even Hong-kong is reached at last.
We rush up on deck after breakfast to see the first of the brown, sun-scorched island. It is shrouded in mist, however, and there is not much to look at. But every one is excited and flurried, and in the happiness of realising the luxury of being on land, we feel kindly towards all mankind, and bid a cordial farewell to our fellow-passengers. In a short while we are in harbour, and the little colony, planted at the foot of wild and rugged hills matching those of the mainland opposite, lies before us. A crowd of boats plying for hire, and partly manned, to use a bull, by women often pulling away lustily with a baby slung across their backs, hail us with cries of “Wanchee boat?” “Wanchee big boat?” These Chinese boatwomen are real wonders. Hardy, strong, and burnt by the sun, they look and probably are as sturdy as any of the men. At any rate I saw one woman fight and thrash a couple of stalwart young boatmen; and a good stand-up fight it was, give and take. They did not spare her, and she belaboured them most lustily, screaming and chattering all the while in a way that would have frightened Billingsgate itself into silence. The boats seem to hold whole families,—even the nursery,—the small boys wearing corks or bottles to keep them afloat when they tumble overboard. The girls, being reckoned of no value, take their chance, and wear nothing to protect them. As soon as we came to an anchor the boats of the great commercial firms came alongside, each probably steered by a partner eager to hear the latest news or to welcome a friend. One by one the passengers disappear, and he who has letters for one of the merchant princes of China may look forward to luxurious quarters and a warm welcome, for nowhere else is hospitality carried to such an extent as it is here.
The houses in Hong-kong are large and airy. Lofty and spacious rooms not overloaded with furniture (for everything is dispensed with an eye to the getting the most air and coolness) look out on to a broad verandah, which is shaded with green rush blinds to keep out the glare. Here bamboo lounging chairs, of indescribable comfort, hold out arms that invite one to doze away the sultry afternoon, or sit smoking a cheroot and sipping cool drinks in the most luxurious laziness. The clean and neat matting on the floors, the rare curiosities and jars which decorate the principal rooms, the quiet, mouse-like steps of the China boys in their blue dresses, who act as servants, coming in to take an order or deliver a message in their quaint pidgin English, give a peculiar and original stamp to the whole, which is of itself immensely refreshing. Everything speaks of rest and quiet, and yet it is in these quiet, idle-seeming houses—very castles of Indolence they appear—that busy brains are at work, toiling all day, calculating rises and falls, watching chances by which thousands are won or lost in a day. In the old days when the opium trade was unlawful, and therefore at its height, when the rival houses had each their fast sailing clippers racing against one another from Bombay and Calcutta, and the first to arrive would lie hidden round the corner of the bay, and send a man on shore across the hills with the all-important intelligence, only showing itself when a price had been made, the life of a man of business at Hong-kong must have been one of untold excitement. Nowadays every man gets his letters by the mail, the opium trade is legitimatised, and there is no longer the same amount of “go” and dash about the thing. Still, a venture of tea to the tune of a million of dollars, upon which 40 or 50 per cent may be made or lost, must be exciting enough for most men. Just at present the China trade is in a singularly bad way; vast sums have been lost in tea speculations; some of the larger houses have been very hard hit, but with plenty of capital at their backs have stood the shock well. Smaller firms, however, not having the same elasticity, have sunk under it; smashes and rumours of smashes are rife; and the only men who have not suffered are those who, with wise prescience, have folded their hands and done nothing, waiting for better times.
Hong-kong presents perhaps one of the oddest jumbles in the whole world. It is neither fish, flesh, fowl, nor good red-herring. The Government and principal people are English—the population are Chinese—the police are Indians—the language is bastard English mixed with Cantonese—the currency is the Mexican dollar, and the elements no more amalgamate than the oil and vinegar in a salad. The Europeans hate the Chinese, and the latter return the compliment with interest. In the streets Chinamen, Indian policemen, Malays, Parsees, and half-castes jostle up against Europeans, naval and military officers, Jack-tars, soldiers, and loafers of all denominations. Constantinople, Smyrna, and Cairo show more picturesque and varied crowds, but nothing can be more grotesque than the street life of Hong-kong. The local cab is a green chair[3] open in front and covered in at the top, in which you may sit Yankeewise, with your feet sprawling above your head, and be carried along at a good pace by a couple of strong-shouldered coolies with shaven polls, long tails, and huge umbrella hats. Plenty of these are waiting for hire at every corner. They have a fixed tariff of ten cents the trip. The weights that these coolies carry slung on their bamboo-poles are something surprising. I have seen Turkish hamals bent nearly double under the most impossible loads, such as no London railway porter would look at; but it makes one’s shoulders ache to see the Chinamen fetch and carry, for they do not hold the poles in their hands with the support of a shoulder-strap, like the chairmen who used to take old ladies out to tea and scandal in English country towns, but the bamboo poles are fastened at the ends, and the men simply hoist them on to their shoulders and stagger off under them. Both men and women of the lower orders are certainly to our eyes mightily ill-favoured, and have villainous countenances which, if all tales be true, do not belie their characters; but now and then one comes across a pretty creature enough, some Cantonese, probably, as frail as fair—for St. Antony is not generally worshipped in seaside garrison towns. The long plaited tails worn by the men, and eked out with silk until they reach nearly to the heels, are a never-ending source of wonder to the new-comer. But there is one fashion of shaving the poll, leaving here and there a hair like the bristles on a gooseberry, which is peculiarly droll in its effect—a “coiffure à la groseille.” The Chinaman is very careful of his tail, and no cat has a greater horror of wetting her coat than he has of a drop of rain falling on his back hair. To cut it off is the height of indignity; and when the Chinese sailors on board the P. and O. ships have been stealing opium from the cargo, which they find it very hard to keep their hands off, they are tied up by their tails to the capstan and summarily flogged; in which case they become useful as well as ornamental. The barber drives a brisk trade; nor does he confine himself to shaving, clipping, and plaiting; he has also cunning instruments with which he cleans the eyes and ears of his clients, the result of which is that the drums of their ears are often injured, and the poor patients afflicted with chronic deafness.
