CHAPTER XV
IN THE HEART OF UNKNOWN CHINA
That Rob accepted Mr. Bishop's proposition goes without saying, for hewas an American boy, and, as such, was filled to the brim with a genuinelove of the adventure and excitement attending explorations in strangecountries. Thus, two days after the offer was made, he found himselfa very important member of an expedition setting forth from the greatsouthern city of Canton and bound for the far north. Two months later,a junk, flying the American flag and having on board our travellers,drifted with the tawny flood of the mighty Yang-tse-kiang (Son of theSea River) along the crowded water-front of Hankow, a city of suchcommercial energy that it is known as the Chicago of China.
During the weeks that had elapsed since they left the last traces ofWestern civilization at Canton, they had seen no white man nor hearda word of English, except such as they spoke to each other. They hadtravelled by sampan up the North River and the Wu Shin, across theprovince of Kwang-tung, to the head of navigation at Ping-Shih. Herethey had engaged coolies to transport their luggage, camp outfit, andprovisions over the "carry," thirty miles long, across the Nan-LingMountains, to Chen-Chow, a quaint, old, walled town, marking thehead of navigation on the Yu-tan River, a branch of the Sian Kiang,which in turn flows northward into the Yang-tse. There they had oncemore chartered a junk; and, always accompanied by a couple of slim,light-draught Chinese guard-boats, had sailed, poled, or drifted acrossthe great inland province of Hu-nan, which is half again as large as theState of New York.
Although always using their boat as headquarters and for thetransportation of supplies, the two Americans had travelled most of theway by land, on foot, on pony-back, or in sedan-chairs borne by coolies.They had slept in temples, examination-halls, tea hongs (warehouses), inofficial yamens, and occasionally, but never when they could help it,in crowded, vermin-infested taverns, always surrounded by throngs ofexcited spectators, who poked holes through the paper windows or widenedcracks in the floors of overhead rooms to gratify their curiosity bypeering at the ridiculous-looking barbarians.
While crossing the Nan-Ling Mountains they had traversed a portionof one of China's great national highways, constructed thousands ofyears ago, and apparently never since repaired. Originally fifteenfeet of its width was paved with large, flat stones, four feet square,and from one foot to eighteen inches thick. Many of these stones haddisappeared, no one could tell how, nor where to, leaving gaping andbottomless mud-holes to entrap the unwary. The remaining blocks weredeeply hollowed by the bare feet of millions of burden-bearing cooliesand scored with wheelbarrow grooves. This great highway was formerlylined along its hundreds of miles of length with temples, tea-houses,rest-houses, and shops; but such of these as have not disappeared arenow in ruins, and serve only as haunts for highwaymen, lepers, andbeggars.
In the remote past the several states or provinces of China wereindependent kingdoms, waging war upon one another; and even to this daythe inhabitants of each province regard the people of those adjoiningas "foreigners." So they fortified themselves against one another,and our explorers were so fortunate as to come across one of thesefortifications. It was a high and very thick wall of masonry, havingbattlements and massive gateway, surmounted by a watch-tower, built ona boundary-line across the highway, where the latter occupied a narrowvalley. The hills on either hand were low enough to be easy of ascent,but the impregnable wall reached only from side to side of the valley.
"What's the matter with walking around an end of it?" asked Rob, staringat this triumph of defensive architecture.
"Nothing at all, that I can see," replied the engineer. "Only, Isuppose, no Chinese ever would think of doing so."
Again the road led over a high, arched bridge that once had crosseda stream; but the stream had altered its course and gone elsewhere,perhaps hundreds of years ago, since no trace even of its bed nowremained. But because the road went over the bridge the cargo coolies,grunting beneath their burdens, continued to toil up the steep ascentand down the other side, without ever a thought of making a new patharound it.
"I won't climb over it, at any rate," declared Rob. So he and theengineer walked around; their own coolies followed them like a flock ofsheep, and those on the bridge stared in amazement at the barbarians whothus dared depart from established custom.
Although other American engineers had preceded our travellers throughthis country, the foreigner was still such a novelty that they wereviewed by thousands of people who never before had seen one, and whocrowded about them in embarrassing throngs. At the same time they neverwere ill-treated nor even molested; for the Chinese, unless roused toa blind fury by wrongs, real or fancied, are the most peaceable andcourteous of people. To be sure, our friends nearly always were spokenof and addressed as "fan kwei" (foreign devils); but this was becausethe natives never had heard foreigners called anything else.
To Mr. Bishop's surprise he discovered, or rather Rob discovered forhim, that many of the Hu-nan people, instead of being opposed to theconstruction of a railway through their country, were desirous for itscoming. Not on account of the facilities it would offer for travel andthe transportation of their products, but because it was rumored farand wide that it would pay liberally for such graves as must be removedfrom its right-of-way. Formerly, and even now in certain districts,the grave problem was, and is, one of the most serious encountered bythe projectors of Chinese railways. Finally it was made a commercialproposition, and the railway companies agreed to pay for such graves ascame within their lines at a rate of eight taels (about eleven dollars)apiece. Now, such of the Chinese as understand this arrangement are morethan willing thus to turn their ancestors to profitable account.
