Page images
PDF
EPUB

From The Spectator.

HWA TSIEN KI.*

GOETHE, who was, in his old age at least, very fond of the proprieties and decorousnesses of life, even where they clearly passed the bounds of artificiality,-perhaps partly by way of reaction from the time when he used to stand with his master the silly wager in the market-place of Weimar, Duke of Weimar cracking horsewhips for a

that it had, even in the least degree, | done much to make his countrymen popular seemed imminent. That the present sys- here. He does this by being at once cortem of keeping enormous armies on foot in dial and straightforward. As Lord Stanley time of peace, in order to be ready for war, said, it was a pleasure to work with him. was most disastrous and pregnant with fu- The old notion of diplomacy and diplomature mischief, appeared to him obvious; but tists is quite worn out. In former days it he confessed that he could find no simple was held to be the highest triumph in diand satisfactory remedy. He is much too plomatic circles to conceal every real sensible and well informed to believe in thought, and only to hint and insinuate projects of disarmament by arrangements aims and ambitions. Now business is done and stipulations as to the number of troops in a different way. A frank statement of and ships that each nation may keep in what is wanted on each side is followed by readiness. In fact, he could think of no a polite and, if possible, an exhaustive dissubstitute for standing armies, or of any cussion. This is much better and much means of lessening their amount. All that simpler; but, far from showing that diplohe thought could be done was to avert, in macy is an extinct trade, it only shows how each case as it arose, an open rupture. To much higher is its present standard, and, make wars few is, he thinks, an aim within far from diplomatists now having nothing to the reach of modern statesmen. This may do, they have to do very difficult things in be done, or at any rate something may gen- the best possible manner. Simplicity is the erally be effected towards doing it by two height of art in this as in everything else. means. In the first place, neutrals who are known to have no sinister motive or interest may exercise their influence to heal quarrels, suggest compromises, and remove grounds of difference. In the next place, nations may choose diplomatic representatives who will be prudent and conciliatory, and who will do their best not to magnify small dissensions, and not to provoke bitterness and jealousy. As Mr. Gladstone truly said, the United States have been very wise and fortunate in this respect and for many years have sent to England not only men among the foremost of those what the Chinese themselves call the they had to send, but men who tried to do justice to England as well as to America, Tao Li,-of Chinese fiction. There was and who, while upholding the honour and something stiff and old-fashioned about the protecting the interests of their own coun- great German poet as a child, and, when try, did not attempt to bully or provoke us, once his youth was passed, the love for the deor to steal small advantages, and keep corous and the measured returned strongly alive petty quarrels. We, in our turn, upon him, nor was he ever more animated may be glad that, at the time when the than in praise of it. To Eckermann he banquet was going on, we had not to re- said in 1827, that the only difference beproach ourselves with having taken the ad- tween the Chinese pictures of life in such vice of those who despise the Americans fictions as he had read, and the German, is most, and having sent them a lord to daz- that with the Chinese "Everything happens zle and delight them. Nothing could be in a clearer, purer, more moral manner. nore contemptuous than the proposal to Everything with them is reasonable, citizengive the post of American Minister always like, without great passion and poetical to a nobleman, whether he was fit or not, rapture, and has in that respect a good because the Americans were snobs, and deal of similarity to my Hermann and Dorwould be proud of talking to him. Expe- othea, as well as to the English romances of Richardson. rienced and conciliatory men of business There is, however, this are what the Americans, like all other nadifference, that with the Chinese the life tions, want to find in the diplomatists sent of outward nature is always interwoven with to them; and Mr. Johnson is an excellent that of the human figures. One always example of what such men can do in a very hears the splashing of the goldfish in the short time, when they set about their task pond, the continuous singing of the birds in the right way. He has not only made himself popular in England, although he has only been a few weeks here, but he has

had a keen appreciation of the decorums,

lated and illustrated with Notes by Sir John Bowring, LL.D., F.R.S. London: W. H. Allen and Co.

