Part 29

Many have asked what was the organization of the crown colony of Hongkong Island, where 3,000 white troops, a navy, 2,000 Indian troops, and 500 British, Indian and Chinese police guard and rule 3,000 white men and 500,000 Chinese so successfully that after paying her own expenses, Hongkong continues, what she was the first colony to offer, to pay to the British government a large sum for military and naval expenses. The government is organized under the Home Colonial Office, as follows: a governor, the general of British troops in China, a local colonial secretary, an attorney-general, a colonial treasurer, a director of public works, a registrar-general, a superintendent of police, a clerk of councils, four white civilians, and two Chinese civilians, the six latter serving mainly for the honor. The famous Sanitary Board serves as a separate commission. Almost every one will admit that this is a compact, graftless, powerful and very economical organization, and it has more than answered expectations in a worldwide fame, both for Britain and China. The able newspapers of the ports are the Opposition, and keep the government up to efficiency. There is only one flaw, which may soon be remedied. There should be a director of education, for the purpose of honoring education, and not because education is backward in the progressive colony, which has had so many hero governors and cultured heads of department. Their great deeds would fill volumes as yet unwritten, for the many authors who have lived and served at Hongkong have not written of themselves. _In modestia magnus!_ Hongkong has had some famous regiments in its garrison, musical and sporting life. After the South African War the Royal Welsh, Derbyshire and Lincolnshire regiments came. In 1911 the noted Yorkshire Light Infantry were in garrison. Their fine bands, often massed with the Indian regiments’ bands, are the feature in the musical life of the royal colony. The Yorkshires served in garrisoning the foreign settlement on Shameen Island, Canton, when, following the revolution of 1911, the pirate chief Luk seized the forts around Canton. Over at Kowloon, the mainland section of the colony in 1860, was mobilized the army of Sir Hope Grant’s 13,000 British troops and Baron Gros’ 6,000 French troops for the Taku-Peking campaign, and though the existence of their nation was at stake, the southern Chinese did not make a protest against this mobilization on what was then China’s territory.

The municipal organization at Amoy is seven councilmen, two of whom are a clergyman and a physician. They employ a captain-superintendent, and a judge who sits in a “Mixed Court” with a Chinese mandarin. American naval officers were given warm receptions by the Chinese of Amoy when the battleship fleet went round the world in 1908. The island-dotted and hill-surrounded harbor is one of the finest and most beautiful in China, and there is a great future before the port. At one time it was the largest tea port in China. The foreign settlement is on the hilly Kulangsu Island. The streets to see are Likin, Temple, Bootmaker, etc. The native Chamber of Commerce entertained the visiting members of the American Chambers of Commerce in 1910 in the Nan Pu Tu Temple. There are notable clubs and theaters; the Kwan Tai and other temples. The scenery is famous for the Valley of 10,000 Boulders, a sort of “Garden of the Gods”, in which the Deified Rock is worshiped. Many of the boulders are engraved by nature-worshipers. Note should be taken of the dainty architecture of the White Stag Temple and gates. The London Mission at the boat landing has partially adopted the Chinese style of architecture in the up-curling cornices. Forts which have seen hard service are placed on the hills. The foreign race course and jockey club is under the hill where the noted Lampotah Temple stands. Amoy is particularly famous for the best oysters, coolie oranges, pumeloes (grapefruit), fish, game, sugar, ginger and grasscloth in China. At Amoy stone buildings are seen everywhere, and extend southward through Fukien and Kwangtung provinces. The natives, who have a little Arab blood, and who often wear turbans as well as hats, are tall, turbulent, humorous and curious. There is much infanticide, because the small farms are only able to support sons. Amoy is connected by railway with Changchow on the Lung (Dragon) River, and it is planned to have a coast railway connecting all these cities from Shanghai to Canton. There is almost daily steamship connection with Hongkong. Native Amoy City is on a large island. The walls, which climb straight up the hills, are about eight miles around. The city was taken by the republicans on November 12, 1911, and there were many subsequent engagements with pirates when American marines from the _Monterey_ had to be landed. Centuries ago the people of this province offered the most stubborn resistance to the Manchus when that dynasty conquered China. The dialect is the most isolated in China, showing that the northern ruling Chinese influenced the people very slightly. To instance:

In Fukien In Mandarin ---------- ----------- Hokchiu Fuchau Amoy Hsia-men Quemoy Chinmen

Though the port was formally opened to foreign trade in 1842, the East India Company had hongs here as early as 1661 and up to 1730.

