The Civilization of China

by Herbert Allen Giles

Hawking was practised at least so far back as a century before Christ; for we have a note on a man of that period who "loved to gallop after wily animals with horse and dog, or follow up with falcon the pheasant and the hare." The sport may be seen in northern China at the present day. A hare is put up, and a couple of native greyhounds are dispatched after it; these animals, however, would soon be distanced by the hare, which can run straight away from them without doubling, but for the sudden descent of the falcon, and a blow from its claw, often stunning the hare at the first attempt, and enabling the dogs to come up.

Sportsmen who have to make their living by the business frequently descend to methods which are sometimes very ingenious, and more remunerative than the gun, but can hardly be classified as sport. Thus, a man in search of wild duck will mark down a flock settled on some shallow sheet of water. He will then put a crate over his head and shoulders, and gradually approach the flock as though the crate were drifting on the surface. Once among them, he puts out a hand under water, seizes hold of a duck's legs, and rapidly pulls the bird down. The sudden disappearance of a colleague does not seem to trouble its companions, and in a short time a very considerable bag has been obtained. Tradition says that Confucius was fond of sport, but would never let fly at birds sitting; which, considering that his weapon was a bow-and-arrow, must be set down as a marvel of self-restraint.

Scores of Chinese poets have dwelt upon the joys of angling, and fishing is widely carried on over the inland waters; but the rod, except as a matter of pure sport, has given place to the businesslike net. The account of the use of fishing cormorants was formerly regarded as a traveller's tale. It is quite true, however, that small rafts carrying several of these birds, with a fisherman gently sculling at the stern, may be seen on the rivers of southern China. The cormorant seizes a passing fish, and the fisherman takes the fish from its beak. The bird is trained with a ring round its neck, which prevents it from swallowing the prey; while for each capture it is rewarded with a small piece of fish. Well-trained cormorants can be trusted to fish without the restraint of the ring. Confucius, again, is said to have been fond of fishing, but he would not use a net; and there was another sage of antiquity who would not even use a hook, but fished with a straight piece of iron, apparently thinking that the advantage would be an unfair one as against the resources of the fish; and declaring openly that he would only take such fish as wished to be caught. By such simple narratives do the Chinese strive to convey great truths to childish ears.

Many sports were once common in China which have long since passed out of the national life, and exist only in the record of books. Among these may be mentioned "butting," a very ancient pastime, mentioned in history two centuries before the Christian era. The sport consisted in putting an ox-skin, horns and all, over the head, and then trying to knock one's adversary out of time by butting at him after the fashion of bulls, the result being, as the history of a thousand years later tells us, "smashed heads, broken arms, and blood running in the Palace yard."

The art of boxing, which included wrestling, had been practised by the Chinese several centuries before butting was introduced. Its most accomplished exponents were subsequently found among the priests of a Buddhist monastery, built about A.D. 500; and it was undoubtedly from their successors that the Japanese acquired a knowledge of the modern jiu-jitsu, which is simply the equivalent of the old Chinese term meaning "gentle art." A few words from a chapter on "boxing" in a military work of the sixteenth century will give some idea of the scope of the Chinese sport.

"The body must be quick to move, the hands quick to take advantage, and the legs lightly planted but firm, so as to advance or retire with effect. In the flying leap of the leg lies the skill of the art; in turning the adversary upside down lies its ferocity; in planting a straight blow with the fist lies its rapidity; and in deftly holding the adversary face upwards lies its gentleness."

Football was played in China at a very early date; originally, with a ball stuffed full of hair; from the fifth century A.D., with an inflated bladder covered with leather. A picture of the goal, which is something like a triumphal arch, has come down to us, and also the technical names and positions of the players; even more than seventy kinds of kicks are enumerated, but the actual rules of the game are not known. It is recorded by one writer that "the winners were rewarded with flowers, fruit and wine, and even with silver bowls and brocades, while the captain of the losing team was flogged, and suffered other indignities." The game, which had disappeared for some centuries, is now being revived in Chinese schools and colleges under the control of foreigners, and finds great favour with the rising generation.

Polo is first mentioned in Chinese literature under the year A.D. 710, the reference being to a game played before the Emperor and his court. The game was very much in vogue for a long period, and even women were taught to play—on donkey-back. The Kitan Tartars were the most skilful players; it is doubtful if the game originated with them, or if it was introduced from Persia, with which country China had relations at a very early date. A statesman of the tenth century, disgusted at the way in which the Emperor played polo to excess, presented a long memorial, urging his Majesty to discontinue the practice. The reasons given for this advice were three in number. "(1) When sovereign and subject play together, there must be contention. If the sovereign wins, the subject is ashamed; if the former loses, the latter exults. (2) To jump on a horse and swing a mallet, galloping here and there, with no distinctions of rank, but only eager to be first and win, is destructive of all ceremony between sovereign and subject. (3) To make light of the responsibilities of empire, and run even the remotest risk of an accident, is to disregard obligations to the state and to her Imperial Majesty the Empress."

It has always been recognized that the chief duty of a statesman is to advise his master without fear or favour, and to protest loudly and openly against any course which is likely to be disadvantageous to the commonwealth, or to bring discredit on the court. It has also been always understood that such protests are made entirely at the risk of the statesman in question, who must be prepared to pay with his head for counsels which may be stigmatized as unpatriotic, though in reality they may be nothing more than unpalatable at the moment.

In the year A.D. 814 the Emperor, who had become a devout Buddhist, made arrangements for receiving with extravagant honours a bone of Buddha, which had been forwarded from India to be preserved as a relic. This was too much for Han Yu (already mentioned), the leading statesman of the day, who was a man of the people, raised by his own genius, and who, to make things worse, had already been banished eleven years previously for presenting an offensive Memorial on the subject of tax-collection, for which he had been forgiven and recalled. He promptly sent in a respectful but bitter denunciation of Buddha and all his works, and entreated his Majesty not to stain the Confucian purity of thought by tolerating such a degrading exhibition as that proposed. But for the intercession of friends, the answer to this bold memorial would have been death; as it was he was banished to the neighbourhood of the modern Swatow, then a wild and barbarous region, hardly incorporated into the Empire. There he set himself to civilize the rude inhabitants, until soon recalled and once more reinstated in office; and to this day there is a shrine dedicated to his memory, containing the following inscription: "Wherever he passed, he purified."