The common practice of flogging with the bamboo has generally been considered by the missionaries in the light of a gentle correction, exercised by men in power over their inferiors, just as a father would chastise his son, but not as a punishment to which disgrace is attached.
However lightly these gentlemen may chuse to treat this humiliating chastis.e.m.e.nt, to which all are liable from the prime minister to the peasant, it is but too often inflicted in the anger and by the caprice of a man in office, and frequently with circ.u.mstances of unwarrantable cruelty and injustice. Of the truth of this remark we had several instances. In our return down the _Pei-ho_, the water being considerably shallower than when we first sailed up this river, one of our accommodation barges got aground in the middle of the night. The air was piercing cold, and the poor creatures belonging to the vessel were busy until sun-rise in midst of the river, using their endeavours to get her off. The rest of the fleet had proceeded, and the patience of the superintending officer at length being exhausted, he ordered his soldiers to flog the captain and the whole crew; which was accordingly done in a most unmerciful manner and this was their only reward for the use of the yacht, their time and labour for two days. The instance of degrading an officer and flogging all his people, because the meat brought for our use was a little tainted when the temperature was at 88 in the shade, I have already had occasion to notice.
Whenever the wind was contrary, or it was found necessary to track the vessels against the stream, a number of men were employed for this purpose. The poor creatures were always pressed into this disagreeable and laborious service, for which they were to receive about six-pence a day so long as they tracked, without any allowance being made to them for returning to the place from whence they were forced. These people knowing the difficulty there was of getting others to supply their places, and that their services would be required until such should be procured, generally deserted by night, disregarding their pay. In order to procure others, the officers dispatched their soldiers to the nearest village, taking the inhabitants by surprize and forcing them out of their beds to join the yachts. Scarcely a night occurred in which some poor wretches did not suffer the lashes of the soldiers for attempting to escape, or for pleading the excuse of old age, or infirmity. It was painful to behold the deplorable condition of some of these creatures.
Several were half naked and appeared to be wasting and languishing for want of food. Yet the task of dragging along the vessels was far from being light. Sometimes they were under the necessity of wading to the middle in mud; sometimes to swim across creeks, and immediately afterwards to expose their naked bodies to a scorching sun; and they were always driven by a soldier or the lictor of some petty police officer carrying in his hand an enormous whip, with which he lashed them with as little reluctance as if they had been a team of horses.
The Dutch Emba.s.sy proceeded by land to the capital, in the middle of winter, when the rivers and ca.n.a.ls were frozen. The thermometer was frequently from 8 to 16 degrees below the freeing point, and the face of the country was mostly covered with ice and snow; yet they were often under the necessity of travelling all night; and the peasantry, who were pressed to carry the presents and their baggage, notwithstanding their heavy loads, were obliged to keep up with them as long as they could. In the course of two nights, Mr. Van Braam observes, not less than eight of these poor wretches actually expired under their burdens, through cold, hunger, fatigue, and the cruel treatment of their drivers.
It had been the practice of some of the gentlemen of the British emba.s.sy, in their return through the country, to walk during a part of the day, and to join the barges towards the hour of dinner. One day an officer of high rank took it into his head to interrupt them in their usual walk, and for this purpose dispatched after them nine or ten of his soldiers, who forced them in a rude manner to return to the vessels.
Our two conductors _Van_ and _Chou_, coming up at the time, and being made acquainted with the circ.u.mstance, gave to each of the soldiers a most severe flogging. One of these, who had been particularly insolent, had his ears bored through with iron wire, and his hands bound to them for several days. The viceroy of Canton was at this time with the emba.s.sy, and being in rank superior to the offending officer, he ordered the latter to appear before him, gave him a severe reprimand, and sentenced him to receive forty strokes of the bamboo as a _gentle correction_. Our two Chinese friends were particularly pressing that the gentlemen insulted should be present at the punishment of the officer, and it was not without difficulty they could be persuaded that such a scene would not afford them any gratification. It happened also, in the Dutch emba.s.sy, that an inferior officer was flogged and disgraced by their conductors for not having in readiness a sufficient number of coolies or porters to proceed with the baggage, and to carry the sedan chairs in which they travelled.
The tyranny that men in office exercise over the mult.i.tude, and each other, is perfectly agreeable to the systematic subordination which the law has sanctioned. But as authority is a dangerous deposit in the hands of the wisest, and leads sometimes the most wary to
"Play such fantastic tricks before high heaven As make the angels weep,"
what must the effects of it be when vested in an illiterate Chinese or rude Tartar who has no other talent or recommendation for his authority than the power alone which his office allows him to exercise?
