It was interesting not so much for the sports themselves, those may be better seen in any well-regulated boys' school, but because this is the first time such efforts have been made in China, and made by the Chinese themselves. That a man should take any violent exercise, unless he were absolutely obliged, that he should have any ideal beyond looking fat, and sleek, and well-fed, is entirely contrary to all received Chinese ideas, and must mark a great step in their advancement.
And then they brought me the youngest orphan, a wee, fat boy of eight, and though he looked well, he seemed much younger. Probably he was. As I understand it, the Chinese counts himself a year old in the year he is born, and the first New Year's day adds another year to his life, so that the child born on the last day of the old year, would on New Year's Day, be two years old! There is something very lovable about a small child, and there was about this little smiling chap, though he was unbecomingly dressed in coat and trousers of unbleached calico, and his head was shaven bare. He held out his hand to me when he was told, bowed low when I gave him a little piece, a very little piece, of money, and then trotted across the grounds to where a young monk was looking on at the show. He caught hold of the monk's robe, and nestled against him, and the man put down a tender hand and caressed him. No child of his own, by his vows, would he ever have, but he was a tender father to this little lonely waif. A waif? He was well-fed, he was suitably clad, and here I saw with my own eyes he had tenderness, could any child have had more? Could men do more? And again I say, as I said when I looked at the Mission to the Blind, I think not. Very surely I think not. At least one of these monks was giving what no Westerner could possibly give to a child of an alien race, that tenderness that softens and smooths life. “They brought young children to Him, that He should touch them... and He took them up in His arms, put His hands upon them, and blessed them.”
These monks profess a faith that was old when Christianity was born, but they are carrying out as faithfully as ever did any follower of Christ His behests. What matter the creed? What matter by what name we call it? Away in this old Eastern city here, they are preaching, in deeds, the gospel of love and kindness, and no man can do more.
We are apt to think that charity and pity are attributes of the Christian faith only but that is to insult the many good and holy men of other faiths. I am not scorning the kindness and self-sacrifice of the Christian missionary, but it is better, where it is possible, that charity and pity for the Chinese should come from those of their own race. For, however tender and kind an alien may be, he still stands outside, and the recipient to a certain extent is necessarily alone. Therefore am I doubly grateful to Mr Johnston for taking me to this Orphanage, where I could see how good the Chinese could be to the waifs and strays of their own people.
Pity and mercy belong not to the Western nations alone. They come from the Most High, and are common to all His people, Christian missionary selling Bibles, and pitying the blind upon the Beggars' Bridge, or Buddhist monk taking to his heart the little forsaken child in the monastery of an older faith in the Chinese City. For such love as that we find in the world we, who look on, can only bow our heads and give thanks.
CHAPTER IX—A CHINESE INN
The start for Jehol—Tuan—A Peking cart—Chinese roads—A great highway—Chances of camping out—“Room for ten thousand merchant guests”—Human occupancy—Dust of ages—Eyes at the window—Catering for the journey—The Chinese chicken, minced.