Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate Novara Volume Ii Part 15

[111] A Chinese sailor, on being asked why his vessel had an eye painted on its bulwark, replied in Canton-English, "Suppose no hab eye, how can see?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: Life in Hong-kong.]

XIV.

Hong-kong.

Duration of Stay from 5th to 18th July, 1858.

Rapid increase of the colony of Victoria or Hong-kong.-- Disagreeables.--Public character.--The Comprador, or "fac-totum."--A Chinese fortune-teller.--Curiosity-stalls.--The To-stone.--Pictures on so-called rice-paper.--Canton-English.-- Notices on the Chinese language and mode of writing.-- Manufacture of ink.--Hospitality of German missionaries.--The custom of exposing and murdering female children.--Method of dwarfing the female foot.--Sir John Bowring.--Branch Inst.i.tute of the Royal Asiatic Society.--An ecclesiastical dignitary on the study of natural sciences.--The Chinese in the East Indies.-- Green indigo or Lu-Kao.--Kind reception by German countrymen.-- Anthropometrical measurements.--Ramble to Little Hong-kong.-- Excursion to Canton on board H.M. gun-boat Algerine.--A day at the English head-quarters.--The Treaty of Tien-Tsin.--Visit to the Portuguese settlement of Macao.--Herr von Carlowitz.-- Camoens' Grotto.--Church for Protestants.--PaG.o.da Makok.--Dr.

Kane.--Present position of the colony.--Slave-trade revived under the name of Chinese emigration.--Excursions round Macao.-- The Isthmus.--Chinese graves.--Praya Granite.--A Chinese physician.--Singing stones.--Departure.--Gutzlaff's Island.-- Voyage to the Yang-tse-Kiang.--Wusung.--Arrival at Shanghai.

Victoria, the name by which the settlement situate on the north side of the island of Hong-kong is known in official doc.u.ments, strongly recalls another renowned British possession, Gibraltar. A mere uninviting granite rock of about 9 miles in length, 8 in breadth, and 26 in circ.u.mference, Hong-kong, situate as it is at the mouth of the Canton River, is one of the best harbours in the Chinese Empire. Owing to the barren, treeless surface, which consists for the most part of chains of hills, the highest point of which is 1825 feet above sea-level, with narrow valleys between, and a small extent of level ground around the bay, hardly a twentieth part of its surface is adapted to agriculture. The modern cheerful town, thoroughly European in character, has within these few years rapidly attained large dimensions, and its numerous palatial structures speak volumes for the wealth and prosperity of the residents. The buildings of the colony rise terrace-like one above another, and extend in rows all along the steep slope of the granite, for a distance of nearly three miles. Besides the population inhabiting the town, many thousand Chinese of the very lowest cla.s.s with their wives and children live here in small boats year after year, so that the total population of the island amounts to about 80,000 souls.

Twenty years back Hong-kong was but an insignificant place. Only since the peace of Nangking in 1842, which shook to its foundation the exclusive system till then prevalent, and among other important advantages secured the island of Hong-kong to the English, besides bringing into the community of nations the huge unwieldy empire with its 400,000,000, occupying 78 degrees of longitude and 38 of lat.i.tude, has it been developed into the most important business centre of China. It became an emporium for all European manufactures, as well as for all produce from the interior, which is s.h.i.+pped hence to the various marts of the world.

Unfortunately the period at which the flag of the great Mandjing, or Double Eagle, as the Chinese call Austria, was for the first time unfurled on the sh.o.r.es of the Celestial Kingdom proved most unsuitable for scientific observation. While in the interior a variety of circ.u.mstances seriously threatened the stability of the throne of the reigning dynasty, the flames of war were once more breaking out along the coast also, and adding to the confusion and distress of the Chinese diplomatists. In the present war the English were for the first time in these waters fighting side by side with the French, while the Russians and North Americans were cautiously maintaining an observant, but none the less on that account menacing att.i.tude. The hatred and animosity of the Chinese populace, stirred up by their own authorities, was continually goaded to increasing fury with each new victory of the "red-haired barbarians." The Chinese bakers in Hong-kong had devised the cruel expedient of poisoning the bread purchased by the English, and thus avenging themselves on the foe more fatally and more certainly than by Chinese weapons. Even while walking in the neighbourhood one's life was not safe, and even the usually not very easily terrified Englishman was now begirt with "revolvers," when he rode forth of an afternoon with his wife, or was taken in a sedan-chair to a friend's house of an evening.

