The city of Chinchew (or Tsiuenchau), north of Amoy, was once the larger of the two. It is described by Marco Polo, who reached it after five days’ journey from Fuhchau, meeting with a constant succession of flourishing cities, towns and villages. “At this city is the haven of Zayton, frequented by all the ships from India, ... and by all the merchants of Manzi, for hither is imported the most astonishing quantity of goods and of precious stones and pearls.... For it is one of the two greatest havens in the world for commerce.”[69] It was gradually forsaken for Amoy, which was more accessible to junks. From Zayton, Kublai Khan’s expedition to Java and Japan sailed, and here the men from Egypt and Arabia traded for silks, sugar, and spices long after the Portuguese reached China.
The department of Hinghwa, situate on the coast between Tsiuenchau and Fuhchau, is exceedingly populous, and its dialect differs distinctly from both of the adjoining prefectures. Its people have a bad reputation, and female infanticide prevails here to a greater degree than elsewhere. At Yenping, on the Min River, the people speak the dialect of Nanking, showing their origin of not many scores of years past; there are many patois in these hilly parts of Fuhkien, and the province as a whole exhibits probably greater discrepancies in its dialects than any other. Its produce is exported north and west, as well as coastwise, and this intercourse tends to assimilate the speech of the inhabitants with their neighbors. The natural scenery in the ranges near the Bohea Hills in the borders of Kiangsí attracts visitors from afar. Fortune describes the picturesque grouping of steep rocks, lonely temples on jutting ledges and hidden adits, alternating with hamlets, along the banks of the stream which carries the boats and produce away to a market. The rocks and cliffs here have furnished Chinese artists with many subjects for pen and pencil, while the valley in addition to its natural beauty brings forth the best of teas.
THE ISLAND OF FORMOSA.
The island of Formosa, lying 90 miles west of Amoy, together with the Pescadore group, forms a department called Taiwan. The former is a fertile, well-watered region, possessing a salubrious climate, and meriting in every respect its name Formosa—a descriptive term first given by the Portuguese to their settlement at Kilung in 1590, and extended afterward to the entire island. Its total length is about 235 miles, while the width at the centre is not far from 80 miles; the limits of Chinese jurisdiction do not, however, embrace more than the western or level portion, leaving to untamed aborigines the thickly wooded districts beyond the Muh kan shan, a lofty range of mountains running north and south and forming the backbone of the island. The western coast presents no good harbors, and vessels lying a long distance off shore are exposed to the double inconvenience of a dangerous anchorage and an inhospitable reception from the natives; the eastern side is still less inviting, owing to its possession by savage tribes. From recent reports it appears, moreover, that the whole coast line is rising with unusual persistence and regularity, and that the streams are being choked up at their mouths.
The aborigines of this island are, in those districts that remain uncontaminated by mixture with Chinese settlers, a remarkably well-built, handsome race, strong, large of eye, bold, and devoted to hunting and ardent spirits (when the latter is procurable), after the manner of wild people the world over; no written language exists among them, nor do they employ any fixed method of reckoning time. They and the inhabitants of Lewchew and neighboring islands are probably of the same race with the Philippine Tagalas, though some have supposed them to be of Malay or Polynesian origin. Like the North American Indians they are divided into numerous clans, whose mutual feuds are likely to last until one party or another is exterminated; this turbulence restrains them from any united action against the Chinese, whose occupation of the island has always been irksome to the natives. Their social condition is extremely low; though free from the petty vices of thieving and deception, and friendly toward strangers, the principle of blood-requital holds among them with full force, and family revenge is usually the sole object of life among the men. No savage is esteemed who has not beheaded a Chinaman, while the greater the number of heads brought home from a fray, the higher the position of a brave in the community. The women are forced to attend both to house and field, but share the laziness of their masters, insomuch that they never cut from the growing rice or millet more than enough for the day’s provision. “Although these people have men’s forms,” observes a Chinese writer in the peculiar antithetical style common to their literary productions, “they have not men’s natures. To govern them is impossible; to exterminate them not to be thought of; and so nothing can be done with them. The only thing left is to establish troops with cannon at all the passes through which they issue on their raids, and so overawe them, by military display, from coming out of their fastnesses. The savage tracks lie only through the dense forests, thick with underbrush, where hiding is easy. When they cut off a head, they boil it to separate the flesh, adorn the skull with various ornaments, and hang it up in their huts as evidence of their valor.” In addition to a few native clans who have submitted to the rulers from the mainland and dwell in the border region between the colonists and aborigines proper, a peculiarly situated race, called Hakkas, maintains a neutral position between the hill tribes and the Chinese. These people were formerly industrious but persecuted inhabitants of Kwangtung province, who, in order to better their lot, emigrated to Formosa and established close communication with the natives there, making themselves indispensable to them by procuring arms, powder, and manufactured goods, while owing to their industry they were able in time to monopolize the camphor trade. Though retaining the Chinese costume and shaving their heads, they practically ignore Chinese rule, paying tribute and intermarrying with the mountaineers, from whom they have also obtained large tracts of land.