In this island of contrasts none is greater than that between the European and Chinese quarters of the town. In the former the houses are large and well built of gray slate-coloured bricks and fine granite, and others, some of which will be real palaces, are in course of construction. In the latter, on the contrary, the houses are low and mean. They are generally built with one story: on the ground floor is the shop with its various goods and quaint perpendicular inscriptions and advertisements; on the first floor, which is thrown out over the footway and supported by wooden posts, so as to form a covered walk, the family live, and here the ugly old women—uglier in China than anywhere—and queer little yellow children may be seen peering out of their dens at the passers-by. Towards evening, when the paper lanterns are lighted and the shops are shut up, not by doors and shutters as with us, but by a sort of cage of bamboo poles, through which the interior is visible, the Chinese house looks very fantastic and strange. This quarter of the town bears a very bad name. It swarms with houses of the worst repute, and low grog-shops which are largely patronised by the sailors. The coolies in the street are a most ruffianly looking lot, not pleasant to meet in a by-road alone and unarmed. Indeed, life and property seem to be by no means so safe in the colony as they should be, considering the force which is kept here. A short time since a gentleman was attacked in broad daylight in the middle of the town, knocked down and robbed; and it is downright dangerous to venture on the hills alone without the moral influence of a revolver. The Chinamen are very clever thieves and housebreakers, and will even venture into barracks, smuggle themselves into the officers’ quarters, burn a little opium under the nose of some sleeping hero, and in double-quick time clear the room of watch, chain, loose cash, and valuables. Sometimes, however, they get caught. The other night a young officer was too quick for one of these light-fingered gentlemen, and pinned him just as he was making off. A mighty pretty dressing he got too—for when the officers were tired of thrashing him, with ingenious cruelty they turned him into the lock-up where the drunken soldiers were, and I leave you to guess what sort of a night he spent. It is said that a Hindoo will rob a man of the sheet he is sleeping on without disturbing him, but I think to clear the goods out of a large warehouse under the owner’s nose, and with the police looking on, is at least as great a feat. This happened in this wise. A “godown” or storehouse full of valuable goods was fixed upon, a number of coolies walked in one fine day with a “comprador” (headman, bailiff, steward, and factotum), and with the utmost innocence set to work emptying the place, the pretended comprador all the while, in the most businesslike manner, making notes of the bales which were sent down to the quay and shipped off in small boats. One coolie is so like another that no wonder the policeman who was standing by thought it was all right, and the very audacity of the robbery put him off his guard. By the time the theft was discovered, goods, coolies, and comprador were well out of reach, and the owner was left lamenting over his empty godown.
It is rather hard on a man when he first comes to these parts to have to learn a new dialect of his own language more bizarre than broad Somersetshire, more unintelligible than that of Tennyson’s northern farmer. This is the Cantonese or “pidgin” English. Pidgin means business, of which word it is not difficult to see that it is a corruption, and the jargon is the patois that has invented itself for transacting affairs with the natives. Use a plain English word to a Chinaman, and he will stare and “no sabé”; but distort it, add a syllable or two, put it in its wrong place, and, in short, make it so unlike itself that its own root would not acknowledge it, and he will catch your meaning at once. Several Chinese, Portuguese, and other words of doubtful pedigree, mixed up with this maltreated English, make up the lingo, which is a literal translation of Chinese syntax, and puzzling enough at first. Here is a specimen. I should tell you that in pidgin bull is male, cow female. An English gentleman from Shanghai went to call at a friend’s house in Hong-kong. The door was opened by the head Chinese boy. “Mississee have got?” said the gentleman. “Have got,” answered the boy, “but just now no can see.” “How fashion no can see?” The boy answered, grinning from ear to ear, “Last night have catchee one number one piecee bull chilo!” The lady of the house had been safely brought to bed during the night of a fine baby boy! Sometimes the boy will dot his I’s and cross his T’s with unfortunate distinctness as to the occupations in which his master or mistress is engaged, putting one in mind of Gavarni’s Enfants Terribles. It is not to be wondered at that the coolies and servant boys should talk this lingo, but that clever, intelligent fellows like the compradors in big houses should not have acquired a better form of English is indeed strange.
