In China the custom of celebrating the birthday anniversary is universal; these wandering minstrels recollect the date of the birth of each individual for miles around, with unerring exactness, and when a birthday fete occurs in any family, they may calculate with some degree of certainty that the music will come without being sent for.
There are other occasions, where these shrewd disciples of the muses can turn an honest penny; if a skillful physician has saved the life of the wife or child of some rich man no higher compliment can be given to him (besides his fee) by the grateful nabob, than to invite him to a great feast, and to send an escort of eight musicians to convey him thither, besides bringing him numerous presents.
Music is employed at funerals, but the friends of the deceased, are not allowed to perform it; for months after, etiquette forbids their touching any musical instruments.
The mourning for a parent, or grandparent is very strict and protracted. In China filial love and obedience are the virtues most insisted upon. If the descendants give forth any musical sounds at all it is only to howl dismally a chant respecting the virtues of the defunct; there are many of these compositions, or “lamentations” in existence, of which the poetry is by no means despicable. When the funeral ceremony is taking place, some trumpets and a drum placed at the door, announce the arrival of visitors who come with their condolences to the afflicted family. After the body is buried with the ancestors, the bonzes, (Chinese priests) chant the office of the dead, for nine days, and in the procession itself drums, trumpets, tam tams, flutes, etc., play a discordant dirge.
We have already mentioned the wooden fish suspended at the tent door of military commanders to summon them to audiences concerning public and private affairs. Mandarins have, in like manner, a drum in the outer hall of their palaces, by means of which they can be summoned to give audience to any applicant; they are obliged to give immediate attention to the complaint of any person beating the drum, but woe to the audacious drummer who does not have some very especial wrong to complain of; he is immediately soundly bastinadoed.
At eclipses of the moon, the Chinese use their musical instruments in a purposely hideous manner. This is done to frighten away the dragon which is supposed to be eating up the orb of night. Instruments of percussion are chiefly used on this occasion. The same instruments (i. e. gongs, drums, trumpets and tam-tams) are used to aid the marching of the army.
The musical language such as we use in directing the movements of cavalry and artillery, is much more extended, though differently used in China; such musical signals are used in commanding civil as well as military personages. Various trades have their especial songs also, which they sing at their work.
But the music of China, although extending into every department of social and official life, is totally incapable of any advancement. Musical martinets are continually exclaiming against the changes in style of composition, which innovators are constantly introducing into our art,[126] but it is these changes which give the surest signs of real life and intrinsic merit to modern music.
In China, precisely as formerly in ancient Egypt, no such changes are possible; the music for each and every event is as carefully mapped out and adhered to, as is the cut of the garments, or the exchange of civilities among this precise people.[127]
If ever change takes place in their musical system it will assuredly be a gravitation towards the European, as they have in a certain measure a comprehension, theoretically at least, of our system of semi-tones, but could by no means conceive of, and accurately produce the third and quarter tones of Indian music. We have already related the ineffectual movement towards western style, made in the last century; during the embassy of 1793, Macartney observed many indications of inclination for our system, such as the use of the violin,[128] the notation of music upon ruled paper, and interest in the band concerts given at his rooms each evening. He also found in the emperor’s palace at Yuen min-yuen, an English musical clock, made by Geo. Clarke, Leadenhall Street, London, which played many selections from the “Beggar’s Opera.”[129] It is certainly not too venturesome to predict, in spite of the jarring of their music upon us, that they may yet develop a taste for some of the coarser branches of ours.