SIGHTS IN CANTON.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XCIX, Issue 11557, 19 April 1898, Page 2

SIGHTS IN CANTON.

(From “Three Oriental Cities," in the Eureka Magazine.) The progressive commercial enterprise of the Briton is strikingly seen in the development of the once barren island of Hong Kong. To an equal degree is the intense conservatism of the Chinese exhibited in the chief city of the southern part of the great Celestial Empire. There are Europeans at Canton, but they live in a settlement outside the native city. Their influence, like their place of abode, is merely upon the outermost edge of the community. Our ideals of civilisation have not touched the people. They are to-day as they have been for centuries past. They sneer at our institutions, and consider themselves in every way superior to the white “ barbarian,” Casual visitors to the crowded city visit the various points of interest by means of sedan chairs. They are accompanied by a native guide, who conscientiously goes through a long catalogue of things, wonderful or horrible, in English which is fluently spoken, bub imperfectly understood by those to whom it is addressed. The guide is very attentive to those in his care, very polite in his manners, and often possessed of A FAIR AMOUNT OP HUMOUR. It is said that Admiral Fremantle once visited Canton with several ladies. When the steamer anchored off the city, the guides, as is their custom, boarded her at once. The Admiral and his friends chose their guide, and prepared to follow him. The Admiral was about to descend the ladder and get into a native “ sampan,” when the guide gently pushed him back, saying, “ Ladies first.” “ Oh, that doesn’t matter,” said the Admiral. “ I’m an old man” “Ole man!” said the guide, “ole man all more ought to know muohee better.” The streets of the city are of a pattern of immemorial antiquity. Hone are more than ten feet wide. The houses lean inwards from the base, and almost meet overhead, shutting out all but the narrowest strip of daylight. Sign-boards are hung perpendicularly outside every house. They are elaborately carved, and gaily decorated with abundance of gold-leaf and scarlet or black lacquer 1 . The' mystic-look-ing symbols inform the curious that one particular shop is “Prospered by Heaven,” another has “Never-ending Good Luck,” while yet another is “The Market of Golden Profits” —the said profits, be it known, going into the pocket of the dealer. * * * Amongst the most interesting sights of this unchangeable city are the pawnshops. They are often great, square, solid granite structures, which look more like old Border Keeps than the residences of ACCOMMODATING “ UNCLES.” The pawnshop fulfils a double purpose. It advances money at an interest varying from twenty to thirty-six per cent, and it stores in safety within its massive walls those articles of finery and adornment which are only required at special times and seasons. On the flat roofs of these citadels are piles of stones, and jars of vitriol, ready to repel any attack that may be made by thieves, whose methods of plunder are less refined than those of the pawnbrokers. In the jade-stone market we meet with the Chinese parallel to the Western diamond. The best stones are very valuable, and are brought from Turkestan, the only place in the world where mines of this stone are worked. Every well-to-do Chinaman wears a ring, brooch, or bracelet of jade, and the poor, who are unable to purchase the real article, wear ornaments of glass, which are coloured in imitation of the more expensive jade. Shaggy dogs, with coal-black tongues, are disposed of in another market. Pried rat and boiled frog, not to mention fricasseed puppy, tempt the hungry into the native restaurant.

THE LOCAL “MEDICINE-MAN,” adhering to the prescriptions of his ancestors, makes pills and potions of which the chief ingredients are wax, deers’ horns, petrified , bones, petrified crabs, snakes, scales of the armadillo, tigers’ bones and lime. When the medicines do not cure, they kill, and whether the patient lives or dies, he does so knowing that at any rate no hated foreigner has had anything to do with the strength or quality of his medical diet. Some elementary methods of measuring time are to be seen in the Temple Tower. Candles that burn at uniform rates mark in lessening inches the flight of the hours, and, intentionally or otherwise, symbolise in the dying of the flame the passage of human life. There is also a water-clock, composed of four copper buckets. Slowly, drop by drop, the water passes from one to the other. In the lowest one a float carries a rod that indicates the time. When a full hour has passed away, the watchman places outside the tower a big white board, on which is painted, in large black characters, the time of day. Every twelve hours the water is transferred from the lower to the upper bucket, and once in three months a fresh supply is allowed. The temples that are shown to the traveller are very numerous, but except in a few instances they are extremely uninteresting, and one pays to enter and to leave with a monotonous regularity that is not calculated to awaken or stimulate any excessive OUTBURST OP RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT. There is the Temple of the Five Hundred Genii, where five hundred images, of rude workmanship and ugly countenance, sit in silent, solemn conclave round the sides of a large but dusty building. One of them, in European costume of ludicrous character, represents Marco Polo. In all his travels this ancient wanderer surely never reached so strange a resting place. * * * The Temple of Horrors, unlike the celebrated Chamber of Horrors in a popular London resort, may be visited by the nervous, without any fear of subsequent nightmare. To the Western eye the exhibition is ludicrous ; to the Western mind it is revolting. Pound the sides of the principal court-yard are placed a series of carved and painted tableaux, representing the terrible tortures inflicted upon the lost in the Buddhist hell. The models are so curiously made and placed that they call forth only smiles, though had they been executed with any approach to realism, a more revolting spectacle could scarcely have been conceived. In front of the “horrors” sit fortune-tellers, gamblers, dentists, pastrycooks, quacks and peddlers, who are all busily engaged in attending to the wordly wants of the worshippers. The dealers in incense sticks and

PRINTED PRATER PAPERS are in great request. Those who are fond of uninviting spectacles make their way to the execution ground. This is surrounded by shops where pottery is made. When not required for executions, the ground is used for drying pottery. Unfortunately it is only too frequently occupied by the officers who administer the death penalty. Ten to twenty criminals often meet their fate at the same time. The average number of executions is three hundred each year. In 1855, no less than fifty thousand rebels were beheaded on this ground. The wooden crosses that lean against the walls are used in the execution of females and criminals of the worst kind. These offenders are first fastened to the crosses and then cut in pieces. If not so executed they are strangled.