Several instances however occurred in the course of our journey through the country, which seemed to mark the same unfeeling and hard-hearted disposition to exist between persons of equal condition in life, as in men in office over their inferiors. One of these afforded an extraordinary trait of inhumanity. A poor fellow at Macao, in the employ of the British factory there, fell by accident from a wall and pitched upon his skull. His companions took him up with very little appearance of life and, in this state, were carrying him away towards the skirts of the town, where they were met by one of the medical gentlemen belonging to the emba.s.sy. He interrogated them what they meant to do with the unfortunate man, and was very coolly answered, they were going to bury him. Having expressed his astonishment that they should think of putting a man into the grave before the breath was out of his body, they replied that they were of opinion he never could recover, and that if they carried him home he would only be a trouble and expence to his friends so long as he remained in a situation which rendered him unable to a.s.sist himself. The man, however, by the humanity and attention of Doctor Scott, was restored again to his family and to those friends who knew so well to appreciate the value of his life.
The doctor however was not aware of the risk he ran in thus exercising his humanity, as by a law of the country, which appears to us extraordinary, if a wounded man be taken into the protection and charge of any person with a view to effect his recovery, and he should happen to die under his hands, the person into whose care he was last taken is liable to be punished with death, unless he can produce undeniable evidence to prove how the wound was made, or that he survived it forty days. The consequence of such a law is, that if a person should happen to be mortally wounded in an affray, he is suffered to die in the streets, from the fear (should any one take charge of him) of being made responsible for his life.
A striking instance of the fatal effects of such a law happened at Canton lately. A fire broke out in the suburbs and three Chinese, in a.s.sisting to extinguish it, had their limbs fractured and were otherwise dreadfully wounded by the falling of a wall. The surgeon of the English factory, with all the alacrity to administer relief to suffering humanity, which characterizes the profession in Britain, directed them to be carried to the factory, and was preparing to perform amputation, as the only possible means of saving their lives, when one of the Hong merchants having heard what was going on ran with great haste to the place, and entreated the surgeon by no means to think of performing any operation upon them, but rather to suffer them to be taken away from the factory as speedily as possible; adding that, however good his intentions might be, if any one of the patients should die under his hands, he would inevitably be tried for murder, and the most mitigated punishment would be that of banishment for life into the wilds of Tartary. The wounded Chinese were accordingly removed privately, and, no doubt, abandoned to their fate.
The operation of such a barbarous law (for so it appears to us) will serve to explain the conduct of the Chinese in the following instance.
In the course of our journey down the grand ca.n.a.l we had occasion to witness a scene, which was considered as a remarkable example of a want of fellow-feeling. Of the number of persons who had crowded down to the banks of the ca.n.a.l several had posted themselves upon the high projecting stern of an old vessel which, unfortunately, breaking down with the weight, the whole groupe tumbled with the wreck into the ca.n.a.l, just at the moment when the yachts of the emba.s.sy were pa.s.sing. Although numbers of boats were sailing about the place, none were perceived to go to the a.s.sistance of those that were struggling in the water. They even seemed not to know that such an accident had happened, nor could the shrieks of the boys, floating on pieces of the wreck, attract their attention. One fellow was observed very busily employed in picking up, with his boat-hook, the hat of a drowning man. It was in vain we endeavoured to prevail on the people of our vessel to heave to and send the boat to their a.s.sistance. It is true, we were then going at the rate of seven miles an hour, which was the plea they made for not stopping. I have no doubt that several of these unfortunate people must inevitably have perished.
Being thus insensible to the sufferings of their companions and countrymen, little compa.s.sion is to be expected from them towards strangers. From a ma.n.u.script journal, kept by a gentleman in the suite of the Dutch Emba.s.sador, it appears that, on their route to the capital, the writer felt an inclination to try his skaits on a sheet of ice that they pa.s.sed by the road-side; he was also urged to it by the conducing officers. Having proceeded to some distance from the sh.o.r.e, the ice gave way and he fell in up to the neck. The Chinese, instead of rendering him any a.s.sistance, in the absence of his own countrymen who had gone forwards, ran away laughing at this accident and left him to scramble out as well as he could, which was not effected without very great difficulty.
