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THE SONS OF HAN
THE
SONS OF HAN
Stories of Chinese Life and Mission Work
BY THE
REV. BERNARD UPWARD
(HANKOW, CENTRAL CHINA)
*>
WITH SEVENTY-FOUR ILLUSTRATIONS
X o n & o n
LONDON MISSIONARY SOCIETY
1 6 NEW BRIDGE STREET, E.C.
Trade Agents
MESSRS. SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO., LTD.
1908
UXORI CARISSIMAE
CONSILII
ET
LABORIS PARTICIPI
PREFACE
A BOOK for young people, with plenty of pictures and stories, was
asked for ; and these pages of missionary commonplaces are
the result.
The idea throughout has been to give an account of some of the
phases of Chinese life and of mission work among this great people.
With a field so wide in which to range the difficulty is altogether one
of selection. Child-life is so fascinating a subject that these pages might
easily have been filled with stories of children and their ways. Folk
lore is an inviting study, and material for it abounds, yielding many
a weird story. To describe fully the different branches of our mission
work in Central China would, perhaps, not have been the best way
to introduce the young folk, for which this little book is intended, to
the study of a great people of whom the missionary can truly say that
the more he knows them, the more he finds in them to love. The
writer has taken a few of the more prominent aspects of Chinese life
as the missionary sees it, and sought by pen and camera to bring them
before his youthful readers, in the hope that seed of interest may be
sown that will in years to come spring up and yield fruit to the saving
of the Sons of Han.
BERNARD UPWARD.
HANKOW,
July, 1907.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
MY best thanks are due to the Rev. A. J. McFarlane, M.A., who has
kindly revised the manuscript, and has made many valuable sugges
tions ; to Dr. Cormack, who has given the design for the cover ; to all
those friends who have willingly given information about their own
particular work ; and particularly to the Rev. Lewis H. Gaunt, M.A.,
the London Missionary Society s Editor, who has attended to all
the drudgery of proof-reading and the piloting of this little voyager
through the press.
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
MAKING BELIEVE
CHAPTER II
How THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW . . . . . .21
CHAPTER III
LEARNING NEW LESSONS ......... 39
CHAPTER IV
" IN JOURNEYS OFT "......... 50
CHAPTER V
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE ........ 68
CHAPTER VI
BOYS AND GIRLS 90
8 CONTENTS
CHAPTER VII PAGE
PLAYTIME ....... .... 106
CHAPTER VIII
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS. . . . . . . . .118
CHAPTER IX
A DAY OF REJOICING 134
CHAPTER X
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS . . . . . . .149
CHAPTER XI
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS .... 164
CHAPTER XII
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING ........ 176
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
An Ancient Bridge near Hankow, with the Ruling Mountains behind Frontispiece
Our Mission Stations in China . . . . . . . .12
The Mouth of the Han, always crammed with Shipping . . .13
Wuchang ........... 15
Chang Chih-Tung . . . . . . . ... .16
A Picturesque Corner of Hanyang . . . . . . .17
A Busy Ma-tou or Jetty ......... 19
Red Hill Pagoda, Wuchang ........ 22
Gateway of Confucian Temple ........ 24
The New Chinese Cavalry, Wuchang . . . . . .25
Out to see the Foreigner . . . . . . . . .27
A Ruined Pagoda, 4,000 feet above sea-level ..... 29
Boats on the Yangtse ......... 30
A Lovely Scene on the Yangtse . . . . . . .32
Mud-Diggers ........... 35
Carrying away the Silt ......... 36
How Hankow is being Raised . . . . . . . -37
How to " Shake Hands" . . . . . . . . .41
Worshippers leaving a Temple ........ 43
" Upon every high hill "......... 44
" Under every green tree " . . . . . . . .45
" At the top of a hill where was a temple " . . . .48
Photo of Passport .......... 52
Our Boat ........... 54
The Cast Net 56
V-shaped Net for Catching Tiny Fish . . . . . -57
Timber Raft ........... 59
Inquisitive Villagers ......... 60
Awaiting the Foreigner s Arrival ....... 63
The Prophet s Chamber at Lin San Ho ...... 66
Rice Fields ........... 69
Planting out the Rice ......... 70
The Bridge at Li-kia-ki . . . . . . . . .72
A celebrated Temple built round a Camphor Tree .... 74
Temple to the God of Riches . . . . . . . .76
San-Tien City Wall 77
o
io LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Pastor Liu Preaching to a Village Street Audience .... 80
Reading a Proclamation about the New Railway .... 84
Crowds following through the Corn Fields as we left San-Tien . . 86
A Difficult Bridge 87
A Chinese Baby .......... 90
Baby-Tower .... ...... 92
Only the Women at Home ........ 95
How to Carry a Daughter ......... 99
Our Hankow and Wuchang Missionaries . . . . . .102
Swinging in the Playground . . . . . . . .107
Pastor Liu s Son winning the Pole Jump at the Hankow College Sports,
May, 1907 .... ...... 108
Chinese Wild Flowers . . . . . . . . .no
Riding the Water Buffalo . . . . . . . .112
A Happy "Mother" with her Dolly ....... 116
The Reed Cutter . . ....... 119
A Country Temple . . . . . . . . . .120
" All Done ! " ....... 122
Ancestral Tablet . . . . . . . . . . 128
The Pig s Grave . . . . . . . . . .129
The Dragon Procession . . . . . . . . .131
A Young Harvester carrying Home the Barley . . . . 133
A Christian Bride and Bridegroom . . . . . . .136
Memorial Arch to a Widow who never re-married . . . .140
A Picturesque Chinese Farmstead . . . . . . .143
" Come and see the Missionary ! " . . . . . .150
A Little Leper Girl .......... 157
Getting Better .......... 159
Hankow. The first Jetty, with British Municipal Buildings . . . 161
" A busy place like Hankow " . . . . . . .165
In the Wards of our Hankow Hospital . . . . . .167
An Old Beggar .......... 170
A Contortionist Beggar . . . . . . . . .171
The Lepers at Play with Dr. Fowler . . . . . . .172
Scholars and Teachers of the College, with Dr. John in centre . .177
A Writing Lesson .......... 180
Miss Wei giving a Blackboard Lesson . . . . . .182
Laying the Foundation Stones of the New College . . . .185
The Theological Hall, with High School Students at Drill . .188
CHAPTER I
MAKING BELIEVE
LET us suppose ! Ever since we were little children we have been
playing this game of " make-believe " ; so it will be quite easy
to play it once again, as you borrow my pen and camera, and pretend
you are in Central China with one of your own missionaries, seeing
what he sees, hearing what he hears, and knowing what he knows about
the wonderful people called Chinese ; about the way they live and
work and play ; about the ways in which they differ from us in their
habits ; about the joys and sorrows, superstitions and hopes, of a
nation that is almost great, and will become truly great when the spirit
of Christianity takes hold of these Sons of Han (as they love to call
themselves) and gives them what they so much need moral backbone,
Christian character.
As you will be most of your time in Hankow, the heart of the
empire, we must first have a lesson in geography, so that you may
know something about the place in which you are to spend a few happy
days.
If you open an atlas at the map of China, and look at it carefully,
you will see that it is a very large country. Indeed it is almost as
large as Europe. It is divided into eighteen provinces, each one of them
having a name very difficult to pronounce unless you hear how a
Chinaman says it. If you place your finger as nearly as you can in
the middle of the map, you will be almost certain to touch some part
12
THE SONS OF HAN
of the province of HUPEH. (You will be very nearly correct if you
pronounce the " Hu " like the relative pronoun " who " and the
" peh " like per in " person.") On a small map Hupeh does not look
English Miles
JOO 300 SOO 400
OUR MISSION STATIONS IN CHINA.
very large ; so we must remember that it is half as large again as
England, that it is divided into sixty-seven counties nearly twice as
many as there are in England with a population of over 34,000,000.
One other way of thinking about its size and the number of its people
MAKING BELIEVE 13
is to remember that the area of Hupeh is 70,450 square miles, and that
for each of these square miles there are nearly 500 people.
The middle of Hupeh is a flat fertile plain ; and through this plain
comes the grand old river Yangtse, the Son of the Ocean, 1 from its
far off home in the unknown land of Tibet, rolling its mile-wide flood
of yellow waters on to the Yellow Sea, nearly 800 miles further east.
THE MOUTH OF THE HAN, ALWAYS CRAMMED WITH SHIPPING.
Later on, there will be something to say about the joys and sorrows
these " yellow waters " bring to the people living in the Yangtse
Valley.
At the very heart of this great plain is a celebrated cluster of three
cities, just at the point where the River Han, coming down from the
north, pours its waters into the Yangtse. Opposite the mouth of the
Han, on the east bank of the great river (for the Yangtse flows in a
northerly direction just here) is the provincial capital, WUCHANG,
the centre of government and learning. In it lives the great Viceroy,
1 Yang means ocean, and tse means son.
14 THE SONS OF HAN
Chang Chih-tung, patriot and statesman. Dr. Griffith John says of
him l that " The Viceroy of Hupeh and Hunan occupies a unique
place among the officials of China at this time. He is a man of pro
found scholarship, wide information, great mental energy, and restless
activity. He is endowed with a strong will and no little courage and
daring. As a public officer he is distinguished for his loyalty, his
purity, and unselfish devotion to the good of the people under his
jurisdiction and to the well-being of the empire at large. In one
respect he is looked upon as a phenomenon among the officials of his
day. The love of money does not seem to be in him. He might have
been one of the richest men in the empire ... as a matter of fact
he is known to be a comparatively poor man. ... All the wealth
that flows into his yamen [official residence] is spent on public works
and public charity. . . . He is to-day one of China s greatest men."
A day spent in wandering about this great city for its walls are
eight miles in circumference leaves one with the impression that
Chang Chih-tung has filled the place with mandarins, students, soldiers,
and factories. It is said that Wuchang is the centre of the w r ork of
fifty public magistrates ; that over two thousand mandarins are
living there, patiently awaiting a call to some office to which either
money or examination success has entitled them ; while one in every
ten of its people is either employed in or connected with a yamen..
Students in uniform seem to be in evidence wherever one goes, so many
government colleges are there, mostly built in semi-foreign fashion ;
while from the top of the Serpent Hill which runs through the city,
can be seen rows and rows of barracks crammed with foreign-drilled
soldiers, as well as numbers of tall smoke-stacks telling of the restless
activity of the Viceroy in both protecting and providing for the people
over whom he rules.
There is a story told, that when, a few years ago, the superstitious
1 See introduction to China s Only Hope.
MAKING BELIEVE 15
Chinese began to complain of the new notions of the Viceroy, fearing
that these tall chimneys with their black smoky clouds would bring
ill luck to the city, His Excellency offered a prize for the best compli
mentary description of these smoking stalks. By this means he secured
a good name for the works so dear to his heart and the good will of the
scholars towards his new undertakings. For the scholar who was
made happy with a prize for the essay that was to calm the fears of the
WUCHANG.
populace, described these tall chimneys as being THE PENS OF DESTINY
WRITING THE FORTUNES OF CHINA IN THE SKY. Of COUrSC little Could
be said against them after that. And now no one thinks of them
save that they mean busy wheels humming round in the Mint, Cotton
Mills, Steelworks, etc., giving employment to hundreds of men, women,
and children, while at the same time bringing money into the coffers
of the Great Viceroy.
Although the astute man knew well how to deal with the supersti
tions of the people, yet once at least he has fallen a victim to the same
i6
THE SONS OF HAN
thing himself. There is a story told against him concerning that long
hill that runs across the city, Serpent Hill. A few years ago, the Vice
roy, who was constructing a roadway, had a gap cut in this hill to join
the two parts of the
city together. When
he did this there was
much fear and tremb
ling on the part of the
populace. Just fancy !
Cutting a " mouth " in
the Serpent Hill ! It
would leave a gateway
for all sorts of evil
spirits to come in at ;
and who could tell how
many harmful things
might come out of the
hill itself ! However,
all fear is gone now.
Once again the road
climbs up one side of
the hill and down the
other. It happened in
this way. The Viceroy
was smitten with a dis
ease that affected his
mouth. All sorts of remedies were tried, and many doctors were
called in. Perhaps their medicine was not taken : or perhaps the
many medicines were taken all to no purpose. Anyhow the Viceroy
got no better. So the idols were consulted. The oracle declared
that the trouble was all owing to the Viceroy having cut a " k ou "
CHANG CHIH-TUNG.
MAKING BELIEVE 17
(mouth) in the hill, and that to show their displeasure the spirits
had inflicted this disease of the " k ou " on the Great Man. The pre
scription was : Heal (i.e. fill up) the mouth that has been cut in the
hill, and the mouth of the patient would be healed also. So the
cutting in the hill was closed up, and as a result, the Viceroy s mouth
is as bad to-day as ever, or it was so, the last time I heard about it !
Opposite the city of Wuchang on either side of the mouth of the
A PICTURESQUE CORNER OF HANYANG.
Han are the two sister cities : HANYANG and HANKOW. Of the two,
Hankow is by far the more important as far as its relation with
the rest of China and the outside world is concerned ; although
from a Chinese standpoint it is a city of inferior grade. Hanyang,
excepting for its iron and steel and other Government works, is much
like any other Chinese city, a collection of more or less squalid
houses interspersed with a few yamens and temples, and houses of the
better class, all linked together by so many miles of narrow, badly-
1 8 THE SOXS OF HAN
scavangered streets, and crowded with a busy population of black-
haired humans, each very much concerned as to what he shall eat
and what he shall drink and what he shall wear. So for the present we
will be content with noticing that the city is there, and hope later on
to visit it and find out about its many objects of special interest, which
it has in common with every Chinese city.
Hankow is such an important place to every student of the history
of Missions, as being the birthplace of the Central China Mission, and
the home of its founder, Dr. Griffith John, as well as the centre of his
labours for half a century, that we must have a good look at the
place, and get to know something about it.
There is yet another reason for thinking Hankow important. It is
not only the great market city of Central China, but is destined to
become one of the greatest, if not the greatest, of this great empire s
commercial cities. It is, too, to become the heart of China s immense
railway system, that is now but in its infancy. From this centre will
go out in all directions the iron arteries and veins of a truly vast system :
passengers and freight, from all parts, will find in Hankow a great clear
ing house. And, again, the traffic on the Yangtse, both by steamer
and junk, is rapidly increasing. So, in a few short years, there will be
rapid and frequent transit, both of the merchant and his merchandise,
the passenger and his baggage, from far- west Sichuan to Shanghai, and
from Canton in the south to Peking and beyond in the north ; the
greater portion of it all passing through Hankow.
The civilizing railway has only just begun to affect Hankow.
There are in China, as a result of the activities of the past few years, no
less than 3,746 miles of railway completed ; and reckoning the line
from Hankow to Canton, 1,622 miles in course of construction. But
only 228 miles of the open way really belong to Central and South
China, where the most trade is. It will be a revolution when the iron
horse is found running in each of these great wealthy commercial
MAKIXG BELIEVE
provinces, a revolution that will affect Hankow in a way that at
present we can scarcely dream of.
There are two Hankows, really. The one is a " native city " in
the shape of a somewhat damaged acute-angled triangle, containing
about 800,000 people a veritable hive of bees : the other is the
" foreign concession," with its factories, banks, well-built residences,
and well-bunded foreshore that will, when completed, stretch for
A BUSY MA-TOU OR JETTY.
some five and a hrlf miles along the river side. The one h?.s practically
made the other. For without the busy Chinese market, the central
point of a very rich province, there would have been no incentive for
the foreigner to have settled in this particular spot ; and it is safe to
say, that without the incoming of the foreigner, with his engineering
skill and knowledge of the foreign market, Hankow would not be the
place of importance it is to-day.
20 THE SONS OF HAN
Of the native city it is said that its glory is departed. Before the
arrival of the dreaded Taipings it was a much larger place, and boasts
of having had a main street twelve miles in length and a total popula
tion of two and a half millions. Four times did the rebels come to
Hankow, and the last time poured out all their fury on the ill-fated
city : killing, looting, burning, until there was none left to put to the
sword, and nought to destroy. One authority says that, " scarcely
was one brick left upon another." But the sound of battle passed away.
And then, from the surrounding country, the villagers and townspeople
came into the desert mart, and soon a new city grew on the site of the
former one. This may explain why, to this day, the greater part of the
men of Hankow have their wives and families in the country, and pay
them periodical visits. And, in passing, it will be well to note that this
lack of home life in the city makes the work of the missionary all the
more difficult, and the growth of a strong native church so very slow.
But where was the foreign settlement then ? What was it like ?
Fifty years ago there was neither missionary nor merchant here. The
settlement did not exist. If you go out in the summer time, and look
at the plain that is in the rear of Hankow, you will see what the site of
Hankow was then like a mud swamp ; a breeding place for mos
quitoes and other human tormentors, the home of all kinds of fevers
and diseases. No wonder it was considered an unlucky spot by the
Chinese in those days !
How came it all about ? How was the mud swamp changed into the
well-appointed concession ? This is a long story. And as it is so
much involved with the story of the opening of China to foreign
residence and to missionary work, it will be better to commence
with a fresh chapter.
CHAPTER II
HOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW
A FEW days ago, whilst looking through an old book, I came
across a map of China. What a curious thing it seemed !
Names of places and rivers, in their quaint, old-fashioned spelling,
were almost unrecognizable : towns that are now of little importance
were then printed in large type, while some cities, that every school
boy the world over is now familiar with, were then omitted altogether.
Hankow was one of these. Fancy drawing a map of England and
leaving out Birmingham ! or of America, and leaving out Chicago !
Wuchang and Hanyang were there : but Hankow had evidently
yet to make a name for itself in the outside world.
In those days, the Yellow River called " China s Sorrow," from
the number of times it has overflowed its banks and flooded the
surrounding country, with great destruction of life and property
after passing the capital of Honan, K ai-fung Fu, flowed in a south
easterly direction, through the province of Kiang-su, pouring its flood
of muddy waters into the Yellow Sea. Now, as you know, it runs
away from K ai-fung Fu towards the north-east, finding its way into
the ocean through the Gulf of Pe-chili, some 300 miles north of its
old mouth. Then, the only port open to the merchants and ships
of other nations was Canton, and even that was by no means a free
port : now the empire is open from end to end. Truly a great change
has come over the country during this past century, as well as a change
in our knowledge of tha land and its peoples !
21
22
THE SONS OF HAN
In 1807, just a hundred years ago, the pioneer of Protestant
missionaries, ROBERT MORRISON, reached Canton, and began
knocking at a fast closed door. It was never opened unto him. For
.^^^^^^^^^^^ twenty-six years he continued knock
ing, but all to no purpose. He did
get into a Chinese house, learnt to
speak the Cantonese dialect, and
tried to teach the message of the
Cross to the few Chinese who came
about him. But that door into China,
into the hearts and minds of her
people, into the goodwill of her
officials, seemed never to yield an
inch. Not his was the joy of having
a church filled with worshippers com
ing to hear him
preach, Sunday
by Sunday : not
his the joy of
seeing the King-
dom of God
coming amongst
in en in the
Flowery Land.
His was the work
of the pioneer :
clearing the
ground and preparing material so that those who came after might
begin building the Church of Christ.
He had, too, to open a way into the Chinese language. Those
of us who now have fine dictionaries, vocabularies, and translations
RED HILL PAGODA. WUCHANG.
UOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO IIAXKOW 23
cf the Chinese Classics, and are perfectly free to call in the finest
Chinese scholar we can secure to help us in our studies of this difficult
language, marvel that Morrison ever did manage to translate the
Scriptures and compile his Dictionary, in those days when hardly
any help was to be obtained from books, and when scholars were
forbidden to teach the " sacred " language to the despised foreigner !
It has been well said that the making of his Dictionary was such a
tremendous task that " no finer monument of human perseverance
exists." Then, in the year 1834, w i tn tne c ^ oor f China still fast
closed to him and to the Gospel he loved to preach, the door of Heaven
opened to receive him, and he passed away from the scene of his
earthly labours.
Morrison had failed ; so some people said. Had he not toiled
for nearly thirty years and only baptized three or four converts ?
Yes ! If we measure his success by the number of converts he secured
to Christianity, we shall not call him a " successful missionary."
Yet the " failures " of some men count for far more than the successes
of others. Morrison was one of those " heroic failures," who, whilst
failing to win a large following to Christianity in a land whose people
were given over to superstition and idolatry, because of the failure
won converts from the churches at home : men who brought their
devotion to Christ and their knowledge of His Truth to the stupendous
work of winning China for their Lord. ,
This year, we are celebrating Morrison s Centenary. The pens
of the great and of the learned all unite in setting forth the magnitude
of the task Morrison set himself to do, of the great things he accom
plished, and of the debt that merchant, missionary, and minister
alike, owe to the poor boot-tree maker s son, who quietly began and
heroically carried through the work of putting before the eyes of
an alien race the message of the gospel of peace and hope. And
perhaps it is much ensier for us now to see how really Morrison sue-
24 THE SONS OF HAN
ceeded ; and we must not be too hard in our judgment on those
who then thought that his life had been a waste of talent thrown
away in a hopeless cause.
GATEWAY OF CONFUCIAN TEMPLE.
Tne next quarter of a century seemed to be equally fruitful of
failure. For it \vas the time of driving in the thin end of the wedge
of truth that was to open the fast-closed land. Here are some figures
HOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW 35
that tell their own story, and make us realize how hard a thing it
was to make a beginning in this conservative and self-satisfied
empire :
After twenty-six years of work . . .3 converts.
After forty years . . . . . .9 converts.
Nine out of 400,000,000 people won for Christ ! Thb was how
the record stood. Not much to look at if we believe only in figures,
is it ?
But there was something else happening all this time that never
THE NEW CHINESE CAVALRY,
can be shown in any kind of statistical returns. For the winning
of these nine converts other missionaries from America and England
had come out to China, and had, by their coming, stirred up Christians
the world over to pray for this land. Political forces were at work,
too. Rightly or wrongly, the Western Powers were determined to
compel the proud " Son of Heaven," as the Emperor of China is called,
on his Dragon Throne, to allow the commerce and influence of the
West to come into the land over which he ruled. No doubt there
26 THE SONS OF HAN
was much cause for complaint on both sides. China insisted on
slighting and treating as vassals all ambassadors from Christian
countries ; for China s ignorance of the world outside her own territory
was colossal. On the other hand, opium was being smuggled into
the country by British merchants or at their instigation, and this
opium was grown on British territory. It is not true, however, that
the war known as the Opium War was all on account of opium, or
that it was mainly because England wished to keep China as an open
market for the Indian opium. Reading the history of those time3 it
would seem as if war with China was the last thing England wished
for. A British ambassador had been refused an audience with the
Emperor because he would not do homage to him as a vassal. Even
a viceroy had refused to grant an interview to a British lord because
his letters were not sent into the yamen as servile petitions. Yet
very slowly indeed was England roused to action. It does seem
a great pity that the event which at last called for an appeal to arms
was connected with one of the most disgraceful trades that has ever
marred man s dealings with his fellows.
It happened in this way. A new viceroy was sent to Canton,
and one of his instructions from the Emperor was to put a stop to
the import of opium which all recognized as being morally evil. He
took very severe measures indeed. His actions give a good idea of
his opinions of the outside world. The Queen of England, as a vassal
of China, was commanded to obey the viceroy ! The little foreign
community in Canton were surrounded by soldiers, and were given
a short time to choose between handing over all the opium which
was stored in ships out amongst the islands, away from Canton alto
gether, or death ! To save their lives, all the opium, some 20,000
cases, was handed over to the Chinese authorities, mixed with lime,
and poured into the river. This did little more than bring matters
to a crisis. It was the proverbial " last straw," and war, with its
HOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW 27
disastrous consequences to China, followed. The Treaty of Nanking,
which was signed in 1842, opened five ports to foreign trade and
intercourse. And to occupy these ports of Canton, Amoy, Foochow,
Ningpo, and Shanghai, missionaries were soon speeding over the
seas.
Some part of China was at last opened to the preaching of the
OUT TO SEE THE FOREIGNER.
Gospel. Missionaries might wish the opening had come in some
other way than by a cleaving with the sword, but they were thankful
to take the opportunity presented. How hard their work was may
be gathered from the fact that at the end of the first fifty years of
Protestant mission work in China one missionary had died a victim
to an unhealthy climate for every convert won. When the second
28 THE SONS OF HAN
half of the century dawned, there was, scattered over a wide area,
a little Christian Church of about 400 souls. This was the time of
dawn on the " Hills of Tang," as China is sometimes called.
All this time Central China, with its teeming population, was
without the message of salvation. God seemed to be working very
slowly indeed. Perhaps it was as well that the messengers should
learn more about the people they wished to give their message to,
ere going right amongst them. For the missionary must ever appeal
to the Chinese as a strange people, with strange manners, and strange
way of speaking a language that even the little children of the country
were quite fluent in ! But even whilst the way was being made plain
for the opening up of Central China, God was preparing the man to
be the Apostle to the Yangtse Valley.
Just before the half-century closed, Griffith John had responded
to the invitation of L.M.S. Directors, and joined the band of waiting
missionaries in Shanghai. A band of stalwarts it was. Boone,
William Burns, Burdon, Medhurst, Muirhead, Lockhart, Hudson
Taylor, and Wylie, with many others : all men who have left memories
of inspiration behind them, and from whose abundant labours a
harvest is even now being reaped. All were preparing themselves
for the busy devoted lives which followed ; all, too, waiting and praying
for the scattering time that should come when the doors of other
cities in China should be opened for their eager entry.
By " waiting for China to open up " it must not be thought that
they had nothing to do in and around Shanghai. Theirs was a real
missionary way of waiting : making long journeys into the country
round about the Treaty Port, distributing Bibles and other Christian
literature wherever and whenever there was an opportunity, and ever
telling in the wonderful Chinese language they had learned to speak
a still more wonderful story of the Christ of God they had learned
in their far away Christian home, and were now proving the truth.
HOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW
29
of amidst a people who looked upon them and spoke of them as
" foreign devils."
Dr. John and other missionaries had hoped much from the strange
movement known as the T ai-p ing Rebellion. His journeys to
the rebel cr.mps ; his success in obtaining an
Edict of Toleration from the rebel king (which
would have thrown China open to the preach
ing of the Gospel from end to end, and
secured for the converts what the treaties of
the past fifty years have failed to obtain
religious liberty) are matters of London Mission
history. But with the end of the rebellion, all
this was worth little,
and the disappoint
ment must have been
great to all con
cerned.
Yet all realized
that it was the dark
hour before d a y -
dawn, and were per
suaded that God
was soon to give the
open door that had
so long been prayed
for.
The Treaty of
T ientsin was the first step in this direction. By this treaty, nine
more Treaty Ports, as they are called, were opened to foreign trade
and residence. This meant, too, the opening of the cities of the
coast, of North China, and of the Yangtse Valley, to the influence
A RUINED PAGODA, 4.OOO
FEET ABOVE SEA LEVEL.
30 THE SONS OF HAN
of the missionary as well as to the trade of the merchant. In
the spring of March, 1861, a British naval expedition was planned
to go up the Yangtse and investigate matters, with special instructions
to make arrangements for opening the ports of Kiukiang and Hankow.
This was an opportunity of getting up river to " spy out the land "
and see what Hankow promised in the way of being a centre for
BOATS ON THE YANGTSE.
missionary work. So Dr. John went to Shanghai in the hope of being
able to go up with Consul Parkes as an ordinary passenger. He was
not in time to join the expedition, however, and had to try and get a
passage on one of the few merchant ships that were beginning to
run.
In these days we just go to the shipping office and book a cabin
on a well-appointed steamer. Everything is done to make the journey
HOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO HAXKOU jt
between Hankow and Shanghai both speedy and pleasant. It h but
a question of choosing the day of sailing, or the particular Company s
boat you prefer to travel by. The cost, too, is but 4 or so. But
there was no little difficulty in arranging about that first journey of
Dr. John s : many were eager to avail themselves of the very limited
accommodation, so prices of tickets were high. One captain wanted
over 100 to take the missionary up to the busy market-city in Hupeh !
After nearly three months of waiting, with the Rev. R. Wilson as
colleague, the persistent missionary was able to secure passages on
the ss. Hellespont, and start on that memorable first visit to the place
that was to become his home.
The Yangtse was in flood. And as this means that in some places
the river had leaped over its banks and become an inland sea instead
of a mile-wide river, navigation was not of the easiest. At length,
on the night of June 21, they dropped anchor off Hankow, and waited
for the morning s light.
Hankow at last ! Let Dr. John tell in his own words what it meant
to him to reach the city of his desires :
" It would be impossible for me to describe my feelings when I
found myself actually in Hankow. I could hardly believe that I
was standing in the very centre of that China that had been closed
till then against the outer barbarian, and that it would be my privilege
on the very next day to appear as a missionary of the Cross in the
streets of the famous city. I thought of the great and good men
who had been longing to see what I was seeing, but did not see it.