*The Flowery Scroll. A Chinese Novel. Trans

distances, physical or moral, are not well kept. This it is which, in spite of the tameness, gives the air of extravagance and exaggeration to all the writing, descriptive or sentimental. While the outward and inward are so closely mingled, there is something childish in the apparent inability to use more than one tone or tint at a time, whether in describing feelings or scenes. There is an entire absence of either pictorial or moral graduation. As the moonlight is painted just as bright as the sunlight, so there is no graduation in the picture of emotion. Ordinary courtesies take as intense a colour as the most passionate lovers' sentiments. The modesty of self-depreciation is even more exaggerated in its language than the humility of love. This is, however, rather a specially Oriental than a Chinese characteristic. Sir John Bowring mentions, what is well known, how the Chinese despise our despatches for their plain and straightforward expressions, their absence of hyperbole. We remember seeing in some old newspaper that a Chinese deputation to Sir John stated that the deputies "wondered at the splendour of his Phoenixlike appearance," a statement which certainly out-tops the most lover-like extravagances of English poetry. So of the common compliments of life, Sir John tells us what every one has probably heard before,

in the branches; the day is always bright
and sunny, the night always clear; there is
a great deal about the moon, only it does
not change the aspect of the landscape; its
rays are conceived as bright as those of
the sun itself. And the interior of the
houses is as neat and elegant as their pic-
tures; for example, I heard the pretty
maidens laugh, and when I caught sight of
them they were sitting on fine bamboo
chairs. There you have in a touch the
most charming situation; for you cannot
think of bamboo chairs without the great-
est lightness and elegance." He went on
to remark that the substance of the Chinese
fictions "always turns on what is moral and
seemly. And it is just in consequence of
this severe regulation in everything that
the Chinese Empire sustained itself for
thousand of years, and will, by the same
quality, continue to sustain itself in the fu-
ture." No one can read this story, which
Sir John Bowring has translated for us,
without being reminded of Goethe's criti-
cism. It is a very amusing story to one
quite unversed in Chinese fictions, though
but a little of this sort of thing would cer-
tainly be too much. What one feels most,
is the tame extravagance, if we may use a
sort of paradox, both of the life and of the
style. Goethe is quite right in saying that
there is a civic, citizenlike, customary, con-
siderate, in a word, tame air about them that
which suggests a great resemblance to the
life of the old-fashioned German cities, old |
Nuremberg, or Goethe's own city, old
Frankfort. Everything is ceremonious with-
out being aristocratic; the young are as
pompous as the old; there is much bowing
and handing about, and large words to
small actions; but there is a pacific tone of
town life and popular competition about it
all; the energy is all strictly confined with-
in customary channels which it is an unheard-
of thing to transgress. The modes and im-
pulses of human action all resemble canals
rather than rivers; they are artificial, meth-
odical, carefully banked up, and connected
together in formal net-works. But though
the human life is so regulated, and tame,
and formal, the garden and open-air life of
China is interwoven, as Goethe says, com-
pletely with the human figures. The sun,
and the moon, and the flowers, and the
trees, and the ponds, and the birds are in-
corporated with every phrase describing
human sentiment and purpose. Again, as
Goethe also says, there is no graduation in
the landscape effects; there is the same
want of perspective in the literary pictures
as in the Chinese painting; the moonlight
is as bright and sharp as the sunlight; the

"In all their intercourse the Chinese use

the most exaggerated expressions, in deprecation of themselves and their belongings, and of laudation of the persons and possessions of those they address. Their own abodes, however grand, they call their humble cottage,'-that, however lowly, of him with whom they converse, the illustrious palace.' Evidences of this extravagant form of expression pervade this and all Chinese novels."

[ocr errors]

Now, it is not the mere exaggeration of this sort of phraseology, so much as the loss of perspective, which is necessarily produced by there being nothing stronger left to say where stronger emotions and passions have to be represented, that strikes the reader of a Chinese fiction. The meaningless compliments of life are as emphatic as its most passionate vows; and so, too, in the painting of nature, as the buttercups and daisies, or whatever may be the Chinese equivalents, are left out of the picture altogether, and we have nothing but the peonies and the lotuses and the chloranthuses, the imagination gets fatigued with spots of equally ostentatious colour and the consequent absence of all tone in the art. Perhaps it is in some measure in consequence

dial and straightforward. As Lord Stanley said, it was a pleasure to work with him. The old notion of diplomacy and diplomatists is quite worn out. In former days it was held to be the highest triumph in diplomatic circles to conceal every real thought, and only to hint and insinuate aims and ambitions. Now business is done in a different way. A frank statement of what is wanted on each side is followed by a polite and, if possible, an exhaustive discussion. This is much better and much simpler; but, far from showing that diplomacy is an extinct trade, it only shows how much higher is its present standard, and, far from diplomatists now having nothing to do, they have to do very difficult things in the best possible manner. Simplicity is the height of art in this as in everything else.

