Schoolmaster; One Pupil Reciting with Back to the Table and One Doing Penance 237 The Peking Waterworks 241 The Emperor at the Plow 243 The Island Bridge and Hill of Longevity To face 244 Lama Priest, Prayer Wheel, and Idols 248 The Great Wall at Nankow Pass To face 251 Temtle Attached to the Altar of Heaven 264 Police Station 267 My Bedstead z69 A Portable Kitchen 27° A Suburb of Peking 279 / Confucius Giving a Lecture 287 Colossal Images—Ming Tombs 292 Dr. Martin, First President of the Tungwen College.. To face 293 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS »3 PAGE Printing with Block and Brush 305 Barber Shaving Student's Head 307 Professor Li and his Mathematical Class 312 Mr. Chang Toyi, English Tutor to the Emperor (Summer Dress) 316 Mr. Shen Toh, English Tutor to the Emperor (Winter Dress) 318 Mr. Tching, Wife, and Child 326 Altar of Heaven 327 TSUNGLI YAMEN AND MINISTERS OF STATE To face 338 A Street Show in Peking 343 Li Hung Chang at Fifty 348 . Fan Presented to Dr. Martin by the Marquis Tseng. To face 364 The Marquis Tseng in Summer Dress 365 The Bridal Pair Worshiping a Tablet Inscribed with the Five Objects of Veneration 367 The Bridal Pair (" Joy" in Huge Letters above their Heads) To face 368 The Bride in the Flowery Chair Arriving at her New Home 368 Ministers of the First Four Treaty Powers: Berthemy, Vlangali, Bruce, Burlingame 379 The Marquis Tseng in Winter Dress 385 Blind Musician, by Profession a Fortune-teller 399 Sir Robert Hart, Baronet 412 Midway Arch in Pass at the Great Wall 426 Hall of the Stone Classics To face 447 Map To follow 464 PART I LIFE IN SOUTH CHINA '5 aV aV aV aV aV aV ^ aV a^ A> aV aV aV aV aV >♦<<> aV-'A' aV aV :w::v::y::y;:y::y::y;^ ^,^> **> *V-y> «aV-*> *V*> *V*> *V*> ^V*>,*V j/^fc J^fc i^V J^t v^V /^V v^fc V^V; ji^jfe v^V jJ^fc J^V LIFE IN SOUTH CHINA CHAPTER I FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA Policy of seclusion — Opium war— Hong Kong—Canton — Foot-binding — Macao—The coolie-trade—The " term question" EARLY in the morning of April 10, 1850, we* were startled by the cry of " Pirate! pirate!" from our Dutch cabin-boy; but instead of those freebooters, so dreaded in the China seas, we were boarded by a pilot, who soon brought the good ship " Lantao" to anchor in the harbor of Hong Kong, after a voyage of one hundred and thirty-four days from Bos- ton—a voyage which may now be made in one fifth of the time. None but those who have worn out a considerable por- tion of their lives in doubling capes and contending with head - winds, or with still more vexatious calms, can properly appre- ciate what steam has done to bring the ends of the earth to- gether. The transformation may be said to realize the dream * There were six of us, namely, Rev. Justus Doolittle, of the American Board, author of a well-known book on the " Social Life of the Chinese "; my brother, Rev. S. N. D. Martin, myself, and our wives, of the Pres- byterian Board. 17 i8 A CYCLE OF CATHAY of an ancient Chinese fabulist, who represents an imperial trav- eler as receiving from the gods a whip, whose blows had the effect of causing the earth to shrink to small dimensions.* Politically, the place we saw before us was not China; the little rocky islet having been ceded to Great Britain in 1843, after the close of the war. The conquering power might as easily have annexed a province, or a larger island farther up the coast; but with the instinct of a maritime empire, which has led her to pick up such rocks as Gibraltar and Malta, Aden and Singapore, she chose to retain none of her conquests save this sea-girt mountain. Hong Kong possesses a magnificent harbor, easy to fortify, and commands not merely the approaches to Canton, but the whole commerce of the China coast, and, to some extent, that of Japan. From a mere fishing-village it had already grown to be a thriving town; and now it is a great city of two or three hundred thousand inhabitants. The Peak of Victoria, which we then saw rising before us in rugged majesty, is to-day crowned with magnificent buildings, to which the occupants are lifted by steam; and the sides of the mountain, then clad with tropical jungle, are now adorned by gay streets gleaming like golden bands on the shoulders of a naval Atlas. One morning shortly after our arrival I set out for the sum- mit of the Peak, nearly two thousand feet above the sea, say- ing that I would be home for early breakfast. Soon, however, the grassy carpet that seemed to extend to the top resolved itself into a network of creepers, overlying huge fragments of stone, and concealing cliffs which I had to scale in my stock- ing-feet. It was high noon when I reached the goal, and then I discovered a beaten path, which, had I known of it, would have saved me all that trouble and danger. I resolved thence- * The traveler, an historical character, was the Emperor Muh, who reigned 1000 B.C. The fiction, founded on his travels, is as old as the era of the Punic Wars. FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA '9 forth not to attack a difficulty until I had surveyed it on all sides. We were kindly lodged at the house of the Rev. Mr. Johnson, of the American Baptist Mission, who made us feel at home by permitting us to pay our proportion of his family expenses —an arrangement indispensable for those missionaries who, liv- ing on grand routes of travel, keep open house for all comers. My brother proceeded to the North in the "Lady Mary Wood," the only steamer then plying on a coast where there are now literally thousands, large and small. The rate of pas- sage to Shanghai was exorbitant (about two hundred dollars in gold); and to save expense, as well as to get a view of several seaports on the way, my wife and I preferred to join a party in chartering a Portuguese schooner, or lorcha. Before going to bed on the day of our arrival—my birthday as well as my entrance on a new life—I wrote in my journal a long series of good resolutions. Luckily they were lost at sea, otherwise the contrast between purpose and attainment might now have been too humiliating. A retrospect is here required as a key to the situation. My interest in China was first awakened in 1839 by the boom of British cannon battering down her outer walls. In the case of China, as in that of Japan, the policy of seclusion was recent, and was adopted by both for the same reason. China had always prided herself on having distant nations knock at her doors; and she encouraged them to come in by allowing their tribute missions to carry on trade duty-free. But a change of policy came with the discovery of a new route to the East by the Cape of Good Hope. When she saw Europeans arrive with stronger ships and better artillery than her own, her fears began to be excited. When she observed them pocketing the islands of the Eastern seas, and contend- ing for fragments of the empire of her kinsman, the Great Mogul, she deemed it prudent to close her ports, leaving the 20 A CYCLE OF CATHAY gates ajar at one point only, namely, Canton, the emporium, of the South. The impression made by the unscrupulous aggressions of European adventurers is well set forth in a fictitious narrative called "The Magic Carpet," written by a Chinese author two centuries ago. "In the days of the Ming dynasty," says this Oriental apologue, "a ship of the red-haired barbarians came to one of our southern seaports and requested permission to trade. This being refused, the strangers begged to be allowed the use of so much ground as they could cover with a carpet, for the purpose of drying their goods. Their petition was granted; and, taking the carpet by the corners, they stretched it until there was room for a large body of men, who, drawing their swords, took possession of the city." Japan at this period excluded all but the Dutch and the Chinese; but the merchants of those favored nations had to submit to be locked up at night like malefactors. China was more impartial, admitting all comers, and treating all with equal indignity and suspicion. Like Japan, she turned the missionaries out of doors and banished or butchered their converts, lest a religious propaganda should pave the way for political encroachment. The merchants she allowed to re- side at Canton for only a short time in the year; and, with a natural prevision, she objected to their bringing their wives, since that indicated a disposition to stay. The first woman to set this restriction at defiance was the wife of an English super- intendent of trade, and cannon had to be planted before her door to deter the natives from attempting her expulsion. Foreigners were confined to a suburb, and on no account were they permitted to enter the gates of the city. What is more significant is that native scholars were forbidden to teach them the mysteries of the Chinese written language. A teacher en- gaged by Dr. Morrison, the first English missionary, always car- ried poison, so as to be able by suicide to escape the clutches FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 21 of the mandarins should he fall into their hands on the charge of being guilty of so heinous a crime. The reign of terror was somewhat mitigated when a teacher in the employ of Dr. Wil- liams, one of our earliest American missionaries, was known in his comings and goings to bear in his hand an old shoe, that he might, in an emergency, pass himself off for a cobbler. The conflict that put an end to this cowardly policy bears the malodorous name of the "opium war "; conveying an im- pression that it was waged by England for the sole purpose of compelling the Chinese to keep an open market for that pro- duct of her Indian poppy-fields. Nothing could be more er- roneous. Grievances had been accumulating such as a self- respecting people cannot endure forever. "For one hundred and fifty years, up to the year 1842," says Dr. Williams, "a leading grievance was that proclamations were annually issued by the government accusing foreigners of horrible crimes." In 1816 a British ambassador had been refused an audience by the emperor because he declined to do homage by performing the Koto, or Nine Prostrations. In 1834 Lord Napier, Brit- ish superintendent of trade, was not only denied an interview with the governor of Canton, but his letters were rejected be- cause they were not stamped with the word pin ("petition"), a word which in Chinese expresses abject inferiority. Either of these indignities—not to enumerate others—might have fur- nished ground for a just war; and if England had promptly appealed to arms to prevent violence and vindicate honor, her record would have stood fairer than unhappily it does now. Interest had to combine with indignation before she could be roused to action. Her opportunity, however, came when the Emperor Tao- kwang despatched a high commissioner to Canton to fill the office of viceroy and put a stop to the traffic in opium. The drug was already contraband by imperial decree; England had made no protest; nor would she have lifted a finger to pro- 22 A CYCLE OF CATHAY tect her people in their smuggling trade if Chinese cruisers had driven them from the coast. But when Commissioner Lin is- sued commands to the Queen as a vassal of China, and treated her subjects with unjustifiable violence, the question entered upon another phase. The opium was stored on ships that lay outside among the islands, but its owners were at Canton. Without taking the trouble to identify them, the commissioner surrounded the factories with a cordon of soldiers and threat- ened the whole foreign colony with death if their opium was not surrendered by a fixed date. To give them an idea of what they had to expect, a native opium-smuggler had shortly before been put to death in an open spot in front of the factories. Captain Elliot, the superintendent of trade, who was at Macao, hearing of these high-handed proceedings, hastened to Canton to share the perils of his countrymen. Without him- self having the least sympathy with their illicit commerce, he called upon them to deliver their opium to him for the service of the Queen, and then handed it over to the viceroy as a ran- som for British lives. Over twenty thousand chests, valued at nine million dollars, were then destroyed by mixing the drug with quicklime and pouring it into the river. This property having been demanded by her representative for her service, the Queen was pledged to see that the owners were indemni- fied. An order in council authorized reprisals, to compel the Chinese to make amends for their act of spoliation. Thus began a war which was more fortunate for England than that which followed the destruction of her tea in Boston harbor. After many battles, in all of which the Chinese were worsted, it ended in the treaty of 1842, by which the five ports of Can- ton, Amoy, Fuchau, Ningpo, and Shanghai were opened to British trade. Not a word was inserted in the treaty in favor of the trade in opium; yet the result was, as foreseen, a com- plete immunity from interference; and the traffic flourished be- FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 23 yond measure, the traders having nothing to fear and no duties to pay. Had England, after exacting due reparation, intro- duced a prohibition clause, there can be no doubt that China might have been freed from a terrible scourge. What a con- trast between her opium policy and her antislavery legislation! In the treaties which followed with France and the United States (1844) the subject of opium was likewise ignored. Had Mr. dishing at that early date placed the abominable traffic under the ban of the law, and induced France to do likewise, the moral effect could not have failed to be excellent. But when Mr. Angell condemned it in his treaty, nearly forty years later, it was then too late. At the instance of the French min- ister, the persecuting edicts were withdrawn, Christian exiles were recalled from banishment, and the propagation of the faith was formally sanctioned. Roman Catholic missionaries had never ceased to carry on a secret propaganda, but they now entered the country in greater numbers, and Protestants began to establish themselves in the "open ports." Such was the state of things at the date of my arrival. While waiting for our vessel we made a visit to Canton. A small steamer carried us across the bay and forty miles up the Pearl River to a landing-place in a suburb of the great city. Our host, Dr. Happer, was there to receive us, and we made our way to his house through a forest of junks, in a small boat sculled by a large-footed woman—a fine specimen of nature undeformed. It was the abode of a family, who crowded themselves into a stern cabin, leaving for the use of passengers the front cabin, which was neatly spread with matting and adorned with flowers. Babies born on these boats are aquatic by early habit, if not by instinct. It is said that they can swim when first thrown into the water; but, in case of accident, they always have a joint of bamboo strapped on the back, to en- able their parents to fish them up. The river population would alone suffice to people a considerable city. It consists of three A CYCLE OF CATHAY classes: the crews of junks that come and go; those who live and make their living on the river; and those who do business on land but lodge in boats for the want of a pied-a-terre. Among the boats moored to the shore a large number are richly curtained and ornamented with beautiful carvings. These are the so-called "flower-boats," mostly the abode of bedizened Cyprians, who are enrolled by the police and recognized as pursuing a lawful calling. The legal sanction of vice always indicates a low standard of morality. As we stepped on shore we were greeted by a hooting crowd, who shouted Fanqui, fanqui! shato, shato! (" Foreign devils! cut off their heads!"). "Is this," I mused, "the boasted civ- ilization of China? Are these the people for whom I left my home?" But, I reflected, if they were not heathen, why should I have come? They looked as savage and as fierce as canni- bals—the junkmen being always half-naked. Not long before this Dr. Ball, an old missionary, being thrown into the water by the overturning of a boat, caught the cable of a junk and called for help. He was soon surrounded by a number of small craft, but not one of their greedy occupants would take him ashore until a promise of twenty dollars had been extorted. Whether that is to be set down to hostility or to cupidity, I leave the reader to decide. Canton having been held to ransom instead of being taken by British troops in the first war, the native insolence of the people was in no degree abated. They even pretended that their assailants were driven away; and it is said they erected a monument to commemorate their victory! In the second war, which occurred in 1857, the Allies, now grown wiser, took good care to occupy the city. A great change was visible in the disposition of the inhabitants; but a generation has passed since then, and they now seem to need another lesson. I observed that the heads of the men were covered with a coat of short frowzy hair, in striking contrast with the shining FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 25 scalps we had seen in Hong Kong. The difference was due to the recent death of the Emperor Taokwang, for whom a rigid mourning of a hundred days was exacted of all under the scep- ter of China. In ordinary times, for a Chinese to let his hair grow is to risk his head; nor is it less perilous to shave it dur- ing a period of mourning. After the death of the Emperor Tungchih, in 1874, an officer in Yunnan was cashiered for call- ing his barber a few days too soon. The cue and the tonsure are emblems of subjection imposed on the men by their Tartar conquerors two hundred and fifty years ago. They did not, however, interfere with the women, who, uninfluenced by the ladies of the court, persist in compressing their feet and in dress- ing their hair in a style different from that of the Manchus. The whimsical fashion which condemns Chinese women to totter on their tiptoes is said in the Kingyuen, or "Mirror of Research," to have originated between 300 and 500 a.d.; but native scholars generally maintain that the custom sprang from emulation of Lady Yang—a small-footed Cinderella— who bewitched the Emperor Minghuang twelve centuries ago. So light was her step that, Camilla-like, she " skimmed o'er the unbending corn," or, as the Chinese say, "over the tops of golden lilies;" but her imitators have since ceased either to run or to dance. The source of many evils and of no good what- ever—unless it be that of keeping women at home—this usage surpasses anything we meet with in the West as an example of the tyranny of a perverted taste, the passion for a waspish waist or that for a flattened skull not excepted. These are sporadic or tribal; the other is national. For thirty generations have the women of China groaned under the "torture of the boot "—what a pity their daughters are not born with feet of the admired type! Unknown in the days of Confucius, this practice has risen up in defiance of his maxim that "filial piety requires you to preserve your bodily members entire, as you received them from your parents." 26 A CYCLE OF CATHAY Were it connected with Buddhism, its self-inflicted torment would be more intelligible. In no way religious in origin, re- ligion will have to be invoked for its abolition, teaching Chi- nese women the sin of mutilating or distorting the Creator's workmanship and inflicting cruel sufferings on their innocent offspring. When a tortured child shrinks from the ordeal, she is told that she must submit or become the butt of ridicule and be ineligible in the marriage market. The streets, which in hot weather are completely shaded with awnings, are narrow, paved with flagstones, and gay with pen- dent sign-boards, the Chinese characters producing a fine pic- torial effect. When you stop to read them the effect is com- ical. "Righteousness and Peace," "Benevolence and Jus- tice," " Unselfish Generosity," " Friendship and Fidelity," and a hundred other high-sounding combinations are employed to set forth the virtues of the proprietors. One likes to see prominence given to the moral sentiments, but the suggestion of a differ- ence between profession and practice is not agreeable. The wall which incloses the city proper is of stone, and, were it not hidden by houses, forms a feature in a landscape in which the only other objects that can be called picturesque are an occa- sional pagoda, two noble rivers, and the White Cloud Hills, seen in the distance. The population of city and suburbs is about one million. The foreign factories, or residence of the mercantile colony, we found were in a crowded suburb, near one of the gates; but after the second war they were removed to a pretty island in the river called Shamien. How happens it, it may be asked, that a large city like Can- ton is situated so far from the river's mouth? The same pecu- liarity is to be remarked in the case of all Chinese cities on rivers emptying into the sea. Does it not show that inland trade has been to them a more important factor than ocean commerce? Or were they placed at a distance from the sea- MUST GLIMPSES OF CHINA %1 board to be out of the reach of pirates? So rife was piracy in the reign of Kanghi (1662-1723) that he ordered the whole population to remove inland, to the distance of thirty li, or ten miles, in order to starve out the freebooters. During our ten days' sojourn we made the acquaintance of a number of persons who have left their impress on the course of events in China. The then British consul was Dr. (after- ward Sir John) Bowring, governor of Hong Kong—poet and linguist. His best-known verses are the missionary hymns, "Watchman, tell us of the night," and "In the cross of Christ I glory," both so full of faith and fervor that one would hardly suspect their author of being a Unitarian. Presenting a letter from one of his American cousins, Miss Maylin, a friend of my wife, we were invited to breakfast at the consulate. We met there the captain of a British man- of-war, to whom, as well as to us, Dr. Bowring expatiated on the principles of the Peace Society. He maintained that all wars might be avoided; and, in proof of the radical kindliness of human nature, he told us that he had succeeded in walking around the city, from the interior of which foreigners were not only excluded, but in the neighborhood of which they could not go about with safety. A gang of roughs opposed his pas- sage with stones in their hands, but they laughed and dropped their missiles when he addressed them in their own tongue. Who could have imagined that this apostle of peace would be the author of the next war! Dr. Peter Parker was in charge of a hospital which he had conducted for many years. He called it an ophthalmic hos- pital, because the skilled treatment of the eye made then, as it still does, the deepest impression on the Chinese. The hos- pital walls, however, were embellished with drawings of cap- ital operations in more than one department of surgery. The first sermon I heard in Chinese was from Dr. Parker's lips, ad- dressed to a crowd who were waiting for the moving of the 28 A CYCLE OF CAM AY waters. He afterward became United States minister, retired to Washington, and closed his days in a sumptuous dwelling near the Presidential mansion. His fame, however, rests on his work as a pioneer of medical missions. Still more distinguished was the career of Dr. S. Wells Wil- liams. Missionary, diplomatist, and sinologue, his life was many-sided, and in every situation he displayed a phenomenal power of systematic industry. Beginning as a printer to the American Board Mission, and entering the diplomatic service only when his printing-office had been destroyed in a confla- gration of the foreign settlement, he closed his life in China by being charge d'affaires for the ninth time. The government might have honored itself by making him minister. "The fact is," said Secretary Seward, when asked why it had not done so, "we have found him indispensable as a secretary of lega- tion." Ministers might come and go, but he remained to pilot the new-comers and aid each by his wisdom and experience. Much as he was able to accomplish in the service of the gov- ernment, he has done more as an author. Not to speak of minor publications, his " Middle Kingdom" is a storehouse of infor- mation on China not likely soon to be superseded. More prob- lematical is the future of his "Chinese Dictionary," which, de- spite its many merits, can hardly hope for permanence with- out a thorough revision by some one familiar with the dialects of the North. Each of these works is broad enough for the pedestal of a first-class reputation. It must be remembered that the former was produced while he was engaged as a mis- sionary, and the latter in such moments as he could snatch from his duties at the legation. "Here is a new page to be written for eternity," he said to me one morning during our negotia- tions in Tientsin. Such was his habitual feeling: each day was a divine gift to be accounted for: hence his conscientious in- dustry. Besides contributing much to the opening of China, Dr. Williams