There is much for the antiquarian to trace as he follows the traditions of Arab visits in centuries preceding the Portugese discovery, at Canton. We hear reports that St. Thomas, the disciple, and Mohammed’s uncle journeyed here, taking the route none ever has since, across Persia, India and Burma. The tourist should not fail to visit the noble park of thousands of examination stalls, where the old classical learning held rule from Confucius’ time until recently. There is evidence enough that the state has grasped the new educational conditions recommended by the great Emperor Kwang Hsu, and the Cantonese reformers, in the splendid Kwangtung normal college, which consists of two wings and a tower building in the style of the University of New York. A noble stucco wall, pierced with portholes, surrounds the college. There is also the Canton Christian College, established in the fine Martin Hall. It is supported by Americans. American statesmanship and philanthropy will miss their glorious opportunity if they do not soon erect at Canton the preparatory department of a comprehensive American-Chinese university, the higher classes to be at Peking or Nanking. Trace should also be made of the factory of Milner & Bull, of New York, which sheltered Robert Morrison in 1807, when he was preparing for his immortal translations and dictionary. This was the time when American tradesmen of New York, Philadelphia and Boston showed keen sympathy with statesmanship and learning. Olyphant & Company, of New York and Canton, backed the printing of the priceless _Chinese Repository_, and brought fifty missionaries free from New York in their famous clipper ships. The Boston merchants who ran regular lines in those days to Canton, and had factories there, were Forbes, Perkins, Cabot, Sturgis, Russell, Cushing and Coolidge.

The morbid will want to see the execution ground in the Thirteen Factories section. It has no rival as the bloodiest spot on this earth. Governor Yeh, of Kwangtung, during the Taiping rebellion in October, 1856, beheaded 100,000 rebels here, and during the pirates’ attack under Luk, at Canton, in March, 1912, executions were part of each day’s work here. The ground is small and insignificant looking, and when not legally in use is used for spreading pottery in the sun. This Thirteen Factories section is in rather bad odor as an entertainer of opium smugglers and counterfeiters. Confucius’ temple near the Examination Park should not be missed, not for its beauty, but for its significance in the national ethics of so many centuries of one uninterrupted idea. The Parade Ground, under the eastern wall of the old city, should be visited, for here the nucleus of China’s new army, which we will some day hear much of, is training. China must learn to marry martial force and productive mechanics to, what through the long ages she has been preeminent in, literature, agriculture and art. In the western suburbs, the looms of the silk weavers, the native hospital, the Temple of Longevity, and the Temple of Five Hundred Genii are of exceeding interest, and if one can go as far as the White Cloud Hills there is the historic spot to see, where Morrison baptized, in 1804, Tsai Ah Ko, the first Protestant convert in China.