Shortly before our arrival, the captain of a merchantman, while taking a walk outside the city, was set upon by some Chinese, robbed, and so severely maltreated that he expired of the injuries he received. So too the clerk of a mercantile house had been picked up just outside the city weltering in his blood and pierced with a number of wounds from a dagger, the murderer in this case also evading detection. An attempt was even made against the life of the Governor, Sir John Bowring, which was only frustrated through the vigilance of the sentinel, who discharged his piece at the scoundrels just as, favoured by night, they were stealing over the walls of the Government-house, with the view of creeping through the garden as far as Sir John's cabinet.

Even in the most ordinary domestic matters might be traced the same relentless hostility on the part of the Chinese, and the state of affairs was becoming every day more intolerable to the European residents. All the domestic servants at Hong-kong are Chinese, who come hither from the nearest provinces of the mainland, in order to benefit by the rate of wages paid by the "foreign barbarian." The Chinese officials, vying with each other in every possible method of showing their implacable hatred to the strangers and to embitter their life in China, now issued an order to all the Chinese resident in Hong-kong to quit the island and return to their native country. This ordinance would a.s.suredly have been disregarded by most of the resident Chinese of the Middle Empire, had not any violation of the Imperial rescripts been visited with such appalling consequences. For by the Draconic laws of the Empire, the family of the criminal expiate his offence, should he take to flight and get beyond the reach of the arm of Chinese justice. For any such absentee from justice, some other member of the family is subst.i.tuted, who may be still on the spot; as for instance, the father, mother, or brother, who is punished exactly as though he had in person been guilty of the crime or misdemeanour. With such terrific means of repressing disobedience impending over him, no Chinese would venture to set at defiance the orders of the Mandarins; and accordingly, during the summer of 1858, 10,000 Chinese returned home at once; others, who did not dare to return, but could not endure that the ruthless doom should be executed upon their relatives, committed suicide. The position of European ladies in Hong-kong became anything but enviable, as they had at a moment's notice to take up the pot-ladle for themselves, and get through the various fatiguing details of their households with what skill they could. Moreover there was good ground for apprehension that the Mandarins might cut off all communications with the neighbouring provinces, which move, as the greater part of the every-day necessaries of life are supplied from the mainland, might have exposed the population of Hong-kong to the severest straits.

Under these circ.u.mstances any more remote excursions, or visits to the adjacent mainland, were of course impossible. We had to confine our investigations to the island itself, there to collect what memoranda we could, and see as much of the island and its inhabitants as the shortness of our stay and the prevailing disorders might admit.

Life in Hong-kong has already a strong leaven of western civilization.

Only in the narrowest streets does the visitor come upon examples of the genuine Chinese type. Most of the natives even inhabit houses built in the European style, so that one feels as though in a European city inhabited by a Chinese population, the latter having however greatly altered from its originality. Only very few types of Chinese popular life are met with in this English colony. Of these characters the most interesting and unique is the _Comprador_ (_Mai-pau_), a sort of factotum, whom no household can dispense with, and whose importance only those can adequately do justice to who have lived some time in the country. The Comprador, or _shroff_, is the soul, the good or evil genius, of the house: he sees to all sorts of purchases, manages the domestic economy, and maintains order and discipline in the house and household. The entire domestic control is exclusively lodged in his hands, to that extent that even the master and mistress of the house may not, without consulting the Comprador, dismiss one of the servants or engage a new one. For all that goes on, the latter is responsible. He has to answer for the honesty of the servants, and must replace anything that may have gone amissing from the house inventory. If the family leave their house for any time, the Comprador is informed of the place where the most valuable articles are deposited, where they are more likely to be found in proper order on their return than by any other device. Even during the late war, in which the feeling of the Chinese to the Europeans was anything but friendly, the Comprador held to his fidelity, and was as useful as ever. In view of the actual state of matters, a traveller must feel no little astonishment at beholding the doors and windows of the private dwelling-houses everywhere wide open, and valuable articles lying exposed in the various apartments.

As however the Comprador himself must get a number of bails to become responsible for him, and as the post is a very profitable one, it follows that there are but few cases of dishonesty in this singular profession. It is especially remarkable that few of the populace seem to be as hostile to the strangers as the Mandarins, and all the numerous annoyances inflicted on the latter are invariably to be traced to the intrigues of the Chinese authorities. How else would it be possible for a couple of hundred Europeans to rule a colony in which are 80,000 Chinese, and which moreover is dependent upon the mainland for the very first necessities of life?