From The Spectator.

HWA TSIEN KI.*

GOETHE, who was, in his old age at least,

that it had, even in the least degree, | done much to make his countrymen popular seemed imminent. That the present sys- here. He does this by being at once cortem of keeping enormous armies on foot in time of peace, in order to be ready for war, was most disastrous and pregnant with future mischief, appeared to him obvious; but he confessed that he could find no simple and satisfactory remedy. He is much too sensible and well informed to believe in projects of disarmament by arrangements and stipulations as to the number of troops and ships that each nation may keep in readiness. In fact, he could think of no substitute for standing armies, or of any means of lessening their amount. All that he thought could be done was to avert, in each case as it arose, an open rupture. To make wars few is, he thinks, an aim within the reach of modern statesmen. This may be done, or at any rate something may generally be effected towards doing it by two means. In the first place, neutrals who are known to have no sinister motive or interest may exercise their influence to heal quarrels, suggest compromises, and remove grounds of difference. In the next place, nations may choose diplomatic representatives who will be prudent and conciliatory, very fond of the proprieties and decorousand who will do their best not to magnify nesses of life, even where they clearly small dissensions, and not to provoke bit-passed the bounds of artificiality,-perhaps terness and jealousy. As Mr. Gladstone truly said, the United States have been very wise and fortunate in this respect; and for many years have sent to England not only men among the foremost of those what the Chinese themselves call the they had to send, but men who tried to do justice to England as well as to America, Tao Li,-of Chinese fiction. There was and who, while upholding the honour and something stiff and old-fashioned about the protecting the interests of their own coun- great German poet as a child, and, when try, did not attempt to bully or provoke us, once his youth was passed, the love for the deor to steal small advantages, and keep corous and the measured returned strongly alive petty quarrels. We, in our turn, upon him, nor was he ever more animated may be glad that, at the time when the than in praise of it. To Eckermann he banquet was going on, we had not to re- said in 1827, that the only difference be proach ourselves with having taken the ad- tween the Chinese pictures of life in such vice of those who despise the Americans fictions as he had read, and the German, is most, and having sent them a lord to daz- that with the Chinese "Everything happens zle and delight them. Nothing could be in a clearer, purer, more moral manner. nore contemptuous than the proposal to Everything with them is reasonable, citizengive the post of American Minister always like, without great passion and poetical to a nobleman, whether he was fit or not, rapture, and has in that respect a good because the Americans were snobs, and deal of similarity to my Hermann and Dor would be proud of talking to him. Expe- thea, as well as to the English There is, however, this rienced and conciliatory men of business of Richardson. are what the Americans, like all other na- difference, that with the Chinese the life tions, want to find in the diplomatists sent of outward nature is always interwoven with to them; and Mr. Johnson is an excellent that of the human figures. One always example of what such men can do in a very hears the splashing of the goldfish in the short time, when they set about their task pond, the continuous singing of the birds in the right way. He has not only made himself popular in England, although he has only been a few weeks here, but he has

partly by way of reaction from the time when he used to stand with his master the Duke of Weimar cracking horsewhips for a silly wager in the market-place of Weimar, -had a keen appreciation of the decorums,

romances

lated and illustrated with Notes by Sir John B
*The Flowery Scroll. A Chinese Novel. Trat
ring, LL.D., F.R.S. London: W. H. Allen and Co.