PRODUCTIONS OF FORMOSA.
Maize, potatoes, fruits, tobacco, indigo, sugar, rice, and tea, are all grown on this island, the three latter in rapidly increasing quantities for purposes of export. Of natural products salt, coal, sulphur, petroleum, and camphor are of the first importance. The vast coal basins have hardly been opened or even explored, the only mines now worked being those in the northern part, near Kilung. Native methods of mining are, however, the only ones employed thus far, and it is not surprising, considering their extreme simplicity, that they have not been able to extract coal from remote districts, where the natural difficulties encountered are greatest. Hand labor alone is used, and draining a pit unheard of—compelling a speedy abandoning of the mines when pierced to any great depth in the mountain side. The cost of the coal at the mouth of the pit is about 65 cents per ton for the first qualities, which price improved methods might reduce a third. The presence of volcanoes on this island will, nevertheless, present a serious obstacle to the employment of western mining machinery, especially along the coast, where the measures appear to be excessively dislocated and the work of draining is rendered more difficult. Petroleum is abundant in certain tracts of northern Formosa, flowing plentifully from crevices in the hills, and used to some extent for burning and medicinal purposes by the natives, but not exported. The possibilities of a large sulphur trade are much more important. It is brought from solfatarae and geysers at Tah-yu kang, near Kilung, where it is found in a nearly pure state, as well, too, as a great quantity of sulphurous acid which might with profit be used in the sugar refineries on the island. The manufacture of sulphur is, however, forbidden by treaty, though its exportation goes on in small quantities, the contractors taking on themselves all risk of seizure. Camphor, perhaps the greatest source of wealth to Formosa, is obtained here by saturating small sticks of the wood with steam, not by boiling as in Japan. The crystals of camphor condense in a receiver placed above the furnace; during the process of distillation an essential oil is produced, which when chemically treated with nitric acid becomes solid camphor. The trees from which the wood is cut grow in the most inaccessible tracts of the island, and are, according to all descriptions, of immense extent, though chopped down by the natives without discrimination or idea of encouraging a second growth.
Among the most interesting natural phenomena of this district are the so-called volcanoes, whose occasional eruptions have been noticed by many. Mr. Le Gendre, United States Consul at Amoy in 1869, upon a visit to Formosa took occasion to examine more closely into this subject. It appears from his report[70] that a gas is constantly issuing from the earth, and when a hole to the depth of a few inches is made it can be lighted. It is most likely, he continues, that from time to time gas jets break forth at points of the hills where they had not been observed before, rushing through its long grass and forests of huge trees, and the rock oil which as a general thing flows in their vicinity. As they are apt to spontaneously ignite in contact with the atmosphere, they must set fire to these materials and cause a local conflagration, that gives to the many peaks of the chain the appearance of volcanoes.
FORMOSA AND THE PESCADORES.
Previous to the first half of the fifteenth century the Chinese had little knowledge of Formosa, nor was their sway established over any part of it until 1683. It was never really colonized, and became a misgoverned and refractory region from the earliest attempts at subjection. A great emigration is constantly going on from the main, and lands are taken up by capitalists, who not only encourage the people in settling there, but actually purchase large numbers of poor people to occupy these districts. Taiwan fu, the seat of local government, is the largest place on the island; other harbors or places of importance are Ku-sia and Takow, some miles south of Taiwan, the latter, with Tamsui, on the north-west coast, being one of the recently opened ports of trade. Kílung possesses a good harbor and is the entrepôt of goods for the northern end of the island. Since the opening (in 1861) of these three towns to foreign intercourse, and the more careful examination of the neutral territory at the foot of the mountains, the resources, peoples, and condition of this productive isle have become better known.