The Comprador receives for all his services and attentions no higher pay than from 12 to 15 dollars a month, besides support for himself and family. This however is not his sole income, as every tradesman must give the Comprador a per-centage upon everything, even the most insignificant article that enters the house, and this custom even extends to any purchases made by a Chinese in the warehouses of the foreign merchant.

Another "public character," whom one frequently meets in the lower parts of the city in the public streets of the Chinese quarter, is the "soothsayer." On a small table before him stands an open draught-board with a number of squares, on which are inscribed a variety of proverbs and oracular sayings. In each square is a grain of rice, and quite close to the board is a bird-cage with a tame canary. Presently some good-humoured gaping rustic comes up, who wishes to learn his destiny, upon which the soothsayer suffers the canary to hop out of his cage upon one of the squares, and pick up a grain of rice _ad libitum_. The sentences and interpretations, which are inscribed on each square from which the canary snaps up his food serve for a reply and decision to the curious questioner, who hands over a small _honorarium_. The apparatus is simple and ingenious, but the proverbs are excessively silly, and recall much less the land of Confucius than the dream-books of certain countries standing high in European civilization.

The stores which seem most to attract the attention of a stranger are the "Curiosity-shops," in which are heaped up those innumerable articles of Chinese industry and Chinese taste which are so characteristic of the country and its inhabitants. Here the eye rests upon objects of the most bizarre shapes, which in material design and execution are totally unlike anything the European sees elsewhere; workmans.h.i.+p in wood and stone, that ill.u.s.trates in a remarkable manner the extraordinary patience of the artisan, such as drinking-cups, barrels, frames, cut all in one piece, and beautifully carved, elegant fancy articles of horn, stone, mother-of-pearl, ivory, roots of trees, metal, or wood, vases and dishes, statuettes in copper and clay, woven portraits, embroidery, &c. &c.

Among all these various manufactures, one especially remarks those prepared from a leek-green, slimy-feeling stone (nephrite), which is in much request among the Chinese, and is highly valued. The Chinese name, Yo, from which in all probability is derived the French name _Jade_, does not indicate however a peculiar species, but is used for all sorts of carved stone-work and gems, while the most valuable one is called by the Chinese the "mutton-fat" stone. The articles prepared of what is named steat.i.te, or soap-stone, are largely used in commerce, but are of very small value, and usually cut only in very clumsy figures.

But these manufactures make much less impression upon the stranger than the beautiful pictures of the Chinese artists upon rice-paper, a peculiar branch of art, cultivated by the Chinese alone, and which as yet has never been successfully imitated in any other country. The most exquisite specimens of these are sent to Canton, but among the Chinese in Hong-kong we saw several beautiful works in this style of painting. The common designation of rice-paper has led to the erroneous idea that the substance of which these pictures are made is manufactured from the leaves of the rice-plant, whereas it is prepared from the pith of an entirely different plant (_Aralia papyrifera_), which grows in Funan and Tukun. The marrow is steeped for some time in water, after which it is split by means of very keen sharp knives into thin leaves, which are then subjected to gentle pressure. The largest are about a foot square, and are reserved almost exclusively for pictures, the shreds and inferior sorts alone being used for the manufacture of artificial flowers. We saw portraits of the Emperor and Empress, of the rebel leader, Tai-ping, of the notorious Yeh, ex-governor of Canton, and other well-known or conspicuous personages.

Latterly there has sprung up a strong tendency among the Chinese artists to daguerreotypes and photographs in miniature upon ivory; and in the _ateliers_ of Hong-kong a number of artists were engaged in this, at present the most profitable branch of Chinese artistic skill.

In all these shops the medium of trade is what is called Canton-English, less a dialect than a confused jargon of English and Chinese words, consisting of concessions made on either side to the grammar and idiom of the other, so as the more readily to comprehend each other. A few Spanish and Portuguese words have also crept in, recalling the former relations of these countries with China. All English words ending in _e_ mute have in this gibberish an _i_ attached to them, as also all other words whatever.

Thus they say _timi_, _housi_, _pieci_, _coachi_, _cooki_, &c. &c. There are certain Chinese, especially in Canton, who pick up a living by initiating young country folks, who are about entering service in English mercantile houses, in this singular language. Curious and unpleasant as this Chinese English dialect sounds in the ears of strangers, it is found greatly to facilitate intercourse with the Chinese, in consequence of the immense difficulties attending the study of Chinese, so that most Europeans find it far more comfortable to master this jargon, which is not without some influence on the spread of English in the chief commercial cities, than to occupy themselves with mastering Chinese. The language spoken by the sons of the "middle kingdom" consists of 450 monosyllabic sounds, which by various delicate differences in accentuation may increase to about 1600. The slight, and to unaccustomed ears almost inappreciable, shades of aspiration and accentuation, are the main difficulty in the way of foreigners desirous of learning the Chinese language.

