Chapter 7 No.7

A very queer craft is a Chinese junk. Few Europeans have any defined idea what they are like. They are of different sizes, most of them suited to the numerous rivers and canals which intersect the country in every part. The largest are of about one thousand tons burden. The whole mode of building is most peculiar. Instead of the timbers being first raised as with us, they are the last in their places, and the vessel is put together with immense spiked nails. The next process is doubling and clamping above and below decks.

Two immense beams or string pieces are then ranged below, fore and aft, and keep the other beams in their places. The deck-frames are an arch, and a platform erected on it protects it from the sun, and from other injuries otherwise inevitable. The seams are caulked either with old fishing-net or bamboo shavings, and then paid with a cement called chinam, consisting of oyster-shells burnt to lime, with a mixture of fine bamboo shavings, pounded together with a vegetable oil extracted from a ground nut. When dried it becomes excessively hard; it never starts, and the seams thus secured are perfectly safe and water-tight. All the work about her is of the roughest kind. The trees when found of a suitable size are cut down, stripped of their bark, and sawn into convenient lengths; the sides are not squared, but left just as they grew. No artificial means are resorted to for any bends; a tree or branch of a tree is found with the requisite natural curvature. There is not in the building, rigging, or fitting-up of a Chinese junk one single thing which is similar to what we see on board a European vessel. Everything is different; the mode of construction; the absence of keel, bowsprit, and shrouds; the materials employed; the mast, the sails, the yard, the rudder, the compass, the anchor-all are dissimilar.

The vessel in which I now found myself, the King-Shing, was of about seven hundred tons. She was built entirely of teak, and her skipper, or Ty Kong, as he is called, alleged that she was more than a hundred years old, and said that one of her crew who had recently died, had served in her for fifty years. Her extreme length was one hundred and sixty feet; breadth of beam, twenty-five feet and a half; depth of hold, twelve feet; height of poop from the water, thirty-eight feet; height of bow, thirty feet. Her most attractive portion was the saloon, or state cabin, the beauty of whose furniture and decorations formed a curious contrast to the rude and rough workmanship of the cabin itself. Its carved and gilded entrance was protected by a sort of skylight, the sides of which were formed of the prepared oyster-shells so commonly used in China instead of glass, the latter being too expensive for general purposes. The enclosure was thirty feet long, twenty-five broad, and eleven in height. From the beams overhead were suspended numbers of the different kinds of lanterns used in China. They were of every imaginable form, size, and variety of material. The sides and deck-roof were of a yellow ground, and covered with paintings of flowers, leaves, fruit, insects, birds, monkeys, dogs, and cats; some of those latter animals were what in heraldic language would be called queue-fourchée. The place was filled with a vast assortment of curious and beautiful articles, gathered together during the long existence of the vessel. To give a list of them would require pages; brought to Europe they would have made the reputations of a dozen museums.

At the end of the saloon was the Joss-house, or idol-house, containing the idol Chin-Tee, having eighteen arms, with her attendants, Tung-Sam and Tung-See. The richly-gilt idol was made of one solid piece of camphor-wood, and had a red scarf thrown round it. An altar-table, also of camphor-wood, and painted red, stood in front of the Joss-house, with an incense burner placed upon it. The red ground of the table had gilt carvings of flowers and insects, and the imperial dragons with the ball of flame between them. On each side of the front was a square place painted green, with words in Chinese inviting worshippers to bring gold and agate stones as offerings.

The sleeping berths of the crew were all aft, on a lower deck. Close by these was the most astonishing part of the vessel, the colossal rudder, not hung with pintles and gudgeons, the vessel having no stern-post, but suspended to two windlasses by three large ropes made of cane and hemp; one round a windlass on the next deck, and two round a windlass on the upper deck of all, so that it could be raised or lowered according to the depth of water. When lowered to its full extent it drew about twenty-four feet, being twelve feet more than the draught of the vessel. It was steered on this berth-deck when fully lowered. It was also drawn close into the stern, into a kind of socket, by means of two immense bamboo ropes attached to the bottom of the rudder, passing beneath the bottom of the vessel, and coming over the bow on the upper deck, and there hove in taut and fastened. When let down to its greatest depth it required occasionally the strength of fifteen men to move the large tiller.