I thought of MILNE, who, on his arrival at Canton knocked earnestly
for admission but was ruthlessly driven away. I thought of MDRRISON
who knocked for twenty-six years but died without having received
the promise. I thought of MEDHURST, and remembered the last
prayer I heard him offer up at Shanghai : " God, open China, and
scatter Thy servants." I thought of these and many others, who had
32 THE SONS OF HAN
laboured long and well in the days gone by, and felt as if they were
present on this occasion, beholding my joy and rejoicing with me
in the triumph of Divine Providence over China s exclusiveness. I
felt that I had got at last to the place where God would have me
be ; and my heart was at rest."
The next day a beginning was made. In the streets of the city,
A LOVELY SCENE ON THE YANGTSE.
more than half in ruins, Dr. John and his colleague Gpoke of the un
searchable riches of the gospel of Christ. And then, having found
a house that could be rented, off a narrow, evil-smelling street, the
two brave missionaries returned to Shanghai, but only to make
preparations for a speedy return to take possession of this great
strategic point in the name of the Lord. On his return to Hankow
HOW THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW 33
with his family Dr. John at once began his evangelistic campaign that
is not yet brought to its close. A street chapel was soon got into
working order, and there, day by day, the good seed of the kingdom
was sown in the hearts of men. In this place the missionary met
with men from nearly all the provinces in China : men who would
become interested in the Truth, return to their far off homes when
the business that had brought them to Hankow was concluded, and
there, hundreds of miles from the preacher, try to live out some of the
new ideals of life they had learned about in the busy market city.
Soon the need for literature was found. There was no Central
China Tract Society in those days ; so Dr. John compiled his little
booklets, that answer the ever-recurring questions, What is the Doc
trine about ? Who was Jesus Christ ? How can Sins be Forgiven ?
and so on. These little books would be carried away to many
places the missionary was unable to reach, and so become silent
messengers of the Good News.
And this is how the Gospel of Christ was brought to Central China.
Nearly fifty years have passed away since then. Other helpers
have come to share in the work. Some of these have fallen on sleep,
some have moved to other parts of the empire, but all have had a
share in the building up of the Church of Christ in the Celestial Empire.
" The little one has become a thousand." That little street-chapel in
Hankow was the birthplace of the Centre.! China Mission. For Dr.
John was always pushing farther afield. His was ever a life given
up to seeking others. And as a result there are to-day the Mission
in the West at Chungking ; the three centres of Christian activity
in Hunan ; hospitals, schools, and church in Hupeh s proud capital
across the river ; the Leper Home, hospital church, and schools
in Hsiaokan ; church, educational, and medical work that looks
upon Tsaoshih as its centre ; the newly-made centre at Hwangp i
which has to look after Christian work in three counties ; and lastly
c
34 THE SONS OF II AN
the " mother church " in Hankow itself, with all its manifold activities
in preparing efficient helpers for all branches of our mission work.
It would take a visitor months of hard work to look at the work
in all these centres, with their hundreds of out-stations ; so we must
be content to take typical institutions, and in looking at them to
remember they are but parts of the whole, yet that each one represents
years of devotion and prayer ; and that each is there to-day because,
in the Spirit of hope and patience, sorrow, loss, disappointment, and
failure, have been endured and overcome for Christ s sake and the
Gospel.
For some time both missionary and merchant lived as well as worked
in the native city, but the Treaty of Tientsin provided for the safety
of the foreigners as far as possible, and arranged that plots of ground
should be set aside as " concessions," enabling them to be freed from
the insanitary conditions that prevail in every Chinese city. Just
below Hankow was a swampy piece of ground of about 90 acres. It
was a very malarious district, and had the reputation of being very
unlucky. The " fung-s/mi," or spirit influences, were all for
evil and not for good. When Lord Elgin negotiated for the con
cession, the wily mandarins thought it would be an excellent joke
to give way to the " foreign devil " in such a way as to comply with
the Treaty requirements, yet let him have such a bad piece of ground,
so full of all things evil, that his trade would be doomed to failure
from the very first. So in due time the concession was granted,
and the foreigner entered in. But in place of succumbing to the bad
luck of the place, he immediately began to fill in the swampy ground
(by digging up the mud deposited on the banks of the river during
flood-time), made roads, planted trees, and built good houses and
warehouses. Then jetties were arranged for along the river front ;
steamers bcjan to ply between the market-city and the other ports
in the Yan^tse valley ; rind to cut a long story short, the mud swamp
HO 17 THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW
35
was transformed into a quite foreign looking and foreign controlled
city.
But Hankow is even now in the making. In recent years other
MUD-DIGGERS.
concessions have been granted to people of other civilized nations,
until the river frontage of the foreign part of the concession is five
THE SONS OF HAN
times as long as it used to be, and the city has grown nearly twice
as wide. First Russia, then France, Germany, Japan and Belgium,
all " asked for " and received concessions ; more low-lying land, of
course, but following the example of the British, they raised their
ground, built a stone bund, or facing, at the river side, and laid their
CARRYING AWAY THE SILT.
plots out in European fashion. The Japanese and Belgians hr.ve
still to do a lot to make their concessions usable by foreigners, but
good beginnings have been made.
This object lesson has not been without its influence on the Chinese.
There has just been a land boom here ; and native merchants and
others have been buying up land in every direction. Great schemes
HO\V THE GOSPEL CAME TO HANKOW
37
are in contemplation, some even on the way to completion. All
this past winter thousands of men, women, boys, and even girls, have
been busily engaged digging up the deposited mud on the river frontage
and carrying it, in little woven bamboo baskets at either end of a pole,
away to the back of the concession. This work, although the pay
HOW HANKOW IS BEING RAISED.
is poor one farthing for digging up a load and carrying it for a mile
has been the only thing that has stood between many of the country
people and starvation, and been to them the hand of Providence
supplying the daily bread. One of their proverbs, says, Three
men of one mind, and yellow earth is changed to gold." Of course
it refers to the benefits of mutual effort, but it is true that hundreds
3 8 THE SONS OF HAN
of tons of this earth have been turned into gold by the ceaseless toiling
of these long strings of ant-like humans, as they went to and fro with
their little spades and mud-filled baskets.
From the lake side, away out in the plain, there is poured in daily
tons of earth, by means of trolleys on light railways pushed along by
men. The ground at the back of the concession is being raised fifteen
feet above the level of the plain. New roads are to be laid out, houses
and factories built ; and so will spring up a newer and far greater
Hankow than was dreamed of, even in the days of its " twelve mile
street."
One very important result of this filling up of land, is the doing
away with the breeding places of the mosquitoes that swarm here in
their millions during the hot weather. And this, together with the
blessings of a water supply that is promised in the near future, should
make Hankow a place less deadly to the foreign resident than it has
been in the past.
CHAPTER III
LEARNING NEV/ LESSONS
T T does not take the new arrival long to find out that he comes to
A China to go to school before he can commence teaching the Chinese.
To begin with, there is the Chinese way of looking at things that is
so puzzling to us foreigners. Even the word " foreign " has a new
meaning for us. Everything that is not Chinese is foreign. You are
a foreigner to the Chinaman ; your language is foreign speech to him ;
you act and think in a foreign way, which is often just the reverse of his
way of acting and thinking. Of course he thinks you are wrong, and
you think he is wrong in all these things : while all the time both may
be right or both may be wrong ! The fact is, life in China is very
different from life in Europe ; climate, manners and customs,
all are different ; and although some things may seem to us to be
done the wrong way round, and others may be altogether against our
accepted notions of etiquette, yet there is generally a very good reason
for the Chinaman doing things the way he does. And if, at first, no
real reason is obvious, you can shelter him either behind the excuse
of ignorance or that divinity of the Celestial, " old customs."
AH boys and girls in the homeland know that when meeting a Chinese
friend you do not shike his hand, but raise your own clasped hands
on a level with your chin and shake them at him, and of course he
returns the compliment. When your friend asks you your age, and all
about your family affairs, or when he fingers your garments and asks
the price of them, he is not being rude, but acting according to his
ideas of politeness.
89
40 THE SGXS OF HAN
After a little while you discover that very many things indeed are
" just the other way round " in this land. The little girl learning to
sew is taught to begin at the left-hand and work towards the right,
and would never dream of going from right to left as girls are taught
at home. We think it correct to put on black for mourning and wear
white at weddings. But out here the proper sign of mourning is white :
a white button on the hat, a white string plaited into the queue,
white shoes on the feet, are all signs of deep mourning. In reading
Chinese books we find that the page begins on the right-hand side, and
the lines read from top to bottom of the page, so that their " finis "
is written where our preface would begin. Another thing that strikes
us is that the page numbers of a Chinese books are two-thirds of the
way down on the outside margins, whilst the foot-notes are all at the
top of the page. If you ask a schoolboy which way the needle of the
compass points, he will tell you " Towards the south." And a Chinese
sailor will speak of an east-south, or west-south wind, as the case
may be.
Perhaps their manners, too, will shock us as much as ours do them
In China it is most polite to make a lot of noise, smacking the lips, etc.,
whilst eating ; and then, when the meal is over, it is a compliment to the
host to hiccup freely. All this is good breeding ; and is intended to
let the folk know how much the food has been enjoyed. It is the cor
rect thing for a younger man to walk just a shoulder behind his elder
companion : it would be rude to walk abreast of him. In the Sacred
Edict, this is used as an illustration in exhorting the younger brother
to give way to the elder. The paragraph reads, " If one of the men
of old times saw a mm of his own hamlet or village . . . older than
himself by five years, he would follow in the rear, and not dare to
hurry past him."
A Chinese gentleman would never dream of walking arm-in-arm with
his wife : to do so would be a great breach of public manners. He would
LEARNING NEW LESSONS
not even shake hands with a lady, nor would a lady with a gentleman.
Once, in a Chinese city, I v. r as helping a lady over a lot of loose stones
on the city wall, and this action provoked the approval of a bystander
in the following
words : " Look !
Even foreigners ex
hibit filial piety.
The dutiful son is
helping his aged
mother to walk."
You must imagine
the feelings of the
lady, who was but
very few years older
than myself !
There is little
doubt that the
foreigner s life is a
perpetual puzzle to
the Chinese. Do as
we will, there must
always be many
ways in which we
6ffend against their
accepted notions of
propriety, both by
doing what they
think we ought not
to do, and in not doing what every well-brought-up Chinaman expects
we ought to do. Some missionaries make a point of trying to become
like the Chinese : others feel the hopelessness of the task, and con-
now TO "SHAKE HANDS.
42 THE SONS OF HAN
tent themselves with trying to master the rudiments of politeness
from a Chinese standpoint, and then try not to cause them to think
worse of the foreigner than they generally do.
One writer on the Chinese religion for the Chinese has called it a
religion of " Principles and Propriety." It is indeed true that a very
great deal of time and trouble is taken to make the scholars familiar
with the laws of propriety. Every schoolboy seems to know how to
conduct himself on all occasions. To see them saluting guests in their
homes, or engaging in any of the many social duties at such times as
the New Year Festival, gives one the impression that they are little
old men. When we are told that a book containing three thousand
rules of etiquette is studied at school, we begin to understand how it is
that a well-bred lad just knows exactly what to do and exactly when to
do it, and is never so overcome with bashfulness as not to know what to
do with his legs or his hands !
A resident amongst this people soon begins to learn that Chinese
life has much to teach him about his Bible. The Bible was written
by Orientals, as we know, and much of it is descriptive of life lived in
oriental lands. We used to wonder however a man was able to take
up his bed and walk ! But a stroll along a Chinese street lets us see
the meaning of this ; we meet a man with his bed either a woven rush
mat in the hot weather, or a wadded quilt in the colder part of the year
slung on one end of his carrying pole, or else tucked under his arm,
humming some song in a high falsetto voice as he goes along his way.
In almost every village we pass through, we are certain to see the
" woman grinding at the mill " the little stone hand-mill of the east.
A missionary seldom takes a journey without somewhere receiving an
invitation to a " feast." Then, just before the hour appointed, comes
the second invitation," Come, for all things are now ready." Until this
second summons comes no movement is made towards the house of
the host.
LEARNING NEW LESSONS
43
Whilst at the feast, we notice that there are " higher and lower "
seats. It would never do for the host to make a mistake in the seating
of his guests. A friend of mine was once at a feast when such a catas
trophe happened, and all the guests rose and left the house ! " Friend,
go up higher," is another sidelight on Bible teaching. The fact is, it
is very good manners to pretend to decline the seat the host wishes you
WORSHIPPERS LEAVING A TEMPLE.
to sit in, and try to take a lower one. This is all " make-believe "
humility ; for every one knows perfectly well how they ought to sit,
and how they eventually will sit ; but for the sake of keeping up
appearances there is a good deal of pulling one another about, and of
wordy warfare, before the guests are all properly seated, each in his
proper place, according to age or position. Even the boys in our schools
observe this strictly : and it sometimes happens that the master has
THE SOXS OF HAN
to be called in because two boys are of the same age at one table, and
as they cannot both sit on one seat, there is trouble until provision is
made for the transference of one of the " equal ages " to another table.
The " dogs that eat of the crumbs " are a great acquisition to a
feast especially so from the foreigner s standpoint. All bones and
scraps are thrown under the table, where the half-starved " wonk "
(dog) is eagerly awaiting
his share of the good
things. Miny a poor
missionary, hopelessly try
ing to swallow a huge
piece of fat, which he has
inadvertently taken with
his chopsticks from the
common bowl, has blessed
the friendly dog who came
to his rescue.
" Children playing in
the market place " it is
still the old-style kind of
game : weddings and
funerals, with an idol pro
cession thrown in, when
there is a terrific beating of
old tin canisters in lieu of
gongs. Weddings and funerals themselves serve to light up the pages of
Sacred Story, as we see the various scenes being enacted in much the
same way as they were two thousand years ago. It is true that there
is no chorus of happy maidens going out to meet the bride, but the
friends of the bridegroom are there to escort her to her new home. The
custom is only just the reverse of the Jewish method ; and v:e sometimes
"UPON EVERY HIGH HILL.
LEARXIXG XE\r LESSONS
45
expect this in China. But if \ve have once seen a Chinese wedding, we
no longer wonder at Jacob being deceived in his marriage with Leah ;
for the bride s face is covered with a red veil until after the ceremony.
Thus, not until happily (or otherwise) married, does the bridegroom
lift the veil from the face of his bride. The " mediator," or " middle
man " is very necessary in all matters of arrangement between two
parties ; and in none more so than in settling such affairs as engage
ments and marriages.
"UNDER liVERY UREEN TREE."
In most parts of China silver is still " weighed out " so many
ounces of silver just as Abraham weighed out his silver when pur
chasing the plot of ground for Sarah s grave.
There is a new meaning for us in that sentence of the prophet s
complaint " Upon every high hill and under every green tree," when
we find an idolatrous and superstitious people erecting their altars and
shrines in these places, especially so when there is any freak of nature,
either in shape of tree or contour of hill.
46 THE SONS OF HAN
Texts are written on every doorpost ; whilst one often meets some
congratulatory inscription or complimentary verse " graven with an
iron pen on the rock," and this even on the tops of very high
mountains.
" Hired mourners " are often to be met with, shedding crocodile
tears for a couple of hundred cash a day, and making the district
miserable with their wailing. Quite ready, are they, to stop for a while
on the approach of the foreigner and have a good look at him and gossip
about him before resuming their doleful duties.
All these customs, and many more, such as the drawing of water,
wearing of sandals, casting of lots, etc., are daily reminding us of the
parables from common life that were spoken by the Christ in the days
of His flesh.
One other " text illuminator " and the long list will be brought
to an end. What is the meaning of " Use not vain repetitions " ? The
Chinese, not unlike many religious people of other lands, do their
praying in two ways, both by praying themselves and paying others to
pray for them. On one of my visits to a Buddhist Temple, I found priests
only at prayers. They were walking round and. round in the hall in
front of the great Buddha idol, ringing a little bell, and chanting their
Sanscrit prayers. The sounds were Chinese, but the meaning was quite
another matter. A good part of the " vain repetition " seemed to be
the continuous repetition of Buddha s name " 0-mi-to-Fuh." The
rhythm of the chant, the ting-ting of the bell, the solemnity of these
priests, the sickly scent of the burning incense, the evening shadow in
the dimly lighted temple, all these burned themselves into my memory,
and had I not known something of the lives of these men when not at
prayers, I might have thought what a good thing it was to find some
real worship in China, even though it was worship of a piece of carved
wood, or rather of what the figure represented. As I watched and
listened, the expressionless faces, the reiterated name, the meaningless
LEARNING NEW LESSONS 47
sounds, brought before my mind the picture of the Saviour teaching
His disciples to pray, and the words seemed once again to be spoken
in that weird idol-temple, " Use not vain repetitions, as the heathen
do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. "
A few months later, when spring had clothed anew both hill and
plain, on one of Buddha s days the first and fifteenth of the month
being sacred to him I came in my journey to a temple in which some
fifty women were kneeling down on the round grass-mats before the
shrine, chanting in chorus the magic name, keeping time with their
voices and swaying bodies as they bowed their heads to the ground
before the idol. As soon as my presence was observed, even though I
tried to keep in the shadow of the door, some of the women saw
me, and in a moment worship was forgotten in the novelty of having
a foreigner to look at and talk about. Not wishing to disturb them, I
withdrew ; and as I left the temple precincts once more rose on the
morning air the monotonous chant : " 0-mi-to-Fuh, 0-mi-io-Fuh."
Poor souls ! Conscious of a lack in their lives : longing for some
Power greater than themselves to help them : anxious to escape the
pangs of hell which they are taught to expect on the other side of the
river of death : they vainly hope that the endless repetition of the
name will be accounted unto them for merit, and thus, in some way
save them in the evil hour. To cure them from disease, to bring them
happinesi, they know nothing better than this " vain repetition."
Returning from my visit to a neighbouring village in the evening of
that day, I remember meeting an old lady, sitting by the road side.
She was curious and inquisitive, and we had a long conversation. At
last, after satisfying her about my relations and friends, my clothes,
my age, and many other things, I told her about the Christ of God who
taketh away the sins of the world. " Is that true ? " she asked ; " will
Jesus pardon my sins ? " Then after a little further talk she said, as I left
her, " I ll never worship that old Buddha idol again as lonj aj I live.
4 8
THE SONS OF HAN
Here I have been all this day kneeling before him till my knees are stiff,
and I do not feel one bit the better for it. I am going to worship Jesus."
And as I went on my way I wondered if anything of the Truth had got
into her heart.
One other picture. It was the ist of January and we were on the
top of a high hill, where
was a temple. Whilst
standing quietly watching
an old grey-bearded for
tune-teller, I noticed a
young, well-dressed man
come in. His child was
sick ; would he recover ?
If so, what medicine
should be used. These
were his questions. With
out a word the old keeper
of the oracles handed him
a canister in which were
a number of bamboo spills
about one foot in length
and one-eighth of an inch
thick, all of which were
numbered. The young
man held this in both
hands in front of an idol and commenced to shake the canister, all the
time repeating the " 0-mi-to-Fuh." Presently the sticks began to rice,
some higher than others, and after more shaking and more " 0-mi-to-
Fuh s " one of them fell to the ground the idol had drawn the lot.
What did it mean ? We returned together to the old man (for I was
greatly interested and had forgotten all about " good manners "), who
"AT THE TOP OF A HILL WHERE WAS A TEMPLE.
LEARNING NEW LESSONS 49
no sooner read the number, than he shook his head slowly from side
to side. " What is the matter ? " eagerly asked the young man. " This
won t do at all, at all. You could not have drawn a worse one from the
pack ; better have another try," was the very disinterested rejoinder.
So another lot of cash was given the old fortune-teller, for his rule
was " Money first and fortune after," and the whole process was
gone through again. This time the oracle was favourable, and the
young fellow s face lighted up with hope, as the old rascal, after referring
to a slip of paper that tallied with the number drawn, said that the
child would recover if some part of the inside of a pig were burnt to
ashes, ground to powder, and given to the little one to drink in some
tea ! Poor little sufferer. I wonder whether he did get better ?
CHAPTER IV
"IN JOURNEYS OFT"
ONE day, just before Dr. John went on furlough, we were talking
about the wonderful opportunities now presented in China for the
Christian educationalist, and of the work the London Missionary
Society might do in teaching and training the young folk in schools
where there would be a Christian atmosphere. Yes," said our
famous missionary, " but this would have been utterly impossible
without all these years of evangelistic work. We had to sow the
seed for a long time to prepare for this. Now the time has come ;
and no one rejoices more than I do in these training institutions.
College, Medical School, Divinity and Normal Schools : I am thank
ful for them all. But they can never displace the preaching of the
Gospel."
The missionary is first of all a preacher. He brings a new message
to the Chinese : a message from God, and one that the people need,
though they know it not. It would have been quite easy, in one
way, to have settled down in Hankow, and formed a little Church that
would by this time have got to be a self-supporting and self-governing
one. But the missionaries were always thinking of the people who
had not yet heard. So, instead of staying in Hankow, waiting for
the people to come in and be taught in some marvellous way at a
very distant date, the missionary just started on his preaching tour,
here, there, and everywhere, wherever there was a good opportunity,
and whenever he could get the time.
So, in this way, the work begun in Hankow has crept out and
50
" IN JOURNEYS OFT" 51
out ; until now there are little groups of Christians meeting in their
chapels every Sunday, in very many of the important towns and
villages of this great province. Some missionaries in China are able
to give themselves altogether to this pioneer evangelizing, but most
of them have churches, or schools, or colleges to attend to in the
centre. It is always a joy, however, to get away for a tour round the
outlying districts, visiting the converts, examining and baptizing
candidates at the outstations, cheering and helping the native evangel
ists who are left in charge of these village churches, and always
finding some new place to visit, some new work to do.
Starting on a journey in China is not exactly like what it is in
England. You must not think of going to a booking-office, getting
time-tables that tell you how much time it will take you to do your
journey, and exactly how much money you will spend. A country
tour in the Far East means a perpetual triumph of patience over
inclination, and of "hope over experience." You can generally plan
for the starting, and get off within an hour or so of the appointed time,
but after that it is best to have a plan that you hope may be carried
out, but take everything as it comes.
First there is the passport to be secured. We go to the Consulate
and ask that this document may be prepared. This may take some
time, as it has to be signed by the British Consul and also by the
Chinese Taot ai (an official who has charge of two or more prefectures).
The passport is supposed to ensure the traveller being allowed to go
from place to place without being molested or hindered by the
officials, or stopped at ferries and customs-barriers. This is one of the
fruits of the Treaty of Tientsin, already referred to, and gives the
applicant the right to travel in any part of the provinces mentioned
in the passport, for the period of one year. After this time has
expired the thing is only a " sheet of paper," and a further passport
has to be taken out.
THE SONS OF HAN
The next step is to let the magistrate of the district to be visited
know of your intended journey. A few days after this letter had gone
off, and whilst we were busily engaged in making all the preparations
for a tour, my
boy brought in a
large red visiting
card, saying,
see you, sir." I
soon found out
that he had been
sent to see me
about my jour
ney. He told me
what a bad lot
the people were
in the district I
wished to go to ;
how the whole
country side was
disturbed ; and
how that all the
country-people
would be gamb
ling and having
theatricals, and
so would be very
turbulent, and I might have some unpleasant times, and so on. He
had really called to find out why I was going to Hwangkang, in
the hope, too, that I might be persuaded to give up the idea.
You will not blame him for trying to " frighten me off " if you
PHOTO OF PASSPORT.
" 7.V JOURNEYS OFT" 53
remember that the awful massacre of English and French mission
aries had only just occurred in an adjoining province ; and the
populace, very much in ignorance as to the real facts of the case,
believed that this calamity had befallen the nation because of the
murder of the official by the French priest. There was another
reason for his anxiety. The magistrate had been newly appointed
to office, probably having had to pay a large sum of money for the
appointment ; and he was very anxious indeed that nothing should
happen that might endanger his " button," that is, cause him to be
dismissed before he had got back in fees and " squeezes" the money
he had paid out as well as something over by way of interest.
After a long chat it was made clear that the journey was unavoid
able ; that I was only going to visit the various churches in the county
and had no ulterior motive in going, and also that it was the most
convenient time for me to go. At the same time I promised to delay
my going for a few days to give them time to put out proclamations
telling the people to be on their good behaviour. With this arrange
ment the " great man " professed himself to be quite satisfied : and after
drinking tea together in English fashion, we took leave of each other
in Chinese fashion with a succession of profound bows that only a
Chinaman can make to perfection.
The morning of the day we were to start dawned all too early. It
seemed but a few minutes after my head touched the pillow, when my
boy came in with a knock at the door and an awakening remark of,
" It is half-past five, sir, and I ought to be rolling up your bedding."
So far, all was well. I had got up at the right time, and we should be
able to get off by seven o clock easily ! But breakfast was late ;
and then, just as I was sitting down, a Chinese evangelist came in to
see me. Then a letter had to be written, and fellow-travellers to be
waited for, and coolies to be called at the last minute to take the
baggage to the boat. And then, the boy remembered that the bread
54
THE SONS OF HAN
had not been packed, and the basket had already gone on board,
and sundry other things that always happen in the land where a
start is generally made at a much later hour than originally planned.
At length we really got off. At the riverside we picked out our
boat, after a little difficulty, from amongst a score or two of craft.
The bargain had been made for a whole boat to ourselves, manned
by three men : it had also been made clear that there was to be no
cargo on board,
smuggled or other
wise. On more
than one occasion
it has been my
happy lot to arrive
at the boat only
to find several
unwelcome p a s -
sengers fast asleep
up in the bow,
behind a heap of
baggage. Their
snores betrayed
them ! Of course
the laopan (skip-
per) was very
angry with them for being found on board before we had started :
once away from the anchorage he would have presumed on the good
nature of the foreigner to let him make this little squeeze. This
particular morning, Mr. Ch en had gone along at an early hour,
turned out some undesirable cargo, banished some of these unbidden
passengers, kept at bay many applicants for places in the boat, and so
we were spared the petty annoyances that would have made it im-
OUR BOAT.
"IN JOURNEYS OFT" 55
possible for us to have secured quiet conversations on the important
matters we were to investigate on our journey.
A Chinese proverb runs, " Between moving boats, cursing : but
tween anchored boats a chat." We certainly experienced the truth of
the first part of the old saying as we pushed and bumped our way
out of the jam of boats at the jetty. As our craft moved out, each of
the skippers on the outside edge was anxious to secure the vacant place,
or at least get a few yards in nearer the shore. No one would give
way to the other, and all used their oars as poles to keep a neighbour
ing boat away, or use it as a vantage ground for getting a good push ;
and all the time reviling one another as only Chinamen can. But
with the hoisting of the sail in this instance a choice collection of
holes dexterously sewn together and once out in the fairway, we
soon left the foul language and evil smells of the riverside behind.
The current was with us, the favourable wind filled out the bamboo
ribs of the lean-looking sail, and with the help of our " three men "
at the oar, we slipped rapidly down stream. You would wonder
wherever the " three men " were, if you had made the contract and
then saw the crew : I could only make out one and a half, plus
a quarter in the shape of a very small boy without a hair on
his head ! However, the word ren (man) is applied to anything
human, and doubtless the skipper had no qualms of conscience in
charging for these oddments as being according to contract ; he
certainly wanted his full number of cash, and a few hundreds extra,
when we reached our journey s end.
A day on the Yangtse in a small boat, sailing close in shore, makes
one realize something of what this mighty stream is to China and
her millions. Thousands of ships are ever coming and going on its
waters, from the tiny sampan to the big battleship that sometimes
anchors off Hankow. Millions of people are dependent on its waters.
We passed hundreds of fishing boats, all busily catching yet never
THE SONS OF HAN
seeming to lessen the number of fish that teem everywhere. Some
were trawling ; others had long lines, with a short string and a hook
every yard or so, and again we met some paying out their long nets,
hoping to enclose a large number of finny things in one big haul. In
the shallow waters close to the banks, men were wading with large
nets something like those used by the shrimpers at home : whilst we
THE CAST NET.
often passed a very characteristic kind of net on the bank. This
is a kind of see-saw net which is lowered at intervals into the water.
The net itself is usually about 15 or 20 square feet, though often
of much greater size. Four bamboos are tied together at the
thicker ends, and one tip of each is fastened to a corner of the net.