To learn the written characters is equally arduous, and requires not less time and perseverance; for this does not consist of a number of letters, the varying arrangement of which const.i.tutes words, but of 40,000 more or less complicated signs, each of which expresses a whole word. They are rude forms, representing most imperfectly ideas and material objects;[112]

however, the knowledge of 4000 to 6000 such signs, with their various significations, suffices to understand most of the common Chinese books.

These singular hieroglyphics are not written horizontally but vertically.

Moreover, the Chinese begin from the right side, so that, directly the reverse of the European custom, the t.i.tle of a Chinese book is found on the first page, the leaf furthest to the right hand. Long ago, the Chinese, like most other Asiatic nations at the present day, wrote with metal _styli_ upon split leaves of bamboo. Ever since the third century before Christ, however, when the art was invented of making paper from the rind of the mulberry tree and the bamboo-cane, and preparing pin-soot, glair, musk, glue, Indian ink[113] (meh), and other substances, the pencil has taken the place of the graver. The hieroglyphics now made on paper are softer, more elegant, and in distinctness of outline admit greater varieties of form. Most of the Chinese whom we saw engaged in writing formed the most complicated characters with great celerity and ease upon the thin paper, and without the firm strokes losing anything of their neatness and clearness of outline.

Among the various scientific objects recommended as important objects of inquiry to the members of the Expedition, during their visit to China, by the renowned sinologue Dr. Pfitzmaier, was the obtaining of rare Chinese books, and the elucidation of certain ethnographic and linguistic questions. Whatever was achieved by us in throwing light upon these matters is due in great measure to the cordial reception with which we were received by men of science resident at Hong-kong. Especially we would name in this respect Dr. M. Lobscheid, a German by birth, a missionary and inspector of schools, who, thoroughly conversant with the Chinese language, exerted himself to the utmost in forwarding the objects of the scientific corps, besides a.s.sisting us in the purchase of a variety of the most valuable Chinese works, and giving us much interesting information respecting the country and the inhabitants. Dr. Lobscheid himself has a well-selected, valuable, and extensive library of rare Chinese works on geography, natural science, history, philology, and numismatics, and presented a number of valuable gifts to the Expedition. One of his colleagues, Dr. Ph. Winnes, also a German, and a missionary from the Mission Society of Bale, compiled for us a list of words of the Hakka dialect, as spoken in the interior of the province of Quang-Tung, hitherto so little known philologically. It is indeed astonis.h.i.+ng what English, and German, and American missionaries have effected as publicists, during the short period they have been resident here. The educational and religious works published in Chinese at the expense of the various religious societies form already quite a respectable literature of themselves, although the Chinese language puts as many obstacles in the way of mere Christian civilization as in that of the propagation of the Evangile itself. Most of the missionaries consider any attempt to subst.i.tute Romish for Chinese characters as being quite vain. The indistinctness of Chinese signs has already been fruitful of much controversy among the missionaries themselves. Thus, for example, those engaged in promulgating the Christian faith are not as yet agreed by what Chinese word the G.o.d of Christianity may best be indicated. The Roman Catholic missionaries write _Tientschu_ (the Highest of all things); the English and German Protestants use the sign _Schang-Ti_ (the Most High); the American Protestants make use of the word _Schin_ (Spirit). These varieties of opinion as to the mode of expressing the idea of "G.o.d," have given rise to a vast number of publications, which however have unfortunately tended rather to envenom the dispute than smooth the way to a common understanding.

Conspicuous, however, as are the services of the missionaries in the publication and diffusion of useful and moral books in the Chinese language, their direct efforts have, on the other hand, been attended with but limited results. .h.i.therto, and although it is always laid down as an axiom in the books and manifestoes of the Tai-Ping insurgents, that the doctrines of Christianity, as deduced from the writings of the Missionary Societies, are the leading principle of the movement, yet, as set forth and promulgated by the insurgent chiefs, they cannot be said to deserve recognition by any known form of Christianity.

As in their religion, so in their mode of life, and their national customs, the Chinese remain stiff-necked and obstinate, and in this direction also Christianity is in but few cases capable of mitigating their frequently barbarous customs. Children in China are constantly exposed in large numbers, and that not owing to poverty, but from indifference to the female children. One Chinese woman who at present professes Christianity, and is a member of the Bale missionary community, has herself killed eight female children whom she had herself carried in her womb! Dr. Lobscheid informed us that he was personally cognizant of one case, where a Chinese mother-in-law, irritated at the birth of a female child, murdered it before its mother's eyes, almost immediately after it had come into the world, and this in a rather well-to-do family!

