Perhaps four hundred and twenty million people dwell in the Chinese Empire and are called Chinese. They are not, however, all true Chinese. When the Chinese (or their ancestors) moved eastward into what is now China, four thousand or more years ago, they found many different tribes living there. Some of these were driven forth to seek new homes; many remained and have mixed and mingled with the Chinese.

So many Chinese now live in our country that you all know how they look and dress. The Chinese in America are mostly from the poorest and meanest class, and most of them come from Canton. Most of those here are laundrymen, but in some of our larger cities there are merchants and restaurant keepers, and in California hundreds of them are gardeners. They quickly learn our ways of doing, and many are employed in cigar-making, shirt-making, and railroad-building. They work hard and save their money, as they want sometime to go home to their own country. Chinamen who die here are buried only for a little time: later the bones are gathered and sent home to be buried in China.

The Chinese who come here are short or of medium stature. In the interior and north of China they are taller. They have yellow skin, black straight hair, and black eyes. Their eyes appear to slant or be set crookedly, the inner corners being lower than the outer; they are really almost as straight as our own, and the appearance is due to a fold of skin at the inner corner. The long queue that hangs down the Chinaman’s back is not composed entirely of hair; it is pieced out below with cord or strings braided in. This style of wearing the hair is not truly Chinese. Formerly the Chinese wore their hair in a knot on top of the head, but at the time of the Manchu Conquest, two hundred and fifty or so years ago, they were compelled to wear the hair in the Manchu fashion. For a Chinaman to cut off his queue would be almost the same as declaring himself unloyal to his Manchu rulers.

Chinamen usually have three names. The family name, which we place last, they place first. Thus Li Hung Chang, the great Chinese viceroy, belongs to the Li family. Few of the Chinese laundrymen in this country have their true names on their signs. The Li family is one of the largest in China, but it is also generally poor and despised. Most of our Chinese laundrymen are Lis, and are related to Li Hung Chang.

In writing, the Chinese use a brush, which they dip into ink. A single character represents a word, though many Chinese words are written with compound characters, one part of which gives the sound, and the other part pictures the meaning. In Chinese many sounds have several different meanings. If the character with which the sound is written stood alone, it would not be clear which meaning was intended. Chinese books are printed on thin paper, which is folded back and forth like a screen or fan and then stitched at the back; this makes the pages double. The Chinese book begins at what we would consider the back and goes through to what we would call the front. The print goes from the top of the page down, in vertical columns, and the first column is the one to the right hand.

To be able to write well is considered of the greatest importance in China. The Chinese respect learning also, and no man can hold office in China unless he is educated and has passed his examinations. From the time when a boy begins study he must keep it up for many years, if he hopes for a government position. Often he is a middle-aged or old man before he succeeds in passing all the necessary examinations. To be able to write beautifully, to be able to compose a poem upon any given subject, and to know the writings of Confucius and the other old philosophers are the things the Chinaman must learn. The great examinations at the Capital are attended by thousands from every part of the Empire. The man who stands first is sure to have an important governorship given to him at once.

There are many curious customs regarding Chinese children. One takes place when a little boy is one year old. A great bamboo sieve, such as farmers use, is placed upon the table. Upon it are spread many articles—money-scales, shears, a measure, a mirror, a pencil, ink, paper, inkstone, books, the counting-board, objects of gold or silver, fruits, etc. The baby, all dressed in his best clothes, is then set in the midst of the objects, on the sieve. His parents and friends watch anxiously to see which of the articles he will grasp. They believe it will show what he will do when he is a man. If he takes the money-scales or the gold or silver, he will become a rich merchant; if he takes the book or pencil, he will be a great scholar, and so on.

Chinese money consists chiefly of round brass coins with a square hole in the middle. It takes from eight to sixteen of them to make one cent of ours. They are called “cash” and are often strung on strings for convenient carrying. Many hundreds of years ago the ancient Chinese used clothing and tools for money. When they began to make metal coins they made these in the shape of shirts, knives, and spades, and called them shirt money, knife money, and spade money.

In eating the Chinese do not use knives and forks, but a pair of slender sticks called “chopsticks.” These are both taken in one hand, and are used to pick up bits of meat or vegetables from the soup or to lift boiled rice or dumplings to the mouth. For eating soup they use little flat-bottomed spoons of chinaware, which will not fall over when set down on the table. In making tea the cup or bowl for each person stands on the table with tea leaves in it; it sets into a little ring-shaped saucer and has a little cover over it like a saucer turned bottom upward. The servant lifts the cover and pours boiling water upon the leaves and then replaces the cover to let the tea steep. The cover may be used to stir the tea for cooling it, and when held in proper position prevents the tea leaves from getting into the mouth of the person who is drinking.

But how many things are left that we cannot speak of! The busy work in the fields, the preparation of tea, the rearing of silkworms and making of silk, the trades, the government, the love and respect for parents, the respect for the graves of ancestors, the religious ideas, the life and teachings of Confucius—these things would need many books like this.