But, if further proofs were wanting to establish the insensible and incompa.s.sionate character of the Chinese, the horrid practice of infanticide, tolerated by custom and encouraged by the government, can leave no doubt on this subject.--I venture to say encouraged, because where the legislature does not interfere to prevent crimes, it certainly may be said to lend them its countenance. No law, however, allows, as I observe it noticed in a modern author of reputation, a father to expose all the daughters and the third son. I believe the laws of China do not suppose such an unnatural crime to exist, and have therefore provided no punishment for it. It is true, they have left a child to the entire disposal of the father, concluding, perhaps, that if his feelings will not prevent him from doing an injury, no other consideration will. Thus, though the commission of infanticide be frequent in China, it is considered as more prudent to wink at it as an inevitable evil which natural affection will better correct than penal statues; an evil that, on the other hand, if publicly tolerated, would directly contradict the grand principle of filial piety, upon which their system of obedience rests, and their patriarchal form of government is founded.
It is, however, tacitly considered as a part of the duty of the police of Pekin to employ certain persons to go their rounds, at an early hour in the morning, with carts, in order to pick up such bodies of infants as may have been thrown out into the streets in the course of the night.
No inquiries are made, but the bodies are carried to a common pit without the city walls, into which all those that may be living, as well as those that are dead, are said to be thrown promiscuously. At this horrible pit of destruction the Roman Catholic missionaries, established in Pekin, attend by turns as a part of the duties of their office, in order, as one of them expressed himself to me on this subject, to chuse among them those that are the most _lively_, to make future proselytes, and by the administration of baptism to such of the rest as might be still alive, _pour leur sauver l"ame_. The Mahomedans who, at the time that their services were useful in a.s.sisting to prepare the national calendar, had a powerful influence at Court, did much better: these zealous bigots to a religion, whose least distinguishing feature is that of humanity, were, however, on these occasions, the means of saving the _lives_ of all the little innocents they possibly could save from this maw of death, which was an humane act, although it might be for the purpose of bringing them up in the principles of their own faith. I was a.s.sured by one of the Christian missionaries, with whom I had daily conversation during a residence of five weeks within the walls of the Emperor"s palace at _Yuen-min-yuen_, and who took his turn in attending, _pour leur sauver l"ame_, that such scenes were sometimes exhibited on these occasions as to make the feeling mind shudder with horror. When I mention that dogs and swine are let loose in all the narrow streets of the capital, the reader may conceive what will sometimes necessarily happen to the exposed infants, before the police-carts can pick them up.
The number of children thus unnaturally and inhumanly slaughtered, or interred alive, in the course of a year, is differently stated by different authors, some making it about ten and others thirty thousand in the whole empire. The truth, as generally happens, may probably lie about the middle. The missionaries, who alone possess the means of ascertaining nearly the number that is thus sacrificed in the capital, differ very materially in their statements: taking the mean, as given by those with whom we conversed on the subject, I should conclude that about twenty-four infants were, on an average, in Pekin, daily carried to the pit of death where the little innocents that have not yet breathed their last are condemned without remorse,
"----to be stifled in the vault, To whose foul mouth no healthsome air breathes in, And there die."
This calculation gives nine thousand nearly for the capital alone, where it is supposed about an equal number are exposed to that of all the other parts of the empire. Those, whose constant residence is upon the water, and whose poverty, or superst.i.tion, or total insensibility, or whatever the cause may be that leads them to the perpetration of an act against which nature revolts, sometimes, it is said, expose their infants by throwing them into the ca.n.a.l or river with a gourd tied round their necks, to keep the head above water, and preserve them alive until some humane person may be induced to pick them up. This hazardous experiment, in a country where humanity appears to be reduced to so low an ebb, can only be considered as an aggravation of cruelty. I have seen the dead body of an infant, but without any gourd, floating down the river of Canton among the boats, and the people seemed to take no more notice of it than if it had been the carcase of a dog: this, indeed, would in all probability have attracted their attention, dogs being an article of food commonly used by them; the miserable half-famished Chinese, living upon the water, are glad to get any thing in the shape of animal food, which they will even eat in a state of putrefaction.
Yet, little scrupulous as they are with regard to diet, I am not credulous enough to believe the information of a Swedish author[9] to be correct in his statement of a cure for a certain disease, though "he has no reason to doubt of the fact," _per te???fa??a? alternis diebus, alternis jejunio--by eating children every other day!_
[9] Mr. Torreen.
A picture so horrid in its nature as the exposing of infants presents to the imagination is not to be surpa.s.sed among the most savage nations.
