Page:Illustrations of China and Its People vol. I. 2ed edition.pdf/37

 FOUR HEADS, TYPES OF THE LABOURING CLASS.

OF the four heads shown in these pictures, the two upper ones are fair types of the aged labourers of China. Darby and Joan have for many years been associated together, and their life has been a uniform scene of hardships and toil. Two generations have now grown up around them, and their sons and grandsons have succeeded them as the bread-winners of the family. The old woman still busies herself in the lighter domestic duties; she is skilful with her needle, and invaluable as a nurse in time of sickness. Her hair has grown thin and white, but she still dresses it with neatness and care.

The old man, who is venerated as the head of the family, gratifies his taste for information by spelling through the cheap literature of the day. This commonly consists of what to us would appear tedious and uninteresting tales, which appeal greatly to the credulity of the reader. The popular books arc printed in the more simple and elementary characters of the language, to suit the capacities of the unlettered class. The old man's eyes failed him years ago, and the use of spectacles was reluctantly forced upon him. These spectacles are of native manufacture, having larger and heavier frames than those which our great-grandfathers wore. The lenses, like our own, are double convex or double concave, to suit peculiarities of vision ; and being made of the finest rock crystal, they possess advantages only appreciated by us at a comparatively recent date. It seems that the Chinese have not so extended this knowledge as to construct microscopes and telescopes. But this branch of optics is now being taught by foreigners in the Foochow Training School.

The two lower heads are those of a son and daughter belonging to the same class. The male is stripped to the waist, as is his wont during the hours of toil. His plaited queue is at such times coiled up out of the way and fixed with a bamboo bodkin at the back of the head. When work is over he will put on his jacket, and betake himself to the nearest barber's, that the front of his head may be shaved. He is a type of the coolies who used to be kidnapped and sent to South America to labour in plantations or mines. Thousands of these men have emigrated to the United States, and have there left a lasting monument to their industry in the great embankments of the Pacific Railroad.

The female head is that of an unmarried woman, engaged with her family in the management of a cargo boat, used in the loading and unloading of ships. The cloth on her head is worn as a protection from the sun. The hair of unmarried women of this class, combed back and plaited into a queue behind, is then coiled up and fastened with a silver pin. In front it is allowed to fall over the forehead, like a silken fringe. After marriage, it is dressed in the form of the old woman's coiffure shown above.