The Middle Kingdom, Volume 1 (of 2) / A Survey of the Geography, Government, Literature, Social Life, Arts, and History of the Chinese Empire and its Inhabitants

The provinces of China Proper are politically subdivided in a scientific manner, but in the regions beyond them, these divisions are considerably modified. Manchuria is regarded as belonging to the reigning family, somewhat as Hanover once pertained to the kings of England, and its scanty population is ruled by a simple military organization, the higher officials being appointed by his majesty himself. The khans of the Mongols in Mongolia and Ílí, the Mohammedan begs in Turkestan, and the lamas in Tibet, are assisted in their rule by Chinese residents and generals who direct and uphold the government.

The geography of foreign countries has not been studied by the Chinese; and so few educated men have travelled even into the islands of the Indian Archipelago, or the kingdoms of Siam, Corea, or Burmah, that the people have had no opportunity to become acquainted with the countries lying on their borders, much less with those in remoter parts, whose names, even, they hardly know. A few native works exist on foreign geography, among which four may be here noticed. “1. Researches in the East and West, 6 vols. 8vo. It was written about two centuries ago; the first volume contains some rude charts intended to show the situation and form of foreign countries. 2. Notices of the Seas, 1 vol. Its author, Yang Ping-nan, obtained his information from a townsman, who, being wrecked at sea, was picked up by a foreign ship, and travelled abroad for fourteen years; on his return to China he became blind, and was engaged as an interpreter in Macao. 3. Notices of Things heard and seen in Foreign Countries, 2 vols. 12mo; written about a century ago, containing among other things a chart of the whole Chinese coast. 4. The Memoranda of Foreign Tribes, 4 vols. 8vo, published in the reign of Kienlung.”[24] A more methodical work is that of Lí Tsing-lai, called ‘Plates Illustrative of the Heavens,’ being an astronomical and geographical work, much of whose contents were obtained from Europeans residing in the country. But even if the Chinese had better treatises on these subjects, the information contained in them would be of little use until it was taught in their schools. The high officers in the government begin now to see the importance of a better acquaintance with general geography. Commissioner Lin, in 1841, published a partial translation of Murray’s Cyclopædia of Geography, in 20 volumes; Gov. Seu Ki-yu, in 1850, issued a compend of geographical notices with maps, and many others, more accurate and extensive, are now extant.

However scarce their geographical works upon foreign countries may be, those delineating the topography of their own are hardly equalled in number and minuteness in any language: every district and town of importance in the empire, as well as every department and province, has a local geography of its own. It may be said that the topographical and statistical works form, after the ethical, the most valuable portion of Chinese literature. It would not be difficult to collect a library of 10,000 volumes of such treatises alone; the topography of the city of Suchau, and of the province of Chehkiang, are each in 40 vols., while the Kwangtung Tung Chí, an ‘Historical and Statistical Account of Kwangtung,’ is in 182 volumes. None of these works, however, would bear to be translated entire, such is the amount of legendary and unimportant matter contained in them; but they contain many data not to be overlooked by one who undertakes to write a geography of China.

The Climate of the Eighteen Provinces has been represented in meteorological tables sufficiently well to ascertain its general salubrity. Pestilences do not frequently visit the land, nor, as in Southern India, is it deluged with rain during one monsoon, and parched with drought during the other. The average temperature of the whole empire is lower than that of any other country on the same latitude, and the coast is subject to the same extremes as that of the Atlantic States in America. The isothermal line of 70° F. as the average for the year, which passes south of Canton, runs by Cairo and New Orleans, eight degrees north of it; the line of 60° F. average passes from Shanghai to Marseilles, Raleigh, St. Louis, and north of San Francisco; and the line of 50° F. average goes near Peking, thence on to Vienna, Dublin, Philadelphia, and Puget’s Sound, in lat. 52°. These various lines show that while Shanghai and Peking have temperatures similar to Raleigh and Philadelphia, nearly on their own parallels, Canton is the coldest place on the globe in its latitude, and the only place within the tropics where snow falls near the sea-shore. One result of this projection of the temperate zone into the tropical is seen in the greater vigor and size of the people of the three southern provinces over any races on the same parallel elsewhere; and the productions are not so strictly tropical. The isothermal lines for the year, as given above, are not so irregular as those for winter. The line of 60° F. runs by the south of Formosa and Hongkong, to Cairo and St. Augustine, a range of nine degrees; but the winter line of 40° F. passes from Shanghai to Constantinople, Milan, Dublin, and Raleigh, ending at Puget’s Sound, a range of twenty degrees. A third line of 32° for winter passes through Shantung to N. Tibet and the Black Sea, Norway, New York, and Sitka—a range of twenty-five degrees.

