Chapter XV: New Year’s Day at Kuei-Chow Fu

New Year’s Day arrived at last, as cold and brilliant as if it were not belated by six weeks. I took a beautiful walk among prosperous farms where the people were all in gala dress. The houses were decked with flags and streamers, and even the buff dogs had knots of colour round their necks. From above the wall the grey city could be seen brilliantly decorated, and sounds of jubilation came up from it. The suburbs and the mat town on the river bank were gay and noisy, and much money was spent on crackers and explosives generally. The junks were decorated, and the “sing-song” boats blossomed into a blaze of colour. Everyone except my trackers appeared in new clothes, and threw off the old ones with rejoicing.

This was my second New Year in China, and I had seen its approach as far back as Ichang, where, as everywhere, tables appeared in the streets a month beforehand, and all sorts of tempting articles were displayed upon them in a tempting manner. This is the time when things can be had cheap, and many articles of _bric-à-brac_ and embroidered dresses are for sale which are not obtainable at any other time. For in order to pay debts, a sacred obligation worthily honoured in the observance, many families are obliged to part with possessions long cherished. The crowds in the streets in gala dresses are enormous; children are gaily dressed, their quaint heads are decorated with flowers, and they receive presents of toys and _bon-bons_. The toy-shops drive a roaring trade.

Red paper appears everywhere in long strips pasted on the lintels and doorposts of houses, emblazoned with the characters for happiness and longevity, and with formal sentences suitable for the festive occasion, many of which are written on tables in the streets which are provided with ink-brushes and ink-stones. Every shop is brilliant with these red papers pasted or suspended, and with _kin hwa_, or “golden flowers,” much made in Shao Hsing, being artificial flowers and leaves often of great size, of yellow tinsel on wires, making a goodly show. The “sing-song” boats were profusely decorated with these, and they are much used for the New Year offerings in temples, and for the annual redecoration of the household tablets. Thousands of vegetable wax candles, with paper wicks, varying in size from the thickness of a man’s leg to that of his finger, coloured vermilion, and painted with humorous and mythical pictures, and many other things used for offerings in the temples, and ribbons and streamers of all descriptions made the streets, even the mat streets outside Kuei Fu, gay.

For the three previous days unlimited scrubbing of clothes, persons, doors, chairs, shutters, and all woodwork went on; and though boats were not as universally turned out and cleaned as at Canton, where I spent a previous New Year, a good many of the smaller craft were beached and cleansed inside and out. Even the trackers scrubbed their faces, and appeared a paler yellow.

Towards the evening of that day, between the din of gongs and the constant explosion at every door of strings of fireworks intended to expel evil spirits and prevent others from entering, the noise became exciting. This idea of expelling evil spirits and preventing their entrance at the incoming of the year is the same as is carried out in Korea by the burning in a potsherd at the house door of the hair of all the inmates, which, when cut off or falling out, is preserved for this purpose. The Chinese, like the Koreans, believe themselves surrounded by legions of demons, mainly malignant, who must either be frightened or propitiated.

Religion plays a most conspicuous part in visits to the temples, and offerings. At all the farms near Kuei Fu, trees, fences, barns, and farming implements, as well as houses, had prayers pasted upon them. The junkmen, though not nearly to the same extent as in Kwantung, pasted paper prayers on oars, sweeps, mast, and rudder, and hung them over the boats’ sterns; and every house was purified by a religious ceremonial. New Year’s Day is kept as the birthday of the entire population, and a child born on the previous day enters his second year upon it. In the houses of well-to-do people such birthdays are great occasions; and abbots, monks, and priests assemble to do them honour, with much noise and many prayers, some read and others chanted from memory, after which the written prayers are burned and libations are poured out. It is the family and social ceremonies connected with idolatry and demonism at this season which are a special difficulty in the way of Christians.

Among other religious duties, some persons, both men and women, burdened with the weight of the sins of the year, employ priests to intercede for them with the unseen powers, and fast, and give away much to the poor. The temples outside Kuei Fu were thronged for the days preceding the New Year with men and women, old and young; and in the midst of clouds of incense rich and poor prostrated themselves before the gods, burning gold and silver tinsel paper, while gongs, bells, drums, and cymbals kept up a ceaseless din.

