Intimate China: The Chinese as I Have Seen Them

by Mrs. Archibald Little

Crowd.—Nuns.—Final Shaving.—Woven Paces.—Burning Heads.—Relationships.—A Living Picture.

I have attended an ordination in St. John Lateran's at Rome, of which my principal recollection is how the Italian young men wriggled as they all lay flat upon the marble floor whilst something was sung over them. Was it a Te Deum? It certainly was very long. The whole service, indeed, seemed very long drawn out. I have also a remembrance of nearly fainting from weariness at an ordination in Exeter Cathedral; and can still recall the thrill of awestruck admiration with which I regarded the reader of the gospel on that occasion, who, as I understood, had passed first, and who yet was overcome by emotion, so far was he from esteeming himself worthy of this honour, in thinking of the work that lay before him. Certainly, long though the proceedings were—and they must have been very long if they seemed so to me, for in those days I was an enthusiast about cathedral services—yet never for a second did reverence of the highest quality cease to brood over all the scene. Thus, when invited by the abbot himself to assist at an ordination in one of the strictest of Chinese monasteries, there was some element of wonder mixed with the fortitude with which I prepared for a barbarous burning rite, and soupe maigre to see it on. Nor was that flask of whisky forgotten that is such a support to the traveller, remaining always full under all emergencies because never wanted. It was not in this case. But as the only European, whose account of such a ceremony I had heard, reported two or three monks carried away fainting, and a general odour of burning flesh, I thought it might be.

AT FENGTU, CHINESE HADES.
By Mrs. Archibald Little.

The large beautifully situated monastery was already full when I arrived; and my husband, who had transmitted the abbot's invitation, and himself had been there two days, informed me his was the only bed with one man in it. "They sleep head and feet," he said, as if this added to the comfort of it. "I can't think where they will put you. They are very, very full; and they are playing cards or smoking opium all the time in my room. But they are very polite,—some one is always 'keeping me company.' I cannot read a word." Indeed, he wore the dazed air of being too much kept company with. At the head of a flight of steps, at the entrance to the women's quarter, a dark den with two beds was, however, found for me; and though several ladies most obligingly offered to occupy the other bed, and "keep me company" all night, I retained undisturbed possession of the two, whenever the door was barred. When it was not, people "kept me company" (pei); ladies, priests, young men friends, and young men who were not friends, but might become such, all crowded in together with some young monks, whose behaviour somewhat surprised me.

Attending meals of an abundant, yet meagre, description with the other ladies, and returning the ladies' calls, I was again and again surprised by the easy behaviour of these young monks, who were apparently especially taken by my gloves, and would feel my hand gloved and feel my hand ungloved, and generally hang around. One seemed very well brought up, and began every sentence with "Omito!" generally finishing it in that way too, and accompanying every remark by a set little bow. We thought perhaps he was a lad—a child—and my husband positively screamed when, on being asked his age, he answered twenty-six. "Did you ever see a young man of twenty-six with such an innocent countenance?" he asked. "Well, I don't know," I said evasively, "I suppose it is all right; but I may as well tell you that never in all my life have I had my hand squeezed as since I came into this monastery. They all do it, every one of them; so I suppose it means nothing." I hastened to add, "But they are in all the ladies' rooms too." "What! in the Chinese ladies' too?" "Yes!" I persisted. "Oh, well, well!" We resigned ourselves to the ways of the country. It was not till two days later the truth dawned upon us that this innocent-faced young man, and some others, who were older and could hardly be described in that way, were nuns, guests like ourselves, and that there were besides sixteen young women going to be made nuns, together with the fifty-two young men who were going to be made priests. We were so glad we found out.

All the day through there were invitations to tea and sugar-plums with the abbot and past abbots (each only rules for three years, and then retires into a picturesque suite of rooms and garden to himself), and all the while again and again sounds of gongs and drums and chanting, and peeps at strange novices, young people with shaven heads, clad in "Liberty-tinted" gowns—dull red, ruddy brown, old gold, cream—kneeling, or prostrating themselves quite flat, or winding in and out with pacings and slow and quick movements. On the morning of the day, after many services in the night and dawning, there was the final shaving. Then each knelt in turn, and had his head felt all over the front, and with great care, by a seated priest with immovable countenance of the Indian type, and long taper, talonlike fingers. If a hair could be felt, back to the barber! If quite smooth, little circles were traced with Indian ink upon the polled pate—this was done by the eye, and often one had to be effaced and retraced; then a tiny packet was handed to the kneeling one. It was some time after this ceremony the abbot, in dull cream, with over-gown of rich red satin, like the others, all made of tiny bits sewn together to simulate rags and poverty, and passed under the right arm, but clasped over the left breast, black-hooded, and bearing in lifted hand before his face a golden jui, or sceptre, entered the large principal temple, and sat on a chair placed upon the altar, a scourge borne behind him, draped with red silk, being placed to his left, and what looked like a censer to his right. Then four priests, with many kneelings and flat prostrations, stood before the altar, seven of the novices following in like fashion, and joining the long line, seven at either end. Each carried a long piece of cloth to spread upon the floor on which to lie prostrate; and as the two lines stood facing each other before the altar, the two in the centre raised the kneeling-cloth to their eyes, and with it solemnly tso-i'd to each other; then each, turning quickly to the right, went through the same ceremony with the man he now found himself confronted with; and so all along the line, only the reverence growing less and less, till the last man hardly got the cloth up as high as his shoulders, for they had to be very quick. The wooden gong was being beaten faster and faster. And now the priests led off; and each set of nine, keeping to its own side of the temple, went through the quickest "woven paces" I have yet seen, curving in and round upon one another, and round the huge stone monoliths that support the vast graceful temple roof, whose erection still remains a mystery, so lofty is it and so large its span, so ample its unsupported roof-curves. It was like the quickest possible follow-my-leader, so that the end of the tail came up always smiling all over, and breathlessly trying to get through the figure. Meanwhile, at the side, towards the back, another dignitary sat in state, and two novices knelt, and went flat, and came forward, and practised taking incense-sticks from the altar with fingers widely spread after a fashion that does not look easy and does look mystic. But what was the meaning of it, or the dance, no one seemed able to say.