Young mothers often lay their children down in the open field, or on the sea-beach, watching anxiously if any one takes it away, or till a wave mercifully sweeps it off. One such infant, accidentally found by some of the crew of the English frigate _Nankin_, and tended with all the tender-heartedness of Jack when he finds an object of compa.s.sion, is at present in the German Mission House at Hong-kong, and was baptized in the cathedral by the chaplain of the frigate, who gave her the name of Victoria Nankin. Other mothers endeavour to choke the new-born girl with moistened ashes, which, not unfrequently with caressing hand, they lay upon the mouth of the little unconscious innocent. Male children, on the other hand, even such as are crippled or deformed, are very seldom, indeed quite exceptionally, exposed or put to death. In proportion to the harsh treatment which the female offspring experience, is the pride and anxious carefulness which wait on the male children. Indeed the Chinese are very much in the habit of having several wives, simply because by so doing they of course have a better chance of a number of male offspring, and it very frequently happens that the lawful wife of a Chinaman, if she has continued any length of time childless, will even seek out and bring to her husband a concubine by whom he may have heirs, that is, _sons_.[114]

In such cases the two wives usually continue on the best of terms, which cannot be said of those instances where the second or third wife is introduced into the family by the husband, without the intervention of his wife. According to the old Chinese law, the man had to be thirty, the woman twenty, before marriage. At present marriages, as a rule, are made between sixteen and twenty years of age. It may be a.s.sumed that one in every fifteen Chinese has more than one wife; the first, usually known as "number one," is generally taken from inclination, whereas the rest are usually bought, the price varying, according to their youth and beauty, from 100 to 600 dollars. This custom gives rise to quite a peculiar trade.

Chinese women make a practice of purchasing for themselves from the poorer cla.s.ses such of the female children as are of good health and well formed, whom they bring up with great care, with the view of selling them, when grown up, to the wealthy Chinese, and even sometimes to--European residents.[115] The custom of child-murder is most prevalent in the coast districts of the province of Fo-kien, so that latterly there was a positive scarcity of women, and marriageable girls had to be imported from the northern part of the province. The prevalence of this custom of child-murder in these localities is to be ascribed to the enormous migration of the male population to Siam, to the islands of the Malay Archipelago, and other points. These emigrants supply the labour market in foreign countries, and but seldom return to their families. Numerous placards and pamphlets, pointing out the enormity of child-murder, and dissuading from its commission, are printed annually, partly at the cost of philanthropists, partly at that of the Chinese Government, and widely diffused, yet without producing any diminution in the practice of this appalling custom.

The custom of distorting the feet of the better cla.s.s of women at the period of their birth, seems to have arisen from the jealousy of the husbands, who in thus preventing the possibility of gadding about, think they have secured an additional guarantee for the fidelity and chast.i.ty of their wives. However, one occasionally hears the first introduction of this singular and cruel custom ascribed to a Chinese empress having once been born with such distortion of the feet, and that in consequence it not only became the fas.h.i.+on among the females of the higher cla.s.s in those days, out of pure obsequiousness, to imitate by artificial means a disfiguration accidentally arising from a freak of Nature, but even to recognize it as a necessary concomitant of the Chinese ideal of beauty.

The Governor of Hong-kong, Sir John Bowring, a distinguished _savant_, who received the members of the Expedition with the utmost consideration, invited them to his house and endeavoured to bring them into personal communication with those residents in the colony most interested in scientific pursuits, so that each one of us could consult with the gentleman best able to advise him in his own department, and thus attain in the shortest time the most satisfactory results. Sir John, moreover, as President of the China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, admitted the members of the Expedition to the honours of an extraordinary session. He welcomed the Austrian naturalists in the heartiest manner, and expressed the most flattering antic.i.p.ations from their visit. Very deserving of remark was the speech made on this occasion by the Lord Bishop of Hong-kong. In his capacity of a dignitary of the Church, he too bade us welcome in the warmest manner, and expressed his conviction that Christianity had nothing to fear, but only to hope, from the study of natural sciences! What would certain ultramontanists, had they been present, have replied to this remark of a high ecclesiastical dignitary?--they who consider government impossible without restricting the study of the natural sciences!

