Chapter 12

In one out-of-the-way village of northwestern China, we were evidently taken for some species of centaurs; the people came up to examine us while on the wheel to see whether or no rider and wheel were one. We became so harassed with importunities to ride that we were compelled at last to seek relief in subterfuge, for an absolute refusal, we found, was of no avail. We would promise to ride for a certain sum of money, thinking thus to throw the burden of refusal on themselves. But, nothing daunted, they would pass round the hat. On several occasions, when told that eggs could not be bought in the community, an offer of an exhibition would bring them out by the dozen. In the same way we received presents of tea, and by this means our cash expenses were considerably curtailed. The interest in the “foreign horses” was sometimes so great as to stop business and even amusements. A rather notable incident of this kind occurred on one of the Chinese holidays. The flag-decked streets, as we rode through, were filled with the neighboring peasantry, attracted by some traveling theatrical troupe engaged for the occasion. In fact, a performance was just then in progress at the open-air theater close at hand. Before we were aware of it we had rolled into its crowded auditorium. The women were sitting on improvised benches, fanning and gossiping, while the men stood about in listless groups. But suddenly their attention was aroused by the counter attraction, and a general rush followed, to the great detriment of the temporary peddlers’ stands erected for the occasion. Although entirely deserted, and no doubt consumed with curiosity, the actors could not lose what the Chinese call “face.” They still continued their hideous noises, pantomimes, and dialogues to the empty seats.

The last fifty miles into Liang-chou, a city founded by a Catholic Chinaman over two hundred years ago, we were compelled to make on foot, owing to an accident that caused us serious trouble all through the remainder of our Chinese journey. In a rapid descent by a narrow pathway, the pedal of one of the machines struck upon a protuberance, concealed by a tuft of grass, snapping off the axle, and scattering the ball-bearings over the ground. For some miles we pushed along on the bare axle inverted in the pedal-crank. But the wrenching the machine thus received soon began to tell. With a sudden jolt on a steep descent, it collapsed entirely, and precipitated the rider over the handle-bars. The lower part of the frame had broken short off, where it was previously cracked, and had bent the top bar almost double in the fall. In this sad plight, we were rejoiced to find in the “City under the Shade” the Scotch missionary, Mr. Laughton, who had founded here the most remote of the China Inland Missions. But even with his assistance, and that of the best native mechanic, our repairs were ineffective. At several points along the route we were delayed on this account. At last the front and rear parts of the machine became entirely separated. There was no such thing as steel to be found in the country, no tools fit to work with, and no one who knew the first principles of soldering. After endeavoring to convince the native blacksmiths that a delicate bicycle would not stand pounding like a Chinese cart-wheel, we took the matter into our own hands. An iron bar was placed in the hollow tubing to hold it in shape, and a band of telegraph wire passed round from front to rear, along the upper and lower rods, and then twisted so as to bring the two parts as tightly together as possible. With a waddling frame, and patched rear-wheel describing eccentric revolutions, we must have presented a rather comical appearance over the remaining thousand miles to the coast.

Across the Yellow Hoang-ho, which is the largest river we encountered in Asia, a pontoon bridge leads into the city of Lan-chou-foo. Its strategical position at the point where the Hoang-ho makes its great bend to the north, and where the gateway of the West begins, as well as its picturesque location in one of the greatest fruit-bearing districts of China, makes it one of the most important cities of the empire. On the commanding heights across the river, we stopped to photograph the picturesque scene. As usual, the crowd swarmed in front of the camera to gaze into the mysterious lens. All the missionaries we had met cautioned us against taking photographs in China, lest we should do violence to the many popular superstitions, but the only trouble we ever experienced in this respect was in arousing popular curiosity. We soon learned that in order to get something besides Chinese heads in our pictures it was necessary first to point the camera in the opposite direction, and then wheel suddenly round to the scene we wished to take. As we crossed the river, the bridge of boats so creaked and swayed beneath the rushing rabble, that we were glad to stand once more upon the terra firma of the city streets, which were here paved with granite and marble blocks. As we rode down the principal thoroughfare, amid the usual din and uproar, a well-dressed Chinaman rushed out from one of the stores and grabbed us by the arm. “Do you speak English?” he shouted, with an accent so like an American, that we leaped from our wheels at once, and grasped his hand as that of a fellow countryman. This, in fact, he proved to be in everything but birth. He was one of that party of mandarins’ sons which had been sent over to our country some years ago, as an experiment by the Chinese government, to receive a thorough American training. We cannot here give the history of that experiment, as Mr. Woo related it—how they were subsequently accused of cutting off their queues and becoming denationalized; how, in consequence, they were recalled to their native land, and degraded rather than elevated, both by the people and the government, because they were foreign in their sentiments and habits; and how, at last, they gradually began to force recognition through the power of merit alone. He had now been sent out by the government to engineer the extension of the telegraph-line from Su-chou to Urumtsi, for it was feared by the government that the employment of a foreigner in this capacity would only increase the power for evil which the natives already attributed to this foreign innovation. The similarity in the phrases, _telegraph pole_ and _dry heaven_, had inspired the common belief that the line of poles then stretching across the country was responsible for the long-existing drought. In one night several miles of poles were sawed short off, by the secret order of a banded conspiracy. After several decapitations, the poles were now being restored, and labeled with the words, “Put up by order of the Emperor.”

