News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1888-03-01
CHINA,S BOAT NJ
Carter Harrison Sees h Sights on
the River at Canton.

One of the most peculiar things which
| strikes the traveller mt Canton is It's vast
floating population and its boats, man
ned by women-another bull. 1t is said
there are not far from so, 900 of the $780,
900 Cantonese who live and die in little
boats on the river. These are OF three
| sizes. The largest or regular marine
boat is twenty-five to forty feet long,
with a beam of ten to fifteen feet. Some
! of them have a sort of second story.
They traffic, carrying freight or passen.
gers. Their owners never go OIL OF
them. At night these lie side by side
ten to twenty deep, with another row
meeting their bows, and so on for hun
dreds of yards. Some of them are beau
tifully decorated within, not outside
no Chinese boat ever is, or even painted
and are called flower boats. Opposite
them are the room boats. Here the
revelry of Canton is carried on.
Susan, our bright sampan girl, guided
us from one boat to another, now and
then stretching out her tiny hand to as
sist us in our movements A gentleman
wishes to entertain some friends. He
hires a flower boat for the evening. He
hires scenery, the supper and wines.
He then hires one, two, three or more
singing and dancing girls-a sort of
odalisque-each guest can bring a girl
if he wishes. Here they meet and make
a night of it, eating and drinking and
gambling, the girls singing, playing and
dancingfOr their amusement. The boats
are all open in front, like the stores, and
hundreds of idlers pass to and fro to see
the jewellers. This they seem to relish.
We were beekOned to come in and par
take, but with a motion of thanks de-
clined. This is kept up from 5 in the
afternoon to 1, 2 or 3 at night. Al
though there are hundreds of these
pleasure boats, and perhaps thousands
of the singing girls, yet the population
goes on night after night throughout
water makes the air cool, and these
flower boats take the place of beer gar
dens in Germany, cafes in France, and
tea houses in Japan and in other cities
in China. The girls are of the lower
classes, belong to the master or mistress
of the house boats, and are hired at 81
an evening. They are allowed to drink
but not to eat. l was told that if this
were permitted their coarse
would crop out in eating, but that they
quickly learn how to drink like ladies.
The sampans are much smaller boats,
about fifteen to twenty feet long, with O
beam from five to eight feet. In this
little affair a oma will live with two
or three childten. If she has no daugh-
ter old enough, she manages to buy a
girl grown or nearly grown. These two
manage the boat-of these there are
thousands. They do all the light river
carrying, and it is very great. One will
rush upon q steamer, seize your valise
or even trunk, and carry it down a gang
way with the strength of a man and with
more agility. They will give one a hand
to steady him, and, in fact, protect and
assist a strong man as he at home has
been accustomed to assist women Our
hotel was in Honan, a suburb across the
river from the main city of Canton.
Susan, 1.-THE, sharp, quick-witted Susan,
owned two boats, and had three pretty
all nearly as old at herself,
and two little children. She OF they
were always on hand to scull us from the
to the city, a few hundred yards
And how they could scull In
and out, under the bows of junks, through
crowds of big boats or little sampans,
rowing like men, climbing like monkeys.
Our Susans were all pretty little women,
beautifully formed, with tiny little hands,
if hard; and such feet and ankles! l
can't describe them. Just imagine them.
You can't go amiss, SO perfect were they
real models in nut brown. And Susan
was ubiquitous. 1t mattered not where
we would reach the river after a walk,
Susan was sure to be there to scull us
over, to take our 10 cents, and to crack a
Joke in pigeon English-a joke not al |
ways the most delicate, for none of the
ousans were prudes. I wondered how
with only two boats, could be every
where at once. On Il last day a wo-
mans voice from another sampan rang
my ears. L looked, and 10, it was
and yet Susan was rowing us l
then discovered that all these little boat
women, that is the young ones, had
beautiful forms and perfect feet and
ankles. The boys on taking q boat never
saw above the ankle, and in that way
were joking with a bright-eyed Susan,
md had not discovered we did not have
Susan, whose ankles were pretty but
whose eyes squinted badly.