The celebrated legislator of Athens made no law to punish parricide, because he considered it as a crime against nature, too heinous ever to be committed, and that the bare supposition of such a crime would have disgraced the country. The Chinese, in like manner, have no positive law against infanticide. The laws of the rude and warlike Spartans allowed infanticide, of which, however, the parents were not the perpetrators, nor the abettors. Nor, among these people, were the weak and sickly children, deemed by the magistrates unlikely ever to become of use to themselves, or to the public, thrown into the ap?????, or common repository of the dead bodies of children, until life had been previously extinguished, we will charitably suppose, by gentle and the least painful means.
The exposing of children, however, it must be allowed, was very common among the ancients. The stern and rigid virtues of the Romans allowed this among many other customs, that were more unnatural than amiable, and such as in civilized societies of the present day would have been considered among the most atrocious of moral crimes. A Roman father, if his infant was meant to be preserved, lifted it from the ground in his arms; if he neglected that ceremony, the child, it would seem, was considered as doomed to exposure in the highway. Thus, in the Andrian of Terence, where, though the scene is not laid in Rome, Roman customs are described, "quidquid peperisset, decreverunt tollere." "Let it be boy or girl they have resolved to lift it from the ground." Nor indeed is secret infanticide unknown in modern Europe, although it may be owing to a different principle. In such cases, the sense of shame and the fear of encountering the scorn and obloquy of the world have determined the conduct of the unhappy mother, before the feelings of nature could have time to operate. For I am willing to hope that none who had ever experienced a mother"s feelings and a mother"s joy would consent by any means, direct or indirect, or under any impression of fear of shame, of scorn, or biting penury, to the destruction of a new-born babe. And I may venture to say with confidence, that a British cottager, however indigent, would divide his scanty pittance among a dozen children rather than consent to let some of them perish, that he and the rest might fare the better, were even our laws as tacit on this subject as those of China.
Some of the Christian missionaries, in their accounts of this country, have attempted to palliate the unnatural act of exposing infants, by attributing it to the midwife, who they pretend to say, from knowing the circ.u.mstances of the parents, strangle the child without the knowledge of the mother, telling her that the infant was still-born. Others have ascribed the practice to a belief in the metempsycosis, or transmigration of souls into other bodies, that the parents, seeing their children must be doomed to poverty, think it is better at once to let the soul escape in search of a more happy asylum, than to linger in one condemned to want and wretchedness. No degree of superst.i.tion, one would imagine, could prevail upon a parent to reason thus, in that most anxious and critical moment when the combined efforts of hope and fear, of exquisite joy and severe pain, agitate by turns the mother"s breast.
Besides, the Chinese trouble themselves very little with superst.i.tious notions, unless where they apprehend some personal danger. Nor is it more probable that the midwife should take upon herself the commission of a concealed and voluntary murder of an innocent and helpless infant, for the sake of sparing those feelings in another, of which the supposition implies she could not possibly partake; and if she should be encouraged by the father, whose affections for an infant child may be more gradually unfolded than the mother"s, to perpetrate so horrid an act, we must allow that to the evidence of unnatural and murtherous parents must be added that of hired ruffians; so that Chinese virtue would gain little by such a supposition.
It is much more probable that extreme poverty and hopeless indigence, the frequent experience of direful famines, and the scenes of misery and calamity occasioned by them, acting on minds whose affections are not very powerful, induce this unnatural crime which common custom has encouraged, and which is not prohibited by positive law. That this is the case, and that future advantages are not overlooked, will appear from the circ.u.mstance of almost all the infants that are exposed being females, who are the least able to provide for themselves, and the least profitable to their parents; and the practice is most frequent in crowded cities, where not only poverty more commonly prevails, but so many examples daily occur of inhumanity, of summary punishments, acts of violence and cruelty, that the mind becomes callous and habituated to scenes that once would have shocked, and is at length scarcely susceptible of the enormity of crimes.
I am afraid, however, it is but too common a practice even in the remotest corners of the provinces. A respectable French missionary, now in London, who was many years in _Fo-kien_, told me that he once happened to call on one of his converts just at the moment his wife was brought to-bed. The devoted infant was delivered to the father in order to be plunged into a jar of water that was prepared for the purpose. The missionary expostulated with the man on the heinousness of an act that was a crime against G.o.d and nature. The man persisted that, having already more than he could support, it would be a greater crime to preserve a life condemned to want and misery, than to take it away without pain. The missionary, finding that no argument of his was likely to divert him from his purpose, observed "that, as a Christian, he could not refuse him the satisfaction of saving the infant"s soul by baptism."
