[612] The long flowing robe is a sign of respectability which all but the very poorest classes love to affect in public. At the port of Haiphong, shoes are the criterion of social standing; but, as a rule, the well-to-do native merchants prefer to go barefoot rather than give the authorities a chance of exacting heavier squeezes, on the strength of such a palpable acknowledgment of wealth.
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[613] See No. I., note 36.
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[614] See No. LVI., note 317; and No. XCVII., note 505.
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[615] The lictor had no right to divulge his errand when he first met the cloth merchant, or to remove the latter’s name from the top to the bottom of the list.
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[616] The clay image makers of Tientsin are wonderfully clever in taking likenesses by these means. Some of the most skilful will even manipulate the clay behind their backs, and then, adding the proper colours, will succeed in producing an exceedingly good resemblance. They find, however, more difficulty with foreign faces, to which they are less accustomed in the trade.
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[617] See No. LXI., note 346.
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[618] See No. LXIV., note 373.
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[619] Such is the officially authorised method of determining a doubtful relationship between a dead parent and a living child, substituting a bone for the clay image here mentioned.
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[620] “In various savage superstitions the minute resemblance of soul to body is forcibly stated.”—Myths and Myth-makers, by John Fiske, p. 228.
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[621] An important point in Chinese etiquette. It is not considered polite for a person in a sitting position to address an equal who is standing.
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[622] By becoming his son and behaving badly to him. See No. CX., note 545, and the text to which it refers.
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[623] See No. CXXXI., note 605.
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[624] The story is intended as a satire on those puffed-up dignitaries who cannot even go to a picnic without all the retinue belonging to their particular rank. See No. LVI., note 315.
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[625] See No. XXIII., note 152.
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[626] The examiner for the bachelor’s, or lowest, degree.
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[627] The Chinese never cut the tails of their horses or mules.
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[628] One of the feudal Governors of by-gone days.
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[629] A Chinese Landseer.
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[630] Advertisements of these professors of physiognomy are to be seen in every Chinese city.
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[631] In order to make some show for the public eye.
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[632] See No. LXIV., note 373.
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[633] A doctor of any repute generally has large numbers of such certificates, generally engraved on wood, hanging before and about his front door. When I was stationed at Swatow, the writer at Her Majesty’s Consulate presented one to Dr. E. J. Scott, the resident medical practitioner, who had cured him of opium smoking. It bore two principal characters, “Miraculous Indeed!” accompanied by a few remarks, in a smaller sized character, laudatory of Dr. Scott’s professional skill. Banners, with graceful inscriptions written upon them, are frequently presented by Chinese passengers to the captains of coasting steamers who may have brought them safely through bad weather.
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[634] The story is intended as a satire upon Chinese doctors generally, whose ranks are recruited from the swarms of half-educated candidates who have been rejected at the great competitive examinations, medical diplomas being quite unknown in China. Doctors’ fees are, by a pleasant fiction, called “horse-money;” and all prescriptions are made up by the local apothecary, never by the physician himself.
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[635] This would be exactly at the hottest season.
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[636] The Jupiter Pluvius of the neighbourhood.
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[637] A sneer at the superstitious custom of praying for good or bad weather, which obtains in China from the Son of Heaven himself down to the lowest agriculturist whose interests are involved. Droughts, floods, famines, and pestilences, are alike set down to the anger of Heaven, to be appeased only by prayer and repentance.