On ascending to the next deck, one passed under a covering made of oyster-shells, similar to that over the entrance to the saloon; under this hung a flag which had been borne before the Emperor on one of the most solemn religious processions. On a piece of wood near one of the windlasses was inscribed-"May the sea never wash over this junk." Close by was the sailors' Joss-house, containing the deity of the sea with her two attendants, each with a red scarf. Near the principal goddess was a piece of the wood from the first timber of the junk that was laid; this was taken to one of their principal temples, there consecrated, and then brought on board, and placed as symbolic of the whole vessel's being under the protection of the deity. A small earthen pot, containing sacred earth and rice, stood in front, in which Joss-sticks and other incense was burnt. A lighted lamp, too, was here always kept burning; if it had gone out during a voyage it would have been considered an omen of bad luck. On the right and left, before coming to this Joss-house, were paintings. One panel represented the Mandarin Ducks; another, a Chinese lady at her toilette; a third, a globe of gold-fish. On this deck were cabins for passengers and supercargoes, the doors painted with different devices. Above was the lofty poop-deck, with one of the rudder-windlasses on it, and the mizzen-mast, fifty feet long, and placed on one side, in order to allow the tiller to work when in shallow water. The main-mast was ninety-five feet in length, and ten feet in circumference at the bottom. It was one spar of teak, and just as the tree grew with merely the bark taken off. It was not perfectly straight-a defect with us, but not so considered by the Chinese, who prefer a mast with a bend in it to one without, thinking it adds to the strength, and is conclusive evidence of the goodness of the spar. This mast was hooped round, in consequence of being cracked while undergoing the process of hardening. The mode adopted for this purpose by the Chinese is to bury the timber for a considerable time in marshy ground; thus treated, they say teak becomes hard as iron. The mast did not go within four feet of the bottom-the ship having no kelson-but, to use the technical term, was "toggled" to two large pieces of wood which answered as partners. To these were added two other heavy pieces as chocks, which were intended to keep the huge spars in their places. Neither stays nor shrouds were used. The main yards were made of teak quite rough; the upper one was seventy-five feet long, and the lower sixty.

The sails were made of closely-woven matting, a substance much lighter than canvas. It holds the wind better, and rarely splits, because it never shakes in the wind. So large and heavy was the mainsail of the King-Shing, that it required forty men with the aid of the capstan to raise it. Without the capstan eighty men would have been needed. It had eighteen reefs. The sails were reefed by being lowered, which precluded any necessity for going aloft.

The vane was in the shape of a fish, the body formed of rattan work, the head and gills of painted matting, with two projections like the antenn? of a butterfly. The tail was furnished with long streamers, and little flags were stuck in the body for additional ornament. There were also Chinese characters painted on the body signifying "Good luck to the Junk." Between the main-mast and fore-mast were two large rough windlasses stretching across the deck, and used for getting up the anchor. By the entrance to the forecastle were two water-tanks, capable of holding one thousand five hundred gallons each. The fore-mast was seventy-five feet from the deck. It raked forward, and was supported by a large piece of wood on the after part, and secured similarly to the main-mast. The anchors were of wood, the flukes shod with iron, and attached to the shank by strong lashings of bamboo. The stock was composed of three separate pieces of wood lashed together by rattan ropes, and was fixed to the crown. As the Chinese drag their anchors on board instead of catting and fishing as other seamen do, this position of the stock offers no impediment. The flukes were of the same dimensions as those of similar sized anchors with us; they were straight and not rounded, and there were no palms. There was also a kedge, with only one fluke. The cables were of rattan. The junk had no bitts, but to supply their place the strong beams across the deck had large holes for stoppers. The "wales" formed another singular feature of the vessel-airtight boxes, projecting three feet from the side; their object was to make the vessel more buoyant, to enable her to carry more cargo, and prevent her rolling, but this last, in my opinion, was chiefly prevented by the size and position of the rudder.

