Imagine three or four hundred of these lanterns passing before you, all brilliant with rich colors. Sandal-wood is burnt in censers carried in small movable pavilions, while bands of music mingle their racket with the applause of the spectators and the jokes of the men in the procession.
Last of all an immense and terrible dragon about forty feet in length is borne along supported on bamboo poles by a dozen or twenty men.
There is another procession similar to this in the fourth month, only it takes place in the daytime instead of at night, and the large number and variety of lanterns are wanting.
In the fifth month are held the dragon-boat races. These boats are narrow and long, capable of holding about one hundred men sitting one behind the other. Each one carries a paddle, and the boat is so made that it can go just as well backwards as forwards. The direction devolves upon the men in the ends of the boat. In the centre the idol from whose ward or district the boat hails, sits enthroned with an immense umbrella of red silk to keep the sun from tanning his complexion. A band of music accompanies each boat. By its warlike clangor it encourages the racers, while its drum beats the time for the stroke. Banners are given after the race, as spoils of victory, to be placed in the temple of the patron deity. The scene on the rivers on such an occasion is very animated and the cheers of the spectators from the different districts attest their interest.
In the eighth month comes the Festival of the Moon, answering to the Harvest Festival in Western countries. What are called “moon-cakes” are sold at this season. If the year has been productive there will be a great deal of rejoicing. Presents are interchanged at this time as also at other festival seasons. As the moon becomes gradually full there appears in it to the Chinese eye a man who is climbing a tree. The full moon is greeted with much ceremony, and the night on which the luminary appears its brightest is passed in feasting and rejoicing.
CHAPTER IX.
STORIES AND STORY-TELLERS.
The Chinese are passionately fond of stories and story-telling. On the public streets and squares, professional story-tellers congregate from noon to midnight, going over the achievements of a hero or portraying the despair of a lover. They recite with a dramatic power not to be expected from their sluggish movements and stolid countenances.
All classes indulge in this favorite pastime. The dignified scholar relishes a good story as much as a child in the lap a fairy tale. Story-books in the language can be counted by the tens of thousands. The subjects are historical or romantic; of war, of love, of magic and enchantment. Some of the legends are really beautiful and are as interesting as a good English novel. There is one book which is the unfailing delight of all classes; I mean the History of the Three Kingdoms. It is an historical novel in twenty volumes, illustrated with wood-cuts. For arrangement of details, delineation of character and elegance of diction, I have found few books in English its equal. It is, in one sense, an epic in prose. When a boy, I used to enjoy hearing passages of it read or explained.
Books of ballads are to be found in every household. Our ladies take great delight in learning to sing them to their own music, music which is not printed in the books, but suggests itself as they recite or sing. Ballad singers are found on all the public squares where they earn their living by passing around the basket at each crisis of the story. The spectators are eager to hear the rest, of course, and so will be more easily induced to pay.
There are no story-books which children can read and enjoy, since it takes them so long to learn the characters. But picture books are sometimes given to children. Still they are not made specially for them as they are in this country; and colored pictures are too costly to be put into children’s hands because they must be drawn by hand, painted by artists. So Chinese boys and girls lack those facilities for enjoyment in picture-books which American and English children have in so great abundance.