LITTLE PIH. ROMANCE OF A CHINESE GIRL.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 32, 7 February 1908, Page 3

LITTLE PIH. ROMANCE OF A CHINESE GIRL.

There passed through Wellington yesterday little Cheng Hua-pih, whose Christian name is Kathleen. ( She is only fi\e years old, and yet His E^ cellency the Governor, the Minister for Customs, and the Collector were all concerned about her coming to New Zealand. Little Pih was born in the Middle Kingdom, which makes her liable to £100 poll tax if she wishes to permanently reside in this country. Pill is aged five years, and she is a bright, intelligent-looking, ruddy-cheeked girl dressed in European 'clothes. She speaks very little English. As she comes here merely as a visitor a guarantee to pay £100, if sho fail? to return to China, has been accepted instead of tho customnry poll tax. This favour was not obtained by Pih's guardian, Miss Eeid, without some trouble. Miss Pieid, who is a nativo of Dunedin, and was formerly a teacher in one of the State schools in that city, has been eleven years in China with the China Inland Mission, but she had not so lost touch with her native land as to be ignorant of iti laws in co far as they restrict Chinese immigra- j tion. Accordingly she addressed a let- J ter to the Governor, three years ago, telling him of her desire and intention to revisifc New Zealand in 1908, and to bring with her a little ' Chinese girl whom she had adopted as her own. Lord Plunket sent a kindly reply, and it was found that there was a clause J in tho Act which enabled the chad to ! travel in New Zealand, but not to settle or trade in tha Dominion without paj-ment of the £100 poll tax. .So little Pih cam 3. When she arrived in Sydney Miss .Reid had much difficulty with the Customs about her young chai-ge. " Before the child was permitted to land two bonds of £100 each had io be given that she should not remain ! longer than a w<vk, in fact, just sufficient time to connect with the steamer ! for New Zealand. j The child's life story is as tragic as lit is hrief. When she was a year old I she was ill with dysentery — a common ailment in China, especially in the I Yangtsze- Valley, and her native town I was Antuiig. , Being at the point ot ■ death and her cass seeming to oe hopeless she was prepared for disposal in the manner customary in Antung. Done up into a parcel, packed in a gunny I bag, sho was got ready for dropping j over the city wall where hordes of j savage hungry dogt, were in waiting to i devour her as they havo done other babies for generations past. I That is the way in Antung. In other • parts there aro towers by the road-side S with apertures in their sides just large j enough to admit a baby. Ths towers j are not high abovs the road, but they ! are deep. Quicklime is thrown into them for hygienic reasons, and the | babies are dropped into the tower, by ; their mothers sometimes, with the coolj ne^s that oii6 would post a letter in I a pillar box in Western countries. In Antung they drop the babies over the, city walls at night. Just in time Miss Reid heard of this i premeditated murder, and she prevented j it. It was a cruel thing to do ; but j then, as would be argued by her par j ents, the child -was 'at the point of ! death, and even if she lived she might f ba weakly all her' days, and to whom could a sickly girl be given in marriage? Finally, after all, she was a girl.i Now, had the babe be;n a boy all ; would have been different; but was a, girl worth saving? Miss Eeid thought so, and she saied the child's life by adopting her. Care is taken to keep the j fact green in the child's mind that she has parents, but so far as the control of her future is concerned that has been entirely relinquished by them. Little Pih will go to school in New Zealand, picbably in Dunedin, and when she returns to China wilf bo as j carefully nurtured as if she were ths child of fond Englbh parents UltiI mately she will bs educated for the j medical profession. Ifc is Miss Reid's hope and intention that the girl shall work among the women of her own | country, \and, if possible, teach them that a girl's life is as sacred as a boy's, and that among the barbarians of the We^t she is held iv equal honour and affection.