In company with the English missionary, Mr. Redfern, while attempting to get out of the city on the way to his mountain home, we were caught in another jam. He counseled us to conceal the weapons we were carrying in our belts, for fear the sight of them should incite the mob to some act of violence. Our own experience, however, had taught us that a revolver in China was worth nothing if not shown. For persistence, this mob surpassed any we had ever seen. They followed us out of the city and over the three miles’ stretch to the mission premises, and there announced their intention of remaining indefinitely. Again Mr. Redfern feared some outbreak, and counseled us to return to the city and apply to the viceroy himself for protection. This proved a good move. A special exhibition on the palace parade-grounds gained for us the valuable favor of one who was only fourth in rank to the emperor himself. A body-guard of soldiers was furnished, not only during our sojourn in the city, but for the journey to Singan-foo, on which a good reception was everywhere insured by an official despatch sent in advance. In order to secure for us future respect, a small flag with the government stamp and of yellow color was given us to fly by the side of our “stars and stripes.” On this was inscribed the title of “The Traveling Students,” as well as answers to the more frequent of the common questions—our nationality, destination, and age. The best mechanic in the local cannon-foundry was then ordered to make, at government expense, whatever repairs were possible on our disabled machines. This, however, as it proved, was not much; most of his time was spent in taking measurements and patterns for another purpose. If his intentions have been carried out, Lan-chou-foo is to-day possessed of a “foot-moving carriage” of home production.

Our sojourn in this city is especially associated with the three names of Woo, Choo, and Moo—names by no means uncommon in Chinese nomenclature. We heard of a boy named the abstract numeral, “sixty-five,” because his grandfather happened to reach that age on the very day of his birth. Mr. Moo was the local telegraph operator, with whom we, and our friends Woo and Choo, of Shanghai, associated. All operators in the Chinese telegraph system are required to read and write English. The school established for this purpose at Lan-chou we occasionally visited, and assisted the Chinese schoolmaster to hear the recitations from Routledge’s spelling-book. He, in turn, was a frequent partaker of our “foreign chows,” which our English-speaking friends served with knives and forks borrowed from the missionaries. Lily and bamboo roots, sharks’ fins and swallows’ nests, and many other Chinese delicacies, were now served in abundance, and with the ever-accompanying bowl of rice. In the matter of eating and drinking, Chinese formality is extreme. A round table is the only one that can be used in an aristocratic household. The seat of honor is always the one next to the wall. Not a mouthful can be taken until the host raises his chop-sticks in the air, and gives the signal. Silence then prevails; for Confucius says: “When a man eats he has no time for talk.” When a cup of tea is served to any one in a social party, he must offer it to every one in the room, no matter how many there are, before proceeding to drink himself. The real basis of Chinese politeness seems to be this: They must be polite enough to offer, and you must be polite enough to refuse. Our ignorance of this great underlying principle during the early part of the Chinese journey led us into errors both many and grievous. In order to show a desire to be sociable, we accepted almost everything that was offered us, to the great chagrin, we fear, of the courteous donors.

VI

AN INTERVIEW WITH THE PRIME MINISTER OF CHINA

Our departure from Lan-chou was not, we thought, regretted by the officials themselves, for we heard that apprehension was expressed lest the crowds continuing to collect around the telegraph-office should indulge in a riot. However, we were loath to leave our genial friends for the society of opium-smokers, for we were now in that province of China which, next to Sechuen, is most addicted to this habit. From dusk till bed-time, the streets of the villages were almost deserted for the squalid opium dens. Even our soldier attendant, as soon as the wooden saddle was taken from his sore-backed government steed, would produce his portable lamp, and proceed to melt on his needle the wax-like contents of a small, black box. When of the proper consistency, the paste was rolled on a metal plate to point it for the aperture in the flute-shaped pipe. Half the night would be given to this process, and a considerable portion of the remaining half would be devoted to smoking small pinches of tobacco in the peculiar Chinese water-pipe. According to an official note, issued early in 1882, by Mr. Hart, Inspector-General of Chinese Customs, considerably less than one per cent. of the population is addicted to opium-smoking, while those who smoke it to excess are few. More to be feared is the use of opium as a poison, especially among Chinese women. The government raises large sums from the import duty on opium, and tacitly connives at its cultivation in most of the provinces, where the traders and mandarins share between them the profits of this officially prohibited drug.

