Is an unfilial son tortured
    of devils? Or does a decadent queen sport with
    her eunuchs?

I cannot tell.
The faces of the people are wooden; only their eyes
    burn dully with a reflected light.
I shall never know.
I am alien … alien.

Nanking

The Well

The Second Well under Heaven lies at the foot of the
    Sacred Mountain.
Perhaps the well is sacred because it is clean; or perhaps
    it is clean because it is sacred.
I cannot tell.

At the bottom of the well are coppers and coins with
    square holes in them, thrown thither by devout
    hands. They gleam enticingly through the shallow
    water.
The people crowd about the well, leaning brown covetous
    faces above the coping as my copper falls
    slantwise to rest.

Perhaps it will bring me luck, who knows?
It is a very sacred well.
Or perhaps, when it is quite dark, someone who is
    hungry….
Then the luck will be his!

The Village of the Mud Idols

The Abandoned God

In the cold darkness of eternity he sits, this god who
    has grown old.
His rounded eyes are open on the whir of time, but
    man who made him has forgotten him.

Blue is his graven face, and silver-blue his hands. His
    eyebrows and his silken beard are scarlet as the
    hope that built him.
The yellow dragon on his rotting robes still rears itself
    majestically, but thread by thread time eats its
    scales away,
And man who made him has forgotten him.

For incense now he breathes the homely smell of rice and tea, stored in his anteroom; For priests the busy spiders hang festoons between his fingers, and nest them in his yellow nails. And darkness broods upon him. The veil that hid the awful face of godhead from the too impetuous gaze of worshippers serves in decay to hide from deity the living face of man, So god no longer sees his maker.

Let us drop the curtain and be gone!
I am old too, here in eternity.

Pa-tze-kiao

The Bridge

The Bridge of the Eight Scholars spans the canal narrowly.
On the gray stone of its arch are carvings in low relief,
    and the curve of its span is pleasing to the eye.
No one knows how old is the Bridge of the Eight
    Scholars.

In our house-boat we pass under it. The boatman
    with the rat-like face twists the long broken-backed
    oar, churning the yellow water, and we creep forward
    steadily.
On the bridge the village is assembled. Foreign devils
    are a rarity.
The gold-brown faces are not unfriendly, merely curious.
    They peer in rows over the rail with grunts
    of nasal interest.
Tentatively, experimentally, as we pass they spit down
    upon us. Not that they wish us ill, but it can be
    done, and the temptation is too great.

We retire into the house-boat.
The roof scrapes as we pass under the span of the
    Bridge of the Eight Scholars.

Pa-tze-kiao

The Shop

(The articles sold here are to be burned at funerals for the use of the dead in the spirit world.)

The master of the shop is a pious man, in good odor with the priests. He is old and honorable and his white moustache droops below his chin. Mencius, I think, looked so.

The shop behind him is a mimic world, a world
    of pieties and shams—the valley of remembrance—the
    dwelling place of the unquiet dead.
Here on his shelves are ranged the splendor and the
    panoply of life, silk in smooth gleaming rolls, silver
    in ingots, carving and embroidery and jade, a
    scarlet bearer-chair, a pipe for opium….
Whatever life has need of, it is here,
And it is for the dead.

Whatever life has need of, it is here. Yet it is here in sham, in effigy, in tortured compromise. The dead have need of silk. Yet silk is dear, and there are living backs to clothe. The rolls are paper…. Do not look too close.

The dead I think will understand. The carvings, too, the bearer-chair, the jade—yes, they are paper; and the shining ingots, they are tinsel. Yet they are made with skill and loving care! And if the priest knows—surely he must know!— when they are burned they'll serve the dead as well as verities. So living mouths can feed.

The master of the shop is a pious man. He has attained much honor and his white moustache droops below his chin. "Such an one" he says "I burned for my own father. And such an one my son will burn for me. For I am old, and half my life already dwells among the dead."

And, as he speaks, behind him in the shop I feel the presence of a hovering host, the myriads of the immortal dead, the rulers of the spirit in this land….

For in this kingdom of the dead they who are living cling with fevered hands to the torn fringes of the mighty past. And if they fail a little, compromise….

The dead I think will understand.

Soochow

My Servant

The feet of my servant thump on the floor. Thump,
    they go, and thump—dully, deformedly.
My servant has shown me her feet.
The instep has been broken upward into a bony cushion.
    The big toe is pointed as an awl. The small
    toes are folded under the cushioned instep. Only
    the heel is untouched.
The thing is white and bloodless with the pallor of
    dead flesh.

But my servant is quite contented. She smiles toothlessly and shows me how small are her feet, her "golden lilies."

Thump, they go, and thump!

Wusih

The Feast

So this is the wedding feast!
The room is not large, but it is heavily crowded, filled
    with small tables, filled with many human bodies.
About the walls are paintings and banners in sharp
    colors; above our heads hang innumerable gaudy
    lanterns of wood and paper. We sit in furs,
    shivering with the cold.
The food passes endlessly, droll combinations in brown
    gravies—roses, sugar, and lard—duck and
    bamboo—lotus, chestnuts, and fish-eggs—an
    "eight-precious pudding."
They tempt curiosity; my chop-sticks are busy. The
    warm rice-wine trickles sparingly.

The groom is invisible somewhere, but the bride
    martyrs among us. She is clad in scarlet satin,
    heavily embroidered with gold. On her head is
    an edifice of scarlet and pearls.
For weeks, I know, she has wept in protest.
The feast-mother leads her in to us with sacrificial
    rites. Her eyes are closed, hidden behind her
    curtain of strung beads; for three days she will
    not open them. She has never seen the bridegroom.