This is slung at one end of an angular wooded erection fixed on the
bank, so as to be easily lowered into the water and raised at intervals
" IN JOURNEYS OFT "
57
to enable the caretaker to rake out the fish by means of a little net at
the end of a long rod. Each fisherman has his own plant, or spot to
work at : and there is a big row if another comes along to try and
oust him. This has given rise to a proverb that is used in speaking
of a selfish man : " Each fisherman keeps his own pitch." For a long
time I was puzzled about a peculiarly shaped net that was always put
V-SHAPED NET FOR CATCHING TINY FISH.
down close in to the bank. On the top of the water was a V-shaped
frame supporting a very fine meshed net. The wide mouth pointed
up stream ; and from the tapered end a narrow net-passage led into a
square box-shaped net about a foot square. Of course I knew it
was used to catch fish, but I wondered why they wanted such
tiny ones as that kind of net was catching, for as we passed I
5 8 THE SONS OF HAN
saw a man in a little boat visit one of these square nets and dip out
with a basin a lot of wee, wee fishes and put them in a bucket. Later
on, while we were travelling over some hills, I met a number of
men carrying loads of these same tiny fish in buckets. They were
taking them inland, selling them by the basinful to the farmers and
villagers, who would put them into their water tanks and ponds
to grow into useful ornaments for their dinner-tables in days to
come !
Sometimes we passed huge rafts of timber and bamboos, being
carried from their western homes to the various ports on the river.
These rafts were often very large, and one of them had quite a small
village living on the top in little bamboo-woven huts. The raft-
villagers were mostly trusting to the current to carry them to their
destination ; but at times they had to work with all their might to
prevent a collision with some junk, or prevent the huge thing running
aground. Such curious oars they had ! In place of the usual blades,
they had a row of big wooden pegs stuck in on either side at the end
of the oar ; and these long sweeps seemed to give them all the power
they needed to enable them to steer past the various difficult places
they came to.
After a pleasant run of three hours or so, we said good-bye to the
Yangtse and turned up a small tributary towards the north. With
this turn everything seemed to turn. The current was now dead
against us ; the wind had shifted, too, and no longer gave us any
help; the sun hid behind a bank of heavy clouds, and before very long
we were in the middle of a big thunder-storm. Then our bedding
had to be rolled up to keep it out of the water that was leaking in
from below and pouring in from above. The crew stopped work
at the big scull in the stern of the boat, and came in for shelter with us
under the leaky bamboo-woven mat that formed our shelter amidships ;
and not until the heavy downpour had given place to a persistent
IN JOURNEYS OFT"
59
drizzle would they pay any attention to the rather strong language
of the skipper, and start work at the scull again.
Most things come to an end. By sunset we were in sight of Ch ang-
chih Pu, and soon rowed over the flooded fields right up to the city gate.
There we found Mr. Yen, our evangelist, and a half-dozen Christians
who welcomed us in true Chinese manner, and formed our escort to
the Hall. Of course there was the usual collection of small boys,
TIMBER HAFT.
who are always " on the spot." The traveller finds him everywhere,
and always finds it pays to be on the right side of him. I have
always found it a good plan to greet him en passant, and thus save
many an uncomplimentary epithet and many a hoot being hurled
after me.
As I reached the door of the Li-pai T ang (Worship Hall) four
soldiers gave me a salute, and the corporal in charge handed me the
card of the official who had sent them. Later on I found out that
these, with two runners from the magistrate s Yamen, were to be my
6o
THE SONS OF HAN
escort throughout the tour. To their credit, be it said, they watched
me well ; except at night, when we were all wrapped in slumber,
their eyes were always on me and my doings. On the road, if I turned
aside to look at a flower or to examine a tree, they turned aside also.
If I stopped, they halted ; and when I moved on they followed at
the respectful ten paces distance. I was shadowed by them from
the time I landed in Ch ang-chih Pu until they saw me on board my
INQUISITIVE VILLAGERS.
little ship bound for Hankow ten days later. I have to thank them
for many little kindnesses, however. Some of the photos could not
have been taken but for them : some of the crowds would have been
more than rude but for their help : and when chairs or coolies could
not be secured in the ordinary way, they settled the matter very
expeditiously with the local headman who was at the bottom of the
trouble : and once at least, but for their help, I should never have
" IX JOURNEYS OFT" 61
forded a river dryshod. Never did I pay " wine-money " (as a tip is
called in this land) more cheerfully than when giving them a few
hundreds of cash each at parting.
Mr. Yen had known of my contemplated visit for at least a month,
and the approximate hour of my arrival at least a fortnight ; but
with true Chinese forethought he refrained from making any pre
parations for my reception until I had actually arrived. Consequently
the first half-hour of my stay in that guest room at the back of the
little chapel will be well remembered. No sooner had I seated myself
at the table, opposite the door, than someone brought a very dirty wet
cloth and began rubbing some of the dirt of ages off the table, " so
that the Pastor might have a clean spot whereat to dine." This
performance over, a broom was produced, and considerable energy
displayed in moving about the loose particles on the mud floor, which
having been laid down many years ago, was now well worn into holes
and hollows. Of course the dust soon filled the room and settled
on everything in it. It was his way of showing respect, and what
could one say to him ?
By this time it was noised abroad that the foreigner had come.
Folks began dropping in to chat with or stare at me. It is really
remarkable how many texts the missionary finds to preach on : texts
that are not in the Bible at all ! The average Chinese guest who drops in
to see the preacher is very keen on showing his interest in things Western.
He by no means lets the missionary do all the talking or questioning.
His " how s and " why s " are as plentiful as Autumn leaves. He
wants to know all about trains, and steamers, electric light and tram
ways, the price of cloth and of foodstuffs in "your honourable country,"
your age, how many children you have, the business that has brought
you to the place, and so on. This latter gives the missionary his
opportunity, and before many minutes are past the " Old, old Story "
is being told. Very often the guest tries to lead the talk into other
62 THE SONS OF HAN
channels, and sometimes it is expedient to humour him, but in the
end the visitor hears the Gospel story told. And not only the visitor,
for there are many cracks and knot-holes in the board partitions
of that guest hall, and each crack and hole has its bright eye : and
the stifled whispering that is going on all the time the other side of
the wall tells of the inquisitive listeners who are very much interested
in, and busily commenting on, the conversation the missionary is hold
ing with the local man.
After a hasty meal, taken in very primitive fashion, with quite
a crowd of onlookers, we found that the little chapel was packed to
the doors, and that the roadway was blocked up outside by the folk
that could not get in ; so not having any fixed time for service, but
just leaving it delightfully vague for the " evening," we could begin as
soon as the audience was ready.
A country service is not easily forgotten. The singing is decidedly
a " preliminary," for most of the congregation cannot read, and being
heathen have no hymn books. Those that can sing, do so with all
their might, with little regard for time, and with none at all for the
tune. The leader can pick out little bits of two or three tunes coming
from different parts of the hall ; and notices, too, that some get to the
end of a verse when others are at the end of the third line only. But
they are doing their best, and will learn better by-and-by. After the
singing we bow our heads in prayer. But first we have to carefully
explain to the crowd, who have come to see, what it is that we are
going to do. At times, seeing the people kneel and hearing one of
the worshippers addressing someone, they give a startled look around
to see who is being spoken to. Then, seeing no idol, it proves too
much for them and they leave precipitously. Perhaps they imagine
that we are invoking the spirits all evil ones to them and are afraid
of some calamity coming upon them.
After another hymn we begin to talk : three or four of the evangel-
"IN JOURNEYS OFT" 63
ists and myself in turn explaining what the Gospel means to us and
has done for us. It must sound so strange to them ; so different
from all that they have thought about it. A proverb or two arrests
the ear ; a reference to a local custom serves to open a door into the
AWAITING THE FOREIGNER S ARRIVAL.
mind ; and then one has the ready attention of an audience as long
as the preacher is interesting. To-night they all seem in a listening
mood ; for very few of them go away at the close of an address. It
is very interesting to watch them from the little platform. The
first few rows are seated ; but then the crowd gets too thick for the
seating accommodation and they stand as thickly as they can squeeze
64 THE SONS OF HAN
together ; behind these, again, there are one or two rows standing
on the forms ; whilst the window-sills at the rear are well patronized.
There is one youngster who is of an inventive turn of mind, for I
see him bring in a small square table on which several of his young
comrades can stand with him, and thus have the privilege of being
in a " reserved seat."
Of course, there are some interruptions. One strong-minded
woman comes in search of her husband, and finding him sitting down
in the front, at once suspects him of " eating the foreign religion,"
and tells him to come home. A chance remark, however, arrests
her, and she stays quite a long while listening to the story. Another
has come away with the key in his pocket and has to be called out
to give up the needed article. Yet another has a joke at the preacher s
expense, but is promptly subdued by those around him. One asks
a question not one of the subtle Hindu kind, but with reference
to a real tangible difficulty. " How can your religion be good when
you tell people not to chin Seng (reverence spirits) ? " Here is
the preacher s opportunity ; and he explains about the true worship
of the True Spirit that it is our one aim to teach. Another says :
" Why do you teach people not to honour their ancestors or parents ? "
Again, the true reverence of ancestors, and the true honouring of
father and mother by obeying them whilst living, is contrasted with
the lack of care while they are in the flesh and the worship of their
names when they have passed away.
The crowd are always interested in hearing these questions answered,
and appreciate a straightforward attempt to clear up a difficulty.
There is not much trouble as a rule in getting an ordinary Chinaman to
agree with you that all men have sinned. A proverb, current in some
parts, says, " There are two good men : one is dead, and the other is
not born yet." There are some who do not at first follow the meaning
of the man who is speaking of "sin," because to the Chinaman the
" IN JOURNEYS OFT" 65
term " sin " and the " punishment for sin " are identical. I used
to wonder at the often-heard blind beggar s lament, as he sat by
the roadside asking an alms : " My sins are great, my sins are great !
Give a copper." One day I discovered that he was not thinking of
his own evil doings at all, but meant that this calamity had come
upon him because of the sins of a previous incarnation he was really
speaking of this punishment as being for sins committed when he
was alive in a previous generation, for he believed in the transmi
gration of souls. Others again say, " Sin ? What sin have I com
mitted ? " They think only of the grosser forms of wrong-doing
like murder.
Sometimes the meaning they get hold of is not quite the one the
preacher wishes to teach them. For instance, about four years
ago a missionary told me the following story : " Last Sunday afternoon
I was preaching in the church on the text Without shedding of
blood there is no remission [of sin]. At the conclusion of the sermon
a well-dressed man came up to the front of the pulpit and asked to
be allowed to say a few words. He then went on to say that he had
committed sin, and as what the preacher had said was true, he wished
to have his sins remitted ; and thereupon drew out a knife and gashed
his own wrist so that the blood flowed freely ! " This was not at
all what the preacher had been saying, was it ? To use a Chinese
idiom, " The preacher spoke east but the man understood west." But
generally when the theme is the forgiveness of sin, and the mercy of
God, there is a sympathetic audience, and a good many affirmative
noddings of heads, as well as well-meant compliments to the new
religion, such as " The man may be a foreign devil, but what he says
is true."
After the service has gone on for about two hours or more, the
smoky lamps begin to burn dim. Some of the audience get sleepy
or yawn very audibly, so with singing the Doxology and prayer,
E
66
THE SONS OF HAN
the meeting comes to an end. Some stay behind for a further talk
on some of these matters, and promise to come to the regular Sunday
services. A few tracts are sold and explained, and then the front
door is closed as the last few stragglers leave with a new thought in
THE PROPHET S CHAMBER AT LIN SAN HO.
their hearts about the foreigner and the strange story he has to tell
about the forgiveness of sins : how that
Jesus, who lives above the sky,
Came down to be a man and die.
Just before midnight, all feeling very sleepy, we get through our
"IN JOURNEYS OFT" 67
church business with the evangelist in charge, and prepare for bed.
There was no bedroom for me ; yet it was better so, as I had the
large guest room for myself instead of some little stuffy hole without
any ventilation. Two stools were brought from the chapel, a door
was taken off its wooden hinges, and soon I was wrapped in my wadded
quilt fast asleep on this springless mattress. Not for long, though.
First came some belated travellers from the station we were to visit
next day. They had come to lead the way, and had to be provided
with a plank-bed in the chapel. Then, next door it sounded as if
a Vulcan were forging thunderbolts, so much noise did he make.
It was a brass-worker who had been lazy all day, and now was making
a great effort to get a large boiler finished by dawn ! The family
dog took up his abode under my bed, and every now and again gave
me a gentle reminder that he was there taking care of me. It was
thoughtful, too, but not over kind, of good chanticleer to remember
that I had brought no watch, and so give a lusty crow every hour
or so to let me know that time was passing ; whilst at intervals the
watchman trudged along the street beating his hollow bamboo, crying
out the hour, and warning all thieves and evil persons to get out of
the way. On the whole, I was rather glad when five o clock came
round, and we all began to get up and prepare for the journey before
us.
CHAPTER V
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE
THE boat is exchanged for the sedan chair, or humbler barrow,
when the waterways are left behind. Neither is an ideal way
of travelling, from any point of view. The barrow, with its great
wheel screeching in its wooden axle, bumps you all to bruises as the
sturdy wheeler trundles along over the rough unkept roads, now in
deep ruts, now through deep mud, and again over loose stones and
boulders. On the other hand, no one likes to be carried on the
shoulders of men for the greater part of a day. It goes against the
grain altogether. The only other way is to walk : but that means
arriving at the journey end too fatigued to work properly. The travel
ler in China has to do as China does in getting from one place to
another. So we just swallow our feelings, hire a chair, and determine
to give the bearers as frequent a rest as possible by getting out and
walking.
In the clear Eastern atmosphere we are seen from afar as we wend
our way through the rice fields ; and at each village entrance the
women, children, and the few old men who are beyond work, are
out to welcome us. At one place it must have been dinner time,
for all had their rice bowls and chop-sticks in their hands. It was
amusing to see the way the little ones kept their eyes glued on the
" procession," all the while shovelling the rice into their mouths as
hard as they could ! We were much struck by the stately appear
ance of one venerable silver-haired dame who was out to see a
68
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 69
foreigner for the first (and perhaps the last) time in her life. I do not
know what sort of being she expected to see, but we came along so
quickly that she had no time to get ready to take in the strange sight.
A startled, excited " Ho ! " that made everybody laugh, was her only
ejaculation ; and we had passed by before she had recovered from
RICE FIELDS.
the shock of seeing such ordinary looking folk, instead of the awful
beings she had imagined us to be when telling her grandchildren of
the " foreign-devils " and using them as bogeys to frighten naughty
children to sleep.
It reminded me of a time when I was travelling across one of the
rice plains some six years ago, and heard an old lady crying out,
70 THE SONS OF HAN
" Where is the foreigner ? I hear there is a foreigner coming. Where
is he ? " All the time she was hobbling along as quickly as her
poor bound feet would allow her. So I thought I would let her see
the " strange sight ! " When she came up to the place where I was
standing, I introduced myself to her. She looked at me steadily
PLANTING OUT THE RICE.
for a few moments, and then said incredulously, " You a foreigner ?
Why ! you have not got devils eyes ; and you are not ugly to death !
You a foreigner ! Ai yah ! "
About mid-day a halt was called for a meal ; it was a, lovely shady
spot we had come to. No noisy village within sight ; just the place
for a picnic. But my coolies thought otherwise. What was the
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 71
use of staying there, with no table and no stools to sit on. At the
village, only a mile ahead, there was an inn where we could get all
we required ! After half-an-hour s walking we came to the place
a collection of mud and grass hovels. There certainly was an inn
of a kind. It consisted of one big room, black with the smoke of
years. The fire had been lighted in it daily to cook for any wayfarer
who wanted a meal, and as there was no chimney the smoke had to
find its way out through the cracks in the roof or through the low
open doorway. There were two stools in the place, and we secured
one. A table, too, was found a small collection of very dirty boards
somehow laid on four rickety legs. The villagers soon made a circle
round us when the table was taken out on to the road in front, and
in the centre of a ring of wondering eyes our table was spread.
It would all seem a very ordinary lunch to you boys and girls at
home. But these people had never seen such a sight before. They
looked eagerly at the knives and forks and enamelled plate and cup and
saucer and no doubt thought it was very barbarous to eat that way
instead of using the kw ai-tsi (" nimble boys "), as chop-sticks are
called. When my boy produced two oranges they felt more at home,
and grew quite excited as to which boy would get the peel. Then we
had a little talk with them under a big willow, telling them, as we had
told many such a little group of almond-eyed, black-haired villagers
before about the Carpenter of Nazareth, who once was a villager in
Judea, but who was really the Son of God who had come to bring
heaven near to men, and men near to God. As we left, we were
followed a short distance by sturdy legs, and a long way by wistful
eyes, until a dip in the hills took the strange-looking man with his
strange-sounding message away from their sight perhaps for months,
perhaps for years, perhaps for ever.
After leaving this latter village we had an uneventful journey to
Li-kia-ki, our next stopping place. As the sun was setting we came
72 THE SONS OF II AN
to the trestle plank bridge spanning the now shallow river. It was
only wide enough for one to cross at a time, though I measured it
some 240 paces long ; it appeared to be about twenty feet above
the water. It reminded me of the old fable of the goats, to see
some coolies lying flat on the bridge to let an empty chair cross over
them. Half way across we had similar difficulties to get over. One
was to get past a group of well dressed girls who were crouching
down, and clinging to the unprotected side of the bridge, to let us
pass. Then we entered by a great hole in the city wall made by the
recent floods.
THE BRIDGE AT LI-KIA-KI.
Whilst staying at this place many were the stories told of the ravages
made when the floods were out. Water had been standing in the
rice fields fifteen feet deep, whilst the river that now flowed along so
peacefully had risen forty feet in a single night. Barrowmen and
heavily-laden coolies had been swept away by the rushing waters ;
ferry-boats, heavily freighted with terror-stricken men and women,
trying to get away to a place of safety, sank with all on board. Passing
along we had seen everywhere traces of the mischief that had been
wrought. One hamlet had been entirely demolished, not one house
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 73
was left standing ; in other places the wooden house-skeletons were
there, but the walh, built of sun-dried bricks, quite good enough for
ordinary times, had collapsed altogether when the floods stood around
them and dissolved the " feet." I asked how many lives had been lost,
but no one could tell. They told me of the terrors of one night in the
city, when houses felt by the score, burying and crushing their inmates ;
some incases transfixing them with the broken, falling beams. Even as
I write, ruin stares many in the face, for the floods left all the fields
covered with fine sand, that has to be carried away or trenched in
before there can be any crops. Many of the men have gone away
to try and get work in other parts of the country, and it will take a
year or two to make this part of Hupeh into a fruitful field. Here and
there were a group of women trying to get at the soil under its load of
sand ; their only hope being to get a few square yards on which to
grow some food, against the coming days of famine. Away on the
distant horizon could be seen the mountains of Honan, lifting their
peaceful heads to the blue sky, as all unconscious of the calamity
they had sent when they poured their sandy torrents on to the fertile
plain below.
You will be glad to know that last week (May 5) the Hankow
church collected 328,000 cash (about 35) for the relief of the sufferers.
It will help many to buy seed or otherwise tide them over their
difficulties.
On our journey through this county we found the attitude of the
people to the Gospel, the receptions we received, the scenery we passed
through, all as variable as the weather we experienced, one day
scorched by the heat : the next unable to move because of a heavy
storm raging, and then when we did get off, having to wade through
mud and water up to our knees. At times we were on the plain a
dull monotonous level, only relieved by the hundreds of hamlets that
looked like islands in a green sea of growing crops.
74
THE SONS OF HAN
The thought will come, what a number of years it will be before
the Gospel reaches each of these " islands ! " Standing on a little
knoll I can count half a hundred of these clusters of houses, and am
told that there is not a Christian living in any one of them. " Is it
not hopeless," says some one, " to expect the conversion of China,
A CELEBRATED TEMPLE BUILT ROUND A CAMPHOR TREE.
when all over the eighteen provinces a similar sight may be seen : as
far as the eye can reach, nothing but heathen temples, and peoples
that bow down, when they bow down at all, to deaf and dumb and
blind idols ? "
Just think for a moment ! With great difficulty a beginning was
made in this county only thirteen years ago. So far from Hankow,
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 75
and with very little foreign supervision on the spot, in spite of perse
cutions from without and trouble from within the little church, the
work has slowly grown and spread out, until now there are services
held in thirteen different places. Much preparing of the ground and
much sowing has been done, no little reaping, too, has rejoiced the
missionaries hearts as they have gone round examining candidates
for baptism. And while there may be much to disappoint, there is
also as much and more to wonder at, that in such a little while GOD
has given such an increase. Morrison and Milne hoped that after a
hundred years of work in China there might be a thousand Chris
tians won to Christ. And now that the hundredth year has come to
its close, we find that there are nearly four times that number of mission
aries at work in the Empire, and two hundred times as many church
members ! Our successors, a hundred years hence, will be counting
the small number of heathen left !
Once, passing through a village, we came upon a woman who was
standing out in the roadway, screaming out curses at the top of her
voice. We had heard her long before we saw her ; and her shrill
voice followed us long after we had left the place. " What is the
matter ? " I asked. " Oh, a thief has stolen something of hers that
she left out to dry, and she is cursing him and his ancestors.
Another time, just as the evening shadows had come down on plain
and mountain, and when the hour of stillness had come over all, we
were startled by hearing a woman s plaintive voice begin to wail at
the side of a coffin a little way up the hillside. She began softly, in a
way that gave one an eerie feeling, until it was discovered that it was
no wandering sprite howling in the darkness, but a poor woman whose
heart was aching because the breadwinner had gone out into the un
known and she knew not whither he had gone. After a little while
her voice grew louder and shriller until there seemed to be no other
sound in heaven and earth but that wailing of a desolate soul. Even
THE SONS OF HAN
while the longing came to be able to take some message of comfort to
her, the voice died away, and the quietness that came seemed almost
to hurt one s ears.
This chapter would be far too long if I told of all the sights, strange
TEMPLE TO THE GOD OF RICHES.
to English eyes, that were met with ; of the huge water buffalo
ponderously dragging the primitive plough through the muddy rice-
patch ; of the curious-looking chain pumps worked by the feet of two
or three men and boys, raising the water from the lake or pond to the
fields above ; or of the various cities and villages we visited and
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE
77
stayed in. I have already given you some idea of the country service
in districts where the work is still young, and the majority have not
yet become interested in the Truth. In the main, it is but a
repetition at each place, with various little differences owing to the
increased friendliness, or otherwise, of the villagers or townsfolk.
SAN TIEN CITY WALL.
Many are the stories we have to hear of the Christians being sub
jected to persecution in times of heathen festival. At one market
village, there was an old man dragged by the hair of his head the
whole length of the street, because he would not pay the idol dues
at the Dragon Boat Festival ! Sometimes the trouble seemed to be
78 THE SONS OF HAN
brought about by want of tact and patience on the part of the half-
enlightened inquirer ; but we must remember how slowly the truth of
Christianity dawned upon our own land, and how slowly the way of
the Cross is yet learned even by people who have been all their lives
brought up in a land where Christianity is not the " foreign " but the
" native " religion, and then we shall have more sympathy with these
little ones in the faith, where all the law that is, is against them
and their religious grievances.
In the course of our journey we came to a place called San Tien,
or Three Taverns. It is a busy market town, looking like a real city
encircled by its big stone wall. It is in a district sometimes visited
by the robbers from the mountains, and so all the larger towns are thus
protected. Our little chapel in the neighbouring town is in the remains
of a house nearly all destroyed by one of these robber bands. The
charred ends of the beams still remain as silent witnesses to the ill
deeds done years ago.
I had been told that this was to be the first stay of a foreigner in
Three Taverns Town, but that the people would be quite friendly.
This proved to be a true prophecy. For in spite of the immense crowd
of people that made it almost impossible to get along the streets, even
the small boys were on their best behaviour.
This was to be a red-letter day for the few Christians who live here.
The chapel was to be formally opened for worship, and the first believers
baptized and received into the Church. Within half-an-hour of our
arrival the " whole city was gathered together at the door." More
than once the patience of my escort was on the point of giving out, for
some fellows " of the baser sort " were by no means easy to deal with ;
and more than once I had to go out and tell them not to beat the
people who were trying to crowd into the house. Next morning I
heard that one rascal, afraid to say anything against the men of our
party, thought he could curse the evangelist s wife with impunity,
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 79
but that the corporal had given him a caning for it. However, I
did not see anything of it. Perhaps it was as well.
At half-past four in the afternoon we were told that all the inquirers
had come, and were ready for examination. So, with the help of the
two evangelists who had come with me from Hankow, the work
commenced. Most of these people had been professing Christians
for over two years, and some for even a longer period. You see, it
is very difficult to get to know the reason a Chinaman has for joining
himself to us; and we have to take many precautions that would not
be necessary at home. It used to be said that the early days were
the days of " rice Christians," as they were called, when men came
to ctiih riao, that is to EAT the doctrine. You may remember that
one of Dr. John s first visitors was a boy who came with this idea in
his head the foreigner had come to give away food, etc. This stage
has been passed through. Then came another stage, when men
found in Christianity a new power that would come in and help them
against the oppression of their unrighteous rulers. This was the law
suit stage, when men came hoping to get justice without having to
ruin themselves by getting it through bribing the magistrate. And this,
too, is passing away. But great care is necessary, for even with all
the probation and public examination of a candidate, a good many
weeds still get planted in the garden of the Lord, and have to be
rooted out ; alas, after sometimes dropping a good deal of their seed to
spring up in days to come.
What is an examination like ?
Well, it is, firstly, an attempt to find out if the man has been trying
to learn the lessons Christianity teaches, and seeking to know what
the true religion and worship of God is. So we begin by asking a
good many questions about Jesus Christ, and the way of forgiveness.
We also ask the candidate about idol worship and other evil practices.
But as most of these questions can be answered by learning Dr.
8o
THE SONS OF HAN
John s catechism, the missionary tries to find out something of the
man s ideas about good living. He is asked about his trade or busi
ness : about his desire of joining himself to us, and about the duties
of a Christian to others. Often in this cross-examination some fact
leaks out, that tells us the man or woman is not clear of idol worship
the Kitchen God is still up over
the stove, or that incense is still
PASTOR LIU PREACHING TO A VILLAGE STREET AUDIENCE.
burnt to the idols ; or else that the man is a gambler, or an opium smoker.
It was a very mixed lot that came up for examination at San Tien
that evening. One man was a bumptious young fellow who came up
to the table and sat down with a swagger and leer. After answering
a few doctrinal questions in a very ostentatious manner, he began to
snigger. He was promptly pulled up short, and sent away to learn the
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE i
first principles of Christianity. We found out later that he had
induced the young colporteur here to put his name down as an inquirer
on purpose to make fun of us and our religion ; but the " joke " was
turned against him, and his boon companions gave him a bad time
of it for having failed. One man, who seemed to know all about the
truth, and who, from his answers, appeared to be a conscientious man,
gave us no little trouble of soul. Something told us something was
wrong. When asking him about gambling I detected a smile on the
face of a bystander a smile that was instantly smoothed away into a
look of stony indifference when he saw I was looking at him. So I
declined to let him pass. Later on it came out that he had been
an inveterate gambler for years, and was still addicted to this
vice. Another man was found to be an opium smoker. He
resolutely denied the accusation, even though his face told its
story all too plainly. He was caught by an apparently careless
remark to which, taken off his guard, he assented. " Not got to
the craving stage yet, eh ? " " Not yet," was the reply that
made the listeners fully aware of his situation. I could not help
feeling sorry for him. He was in earnest about the whole matter, and
wanted to become a Christian that he might be free of his evil habit.
Perhaps he thought there was some magic in the water he would be
sprinkled with in baptism, and that this would set him free from
the scourge. At any rate, I had to tell him he could not be received
into the Church, even though he only smoked a little of the hateful
thing, but that the Christ could enable him to break the power of this
sin, and free him from the chains of this vice. We urged him to get
cured of the habit, and present himself at our next visit.
But this is all or.3 side, and that the dark side, of the story. Many
are the stories we hear that gladden our hearts that night. One
husband and wife have come together to publicly confess Christ. She
is by far the more intelligent, and is really a woman " whose heart
F
82 THE SONS, OF II AN
the Lord has opened." He is a simple-minded countryman, who sec::i3
to have been led into the fold by his wife. This much is certain :
they have both learned to love their Saviour, and have already endured
hardness for His sake. We gladly welcome them.
Two young men of eighteen years are quite bright. One of them is
a young scholar. He answered a good many questions from Mat
thew s Gospel, and had evidently thought much for himself on some
of the great matters that perplex all minds that try to find out who we
are, whence we come, whither we go.
After about two hours of steady examining, we have to stop. My
fellow travellers remind me that we have had no meal since the
morning and that now is a favourable opportunity to look after these
creature comforts. The interval passes, and we once again give
ourselves to the welcome task of seeking from among the many those
who are ready for baptism.