During the ceremony, as the father held the infant in his arms he happened to fix his eyes on its face, when the missionary thought he perceived the feelings of nature begin to work; and he protracted the ceremony to give time for the latent spark of parental affection to kindle into flame. When the ceremony was ended; "Now," says the missionary, "I have done my duty in saving a soul from perishing." "And I," rejoined the man, "will do mine, by saving its life," and hurried away with the infant to deposit it in the bosom of its mother.
How very weak then, in reality, must be the boasted filial affection of the Chinese for their parents, when they scruple not to become the murderers of their own children, towards whom, according to the immutable laws of nature, the force of affection will ever be stronger than for those whom the laws of China, in preference, have commanded to be protected and supported when rendered incapable of a.s.sisting themselves. The truth of this observation, which I believe few will call in question, is a strong proof that, as I have already remarked, filial piety among the Chinese may rather be considered in the light of an ancient precept, carrying with it the weight of a positive law, than the effect of sentiment.
It is right to mention here (what however is no palliation of the crime, though a diminution of the extent of it) a circ.u.mstance which I do not recollect to have seen noticed by any author, and the truth of which I have too good authority to call in question. As every corpse great and small must be carried to a place of burial at a considerable distance without the city, and as custom requires that all funerals should be conducted with very heavy expences, people in Pekin, even those in comfortable circ.u.mstances, make no hesitation in laying in baskets still-born children, or infants who may die the first month, knowing that they will be taken up by the police. This being the case, we may easily conceive that, in a city said to contain three millions of people, a great proportion of the nine thousand, which we have supposed to be annually exposed, may be of the above description. According to the rules of political arithmetic, and supposing half of those who died to be exposed, the number would be diminished to about 4000. The expence attending a Chinese funeral is more extravagant than an European can well conceive. A rich Hong merchant at Canton is known to have kept his mother near twelve months above ground, because it was not convenient for him to bury her in a manner suitable to his supposed wealth and station.
I am informed also that foundling hospitals do exist in China, but that they are on a small scale, being raised and supported by donations of individuals, and their continuance is therefore as precarious as the wealth of their charitable founders.
These unfavourable features in the character of a people, whose natural disposition is neither ferocious nor morose; but, on the contrary, mild, obliging, and cheerful, can be attributed only to the habits in which they have been trained, and to the heavy hand of power perpetually hanging over them. That this is actually the case may be inferred from the general conduct and character of those vast mult.i.tudes who, from time to time, have emigrated to the Philippine islands, Batavia, Pulo Pinang and other parts of our East Indian settlements. In those places they are not less remarkable for their honesty, than for their peaceable and industrious habits. To the Dutch in Batavia they are masons, carpenters, tailors, shoemakers, shopkeepers, bankers, and, in short, every thing. Indolence and luxury are there arrived to such a height that, without the a.s.sistance of the Chinese, the Dutch would literally be in danger of starving. Yet the infamous government of that place, in the year 1741, caused to be ma.s.sacred, in cold blood, many thousands of these harmless people who offered no resistance; neither women nor children escaped the fury of these blood-hounds.
In these places it appears also, that their quickness at invention is not surpa.s.sed by accuracy of imitation, for which they have always been accounted remarkably expert in their own country. Man is, by nature, a h.o.a.rding animal; and his endeavours to acc.u.mulate property will be proportioned to the security and stability which the laws afford for the possession and enjoyment of that property. In China, the laws regarding property are insufficient to give it that security: hence the talent of invention is there seldom exercised beyond suggesting the means of providing for the first necessities and the most pressing wants. A man, indeed, is afraid here to be considered as wealthy, well knowing that some of the rapacious officers of the state would find legal reasons to extort his riches from him.
