A Woman In China

by Mary Gaunt

Occasionally the hills receded just a little and left a small stretch of flat country where there were always exceedingly neat-looking huts. There were the neatest bundles of sticks stacked all round them, just twigs, and we landed once to buy some, for the men cooked entirely with them, and my little stove needed them to start the charcoal. But oh, the people who came out of those houses were dirty. Never have I seen such unclean-looking unattractive women. One had a child in her arms with perfectly horrible-looking eyes, and I knew there was another unfortunate going to be added to the many blind of China. She ran away at the sight of me, and so did two little stark-naked boys. I tempted them with biscuits, and their grandfather or great-grandfather, he might have been, watched with the deepest interest. He and I struck up quite a friendship over the incident, smiling and laughing and nodding to one another, as much as to say, “Yes, it was natural they should be afraid, but we—we, who had seen the world—of course knew better.” Then he went away and fetched back in his arms another small shaven-headed youngster whom he patted and petted and called my attention to, as much as to say this was little Benjamin, the well-beloved, had I not a biscuit for him? Alas I had been too long away from civilisation and I had given away all I had. But when I think about it, it is always with a feeling of regret that I had not a sweet biscuit for that old Chinaman up in the mountains and his best-beloved grandson.

I saw one morning some men fishing in the shallows by a great rock, and I demanded at once that we buy a fish. They were spearing the fish and we bought a great mud-fish for five cents, for I saw the money handed over, and then the unfortunate fish with a reed through his gills was dragged through the water alongside the boat. When I came to eat a small piece of him, which I did with interest I was so tired of chicken, he was abominable, and I smiled a little ruefully when I found in the accounts he was charged at thirty-five cents! Judging by the nastiness of that fish one ought to be able to buy up the entire contents of the Lanho for such a sum. However, the boatmen ate him gladly, and I suppose if I lived on millet for breakfast, tiffin, and dinner, and any time else when I felt hungry, I might even welcome a mud-fish for a change. Their only relish appeared to be what Tuan called “sour pickle.” There was one most unappetising-looking salted turnip which lasted a long while, though every one of the crew had a bite at it.

Gorge after gorge we passed, and the rocks rising above us seemed very high, while the sun beating down upon the water in that enclosed space made it very hot in the middle of the day, and I was very glad indeed of the mat awning, though, of course, it was of necessity so low that even I, who am a short woman, could not stand up underneath, but it kept off the sun, and the air, coming through as we were rowed along, made a little breeze. There were rapids, many rapids, but they did not impress me. I couldn't even get up a thrill, sometimes indeed the boat was turned right round, but it always seemed that the worst that might happen to me would be that I should have to get out and walk, and of course get rather wet in the process. Tuan made a great fuss about them all, “must take care” but the worst one of all he was so exceedingly grave over that I felt at least we were risking our valuable lives. It was inside the wall and was called “Racing Horse Rapid” but it wasn't very bad. I have been up much worse rapids on the Volta, in West Africa, and nobody seemed to think they were anything out of the ordinary, but then the negro has not such a rooted objection to water as the Chinaman apparently has. My crew had to get wet, up to their waists sometimes, and it was a little rough on them—I remembered it in their cumshaw—that having a woman on board their modesty did not allow them to strip, and they went in with all their clothes on.

The Wall, broken for the passing of the river, is always a wonder, and here it was wonderful as ever. We stopped here for a little in order, as far as I could make out, that Tuan might get some ragged specimens of humanity to pluck a couple of chickens, being too grand a gentleman to do it himself, and for a brief space the foreshore was white with feathers, for the thrifty Chinaman, who finds a use for everything, once he has made feather dusters has no use for feathers. Feather pillows he knows not. But for once Tuan's skill in putting the work he was paid for doing, off on to other people, failed either to amuse or irritate me. I had eyes for nothing but the Wall—the Wall above all other walls still—for all it is in ruins. As we went down the river it followed along the tops of the highest hills for over a mile. Always the Wall cuts the skyline. There is never anything higher than the Wall. And here, as if this river valley must be extra well guarded, on every accessible peak was a watch-tower. They are all in ruins now, but they speak forcibly of the watch and ward that was kept here once. There was one square ruin on the highest peak. As evening fell, heavy, threatening clouds gathered and it stood out against them. As we went far down the valley it was always visible, now to the right of us, now to the left, as the river wound, and when I thought it was gone in the gathering gloom, a jagged flash of lightning, out of the black cloud behind it, illumined it again, and for the moment I forgot that it was ruined, and thought only what an excellent vantage-point those old-time builders had chosen. All the country round must see the beacon fire flaring there. And again I thought of the signals that must have gone up, “The Mongols are coming down the river. The Manchus are gathering in the hills.”