in the branches; the day is always bright and sunny, the night always clear; there is a great deal about the moon, only it does not change the aspect of the landscape; its rays are conceived as bright as those of the sun itself. And the interior of the houses is as neat and elegant as their pictures; for example, I heard the pretty maidens laugh, and when I caught sight of them they were sitting on fine bamboo chairs. There you have in a touch the most charming situation; for you cannot think of bamboo chairs without the greatest lightness and elegance." He went on to remark that the substance of the Chinese fictions "always turns on what is moral and seemly. And it is just in consequence of this severe regulation in everything that the Chinese Empire sustained itself for thousand of years, and will, by the same quality, continue to sustain itself in the future." No one can read this story, which Sir John Bowring has translated for us, without being reminded of Goethe's criticism. It is a very amusing story to one quite unversed in Chinese fictions, though but a little of this sort of thing would certainly be too much. What one feels most, is the tame extravagance, if we may use a sort of paradox, both of the life and of the style. Goethe is quite right in saying that there is a civic, citizenlike, customary, considerate, in a word, tame air about them which suggests a great resemblance to the life of the old-fashioned German cities, old Nuremberg, or Goethe's own city, old Frankfort. Everything is ceremonious without being aristocratic; the young are as pompous as the old; there is much bowing and handing about, and large words to small actions; but there is a pacific tone of town life and popular competition about it all; the energy is all strictly confined within customary channels which it is an unheardof thing to transgress. The modes and impulses of human action all resemble canals rather than rivers; they are artificial, methodical, carefully banked up, and connected together in formal net-works. But though the human life is so regulated, and tame, and formal, the garden and open-air life of China is interwoven, as Goethe says, completely with the human figures. The sun, and the moon, and the flowers, and the trees, and the ponds, and the birds are incorporated with every phrase describing human sentiment and purpose. Again, as Goethe also says, there is no graduation in the landscape effects; there is the same want of perspective in the literary pictures as in the Chinese painting; the moonlight is as bright and sharp as the sunlight; the

distances, physical or moral, are not well kept. This it is which, in spite of the tameness, gives the air of extravagance and exaggeration to all the writing, descriptive or sentimental. While the outward and inward are so closely mingled, there is something childish in the apparent inability to use more than one tone or tint at a time, whether in describing feelings or scenes. There is an entire absence of either pictorial or moral graduation. As the moonlight is painted just as bright as the sunlight, so there is no graduation in the picture of emotion. Ordinary courtesies take as intense a colour as the most passionate lovers' sentiments. The modesty of self-depreciation is even more exaggerated in its language than the humility of love. This is, however, rather a specially Oriental than a Chinese characteristic. Sir John Bowring mentions, what is well known, how the Chinese despise our despatches for their plain and straightforward expressions, their absence of hyperbole. We remember seeing in some old newspaper that a Chinese deputation to Sir John stated that the deputies "wondered at the splendour of his Phoenixlike appearance,"- - a statement which certainly out-tops the most lover-like extravagances of English poetry. So of the common compliments of life, Sir John tells us what every one has probably heard before, that

"In all their intercourse the Chinese use

the most exaggerated expressions, in deprecation of themselves and their belongings, and of laudation of the persons and possessions of those they address.

they call their humble cottage,'-that, howTheir own abodes, however grand, ever lowly, of him with whom they converse, the illustrious palace.' Evidences of this extravagant form of expression pervade this and all Chinese novels."

Now, it is not the mere exaggeration of this sort of phraseology, so much as the loss of perspective, which is necessarily produced by there being nothing stronger left to say where stronger emotions and passions have to be represented, that strikes the reader of a Chinese fiction. The meaningless compliments of life are as emphatic as its most passionate vows; and so, too, in the painting of nature, as the buttercups and daisies, or whatever may be the Chinese equivalents, are left out of the picture altogether, and we have nothing but the peonies and the lotuses and the chloranthuses, the imagination gets fatigued with spots of equally ostentatious colour and the consequent absence of all tone in the art. haps it is in some measure in consequence

