Adrift in Pacific and Other Great Adventures – 17 Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). Jules Verne
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of an especially individual character, which has not its counterpart anywhere.”
In this little corner of the earth, the foreigner, arriving by the picturesque Blue River, sees four flags unfurled by the same breeze,—the three French colors, the “yacht” of the United Kingdom, the American stars, and the cross of St. Andre, yellow with a green background, of the Flowery Empire.
As for the environs of Shang-hai, they are a flat, treeless country, cut up by narrow, stony roads and footpaths, laid out at right angles, or hollowed out by cisterns and “arroyos” distributing the water through numerous rice-fields, or furrowed by canals conveying junk-boats, which start in the middle of the fields, like the canal-boats through Holland. They are a sort of vast tableau, very green in tone, a picture without a frame.
“The Perma,” on her arrival, anchored at the wharf of the native port, before the eastern suburbs of Shang-hai; and it was there that Wang and Kin-Fo landed in the afternoon.
The coming and going of business people created a traffic that was enormous on the shore, and beyond description on the river.
The junk-boats by hundreds, the flower-boats, the sampans (a kind of gondola managed by the scull), the gigs, and other boats, of every size, formed a kind of floating city inhabited by a maritime population, which cannot be reckoned at less than forty thousand souls,—a population maintained in an inferior situation, and the wealthy part of which cannot rise to the rank of the literary or mandarin class.
The two friends sauntered along the wharf among the strange, motley crowd, which comprised merchants of every kind; venders of arachides, betel-nuts, and oranges, with some from the Indian orange-tree; seamen of every nation, water-carriers, fortune-tellers, bonzes, lamas, Catholic priests clothed in Chinese fashion with pigtail and fan, native soldiers, “tipaos” (the town-bailiffs of the place), and “compradores,” or deputy-brokers, as they might be called, who transact business for European merchants.
Kin-Fo, with his fan in his hand, cast his usual indifferent look over the crowd, and took no interest in what was passing around him. Neither the metallic sound of the Mexican piasters, nor that of the silver taels and copper sapeques, which sellers and buyers were exchanging with considerable noise, could have disturbed him. He had the means to buy out the entire suburbs for cash.
As for Wang, he opened his immense yellow umbrella, which was decorated with black monsters, and constantly faced the east as every high-bred Chinaman should, and looked around everywhere for objects worthy of his observation.
As he passed before the eastern gate, his eyes fell by chance on a dozen bamboo cages, from which the faces of criminals who had been beheaded the evening before grinned at him. “Perhaps,” said he, “there is something better to do than to cut off people’s heads; and that is, to make them stronger.”
Kin-Fo, no doubt, did not hear Wang’s reflection, which, on the part of a former Tai-ping, would have astonished him.
Both continued to follow the wharf, winding around the walls of the Chinese city.
At the extremity of the outskirts, just as they were about to set foot on the French concession, a native in a long blue robe, who was striking a buffalo-horn with a small stick, which produced a harsh, grating sound, attracted quite a crowd around him.
“A sien-cheng,” said the philosopher.
“What is it to us?” added Kin-Fo.
“Friend,” answered Wang, “ask him your fortune. This is a good time, when you are about to be married.”
Kin-Fo started on his way again; but Wang held him back.
The “sien-cheng” is a sort of popular prophet, who for a few sapeques makes a business of foretelling the future. His only professional apparatus is a cage, enclosing a little bird, which he hangs on one of the buttons of his robe, and a pack of sixty-four cards, representing figures of gods, men, or animals. The Chinese of every class, who are generally superstitious, make nothing of the predictions of the sien-cheng, who, probably is not in earnest.
At a sign from Wang, he spread a piece of cotton cloth on the ground, placed his cage on it, drew out his cards, shuffled, and placed them on this carpeting in a manner to display their figures. The door of the cage was then opened; and a little bird came out, selected one of the cards, and went back again, after having received a kernel of rice as a reward.
The sien-cheng turned over the card. It bore the face of a man, and a device written in kunanruna, the mandarin language of the north and an official language used by educated people.
Then, addressing Kin-Fo, the fortune-teller predicted what those of his profession in all countries invariably predict without compromising themselves,—that, after undergoing some near trial, he would enjoy ten thousand years of happiness.
“One,” answered Kin-Fo, “one only, and I won’t insist upon the rest.”
Then he threw a silver tael on the ground, which the prophet scrambled for as a hungry dog does for a bone. Such windfalls did not come to him every day.
After this, Wang and his pupil proceeded to the French colony,—the former thinking of the prediction, which accorded with his own theories about happiness; the latter knowing well that no trial could come to him.
They passed the French consulate, and ascended as far as the culvert thrown across Yang-King-Pang, and crossed the brook; then went in an oblique direction across the English territory, in order to reach the wharf at the European port.
It was just striking twelve; and business, which had been very active throughout the morning, stopped as if by magic. The business-day was ended, we may say; and quiet took the place of bustle, even in the English city, which had become Chinese in this respect.
At this moment several foreign ships were arriving in port, most of them under the flag of the United Kingdom. Nine out of ten, we must state, were laden with opium. This brutalizing substance, this poison with which England encumbers China, creates a traffic amounting to more than two hundred and sixty million francs, and returns three hundred per cent profit. In vain has the Chinese government tried to prevent the importation of opium into the Celestial Empire. The war of 1841 and the treaty of Nankin gave free entry to English merchandise, and yielded the day to the merchant princes. We must also add, that, if the government of Pekin has gone so far as to proclaim death to every Chinaman who sells opium, there are arrangements that can be made, through a financial medium, with the treasurers of the ruler; and it is even believed that the mandarin governor of Shang-hai lays up a million annually by merely shutting his eyes to the acts of his subordinates.
We need not add that neither Kin-Fo nor Wang were addicted to the detestable habit of smoking opium, which destroys all the elasticity of the system, and quickly leads to death. Therefore not an ounce of this substance had even entered the costly dwelling which the two friends reached an hour after landing on the wharf at Shanghai.
Wang (the remark is still more surprising because it is that of an ex-Tai-ping) did not hesitate to say, “Perhaps there is something better than importing that which brutalizes a whole nation. Commerce is well enough; but philosophy is better. Let us be philosophers before all! let us be philosophers!”
CHAPTER IV.
In Which Kin-Fo Receives An Important Letter, Which Is Eight Days Behind Time.
A Yamen is a collection of various buildings ranged along a parallel line, which is cut across perpendicularly by a second line of kiosks and pavilions. Usually the yamen serves as a dwelling for mandarins of high rank, and belongs to the emperor; but wealthy celestials are not forbidden to have one. It was in one of these sumptuous hotels