The cook-house was placed differently from the galleys of European vessels, being aft of the main-mast. The lower part was built of brick, with two square holes in front for the fires. Troughs of water were placed in front of these holes, so that any ignited fuel that might drop out would be at once extinguished. Wood was the fuel used. For cooking they used iron pans surrounded by red tiles. One was covered by a kind of half cask; this was used for boiling the rice, the cover being to preserve the steam after the water was boiled away, which causes the rice to be beautifully done and not soddened, as is often the case in our cooking. It also prevents it from being thrown out when the vessel rolls. The quantity of rice for each man was about three pounds daily. All washing of dishes, etc., was performed on a stage outside the galley so that it might be kept perfectly clean. The proper allowance for each mess was delivered in front. Close to the cook-house was a water-tank of wood, painted in imitation of bricks, and capable of holding three thousand gallons.

Such was the King-Shing junk, and such are most of the craft of the Celestials. They would appear to be gradually coming round to Western ideas in the matter of ships, and in fact have done so entirely for war purposes, but the fashions of their ancestors are still good enough for most of them, and the junk is to be seen everywhere. Not a mere thing of yesterday is the junk. Vessels essentially similar to the one I have described were navigating the Chinese seas and rivers when the fleets of Rome and Carthage were contesting the supremacy of the Mediterranean, and long before. Rome and Carthage, and many another mighty maritime power, have risen and passed away utterly, like bubbles, or dreams, but the Chinaman and his everlasting junk are still here.

The vessel belonged to some mandarins at Shanghai, who used it for trading to Cochin-China. It had recently, however, been despatched with a cargo to Cheefoo, had been blown away north by a gale, and forced to run into the harbour at Port Arthur to escape the Japanese. There it had lain until the place fell. The crew numbered fifty-four, all told.

After floating off the sand-bank, and getting an offing, we were within the Gulf of Pechili, and determined to make for one or other of its ports, but on the first day we encountered a very heavy nor'-wester, which blew us far out of the Gulf. When, after lasting a day and a night, the gale abated, we were well down the Yellow Sea, and the skipper, or Ty Kong, whose name was Sam-Sing, determined to hold on for the port where the junk's owners dwelt. I had no objection to make to this, nor had the mandarin, who possessed friends and relatives in the south. The soldiers on board, however, were very discontented and mutinous, and as they considerably outnumbered the crew I began to fear trouble. They were all from northern provinces and had no desire to go south. Their language was scarcely intelligible even to their nominal countrymen. The immense diversity of dialects in China is, in fact, a great hindrance to progress by preventing the unification of the people. After some excited discussion they were prevailed upon to acquiesce by the solemn promise of the mandarin to make arrangements with the authorities for their return to their own parts, or failing that to send them back at his own expense; besides, the representation that to turn north again would most likely end in capture by the Japanese vessels, through whose present cruising-ground the gale had luckily blown us, had great weight.

I was vastly amused, during my voyage in the King-Shing, by the superstitions of her crew. Their devotion to their idols was indeed truly edifying. A religious man, according to his lights, was Sam-Sing, and rigidly punctual in the daily observance of incense-burning, gong-banging, and other rites supposed to be propitiatory of the deity. He was also, however, greatly addicted to opium-smoking, and when under the influence of the drug, of which, as an old stager, he could consume great quantities without being stupefied, the idea of the occult power of the goddess, never absent from his mind, was turned completely upside down. When free from the fumes of opium nobody could have been more respectful to the Josses, but when intoxicated, and with the weather threatening, he openly poured upon them abuse, reviling, and suspicion. He usually started a pipe of opium about noon, and the change in his demeanour came round gradually during the afternoon. In the morning he was sober and pious, in the evening intoxicated and blasphemous, particularly, as I have said, when the weather was bad. "As for that infernal Chin-Tee," he would say in effect, shaking his fist in the direction of the idol, "it's all her fault we're in this mess. What's the use of her-lazy harridan! Much she cares what becomes of us"-and so on till overpowered by excess. When by the next morning he had slept off his debauch, and came round to recollection of his enormities, his penitence knew no bounds; he would prostrate himself in the Joss-house, and in the most abject terms implore forgiveness for his intemperate language over-night. Then he would generally abstain for two or three days, but at the first sign of bad weather, he took to his pipe, and Chin-Tee came in for another blast of abuse. The rest of the crew were always horrified by the shocking impiety of the Ty Kong, and on more than one occasion I really feared that they were about to proceed to Jonahize him. They were by no means all opium-smokers; some of them smoked tobacco, of a vile quality, in metal pipes, with an under-hanging curved portion containing water, through which the smoke passed. The opium-pipe is a quite different thing. It is a reed of about an inch in diameter, and the aperture in the bowl for the admission of the opium is not larger than a pin's head. The drug is prepared by boiling and evaporation to the consistence of treacle. Very few whiffs can be taken from a single pipe, but one is enough to have an effect on a beginner, as I have already described in my own case, but an old hand, like the Ty Kong, can smoke for hours.