had a hand in the opening of Japan, having learned FIKST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 29 the language from some shipwrecked natives, and accompanied Commodore Perry as interpreter in his expedition to those isl- ands. I shall have frequent occasion to refer to him in the sequel. The Rev. William Burns, of Scotland, a prominent saint in the missionary calendar, I reserve to be noticed in connection with Peking. The Rev. A. P. Happer, M.D., our host, was already a man of note. Trained for medical service, he directed his energies chiefly to educational work and the translation of books. His monument is the Christian college at Canton. From the date of this visit to the close of his life, in 1894, he was my friend and correspondent. His last letter to me, perhaps the last he ever sent to any one, was dictated from his pillow on the day of his decease. The Rev. Issachar Roberts, uncouth and eccentric, then gave no indication of the part he was to play in the great events of the near future; for it was he on whom fell the responsibility of giving shape to the religious element in the Tai-ping rebel- lion—a movement which but for foreign interference would have placed his pupil on the throne of China. With his un- couthness Bishop Smith had been so impressed that he took him as an example of the kind of man who ought not to be sent out, adding, however, the pious reflection, "Yet who knows but that God may have something for him to do? for he often chooses weak things to confound the mighty." "This sen- tence," said the bishop, speaking to me long afterward, " Rob- erts accepted as a prophecy, and bound it as a crown of glory on his head at a time when he had become famous as the teacher of a possible emperor." An instance of Mr. Roberts's eccentricity is worth telling. A young missionary, in a fit of melancholy, attempted suicide, and when discovered was slowly bleeding to death. A young woman, perhaps the innocent cause of the tragedy, ran to the nearest chapel and besought Mr. Rob- 3° A CYCLE OF CATHAY erts to come to the succor of the dying man. "Let the dead bury their dead, but I must preach the gospel," he replied, and proceeded to preach as if nothing had happened. Before leaving Canton we visited the gardens of Howqua, one of the thirteen hong merchants who, prior to the era of the treaties, held a monopoly of foreign trade. They were situ- ated on the opposite bank of the river, in a locality that bore the appropriate name of Fati (" Land of Flowers"). Though extensive, and abounding in strange forms of vegetation, they did not in the least resemble the " Leasowes" of Shenstone or the gardens of Alcinous—making no attempt at landscape be- yond heaps of rockwork, which resembled mountain scenery as much as a brick resembles a house. Rows of evergreens, THE GARDENER AT WORK. twisted into the shapes of birds and beasts, gave us the first example of a form of bad taste peculiarly Chinese. The sum- mer residence of the proprietor was crammed with curious fur- niture, one room being set apart for a collection of clocks of every pattern and principle. It was a museum, not a home. FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 3> On our return trip we touched at Macao, a Portuguese set- tlement built on a peninsula walled off from the mainland, and called, for some reason to me unknown, the " Holy City." One sacred thing which it contains is a grotto, where, it is said, Camoens composed some cantos of the Lusiad, the immortal epic in which he celebrates Vasco da Gama and the opening of the East. For three centuries Macao had thriven on a foreign trade, which it shared with Canton; but it is now overshadowed by Hong Kong and slowly falling to decay. Formerly the Por- tuguese paid the Chinese government a nominal ground-rent of six hundred ounces of silver. But they have now ceased to pay this trifling tribute and obtained a formal recognition of their territorial sovereignty—subject to the proviso that they shall not transfer the colony to any other power without the consent of China. As the Portuguese in Africa were the last Europeans to abandon the trade in negro slaves, those in China have been the last to renounce the profits of the new slave-trade—the traffic in Chinese coolies. Driven from Hong Kong by British humanity, that infamous traffic found for some years a refuge in Macao, which it galvanized into temporary prosperity. It was finally suppressed by the stern determination of the Chi- nese government, encouraged by the public sentiment of the West. The most frequent destination of a coolie cargo was Peru or Cuba, the United States never—the spirit of our laws barring the way even prior to any direct legislation against the importation of contract labor. The first law of that class was enacted to preclude the introduction of Chinese coolies. The number actually held in bondage in each of those coun- tries was estimated at between sixty and a hundred thousand. The total embarked for all parts could not have been less than half a million. Most of them mortgaged their liberty without compulsion; but a large proportion were victims of land-sharks, 33 A CYCLE OF CATHAY who bought them from native kidnappers. Stories were rife of those miscreants throwing a strait-jacket over the head of any man or boy whom they might meet on a lonely path. By their depredations whole provinces were kept in a state of panic, and foreigners of every nationality were in danger of suffering for their supposed complicity in the vile traffic. After securing the person of the victim, it remained to ob- tain his consent to embark. Dr. Ashmore thus describes the process: "The coolies were said to enter into the engagement volun- tarily. To ascertain the facts, the speaker visited Macao. The doors of the barracoons were found to be open, as stated; but on either side was stationed a Portuguese, armed with a heavy club, and egress was at the peril of the coolie's life. The con- tract-stand was visited. The coolies were marched up; the con- tract was read in a rapid manner by a Portuguese to a coolie, who probably did not understand a word of it. Then his hand was seized, and the impress of his thumb forcibly made on the paper. 77iis was the voluntary signing of the compact." * The voyage across the Pacific renewed the horrors of the Atlantic "middle passage," aggravated by its greater length. In the African trade, cases of mutiny were rare; but the Chi- nese, made of sterner stuff than the negro, in many instances butchered the white crew, and in not a few others scuttled or burned the ship from either revenge or despair. The follow- ing account of these atrocities I take from a valuable book on "Chinese Immigration," by the Hon. George F. Seward, formerly minister to China: "The American ship ' Waverley,' laden with coolies, put into the port of Manila. Some of the Chinese asked to go ashore. An altercation ensued, in which one Chinaman was shot, and the rest were forced below and the hatches battened down. * "North China Herald," September 6, 1895. FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 33 These were not opened until the next morning, when two hun- dred and fifty-one coolies were found dead! In an outbreak on the ' Canavero,' an Italian ship, the coolies were similarly driven below and the hatches battened down; but, unwilling to perish by suffocation, they set fire to the ship. The crew escaped in boats, and the ship, with her cargo of human beings, was consumed. "Nor were these tragedies exceptional. In March, 1871, Chief Justice Smale, of the Supreme Court of Hong Kong, de- livered a decision in which the character of the Macao coolie- trade was dealt with at length. 'I have endeavored,' he wrote, 'to make up a list of vessels in which there have been coolie risings and destruction of ships. The list is not complete, but I believe that within a short period some six or seven ships, carrying about three thousand coolies, have been burned or otherwise destroyed, with an immense loss of life, including captains and a relatively large proportion of the crews.'" The last ship to carry away such human freight was, I be- lieve, the " Maria Luz." Putting into Yokohama, en route for Peru, one of her victims threw himself into the sea and swam off to a British man-of-war. The captain refused to give the fugitive up. The case became known to the local authorities, and, to its lasting honor, the Japanese government promptly restored the whole cargo to their native land. This was the coup de grace to a gigantic evil. Going one day to the London Mission Hospital in Hong Kong, my eye was arrested by the appearance of a sign-board, inscribed in Hebrew, with the rallying-cry of the Jews: "Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord." Dr. Hirschberg, the physician in charge, himself a Hebrew, had prepared this in the hope of catching the attention of some wandering Jew. It was known that Jews existed in China, as everywhere else, a small colony of them having been discovered by Catholic missionaries. How little did I dream that it was reserved for 34 A CYCLE OF CATHAY me to penetrate to that colony in the far interior, which no European had visited for two centuries! * In Hong Kong I became acquainted with Bishop Smith, the first bishop of the colony, who signed himself "George Vic- toria," from the official name of his see. Many years later, stopping at Hong Kong, we spent portions of two days at his "palace " on the hillside. Our Civil War was then in progress, and he believed that it would issue in the destruction of our Union—a result which he frankly avowed he desired, because we were "growing too great." Dr. Legge, of the London Mission, was a man of stalwart mould. Earnest, indefatigable, and learned, while laboring with zeal and success in school and chapel, he translated the Confucian classics. That achievement obtained for him an appointment as professor in Oxford, where he has occupied his Chinese easy-chair for a score of years, after spending thirty as a missionary in the East. As long as his translations are not superseded, his name will be inseparably linked with that of Confucius. During our stay at Hong Kong a sign-painter one morning climbed up and carefully erased a Chinese inscription over the door of Dr. Legge's church. The doctor had discovered that he had made a mistake in calling God Chenshen (" True Spirit" or " True God ") instead of Shangti (" Supreme Ruler ")! The "term controversy," after sleeping for two centuries, was thus showing signs of a fresh eruption. In the early period of the Roman Catholic missions it had raged with violence. The Jesuits championed Shangti; the Dominicans accused them of idolatry; and the pope ordered that, instead of Shangti, they should use Tienchu (" Lord of Heaven "), a name found in ancient writings as one of eight minor divinities worshiped by the Wall-builder (240 B.C.), but so little known that it was regarded as practically a fresh coinage. • See Part II., Chapter IV. FIRST GLIMPSES OF CHINA 35 That decision was not binding on Protestants, who in trans- lating the Scriptures stirred up the old question. Some thought that the pope had made a mistake in condemning Shangti; some adhered to Tienchu, while others preferred Shen or Chenshen (" God " or " True God "). The missionaries were charged with wasting years in disputing about the name for God before at- tempting to convert the heathen. Such, however, was not the case: each mission went to work with its own chosen terms— and the Spirit of God appears to have shown no marked pref- erence for any, converts being as readily gathered by the use of one term as by another. The controversy has fortunately ceased without the intervention of a pope; but uniformity of usage has not been attained. Will not the native church set- tle it some day by using all three of the disputed terms? Sir John Bowring, to meet the difficulty, suggested that the letter 6, used in Greek MSS. as an abbreviation for Thcos, might be employed as an expressive symbol, the inner stroke represent- ing unity and the circle eternity. It would, he said, be in har- mony with the picture-writing of the Chinese, and each party might pronounce it according to its own shibboleth. But the suggestion fell to the ground, like a flower plucked from its stem, and died without fruit. EXECUTION OF AN OPiUM-SMUGGLER. CHAPTER II VOYAGE UP THE COAST Amoy—Opening of a new church—Fuchau—Buddhism—Civil-service ex- aminations—Fungshui, or geomancy—Missions—A glance at the map ON the 7th of May we embarked on the lorcha " Macao," Captain Jos6 Maria, along with a goodly company of missionaries, who were bound for different points on the coast. The little craft was less than a hundred tons' burden; but that was her least fault—smaller boats have sometimes weathered a storm where larger ones have foundered. She was old and rotten; but, as we were to keep near the shore, there was rea- son to hope that in case of accident we might all escape to land "on broken pieces of the ship." Providentially, no seri- ous harm befell us, though we were once dismasted, and once or twice in imminent danger of being cast away, for want of a pilot who knew the coast. With pirates we happily did not come in contact, though the seas were infested with them. These lorchas, in fact, made a business of pirate-hunting when they were not doing a little buc- caneering on their own account. The cry of " Pirates to lee- ward!" was indeed once raised, and, looking out, we saw a junk surrounded by small boats, and black with people, who were cutting away its sails and cordage. Captain Maria, from sheer habit, ordered his gunners to fire on them, but the shot flew wide of the mark. As we swept by, Dr. Welton, an English 3° VOYAGE UP THE COAST 37 medical missionary bound for Fuchau, shouted out, in great excitement: "Give them another, captain!" We afterward twitted him on his readiness to prescribe iron pills, as well as on his mistaken diagnosis, since the junk, having struck a rock, was not a pirate at all, and the plunderers were wreckers—a very important difference. Touching at Amoy to put off a passenger (Dr. Young, a medical missionary from Scotland), we stopped there four or five days, during which time we were hospitably entertained by the Rev. Alexander Stronach, of the London Missionary Society. On Sunday, attending the dedication of a new chapel belonging to an American mission, I was surprised to see a large and orderly congregation, among whom were a few new con- verts. The Rev. Mr. Doty delivered a fervid discourse, in which the syllables Ap-ek-le-ap-han recurred so frequently that I supposed I had got possession of a very useful phrase. In- quiring as to its meaning, I was told that it was merely the Chinese way of pronouncing "Abraham "! Amoy is a flourishing port, about two hundred miles north of Hong Kong. Its situation is pleasant, and in the harbor there is the island of Kulangsu, then unoccupied, which is now the seat of a foreign colony. Adorned with abodes of wealth and luxury, it shines a gem on the bosom of the waters. Two hun- dred miles farther north we entered the river Min and sailed up to Fuchau, the capital of the province of Fu-kien, where four of our passengers were to find their station. The river is grandly picturesque, reminding one of the Hudson in the vicin- ity of the Catskills, with mountains, however, rising from the banks instead of being visible only in the background. On one side a series of peaks bears the name of Wuhu (" the Five Tigers"), and on the other stands Kushan (" Lone Moun- tain "), famed as the site of a Buddhist monastery. Visiting the monastery, I wrote some rambling verses, of which the first couplet ran: 3» A CYCLE OF CATHAY "The place where I stand is the Creator's shrine, For, above and around, all, all is divine;" and the last: "Yet the ' glory of man ' * is turned into shame, And uttereth naught but an idol's name." The repetition of " Omitofo," a name of Buddha, is the chief part of Buddhist devotion. It is not supposed that the god hears this, having entered Nirvana, a state of unconscious felicity; but it is prescribed in the ritual as a discipline well fitted to withdraw the mind from worldly thoughts. The acme of at- tainment nearest to Nirvana is to think nothing and to feel nothing, in which state the soul will of course enjoy perfect tranquillity. With such a discipline a highly intellectual clergy could hardly be expected. In general, the priests have stolid faces and eyes fixed on vacancy. Most of them are unable to read, the recitation of prayers being their sole duty. No longer doing anything to strengthen or renovate Chinese society, Buddhism clings to it as ivy clings to a crumbling tower, deriving its nourishment from the rottenness of the structure. While at the monastery we were shown a tank full of large fish, which are in no danger from the treacherous hook; also a herd of fat porkers, safe from the butcher's knife. The latter were reserved to die of old age—a fortune so rare for swine that I have never yet heard a statement of the age a pig may reasonably hope to attain. Compassion for brute animals is an amiable feature of Buddhism, as well as of Brahmanism, from which it is derived. With us, a mystic like St. Francis of Assisi may fraternize with beasts and birds, or a poet like Coleridge apostrophize a young ass, "I hail thee, brother." A Buddhist is not sure that the ass may not be his father! The Buddhistic doctrine of metempsychosis indisputably tends to lower the sense of human dignity, and if it conduces * A Hebraism for " the tongue." VOYAGE LT THE COAST 39 in any way (which may be doubted) to the better treatment of lower animals, it does so at the expense of humanity to man. Was not Arjuna, in the Mahabharata, encouraged to slaugh- ter his kindred in the opposing ranks by the suggestion that the "spirit changes bodies as a man doth a garment"? "It neither slays nor is slain; nor is there any essential difference between killing and being killed." As generally held, this doctrine is largely responsible for the prevalence of suicide, leading those who are hopelessly wretched to try their luck on another throw of the dice. Pictorially, the doctrine is represented by a wheel, or urn, from which six streams of life are seen to issue—in- sect, reptile, and fish from its lower half, bird, beast, and man from its upper portion. WHEEL OF FATE. On the hillside was a "hermitage "—not a secluded cottage where some meditative monk, in the shade of flowering creep- ers and soothed by falling waters, might woo the philosophic muse, but a small chamber built of rough stones, without door or window. It was occupied by a devotee, who was doing pen- ance for imaginary sins committed in a former state of exis- tence, and storing up imaginary merit with a view to improv- 4o A CYCLE OF CATHAY ing his condition in the next life. He had been immured for twenty-four years, the stones having been built up around him. They seemed to cut him off from the world; but he was still full of pride and avarice, and continued to carry the world in his heart. He never washed, and was therefore deemed very holy. Other priests shave the entire head; but his locks were allowed to grow, and, naturally, they were "shent with Egypt's plague." His finger-nails, which he was fond of ex- hibiting, looked like filaments of ram's horn or the legs of an octopus; each had a separate sheath of bamboo. Fine ladies in China have nails as long; but they are sheathed in silver. Fuchau, which contains about 700,000 inhabitants, is the capital of the province of Fu-kien, and the chief center for the export of black teas. Standing on an undulating plain twenty- two miles from the sea, it is one of the cleanest and best-built cities to be seen on the coast of China. In order to give us a comprehensive view of it, some of our friends formed a party shelter from heat and a relief from fatigue where horse and car- riage are not available. This sage opinion, the result of experi- ence, was at that time so far from taking shape in my mind A COMMON SEDAN. to make the circuit of the wall, not, as Bow- ring made it at Canton, on the outside, but on the top of the environ- ing structure. We were provided with palan- quins, each borne by two stout coolies; those who affect dignity have usually four. To for- eigners the palanquins are indispensable as a VOYAGE UP THE COAST 41 that I allowed my coolies to carry the empty chair, or "se- dan," as it is called, at my heels all day long, through repug- nance to riding on the necks of my fellow-men. A tramp of ten miles—the walls measure nine—helped me, however, to get over that scruple. Within the inclosure rises a hill, covered with trees and rocks, with here and there a small house hidden in the foliage. This is the palladium of the city, an elevation which draws propi- tious influences from the four winds and pours them down on the people below. The Chinese believe in this sort of geoman- tic influence as firmly as we do in the lightning-rod. They call it fungshui ("wind and water"), from the elements that most frequently form the vehicle for good or evil luck. The notion probably originated in the observation that wind and water have much to do with commercial prosperity. But it has grown into a whole system of superstitious notions, as complex as the cabala and as pernicious as witchcraft. Our treaty contains an allusion to this potent system of evil in a clause which provides that in the purchase of a site for building "the local author- ities shall not interfere unless there be some objections offered on the part of the inhabitants respecting the place." Some years later, English missionaries built on that hill, and the popu- lace became so excited lest their presence might disturb its good influences that they rose en masse, and demolished church, school-house, and dwelling. In Hangchau, a magistrate having died suddenly, his death was believed to have been caused by a mission building on a hillside overlooking the yamen, or official residence. The missionaries were courteously invited to accept another site in exchange, to which they ac- ceded rather than have their houses pulled about their ears. Instances of this kind of courtesy are too numerous to recount, but those just mentioned are sufficient to show what danger lies hidden under the name fungshui. It is a false science, with libraries to expound it and professors to teach it. Nor is any 42 A CYCLE OF CATHAY Chinese bold enough to build a house or dig a grave without calling in a professor to decide whether or not the site is auspicious. Looking over the city, the eye rested on nothing worthy of note in the way of architecture; yet there was one object which it fixed on as illustrating the best side of Chinese civilization. This was the Civil-Service Examination Hall, consisting of low cells, sufficient to accommodate ten thousand students, with larger rooms for examiners, and elevated stages for the police —the whole inclosed with a high wall coped with prickly thorns. Each city, large or small, contains a similar establishment. Not merely may this be taken as characteristic of the educational system of China; there is, in truth, no public education apart from it; for, theoretically, the government encourages educa- tion for no other purpose than to provide itself with a supply of competent officers. To this end public schools are not thought necessary, though a few are endowed by the government, and conducted under official supervision. The essential feature is the motive to study—an impartial offer of honors and emolu- ments to all whose attainments come up to a required standard. That standard is unfortunately defective, consisting of literature without science, and of Chinese literature without any hint of such a thing as literature existing in foreign nations. It, more- over, directs the student exclusively to the imitation of ancient models, and thus interposes an obstacle in the way of progress. Admirable in its grand features, this system is the slow growth of thousands of years; but it needs to be inoculated (as it will be) with ideas from the West to adapt it to the changed con- ditions of modern life. The civil-service examinations; which are gaining ground in England, France, and the United States, are borrowed from the experience of the Chinese empire. Mr. Curzon acknowledges the obligation in this fashion: "A system from whose premonitory symptoms our own country, a tardy convert to Celestial ideas, is beginning to suffer." VOYAGE UP THE COAST 43 England certainly has not suffered from the competitive sys- tem in her Indian civil service, nor in her admirable consular service in China, both of which are supplied from "competi- tion wallas." If she suffers anywhere, it is not from the sys- tem, but from its injudicious application. America, still more tardy in its adoption, is now convinced that it offers the only antidote for the corruptions of the spoils system. Its extension to an ever-widening circle is assured; though I do not suppose that a time will soon come when either our military comman- ders or our cabinet ministers will be chosen in that way. With us the examinations are specialized; in China