This part of the great historic highway on which we were now traveling, between the two bends of the Hoang-ho, was found more extensively patronized than heretofore. Besides the usual caravans of horses, donkeys, and two-wheeled vans, we occasionally met with a party of shaven-headed Tibetans traveling either as emissaries, or as traders in the famous Tibetan sheep-skins and furs, and the strongly-scented bags of the musk-deer. A funeral cortège was also a very frequent sight. Chinese custom requires that the remains of the dead be brought back to their native place, no matter how far they may have wandered during life, and as the carriage of a single body would often be expensive, they are generally interred in temporary cemeteries or mortuary villages, until a sufficient number can be got together to form a large convoy. Mandarins, however, in death as in life, travel alone and with retinue. One coffin we met which rested upon poles supported on the shoulders of thirty-two men. Above on the coffin was perched the usual white rooster, which is supposed to incorporate, during transportation, the spirit of the departed. In funeral ceremonies, especially of the father, custom also requires the children to give public expression to their grief. Besides many other filial observances, the eldest son is in duty bound to render the journey easy for the departed by scattering fictitious paper-money, as spirit toll, at the various roadside temples.

Singan-foo, the capital of the Middle Kingdom, under the Tsin dynasty, and a city of the first importance more than two thousand years ago, is still one of the largest places in the empire, being exceeded in population probably by Canton alone. Each of its four walls, facing the cardinal points, is over six miles long and is pierced in the center by a monumental gate with lofty pavilions. It was here, among the ruins of an old Nestorian church, built several centuries before, that was found the famous tablet now sought at a high price by the British Museum. The harassing mobs gathered from its teeming population, as well as the lateness of the season, prompted us to make our sojourn as short as possible. Only a day sufficed to reach Tong-quan, which is the central stronghold of the Hoang-ho basin, and one of the best defended points in China. Here, between precipitous cliffs, this giant stream rushes madly by, as if in protest against its sudden deflection. Our ferry this time was not the back of a Chinese coolie nor a jolting ox-cart, but a spacious flat-boat made to accommodate one or two vehicles at a time. This was rowed at the stern, like the gondolas of Venice. The mob of hundreds that had been dogging our foot-steps and making life miserable, during our brief stop for food, watched our embarkation. We reached the opposite shore, a mile below the starting-point, and began to ascend from the river-basin to the highlands by an excavated fissure in the famous “yellow earth.” This gives its name, not only to the river it discolors, but, from the extensive region comprised, even to the emperor himself, who takes the title of “Yellow Lord,” as equivalent to “Master of the World.” The thickness of this the richest soil in China, which according to Baron Richthofen is nothing more than so much dust accumulated during the course of ages by the winds from the northern deserts, is in some places at least two thousand feet. Much ingenuity has been displayed in overcoming the difficulties offered to free communication by the perpendicular walls of these yellow lands. Some of the most frequented roads have been excavated to depths of from forty to one hundred feet. Being seldom more than eight or ten feet wide, the wheeled traffic is conducted by means of sidings, like the “stations” in the Suez Canal. Being undrained or unswept by the winds, these walled-up tracks are either dust-beds or quagmires, according to the season; for us, the autumn rains had converted them into the latter. Although on one of the imperial highways which once excited the admiration of Marco Polo, we were now treated to some of the worst stretches we have ever seen. The mountain ascents, especially those stair-like approaches to the “Heavenly Gates” before reaching the Pe-chili plains, were steep, gradeless inclines, strewn with huge upturned blocks of stone, over which the heavy carts were fairly lifted by the sheer force of additional horse-flesh. The bridges, too, whose Roman-like masonry attests the high degree of Chinese civilization during the middle ages, have long since been abandoned to the ravages of time; while over the whole country the late Dungan rebellion has left its countless ruins.