Various other places of interest are Tsiang Lan Kiai (Physic Street), which is protected from the sun with matting; Ma An Street, where the shoe shops are; Book Store and Jade Streets, with their tea saloons; the Hall of Green Tea Merchants radiant in porcelain; the Pok Chai native hospital; and the public gardens which were confiscated from the rich salt merchant, Pun Shih Cheng, because he evaded the law by smuggling, etc. China first prophesied that restitutionary besides prohibitive laws will yet be adopted world-wide to straighten out the economic tangle. Many modern improvements have come to Canton, such as a wide modern bund, electric cars and light, water, sanitary buildings, hospitals, etc. The University of Pennsylvania and the American Presbyterian Women have notable medical establishments at Canton, which city is connected with the early life of Doctor Sun Yat Sen, who has become immortal by formulating the republican Chinese rebellion and nation. Canton is already a railroad center, having rails east to Hongkong, south to medieval Macao, and north toward Hankau, and she proposes to link up west by running a railroad to Nanning and Yunnan. There is a vast steamer and launch traffic to Hongkong and up the West (Si) and North (Pe) Rivers, and along the iron-bound coast. Canton is the largest and most representative city of ethnical, republican and commercial China. Its stores and small factories are decidedly the most notable, efficient and varied in the wide land. The foreign settlement on Shameen Island in the Pearl River has every luxury in the way of modern clubs, hotels and residences, and in the native city there are clubs where the foreigner and native gentleman are trying to approach nearer to each other. Canton has two dialects, the Cantonese and the Hakka, and I know of no better authority on them than my old friend, Dyer Ball, the veteran author and linguist of Hongkong, though Canton has had many famous foreign students among her foreign residents in exile. The curious Hakka tribe composes one-third of the inhabitants of Canton. They can be distinguished by vivacity, by the flat hat with valance, worn by the women, and by their love of jewelry. The sanpan, junk, slipper boat and launch people, the most distinctive feature of Canton’s life, are largely Hakka. For further information regarding this tribe, which is also largely in evidence at Hongkong, Amoy and Swatow, I would recommend Dyer Ball’s authoritative books. _Dutch Folly Island_ commemorates an early settlement of trading Hollanders.

The writer in his book, _The Chinese_, dealt at length with the oldest foreign settlement in China, the Portugese city of Macao, and its famous author, Camoens, who wrote _The Lusiads_. Authors who have written on quaint medieval Macao are Doctor Eitel, Norton Kyshe, Montalto de Jesus, Kutschera, Ljungstedt, the famous Sir John Bowring and the immortal Camoens himself. The largest library on the subject is to be found in the National Libraries of Lisbon, Coimbra, and other educational centers of old Portugal. The first American consuls lived at Macao, as did also the noted Jesuit explorer Abbé Huc, in 1840, in the seminary here. The British artist, Chinnery, lived and painted at Macao, as did the lovely Chinese colorist, Nam Cheong. Edmund Roberts, the first American ambassador of the United States “to Siam, Cochin and Muscat” died of bubonic plague here on June 12, 1836. In a study of Macao the old volume of the _Chinese Repository_ should not be left unsearched. In a temple at Wang Hiya, beyond the quaint Porto Cerco gate, the first commercial treaty between America and China was signed respectively by Cushing, Daniel Webster’s son Fletcher, and Ki Ying. The remarkable miniature garden at the governor’s summer palace on the Monte Road should be seen, and rather amusing miniature photo statues are to be seen in the cemeteries. The largest cement factory in China (British owned) is on Green Island, which is connected by a causeway with Macao. The silted up harbor is being dredged in an effort to bring the long lost shipping back to old Macao. There is to be railway connection with Canton, and there is palatial steamer connection with Hongkong and Canton. The modern hotels, such as the Boa Vista and the Hing Kee, are excellent, the former occupying an unusually scenic site. The drives and Praya Grande are delightful. Macao is famous for its medieval carnivals and processions. It has an ambitious Chinese population whose leading spirits are the progressive Ho Sui Tin and Fong families. Its gambling houses are possibly notorious, and its opium farm, now somewhat restricted, was once a great thorn in international and hygienic matters.

Off the three-mile limit at Kowhowyang anchorage, the smuggling steamers occasionally lie. The trouble between Japan and China over the “Tatsu Maru” incident, and the subsequent severe trade boycott, which nearly bankrupted a Japanese trans-Pacific steamship and coastal line, will be recalled. The Chinese and Portuguese are constantly at swords’ points over harbor questions and the inclusion of the large islands of Lapa, Joao and Taipa in the beautiful colony, which would have been rushed long ago by the Chinese but for fear of Britain which supports Portugal “for auld acquaintance’ sake” and the memories of Wellington’s peninsular campaign when Portugal assisted Britain in her need. Chinese and Portuguese gunboats are always watching each other in the rather turbulent waters.

