The periodical offerings to the gods are very striking exhibitions to the stranger who looks upon them for the first time. When staying at Shanghae, in November, 1844, I witnessed a most curious spectacle in the house where I was residing. It was a family offering to the gods. Early in the morning the principal hall in the house was set in order, a large table was placed in the centre, and shortly afterwards covered with small dishes filled with the various articles commonly used as food by the Chinese. All these were of the very best description which could be procured. After a certain time had elapsed a number of candles were lighted, and columns of smoke and fragrant odours began to rise from the incense which was burning on the table. All the inmates of the house and their friends were clad in their best attire, and in turn came to Ko-tou, or bow lowly and repeatedly in front of the table and the altar. The scene, although it was an idolatrous one, seemed to me to have something very impressive about it, and whilst I pitied the delusion of our host and his friends, I could not but admire their devotion. In a short time after this ceremony was completed a large quantity of tinsel paper, made up in the form and shape of the ingots of Sycee silver common in China, was heaped on the floor in front of the tables, the burning incense was then taken from the table and placed in the midst of it, and the whole consumed together. By and by, when the gods were supposed to have finished their repast, all the articles of food were removed from the tables, cut up, and consumed by people connected with the family.
On another occasion, when at Ning-po, having been out some distance in the country, it was night and dark before I reached the cast gate of the city, near which I was lodged in the house of a Chinese merchant. The city gates were closed, but two or three loud knocks soon brought the warder, who instantly admitted me. I was now in the widest and finest street in the city, which seemed in a blaze of light and unusually lively for any part of a Chinese town after nightfall. The sounds of music fell, upon my ear, the gong, the drum, and the more plaintive and pleasing tones of several wind instruments. I was soon near enough to observe what was going on, and saw, at a glance, that it was a public offering to the gods, but far grander and more striking than I had before witnessed. The table was spread in the open street, and every thing was on a large and expensive scale. Instead of small dishes, whole animals were sacrificed on the occasion. A pig was placed on one side of the table, and a sheep on the other, the former scraped clean, in the usual way, and the latter skinned; the entrails of both were removed, and on each were placed some flowers, an onion, and a knife. The other parts of the table groaned with all the delicacies in common use amongst the respectable portion of the Chinese, such as fowls, ducks, numerous compound dishes, fruits, vegetables, and rice. Chairs were placed at one end of the table on which the gods were supposed to sit during the meal, and chopsticks were regularly laid at the sides of the different dishes. A blaze of light illuminated the whole place, and the smoke of the fragrant incense rose up into the air in wreaths. At intervals the band struck up their favourite plaintive national airs, and altogether the whole scene was one of the strangest and most curious which it has ever been my lot to witness.
There is another ceremony of a religious character which I frequently observed in the northern cities—I allude to processions in honour of the gods. I saw one of them at Shanghae, which must have been at least a mile in length. The gods, or josses, were dressed up in the finest silks, and carried about in splendid sedan-chairs, preceded and succeeded by their numerous devotees, superbly dressed for the occasion, and bearing the different badges of office. The dresses of the officials were exactly the same as of those who form the train of some of the high mandarins. Some had a broad fan, made of peacock feathers, which they wore on the sides of their hats, others were clad in glaring theatrical dresses, with low caps, and two long black feathers stuck in them, and hanging over their shoulders like two horns. Then there were the ill-looking executioners with long, conical, black hats on their heads, and whips in their hands for the punishment of the refractory. Bands of music, placed in different parts of the procession, played at intervals as it proceeded. Anxious to see the end of this curious exhibition, I followed the procession until it arrived at a temple in the suburbs, where it halted. The gods were taken out of the sedan-chairs, and replaced with due honours, in the temple, from which they had been taken in the morning. Here their numerous votaries bent low before them, burned incense, and left their gifts upon the altar. Numerous groups of well-dressed ladies and their children were scattered over the ground in the vicinity of the temple, all bending their knees and seemingly engaged in earnest devotion. A large quantity of paper, in the form of the Sycee ingots, was heaped up on the grass as it was brought by the different devotees, and, when the ceremonies of the day were drawing to a close, the whole was burned in honour of, or as an offering to, the gods. The sight was interesting, but it was one which no Christian could look upon without feelings of the deepest commiseration.