Life at Hong-kong passes away pleasantly enough. The residents are very rich, and they spend their money like princes. Their hospitality is boundless, and open house is the rule. I can fancy no better quarters for a naval or military man. The climate is very different from what it used to be, and has become very healthy; but if a man should fall ill he can get away north to Peking, or run up to Japan, or choose between a dozen trips nearer at hand. The usual daily routine here at this season of the year is as follows:—At six your boy wakes you with a cup of tea; you rise and bathe, and read or write till it is time to dress for breakfast at twelve (the merchants, of course, go to their offices at ten or even much earlier). Breakfast, as it is called, is a regular set meal with several courses, and champagne or claret; any one comes in who pleases, and is sure of a cordial welcome, and probably an invitation to return to dinner. After a cup of coffee and a cheroot, office work begins again, and goes on until about five, when every one turns out to ride, drive, or walk until seven, which is the hour for gossip, and sherry and bitters at the club, a first-rate establishment to which strangers are admitted as visitors, and where a man may put up if he pleases. Dinner is at eight, and a very serious affair it is, for Hong-kong is fond of good living and fine vintages; and this rule does not apply only to the heads of houses, for their clerks are lodged and boarded exactly on the same scale as themselves, and a boy who has been content to dine for a shilling at a London chop-house, sits down here to a dinner fit for a duke, criticises the champagne and claret with the air of a connoisseur, and rattles in his pocket £300 or £400 a year for his menus plaisirs. Which shows the superiority of vulgar fractions to genteel Latin and Greek.
The rides and drives about Hong-kong are in their way very pretty, though the almost entire absence of trees presents a violent contrast to the rich tropical vegetation of Singapore and Penang. On the other hand, both on the mainland and in the island itself, there are bold, rugged mountain outlines, often shrouded in a mist that reminds one of Scotland and Ireland; huge boulders of rock from which beautiful ferns of every variety (fifty-two species have been classed) grow in profusion; a bay studded with wild barren islands; and to the east, where the colony is only separated from the mainland by about a mile of sea, the picturesque peninsula of Kowloon. The racecourse in the Happy Valley is a lovely spot. It is surrounded by hills on three sides, and from the fourth, which is close to the bay, one looks up a blue glen such as Sir Walter Scott might have described. Here on the slope of the hill is the cemetery, and here and at Government House there are some trees, among which the graceful bamboo is conspicuous. But it is the south-west of the island that is most affected by the residents. At a place called Pok Fo Lum, about four miles off, several of the rich merchants have built bungalows to which in summer-time, after stewing all day in their offices, it is their wont to resort of an afternoon, and let the fresh sea-breeze clear their brains of tea, opium, silk, rises and falls, and such-like cobwebs. On a fine evening these gardens are a very pleasant lounge. At the back rises the Peak, a fine bold rock some 1700 feet high; all around are sweet-scented tropical flowers teeming with strange, many-coloured insects and gorgeous butterflies; while in front the view stretches to the mainland hills across the brilliant sea rippling against little islands, and covered with flotillas of native boats, peaceful enough to all appearance, but ever ready for any little piece of light piracy that may turn up.
I was very anxious before leaving the south of China to see Canton, and accordingly on the 28th April I started with a friend in one of the huge house-steamers that ply between Hong-kong and Canton, and are of themselves curiosities. They are divided into separate parts for Europeans, Parsees, and natives of the poorer class, with loose boxes into which bettermost Chinese families are put. You may form some idea of their size when I tell you that three weeks ago, on the occasion of a festival, our boat the Kin Shan took up 2063 Chinamen to Canton, whither they were bound to “chin-chin” the graves of their ancestors. In all American steamers—and this is a Yankee venture—speed is the great object, and we accomplished the distance, between 80 and 90 miles, under the six hours.
We had a bright sunny morning for our expedition, and the harbour of Hong-kong appeared to great advantage, for there were plenty of fleecy clouds in the sky throwing fantastic shadows over the hills around. The sea was as calm and transparent as a lake, and we could sit in the best cabin, which is a huge building on the forecastle, catching every breath of air, and enjoying the scenery. The river-banks are at first wild, barren, and hilly, like Hong-kong, but higher up there begin to be signs of cultivation. Plantains and rice, which is the greenest of all green grasses, grow in profusion among the snipe marshes. Bamboos spring up close to the water’s edge, and the hills are lower, less savage-looking, and more fruitful. Ruined forts, destroyed when we forced our trade upon the unwilling Chinese, numberless boats and junks, here and there a pagoda with different sorts of plants peeping out of its many stories, tell us that we are drawing near a town, and after about four hours and a half we reach Wampoa, a miserable place, with about as dirty and degraded-looking a population as could be seen anywhere. A few lime kilns, soy or ketchup factories, and dry docks where ships are brought to have their keels cleaned of barnacles and sea-muck, seem to constitute all the business of the place. I shall always henceforth look upon soy as the essence of the dirt of Wampoa.