The exterior deportment of every cla.s.s in China is uncommonly decent, and all their manners mild and engaging; but even these among persons of any rank are considered as objects worthy the interference of the legislature; hence it follows that they are ceremonious without sincerity, studious of the forms only of politeness without either the ease or elegance of good-breeding. An inferior makes a sham attempt to fall on his knees before his superior, and the latter affects a slight motion to raise him. A common salutation has its mode prescribed by the court of ceremonies; and any neglect or default in a plebeian towards his superior is punishable by corporal chastis.e.m.e.nt, and in men in office by degradation or suspension. In making thus the exterior and public manners of the people a concern of the legislature, society in many respects was considerably benefited. Between equals, and among the lower orders of people, abusive language is very unusual, and they seldom proceed to blows. If a quarrel should be carried to this extremity, the contest is rarely attended with more serious consequences than the loss of the long lock of hair growing from the crown of the head, or the rent of their clothes. The act of drawing a sword, or presenting a pistol, is sufficient to frighten a common Chinese into convulsions; and their warriors shew but few symptoms of bravery. The Chinese may certainly be considered among the most timid people on the face of the earth; they seem to possess neither personal courage, nor the least pretence of mind in dangers or difficulties; consequences that are derived probably from the influence of the moral over the physical character. Yet there is perhaps no country where acts of suicide occur more frequently than in China, among the women as well as the men: such acts being marked with no disgrace, are not held in any abhorrence. The government, indeed, should seem to hold out encouragement to suicide, by a very common practice of mitigating the sentence of death, in allowing the criminal to be his own executioner. The late viceroy of Canton, about two years ago, put an end to his life by swallowing his stone snuff-bottle, which stuck in the oesophagus; and he died in excruciating agonies.
In a government, where every man is liable to be made a slave, where every man is subject to be flogged with the bamboo at the nod of one of the lowest rank of those in office, and where he is compelled to kiss the rod that beats him or, which amounts to the same thing, to thank the tyrant on his knees for the trouble he has taken to correct his morals, high notions of honour and dignified sentiments are not to be expected.
Where the maxims of the government commanding, and the opinions of the people agreeing, that corporal punishment may be inflicted, on the ground of a favour conferred upon the person punished, a principle of humiliation is admitted that is well calculated to exclude and obliterate every notion of the dignity of human nature.
A slave, in fact, cannot be dishonoured. The condition itself of being dependent upon and subject to the caprice of another, without the privilege of appeal, is such a degraded state of the human species, that those who are unfortunately reduced to it have no further ignominy or sense of shame to undergo. The vices of such a condition are innumerable, and they appear on all occasions among this people celebrated (rather undeservedly I think) for their polished manners and civilized government. A Chinese merchant will cheat, whenever an opportunity offers him the means, because he is considered to be incapable of acting honestly; a Chinese peasant will steal when ever he can do it without danger of being detected, because the punishment is only the bamboo, to which he is daily liable; and a Chinese prince, or a prime minister, will extort the property of the subject, and apply it to his private use, whenever he thinks he can do it with impunity. The only check upon the rapacity of men in power is the influence of fear, arising from the possibility of detection: the love of honour, the dread of shame, and a sense of justice, seem to be equally unfelt by the majority of men in office.
It would be needless to multiply instances to those already on record of the refined knavery displayed by Chinese merchants in their dealings with Europeans, or the tricks that they play off in their transactions with one another. They are well known to most nations, and are proverbial in their own. A merchant with them is considered as the lowest character in the country, as a man that will cheat if he can, and whose trade it is to create and then supply artificial wants. To this general character, which public opinion has most probably made to be what it is, an exception is due to those merchants who, acting under the immediate sanction of the government, have always been remarked for their liberality and accuracy in their dealings with Europeans trading to Canton. These men who are styled the _Hong_ merchants, in distinction to a common merchant whom they call _mai-mai-gin_, _a buying and selling man_, might not unjustly be compared with the most eminent of the mercantile cla.s.s in England.
But as traders in general are degraded in all the state maxims, and consequently in public opinion, it is not surprising they should attach so little respect to the character of foreign merchants trading to their ports, especially as several knavish tricks have been practised upon them, in spite of all their acuteness and precaution. The gaudy watches of indifferent workmanship, fabricated purposely for the China market and once in universal demand, are now scarcely asked for. One gentleman in the Honourable East India Company"s employ took it into his head that cuckoo clocks might prove a saleable article in China, and accordingly laid in a large a.s.sortment, which more than answered his most sanguine expectations. But as these wooden machines were constructed for sale only, and not for use, the cuckoo clocks became all mute long before the second arrival of this gentleman with another cargo. His clocks were now not only unsaleable, but the former purchasers threatened to return theirs upon his hands, which would certainly have been done, had not a thought entered his head, that not only pacified his former customers but procured him also other purchasers for his second cargo--he convinced them by undeniable authorities, that the cuckoo was a very odd kind of bird which sung only at certain seasons of the year, and a.s.sured them that whenever the proper time arrived, all the cuckoos they had purchased would once again "tune their melodious throats." After this it would only be fair to allow the Chinese sometimes to trick the European purchaser with a wooden ham instead of a real one.
