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Copyright 2001-7 by Sue Brown & Dr.
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Amoy
Hill's PhotosAmoyMission-1893
NARRATIVE OF EXPLORATORY VISIT TO CONSULAR CITIES OF CHINA
(1844, 1845, 1846)
BY
REV. GEORGE SMITH, 1857 Scanned
by Dr. Bill Brown
Chap
25 Departure to Amoy Chap
26 Daily Occurrences at Amoy
Chap
27 New Year Festivities Chap
28 Visit Amoy High Mandarins
Chap
29 Prevalance of Opium Smoking Chap
30 Female Infanticide
Chap
31 Daily Incidents at Amoy Cont'd Chap
32 Mandarins Entertain Missionaries
Chap
33 General Description of Amoy Chap
34 Depart Amoy for Canton; Opium Problem
CHAPTER XXX. FACTS ILLUSTRATIVE OF FEMALE INFANTICIDE.
Trip to surrounding Villages-Testimony of Villagers as to the Prevalence
and the Motives of Infanticide-Village Clanships-Ancestral Temple-Village
School-house-Confessions of infanticide Parlents--Modes of Death commonly
Practiced-Hospitality of a medical Patient-Case of attempted Infanticide-Degradation
of the female Sex.
Jan. 30th.-DURING my occasional visits on horseback to
the villages scattered over the island, the subject of female infanticide
was brought under my notice. The facts with which I became acquainted
at Amoy produced in my mind a conviction that this social evil exists
in the province of Fokeen to an extent which would be incredible, unless
the fullest evidence were at hand to establish its truth. In the other
parts of China which I visited, no well-authenticated cases were brought
under my knowledge sufficient to prove that this crime prevailed to any
considerable extent. In the vicinity of Shanghai and Ningpo, the moral
atrocity, if perpetrated, lurks in secret, and is comparatively too rare
an occurrence to be regarded as possessing the sanction of public opinion.
On this day I was accompanied by the same kind friend, who was ever ready
to place his valuable aid at my disposal, in visiting and gaining information
from the people. We set out for some native villages on the opposite side
of the island, and at an early hour of the day had passed through the
suburb on the east of the city. Our course lay over an extensive military
parade-ground, situated above the sea-battery. In one part there was a
little tower, on the top of which the high military officers were accustomed
to sit as judges of the skill of the troops in shooting arrows at a large
target, which was placed against a pillar at a little distance. In another
part of the ground there were some walls, with mounds of sand, at which
the soldiers practiced firing with bullets. At a little distance beyond,
a line of massive fortifications skirted the beach for a mile, till, at
the farther end, bending to the north, it formed a junction with the lofty
precipices, which constitute a mountain barrier of natural defenses to
the city on its northern and eastern sides. Through this wall we passed
under one of the gateways by which the British troops had entered in their
advance toward the city. The whole line of fortifications appeared to
be in good repair, but to be entirely destitute of guns, both on the ramparts
and on the watch-towers.
After a ride of six miles, we entered a village named Hong-choo, where
the people soon gathered around us, and my companion entered into conversation
with them. The subject was gradually and cautiously led to infanticide,
on which they readily offered various items of statistical information.
They asserted, without hesitation, that female infanticide was generally
practiced among them; and their statements were offered to us in a manner
which indicated the total absence of criminality from their views of the
practice. They stated that poor persons generally put to death two female
infants out of every four, immediately after birth; but that rich persons,
who could afford to rear their female offspring, were not in the habit
of murdering their daughters.
In the next village, about a mile distant, called Baw-a-aou, we remained
for two or three hours among the people, who partook of the general friendly
character of Chinese villagers. The whole village was inhabited by persons
having the same surname of Lim, or Lin, who appeared to be united together
by the ties of patriarchal law. This village clanship is a powerful bond
of union, all the inhabitants regarding each other as heung-te, brethren
or cousins. They have a common property in the wells and the temples within
their boundaries, which form subjects of occasional dispute with the people
of the next village. These quarrels sometimes are carried to such an extent
that the belligerents on either side regularly muster their forces, and
an appeal is made to physical violence; the results of this village warfare
seldom, however, extending beyond broken heads and fractured limbs. They
seemed to experience satisfaction in showing us the little temples and
shrines, and especially in conducting us to explore that most potent charm
in the ancient associations and legends of the village-the temple assigned
to the sepulchral tablets of their common ancestors. The ancestral tablets
of the original founders of the clan were duly arranged in three rows.
In the principal hall, which opened into an adjoining square, there were
about six tablets in all. The earliest were placed in the third rank behind,
and professed to number ten generations; the middle rank eleven, and the
fore rank twelve. The latest of these tablets were two or three hundred
years old, since which time no addition had been made to their number.
At the present time, even the oldest and most respected men of the village,
after their death, merely had their tablets erected in the private dwellings
of their own family. There was an immense vase for incense, with a lion
carved on the top, and with incense-sticks on a table, which stood before
it. The people seemed to attach great sanctity to the tablets, and said
that no amount of money could prevail on them to dispose of these emblems
of ancestral worth.