The people of Shan-si province are noted for their special thrift, but this quality we observed was sometimes exhibited at the expense of the higher virtue of honesty. One of the most serious of the many cases of attempted extortion occurred at a remote country town, where we arrived late one evening, after learning to our dismay that one of our remarkably few mistakes in the road had brought us just fifty miles out of the way. Unusually wearied as we were by the cross-country cuts, we desired to retire early. In fact, on this account, we were not so observant of Chinese formality as we might have been. We did not heed the hinted requests of the visiting officials for a moon-light exhibition, nor go to the inn-door to bow them respectfully out. We were glad to take them at their word when they said, with the usual hypocritical smirk, “Now, don’t come out any farther.” This indiscretion on our part caused them, as well as ourselves, to suffer in the respect of the assembled rabble. With official connivance, the latter were now free, they thought, to take unusual liberties. So far, in our dealings with the Chinese, we had never objected to anything that was reasonable even from the native point of view. We had long since learned the force of the Chinese proverb that, “in order to avoid suspicion you must not live behind closed doors”; and in consequence had always recognized the common prerogative to ransack our private quarters and our luggage, so long as nothing was seriously disturbed. We never objected, either, to their wetting our paper windows with their tongues, so that they might noiselessly slit a hole in them with their exceptionally long finger nails, although we did wake up some mornings to find the panes entirely gone. It was only at the request of the innkeeper that we sometimes undertook the job of cleaning out the inn-yard; but this, with the prevalent superstition about the “withering touch of the foreigner,” was very easily accomplished. Nor had we ever shown the slightest resentment at being called “foreign devils”; for this, we learned, was, with the younger generation at least, the only title by which foreigners were known. But on this particular night, our forbearance being quite exhausted, we ejected the intruders bodily. Mid mutterings and threats we turned out the lights, and the crowd as well as ourselves retired. The next morning the usual exorbitant bill was presented by the innkeeper, and, as usual, one half or one third was offered and finally accepted, with the customary protestations about being under-paid. The innkeeper’s grumblings incited the crowd which early assembled, and from their whispers and glances we could see that trouble of some kind was brewing. We now hastened to get the wheels into the road. Just then the innkeeper, at the instigation of the crowd, rushed out and grabbed the handle-bars, demanding at the same time a sum that was even in advance of his original price. Extortion was now self-evident, and, remonstrance being of no avail, we were obliged to protect ourselves with our fists. The crowd began to close in upon us, until, with our backs against the adjoining wall, we drew our weapons, at which the onward movement changed suddenly to a retreat. Then we assumed the aggressive, and regained the wheels which had been left in the middle of the road. The innkeeper and his friend now caught hold of the rear wheels. Only by seizing their queues could we drag them away at all, but even then before we could mount they would renew their grasp. It was only after another direct attack upon them that we were able to mount, and dash away.

A week’s journeying after this unpleasant episode brought us among the peanuts, pigs, and pig-tails of the famous Pe-chili plains. Vast fields of peanuts were now being plowed, ready to be passed through a huge coarse sieve to separate the nuts from the sandy loam. Sweet potatoes, too, were plentiful. These, as well as rice balls, boiled with a peculiar dry date in a triangular corn-leaf wrapper, we purchased every morning at daybreak from the pots of the early street-venders, and then proceeded to the local bake-shops, where the rattling of the rolling-pins prophesied of stringy fat cakes cooked in boiling linseed oil, and heavy dough biscuits cleaving to the urn-like oven.

It was well that we were now approaching the end of our journey, for our wheels and clothing were nearly in pieces. Our bare calves were pinched by the frost, for on some of the coldest mornings we would find a quarter of an inch of ice. Our rest at night was broken for the want of sufficient covering. The straw-heated _kangs_ would soon cool off, and leave us half the night with only our thin sleeping-bags to ward off rheumatism.

But over the beaten paths made by countless wheelbarrows we were now fast nearing the end. It was on the evening of November 3, that the giant walls of the great “Residence,” as the people call their imperial capital, broke suddenly into view through a vista in the surrounding foliage. The goal of our three-thousand-one-hundred-and-sixteen-mile journey was now before us, and the work of the seventy-first riding day almost ended. With the dusk of evening we entered the western gate of the “Manchu City,” and began to thread its crowded thoroughfares. By the time we reached Legation street or, as the natives egotistically call it, “The Street of the Foreign Dependencies,” night had veiled our haggard features and ragged garments. In a dimly lighted courtyard we came face to face with the English proprietor of the Hotel de Peking. At our request for lodging, he said, “Pardon me, but may I first ask who you are and where you come from?” Our unprepossessing appearance was no doubt a sufficient excuse for this precaution. But just then his features changed, and he greeted us effusively. Explanations were now superfluous. The “North China Herald” correspondent at Pao-ting-foo had already published our story to the coast.

That evening the son of the United States minister visited us, and offered a selection from his own wardrobe until a Chinese tailor could renew our clothing. With borrowed plumes we were able to accept invitations from foreign and Chinese officials. Polite cross-examinations were not infrequent, and we fear that entire faith in our alleged journey was not general until, by riding through the dust and mud of Legation street, we proved that Chinese roads were not altogether impracticable for bicycle traveling.