Peking (lat. 39° 55′ N.) exhibits a fair average of the climate in that part of the Plain. The extremes range from 104° to zero F., but the mean annual temperature is 52.3° F., or more than 9° lower than Naples; the mean winter range is 12° below freezing, or about 18° lower than that of Paris (lat. 48° 50′), and 15° lower than Copenhagen. The rainfall seldom reaches sixteen inches in a year, most of it coming in July and August; the little snow that descends remains only two or three days on the ground, and is blown away rather than melted; no one associates white with winter, but snow is earnestly prayed for as a purifier of the air against diphtheria and fevers. The winds from the Plateau cause the barometer and thermometer to fall, but the sky is clear. In the spring, as the heat increases, the winds raise the dust and sand over the country; some of these sand-storms extend even to Shanghai, carrying millions of tons of soil from its original place. The dryness of the region has apparently increased during the last century, and constant droughts destroy the trees, which by their absence increase the desiccation now going on. Frost closes the rivers for three months, and ice is cheap. After the second crops fully start in August, the autumns become mild, and till the 10th of December are calm and genial.[25]

The climate of the Plain is generally good, but near the rivers and marshy grounds along the Grand Canal, agues and bowel complaints prevail. A resident speaks of the temperature of Nanking and the region around it: “This vast Plain being only a marsh half drained, the moisture is excessive, giving rise to many strange diseases, all of them serious, and not unfrequently mortal. The climate affects the natives from other provinces, and Europeans. I have not known one of the latter who was not sick for six months or a year after his arrival. Every one who comes here must prepare himself for a tertian or quotidian. For myself, after suffering two months from a malignant fever, I had ten attacks of a malady the Chinese here call the sand, from the skin being covered with little blackish pimples, resembling grains of dust. It is prompt and violent in its progress, and corrupts the blood so rapidly that in a few minutes it stagnates and coagulates in the veins. The best remedy the people have is to cicatrize the least fleshy parts of the body with a copper cash. The first attack I experienced rendered all my limbs insensible in two minutes, and I expected to die before I could receive extreme unction. After recovering a little, great lassitude succeeded.”[26] The monsoons form an important element in the seaside climate as far north as latitude 31°. The dry and wet seasons correspond to the north-east and south-west monsoons, assuaging the heats of summer by their cooling showers, and making the winters bracing and healthy. Above the Formosa Channel they are less regular in the summer than in winter.

The inhabitants of Shanghai suffer from rapid changes in the autumn and spring months, and pulmonary and rheumatic complaints are common. The maximum of heat is 100° F., and the minimum 24°, but ice is not common, nor does snow remain long on the ground. The average temperature of the summer is from 80° to 93° by day, and from 60° to 75° by night; the thermometer in winter ranges from 45° to 60° by day, and from 36° to 45° by night.

Owing in some degree to the hills, the extremes are rather greater at Ningpo than Shanghai. The thermometer ranges from 24° to 107° during the twelvemonth, and changes of 20° in the course of two hours are not unusual, rendering it the most unhealthy station along the coast. There is a hot and cold season of three months each at this place. The cold is very piercing when the north-east winds set in, and fires are needed, but natives content themselves with additional clothing. The large brick beds (kang) common in Chihlí are not often seen. Ice forms in pools, and is gathered to preserve fish. Snow frequently falls, but does not remain long. Occasionally it covers the hills in Chehkiang for several weeks to the depth of six inches. Fuhchau and Canton lie at the base of hills, within a hundred miles of the sea-coast, and their climates exhibit greater extremes than Amoy and Hongkong. Frost and ice are common every winter at each of the former, and fires are therefore pleasant in the house. The extremes at Fuhchau are from 38° to 95°, with an average of 56° during December and 82° for August. Along this whole coast the most refreshing monsoon makes the summers very agreeable. The climate of Amoy is delightful, but its insular position renders a residence somewhat less agreeable than on the main. Here the thermometer ranges from 40° to 96° during the year, without the rapid changes of Ningpo. The heat continues longer, though assuaged by breezes from the sea.

