Fortresses and pagodas dotted the banks, with here and there a scattered collection of squalid huts. The sky was royal, and the perfumed air swayed the branches of a dozen, to us unknown, trees.
Just before we reached Canton we passed the leper boats. The population of Canton is too dense for the most truly paternal Government on earth to risk the presence of lepers in the midst of the Cantonese myriads. The miserable lepers looked out at us from the windows of their boat-prisons. Had we been nearer they would have cried to us for food and cash. The sufferings of the Asiatic lepers are not exaggerated. I never went amongst them (and in India I went amongst them often) without thinking, “How long, O Lord! how long?”
Nothing impressed me as more unique in unique China than the perseverance of the Roman Catholic Church in her desperate attempt to convert the unconvertible Chinese.
The following telegram was recently sent from Shanghai:—“The Roman Catholic Mission at Lichuen, near the Szechuen border of the province of Hu-Peli, has been attacked by a mob. The priests escaped into the neighbouring provinces.”—Reuter. Similar messages have been flashed to us before; similar messages will be flashed to us again. So long as Europe overstrains the forbearance of Asia, the blood of a few Europeans must dampen the ire of the Asiatic populace.
I met in Canton a venerable churchman who has been for many years eminent in Roman Catholicism in China. Like all men eminent in the Church of Rome, he was a man of the world, open-minded, cultivated, and charmingly companionable. I ventured to ask him, “How many Chinamen have you converted during your long residence here—converted in the fullest, most absolute significance of the word?”
The old man looked across the Canton river, upon which we were at the time. To our left lay the floating prisons of the Cantonese lepers. To our right, floated the “flower boats” of the Cantonese frail. Then he answered me: “Daughter, none! But”—pointing with his thin white hand to the left—“we have alleviated suffering, and”—pointing to the right, “we have checked sin. There is yet great sin and great suffering calling out to us for help; and we are paving the way for the spiritual success of the priests unborn. Rome of the seven hills was not built in a day. Rome, the spiritual, will not be made perfect and entire in a generation. Little by little we are gaining ground here. A Chinaman pretends a conversion he does not experience—for the sake of benefits we confer on him. His children grow accustomed to our blessed symbols and our holy rites. It is our great hope that his grandchildren, or perhaps his great-grandchildren, may become truly and entirely sons of the true Church. In the meantime, we hope and pray and work, and do what good we may.” This then is the hope of Rome concerning China—to make possible the conversion of the Chinese of the future.
For this possible future accomplishment Rome spends vast sums of money—erects superb edifices—risks many noble lives. The Chinese accept the comforts bought with the money. They take shelter—when it suits their convenience—in the buildings that they demolish when it pleases their enraged whim; and they destroy the lives dedicated wisely, or unwisely, to their service.
CHINESE ACTORS. Page 136.