their weakness is the want of special adaptation. With all their drawbacks, they have done more than anything else to hold China together, and help her to maintain a respectable standard of civilization. So much of haphazard is there in the results of these con- tests that they are made the subject of systematic gambling. That circumstance also causes them to be regarded as a spe- cial arena for providential rewards or punishments. Students who are dubious as to their intellectual equipment are, as the day approaches, especially careful of their moral conduct. In lieu, however, of the weightier matters of the law, they are apt to substitute such humane acts as the rescue of ants that are struggling in the mud, the release of mice caught in a trap, or the restoration to their watery element of fish purchased alive in the market. Any one of these acts, done at the critical moment, inspires immense confidence, and who shall say that it has no effect on the result of the competition? The Manchu quarter, set apart for a garrison of the ruling race, is a feature to be met with in China in only a few impor- tant centers. It proves that the throne, won by the sword two hundred and fifty years ago, must be held by at least a show of force. It offers to the view nothing of particular interest, and the general panorama of city and suburbs consists of what may be seen in any large town of the empire—square miles of A CYCLE OF CATHAK gray tiles, the roofs of low houses, unnumbered arid innumer- able, the long rows of which are parted by paved paths, by courtesy called streets. To find anything picturesque, the eye has to wander away to the blue mountains rising in the. dis- tance, or to the silvery stream winding through a richly cul- tivated valley. The Wan-sue-chiao, or "bridge of ten thousand years," a massive structure of rough granite, was a marvel of primitive engineering. We admired its rude solidity, little dreaming that in a short time it would be carried away by a Hood, after hav- ing braved the fury of the elements for many a century. It was lined with stalls for traders on both sides of the roadway, such as one sees on the bridges of the Arno at Florence. There were Protestant missionaries of four societies laboring at Fuchau, namely, those of the American Board, American Methodist, Church of England, and Swedish Lutheran. The stations of the three former have their ramifications far into the interior, and they have gathered a large following of converts, now a score of thousands, in lieu of the score of individuals whom they counted at the date of our visit. Nor are these all poor and despised. One member of the Methodist Church a few years ago gave ten thousand dollars to found a college; and the natives of the same church organized and supported a mission to Corea. The Swedish Mission was brought to an end by a tragic oc- currence which illustrates one of the perils to which mission- aries are exposed in China. The two missionaries, Fast and Elquist, while returning from the lower anchorage, where they had gone to exchange their bills for silver, were attacked by river-pirates. Fast discharged a pistol, and was either killed or drowned. His companion suffered such a shock that his health gave way and he retired from the field. Nor was this a solitary instance of what, at times, may befall the stranger. The Rev. Walter Lowrie, of the American Presbyterian Board, VOYAGE UP THE COAST 45 was murdered by pirates near Ningpo two or three years ber fore, and some years later the Rev. James Williamson, of the London Mission, was drowned by the same class of social pests in the Grand Canal near Tientsin. . . ;; . . As a mark of progress in the way of material renovation, I may mention that opposite the pagoda anchorage is now to be found an arsenal, naval school, and shipyard, from which a score or more of gunboats have been turned out and equipped. In 1884 the river at that point was the scene of a bloody bat- tle, in which the carnage was all on one side. A French squad- ron of five ships, on the eve of hostilities, and with the inten- tion of opening the ball then and there, entered the harbor and took up a commanding position. The Chinese commander, whom I knew personally, was a shallow, vainglorious civilian. Having eleven gunboats ready to engage them, he allowed them to pass the forts unchallenged, believing that they were wan- tonly leaping into the dragon's jaws; but the French, besides having heavier ships and better gunners, had the advantage of firing the first broadside. This was feebly answered, and when the smoke cleared most of the Chinese vessels were seen to be sinking and their crews struggling in the water. The arsenal was burned, and nine gunboats destroyed, with the loss of a thousand lives. At Fuchau we were entertained by Dr. and Mrs. Caleb Baldwin, of the American Board, who remained there long enough to complete their half-century of missionary life, reap- ing in age what they had sown in youth. After a delightful week on shore, we put to sea again; but on the first day out our lorcha was struck by a squall; her mainmast went over with a crash, and thus fortunately saved her from being capsized. Putting back to refit, we passed five days more with our friends, and then resumed our voyage, arriving at Ningpo on the 26th of June, having spent no less than thirty-five days at sea, grop- ing among the islands and inlets that fringe- the coast-line. 46 A CYCLE OF CATHAY Throughout our voyage the landward view was bounded by a range of hills, rising in places to the dignity of mountains. Their treeless tops and furrowed, sunburnt sides gave no hint of the charming valleys which they inclose, nor of the popu- lous interior to which they serve as a bulwark. Before going ashore to mingle with the people, let us take a rapid survey of the goodly land in which they dwell. Lying very nearly between the same parallels as the eastern half of the United States, China proper covers about an equal area, enjoy- ing a similar range of climate and variety of productions. Her domain is the flower of Asia, as ours is of the American con- tinent. Fronting on one ocean while we look out on two, her coast-line is very extensive, amounting to little less than three thousand miles, after deducting what she has ceded to Russia. Through most of this distance the coast is protected by a broken chain of islands, four of which are something more than specks on the bosom of the sea. Hainan, in the extreme south, is a tropical garden, larger than the State of Connecticut. Its cli- mate is diversified by mountains and valleys, and its interior inhabited by savage tribes perpetually at war with the Chinese on the coast. Much the same description applies to Formosa, the " Isle of Beauty," as it was called by the Portuguese. But in Formosa everything is on a grander scale. The island is two hundred and fifty miles in length by eighty in breadth. It is rich in coal, possesses oil-springs of unknown value, and produces vast quantities of camphor and sugar. With a view to defending it against covetous neighbors, it was lately "admitted into the Union," not as a territory, but as a state or province, one of the twenty-three which constituted the organized portion of the empire. English and Canadian missionaries have succeeded in planting here a large number of flourishing churches, some of which are among the civilized Formosans of the interior, the eastern part of the island being still in the hands of aborig- VOYAGE UP THE COAST 47 inal savages. Since the above was written, this gem of the sea has been transferred to the crown of Japan.* Chusan is an island of great strategic value, commanding a portion of the coast which is studded with inlets and great cities. Fifty miles in circumference, it contains eighteen fertile val- leys, whose productions would supply food for a large colony. The British took possession of it in 1841, and considering its many advantages, it is strange they did not think it worth keeping. The only trace of their transient occupation is a soldier cemetery, with broken gravestones. Dzungming, at the mouth of the Great River, will be described in another chapter. The rivers of China are her glory, and one of them her special "sorrow." To the eye of a physical geographer they tell the whole story of the interior. Their number and magnitude cor- respond to the number and magnitude of the mountain systems, where they take their rise; their volume affords a clue to the area which they drain; and their sedimentary deposit shows the nature of the soil through which they pass. The Pearl River of Canton is navigable for small boats for over a thousand miles, affording one of the best routes of travel to the provinces in the Southwest. The Great River, or Yang-tse (so called from the ancient province of Yangchau, and designated "the Blue " by the French, but never by the Chinese), is in volume the third river of the world. It is without a rival in the popu- lation to which it gives access. Rising in Tibet, it traverses the whole of China, receiving affluents from half the provinces, and pouring into the sea a mass of water many times greater than the Mississippi. If the Nile has made Egypt, the vast plain of central China is the product of the Yang-tse and its northern compeer, the Hoang-Ho. The Hoang-Ho, or Yellow River, reaches the sea after a tortuous course of nearly three * The best account of this fine island is that given by Dr. MacKay in his " From Far Formosa" (New York: Fleming H. Revell Company). 4* A CYCLE OF CATHAY thousand miles from its source in the mountains of Tibet. Everywhere impetuous, it is of little use for navigation, being full of obstructions, and fluctuating in volume from a vast flood, submerging plains and drowning cities, to a rivulet that hides itself between high banks. The ancient Chinese, who introduced civilization and sub- dued the aborigines, entered China from the northwest, follow- ing the course of this river. Their earliest capitals were on its banks, and the states renowned in ancient history were ranged on either side. The valley of the Yang-tse and the whole re- gion to the south continued, up to the Christian era, to be the abode of savage tribes, which were only gradually absorbed and assimilated. The Yellow River is noted for its erratic changes of channel, at one epoch falling into the Yellow Sea on the east, at another finding its way to the Gulf of Pechili. At intervals of centuries it swings, like a huge pendulum, from the one to the other, a distance of five hundred miles; or, dividing itself between the two channels, reduces the province of Shantung, to an island in its enormous delta. In 1852 the river broke its banks and astonished the world by rushing away to the north. In 1889 its vagaries were more unprecedented, as it broke away toward the south and joined its waters to those of the Yang- tse- Kiang. The labor of bringing it back to its northern bed, at a cost of thirteen million dollars, was a triumph of hydraulic engineering, reflecting infinite credit on the perseverance and enterprise of the Chinese people. After a year of unsuccessful effort they called in the aid of modern appliances—the elec- tric light, turning night to day, and a portable railway, trans- porting materials formerly carried on the backs of coolies. In ancient times, as history tells us, these rivers all ran riot; but their wild forces were working for the welfare of genera- tions to come. They are still seemingly toiling to the same end, in driving back the sea and winning fresh fields for the ever-growing population. The rate at which the land is ex- VOYAGE UP THE COAST 49 tended by the action of the rivers has, I believe, no parallel in any other part of the earth. Besides these first-class rivers and their affluents, there are numerous minor streams, from two to five hundred miles in length, which have scooped out harbors on the sea-coast, and which supply them with the products of extensive regions. With the exception of the Central Plain, which is formed by the alluvium of her two great streams, the whole of China is covered by a network of hills, which beautify the landscape and diver- sify the surface of the country. None reaches the snow-line except a single range in Szechuen, where the land rises toward the frontier of Tibet. Mount Ome, in the same province, which rises to the height of 11,000 feet, is sacred to Buddha. The Dragon and Tiger mountains, in Kiangsi, about half that altitude, are sacred to Taoism. The Taishan, in Shantung, is a high place of the state religion; while Wutai, in Chihli, is devoted to Lamaism. Vast and varied are the mineral treasures buried in these mountain masses awaiting the dawn of an enlightened policy to make China one of the richest nations on earth. Except in her outlying dependencies (notably in Manchuria), she has but little gold or silver; but her coal-measures probably exceed those of any nation in the world, assuring to her the elements of power when the mineral resources of Europe are exhausted. The same hills that yield coal and iron contain extensive pro- vision for electric force in their numberless waterfalls. Her population, which is not far short of four hundred millions,* bears witness not only to the fecundity of the people, but to the fertility of her soil and the salubrity of her climate. In the North, millet, wheat, and Indian corn are the principal cereals, * If any one desires to obtain the most reliable information as to the distribution of this immense mass of human life, he will find it in Appen- dix A, together with some amusing facts in regard to the Chinese mode of dealing with their census. Tables relating to trade, etc., are added. 5° A CYCLE OF CATHAY while rice is the staple of central and southern China. Cot- ton and sugar-cane thrive in the South, and tea and silk are cultivated in two thirds of the provinces. Nearly all the fruits of the tropics, as well as those of the temperate zones, flourish in China. Forming a world in herself, and producing all that her people require, she would stand in little need of foreign commerce, were it not for the superior skill of Europeans in the industrial arts. IRRIGATING RICE-FIELDS. CHAPTER III LEARNING THE LANGUAGE Two forms and many dialects—Musical tones —Reducing a dialect to writing—Classical studies—" Pidgin-English" NINGPO, like the other seaports, is not on the sea, but twelve miles inland, at the junction of two streams which form the river Yung; a smaller town, according to Chinese fashion, being situated at the river's mouth. The name does not signify, as generally stated, "peaceful wave," but the " city that gives peace to the waves "; the place being a fortress des- tined to hold sea-robbers in check. The approach to the city is imposing. At the mouth of the river a rocky island, surmounted by a fortified monastery and girt with batteries, bars the entrance. On the northern side stretches the crenelated wall of Chinhai (the " Defense of the Sea "), a district city subordinate to the prefecture of Ningpo. On the other side, a range of hills, green with groves of fir, forms the boundary of a fertile plain, intersected by innumer- able canals, which serve the double purpose of irrigation and transport. All Chinese cities are walled, like those of Europe in the middle ages, suggesting a state of society in which the pred- atory elements are rife. Politically, they are divided into three orders; namely, chief cities of provinces, departments or prefectures, and districts—the last being of three classes: cho, ting, hien; but a more simple division is into mud walls, brick 5" 52 A CYCLE OF CATHAY walls, and stone walls. Ningpo belongs to the latter class; its wall, twenty or thirty feet high and six miles in circuit, con- structed of huge blocks of granite, gray with age and covered with creepers, but still in good repair, wears a venerable aspect, in harmony with the hills that rise in the background. On the top it is broad enough for a carriage drive; but it is never used for that purpose, nor even for walking, except by beggars, sol- diers, and missionaries. In later years, when health required, I hired a soldier's horse and rode on the wall—the narrowness of the streets, unlike those of northern cities, not admitting of equestrian exercise. We were received at Ningpo by the Rev. M. S. Culbertson, who, a few days later, removed to Shanghai to take part in translating the Scriptures, leaving us, in deep water, to sink or swim. We had, it is true, his house to shelter us and his servants to wait on us, but no words in which to express our wants. The first word we learned in the dialect of Ningpo was zaban (" fire-wood "), the cook having brought in a stick to make us understand that he wished to buy some. The next was fanping (" dollar "), which he represented by form- ing his fingers into a ring and pointing to the wood, the connection being sufficiently obvious. A teacher was found for us who knew not a word of English, and our only key to all his lore was the phrase keh-z-soh-go i-sze (" What does that mean? "), with which we were kindly supplied by a mis- sionary friend. Beginning with object-lessons, he said some- thing about wongki, which not being quite clear, he brought in a little dog, saying, ''There it is," and burst into a fit of laughter at the thought that anybody could be so stupid as not to know wongki. Sometimes mimicry sufficed for explanation, as, for instance, when he ran back and forth, puffing and blow- ing, to make us understand that holungtsaw meant a railway train. As this teacher was unequal to the strain of imparting knowledge in this fashion through a whole day, I employed an LEARNING THE LANGUAGE 53 auxiliary, who enabled me to continue my studies in the after- noon and evening. In a few days the mists began to rise, and our further progress, from an irksome task, became a fascinat- ing pastime. My wife was my companion in study, keeping well up in the race until handicapped by family cares. She succeeded, however, in acquiring a good command of the local dialect, and found time to use it in winning to Christ some of the native women. The spoken language of China is divided into a babel of dia- lects: those of the North and West forming one group, based on the Mandarin or court dialect; while those of the Southeast differ as widely as do the languages of southwestern Europe. As French and Spanish took shape under the influence of the original speech of Celt and Vandal, so these dialects point back to aboriginal tribes absorbed by the more civilized Chinese. This conjecture is borne out by the fact of a marked difference in physiognomy, e.g., between high cheek-bones at Fuchau and the oval faces seen at Ningpo. One or two words may suffice to show the extent of these dialectic variations. Man is in Peking Jin; in Shantung, yin; at Shanghai, nieng; at Ningpo, ning; at Fuchau, long; at Canton, yan. Tide is in Peking ch'ao; at Shanghai, dzaw; at Ningpo, dziao; at Swatow, tie. Some of the dialects are soft, others harsh, the Ningpo being among the more mellifluous. So great is this difference that a proverb says: "I'd rather take a scolding at Suchao Than listen to a love-song at Siao [scil., Siaoshan]." Through all the series runs a diatonic scale, with three or at most four tones in the North; a gamut of a full octave in the Southeast; and in the central region, about Ningpo, only one or two tones that require attention. Three of these tones (those heard at Peking) may be illustrated, according to Sir T. F. Wade, by the statement, "James is dead;" the question, 54 A CYCLE OF CATHAY "Is he dead? " and the answer, " He is dead." The difference between ground-nuts and ground nuts (ground in a mill) may also help to comprehend a distinction which it requires an edu- cation to perceive. How essential it is to intelligibility may be gathered from' an experience of an English friend, who once sojourned at Fuchau. After studying the language for a month or two, he one morning directed his cook to buy eigh- teen yangmi, a plum-like fruit, called arbutus. To his surprise the man came home panting under a load of sheep's tails—the heavy fat tails of a certain breed being much prized—and ex- cused himself for being late by saying that he had walked the streets all day, but had only been able to find twelve. They were yangmi, as well as the fruit, but there was a difference in tone. By way of further explanation I may mention the follow- ing: In Peking I one day sent an attendant from the college to the Board of Foreign Affairs, to inquire, as was my wont, which of the Chinese ministers were there. Coming back in a few minutes, he made his report in three syllables, or one syl- lable in three tones: "Hew 2, Hew3, Hew *." Simply this and nothing more; for, as it happened, out of nine members there were only those three present. Why Providence so ordered it I cannot divine, unless it was to supply me with this illustra- tion. The Ningpo dialect being unwritten, and incapable of expression by Chinese characters, which, being ideographic in their nature, have a very uncertain phonetic value, we were re- duced to the necessity of representing it as best we might by some application of the ever-accommodating Roman alphabet. With no book or vocabulary to guide me—the Ningpo mis- sionaries not having published anything of the sort—I was left to form my own system. I took the German, or rather Conti- nental, vowels as the basis, and, with a few modifications, soon arrived at a mode of notation which enabled me to reproduce what I had written down from the lips of my teacher. The LEARNING THE LANGUAGE 55 idea struck me of teaching him to write in the same way; and this was easily done, as we had got a new teacher of quick ap- prehension, by the name of Lu. In a day or two he was able to write separate words, and a week later I received from him a neatly written note inviting us to take a " tiffin," or noonday meal, at his house. Its lucidity and simplicity delighted me, and I exhibited it rather ostentatiously at the breakfast-table. A missionary physician, who had been seven years at the sta- tion and held the post of Sir Oracle, withered me with the sneer that if he had taught a native to produce such a thing as that he "should not think he had done a haoze" or work of merit. I next showed it to Messrs. Cobbold, Russell, and Gough, of the English Church Mission, visiting each in succession and ex- plaining the system by which I proposed to teach the natives to write with Roman letters. They received me with the warm- est sympathy ; admitted the full force of the fact that one native had been taught to write in this way, and drew from it all the consequences which it seemed to justify. Before the sun had set on that to me memorable day, in January, 1851, we had formed a society for the purpose of fixing a definitive system for the writing of the " Ningpo colloquial." Other missionaries fell in with the movement one by one, and, last of all, the good doctor who had given my overture such an ungracious recep- tion made amends by zealous and fruitful cooperation. The next step was the preparation and printing of books. Causing a set of letters to be engraved on separate pieces of horn, I taught a young man to use them in stamping the pages of a primer. This was roughly engraved on wood, in the Chi- nese manner, called "block-printing," and deserves to be men- tioned as the germ of a new literature, which, though restricted as yet to the use of the missions in that region, has proved itself highly beneficial. The Chinese saw with astonishment their children taught to read in a few days, instead of spending years in painful toil, 56 A CYCLE OF CATHAY as they must with the native characters. Old women of three- score and ten, and illiterate servants and laborers, on their con- version, found by this means their eyes opened to read in their own tongue wherein they were born the wonderful works of God. So manifest were the advantages of the new system that at one time I imagined it would spread among the non-Chris- tian Chinese. Up to the present date this expectation has not, however, been realized, but a similar experiment has been suc- cessfully tried at Amoy and Shanghai. It ought to be tried on the Mandarin dialect, which is current through more than half the empire, though, this being written with Chinese characters, there is no urgent necessity for seek- ing another vehicle. If the experiment were satisfactory—and it could hardly be otherwise—who knows but some enlightened emperor might give it countenance, and make the Chinese lan- guage, as written with Roman characters, a medium for pub- lic instruction? Indeed, the Mongol Kublai Khan is said to have attempted something of the sort; but for success in such an undertaking imperial power is not the sole requisite. The Ningpo dialect, though pleasant to the ear and easy of acquisition, is limited in territorial extent, being confined to a radius of fifty miles and a population of one or two millions, of whom three hundred thousand live in the city and suburbs. In the South it shades off through cognate dialects into the poly tonic group of Fu-kien; and in the North and West into the harsher aspirations of the