The Chinese look upon a daughter, at her birth, as a misfortune, one of the ills that must be endured, and while loving her individually, a daughter is not welcomed into the family nor allowed the privileges of a son. It is, however, quite different with the Manchus. A daughter not being able to sacrifice to the ancestors, even Manchus prefer a son; but a daughter is a welcome member of the family, and she has a distinct and independent position of her own. One of the Chinese ministers to Washington once told me that the only unmarried woman in the world whose position is analogous to that of the “American Girl,” in her own family, is the Manchu girl.
As long as the Manchu girl remains unmarried, she is a veritable power in the household. She ranks as high as her brother, and always takes precedence of her brother’s wife, even if that wife be double her age and married before she was born. She precedes her mother even, as she is of the Blood and her mother of “another family.” Not only has she these social privileges, but she has well-defined legal rights. Her father cannot make a disposition of his property without his eldest daughter’s consent. She can go into her brother’s house, dismiss his servants, and generally direct his affairs. Her word has more weight as to the bringing up of her brother’s children than his wife’s, as she is a sister, a born relation, and the wife is only an acquired relation. When she marries, however, she becomes a member of the family into which she marries; but even then, such is the ascendancy of the girl in the Manchu family, even after her marriage into another family, she often goes on dictating to her brother’s family and her own as before, if she does not find her own household duties and her own family sufficient occupation to keep her from doing so. Such is the force of consanguinity among the Manchus, and the position of the daughter in the family.
The unmarried Manchu girl has not only this liberty in her family, but she has more liberty in the outside world than any other Oriental woman.
They are not so restricted in their social intercourse as any other Oriental women, and while they are not so literary as the Chinese, they have more social qualities and are brighter conversationalists, being both witty and gay.
They are not forced to marry against their inclinations and some remain single to the end of their days, or marry late in life if they so desire. These unmarried ladies are not only looked up to by their own families, but they are not regarded as being objects of commiseration by the world at large. On the contrary, they are rewarded with triumphal arches and splendid monuments if they have passed a long and exemplary life of maidenhood. Although the brides that came into the Palace were generally young, one who came to make her bow to the Empress Dowager, while I was there, was a lady of forty-two summers. She had brought up two or three families of brothers’ children and directed their households; but she finally succumbed to the charms of a wealthy official, who had lost his wife two years before and who had a number of children on which she could continue to practise her theories as to their bringing up. Had she held out longer and died a maiden, she might have had an arch built to her memory after death and gone down to posterity.
Only ladies, young girls and boys under seventeen were ever guests of the Empress Dowager in her Palace. The Manchu nobles and high officials were invited on certain days to the Theater, but there was always the high intervening screen between them and Her Majesty’s and the Ladies’ loges. The Princes and nobles who have official positions, see the Empress Dowager in the Audience Hall, and she is now over sixty. She has more liberty than before, but generally their Audiences are with the Emperor alone, and they never come into the Ladies’ Precincts. At the performance of the European circus in the Palace grounds I saw, for the first time, nearly all the Princes and Manchu officials.
The Manchus are a taller race than the Chinese and more athletic-looking. They are fond of exercise, indulge in archery, riding, etc, and do not look down upon a military career, as do the Chinese. It is said that polo playing, which the English got from India, originated among the Tartars, and that it is still played in Manchuria. I never saw polo played by the Manchus, but I have seen some daring riding done by the young nobles that would seem to show they could play polo if they would. The Manchu nobles have an inherited military rank, and they also receive military advancement for proficiency in archery and riding. The warlike spirit that prompted the Manchus and their progenitors, the Nu-Chih Tartars, who not only conquered China, but, as “the Huns,” almost overran Europe itself, is no longer so militant as it was. The modern Manchu is becoming almost as peace-loving as the Chinese themselves, but there are still qualities which show their descent from a race of warriors.
They wear the ordinary Chinese costume, and though it is said “the shaven head and wearing of the queue” were instituted as marks of degradation for the Chinese when they were conquered
