Travels in China by Sir John Barrow (top e book reader .txt) 📕

It was a remark too singular to escape notice that, except in the neighbourhood of the Po-yang lake, the peasantry of the province in which the capital stands were more miserable, their houses more mean and wretched, and their lands in a worse state of cultivation, than in any other part of the route—a remark which also agrees with the accounts given by the Dutch embassy of that part of Pe-tche-lee, on the south-west side of the capital, through which they passed. Four mud walls covered over with a thatch of reeds, or the straw of millet, or the stems of holcus, compose their habitations; and they are most commonly surrounded with clay walls, or with a fence made of the strong stems of the Holcus Sorghum. A partition of matting divides the hovel into two apartments; each of which has a small opening in the wall to admit the air and light; but one door generally serves as an entrance, the closure of which is frequently nothing more than a strong mat. A blue cotton jacket and a pair of trowsers, a straw hat and shoes of the same material, constitute the dress of the majority of the people. Matting of reeds or bamboo, a cylindrical pillow of wood covered with leather, a kind of rug or felt blanket made of the hairy wool of the broad-tailed sheep, not spun and woven but beat together as in the process for making hats, and sometimes a mattress stuffed with wool, hair, or straw, constitute their bedding. Two or three jars, a few basons of earthen-ware of the coarsest kind, a large iron pot, a frying-pan and a portable stove, are the chief articles of furniture. Chairs and tables are not necessary; both men and women sit on their heels; and in this posture they surround the great iron pot, with each a bason in his hands, when they take their meals. The poverty of their food was sufficiently indicated by their meagre appearance. It consists chiefly of boiled rice, millet, or other grain, with the addition of onions or garlic, and mixed sometimes with a few other vegetables that, by way of relish, are fried in rancid oil, extracted from a variety of plants, such as the Seffamum, Brassica orientalis, Cytisus Cadjan, a species of Dolichos, and, among others, from the same species of Ricinus or Palma-Christi, from which the Castor is drawn, and used only in Europe as a powerful purgative. Its drastic qualities may probably be diminished by applying less pressure in extracting the oil, or by habit, or by using it fresh, as it does not appear that the Chinese suffer any inconvenience in its application to culinary purposes. As well as I could understand, the seeds were first bruised and then boiled in water, and the oil that floated on the surface was skimmed off. Our Florence oil they affected not to admire having, as they said, no taste. The Chinese, like the inhabitants of the South of Europe, seem to attach a higher value on oils, in proportion as age has given to them a higher degree of rancidity.

Fish of any kind, in this part of the country, is a great rarity; few are caught in the rivers of Pe-tche-lee. We met with none in the whole province, except at Tien-sing and in the capital, whose market, no doubt, like that of London, draws to its center the choice products of a very extensive circuit. Salt and dried fish, it is true, are brought from the southward as articles of commerce, but the poor peasantry cannot afford to purchase them for general use. They obtain them only sometimes by bartering millet or vegetables in exchange. A morsel of pork to relish their rice is almost the only kind of meat that the poor can afford to taste. They have little milk and neither butter, nor cheese, nor bread; articles of nourishment to which, with potatoes, the peasantry of Europe owe their chief support. Boiled rice, indeed, and not bread, is considered as an article of the first necessity, the staff of life in China. Hence the monosyllable fan, which signifies boiled rice, enters into every compound that implies eating; thus tche-fan, the name of a meal in general, is to eat rice; breakfast is called the tsao-fan or morning rice, and supper the ouan-fan or evening rice. Their principal and indeed their best beverage is bad tea, boiled over and over again as long as any bitter remains in the leaves, taken without milk or sugar, or any other ingredient except, in cold weather, a little ginger. In this weak state the only purpose it seems to answer is that of carrying down the sediment of muddy water that abounds in all the flat provinces of China, which the leaves of tea (as I fancy those of any other plant would) are found to do. These poor creatures, however, are instructed by popular opinion to ascribe to it many extraordinary qualities[59].

It would require a more familiar acquaintance with the people and a longer residence among them, than was allowed to us, to explain the true reason of such real poverty among the peasantry in the vicinity of the capital. Perhaps, indeed, it may be owing, in a great degree, to the proximity of the court, which in all countries has the effect of drawing together a crowd of people to consume the products of the soil, without contributing any portion of labour towards their production. The encouragement that is here given to idleness and dissipation is but too apt to entice the young peasantry in the neighbourhood from their houses, and thus rob the country of its best hands. The soil, likewise, near the capital is barren and sandy, producing few supplies beyond the wants of the several tenants; and all other necessaries of life not raised by them must be purchased extravagantly dear. It is, indeed, surprizing how this immense city, said to contain three millions of inhabitants, is contrived to be supplied at any rate, considering the very sterile and unproductive state of the country for many miles around it. It might not, however, be a matter of less astonishment to a Chinese, nor less difficult for him to conceive, in what manner our own capital receives its daily supplies, especially after he had observed that there is not a single road, by which London can be approached, that is not carried over vast tracts of uncultivated commons and waste grounds.