Mandarin family. In applying our new mode of writing, each syllable is divided into initial and final, the syllable ning being, for instance, spelled n-ing; hang, h-ang; long, l-ong, etc.; the final, in every case, being regarded as a simple vowel, like a in ba. The new alphabet consists, therefore, of a series of initials and finals, less than fifty in number, and when these are acquired their combination in spelling is as simple as a word of two let- ters. This ingenious simplification was introduced by Messrs. LEARNING THE LANGUAGE 57 Cobbold and Russell, who borrowed it from a rough kind of spelling found in Chinese dictionaries, for which the Chinese in turn are indebted to the Buddhists of India. The Emperor Kanghi, in his personal memoirs, prides himself on its intro- duction. Here are two lines of an ode for children, written by Dr. McCartee, and printed in the Roman letter (the sylla- bles are numbered to aid comparison): "Lae ng-la keh-pan siao-siao nying, 123 45 Ngo iao tch ng-la wo ih sing." 123 4567 "Come, all ye little ones, I pray; 13245 I have a word to you to say." 136734 5 One of the most useful books prepared in the colloquial tongue was a hymn-book compiled by the Rev. H. V. Rankin. I contributed two or three hymns, that continue to be favorites; but the majority were made by my brother, who was gifted with a rare facility in versification. To learn to speak the Ningpo, or indeed any dialect of Chinese, is a simple affair in compari- son with the reading of the learned language as it is found in the native books. Addressed to the eye rather than to the ear, this learned style is, as Dr. Medhurst said, an occulage, not a language. Its words, of which five or six thousand are in com- mon use, are represented each by a distinct symbol. So arbi- trary and vague are the relations between them as to make any system of classification incomplete, and convert the task of ac- quisition into a dead lift of memory. It began in picture-writ- ing, but, like the Egyptian, soon passed into a phonetic stage, though it remains in a state of arrested development, without an alphabet. With the local dialect I was compelled to begin in order 58 A CYCLE OF CATHAY to put myself in communication with the people, as well as to find my way into the higher mysteries of this ideographic sys- tem, which I shall call the "book-language." In six months I made an attempt at preaching. Mr. Rankin proposing to open the exercises with prayer, I did not object, but said I could hardly ask the Lord to convert anybody by means so feeble. In another six months I had acquired a free command of a pretty large vocabulary. In the third half-year was composed my first and perhaps my best hymn, beginning, To dzing todzing Tien- Vu Tsing-jing. One objection to the new mode of writing the colloquial was its tendency to divert missionaries from the study of the ancient books. On others it may have had that effect, but not on me. Within three months of my arrival, i.e., as soon as I could under- stand the explanations of a native teacher, I applied myself with vigor to the study of the book-language. From religious tracts and native story-books, I entered on the classics, completing within the first five years the reading of the nine chief works which form the basis of Chinese literature. But for distrac- tions, incident to active duty, I might have accomplished this in a shorter time. Within this period I began to employ the learned or classic language for the purpose of composition, and wrote in it the Tien-tao Su-yuen (a book on the Evidences of Christianity), which has been widely circulated and often reprinted both in China and in Japan. It has, I believe, led to the conversion of many among the educated classes. Deo soli gloria! Of the nine classics above referred to, five relate to pre-Con- fucian times, that is, prior to the sixth century B.C. Four con- tain the personal teachings of Confucius and his disciples. Native Christians can hardly be blamed if they discover in these two collections a fanciful analogy to the Five Books of Moses and the Four Gospels, relating, as they do, to something like an earlier and a later dispensation. In contrast, however, with LEARNING THE LANGUAGE 59 our Holy Scriptures, the religious element in them is so faint and feeble as to suggest the aurora borealis rather than the life- giving sunshine. They recognize, under the names of Shangti and Tien, a Supreme Power, who presides over the destinies of men and dispenses rewards and punishments; but they do not inculcate the worship of that august Being. He is conse- quently forgotten by the people, and his place is usurped by idols. Yet so pure are the moral teachings of these ancient writings that no nation, with one exception, ever received from antiquity a more precious heritage. While some of the Sacred Books of the Hindus are unfit for translation, in the Chinese canon there is nothing to offend the most delicate sense of propriety. Referring to the nine works seriatim, I may give a paragraph to each. 1. The " Book of History " consists of fragments (more or less modified by redaction) treating of the first three dynasties; and, prior to the first (B.c. 2200), of a golden age, in which the throne was not strictly hereditary, but the prize of merit— good kings passing over their own offspring to adopt worthier successors. 2. The "Book of Changes," supposed to date from 2800 B.C., is esteemed an abyss of wisdom so profound that no for- eigner (and, some would add, no Chinese) can hope to under- stand it. Without professing to understand it, I have no hesi- tation in saying that, under the guise of science, it is an absurd system of divination, and that it has done more than any other book to impose on the Chinese mind the fetters of obstructive superstition. It is to-day the text-book of fortune-tellers of every description, as it was four thousand years ago. 3. The " Book of Odes," an anthology of primitive poetry, which had its origin from 600 to 1100 B.C. Invaluable as a picture of life and manners, there is little in it to suggest the fire and fancy of the Greek muse, and nothing resembling the sublime poetry of the Hebrews. "You should read the ' Book 6o A CYCLE OF CATHAY of Odes,'" said Confucius to his son, "and you will learn the names of many birds, beasts, and vegetables." 4. The " Annals of Lu," compiled by Confucius, and charm- ingly amplified by his disciple Tso. This work is the recog- nized model for historic composition. 5. The "Book of Rites," a collection of court etiquette, social usages, and religious ritual, which has had a great in- fluence in moulding the manners of the Chinese people. It has made them the most ceremonious nation on earth. The later collection, called the Four Books, is the New Tes- tament of China, though it resembles the Talmud rather than the Gospels. 1. The "Analects or Sayings of Confucius," which form the most important part of it, are so wise and good that many of them have passed into the current language in the form of proverbs. The Sage's most remarkable utterance is a negative statement of the golden rule—answering exactly to that given in the Book of Tobit, iv. 16* 2. The " Great Study "—instructions for rulers how to ac- complish the "renovation of their people." They are taught to begin by "renewing themselves " after the example of a good emperor who inscribed on his wash-basin the words: "Daily renew thyself." With such precepts and such examples, is it not strange that social regeneration is the last thing desifed by the Chinese? 3. The "Just Mean." This is a theory of virtue, as the mean between extremes of excess and defect—eloquently set forth by the Sage's grandson, for whom the Sage himself serves as a perfect model. 4. "Discourses of Mencius," the St. Paul of the Confucian school, who, bom a hundred and eighty years later than Con- fucius, revived his doctrines and gave them currency. He preached the principles of his master with the zeal of an apos- * Quod ab alio oderis, vide nt tu alteri facias. LEARNING THE LANGUAGE 61 tie, and rebuked vice in high places with the courage of a Hebrew prophet. Building on this fair foundation, the Chinese have, in the course of twenty-three centuries, erected a magnificent struc- ture. Its leading sections are: 1. Histories vast in extent and containing an unparalleled wealth of recorded facts. India has nothing to compare with- them. 2. Philosophers, acute and daring in speculation, but by no means scientific in method. 3. Poets, nearly all of the lyric order, some of whom may challenge comparison with those of Greece or Rome. 4. Novelists, who developed the modern novel a thousand years before its appearance in our horizon. Will not this colossal literature, in which is mirrored the life of one of the grandest divisions of the human race, some day' claim a place in our seats of learning? The following will serve to exemplify the origin of Chinese writing, and the manner in which pictures of objects came to ex* press attributes. TABLE OF CHINESE CHARACTERS. 9Ji, the sun, its outline proving that the Chinese knew how to square the circle a long time ago. Does not the dot inside indicate that there are spots on the sun, a fact which the Chinese were among the first to observe? -a Yuih, the moon, not taken at the full, because that might El be confused with the sun, but in her ordinary state of incompleteness, the curved lines, as in other characters, being made angular to suit the modern pencil. Jf Jin, man, the prince of bipeds, his head being omitted as of no great importance. Muh, a tree or wood, its branches, by the rule of con- traries, turning down instead of up. 6a A CYCLE OF CATHAY CM, a wheeled vehicle. Seen from above, the wheels are projected as lines, and the body as a square. Ming, bright; an idea suggested by combining the two brightest objects. Mun, a gate. Kung, a bow. Kou, mouth. Tan, morning; from the sun rising out of the sea. ^ Sih, evening; from the moon, slightly varied. Cn'iu, prisoner; a man shut up by four walls. Lin, grove, forest; from trees standing together. Kin, to forbid; from two trees and the verb "to show." Lan, to desire or covet; a woman under two trees. This and the preceding, say the Jesuit fathers, point back to the garden of Eden! Kia, family; a pig under shelter, as a sign of settled life, j^j^ Wen, to ask. j^j^ Wen, to hear. These last, like most Chinese characters, consist of two parts, a phonetic and a radical; the former giving the approxi- mate sound, the latter the sense in general. In one is a mouth, LEARNING THE LANGUAGE 63 in the other an ear, to differentiate the meaning of similar sounds now marked by different tones, but anciently identical. Yin, to draw or lead, as a string does a bow. Hung, to rumble or roar, like many chariots; hence, to bombard. These examples afford a hint of the charm attaching to the study of Chinese characters; tracing them from the simple germ of object-pictures through the complex combinations by which they form all the parts of speech and express all the concepts of the mind. But I am here not writing a grammar or a lexicon. One day a Chinaman addressed me on this wise: "Assay! spose wanchee tail pidgin?" Here was a lingo I had never learned. What could he mean? Had he pigeons for sale? They count fish by the tail as we count cows by the head— did they count birds in the same way? By dint of question- ing I found out that he desired to know whether I had any work for a tailor: "I say! suppose you want tailor business done, here I am." He was speaking "pidgin-English," a lingua franca much employed in the open ports as a substitute for Chinese. It grew up at Canton from the practice of learn- ing English without a master—the little manuals prepared by the natives giving sounds incorrectly and syntax not at all. The following specimens may help the reader to form an idea of it; but should any one go to China he will find to his cost that pidgin-English, like any other language, requires time and attention to speak it correctly, not to say with ele- gance. Master (hearing music in next house). Boy! what for makee too muchee bobbery that side? 64 A CYCLE OF CATHAY Servant. He cachee one piecee bull chilo (he is celebrating the birth of a son). Master. That piecee boat, what for have got eye? Servant. No got eye, how can see? No can see, how can sabby {know the way)? (N. B. All Chinese junks are pro- vided with eyes.) Master (concerned for the spiritual welfare of the heathen). Spose you learn joss pidgin (religion) all right: be number one, good man; makee die can go topside (to heaven) chopchop (quickly). The British and Foreign Bible Society have published the Scriptures in the negro-English of Jamaica; will they not consider the advisability of giving the Chinese an edition in pidgin-English? Here is a verse of Longfellow's "Excelsior," which will serve to show its adaptation to psalmody: "That nightee time begin chop-chop. One young man walkee; no can stop. Maskee de snow; maskee de ice! He carry flag wid chop so nice— Topside galow." CHAPTER IV SCENES IN NINGPO The new church—Natives seeking a lost soul—Well disposed; why ?— Study of Mandarin — Tried converts — Chapel preaching—Casting out a devil—Idol processions—Theatricals for the gods—The Chinese drama—Eyeless deities — Releasing a prisoner — Military antics N the river-bank opposite the city stood a row of pretty V./ bungalows—dwellings and schools of the Presbyterian Mission. The site was breezy and supposed to be healthier than the interior of the city; yet, when the question of a house for myself and family came up, I decided in favor of the city. I wished to be near the people; the English Church mission- aries were there; and what they could stand, we could. My colleagues remonstrated, and refused to build us a house within the walls; but my wife and I, not to be turned from our pur- pose, agreed to accept a small building attached to our new church, intended for a native catechist. There I spent six years, the most fruitful of my life; and there I came to know the people as I could not had I been content to view them at a distance. The church was erected by the joint contribution of a "Brother and Sister," the Lenoxes of New York. Its foun- dations were laid about the time of our arrival, and I took my turn with other members of the mission in standing as watch- man on the walls of Zion, to see that our Chinese contractors did not fill in with wood, hay, and stubble, instead of solid brick. 66 A CYCLE OF CATHAY This edifice, designed by the Rev. M. S. Culbertson, having a handsome portico with Corinthian columns, excited so pow- erfully the curiosity of the natives that an enterprising artist found it worth while to circulate a representation of it engraved on wood, and labeled the " New Bell-Tower." Crowds came to see it, and when it was nearly completed they were freely admitted to inspect the inside, in order to prevent or allay suspicion. Early one Sunday morning a mob came thundering at our gate, demanding admission to the church. This time they were actuated by motives more serious than curiosity. A weeping mother led the way; and when I inquired what she wanted, she replied that her little boy "had lost his soul in the church the day before, and she wished access to the interior to look for it." The child, who had been playing there, had, on going home, been taken with a sudden fever (from exposure to the sun, perhaps), and was then delirious. In delirium the rational soul is supposed to be absent, and in this case its absence was ascribed to a fright caused by looking up to the height of the edifice, or down from some elevation to which the boy had climbed. The soul, according to the poor woman's belief, was still hovering in the hall like a bewildered bird. Entering the church with a bundle of the boy's garments, they prayed the animula vagula to perch on the bundle and return to its rest- ing-place. This done, they departed, firmly persuaded that they had captured the fugitive soul. The people of Ningpo were well disposed toward us, because, as they said, they had " experienced kind treatment at the hands of the British during the war." The city being occupied after a battle at the mouth of the river, the inhabitants were aston- ished to be protected instead of pillaged. Before the battle they were in mortal terror—in dread of the "red-haired bar- barians," and in equal dread of their own soldiers. They were never tired of telling how Dr. Gutzlaff, formerly a missionary 68 A CYCLE OF CATHAY his mother, a devout Buddhist, who had bitterly opposed his change of faith. "Wait," she said, when her consent was asked, "until I am dead, and then you may burn my bones if you wish; but, while I live, keep clear of the foreign religion." Lu was neither strong nor courageous, but very sincere; and God gave him grace in this instance to break the bond of filial piety, which in China so often stands in the way of piety to God. There is many a would-be convert who says to the mis- sionary: "Suffer me first to go and bury my father." It is pleasing to be able to relate that the son's prayers prevailed, and that the old lady became as zealous for Christ as she had been for Buddha. Two other converts brought into the church about the same time were Dzing and Zia; the former a man whom I employed in the printing of romanized Chinese, the other a friend of his. Both had been devout in their way, leading a life of vir- tue according to their light, and striving to store up merit by the practice of religious rites. The case of Zia merits a fuller notice. Obtaining his first notions of Christianity from his friend, he came to me as an inquirer, but in a frame of mind very different from that of most so-called inquirers. He was pugnacious and acute in argument but withal reasonable, and open to conviction. He came alone, and, Nicodemus-like, at night, bringing with him a written statement of his doubts and queries. One evening, instead of this he handed me a letter addressed to his elder brother, who held a lucrative office at the army headquarters. It ran thus: "For more than three months I have been exam- ining into the religion of Jesus. Having plied the missionary with hard questions, all of which he has answered to my satis- faction, I know that it is true, and I am resolved to be a Chris- tian." His brother made no serious opposition; but the family of his fiancee broke off the engagement without returning the betrothal presents, a circumstance which tested his firmness in SCENES IN NINGPO 6g no small degree, especially, he said, as he "had heard that the young lady was good-looking." More serious yet, his employ- ers (he was clerk in a china-shop) threatened to dismiss him; and, most serious of all, his mother threatened to give him a beating. He manfully withstood this threefold form of temp- tation, sacrificed his bride, gave up his business, and took the beating, rather than renounce Christ. On the morning of his baptism, his mother, failing to move him by threats or entreat- ies, came to beg me, for a mother's sake, to withhold the rite. Without yielding to her request, I succeeded in mollifying her feelings. This bold confessor I put in charge of a school where he pursued a course in Christian theology while instructing his pupils. He subsequently became, and continues to be, one of the most successful of a large circle of native pastors, pos- sessing in a high degree "grace, grit, and gumption," the three qualities which the Rev. Griffith John lays down as essential to the success of a missionary. These young converts had to be examined for admission to a church of which I was not pastor, and their answers touch- ing the mystery of the hypostatic union of persons in the Trin- ity came very near getting their instructor into trouble. Their statements were objected to as smacking of Sabellianism, which in them was imputed to ignorance, but in me was denounced as error. Two members of the Shanghai Mission, hearing of my heresy, addressed me letters of expostulation. One was from my friend Culbertson, and in tone was so moderate and rational that we were able to exchange a good many epistles without exhausting the subject or our stock of good-temper. One advantage of my residence within the walls was the op- portunity it afforded for conducting evening meetings in our city chapels. The smaller of these chapels, with seats for two hundred, was often crowded with an audience consisting mostly of artisans, who after their day's work came in to hear an ex- position of one of our Lord's wonderful parables. As they 7° A CYCLE OF CATHAY went away I more than once heard them say to one another, "That discourse was better than a theatrical." In the larger chapel, or church, as we called it, my audience was more select. It consisted in part of educated men, some of whom were teachers and preachers in the service of other missions. Feeling the want of a work on Christian apologetics or evidences, I resolved to make one, the Tien-tao Su-yuen mentioned in Chapter III. Arranging the topics in my own mind, I made them the subject of my evening discourses—not merely presenting my views, but discussing them with my hear- ers. Each morning I put into shape the matter which had been rendered warm and malleable by the discussion of the previous evening. I followed no authority, translated no page of any text-book, and rarely, if ever, referred to one in the course of my lectures. Matter and form grew out of the occa- sion, the result being a live book, adapted to the taste as well as to the wants of the Chinese. One evening before service, going into a school-room above the chapel, I noticed a rusty sword hanging on the wall. "Whose is it," I asked, "and why is it here?" "It belongs to one of my friends," said the chapel-keeper; "I borrowed it to frighten away an evil spirit. The spirits, I am told, are afraid of a knife that has been stained with human blood." "But what have you to do with evil spirits?" "I am not much troubled in that way myself, but my sis- ter-in-law is grievously tormented by one that pays her a visit every evening. Thinking a devil would not dare to enter the house of God, we brought her in here last night, and hung the sword on the wall." "And did the spirit stay away?" "No, not altogether; but he seemed afraid, and did not vex her much." "No wonder," said I; "your faith was not strong enough. SCENES IN NINGPO 7> You and your sister-in-law ought to have trusted in God and not in a rusty sword." I then went to see the patient, a pretty young woman of twenty-five, and finding that she needed medicine as well as instruction, I gave her a dose of castor-oil. Inquiring a few days later, I was told that the evil spirit had not come again, '' being put to flight by the bad smell of the medicine," as, in the Book of Tobit, Asmodeus flies from the smell of fish-gall. This was my first and last experience in casting out a devil. At Ningpo a divinity much worshiped, because feared, is the thunder-god. While I was there a poet of local repute com- posed a commentary on the ritual for his service—as an expiation for the crime of publishing im- moral verses, and to ward off his dreaded bolts. In all the cities of China ex- cept Peking, idol processions are frequent, and sometimes they are splendid and costly. In the cap- ital they are forbidden, through fear that they might be made to cover an insurrection. Else- where they are occasionally pro- hibited, but for the most part they are encouraged by the officials, as gratifying a taste for spectacles and tending to divert the public mind from politics. At Ningpo the most popular is that in honor of the dragon. An immense effigy of painted silk is borne by hundreds of men, whose heads are con- cealed beneath its scaly folds as they wind through the narrow streets, presenting more the aspect of a huge centipede than the flying monster it is supposed to represent. This is followed by a troop of fairies floating in the air; each fairy being a liv- THE THUNDER-GOD HURLING DEATH- BOLTS. 