Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1917-07-11
CANTON, CHINA AS
seen BY A. C. BAKER
The City Where the Linens and
Silks So Much Priced by Our
Women Are Manufactured.
MANY OF THE PEOPLE
LIVE ON FLOATING HOMES
Rats, Lizards, Cats and Dogs and All
Animal Life offered on the
Market for Human
Consumption.

Consumption.
We are steaming to our landing at
Canton. On all sides are strange
crafts, Sampans, Dahows and Junks.
Here we see crafts with their chick
ems and garden on board. They have
raft connected in which they
dredge the rich mud from the bottom
OF the river AID on this raise their
vegetables. 1t is said that many
of these people are born, live and die
on these odd floating homes and
never put their feet on land.
They drink the filthy water from
the river so full of germs that a
spoonful would infect city, yet they
are immune from any germ disease.
We are passing the European set
tlement of Shameel (from the Chi
nese Shamien) meaning the fats. In
lS41 when the English forced the
Chinese to give the island of Hong
Kong they found their trading pla-
ces at Canton demolished and forced
the concession of this sand island in
front of the city. They built a
retaining wall around 1t, beautified it
with banyan, camphor, Lamarind,
and other trees, erected substantial
buildings and it is a pearl in this
surrounding of quagmire and filth.
Shameen island is Only 1850 feet
long and $50 wide On the two
sides adjoining Canton there is a
canal and no native is allowed to
cross the two bridges connecting
without a pass. Iron gates are at
each end of the bridges and guards
to keep out this mass of diseased
humanity.
We are near landing and can look
over the city of red tile roofs, most
ly not over one story and the high
est-the pawn shops--towering up
like our grain elevators. These pawn
shops are common in China, the peo-
pie take their goods there for safe
keeping until disposed of, draw mo-
Iney on them and are charged cer-
tain per cent for insurance and ac-
|commodations. In these pawn shops
as they are called are stored the most
of the valuable goods made in China.
We are landed at a wharf in Can
ton proper and take hickshas to
Shameen. When We reach the
bridge crossing over the canal to
Shameen our guide who had come up
with us from Hong Kong had pass
for us, the gate was opened and We
were soon at our hotel, the Victoria,
a place no doubt which has seen
much more prosperous conditions,
but since the war almost deserted,
as taere are no English travelling.
We found the service very poor, in
fact, as poor as any place on our
trip.
After this poor breakfast we take
Is sedans with As cooleys to carry
us and are carried through the dirty
city.
Canton Is the city from which most
Of our Chinese come. It has never
been in sympathy with the Manchu
government a1d at all times has de-
fed the government by reviling it..
1t was here that the insurrection,
which finally terminated In driving
out the Manchu dynasty and FORM
| ing the republic, was started.
The Chinese here are as we see
them in this country, small, quiet
and inoffensive, but as one goes far
ther north he finds great large men,
much larger than the American.
We cross the bridge and enter the
| walled city whose gates are as in
all Chinese cities closed at nine o.
clock. These walls are six miles in
circumference and inside this small
space are six hundred narrow streets,
SO narrow we are obliged to take
sedans, as Rickshas could not pass
through them. We went through
some streets not thirty inches wide
with recking filth beneath and the
air foul with stencil and yet we are
II in that city that furnishes the finest
silks known. Look into this place
they call factory. Here in an i'll
constructed bamboo loom are being
woven silks so perfect that you can
not discover an imperfection. A dirt
floor, all surroundings filthy, yet
wrapped as fast as the hand loom
turns out its beautiful finished pro-
duct it is folded in this cover that
it may not come il contact with the
surrounding filth.
| One must hold his nose as he ap'
proaches these shops with the sewer
above ground in the center OF the
| street, with all KINDS Oh nIth Putrl
flying, you wonder how these beauti
| full goods and embroideries, worn b,
royalty the world over and priced a.
perfect, can come from such sur
roundings.
The signs in the streets announc
ing the location of place of busi
ness create a color scheme which Il
the despair of painters. Hung from
brackets extending from the shol
fronts with every gaudy hue in thu
solar spectrum, with great amour
of gold leaf in barbaric characters
they are a study for the tourist.
Each district has its speciality o
goods to manufacture so IL you wisl
to buy of certain line you lind eacl
line in its district, making shopping
easy.
| We 60 to the temple of 500 Gen