VI
OUR CHINESE NEIGHBOR

The Misunderstood Chinese. The Chinese are the most misunderstood people in America, and the reason is probably found in the Celestials themselves. No author in writing about this myriad people feels that he can give an account of the Chinese in one province, or city, or village, that he is sure will hold good in another. The earliest bit of wisdom concerning the Chinese that I remember acquiring was the statement in an old geography that to write one’s name in Chinese characters was a sure way of winning their favor. I now know that I am no surer of winning the favor of a Chinaman by writing my name in Chinese characters than a Chinese would be of winning my favor by writing his name in English letters. But the writer of the old geography may have been acquainted with some place in China where what he states was true.

In our short account of these people we can catch but a fleeting glance, seeing little more than the curious Chinese himself, who, “when he wants to get a peep inside a house applies a wet finger to a paper window so that when the digit is withdrawn there remains a tiny hole through which an observant eye may at least see something.”

Unchanging China. What force was back of the movement that reached its height in 1892, when almost 40,000 of these people landed in America? What caused the first large migration from China to the United States? Today very few come. In 1911 but 5,657 Chinese entered, while 7,065 went back to China.

That the Chinese would require some powerful force to set this tide in motion, a few instances would indicate. The Chinese do the same thing in the same way today as their ancestors did it five hundred years ago. If a village street is so crooked that one must walk an extra mile, no one would think of straightening the street. If the village well was the source of water supply in the past centuries, the substitution of a pump would not be thought of, as it would be an insult to the past. They dislike even the most trivial changes; the altering of the time of the regular hour of meetings; a re-arrangement in the seating of their class rooms, or the transfer of a teacher, all disturb them. Because things used to be done in such and such a way is the reason that they ought to be done so now.

Old customs are followed, although the life has long since departed from them.

For example, “It is the custom in Mongolia for every one who can afford it to use snuff and offer it to his friends. Each man has a small snuff box which he produces whenever he encounters a friend; if the person with the snuff box happens to be out of snuff, that does not prevent the passing of the box, from which each guest takes a deliberate, though imaginary, pinch and returns it to the owner. To seem to notice that the box was empty would not be good form, and all is according to a well settled precedent.”

“In a country like China, which stretches through some twenty-five degrees of latitude, but in which furs are taken off and straw hats are put on according to a fixed rule for the whole Empire, in regions where the only heat in the house during the winter comes from the stove bed or k’ang, it is not uncommon for travelers who have been caught in a ‘cold snap’ to find that no arguments can induce the landlord of the inn to heat the k’ang, because ‘the season for heating the k’ang has not arrived.’” American street car companies and apartment house owners have at times taken a leaf from the Chinese in this particular. What could move this people to leave their home and seek a new world?

THE CHINESE IN AMERICA

What Caused Their Coming? The first large migration of the Chinese to America may be explained by two words, War and Gold.

In 1850 the great Tai Ping rebellion broke out and soon spread poverty and ruin through southeastern China; the terrors of war with its ever present hand-maidens, famine and plunder, ruined all business and paralyzed all industry. The farmer class of the sea coast districts was driven into Hong Kong and there they met the astonishing stories of the fabulous wealth in the recently discovered gold fields of California and Australia. That, in brief, is the history of the first big wave of Chinese migration to America.

The Sort of Chinese Who Came. Those who came were largely from the farmer class. The Chinese farmer is very different from the Sicilian farmer; the latter rents his land at a ruinous price from the large land owner, or works it for a meagre wage almost as a serf; the Chinese farmer belongs to one of the most honored classes in China. “He owns the land, has freedom of trade and industry, local self-government, can appeal against official misgovernment and has the opportunity to rise to any social or political station.” The social system of China is well worth keeping in mind. First in rank comes the scholar, the man with the trained mind fitting him to be a wise leader and guide; second, the farmer, the producer, the creator of wealth; third, the artisan, who changes the raw material into usable forms, makes furniture of the timber, pots from the iron, dishes from the clay; fourth, the merchant, the middleman, who sees to the distribution of flour, rice, clothing, etc.; fifth, the laborer; and last, the soldier or non-producer. In what order do we rank these classes? The early type of immigration from China was of a high grade.

How They Were Received. The Chinese were received in California with open arms, so to speak. “Industrial necessity” overlooked the visually present race prejudice, and the Chinese turned their hands to anything that would fill the gap the American gold-seeker had created. They became cooks, restaurant keepers, laborers, household servants—there were no women on the Pacific Coast then, willing to do the last named work—carpenters, farmers of neglected land. Governor McDougall, in 1852, recommended a series of land grants to induce their further coming; editors praised their industry, their cheerfulness, and personal cleanliness; the Chinamen must have thought the Golden Age was come again.

