Travels in China - Sir John Barrow (drm ebook reader .TXT) 📗
- Author: Sir John Barrow
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To the west of Sau-tchoo-foo is a range of mountains higher than any we had yet seen, well covered with wood; and an extensive lake stretches along their base, famed in China for its picturesque beauties and for its fish. We would gladly have made a party of pleasure to this delightful spot, but innumerable objections, as usual, were started by our conductors, on the score of delay that such an excursion would occasion.
The two great products of this part of the country are rice and silk; the former of which, at this time, they were busily employed in reaping. Plantations of the mulberry tree were extended on both sides of the canal and into the country beyond the reach of sight. They appeared to be of two distinct species; the one, the common mulberry, morus nigra, and the other having much smaller leaves, smooth and heart-shaped, and bearing a white berry about the size of the field strawberry. The latter had more the habit of a shrub, but the branches of neither were suffered to run into strong wood, being frequently pruned in order that the trunk might annually throw out young scions, whose leaves were considered to be more tender than such as grew from old branches. Another reason was also assigned for this operation. A tree, when left to itself, throws out the greatest part of its leaves at once, in the spring of the year, but if the thick wood be cut out from time to time, new leaves will continue to push below the parts so cut off during the whole season; and, accordingly, the Chinese are particularly attentive to prune afresh in the autumn, in order to obtain a supply of young leaves in the after spring. The thermometer at this place, on the 9th of November at sun-rise, stood at 64°, and at noon in the shade at 70° degrees.
It was in this part of the canal where the bridge of ninety-one arches, mentioned in the sixth chapter, was thrown across the arm of a lake that joined the canal. I lament exceedingly that we passed this extraordinary fabric in the night. It happened to catch the attention of a Swiss servant who, as the yacht glided along, began to count the arches, but finding them increase in number much beyond his expectation and, at the same time, in dimensions, he ran into the cabin calling out with great eagerness, "For God's sake, gentlemen, come upon deck, for here is a bridge such as I never saw before; it has no end." Mr. Maxwell and I hastened upon deck and, by the faint light, could sufficiently distinguish the arches of a bridge running parallel with the eastern bank of the canal, across the arm of a vast lake, with which the navigation thus communicated. From the highest point, or what appeared to us to be the central arch, I counted forty-five to the end; here they were very small, but the central arch I guessed to be about thirty feet high and forty wide; and the whole length of the bridge I calculated to be about half a mile. The construction of such a bridge, in such a situation, could obviously have been employed for no other purpose than that of opening a free communication with the lake; and, at the same time, of avoiding the labour and expence of accumulating materials sufficient for making a solid embankment.
After sailing a great part of the day through a forest of mulberry trees, planted with much regularity, we arrived on the 10th at the city of Hang-tchoo-foo, the capital of the province of Tche-kiang. Here that branch of the grand canal which communicates with the Yang-tse-kiang terminates in a large commodious bason, at this time crowded with shipping. From this bason a number of smaller canals, passing through arches turned in the walls and intersecting the city in every direction, are finally united in a lake beyond the western wall called the See-hoo. The natural and artificial beauties of this lake far exceeded any thing we had hitherto had an opportunity of seeing in China. The mountains surrounding it were lofty and broken into a variety of forms that were highly picturesque; and the vallies were richly cloathed with trees of different kinds, among which three species were remarkably striking, not only by their intrinsic beauty, but also by the contrast they formed with themselves and the rest of the trees of the forest. These were the Laurus Camphora or camphor tree, the Croton sebiferum or tallow tree, and the Thuia Orientalis or arbor vitæ. The bright shining green foliage of the first, mingled with the purple leaves of the second, and overtopped by the tall and stately tree of life, of the deepest green, produced a pleasing effect to the eye; and the landscape was rendered still more interesting to the mind, by the very singular and diversified appearance of several repositories of the dead, upon the sloping sides of the inferior hills. Here, as well as elsewhere, the sombre and upright cypress was destined to be the melancholy companion of the tombs. Higher still among the woods, avenues had been opened to admit of rows of small blue houses, supported on white colonnades which, on examination, were also found to be mansions of the dead. Naked coffins of extraordinary thickness were every where lying upon the surface of the ground.
The lake that extended from the walls of the city to the feet of the mountains, and threw its numerous arms into the wooded vallies, was the seat of pleasure, as well as of profit, to the inhabitants of Hang-tchoo-foo. These amusements, however, of floating upon barges in the lake are principally confined to one sex. Few women, except those of loose character, join in the parties of men. How miserable or, at best, how little interest can be raised in that state of society where no social intercourse of the sexes exists; where sentiment, nice feeling and the sport and play of the softer passions are totally unknown, and where reason and philosophy are at so low an ebb! In more enlightened countries, when age may have weakened the ardour of joining in the sprightly female circle, or inclination lead to more serious conversations, numberless resources are still left to exercise the faculties of the mind, and society may always be had for such as can relish
But in China the tenor of their conversation must be always nearly the same, turning chiefly on the affairs of the neighbourhood, the injustice of the magistrates, the tricks and stratagems of the crafty merchant, or of the low mechanic. In entertainments given by those who can afford to drink wine, it is seldom served round as in other countries, but a number of puerile contrivances are practised to determine which of the party is to drink, as in the case I have already noticed of the game of the fingers. Thus, a nosegay is passed round from hand to hand, whilst a man in an adjoining room beats a drum or the gong, and he who happens to hold the nosegay when the instrument ceases must drink a cup of wine. Many other methods still more childish are resorted to, in order to pass the time and to give a zest to their wine; but the usual resource here, as well as elsewhere, against the tediousness of time, is gaming. An attachment to this vice accompanies the lowest Chinese wherever he goes. It is said that in one of our eastern colonies, where Chinese are encouraged to settle, they pay to the government the annual sum of ten thousand dollars for a licence to keep gaming tables and sell opium.
Our route being necessarily delayed for two days at this place, on account of an intervening neck of land over which all the baggage was to be transported, I prevailed upon our good natured companion Van-ta-gin to make a party to the lake See-hoo, to which he readily assented; and this was the only excursion that we had in the course of the whole journey. We had a splendid yacht and another made fast to it to serve as a kitchen; the dinner began the instant we went on board and ceased only when we stepped a-shore. It consisted of at least a hundred dishes in succession, among which were excellent eels, fresh caught in the lake and dressed in a variety of ways; yet the water was clear as crystal. Vast numbers of barges were sailing to and fro, all gaily decorated with paint and gilding and streaming colours; the parties within
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