We soon adjourned to another public room of the village, which was used
as a school-house. The people were rather afraid of our horses; and it
was some time before we could prevail on the most courageous of their
number to get some fodder, and to undertake to hold them. We were then
taken to some seats in the principal hall, at the other end of which some
idols were standing on a little platform. About a hundred people were
speedily collected around us, most of whom adopted various methods of
showing civility. The horrible subject of infanticide was here also introduced.
They confirmed the testimony of the people in the last village, that out
of four daughters poor men generally murdered two, and sometimes even
three. They stated that, in their own vil1age, out of six daughters it
was customary to kill three; some murdered four, and a few even five out
of the same number. They said that the proportion of female children which
they put to death entirely depended on the poverty of the individual.
They told us that the death of the infant was effected immediately after
birth, and that four different modes of infanticide were practiced among
them, viz., drowning in a vessel of water, pinching the throat, stifling
by means of a wet cloth over the mouth, and choking by a few grains of
rice placed into the mouth of the infant. If sons were alternately interspersed
with daughters in a family, the people esteemed it good luck, and were
not accustomed to murder the female children. We told them that many persons
in our native lands were unwilling to believe that the Chinese were guilty
of so cruel a practice. They all asserted that their statements were true;
but after this, as might have been expected, they individually showed
reluctance in acknowledging that either themselves or their parents had
been guilty of infanticide. Finding that we strongly condemned the custom,
they were rather guarded in making any confessions of personal participation
in the practice.
At this time a. man of the village, named Lin Heaou, joined our party,
and gave us an invitation to his house, which was a well-intended compliment,
but which our knowledge of his deep poverty prevented our accepting, as
we thought that he would be better pleased with our declining. The poor
man had previously become acquainted with my companion in a remarkable
manner. The latter, while walking, a few days previously, near the city
with another missionary, had met this villager with a fine, healthy-looking
child in his arms, and had commenced a conversation with him by expressing
admiration of the child. The father, with a look indicating extreme wretchedness,
shook his head, and said that he was the most unfortunate of human beings,
as it was a female child. On their making further inquiry, he informed
them that he had had eight children, all daughters, of whom be had murdered
five. The man now appeared before us, with the same child in his arms,
and renewed his pitiable tale, which was confirmed, as a matter of perfect
notoriety, by the crowd around us. As he fondled the child in his arms,
his manner indicated no deficiency in paternal affection toward his offspring.
He dwelt, however, on the misery of his "fate," and described
the process of his former infanticide, by placing the infants in a tub
of water immediately after birth. Heaou was a small farmer, or gardener,
cultivating four little plots of ground. He had no son on whom to lean
for support in his old age. He seemed deeply affected as he dwelt on his
sorrows, esteeming himself the most ill-fated of men in having eight children,
and no son among them. The people around, especially the women, appeared
to think light of the matter, and indulged in frequent humor and levity.
The man himself said that he always had compunctions of grief for ten
days after murdering a child; and that both he and his wife wept very
much at the time, and grieved at their misfortune in having female offspring.
One old man, whom we questioned, confessed publicly before the crowd,
that out of six daughters he had murdered three. At first, he said that
he did not remember whether he had murdered two or three. He said that
he smothered them by putting grass into their mouth, and that he felt
more peaceful and quiet in his mind under the disgrace which he suffered,
when he had thus put his female offspring out of the way. Both he and
his wife wept very much, but felt no compunctions of conscience at the
deed. He replied to Mr. Pohlman's remonstrance by saying that he would
admonish all his daughters-in-law in future to preserve their female children.
A former patient of the Medical Missionary Hospital, named Lin gnew, now
joined us, who had had a tumor, weighing nearly two pounds, removed by
a surgical operation from his neck, and had his life thus prolonged by
foreign benevolence and skill. We accepted his invitation to take a meal,
which was, in the course of half an hour, set out for us in the public
hall. My companion told the crowd that it was the custom of Christians
to thank God for His daily mercies, and to ask a blessing before a meal;
and requested them to preserve silence while I invoked the Divine blessing
on ourselves and the poor deluded heathen by whom we were surrounded.
They remained in deep and attentive silence during the time. We were supplied
with wooden chop-sticks, and we took our dinner from dishes of purely
Chinese composition, consisting of boiled rice, ducks' eggs, and a boiled
mixture of cabbage, oysters, and vermicelli. A handkerchief served as
a table-cloth, and our host brought each of us a basin of water to wash
our hands after the repast. We offered some money in return for the meal;
but both Lin gnew and the neighbors who stood around us stoutly refused
to accept any payment, and waved their hands at the unreasonableness of
our proposal. He afterward accepted Mr. Pohlman's invitation to return
our visit on the following Sabbath, in order to be present at our religious
worship, and to hear the missionaries preach about Jesus Christ. This
engagement he accordingly fulfilled on the next Sunday, accompanied by
two of his neighbors, all dressed out in their best holyday clotbes. Respecting
the population of their village, they could give us no definite information,
except the fact that it contained one hundred and eighty family messes,
which they said would probably make it amount to one thousand persons.