11 A CYCLE OF CATHAY ing girl, often of great beauty, and gorgeously attired, supported by a framework of wires so contrived as to be invisible. These are followed by all sorts of objects, rare and strange. In one instance a pair of turkeys, borrowed from the British consul, were seen in the parade. By these shows the gods are thought to be propitiated, as also by theatrical performances. Every temple is provided with a stage directly in front of the idols, which are regarded as the chief spectators; though as the meats offered to them provide a feast for the people, so theat- ricals given to the gods are enjoyed gratis by the populace. Spectators are expected to stand, as there are seldom any seats in a temple. Whether they listen depends, therefore, as much on their muscular endurance as on the drawing-power of the troupe. Whether sung like an opera or declaimed, as usual, in a strange dialect, the play would be unintelligible but for the costumes and acting. Still it exercises a strange fas- cination, and, being almost always historical, it serves to teach history and to inculcate virtue, as much as in ancient Greece, where "To purify with pity and with dread, Sage tragedy her moral lesson spread." Lascivious plays are, however, not unknown; and partly on that account, but more because of lewd practices connected with the theater, women are not permitted to appear on the boards or to look at the spectacle. Theatricals in private houses are, however, exempt from official censorship. China has her Garrick and Kemble, but no Siddons or Bernhardt. Worst of all, she has never had a Shakespeare. Few plays possess any literary merit, and, like illegitimate offspring, they live or die unacknowledged by their authors. To the Chinese there would be nothing incredible in the theory that the real Shakespeare was Bacon. So great is the influence of the drama, that Buddhists, like some of the Christian fathers, have SCENES IN NINGPO 73 attempted to make use of it to inculcate their religion. Such plays, it need hardly be said, are too dull to please the public, as they lack the piquancy of vice. In Chinese theaters, even the best appointed, there is no at- tempt at scenic effect, the only outward aid to the imagination being a change of raiment, often effected in full view of the audience. The actor in every case announces himself, and it seems strange to see one who has just been playing the villain strut on to the stage in gorgeous apparel and announce, " I am your humble servant, the emperor "—Hia kwan Hwangtishiye. The young brother of a rich banker one day applied to Mr. Burlingame for the loan of a suit of clothes—explaining that he was going to personate a foreigner. The minister kindly ac- commodated him; but it is doubtful that he would have done so if he had known the role to be played. The foreigner in such cases is not merely the butt of ridicule; he is always beaten in battle; and after being kicked and cuffed, he is chased off the stage amid the vociferous applause of a patriotic crowd. Near the center of the city stood a ruined temple of vast dimensions. Its dilapidated hall retained no trace of its former grandeur except two rows of gigantic idols—nine on either side. These were the eighteen lohan ("arhats"), deified disciples of Buddha. Noticing one day that instead of eyes they had only hollow cavities, "What has become of their eyes?" I asked, turning to a crowd who had gathered about me. "They were made of jewels, and thieves have stolen them," was the reply. "Are these, then, the gods you look to for protection—gods that are incapable of protecting their own eyes?" They laughed heartily at this home thrust, and I proceeded to speak to them of Him who planted the ear, formed the eye, and endowed us with understanding—that we might seek after Him and find Him. Nothing is easier than to make the Chinese laugh at the ab- 74 A CYCLE OF CATHAY surdities of idolatry, nor is anything more difficult than to per- suade them to give their idols up. I have known missionaries who made it a point to provoke merriment by exposing the ridiculous side of idolatry, but I thought they might have made a better impression had they taken it on the pathetic side. Is it not Cowper who says: "'Tis pitiful to court a grin When you should woo a soul"? In the fall of 1853 Shanghai was taken by a body of rebels, not Taipings, but Triads ; a secret society, so called from a form of oath which appeals to Heaven, Earth, and Man, the trinity of powers in the Chinese universe. The event caused much excitement at Ningpo, so near are the two seaports and so intimate their business relations. Everybody at Ningpo was expecting a similar rising, and the authorities were on the look- out for rebel emissaries. One Sunday, just as I was opening our afternoon service, a messenger came to say that a tailor, known to many of our people, had been arrested as a spy, and was about to be led out to execution. No time was to be lost, for executions were not attended with many formalities in those days, though, in normal times, the sanction of the em- peror has to be obtained. Explaining to the congregation that when an ass falls into a pit it is a duty to draw him out on the Sabbath day, and charging them to pray for my suc- cess, I hurried away to see the mayor. He received me cour- teously, and told me that the young man had been examined (doubtless by scourging and suspension by the thumbs, though he did not say so); that no confession had as yet been ob- tained; but that a brass badge had been found on his person, which made it certain that he belonged to a secret society. "Here it is," he added, producing the object with an air of confidence that seemed to say, "Now there's an end of the matter." SCENES IN NINGPO 75 On one side was the image of a woman, with the words, La Fondatrice des Ursulines; on the other the legend, Elk est ma mere. "Is that all?" inquired the magistrate, when I had trans- lated the inscriptions. "Then I may let him go." Scarcely had I time to reach home when the poor fellow appeared under guard and was handed over to me, naked, bruised, and emaciated from ten days of maltreatment. Not far from our house was a parade-ground, to which I sometimes went to see military exercises. Nothing could be more amusing. The performance that ranked highest on the scale was horseback archery. A trench was cut a hundred paces in length, to spare the rider the trouble of guiding his steed. All he had to do was to start him in the trench, prick him to a gallop, and as he passed a target, distant some twenty or thirty paces, let fly his arrow. Mostly the arrows flew wide of the mark—so wide, indeed, that one day I saw a spectator brought down by a shot in the leg. Protected by a high satin boot, not much harm was done; but the occurrence excited as much commotion as if a battle had taken place. Sham fights frequently drew me to the place, and were a favor- ite maneuver. Two lines of troops stood facing each other, one simulating tigers, clad in yellow uniforms with black stripes, their caps duly garnished with ears and bristles; the others, adorned with horns and shining scales, were supposed to rep- resent dragons, though not mounted like our dragoons. At beat of drum they leaped into the air, and closed in combat, howling and roaring. No weapons were used, feats of indi- vidual strength taking their place. He was deemed victorious who could seize an antagonist and drag or carry him away as a prisoner. The combat ended, they further tested their strength by striving, like Ajax, "Some stone's huge weight to throw," 7 6 A CYCLE OF CATHAY or brandishing a sword that might weigh a hundred pounds. Nothing answering to our modern drill had then been intro- duced. The text-book of tactics was still that of Sun Wu, which dates from 550 B.C. Yet these people had seen British soldiers, and been beaten by them! Most of the soldiers had the word " brave" stamped on their breasts, and on their backs as well. A GROUP OF BEGCjAKS. (hEE PAGE 78.) CHAPTER V SCENES AND INCIDENTS A liberal Buddhist — Cunning beggars — Invocation of devils — Impreca- tions and curses — Curious commemorations — Women at a temple — Avatar of rain-god—Chasing the flood-fiend—Evils of opium IN those early days, when impressions were fresh and obser- vation alert, something occurred almost every day to throw light on the character of the people. A few of the more note- worthy incidents I cull for this and the succeeding chapter, leaving them to speak for themselves, without much in the way of comment. In seasons of drought, which occurred pretty frequently, the city was infested by beggars. Official relief was distributed, and the missionaries gave alms as they were able. The abbot of a large Buddhist monastery, a man of learning, who was in the habit of visiting me, came one clay with a naive proposal for cooperation in the work of relieving the poor. "You for- eigners," said he, "have plenty of money; now, there is my temple at your service. Let us fill it with the hungry poor; you will feed them, and such of them as know letters may read your books; those who cannot read can at least repeat our Buddhist prayers." The good man was very sincere, both in his charity and his religion, but in this case he would have had the best of the bargain, as nine out of ten would have spent their time in reciting the name and titles of Buddha. Besides people who suffered from temporary distress, there 77 78 A CYCLE OF CATHAY were a great many professional beggars, who during the day plied their calling as blind, halt, or dumb, and in the evening met together to spend their gleanings, suddenly recovering from their infirmities, as in Victor Hugo's "Cour des Miracles." Mr. Russell, of the English Church Mission, walking on the wall one evening, noticed a comfortable-looking party seated at table. Saluting them in passing, they politely invited him to take a cup of tea. To their surprise he accepted the offer, and, by way of opening a useful conversation, inquired, " What is your noble profession?" "We are beggars," they replied, to his surprise. Mr. Cobbold, of the same mission, was one day accosted by a poor man who asked alms, holding up a bloody hand, which he said had been badly cut by river-pirates, to show that he was unfit for work. The missionary bade him follow to a hospital, which he did in hopes of gaining another penny. When turning away from the door he was gently drawn inside, and the doctor proceeded to dress the wound. The man winced terribly while the bloody bandages were being removed, and most of all when the last rag came away, revealing an arm and hand clean and sound. Cobbold's quick temper was roused, and the beggar carried away a wound, though he had brought none. Such fellows overtax the patience of a saint. It is recorded of Confucius, who was meek as Moses, that he once whacked one of them across the shins with his walking- stick. Among my pensioners was a white-haired man, of near four- score. Falling ill, he was unable to come for his dole, and a younger man, his cousin, was permitted to carry him the daily allowance. At length, suspecting that something was wrong, . I declined to send the dole. The young man declared that . his relative was alive, and promised to bring him on his back, in proof of the fact. The next day he appeared at the usual hour, bearing on his shoulders a white-haired man, who re- SCENES AND INCIDENTS 79 sembled my pensioner as much as sickness resembles health. At first I accepted the claimant as genuine, but as soon as he opened his mouth the deception was apparent. Not a trace remained of the fine teeth of my octogenarian mendicant. I followed the example of Confucius; and the young man, per- sisting in carrying out the fraud, exclaimed, as he bowed his shoulders to the burden: "O my brother, what pains do I en- dure on your account!" One of those poor old men, whom I encouraged to relate some of the experiences of his life, concluded his story of mis- fortune and disappointment thus: "I dream that I am dining with the governor, and wake to find that I am hungry. I dream that I am gathering pearls by the handful; but when I wake, my hands are as empty as my beggar's bowl." How many visions of wealth and grandeur are equally unsubstantial! Begging is one of the pests of China. Buddhism encour- ages it, every priest being supposed to pass through a stage of mendicancy. In every city the beggars form a kind of guild, under the leadership of one who is called their king. By paying a fixed tribute to this potentate, an exemption from their importunities may be purchased. My wife several times attempted to reclaim young beggars, and to introduce them to some reputable industry. Several ran away, preferring their Bohemian existence, but two of them became honest crafts- men. A pretty child one day asked alms, and I replied by bidding him follow me to my door. He trotted after me in expectation of some copper coins, though better things were in prospect if he had only known it; for I was thinking of put- ting him to school or teaching him a trade. But, on looking round, the urchin was gone. Are not faith and patience essen- tial to salvation? Custom allows a mendicant to annoy people until they give at least a copper cash, equal to a tenth of a cent. You may at times see the importunate lay siege to a shop, ring a bell, 8o A CYCLE OF CATHAY blow a horn, or expose unsightly sores, to compel compliance with their demands. Some missionaries refuse to give anything in the street, disapproving of that mode of charity. I always gave, though not from the highest motives: first, to get rid of importunity; second, not to harden my heart by refusal; third, to be seen of men—violating the letter of his precept that I might not injure the cause of Christ by seeming to be uncharita- ble. Once a well-dressed young man, standing with a squad of fellows on a street-corner, thought to amuse them by address- ing me in tones of noisy familiarity. Without turning my head, I tossed him a copper cash, and they roared with laughter. One night my attention was attracted to a religious cere- mony that was going on in the yard of one of our poor neigh- bors. Tables were spread, candles lighted, and with the smoke of incense arose the wail of a wild, weird chant. Leaning over the balustrade of our upper veranda, my ear caught the words: "Oh, all ye dead that have perished by violence—whether slain by the sword, drowned by floods, hanged by cords, or crushed by falling walls—and you, O Li, Me, Wang, Liang [" mischievous sprites "], come to the feast we have spread for your entertainment!" A conflagration had taken place the previous night, and this man, while doing a little salvage on his own account, was hurt or frightened by the falling of burn- ing timbers. As he lay in a state of unconsciousness, his soul was supposed to have been carried away by some of the sprites above referred to. All such are believed to be malevolent. The feast was spread to propitiate them and to secure the re- lease of their victim. When a person dies abroad, the soul is called home to the family cemetery by ceremonies similar to these. Chii Yuen, a gifted poet, being sent into exile, compares his situation to that of such a soul, and writes an ode to solicit the return of the wanderer. The Chao Hwen is one of the most touching elegies in the Chinese language. Some, however, take it liter- SCENES AND INCIDENTS Si ally, and ascribe the composition to his friend Sung Yu, who wrote it, they say, after the suicide of the poet. That sad event, which occurred about 300 B.C., is commemorated by one of the most picturesque observances of the present day. At the festival preceding the summer solstice a leading amusement is a regatta of dragon-boats, so called from their shape and or- naments. Nominally, they go out to search for the body of the dead poet; in reality, to race and make merry. Chii Yuen's poems are a long jeremiad on the degeneracy of his times. They reflect a peevish, melancholy temper, and on reading them one is not surprised that he put an end to himself. The wonder is that he is honored by such a brilliant commemoration. Prince and councilor, his relative, the King of Chu, spurned his advice, whereon, Ahithophel-like, he went and drowned himself. His virtues, talents, and hapless fate are scarcely sufficient to account for the extraordinary honors paid to his memory. An observance very similar in origin occurs in the spring— a three days' curfew; during which no fire is lighted and noth- ing but cold food eaten. Kietue, in whose memory it was in- stituted, lived in the ninth century B.C. He followed an exiled prince for twenty years, and when his master came to the throne, wounded by neglect, he hid himself in a forest. The prince set fire to the forest, and he perished in the flames. The eating of cold food is an impressive mode of recalling his sad fate, resembling somewhat our sacrament of the Lord's Supper; with this difference, that it has nothing sacramental in it, and that its hero never did anything deserving of commemoration. The painted eggs profusely displayed on that occasion remind us of our Easter usages. They are a convenient form of cold food. In a street near the church I one day remarked an old woman railing angrily at a young man who was kneeling on the ground and bowing his head toward her while he muttered 82 A CYCLE OF CATHAY something, to me inaudible. Standing still to study the scene, as did many of the passers-by, I was moved with pity for the lad, who appeared to be so harshly treated, and yet was so re- spectful and penitent. "Just look at that boy," exclaimed the old woman, turning to me; "he is my adopted son. I took him when an infant and cared for all his wants with these old hands. Because I refuse to give him mone'y to squander, the ungrateful wretch is now trying to pray me to death." I then for the first time noticed a stick of incense burning on the ground, and understood that the apparent act of reverence was not to invoke blessings, but a curse. In a little temple on the river-bank I once noticed a woman who was praying with great fervor and energy. Like Hannah of old, she was a "woman of a sorrowful spirit"; unlike Hannah, however, she was not asking for a blessing, but imprecating a curse upon some one who had done her wrong—whether a rival in the affections of her husband, or an exacting creditor, I was unable to make out. The Chinese are prone to curse, but, in lieu of the curse direct, they revile one's ancestors, in this agreeing with the negroes of West Africa. A traveler on the Guinea coast re- lates that, struck with a soft strain chanted by his boatman, he asked his servant what he was saying. "He cussin', sah," replied the boy; "he cuss toder man's fader and moder." It is only from the gospel that men learn to "bless, and curse not." In another temple, not a small one, also on the river-bank, I once saw two or three thousand women reciting prayers to Buddha, on the occasion of a festival. "Why are all the wor- shipers women, and what are they praying for?" I inquired. "They are praying that they may be born into the world as men," was the answer—so unhappy, as well as inferior, are they taught to consider their present condition. Morally, however, they are China's better half—modest, graceful, and SCENES AND INCIDENTS »3 attractive. Intellectually, they are not stupid, but ignorant, left to grow up in a kind of twilight, without the benefit of schools. What they are capable of may be inferred from the fact that, in spite of disadvantages, many of them are found on the roll of honor as poets, historians, and rulers. Some of the brightest minds I ever met in China were those of girls in our mission schools. Woman ignorant has made China Bud- dhist; will not woman educated make her Christian? The national literature needs women to purify it; for while the sacred books are pure, novels and jest-books are unspeakably filthy, which would not be the case if they were expected to pass under the eyes of women. An exception which proves the statement is the Kinku, a collection of stories intended to be read aloud to women in the palace, and these are irreproach- able in point of morals. Not far from our church was the yamen or public office of the city prefect. During a season of intense drought I once saw a long procession of country people enter his courtyard, bearing in their hands branches of green willows, and escort- ing a kind of palanquin or litter woven of willows. "What is the object of this procession? " I inquired of one of the rustics. "We are praying for rain," he replied. "We have caught the dragon-king, and are bringing him to receive the worship of the magistrates. There he is in the palanquin; you can see him for yourself!" There he was, sure enough, in an earthen vessel, swimming in his own element. He was for the nonce a water-lizard, about four inches in length. The people had besought the god to manifest himself, and, going to the sacred pool, the first living form that met their eyes was this miserable amphibian. While I was standing there a carpet was spread on the ground, and the prefect, in full robes, knelt down and worshiped the avatar of the dragon-king. The ceremony was repeated at all the yamens, and the people, as they restored the animal to the 84 A CYCLE OF CATHAY pool, felt that if they did not get rain it would not be for want of respect for the dragon-king. A few years ago, during an overflow of the Peiho, a small snake was captured in the river, and brought to the viceroy, Li Hung Chang, who accepted it as the incarnation of the dragon, and, performing the koto before it, besought it to cause the waters to subside. Sudden and disastrous floods are sup- posed to be caused by a sort of dragon called kiao ("flood- fiend "). In the "Calendar of Hia," one of the oldest books, it is made the duty of a magistrate, at certain seasons, to lead the people out to hunt and destroy the flood-fiend. The mayor of Ningpo conformed to this ancient usage at least once while I was there, and the rustic ^.-^jfc— folk, I was told, finding a black r-***- dog (a black poodle, no doubt) under a stone, took him for the mask of the flood-fiend, and as such put him to death. A cloud-burst on one occasion caused great damage to life and property at Canton; the natives blamed foreigners for having pro- voked the calamity by firing on a dragon as he flew over their set- tlement. Here is a facsimile of a woodcut representing the dra- gon as he appeared incomplete in the clouds when the foreigners im- piously discharged their cannon at him. The letterpress con- tains nothing additional except details of the calamity, for which, it insinuates, the foreigner is to be held responsible. In the " Book of Changes," the oldest of the classics, the dragon is said to represent an emperor. Hence the use of a dragon as an imperial emblem on the national flag, the throne, THE WATMILUNG OR BOD-TAILED DRAGON, FIRED ON BY IMPIOUS FOREIGNERS. SCENES AND INCIDENTS 85 and the vestments of majesty. The dragon myth sprang orig- inally from an imaginary combination of crocodile and boa- constrictor. Is it not curious that the form which the Chinese give to one of their most beneficent deities should be the sym- bol of Satan? * (See Rev. xx. 1,2.) How lamentable that this silly superstition should keep them from acknowledging the blessed and only Potentate, who has not left himself without witness, in that he gives rain from heaven and fruitful seasons! At Ningpo I began to study the effects of opium-smoking, nor was it possible to dismiss the subject as long as I remained in China. The conclusion to which I was brought is, that to the Chinese the practice is an unmitigated curse. Whether it is worse than the abuse of alcohol among us I shall not under- take to decide. The contrast between the effects of the two drugs is remarkable. Liquor makes a man noisy and furious; opium makes him quiet and rational. The drinker commits crime when he has too much; the opium-smoker when he has too little. Drinking is a social vice, and drunkenness a public nuisance; opium-smoking is mostly a private vice, indulged at home; but even in opium-shops it is more offensive to the nose than to the eye or ear. Alcohol imprints on the face a fiery glow; opium, an ashy paleness. Alcoholic drinks bloat and fatten; opium emaciates. A drunkard may work well if kept from his cups; an opium-smoker is good for nothing until he has had his pipe. A drunkard can in most cases cure himself by force of will; the opium habit is a disease, which to break from requires, in all cases, the help of medicine. It takes years for alcohol to reduce a man to slavery; opium rivets its fetters in a few weeks or months. It does not take the place of tobacco, which, used by all classes as a more or less inno- * Not stranger than the change of meaning which Christianity gives to the Greek dtemon, or the different significations of clcsa in India and Persia. 