CANTON.

Hokitika Guardian, 26 August 1921, Page 4

CANTON.

CHINA’S REVOLUTIONARY CAPITAL. (By T. J. Henry). A few weeks ago I visited Canton, the city from whiclVDr Sun Yat Sen, the famous revolutionary, has just issued a declaration denying the right 01 the Government at Peking to despatch to the Washington Conference a delegate for the whole of China.. He contends that the Parliament of Canton which follows him, has the right to send an emissary who will represent South China as a separate and sovereign State. There are two rival Gov ernments, and two rival Presidents, i. I China, and each declares the other U be illegal. Canton impressed me as' a city of. striking contrasts, where customs an conditions deeprooted for nearly 1 thousand years, survive side by sal with modern triumphs. The steamer on which I travelled the 80 miles at the Pearl River from Hong Kong ! Canton was a magnificent three-decker, provided with the finest state rooms I ] have seen, and with a spacious dining- : room, which was also furnished with reading and writing desks. On promenade decks were movable wicker armchairs, while at the touch, of an electric button an elert “celestial” would appear, dum]) down a little table, on which he would deftly lay tea and cakes, or which could he used tor card-playing, to support books, or at which industrious ladies could do some sewing. But on each side of the deck stood an armed sentry; the officers carried revolvers, and tile captain’s office was a small armoury. Moreover the navigation quarters were shut oil by a formidable iron grill, and the bridge protected by barbed wire and bullet-proof bulwarks. The lowest deck, bv which coolies travelled, was also barred with iron gates Why those defensive precautions in time of peace? Because the ancient and at one time not thought dishonorable profession of piracy still exists. Within the past year or two one of those steamers was held up and looted Among those clumsy antique junks with time-tattortd sails of matting may he some manned by crews whose ancestors were open and unabashed pirates. The old buccaneer blood runs in their veins. At any favourable opportunity they might revert to hereditary type and attack any craft worth while. -Many of the junks themselves arc armed with cannon or other arms ol old-tashioiKul design. But archaic junks, with sterns built high like galleons in pictures ol lie Armada, arc not the only vessels whirl, coin rust with our stately ship, with compound steam engine.- as motive power. As we approached Canton w. several times passed strange trait, propelll d bv stern wheels, and earning anything from twenty to thirty passengers, and considerable loads ol goods Their motive power was not steam, bn! the oldest in the world—that of liuinan muscle. On the after part of cad: sheltered under an awning, were irma six to twenty almost nude coolies, who grasped cross bars for support "while their feel worked a treadmill whereby the propelling wheel was turned, I'bev* venerable cratt are extremely cheap run. Tho stalwarts who work their primitive mechanism work their passages at the same time. These men power boats cast off as soon as the waiting list lor passengers on 'lave terms is filled. At Canton, the river is about as wide as from'Dawes Point to Milsou’s Point —:t fast-llowing, turbid, yellow flood. On the water, side by side with primitive coolie-propelled craft, or meagre sampans, in which women and even little girls do the laborious work of sculling, are motor boats and waterplanes. An enormous population lives entirely in boats. They are born and stay their whole lives thereon, forming an aquatic community, marrying and giving in marriage among water-folk. Some indeed pass to mother earth only for burial. There are in places long rows of permanent houseboats, moored! side by side with a continuous pontoon i footpath I'roiitiYig them, and communicating tints with the shore. Some arc cabarets of doubtful repute to which shore-dwellers resort for dissipation. They arc l characterised hv gaudy ornamentation and little Hags of many colours. Along the “Bund” or water front, contrast is still thy note. Dingy and crumbling native dwellings and stores, which look as if they have not been cleaned for centuries, are neighboured by lofty structures of I'erro-eim- [ erete. 'Pile “Asia,” for instance, rears its imposing facade of 10 stories. I n-

der its ample roof are department stores which would not disgrace our Bitt-stroct, an up-to-date hotel, a marrionette show (of which the Chinese are | very loud), a cinema theatre ( which lias , captivated the children of the “Chows”) and a roof-restaurant. Nor is this complex establishment - chiefly for Europeans; rather is it for Europeanised Chinese. The friend who accompanied me visited the restaurant one night and found that out of a great crush he was the only Caucasian. Contrast again is, strong between “Shameen,” the ‘ foreign” (that is non-Chinese) quarter, and the native city. 1 stayed at the Victoria Hotel. Its bedrooms have each a J hath alcove, with running hot and c<dd ; water. It stands, one ot a row of , handsome, modern buildings, on a Irontage flagged with neatly-jointed granite blocks, and brightened with strips of lawn and symmetrical shrubs and trees. Yet. it laces a canal, which is almost full with humble houseboats, on each side of which a family resides. Opposite, just across the canal, is too facade of a dingy native street, composed ot small narrow darksome nondescript shops, its narrow footway a perilous composite of irregular and broken stones, whose innumerable hollows drainage water has converted into iepulsive puddles. _ 1 The proud boast is “What Canton thinks to-day China will think to-mor-row.” Her population is 2.dt)0,000 of whom 200.000 live on the river. Those broad yellow waters arc indeed scenes of tumultuous activity such as none out of China can approach. Sydney Harbour is a- restful lake compared with it. Canton has an individuality, a soul of her own. “The voice of the city” is rebellious, loud, insistent. She has long been the storm centre from which radiate waves of disaffection against the northern political .capital of Pekin. Because of geographical position the Canton districts have had far more communication with the West than have the northern centres. An overwhelming proportion of Chinese who liavr gone abroad have been Cantonese. Tile intelligent and educated wrote millions of letters and returned in hundreds of thousands and told of the wonders they had seen in the mysterious “barbarian” lands beyond the blue ocean. It became their delight io f astonish their neighbours with tales of t European progress, to themselves adopt ; European customs and clothing. ■ There is a municipal council. 11'° city is divided into iire-precincts, each of which comprises two wards There are motor lire engines. In contrast I saw a discarded manual engine, of grotesquely antique type, preserved a-s a memento. The greater part ot the eirt is made up of streets so narrow that the occupants of onnosite shops cn shake hands without leaving Iheir doorwavs. They form a veritable Inbryinil in which a stranger would he soon “in wandering mazes lost.” In many si roots ancient trades cluster together. One seep. still oxisfing the old patriarchal system which prevailed in Europe before the industrial era the family weaving at hand looms, or n little knot of workers fashioning furniture. or making hats, grandparents and children assisting. Tn contrast are noarbv large factories. Labour unions exist, and at tho time I was there, sword strikes were on.. But tlm municipality is improving the cite: dilrmdat*vl slums are razed, and wide streets substituted. The am imit r itv wall, the delight of the antiquarian. is doomed. Much has* beep already torn down -m 1 its site , onverted into broad boulevards, oil whose asphalted surfaces motor cars howl briskly along, Tn an annexe, fry a Buddhist Temnio, in .whoso dreary halls are enshrined tile life-size gilded idols of five hundred saints, who have achieved “Nirvana” ! T found a school in which Chinese S youths were being given an elaborate !* education in English by a Chinese teacher. I was told that the school was run by a Christian church organisation. |On the outward walls these youths. 5 the “intelligentsiathe fulure citizens % of light and leading, had scrawled in i chalk, “boycott Japanese goods.” May [ iheir slogan never he “bovcott” AusI tralia.”