The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1874-05-08
Correspondence Of The Ayis d Mtelligencer.
LETTER FROM CHINA.
Hone KoNe, 10th March, 1874.

driving ram consequently could not see the sur
roundngs OF the Golden Gate. The mist was
terribly thick and we had difficulty in getting
out. After getting fairly started one always be-
gins 10 look amongst the passengers for men 10
be friends with on the voyage, and assure you
| it requires some little management to make
| good selections. You don't want to become too
| intimate with some people, as it is usually much
easier to make acquaintance than it is to shake
them off My selection was soon made, (that is
| in my own mind) had my eye on an English
man, one American and two Frenchmen. d.
| vided the nationalities you sec. The selection
seemed to be mutual, because it was not many
| days before we were all as thick as hops.
The "China," is an immense ship of about A.
900 tons side wheel steamer, and about 800 feet
long, awfully wide in fact q very fine ship, but
as slow as any OK, ito use country expression)
we mad regular barn yard aboard having TO
carry all ourmeat in live state. We had about
~ head of fat CATTLE so sheep, IS hogs, several
| COWS and Is calves, to say nothing Of poultry
pigeons, rabbits, ETC. Our passenger list con-
There was very nice piano, and we had lots
Of music, and last but not least, church every
Sunday. The Captain acted as parson and did
very well except when he came to a word in the
Bible; then he always got 'panicky'' for about
fly" minutes, and as he would say twas all at
sea" All the saiors, walters and nremen on
| these Pacific Mail steamers are from the Flow
cry Kingdom, but they do very we'll
| Alter 20 days we arrived in the Bay of Yeddo,
Japan, and came to anchor off the city of Yoko-
hama, and happy crowd We were. The ship
| would hardly hold us. We arrived at Y Yokohama
Wednesday, March 4th, at 2P. NJ, after a 6, 600
| mile trip, and in ten minutes was ashore
There are no wharves there for the steamers to
| go up to, so they lay offabout mile from shore
The Bay is quite pretty and seemed to be about
| 10 miles across.
1t was warm, pleasant day. and as the ship
was to leave the next day at P. NJ, I was
obliged to make hay while the sun shone We
went ashore from the steamer in "Sanpans,"
| little flat bottomed boats about 16 feet long and
feet wide ; no paint on them, and very clean;
| usually sculled by man and woman. They
| go like lightning through the water and are
sculled from the sides near the stern, not as we
| do right from the stern.
The Hotel is called the "Grand," and is
great big stone structure, quite pretty. From
| there six of us started out to see the town, We
first had one of the native trihes called pepper
prince and it was SO hot that felt as il / had
swallowed forked lightning. Instead of taking
a carriage or cart, we each of us got into
"Gnrickshaw," which is nothing more or less
| than large baby carriage, pulled by native,
who gets himself into little pair of shafts, and
starts off at a trot which he can keep up for an
hour or too. The things have only two wheels
and are very nice to ride in. All fellow needs
TO carry him back to first principles is n sugar
| bag, small rattle and an indiarubber ring to
| bite his gums on. The town is divided into
| three PARASITIC bluff where nearly all the Euro
| peans live; then the business part of the town,
where are all the warehouses or go-downs and
stores, where you get European goods; then the
native town-there's where the curiosities are
| to be seen. The dwellings on the bluff are love-
| ly; cottages, usually, only one story, built of
| Frame immense ycrandas and pretty grounds,
| planted in flowers, shrubs and some eyergreens.
There are no large trees any where to be seen ex-
ccpt few pines.