The Rude Awakening. In 1854 came the collapse of the California boom; placer mines gave out; men from the mines seeking employment were coming to the city in droves; the wage of $10 per day for skilled and $3.50 to $5 for unskilled labor was over; then came the cry of America for Americans. The Chinese were ill-treated and many lost their lives. Committees were formed by the better class of Americans to protect them, but the cry against them never ceased in California until the Chinese exclusion law of 1888 was enacted, barring them from the country.

The Chinese Intellectually. The Chinese rank high intellectually. Their age-long reverence for learning—for a knowledge of the Chinese classics opened the door to the highest positions—has undoubtedly had a marked effect upon the mental side of the nation. The Chinese hero has been the one who passed successfully through the various examinations in the classics and finally, after many difficulties, attained the coveted degree. Their “highways are spanned with arches erected, not to great soldiers, but to great scholars.”

The nature of the outings that the average young American of the East Side conducts is pretty well known throughout the city of New York. They are usually anything but orderly and thoughtful. But on a Christian Chinese picnic I have gone from the bow to the stern of the boat and found numerous games of Chinese chess in progress, each game surrounded by an excited group of advisers telling the players what move to make to checkmate their opponents. The playing of a good game of chess is not a childish task. The Chinese are a thoughtful people.

Generosity. Few favors done the Chinese pass unrewarded. I have seen many touching examples of sympathetic helpfulness. A few years ago a beautiful Chinese woman was helped to escape from worse than slavery. To save her from the sworn vengeance of her master, it was necessary to send her clear across the continent in company with a missionary. This we did. Like Nicodemus, who came to our Lord under cover of darkness, there came to us later a woman from Chinatown. Her husband is one of the most notorious gamblers in the country, but his wife had a woman’s sympathy with the kindly service rendered, and she left a hundred dollars as her gift toward the safety of her unfortunate countrywoman.

Spiritually. I am repeatedly asked, “Do the Chinese ever become Christians?” Their spiritual nature is as keen as that of any foreign-speaking people that come to us. The spirit that changes the life of a wicked, gambling, drinking American performs a like office in a wicked, gambling, opium-smoking Chinese. The Christ that attracts little American boys and girls is a like magnet to these little Chinese lads and lassies. We had in our school for some years a little Chinese boy named Guy. He was bright and courageous, and accompanied our missionary on many of her visits among the Chinese. He said one day, with great earnestness, “There are three things I want. First, I want to become a Christian and get my heart right; second, I want to be baptized so that all the Chinese may know that I am separated from paganism, and third, I want to be a preacher of the Gospel so that many may hear the glad news.” You will agree that these are good wishes for even an American boy. One night he dreamed that his father, who was in China, had returned to America and that he and Guy stood together at the altar of a church while Guy was being baptized.

Wong Sing came into our night school seven years ago. He hated the name of “Jesus.” When he heard in America that Christ was being preached in his native village, he said, “Hot anger rose within me.” One reason for this was that Wong Sing knew only the Christianity of Mexico, and this is cruel and disdainful toward the Chinese. It has taken the world many centuries to learn that the Christianity of Jesus is best extended not by sword or force, or even by argument, but by loving-kindness.

One day Wong Sing went home from our school with a Chinese New Testament, and to him it was the Word of God from heaven. He read it all night, getting an hour’s sleep in the early morning before he went to work. He was converted by the reading, and then he threw himself, with all his soul, into the work of the church. He was all for Christ. In the last four years he was with us he did not miss one session of the school.

Finally, business called him home. His mother in China was greatly grieved at his conversion. She said, “My son has deserted the old faith. When I die, who will worship at my tablet? My son went away a good boy, he comes back possessed of a devil.” Wong was the only Christian in the village. He tried to show his mother the better way he had found in Christ, but without success, and in great bitterness of heart over the loss of her boy’s faith in the old religion, she ended her own life. On this young Christian has fallen the curses and revilings of the entire village, but he has “kept the faith.”

When You Toy, a little Chinese slave girl whom we had rescued, told us her dream, we felt that there was a relation between it and her own life and thinking. “Oh,” she said, “I had such a wonderful dream; I saw God and He had a great book, and He called me to Him and said, ‘Here, You Toy, look in this book,’ and I looked and there was my name, and after it in bright letters was written, ‘You are my precious one.’” I believe that a little orphan girl from a far country, trained in ancestor worship, could never have had that dream if God were not a known and near friend. What do you think about it?

The Russians, Hebrews, Italians and Americans—none of these people surpasses the Chinese in loyalty and in labors, once they become followers of Christ.