The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1892-08-06
THE sIoup CHINESE.

THE $TouD CHINESE.
Light and Noise Do Not Disturb
the Rest Bought With Opium.
ssIt seems to make no particular
difference to Chinese how long he
remains in one position. He will
write all day, like an automaton.
If he is q handicraftsman he will
stand in one place from dewy morn
till dusky eve, working away at his
weaving, his gold beating, or what
ever it may be, and do it every day
without any variation in the monot-
ony and apparently no special con-
seriousness that there is any monot-
ony to be varied.
s.In the same way Chinese school
children are subjected to an amount
of confinement, unrelieved by any
recesses or change Of work, which
would soon drive western pupils to
the. verge of insanity. The very
infants in arms, instead of squirm-
ing and wriggling as our children
begin to do as soon as they are born,
lie as impassive as so many mud
gods. And at q more advanced age,
when western children would vie
with the monkey in its widest an
tics, Chinese children will often
stand, sit or squat in the same pos
ture for a great length Of time.
''In the item Of sleep the Chinese
establishes the same difference be-
tween himself and the Occidental
as in the directions already specified.
Generally speaking, he is able to
sleep panywhere. None Of the trifling
disturbances which drive US to de-
spair annoy him. With a brick for
a pillow he can lie down on his bed
of stalks, of mud bricks or rattan:
and sleep the sleep of the just, with
no reference to the rest of creation.
He does not want his room dark
ened nor does he require others to
be still. The infant crying in the
night may continue to cry for all
he cares, for itdoes not disturb him.
"In some regions the entire pop
ulation seem to fall asleep, as by a
common instinct (like that of the
alternating bear) during the first
two hours Of summer afternoons,
and they do this with regularity, no
matter where they may be. Attwo
hours after noon the universe at
such seasons is as still as at two
hours after midnight. In the case
of most working people at least
and also in that of many others po-
sition in sleep is no sort of con-
sequence. 1t would be easy to raise
in China an army of q million
nay, of 10000, ,OO0-tested by COM
petitative examination as to their
to go to sleep across three
wheelbarrows with head downward
like spider, their mouths wide
open and fly inside.
"The same freedom from tyranny
of nerves is exhibited in the Chi
nese endurance of physical pain.
Those who have any acquaintance
with the operations in hospitals in
China know how common or rather
how almost universal it is for the
patients to bear without flinching
degree of pain from which the
stoutest of US would shrink in terror.
ut would be easy to expand this
topic alone into an essay, but we
must pass it by, merely calling at
tention to q remark of George Eliot,
in one of her letters. The highest
calling and election she says
rritated, no doubt, by theological
for which she had no
,aste-'is to do without opium, and
% bear pain with clear-eyed endur-
ance.' If she is right there can be
little doubt that most Chinese, at
east, have made their calling and
election sure. Arthur H. Smith |
n Melbourne Leader.