The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-01-02
CANYONS GAY STREETS.
ALLEYS GF HIGH-SO UNDING
 NAMES ABLAzE WITH COLOR.
idings-Picturcsque Crowds And PrOcessions Add to the Ltvelimess of the soeme--Teem!ng Life on the Pearl River,

the soeme--Teem.ng Life on the Pear
 River.
 The narrow, evil-smelling streets O
 Canton are picturesque, fascinating
 wonderful. Some of them bear high
 sounding names, such as; The Street ot
 Reposing Dragons, The Street of Sa
 luting Dragons The Street of One Hun
 dred GrandSons, The Street of Ont Thousand Grandsons, The Street o1
 Golden Profits, The Street of Colder Flowers, The Street of Ten Thousand
 Happinesses Others are more simply
 dubbed: Old Clothes Street, Physic
 Street, New Green Pea Street. Only
 eight or nine feet in width, paved, but
 lacking sidewalks, and impossible for
 wagons, or carriages, these tiny alleys
 glow with color, teem With busy life,
 and to the eyes of a foreign devil offer innumerable novelties.
 l The fragility and the insignificance
 of most Cantonese buildings make it
 difficult to realize the city dates back
 two centuries before the Christian era,
 It has, to be sure many times been
 
 the surrounding wall and several Of the
 pagodas are known to be very old. To all streets in the shop district 8 festal air is given by colored signboards
 decorated with golden characters, which on projecting bars, hung lengthwise. To
 their somewhat bewildering blaze are added the blue of cotton clothes worn by hustling, busting crowd. the vari- ed hues of silks in which Mandarins are clad, and the gay banners, flags, lan- terms and umbrellas held aloft in the processions always escorting the sedan chairs of their Excelencies. These streets, the most characteristic and in- terestiing in the city, are lined by two- story buildings supporting on their roofs lattice work of bamboo poles, on which rest mats capable of being moved back and forth as the weather suggests. At night, sliding shutters furnish protection, but while daylight lasts the entire front of these doorless, windoWless shops is thrown open. This arrangement adds gayety, to the thor oughfares, and a shops Vaccinations are often doubled by it's having beyond the counter an open division where the article is manufactured In full view men are carving wood, painting fans or lanterns, weaving on hand looms, working in metals, embroiderlng, all of which is done with marvellously little elbow room the Chinese being remark able for their ability to work and live in a small space
 One does not find all these industries grouped together. Entire streets are devoted to the manufacture and sale of streets, fan streets, carved streets, ivory streets, shoe streets, where can be found all kinds of foot coverings, ranging from coolie's cheap straw sandal to the tiny embroidered shoes with painted heels destined for golden lilies. as the compressed feet are called. There are streets all glowing green with jade. The prettiest of all are the lantern streets Tn addition to the great variety of lanterns used in everyday life by the Chinese, vast num- oers are made for particular occasions snd festivals. These are sometimes lung not only beside the shop but also rom the bamboo trellis work extend 1 ng across the street. Besides all the ! ancfully painted lanterns of continent II shapes there is a gay confusion of | lowers, fruits, birds. insects, dragons. | ishes, which combine to make a very air imitation of fairyland So beauti- ully made are these lanterns and so bsurdly cheap are they, that 1t requires elf-contfol to refrain from buying them " hundreds.
 One does not soon tire of the shops, ut many other things in thes streets ttract one's attention. There are the wise men, or fortunetellers with their assisting trained birds seated on the orners the itinerant restaurants con- aiming such a variety of queer vege- abes: the clever prestidigitators ready 0 squat down and for a few cash to erform wonders; the migratory den- ist wearing as a necklace string of eeth: the barber whose home is a seat n his box, and who after shaving a brushing out and plating his igtail proceeds in the name of mas age, unmercifully to punch and pound i'm, winding up the performance by igorously driving into his victims ears
 long ivory instrument which an nno- ant foreign devil almost expects to see merge through the opposite orifce: le money changers who sit behind , ,bles to which their string of cash are 1ained and the menders and vendors , all kinds of things, who walk about ith trays containing tools or goods. as i le case may be, slung onNther shoul- CTS. Then there are the processions, such 2 $ funerals all white scarfs and hoWls: 6 eddings all abaze with scarlet and a l 'ackle, crackle of exploding flrecrack- z s; joss pidgin processions witb their | ,ast pigs, baskets of artificial flowers, f 1earthly so-called music, and the usual | gs, banners, and umbre las All these, l. , well as the long trains which ac- ,mpany mandarns' chairs, belong to o 'eryday life; but a great many days 4 ring the year have their own special ~ occasions, such as for instance, as the - sherman's characterized by it's lam u rms resembling fish; Paak-ta is, dis 1 nguiehed by stuffed birds borne on = lies and trays containing wax figures = presenting historical scenes: the pro- - ssion in which red giants and black r varfs are prominent; the dragon pro- ', ssion. and the lantern parade Several streets are occupied by the ung Yuen, or examination hall This sI insists of thousands uf tiny brick u
 n