The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-07-12
VARIETIES OF CHINESE.
The Women as Modest as Any in the
World.

Julian Ralph In Harper's Magazine.
There are many Chinas. or many kinds
of China, but the only one expected to
flnd was the one did not see. 1t was an
ideal l had been forming all along the
years between my first geography and my
latest purchased book-of a country peo-
pied by men wearing broad-brimmed, cone
shaped hats, and carrying boxes of tea on
each end of the bamboo poles they bal
anced on one shoulder. That sort of man
l saw once or twice among the millions |
met, but the whole combination 1 missed
altogether. My China has its gentry. it's
merchants, Its workingmen, and its farm
ers-not to speak of beggars, actors, priests
conJurors, and sailors. We found its mer-
chant class polite, patient, extremely
shrewd, well-dressed, pattern shop-keep-
ers. We found its gentlemen graceful, pol
ished, generous and amiable. But the peas
antry constantly reminded us of the coun-
try folk of continental Europe outside of
Russia.
Theirs was the same simplicity of cos
tune, intelligence and manners They lived
in very much the same little villages of
matched cottages. Theirs was the same
awkwardness, shyness, cunning in trade.
the same distrust of strangers and of
strange things. The sharpest fracture of
the comparison was seen in the Chinese
FARMS; for, where we were, every handful
OF earth was almost literally passed
through the hands of its cultivators, every
leaf was inspected, every inch was watered
manured, watched and cared for as a re-
tired Englishman looks after his back gar
den. The result, was a fertility beyond
compare, glory of vegetation, a univer-
sanity OF cultivation that permitted no
waste places. 1t was a system that always
included the preparation of a second
growth to be transplanted into the place
OF the main growth when the first reached
It's harvest. As compared with Japan, one
feature of every view was strikingly in ia
Vor or the larger country. The dress and
behavior of the Chinese will not offend Eu-
ropeans.
The women of Central China are not
merely most modest, they are as complete
~ dressed as any women ever have seen.
They are covered from neck to heels in a
costume composed of a Jacket and from
sers AS Mr.. Weldon says Their com
plete freedom of movement is calculated
10 produce the most perfect nation, physi-
cally. 1t IS Gods providence that this
menace TO the safety of the world is Off
SET by their innutritious food and their
Iohdness for the Gripping of women's
Ieet In Japan nakedness is what startles
the newcomer on all sides. In China ''the
altogether" that Trilby posed for is a
product that l only saw in the cases OF
less than half dozen children. 1 am
told that in the country one sees women
half barred above the waist when the sun
shines tropically, but cannot prove that
l saw one farmer girl with only her pad
IKE frontlet of cotton on above her trou-
sers, but 1 cannot announce a national
custom upon that slender basis
On the other hand, l saw the women at
every sort of labor, squatted down upon
the rivers edge. climbing like boys. wres-
ing, frolicking, rowing boats with their
Ieet, wading streams, yet never having
occasion to regard that jealous modes.y
Whlch Is safeguarded in their dress and in
their souls from infancy onward. 1 never
except in two instances among thou
sands-raised my eyes to have them meet
those OF woman that she did not cast
hefs down, or turn and run indoors as fast
as her golden lilies goats feet, We'll
uoh calls them-would carry her. Even in
the night resorts of the gentlemen. where |
the beJewelled sing-song girls ply their
service Of song and attendance during the |
formal dinners OF men and means, l never
saw the suggestion Of improper behavior
On the mems or the women's parts. To he