Among the various subjects discussed at this meeting were several of great interest, which sufficiently evidenced what a thorough disposition to mental activity the English show, even in a place where material interests are necessarily the main objects of attention, and where they, moreover, are continually exposed to great personal danger.

One of the communications received by the Society was a memoir by Mr. W.

Alabaster, who had accompanied ex-governor Yeh to Calcutta as interpreter, treating of the Chinese population there, and its influence on the state of society. The memoir contained the very remarkable statement that the Chinese colony in Calcutta, which in 1858 counted little more than 500 souls, had not alone monopolized several employments, such as shoemakers, tailors, &c., but had, even when thousands of miles distant from home, jealously maintained several of their customs and rites intact. This Chinese community, so inconsiderable in point of mere numbers, already possesses its own temple, its own priests, and its own teachers, who guard any Chinese immigrants from the perils of proselytism; it has founded a special a.s.sociation, whose object it is to transmit to their native land the bodies of such as die abroad, while their luxury is beginning to develope itself to the extent of ordering from China at considerable expense troops of actors, so as even at this distance to provide themselves with the national amus.e.m.e.nt of a genuine Sing-Song. This peculiarity is of great importance, inasmuch as the emigration from China is ever a.s.suming more extended dimensions, and already embraces several portions of the world. We find Chinese scattered throughout Eastern Asia, in Australia, in California, in Peru, in Brazil, in the West Indies, and, what is very astonis.h.i.+ng they thrive and prosper at most places they visit, despite the not very humane treatment they receive, and the wretched, desolate state in which they leave their homes. This enormous emigration of the sons of the Flowery Land seems destined to be of immense importance, and to be fraught with momentous influence upon the future of the other Asiatic populations, whom the Chinese greatly excel in capacity for work, mechanical dexterity, and dogged perseverance. Even the religious movement gives the Chinese certain advantages over all other nations of the Asiatic type of civilization. The Hindoo, like the Catholic, has numbers of festivals, which greatly diminish the number of his actual working days; the daily ceremonies prescribed by Brahminism further curtail the most precious hours of labour; his exclusively vegetarian food not alone prevents the proper development of his muscular power, but also by its ostentatiously morbid delicacy, brings him constantly into collision with the social order of a Christian household.

The Chinese, on the other hand, keeps but one holiday-time, the beginning of the new year, which he celebrates for fourteen days without intermission. But the remaining 11-1/2 months of the year are for him but one long day of work. Moreover, the Chinese has no fastidious notions about his food. He eats pork, and drinks wine, and prefers fat meat to meagre fruit diet, thoroughly unrestrained by any considerations as to whether such a mode of life accords with the inst.i.tutes of Brahma and Menu, or the teaching of Confucius. Their sobriety, their capacity, their industry, their frugal mode of life, and their numbers, all seem to indicate the Chinese as destined to play an important part, not alone in the development of the Oriental nations, but also in the history of mankind. They are, as a German philosopher has profoundly remarked, the Greeks and Romans of Eastern Asia, and they will, if once hurried onwards by the great tide of Christian civilization, perform such feats as to fill even the nations of the old world with wonder and amazement.

Another communication, made during the same meeting of this meritorious branch of the Royal Asiatic Society in Hong-kong, related to that singular plant, which has within the last few years excited so much attention in industrial circles throughout Europe under the name of "Green dye," or "Vert Chinois." Notwithstanding the experiments. .h.i.therto made with this valuable dye, and the excellent use which has been made of it, more especially by the Chamber of Commerce at Lyons, the first in Europe to make application of the new colour, there was yet much to be learned respecting the mode of raising and manufacturing it, in order to render its employment entirely practicable. The elegant pamphlet of the Lyons Chamber of Commerce[116] had just arrived from Europe, and led to a variety of interesting investigations. Nothing was known in Hong-kong respecting the plant beyond what was already contained in Robert Fortune's excellent work and Rondot's treatise. Somewhat later, we were furnished with more accurate and circ.u.mstantial information respecting the Lu-Kao, the well-known "Green dye" of the English (a species of _Rhamnus_ or buckthorn), which we shall here transcribe pretty fully.[117]

Lu-Kao is grown chiefly in the northern provinces, extensive plantations of this valuable plant existing in the country around Foo-Chow and the environs of the city of Haening. The valuable green dye matter is obtained, however, from the rind, not of one but of two species _Rhamnus_, of which the "yellow" grows on the flats, the "white" on the high-grounds in a wild state. The preparation of the substance, which does not differ much in appearance from common indigo, is exceedingly primitive. Both plants are boiled for a considerable time in iron kettles, the yellow deposit or _residuum_ being suffered to remain undisturbed for several days. Transferred thence into earthen vessels, a piece of cotton cloth is steeped into it five or six times, after which the adherent dye is wrung out, and exposed a second time to the process of boiling in iron pans. The next step in the manipulation consists in permitting the dye stuff, which now has much more consistence, to be soaked up by some pieces of cotton, when it is once more washed, sprinkled upon thin paper, and, lastly, exposed for some time to the sun.

