Travels in China, Sir John Barrow [phonics readers txt] 📗

In short, the greater part of the amusements of the Chinese are, at the present day, of a nature so very puerile, or so gross and vulgar, that the tricks and the puppet-shews which are occasionally exhibited in a common fair of one of the country towns of England, may be considered as comparatively polished, interesting, and rational. In slight-of-hand, in posture-making, rope-dancing, riding, and athletic exercises, they are much inferior to Europeans; but in the variety of their fire-works they, perhaps, may carry the palm against the whole world. In every other respect the amusements of the capital of China appear to be of a low and trifling nature, neither suited to the affected gravity of the government nor to the generally supposed state of civilization among the people.

The old Emperor, as he observed to Lord Macartney, seldom partook of such amusements. Considering, indeed, all the circumstances connected with the reign of the present dynasty on the throne, the government of an empire of such vast magnitude, stored with an almost incalculable population, must necessarily be a task of inconceivable vigilance and toil; a task that must have required all the time, the talents, and the attention of the four sovereigns to ensure the brilliant and unparalleled successes that have distinguished their long reign. Tchien Lung, at the age of eighty-three, was so little afflicted with the infirmities of age, that he had all the appearance and activity of a hale man of sixty. His eye was dark, quick, and penetrating, his nose rather aquiline, and his complexion, even at this advanced age, was florid. His height I should suppose to be about five feet ten inches, and he was perfectly upright. Though neither corpulent nor muscular at eighty-three, it was not difficult to perceive that he once had possessed great bodily strength. He always enjoyed a vigorous constitution, which the regularity of his life did not impair. Like all the Mantchoo Tartars he was fond of hunting, an exercise that during the summer months he never neglected. He had the reputation of being an expert bowman, and inferior only in drawing this weapon to his grandfather Caung-shee, who boasts, in his last will, that he drew a bow of the weight or strength of one hundred and fifty pounds.

Nor were the faculties of his mind less active, or less powerful, than those of his body. As prompt in conceiving as resolute in executing his plans of conquest, he seemed to command success. Kind and charitable, as on all occasions he shewed himself to his subjects, by remitting the taxes, and administering relief in seasons of distress, he was no less vindictive and relentless to his enemies. Impatient of restraint or reverses, he has sometimes been led to act with injustice, and to punish with too great severity. His irascible temper was once the cause of a severe and lasting affliction to himself, and the circumstances connected with it are said to have produced a gloom and melancholy on his mind which never entirely forsook him. About the middle part of his reign, he made a circuit through the heart of his empire. At Sau-tchoo-foo, a city that is celebrated for its beautiful ladies which, being purchased when infants, are educated there for sale to the opulent, he was captivated with a girl of extraordinary beauty and talents, whom he intended to carry back with him to his capital. The Empress, by means of an eunuch, was made acquainted with his new amour, and dreading his future neglect, her spirits were depressed to such a degree, that a few days after receiving the intelligence she put an end to her existence with a cord. The Emperor, on hearing this melancholy news, was greatly distressed and repaired without delay to Pekin. One of his sons, a very amiable youth, fearful of incurring his father's displeasure, had entertained some doubts whether it would be most proper to appear before him in deep mourning for his mother, which might be construed as an insult to the father, who had been the cause of her death, or in his robes of ceremony, which would be disrespectful to the memory of his deceased mother. In this dilemma he consulted his schoolmaster, who, like a true Chinese, advised him to put on both. He did so and, unfortunately for him, covered the mourning with the ceremonial habit. Tchien-Lung, whose affection had now returned for his deceased Empress, and whose melancholy fate he was deeply lamenting, on perceiving his son at his feet without mourning, was so shocked and exasperated at the supposed want of filial duty that, in the moment of rage, he gave him a violent kick in an unfortunate place which, after his languishing a few days, proved fatal.

None of his four surviving sons ever possessed any share of his confidence or authority which, of late years, were wholly bestowed on his first minister Ho-chung-tong. He had a due sense of religious duties, which he regularly performed every morning. Having made a vow at the early part of his reign that, should it please heaven to grant him to govern his dominions for a complete cycle, or sixty years, he would then retire, and resign the throne to his successor, he religiously observed it on the accomplishment of the event. The sincerity of his faith may partly be inferred from the numerous and splendid temples he built and endowed in different parts of oriental Tartary, of which the Poo-ta-la, or convent of Budha at Gehol, is the most magnificent. It is said indeed, from the circumstance of his long and fortunate reign, he had, in his later years, entertained an idea, that the Lama, or Budha, or Fo, for they are all the same personage, had condescended to become incarnate in his person. "However wild and extravagant," observes Lord Macartney, "such a conceit may be regarded, we know from history how much even the best understandings may be perverted by prosperity, and that human nature, not satisfied with the good things of this world, sometimes wishes to anticipate the condition and felicity of the next. If Alexander scorned to own less than Jupiter Ammon for his father, if many Roman Emperors extorted altars and sacrifices in their lifetime, if, even in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, an English nobleman[13] encouraged the belief of his descent from a swan, and was complimented in a dedication upon his feathered pedigree,