Meteorology at Canton and its vicinity has been carefully studied; on the whole, its climate, and especially that of Macao, may be considered more salubrious than in most other places situated between the tropics. The thermometer at Canton in July and August stands on an average at 80° to 88°, and in January and February at 50° to 60°. The highest recorded observation in 1831 was 94°, in July; and the lowest, 29° in January. Ice sometimes forms in shallow vessels a line or two in thickness, but no use is made of it. A fall of snow nearly two inches deep occurred there in February, 1835, which remained on the ground three hours. Having never seen any before, the citizens hardly knew what was its proper name, some calling it falling cotton, and every one endeavoring to preserve a little for a febrifuge. Another similar fall occurred in the winter of 1861. Fogs are common during February and March, and the heat sometimes renders them very disagreeable, it being necessary to keep up a little fire to dry the house. Most of the rain falls in May and June, but there is nothing like the rainy season at Calcutta and Manilla in July, August, and September. The regular monsoon comes from the south-west, with frequent showers to allay the heat. In the succeeding months, northerly winds commence, but from October to January the temperature is agreeable, the sky clear, and the air invigorating. Few large cities are more healthy than Canton; no epidemics nor malaria prevail, notwithstanding the fact that much of the town is built upon piles.

The climate of Macao and Hongkong has not so great a range as Canton, from their proximity to the sea. Few cities in Asia are more salutiferous than Macao, though it has been remarked that few of the natives there attain a great age. The maximum is 90°, with an average summer heat of 84°. The minimum is 50°, and average winter weather 68°, with almost uninterrupted sunshine. Fogs are not often seen here, but on the river they prevail, being frequent at Whampoa. North-easterly gales are common in the spring and autumn, and have a noticeable periodicity of three days. The vegetation does not change its general aspect during the winter, the trees cease to grow, and the grass becomes brownish; but the stimulus of the warm moisture in March soon makes a sensible difference in the appearance of the landscape, and bright green leaves rapidly replace the old. The reputed insalubrity of Hongkong, in early days, was owing to other causes than climate, and when it became a well-built and well-drained town, its unwholesomeness disappeared. The rain-fall is greater than in Macao, owing to the attraction of the high peaks. During the rainy weather the walls of houses become damp, and if newly plastered, drip with moisture.

The Chinese consider the provinces of Kwangtung, Kwangsí, and Yunnan to be the most unhealthy of the eighteen, and for this reason employ them as places of banishment for criminals from the north-eastern districts. The central portions of the country are on some accounts the most bracing, not so liable to sudden changes as the coast, nor so cold as the western and northern districts. Sz’chuen and Kweichau are cooler than Fuhkien and Chehkiang, owing to the mountains in and upon their borders.

The marked contrast between the Chinese and American coasts in regard to rain is doubtless owing, in a great degree, to the outlying islands from Formosa to Sagalien on the former, whose high mountains arrest the clouds in their progress inland. The Kuro-siwo, being outside of them, allows a far greater mass of cold water between it and the shore on the Chinese, than is the case on the Atlantic coast, and renders it the colder of the two by nearly eight degrees of latitude, if isothermal lines alone are regarded. This mass of cold water, having less evaporation, deprives the maritime provinces of rain in diminishing supply as one goes north along the skirts of the Plain, until the Chang-peh shan are reached. The rains which fall in the western provinces and the slopes of the Bayan kara Mountains, coming up from the Indian Ocean during the south-west monsoon, fall in decreasing quantities as the clouds are driven north-east across the basins of the Yangtsz’ and Yellow rivers. In the western part of Kansuh the humidity covers the mountains with more vegetation than further east, toward the ocean. Snow falls as late as June, and frosts occur in every month of the year. The enormous elevation of the western side of China near Tibet, the absence of an expanse of water like the great lakes, and the bareness of the mountains north of the Mei ling, account for much of this difference between the United States and China; but more extended data are needed for accurate deductions.

The fall of rain at Canton is 70 inches annually, which is the mean of sixteen years’ observation. Ninety inches was registered during one of these years. Nearly one-half of the whole falls during May, June, and September. The average at Shanghai for four years was 36 inches. No observations are recorded for the valley of the Yangtsz’. Near the edge of the Plateau the rainfall averages 16 inches in the province of Chihlí, and rather more in Shansí and Shantung, where moisture is attracted by the mountains. More than three-fourths of the rain falls during the ten weeks ending August 31st. Snow seldom remains on the level over a fortnight.