The Chinese have as yet only used the dye for colouring cloths of coa.r.s.e texture; all attempts. .h.i.therto to apply it to silks, &c., have proved fruitless. But the great development of chemical science in Europe justifies us in expecting that a method will ere long be devised for fixing this beautiful, durable light green tint, which does not alter even in candlelight, upon fabrics of fine smooth texture, and thus greatly enhance its value in the industrial arts. The Lu-Kao has from time immemorial been used by the Chinese in watercolour paintings, but its use in industrial processes only dates from about 20 years back. The very price charged for the small quant.i.ties. .h.i.therto brought from China, is by no means natural, but seems to have been artificially forced up by speculation, apparently in consequence of an unusual demand. In Foo-Chow the price of one Catti, about 1-3/4 lbs., is 20 _Taels_, or about 6 10_s._ Were the production of this dye stuff really so expensive, we may be sure it would not be made use of by the Chinese for their ordinary stuffs, nor could these be sold as cheap as they are. We have found our opinion confirmed by competent observers in various parts of China, that this valuable product is susceptible of being acclimatized in Europe, and of being cultivated with profit, especially in those places where, together with favourable conditions of temperature and soil, the wages of labour are not too high.

Like the English authorities and Government officials, our German fellow-countrymen, resident in Hong-kong, did not fail to exercise their hospitality for the benefit of the a.s.sociates of the Expedition, and we cannot sufficiently express our obligations to the Austrian Consul, Mr. G.

Wiener, and the Prussian vice-consul, Mr. Gustav Oberbeck, for their delicate attention. The latter presented the Expedition with a number of articles interesting as ill.u.s.trating the advances of civilization, which he had obtained during the siege of Canton, in Dec. 1857, and of which the greater part have since been deposited at the Imperial Cabinet of Antiquities at Vienna.

Through the kindness and interest of Dr. Harland (since deceased), surgeon-in-chief of the colony, some of the members of the Expedition were enabled to make corporeal measurements in the great prison, the inmates of which come from the most various parts of the empire, as well as in the hospital, upon a number of individuals of either s.e.x, all "fair specimens of the Chinese race," as Dr. Harland a.s.sured them, the results of which will be found in the anthropological section of the _Novara_ publications.

Before the frigate left Hong-kong, despite the insecurity of public affairs, several excursions were made to the south side of the island, to Canton, and to the Portuguese settlement of Macao, which proved as interesting as they were satisfactory.

In the course of their peregrinations about the mountains on the island, as far as the fis.h.i.+ng village on the south side of the island, known as Little Hong-kong (sweet-waters), the naturalists of the Expedition were accompanied by Dr. Hance, the botanist, and the missionary, Dr. Lobscheid, both thoroughly acquainted with the Chinese language. Little as the pretty name of this small settlement, founded so far back as 1668, is applicable to the entire island, it yet corresponds well, and is eminently suitable, to the smiling valley, entirely shut in by lofty rocks, in which lies wretched Little Hong-kong. A beautiful wood filled with tufts of flowers, forming for the labours of the botanist a rich supply of the most splendid plants, and refreshed by copious springs of water from the mountains, const.i.tute a lovely landscape. Above the limit of vegetation of the foliage trees, are seen on the slopes of the mountain groups of pines, while the level ground at the bottom of the valley is laid out in smiling rice fields. The miserable inhabitants of the village, which looks gloomily out from among the trees, are not safe from the predatory onslaughts of ferocious pirates, even among the recesses of the valley.

The streets of the village, hidden between trees, are uncommonly narrow, so that two men can scarcely pa.s.s each other, and the huts are all placed on purpose close against each other, in order, we were told, to be able more easily to admit of defence. Our rambles were rewarded with an abundant collection of specimens, and were particularly instructive in a geognostical point of view, as satisfying us that the island does not consist entirely of granite, but that a large proportion of the mountain is porphyritic.