86 A CYCLE OF CATHAY cent indulgence, is indispensable to the opium-smoker; nor does it take the place of alcoholic drinks, which are consumed as much as ever. Even its moderate use unfits a man for most pursuits. A thousand opium-smokers were at one time dis- missed from the army as disqualified for service. In the long run, the insidious drug saps the strength, stupefies the mind, and of course shortens the span of life. Its expense, though great in the aggregate, is nothing in comparison with the loss of time and energy sure to follow in its wake. Most of these general statements, it is proper to say, have exceptions. I have seen men sink into their graves in a few months from the use of the drug; I have known others to use it for thirty years, but not with impunity. An example of the latter sort was a man who entered my service at the age of fifty. He was active and faithful, but died, in spite of medi- cal care, because his stomach was so tanned that it could no longer digest food or medicine. Chenglin, vice-governor of Peking, told me that he had taken to it as an anodyne for grief at the loss of a child. Not long after that he succumbed to a flux which might have been cured by opium had he not been a smoker. Many a bright student have I seen ruined by opium-smok- ing. In the earlier stages of the habit it is usually impossible to detect, but at length it reveals itself. One who was sent to France as interpreter to the Chinese envoy smoked himself to death as a relief from family troubles. When near his end he said his opium-pipe was his only consolation—Man plaisir unique, he called it. Another, emaciated and sallow when he went to Russia, came back after some years fat and flour- ishing. He explained to me that the change was due to the giving up of opium, which, said he, "I was obliged to forego, because it was not to be had." At first the pipe is sought as a source of enjoyment, or an incentive to the passions; in later stages it is taken as a relief from pain. SCENES AND INCIDENTS 8? UriLM-SMUKKK S I k' ',i I ). THE TUNG WEN COLLEGE 319 Again and again had I represented to the cabinet ministers the desirability of engrafting science on the civil-service exami- nations. The grand secretary, Paoyun, replied that it would be easy if once decided on. "If we could only reverse the order of the three trials, making the third first, the work would be done." The third is nominally devoted to science, but so much neglected is it that it has little or no influence on the success of the candidate. Another grand secretary, Shen- kwefen, said in answer to my advice to open schools for science in the provinces, "We shall some day open the civil-service ex- aminations to the sciences. Students will then find masters for themselves just as they do in their literary studies, in which the government rewards proficiency but does not provide schools." In two instances provincial superintendents of education made attempts to introduce the study of mathematics with- out waiting for orders from the throne. As early as 1874 Tufamen, the "grandfather" above referred to, accompanied a superintendent to Hunan as examiner for mathematics, but no candidates offered. In 1885 a call for mathematical papers was sent out by the superintendent of education in Shantung, and a few were received; but nothing short of an imperial de- cree could turn the mind of the empire into a new channel. In this case the measure is so cautiously guarded that the most conservative can hardly object to it, and yet it admits the edge of the wedge. In the end it is sure to bring about an intellec- tual revolution. The object of the college in its primary stage was, as we have said, to supply interpreters; but from oral interpretation to the higher function of interpreting the literature of one peo- ple for the benefit of another is a natural and almost a neces- sary step. When I took charge I organized a corps of trans- lators, consisting of professors and advanced students. It was approved by the Yamen, and provision was made for reward- ing the diligent and successful. A CYCLE OF CATHAY The works translated comprise, not to mention many others, such subjects as international law, political economy, chemis- try, natural philosophy, physical geography, history, French and English codes of law, anatomy, physiology, materia medica, diplomatic and consular guides, etc., most of which have been issued from the college press for gratuitous distribution among the officials of the empire. Such works are a lever which, with such a fulcrum, must move something. If the creator of a science bores an artesian well, does not the translator lay the pipes for irrigation? Many years ago we formed a medical class, which was placed under Dr. Dudgeon, of the London Mission, who was and continues to be the best-known practitioner in the north- ern capital. Laboring, like most medical missionaries, chiefly for the impecunious, the doors of palaces are also open to him. Aequo pulsat pede regum turns, Panperumque tabernas {absit omen!). The Yamen gave him, as I proposed, the title of pro- fessor, and invited him to lecture, but refused to permit our students to receive clinical instruction at the mission hospital. Ten years were thus lost, the lectures amounting to nothing more than the communication of ideas such as ought to form a part of a liberal education. A change of ministry occurring, I again proposed that the class should receive practical instruc- tion at the hospital. The new ministers consented, but they declined to expand the class into a medical school for fear of encroaching on the domain of the Tai-i-Yuen, an effete col- lege of medicine which has charge of the emperor's health and is supposed to possess a monopoly of medical science. "The fact is," said a leading minister, "I do not myself believe in foreign medicine." Hence the want of any provision for the sick and wounded in the late war, a want which had something to do with the shameful discomfiture of the Chinese troops. Of all the sciences, that which he calls "foreign medicine" THE TUNG WEN COLLEGE is destined to effect the speediest conquest. Like telegraph and railway, war will compel its adoption. Soldiers who when wounded are left to perish will not take any risks, especially since Confucius lays it down as the "first of duties to return your body to earth complete as it came from your mother." The viceroy Li, who does believe in foreign medicine, opened a school for military surgery two years ago—too late, however, to be of much service in the war with Japan. Native practi- tioners cover all sorts of wounds with plasters; they never amputate, probably out of deference to the above-cited maxim of their Sage, which requires a soldier to bring home a whole skin. For the same reason they never dissect a human subject, and scarcely know the position of the greater viscera. Yet to cure certain diseases they do not hesitate to drive a needle through the body where it is liable to encounter vital organs. If the patient dies he has the consolation of dying entire. In the treatment of medical diseases an experience of millenniums must have hit on a number of useful remedies by haphazard if not by research or science, but most of their medicines are inert and some of them inexpressibly disgusting. Similia similibus curantur is with them an old saw. A writer in my employ, who was suffering from the itch, calcined a toad and drank the ashes—it being prescribed probably because its warty skin bears some resemblance to the disease. When I was weakened by an obstinate cough one of my students pre- sented me with a pair of bear's paws, assuring me that they are a sovereign remedy to restore strength. For rheumatism he would have given me pills made of the sinews of a deer. "Poison cures poison" is another of their therapeutic laws, which places many a life in jeopardy. Hence serpents and insects that are the most venomous are the most prized. Of this assertion the apologue of the "snake-catcher " * is part proof, and for the other part I have had ocular evidence, hav- * See Chapter VIII. 322 A CYCLE OF CATHAY ing seen them catching scorpions for medicine with lanterns at night among the ruins of old houses. "Dried scorpions" appear in the customs returns of Tientsin, whence they are ex- ported, not to foreign countries, but to other parts of China. They have a queer way of classifying diseases according to the five elements. A writer attached to the United States lega- tion, being taken with fever in one of our expeditions to the North, said that it was caused by "too much wood," and that the best remedy would be "earth." In fact, was he not suf- fering from life on shipboard? and would he not be cured by life on land? For extreme cases they have great faith in medicines derived from the human body. According to Dr. Macgowan, no less than thirty-two of its parts or products enter into the materia medica of the Chinese. The brain, eyes, gall, liver, are spe- cially sought for; and a frightful massacre of foreigners was once caused by a rumor that sisters of charity were decoying little children to be made into medicine. Nor is this merely a superstition of the vulgar. A governor of Jehol (brother of the well-known Chunghau) reported to the throne that a vaga- bond being detected in stealing children's eyes to make into medicine, he had caused him to be summarily decapitated. Some of these drugs are used for magical purposes, for in China magic and medicine go hand in hand. Medical mis- sions are doing much to dispel a superstition so dangerous to the peace of society. They are also striving to raise up a native faculty to supersede the quackery of the old school. Though claiming superiority in the realm of "internal dis- ease," the Chinese are ready enough to concede our skill in "external" or surgical cases. I was once telling a number of mandarins of a marvelous operation performed by Dr. Dudgeon in removing a tumor from a young man's throat. "Oh yes," said the grand secretary, Shen. "I know all about that; the patient was my cousin." THE TUNG WEN COLLEGE 323 Ceremony, not enjoined but spontaneous, was a large ele- ment in our college life. After a vacation each division, clad in festive robes, made a salaam to their own instructor, and all to the president. After leave of absence, long or short, each student came to make his salaam, and the same in more elab- orate fashion on being advanced on the pay-roll or promoted in the mandarinic scale. The most ceremonious people on earth are the Chinese. Their "ancient kings," so the books say, "shook their robes and kept the world in order "—a display of gorgeous vestments and scenic rites impressing their vassals with religious awe. Nor is the ceremonial of a court function less imposing at the present day. Ceremony as an instrument of government runs through the whole framework of society. One of the six departments of state is a board of rites. It includes the duties of a ministry of worship and education, but questions of state ceremony and official etiquette form the subject of its gravest deliberations. On such occasions as imperial funerals or marriages, it issues a program, extending to the size of a volume. That of the sixtieth anniversary of the empress dowager filled two such volumes, covered with red satin, the festive color. A book containing three thousand rules of etiquette is studied at school, so that a well-bred lad always knows how to do the right thing at the right time. He is never embarrassed, but goes through the prescribed forms as a soldier does his drill. For each occasion he has a special dress. On the death of a parent he puts on white, unbleached, unadorned, but he restrains his grief until the robe is properly adjusted—and then he howls. If he chance to meet you on New-Year's morning he offers no salu- tation unless he happens to be in proper costume, apologizing, and promising to come for the purpose suitably attired, inform- ing you even whose robes he expects to borrow. Robes of ceremony are hired for the occasion, and often do duty for 324 A CYCLE OF CATHAY more than one individual. Two or more drive in one cart from house to house, one going in and making his obeisance in full dress, while the others wait their turn at the door. You are amused to see the same tasseled cap and robe of sable reap- pear at intervals of a few minutes with different face and figure. The first of the three thousand rules is, " Let your face and attitude be grave and thoughtful;" the second, "Let your steps be deliberate and regular." Our students, accordingly, deem it undignified to engage in gymnastics, a slow, solemn walk being the only exercise they can be induced to take. For them there are no rough-and-tumble games like foot-ball or cricket. Another rule says, "If rain is coming take it, but do not quicken your pace." A scholar who prided himself on his dignity of carriage once jumped a brook to escape a shower; when finding that a boy had witnessed his performance, he gave him a piece of money and exacted a promise of secrecy. Dignity of carriage is enforced by a costume that impedes motion. A company of civil mandarins, with satin boots, em- broidered vest, cap adorned with a peacock's plume, and button distinctive of rank, would make a sensation in the gayest court of Europe. Among our students all the nine grades are represented ex- cept the first. As they keep their caps on instead of holding them in the lap or stuffing them in their pockets, the hall, filled with one hundred and twenty students on some state occasion, presents a decidedly respectable appearance. Of the gala displays that have occurred in the history of the college none has been more worthy of note than the visit of General Grant in 1878. The college being attached to the Yamen (not as Thomson, an English traveler, has it, "the Yamen within the gates of the college "), it was arranged that this visit should follow his reception by Prince Kung, who escorted the general to the college gate. Our students, in fes- tive costume, looked well as they rose to receive our illustrious THE TUNG WEN COLLEGE 325 visitor. One of them read on their behalf an address com- posed by himself, and presented a handsome fan as a souvenir of the occasion. Contrary to his wont, General Grant replied in a speech of considerable length, the novelty of the audience having sufficed to loosen the tongue of the silent man. In 1894 the Hon. J. W. Foster, late Secretary of State, was re- ceived with similar honors. After what has been said of their stiff adherence to etiquette it is due to the students to add that their uniform politeness to me was the effect of good feeling, not of ceremony. On one occasion the official gazette containing an uncomplimen- tary reference to foreigners, the students took pains to mutilate our class-room copy before it came into my hands. Of their feelings I was not always quite so careful. In the school for interpreters an English class were reading a book of descrip- tive geography, when they came on a passage describing the Chinese as of a "dirty buff color." They took no offense at the uncomplimentary phrase, but I regretted that I had not kept an eye to leeward. In the school-room when I first entered on duty there was a placard containing sundry regulations and forbidding the teaching of the Bible. When I was called to the presidency this was removed by the proctors, leaving me free to use my own judgment. Though the nature of the institution pre- cluded the regular teaching of religion, I always felt at liberty to speak to the students on the subject, and requested profes- sors not to allow their classes to skip the religious lessons in their reading-books. A favorite subject for discussion was the creeds of the pagan and Christian worlds. They usually treated it more intelligently than a Chinese in his book of travels, who, returning from the West, stated that the principal sects in the United States were the Shaykeer and Kwaykeer (Shakers and Quakers). Though deterred from professing Christianity by social con- 326 A CYCLE OF CATHAY siderations or lest it should prejudice their official career, most of them gave it their intellectual assent, frequently expressing in writing or otherwise a belief that a time would come when it will supersede Buddhism and Taoism. They never hinted that it will supersede Confucianism, for they are all Confucian- ists. While they are wont to ridicule the superstitions of the people, they entertain a profound reverence for their great Sage as a Heaven-sent prophet. When China accepts Christianity the Confucian star will pale, but not disappear. One of the students came to my house one day to beg me to invite a foreign doctor to see his mother. Falling on his knees and knocking his head on the ground, he vowed that he "would be a missionary " if God would spare her life. She died, and he did not be- come a "missionary." The same young man, on the eve of going abroad as interpreter to a lega- tion, coming to take leave, Mrs. Martin cau- tioned him against the vices and seductions of Paris. "Haven't I read the story of Joseph?" he replied. "Do you think I would yield to temptations like that?" To the credit of the Chinese ministers be it said, the creed of a MR. TCHING, WIPE AND CHILD. student never seemed to make any difference in his official prospects. Mr. Tching, who has had a brilliant career in Europe, being more than once charge d'affaires in Paris, is a Roman Catholic of old family— CHAPTER VIII MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT—THE TSUNGLI YAMEN Mandarins not a caste—Their grades, their training, their virtues and defects—Independence of the people—Limitations of monarchy— Formation and character of the Yamen—Strange recruits IN forty years' intercourse with Chinese officialdom I became acquainted with mandarins of all grades, civil and military, from policemen to princes. The average foreigner takes a man- darin to be a sort of Brahman of a superior caste, exalted and peculiar. But in Chinese society there is no unalterable strati- fication, nor is there outside of the Tartars any class possessed of hereditary privileges; for the orders of nobility recently con- ferred on a few of those who supported the government in its struggle with rebellion, and two or three who previously en- joyed such distinction as representatives of ancient sages, are not sufficient to constitute a class. "Ministers and generals are not born in office," is a saying constantly cited to encourage the aspirations of youth. They are told without reserve that by learning and wisdom they may rise to the one, or by feats of valor attain to the other. In theory there is no road to office but the thorny path of com- petition. A government that makes this the rule is pure. One that sets it aside even partially is branded as corrupt. Such, in popular estimation, is coming to be the character of the Ta- tsing, or " Great Pure," dynasty, because within the last forty years it has declined from the standard of earlier reigns, in 328 MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 329 every season of distress from war or famine replenishing its exchequer by the sale of honors or office. Yet so cautiously is this done that not one in ten of the mandarins owes his ele- vation to direct purchase. The commonest form of purchase is that of the privilege of competing for higher degrees without passing through lower grades. Where actual office is brought into market it is gen- erally coupled with the condition that applicants must have gained one or two degrees in the regular way. In either case a certain respect is paid to the competitive system, so that peo- ple have not wholly lost confidence in it nor ceased to stake on it the labor of a lifetime. This is a democratic feature in the Chinese constitution, in theory offering to all the inspiration of equal opportunity, and it still exerts an incredible influence in promoting education and maintaining loyalty. But in their official forms there is nothing democratic. No officer, high or low, is chosen by the suffrages of his fellows; all are appointed by the emperor, and from that hour they constitute a body apart. They spring from the people, but they do not, as with us, revert to the people; for, barring crime or blunder, they are in the public service for life. If once in office, real or nominal, money, flattery, fam- ily connections, and sometimes ability, will serve to open the road to further advancement. China is in this respect no ex- ception to the common experience. "This mournful truth is everywhere confessed: Slow rises worth by poverty depressed." To render the segregation of its mandarins more complete the government inculcates a code of official manners and im- poses an embargo on intercourse with the untitled vulgar. I have known men cashiered on that ground, though it usually covers graver charges, such as that of engaging in trade, which to the whole mandarinate is strictly prohibited. So distinct are 33° A CYCLE OF CATHAY they from the people that a special name like mandarin (which is Portuguese for quan, "ruler'') seems not inappropriate. Mandarins, whether civil or military, are divided into nine grades, distinguished by a globular stone or button, that shines on the apex of a conical cap like a gilded ball on a church spire.* Their long silken vestments are in case of civil servants embroidered with birds of gentle disposition and tuneful note; for the military they are emblazoned with ferocious beasts of prey. In any further remarks I shall confine myself to the former, partly because my experiences have been chiefly among them, partly because in China the civil service is the more im- portant. The low estimation in which the military are held accounts in some measure for the misfortunes that have lately overtaken the empire. Military mandarins are mostly illiter- ate, the ground of selection in preliminary tests being feats of strength, skill, and agility, such as throwing a hundred-pound stone, fixing an arrow in a bull's-eye, or turning a double som- ersault. I have known some who possessed the strength—and the intelligence—of an ox. A mandarin's first privilege is exemption from torture. When therefore it is thought desirable to extort a confession from one, even of the humblest, it is necessary to obtain an imperial decree stripping him of his official cap, which, like the magic cap of Siegfried, shields him from violence. It is derogatory to the dignity of a mandarin to go afoot. The military are re- quired to mount a horse, while civilians are carried in a sedan or a cart, a usage older than Confucius, who, when asked to sell his carriage for a charitable object, replied that "being a mandarin he could not go on foot." A sedan with two bear- ers may be enjoyed by any one who can pay for it; but prior to England's first proof of prowess foreigners made use of it at the risk of being dropped in the street if they met a mandarin. A chair with four is what all mandarins are entitled to in the * See p. 151. MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 331 provinces, but only the highest in the capital, where all others must be content with carts, or, in lieu thereof, must take a horse or mule—never a donkey, the royal beast of Palestine being in Peking so irredeemably plebeian that no respectable native will venture to ride it within the walls. When mandarins, no matter of what rank, enter the sacred precinct of the " forbidden city " the awe of majesty falls upon them, and they all come down to their feet, unless by special favor they are granted a horse or a chair and two, an honor conferred only on the aged or the meritorious. Civil mandarins are always men of education, and being, with rare exceptions, the pick of a thousand or it may be of ten thousand, they are men of keen intellect, the flower of their country's culture. The "Book of Rites," with its three thou- sand rules, being one of their text-books, they are an fait in ordi- nary politeness, to say nothing of official etiquette. But for a foreigner to appreciate the charm of their manners he must go through the same discipline and form his taste by the same standards. Manners are their strong, or rather. I should say, their weak point; for they are prone to "Polish up the knocker of the great front door" to the neglect of the furniture within. Possessing very little general knowledge, they are absolutely without the essential requirements for special duties. I have known a man fill, suc- cessively, a post of presiding officer in five out of the six chief departments of state, in which that of rites or ceremonies was the only one whose business he had ever studied. Why should he take the trouble to learn the business of any one office when he knows that each is only a stepping-stone to something be- yond? After all, are there not clerks to keep the Yamen run- ning? These clerks, with or without degrees, are the real rulers though not mandarins, each having a specialty in which he be- 33* A CYCLE OF CATHAY comes expert. Without them the government of a district, not to say of the empire, would be impossible. To become a mandarin in the regular way a man must go through the prescribed curriculum and win its higher honors. A student fresh from the schools by a well-written essay wins the third degree and is rewarded with the governorship of a district city. Here he is "father and mother to the people," and sits under a canopy inscribed with the words, "Ye all are my children." His duties are as multifarious as those of the head of a household. He directs the police, collects the taxes, inspects the schools, superintends the public charities, attends to the interests of agriculture, holds inquests, and his spare time, if he has any, is given to the functions of a judge in a court of first instance—all this without other training than that which comes from experience. His salary is miserably small; three hundred dollars perhaps, with an allowance of three times as much to "encourage probity." Notwithstanding this suggestive inducement he ekes out his income by irregular methods, some of which are sanctioned by custom and some practised though not sanctioned. If they grow rich, the fact is proof of peculation, and they are liable to be compelled to disgorge, as Peking pigeons are made to empty their crops after filling them at the public granaries. Chang Chewan, a cabinet minister, was not long ago called on to explain the cir- cumstance that a bag of silver had been seen entering his gate; and Wen Yu, another cabinet minister, having lost three hundred thousand ounces by the failure of a bank, was cited before the emperor to render an account of the