The face of China

by E. G. Kemp

TALI FU

I made a sketch of a little bridge with a picturesque archway in the shape of a tower leading on to it, behind which may be seen the mountains towering up to a great height. These mountains are very little known, and a European who went up to visit a temple some hours distant got lost, and was three days before he was able to find his way back; when he returned he was quite exhausted for lack of food, and his clothes were almost torn to pieces by the bushes through which he had been obliged to force his way. There are very few inhabitants amongst these mountains, and they are of a fierce and uncertain character.

The Tali Fu women were the most pleasant and responsive we met in the province, and some looked decidedly intelligent. They did beautiful embroidery of various kinds, and we were glad of the opportunity to order straw hats from them with which to protect ourselves from the sun. We were not glad, however, to see them being brought home on the heads of the woman and child; though this seems to be considered quite the correct thing in China. There was no alternative between having these particular hats or going without any, which was too risky. We are quite convinced that the wearing of a “bandeau” inside the hat must have originated in China, where the use of it is universal from the lowest to the highest. The poorest coolie has a basket bandeau in the huge, pancake-like straw hat which shelters him equally from sun or rain. The size of these hats is two feet in diameter, and the bandeaux raise them so high above the head that the effect is extremely comic, and they have to be held on by an elaborate system of strings at the sides and back, sometimes ornamented by the gayest of tassels, and with bright-green strings tied under the chin. The favourite colour of a bandeau is magenta, and the material of which it is made is satin. The portrait of myself at the beginning of this volume shows our complete travelling costume, together with the Buddhist pilgrim stick and the horn spectacles which were formerly a distinctive mark of the “scholar.” On returning home we found the hats were hardly an exaggeration of the size worn in London. Liu had procured himself a different variety of straw hat (see [page 211]) and a bright-green waterproof cover for it.

Few foreign ladies visit Tali Fu, so our arrival created a mild excitement in the place. An official lady (the highest but one in the city) took the opportunity of paying a call on the missionary nurse who was our hostess. She had assisted at the operation performed by the doctor on the lady’s daughter, who was suffering from a disfigurement of the face. The lady called at the moment lunch had been served, so of course it had to be indefinitely postponed (the Chinese calls not unfrequently last for several hours). She was gorgeously attired in a heliotrope skirt embroidered with magenta and green, which had come from Chengtu, and a fur-lined plum-coloured coat. She wore gold pins galore in her hair, and a large amber bead; gold tooth-picks and ear-picks hung from a button, and she used these with French aplomb. Our clothes were examined with much minuteness; she even pinched my toe to see if it could really extend to the full length of my shoe, so I took it off to satisfy her on the subject. Perhaps it was this that encouraged her to begin to undress my friend down the back in order to see how her clothes were put on; but the unfastening of the blouse and camisole still left it a mystery how the skirt could be made to encompass so small a waist—a problem which I fear will never be solved, for Chinese skirts are completely open down one side and are merely folded round the person. On the opposite side they also are open up to the waistband, though this does not show, owing to the upper part of the dress hanging over it. We spent some time drinking tea, and the lady talked impartially with her hostess and her hostess’s servants, her own remaining in the room all the time and also drinking tea. Our ages had to be discussed, and as it appeared that mine almost coincided with her own, I learnt the interesting fact that I was born in the cycle of the dog. Owing to my fair hair I have always been considered by the Chinese to be well over eighty years of age, both now and on my previous visit. This is an extremely useful illusion, as it renders me worthy of great reverence, and made it much more proper for me to be travelling about and sitting by the high-road sketching.

The call still dragged on, and we next discussed the price of our clothes and the places we had visited, why we were unmarried, and many other topics of equal interest. After about an hour of this conversation the caller expressed a wish to see the bedrooms, and having to pass through the dining-room in order to get there, she perceived with surprise that the table was laid for a meal. The white table-cloth was a new object to her, and one of deep interest. She begged to be allowed to watch us eat, so of course she was invited to join the belated meal. While this was being brought in she went upstairs, and having inspected everything carefully, she tried the bed (poor hostess!), and asked for some “flea medicine,” alias Keating.