The vallies of Tartary furnish beeves and broad-tailed sheep for Pekin, and grain is brought by water from every part of the country, of which the government takes the precaution to lay up in store a sufficient quantity for a twelvemonth's consumption. Of animal food, pork is mostly consumed. Few peasants are without their breed of hogs; these animals, indeed, are likewise kept in large cities, where they become public nuisances. Bad beef in Pekin sells for about six-pence the pound; mutton and pork eight-pence; lean fowls and ducks from two to three shillings; eggs are generally about one penny each; small loaves of bread that are boiled in steam, without yeast or leaven, are about four-pence a pound; rice sells usually at three-halfpence or two-pence the pound; wheat flour at two-pence halfpenny or three-pence; fine tea from twelve to thirty shillings a pound; that of the former price, at least such as was procured clandestinely for us, not drinkable, and the latter not near so good as that of about six shillings in London[60]. There are, indeed, plenty of tea-houses in and near the capital, where the labouring people may purchase their cup of tea for two small copper coin (not quite a farthing) but it is miserably bad. A tolerable horse and a man-slave are usually about the same price, being from fifteen to twenty ounces of silver. The article of dress worn by the common people is not very expensive. The peasantry are invariably clad in cotton; and this article is the produce of most of the provinces. The complete dress of a peasant is about fifteen shillings; of a common tradesman three pounds; an officer of government's common dress ten pounds; of ceremony about thirty pounds; and if enriched with embroidery and gold and silver tissue, between two and three hundred pounds: a pair of black satin boots twenty shillings; and a cap or bonnet about the same sum. The price of labour, however, and particularly in Pekin, bears no sort of proportion to the price of provisions. A mechanic in this city thinks himself well paid if he gets a shilling a-day. A common weaver, joiner, or other tradesman earns a bare subsistence for his family; and the best servants may be hired for an ounce of silver a-month. Many are glad to give their services in exchange for their subsistence, without any consideration in hard money. Tobacco being an indispensable article for all ranks of every age and sex bears of course a high price in the capital. It is singular enough, that this plant should have found its way into every part of the world, among savage as well as civilized nations, even into the deserts of Africa, where it was found in constant use among the Booshuanas, a people, till very lately, totally unknown; and it is equally singular, that an herb of so disagreeable a taste should, by habit, obtain an ascendency so far over the appetite, as not easily to be relinquished.

The climate of the northern provinces is unfavourable to the poor peasantry. The summers are so warm that they go nearly naked and the winters so severe that, what with their poor and scanty fare, their want of fuel, clothing, and even shelter, thousands are said to perish from cold and hunger. In such a condition the ties of nature sometimes yield to self-preservation, and children are sold to save both the parent and offspring from perishing for want; and infants become a prey to hopeless indigence. We have seen in the notes taken by the gentleman in the Dutch embassy, how low the temperature is at Pekin in the winter months; and they have no coals nearer than the mountains of Tartary, which are all brought on the backs of dromedaries; of course, they are extravagantly dear. In fact, they are scarcely ever burned pure, but are crumbled to dust and mixed up with earth, in which state they give out a very strong heat, but no flame, and are suitable enough for their small close stoves.

Although it is a principle of the Chinese government to admit of no distinctions among its subjects, except those that learning and office confer; and although the most rigid sumptuary laws have been imposed to check that tendency to shew and splendor, which wealth is apt to assume; and to bring as much as possible on a level, at least in outward appearance, all conditions of men; yet, with regard to diet, there is a wider difference perhaps between the rich and the poor of China, than in any other country. That wealth which, if permitted, would be expended in flattering the vanity of its possessors, is now applied in the purchase of dainties to pamper the appetite. Their famous Gin-sing, a name signifying the life of man (the Panax quinquefolium of Linnæus) on account of its supposed invigorating and aphrodisiac qualities was, for a length of time, weighed against gold. The sinewy parts of stags and other animals, with the fins of sharks, as productive of the same effects, are purchased by the wealthy at enormous prices: and the nests that are constructed by small swallows on the coasts of Cochin-China, Cambodia,