Arizona weekly citizen., 1890-01-04
CHINESE AND THEIR WAYS.
They Know Better Than Any Other Peo-
 pie What Economy Means

They Know Better Than Any Other Peo-
 pie What Economy Means.
 The Chinese are pre-eminently econo- nical, whether it be in limiting the num- Der of wants, in preventing waste, or in adjusting forces in such manner as to make little represent great deal. The universal diet consists of rice, beans, millet, garden vegetables, and fish, with little meat on high festivals. Whole some food in abundance may be supplied at less than penny day for each adult, and even in famine times thousands of persons have been kept alive for months on about halfpenny a day each. This implies the existence of high degree of culinary skill in the Chinese. Their modes of preparing food arc thorough and various. There is no waste; every thing is made to do as much duty as pos sible What is left is the veriest trifle. The physical condition of the Chinese cat or dog, who has to live on the leav- ings of thefamily, shows this. They are clearly kept on starvation allowances.
 The Chinese are not extremely fastid- ious in regard to food; all is fish that comes to their net, and most things come there sooner or later. Certain disturb ances of the human organization, due to eating diseased meat, are well recog nized among the people. but it is con- sidered better to eat the meat, the cheap ness of which is certain, and run the risk of the consequences, which are not quite certain, than to buy dear meat, even with the assurance of no evil results. h. deed. the meat of animals which have died of ordinary ailments is rather dear CT than that of those which have in an epidemic. such as pleuro-pneumonia Another example of careful, calculating economy is the construction of the cook ing pots and boilers, the bottoms of which are as thin as possible, that the contents may boil all the sooner, for fuel is scarce and dear, and consists generally of nothing but the stalks and roots of the crops. which make rapid blaze and dis appear. The business of gathering fuel is committed to children, for one who can do nothing else can at least pick up straws and leaves and weeds. In autumn and winter vast army of fuel gatherers spread over the land. Boys ascend trees and beat them with clubs to shake all the leaves; the very straws get no time to show which way the wind blows be- fore they are annexed by some collector.
 Similarly professional manure collect ors swarm over all the roads of the coun- try Chinese women carry this minute economy into their dress. Nothing comes amiss to them; if it is not used in one place it is in another, where it ap- pears thing of beauty. Foreign resi- dents who gave their cast off clothing to Chinese may be assured the career of usefulness of these garments is at last about to commence. Chinese wheelbar- rows squeak for want of a few drops of oil, but to people who have no nerves the squeak is cheaper than the oil Simi- larly dirt is cheaper than hot water, and so. as a rule, the people do not wash. The motto Cheaper than dirt" which lhc soap dealer puts in his windows, could not be made intelligible to the Chi nese. To them the average foreigners are mere soap wasters.
 Scarcely any tool can be got ready ma;ie. it is so much cheaper to buy the parts and put them together for your self. and as almost everybody takes this view. ready made tools are not to be got. Two rooms are dimly lighted with sin gle lamp deftly placed in hole in the dividing wall. Chinese, in fact, seem to be capable of doing anything by means of almost nothing. They will give you an iron foundry on a minute scale of completeness in a back yard, and will make in an hour cooking range, a strong and perfect draught, out of pile of mud bricks. lasting indefinitely, op- erating perfectly and costing nothing The old woman who in her last moments hO5bled as near as possible to the family graveyard in order to die so as to avoid the expense of coffin bearers was Chi nese.-North China Herald.