The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-11-29
A TRIP TO CHINATOWN.

English. l started at l1:lO O'Clock D. IN.
and found myself in my own room at SEQ
O'Clock a. m. What l saw in that one night
out HerOds Herod. We walked down
Kearney street as far as China
town. There names Of streets
end You enter labyrinth
OF alleys, a network of paths and walks
the homes of the Mongohans You are
among Celestials, but what a celestial
sphere do they live in First l visited the
Chinese theater. / consider this q remark
able institution. When my guide informed
the Chinese manager who 1 was he placed
me on the stage and requested me to see the
performance. A Chinese play lasts seven
days.
1t begins on Monday at 7:SO p. m, and
plays till midnight each night until the fol-
towing Monday. The play L saw was tine
trial Of a woman who was accused of hav-
ing more than one husband. She was con-
Yicted and sentenced to have her head cut
off, when a character which corresponds to
the chambermaid of English drama espoused
her cause, declaring that the wife was in
nocent, and to prove it she engaged in
singlehand combat with the judge, the ex-
ecutioner and several Of the guards, killing
each in turn and at midnight exactly
marched away with the accused.
There Is no curtain and no scenery.
Everything is make believe, something
after this style in which children play. The
orchestra is on the stage and keeps up an in
cessant screeohing and rasping. The stage
hands come on in full view of the audience
and change the furniture, and man or
woman is killed by a pass of the hand
within six inches of the throat or head. The
dead one passes through between the legs of
the one who does the killing and walks off.
Primitive beyond measure.
Some of the costumes are very expensive
and beautifully accorded with Chinese views
of beauty. Women do not act. Men play
the female characters. Back-of the stage is
the wardrobe man. He dresses all the actors
and takes charge Of the costumes. After
the performance l made TIE tour of the
theater. All the actors, stage hands, help,
and / suppose many of the audience live in
the theater-down stairs, underneath the
stage. They are fed from one common
kitchen. The house is laid out like q small
town. The paths are streets and the doors
are cotton curtains. The Chinese have no
privacy, no sense of shame or modesty.
They wash, dress and undress in full view
of each other. In one of these novels l
found a little girl-proDably years old.
She was undergoing the barbarous cruelty
and torture which is inflicted on all female
Chinese misunderstanding the growth of
the feet The baby could not walk, of
course, so the mother brought her in, placed
her on a stool and asked her TO sing for tho
"MeIican" lady. The most pathetic song l
ever heard was this little heather singing.
my Jesus Loves Me-"
Chinese women do not work The men
work early and late, the women do nothing.
There may be respectable Chinese women
in China, but was told there are but few,
if any, in San Francisco A Chinese woman
looks as though she had been drawn out of
a tub of fat, all slick and shiny and greasy.
Null Is the Chinese beauty. She is about
fifty-four inches In hight, well formed and
fairly good looking. Her reputation is
mainly due to a monstrous cruelty of
Chinese invention, which was inflicted
on her to make money. She is now
on exhibition-private of course-in one
of those infamous dens which could
exist in no other city in the United States.
What a world What a peoplel What
life! Knob Hill above with its mansions,
its palaces, its millionaires and its luxury I;
beneath. these human beings, crawling
about like worms, living in the earth, in
darkness, without air. Refinement and
degradation, modesty and brazenness, ex-
travagance and penury, luxury and starva-
ton, virtue aud vice of every grade, elbow
each other-liYe, one may say, in the same
house, grow side by side, and YET are as
careless of each others existence as though
oceans separated them.
The guide had taken me down about
three stories, should judge, when he
pointed out to me man who, it is said, has
been sitting fourteen years. He is con-
demned for some offenSe to this punishment.
Prometheuslike- only after Chinese fashion.
bound to q chair and not able to lie down
or sleep.
want to say that the formality of asking
permission to inspect Chipamans house or
room is not required. There is no knocking
on the door. for their doors are curtains.
You simply walk in without leave and take
your chances on what the occupants at that
Identical moment may be doing.
AS l walked along these underground
galleries the guide suggested | should see
may be called a row of Cinnamon in ali
stages of opium delirium. "Lede likee hitee
pipee" said one of these to the guide. He
told him something in Chinese and the
blink-eyed little heather went on as uncon-
cernedly with his preparations for celestial
visions by means of the opium pipe as
though he were alone. Degradation can
sink no lower. When humanity parades its
vices without shame the lowest depth is
reached. Smoking opium is the quintes-
sence of degradation. Drinking whisky is a
religious ceremony in comparison. 1t is
wallowing in mire like swine only pur.
posely and unconscious.
Chinese people do not sleep on pillows.
| They rest their heads on small blocks. Some
are made of wood. some are wicker work
but all are solid. In the row now speak
| of there were probably ninety or more
| Cinnamon. Some smoking, some prepar.
| ing to smoke. The pipe Is a bulb at the end
| of stem. On this bulb the opium is
smeared, and bulb and opium are held close
| to the light so as to heat the
opium and soak 1t into the hole OF
| this bulb. A Chinaman hangs over
this smearing and soaking process with
religious fervor. When the pipe is ready he
| lights it, inhales the smoke and lets it out
! in clouds. 1t is of q milky, translucent
! color, four or five puffs exhausts a pipe
! The smoker fills it, inhales and puffs agair
and continues till the pipe falls from his
nerveless hands. At this stage he has had
enough and is ready for Celestial visions
| Ordinarily six or seven pipes affect this
| With some it requires more.
| The opium stages vary. From the time
the pipe falls from the nerveless hand til
the waking of the victim he is worse than
dead-he is alive but helpless. This row of
| living dead men is a sight which will never
| leave my memory. The Paris morgue with
its disfgured, murdered, laid out in death
and barely covered with their blood and
| mud stained garments is nothing compared
with the ghostly ghastliness and horror OF
these opium dens. Their ash color, upturned
faces, their rolling eyes, the contortions of
the muscles as the victims body follows his
minds visions, the general horror of each
one fills me with wonder and with terror.
Had l not seen these things would never