The incense burned before the idols consisted mostly of pieces of aromatic wood, called Joss-sticks, silvered paper, and tin-foil. One of their most revered objects was the mariner's compass, and before it they would place tea, sweet cake, and pork, in order to keep it faithful and true! It is well known that the Chinese were acquainted with the phenomenon of the magnetized needle centuries before it was known in Europe, and their compass differs materially from ours; instead of consisting of a movable card attached to the needle, theirs is simply a needle of little more than an inch in length balanced in a glazed hole in the centre of a solid wooden dish, finely varnished. It has only twenty-four points, and with its use they combine some of their most ancient astrological ideas. The broad circumference of the dish is marked off into concentric circles, inscribed with mystical figures. We say the needle points to the north; they hold that the attraction is to the south, and therefore colour that end of the needle red, a hue that appears to have a mysterious efficacy in their eyes. I have already told how the Josses were wrapped in red scarves, and bits of red cloth were tied on the rudder, cable, mast, and other principal parts of the vessel, as safeguards against danger. There was also a large painted eye on either side of the bow, to enable the junk to see her way! At first I could not understand the meaning of this, and told Chung to ask the Ty Kong for an explanation. "Have eye," translated Chung, "can see; no have eye, no can see." On occasions of special religious demonstration these optics were decorated with strips of red cloth. On one occasion when a steamer suspiciously like a Japanese cruiser hove in sight, they tied red rags to their antique guns, or gin-galls, and with this consecration on their defensive arrangements, seemed to feel perfectly secure. I suppose the English-trained crews of their navy must have been persuaded out of these amazing notions, and taught the European compass, but the ideas of Sam-Sing and his merry men were as old as their vessel.

I have not yet described my mandarin friend. His name was Ki-Chang; he was a mandarin of the fifth class, his distinctive mark being a crystal button on the top of his cap. He was forty-six years old, intelligent, amiable, and gentlemanly. He and I had much intercourse during the voyage, with Chung for an interpreter. I taught him a little English, and how to write his name in English, an accomplishment of which he seemed extremely proud. Like most of the educated Chinese, he wrote his own language very beautifully. He was a wealthy and influential man.