It is a very unique examination service, I must confess. Never
before nor since have I had one exactly like it. At such times one
likes to get the candidate alone, and really get to know something of
the way he. has been led to find the Christ ; but on this first occasion
in San-tien it was out of the question. The Chinese mind ever
ready to suspect the worst of the foreigner might imagine all sorts
of things going on in secret, so we have to make these sacred things
public property for this time. The opportunity is fraught with glorious
possibilities. At times over sixty are crowded into that little room
at the back of the chapel, to hear the candidates asked questions ; and
as the story of the Cross is gone over fifty times that night, many
must have got such a grasp of the " fundamentals " as would not be
possible in the ordinary way. It is amusing to ncte how the heathen
audience enters into the spirit of the examination, and when one candi
date, through nervousness, made a mistake in answering a question,
a smart youth, who had never heard the Gospel before that day,
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 83
was keen to correct him, and then blushed crimson at his temerity as
he saw my smile that greeted his well-meant effort. The greater
part stay the whole evening, and by the time we get to the last ten
or so, a great number of heads nod approval at a correct answer given,
or shake soberly at a mistake.
It is 10-30 p.m. before we have finished and the case of the last
candidate is decided on, and as we are to be on the march by 6 a.m.
on the morrow, we have to hold the dedication service and baptismal
service forthwith. Even at this late hour the interest of the towns
people is fully sustained, and there are as many outside in the open
space before the chapel as there are within the building. The whole
of the front, consisting of shutters, is taken down so that ah 1 may
see and hear, and we have a splendid gathering that lasts until after
midnight. Even then it is with difficulty we get the people to go home.
Twenty-five adults and five children were baptized, and a greater
number entered on the Inquirers Roll. With thankful hearts, though
tired bodies, we went that night to bed.
My next experience of San-tien was of a very different nature.
In one way it was the same crowds of people gathered together to
welcome us, but were not quite so noisy as on the previous visit, and
as there was to be no baptism service this time we had quite a long
evening before us, which we hoped might be a fruitful preaching of
the Gospel. We waited some little time after our evening meal, selling
booklets and chatting to the people, who (as Evangelist Ch en said)
always had " hungry eyes," no matter how long they stared at us ;
and then, as the folk began to settle down, we decided to have service.
The people of this district have a reputation for being rowdy, but
as on the previous visit all the pushing and crowding had been of a
good-natured curiosity order, I thought little of the rather boisterous
demonstration made by two or three, when at seven o clock I tried
to get order and commence,
8 4
THE SONS OF HAN
The " pulpit " here is a little platform with a reading desk facing
the door. The little chapel is only some thirty feet in depth, so the
platform and doorway are not far apart, quite near enough for the
one in the light to be easily seen and heard by those in the darkness
READING A PROCLAMATION ABOUT THE NEW RAILWAY.
without. We went through the preliminary part of the service in
quietness ; but soon after our veteran evangelist Mr. Liu began to
speak the storm burst. One or two people at the doorway began to
make a noise ; and a stone was thrown against the wooden shutters
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 85
in front ; but merely asking the people not to make a noise, Mr. Liu
went on with his address.
At this juncture, a shopkeeper came in and began to take down
the shutters, saying " We can neither see nor hear," but as he was
behaving very rudely, I went down to stop him. It was fortunate
that I did so. No sooner had I reached the floor than a volley of
bricks and pieces of stone, hurled at close range through the open
doorway, struck the back of the pulpit just where my head would
have been. Volley after volley came, but providentially no one was
hurt. A Chinese lantern was smashed just over my head, but the
one large paraffin lamp escaped. The only one struck was old Mr. Liu,
and that only by a rebounding stone. Some of the missiles narrowly
missed the Rev. Dr. Taylor, who was accompanying me on this journey.
The pulpit front was smashed in, and other damage done to the wood
work, however.
We presumed that the rascals, after bombarding us in this manner,
had run away, for there came a lull, and Mr. Liu went on speaking,
hoping the affair was over. But after a short interval the stoning recom
menced, and there was nothing for it but to close the meeting with
the singing of the doxology and the benediction, all to the accompani
ment of the breaking of tiles on the roof, and the rattling of stones on
the shutters.
The town constable came, and he and our escort did all they could
to stop the disturbers, but the spirit of evil seemed to be abroad, and
stones came flying through the darkness from all directions. The
evangelists came and asked me if I would send my cards to the local
gentry, the Literati, telling them of our little trouble, and asking
them to use their influence. For they are supposed to be responsible
for the good behaviour of the people. Fully knowing it would be
useless, I did so and then we sat down, quietly praying that nothing
serious might occur. You see, we realized we were in our Father s
86
THE SONS OF HAN
keeping, and had no reason to be afraid. If we had shown signs of
fear it would have been very bad for the many converts who were
gathered with us.
As anticipated, the Literati proved but broken reeds, and we then
found out that the old evangelist had previously sent to them without
my knowledge at the very beginning of trouble, but their answer to
his request was that they were " too busy to come." When the
CROWDS FOLLOWING THROUGH THE CORN FIELDS AS WE LEFT SAN-TIEN.
messenger went with my card, the reply was sent " It was very
unfortunate, but they were all away at the neighbouring city, and so
could not help me ! "
So we quietly waited : reading, or writing, or chatting to the
Christians around us. Even while the stoning was going on, I got to
know the reason of it all. In this district there is a very powerful
clan the Sung clan. One of the young men belonging to them had for
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 87
some little time been of a thoughtful turn of mind, eager to learn
the way of life. He sought for this knowledge in many ways,
but at length, hearing of the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of
the world, he found the Truth in Him. The clan were determined he
should have nothing to do with Christianity, and began a series of
petty persecutions, getting more and more violent .as they saw his
constant determination to follow Christ. Quite recently they had
hired some ruffians to assault and beat him whilst on a journey ; and
now, as a last resort, they had determined on wrecking the meeting at
which he was to be present. What their end was, and how they
A DIFFICULT BRIDGE.
thought to accomplish it by such means, we must not spend time in
speculating on.
After about an hour and a half the stone throwing ceased, and the
rowdies dispersed, largely owing to the efforts of our small escort, who
worked hard to prevent any mischief coming to us. It would have
been a bad look-out for them if we had suffered any personal violence.
Then rain began to fall, and we knew there would be no more trouble
that night. So we gathered in a little group in the chapel, listening to
the stories of persecutions in bygone days told us by Mr. Liu and
Mr. Shu, who have both been through the fire more than once. Later
88 THE SONS OF HAN
on a young convert brought in a wooden tray which he placed
on a stool in front of us. Next he began to shake his capacious sleeves
and out came two or three pounds of roast pea-nuts. So we all fell
to discussing these and the intricacies of the Chinese language.
At least four of our number spoke two different dialects, and it
was most interesting to us to compare notes. Old Mr. Shu, very
asthmatical, but very much of a talker for all that, was most down
on some of the natives for carelessness in speaking their own language.
He instanced some peculiarities in the different districts he had travelled
over in his colporteur days ; and was specially down on the people of
one district who could not even pronounce the word ren (man) correctly.
He next began a disquisition on the way missionaries mispronounced
certain sounds, and to his delight, to say nothing of my own (?) he put
me through a long cross-examination on the Chinese sounds as heard
in Hankow. It began to get monotonous. He was having it all
his own way. So it was time to turn the tables on him.
" Now, Mr. Shu, say nan."
" Nan," he replied, quite correctly.
" Please say Ian."
" Nan."
" No. That is wrong. Say LAN."
" Nan ! Nan ! NAN " getting louder and louder, and very red in
the face as four of us shook our heads and laughed at him. For like
a true son of Central China, he could not distinguish the difference
between the initial " n " and "1."
By this time it was ten o clock, and feeling rather tired we sug
gested bed. No sooner said, than we were reminded of our recent
anxious moments by another shower of stones, that did no other damage
beyond breaking a few tiles and giving us a start.
The Chinese were watching us closely to see what we would do. So,
we had two stools brought, two doors taken down, our bedding
FROM VILLAGE TO VILLAGE 89
unrolled, and in the little chapel we began slowly to undress. This
quietened them wonderfully, and ere very long they were all following
our example.
But we reckoned without a donkey who was stabled in an adjoining
room, and who frightened sleep away for some time by the rattling of
his chain. Rats swarmed over this house, as indeed they did over
every other place we stayed at. And when I did begin to doze off,
every now and then I would wake up with a start, thinking another
stone had hit the building. It was only a rat, that had taken a big
leap in his gambols and come down with a thud. Towards morning
sound sleep came ; and when we woke the sun was rising over the eastern
hills, dispelling all the darkness, and with the darkness taking away
the covering under which evil men find it so easy to do evil deeds.
Soon, however, we were under way, and left San-tien so quietly that
very few people knew we had gone.
Late that night, the rowdies came again. They, tried to burn
down the chapel by placing a pile of brushwood against the door and
setting it on fire. This time the gentry did interfere, as it is a very serious
offence to start a conflagration amongst the wooden houses of a Chinese
city. One of them, single handed, kicked out the fire, and with the
help of the town constable drove off the miscreants who were bent
on doing us mischief.
CHAPTER VI
BOYS AND GIRLS
EVERYWHERE the traveller goes there is sure to be one side
of Chinese life that is of perpetual interest, so full is it of colour
and attraction. In town and village, in the busy, bustling city street,
and beside the quiet
country road, there is
ever the child : often
very dirty and neg
lected, yet as often
sweet and engaging. In
the midst of child-life
the sordidness of the
average Chinese life is
forgotten. These little
" angels of humanity "
have their times of pain
and trouble and suffer
ing, as have children in
all lands. But the
thing that strikes us
everywhere is the fun,
and jollity, and real pleasure of living enjoyed by these little yellow-
skinned folk. In fact they are very much like the boys and girls at
home, only they show their happiness in somewhat different ways.
A CHINESE BABY.
BOYS AND GIRLS 91
Yet when we begin to ask about their lives, how they live and
grow, we are almost inclined to say that the poor little Chinese babies
are born to trouble." No sooner has the little baby uttered
its first cry than the reign of the baby-doctor begins. She is usually
an old woman who is the mother of several children, and owing to
her experiments on them and her grandchildren has become f> wise "
in her knowledge of how to treat the baby. She is very much believed
in by the young mothers, who often prefer to bring her in, even though
there is a good Mission doctor within a few yards of the house. Not so
very long ago in England the baby had almost as bad a time of it.
Let us hope that in a few years time a new era will dawn for it in
China. What does she do to the baby ? Well ! She not only has
several " cures " for it in its sicknesses, but a good many " prevent-
atives " to keep it from getting ill.
How would you like your little brother to be treated like this ?
When but a few days old the little mite has to be burned with a lighted
match on the nose and crown of the head. To be efficacious this has
to be done again and again until the baby cries with pain. If it did
not feel the burning, then they could not be sure that it would be
kept from catching cold. When the cry of pain is heard, then the family
feel they can " let down their hearts," which is their way of saying
they need not be anxious. If in spite of this the baby does catch
cold, then he has to suffer for it in more ways than one. The baby-
curer (or " baby-killer " as some missionaries are tempted to call her)
is at once called in. Perhaps the little thing has a sharp attack of
bronchitis. So the old lady puts on her large tortoise-shell rimmed
glasses, seizes the little sufferer with no very gentle hands, forces open
its mouth in order to examine its throat, and with a chop-stick, or
sometimes a pair of them, begins to dig out from its tender throat the
" white phlegm " of which they are so much afraid. Once, when I
was sent for to see a Christian s sick baby, I found the old wom:m
THE SONS OF HAN
in the midst of her cruel work. She gave me a decided reproof when
I stopped her ; saying also, with a triumphant smile, " See, what a
lot of phlegm and blood I have got up ! " And then shaking her head
slowly observed, " Whatever is it that makes him cry so ! " She
must have thought me very impolite when I told her what I thought
about the whole business.
The chances from the very first seem all against a child s living.
There is little real cleanliness in the homes, and none at all outside
of them. The
young mothers
are sometimes
too young to
know how to
take care of
their little ones ;
and every child
invariably gets
what it cries for
if it only cries
long enough.
At a very early
date it begins
to eat raw potatoes or cucumbers, or anything it can grab from the
table when the family is dining. It has unlimited opportunities
of rolling in and playing with the dirt and filth of the street or
yard, and much that is not good for it consequently gets into baby s
mouth. But as the Chinese are not yet worried with " microbe theories,"
these things never trouble them. It is no great matter of surprise
that every morning for the last three months, when on my way along
the road at the back of the native city towards the college buildings,
I have counted a score of little coffins being carried out for rude buric.1.
BABY-TOWER.
BOYS AND GIRLS 93
Each little rough, unpainted, unplaned wooden box represented a
life sacrificed to ignorance or indifference. Riding along this road,
too, one sees three baby-towers. On the top of each is a grating
on which are usually some little coffins awaiting somebody s " good
deeds " to give them a burial ; and occasionally I have seen on the
ground at the foot, some little bundles of matting that tell of parents too
poor to afford even the thin coffin. In each of these baby-towers is a
square hole. The use of these holes is mostly confined to the poorest
people of all, and let us hope that they only use them for the dead.
But in spite of all this, and of all the infantile aches and pains
common to childhood, the baby who is old enough to toddle about
begins to reign in the household. A boy-baby is always wanted, no
matter how many mouths there are already to feed ; and even a girl is
sometimes welcomed. Why do I say sometimes ? Perhaps the grand
mother does not think they ought to afford to keep a girl ; perhaps
the husband is very cross because it is not a boy ; perhaps there are
already too many girls in the family : and the little unwelcome
stranger is put on a cold shelf as soon as it is born, to die, if it is not
thrown into water, or destroyed in some other way. You see, they
think that, very little children have no souls, so it does not matter.
Yet strange to say, I have often seen Chinese burning paper money and
incense by the side of the baby-towers at the back of the city. I
wonder if there is sometimes a fearful thought that comes : " We
had better treat their spirits well, in case there should happen to
be any souls in children." How far such conditions are from the
ideal kingdom-of-heaven-life Jesus spoke of ! These people need
very much to be taught how Christ looked upon children and child
life.
The Roman Catholics have done a lot for the children of China in
having Foundling Homes where unwanted little ones can be left and
cared for. I was in one of these places recently, and saw the little
94 THE SONS OF HAN
girls who had been left on the doorstep of the Hospital by night, or
brought by neighbours and friends in the daytime. Even the tiniest
ones seemed busy as bees and perfectly happy. Some were at play,
some at their lessons, some at work making exquisite pillow-lace
their little fingers seemed to be dancing for joy in the sunbeams that
were playing upon them, whilst the bigger girls were hard at work
making their wedding clothes just previous to their marriage.
Very touching was the story of a little babe, whose feeble cry I
heard when passing along from one building to another. In a village
ten English miles away a little baby had come to the home. Alas !
it was a girl. The mother wanted it to love and cherish. But the
father s mother was very angry. She would not have the thing in
the house. " What," she said, " another useless girl ! Are there
not mouths enough to fill already ? " So she cursed the unhappy
mother for bringing a baby-girl into the world. Had it been a boy
there would have been a different story to tell. As the hours flew by
the old grandmother got more and more angry ; and at last she laid
hold of the tiny mite and threw her into a tub of ice-cold water.
Love for the child, and anger at the cruel mother-in-law, gave the
strength of frenzy to the young mother, though she was little more
than a girl herself. She rushed for the child, snatched it out of its
perilous bath, wrapped it in her own garments, and then, weak as
she was, and though bitterly cold the weather, tramped her weary
way to the Foundlings Home.
No one knows how she got there, nor how long she took on the
journey. With all her remaining strength she called the porter
and then collapsed, utterly exhausted, with the babe clasped to her
bosom saved.
A girl has no soul, they say. And some of the girls seem to believe
it. Nearly nine years ago, when on a preaching tour with an elder] y
evangelist, we came in our journey to a large farmhouse. We found
BOYS AND GIRLS
05
to our regret that all the men were ?.t work in the fields, except one
old gramfer who was too deaf to hear anything said to him, and almost
too blind to see. Hearing the sound of voices and laughter we went to
a large barn, and found the young daughters-in-law of the establish
ment, with their hands as busy as their tongues, weaving cloth. The
ONLY THE WOMEN AT HOME.
old evangelist could never miss an opportunity of telling the good
news of salvation. So, while I was being looked at by several pairs
of bright eyes, he began to tell them why we had come from the city
far away. We were not pilgrims on a journey to sonic sacred hill,
and so had not come to beg money or food to help us on our way. We
96 THE SONS OF HAN
had not come to buy of their goods ; and although we had come to sell,
our merchandise could not be bought with silver and gold. Then he
told them of Jesus, who wanted to be their Saviour, and cleanse their
souls from sin. " Souls," shrieked one of the young women, laugh
ingly. "We! Souls? Why, we are ONLY GIRLS!"
Jolly, laughing boys and girls ! How the grown-up people must envy
them as they play together making mud-pies, playing shuttlecock,
and using their feet as bats, forming little processions as they play
at being grown up : just like the children at home. If you knew
some of them you would wish there was a " garden-city " to which
they could all be taken while still very young, and there taught to be
good and true, and given an opportunity to grow up clean-lipped,
and clean-handed men and women. Some of you have heard
about the little slum-babies of the great cities, who are brought up
in daily contact with the bad things of life. It is something like
this out here. Their little eyes and ears are all too soon busily taking
in bad words and actions ; and as they grow up they imitate. And
not only imitate. The little boy is taught to curse his mother, " to
make him smart," says the father. Poor little chappie, he has no
notion of the meaning of the words he says. He is taught, too, to
call out all sorts of names at other people. Taught to lie : by hearing
everybody around him telling untruths as a matter of course. No
wonder he grows up like all the other boys around him. Taught to
steal by seeing the others doing it in the house. It is a very common
thing fcr the daughter in-law to steal in her husband s household, in
order to help her own mother ; and the complaint of an old grandmother
about her little daughters-in-law was something like this, " They are
all thieves, every one of them. They would soon ruin us altogether
if my own daughters did not steal in their new homes, and send help
to me."
From his earliest years the child is taught to gamble. He plays
BOYS AND GIRLS 37
for cash, as boys at home play for marbles or buttons ; and much
prefers to buy his sweets or peanuts by a throw of the dice or a turn
of the fortune- wheel, hoping to get a " big pennyworth " by a lucky
throw or turn. As he grows up it is not surprising that his every game,
be it guessing, dominoes, or chess, is played for money.
As a little child, the girl is as free to play and be as merry in her gam
bols as the boy. All too soon these early year-, roll swiftly by, and
the discipline of life begins. Walking along one of the quieter streets
of a city I once heard a child screaming loudly. " Mother-in-law beat
ing her," I said to myself. " What a shame ! " But a few more steps,
and I came to an open doorway, and then saw what it was all about.
Two women were sitting down, gossiping at a great rate. Between
them was the little girl, screaming with pain. Nothing was the matter !
They were only following Dame Fashion and binding her feet : making
her a cripple for life : crushing the little toes with every pull on
the tight bandage ! By and by she will get used to the pain and
be able to hobble about : like one walking on stilts. But her days
of child-scampering are over. She is learning to become a woman.
The little boy, too, has to learn to become a man. But being of
much more importance than a girl, he very early learns to take first
place. Even in the matter of choosing a name there is a great differ
ence made. The little girl may be called Sister One, or Two, or Three,
or even be content with less than that ; but the boy has more trouble
taken with his name. This is how one little boy got his name. When
he was born there was great joy in the home because the parents had
wanted a little son very much. Now he had come, they knew that
God had sent him. For they believed in the Gospel for a little time, and
had learned to pray to the true God. So very soon the father went off
to the nearest chapel to ask the evangelist about choosing a name for
his little son. Of course they wanted a Christian name, and not a
heathen one. So a few of the converts were called together, and then
G
9 8 THE SONS OF HAN
the evangelist in a simple manner told God all about it, and how
they wanted a good name for this child. After praying awhile, he said,
taking a Chinese Bible in his hand, " Lord, let it please Thee to cause
the Holy Book to open at a place where there is the name of an apostle
or prophet, which we may take as the name for the child." It fell
open at the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew. On reading it through,
to their intense delight, they discovered not one name only, but two
Noah and Daniel. In a truly Chinese way they put the best construct
ion on the matter, and gave thanks for the grace that gave such an
abundant answer to their petition. But now they were in difficulties.
The boy s name is usually of three one-syllable words. The first one
has to be the surname. So if the family name is Pao, then the
other name might be Ren Ching, or some such name. Now Noah
in his Chinese dress is a two-syllable name No-yah. But this was
not reckoned very easy to pronounce. So they decided not to have
No-yah. But then Daniel in his Chinese style is Da Ye Lee. This
would be one syllable too many. However, a brilliant idea came to one
of them, and all agreed to drop the first syllable, and so call the child
Ye Lee.
The first great day in the boy s history is when he " completes the
circle," that is when the end of his first year on this planet has been
reached. He is then according to Chinese reckoning two years old,
and not one as we would count it. A great feast is given in his honour,
presents are sent him, a large silver necklet is put round his neck,
and perhaps a chain with a silver lock on is added. This latter is to
lock him down to earth, of course, and so prevent him from running
away, i.e., dying. But more important in some ways than any of
these things, the feast alone excepted, is the placing of the inkslab,
reckoning-board, pen, scales, stick of indian ink, etc., before him.
Baby-like he will grab at some one of the things that takes his fancy,
and he is eagerly watched to see which he touches first. Great is the
BOYS AND GIRLS. 99
rejoicing if he touches the pen, or ink, or a
piece of writing paper. For this is a sign
that in the future a scholar s fame and
career will be his.
The feast is a very important item on
this birthday, as each guest brings a gift of
money, and so after the feast is paid for there
is a good balance in hand that goes to swell
the slender resources of the family.
Although this is the great birthday of
-the first year, there are two other
days that are reckoned as impor
tant functions : the first is the
occasion of the baby s first bath or
wash, according to the time of the
year. This is generally on the third day
after its birth. The second ceremonial
day is the occasion of its first shave,
when it is about a month old. Then
baby s head is rubbed all over with hot
water and the fluffy hair shaved off
HOW TO CARRY A LITTLE DAUGHTER.
with a keen razor.
After the first circle is completed birthdays are not kept, except
every ten years, the New Year s feasts being the birthdays of the
whole family. When the Ta Sen Erh, or tenth birthday, comes along,
there is rejoicing and feasting according to the social position of the
family and the number of tens that have been passed. A seventieth
or eightieth birthday is the occasion of great celebrations feasts
and firing of crackers, and presentations of silk banners and other gifts
being only limited by the amount of money in the family purse.
After young hopeful has played about for some five years or so,
ioo THE SONS OF HAN
he goes to school. With the new era that has dawned on China from
an educational standpoint, it is difficult to say anything that is very
definite about him at this age. Old customs are changing, and many
things that have been done for millenniums no longer obtain. A few
years ago the boy would have gone to a private school or else would
have joined in the use of a teacher in some other family. Now he
probably goes to a Government school, wears a fine uniform, and
learns very little that is much good to him. For although China
has gone in for new lines of education she has not yet got teachers
for her schools who know much about the subjects they are supposed
to teach. We must remember that for hundreds of years the book
and not the teacher has been the main idea in study. The teacher
may be a very poor tool indeed, but if the scholar has the book what
does it matter ? So now science is taught (?) by men who know no
more about it than they have got from the casual reading of a book.
They explain the characters to their scholars, and that is an end of it.
Of course there are a few good men who have studied in mission col
leges, or received an education abroad, but the majority of the best
that China can show have been to Japan for six months, learnt a few
foreign notions, imbibed a good deal of unbalanced " patriotic " teach
ing, and are wishing to pose as the pioneers of progress and reform.
Even yet, in the majority of cases, it is safe to say that the boy,
on first going to school, goes through the same process of enlightenment
as did his forefathers. On the first day of his school life he bows in
reverence before the Tablet of the Great Sage of China, Confucius. He
then prostrates himself before the teacher, who is now to take the place
of father, offers him a present of money wrapped up in red paper (which
offer is never under any circumstance refused), takes his place at
the appointed table, and begins to swell the chorus of similar juveniles
who are howling out at the top of their voices Chin s First Steps to
Knowledge, that wonderful compendium of information known as
BOYS AND GIRLS 101
the Three Character Classic, from its being all written in lines of three
words. There is no attempt to teach him, as we understand the term ;
all the boy does is to take a few characters at a time, repeat them after
the teicher, and then shout them out, over and over again, until he
has " put them all into his stomach," where the intellectual faculties
are supposed to lie.
This Three Character Classic is a remarkable book. At the very
beginning is the sentence that has set learned men wrangling ever
since they found that there were things to wrangle about. " Men,
when born, are naturally good : though alike in nature, in practice
they widely differ," it says. It then goes on to show the necessity
for young people to receive instruction (probably to enable them
to get back some of that natural goodness, which by this time they
show signs of having left far, far away).
The book is really an abstract of common knowledge, which might,
in the hands of a capable teacher, be very useful in training the child
to observe and think. But this kind of teaching has no part in the
average scholar s education. He has to learn how the ancients
thought, and not to cultivate his own powers of observation.
So the child has to learn the sound of each character, and be able
to rattle off the whole book from beginning to end, almost without
a pause and never know the meaning of a single sentence. Take
these first few lines, for instance :
Duty to elders ought early to be understood.
First practice filial and brotherly duties : next observe and listen.
*****
There are three powers heaven, earth, and man.
Three lights sun, moon, and stars.
There are three relations : between prince and minister, justice.
Between father and son affection ; tween man and wife concord.
Just these bare statements and no explanations. To illustrate the
" fours," there are the four seasons and the hour points of the com
pass. The " fives " introduce him to chemistry and ethics, but
IO2
THE SONS OF HAN
leave him with the barren statement that there are five elements :
water, fire, wood, metal, and earth, and that these five elements are
the origin of everything. The five cardinal virtues are humanity,
justice, propriety, wisdom, and truth, all of which the child hears
frequently mentioned as words, but seldom sees exemplified in the
actions of his elders. The " sixes " are the six kinds of grain (grown in
China), rice, millet, pulse, wheat,
rye, and barley ; and also the
OUR HANKOW AND WUCHANG MISSIONARIES.
Dr. Gn ffl h John is seated in the centre; Mr. Upward, the author of
this book, is the second from the left in the back row.
six domestic animals, horse, cow, sheep, dog, fowl, and pig. Then
come the seven passions : joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hatred and
desire ; showing that there is as much " human nature " in the China
man as there is in his Western brother. Next are enumerated the
eight kinds of music, or rather materials of which musical instruments
are made : gourd (some kind of instrument made out of these hollow
BOYS AND GIRLS 103
wooden things), earth (an instrument made of burnt earth, i.e., porce
lain), skin (drum), wood (a raucous clarionette) , stone, metal (bell), silk
(stringed instniment), and bamboo (flute). The nine relationships follow.
These are the four senior and four junior generations ; the middle,
the ninth, being of course the learner himself. And the ten serves
to set forth the ten moral relationships, being affection between
father and son, concord between husband and wife, the proper dealings
between the elder and younger brother, proprieties between juniors
and seniors, the friendship of friends, and the relationship that should
exist between prince and minister. Then comes the reason of the
inclusion of these things in the primer : " All teachers of youth should
give lucid explanations, supply illustrations and proofs, and clearly
mark the stops." But this kind of teaching, even if it ever comes
into the mind of the teacher, is postponed until that day which i?
known as " to-morrow " the day that never comes.
After this opening section comes an outline of what the boy will
have to study later on, beginning with the sayings of the ancient
sages Confucius and Mencius. Next comes an outline of Chinese
history down to the year 1644 A.D., when it comes to an abrupt stop.
Why t Because no history of the present dynasty must be taught in
the schools. Nowadays in England, unless he has already compiled
an autobiography, a great man is scarcely dead before his " life "
appears. What would you think of a law that enacted that no
biography of a man should be written until his family had become
extinct 1 For that is really what this taboo of current history
amounts to.
And after all these things, the little book is brought to a con
clusion with sundry reasons why the child should study, and many
inducements to him to give himself to letters.
Except in mission-schools, and secondary schools where the
" New Learning " is taught, the scholar follows his predecessors along
104 THE SONS OF HAN
a well-beaten track. An early task is the learning of a little book
called the Hundred Family Names. It is a list of the various char
acters used as surnames in China. The nearest thing we have to it
in the home country is a Directory ; and very few of you will think
there is much " fun " in learning to repeat a book like that!
