Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-04-17
Consul Bedloe Gives a Clever Sketch
of Its Origin and Meaning.
T0NsURE SAID TO, BE EGYPTIAN.
The Long Pig-Tail serves the Celestial
Policemen q Good Turn.
WEARING 4 WIG Ur0N THE CHIN

| lt1es are OF sort that get him friends with
out effort of his, and his successes in and
out of public life have been less things of
his seeking than those that have been given
him as compliment so we'll deserved that
they were higher compliment to the giver.
At the risk of telling too much, may
say that his innumerable friends, without
his desire or knowledge, are now urging his
appointment to the vacant mission to Japan,
and certainly no one could be better fitted
for that position than the genial doctor,
whose knowledge of the affairs and people
of that tarthest Orient is inexhaustable
Sitting the other evening with acircle Of
which he was, of course, the center, and
when he was RECALLING his auditors with
pictures of strange things in that mysteri-
Gus country, someone asked the doctor If
he could give the history OF the queue. He
Immediately launched out upon this topic.
and his close knowledge of Chinese customs
is shown by the story of the pig-taiL
The History OF the Oueus.
"Why some people wear queue and
others shave the head bare" began the
doctor, "was as great puzzle 1900 years
ago as 1t is at the present time. In curious
Chinese book, written about 6O4 A. D., the
author, Tien-Ching-Chung, priest of great
learning, says: In Djambudwipa (that is
Asia) the clothing of the inhabitants varies
to large extent, and the custom of shaving
of the hair and beard exists in some re-
| gions, while elsewhere hair is worn divided
into two pendant tails There are also
countries where all the hair is shaved of
except that at the crown, which is tied into
one queue. This author also mentions that
some nations pluck out the hair entirely,
while others cut it short Some people, he
says, let the hair flow loose down on the
shoulders, while others prefer to plat it.
In some instances the front hair is plated
and the back hair left loose.
'e1t is difficult to locate with exactness the
places he names, tor II centuries ago. the
Asiatic peoples were more migratory than
at present and named the lands they lived
in from themselves no matter how often
they changed their residence. 1t is easy to
determine that the people who shaved the
head and beard were the Buddhist monks
and nuns in India, Cevlon. Siam and China;
that the people with two tails were the
Japanese, Coreans and some of the tribes
now called the, Independent Tartars' (be-
cause probably they are owned body and
boots by Russa), and that the race which
shaved all but the crown and tied the hair
at that spot into one queue were the
Manchu-Tartars or nomad dwellers of Man
churia.
A Crown Woven From His Hair.
'The Chinese peoples, for at that time
what is now single empire was a large
number of petty Kingdoms, wore their hair
according to their pleasure. The poorer
classes kept it cut short; the wealthy al
lowed it to grow long, and. like the Roman
nobility in the reign of Nero, spent ex-
traordinary amounts of time, trouble and
money upon its cultivation. A prince of
Shen-si, about 700 A. D., is described as
wearing a crown braided from 1S plaits of
his hair, and ornamented with silver jewels.
A thousand years passed away and the Tar
tar CUSTOM which this author described as
an outlandish novelty. became the custom
of all China The crown was left, but all
the rest of the hair was shaven. This be-
came the national custom at the Manchu
conquest about l. D. 1914. 1t did not be-
come the rule in China to shave off the hair
all round the crown from any religious mo-
tive, but simply by military compulsion.
You have to obey ORDERS said the con-
querors, sword in hand; if you refuse to
shave according to our Tartar custom you
must die, for refusal will constitute you a
northeast province, as the conquest pro-
ceeded till the whole nation had their heads
shaved except the crown. And they have
kept it up ever since.
A Chinaman Without a Queue.
"Of the 200, 900, 900 male citizens of the
Celestial Kingdom 199, 500, 900 sport the
queue. There is belief current in the
United States that Chinaman who loses
,irtoi ic o1I I
native land This is arrant nonsense. A
Chinaman who cuts off his capillary ap-
pendage and appears in public in short hair
is viewed exactly as an American would be
who presented himself in the streets fully
dressed with the omission of trousersl
"a queue is wearing apparel! A Mon
golian with scant hair braids in artificial
hair or adds silk threads. A bald man en-
ploys false queue that is fastened to the
inside of his cap. A Coolie regards HIM
self we'll attired when he wears bathing
trunks and has his pigtail nicely combed
and oiled.
'The Manchus. when they began their
wonderful career of conquest in the
thirteenth century, did not at first insist
upon their conquered foes adopting the ton
serial style as mark of subsection. Only
when they had overrun so many lands and
peoples that it became difficult to dis
tinguish vassal and serf from open foe, did
they ADOPT the present system. The queue
was forced upon Kuldja tribes in the
fifteenth century, upon the people of Mon
golia in the sixteenth, on Shantung at the
beginning of the seventeenth, and on the
remainder of China in the next 80 years.
Shaving tho Entire Head.
'Tf it be asked why did the Tartars
shave, the reply will probably be correct
hat ho ho in tptn onl
continued for cleanliness, for fashions sake
and for the comfort of the skin. That re-
ligion was the originating cause is likely,
because in India, with the spread Of
Buddhism, the shaving of the entire head
became very common. This was in pursu-
ance of vow to fersake the world. The
monastic vow of the Buddhists requires
abandonment of worldly enjoyments and
luxuries To drink wine and eat flesh are
beth forbidden. People prided themselves
on their hair end, therefore that must go
alss. The monk and nun must truly for
sake the world. In the case of every Budd-
hist, the shaving of the entire hair is the
fruit of a religious vow, professedly made
with the most serious and desired act of
will to torsake the world. 1t is only dis
pensed with when he takes greater VOW,
that of the long g-haired ascetic. Buddhism
opens the way to a succession of stages in
the rellglouS LIE, ana ne VINO wears MS
hair unshern has reached higher grade
than the shaven crowd OF monks who chant
their prayers together in praise of Buddha
in the sacred hall Of. their temple.
The Tonsure Began in Egypt.
'Tn the josshouses at Annoy, you can
grade the priests according to their pelts.
The greenhorn is undistinguishable from
the everyday citizen; but the boss hieroph-
ant, the full incarnation of sanctity, has q
cranium as smooth as q billiard ball. But