The King-Shing showed herself a remarkably good sea-boat, but desperately slow. No device could get more than eight knots out of her, and this was much above her average. We encountered one or two violent storms, in which she behaved wonderfully. One night the wind, after veering all round the compass with vivid lightning and thunder, settled in the south-west and blew a perfect hurricane. All sails were lowered, except half the fore-sail, and twenty-five men were required at the mammoth rudder. We were obliged to start some eight tons of water out of the deck tanks, and everything on deck, fore and aft, was secured. The junk laboured heavily, but shipped no water. At day-break the weather moderated, and we were able to set more sail; but in two or three hours the wind chopped round to the north-west, and blew more fiercely than ever, attended by squalls of hailstones as big as marbles, the knocks of which made my countenance look as if I had come off second-best in a middle-weight "scrap." We lowered the main-sail again, and set four reefs of fore-sail to scud under. At three o'clock the vessel took a tremendous lurch, and washed away our lee-quarter boat. It was dark, and the sea barely discernible at a distance of thirty yards, being blown into a thick mist. At six the hurricane continued with unabated fury with terrific squalls; a fearful sea struck the ship and nearly broached her to. The sea was a mass of foam, and running very high, but kept down to some extent by the violence of the wind. Later we were running under bare poles. Again the gale went down, and again we got up sail, but without warning a tremendous squall struck us and laid us on our beam ends. A boat was blown away, the fore-sail split, and through the carelessness of the men at the rudder they jibed the main-sail; it came over with terrific force, but fortunately did no harm. Luckily the sails could be very easily and rapidly lowered. One only had to let go or cut the halyards and down they came. Throughout all this the junk behaved in a manner which astounded me. She actually never shipped any water, that which came aboard being tops of seas blown off. But the very qualities which made her so steady-going militated against her speed. She was a safe boat at all points. One night we had to anchor off a dead lee-shore; the crew decorated their cables with some extra red rags, and with death grinning under our lee, went to supper with a serenity which I should have been glad to be able to imitate. But their confidence was as well grounded as their anchors, which held with an unshakable tenacity.

Though so long acquainted with the compass, the Chinese have always been as unenterprising in sailoring as in everything else, and seldom lose sight of the land, if they can help it. Their fondness for hugging the coast was very noticeable to me, and, unused to the constant vigilance and care which a long sea voyage demands, their system of duty was very lax and careless. There were no proper watches; at nightfall the Ty Kong used quietly to lower about three reefs of the main-sail and the whole of the mizzen. All the crew would then go to their cabin, leaving the helmsmen alone on deck. At midnight a supper was prepared, and the sleepers awakened. The meal ended, the helm would be relieved and the men retired to their berths again.

At this rate it may be supposed that we made slow progress, and more than one incipient mutiny had to be dealt with, some of the crew refusing to work, and the soldiers complaining on the far from unreasonable ground that they had not enough to eat. We spoke several northward-bound vessels, both native and foreign, to whom we wished to entrust the discontented warriors, but these ships one and all gratefully but firmly declined the compliment. By dint of necessity, aided by the mandarin's promises, we struggled along, and as everything must come to an end some time or other, we reached our port at the beginning of January.

I have little more to add. Ki-Chang showed himself grateful, and not only entertained me royally, but gave me substantial pecuniary aid, a thing I was in very pressing need of. Of course I have long since repaid his loan.

I obtained a passage in a French steamer to Callao, whence I made my way overland to San Francisco. I called on Mr. H--, who informed me that the Columbia (not then in port) had made another successful trip, but with results so diminished in the pecuniary sense that he had determined not to risk her again for inadequate profits. Columbia, I may say, was not the steamer's real name.

I next met Webster at Sydney. The explanation of my being left behind at Port Arthur was simple enough. The "houtcast" had taken so many "caulkers" of rum during the day that he became oblivious to the fact of my being ashore, and Chubb took it for granted that I had returned on board, especially as I had sent back the boat in which I landed with the Chinese agent. My absence was not noted until the small hours of the ensuing morning, when the swift steamer was far enough away. Webster wanted to put back for me, but Chubb, whose regards were strictly confined to number one, decided against it, coolly saying that they could pick me up next trip, and that as it was Webster's fault I had been left, he, Webster, might if he liked swim back for me. This unmessmate-like conduct, when recounted to me, so excited my ire, that if the worthy Chubb had been within kicking distance at the time, he should have known something further about it. I have not, however, seen him since.

Such were the things I saw and did where the Dragon Flag waves in splendid impotence. I took no notes of anything, excepting as to the build and fittings of the junk, and that merely for my own information, and it was not until long after that the idea of writing an account of these occurrences entered my mind; but I can trust my memory for the main events. If my little narrative should for only a few furnish not merely entertainment but admonition, I shall not have gone through quite uselessly my varied and painful experience of life.

THE END

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Richard Clay & Sons, Limited, London & Bungay.

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