Those heavy clouds bespoke rain, and that night it came down, came down in torrents, and if there is a more uncomfortable place in which to be rained upon than a small boat I have yet to find it. Those grass mats kept off some of the rain, but they were by no means as water-tight as I should have liked. I spread my burberry over my bed, put up my umbrella, and stopped up the worst leaks with all the towels I could spare, and yet the water came in, and on the other side of my calico screen I could hear the men making a few remarks, which Tuan told me next day were because, “she no can cook dinner, no can dry clothes.” I had lent them my charcoal stove, but it was small and would only dry “littee, littee clothe” so everybody including myself got up next morning in a querulous mood, and very sorry for themselves. The others at least were earning their pay, but I wondered how I was going to make money out of it, and again I questioned the curious fate that sent me wandering uncomfortably about the world, and sometimes actually—yes actually getting enjoyment out of it.

I didn't enjoy that day, however. We went on a little and at length we stopped, all the country was veiled in soft moist grey mist, the perpetual sunshine of Northern China was gone, and Tuan and the boatman came to me. They proposed, of all the Chinese things in this world to do, to go back! Why I don't know now, for to go back meant going against the stream and towing the boat! A very much harder job than guiding it down stream, where it would go of its own weight. I have not often put my foot down in China. I have always found it best to let my servants, or those I employed, go about things their own way, but this was too much for me. I made it clearly understood that the boat belonged to me for the time being, and that back I would not go.

Tuan murmured something about some place “she get dry” and I quite agreed looking at the shivering wretches, but that place had got to be ahead, not behind us. However, go on they would not, so we pulled up against the bank and all four of them cowered over the little charcoal stove till I feared lest they would be asphyxiated with the fumes. I got in my bed, pulled my eiderdown round me, and thanked Providence I had it, a sleeping bag, and a burberry, and then as best I could I dodged the drops that came through the matting, but I knew I wasn't nearly so uncomfortable as my men. At last the rain lifted a little, and three rueful figures pulled us down to a small, a very small temple wherein they lighted a fire and cooked themselves a warm meal. By that time the rain had gone, and they were smiling and cheerful once more.

As the result of that rain the river rose three feet, the rapids were easier than ever to go over, only of course there was the risk of hitting the rocks that were now submerged, and the waters were muddier than ever. I felt as if all those mountain-sides were being washed down into the Lanho, as they probably were. All along the banks, too, the people were collected gathering—not driftwood, for there was none, but driftweed, gathering it in with rakes and dipping-in baskets, holding them out for the water to run away and using the residuum “for burn,” as Tuan put it. It was dreary, wet, grey, cold. The country grew flatter as we came down the river, the hills receded; we were in an agricultural country which was benefiting, I doubt not, by this rain, but with the mountains went the stern grandeur, and cold rain on a flat country is uninspiring. Besides breakfast before five-thirty leaves a long day before one, and the incidents were so small. I watched the captain steering and refreshing himself with a bite at a pink radish as large and as long as a parsnip, and it looked cold and uninviting. Surely I ought to be thankful that Fate had not caused me to be born a Chinese of the working classes.

The captain had a large cash-box which reposed trustfully at the end of my bed. Not that I could have got into it, for it was fastened with the sort of padlock that I should put on park gates, and I certainly couldn't have carried it away, at least not unbeknownst, for it was a cube of at least eighteen inches. It gave me the idea of great wealth, for never in my life do I expect to require a cash-box like that. If I did I should give up story writing and grow old with a quiet mind. But then I do not take my earnings in copper cash.