In the course of my travels in China I often met with Christian missionaries, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, who have been labouring amongst the Chinese for many years. Until very lately the efforts of the Protestants had been chiefly confined to Macao and Canton. Since the war, however, they have had an opportunity of extending their operations, and some are now settled at all the new ports which have been opened for foreign trade, as well as on our Island of Hong-kong, which will now become their head-quarters.
The medical missionaries also act in conjunction with the others, and are of great use in curing many of the diseases which prevail in the country, while, at the same time, the truths of the Christian faith are presented to the minds of their patients. Dr. Lockhart of the London Missionary Society, who has established himself in the town of Shanghae, had his hospital daily crowded with patients, many of whom had come from very distant parts of the country. All were attended to in the most skilful and careful manner, "without money and without price." The Rev. Mr. Medhurst, who has laboured long and zealously as a Christian missionary in the East, was also at Shanghae. This gentleman is well known as an eminent Chinese scholar, and, besides preaching to the people in their own tongue, he has a printing establishment with Chinese type continually at work, for the dissemination of the truths of the gospel. Several other gentlemen and their families had arrived at the same port previous to my departure, and were closely engaged in the study of the language. Ning-po and Amoy were also occupied by missionaries, both from England and America, and I suppose, ere this time, some have also reached Foo-chow-foo on the River Min.
From my own experience of Chinese character, and from what I have seen of the working of the Medical Missionary Society, I am convinced that it must be a powerful auxiliary to the missionaries in the conversion of the Chinese. I regret, however, to say, that up to the present time little progress appears to have been made. One portion of the people, and a large one, is entirely indifferent to religion of any kind, and the rest are so bigoted and conceited, that it will be a most difficult task to convince them that any religion is better or purer than their own.
The Roman Catholic missionaries conduct their operations in a manner somewhat different from the Protestants. They do not restrict themselves to the out-ports of the empire, where foreigners are permitted to trade, but penetrate into the interior, and distribute themselves over all the country. One of their bishops, an Italian nobleman, resides in the province of Keang-soo, a few miles from Shanghae, where I have frequently met him. He dresses in the costume of the country, and speaks the language with the most perfect fluency. In the place where he lives he is surrounded by his converts; in fact it is a little Christian village, where he is perfectly safe, and I believe is seldom if ever annoyed in any way by the Chinese authorities. When new Roman Catholic missionaries arrive, they are met by some of their brethren or their converts at the port nearest their destination, and secretly conveyed into the interior; the Chinese dress is substituted for the European; their heads are shaved, and in this state they are conducted to the scene of their future labours, where they commence the study of the language, if they have not learned it before, and in about two years are able to speak it sufficiently well to enable them to instruct the people. These poor men submit to many privations and dangers for the cause they have espoused, and although I do not approve of the doctrines which they teach, I must give them the highest praise for enthusiasm and devotion to their faith. European customs, habits, and luxuries are all abandoned from the moment they put their feet on the shores of China; parents, friends, and home, in many instances, are heard of no more; before them lies a heathen land of strangers, cold and unconcerned about the religion for which they themselves are sacrificing everything, and they know that their graves will be far away from the land of their birth and the home of their early years. They seem to have much of the spirit and enthusiasm of the first preachers of the Christian religion, when they were sent out into the world by their Divine Master to "preach the gospel to every creature," and "to obey God rather than man."
According to the accounts of these missionaries, the number of converts to their faith is very considerable; but I fear they, as well as the Protestants, are often led away by false appearances and assertions. Many of the Chinese are unprincipled and deceitful enough to become Christians or in fact any thing else, in name, to accomplish the object they may have in view, and they would become Budhists the very next day should any inducement be offered them to do so. Judging from appearances, the day must yet be very distant when the Chinese, as a nation, will be converted to the Christian faith. Could those individuals in our time, who predict the near approach of the Millennium, see the length and breadth of this vast country, with its three hundred millions of souls, they would surely pause and reflect before they published their absurd and foolish predictions.