After this comes the learning of the Classics proper : The Confucian
Analect, The Great Learning, The Doctrine of the Mean, Mencius, The
Book of Changes, The Book of the Odes, Chinese History, and the one
book Confucius is supposed to have written, The Annals of Spring and
Autumn. But unless the youth is destined to become a scholar, and
regularly sit for the Government competitive examinations, his educa
tion ends long before he gets through this long list.
A year or so at school : playing truant whenever he can ; learning
what he is made to by means of the cane (or whatever takes its place
in the Chinese school) ; repeating a book or two ; and then leaving to
be apprenticed to some trade, or to help his people in the fields this
is the history of many a boy s " education ; " and he leaves school
without knowledge to write the shortest letter, or read the simplest
book. But if his school-days have been few and often sorrowful,
he soon finds that he is now in a realm where the hours are long,
where prizes are few, and only to be obtained after plenty of hard
work. In this school of the world he learns both how to make the
best of a bargain, and the best of a life that is all too crooked. Even
whilst we are thinking of him as a child, he is married to a girl, scarcely
in her teens, it may be ; grows up, grows old, and leaves the days of
childhood far behind.
His little sister has her well-trodden path to pursue. Far too early,
the few toys she has are put on one side. Quite pathetic is it to watch
her working away like a little old woman. Often she is sold away
from home for a few dollars, to become a daughter-in-law in a strange
house. In reality this means that she becomes a household drudge.
BOYS AND GIRLS 105
When she is old enough, the son takes her to be his wife. By and by
she too will grow up, have children of her own, get daughters-in-law
under her thumb, and have the joy (?) of treating them as she was
treated when a little girl.
Going about among the common people of China, the traveller
cannot help wondering where the laughing child-spirit has gone !
Why has it left these, who, but a few years ago, were merry children ?
Then, on thinking of their monotonous lives, their dreary round of
struggle against disease and disabilities, there comes the sense of
the hopelessness that is like a cloud over all. There is for them no
" sure and certain hope." How much there is against them ! How
little to inspire them ! Each seeks to live for himself by living on
others : their oft-quoted proverb, " Big fish eat little fish : little
fish eat shrimps : shrimps eat mud," but too well telling the story of
their lives the " big fish " being of course the officials, and so on,
down to the " mud " : the common people.
O pray that many such, ere the light of life flickers out, may get
to know Jesus, the Light that is the life of men.
CHAPTER VII
PLAYTIME
AFTER school is over, the children are supposed to walk soberly
back to their homes. They must on no account hop, or skip
or run, or whoop, or sing, and so on. Such is the rule that is read
out each term on the re-assembling of the day-school. But like a
good many other rules in this land, it is seldom kept.
They must not play in the streets ! So very often, when little
boys are playing together in some side-street, you might hear one
of them suddenly say, " Teacher s coming ! " his quick eye has
seen the old pundit, or perhaps the missionary, coming round the
corner. In an instant all play is over ; the coins they have been play
ing with are scrambled for ; there is a rush into the nearest friendly
house, or down some alley- way ; and by the time the teacher arrives
there are only two or three boys to be seen, who politely step aside
and bow in the most gentlemanly manner, scarcely daring to raise
their innocent-looking faces to him ! He, of course, generally pretends
that he has seen nothing, unless there has been other than innocent
fun. Indeed, one of the first things the young missionary has to learn
is that for many things he must have no eyes, and in some cases he must
leave his ears at home. Chinese boys and girls are great tale-bearers ;
and a fault-finding teacher would have a very bad time of it if he
listened to all their complaints, or corrected his pupils for every trifling
fault.
If two children quarrel, or if two students have a battle of words
106
PLAYTIME
107
with each other, both sides eventually rush to the master, each anxious
to get his story told first. Both
stories have to be listened to ; and
very little must be said until many
questions have been asked of other
people. But it is generally a safe
rule to be prepared to find that the
one who most fiercely accuses the
other is the real culprit.
As in other lands, playtime comes
as a welcome friend to the young folk
of China. In the cool of the sum
mer evening, or in the sunny winter
afternoons, when there is no school
or no home duty to call them away,
you may often find the children at
play. At such times the playground
of the mission school, the quieter
side-street, the village green, or the
vacant places on the city walls, are
their favourite haunts. Sometimes
you will find them playing at soldiers,
or Mandarins, or pretending to be
coolies carrying little loads on a
bamboo pole, and trying to imitate
the coolie sing-song cry as they trot
along ; or again they pretend to be
cooks and make the most delicious
mudpies ! And then it is quite a SWINGING IN THE PLAYGRO UN-D.
common sight to see them playing at
weddings and funerals, just as Jesus Christ saw the little ones doing
io3
THE SONS OF HAN
in the market places of the towns of Palestine. A good many of
their games are imitations of grown-up people at work, or engaged
in the social duties of life. For, like true children, the little almond-
eyed and black-haired celestials live for some time in the city of Make-
PASTOR LIU S SON WINNING THE POLE JUMP AT THE HANKOW COLLEGE SPORTS,
MAY, 1907.
believe, which, as you know, is the chief town of the country of
Nurserydom.
Many of their games are like those played by their brothers and
sisters the world over : Blind Man s Buff, Catch-as-Catch-Can, The
Wolf and the Lambs (this they sometimes call The Hawk and the
Chickens "), Hopping, Prisoner s Base, and so on. They are also
PLA YTIME 109
learning to play other games in the Mission Schools, and are getting
quite fond of the more manly games such as football, cricket, tennis,
hockey, and all kinds of running and jumping.
Of the truly native games there are a great number. Some, as
I have already mentioned, are purely imitative. Others teach
quickness of action, or of thought. Let me describe one of this
latter kind at which I have often watched boys, both small and great,
playing with much enjoyment to themselves as well as to the
onlookers.
It is an " Apology Game," and consists of trying to make another
boy " lose face " whilst at the same time each player is keen on
" saving " his own. Some score of boys sit down on their heels in a
circle, with their faces towards the centre. One boy is then counted
out and a handkerchief given him. He steps out of the ring and
commences to run round from left to right. There is no song sung,
as in some of the children s games, but there is plenty of excitement
and the game is really a very quick one. For as the " out " man runs
round, he tries to catch some one who is not on the watch. He drops
the handkerchief lightly on the back or behind the heels of the unsus
pecting one, and without a moment s pause still keeps on his run.
But the little fellows soon notice that his hand is empty. Round
go their heads more quickly than can be described. And just in time,
one of them finds the white thing on his shoulder or on the ground
behind him. He is up in a moment ; and off round the ring as fast
as his legs can carry him, lest the " out " man catch him. On coming
to the vacant place the erstwhile " out " man squats down, and
watches keenly the tactics of his successor with the kandkerchief.
Perhaps it has been noticed that one of the number is not watchful,
or is so taken up with hoping that some one else may be caught as
to forget all about his own danger. Lightly as a feather the tell-tale
is dropped on him. On goes the quick runner without a pause. Not
110
THE SONS OF HAN
another boy looks at the unconscious victim, who is presently awakened
by a vigorous slap on the back when the " out " man has completed
the circuit after dropping the handkerchief. Then there is much
jeering and shouting at him. All his playmates, still squatting
on their heels, laugh heartily at him as he goes into the middle of
the ring and makes a low bow all round. He has very much " lost
face" ; and now with all his wits about him, he becomes the " out "
man and tries to score off somebody else.
Girls have games that are the counterpart of those played by the
boys. One favourite is a " Garden " game ; they sometimes call it
" Watering Flowers."
The lady (one of the
girls) makes a beautiful
garden, planting in it
many exquisite flowers,
represented by her
playmates. Then,
gathering her apron up
in front to make it look
like a bowl, she goes
round the sitting chil
dren, pretending to
sprinkle them with
water lest the sun scorch them and they wither away. All the time
she sings a little ditty about her " beautiful flowers." After watering
them she finds she has to go away ; so calling her little slave-girl (the
other " out " one), she bids her to be on the watch lest a thief should
come and steal the flowers. Whilst the lady s back is turned, the
naughty slave " steals one," that is, places her over in a corner.
When the lady comes back she soon finds out the theft. " One
of my flowers is gone ! Who has stolen it ? " she cries.
CHINESE WILD FLOWERS.
PLAYTIME in
" A man came and stole it. I ran after him, but could not overtake
him," is the ready answer.
Once again the flowers are watered, and the slave told to watch while
the mistress " goes to have her rice." Now is the chance to steal
one more of the blossoming plants. When the new loss is enquired
about, the same story is told. And so the game goes on until all
the " flowers " are " stolen." All sorts of stories are made up by
the wicked slave to account for the successive misfortunes, such as " a
chicken ate it," or " a pig swallowed it," as one flower after another
goes. With all the flowers gone the lady falls to crying, gets very
angry, and beats the slave girl, who runs away.
Even while the lady is bewailing the loss of her beloved plants
the voice of a flower-seller is heard in the street. " Who ll buy my
pretty flowers ? " (It is the slave going by with all the children going
after her, holding on to each other s skirts). So, thinking it a good
opportunity to fill up her now empty garden, the mistress comes out,
recognizes her stolen flowers, and begins to " steal " back her property
by taking one and another away from the end of the " string." After
the last one has been safely replanted in the garden she comes to the
naughty slave, who is still going round crying out " Flowers for sale !
Pretty flowers for sale," all unconscious that the plants have been taken
back. Of course a " pretence whipping " follows. The children shriek
with laughter as one and another is stolen, or is taken back again,
and the game closes with a kind of screaming match, the excitement
being at its height during the " whipping " given to the naughty thief.
It is very good exercise, alike for lungs and limbs and tempers.
Sometimes the boys and girls play together. I have just come
from a little village where I saw some fairly big girls joining in
a merry game of shuttlecock along with some smaller boys. The
shuttlecock is made of a few feathers or paper shavings fastened to two
or three cash to give it weight. This is kicked up in the air with heel
112
THE SONS OF HAN
and toe and inner side of the foot ; the player spins round on one foot,
and is just in time to kick the shuttlecock high in the air again ere it
falls to the ground. The one who keeps it up longest, wins.
Toys there are in plenty on the street stalls. Nowadays no toy
shop is considered well stocked unless there is a collection of the
commonest of common foreign productions as well. The native
RIDING THE WATER BUFFALO.
toys are mostly of the " cheap and nasty " kind. True, they can
be bought for next to nothing, and are but meant to please the child
for a passing moment. So you will not be surprised to hear that
" Dolly," the dearly loved child of the little girlie-mother, is unknown.
(This refers to the native article ; in Mission schools where boxes of
gifts come out from home, or in the Ports where the influence of
PLAYTIME 113
foreign toys is beginning to be felt, dolls are of course found in plenty.)
There are some things, figures made of clay and painted in gaudy
colours, that might be called " dolls," but as these so easily come to
pieces, their life is too short to allow of any great attachment to them
on the part of the little girl.
A few years ago several of us went to see a celebrated temple.
One of our number was a little English girl of some six summers. Of
course she could not dream of going without taking dolly to see the
strange sights, could she ? For three hours the journey was by boat.
After this we had to walk through a Chinese village to get to the
temple. As it was a busy time for the farmers, most of the men were
in the fields hard at work, and the inevitable crowd that came out to
see us consisted mostly of women and children. However, we went
through the place quietly enough, had a good look round the temple,
and saw all its wonders. One of the sights was a hole in the rock, from
which it is said rice once flowed to save the starving people in a time
of famine. You see, the people had been praying to the idols and
making vows ; so there had to be some answer to their prayers or they
would have smashed up temple and priests and idols and all ! Some
of us were inclined to think that the miracle was accomplished in this
way : There was a little tunnel leading to a cave just above this wonder
ful hole ; some bags of rice must have been taken there in the night,
and when the time for the miracle came along, one of the priests just
emptied the rice down the small funnel-like cleft. Soon afterwards
the rain came in plenty, and good crops followed. There, to-day,
is an inscription upon the rock,^telling of the wonderful thing thit
happened long ago and setting forth the power of the idols within
the temple.
Having seen all there was to be seen, and having had a good scramble
on the hills behind this sacred spot, the time came for us to return.
As we came back to the village a great crowd came out to meet us.
H
114 THE SONS OF HAN
I do not know what wild story had been going the rounds, but you
can guess something of what it was like when I tell you that these
people had all come out to see " the little dwarf mother and her wonder
fully tiny baby ! " Never having seen a doll before, they thought this
one was really alive ! Much to the dismay of the little girl, who thought
something dreadful was sure to happen to dolly, the rough village folk
would not be content till they had fingered the doll, and satisfied
themselves that it was only made of china.
Peep-shows of all kinds are very popular with the young folk, and
even with those who are old in years but not in spirit. It is quite
a common sight to see the showman with his little stand of pictures,
which he exhibits one at a time to the open-eyed and open-mouthed
audience gathered round him. He can describe any picture at
a moment s notice ; for if he has not " kissed the blarney stone " he
has at least gone through the Chinese equivalent to this performance.
What he does not know, very few of his audience do, and knowing
that it is generally safe to presume on human ignorance, he just
makes up his stories about the subject matter of his picture as he goes
along, regardless of truth. (It must have been from some such a story
teller that my teacher got the startling information that foreign
fowls were as strange as the foreign people in their habits, for the hens
in foreign countries laid square eggs ! It was difficult for him to be
lieve me when I told him the truth about the matter.)
Punch and Judy is a very popular entertainment. And although
Punch is not exactly like our Punch, and Judy is not the same as
our Judy, yet Dog Toby is there, very much in evidence, with his
ruffle round his neck, looking like an old friend.
The Chinese are never tired of looking at any new or interesting
object. A very little thing will not only gather but suffice to keep a
crowd. Not long ago, in a country village, the children so filled the
little chapel that grown-up folk had no room to sit down, although
PLAYTIME 115
they had come to service. As most of the youngsters had been
there for two or three hours, I felt called on to suggest that it was
long past their supper time, and that, as they had seen all there was
to be seen, they had better run along home ; adding, a 3 a concluding
sentence, " You must be quite tired of looking at us."
" Tired of looking ! " said the old evangelist, " they would look
at you all day, and then come back to-morrow as though they had
never seen you ! "
And he was quite correct in his estimation of their " looking "
propensities. All day long will they stand watching the theatricals,
though they have but the faintest notion of what it is all about.
We have already seen to what an extent money enters into
the games and thoughts of the children. One money-game is played
in this way : Two holes are made about ten feet apart ; then,
with one foot behind one hole each boy in turn tries to lob his cash
in or near to the other hole. When all have pitched their coins, the
one in or nearest the hole has the privilege of spanning. If by putting
his thumb on his own coin he can reach any other coins with his little
ringer, he keeps them.
A great favourite with the children is the game called " Rolling
Cash." The cash is held upright between the thumb and finger about
three feet from the ground, and dropped so as to strike on a piece of
sloping brick or tile, when it bounds off and rolls away. When all
have played, the boy whose cash has rolled the farthest tries, by pitching
his own coin, to hit those of his opponents. All he hits he wins. If
he misses, all take up their coins, and a new game begins.
Thus in one way or another the Chinese child manages to get a good
many hours of play out of the year. Even if there are no companions
to join with him in a round game, there is his top to spin, or his kite
to fly. This latter amusement he goes in for with much zest every
spring and summer, in company with many of his adult fellow-country-
n6
THE SONS OF HAN
men. Or, if these things do not please him, there is the solitary and
patient watching by the waterside, when, like his Western brother,
he drowns a good many worms in his attempts to catch fish with his
hook and line.
As these little ones grow
up, they seem to grow out of
all these games, with the ex
ceptions of the all-alluring
kite-flying and the all-pre
vailing gambling. Fun and
innocence are no longer twin-
sisters, like good fairies, pre
siding over the amusements
of the people. Gambling,
the opium-pipe, the theatre,
and other wicked things, are
all too much mixed up with
the adult Chinaman s recrea
tion, so we will not talk
about it here.
Little girls, as they grow
up, get more and more shut
into their homes ; and ladies
have to find their amuse
ments mostly within their
own houses. Until Christ,
with His saving power, comes into their lives, they think very little
of the difference between right and wrong in the affairs of life ; and as
they are shut out so much from the beauty of the world and the joy of
life, we must not wonder, nor must we think too hardly of them, if
their leisure time is given up to gambling with cards, dice, or dominoes.
A HAPPY "MOTHER" WITH HER DOLLY.
PLAYTIME 117
If they have social intercourse among themselves, then talking scandal,
and the use of the opium-pipe, pass away the tedious hour.
Let us pray for, as we pity, the women of the Flowery Land.
Hundreds and thousands have had but little training as girls. Few
can read, and fewer still can write. Very few of them have the
mother s joy of seeking to bring up their children to speak truth, do
good, and serve Christ. A prison life is their s : broken into only
by an occasional visit to a temple or theatre, or a trip to the old home.
Even then, when they do get out of their prison walls, it is but to be
carried in a closely covered sedan chair, seeing and being seen but
little, as they are borne swiftly along on the shoulders of their sturdy
bearers.
CHAPTER VIII
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS
WE frequently hear it said that the life of the Chinaman is one
ceaseless round of toil. His working day is from sunrise to
sunset although it must be confessed that he takes a good many
pulls at his pipe and drinks a good many basins of tea in the course of
a day, all of which can by no means be done in a hurry. The school
boys are equally fortunate (or unfortunate) in the amount of time
they have to spend over their books. No Saturday or Wednesday
half-holiday comes to vary the monotony of school routine ; and, until
recently, the work went on for seven days a week. Lately, however,
owing to the influence of the Missionary Schools, the Government
Schools in this district are being closed on Sundays. Shopkeepers and
merchants, with the exception of the few who have put away their idols
and turned to Jesus Christ for salvation, have not yet learned to value
the Day of Rest. Business goes on as usual. Here and there one
may possibly find a shop with the shutters up, and a notice outside
to the effect that " To-day is Worship Day : no business is done."
But the majority of the buyers and sellers are as busy as ever, making
the contrast all the greater when, after a long walk through the busy
streets, one turns into the Worship Hall to find the congregation all
quietly waiting the arrival of the preacher.
It must not be supposed, however, that the Chinaman works away
from morn till eve, day in and day out, from year s end to year s end,
without a holiday. China does not keep Christmas as a holiday, nor
118
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS
119
has she followed the example of Japan, in making her New Years
Day the same as ours. China s New Year comes about the end of
January or beginning of February. But when it does come, it is the
event of the year. For weeks beforehand everybody is talking of and
preparing for it. Hung out on the roofs of houses, or suspended on
poles over the doorways,
no matter where one goes,
fish, ducks, chicken, and
long strips of pork can be
seen drying in the sun.
These are the delicacies
that are being "saved up"
for the feastings that are
to come.
Inside the houses the
people are also very busy.
In most of the eighteen
provinces the motto at
this time is " Away with
the old : change it for
new ! " And this means,
amongst many other
things, an annual " clean
up " of the house. In the
south, the wooden beds are
taken to pieces and thrown
into the lakes or canals ; tables, chairs, buckets, and other furniture,
getting a like treatment. After they have had a good soak, they are
scrubbed, dried in the sun, put together again, and restored to their
accustomed places.
At such times one is glad to remember that very little food is eaten
THE REED CUTTER.
I2O
THE SONS OF HAN
raw by the Celestials, for it is no uncommon sight to see a group of
people by the side of some dirty puddle or canal, washing furniture,
clothes, rice, and vegetables for their dinner, all in the same water.
And such water ! If " cleanliness is next to godliness," the Chinese
have a lot of lost ground to make up in their pursuit of both ideals.
Still, at New Year time, they do " make an effort " to get their
houses clean. Not only is the furniture scrubbed, the whole place
A COUNTRY TEMPLE.
(Note Ik} hu*e cails of i:icjnse drying in the sun.)
gets a good over-hauling. Even the beaten mud floor has a better
sweeping than usual. The " old " kitchen god, who has done duty for
the " old " year, hearing and seeing all that has happened in the
kitchen, is taken down from his shrine over the stove, has some sweet
sticky stuff smeared over his lips (either to keep his lips shut, so that
he cannot tell tales, or else to make him say " sweet " things about the
household), and then, by being burnt in the fire, is sent on his way to
the spirit-world to give in his report. The old mottoes, or rather any
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS 121
shreds of them that may remain, are taken off the door posts, and the
" door gods " come off the front doors themselves ; and ere the
visitor goes round on New Year s Day all these have been " changed
for new."
On this great feast day a town wears quite a gala appearance. Each
house is resplendent with new door gods, and decorated with mottoes
written with black ink on long strips of red paper (unless the family
is in mourning, in which case the paper is of a blue colour).
Millions of Chinese have no other homes but their boats. These
are by no means behindhand with their preparations. Although the
regulation door-post is lacking, there is the mast, and on the front of
the mast, a few feet from the deck, the motto finds its place. Some
times the bow of the ship is decorated with the red strip, with its well-
turned sentence of good wish or maxim.
Another important item in the preparations is the making of the
New Year cakes, or puddings. One New Year s time I was living in
a Chinese house with a native pastor, so I had a good opportunity of
seeing how it was done. For two days a man was kept busily at work
preparing the rice. After being soaked in water until the grain was
fairly soft, it was thrown, handful by handful, into the little stone
mill, and ground into a paste, which was collected in a wooden bucket as
it ran from between the two stones. When the good people thought
there was enough of this rice paste (i.e., as much as they could possibly
afford, and a little more), the kitchen door was lifted down off its
wooden hinges, wiped over with a fairly clean cloth, and used as a
kneading board to work up the dough on. The " head of the house
hold," the children, and several friends of the family, all came in to
lend a hand ; in fact it was just such a merry time as we used to have
when stirring the Christmas pudding at home ! Then came the boiling,
or rather steaming, of the puddings. This was done on the household
cooking stove, which is very much like an old-fashioned copper, but has a
122
THE SONS OF HAN
much shallower pan. The puddings were put into little wooden moulds :
some having an ornamental surface on the upper side, others round and
large. The New Year cakes cooked in the
small moulds would be used for giving
away to visitors, whilst the larger puddings
were to be cut up into squares and warmed
up with the food at each meal for some
time to come. Most of them were
flavoured with dark brown sugar only
(excepting, of course, the flavour they
got from the door on which they had
been so mercilessly thumped and rolled) ;
but others, the pride of the family, had
little lumps of fat pork in them as well as
the sugar !
To me the boiling was the worst part
of it all, worse even than having to join
in the eating of the pudding later on, and
trying to look as if I enjoyed it as much
as the other members of the household.
The fire under the copper was kept going
night and day until the last pudding was
cooked. As their only fuel consisted of
bundles of grass from the hillside, with a
few half-dry pine branches, that fire
smoked prodigiously. This would not
have mattered so much, if the staircase
that led from the kitchen to my room in the loft had not been converted
into a chimney for the acrid smoke that filled the whole house. Eating,
sleeping, writing, or receiving visitors, it was all the same enveloped
in a cloud of smoke that seemed verily to bite the eyes, so pungent was it.
ALL DONE !
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS 123
You may be sure that by the time the last of those puddings was cooked
my eyes were as red as the face of the busy housewife, and ached as
much as did her tired arms.
New Year s Eve comes. Out in the streets all is confusion worse
confounded. Every one seems to be busy collecting his debts or trying
to escape from his creditors. Many a bitter quarrel, much cursing
and reviling, and a good deal of giving and taking of blows is there at
the time when we should be solemnly thinking of the passing of the old
year. This kind of thing goes on, though gradually getting less and
less, all the night. Morning dawns ; and still in broad daylight men
may be seen, looking haggard and worn, unwashed and unshorn, going
about with a lighted lantern, " making believe" it is still night time,
hoping to get a few more cash out of some unlucky debtor.
By this time a strange quiet is settling down on the city. For soon
after midnight the signal cracker would be fired that seemed to set
the whole cracker-artillery of the land in action. Such a rattle and
sputter, such a popping and banging then takes place, that only those
who have tried to sleep through it can fully understand what the first
hour or two of the New Year in a Chinese city really means. Then
shops are shut up, streets are emptied of their busy throngs, and the
New Year Festival has begun.
On coming down to breakfast in the morning, the resident in China
will find all the house servants awaiting him, arrayed in their best
clothes. The Number One (head servant) begins the ceremony of
congratulation, which is the making of a profound bow and the ejacula
tion of the magic formula, " Kung-shi, kung-shi," which may be
interpreted to mean, " I congratulate you." Perhaps you miss the
gardener, or one of the other servants, from the little group. You
do not need to ask any questions. Presently, when the first lot of
" congratulators " have gone out, in comes the missing one wearing
the clothes belonging to the cook or the " boy ! " He evidently is in
124 TH E S NS OF HAN
low water financially, or else has left his best clothes at home. But
what matters it ? He is quite ready to borrow, and the other is as
willing to lend. His " face is saved," the proprieties are attended to,
and all are satisfied.
On New Year s Day unlucky words such as " death" or " disease"
must on no account be uttered. No scolding words must be used.
Were the word " loss " to be mentioned it would be most unfortunate, as
bad luck for the year would follow. All must be joy and gladness. The
past must be forgotten. The sorrows of the Old Year must be buried in
the Old Year s grave ; at least for the first few days of the New. The
sight of all sights is to see the fathers proudly leading about their
children, prettily dressed in their gaily coloured silks or cottons. Even
the coolies have on their long gowns ; and every one puts on all the
" best clothes " he has. To do this there has been a great raid on the
pawnshops (by the way, they do not call a pawnbroker " Uncle "
out here but" Great Aunt " just the other way round, of course, like
every thing else), though often to get the clothes " out," tools and other
things go " in."
As creditors do not dun for money, and as all business is suspended,
both of the official and of the commercial kind, the New Year com
mences peacefully enough. Then comes a change. The holidays
continue for some ten to twenty days, and whatever good resolutions
may have been made when the year dawned are quickly forgotten.
The rattle of dice and dominoes is heard on every hand ; and there
seems to be a special license for the gamblers during the first fort
night. For, as the new kitchen god is not put up in his shrine during
this period, and as the yamens are closed as well, all moral and official
restraint is assumed not to exist.
Slowly, but surely, however, Christianity is capturing the New Year
holiday. In many districts the first month of the year is a golden
opportunity for the missionary to gather together the converts, and
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS 125
tho:,e interested in the trath, for conferences, Bible study, and general
instruction ; for it is the time when there is nothing to be done in
the fields, and when there is very little work in connexion with the
shops.
One of the first questions a visitor asks at this festival time is,
Why do they fire off all these crackers ? For not only at New Year
time, but on all festive occasions, weddings and funerals and the
like, the sputter of crackers, firing of guns, and banging of gongs,
are sure to be heard. There is a custom in connexion with some
temples to fire off two loud double-crackers (one explosion taking
place on the ground and the other in mid-air) before the temple
doors are opened in the morning ; the ceremony being repeated before
they are closed again at night. On asking a Chinese gentlemen
why this was done, he replied, " It s just an old custom : there is
no meaning attached to it." However, I pointed out that the very
names given to the performance in that locality, namely, " Door-
opener " and " Door-closer " seemed to demand that there was some
superstition connected with it, so he promised to make inquiries for
me and let me know the result laten
As I had surmised, there was not only one explanation .given,
but several, each supposed to account for the origin of the practice.
But, as he said, nowadays the people do it because it is " the correct
thing " to do, and give very little, if any, thought as to its origin.
One of the stories told about the origin of cracker-firing, and the
one most generally accepted, is as follows:
Ever so many years ago there was a good man ramed Li Muh,
who lived in a house on a mountain. Like most good men he had
many enemies ; amongst them being some neighbours who sent
wicked mountain spirits to disturb and injure him. For a long time
Li Muh endured all their torments, not knowing how to get rid of his
unwelcome visitors. One day, as he was filling some hollow bamboo
126 THE SONS OF HAN
tubes with gunpowder, a happy thought came to him ; and calling
all the spirits to come to a flat threshing-floor in front of his house,
he fired off these wooden guns at them. The spirits were not only
successfully driven off on this occasion, but were so frightened by
the noise and flashes of the explosions of these squibs, that they
never dared to return to the place. So ever afterwards Li Muh was
left in peace. And of course from that time onward the Chinese
people everywhere adopted this plan of scaring away the tormenting
spirits.
The reason for pasting the door-gods on the outside doors of the
house is of a somewhat similar origin. Every one knows that these
two fierce looking warriors, armed to the teeth, are to guard the
entrance to the house and protect the household from evil. As in
the case of firing off crackers, the origin of the custom is not thought
of by the common people, and nothing but the favourite explanation
of " old custom " would be given if a Celestial were asked at New
Year time why he was pasting those ugly pictures on his front doors.
They came to be used in the following way :
Long years ago, in the Tung Dynasty, the old Emperor fell sick.