But as something more honourable might be expected in a prince of the blood, a grandson of the Emperor, I shall just mention one anecdote that happened during my abode in the palace of _Yuen-min-yuen_. This gentleman, then about five-and-twenty years of age, having no ostensible employment, came almost daily to the hall of audience, where we were arranging the presents for the Emperor. He had frequently desired to look at a gold time-piece which I wore in my pocket; one morning I received a message from him, by one of the missionaries, to know if I would sell it and for what price. I explained to the missionary that, being a present from a friend and a token of remembrance, I could not willingly part with it, but that I would endeavour to procure him one equally good from our artificers who I thought had such articles for sale. I soon discovered, however, that his Royal Highness had already been with these people, but did not like their prices. The following morning a second missionary came to me, bringing a present from the prince consisting of about half a pound of common tea, a silk purse, and a few trumpery trinkets, hinting at the same time, that he was expected to carry back the watch in return as an equivalent. I requested the missionary immediately to take back the princely present, which he did with considerable reluctance, dreading his Highness"s displeasure. The poor fellow happened to have a gold watch about him, which he was desired to shew; and the same day he had a visit from one of the prince"s domestics to say, that his master would do him the honour to accept his watch; which he was not only under the necessity of sending, but was obliged to thank him, on his knees, for this extraordinary mark of distinction. He told me, moreover, that this same gentleman had at least a dozen watches which had been procured in the same honourable way.
In the list of presents carried by the late Dutch Emba.s.sador were two grand pieces of machinery, that formerly were a part of the curious museum of the ingenious Mr. c.o.xe. In the course of the long journey from Canton to Pekin they had suffered some slight damage. On leaving the capital they discovered, through one of the missionaries, that while these pieces were under repair, the prime minister _Ho-tchung-tang_ had subst.i.tuted two others of a very inferior and common sort to complete the list, reserving the two grand pieces of clock-work for himself, which, at some future period, he would, perhaps, take the merit of presenting to the Emperor in his own name.
These examples but too clearly ill.u.s.trate a great defect in the boasted moral character of the Chinese. But the fault, as I before observed, seems to be more in the system of government than in the nature and disposition of the people. The accession of a foreign power to the throne, by adopting the language, the laws, and the customs of the conquered, has preserved with the forms all the abuses of the ancient government. The character of the governors may differ a little, but that of the governed remains unchanged. The Tartars, by a.s.suming the dress, the manners, and the habits of the Chinese, by being originally descended from the same stock, and by a great resemblance of features, are scarcely distinguishable from them in their external appearance. And if any physical difference exist, it seems to be in stature only, which may have arisen from local causes. The Chinese are rather taller, and of a more slender and delicate form than the Tartars, who are in general short, thick, and robust. The small eye, elliptical at the end next to the nose, is a predominating feature in the cast of both the Tartar and the Chinese countenance, and they have both the same high cheek bones and pointed chins, which, with the custom of shaving off the hair, gives to the head the shape of an inverted cone, remarkable enough in some subjects, but neither so general, nor so singular, as to warrant their being considered among the _monsters_ in nature, _h.o.m.o monstrosus_, _macrocephalus_, _capite conico_, _Chinensis_[10]. The head of our worthy conductor _Van-ta-gin_, who was a real Chinese, had nothing in its shape different from that of an European, except the eye. The portrait of this gentleman, drawn by Mr. Hickey, is so strong a likeness, and he was deservedly so great a favourite of every Englishman in the train of the British Emba.s.sador, that I am happy in having in opportunity of placing it at the head of this work.
[10] Linn. Systema Naturae.
The natural colour both of the Chinese and Tartars seems to be that tint between a fair and dark complexion, which we distinguish the word _brunet_ or _brunette_; and the shades of this complexion are deeper, or lighter, according as they have been more or less exposed to the influence of the climate. The women of the lower cla.s.s, who labour in the fields or who dwell in vessels, are almost invariably coa.r.s.e, ill-featured, and of a deep brown complexion, like that of the Hottentot. But this we find to be the case among the poor of almost every nation. Hard labour, scanty fare, and early and frequent parturition, soon wither the delicate buds of beauty. The sprightliness and expression of the features, as well as the colour of the skin, which distinguish the higher ranks from the vulgar, are the effects of ease and education. We saw women in China, though very few, that might pa.s.s for beauties even in Europe. The Malay features however prevail in most; a small black or dark brown eye, a short rounded nose, generally a little flattened, lips considerably thicker than in Europeans, and black hair, are universal.