Lovely flowery Macao, of fast and festival, is the favorite health resort of Hongkong, because of its sou-west monsoon in the summer months. The wave of the Portuguese republican revolution took a month to reach Indian Goa and Cathayan Macao. The newspapers were read by the soldiers in the two beautiful barracks which stand high over Cape Sao Francisco and beneath Monte Fort. They were then loaned to the sailors on the gunboat _Patria_ which rose and fell on the yellow tide in the offing. On November 29, 1910, the sailors of the _Patria_ landed, marched to the square where the Senato Leal stands on high ground on Rua Central in the center of the closely built city. There three volleys were fired as a signal to the troops who, a mile away, broke into the armories and armed with ball cartridge ready for liberty’s business! The Legionaires Regiment first proceeded to the Santa Clara Convent, drove the nuns to the steamboats lying in the inner harbor, and forced them to sail for Hongkong, forty miles away, the objection to the long intrenched religious orders being that they successfully compete with business by not paying taxes. Then the revolutionists, dragging cannon, marched to the artistic government “Palais” on the picturesque Praya Grande, where the governor and representatives of the Senato Leal were forced at the bayonet’s point to agree to the expulsion of favored religious orders, the establishment of a republic in Portugal and her colonies, the suppression of the oligarchic and religious organ, _Vida Nova_, and similar reforms obtained by the republicans in Portugal. Most wonderful to relate, as a new sign on the horizon of the twentieth century, the Chinese viceroy of Kwangtung province brought up his Chinese army to stand by and see that order elsewhere was maintained while European revolutionists, European monarchists and reactionary Catholics fought out questions of representative and popular government in a corner of the sacred soil of old China. Correctly speaking then, it was little historic Portugal, and not ancient China, that first established a republic on Chinese soil, and Portugal’s republican influence, _multum in parvo_, as well as America’s and France’s, has been influential with Chinese reformers.

Fuchau, the capital of turbulent Fukien province, is situated twenty-five miles from the coast on one of the most romantic rivers of China, the Min. “Fu” means happy, and is the most used word in superstitious China, if we except perhaps a “strange oath” or two, and the family name Chang, which almost half of the Chinese carry. This city lies in a river plain surrounded by a glorious amphitheater of hills. With Hongkong, Fuchau joins as the two most scenic ports of China. The wide walls are thirty feet high, ten miles around, and up a mountain on one side, and there are seven fort gates, the most notable being the North Tower, with its curious spirit shrines. The most noted temples are those to the goddess Kwan Yun, the God of War, and Ching Hwang Temple. The seven-storied White Pagoda is famous. It has Romanesque doors and stunted galleries with railings. It is more ponderous than beautiful, and is remarkable for its great antiquity. The city is a noted educational center, missionary and native, It was a reform center even back into the Dowager Empress Tse Hsi’s day in 1897 and 1898, and produced its martyr, young Lin, who fell a victim of that reactionary Jezebel. Six miles south of the city on Ku-Shan, 1,700 feet high, is the noted Bubbling Well Monastery. The chair ride there affords a wonderful view. Fuchau is a health resort, as it has many hot springs. The Pacific Coast Chamber of Commerce was entertained by the city guilds at the Nan Pu Tu Temple in October, 1910. The valley of boulders is notable, as are also the rich pumelo groves. Fuchau used to be a great tea port. The trade declined from 1898 to 1907, but it is picking up again with the increased demand for China teas. Pagoda Island exhibits a severely plain and ancient pagoda and some remarkable Pai Piku (white stern) junks of the olden time. An ancient bridge nine centuries old, with sixty arches, on which are many overhanging shops, propped from the piers, connects one of the islands.

Fuchau went over to the rebel provisional government in October, 1911, but the Manchu city was not captured until a month later. There is a naval arsenal here, a dock, navy school, mint and a foreign settlement on Nan Tai Island. The climate is extremely trying.