All the evil spirits were very glad of this, and to prevent his getting
well again they came in crowds every night to annoy him and so
prevent his sleeping. All night long they kept throwing stones
and bricks and other things, making a dreadful noise. At last the
old Emperor could stand it no longer, and took counsel with his
warriors as to the best thing to be done to stop the thing that was
preventing his recovery. Two very brave soldiers thereupon volun
teered to stand all night outside his door with drawn swords, and
keep the wicked devils away. This they did most successfully.
But the Emperor did not like to think of such brave men getting
no sleep night after night. So, knowing that spirits are really very
stupid, he had the portrait of these two warriors painted on boards,
FESTIVALS AXD HOLIDAYS 127
and placed just outside the doors, where these men usually stood.
The ruse was successful. The spirits, thinking that the armed men
were going to stand there for ever, gave up persecuting the Emperor
and never returned to annoy him any more. He recovered from his
sickness, and the cause of his recovery soon spread all over the country.
From that time forth the common people adopted this plan of keeping
evil spirits away from their dwellings. And that is the reason why
every house, with the exception of the dwellings of Christians, is
decorated with pictures of these awful looking fierce warriors.
The New Year festivities reach a climax at the first full moon,
the fifteenth of the month. On this night every house is brilliantly
lighted up with lanterns, giving the whole place a most festive appear
ance. From this custom the Fifteenth of the First Moon gets the
name of the " Feast of Lanterns." It is evidently a surviving custom
connected with the worship of the moon in bygone ages.
This chapter would be far too long if every festival was fully
described. Suffice it to mention the names of the principal Feast
Days of the year, with a few notes on the more important ones :
New Year s Day ; Feast of Lanterns (i5th of ist Moon) ; Festival
of the Dead (3rd Moon) ; Dragon Boat Festival (5th of the 5th Moon) ;
Ts ih Chiao (;th of 7th Moon) ; Mid Autumn Festival (8th of the
8th Moon) ; Chung Yang (gth of the gth Moon) ; and, lastly, The
Winter Solstice (nth Moon) the shortest day.
Of these, the next in importance to the New Year Festival is the
Ch ing Ming, or Festival of the Dead. This is the great day of Ances
tral Worship. Varying in detail according to local custom, some
400,000,000 people give themselves to the worship of the spirits of
the dead on this day. It means far more than the Decoration Day
of America does ; far more than the putting of a wreath on the grave
or tomb of the departed hero on the anniversary of his death ; and
far more, too, than the loving attention to the grave of the loved
128
THE SONS OF HAN
one gone before. In the Ancestral Halls, all over the Empire, sacri
fices are offered, and prayers said before the tablet that is there in
memory of the departed. But this tablet is not only in memory of
the departed ; it is firmly believed that the spirit of the deceased lives
in that little wooden tablet ; and to this spirit the sacrifices are offered
and the prayers said ; thus rendering the ser
vice something far more than a mere act of
homage in memory of the ancestor. It is wor
ship offered to spirits. The graves are also
visited ; and everywhere on this day can be
seen the little groups of worshippers with
trays of food offered in sacrifice, smoking in
cense sticks, and burning candles by the side
of the mounds of earth or the more elaborate
burial places of the rich ; and everywhere are
heard the weird voices of mourners calling
upon the ones who have gone from them to
that unknown country across the river of
death.
Ancestral worship, coupled with a belief
in the transmigration of souls (that is to
say that when any one dies they may be
re-born into a lower form of animal life), is
responsible for some very curious super
stitions. One is that animals with five toes are always con
sidered as sacred : they may not be killed and eaten in the ordinary
way. In the photograph, "A pig s grave," there are several points
on interest. A pig, on coming into this world, was found to have
an extra " toe," or as the Chinese say " had five claws." This con
clusively proved to the owner that in the previous state of existence
the animal had been a man : hence the five toes. The very natural
ANCESTRAL TABLE!.
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS
129
thought is, " He is somebody s ancestor ! What if it should prove
to be that my ancestor has been thus re-born ? " The man has no way
of finding out, so he errs on the safe side and treats the pig as sacred.
I am told that in Hanyang there is a Temple in which there are many
of such " freaks of nature " being carefully tended. When this
particular pig died, he was put into a coffin like an ordinary human
being, and had a proper funeral. Later on somebody in distress
Photo by]
THE PIG S GRAVE.
[L. C. F. TOMKINS.
came and prayed to the spirit of this " ancestor " for help in some
matter or another. Perhaps there was sickness or other misfortune
in the house and health or help was urgently required. The sick
one got better, or the trouble passed over after the prayer had been
offered at the pig s grave, and so the grateful worshipper has pre
sented a " pien," or complimentary tablet, to the spirit of the pig.
On this tablet in large letters is the inscription which may be translated
" Ask, and ye shall receive."
How strange that in a land where it is considered an intolerable
i
1 30 THE SONS OF HAN
thing to be called a " pig," one of these very animals should have
been made into a god !
Scholars tell us that the ancestral worship as practised now, is
by no means the same as the " Reverence of Ancestors " taught by
Confucius. Indeed we know that China s great sage never knew
where his own father was buried, and so could not have worshipped
at his graveside. At that early date there were no prayers and no
sacrifices. If this were the case now, there would be no opposition
to Ancestral Worship on the part of the missionaries. With the
present customs and beliefs connected with such worship, there can
be no countenance given to it by the Christian. While all would
have the memory of the dead a sacred thing, none can desire other
than the casting off the yoke of fear, false fear, and false worship,
that Ancestral Worship places on the neck of the Chinese race.
On the Qth of the gth Moon there is a further worshipping of
ancestors with sacrifices at the graves.
Next, both in order of time and importance, is the " Dragon Boat
Festival." There are two parts to the Feast. The one in which
all take an active part, the other in which the hard work is left to
the young men, while the majority play the part of enthusiastic
lookers-on. The first part centres round the gathering of the acorus
calamus at noontide, from the waterside. This is steeped in spirits,
and the potion drunk as a preventative from the summer epidemics
and complaints. The other part is the event which gives its name
to the Festival the racing of the Dragon Boats. This is a sort of
regatta, and is another of those instances the traveller comes across
so frequently in this land, when the custom survives long after its
origin has been forgotten.
The story is, that in the good old days of yore, a Chinese Emperor
took a dislike to his faithful adviser, an official beloved of the people,
and ordered him to be banished to a distant country. The poor
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS 131
old man was broken-hearted. Neither able to leave his beloved
homeland, nor to bear the disgrace of his unmerited punishment,
he plunged into the water to commit suicide. When the populace
saw this, they hurriedly launched their boats, and rowed with all the
strength they possessed to try and rescue the good old man from
his watery grave ; each man anxious to be the first to save him.
THE DRAGON PROCESSION.
(Only the head is seen in the pi:t.i:e ; t1:e body is supported by a num j.r if men following behind.)
Alas ! All too late, they arrived at the spot where Chu Yuan (for
that w r as his name) had sunk to rise no more. But each year after
wards, on the anniversary of his death, the 5th of the 5th Moon,
the people raced to the spot to look for his body. And this is the
story of the origin of Dragon Boat racing. Then they used their
ordinary little boats ; now of course they are long affairs, gorgeously
decorated and manned by many sturdy rowers.
1 32 THE SONS OF HAN
The people get so excited at these times, and so many accidents
and disturbances occur, that it is customary for the Officials to put
out proclamations forbidding these races, year by year. Yet the
people have their own way, and the proclamation has its usual " face
value " only ; that is to say, it would save the official " face " if any
trouble occurred through the official commands being disregarded.
As a general levy is made on every householder in each district
to meet the expenses of these races and the feasting and idolatrous
practices connected therewith, there is usually much petty persecu
tion of Christians at this time. Sometimes it really is because the
Christian cannot conscientiously pay the money for such customs that
always centre round the temple and the idol worship carried on there ;
and thereupon his house gets smashed or he himself beaten. At
other times it is a case of paying off old scores. The real reason not
being that the Christian does not pay this particular tax, but his not
paying gives some enemy an opportunity of settling an old score.
So a few bullies are got together, the man accused of setting himself
against the " traditions of the elders," and he is made to suffer in
this indirect way for some injury he has done to another in the day
before he knew anything about Christ or Christianity.
The feasts of the Seventh, Eighth, and Eleventh Moons are sur
vivals of the earlier worship of the heavenly bodies. In the Seventh
Moon the Weaving Maiden, a star in the constellation of Lyra, is
worshipped. Of course there is the usual story about her, and how
she got up there to her home among the stars, but it is too long to add
to this very long chapter.
In the Eighth Moon the Harvest Moon is worshipped. Sacrifices
are offered to the rising moon, laid out on the roofs or houses
and other suitable spots, while all over the city can be seen large
lanterns fixed on poles. Then in the Eleventh Moon is the worship
of the Sun. On this day the sun begins to return to the south ;
FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS
133
after this the nights get shorter and the days get longer, so it is
quite a fitting day for a feast. No matter what the origin of these
feasts was, it has long since been forgotten by the Chinese common
A YOUNG HARVESTER CARRYING HOME THE BARLEY.
people, and the celebration now consists of a good deal of eating
and drinking, of banging of gongs and firing of crackers, and of visits
to temples and worship of idols.
CHAPTER IX
A DAY OF REJOICING
YOU will have found out by this time that feasting is one of the
fine arts in China : something that is never out of place, and
always the one thing that must be in evidence on every important
occasion. Christmas Day without a Christmas dinner ! So would
it be to a Chinaman if a day of consequence were passed without
spreading a feast and calling in his friends to rejoice with him. At
the birth of the baby-boy a feast. When he has safely . completed
the circle," the first year a feast. When he first goes to school
a feast. When he is betrothed to a little girl a feast. When, later
on in life, the marriage ceremony takes place a feast. When a
little child comes to gladden his home a feast. When a quarrel
or lawsuit between him and somebody else is brought to a settlement
a feast. \Vhen he opens a new shop a feast. When he borrows
money with which to pay off some of his debts a feast. When he
buys a piece of ground a feast. At every important turn of his
life a feast. And at last, when he has completed the number of his
days and is laid in his coffin a feast. Then, some weeks or it may
be years, later, when the lucky day has been chosen for burying him
a feast. And all these feasts are above and beyond the holiday feasts
of which we have just been reading.
Long ere this, you will have come to the conclusion that there is
all too much of the dull drab of monotony about the everyday life
of the Chinaman, so you will not grudge him a time when he can make
A DAY OF REJOICING 135
merry with his friends. Least of all, will you hesitate to jhare injm
" Occasion of Joy," as he calls the Marriage Feast. At such times
let our only regret be that he is often tempted to spend so much more
money than he can afford over the rejoicing.
Ere the marriage feast is reached, however, there is a long and
roundabout road along which the parents and young couple must
travel. But as it will all sound so strange to those of you who have
never read of these things before, so unlike " our way," and therefore
" not just the best way of doing it," I should first like to telj you a
story.
One day, in the course of a conversation with a friendly Chinese
scholar on the local marriage customs, he aske i the following questions
" Is it true that in your honourable country the young men have
themselves to ask the young ladies if they will marry them ? "
" Yes : it is the general custom for the young man to propose to
the young lady of his choice."
" What a shameful thing ! Why, supposing the young lady should
say No, what then ? "
" If the lady is altogether unwilling to marry him, he would reaLze
that the No meant he must not pay his attentions to her any more.
Perhaps he might eventually be successful elsewhere."
" What shame ! What shame ! Why he would have no face left
at all ! How could a gentleman allow himself to be so disgraced ? "
Of course I explained a good many things that helped him to
understand the English position a little better ; but the proud Con-
fucianist would never be able to look upon a proposal in any but a
Chinese way. It would be, to him, a thing intolerable to be " refused."
And indeed, it is commonly reported that the intense dislike to foreigners
manifested on every possible occasion by a certain Chinese official,
is largely owing to his having been " refused " by a young lady during
his student days abroad.
136
THE SONS OF HAN
" But why do you English not employ a match-maker ? " con
tinued my friend. " It is so much more simple that way."
" Who is this match-maker ? What has the match-maker to
do ? " you ask.
W 7 ell ! Suppose the boy is growing up, and that he has not had a
bride chosen for him before he was born, or when he was a tiny baby.
A friend of the family will
say to the parents, " In
such and such a family
there is a girl who I think
would do for your son :
shall I see about making
the arrangements for a be
trothal ? " If the parents
are pleased with the propo
sition, off goes the match
maker (we will call this
personage he, although a
woman often acts in such a
matter) to the home of the
girl in question. Of course
he cannot go to any family,
or choose any girl that might
be pleasing to the boy s
parents. Several very important restrictions have to be remembered
by him. Let me tell you some of the rules that must be observed in
making a match of this kind.
The girl s surname must be different to that of the boy. Now as
there are not a very great number of surnames in China, a difficulty
often arises. For instance, there are thousands of people, each bearing
the name of Li or Wang or Chen. Even if two of the name of Li
A CHRISTIAN CIUDE AND BRIDEGROOM.
A DAY OF REJOICING 137
are not in the remotest degree related, and, if the young couple come
from two different provinces, still, being of the same surname, they
cannot marry. It is the same with any other surname. Just recently
I read of a band of robbers, who lived in an impregnable mountain
stronghold, from which they were wont to descend to the villages on
the plains and carry off people, holding them to ransom ; looting
and plundering wherever they went. Now all is changed. And the
bandits, who defied Government troops for decades, have become fairly
peaceful and law-abiding subjects of the Emperor. How ? Not
by being subdued by sword or gun. The main factor in their civiliza
tion was this : their sons grew up, and having only two or three surnames
amongst them, they had to go down to the plains to get wives for
their boys ; and so gradually they became related to the people all
around. Then their secret paths became known to so many people
that the old life was gradually given up. In this case the rule regarding
surnames was a blessing to all.
The prospective bridegroom ought not to look upon his bride s
face until after they are married. And so she ought not to be living
in the same village or town ; otherwise it would become very
inconvenient.
It is not desirable that she should be a girl whose home is in a
village very far away from that of the bridegroom s, as she would not
be able to visit her maternal home ; and should her husband ill-treat
her and behave cruelly towards her, she would have no relations to
take her part and give the bad husband a thrashing if she lived far
away.
Perhaps you have heard that all children in this land are regarded
as " born under an animal." We used to say much the same thing in
England, and believe that children were "born under a star." Even
now we use as a proverb the expression " Born under a lucky star,"
if a man succeeds in life ; or the reverse if he should make a failure
i 3 8 THE SOXS OF HAN
of his life s work. But in China the child is born under a certain
animal ; that is, each year represents an animal, and to be born in
the year that represents the Dragon is to be " born under the Dragon."
Some of these animals are " opposites." So if he were born under the
" Dragon " and she under the " Tiger " the match could never be
arranged !
The first thing the match-maker does is to get the " eight_char-
acters " written out. Some scribe gets his writing brush, and slate
or stone inkslab, and a stick of ink ; he pours a little water on the
slab, rubs up a little of the ink, and, after sucking the pen to make
it nice and round and pointed, he carefully takes a little of the ink
and writes out on a piece of tissue-like paper the year, the month,
the day, and the hour of birth of the girl, and then does the same for
the boy. Each date consists of two characters, eight in all on each
slip of paper. These are given to the parents of the young people ;
the boy s " eight " going to the girl s parents and vice versa. This
ceremony is called " Exchanging the Eight Characters."
Custom may vary as to the details, and each village may have
some little custom peculiar to itself. In some places again, the whole
thing may be quite different. But as far as I can ascertain the general
way of finding out if the " Eight Characters " are or are not favourable
is as follows. The " Eight Characters " of the girl are handed over
to the boy s parents. The head of the family places them on the
: r amily altar, that is before the image of the household god, under the
jar in which the incense sticks are burned. This is done to secure
the god s decision on the matter. For some three days they are left
in this spot, and the household doings carefully watched. Should
anything unlucky happen in the house during this time sickness,
death, breaking of crockery, etc. the sign is received as a token of
the god s displeasure, and the attempt to make a match given up.
If this ordeal is safely gone through, the fortune-teller is called
A DAY OF REJOICING 139
in to decide on the propitiousness or otherwise of the contemplated
union There is no lack of fortune-tellers in China ! One has only
to go along a street to meet with any number of these " gentry." There
they are, seated at their little tables, with little rolls of " fortunes
all prepared," or else prepared to dissect any character you may like
to choose and from it tell your fortune. One of these gentlemen I
came across recently had his table pitched in an angle of the city
wall, doing a " roaring trade " with the country-folk coming into
market. No wonder they believed in him ! His signboard was a
little banner stretched out at the back of him, above his head. And
this was the inscription on it, " I TELL FORTUNES LIKE A GOD." At
any rate he was collecting coin from these credulous people, and
deceiving them very very much like a MAN who has no regard for
truth, nor for the consequences of his clever fraud.
If the fortune-telling man has nothing evil to say against the
match (and if the fee is large enough, this can be made all r. ght),
the match-maker is able to begin his delicate business. Hitherto all
has been preliminary : now the real hard work commences. He
has to arrange the price of the bride. How much money will the
parents take as her dowry ? (The Chinese speak of it as " buying
the bride," and many from our own land take this with a Western
meaning, speaking of these little brides as being " sold into slavery."
Whatever may be our views on the subject, we must ever remember
that a greater part, if not all, of the money given by the parents of
the bridegroom goes directly to form her dowry or towards the
expenses of the wedding.) In arranging the financial side of the
betrothal the match-maker is invaluable. He probably knows to a
fraction the available money on the one side, and the " reserve price "
on the other side : his business is to so adjust everything that the
supply shall equal the demand, and then leave enough over to com
pensate him for his trouble in the matter.
140
THE SONS OF HAN
When all this is settled the exchange of presents takes place :
ring, bangles, ear-rings, and the hairpin to the girl, and a piece of
silk or cloth to the boy. This ratines the engagement ; an engagement
never to be broken without great loss of " face " and money.
MEMORIAL ARCH TO A WIDOW WHO NEVER RE-MARRIED.
Many and sad are the stories the missionary in China can tell
about the good-for-nothing scamp wedded to the bright well-trained
girl who has received the best of educations in a mission-school, all
because she was betrothed when a tiny tot. Now, rather than bring
disgrace upon her parents, she submits to a life-long martyrdom.
A DAY OF REJOICING 141
Or again, a bright young fellow has been mated to a girl who is half
an idiot by unthinking parents who got her " cheap " because she
was stupid. He does his best to get her trained a little at the mission-
school, but the one who might have been a help-meet is but a drag
and a handicap all his days. Sometimes it happens that a missionary
is able to set one of these slaves to foolishness free. A case in point
is where a little girl lost both her feet through frost-bite and neglect.
She was taken to the hospital to be cured, that is to have her legs
amputated properly and carefully dressed until the poor stumps
were healed. Later on she entered the school, proving an apt and
hard-working scholar. I have just been reading the document that
set her free from a marriage that would have meant life-long misery
to her. Both the parents and the man to whom she was betrothed
renounce all claim to her and make her over to the missionaries abso
lutely. There, in the mission-school, she will find a congenial life,
a work she loves and is well fitted to do, and become a great help to
the missionary who looks after the school.
But one is tempted to ask, what is one among so many ? What
of the hundreds who do not get their freedom ? A sad lot is theirs.
I think of one, as I write, who spent years in a mission-school, eventually
becoming a teacher in it : a bright, clever, well-read girl who would
have made any Chinese pastor a capable and helpful wife. She has
now to do needlework to help keep a gambling scamp of a husband
who makes her life a misery to her by his cruelty.
With betrothals arranged so early in life the wedding often takes
place years later. If, in the meantime, anything should happen
to the bridegroom-elect, it is regarded as a great calamity. You see
it cuts at the root of the genealogical tree, especially if he is the eldest
son. It is unfortunate for the girl, too, although her plight is by
no means as bad as that of the poor little girl-widow of India ; for it is
always possible for the Chinese girl to eventually marry some one
142 THE SONS OF PI AN
else. At the same time, there are cases where the girl has resolutely
preferred to remain a " widow " all her days. One very strange custom
must be mentioned : sometimes the girl chooses to be married to the
"spirit "of her betrothed. The ceremony is gone through with the
bride grasping the Ancestral Tablet in which the spirit of the departed
bridegroom is supposed to reside.
The Rev. E. Box, of Shanghai, tells a curious story about this
" being married to a spirit." A bride-elect died when quite young.
Later on in life, the poor student to whom she had been engaged
secured the much-coveted Hanlin degree, coming out top of his year
in the highest class of the Government examinations. Now it is
considered a very great honour indeed to have a Hanlin in the family ;
and although the little girl had been dead many years, and although
the young man had since married and was the father of a family, her
parents saw an opportunity of securing this much-to-be-coveted
honour. To have a Hanlin for a son-in-law was worth some sacrifice,
they thought, so they arranged to pay him a sum of money for the
honour of marrying the spirit of the dead girl to him. He, being like
most scholars, without much of this world s goods, gladly consented
to the proposed union. So they had a grand wedding : arranging
everything as if the whole affair was a real proper marriage. After
the ceremony, the girl s cofhn was removed to the young Hanlin s
burying ground ; and thus he became the son-in-law of these rich people.
All this time he had never left Peking, hundreds of miles away. If
he was present at the wedding at all, it was only " in spirit " when the
spirit-girl was married to him. But this was all as it should be
from the Chinese standpoint. The main thing was, that every ono
was satisfied. The bridegroom got some money which he was much
in need of, and the girl s family secured the much-coveted honour.
As you may suppose, the day of the wedding is not fixed by the
bride. The bridegroom s family do this for the young people. For
A DAY OF REJOICING
43
some time beforehand all is bustle and confusion : and great are the
preparations, taking up much time and money in both of the
homes concerned. Such a making of clothes and embroidering of
silk shoes ! Such wholesale sending out of invitations to the wedding
feast in large red envelopes about a foot long and five inches broad.
A PICTURESQUE CHINESE FARMSTEAD.
Such a hiring of decorations for the house, to say nothing of the flowery
chair in which the bride is to be carried to the house of her husband.
But into the details of these preparations we cannot enter. Suffice
it to say that when the eventful day arrives, everything that can be
done to make the day an "occasion of rejoicing" from a Chinese stand
point, has been done.
144 THE SONS OF HAN
All the bride s clothes and possessions have been sent on beforehand
to the bridegroom s home. The keys of her boxes are handed to him
as a symbol of the young man s authority over his bride. The flowery
chair in which she is to ride has been sent off to- her home, and guests
and bridegroom and all sit down to await her coming.
It must not be supposed that the young people have a new house
taken for them in a different part of the town or city to that in which
their parents live. Such a thing would not be at all nice from a
Chinese standpoint. Setting up house usually means that a separate
room is set apart for the use of the young people. As to eating and
other domestic arrangements, they will just take their share with the
rest of the family. The only difference, as far as household order
is concerned, is that the son gets a wife, while the mother-in-law gets
a new servant, and often gives her a pretty bad time of it. She herself
was a daughter-in-law once, and well remembers the trials of her early
married life. Now her turn has come, and she makes the most of it.
Most of the suffering comes to the young girl because of the Chinese
woman s ungoverned temper. She has not yet learnt the meaning
of self-control or temperance. So long as the parent has the power of
life and death over the child, and the child has no one to take up her
case, these things must be.
But a new force is working in Old China. There is one great factor
in this change that is coming over the thought of the Empire, and that
factor is the newspaper. Although at present the native Press is neither
truthful nor reliable, yet it gives publicity to a good many deeds of
darkness ; and when the Press comes to be more the power it is in other
civilized lands, public men will be compelled to take up the case of
the weak against the strong.
On the last day of the wedding preparations all is bustle at the
bride s home, preparing her for her journey. She herself has been
almost fasting for the last two or three days, eating hardly anything.
A DAY OF REJOICING 145
All this is supposed to be through grief at the leaving of the old home.
She refuses to be dressed in her wedding clothes, or rather makes a
pretence of refusing, all the time weeping copious tears at the prospect
of leaving her parents. As a natural consequence she gets very weak,
and is scarcely able to stand during the ceremony. If one judges by
appearances, she certainly needs the help of her " grannie," an old
woman who acts as her " bridesmaid." However, all know this
inability to stand up on her feet is the correct thing, and give little
heed to the girl, who may have been almost fainting from the long
imprisonment in the closely shut-up chair.
But by the time fixed for the departure, the bride is got ready.
Her face has been painted and powdered till there is no trace of the
original complexion to be seen. The yellow skin has disappeared,
and she is now like Snowdrop in the fairy-tale, with lily-white cheeks,
ruby-red lips, and tresses as black as ebony.
One interesting part of her dressing is the plucking out of all the
short hairs on her forehead. The girlish fringe disappears for ever ;
and the placid matronly brow takes its place. All the long hair is
then drawn back and carefully smoothed down. But in this matter,
custom is on the change, and the married woman with a fringe is
now to be seen.
When all is ready, the hired wedding dress of gorgeous crimson silk
embroidered with gold, is put on her, the " crown " is placed on her
head so that the strings of beads and pearls that hang down shall
hide her dazzling beauty, and over all is thrown a fine crimson silk
veil. This latter is never lifted until she has been duly married to the
young man, whose privilege it is to lift it in the bridal apartment.
And lastly, amidst a chorus of weeping and lamentation she is placed
in her flowery chair and borne on the shoulders of stalwart coolies to
her waiting bridegroom.
On a lucky day, numbers of these processions, varying in length
K
145
THE SONS OF HAN
and splendour, more or less tawdry, according to the wealth and
position of the bridegroom s family, may be seen wending their way
from village to village across the plain. Quite recently, during a short
ten miles ride, I counted ten such bridal escorts.
Generally towards evening the chair reaches its destination. It
is carried right into the guest hall of the house, and then when a strip
of carpet is laid down, the young bride steps out and walks right into
the living room.
If the young people are Christians, the wedding ceremony now
takes place, and before God the happy couple pledge themselves
to each other and receive a Christian blessing on their union. I have
sometimes married them in the Guest Hall itself. Customs may
vary in this respect with the locality. In many places the " ring "
is coming into fashion, for western ways are being very much copied
by the Chinese. Their own custom is a very beautiful and symbolic
one. Two cups are brought, joined together with a piece of red cord
two or three feet in length, and wine is poured into each. One cup
is first handed to the bridegroom, who takes a sip, and hands it back.
The other cup is then sipped by the bride in like manner. Then comes
the ceremony of mingling the cups, when the wine from the bride s
cup is poured into that of the bridegroom, signifying that she is to
be merged into his personality, and also conveying the idea of the
closeness of the union of man and wife. Both then drink in turn,
the bridegroom first. /
Such is the case when everything comes off without a hitch. But
many and long are the waitings at the house of the bridegroom, and
much heart-burning is there at times, because of the tardy arrival
of the bride. Last month I was at a wedding feast. We waited
a long time, but no bride came. Patience was exhausted, and the
feast we were to have partaken of after the ceremony, was in danger
of spoiling. It became evident that something had happened to
A DAY OF REJOICING 147
delay the bride. What was to be done ? " Eat the feast ! " said
the host, the father of the bridegroom. So in a very short time the
square tables, each holding eight people, were put in position, prayer
was offered for the young couple and the feast commenced. It must
have taken us considerably over an hour, perhaps nearly two hours,
to discuss the various dishes that were brought in and placed, one
at a time in the centre of the table, and into which everybody dived
for the luscious dainties that are the correct things to have at a
feast, but which taste much nicer than a description of them would
sound. Still the bride came not. Finally we had to leave, hoping
that the flowery chair with its precious burden would arrive in due
course, to report that there had been nothing more serious than the
usual delays.
. .And what are " the usual delays " ? In the case above mentioned,
it may have been that a contrary wind hindered the boat that was
bringing her to the city gate. Or it may have been that the rascals
who were carrying her refused more than once to go on unless some
more money were given them, even though the price had been already
fixed. Sometimes they will get the chair as far as the outside of
the Guest Hall, and then refuse to carry it over the threshold, unless
the extra money is produced. Of course they know the householder
will not wish to lose face over the matter, and so count on his wish
to keep up appearances, to make him pay the squeeze.
It is after the ceremony that the bride s first ordeal comes. Timid,
modest, a stranger in a strange house, unutterably lonely, she has
to submit to the cruel performance known as " teasing the bride."
All through the inhuman process, no matter what may be said to
her or about her, she must remain with closed eyes (what a mercy
that she is allowed that privilege ! ) and make no sign that she is
annoyed. At such times every good feeling may be outraged, but
she dare make neither retort nor rebuke.
148 THE SONS OF HAN
We leave her there ; sitting on the edge of her bed ; hoping that
the best of married life, such as it is in China, may be hers.