In the midst of the general winding up of all affairs, spiritual and temporal, and starting on the New Year clear, the great matter of debt is not forgotten. The paying of debts and settling of accounts is a highly praiseworthy custom, and one which we might introduce among ourselves with advantage. Although only a custom, it has all the force of law. If it can be avoided by any sacrifice, no debt is carried over New Year’s Day without either an actual settlement or an arrangement regarded as satisfactory by the creditor. To do otherwise would be to secure a blasted reputation. If men owe more than they can pay, custom compels them at this season to put all they have into the hands of their creditors and close their business concerns; and one among the causes of suicide is when men have not enough to pay their debts with. Interest on loans rises, the pawnbrokers’ warehouses are choke-full, and most kinds of commodities fall in value, while second-hand clothing and many other personal possessions are to be bought cheap. The future to a Chinese often consists of little more than his funeral and the New Year! People dread the difficulties, expense, and delays of resorting to law for the recovery of debts; and all are agreed on maintaining this wholesome custom, which has a great tendency to weed out from among traders the shifty and dishonest. I have heard that one method of compelling an unwilling debtor to pay his debts is to remove the door from his house or shop, so as to allow of the ingress of evil and malignant demons. This last resort is said never to fail!

All the ceremonies which are to welcome the New Year, with the garnishing of the house with red paper, tinsel flowers, streamers, and the pictures, ornamenting of the ancestral shrine, and the general “redding up,” occupy much of the previous night; and the stillness of the first hours of the great day reminds one of an old-fashioned Scotch Sunday.

Towards noon the streets begin to fill, as in America, with men with card-cases paying visits. All are well dressed, even to the coolies, for those who have not grand clothes hire them. Inside Kuei Fu sedan chairs were _en règle_; outside, men made their calls on foot, in many instances cards sufficing, inscribed with a device suggesting the three good wishes of children (_i.e._ sons), wealth or rank, and longevity. Men meeting in the streets greeted each other with profound respect, and with the good wish, “May the new joy be yours,” which reminded me of the Syrian salutation on the feast of the Epiphany, or with the words, “I respectfully wish you joy.” Universal politeness and good behaviour prevailed, and not a tipsy man was to be seen during the day or evening.

Mourners remain within doors, and strips of blue paper mixed with red denote houses into which death has entered during the previous year. Be-dien told me that in the city, where there are many _literati_ and rich men, there were houses with all their woodwork covered with gold-sprinkled red paper, and on the lintels five slips expressing the desire of the owner for the “five blessings”: riches, health, love of virtue, longevity, and a natural death. Over some shops was a decorated slip, “May rich customers ever enter this door,” and in many stately vestibules, in which handsome presentation coffins were reared on end, there were costly scrolls inscribed with aphorisms and other sentences.[27]

On New Year’s Day gods and ancestors receive prostrations, and are presented with gifts in the temples and in the clan or family ancestral halls. It would be a gross breach of etiquette and an unthinkable outrage if inferiors were not to pay their respects to superiors, pupils to salute their teachers, and children to prostrate themselves before their parents.

When evening came, lanterns, transparencies, and fireworks appeared, and very effective coloured fires reddened the broad bosom of the Yangtze. Hilarious sounds proceeding from closed doors showed that, as in Korea at the same hour, sacrifices were being offered to departed parents, and that families were gathered at the final feast of the day. My trackers hung coloured lanterns from the matted roof and feasted on pork with wine, but there was no excess, and it was a real pleasure to see them get one good meal with time to enjoy it. Owing to the moderate use of intoxicants, and that chiefly with food, the three holidays of this universal festival pass by without turmoil or disgrace, and the population goes back to trade and work out of debt and not demoralised by its spell of social festivity.

So the most ancient of the world’s existing civilisations comports itself on its great holiday, while our civilisation of yesterday, especially in Scotland, what with “first-footing,” “treating,” and general sociability, is apt to turn the holiday into a pandemonium.