We sat down to lunch, and the lady sent her servant to bring from her sedan-chair a beautifully coloured silk serviette, which she fastened to a button at the neck of her coat with a gold clasp. She got on very well with a fork instead of chopsticks, but found the combined use of knife and fork as difficult as we did that of chopsticks. According to Chinese etiquette, all the company use their own implements to help themselves, and the dish was conveniently near to the lady! When she had no further use for the chicken bones she handed them over her shoulder to the maid, to be thrown into the courtyard; the more natural course, which would have been adopted had she been at home, would have been to put them under the table. Carpets are not in use even in the houses of the wealthy, except on special occasions such as the New Year, so that the floors are treated in the same way as the ground out of doors! Any “plat” which was not to the lady’s liking was also handed to the maid to eat, and it struck us as quite a new use for servants. When the table boy was not otherwise employed, she questioned him minutely as to household arrangements, the buying of food, &c., as if his mistress were not present, and the information she received seemed to interest her vastly. She continually pressed us to eat, and did full justice to the meal herself, ladling the gravy out of the dish at intervals with her own spoon, despite the fact that she was on her way to a feast. I presented her with a piece of English ribbon and explained its use, which happily coincided with what she had already heard of English dress; but I was disappointed that she did not follow the Chinese custom of presenting me with something in return. My curiosity to see what her gift would be was justly punished. Finally she left, seemingly well pleased with her visit, which would not have been considered at all a long one in “the middle kingdom,” although we had found it somewhat exhausting.

CHAPTER XXII
Tali Fu to Teng Yueh

We left Tali Fu on a stormy-looking morning, accompanied by the usual windy gusts, and after about a couple of miles we reached the famous temple of the goddess of mercy, the Buddhist Kwanyin. Our coolies went in to offer incense and to invoke the goddess, as they did on their arrival at Tali Fu; for she is a great favourite with the coolie class. There is a beautiful little shrine perched on a big rock in a sort of small tank, which the goddess (under the guise of an old woman) is supposed to have brought here. In the courtyard beyond is a Buddhist temple, and in one of the side courts a temple to a famous general, containing a statue of him much more life-like than any we have yet seen. The head coolie took this opportunity of consulting the goddess as to his mother’s welfare—he has not seen her for over ten years—but the answer was both unsatisfactory and vague! Our head coolie is a quaint individual, but decidedly attractive. When we gave him a tael for a pork-feast for the men he kept back part of it, and they were extremely angry. In order to appease them, he not only had to pay up, but also to give them a pork-feast on his own account. He wears a most beautiful jade bangle, and is always immaculately clean to look at, however dust-stained the rest of us may be. Some Chinamen have that delightful quality of always looking clean and keeping tidy.

When we were ready to start again the rain came down in torrents, so the men put on their hats and every one demurred to going on. There was no time to waste, however, so we insisted on setting out, and after a time the rain stopped and the wind soon dried our wet clothes. Turning down the valley after passing through Siakwan, we entered the defile through a heavy gateway, which is part of the fortifications, through which the wind tore like a hurricane, snatching off the black scarf I had wound round my hair in Chinese fashion, for it was impossible to keep on our gigantic hats. We made our way through an impressive gorge, following the river till we came to our halting-place at night. We had learnt at Tali that the official rest-houses are open to travellers when not occupied by officials, so we sent on to engage rooms in one, and certainly gained both in quality and quantity, as we occupied a sort of large barn with pillars in it, which looked as if it had formerly been used as a stable. The next night we were not so lucky, and had the most riotous party of rats in the loft above us that I have ever encountered. Their revels brought down no inconsiderable portion of the ceiling on our heads, and finally the rats themselves came down in a sort of stampede upon us, showing no respect whatever for the British face or form. The early dawn was further made hideous by a chorus of geese, pigs, fowls, and mules, a horrid discord from which we hurried away into the lovely dew-drenched country. Crossing a suspension-bridge, we began a long, steep climb through the pine woods, and the miseries undergone were soon forgotten in the ever fresh beauties of the day. The long range of snow-capped mountains lay behind us, and for three hours we mounted higher and higher, coming to large trees of brilliant crimson rhododendrons, and various kinds of roses climbing high up amongst them.