A Wayfarer in China Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia — Reading Notes

West had already left its stamp. So I turned to the interior, to the western provinces of Yunnan and Szechuan. Wonderful for scenery, important in commerce and politics, still unspoiled, there I could find what I wanted.

Of course I was told not to do it, it would not be safe, but that is what one is always told. A long, solitary summer spent a few years ago among the Himalayas of Western Tibet, in Ladakh and Baltistan, gave me heart to face such discouragement, and I found, as I had found before, that those who knew the country best were most ready to speed me onward. And as the following pages show, there was nothing to fear. I had no difficulties, no adventures, hardly enough to make the tale interesting.

It is true, I had some special advantages. I was an American and a woman, and no longer young. Chinese respect for grey hair is a very real thing; a woman is not feared as a man may be, and hostility is often nothing more than fear; and even in remote Szechuan I met men who knew that the American Government had returned the Boxer indemnity, and who looked kindly upon me for that reason. If the word of certain foreigners is to be trusted, I gained in not knowing the language; the people would not take advantage of my helplessness. That seems rather incredible; if it is true, the whole Western world has something to learn of China.

But I could not have done what I did without the wise and generous aid of many whom I met along the way, Europeans and Chinese, officials, merchants, and above all missionaries, everywhere the pioneers. To them all I tender here my grateful thanks. And to the representatives of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank wherever I met them, and also to those of the Russo-Asiatic Bank I would express my gratitude for many courtesies shown me.

As I look back I know it was worth while, all of it. Half a dozen months count for little toward the real understanding of a strange civilization, but it is something to have seen a great people in its home, to have watched it at work and at play, for you have been forced once again to realize that although "East is East and West is West," the thing that most matters is the nature of the man, and that everywhere human nature is much the same.

THE ORCHARD, WELLESLEY, MASSACHUSETTS, November, 1912.

II. DAYS IN YUNNAN-FU 24

III. ACROSS YUNNAN 41

IV. THE CHIEN-CH'ANG 71

V. ON THE MANDARIN ROAD 101

VII. THE LESSER TRAIL 139

VIII. ACROSS CHENGTU PLAIN 161

IX. OMEI SHAN, THE SACRED 180

X. DOWN THE YANGTSE 202

XI. FROM THE GREAT RIVER TO THE GREAT WALL 221

XII. THE MONGOLIAN GRASSLAND 236

XIII. ACROSS THE DESERT OF GOBI 256

XIV. URGA, THE SACRED CITY 276

XV. NORTH TO THE SIBERIAN RAILWAY 289

XVI. A FEW FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF CHINA 308

THE LITTLE "FU T'OU" (CARAVAN HEADMAN) (p. 6) _Frontispiece_

MAP OF CHINESE EMPIRE 3

OUTSIDE THE WALLS OF YUNNAN-FU 6

MY SEDAN CHAIR AND BEARERS 32

A MEMORIAL ARCH NEAR YUNNAN-FU 32

ON A YUNNAN ROAD: MY CARAVAN--THE MILITARY ESCORT 44

WU-TING-CHOU: TEMPLE GATEWAY--TEMPLE CORNER 60

"TAME, WILD" LOLOS 80

A MEMORIAL ARCH. SZECHUAN 92

FORTIFIED VILLAGE IN THE CHIEN-CH'ANG VALLEY 92

"MERCURY," MY FLEET COOLIE 106

A GROUP OF SZECHUAN FARMHOUSES 114

A VIEW OF TACHIENLU 124

LAMA AND DOG AT TACHIENLU 134

THE GATE OF TIBET 134

A WAYSIDE REST-HOUSE 146

A ROADSIDE TEA-HOUSE 152

TEA COOLIE CROSSING A SUSPENSION BRIDGE 152

A FARMHOUSE IN CHENGTU PLAIN 162

MEMORIAL ARCH TO A "VIRTUOUS WIDOW," CHENGTU PLAIN 168

THE "REJECTION OF THE BODY" (CLIFF A MILE HIGH), MOUNT OMEI, WEST SZECHUAN 196

IN THE YANGTSE GORGES 218

TARTAR WALL, PEKING 230

CARAVAN OUTSIDE THE TARTAR WALL 230

A POOR MONGOL FAMILY AND YURT 248

JACK AND HIS LAMA FRIEND 258

MY CARAVAN ACROSS MONGOLIA 258

HORSEMEN OF THE DESERT, NORTH MONGOLIA 268

A LAMA BOUND FOR URGA 278

A MONGOL BELLE, URGA 278

MY MONGOL HOSTESS 284

THE MONGOL HOUSE WHERE I STAYED IN URGA 284

LAMA AND HIS "WIFE" 298

My thanks are due to Robert J. Davidson, Esq., of Chengtu, Szechuan, for kind permission to use the photograph of the Yangtse Gorges. Also to Messrs. Underwood & Underwood, of New York, for the photographs of the Tartar Wall, Peking. With these exceptions the illustrations are from photographs made by myself on the journey. I should like to express here my appreciation of the care and skill shown by the staff of the Kodak Agency, Regent Street, West, in handling films often used under very unfavourable conditions.

SUGGESTIONS FOR PRONOUNCING CHINESE NAMES IN THE TEXT

In general vowels are pronounced as in Italian.