A CHINESE MANDARIN ON WESTERN WOMEN.

Waikato Times, Volume 2656, Issue 2656, 20 July 1889, Page 1 (Supplement)

A CHINESE MANDARIN ON WESTERN WOMEN.

A TRAYKLI.un Chinese Mandarin who lias lately communicated his impressions of the West to his countrymen deals with (/reat particularity with the and treatment of women in Europe. These surprise him beyond measure. Thus the notion of husband and wife walking arm in arm in public places fills him with amusement. " Nobody smiles at it, lie says ; "and even a husband may perform any menial task in his wife's presence, yet no one will laugh at him." Ti.en, again, the notion of men standing aside to let a woman pass, and the code of politeness which requires men to make way for a woman, are to him incomprehensible. In China, when the men are gorged the women dine off the scraps ; but in the West "at meal-time the men inu«t wait until the women are seated, and then take one after another their place*, and the same rule must be observed when the meal is finished." Western women have curious notions about dress and appearance, "They set store by a larue 'oust and slender waist, but while the waist can be compressed, tV.e bust cannot naturally be enlarged, lhe majority have a wicker contrivance mad.-, which is concealed under the bodice on either side, and is consideied an adornment If a woman is short-sighted she will puMidy mount spectacles. Even young girls in their teens puss thus along the streets, and it is not regarded as strange." As for low dresses, lie observes in bewildeinnient that women goin<r to court reirard a buro skin ns a mark of respect. He is greatly exorcised liovv to dcscribo kissing : ihn thing or word does not exist among t.ho Chinee, and accordingly he is driven to describe it. "It is," he says, a " form of cou'tesy whic.h consists in presenting* the lips to the lower part of the chin and making a sound "—again, " children, when vi-iting their seniors, apply their month to the left or right lips of the elder with a smacking noise." Women as shop attendants, wotneu at home, women with moustaches, then engage the writer s attention, and he passes on to "at homes" and dances. "Besides invitations to dinner there are invitations to a tea gathering, such as arc occasionally given by wealthy merchants or distinguished officials. When the time comes invitations are sent to an equal number of men and women, and after these are all assembled tea and sugar, milk, bread, and the like are set out as aids to conversation. More particularly arc there invitations to skip and posture, when the host decides what man is to be tno partner of what woman, and what woman of what man. Then, with both amis grasping each other, they leave their places in pairs and leap, skip, posture and prance for their mutual gratification. A man and a woman previously unknown to one another may take part in it."—Loudou 'ii'imes.