Per

it, her dominoes she flung about on all sides. The sight of anything that had given her pleas ure was intolerably painful. On whom shall I wreak my vengeance? On you, faithless one! on you, be my last curses!' And then she threw her embroidered silks and satins into the fire. What have I now to do with the adornself with an ornamented belt. No! I will forget everything. But know you, treacherous Liang, that you are the cause of my destruction.' So, having burnt her garments, she broke her golden nails."*

of this that, in spite of the general tameness of effect, the want of any conflict, of any stand-up fight, of any elasticity and variety in the so-called action of the novel, there is so much hysteric violence about the various lovers' despair. It would almost seem as if the Orientals, having ex-ings of the toilet? Never, again, will I gird myhausted all the force of expression on tame and ceremonious compliments, are forced to get hold of something stronger than language when they get to anything like real emotion; and are therefore compelled to introduce floods of tears, shiverings, raids upon furniture, and suicide, as the only fit And of another young lady, when in a parexpressions of actual misery when they de- oxysm of despair of a rather less keen orsire to paint it vividly. The range of ex- der,- despair for a betrothed husband whom pression which words can convey having she has never seen or heard from, and who been entirely used up for the faintest and does not care for her, it is told that "she feeblest feelings, the Orientals are forced rouged herself no longer, dropped her paintto tear their garments, cast dust on their box, and was sorely afflicted," vowing to heads, and use, in short, violent action, wear "silk dresses" no more. The "breakwhen they want to delineate strong feelings. ing the golden nails" is a very expressive But this, as we said, is not, we fancy, spe- act of Chinese despair, just as letting them cially Chinese, but Oriental. What does grow, and crushing the feet till neither feet seem to be Chinese is the specially artificial nor hands are of any use, is very expresmode of conveying hysterical feeling, the sive of the thorough artificiality of Chinese high-born mode of committing suicide, fashion. The very highest expression of for instance, by eating gold leaf,-the fash- despair short of suicide seems, in China, to ion whereby a young lady expresses a break- be expressed by the repudiation of the most ing heart by burning her cosmetics and her artificial amusements and conventions of backgammon board, and scattering her life, the destruction of cosmetics, the scatdraughts and dominoes over the floor of tering of the dominoes and draughts, the her chamber. Here for instance is a pic-breaking of the golden nails. Where this ture of such a young lady's despair:

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

"She threw her rouge and cosmetic box into the pond, that she might show her determination to abandon all care of her pretty face. I will not even hope for peace or joy. I will seek my way to the yellow wells, and find forgetfulness there.' And then she took up her luxurious looking-glass and her costly lute and broke them in pieces. Who, in the world, cares for my music, now,- Who will ever ask me how I look in the mirror? Like a solitary phoenix,-like a lonely swallow, I shall droop and die.' She threw her jasper flute away,- she tore the strings of her guitar,- But fell weeping like Yu Kwan, whose tears stained her silk garments. I would not yield to the entreaties of Lung Yu, himself, nor subject myself to be betrayed by a perfidious Liao Chi. I will rather die. A pile of yellow earth shall be my habitation.' She next burnt her many-coloured pencils, and tore up her flowery note-paper. I will write no more poetry,I will not leave a fragment behind me. I long only to sleep for ever among the flowers.' Next, she burnt her backgammon board, and scattered her draughts over all the chamber. 'He has deceived me with treachery and lies! I think on these fleeting moments of hope and bliss with vain regrets. What, though my eyes weep blood,-what, though my sleeves are drenched with tears!' She seized her harp and broke

same young lady recovers her lover, we hear, "Yao Sien's spirits revived, and from that hour she began again to paint her eyebrows."

One feels a certain dread, as one reads this picture of Chinese life, especially as regards the elaborate system of civil-service competitive examinations, and the bureaucratic spirit which seems ingrained in the very heart of Chinese life, lest the Western civilization should ever tend towards this goal. When one reads of a young lady drowning under the eyes of some boatmen "who had heard cries of distress, but waited for orders, and took no steps to save Yu Khing," and considers Sir John Bowring's note thereon, it is impossible not to feel a certain spasm of fear. This is Sir John Bowring's remark:—

"This is characteristic of the Chinese. I have known robberies take place in crowded streets, with not the slightest interference from the passengers, or from persons looking out

*"Chinese ladies of rank allow their nails to

grow to the length of several inches, as an evidence that they are never employed in manual labour. They stain them of a golden colour, and at night they are, protected with metallic coverings, to prevent their being accidentally broken. To break the long nails is the last act of despair."

« EelmineJätka »