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[638] Planchette was in full swing in China at the date of the composition of these stories, more than 200 years ago, and remains so at the present day. The character chi, used here and elsewhere for Planchette, is defined in the Shuo Wên, a Chinese dictionary, published A.D. 100, “to inquire by divination on doubtful topics,” no mention being made of the particular manner in which responses are obtained. For the purpose of writing from personal experience, I recently attended a séance at a temple in Amoy, and witnessed the whole performance. After much delay, I was requested to write on a slip of paper “any question I might have to put to the God;” and, accordingly, I took a pencil and wrote down, “A humble suppliant ventures to inquire if he will win the Manila lottery.” This question was then placed upon the altar, at the feet of the God; and shortly afterwards two respectable-looking Chinamen, not priests, approached a small table covered with sand, and each seized one arm of a forked piece of wood, at the fork of which was a stumpy end, at right angles to the plane of the arms. Immediately the attendants began burning quantities of joss-paper, while the two performers whirled the instrument round and round at a rapid rate, its vertical point being all the time pressed down upon the table of sand. All of a sudden the whirling movement stopped, and the point of the instrument rapidly traced a character in the sand, which was at once identified by several of the bystanders, and forthwith copied down by a clerk in attendance. The whirling movement was then continued until a similar pause was made and another character appeared; and so on, until I had four lines of correctly-rhymed Chinese verse, each line consisting of seven characters. The following is an almost word-for-word translation:—

As the question is not concealed from view, all that is necessary for such a hollow deception is a quick-witted versifier who can put together a poetical response stans pede in uno. But in such matters the unlettered masses of China are easily outwitted, and are a profitable source of income to the more astute of their fellow-countrymen.
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[639] An official who flourished in the eighth century of our era, and who, for his devotion to the Taoist religion, was subsequently canonized as one of the Eight Immortals. He is generally represented as riding on a crane.
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[640] That is, by means of the planchette-table.
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[641] Our author was here evidently thinking of his own unlucky fate.
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[642] See No. CXXXI., note 607.
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[643] See No. LXXV., note 426.
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[644] Literally, “golden oranges.” These are skilfully preserved by the Cantonese, and form a delicious sweetmeat for dessert.
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[645] A.D. 1573–1620, the epoch of the most celebrated “blue china.”
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[646] A satirical remark of Mencius (Book I.), used by the sage when combating the visionary projects of a monarch of antiquity.
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[647] This disgusting process is too frequently performed by native butchers at the present day, in order to give their meat a more tempting appearance. Water is also blown in through a tube, to make it heavier; and inexperienced housekeepers are often astonished to find how light ducks and geese become after being cooked, not knowing that the fraudulent poulterer had previously stuffed their throats as full as possible of sand.
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[648] This was the man whose destiny it was really to die just then, and appear before the Ruler of Purgatory.
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[649] The city of Canton boasts several “cat and dog” restaurants; but the consumption of this kind of food is much less universal than is generally supposed.
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[650] Not in our sense of the term. It was not death, but decapitation, or even mutilation, from which the trader begged to be spared. See No. LXXII., note 414.
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[651] The Chinese dog is usually an ill-fed, barking cur, without one redeeming trait in its character. Valued as a guardian of house and property, this animal does not hold the same social position as with us; its very name is a by-word of reproach; and the people of Tonquin explain their filthy custom of blackening the teeth on the ground that a dog’s teeth are white.
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[652] A celebrated scholar and statesman, who flourished towards the close of the Ming dynasty, and distinguished himself by his impeachment of the powerful eunuch, Wei Chung-hsien,—a dangerous step to take in those eunuch-ridden times.
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[653] Mr. Yang was a man of tried virtue, and had he been able to tolerate oculo irretorto, the loss of his money, the priest would have given him, not merely a cure for the bodily ailment under which he was suffering, but a knowledge of those means by which he might have obtained the salvation of his soul, and have enrolled himself among the ranks of the Taoist Immortals. “To those, however,” remarks the commentator, “who lament that Mr. Yang was too worldly-minded to secure this great prize, I reply, ‘Better one more good man on earth, than an extra angel in heaven.’”
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[654] Alchemy was widely cultivated in China during the Han dynasty by priests of the Taoist religion, but all traces of it have now long since disappeared.
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[655] See No. XXII., note 143.
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[656] These are used, together with a heavy wooden bâton, by the Chinese washerman, the effect being most disastrous to a European wardrobe.
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[657] For thus interfering with the appointments of Destiny.
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[658] To provide coffins for poor people has ever been regarded as an act of transcendent merit. The tornado at Canton, in April, 1878, in which several thousand lives were lost, afforded an admirable opportunity for the exercise of this form of charity—an opportunity which was very largely availed of by the benevolent.
