The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1879-12-09

his "palatial nansipn" might very pos
siBiy he nothing more chan "two-pair
back" or rather the equivalent of some
such humble lodging, as Chinese houses
rarely rise more than one story above
the ground. "Ten thousand" is merely
an intensive, answering to "on no ac-
count" but |'to spare jade" is an eclipse
for"tto spare ene's jsde footsteps" the
complimentary word 'jade," or q similar
term, being invariably inserted when
writing or speaking of anybody else's be-
longings.
Thus, persons wife is .the precious
lady" his father ''the honored v,mera-
BILE" his son "the honored gentleman"
his daughter "the honored loved 'one,"
often ''the honored 10,000 1uunces of)
gold" as Indicative of her great value;
and even if a man has the stomach ache
it is absolutely necessary to speak of it to
him as his "worshipful complaint" /
mayhefe mention, en- PEASANT, that CON-
mon nickname for ones own daughter, or
girls in general, is 'lose-money-goods,"
from the fact that daughter always car
ries money in the shape of dowry from
her own to strangers family; this pro-
cess being, of course, reversed in the case
of sons. But to proceed. 1t is impossi-
BILE, according to all laws of epistolary
and conversational etiqnette in China, to
address any one but an inferior in the
second person. Ihave put "your bright
ness" for the sake of making it clear to
the reader that the meaning is ''you;"
the original would contain but the single
word brightness"
II The crush hut" is, course, antithetical
to the "palatid mansion;" to ''talk with
fingers is an elegant expression for
"playing at chess" andthe "Silver River
is better known to Europeans as the
'sMilky Way" "Unworthy Meniar"
stands for the pronOun d." and to
"draw near the wood" is but another
form of our own 'one foot in the grave"
the term wood being used by metony-
my for the coffin. This last exquisite
figure originated with the philosopher
Tso, who wrote the celebrated commen-
tary ("Tso Chuan' ION Confucius's great
work, "Spring and Autumn" "She is
% and I am '25; and marrying thus,
We shall draw near the wood together"
A "hand-the.clothes, Z" sometimes "hand-
the-towel-and-comb," is common book
term for wife, from her supposed
duties as femme de chxmbre to her nus
band; its use, however, is illustrative
rather of theory than Of any system
actually in practice among the Chinese.
So "little dog" is said deprecatingly |
OF ones own son; and 'tthe planks and
robes Of old age" are the boards and
grawe-clothes that will molder with the
body to dust in its last resting-place,
"the Terrace Of an Eternal Night.
Death has comparatively few terrors for
the peaceable, law-abiding Chinaman,
who is conscious of no neglect to his 4
country gods; but it is none the less a
hateful contingency, in that he is there
by deprived Of the light of day, the Oft
recurring pleasures Of the rice bowl, and
the sound of his chitiren's voices.
Therefore he wells every allusion to the
inevitable hour with some graceful met
aphor, investing the circumstances of
dissolution with dssirableness not their
own. Everything connected with the
grave is spoken of as part of an imagin-
ary "old age" which two words may be
seen conspicuous in the shop-sign Of
every Chinese undertaken. .