The part of the town where the European
warehouses are is closely built, narrow streets,
paved with very fine broken stone and covered
with a sort of mortar, making them as smooth
as table. None of the houses are more than
two stories, some have large plate glass windows
| n NJ md vnp mi MI
imagine yourself in Christian country, except
for the almost entire absence of horses, and the
funny looking people round you. Everything
is as silent as it is with us on Sunday. The only
noise you hear is the click click, of the wooden
sandals the Japs wear and the monotonous
song of the Coolies, who are either carrying or
pushing on two-whcelcd trucks all sorts of mer-
chandisc. Every now and then little pony
running ahead to keep people from being run
over, for every one walks in the middle OF the
| street. They don't seem to use horses for any
purposes of labor. They don't have many, and
what there are, are like Canadian ponies
Coolie labor is cheaper than horse labor every
where in this part Of the world. The trucks the
| Coolies use TO transfer everything on, are all
heavy things; looking like the things the Ro-
mans had Two big wheels all made of wood,
with wood tires ; in fact the wheel is nearly all
hub and rim, and though quite high the spokes
are only about foot long and the aXles, In
stead of being dishcd so as to throw the wheels
| III III luC DOllOul, arc HluuC So tuut tHcy uTC
thrown out at the bottom and in on top. For
while / thought the aXles were either all broken
or bent from hauling heavy weights, but that
was not the cause. They were intended TO be so.
Six or eight men will haul several tons.
| The native houses are all small, about IL feet
| 'front.' and one story of about 6 feet and one offs
feet They sleep in the three foot part and have
their shop below. No fronts to the first story;
open all day, and at night they put up poles
close together and hang curtains At night the
things look like cages, and may say, with great
truth, that most of the people inside look like
monkeys. The natives have shops of all kinds,
just as we do, and they seem to have good idea
of business, which they do on the Jewish princi-
ple always charge twice as much as they ex-
pect to get. The Japs all wear sandals, some
made of wood and some of straw. saw one or
two horses shod with straw shoes. The married
women all have their teeth blackened so as to
be known from the single ones, but that is not
necessary ii seems to me, because the married
ones all have babies tied on their backs, and of
course the single ones can't have that distin-
gushing mark. The native houses are all built
of wood and bamboo in fact bamboo enters
into the construction of everything, from lot of
preserves to a dwelling house. There is very
nice preserve made Of bamboo shoots, taken
| when very young. The Japanese live mostly on
fish and rice and those that dress at all get them
selves up in the most astonishing fashion, with
blue cloth arrangements, and manage to get
their legs so tied up that they can hardly walk.
Lots of them go in the pure Georgia major style
or like the Sandwich Island maiden in her fash.
ionablc church attire, high hat and sun shade.
The Coole laborers you see in the streets seldom
have any thing on except girdle round the
waist. The babies are like those in all other
parts of the world; cry in the same way and have
dirty noses The fruits at this season of the year
don't amount to much, though like the 'man-
DARN orange" very small production, but q
loose skinned orange. The skin is almost ready
The Pcrsimmons are as large as figs, and all sug-
AIRED and sold about the streets, but they are
very apt to draw up your mouth just like our
own. l went Off in the country little way to
look at the farming, such as it is. The fields are
all little patches of one or two acres, and all
that saw were planted in wheat, then about
eight inches high, of fine color and very rank;
sowed in rows IS inches apart and then in
punches about inches apart. They have very
few plows. Most of the ground is spaded up;
in fact all the work is done by men. l saw lot
ofplaees ready for planting rice. The soil all
about was very rich, and beautifully fine, and
seemed TO be in very fine state of cultivation
l was told that it was impossible to produce
crop unless the ground was very heavily ma
nured They apply nothing but animal ma
nurcs.
Their vegetables are all very large and very
tender, and sweet potatoes almost grow wild.-
Lots of flowers everywhere. Japoncas and aza-
lea trees six inches in diameter and full of flow
ers. With us they seldom get thicker than the
thumb. can't close my letter without saying
something about the Japanese girls. Some of
them ifyou will believe me, are really very pref
ty; have good features and fine color. rosy
checks, pretty eyes and teeth. Their cheeks
would force some of our own girls up to an arti.
fetal blush, and then they would not be up to
the mark. | never expected to see pretty
japanese girl; would not have believed there was
such thing.
There are very few cattle in Japan, and the
foreign cattle that are imported have to be sta
bled on account of there being native grass that
kills them in about two years. Efforts are now
being made to grow imported grass, but are not
h..
come up through the other. They make no
butter and a small bottle of milk costs SO cents.