Writing of this, a far different scene comes to my memory. I
see a happy bride, receiving the congratulations of her friends and
neighbours after a Christian marriage. True, there is the same
" teasing of the bride," but the coarse jokes are entirely absent. All
is as full of joy and happiness for her as if she had been a bride in
Merry England. She was a girl who had been all her life in a mission-
school, was now being married to an earnest Christian Chinese, and
at her marriage was surrounded by the maidens who had been her
companions in the school, and who, although full of tears because
she was leaving them, were yet determined to make her wedding
day one to be long remembered with joy. So may all wedding days
be hallowed by the presence of the Saviour who giveth joys and addeth
no sorrows !
CHAPTER X
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS
ONE sunny Spring morning in 1899, a Chinese evangelist came
to me, telling a long story about a man who, although he had
been attending services for a few days only, had that morning at
family prayers in the evangelist s house expounded the Scriptures
in a truly remarkable manner. As the story was told me, I did
what perhaps ninety-nine out of every hundred missionaries would
have done sat and wondered. Wondered if this " sudden conversion "
was true ; wondered what motive prompted the man to take such
a prominent position so soon after confessing Christ ; and wondered
if he, like so many others, would be found wanting when the time
of testing should come !
The critical moment came some few days later, when a considerable
sum of money was offered him, if he would take up some shady Yamen
case, and he, without having a cash in his pocket at the time, at once
refused it, saying, " Two weeks ago I would have been glad of the
opportunity. But now I am a saved man and cannot touch unclean
money even though I am in want."
In the meantime I had met and talked with Mr. Wu, for this was
his name, learned something of his life story, and been impressed
by his sincerity and humility. He had been a slave to the opium
pipe for forty long years, and latterly had required to take such a
large amount of the drug to satisfy the craving, that he had been
ruined by the habit. Piece by piece the home had been broken up,
149
150
THE SONS OF HAN
more than one of his children had already been sold, and he was on
the point of selling his only son to get the necessary opium when one
day he felt a strange inclination to enter a house wherein he heard the
sound of a man preaching.
For years he had been connected with some Yamen, at one time
very prominent in any matters that required help in exchange for
"COME AND SEE THE MISSIONARY!"
cash, as is the usual way in Chinese Courts of Justice. He sunk lower
and lower in the social scale as the seductive poppy-juice stole away
more and more of his energy and morals, until towards the end, while
still recognized as a man of ability, none but the shadiest kind of
Yamen business was ever entrusted to him.
Twenty years ago, when on a journey, a man had met with him
and told him about " a God who forgave sins for nothing," and urged
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS 151
him to pray to this God. In total ignorance of the Gospel message,
Mr. Wu determined to say prayers to this unknown God, and for a
long time continued his petitions. What was his surprise, on entering
the little chapel that day, to hear an evangelist speaking of this very
God, all-merciful to forgive, all-powerful to save.
An opium-sot, ruined, with no hope even of getting money where
with to buy enough of the drug to satisfy the craving within, Mr.
Wu was constrained to cry out in agony, " Can He save me from my
opium-habit ? "
" Yes," was the ready reply, " if you trust Him fully. And not
only from that, but from all your other sins."
" I believe it : I will trust Him," came the response. Mr. Wu s
struggle to rise again had begun.
In the strength of this new-born trust in God, the pangs of the
one who tries to escape the opium-habit were triumphantly endured ;
and it was a happy man who, some little time later, presented me
with the sodden evil-smelling opium pipe that was never more to be
used save as an illustration of the power of God to save.
In depth of poverty, and in great bodily weakness, Mr. Wu set
to work to study the Scriptures and learn of Christ. During this
time he was ministered to by Christians almost as poor as himself,
who gladly shared their scanty fare with him.
Strength returned after a while. He was ashamed to live on
other people, and resolved to set about earning something for himself.
After thinking of many things he was shut up to one course a way
must be found of earning money which involved no use of capital to
start with. This prevented his either opening a shop, or engaging
in business. All suggestions, but one, were found unworkable : this
one exception was that he should become a doctor. I was consulted,
and at once raised the objection that he had received no training.
" Oh, that does not matter ! He reads the Chinese books well, and
152 THE SONS OF HAN
so can find out all about the treatment of diseases." And after
that all-inclusive reply what more could be said against it ? The only
remaining question I could ask was, " What would you like me to
do in the matter ? " And the answer showed that the course of
procedure had been well thought out. " Mr. Wu has the books,
and has a pair of spectacles (large ones, with tortoise-shell rims, too),
but has neither coat nor gown nor respectable hat. Does the pastor
see his way to help him ? "
The pastor had these very garments, as the Christians who asked
well knew ; and the next day saw Mr. Wu, arrayed in these " borrowed
plumes," beginning his career as a doctor. He did well, and has be
come a preacher-healer, and won for Christ many who were such as
he himself had been in the days when he was a hopeless opium sot.
Now I am sure you will see the point of the story. It has introduced
the reader to the easy way in which a Chinese may become a doctor.
Truly it may be well said in this land that " a doctor is born, and not
made," either by college education or hospital training. So, needless
to say, " quacks " abound on every hand. Every medical missionary
is very well acquainted with the poor woman who had spent all that
she had, and who, after suffering many things of many physicians,
is worse rather than better.
Of surgery little, if anything, is known ; of antiseptic treatment,
absolutely nothing. A fully qualified Chinese doctor who had been
well trained in a recognized college, when speaking to me of his country s
need, told the following incident : One day a man was brought into
hospital with an awful leg. A nurse was set to work to clean it
up a little previous to the doctor s inspection. Much black filth
was removed stuff that had been plastered on to cover up the abscess ;
and then, firmly embedded in the leg, was discovered a brass drainage
tube, pointed at both ends ! On making inquiries, they found that
originally the man had gone with a small abscess in the leg to a native
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS 153
practitioner. This man must have read about foreign methods
of treatment, for after lancing with a (probably) dirty knife, he
inserted a piece of brass tubing to drain the cavity. The result may
be imagined. It led to the total loss of the leg.
The use of various drugs is well known to the Chinese, and these,
together with all kinds of abominable things we cannot tell children
about, constitute the Chinese doctor s stock in trade. Some of their
ways of healing are amusing, others as revolting. Here is a cutting
from the daily press of a few days ago :
" CURIOUS MEDICINE."
" At the instance of a Chinese gentleman, said to be a brother of one
of the magistrates, a shop-keeper was charged at the Mixed Court (in Shanghai)
yesterday with selling a cake unfit for human consumption. The cake was
produced in Court, and contained quite an entomological collection, including
several cockroaches, two or three centipedes, and a beetle. A servant of the
complainant gave evidence of buying the cake. Accused apologized for the
mistake. He had prepared the cake as medicine for himself ! His assistant
had sold it to the servant by mistake."
His story was very probably true, for centipedes are very often
used as medicine. My house boy caught one last week on the stairs,
and when I said to him, " You had better dry that and keep it for me,"
he smilingly replied, " Why, I can get ten cents for it at the chemist s ! "
Every man who keeps a little medicine shop is a " doctor," but
every " doctor " does not keep a shop. He may have a few drugs, but
the general custom is for the patient to buy the prescription from
the medical man, and then go to the medicine shop to have the dose
prepared. And a very big and nasty dose it usually is.
You will readily understand that medical missionaries, almost
from the first, were gladly welcomed to the homes of many of the
Chinese people. Of course they had to live down all sorts of horrid
slanders. The people, addicted to all kinds of cruel practices them-
1 5 4 THE SONS OF HAN
selves, readily believed that the foreigners (who came with the love
of Christ in their hearts to try and alleviate suffering and save the
lives of the people) had really come to get hold of the little children,
gouge out their eyes and tear out their hearts, and then make these
into medicine for their own diseases !
We laugh at the absurdity of it. But the idea is one very readily
accepted by the people whose highest officials can drink the blood
warm from the body of a beheaded criminal, and whose soldiery
can savagely tear out and devour the hearts of slaughtered rebels after
the battle with them is over ! These dreadful things did not happen
long ago in the dark ages, but within the last year, the first in Canton
province, and the second series of horrors in Hunan. In March of
this year, in an adjoining province, one of those cruel tragedies occurred
which show how often unpremeditated and sudden passion may have
been the cause of some of the cruel doing to death of missionaries
in this land. A young man and his mother quarrelled over some
trivial matter. Both losing their tempers and using bad language
to each other only served to intensify the quarrel. In the end the
son struck his mother, an action which is punishable with death
according to the Chinese penal code. The mother, white with passion,
went to the village tea-shop and appealed to the village bully, the
scoundrel of the district, who happened to have a grudge against
the young man. In his virtuous (!) indignation that worthy cried
out against the unfilial conduct. " Unrighteous wretch ! Burn him !
Burn him." In her mad fury the mother took up the cry. A by
stander bought ten cents worth of paraffin oil, and the whole village
turned on the unfortunate young man. He was caught and tied to a
tree. Not realizing the gravity of the situation, he defied the crowd.
Then the oil was poured over him, and a match put into the mother s
hand. She struck it, put out her hand to light the oil-soaked clothing
of her son, but then remembered, and cast the lighted splinter
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS 155
away. Some one, however, took advantage of the confusion that
followed her attempt, and actually did set light to the young fellow.
In a few minutes all was over. Then fuel was piled round the lifeless
body and all was consumed except the extremities, and these were
purposely thrown to the dogs. 1
With passions so easily aroused and so blindly followed, it is no
wonder that riots occur on the most trivial incidents. For a long time
the medical missionaries path was strewn with difficulties, not to say
dangers ; but now the love of Christ, as manifested in these self-denying
men and women, has conquered, and people bring their dearest and
put them into the medical missionary s hands, knowing that what
devotion and skill can do will be done for their sick.
I shall never forget a poor old man coming to the dispensary on
one occasion, carrying his little boy on his back. It was a hot summer s
day, and the father was nearly exhausted, but the smile of hope was
on his face when he at last came into the waiting-room. The mis
sionary carefully examined the boy, and moved almost to tears with
the pathos of it all, had to tell the father as gently as he could that
nothing could be done ; the disease, now in its last stages, was incur
able. Poor man ! The faith in the foreigner s power had been so
complete that the only difficulty ever presented to his mind was
how to get the sick boy to the foreigner ; there never had been a doubt
as to the curability of the disease. For a time sobs convulsed him :
then trying bravely to smile through his tears, he thanked the foreigner
for his sympathy, saying he knew that what had been told him was
the truth, and that if there had been a possibility of saving his child
the missionary would have done it. Surely a testimony worth having,
though it cut the heart to the quick to hear it said.
In Central China the London Mission has two hospitals for women
and five for men, with a sixth one soon to be built at Hwangpi. As
1 See North China Daily News, March 18, 1907.
156 THE SONS OF HAN
we shall want by and by to see the men s hospital in Hankow, let us
first go across the river to Wuchang for our glimpse at the work
among women.
Just under the north wall of Wuchang city nestles a cluster of
foreign buildings : quite a beehive of missionary activity. Perhaps
the least conspicuous, but busy as any, is our Women s Hospital.
When Dr. Massey came out there was no hospital building, and work
had to be begun in a part of the Girls School. This was six year
ago. Then came the welcome gift from a friend of Missions at home,
and first the hospital was built. Then through the gift of a missionary
in the field, a much needed ward was added, and last of all the new
convenient dispensary and waiting-room was erected.
Just as the building has grown, so too has the work of the doctor
and her devoted assistant, Miss Calvert. Begun in a very humble
way in the dispensary of the Men s Hospital, and carried on for a
time in a native house, the work has now won for itself the confidence
of the women of Wuchang ; and not of Wuchang only, as the number
of those coming to the hospital from a distance testifies.
When I went to the hospital a few weeks ago, I was fortunate
enough to get Dr. Massey to take me over the building. The doctor
was busy in the operating theatre when I arrived, and later on,
when free to see me, was full of apologies for the delay. Her reason
not only would satisfy any one, but would give an insight to the medical
missionary s strenuous life : " We were out all night ; seeing a patient
until three o clock this morning. We did not intend having any
operations to-day ; but there were the cases, and we just had to have
them."
First we went into the large ward, where there were ten beds
fully occupied, and also three couches that had been squeezed into
odd corners to accommodate some who could not be turned away even
though the hospital was full up. Then I peeped into a small ward
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS
157
with two beds ; these also had their suffering tenants. This is the
private ward, where patients can secure special privacy for the sum
of 2s. per day. Sometimes it is a semi-private ward with three beds
in it ; then the patients each pay is. a day for the privilege. This
morning I found the nurses busy with a poor little baby who was
suffering with broncho-pneumonia. His grandfather was employed
in the Viceroy s yamen, the doctor told me, and was by no means
dealing tenderly with his household in their distress. The baby was
so ill that it was thought best to prepare the
young mother for the worst. Of course when she
found out that her baby-boy was not likely to
live she was very much upset. But what seemed
to make the cup of her grief full to overflowing was
the order sent by the grandfather, " If the baby is
going to die, come away home, all of you." He
was not going to have his daughter-in-law made
ill by nursing a hopeless case. When I went in,
the nurse and doctor had by no means given up
hope of a recovery, but the two old nurse-women
sent from the yamen to watch the baby were
busily employed stitching away at its grave-
clothes ; and the ground in which baby was to be
buried had already been bought !
In one room at the back of the hospital was a little leper girl. When
showing her to me the doctor told me what an awful little thief she
was. At prayer times, when all the nurses would be in the ward, she
w f ould steal out of her room, and go into the kitchen to steal food. As
she would pull all the food about with her leprous hands it caused no
little anxiety to the ones in charge of the hospital. She would go,
too, into the nurses rooms and steal their money and anything else
she could get hold of.
A LITTLE LEPER
GIRL.
158 THE SONS OF HAN
Hers is a very sad story. It was three years ago when the doctor
first saw her. She was brought to the hospital one day with her arms
badly burnt. Knowing the cruel way in which these little slave-girls
are handled, the missionaries thought she had been burnt on purpose
by her mistress. When they found that she was black and blue all
over the body as well, they felt pretty well sure of the cause of it all.
For some six or seven weeks she was in there, but no one detected
any sign of leprosy at the time. Last year she /came in again for
treatment once again it was burning. This time she said, she might
have burnt herself, but had never felt it. . This at once led to careful
examination, and she was found to be suffering from the anaesthetic
form of leprosy, and other signs of the disease were noted. There was
an opportunity of sending her down to the nearest leper home for
women at Hangchow ; but her people came and took her away, for
the master had given her to one of his servants who. had sold her
to a native doctor who " knew all about everything and could easily
cure her ! " Dr. Massey made an attempt to get her back from this
man, but without success. Then some six months passed away. One
Wednesday afternoon, when on the way to the week-day service, she
was met tearing along as hard as she could run in the direction of the
hospital. She had run away from her owner and came back to the
only place on earth where she had received kindly treatment. For
finding that her case was hopeless she had been turned out to beg
out into the pitiless streets.
At the time of the visit Dr. Massey was in a great dilemma. By
this time the disease was so far advanced, that it would be difficult to
get her taken on board a steamer to be sent to Hangchow : on the other
hand it was impossible to keep her much longer in the hospital, for
fear of contagion. Since then, the difficulties have been overcome,
and she has started on her 800 miles journey to the Women s Leper
Home, where good Dr. Main will not only seek to take every care of her
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS
159
poor leprous body, but seek to prepare her for that longer journey still
that she will have to take in a few years time. Pray for her, that
she may soon learn to love Jesus Christ, and be received without " spot
or blemish or any such
thing " into one of the
mansions He has pre
pared for all who love
Him.
In one of the beds
in the large ward I
found two little chil
dren. One was a par
ticularly pathetic case.
Through neglect both
her feet had been frost
bitten, and had to be
amputated. In ad
dition to this she had
an awful squint and
appeared to be men
tally deficient. Dr.
Massey hoped to be able
to get her taken into
the Shanghai slave
home. When I asked
her age I was told,
" She is ten years old, GETTING BETTER.
her people say, but she
looks barely five." Her hospital name was Jemima. Possibly the
quaint old name was given her because she looked so very quaint
and old-fashioned. She was just one of China s waifs and strays.
160 THE SONS OR HAN
Her parents being dead, she had fallen into the hands of her relative,
an aunt, who had promptly made her over to somebody as a
daughter-in-law.
The other girlie was a merry little mortal, and evidently one of the
ward pets. She, too, had suffered from frostbite during the first cold
in November, last year. After more or less neglect, the mother brought
her to hospital for treatment. When the doctor told her the foot must
be taken off she refused to allow it to be done, saying that the child
could feel no pain in the foot, and all she needed was some medicine.
After a while she consented to have the operation performed ; but
changing her mind when all preparations had been made, wrapped
the child up in her dirty clothes and took her away. Not until the
dead foot dropped off would the mother let the doctor do what was
necessary to save the rest of her leg. Evidently the fear of a " mother-
in-law " to whom she had been " given " (for a consideration) was
the reason for her hoping that the leg would heal without the loss of
any part of it, for when the foot came off she wrapped it up in a piece
of oiled paper and took it away for the mother-in-law to see ! When
I saw her the stump had been properly dressed, and although the
four-year-old girlie had lost one foot, and all the toes of her other
foot, she was playing away quite happily with a foreign handkerchief.
Dr. Massey and Miss Calvert could tell you of many such cases,
where the missionaries have been able to save lives and heal diseases ;
in some instances taking the ill-treated children into a new kind of life,
where, let us hope, the awful experiences of their early years are soon
forgotten. Very many cases that come to the hospital for treatment
are the results of accident, or ignorant treatment of disease. All are
welcomed, and all have the doctor s skilful attention and the
nurse s care, whether their stay be one of days or of weeks.
Each Tuesday and Friday is an out-patient day, when all who
are not ill enough to need hospital treatment, come to have their
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS
161
wounds dressed or to get medicines for their ailments. In busy times
as many as eighty or a hundred will come to the dispensary. On
these days Mrs. Foster and the Bible-woman hold a service, trying to
give these casual visitors some idea of the Gospel story, telling them
of the Great Physician who is able to heal all the diseases of their souls,
HANKOW. THE FIRST JETTY, WITH BRITISH MUNICIPAL BUILDINGS.
(The L.M.S. Mission Compound is two minutes walk from here.)
and save them for His Kingdom. After the service is over the seeing
of the patients begins.
You do not need to be told that the dispensing of medicines and
dressing of wounds and patching up of bodies is not all the work that
is done in our hospitals. This is but a means to an end. The
L
1 62 THE SONS OF HAN
missionary is there because Christ has sent him to preach the glad
tidings to the sick and suffering, as well as to bind up their wounds.
Every morning, Mrs. Foster has prayers with the patients in the ward.
In the evening Dr. Massey and Miss Calvert take turns, one week
teaching the Christians and another week seeking to impart the
knowledge of life to the heathen patients. Sometimes, if the mission
aries are called away, the nurses lead the ward service. Then every
morning the Bible-woman comes, sits down by the sides of the beds,
and speaks to the patients about Jesus ; and the nurses themselves
as they go about their work do a good deal of teaching. A service
is held in the ward every Sunday afternoon. But I think that what
the patients enjoy most of all is the Song Service the Christian
Endeavourers from the Girls School sometimes hold. Some of the
best singers will go and sing in the ward for half an hour : singing
the hymns you know so well, but which you would scarcely recognize
in their Chinese dress were it not for the tunes. Unfortunately this
term the girls have not been able to do much in this way ; for first
came measles, and then came mumps, and the poor girls had to stay
away either because they were sick themselves or through fear lest
they should infect others.
In chatting about the work I found that, just like other
missionaries in other departments, Dr. Massey and Miss Calvert had
plenty of disappointments in their work. The missionary works
for the saving of the people, body and soul. Yet how often does it
appear that these people seem to care nothing for anything but their
bodies ! Many of them are grateful for the kindness received, and
that is something ; but it is only the few who respond to the attempt
to win them to higher things. As far as can be ascertained, work
among the out-patients is more productive of results than among
those who stay in for treatment. Perhaps this is partly owing to
our idea of " results," partly owing to the fact that in-patients mostly
DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS 163
come from homes far away and are seldom heard of after their return
to the native place, and partly, too, because of the greater number
o f the out-patients.
Sometimes, however, a letter comes from a home away in Hunan,
where lives a family that will ever gratefully remember the lady
doctor and her fellow- worker. The wife of an official, her daughter,
and a little boy all came to the hospital for treatment. The girl was
suffering with tubercular disease of the ankle joint, yet after a long
time of treatment the leg was saved, although the foot was lost.
Now in her Hunan home she is well and happy, and wears a false foot
stuffed with cotton-wool, so that only her friends know of her . oss.
As she stayed in the hospital for six months, and the little boy five
months longer, they learned a good deal of scripture, and, better still,
were taught to pray to God. Long before the boy was well the funds
were used up, as the father not only had a small income, but was an
opium-smoker as well. Before going home the mother asked the
" Doctrine Sister " to kneel down in the Guest Hall with her and
pray ; and then when the parting came told them that she knew
they had done all they could, and now in their far-away home they
would continue to pray to God that the boy might be healed.
What a number of homes in Central China must bless the day when
Christians in England began to think of their sisters in China, and
determined to send them lady. doctors and nurses ! What a story will
be told some day ; and what a rejoicing there will be when doctors
and patients and those who have prayed for the workers and supported
the hospitals meet in that City where there is no more pain !
CHAPTER XI
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS
TN a busy place like Hankow, where there are so many factories,
and where so many ships are loaded and unloaded without the help
of cranes or other lifting machinery, the number of coolies employed
is enormous, and the number of serious accidents correspondingly
great. As you know, the London Mission Hospital in Hankow has
been established for many years, and the fame of its doctors spread
far and wide. So no matter when the visitor calls at the hospital in
T ai-p ing Road he will find both doctors and nurses with as much
as they can do to attend to the patients. In spring and autumn,
when the weather is good for travelling, some of the patients come
very long distances indeed to get cured : a journey of 500 miles, in
spite of the very primitive method of travel, is thought little of.
It is during these busier months of the year that Dr. Gillison and
his fellow-workers find that the old-fashioned hospital, which has
been added to little by little to meet increasing needs, is now not
only too small for the demands upon it, but unsuitable in many ways.
Ere long the doctors hope to see their dreams come to pass, and with
new and more extensive premises be able to do a greater work than
they have yet thought possible.
On a recent visit to the hospital in search of photographs, Dr. Cor-
mack, who is there while Dr. McAll is on furlough, showed me over
the building, and I was struck with the difference between the appear
ance of the large ward upstairs on this occasion and condition of
164
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS 165
things when I first went to it at the end of a busy spring day. When
my camera went to look at the various parts of the hospital it was
on a hot summer s morning, and while there were patients in nearly
all the beds there was no impression of overcrowding. Everything
looked most orderly and hospital-like. But the visit I paid in the
spring-time has remained a haunting picture in my mind ever since.
Not only was every bed filled, but all other available floor-space also.
But what can the doctor do ? A man has come a long distance to
Photo by] [A. J. MCFARLANE.
"A BUSY PLACE LIKE HANKOW."
have an operation performed, having heard of the marvellous cures
wrought by the foreigner in Hankow. Somehow he gets faith to
come and money to pay the expenses of the journey. After days of
painful travelling, he arrives one morning at the hospital door to find
that it is the " busy time," and the chances of his being admitted
are doubtful. The doctor sees him ; realizes that if the operation
is not performed, the man will die. But what can he do ? Every
bed is occupied, to say nothing of the improvized sleeping places in
all sorts of unorthodox positions. Hygiene, hospital laws, and
1 66 THE SOXS OF HAN
everything but the doctor s brotherly heart, say at once : " The
place is too full already ; it is not right to take in another single patient.
Poor fellow ! we are sorry for him, but until the good folk at home
send us the money wherewith to build a larger hospital such things
must be every year. Speak kindly to him, give him some physic, and
send him home."
But the doctor is just human. The place is very much over
crowded, it is true. He ought not to be taken in. But then a rough
calculation of the beds and couches in the ward is quickly made,
and the resolve is taken. There is no room on a bed ; yet for this once
we will put him on the floor between two beds, and he can take his
turn when an empty bed comes. Before the busy season comes to
an end the " this once " occurs a good many times ; and after the
rush is over, the doctor resolves never to do it again. And he will
not . . . until next time ! For somehow the patients treated in
this fashion do not die, but get better in a marvellous manner, and there
are many in this land to-day who are well and strong, and have a
knowledge of the love of God in their hearts, and a very grateful recollec
tion of the time spent in our London Hospital, because the doctor
said in their case, " only this once."
This is not as it should be, however ; and a work so famous as the
London Mission Hospital in Central China deserves to have better
accommodation in the near future.
With but two main wards, and a few more or less private rooms
for the use of better class patients, or for those whose diseases require
isolation or some special treatment, it is astonishing what a number
of cures are effected in the course of a single year.
Some years ago, Dr. Gillison came to the conclusion that it would
be better to devote less time to the out-patient department and give
more attention to those coming into the hospital for more lengthy
treatment. So the days on which sick folk could be seen were finally
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS 167
reduced to two a week. Even with this reduction no less than 3,942
new patients were seen last year, and altogether 6,500 visits were
paid by those who came for medicine or dressing only. Inside the
hospital 837 patients were treated : the greatest number that have yet
passed through the wards in the course of a single year.
I VBB fiB
IN THE WARDS OF OUR HANKOW HOSPITAL.
Last year a little boy of twelve years old was brought to the
hospital. Ever since he was three he had been suffering severely
with a chronic complaint. Sometimes the pain never ceased from
morn till eve. When his father brought him in, and the strange-looking
foreigner came to examine him, the little fellow began to cry. Trying
to comfort his little son the father said : " Hush, don t cry ; the
god has come to cure you." He meant the missionary, all the time.
168 THE SONS OF HAN
The boy soon got over his fear of the missionary, and when after an
operation he found that the pain did not come back, and he began
to get strong, a bright smile came instead of his tears whenever the
doctor came to his bedside. In a month from the time of his operation
he was running about quite merrily ; quite another wee mannie. The
day came when he had to leave the hospital : he rolled up his bedding,
put on his own clothes, and prepared to leave with the two men who
had come to take him away. " Where is his father ? " the missionary
asked, thinking of the strong-looking countryman who had brought the
boy in a month ago. " O, he s dead," was the laconic answer, " he
died a few days since. Something was the matter with his throat."
It was only too true. The weak little son had been cured, while
the strong man had died suddenly. Poor little chappie ! How
he sobbed, and how helpless the doctor was to comfort him. Some
scripture text-cards that some kind friend had sent from home, and
a few cash with which to buy sweets, made his eyes sparkle for a
little, as he forgot the intensity of his grief in his new possessions.
The old evangelist had found him an apt pupil whilst in bed, listening
readily to the gospel stories, and very pleased to have some cards
given him. Let us hope and pray that he will not only remember
the place where he was freed from his burden of suffering, but also
the truths that were taught him by old Mr. T ang about God who
is love, and Whose greatest love-gift to us is Jesus Christ our Lord.
In the lower ward I found a little boy lying flat on his back in
one of the beds. To look at his face one would not think there was
anything the matter with him. The day before he had been playing
with some companions ; and, while running about with an open
pair of scissors in his hand, had fallen down and run the sharp blades
of the open scissors into his little stomach. When brought in much
that ought to have been inside of him was on the outside of the wound,
and the doctor had to put him right and stitch him up. Very comical
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS 169
was his cheerful remark to the doctor, " You must look for two holes
in me, doctor, as the scissors were open when I fell on them ! " There
he lay, smiling happily, not a bit afraid of being in the strange place.
In place of lingering on in pain, and perhaps dying of blood-poisoning
or some such thing, as would have been the case had there been
no foreigner to help him, he is running about happily by this time,
quite well and strong, with a new idea of foreigners in his little mind,
and no little knowledge of the Gospel as well.
It would be quite easy to tell a hundred stories a year about the
patients who lie in the wards : pathetic stories, humorous stories,
stories that make one shudder at the awful amount of wickedness that
goes on in this land, stories that tell of much that is good and brave,
and stories too that will let the friends of mission work know how
near to the hearts of the Chinese the medical missionary gets, and
how often he but heals their bodies as a preliminary to bringing them
to Christ for the saving of their souls. Just now one of the best ways
of bringing the Chinese to Christ is by means of medical work done
by consecrated men and women. Here is an open door indeed ; a
door that is never shut through fear of political intrigue ; a door that
the missionary can enter at once, finding endless opportunities of
serving and preaching the Lord Christ. For not only do the " common
people " trust our doctors, an ever increasing number of those
better-class and more cultured people who never will come to our
churches to hear the Gospel, seek the doctor in their distress and
receive from him the help they need and see in him the Gospel as
he writes it day by day in his merciful work.