The increased temperature on the southern coast during the months of June and July operates, with other causes, to produce violent storms along the seaboard, called tyfoons, a word derived from the Chinese ta-fung, or ‘great wind.’ These destructive tornadoes occur from Hainan to Chusan, between July and October, gradually progressing northward as the season advances, and diminishing in fury in the higher latitudes. They annually occasion great losses to the native and foreign shipping in Chinese waters, more than half the sailing ships lost on that coast having suffered in them. Happily, their fury is oftenest spent at sea, but when they occur inland, the loss of life is fearful. In August, 1862, and September 21, 1874, the deaths reported in two such storms near Canton, Hongkong, and their vicinity, were upward of 30,000 each. In the latter instance the American steamer Alaska, of 3,500 tons, was lifted from her anchorage and quietly put down in five feet of water near the shore, from whence she was safely floated some months afterward.

Tyfoons exhaust their force within a narrow track, which, in such cases as have been registered, lies in no uniform direction, other than from south to north, at a greater or less angle, along the coast. The principal phenomena indicating their approach are the direction of the wind, which commences to blow in soft zephyrs from the north, without, however, assuaging the heat or disturbing the stifling calm, and the falling barometer. The glass usually begins to fall several hours before the storm commences, and the rarefaction of the air is further shown by the heavy swell rolling in upon the beach, though the sea remains unruffled. The wind increases as it veers to the north-east, and from that point to south-east blows with the greatest force in fitful gusts. The rain falls heaviest toward the close of the gale, when the glass begins to rise. The barometer not unfrequently falls below 28 in. Capt. Krusenstern in 1804 records his surprise at seeing the mercury sink out of sight.

The Chinese have erected temples in Hainan to the Tyfoon Mother, a goddess whom they supplicate for protection against these hurricanes. They say “that a few days before a tyfoon comes on, a slight noise is heard at intervals, whirling round and then stopping, sometimes impetuous and sometimes slow. This is a ‘tyfoon brewing.’ Then fiery clouds collect in thick masses; the thunder sounds deep and heavy. Rainbows appear, now forming an unbroken curve and again separating, and the ends of the bow dip into the sea. The sea sends back a bellowing sound, and boils with angry surges; the loose rocks dash against each other, and detached sea-weed covers the water; there is a thick, murky atmosphere; the water-fowl fly about affrighted; the trees and leaves bend to the south—the tyfoon has commenced. When to it is superadded a violent rain and a frightful surf, the force of the tempest is let loose, and away fly the houses up to the hills, and the ships and boats are removed to the dry land; horses and cattle are turned heels over head, trees are torn up by the roots, and the sea boils up twenty or thirty feet, inundating the fields and destroying vegetation. This is called tieh kü, or an iron whirlwind.”[27] Those remarkable gusts which annually occur in the Atlantic States, called tornadoes, defined as local storms affecting a thread of surface a few miles long, are unknown in China. The healthy climate of China has had much to do with the civilization of its inhabitants. No similar area in the world exceeds it for general salubrity.

The Chinese are the only people who have, by means of a term added to the name of a place, endeavored to designate its relative rank. Three of the words used for this purpose, viz., fu, chau, and hien, have been translated as ‘first,’ ‘second,’ and ‘third’ rank; but this gradation is not quite correct, for the terms do not apply to the city or town alone, but to the portions of country of which it is the capital. The nature of these and other terms, and the divisions intended by them, are thus explained:

The eighteen provinces received their present boundaries and divisions in the reign of Kienlung; and the little advance which has been made abroad in the geography of China is shown by the fact, that although these divisions were established a hundred years ago, the old demarkations, existing at the time of the survey in 1710, are still found in many modern European geographies and maps. The following table shows their present divisions and government. The three columns under the head of Departments contain the fu, chihlí ting, and chihlí chau, all of which are properly prefectures; the three columns under the head of Districts contain the ting, chau, and hien.

