The compass has been known for many centuries to the Chinese, but in accordance with their strange habit of doing so many things in an exactly contrary manner to Europeans, they "box" it the reverse way to ourselves, speaking of an east-north or a west-south breeze, and so on.
The expressions "to the right" and "to the left" I have never heard, for it is the custom to say "go to the east-south" or to the "west-north," as the case may be. Even in cities, when asking your way, the natives will direct you by the points of the compass rather than by the names of the streets.
Chinese screws turn from right to left, which is the opposite way to our own, and of this I had a practical demonstration when, on returning one morning from the mountains, a chair-coolie surreptitiously abstracted my flask from the tiffin-basket and tried to unscrew the stopper to get at the whisky, but being ignorant of the different method, he in reality screwed it on tighter, till at last it broke off, and when some hours later, on board the steamer, I discovered my ruined flask, an array of teeth-marks deeply imbedded in the metal plainly told the guilty tale.
At Peking, when studying Chinese, my teacher would often come after dinner during the long winter evenings, when seated by a roaring fire we discussed for practice in talking any subjects of interest. Amongst many curious things which I thus heard the following has always puzzled me with the conjecture, "Can there possibly be any truth in it?"
I had that day purchased some fur rugs of no particular value, and not being sure whether they were of dog-skin or goat-skin, asked the teacher his opinion. What his reply was I do not remember, but the conversation having turned on the subject of furs in general, he told me that some rare wolf-skins were exceedingly costly from the fact that the wolves, after being caught by Mongol hunters, had been skinned alive and the skins dressed in a particular manner. Rugs made of these, he declared, on the approach to the house of wild animals, robbers or of any threatening danger, would bristle up as if still on the back of the live animal when angered, and so give timely warning to the inmates; for which reason they were so highly valued.
I have never seen what purposed to be such a skin, but repeat the story if only for its Oriental weirdness.
Water buffaloes are a striking feature in Chinese rural life, more especially in the central and southern provinces. With a carcase almost as large and devoid of hair as that of an elephant, they have very short legs, and are consequently but little taller than the ordinary ox. Carrying on their heavy skulls enormous, semi-circular horns, they have a ferocious aspect, but strangely enough are exceedingly timid and docile. In summer, for the sake of coolness and to avoid mosquitoes, they plunge into streams or mud-holes, and lie there for hours with only their muzzles and eyes above water. It is rather a pleasing sight to see one of these unwieldy, dangerous-looking brutes being led quietly along, by means of a thin string attached to its nose, by a wee native girl, who, when tired of walking, stops the animal, draws its head down by the string, places her tiny foot on the massive horn and is slowly raised from the ground by the buffalo and placed gently on his back, which is so broad that she can kneel and play about on it while her charge is grazing. These buffaloes are chiefly employed in the cultivation of rice, and as the flesh of oxen is but rarely eaten by the Chinese, they usually die of old age.
On one occasion I saw a large family of natives returning mournfully to their village from a neighbouring meadow, and on making inquiries was told that they had been to bury their water buffalo, which had just died after a faithful service of more than twenty years.
When on a shooting trip far up the River Han I saw a large buffalo with four boys on his back, grazing by the side of a water-ditch, which lay between him and a steep bank some ten feet high. The grass being very soft, my close approach was unobserved, until a hare getting up I fired off my gun. Instantly the buffalo dashed through the ditch and up the bank, when the boys, having nothing to hold on to except one another, were shot off backwards into the water, where they formed a perfect heap of struggling arms and legs, to my great amusement.
Chinese farm-houses are very different from the substantial, comfortable dwellings obtaining in this country, being primitive clay hovels with no upper storeys, having tile roofs, windows of oiled paper, and mud floors, while the furniture is home-made and of the roughest description. No walks or gardens surround the house, which stands in the centre of the farm-yard, outbuildings and cesspools, with the threshing-floor, as a rule, immediately outside the front door. Pigs, dogs, fowls and goats roam at will through the dwelling and about the premises, while the two or three buffaloes and oxen used for ploughing and threshing are tethered to neighbouring trees.