XIII.
CHINESE.
Perhaps four hundred and twenty million people dwell in the Chinese Empire and are called Chinese. They are not, however, all true Chinese. When the Chinese (or their ancestors) moved eastward into what is now China, four thousand or more years ago, they found many different tribes living there. Some of these were driven forth to seek new homes; many remained and have mixed and mingled with the Chinese.
So many Chinese now live in our country that you all know how they look and dress. The Chinese in America are mostly from the poorest and meanest class, and most of them come from Canton. Most of those here are laundrymen, but in some of our larger cities there are merchants and restaurant keepers, and in California hundreds of them are gardeners. They quickly learn our ways of doing, and many are employed in cigar-making, shirt-making, and railroad-building. They work hard and save their money, as they want sometime to go home to their own country. Chinamen who die here are buried only for a little time: later the bones are gathered and sent home to be buried in China.
The Chinese who come here are short or of medium stature. In the interior and north of China they are taller. They have yellow skin, black straight hair, and black eyes. Their eyes appear to slant or be set crookedly, the inner corners being lower than the outer; they are really almost as straight as our own, and the appearance is due to a fold of skin at the inner corner. The long queue that hangs down the Chinaman’s back is not composed entirely of hair; it is pieced out below with cord or strings braided in. This style of wearing the hair is not truly Chinese. Formerly the Chinese wore their hair in a knot on top of the head, but at the time of the Manchu Conquest, two hundred and fifty or so years ago, they were compelled to wear the hair in the Manchu fashion. For a Chinaman to cut off his queue would be almost the same as declaring himself unloyal to his Manchu rulers.
CHINESE MANDARIN (RATZEL).
Chinamen usually have three names. The family name, which we place last, they place first. Thus Li Hung Chang, the great Chinese viceroy, belongs to the Li family. Few of the Chinese laundrymen in this country have their true names on their signs. The Li family is one of the largest in China, but it is also generally poor and despised. Most of our Chinese laundrymen are Lis, and are related to Li Hung Chang.
In writing, the Chinese use a brush, which they dip into ink. A single character represents a word, though many Chinese words are written with compound characters, one part of which gives the sound, and the other part pictures the meaning. In Chinese many sounds have several different meanings. If the character with which the sound is written stood alone, it would not be clear which meaning was intended. Chinese books are printed on thin paper, which is folded back and forth like a screen or fan and then stitched at the back; this makes the pages double. The Chinese book begins at what we would consider the back and goes through to what we would call the front. The print goes from the top of the page down, in vertical columns, and the first column is the one to the right hand.
To be able to write well is considered of the greatest importance in China. The Chinese respect learning also, and no man can hold office in China unless he is educated and has passed his examinations. From the time when a boy begins study he must keep it up for many years, if he hopes for a government position. Often he is a middle-aged or old man before he succeeds in passing all the necessary examinations. To be able to write beautifully, to be able to compose a poem upon any given subject, and to know the writings of Confucius and the other old philosophers are the things the Chinaman must learn. The great examinations at the Capital are attended by thousands from every part of the Empire. The man who stands first is sure to have an important governorship given to him at once.
