The Marble times and Crystal silver lance., 1900-11-16
CHINESE POOR FOLKS.
Their Earnings Worry Small and Their In
dustry UnremIttIng.


dustry Unremitting.
A rich Chinaman wears silk. poor
one cotton. Since the proportion of
rich to poor is about one to a thou
sand, Il follows that the growth and
manufacture of cotton are of prime
necessity. 1t is thought cotton cul-
ture was begun in the thirteenth CEN
tury, the plant coming from India,
where 1t has been known for 1000
years. In spite of her unequaled agri-
culture, China does not raise cotton
for export-nor, in fact, enough for
her own needs. In the growth and
manufacture of it, as in everything
else, the aim is not, as in the United
States. to save hand labor, but to use
as much Of it as possible. There are
no power gins for taking out the seed.
Instead, the Chinese use little hand
gins very like those still to be found
in the homespun regions of the Ap-
palachian chain. The gain is nothing
more than a couple Of small wooden
rollers, made fast in uprights affixed
to bench. They are turned by .
wooden crank, revolve one against the
other, and free the cotton of seed by
drawing the lint through the narrow
space between. The lint is fed to
them by hand, and it takes long and
steady days work to gin five pounds
Of lint-which means twenty pounds OF
cotton in the seed.
The cotton is carded simultaneously
with the ginning. A second man
stands at the end of the bench beat
ing the clean cotton with the tee-kung,
or earth bow, into big, faky bats.
These bats the women spin in vari-
Gus ways. Sometimes they use the
old-fashioned spinning wheel. Much
oftener it is something approximating
the ancient distaff. The spinner
twirls it steadily, walking around and
around as she twirls, thus winding
the lengthening thread into very long
hanks. If it is spun and run into
breaches or quills, they are often
reeled with hand reel. Chinese in
dustry indeed is as inveterate as
Chinese economy Women usually
work at such reeling while they stand
at gossip in the alleyways between
their houses. If there is no reel
handy they will be stitching upon a
shoe sole, always salable article. Bare
feet are unknown in China. Even a
beggar wears shoes, though he may
have no other clothing than the head
bowl, which serves both as a hat and
to hold out when there is chance OF
aims. Nothing is wasted in China.
Even grass and wheat roots are pulled
up, washed dried and used for fuel.
Scraps of paper and cloth are pasted
together to make the insoles of shoes.
Bits of wood are glued to build up
either board or post. Women
spinners and straw-plaiters earn Two
cents day. The spinning, though.
is most commonly, like the weaving
at the handlooms, only part of in
paid household labor Machine-made
cloth and thread have of late come to
bear heavily upon the cotton workers,
but that fact is in degree offset by
the growing imports Of raw cotton.
Still some of the light yellow hand
made fabric, known the world over
as nankeen, from the city of export,
Nankin, is shipped abroad. 1t is made
from peculiar yellow-staple cotton,
hence not dyed. The same yellow
staple cotton is grown and manu-
factured by Acadians in Louisiana, but
the fabric is so coarse that it does not
compete with the Chinese one.
Five dollars year will clothe a
Chinese husband and wife something
more than decently. Underwear is un-
known-so is fitting garment. The
only measures taken are from the hip
to the ground, and from the middle of
the breast to the finger tips. Fashions
do not change. Winter garments and
bedding are wadded with cotton. Once
a year they must be ripped apart and
washed, padding and all. How need
full is economy may be judged from a
few figures. Unskilled laborers re-
ceive upon an average seven cents a
day. Masons, carpenters and stone
cutters, here as elsewhere the aristo-
cracy of labor, get form rs to 80 cents
a day. Work begins at sunrise and
keeps up until dark Strikes are vir-
tually unknown, and the Chinese la
borer is the happiest and most con-
tented in all the world.-New York
SIN