CONTRARIETIES IN CHINESE AND WESTERN USAGE.
On asking the boatman in which direction the harbor lay, I was answered west-north, and the wind, he said, was west-south; he still further perplexed my ideas as to our course by getting out his compass and showing me that the needle pointed south. It was really a needle as to size, weight, and length, about an inch and a half long, the south end of it painted red, and all the time quivering on the pivot. His boat differed from our vessels, too, in many ways: the cooking was done in the stern and the passengers were all accommodated in the bow, while the sailors slept on deck and had their kits stowed in lockers amidships.
On landing, the first object that attracted my attention was a military officer wearing an embroidered petticoat, who had a string of beads around his neck and a fan in his hand. His insignia of rank was a peacock’s feather pointing downward instead of a plume turning upward; he had a round knob or button on the apex of his sugar-loaf cap, instead of a star on his breast or epaulettes on his shoulders; and it was with some dismay that I saw him mount his horse on the right side. Several scabbards hung from his belt, which I naturally supposed must be dress swords or dirks; but on venturing near through the crowd I was undeceived by seeing a pair of chopsticks and a knife-handle sticking out of one, and soon his fan was folded up and put in the other. I therefore concluded that he was going to a dinner instead of a review. The natives around me shaved the hair from the front half of their heads and let it grow long behind: many of them did not shave their faces, and others employed their leisure in diligently pulling the straggling hairs down over their mouths. We arrange our toilets differently, thought I; but could easily see the happy device of chopsticks, which enabled these gentlemen to put their food into the mouth endwise under this natural fringe. A group of hungry fellows, around the stall of a travelling cook, further exhibited the utility of these kwai-tsz’, or ‘nimble lads’ (as I afterward learned chopsticks were called), for each had put his bowl of rice to his lips, and was shovelling in the contents till the mouth would hold no more. “We keep our bowls on the table,” said I, “do our cooking in the house, and wait for customers to come there instead of travelling around after them;” but these chopsticks serve for knife, fork, and spoon in one.
On my way to the hotel I saw a group of old people and graybeards. A few were chirruping and chuckling to larks or thrushes, which they carried perched on a stick or in cages; others were catching flies or hunting for crickets to feed them, while the remainder of the party seemed to be delightfully employed in flying fantastic paper kites. A group of boys were gravely looking on and regarding these innocent occupations of their seniors with the most serious and gratified attention. A few of the most sprightly were kicking a shuttlecock back and forth with great energy, instead of playing rounders with bat and ball as boys would do.
As I had come to the country to reside for some time, I made inquiries respecting a teacher, and happily found one who understood English. On entering he stood at the door, and instead of coming forward and shaking my hands, he politely bowed and shook his own, clasping them before his breast. I looked upon this mode as an improvement on our custom, especially when the condition of the hands might be doubtful, and requested him to be seated. I knew that I was to study a language without an alphabet, but was not prepared to see him begin at what I had always considered to be the end of the book. He read the date of its publication, “the fifth year, tenth month, and first day.” “We arrange our dates differently,” I observed, and begged him to read—which he did, from top to bottom, and proceeding from right to left. “You have an odd book here,” remarked I, taking it up; “what is the price?” “A dollar and eight-thirds,” said he, upon which I counted out three dollars and two-thirds and went on looking at it. The paper was printed only on one side; the running title was on the edge of the leaves instead of the top of the page, the paging was near the bottom, the number and contents of the chapters were at their ends, the marginal notes on the top, where the blank was double the size at the foot, and a broad black line across the middle of each page, like that seen in some French newspapers, separated the two works composing the volume, instead of one being printed after the other. The back was open and the sewing outside, and the name neatly written on the bottom edge. “You have given me too much,” said he, as he handed me back two dollars and one-third, and then explained that eight-thirds meant eight divided by three, or only three-eighths. A small native vocabulary which he carried with him had the characters arranged according to the termination of their sounds, ming, sing, king, being all in a row, and the first word in it being seen. “Ah! my friend,” said I, “English won’t help me to find a word in that book; please give me your address.” He accordingly took out a red card, big as a sheet of paper, on which was written Ying San-yuen in large characters, and pointed out the place of his residence, written on the other side. “I thought your name was Mr. Ying; why do you write your name wrong end first?” “It is you who are in the wrong,” replied he; “look in your yearly directory, where alone you write names as they should be written, putting the honored family name first.”
I could only say, “Customs differ;” and begged him to speak of ceremony, as I gave him back the book. He commenced, “When you receive a distinguished guest, do not fail to place him on your left, for that is the seat of honor; and be careful not to uncover the head, as that would be an unbecoming act of familiarity.” This was a little opposed to my established notions; but when he reopened the volume and read, “The most learned men are decidedly of the opinion that the seat of the human understanding is in the belly,” I cried out, “Better say it is in the feet!” and straightway shut up the book, dismissing him for another day; for this shocked all my principles of correct philosophy, even if King Solomon was against me.
On going abroad I met so many things contrary to my early notions of propriety that I readily assented to a friend’s observation, that the Chinese were our antipodes in many things besides geographical position. “Indeed,” said I, “they are so; I shall expect shortly to see a man walking on his head. Look! there’s a woman in trousers and a party of gentlemen in petticoats; she is smoking and they are fanning themselves.” However, on passing them I saw that the latter had on tight leggings. We soon met the steward of the house dressed in white, and I asked him what merry-making he was invited to; with a look of concern he told me he was returning from his father’s funeral. Instead of having crape on his head he wore white shoes, and his dress was slovenly and neglected. My companion informed me that in the north of China it was common for rich people at funerals to put a white harness on the mules and shroud the carts in coarse cotton; while the chief mourners walked next to the bier, making loud cryings and showing their grief by leaning on the attendants. The friends rode behind and the musicians preceded the coffin—all being unlike our sable plumes and black crapes.
We next went through a retired street, where we heard sobbing and crying inside a court, and I inquired who was dead or ill. The man, suppressing a smile, said, “It is a girl about to be married, who is lamenting with her relatives and fellows as she bids adieu to the family penates and lares and her paternal home. She has enough to cry about, though, in the prospect of going to her mother-in-law’s house.”
I thought, after these unlucky essays, I would ask no more questions, but use my eyes instead. Looking into a shop, I saw a stout fellow sewing lace on a bonnet for a foreign lady; and going on to the landing-place, behold, all the ferry-boats were rowed by women, and from a passage-boat at the wharf I saw all the women get out of the bow to go ashore. “What are we coming to next?” said I; and just then saw a carpenter take his foot-rule out of his stocking to measure some timber which an apprentice was cutting with a saw whose blade was set nearly at right angles with the frame. Before the door sat a man busily engaged in whitening the thick soles of a pair of cloth shoes. “That’s a shoewhite, I suppose,” said I; “and he answers to the shoeblacks in New York, who cry ‘Shine! shine!’” “Just so,” said my friend; “and beyond him see the poor wretch in chokey, with a board or cangue around his neck for a shirt-collar; an article of his toilet which answers to the cuffs with which the lads in the Tombs there are garnished instead of bracelets. In the prisons in this land, instead of cropping the hair of a criminal, as with us, no man is allowed to have his head shaved.”
In the alleys called streets, few of them ten feet wide, the signs stood on their ends or hung from the eaves; the counters of the shops were next the street, the fronts were all open, and I saw the holes for the upright bars which secured the shop at night. Everything was done or sold in the streets or markets, which presented a strange medley. The hogs were transported in hampers on the shoulders of coolies, to the evident satisfaction of the inmates, and small pigs were put into baskets carried in slings, while the fish were frisking and jumping in shallow tubs as they were hawked from door to door.