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[659] For usurping its prerogative by allowing Chia to obtain unauthorized wealth.
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[660] See No. XIV., note 97.
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[661] See No. LIV., note 293.
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[662] The God of Literature.
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[663] See No. LXXVII., note 431.
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[664] See No. XXVI., note 182.
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[665] A fleshy protuberance on the head, which is the distinguishing mark of a Buddha.
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[666] The eighteen personal disciples of Shâkyamuni Buddha. Sixteen of these are Hindoos, which number was subsequently increased by the addition of two Chinese Buddhists.
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[667] Literally, “wind and water,” or that which cannot be seen and that which cannot be grasped. I have explained the term in my Chinese Sketches, p. 143, as “a system of geomancy, by the science of which it is possible to determine the desirability of sites,—whether of tombs, houses, or cities, from the configuration of such natural objects as rivers, trees, and hills, and to foretell with certainty the fortunes of any family, community, or individual, according to the spot selected; by the art of which it is in the power of the geomancer to counteract evil influences by good ones, to transform straight and noxious outlines into undulating and propitious curves, and rescue whole districts from the devastations of flood or pestilence.”
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[668] As a rule, only the daughters of wealthy families receive any education to speak of.
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[669] A reprehensible proceeding in the eyes of all respectable Chinese, both from a moral and a practical point of view; “for when brothers fall out,” says the proverb, “strangers get an advantage over them.”
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[670] Chinese tradesmen invariably begin by giving short weight in such transactions as these, partly in order to be in a position to gratify the customer by throwing in a trifle more and thus acquire a reputation for fair dealing.
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[671] It was only his soul that had left the house.
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[672] See No. LVI., note 322.
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[673] See No. CXXIII., note 589.
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[674] A common saying is “Foxes in the north; devils in the south,” as illustrative of the folk-lore of these two great divisions of China.
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[675] In no country in the world is adulteration more extensively practised than in China, the only formal check upon it being a religious one—the dread of punishment in the world below.
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[676] The text has here a word (literally, “mud”) explained to be the name of a boneless aquatic creature, which on being removed from the water lies motionless like a lump of mud. The common term for a jelly-fish is shui-mu, “water-mother.”
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[677] See No. LXXIII., note 417.
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[678] There is a widespread belief that human life in China is held at a cheap rate. This may be accounted for by the fact that death is the legal punishment for many crimes not considered capital in the West; and by the severe measures that are always taken in cases of rebellion, when the innocent and guilty are often indiscriminately massacred. In times of tranquillity, however, this is not the case; and the execution of a criminal is surrounded by a number of formalities which go far to prevent the shedding of innocent blood. The Hsi-yüan-lu (see No. XIV., note 100) opens with the words, “There is nothing more important than human life.”
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[679] See No. LXVIII., note 385.
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[680] This story is inserted chiefly in illustration of the fact that all countries have a record of some enormous bird such as the roc of the “Arabian Nights.”
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[681] See No. XXXV., note 217.
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[682] The term here used refers to a creature which partakes rather of the fabulous than of the real. The Kuang-yün says it is “a kind of lion;” but other authorities describe it as a horse. Its favourite food is tiger-flesh. Incense-burners are often made after the “lion” pattern and called by this name, the smoke of the incense issuing from the mouth of the animal, like our own gargoyles.
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[683] The Law of Inheritance, as it obtains in China, has been ably illustrated by Mr. Chal. Alabaster in Vols. V. and VI. of the China Review. This writer states that “there seems to be no absolutely fixed law in regard either of inheritance or testamentary dispositions of property, but certain general principles are recognised which the court will not allow to be disregarded without sufficient cause.” As a rule the sons, whether by wife or concubine, share equally, and in preference to daughters, even though there should be a written will in favour of the latter.
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[684] This has reference to the “seed-time and harvest.”
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[685] See No. I., note 36.
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[686] Clouds being naturally connected in every Chinaman’s mind with these fabulous creatures, the origin of which has been traced by some to waterspouts. See No. LXXXI., note 439.
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