On our return we put similar questions concerning infanticide to the villagers
at Chan-chew-hwa, and invariably obtained, in reply, a confirmation of
the previous information supplied to us respecting its general prevalence.
The average number of females put to death in the several villages was
generally stated to amount to the proportion of one half. While we were
questioning one old man, the crowd, unable to comprehend the drift or
object of our inquiries, were greatly amused, and indulged in a little
pleasantry, saying that we were fortune-tellers, and were going to tell
the old man's fate. They afterward became more reserved in their communications,
suspecting that we were employed as spies of the mandarins. They soon,
however, resumed their friendly and communicative manner; and as we prepared
to take our departure they urged us to remain to partake of food, and
to hold conversation with them.
The same confessions as to the proportion of female infants murdered after
birth were made in another village named O-ne, but none of the inhabitants
were willing to confess that they themselves had perpetrated infanticide,
though they testified to its universal prevalence around them.
I was furnished with the following fact by Captain Collinson, R.N., C.B., of the ¡°Plover" sloopof-war, recently engaged in the survey of the coast of China, who has kindly given me his authority for its publication. On a little point of shore, near the city of Tong-shan, on the coast of Fokeen, about half way between Amoy and Namoa, a Chinese boat, with two men and three women, approached that part of the beach, in which some of his party were engaged in their surveying operations. The Chinese brought with them four infants, and proceeded to dig two pits in the sand, in which they were about to bury the four infants alive, till a sailor and a boy, assisting Captain Collinson (who was at some little distance), succeeded in driving them away from the spot. Captain Collinson watched the Chinese with his telescope as they proceeded with the infants around a headland to some other point, where they would be free from interruption in their work of cruelty.
The same facts were corroborated
by the evidence of several Chinese in the city, the inhabitants of which,
though not so universally given to the practice as the villagers, were
by no means free from the evil Some respectable natives spoke of its prevalence.
Not only in the villages, but also in the city, to an awful extent, even
saying that one half of the female infants of the poor within the city
were put to death by their inhuman parents. The real cause of this horrible
custom is to be found, partly in the extreme poverty of the people, and
partly in the unenlightened state of their conscience, which fails to
realize the flagrant enormity of a social crime with which their minds
having been long familiarized, and by which their moral perceptions have
become blunted.
The dreadful effects of this evil on society are obvious to every visitor
of the rural hamlets, where the most cursory investigation reveals the
small proportion of the female inhabitants. The more disastrous consequences
of female infanticide, and of the paucity of women occasioned thereby,
may easily be imagined; but their recital can not be permitted to offend
the eye of the reader.
It is easy to account for the prevalence of this idea of misfortune and
calamity in having female children, and being without sons. The explanation
is found in the following facts. 1. Sons are the support and comfort of
their parents in adversity and old age. A Chinese whose sons are in prosperous
circumstances generally ceases from laboring for his subsistence after
he has attained the age of fifty, the sons contributing to support their
parent in honorable ease. 2. Daughters, at the age of sixteen, are generally
married into another family; on which occasion, however, a sum of money
is paid to the parents by the husband-virtually as a matter of purchase,
but ostensibly for the purpose of refunding the expense of a wife's support
from infancy. 3. Daughters, when married, are no longer considered as
a part of the family, and assume their husband's surname; so that they
are frequently omitted by parents in the enumeration of their children,
and are merely regarded as secondary relations. 4. Daughters afford no
hope of preserving the family name of the father, and of performing the
funeral rites and other sacrificial offerings to the spirits of their
ancestors. 5. The general degradation and comparative uselessness of females
are considered as offering no adequate compensation for the expense of
their nurture and support. The villager, who had eight daughters and no
sons, might naturally, in such a state of public opinion, deem himself
very unfortunate in the absence of a belief in the wisdom and goodness
of a directing Providence.
The initials
L. M. S. = London Missionary Society.
A. B. C. F. M. = American Board for Conduction Foreign Missions
A. B. B. F. M. = American Baptist Board for Conducting Foreign Missions.
Am. Ep. Ch. = American Episcopal Church
A. G. A. B. = American General Assembly¡¯s Board
C. M. S. = Church (of England) Missionary Society
E. B. M. S. = English Baptist Missionary Society.
A Narrative of an Exploratory Visit to each of the Consular Cities of
China, and to the Islands of Hong Kong and Chusan, in Behalf of the Church
Missionary Society, in the years 1844, 1845, 1846, by the Rev. George
Smith, M.A., of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, and Late Missionary in China
New York, Harper and Brothers Publishers, 52 Cliff Street, 1847
Scanned by Dr.
Bill Brown Xiamen University MBA Center
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Box 1288 Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian PRC 361005
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