The Mantchoo Tartars would appear to be composed of a mixed race: among these we observed several, both men and women, that were extremely fair and of florid complexions: some had light blue eyes, straight or aquiline noses, brown hair, immense bushy beards, and had much more the appearance of Greeks than of Tartars. It is certainly not improbable that the Greeks of Sogdiana, whose descendants must have blended with the western Tartars and with whom the Mantchoos were connected, may have communicated this cast of countenance. _Tchien-lung_, whose nose was somewhat aquiline and complexion florid, used to boast of his descent from _Gengis-khan_: these, however, are exceptions to the general character, which is evidently the same as that of the Chinese.
But although their appearance and manners are externally the same, a closer acquaintance soon discovers that in disposition they are widely different. Those who are better pleased with a blunt sincerity bordering on rudeness than a studied complaisance approaching to servility; who may think it better to be robbed openly than cheated civilly, will be apt to give the preference to the Tartar character. Yet those Tartars of distinction, who fill some of the higher situations in the state, soon lose their native roughness and are scarcely distinguishable in their manners and demeanour from the Chinese.
The ease, politeness, and dignified carriage of the old viceroy of _Pe-tche-lee_, who was a Mantchoo, could not be exceeded by the most practiced courtier in modern Europe: the attention he shewed to every thing that concerned the emba.s.sy, the unaffected manner in which he received and entertained us at _Tien-sing_; the kindness and condescension with which he gave his orders to the inferior officers and to his domestics, placed him in a very amiable point of view. He was a very fine old man of seventy-eight years of age, of low stature, with small sparkling eyes, a benign aspect, a long silver beard, and the whole of his appearance calm, venerable, and dignified. The manners of _Sun-ta-gin_, a relation of the Emperor and one of the six ministers of state, were no less dignified, easy, and engaging; and _Chung-ta-gin_, the new viceroy of Canton, was a plain, una.s.suming, and good-natured man. The prime minister _Ho-chang-tong_, the little Tartar legate, and the ex-viceroy of Canton, were the only persons of rank among the many we had occasion to converse with that discovered the least ill-humour, distant hauteur, and want of complaisance. All the rest with whom we had any concern, whether Tartars or Chinese, when in our private society, were easy, affable, and familiar, extremely good-humoured, loquacious, communicative. It was in public only, and towards each other, that they a.s.sumed their ceremonious gravity, and practised all the tricks of demeanour which custom requires of them.
The general character, however, of the nation is a strange compound of pride and meanness, of affected gravity and real frivolousness, of refined civility and gross indelicacy. With an appearance of great simplicity and openness in conversation, they practise a degree of art and cunning against which an European is but ill prepared. Their manner of introducing the subject of the court ceremonies in conversation with the Emba.s.sador is no bad specimen of their sly address in managing matters of this sort. Some of them observed, by mere accident as it were, how curious it was to see the different modes of dress that prevailed among different nations: this naturally brought on a comparison between theirs and ours, the latter of which they pretended to examine with critical attention. After a good deal of circ.u.mlocutory observations, they thought their own ent.i.tled to the preference, being more convenient, on account of its being made wide and loose and free from tight ligatures; whereas ours must be exceedingly uneasy and troublesome in any other posture than that of standing upright; and particularly so in making the genuflections and prostrations which were customary and indeed necessary to be performed by all persons whenever the Emperor appeared in public. No notice being taken of this broad hint, so artfully introduced, they proceeded to compare their wide petticoats with our breeches, and to contrast the play and freedom of their knee-joints with the obstruction that our knee-buckles and garters must necessarily occasion. This brought them directly to the point, and they finished by recommending, in the warmth of their friendship, that we should disenc.u.mber ourselves of our breeches, as they would certainly be inconvenient to appear in at court.
Of perseverance in negociation, or more properly speaking, _in driving a bargain_, the Tartar legate gave no bad specimen of his talent. Having in vain practiced every art to obtain from the Emba.s.sador an unconditional compliance with the court ceremony, he was sent at length by the Prime Minister to inform him, that the important point was finally decided and that the English mode was to be adopted; but, he observed, that as it was not the custom of China to kiss the Emperor"s hand, he had something to propose to which there could be no objection, and which was that, in lieu of that part of the English ceremony, he should put the second knee upon the ground and, instead of bending one knee, to kneel on both. In fact, they negociate on the most trifling point with as much caution and preciseness, as if they were forming a treaty of peace, and with more address than some treaties of peace have been negociated.