Another excursion was made by the Commodore and some of his staff as far as Canton. The Commandant of the station, Commodore Stewart, had for this purpose placed the gun-boat _Algerine_ at our disposal. The distance from Hong-kong to Canton is about 87 nautical miles (100 statute miles), and the voyage took full eleven hours, viz. from 6.30 A.M. to 5.30 P.M.

Canton, the third capital of the Chinese Empire, and its most flouris.h.i.+ng commercial city, which but a short time before had numbered about 1,000,000 inhabitants, was at this period a desolate, almost entirely abandoned ma.s.s of houses, half in ruins, half burnt. The stately European factories, which had adorned the banks of the river up to the walls of the Chinese city, were heaps of ashes. The floating town upon the river itself, the renowned flower-boats of Canton, with their marvellous splendour and their luxurious beauty, had entirely disappeared, leaving no trace. Whoever had anything to lose had fled the country. English sentinels patrolled the walls and occupied the streets of the interior of the city, and only the very poorest of the mob remained behind, watching every opportunity of getting the "head-money," which the Mandarins of the province of Kuang-Tung had offered for every head of a "barbarian" brought in. "The state of matters in Canton gets worse and worse every day," said the latest issue of the Hong-kong journals. Since the Americans and Russians had concluded private treaties with the Imperial Government, and the English and French allied fleet had gone north to the Gulf of Pe-Cheli, to treat at Tien-Tsin with the Imperial commissioners, the Chinese of Canton had been plucking up courage. They conceived the allies to be isolated; the Russians and the Americans they held to be hostile to them. The Mandarins and Imperial commissioners launched proclamations by the dozen at the "foreign devils,"[118] set on foot organized Guerilla bands, which were called "Braves," who every night discharged rockets into the city, murdered and pillaged, and kept the allied troops, who were only 3500 strong (800 of whom were in hospital) almost continually on the alert.

When the gun-boat _Algerine_ arrived off Canton, the Commodore, although it was late in the evening, was accompanied by a military escort to the head-quarters of General Straubenzee, commander of the allied troops. A stillness as of a grave-yard reigned throughout the city, and not a light was to be seen. By 10.30 P.M. the Commodore reached the post, and was most hospitably received by the General. The head-quarters were situated on a hillock commanding the city, surrounded by the numerous buildings of a country-seat or _Yamun_, which had been the property of the father of Governor Yeh, who had acquired such notoriety during the recent warlike troubles. The ostentatious splendour of the apartments, the splendid ebony carved work, gave such an idea of the magnificence, the luxury, the gorgeousness of the Chinese princes, as can only be paralleled by what we read of the palaces of the emperors of ancient Rome. Yeh himself had by this time been removed from the political scene, and was a state prisoner in Calcutta, where he lived in more than monastic seclusion. To judge by his portrait, which was for sale in all the print-shops of Hong-kong, Yeh was a fine-looking man with energetic features, and an expression full of intellect, and, so far as his physical appearance went, seemed to take after his father, who in his ninety-second year was still tasting joys of paternity. In his own country, even among the Europeans, Yeh enjoys the reputation of being not only an able diplomatist, but a man of varied information as well. While at Hong-kong we were shown some large anatomical woodcuts, which Yeh had himself borrowed from a European work on anatomy, and published at his own cost on an enlarged scale, accompanied by a preface from his pen.[119]

Even more extensive and elegant in its outward aspect than that of Yeh, was the palace of the Tartar general Pihkwei, now employed for barracks and the officers of the English and French commissariat, while a much less pretentious building had been a.s.signed to the Tartar general for his present residence.

The Commodore had reached head-quarters and was sitting at the tea-table with General Straubenzee, when an alarm of fire was heard. The "Braves"

had fired a house close by in the hope, it should seem, that the flames would catch the barracks as well as the powder depot, or at all events compel the English to withdraw their troops from the post, and give an opportunity for inflicting some loss on them. Fortunately, however, what had been set on fire burned quite out, without fulfilling the antic.i.p.ations of the "Braves."

In the course of a stroll, which our Commodore took with the General somewhat later in the night, they perceived that the Chinese kept up a continual flight of rockets against the sentries and buildings of the post, from a small eminence not two hundred yards distant, which was provided with ramparts and cannon, and the Austrian guests greatly marvelled that no energetic steps were taken to obviate the disorders produced by these guerilla bands of Chinese, who every night with their incendiarism and fire-b.a.l.l.s kept the city, the head-quarters, and the pickets in constant alarm, seeing that their inactivity only tended to animate the courage of the Chinese, while in such hara.s.sing service, unattended as it was with any results, their own forces, already very much reduced, were proportionately weakened.