Manjour Traveling Carriage
The shafts were like those of a common dray, and the driver’s position was on a sort of shelf within ten inches of the horse’s tail. There was room for a postillion on the shelf with the driver, the two sitting back to back and their legs hanging over the side. The wheel-tires were slightly cogged as if made for use in a machine, and altogether the vehicle did not impress me as a comfortable one. Being without springs it gives the occupant the benefit of all jolting, and as the Chinese roads are execrable, I imagine one might feel after a hundred miles in such a conveyance very much as if emerging from an encounter with a champion prize-fighter.
Sometimes the Chinese officials set the wheels of their carts very far aft so as to get a little spring from the long shafts. Even with this improvement the carriage is uncomfortable, and it is no wonder that the Chinese never travel when they can avoid it.
Entering a hall that led to a larger apartment, we reached the presence of the governor of Igoon. He was seated on a mat near the edge of a wide divan, his legs crossed like a tailor’s at his work. He was in a suit of light-colored silk, with a conical hat bearing a crystal ball on the top. It is generally understood that the grade of a Chinese official may be known by the ball he wears on his hat. Thus there are red, blue, white, yellow, green, crystal, copper, brass, et cetera, according to the rank of the wearer. These balls take the place of the shoulder-strap and epaulettes of western civilization, and it must be admitted that they occupy the most conspicuous position one could select. As I am not versed in details of the orders of Chinese rank I will not attempt to give the military and civil status of my new acquaintance. I learned that he was a general in the army, had displayed skill and bravery in subduing the rebellion, and been personally decorated by the Emperor.
He was enjoying his pipe and a cup of tea, resting the latter on a little table at his side. He was an old man,—of how many years I dare not try to guess,—with a thin gray beard on his short chin, and a face that might have been worn by the Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance. I was introduced as an American who had come to see China, and especially the portion bordering on the Amoor. We shook hands and I was motioned to a seat at his side on the edge of the divan.
Tea and cigars opened the way to a slow fire of conversation. I spoke in French with Borasdine, who rendered my words in Russian to the governor’s interpreter. The principal remarks were that we were mutually enchanted to see each other, and that I was delighted at my visit to Igoon and Sakhalin-Oula.
Several officials entered and bowed low before the governor, shaking their clenched hands at him during the obeisance. One wore a red and another a yellow ball, the first being in a black uniform and the second in a white one. The principal feature of each uniform was a long coat reaching below the knees, with a cape like the capes of our military cloaks. Both dresses were of silk, and the material was of excellent quality.
The floor of the room was of clay, beaten smooth and cleanly swept. The furniture consisted of the divan before mentioned, with two or three rolls of bedding upon it, a Chinese table, and two Chinese and three Russian chairs. The walls were covered with various devices produced from the oriental brain; and an American clock and a French mirror showed how the Celestials have become demoralized by commerce with outside barbarians. The odor from the kitchen filled the room, and as we thought the governor might be waiting for his supper, we bade him good evening and returned to the boat and the Russian shore.
During my stay at Blagoveshchensk I was invited to assist at a visit made by the governor of Igoon to Colonel Pedeshenk. The latter sent his carriage at the appointed hour to bring the Chinese dignitary and his chief of staff. A retinue of ten or twelve officers followed on foot, and on entering the audience hall they remained standing near the door. The greetings and hand-shakings were in the European style, and after they were ended the Chinese governor took a seat and received his pipe from his pipe-bearer. He wore a plain dress of grey silk and a doublet or cape of blue with embroidery along the front. He did not wear his decorations, the visit being unofficial.
In addition to the ball on his hat he wore a plume or feather that stood in a horizontal position. His chief of staff was the most elaborately dressed man of the party, his robes being more gaily decorated than the governor’s. The members of the staff wore mandarin balls of different colors, and all had feathers in their hats. The governor’s hair was carefully done up, and I suspect his queue was lengthened with black silk.