methods by which he had amassed so great a fortune. "May it please your Majesty," he said, " that little pittance was all due to the favor of your ancestors, and it was all I was able to save in thirty years of public service." A merchant may keep his wealth, but not a mandarin, unless he conceals it with great skill. MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 333 Mayoralties are divided into four classes, nominally from the importance of the post, really from the amount of probable emolument—some of them yielding, under skilful cultivation, from sixty to a hundred thousand taels per annum. Enjoying a respectable revenue and ruling with the authority of a little king, a mayor has reason to be satisfied even if he does not grow into a taotai, or prefect. "I would rather be a mayor in China than President of the United States," said a Chinese charge (faffaires to me when he saw our chief magistrate rele- gated to private life. In a country where there is no free press and no ballot-box the district mandarins enjoy an almost autocratic immunity from interference. So general is the tendency to make the most of their opportunities that Chinese writers assert that among them corruption is the rule, and integrity the exception. Passing by a lonely mountain, Confucius heard the wail of a woman. Inquiring the cause of her grief, he was told that her husband and son had been eaten by tigers. "Why do you live in such a place? " asked the Sage. "We came here," she replied, "to be free from exactions." "Mark that, my chil- dren," said the Sage, turning to his disciples; "evil officers are more dreaded than tigers." This is from an ancient book, but it is constantly cited as applicable to the present day. In the same vein a modern writer, who lived a little more than a thousand years ago, tells of a family who, to be free from oppression by mandarins, chose to dwell in a dismal swamp and subsist by catching snakes for medicine. Good officers do exist, nevertheless. Witness the boots now and then to be seen hanging at a city gate—I have myself seen such—left there by a departing magistrate, at the request of the people, as a hint that his successor should walk in his steps. Witness also innumerable anecdotes such as the following: A poor woman appealed for help to a new magistrate. "What do you wish me to do for you, my good dame?" 334 A CYCLE OF CATHAY "The fame of your honor has come in advance. You always pity the poor, and I have been told you will give every poor family a donkey." "I shall think about that; but while I am thinking you may go out and buy me a pound of salt." When the salt came he learned that the woman had to pay for it three times the regulation price. Sending for the shop- keeper, he imposed a fine, which he handed over to the wo- man, saying, " Now go and buy your donkey." The predatory tendencies of provincial magistrates are ag- gravated by the fact that they are strangers from abroad, the law forbidding them to take up a post within two hundred miles of their birthplace or to form marriage ties of any kind within their districts. As a device for making the mandarinate wholly dependent on their sovereign nothing could be better. They have no local attachments, no home except a cradle and a grave, and in their perambulatory movements they are not permitted to stop at one post long enough to acquire an influ- ence which might become a danger. Toward the people its aspect appears to be benevolent, securing impartiality in ad- ministration and protecting them from the tyranny of great houses, who would otherwise usurp the local government. It has, however, the disadvantage of delivering them into the hands of strangers, who, as their tenure is brief, do not scruple to make hay while the sun shines. If it be asked why the people submit to such a system, I answer, because on the whole it works to their advantage. The family council, in which disputes are settled and crime sometimes punished, serves, moreover, as a buffer between them and their magistrates. The framework of Chinese society rests on a patria potestas as extreme as that of ancient Rome. Filial piety, which means paternal authority, is the ground-law of the empire. The head of the family is a diminutive type of the divinely appointed MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 335 head of the state. Sons and grandsons, instead of being scat- tered to the winds by a centrifugal force, are expected to cleave to the ancestral tree, and, banian-like, take root in its shade. The family is therefore more complex than with us, the grand- sire reigning over it with the power of a monarch, thrashing or maltreating his offspring, who continue to be minors as long as he lives. When several such units of one stock are combined in a class, with temple, cemetery, and glebe-lands in common, the power of their elders is such that if they do not defy the magistrate they can at least dispense with his services. They do not shrink in certain cases from inflicting a death-penalty. I have known a youth to be drowned by order of such a coun- cil; prodigals and other incorrigible offenders are sometimes buried alive, care being taken in such cases that the corpse shall bear no trace of a wound; otherwise official interference will be inevitable. There is no country like China for home rule of this descrip- tion, and it extends to villages, especially where they consist of one or more clans. Schooled in these patriarchal institu- tions, the people in rural districts grow up with a thorough in- difference, if nothing worse, toward their mandarins; nor be- yond the payment of a moderate tax do they concern them- selves about the government. It is said of the Emperor Yao, who lived four thousand years ago, that, being on a tour of inspection, he heard an old man singing to the sound of his lute: "I plow my ground and eat, I dig my well and drink; For king or emperor What use have I?" An emperor of the present day, if he made such tours, might in many a place have the same experience, and, like the ven- erable Yao, rejoice to be forgotten. So far are the Chinese from presenting the aspect of an op- 336 A CYCLE OF CATHAY pressed people, that no people in the world are more exempt from official interference. You might spend days in a Chi- nese town without seeing a policeman. Every man seems free to do what is right in his own eyes. He throws his gar- bage in the street, and no one calls him to account. He stops his cart in the street, and everybody turns out without com- plaining. In most places, though not in the capital, on the occurrence of a marriage or funeral, in both which the festivi- ties last for several days, he may enlarge his house by taking in a part or the whole of the street; and other people submit to the inconvenience, knowing that time and circumstance will bring their revenge. The legal imposts are not oppressive, and if a greedy officer ventures to add too much to the burden, the people may peti- tion for his removal or, in extreme cases, band together for armed resistance.' Resistance on a large scale becomes rebel- lion, which may lead to revolution. It is not a little singular that the very books that consecrate the rights of kings make provision for this last remedy. The right of rebellion is taught and enforced by the example of holy sages who took up arms to deliver the people from tyranny. The monarch rules by the will of Heaven, but Heaven's will is manifested through the people. (" Heaven hears through the ears of my people," said the wise Shun.) If through his misconduct their hearts are al- ienated his commission is forfeited and their allegiance may be transferred to another. Tien nling ivu chang (" The divine right does not last forever"), say the holy books. It is thus that dynasties are changed, and the title of a new one when once established is as good as that of its predecessor. The transfer of power is not made, however, without a terrible sacrifice of life. History counts twenty-four dynasties in about four thousand years, making a long average of comparative tranquillity. Reigning by the will of Heaven, the emperor is of course absolute in theory, but in practice no ruler of any MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 337 country is less capricious or tyrannical. In the absence of constitutional limitations, this is secured by a careful system of education, which aims at three things: first, to imbue him with a sense of responsibility to the Sovereign of the universe and to the spirits of his ancestors; second, to inspire him with re- spect for existing institutions; and third, to instruct him how to employ the machinery of government. He rarely abolishes any portion of that machinery, however effete or obsolete; nor does he readily consent to any addition that may have the appearance of innovation. Barnacles accumulate, and the hull of the ship is never scraped. In the general administration the leading departments are six, viz., the boards of civil office, of war (or military office), of rites (or education and religion), of justice, of finance, of pub- lic works. Any question coming before the emperor, no mat- ter through what channel, is not likely to be decided without many formalities and much deliberation. In ordinary matters he indorses the document with the words, "Let the proper board take cognizance," in which case its action is definitive. If the indorsement says, "Let the proper board report," a more careful investigation is assured, but the emperor almost uniformly sanctions the advice of the board. The cases in which he departs from it are mostly those that relate to re- wards or punishments, in which he displays his sovereign pre- rogative in acts of generosity or mercy. In matters of ex- treme moment all six of the boards are sometimes required to consult, aided by several other metropolitan tribunals. The collective wisdom of this august parliament is never rejected; the emperor conforms to it as the best means for securing the support of his people. Besides responsibility to Heaven and the people he is taught to feel himself answerable at the bar of history, his daily words and acts being noted by official scribes, who dog his footsteps like a shadow. Though I had seen much of official life at Ningpo and dur- 338 A CYCLE OF CATHAY ing our expeditions to the North, it was in connection with the . Tsungli Yamen that I had the best opportunity for studying the'Chinese mandarin. This is a new tribunal, called into exis- tence to meet the necessities of intercourse under new condi- tions. Among the six boards there was no portfolio of foreign affairs; the nearest approach to it was a colonial office outside of the six called Lifanyuen. To that office all foreign affairs had been referred—all Western nations who had sent embassies being inscribed on its books as tributaries. When they came as conquerors and stipulated for intercourse on equal terms a new vessel was required to hold the new wine of equality and fraternity. The Tsungli Yamen was invented. It was, how- ever, an evolution from the colonial office. The second syllable, li, which signifies control, serves to connect it with the latter in a way characteristic of Chinese conservatism and soothing to Chinese pride. Launched in 1861 on a small scale, with three ministers under the presidency of Prince Kung, it expanded until it now counts in ordinary eight or nine ministers and as many under- secretaries, or chiefs of bureaus. Under these, again, are an army of assistants, exclusive of scribes who are not in the line of promotion. In this service promotion is more rapid than in any other—possibly because it is deemed dangerous or dis- agreeable to have anything to do with foreign affairs—and every under-secretary or assistant is entitled to expect a step in advance once in three years. It thus happens that scholars of the second or third degree (for no others are admitted), who enter the Yamen as apprentices, are in about ten or twelve years graduated as prefects, or taotais, or drafted off to legations as secretaries, to be promoted to a chargeship or ministership ac- cording to tact, talent, and a judicious application of palm-oil. The president of the Tungwen College, who maintains a direct correspondence with the Tsungli Yamen, is brought at all points into contact with this phalanx of mandarins. Be- Tsungli Yamen and Ministers of State, shen. tung. mao. MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 339 sides elaborate entertainments at the Yamen, to which the in- cumbent of the office is often invited by princes and other high dignitaries, some of the ministers have been in the habit of attending the examinations of the college, and it has been the present writer's duty to dine with them at the college four or five times in the year, and on business to meet some of them every day in the week. These ministers comprise most of the heads of the six boards and always two members of the impe- rial cabinet. They have daily access to the throne, and, col- lectively, form the most powerful tribunal in the empire, issu- ing orders to viceroys, and able at the same time to enforce them if they choose to do so. The emperor always complies with their request when they assure him that there is no other way out of a difficulty. It is accordingly far easier for them to procure the removal of a refractory viceroy than it is for the governments of England or the United States to impose their will on Australia or California in matters touching the Chinese. Yet it is surprising to see how patiently they sometimes brook opposition. Formerly it was the regular thing for the frontier authorities to refuse to recognize their passports for travel in Tibet. I remember to have seen a complaint on that head addressed in German to Prince Kung by an Hungarian count. He had shown his passport to General Tso, viceroy of the Northwest, who was carrying on war with the rebels of Kash- gar. The old general flouted the mandate of the Yamen and put himself in open rebellion against it. Hier bin ich der Herr; das Yamen hat nichts in meincm Gebiete zu thun, * was his an- swer to the application, and the Yamen took the rebuff more patiently than the count. Toward all propositions coming from the representative of a foreign power their normal attitude was that of opposition, a position from which they were only to be dislodged by a pro- tracted siege. It was accordingly surmised that the machine * "I am master here; the Yamen has nothing to do in my jurisdiction." 340 A CYCLE OF CATHAY had been contrived on the principle of a micrometer-screw, to minimize motion, not to expedite business. In some instances a foreigner, weary of waiting for the council to assemble a quorum and come to an understanding among themselves, posted off to Tientsin and got what he wanted in an hour from the viceroy Li Hung Chang, who had special powers, making a change of venue both possible and politic. Proud of his promptitude, the viceroy was once scoffing at the Yamen's diplomacy as decidedly slow, when I said, "It is precisely the case of the two dragons: the one with nine heads is no match for the one with nine tails. The former looks formidable, but the latter can slip through a thicket in half the time." His Excel- lency perceived the application, and his tall form grew taller as he seemed to feel his superiority to the composite body at Peking. In the early years of the Yamen all foreign powers were in- clined to be dictatorial, particularly those which so lately had China at their mercy. One of the ministers, who had been port collector at Canton before its pride had been brought low, once said in my hearing, "Formerly the foreigner was cuffed and abused, but the tables are turned: now it is the Chinaman." With this feeling, was it not natural to oppose to the push of the foreigner that vis inertia in which China so conspicuously excels? Ignorance made them cautious; know- ing nothing of foreign countries, what could they do but feel their way? Seu Kiyu, ex-governor of Fu-kien, was made a member of the Yamen on account of his knowledge of geography. He had compiled a text-book, in which he says that "Rhode Island is remarkable for having a brazen Colossus bestriding its har- bor"! In the previous reign he had been disgraced for the publication of this very book, which was thought to betray proclivities that were un-Chinese. His recall therefore was a good sign, even if his archaeology was slightly at fault. Dans le royaume des aveugles, les borgnes sont rois. MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 341 I was once breakfasting with two ministers at the college, when one of them referred to an item of Indian news, in which the name Piluchi (Beloochistan) occurred. "Piluchi," inter- posed the other—" is not that the same as Pilu [Peru]?" For a minister of foreign affairs this was nearly as bad as Palmer- ston's making Sir Somebody governor of Labuan, and then turn- ing to his secretary with the question, "Where is that island anyhow?" Incredible as it may appear, I have heard a Chi- nese minister ask the same question about Burmah. Among those grandees the only man who ever showed familiarity with geography was Sichen, a Manchu, president of the Board of Civil Office. Being in my room with the grand secretary, Yen, and several other ministers, he noticed a set of relief-maps hang- ing on the wall. Picking out India, though unable to read English, he ran his fingers over the mountain-tops and named the countries adjacent. He might not have known so much about other parts of the world; India is a quarter to which they are accustomed to look with mingled fear and hope. Of all strange things in China nothing is stranger than the way in which this high tribunal recruits its membership. It is, as Chenglin, one of the. body, explained to me, an expedient for averting external opposition by substituting internal friction. "You know," he said, "that the plans of the Tsungli Yamen sometimes go down before the force of outside antagonism. A clever censor or powerful viceroy gets the ear of the emperor, who forthwi h quashes our wisest schemes. In such a case Prince Kung has a way of his own to deal with the difficulty. He memorializes the throne to give his opponent a chair in this council for foreign affairs. The prince knows that, once here, he will not be slow to find out that his Highness's policy is the only possible way of getting along with foreign nations. For that reason and no other were Mao and Shen brought into this Yamen." The first-named rose from a vice-presidency in the censorate to be president of the Board of Civil Office; the 342 A CYCLE OF CATHAY other from the governorship of Shansi rose to be grand secre- tary, with the title of Chungking. Both became loyal col- leagues of the prince—of course after a little instruction in for- eign relations, beginning with a few lessons in geography. A further instance is the case of Wojin, mentioned in a former chapter. Who knows but the old academician might have been as thoroughly converted had he not refused to submit to the educating process? Certainly no members of the Yamen have ever been more satisfactory to deal with than those two. "Our true policy," observed Shen to me, " is to make use of foreigners, but not to let them make use of us." At another time he inveighed against Mr. Yungwing, who had rendered great services to his country, and might have rendered greater but for the suspicions to which his progressive spirit and for- eign tastes made him liable. "I don't like him," he said; "he has married an American wife." He evidently feared that through the wife America might use the husband for some sinister end. "Western cabinets," I replied, "are not so suspicious. Baron Stoeckel, a Russian minister, married an American, and was kept at Washington thirty years. Baron Bunsen, Prussian minister, married an Englishwoman, and was sent to London, where he remained fifteen years." At that time Bismarck had not yet enacted or enforced the rule that a member of the diplomatic service must not marry an alien, a rule under which Mr. von Brandt, one of Germany's ablest representatives, was compelled to leave Peking. For a con- tingency of this kind the diplomacy of ancient China affords no parallel. The nearest precedent is the case of Sunwu, a gen- eral who killed his wife lest, belonging to a hostile state, she should stand in the way of his obtaining a command. Before his appearance at the Yamen, Mao had acquired noto- riety in Peking by the suppression of a Buddhist temple. Crowds were drawn to it by a report, which they found correct, that a huge brass idol had become warm—palpable proof that a di- MANDARINS AND GOVERNMENT 343 vinity had come to dwell there. The place became known as Jefosi (" Temple of the Warm Buddha "). The excitement ran high, and Mao, who was charged with the supervision of that quarter of the capital, deeming it dangerous to the peace of the city, resolved to close it. The priests protested, and menaced him with the anger of their god. "If he is really a god," said Mao, turning to the frightened worshipers, "let him strike me dead. If I live another half-hour you may know that your living idol is nothing but a clever deception, and that you have been cheated by these greedy priests." Noth- ing happened to him within the half-hour, the crowd dis- persed, and the doors were sealed. Wishing to verify the story, I asked him if it were true. He said it was, and I com- plimented him on his courage. He had, moreover, the cour- age to say to several ministers, with whom the present writer was at breakfast, " If everybody presented the claims of Chris- tianity as Dr. Martin does we should not have much reason to object to it." I had given each of them a copy of my book on the Evidences. A SIR.-Ef SHOW IN PEKING. NOTABLE MANDARINS 345 powering him to negotiate a peace. They were struck with the dignity and composure which he manifested in a very em- barrassing situation. The prince had never seen a foreigner, and he was not backed by any visible force; the defenders of the capital having been routed, the summer palace sacked, and the city taken. Yet so far was he from giving way to demonstrations of grief, like Jules Favre on signing his treaty of peace, that he betrayed no sense of weakness and endeavored to obtain the best terms possible. He was fortunate in having to deal with men who were noted for moderation, and who were as anxious as him- self to set the prostrate empire on its feet again. The conven- tion, followed by the withdrawal of the invading forces, brought him into great favor with the emperor, who required him to remain at Peking as his representative. Dying in exile, partly from chagrin, partly from the effects of a dissolute life, Hienfung left an infant son, with two widows to contest the honors of motherhood. Empress No. i, though sonless, claimed the child by virtue of her position as legal consort. Empress No. 2, originally an inferior wife, was the real mother. Raised to imperial rank in recompense for giv- ing an heir to the throne, she was not required to waive her maternal rights. Here were materials for a conflict in which, had not both ladies been gentle and discreet, a sword more formidable than that of Solomon might have settled the dis- pute. Sushun and Toanhoa, two princes of the blood, taking possession of the infant, conciliated the ladies by proclaiming a regency in their name and bringing the new emperor back to Peking. Prince Kung was an obstacle to their ambition, and he was marked for destruction; but, acting on the advice of his father-in-law, the astute old Kweiliang, he was too quick for his enemies, who were seized and decapitated. The im- perial ladies, grateful for deliverance from the self-constituted guardians of their son, proclaimed him Icheng-wang, or "joint regent." They, according to the court phrase, " gave audience 346 A CYCLE OF CATHAY behind a curtain," but he was "to be consulted on affairs of state." When the ship was again in smooth water, with foreign wars ended and internal rebellions suppressed, the regents thought they could do without their pilot. The empress mother was a bold woman, of high ambition and higher genius. She could make a tool of her colleague, but felt that she was not sover- eign as long as she was obliged to obtain the approval of Prince Kung before her decrees should go into effect. Trumping up a charge of arrogance and disrespect toward the emperor, which sounded comical in the mouth of a child of ten, the two ladies issued a decree stripping the prince of all his offices and confining him a prisoner in his own palace. Within three days this was followed by another announcing that "the prince had thrown himself at the foot of the throne and with flowing tears confessed his faults." He was pardoned, and his numerous offices restored one after another, with the addition of new dig- nities, but the title of "joint regent" never reappeared. Lank in figure, swart in complexion, and so near-sighted that he appeared to squint, Prince Kung was not a handsome man, to speak in the past tense, though he still lives. He was, however, kindly and gracious in demeanor, and his rapid and energetic utterance made an impression of independent strength which he was far from possessing. Best known as president of the Board of Foreign Affairs, he was head of the administra- tion in all its branches; but he never acted without the advice of his subordinates, and his speeches were nothing but a sum- mary of their deliberations. Son of one emperor and brother of another, he may be taken as a fair sample of the stuff the present rulers of China are made of. My relations with the prince were frequent and cordial. Be- sides compliments of various kinds, he on one occasion showed me an extraordinary mark of consideration. One of our pro- fessors, while acting as interpreter to a foreign minister, had 34« A CYCLE OF CATHAY brought to my notice by a mandarin from the South, himself rich. He was expecting an appointment in the viceroy's province, and yet he congratulated himself on slipping through Tientsin without seeing him, assigning as excuse for not call- ing that it was "too near the great man's birthday." His location has lifted him to the light. Holding for a score of years the leading viceroyalty, that of Chihli, which makes 1.1 HUNG CHANG AT FIFTY. him chief guardian of the throne, while his brother (who bears the sobriquet of " Bottomless Bag") has through his influence held successively the viceroyalties of Hankow and Canton, he is by far the most powerful of the great satraps.