The province of Chihlí is the most important of the whole. On foreign maps it is sometimes written Pechele (i.e., North Chihlí), a name formerly given it in order to distinguish it from Kiangnan, or Nan-chihlí, in which the seat of government was once located. This name is descriptive, rather than technical, and means ‘Direct rule,’ denoting that from this province the supreme power which governs the empire proceeds; any province, in which the Emperor and court should be fixed, would therefore be termed Chihlí, and its chief city King, ‘capital,’ or King-tu or King-sz’, ‘court of the capital.’ The surface of this province lying south of the Great Wall is level, excepting a few ridges of hills in the west and north, while the eastern parts, and those south to the Gulf, are among the flattest portions of the Great Plain.

It is bounded on the north-east by Liautung, where for a short distance the Great Wall is the frontier line; on the east by the Gulf of Pechele; on the south-east and south by Shantung; on the south-west by Honan; on the west by Shansí; and north by Inner Mongolia, where the river Liau forms the boundary. The extensive region beyond the Wall, occupied mostly by the Tsakhar Mongols, is now included within the jurisdiction, and placed under the administration of officers residing at one of the garrisoned gates of the Great Wall; the area of this part is about half that of the whole province. The chief department in the province, that of Shuntien, being both large and important, as containing the metropolis, is divided into four lu or circuits, each under the rule of a sub-prefect, who is subordinate to the prefect living at Peking.

Peking[29] (i.e., Northern Capital) is situated upon a sandy plain, about twelve miles south-west of the Pei ho, and more than a hundred miles west-north-west of its mouth, in lat. 39° 54′ 36″ N., and long. 116° 27′ E., or nearly on the parallel of Samarkand, Naples, and Philadelphia. It is a city worthy of note on many accounts. Its ancient history as the capital of the Yen Kwoh (the ‘Land of Swallows’) during the feudal times, and its later position as the metropolis of the empire for many centuries, give it historical importance; while its imperial buildings, its broad avenues with their imposing gates and towers, its regular arrangement, extent, populousness, and diversity of costume and equipage, combine to render it to a traveller the most interesting and unique city in Asia. It is now ruinous and poor, but the remains of its former grandeur under Kienlung’s prosperous reign indicate the justness of the comparisons made by the Catholic writers with western cities one hundred and eighty years ago. The entire circuit of the walls and suburbs is reckoned by Hyacinthe at twenty-five miles, and its area at twenty-seven square miles, but more accurate measurements of the walls alone give forty-one li, or 14.25 miles (or 23.55 kilometres) for the Manchu city, including the cross-wall, and twenty-eight li, or ten miles, for the Chinese city on its south; not counting the cross-wall, the circuit measures almost twenty-one miles. The suburbs near the thirteen outer gates altogether form a small proportion to the whole; the area within them is nearly twenty-six square miles. Those residents who have had the best opportunities estimate the entire population at a million or somewhat less; no census returns are available to prove this figure, nor can it be stated what is the proportion of Manchus, Mongols, and Chinese, except that the latter outnumber all others. Du Halde reckoned it to be about three millions, and Klaproth one million three hundred thousand; and each was probably true at some period, for the number has diminished with the poverty of the Government.

Peking is regarded by the Chinese as one of their ancient cities, but it was not made the capital of the whole empire until Kublai established his court at this spot in 1264. The Ming emperors who succeeded the Mongols held their court at Nanking until Yungloh transferred the seat of government to Peking in 1411, where it has since remained. Under the Mongols, the city was called Khan-baligh (i.e., city of the Khan), changed into Cambalu in the accounts of those times; on Chinese maps it is usually called King-sz’.

Peking has, during its history, existed under many different names; after each disaster her walls have been changed and her houses rebuilt, so that to-day she stands, like the capitals of the ancient Roman and Byzantine empires, upon the débris of centuries of buildings. The most important renovations have been those by the Liao dynasty, in 937 A.D., who entirely rebuilt the city, and by the Kin rulers in 1151.

