The national vice of the Chinese, however, is gambling, and it is one very few of them can resist. In his interesting monograph on Peking, Mgr. Favier tells us how the beggars in rags will stake their last scrap of clothing. Certain fanatics will stake their wives and children, and men have been known to wager away their finger-joints. A young Christian, who was an inveterate gambler, on one occasion staked and lost his wife, who was only twenty years of age, for the large sum of 15s. The missionary paid the debt and returned the young woman to her mother. A few months afterwards she rejoined her husband, and, adds the author, with the authority of his thirty-eight years of missionary life in China, ‘in all probability he has staked and lost her again.’
Intemperance, on the other hand, is extremely rare; but those who would be drunkards in Europe, Mgr. Favier assured me when I was in Peking, are opium-smokers in China, where he estimates that about one-fifth of the population of the towns give themselves over to this horrible practice. In the country districts the number is very much less, and another missionary, who lives at Fo-kien in Southern China, estimates it at not more than five per cent. The habit of opium-smoking is very widely spread among the upper classes and the literati; but its effects are not so pronounced among the rich as among the poor, who, by reason of bad diet, are less prepared to resist its effects, especially as they generally indulge in this vice in their leisure hours in the most dreadful dens, and, moreover, smoke a very inferior quality of opium. A young man who begins to indulge in this pernicious habit in his twentieth year usually shuffles off this mortal coil before he is twenty-two. The vices of the Chinese do not particularly shock foreigners who live among them, for they are not obliged to see them; but it is otherwise with their universal and repellently filthy habits and intense love of all kinds of horrible noises, which they indulge in on every possible occasion, be it a sad or merry one, a marriage or a funeral, at festivals as well as at fires. What exasperates a European, however, more than anything else are the vulgar superstitions which replace among the Celestials the spirit of religion, which is quite absent, and which constitute another hindrance to progress. Their strange ideas with respect to feng-shui, or geomancy, often upset the least attempt at introducing any improvement even in European concessions or in such cities as Hong-Kong and Singapore. Then, again, the disposition of the Chinese mind does not admit of general or abstract ideas, and repudiates all sense of the ideal, and, in a word, is sterilized by such absolute materialism as to shock even the most cynical of Europeans. Take them for all in all, therefore, the Celestials may be described as a not particularly seductive or sympathetic people, all the less so as their ugly appearance is not compensated for by the charm of manner which renders the Japanese so agreeable and which enables them to gild even their vices.
The Chinese, however, have certain great qualities which are not precisely amiable, in spite of their extreme politeness, a matter rather of ceremony than of sincerity. These qualities are of a serious nature: patience, perseverance, hard work, the greatest aptitude for commercial pursuits, industry, economy, singular resistive power, and respect for parents and old age, to which may be added a remarkably contented frame of mind. Therefore, even if the Chinese Government presents every indication of decadence, it would be unjust to say the same of its energetic and hard-working subjects. Unquestionably the Government is not the only thing that needs reforming in China. There is the secular habit of always looking to the past for a type of perfection, which produces a certain atrophy of the Chinese intelligence, depriving it of all elasticity, originality and power of invention, and making it only capable of servile imitation, lacking even discernment—a fact which is admirably illustrated in the well-known story of the tailor to whom a European sent an old pair of breeches in order that he might copy them. This he did so conscientiously that he cut a hole in the exact place where there had been one in the well-worn pair which had been entrusted to him. In the same order of ideas is an instance supplied me by the Jesuit Fathers at Sicawei, near Shanghai, who showed me some drawings executed by young Chinese students, intended for the plates to be introduced in a publication on the fauna of the Far East. They included some drawings of the skeletons of animals, which, however, were disfigured, notwithstanding the entreaties of the Fathers, with certain accidental blots and marks that appeared upon the models. It is not impossible to induce the Chinese to learn new habits, but it is almost impossible to induce them to correct those which have been bequeathed to them by their ancestors. It is possible to teach them how to work modern machinery, but no power, human or divine, could teach a Chinese carpenter to work otherwise than he has been trained to do. At the orphanage at Sicawei, under the direction of the Jesuits, I was shown over the carpentry department, and was surprised to find each bench occupied by only one workman. The Father who showed me over the school informed me that it was absolutely impossible to induce two workmen to occupy the same bench. The younger orphans saw the older children and the adults who had remained in the service of the mission working thus, and insisted upon doing likewise.
The awakening of any sense of originality or invention in the mind of this people, by whom these qualities have been lost for the simple reason that they have been systematically trained to look backwards rather than forwards, will be a work of centuries, and only brought about by prolonged contact with the peoples and ideas of the West, and this contact is only now beginning. Before it produces its full effects upon the race it will doubtless do so upon the land of China itself, if permission can only be obtained to exploit the great natural wealth which lies undisturbed beneath the soil of this enormous Empire, and is thus lost to humanity. If the work of developing the economic resources of China be undertaken in a spirit of selfish interest, it will nevertheless very considerably ameliorate the lot of the Chinese people, if only by extending their field of activity, which is now limited to agriculture and small industries. It will allow them, for example, to exploit the subsoil, which is as much neglected in the Celestial Empire as the soil itself has been perfected by exceedingly skilful farming. If, as we believe, the great industries resulting from modern scientific discoveries have really contributed to better the condition of the people of Europe, surely their introduction into China should be most beneficial to the inhabitants of that vast Empire.