Many unique costumes and turbans are to be seen. Fukien province people have some Arab blood in them, though the Mohammedan religion has been lost. They boast that they have never been conquered, and that many of the notorious pirates are Fuchau men. Their women wear a head-dress that looks like the model of an air-ship. There are excellent Methodist and Congregational schools, an American hospital, and a fine London mission which has done what missions should do in architecture. It has adopted to a degree the characteristic and beautiful Chinese style. All the missions and foreign trade buildings should strive to retain this wonderful art instead of daring to bring square ugliness or Greek coldness of column to artistic China, where it does not fit well in so warm a land. Down at the seaside bamboos are placed in the beds so that the oysters may cling to them. There are factories for glass filigree lamps. Trips should be made to the Yuan Fu Monastery, built on props on Wu Hu (Five Tiger) range, and up to which five hundred steps have been cut; the Paeling tea hills, fifteen miles north; the olive and orange groves; and the hot mineral springs. Fuchau is to have railway connection north and south. With Soochow, Fuchau is the center of the lacquer art, and old specimens are highly prized. In 1885 the French fleet under Admiral Courbet sailed into Fuchau and battered at the forts and the city, virtually compelling the Chinese for the time to cede the great province to Tonquin. This is what the Chinese call the “Sacrilege of Fuchau”. The city is also the center of tinfoil workers, their product being used in great quantities in making the gold and silver models which are burned at the graves. Beautiful heavy wall paper is also made. The noted sinologue, Professor Parker, of Manchester University, the witty author of _John Chinaman_, etc., was once British consul at Fuchau.

Ningpo (Peaceful Wave) in friendly Buddhist Chekiang province, could be called the Azalea City, and is one of the most delightful and picturesque cities of China. It is the second oldest in its relations with Europe, the Portuguese having founded a trading settlement here in 1522. The city is moated, and the walls are broken with six gates. Old Krupp cannons lie about on the parapet. The best wood carvers, masons, and varnish makers of the kingdom work here, and their services are sought for all over China. Its artists also are famous. Ningpo lies twelve miles from the sea at the head of the Tatsieh River. Three streams branch out into the hills, which lie spread around in a most picturesque panorama, including valleys, canals and lakes. It is a great fishing center, and its sailors are venturesome. The fast river slipper boats of Ningpo are noted far and wide. The inhabitants do not disdain the use of such a modern thing as ice, as the many straw-covered, peaked ice houses show. Much tea and silk are produced. Excellent stone carving is done, as witness that gem of architecture, the Fukien men’s Guild Hall, with its carved dragon-entwined columns, comical stone lions, and splendid, up-curving tiled roofs. The screens and bronze urns at the many temples are also a delight in this center of culture, the new rights of women, engineering and commerce. There are successfully run native cotton mills, and the district produces fine matting, rice, oils, varnish, sepia, bamboo, lumber, tea, game, flowers, rape, barley, tallow trees, etc. There is a curious street covered with pailoo arches to widows who would not remarry, to scholars, children, etc. There is a foreign quarter with its splendid bund, race course, house boats, clubs, churches, hill bungalows, etc.

No Chinese city affords more delightful excursions to the hills, waterfalls, rapids like the Wenchow, and the wonderful Buddhist monasteries like the noted Tien Dong and the Shih To. The trips to the Ta Lang and Snowy Valleys are exceedingly beautiful. Outside the city the temple to the sailor’s patron goddess, Ma Tsu Pu, at the east gate, is particularly fine in lines, proportion, dignity and rich detail. It was erected in 1680 by sailors of Fukien, the neighboring province. These precious old temples are the last precious gems of a great age in art. The new times in learning, religion, politics and commerce are bringing in an ugly architecture. Ningpo is strongly influenced in Buddhism by the nearness of Phu Tho Island of the Chusan group. There is a quaint pontoon bridge over one of the streams. It has shops upon it, and is the center of a fair. The women of Ningpo are known for their fine needlework, and the old schools were celebrated for their men of letters among the literati officials. The old Tien Fung pentagonal pagoda is perhaps the oldest in China, dating back 1,200 years. Its gold and white tiles have fallen, and the brick and mortar work of the seven stories is exposed.