No number of inquiries, not even a direct letter and special messenger to the monastery, had been able to elicit even the day of the great ceremony, much less the hour; but, since the evening before, we had heard of two o'clock, and at two o'clock precisely in they came. We ladies were crowding on to the few seats in one corner; the male guests, silken-clad, fur-lined, were swelling it about at the sides of the temple, the centre of which appeared already quite filled up by the priests of the monastery, and other priests and men guests, who were all greeting one another, going about, standing in groups, and generally wearing a pleased, excited appearance. Meanwhile, the populace, in serried mass, were looking in through all the many half-doors on all sides, the tops of all the doors being thrown wide open. There was music. Was it the wooden gong or the drum? It was quick, near. It seemed to throb with the intense excitement pervading the building. And in twenty minutes all was over. Every one had come in, the abbot clad as before, all the novices in over-gowns clasped over the left shoulder—both over- and under-gowns of what we call art colours. All had spread out their cloths and knelt and prostrated themselves, before a priest took up his position standing behind each, and extended both hands to hold the novice's head quite steady, fingers wide dispread, so as especially to shield the eyes, all of course closed. Some adhesive mixture was applied to the Indian ink circles; then a priest, standing in front of each novice, took out of the packet previously given him nice little cones of charred sandalwood and saltpetre, and stuck them on the places indicated; and some one else set them alight; and there were sixty-eight young men and women, all kneeling, with their eyes closed, their faces turned up to heaven, and with nine little charcoal cones smouldering on each of their bare pates, whilst they prayed one and all, as it seemed, with all their hearts. For if the heart is pure, you do not suffer, is the saying. My husband says he kept his eyes fixed on the three nearest him, and never saw them wince, or blanch, or utter a sound, or move a muscle. But my place was by the nuns, and one moved, so that one of the smouldering cones fell off and into her bosom, and had to be replaced; and another did not cry out, but roared—roared like a child. Yet such was the din made by the excitingly discordant music, that when I stepped but two off I could not hear a sound from her; so there may have been many others crying out also. I saw one nun press a cloth again and again to her eyes, and take it away apparently soaked by her tears; but her face was steady and upturned, and her expression was that of very earnest prayer. Meanwhile, the cones smouldered down till they just charred those marks with which we are familiar on priests' heads; then they went out, though all that day and on into the next several little unburnt lumps were still adhering to the poor consecrated heads.

We went away to tea and sugar-plums, leaving the new-made monks and nuns still praying; and when we came out, they had only adjourned to another temple to pray. At ten o'clock at night they were calling on Sergiafu (Buddha, Sakyamuni, what you will), thirty-four standing up quite straight, chanting, whilst the other thirty-four were lying prostrate, then going down in their turn whilst the others rose up and chanted. This they did at the rate of three prostrations and uprisings a minute. They are supposed to make ten thousand in the twenty days. It seemed to make me drowsy; so, having twice fallen off asleep whilst they prayed and rose and fell, I went to bed, leaving them still at it, to be thrice awakened by the gong calling to fresh prayers, and, when I arose the following morning, to find the whole set processioning from one dead abbot's grave to the other, praying at each. One of our Chinese gentleman friends we left in the temple at night. At eleven o'clock he was turning in. Then some one proposed ten more rounds of cards, and they played till daybreak. It was only the week before we had been invited to the funeral feast of his grandmother, when, with the coffin in the guest-room, a light underneath it, the ladies of the family played cards all night in a bedroom opening out of the guest-room, though their eyes were dilated either from tears or want of sleep, their heads bound with white mourning-cloths of the same coarse texture as those worn by the peasant. Was it not something like this at one time in our own country at a funeral feast?