CHAPTER VI
FOREIGNERS IN CHINA—THE ATTITUDE OF THE CHINESE TOWARDS WESTERN CIVILIZATION
Concessions successively made by China to foreigners after the Wars of 1842, 1858–60, and 1895–98—Increasing tension between the Chinese and Europeans in consequence of the latter desiring to extend their action—Refusal of Europeans to conform to Chinese usages—Frequent breaches made by them against the rules and traditional customs of the Chinese—Contempt in which Western civilization is held by the Chinese notwithstanding their acknowledgment of its power and material advancement—This hostile spirit more marked among the literati, who direct public opinion, than among the people.
The position of foreigners in the Middle Kingdom has been defined by various formal conventions, the first of which was the Treaty of Nanking, signed between England and China after the war of 1842, known in history as the Opium War. This was followed in 1844 by other treaties upon the same subject with France and the United States, and still later with other nations; in 1858 the treaties of Tien-tsin, which were concluded with France and England after a short war, but which were not ratified until 1860, after a much more serious campaign and the entry of the allied troops into Peking, greatly ameliorated the condition of foreigners in the Celestial Empire. Lastly, in 1895, the treaty of Shimonosaki, imposed upon China by victorious Japan, gave fresh facilities to foreign commerce. It is a characteristic fact, however, that no serious concession has been obtained from China until after a disastrous war, the Government of Peking never ceding to persuasion, only to force.
Since the sixteenth century Europeans have been able, as the Arabs and Malays had before them, to carry on commerce with Canton without being molested, simply because they did not show any intention of extending their commerce further. But in the second quarter of the present century they became more numerous and exacting, and tension began to manifest itself. The pride of the Westerners, who were more than ever convinced of the superiority of their civilization, and whose progress at home was making giant strides, burned to impose their ideas upon the whole world, and thereby wounded the equally great pride of the Chinese, stubbornly attached to those very ancient customs so haughtily despised by the barbarians, as they were pleased to call us. The port of Canton, consecrated by tradition as the exchangemart between foreigners and natives, no longer sufficed for European ambition, and a clamour was raised to get rid of the twelve merchants, or hongs, to whom the Chinese Government had conceded the monopoly of trading with the outer world. The foreigners, moreover, demanded the right to deal with whomsoever they pleased, and refused to submit any longer to the arbitrary taxation and treatment to which they had hitherto been subjected by the local authorities. These demands and others of a similar character, which appear to us perfectly reasonable, were considered exorbitant by the Chinese. To our incessant protests they answered exactly as they had done twenty—nay, fifty—years before, that we wished to compel them to do in their own country exactly as we chose, whereas, considering that we were their guests, the contrary should be the case, and that we ought to submit to their ways, however objectionable they might seem to us, and even contrary to the interests and development of our commerce. This is precisely what Europe to-day, as then, refuses to admit, unless the Chinese very considerably mend their ways, being of opinion that so vast a country has no right to refuse to allow its wealth being exploited for the benefit of humanity, and that if it cannot, either through want of goodwill or of the necessary means, turn it to account itself, it should allow others who possess implements perfected for the purpose to use them. In short, Europe demands the right not only to trade, but also to exploit, and she intends to have it, whatever may be the consequences.
This radical difference in looking at the same thing is the origin of every difficulty that exists between the Powers and the Celestial Empire. The peoples of the West, once they have made up their minds that a thing is likely to further their interests, insist upon its being carried into effect whether the Chinese like it or not, and care very little whether they offend the prejudices or even the sanctity of Chinese tradition. It is not merely in matters of commercial transactions that foreigners behave thus, but also with regard to religion. We profess the most profound admiration and respect for those men who at the risk of their lives bring the Gospel to those who know it not, and who sacrifice everything in the hope of saving souls, and we are thoroughly convinced of the vast superiority of the teaching of Jesus Christ over that of Confucius. Christianity, however, upsets not only the traditions, but also the foundations of Chinese society. No Government of Europe would tolerate a religion which advocated polygamy, and that of the United States rigorously opposes the spread of Mormonism. We must not therefore be surprised if the Chinese do not behold with a friendly eye a religion which opposes their great doctrine of the cultus of ancestors, and if they consider it nothing short of sacrilege and well calculated to overthrow morality and law, and infinitely worse from their point of view than polygamy is from ours. The employment of female missionaries by certain Protestant sects is another scandal, and the sight of young women living under the same roof as men who are not their husbands gives rise in their minds to a train of thought the reverse of edifying. It matters little that the worship of ancestors is but mere outward form, and that the lives of the missionaries are without any reproach: ancient traditions and customs are violated, and to these the average Chinaman holds far more tenaciously than he does to the truths they conceal.
The utter disregard paid by Europeans to even the most cherished customs of the Chinese, and the vast difference which exists between the two civilizations, together with the sense of superiority which both peoples with perfect good faith entertain for themselves, is doubtless at the bottom of that bitter feeling of contempt that causes every Chinaman to despise as well as to hate the intruders. They look upon them as so many barbarians, although Article 51 of the Treaty of Tien-tsin officially ordained the proscription of the particular character describing foreigners by this objectionable word. Our most complicated and wonderful scientific instruments are not considered by the Chinese as criterions of our superiority, and they recognise us to be skilful workmen and clever jugglers, but otherwise only vulgar and ill-educated fellows, and our lack of acquaintance with their ancient lore and literature brings a smile of pity and contempt to their bland countenances. They attach little or no importance to our inventions. ‘I quite understand,’ said Prince Kong to a foreign Ambassador who had just explained to him the theory and practice of railway travelling, ‘that in Europe you should employ iron rails to transport you from one end of your country to another. Here we obtain the same effect with our waggons. We may not travel so expeditiously; but, then, we are never in such a hurry.’ This quaint observation was spoken twenty-five years ago, but it might easily be made to-day: the condition of mind which inspired it is identical and unchanged.