In Macao

by Charles A. Gunnison

I

To those who have been in Southern Europe and have seen the towns along the Riviera, the first view of Macao, as the steamboat approaches from Hong Kong, gives the impression of having been suddenly transported to the sunny Mediterranean. Were it not for the colour of the water, and the Chinese junks, Macao would indeed be a perfect representation of any of those lovely spots, as she lies along her crescent bay, from Mount Nillau to Mount Charil, defended by the frowning forts of Sam Francisco and Our Lady of Bom Parto. Beautiful as this picture is, it was doubly so in the brilliant sunset colouring of a certain March day, as the steamer slowly came to her wharf and the passengers stepped ashore beneath the blue and white flag of Portugal, in this, her farthest eastern possession. The houses with their delicate washings of pink, blue, yellow or green, with white stucco ornaments, now golden in the light, had a warmth of colouring well set off by the dark foliage of camphor and banyan trees showing above the garden walls. The few passengers soon dispersed, in chairs or on foot, leaving but one of their number upon the wharf. He was apparently expecting some one to come for him, for he refused all offers of assistance from the coolies and seated himself just outside the gate. American, of medium height, brown haired and tanned by a tropical sun, Robert Adams was as good a specimen of Anglo Saxon youth as England herself could boast of. He was the last descendant of a New England family, which had preserved its purity for three centuries as unmixed with continental blood as though the three centuries had been passed in the quiet vales of Devon, instead of in the New World with its broken barriers.

For three years, after a successful college course, he had been in the only shipping house in Hong Kong which sickly American commerce of the day was able to support in the once flourishing China trade. A small fortune and a good salary, a constitution which even an Eastern summer could not break down, and above all, the heart of the girl he loved, were surely possessions which any king might envy him. Presently a neat bamboo chair borne by three liveried coolies came at a trot down the street, and being placed before this last of the passengers, carried him away into the darkness which, with the suddenness of the tropics, had fallen upon the city. The stillness was broken only by the noise of escaping steam from the boat and the regular patter of the barefooted chair carriers. When the chair had disappeared up the narrow, winding street, a Portuguese wrapped in a black cloak came from behind a wall, then by another way walked rapidly over the hill and down the other side to the Praya, arriving in front of one of the largest houses on that most beautiful promenade just as the coolies put down their burden.

The oil lamps along the Praya had been lighted, stretching out to the Estrada Sam Francisco, where the bright windows in the hospital of Sam Januarius seemed to be the lake of lights into which this long stream flowed. No one was abroad, no steps sounded along the pavement except those of the sentry as he walked, and smoked, before the neighbouring residence of the Governor. Death at night and sleep in the day time are the characteristics of Macao. No one seems to work, play, sing, dance or even read unless the latter indeed may be done in what Alphonse Daudet calls la Bibliotheque des cigales.

As Robert Adams stepped from the chair, the Portuguese came forward with outstretched hand saying: "What is the news Dom Robert in Hong Kong?" "Oh, Dom Pedro, you came out so suddenly I thought I was attacked. No news, unless it is that the rector of St. John's is to join me to the loveliest girl in Macao or the world, in just three weeks." "I hope you won't disappoint him Dom Robert, you came very near doing so to-night," said Pedro de Amaral with a laugh. "How, pray?" asked Adams as they entered the now unbarred gate. "You were within three feet of the water, if you had fallen in, that would have disappointed him. Not? Three feet is near. Not?" "Yes, and the boiler might have burst," replied Adams laughing. "Or more improbable yet the Portuguese government might have revived Macao, which would kill me with astonishment my dear Amaral."

Having entered the house he was followed by Dom Pedro, who bent upon him such a look of hatred as only the eyes of Latin races can give. The Portuguese turned to the right to his own apartments and Adams following a servant to the left, was soon in the dimly lighted library of Dom Luiz de Amaral the father of Dom Pedro. There were not many books on the shelves but a superb collection of Oriental swords and knives was arranged in the cases from which the shelves had been taken. Two old engravings, one of the poet Camoens and the other of Catarina de Atayde, his beloved, who died of grief at his banishment, hung on the wall; the rest of the furnishings was of that cosmopolitan character which is sure to collect in the home of a European resident in the far East.

"Can't you see me Robert?" said a laughing voice of great sweetness from a corner of the study. "One would think that both your eyes had met the same fate that the right one of poor Camoens did in Morocco." "My darling Priscilla how could I see you ten feet away from the light? You know olive oil don't give the brightest illumination. But its enough though." "Don't!" "Just one," and then a sound not unknown to many of us put a stop to the conversation. "Shall I leave the room children?" came in merry tones from another corner and immediately an old lady came forward giving both hands to him. "That miserable oil of Dom Amaral's has put me into a pretty mess," said Adams half annoyed, but laughing as he greeted the lady. "Don't berate me before my face dear friend about my light, especially when you are so soon to take our brightest light away from us." "Fairly trapped, Dom Amaral," cried Adams laughing heartily at this third interruption. "And here is Dom Pedro dressed for dinner," he continued as the younger Amaral entered the room. "I'll be with you presently and have my eyes toned down to your Macao standard."

Being so constant a visitor, Robert Adams had his own rooms at Dom Amaral's, where he found his bags unpacked and the clothes laid out by those deftest of servants, the Chinese. According to custom the dinner of Macao was served at the late hour of nine.

Dom Luiz Diego de Amaral was one of the wealthiest Portuguese in the city, having, unlike most of his fellow citizens, investments abroad which brought him a considerable income after the birth of Hong Kong killed Macao and left it a city of the past, of poverty and pride. Having in his youth married a Spanish woman who bore him one son, Pedro, he was left a widower before the age of twenty-five.

Some years after, being in Boston where he then had large shipping interests, he took a second wife, Priscilla Harvey, and returned to Macao. Madam de Amaral's only sister, wife of Captain Fernald had one child which was left an orphan at an early age by the drowning of both parents in Portsmouth harbour.

This orphan, Priscilla Fernald, was taken to her aunt in China and became a member of the household of Dom Amaral. It was a strange transplanting for such a flower from the cold coast of Puritan New England to the tropical, Roman Catholic colony in the heart of heathendom. But the flower of so sturdy a stock remained true. It was long accepted by all, even by the maiden Priscilla, that young Amaral was to be her husband though nothing had been said on the subject. Later, the small circle of Macao society, of which poverty and pride were the ruling features, became too dull for the young girl and her foster parents took her often to Hong Kong where she met with those of the outer world.

In that hospitable society of the "city of the fragrant streams," where the dinner table seems to be the only rendezvous, save a garden party now and then, a Tarrantella dance or a Government House ball, the fair Priscilla met young Robert Adams, a native of her far away and almost unknown home. The acquaintance blossomed into friendship and ripened into love. The lover was accepted, and now a courtship of two years was in three weeks to see them married. There were many disappointed youths and envious of Robert Adams, but all took their misfortune as in the way of the world, except young Amaral, who, in silence, had watched the course of events and now hated the happy suitor with all the fierceness of his Southern blood.

That night Robert Adams, unlike the conventional lover, but like a healthy, light-hearted fellow, fell asleep without a sigh, listening to the waves as they broke regularly on the stone embankment before his window. In the room below, Dom Pedro walked until the early morning, no beating of waves could lull him to sleep, for his head ached and his eyes burned in the fever of jealousy. Thus he brooded over his loss till the sun gilded the hermitage fort of Our Lady of Guia.