* His qual- * Since this was written he has been called to take up the office of chief of the privy council in Peking, of which he has long held the honorary title. He is therefore in fact, as in name, Shosiang, " prime minister" of China. A CYCLE OF CATHAY force, and compelled the rebels to surrender the great city of Suchau, the capital of the province, Li was raised to the governorship. The act for which he is best known is his violation of the terms of capitulation, and the perfidious murder of the rebel chiefs while feasting them in his tent. For that act Gordon threatened to put a pistol-ball into his head, and for that act the Chinese government adorned his cap with the buttons and feathers of the highest rank. On the final sup- pression of the rebellion Li came in for a place in the new- made peerage, being created an earl in perpetuity. An exception to the law of rotation, Li has held one post for twenty years, apparently as fixed as the pier of a bridge, which keeps its place however the tide may come and go. The prospect of permanence encouraged him to busy his fer- tile brain with plans for improvement which a stranger and sojourner would not have had courage to undertake. So in- dispensable has his charge of the chief viceroyalty been con- sidered that he was made an exception to another rule, to which all Chinese officials are bound both by law and by re- ligion. On the death of his mother it became his duty to lay down the insignia of office and spend three years mourning in sackcloth. A special decree required him to wait for a con- venient season to indulge his grief. When he renewed his petition the empress regent relented so far as to give him three months' leave of absence, instead of three years and a new post. While the majority of mandarins have to contend with pov- erty in early life, it was Li's fortune to be born rich. His father was a landed proprietor with mandarin rank, and suffi- ciently opulent to have more wives than one. Our viceroy was the child of an inferior wife. Rumor whispered that this lady was a remote relation of the family and of the same name; the union was therefore illegal. It further said that at the age of eighty, having in her own name (Chinese women NOTABLE MANDARINS retain their maiden name as do those of Russia) to acknow- ledge certain presents from the empress regent, her son induced her to write Ki for Li, that the secret of her marriage with her forty-seventh cousin might not come to the ears of the throne. During his long tenure of the viceroyalty Li has established a character as a friend of progress; but that is not synonymous with being a friend of foreigners. May it not be the reverse, for have not all his efforts been directed toward arming his country for war? If she has come to grief in her conflict with Japan it is not Li's fault, but her misfortune in having but one such man. Under his auspices the navy was built, the two naval fortresses were equipped, naval and military schools established, coal-mines opened, a merchant marine or- ganized to fight foreigners in the field of commerce, an army of a hundred thousand armed and drilled; finally, a railway, intended to meet that of Siberia, constructed as far as the ter- minus of the Great Wall. Like all great leaders, Li has understood how to select his agents. His chief representative in creating the splendid fleet of the China Merchant Company was Mr. Tang King Sing, who was educated in a missionary school, and trained to business in the great house of Jardine & Matheson. Writing to me about specimens of coal and iron which he desired to have analyzed at our college, Mr. Tang said, "The viceroy leads, but I am the man that pushes." Li and his wife have shown themselves conspicuous patrons, not of medical missions, but of certain missionaries who won their confidence, notably Dr. McKenzie and Mrs. Dr. King. Residing in Peking, I have had only two interviews with the illustrious vice-emperor. Calling on him five years ago, I was no stranger, nor was I treated as such. Many of my students were in his employ, one of my books had been honored with a preface from his pen, and correspondence had passed be- tween us before as it has since that date. The one disagree- able feature in our meeting was that, a Chinese exclusion bill 352 A CYCLE OF CATHAY having newly become law, he was full of bitterness against my country, venting his wrath the more freely as he considered me in the light of a Chinese official. He dwelt on the subject at the greater length because he desired me to act as a sort of envoy to represent the feelings of his government to the Presi- dent and people of the United States. It was not the act of exclusion so much as the manner of it that roused his ire. Its passage, in violation of previous stip- ulations, was bad faith; that this was done while a newly signed treaty was under consideration, in which China took the initiative by agreeing to stop emigration, was discourteous, to say the least; while the fact that, for political effect, it was rushed through on the eve of an election gave him a poor opinion of our form of government. When his fire had some- what slackened, I ventured to suggest that if he would look at home he would find a state of things not altogether creditable to China. "What, for example," I asked, "are Americans to think of those murderous attacks on foreigners of every nationality and occupation?" "Those," he replied, "are the work of an excited populace; but the oppressions to which our laborers are subjected come from your government, and a government that enacts iniquity is no government [pu chengkwo\ What would you think if /" (he said wo, using, as it were, a very big /) "should expel your missionaries?" "I should think," I replied, "that you were turning your arms against your best friends. I should also say that you were violating a precept of Confucius, which forbids you to vent your displeasure on the unoffending." This quotation from his own sacred book staggered him, and, bursting into a laugh, he said, " I have no intention of doing anything of the kind; I only spoke of it for the sake of argument. The missionaries are good men, I know, but your NOTABLE MANDARINS 353 code of morals is defective, as it seems to me, in one point: it lays too much stress on charity and too little on justice." In letting fly this Parthian arrow he meant that he would like a little less zeal for missions and a little more respect for treaty compacts. The conversation, of which I give only an outline, was thoroughly characteristic. In discussions with foreign envoys he is prone to banter, saying disagreeable things "for the sake of argument," and attacking with feigned as- perity. His thunder is usually followed by a burst of sun- shine, and no man knows better how to intersperse the light and shade, but he is deficient in that polished self-restraint which marks the well-bred mandarin. In our next interview I received his thanks for sundry ser- vices of a semi-diplomatic character which I had rendered to the Chinese government during my stay in the United States. After hearing my report he presented his two younger sons, and desired me to examine them in his presence as to their proficiency in English. When I recently passed through Tientsin on my homeward journey he was away on a tour of inspection to those twin fortresses that have so lately fallen into the hands of the Japanese. The treaty of peace was the crowning act of his busy life. His rank, age, and character all marked him out for that mission, though it was pathetic to see the man who had done most for the defense of his coun- try knocking in suppliant guise at the gates of the conqueror. His credentials are contained in the following decree: "Being desirous of establishing sincere relations of amity with the Emperor of Japan, we specially appoint Li Hung Chang, earl of the first rank, senior grand secretary, viceroy of Chihli, and superintendent of trade for the northern ports, to be our ambassador, with full powers to confer with plenipoten- tiaries appointed by Japan, to settle the terms of a treaty of peace and to sign and seal the same. . . . "The terms of the treaty agreed upon must, however, be 354 A CYCLE OF CATHAY submitted for our inspection, and if found satisfactory they will receive our imperial sanction." Let it be noted that the formal title of plenipotentiary, which the Emperor of China never bestows until he is beaten in bat- tle, is not wanting here. How could it be when the peace mission of Changyinhoan a month earlier was rejected for want of it? But what does it signify after all when the con- dition is appended that the terms agreed on "must be sub- mitted for our inspection"? This means prior to signature as understood by Li himself, who asked and obtained the privi- lege of corresponding with his government in cipher. Is it not true, as Commissioner Tan declared, that " the emperor is the only plenipotentiary"? Li's conduct of the negotiations, charging as it were up a hill, displays a rare combination of courage and tact. Beginning with the proposal of an armistice, he promptly declined it, leaving the Japanese to do their worst rather than comply with the conditions annexed, namely, the sur- render of the fortresses and munitions at Taku, Tientsin, and Shanhaikwan. Returning from his first interview with the Japanese plenipotentiaries, he had the good fortune to be wounded by an assassin, whose ball was so near proving fatal that the best surgeons did not dare to extract it. That single shot saved many a bloody battle; for the Emperor of Japan, yielding to a generous impulse, granted the armistice without condition, apparently to expiate the crime of his subject. The same sentiment led him to mitigate the severity of the terms demanded by his representatives. Those concessions were not, however, like that of the armistice, a spontaneous expres- sion of feeling. They were made in answer to Li's criticism of the Japanese draft of the treaty. That criticism, so com- prehensive and acute that it deserves to take rank among the ablest documents of its class, was drawn up by him on his bed of suffering. He had, it is true, the advice of that most 356 A CYCLE OF CATHAY in 1863, my fondness for Chinese literature forming the first link in our attachment; and for many years he was my friend and patron, aiding me with his ministerial influence. Being twenty years his junior, I was able to show him deference with- out loss of self-respect. He died at the age of eighty-five, keeping up his literary activity to the last. A voluminous author, he gave me copies of all his principal works, one of which, a topographical history of the Grand Canal, extended to forty-eight volumes. They were all written in the hurry of official life in such scraps of time as he was able to pick up in intervals of business or in hours snatched from sleep. Lord Brougham prided himself on having written a scien- tific dissertation while listening to the pleading of a cause. Many a time have I seen Tungsuin driving his pen while as- sisting at an examination as one of the regents of the college; nor would there be anything incredible in Brougham's per- formance had the pleadings, like the trials of our students, been wholly in writing. A prodigy of learning, he was not free from a streak of superstition. One of the houses which Sir Robert Hart bought for the professors happened to be next door to Tung, who objected to having it occupied by a foreigner. When I was made president, Sir Robert suggesting that he might waive his objections out of personal regard for me, I spoke to him on the subject. "You," he replied, "are one of my best friends. How can I object to your coming to be my neighbor? Only please don't build a high chimney near my wall." This request, which I complied with, was prompted by a belief in fungshui, according to which a high object is liable to injure the luck of a place which it overlooks. He said he made it out of regard for the feelings of others, wishing me to think him above such weakness. It stuck to him nevertheless. NOTABLE MANDARINS 357 A politer man I never knew. The expedient to which he once resorted to shield me from the consequences of my own awkwardness reminded me of a Prince of Wales, who saved the blushes of a country lady who drank tea from her saucer by promptly doing the same. At breakfast with several minis- ters, I rose to hand something across the table and clumsily overturned my chair. "Take away that chair," he said to a servant, "and have it repaired; something is wrong with its legs!" He was magnanimous as well as polite. Shortly after my appointment to the presidency of the college one of our stu- dents revealed to me the fact that he had been directed by the minister Tung to translate a document relating to me, add- ing with a frightened look, "Yes, and it is something very bad." He then showed it to me, and, to my surprise, I found it was a letter written by me to a newspaper after the defeat of the Allies at Taku in 1859, to prove that the Chinese gov- ernment did not intend loyally to observe the treaties made at Tientsin. It had found its way into a parliamentary blue book, and some one had sent it to the Yamen to do me an ill turn. Calling on Mr. Tung soon after the translation had been put into his hands, I begged to offer some explanations, and began by asking him to notice the date of the document. "True," he exclaimed, glancing at the heading, "that was be- fore the war. Things are changed now. There is no use say- ing anything more on the subject," and he showed himself as warmly cordial as if I had not impugned the good faith of his government. Like many high officials whom I have known, Tungsuin rose from indigence by means of that admirable system of civil-service examinations, which the Chinese call a "ladder to the clouds." "I began," he said; "to support myself by teaching at eighteen, carrying on my studies at the same time. For twelve years I sat in the chair of a schoolmaster, and that 358 A CYCLE OF CATHAY means twelve hours a day ; but I was fortunate in winning one degree after another, and when, at the age of thirty-two, I gained the doctorate my days of drudgery were ended." He was at once assigned to an official duty, from which he rose to be provincial examiner, superintendent of grain transport, civil governor of the capital, minister of war, minister of finance, and member of the Board of Foreign Affairs. In the Tsungli Yamen it was he who drafted most of the despatches, the very able state papers of Prince Kung being really the productions of Tung's pen. How sincerely he was in sympathy with the cause of progress is apparent in some of them, especially in those relating to the founding of the col- lege. Sir Thomas Wade said of this kindly old man that he was "the most accomplished liar he ever knew." Tungsuin might have taken that as a compliment if he had heard it (and I am not sure that he did not hear it), for Chinese statecraft makes lying a duty. Did not European diplomacy, now so upright and downright, formerly require the same? Did not Louis XI. say to his ambassadors, "If they lie to you, you must lie still more to them "? Nor am I sure that diplomatic lying is even now a lost art. 4. Pao Yun, a Manchu Scholar On the Manchu side the grand chamberlain, Pao Yun, offers a fitting parallel. He also had been a schoolmaster. In fact, I may as well say here, of most of those I have occasion to men- tion, that they too have been schoolmasters. For in China, as elsewhere, rich youth are not generally laborious, and in Pao's early years a golden key was of less service than it is now. China's most eminent scholars have all been poor. It is rare to meet one who has not given himself a lift by teaching, either in public or in private. The reverence for teachers, in which the Chinese excel us as much as they do in respect for NOTABLE MANDARINS 361 that if I followed Plutarch I should offer him as a parallel for Li Hung Chang. He had been a hard student in his youth, but, after attaining the doctorate, statesmanship, and not letters, absorbed his thoughts. His thin crooked body and fine head reminded me of Talleyrand. Speaking of Wensiang, Sir Fred- erick Bruce once remarked to me that he had never encoun- tered a more powerful intellect. Sir Henry Pottinger said something similar of Keying; both judgments were exagger- ated by the surprise of finding such men in "heathen China." Though, properly speaking, China has no such office as prime minister any more than we have in the United States, yet for about ten years Wensiang was virtually premier of the empire, no statesman of his day and country comparing with him in point of influence. Instead of being sent to a viceroy- alty in the provinces, he was from the first retained at court, and it was he who took the lead in the work of reorganization after the second war, as well as in shaping the foreign policy of his government. Unlike the two preceding, who were indemnified for the struggles of early life by dying rich, he took a pride in living poor and dying so. When Secretary Seward was in China he wrote to Wensiang saying that he had heard so much of him, and had with him such official relations, that he desired to call on him at his house. The Tartar premier declined the honor, alleging that his "humble dwelling was not fit to receive an illustrious visitor from beyond the seas," and instead called on Mr. Seward at the United States legation. Nor was the ex- cuse fictitious, for his house was a hired one, and, as he paid for it only four dollars and a half per month, it could not be very splendid. Shen and Yen, two other grand secretaries of my acquaintance, afterward emulated his example of osten- tatious poverty, a distinction scarcely more creditable to the morals of their country than was the fame of chastity acquired by certain Roman matrons. 362 A CYCLE OF CATHAY Wensiang abhorred opium, and took no pains to conceal his disgust when he perceived it on the breath of his colleagues. The two old poets previously mentioned were equally free from any taint of opium; but, like Lipo, China's favorite bard, they were great drinkers of rice-wine, which was not the case with Wensiang. To me he was always accessible, though over- burdened with work. Finding him wheezing with asthma one day, he said to me: "You have seen a small donkey drawing a great load and half choked by its collar. Well, that is a picture of me." In Peking, where wheelbarrows drawn by donkeys and pushed by men are the vehicles most used for the transport of merchandise, the simile was not far fetched. No better proof of Wensiang's enlightened views could be desired than the maxim which he laid down as the principle of his policy. "I shall be guided," he once said to me, "by the precept of Confucius: 'Pick out the good and follow it; pick out the evil and avoid it.' We shall learn all the good we can from you people of the West." Unhappily for China, this remarkable man, from whom so much was to be expected, was snatched away prematurely—though a Chinese proverb says, "Death at fifty is not premature "—just as his country was becoming sufficiently tranquil to begin to act on his wise maxim. Since his death no high official has ever made men- tion of it. I have already related the sound advice as to sites for chapels which he sent to the missionaries of Peking. On another occasion he told me that he had heard missionaries were in the habit of reviling Confucius, and he appeared to be very indignant. "That," said I, "is a calumny; for, though some crank may have spoken slightingly of the Sage, mission- aries as a rule treat his memory with great respect. What better proof is there than the fact that he is beholden to missionaries for the translation of his works into the languages of Europe?" Sensitive to anything like disrespect to his country or its in- stitutions, he at another time expressed displeasure at the des- NOTABLE MANDARINS 363 ecration of the dragon pool by British students, who turned it into a swimming-bath. For Taoism and the dragon he cared very little, but this was a sacred place of his people, and had he not enjoyed the honor of sacrificing a tiger there to procure rain? Hearing that I had visited the Jews in Honan, he desired to learn something about them, giving me an opportunity to speak of our sacred book, which has God for its author and the Jews as the channel of communication. "What a pity God did not also reveal the mysteries of mathematics! " he an- swered, dryly. He believed that Heaven inspired Confucius, but was not so clear in regard to the Hebrew prophets. I sent him my book on the Christian Evidences by way of giv- ing him further light and to show how little antagonism there is between the teachings of Christ and those of Confucius. As long as he lived the entire initiative of the Yamen rested with him. His courage was equal to his intelligence, and had his life been prolonged it is certain that he would have offered decided opposition to the absorption of Tonquin by the French. Would he have averted the fall of the Kung ministry, or precipitated a worse catastrophe? The race that produces such men as Wensiang and Pao Yun is not effete. 6. Marquis Tseng, a Chinese Diplomat The Marquis Tseng, the second of the line, deserves a high place on this roll of honor. His services as diplomatic envoy will be mentioned in the next chapter. It remains to add here a few details by way of exhibiting the marquis at home. His father, Tseng Kofan, having taken a leading part in the suppres- sion of the Taiping rebellion, was placed at the head of the new nobil ty created to reward the loyalty of certain eminent Chi- nese whose devotion saved the Manchu house from extinction. The second marquis, Tseng Kitse, or "Gearkhan of Tseng," as he preferred to call himself, never saw military service, and 3^4 A CYCLE Of CATHAY had nothing martial in aspect or bearing. Homely in features and feeble in frame, he possessed great firmness of character, with no small share of mental vigor. Heir to a noble name, the gates of office flew open to him, without the necessity of running the literary gantlet. He was nevertheless a Bachelor of Arts and a superior scholar in Chinese. A volume of unpub- lished essays, of which he gave me a manuscript copy, shows him to have been a diligent student of history and politics as understood by the statesmen of China. When, in 1877, Tseng arrived in Peking in obedience to imperial mandate to wait the will of his Majesty, he was nearly forty years of age. In English he had made a beginning with a view to the diplomatic service, to which his attention had been directed by the mission to England of Kuo Sungtao, a family connection. Living in the far interior and seldom see- ing a white face, he made his way chiefly by the help of gram- mar and dictionary. Whether owing to seclusion, which de- prived him of the benefit of comparison, or to flattery, which always stands ready to inflate a nobleman, he was not a little vain of his proficiency, presenting his friends with fans bearing bilingual inscriptions, in verse of his own composition. On another page is a facsimile of one with which he honored me. The Chinese original is elegant, but the translation is a unique specimen of " Baboo English." "To combine the reasons of Heaven, Earth, and Man, Only the Sage's disciple, who is, can. Universe to he included in knowledge All men arc, should, But only the wise man who is, could." Without entering himself as a student at college, he came to me for private instruction, seeking information more particu- larly in geography, history, and European politics, and sub- mitting for correction essays in English on those subjects. The lines above given, I need hardly say, are uncorrected; $J»Jaa/y4m\ mi. . mm mJ* it ecmid- Imvic^cJLmm. and. ml ft +i *yt