The National tribune., 1889-01-17

often one side of the street seems inclined to the
other at an angle of45 degrees. Pools of dirty |
water are everywhere, and the driest parts are
marked with human filth. The contrast be-
tween them and the stores is all the more
apparent. These are ybut one story high |
and they are as bright in their decoration as
Solomon in his glory. They are made up of
carved fronts, and these are, in many cases.
covered with goldleaf. THE signs run up and |
down, instead of across the top, as with US, and
they are open to the streets There are no
plate-glass windows and all the light that gets |
to the interior comes through paper panes |
What curious shops they are some sell moth |
ing but snuff, and here is one whose sole stock |
is made up of sticks as big around as the small
est lead pencil, and from one to three feet long
These are i'll packages of so and a hundred. |
They are incense sticks, and they are to be |
burnt at the graves of the purchasers ances- |
tors OF at the joss House. Here is butcher
shop, and there is a place where they sell |
camels and mules meat. The middle of the |
widest streets have tents like the booths of a |
r-ground, and the auctioneer makes as much |
noise here as he does in America. 1t looks, after
all, more like a great fair than city, and the |
lottery men and the story-tellers, who have |
crowds around them remind one of the patent |
medicine vendors of our own country fairs |
There is no mistake about the people being |
alivein China, and in Peking the motto of " Root
hog or die" is in full force.
I go from one part of the city to another by |
side streets. 1t is like moving through walled |
alleys, IN mud up to your knees. The houses |
of the mobiles are all in large yards, back from |
the streets, and so closed that one cannot get |
to them. | hear a singing of voices in concert, |
coming from low building on corner, and |
try to make my way in to see the show. My |
guide is Mortified. He pulls me back, and, in |
pdgin English says: Master no go in there; |
man no wanchee." l push my way past, and |
the guide comes along in despair 1t is my |
first Chinese school, Six little boys in pigtails |
are squatting on their knees on one of the hot |
bake-oven kangs. Each has little table, |
foot high, before him, and on this is his open |
book, containing, no doubt, the precepts of Con-
fucius. The sch0olmaster, an old man, with a |
short cue and spectacles, the eyes of which are
each as big around as the top of tumbler, is,
for wonder, not displeased to see me. He has
long stick under his arm and fan in one
hand. He shakes his hands together as we en-
ter, in Chinese salutation, smoothes his light
blue silk gown down over his yellow trowsers,
and, at the guides request asks the scholars to
go on. Then arises a confusion like that of
Babel. They all sing out their verses in as
many different tones as there are boys, and they
sway their bodies to and fro as they do so. This
is however, the method of study for all China.
Old and young memOrize aloud and the Chi
nese are nation of scholars. The officials are
largely schoolteachers and the Emperor has to
do with the highest examination papers.
spoke of Peking being made up of three
cities. These are the Chinese city, the Tartar
city and the Forbidden city. The Forbidden
city is within wall inside of the Tartar city.
1t comprises hundreds of acres, and it is given
up entirely to the Emperor and his harem.
This Emperor of China has about 1000 sery-
ants, and these are all eunuchs. He has his
pick of the prettiest girls of the Tartar nobil-
h,. Hay
The Empress Regent has just picked out three
wives for him, the first of whom is to be the
Empress, and the Others the highest of his
concubines. Every three years after this he
will have chance to select such pretty girls
as he pleases to fill up the royal seraglio, and,
inasmuch as he is now only 18 years old, he
will by the time he is so have had, in all prob
ability, more wives than Solomon. He is
Tartar, and the Tartars have for several hun
dred years ruled China. The present dynasty
began to reign more than 200 years ago, and
the system of Government inaugurated then
practically exists to-day.
The army of China is largely made up of
the Tartars, apd Peking is protected by the
Eight Banner Corps. They live with their
families in the city and form the Imperial
Army. They dress gorgeously, and their Gen
erals look as though they might have stepped
out of China of the middle ages. They excel
more as archers than as shots with the rifle or
musket, and the officers drill their men more
in gymnastics than anything else. There are
about 100000 men in the Imperial Army, and
there are over 700 military guards in the For
hidden city. / visited an archery-match which
took place outside the city walls last week, and
saw hundreds of these Tartar soldiers gallop-
ing across the fields on ponies and shooting
their arrows at mounds of earth as they flew
by them. They were good shots, and they
were fine specimens of muscular humanity
| They were dressed in long Chinese gowns and
| looked as though they were gotten up for a
masquerade ball rather than for war. As to
arms they have nothing bat the old matchbox
musket as far as | have seen, though | am told
! that half of the cavalry are armed with rifles.
| The cavalry are mounted on ponies, and in
some cases the ponies have bells on their necks.
| The soldiers in reality know nothing about
war, and it is only in some of the Provinces,
/ such as that governed by Ii Hung Chang,
where the army would have any weight what
| ever as against European forces. LII Hung
| Chang's army has been instructed by English
and French officers. 1t is 10000 strong, and it
! has breech- loading rifles and Krupp's steel
cannon. Some of the forces of other Provin-
ces are now being supplied with modern arms,
and there is a military school at Tientsin
| which is turning out some good officers.
China has a provincial army which, accord
| ing to their statistics, numbers about 650000
| men. 1t is an army on paper rather than in
reality, and the country has only about 10000
soldiers who have been properly armed and
drilled. There are several arsenals in the En-
pire which, ! am told, turn out as good cannon
as can be made in Europe, and within the
last few years efforts have been made to i'm
prove the service. The soldiers receive
no pay to speak of and the infantry re-
ceive from 25 to 30 cents week, while the cav
airy soldiers get only dollar and quarter q
week, and each man has to feed his own horse
out of this. If the horse dies the man must
replace it, and altogether the Chinese soldier
has pretty hard time. If he gets sick there
is no hospital for him, and it is only OCCASION
ally that a doctor is attached to camp. Col.
Denby the American Minister to China, says