It was at first surrounded by a single wall pierced by nine gates, whence it is sometimes called the City of Nine Gates. The southern suburbs were inclosed by Kiatsing in 1543, and the city now consists of two portions, the northern or inner city (Nui ching), containing about fifteen square miles, where are the palace, government buildings, and barracks for troops; and the southern or Outer city (Wai ching), where the Chinese live. The wall of the Manchu city averages fifty feet high, forty wide at top, and about sixty at bottom, most of the slope being on the inner face. That around the Outer city is no more than thirty in height, twenty-five thick at bottom, and about fifteen at top. The terre-plein throughout is paved with bricks weighing sixty pounds each; a crenellated parapet runs around the entire town, intended only for archers or musketeers, as no port-holes for cannon exist. It is undoubtedly the finest wall surrounding any city now extant. Near the gates, of which there are sixteen in all, the walls are faced with stone, but in other places with these large bricks, laid in a concrete of lime and clay, which in process of time becomes almost as durable as stone. The intermediate space between facings is filled up with the earth taken from the ditch which surrounds the city. Square buttresses occur at intervals of sixty yards on the outer face, each projecting fifty feet, and every sixth one being twice the size of the others; their tops furnish room for the troops posted there to resist side attacks. Each gate is surmounted with a brick tower of many stories, over a hundred feet high, built in galleries with port-holes, and giving a very imposing appearance to the city as one approaches it from the wide plain. The gates of the Manchu city have a double entrance formed by joining their supporting bastions with a circular wall in which are side entrances, thus making an enceinte of several acres, in which the yellow-tiled temple to the tutelary God of War is conspicuous. The arches of all the gates are built solidly of granite; the massive doors are closed and barred every night soon after dark.

At the sides of the gates, and also between them, are esplanades for mounting to the top; this is shut to the common people, and the guards are not allowed to bring their women upon the wall, which would be deemed an affront to Kwantí. The moat around the city is fed from the Tunghwui River, which also supplies all the other canals leading across or through the city. The approach to Peking from Tung chau is by an elevated stone road, but nothing of the buildings inside the walls is seen; and were it not for the lofty towers over the gates, it would more resemble an encampment inclosed by a massive wall than a large metropolis. No spires or towers of churches, no pillars or monuments, no domes or minarets, nor even many dwellings of superior elevation, break the dull uniformity of this or any Chinese city. In Peking, the different colored yellow or green tiles on official buildings,[30] mixed with the brown roofs of common houses, impart a variety to the scene, but the chief objects to relieve the monotony are the large clumps of trees, and the flag-staffs in pairs near the temples. The view from the walls impresses one with the grand ideas of the founders of the city; and the palaces in the Forbidden City, towering above everything else, worthily exhibit their notions of what was befitting the sovereigns of the Middle Kingdom. The Bell and Clock Towers, the Prospect Hill, the dagobas, pagodas, and gate towers, and lastly the Temple of Heaven, are all likewise visible from this point, and render the scene picturesque and peculiar.[31]

The plan of the city here given is reduced from a large Chinese map, but is not very exact. The northern portion occupies for the most part the same area as the Cambaluc of Marco Polo, which, however, extended about two miles north, where the remains of the old north wall of the Mongols still exist. On their expulsion Hungwu erected the present northern wall, and his son Yungloh rebuilt the other three sides in 1419 on a rather larger scale; but the arrangement of the streets and gates is due to the Great Khan. When taken possession of by the Manchus in 1644, they found a magnificent city ready for them, uninjured and strong, which they apportioned among their officers and bannermen; but necessity soon obliged these men, less frugal and thrifty than the natives, to sell them, and content themselves with humbler abodes; consequently, the greater part of the northern city is now tenanted by Chinese. The innermost inclosure in the Nui Ching contains the palace and its surrounding buildings; the second is occupied by barracks and public offices, and by many private residences; the outer one, for the most part, consists of dwelling-houses, with shops in the large avenues. The inner inclosure measures 6.3 li, or 2.23 miles, in circuit, and is called Tsz’ Kin Ching, or ‘Carnation Prohibited City;’ the wall is less solid and high than the city wall; it is covered with bright yellow tiles, guarded by numerous stations of bannermen and gendarmerie, and surrounded by a deep, wide moat. Two gates, the Tung-hwa and Sí-hwa, on the east and west, afford access to the interior of this habitation of the Emperor, as well as the space and rooms appertaining, which furnish lodgment to the guard defending the approach to the Dragon’s Throne; a tower at each corner, and one over each gateway, also give accommodation to other troops. The interior of this inclosure is divided into three parts by two walls running from south to north, and the whole is occupied by a suite of court-yards and halls, which, in their arrangement and architecture, far exceed any other specimens of the kind in China. According to the notions of a common Chinese, all here is gold and silver; “he will tell you of gold and silver pillars, gold and silver roofs, and gold and silver vases, in which swim gold and silver fishes.”