As the dead are not collected in regularly established burying-grounds,but are scattered about in fields, gardens, or wherever it is mostconvenient to place them, and as the entire country is thickly sownwith these precious relics, no line can be so run as to avoid them.Consequently they must be bought up and removed. For some time Robcould not account for the great anxiety shown by the natives to learnthe exact location of the line. Finally, however, he discovered thatthose persons having graves known to be on the line could raise money onthem in advance, while such as had none proposed to borrow or purchasea few ancestors at places so remote as to be beyond a possibility ofdisturbance and rebury them in more profitable locations.
In the cities of Siang-tan and Chang-sha, both on waters navigableby large Yang-tse junks, our travellers found shops equipped withforeign goods, and notably with American flour, prints, and cannedfoods, though they did not meet an American nor a European in eitherplace. This discovery was of particular interest to Mr. Bishop, as theappearance in those remote localities, and under existing conditions, ofthese goods promised a vast extension of similar trade upon completionof the railway he was about to build.
Thus the entire trip had proved intensely interesting, and its resultswere so highly satisfactory that, as it drew to a close with their nearapproach to Hankow, our explorers already were preparing for anotherjourney from that point to Pekin.
Much as they had enjoyed the one just ending, they were not sorry tosee European buildings in the mission compounds and along the bund atHankow, and it was good to hear their own speech once more. It also wasgood to sit down to an American table, eat home-cooked food, and, aboveall, to sleep between sheets in American beds. But with all these thingsto be enjoyed came two disappointments. Rob's lay in the entire absenceof the letters that he had hoped to find awaiting him at this point.From Canton he had written both to his uncle and his parents at Hatton,requesting answers to be sent to Hankow, but the eagerly expectedletters had not appeared. A number awaited Mr. Bishop, and in them layhis disappointment, for certain of them contained news that rendered itnecessary for him to return at once to Canton. Thus he must give up theproposed overland journey to Pekin.
"It is too bad!" he exclaimed. "There is so much I want to find outabout that northern line, its construction, the nature of the countryit trave
rses, the feeling of the people regarding it, and a dozen otherthings. Now I must indefinitely postpone the trip, and so remain inignorance of many things most important for me to know."
"I wish I could go for you," suggested Rob.
"That is an idea worth considering!" exclaimed the engineer. "And Idon't see why you shouldn't collect the very information I want. You arepretty well broken into the work by this time. But would you dare travelanother thousand miles through China, alone, and in view of the rumorsof trouble that we have been hearing lately?"
"Of course I would," replied Rob, scornfully. "I can't see but what itis just as safe to travel here as in any other country, especially whenone knows the ways of the people and their language as well as I do."
The conversation on this subject was long and earnest, but at itsconclusion it had been decided that Rob Hinckley, provided with amplefunds, should travel as special commissioner of the American railwaysyndicate from Hankow to Pekin. From the latter city he would return byrail and sea to Hong-Kong, where Mr. Bishop would meet him and receivehis report.
"By that time," said the latter, "your pay surely will amount to enoughto carry you to America, with a substantial surplus besides."
The only condition made by our lad was that, upon his arrival inShanghai, Mr. Bishop should cable to the States for informationconcerning Rob's parents, and should transmit the same to Pekin, thereto await the latter's arrival.
A couple of days later the companions who had travelled so far andendured so much together separated, the engineer to proceed by steamerdown the Yang-tse-kiang to Shanghai, and thence by ship to Hong-Kong,and Rob, so confident in his own resources as not to dream of dangersthat he could not overcome, taking train for the north over the shortsection of Belgian railway already constructed. It carried him to theborder of the province of Ho-nan. Across this province and to theHoang-ho, or Yellow River, he made his way successfully, though notwithout encountering many difficulties during the following month. Thenhis real troubles began, for no sooner had he crossed the great river,which, on account of its frequent devastating floods, is called "China'sSorrow," than he found himself on the edge of a fierce "storm of wrath"that threatened to sweep over the entire empire.
An almost unprecedented drought had prevailed over the whole of the vastplain of northern China for nearly three years. For two years there hadbeen no crops, and now the same dreadful condition was promised forthe third. Everywhere were starving, desperate people, who, in theirignorance, attributed their woes to the evil influence of foreigners,and especially to the missionaries, who sought to overthrow the gods ofthe country.
The priests taught that the angry gods thus were punishing the unbeliefof the people, and that prosperity never would return to their landuntil every foreigner was driven from it. Thus it happened that theinhabitants of three provinces were rising against missionaries andrailway-builders, robbing and killing all who did not fly in time,burning and destroying their property, as well as that of all nativeconverts to the new religion. At the same time they were makingpilgrimages to the shrines of their own gods, and imploring them to oncemore send the life-giving rains.
Rob heard rumors of these things, but, believing them to be exaggerated,refused to turn back. So he pushed doggedly ahead, ever nearing thestorm-centre. Finally, late one day, as he approached a walled town inwhich he expected to obtain lodging for the night, he suddenly foundhimself beset by a mob of frantic rain-dancers, who rushed upon him froma sacred grove by the road-side. The slender escort of soldiers that hadthus far accompanied our lad instantly took to their heels, leaving himalone to face the hundreds of yelling demons, who firmly believed that,if they could take his life, the act would be pleasing to their insultedgods.