Conversation was carried on through the Colonel’s interpreter, and ran upon various topics. General Bussy’s death was mentioned in terms of regret, and then followed an interchange of compliments between the two governors who met for the first time. After this the Chinese governor spoke of my visit to Sakhalin-Oula, and said I was the first American he ever met in his province.
“How did I come from America,” he asked, “and how far had I traveled to reach Blagoveshchensk?”
The interpreter named the distance and said I came to the Amoor in a ship connected with the telegraph service.
“When would the telegraph be finished?”
He was told that within two or three years they would probably be able to send messages direct to America.
Then he asked if the railway would not soon follow the telegraph. He had never seen either, but understood perfectly their manner of working. He expressed himself pleased at the progress of the telegraph enterprise, but did not intimate that China desired anything of the kind. The interview lasted about an hour, and ended with a leave-taking after the European manner.
There is much complaint among the Russians that the treaty of 1860 is not carried out by the Chinese. It is stipulated that trade shall be free along the entire boundary between the two empires, and that merchants can enter either country at will. The Chinese merchants are not free to leave their own territory and visit Russia, but are subject to various annoyances at the hands of their own officials. I was repeatedly informed at Blagoveshchensk that the restrictions upon commerce wore very serious and in direct violation of the stipulations. One gentleman told me:
“Every Manjour trader that brings anything here pays a tax of twenty to fifty per cent, for permission to cross the river. We pay now a third more for what we purchase than when we first settled here. The merchants complain of the restriction, and sometimes, though rarely, manage to evade it. Occasionally a Manjour comes to me offering an article twenty or thirty per cent, below his usual price, explaining that he smuggled it and requesting me not to expose him.”
I asked if the taxation was made by the Chinese government, and was answered in the negative.
“Thee police of Igoon and Sakhalin-Oula regulate the whole matter. It is purely a black-mail system, and the merchant who refuses to pay will be thrown into prison on some frivolous charge. The police master of Igoon has a small salary, but has grown very wealthy in a few years. The Russian and Chinese governors have considered the affair several times, but accomplish nothing. On such occasions the Chinese governor summons his police-master and asks him if there is any truth in the charges of the corruption of his subordinates. Of course he declares everything correct, and there the matter ends.”
How history repeats itself! Compare this with the conduct of certain Treasury officials along the Mississippi during our late war. The cases were exactly parallel. The government scandalized, trade restricted, and merchants plundered, to fill the pockets of rapacious officers! I began to think the Mongol more like the Anglo-Saxon than ethnologists believe, and found an additional argument for the unity of the human race.
If I knew the Emperor of China I should counsel him to open his oblique eyes. If he does not he may find the conduct of the Igoon police a serious affair for his dominions. Russia, like Oliver Twist, desires more. When the opportunity comes she will quietly take possession of Manjouria and hold both banks of the Amoor. If the treaty of 1860 continues to be violated the Governor General of Eastern Siberia will have an excellent excuse for taking the district of Igoon and all it contains under his powerful protection.
On the day I reached Blagoveshchensk I saw an emigrant camp near the town. The emigrants had just landed from the rafts with which they descended the Amoor. They came from Astrachan, near the mouth of the Volga, more than five thousand miles away, and had been two years on their travels. They came with wagons to the head waters of the Amoor, and there built rafts, on which they loaded everything, including wagons and teams, and floated to their destination. I did not find their wagons as convenient as our own, though doubtless they are better adapted to the road.
The Russian wagon had a semi-circular body, as if a long hogshead were divided lengthwise and the half of it mounted on wheels, with the open part uppermost. There was a covering of coarse cloth over a light framework, lower and less wide than our army wagons. Household goods fill the wagons, and the emigrants walk for the most part during all their land journey.
I spent a few minutes at the camp near the town, and found the picture much like what I saw years ago beyond the Mississippi. Men were busy with their cattle and securing them for the night; one boy was bringing water from the river, and another gathering fuel for the fire; a young woman was preparing supper, and an older one endeavored, under shelter of the wagon-cover, to put a crying child to sleep.
Westward our star of empire takes its way. Russian emigration presses eastward, and seeks the rising, as ours the setting sun.