There is just one other side to the medical work of the London
Mission in Central China, and this must have more than a passing
glance bestowed upon it. Not until the missionary reaches this
Oriental lard does he understand the meaning of the word " beggars "
You remember the nursery rhyme
THE SONS OF HAN
"Hark ! hark ! the dogs do bark :
The beggars are coming to town ;
Some in rags, and some in tags,
And some in silken gowns."
In China it is really astonishing to note the way in which the dogs
scent the beggars from afar. Recently
I saw a most amusing episode illustrat
ing this nursery jingle. Going along
a road that passed through several
hamlets not very far apart, was a
dirty man, who was strong and well,
and ought to have been at work.
But he was a professional beggar. As
he entered the first village after I
saw him, the chief watch-dog seemed
to much resent the presence of this
man who was getting his living by
eating what other people earned.
" Bow-wow-wow-wow.," he said, " here s
a lazy good-for-nothing. Come along,
all you merry dogs. Don t let him
steal or beg anything in our honour
able village. Bow-wow-wow ! "
\ .J? So all the village dogs came
running out at the first bark of
alarm ; snapped at the beggar s heels,
AN OLD BEGGAR.
barked at him with all their might,
never giving him a moment s peace. He tried to drive them off with
stones and a stick : but the dogs ever avoided his blows, and kept
up a hot attack. They drove him out of their village, and escorted
him to the confines of the next hamlet, where a fresh relay of
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS 171
dogs were waiting to give him a warm reception. And they
did!
Little as we can pity the average beggar in China, there is one
section of them that always appeals to us. I mean the lepers. Just
such pitiable objects as our Lord saw when he walked about the
sunny land of Palestine. In reading about the little leper girl in
the Wuchang Hos
pital, you discovered
that there was no
Leper Home for
women in Central
China. But at Hsiao
Kan, forty-five miles
from Hankow, Dr.
Fowler is doing all
he can for the leper
men. Let us pay
him a visit.
First a train ride
of some two hours
duration, and then
a tramp through the A CONTORTIONIST BEGGAR.
fields or a ride in a
sedan chair for three miles, and the Home is reached. Dr. Fowler
is always glad to receive a " call " from any one interested in his
work ; for he knows that a sight of it will but deepen that inter
est : a sight of the lepers must soon lead to compassion for them
in their misery, and active sympathy with those who are stretching
out to them the helping hand.
So many acres of ground surrounded by a brick wall ; so many
wards ; so many rooms ; a church ; a dispensary ; kitchens ; a bowl-
172
THE SONS OF HAN
ing green ; and the tour is made, and the buildings seen. But the
sight is to see the lepers. Some of them are busy at work, making hair
nets and fishing-nets. These find a ready sale after being thoroughly
disinfected. There they sit, on the ground, or on the verandah, netting
away as fast as they can and until their perishing fingers
compel them to give up this work. This keeps them in pocket money,
for each is allowed to keep what he earns ; it also keeps them employed
and prevents them always thinking of their misery. We may see them,
too, at play, and join them in their games if we like. When I was
THE LEPERS AT PLAY WITH DR. FOWLER.
there some new games had just been sent out from Home quoits,
and bull-board and keen were they to be initiated into the mysteries
of the game. It did one s heart good to hear their merry laughter and
watch their real child-like abandonment to the joys of the games !
As I stood by them, a miracle seemed to be performed on that grassy
sward inside the leper compound : there was Misery smiling, while
her twin-sister Wretchedness was laughing for very joy of heart.
Thanks be to God for the work that brings about such results.
Another sight of sights is to see the lepers in church. The singing
is evidently greatly enjoyed by all. Out here, in most places, we
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS 173
are thankful if the congregation will only sing in time, and all do
their best to try and sing the same tune : but at Hsiao Kan you will
be surprised at the heartiness and tunefulness of the leper music.
The doctor is fond of singing himself, and has evidently done a lot
of work in teaching these poor things to sing praises unto the Most
High.
Some one may say, " Surely lepers have little to be thankful for ! "
You just ask them and see ! Or better still, listen to this story of one
of them, and then try and think of some good Christian man in
England who shows by his life that he loves his Saviour more than did
this afflicted Son of Han.
He was the son of a fairly well-to-do boatman, but his mother
was a leper. They were heathen, and so far as their light went they
seemed to have trained their sons well, sending all four of them to
school. As they grew up they all followed in their father s footsteps
and became apprenticed to the oar. Perhaps to save the boys from
being visited by the evil spirits with their mother s disease, she called
them all very low-sounding names. The eldest one was named
" First Dog," the second being of course " Second Dog," and the others
"Third "and" Fourth Dog "respectively. After a while the mother
died of this terrible disease. Yet the plan to " deceive the spirits "
was not successful, for " First Dog " followed his mother to a leper s
grave, then " second Dog " took the disease, and last of all " Third
Dog " was stricken with it also.
Before " Third Dog " came to Dr. Fowler his baby-name had
been changed for one which means " Leader," and truly did he show
the leader s spirit all the time he was in the Home. Quite early in
life, at his village, he heard of the foreign religion, and soon under
stood the principles of Christianity. But not until he had been for
a time in the Home did he know Jesus Christ his Saviour. He was soon
put in charge of one of the big wards, and never was a post more
174 THE SONS OF HAN
worthily filled. The men in his ward were the most peaceful and
contented of the inmates, and the ward itself the neatest and
cleanest. Dr. Fowler says he was a man of real sympathy and
true sincerity. He not only acknowledged his fault when in the
wrong, but honestly and humbly sought to overcome where he had
been defeated in the Christian fight.
At length he became a leader in spiritual matters also. In the
daily prayer meetings his ability was manifested as he opened up
the Scriptures to his fellow-lepers. And then the end came. Con
sumption set in. A nasty ulcer ate away the sight of one eye. Yet
ever in pain and weariness, he was calm and brave in his Saviour.
When he heard that his days on earth were numbered, he desired to
go back to his native village and bear one last testimony to the suffi
ciency of Jesus Christ. He returned after three weeks, with only
a few hours to live on this earth. The doctor was with him almost
to the end, when he crossed the cold river and made a triumphal
entrance into the Eternal City. The poor thin, disease-ravaged face
was turned towards heaven, and he seemed to see the heavens opened
and to be holding converse with his Saviour. At dead of night,
surrounded by his comrades, he put off the leprous garments of his
flesh, and went in to see the King whom he had long loved and
served in the days of his affliction.
Whilst sitting in the Church, listening to the carefully followed
sermon, or whilst joining with the lepers in their songs of praise,
it was impossible to keep from a continual giving of thanks to the
marvellous Giver of all good things, Who is able to touch the leper
and enable him to respond to the divine call to discipleship. How
strange it seemed to hear the shrill boyish treble mingling with the
gruffer bass ! Leprosy seems to add years to a man s life, and
to make the boy appear like a little old man, but it never touches
the voice : that is spared to the sufferer. Then, as all rose and joined
ANOTHER HOSPITAL, AND A VISIT TO THE LEPERS 175
audibly in the " Our Father, Who art in Heaven," the low reverent
voices seemed to say, " Yes, we may be awful looking lepers, but He
is our Father, and when His Kingdom comes we shall be as we are
now, serving Him in His temple, but with new bodies and robes
washed white in the Blood of the Lamb." You will not be surprised
to hear that although some of the lepers stay but a short time
in the Home, fully fifty per cent, give evidence of a change of heart
ere the Great Call comes.
A visit to the hospital store-room shows what it means to be
the provider for such a large family. Sixty mouths to be fed daily ;
sixty bodies to be clothed ; to say nothing of the drugs and medical
stores required for the treatment of sixty bodies and dressing of their
sores. Some twenty, too, are laid to rest each year in the little leper
graveyard. But there is always a candidate for the empty bed !
Feeding, clothing, dressing, medical treatment, and then the expenses
of the last sad rites all provided out of contributions sent by those
whose heart the Lord has touched !
How great the need for such a Home, and for a larger Home too !
Well may we thank God that ever a Griffith John was moved to
conceive such a work, and that a Dr. Fowler is there to develop and
carry it on.
CHAPTER XII
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING
TEN years ago the District Committee of the London Mission
in Central China realized that the time had come for a new
departure to be taken. A great church had been established. In con
nexion with this church were a great many children of Christian
parents, who had no possible way of being educated other than in a
purely native and heathen school. Amongst these boys we ought
to look for our future teachers and pastors ; but what if we let them
alone while they are young, and make no effort to train them up
in the knowledge of the Bible and of Christ ? True, there were a
few elementary schools, run in almost purely Chinese ways by untrained
teachers ; and in Hankow itself there was some amount of personal
instruction given by the missionary in the schools already started.
But this was felt to be totally inadequate. " A school with a heathen
schoolmaster is worse for the Christian church than no school at all,"
is the verdict of some of the ablest missionaries in China. And any
missionary who has had the oversight of schools with a heathen teacher
moulding the minds of the boys, and also had charge of a school in
which there was a Christian atmosphere, will have no two opinions
on the matter.
Not only was there a need for Christian schools, but for schools
of different grades and for different classes of people. Although there
was lack of both men and money the step was taken in faith.
The existing primary schools were put on a new basis which would
ensure a standard education being given in each. An old tea-box
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING
177
factory was bought, altered, patched up, and made to look resplendent
in its coat of new paint. Here was commenced the High School,
with Rev. A. J. McFarlane as head master : a school that aimed at
securing for the boys of the wealthier and higher classes of Hankow
Chinese society an education under Christian influence. Due provision
was of course made for the promising sons of Christians, who would
need help in securing a better education than could be obtained in
the day schools. The curriculum was not a very comprehensive one
perhaps, but it was all that the hard-working Chinese boy could manage,
coming to such studies in blissful ignorance of their very rudiments
even at the age of sixteen or seventeen. The scholar was to study
his Chinese books, Scripture, mathematics, geography, elementary
Science, History, and the English language.
M
178 THE SONS OF HAN
The girls were not forgotten. In addition to primary schools
there was to be a Boarding School for them, and we shall soon see
what a splendid work Mrs. Foster has done in this connexion.
But there were three other classes of schools that there was imme
diate need for. Teachers were wanted for the day schools in city and
country : there must, therefore, be a NORMAL SCHOOL where these
might be trained. Men who were called of God to preach the Gospel
to their countrymen needed a special course of instruction, fitting them
mentally for their great work. Hence a THEOLOGICAL COLLEGE was
required. MEDICAL WORK in a land of quacks was of paramount
importance : and so preparations had to be made for the work of
training medical students who would eventually become the doctors,
well qualified and much trusted, of their fellows. Bible women were
also needed ; so the WOMEN S TRAINING HOME came into existence
under the care of Mrs. Gillison, who is ably seconded in her good
work by Mrs. Lewis Jones of the China Inland Mission.
Ten years ago such was the dream of the missionaries. To-day
the visitor is taken round to see the fruits of these ten years of toil
and prayer. All hopes have not been realized. But in each depart
ment the missionaries are seeing the day of realization drawing near.
Across the river in Wuchang, by the side of the Women s Hospital,
is the GIRL S BOARDING SCHOOL. Started just before the terrible
Boxer " insurrection, it has these past years been a centre of educational
activity in the best sense of the word. To give a thorough Christian
education to each girl is the aim of the lady in charge, and in this
she will be heartily seconded by Miss Light, who has come out specially
for this work.
The school is divided into three sections, upper, middle and lower.
In the upper school were twenty-four girls this last term, divided
into two classes. In most schools of this kind the instruction is not
confined to mental work only, and Mrs. Foster s school is no exception
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING 179
to the rule. There is a good deal of the housework left to the girls,
while needlework is of course one of the principal subjects taught. I
found that these girls could do arithmetic as far as cube root, the
extraction of which some of us may have forgotten. They were very
carefully taught in Scripture, and a flourishing Endeavour Society
gave them an opportunity of learning how to teach others ; thus
preparing the way for the time when they will be leaders amongst
the Christian women of their town or village. The other subjects being
taught are Chinese reading and writing, geography, astronomy
natural history and Chinese history. And when one realizes that
the average Chinese women is absolutely untaught, one begins to
think of the great power these girls will wield when they grow up
and are able to teach their own children as well as those of other
people.
Some of these elder girls have been in the school from the very
beginning. Having once got into the upper school they grow as
fond of the old class-room and as devoted to their school as do their
sister students in the home country. Real and lasting friendships
are formed here, and when the time comes to say good-bye to the
school-days it is quite a grief to those who go as well as to those who
remain.
But the first-term girl, coming as she does quite undisciplined,
invariably gives much trouble ; especially so if she comes " grown up. "
In one of the class-rooms a girl of eight summers was ahead of another,
whose years were more than twice as many ! Some of the girls are
soon to be married, and have been sent by their future husbands
that they may be taught at least to read ! Small wonder that some
of these find the life irksome, and not one to be enjoyed. On the
other hand, some of the girls are little, and get homesick. This last term
one of the deacons sent his little girl to the school, together with a
friend about her own age. There were many applicants for the few
i8o
THE SONS OF HAN
vacant places ; but wishing to help the Christians, Mrs. Foster took
these two girls instead of other, perhaps more promising, ones. At
the mid-term holidays they went home for a few days, and did not
come back. After a while I saw the father and wanted to know why
they were thus breaking rules. They had been homesick, he said,
A WRITING LESSON.
but would go back " to-morrow." Later on in the day, however, he told
me that the children were very unwilling to go back, saying they
would throw themselves into the river if they were sent across.
They had always been used to having their own way at home and
did not like the school-life at all. One of their greatest trials was
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING 181
having to take a bath ! Once or twice it was promised that they
should go back. But now the term is over, and probably owing to
a foolish mother and weak father these two girls were allowed to
remain at home playing about the house, and may never have another
opportunity of being properly educated.
Many a sidelight on Chinese life does a teacher get in a boarding
school. One girl in this school was engaged to be married to a boy
named John. She was twelve and he ten years old. John s grand
mother got her engaged to the Christian s boy so that she might
be saved. So she was sent to the Mission School. When, in the
Scripture classes, she came to the word "John," nothing could make
her say the word, even when repeating her lesson. The woman must
never say her husband s name in China, you know. So she would
giggle, and then the other girls would giggle, much to the teacher s
amazement and annoyance until the reason of it all was found out.
Frequently, in school, the cause of a quarrel between two scholars
is the one calling out the name of the other s father. This is forbidden
by Chinese rules, and is very much resented as an insult. " She spoke
my father s name," was the angry cry of a fierce little Miss who wished
to do all sorts of things to her little school-fellow.
One of the schoolgirls is the daughter of a small official, who out
of love for his little girl taught her to read and write. She is only
thirteen years old now, but before she came into the school at all
she was out as a governess, teaching a pupil considerably older than
herself. She was in the hospital suffering with hip joint disease when
Mrs. Foster got to know her ; later on she came into the school, eager
to learn, although the securing of the cash to pay the necessary fees
caused her father no little difficulty. In one month she mastered
the first four rules of arithmetic, and if she can stay in the school long
enough she will become a very clever scholar. But money is scarce
in that home. The first month they somehow managed to raise the
THE SONS OF HAN
3,000 cash( about six shillings). But latterly, Mrs. Foster has reduced
it to 2,000 cash, as she was quite unable to pay more. This does not
much more than cover the cost of her food, which for each girl averages
three-halfpence a day. But as they make their own shoes and stock-
Miss WEI GIVING A BLACKBOARD LESSON.
ings, and many other articles, wash all their own clothes, and wash
the floors as well, there are not many " extras. "
Mrs. Foster can tell ever so many stories about these girls of hers.
Some have left school and are married. Yet they never forget the
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING 183
old " home," ever and again returning to show their babies, and enjoy
a peep into their beloved school-life once more. One of these lives
far away in Hunan, her desire for her babies being that as soon as
they grow up, they may come to this school where their mother spent
such happy years. Another " old girl " is a teacher in a government
school, and gets thirty cents an hour (more than a workman gets for
a day of toil) for teaching arithmetic. And, moreover, she only
knows the first four rules !
The visitor leaves the school with the impression that whether as
teachers or as mothers the girls who are being trained to be good and
true women, to love and know their Bibles, and to serve God in their
homes, will be of great value to China in the years that are to come,
when men who have been cradled in goodness and truth will be required
as the teachers and leaders of the Empire.
Just inside the native Hankow city, on the other side of a narrow,
dirty street, called by some people " Pig Lane " because of the
numerous piggeries all round about, is the Educational Compound.
Here is the old transformed " Tea-box Factory," where Mr. MacFarlane
and his helpers have laid the foundations of the LONDON MISSION
COLLEGE. This year all the class-rooms have been full of hard-working
students, and for the first time in the school history over a hundred
sat for the summer examinations. The dormitories have been
crowded ; too much so to be nice ; and we are thankful that the
hottest part of the school year has been passed through without there
being any serious illness among the boys.
Work in the school is very much like work in any school at home,
with the exception that Chinese is the mother-tongue of the scholars,
and English takes the place of Latin and Greek. In the lower forms
nearly all of the curriculum is in Chinese, mathematics, geography,
history, etc., being taught the boys in their own language. English
is taught them from the very first : so, boys that come to school
184 THE SONS OF HAN
without any previous knowledge of that tongue have to enter Form
I, no matter what may be their age. It is amusing to see one of
nine years of age by the side of a young man of nineteen, each spelling
his way through the intricate mazes of the Primer ! While the older
boys get promotion to a higher form more quickly than their younger
companions do, these latter naturally acquire a much better accent.
By the time the Sixth Form is reached, the boys are able to read
and write English fairly well ; although as they think in Chinese, some
of their composition exercises are curious productions. If the boys
sometimes have a good laugh at the funny way in which their English
masters speak Chinese, the masters get their times of amusement
when correcting their pupils exercises. Some boys do remarkably well
in their studies. One who is now a junior master in the school, often
had not a single mistake in his dictation. One day, on seeing a
faultless examination paper, an English merchant who was in Hankow
at the time said, " Why I could not have spelled some of those words
myself ! "
While shorter than the hours of the students in purely native
schools, the time daily given to study by the boys in our College is
fairly long. Starting with Chinese " Prep " before breakfast, they
do not get through their day s work until " Prayers " at 8.30 p.m.
After Morning Prayers at 9 o clock, at present held in the Divinity
Hall, the boys go to their first class. At 12.30 comes the lunch hour,
after which they play games until 2 o clock. The afternoon classes
are over at four, when the evening meal is partaken of. After this
comes the recreation of the day, and football, cricket practice at the
net, photography, and the pursuit of other hobbies, are well taken up
by the boys according to their tastes and ability. Prior to the Athletic
Field days, they go into training : at such times the visitor may find
the youth aspiring for honours, hard at work practising his running,
or jumping, or pole-vaulting, while some whose strong point is not
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING
185
perhaps swiftness of foot are busily putting the weight, or throwing
the cricket ball.
The boys have their own Y.M.C.A. and an English-speaking Club,
which meets every Saturday evening after the play of the half-holiday
is over. This latter is very popular with them.
LAYING THE FOUNDATION STONES OF THE NEW COLLEGE.
Six miles to the west of Hankow, by the side of the river Han,
the new college is now being built. Great is the excitement of
the boys as they look forward to commencing the work of 1908 in this
first block of the permanent home of the London Mission College.
And what becomes of them all when they leave school ? Some lads
go to other schools to " finish." One of the most promising of last
1 86 THE SONS OF HAN
year s fifth Form came to see me the other day, and told me about
his life in a military college near Shanghai. Once, last year, I asked
him about his future work : half shyly, and yet with a look of boyish
pride, he said, " I am going to serve my country. She needs help
just now ; and I hope to go to Japan to study military tactics."
Last week I went to the General Post Office to enquire about
a parcel. The young man who came to attend to me was our last
year s Athletic Champion who won the Clark Shield. Later on in
the day, when posting a registered letter, the one who took it from
me was one of my old Sixth Form boys. I asked " How many of our
school are in the post office now ? " " Eleven, I think, sir," was
the answer. Some boys are away in other paits of the country either
in Government employ or teaching in schools. Others again are in
business houses. There is always employment for the young man
who speaks English. But some few, and we are proud of these, prefer
to remain with us : prefer helping in the work rather than take double
or treble the salary elsewhere.
We laughed a great deal when, a year or two ago, an advertisement
appeared in a certain newspaper saying that a Chinese teacher was
prepared to teach " English, as far as the letter G. Yesterday
a college professor told me of the laziest of his students, one who could
not say a single sentence of English either correctly or intelligently,
and yet had been engaged as English interpreter to a great Chinese
official. When asked how he managed to hold such a position he airily
said, " O, I knew a little English, and they knew nothing at all about
it. So it was quite easy ! "
China will very soon find out that the kind of master she has in
her schools cannot teach if he himself has not been properly taught.
He may know a little of Western learning : a little arithmetic, a
little geography, and perhaps a smattering of science as well ; so,
being better than the man who knows nothing of these things, he
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING 187
gets a situation ; but this kind of man only meets a passing need.
There are many Chinese scholars who are well-trained and well
taught, and have the ability to teach others : but the cry is for thou
sands of these, and there are so few in the land.
Just now it seems as if China would give all she has in exchange
for education. But she wants it in a hurry : something to use at
once. Some of her scholars even speak as if, having a few foreign
textbooks translated into their mother-tongue, they have all they
need ; not realizing that the teacher himself is the great factor in
education. " There are the books : what more is required ? Let
the students learn," seems to be their thought.
Once a Chinese pastor came to know if his somewhat stupid nephew
could not learn to become a photographer. I pointed out to him that
a photographer s outfit cost money, and he was a poor man. Besides,
in his native town there was no photographer, so the boy would
have great difficulty in learning how to take and make pictures.
The ready reply was, " Well, sir ; you see, a man on our street
has a book that tells all about it, and he is willing to teach any one
for the fee of $i (25.)."
" Can the man take photographs himself ? " I asked.
" No, sir, he is a dyer ; but he has a book, and he can teach
photography, watch-making and soap-making, all without tools."
The truth is that for centuries the book has taken the place of the
teacher. The boy repeats his lessons, so many lines a day until he
has learnt the book off by heart. If he can repeat it all, he is a good
scholar. If not, so much beating and so much scolding have to be
given, until the lesson is knocked into his head.
The boys who have passed through our school have a commercial
value. And, no doubt, there is a danger that they will be attracted
by the offer of a high salary rather than by the opportunity to do a
work for the Church and for their fellows where there are no such
i88
THE SONS OF HAN
inducements. But many of these will still be true to the Christian
teaching they have received and the high ideals of life that have
been planted in their hearts. Some will prove to be failures, as in
every other school. But one success counts for more than many
failures ; and the successes we have seen inspire us to increased effort
and prayer to win the young mind for Christ. And we remember, too,
THE THEOLOGICAL HALL, WITH HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS AT DRILL.
that we are often sowing for a harvest that will not be reaped till
after many days
In this same Educational Compound is the THEOLOGICAL HALL,
which Dr. Griffith John gave to the Mission a few years ago. Just
now, besides the men who are to be our future ministers, those who
are learning to be schoolmasters are also in this building. It will
serve this double purpose until the Normal School is built.
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING 189
In the Men s Hospital, the other side of " Pig Lane," is the temporary
quarters of the MEDICAL SCHOOL : the first of its kind in Central China.
Here, under Drs. Gillison and McAll, eighteen young men are being
trained as doctors, and from it we hope that many will go forth with
knowledge and skill to heal diseases, and with a fixed desire to work
for the Master.
With this new departure in mission methods the work of the mis
sionary in Hankow is changing. He sees a new China growing up
all around him : the result of fifty years of teaching and preaching.
It may not be so romantic to read of classes and class-rooms as it is
to peruse the diary of a missionary who is often face to face with
all sorts of dangers from wild beasts or wild men, living in a dark land
and deadly climate ; but it is a work that is becoming more and
more necessary in this land where the Cross has been uplifted these
hundred years. The cry in China to-day is for the trained man. He
is wanted in our churches and schools, where the well-equipped Chinese
will increasingly take the place of the foreign missionary in the work
of teaching the young and feeding the flock of Christ. For the
future of the Chinese Church is in the hands of the Chinese helpers.
She will be largely what they make her by the grace of God. And
they will be largely what the missionary makes them, or rather
what the missionary is, for they will reproduce him, faults and all.
This work of training our helpers has now been properly taken in
hand. It is but a beginning ; but all who are in touch with it, know
it to be a work rich with the promise of great things to come.
And what of the possibilities of Christian work in China ? There
is only one answer that can be given, and that in the words of the
great missionary apostle : it is " above all that we can ask or think."
A glance at the following comparisons will show what may be reason
ably expected. Three great Missionary Conferences have been held
in China ; at each of these, in 1877, in 1890, and at the one held
190 THE SONS OF HAN
this year, various returns were made as to the numbers of mission
aries in the field, the number of converts, and so on. Arranging
these figures side by side we not only find out what has been done
these past few years, but see that Christian influence is pouring into
this land in a mighty flood.
Remember the beginnings of mission work in this Empire : those
days when Morrison and his successors seemed to be hopelessly
trying to cleave a rock in their efforts to bring the Gospel into the
homes of the Sons of Han ; then with thankful hearts read the story
of the past thirty years, as it is told in the following table :
1876. 1889. 1906.
Number of Societies at work in China 29 41 82
Missionaries ..... 473 1,896 3*833
Mission stations . . . . . . 91 632
Mission sub-stations (in charge of Chinese) . 511 5, 102
Ordained Chinese preachers . . . . 73 211 345
Unordained ditto . . . . . 511 1,266 5,722
Bible women ....... 90 180 894
Members in full Communion .... 13,035 37*387 178,351
Members on probation .... 78,528
Pupils in Mission Schools . ... 4,909 16,836 57,683
As far as figures are able to, these statistics show the way the
leaven of Christianity is working. Perhaps the boys and girls who
read this will like to do the following sum : " // the increase of the
Chinese Church is eightfold in seventeen years, how long will it be before
the 400,000,000 people of China are won for Christ ? "
As will be seen, there has been a strongly marked progress in
educational work. Not only has the number of pupils in the schools
trebled during the seventeen years that elapsed between the two
Conferences, but no less than 15,137 were in high schools and colleges
receiving a thoroughly good education. But the greatest increase
of all is in the direct Church work. For not only has the number
THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING 191
of converts increased, the self-help of the Native Church has grown
in like proportion,
1876. 1889. 1906
Church Contributions ..... 1,030 4,096 33,462
Then in addition to the great numbers who must be constantly
hearing the Gospel preached, it is estimated that the 300 fully qualified
medical missionaries treat at least 2,000,000 patients each year ;
and these all have the Gospel message declared unto them.
What a great army the Church of God in China is ! Would that
our greatest hope of all might be realized, and the Holy Spirit come
in quickening power, ushering in the time of a great revival in this
land of many sorrows ! Even now the moving of the Spirit is being
felt in the Empire : let us believe that the day of blessing for Central
China is at hand.
PRAY FOR us.
Butler & Tanner, The Selwood Pruning Works, Frome, and London.
THE STORY OF OUR SHIPS.
THE LONDON MISSIONARY SOCIETY was founded in 1795. In the
following year its first party of missionaries sailed for the South Seas
in the Duff. After the loss of this historic ship communication between
the South Sea Missions was kept up by means of various small vessels
until the year 1838, when the Camden was purchased.
In 1844 the boys and girls of our Sunday Schools collected money
with which to purchase the first John Williams, so named in memory
of the great missionary who had met his death on the island of Erro-
manga in 1839. Since then the " Mission fleet " has been the special
charge of the Sunday scholars, who have collected annually, since 1859,
by means of the " New Year s Offering Collecting Cards," the whole
amount necessary for its maintenance, a total sum of nearly 250,000.
The amount collected last year (January, 1905) was 8,185.
The present John Williams, the fourth of that name, and the first
steamship, was launched in March, 1894. A brief description of her
work may be of interest.
The L.M.S. has missionaries working on six different islands and
groups of islands in the Pacific ; and some of these groups contain
large and important islands with missionaries living on each of them.
Altogether we have twenty-six missionaries at work in this part of the
mission-field, with about 800 native preachers and teachers under
their charge. These missionaries have all to be taken to and from
their stations ; food and clothing and other necessaries of life have to
be taken to them every year, together with building material for
schools and chapels and houses ; Bibles and other books have to be
sent out ; native teachers have to be moved from one island to another ;
and as there is no regular service of ships between these islands, it is
absolutely necessary that the Missionary Society should have a vessel
of its own for this work.
Thus there can be no question as to the value of the John Williams
and the importance of maintaining her in good condition from year to
year. The South Seas have witnessed some of the most glorious
triumphs of the Gospel in the history of the world. Islands, which,
half a century ago, were given over to cannibalism and idolatry, are
to-day Christian lands. Whole nations have been brought into God s
Kingdom. And in this great work the " Children s Ship " has played
her part for more than sixty years.
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