CLEVELAND COURIER
OUR COMIC SECTION
Our Pet Peeve
FINNEY OF THE FORCE A Lot With Perpetual Care
THE FEATHERHEADS That Proves They Were No Good
Passenger-Carrying Wheelbarrows in Szechwan.
(Prepared by the National Geographic
Society. Washington, D. C.)
j f—JEW lem nations in feeding have and a greater clothing prob- their
citizens tliau a single province
In China, Szechwan, where
I approximately 00.000,(100 people live
I isolated behind great mountain bar
! riers. Szediwan is the western
I most of the provinces of the middle
| zone of China, lying over against,
, Tibet. None other of the divisions of
i the great republic has so many in
; habitants.
There is n most Intensive, if primi¬
tive, domestic commerce in Szechwan,
ind millions of ttie laborers of the
; province spend their lives on its roads.
’ hearing burdens on their hacks or
pushing lhe wheelbarrows which sup¬
ply ttie only wheels that ever touch
[he network of roads and trails.
| Sharing with these carriers the bur
Ion of tiie nation’s life is the prover
hiai "Man with the Hoe,” usually a
poor tenant giving half tils crop for the
rent of his acre. Frequently, how
ever, tie is able to own his own Iniple
; ments and a water buffalo, with widen
he plows his own and his neighbor's
plot, receiving In turn his neighbor's
; help In seed time and harvest.
Still others, and on the rich Chengtu
plain they are numerous, are wealthy
| farmers, who live in fine homes and
| till their estates with the help of sons
and grandsons or with hired servants.
To these farmers is given the task
of feeding a nation of 00,000,000 peo
for Szechwan, Isolated by moun¬
tain barriers, must be self-sustaining.
The measure of this task is appreci¬
ated when we consider that fully 50
per cent of the 181,000 square miles of
Szechwan is too mountainous for culti¬
vation, which means that these 60,000.
XX) are sustained on an area less than
one-half that of the state of Texas.
Add to tills condition his lack of
scientific knowledge and the primitive
Implements with which lie labors, as i
well as the necessity of securing and
returning to the soil, as fertilizers, nil
that lie reaps from it; remember, also,
that rice, his chief cereal crop, is the
most difficult of all cereals to produce,
especially in a country where the hilts
must be terraced and water lifted to
fill the paddy fields, and it becomes
evident that the Szechwan farmer's
task is next to impossible and its ac¬
complishment little short of a miracle.
Rich Soil and Plenty of Rain.
He is, however, favored with a tem
perate climate all the year and a
naturally rich soil, an atmosphere
saturated with moisture, an abundant
rainfall, and a never-failing supply of
water for irrigation from the melting
snows on the mountain near by.
He produces nearly every vegetable
and grain found in our market and
others to which we are strangers. The
fruits that are ours are his also.
Apples are few and poor in quality,
but the persimmon and orange are
second to none and are produced in
great abundance. One thousand
oranges on the upper Yangtze can be
purchased for 50 cents,
He knows little of the science of
gardening, but much of its method.
By interplanting, especially beans and
pears, which he knows improves the
quality of the soil; by crop rotation,
which he knows increases his yield,
and by intensive fertilizing and the
sowing of vetch in the fallow season,
he manages to keep his fields rich
and raises from two to six crops a
year. He Iris made Szechwan known
as the Garden of Asia, the land where
famine never comes.
The tenant farmer pays his rent
with the major portion of tils rice,
i which is the master crop and his chief
j concern and joy in life. In the early
I spring tie plows his paddy fields, and
j then prays for rains to flood them,
offering incense to tlie god of the gar
i den. whose shrine is built near by.
When rain and gods fail him, he
| sets to work with endless-chain, foot
; treadle pumps, laboriously lifting into
I his terraced fields the water that he
j has conserved in the valley. Then,
j breaking up the rice sod, which has
i been grown front early sowing in
j ! highly it in hills fertilized in the watered plots, he paddy transplants fields.
| The roily water makes tiie hoeing of
; bis rice field impossible; so he does
* not boe it; he toes it. With bare foot
lie feels about the plant with his toes,
and if he finds a weed, lie toes it out;
then presses the dirt firmly in place
again. With his right foot he toes two
rows, with his left foot he toes two
rows, and thus he toes four rows as
be goes. That’s the way he hoes.
For the harvest the farmers combine
and render mutual assistance. The
rice is cut with the sickle, gathered
in bundles, and the grain beaten out
by striking it upon slats in the center
of a large bin which is pulled along
after tiie threshers. Dried upon bam¬
boo mats, rolled and cleaned, it is then
ready to be transported to market.
Salt Industry at "Flowing Weil.”
About midway between Chung king
and Chengtu the traveler in Szechwan
is templed by the long train of salt
carriers to turn aside and see the
renowned salt industry at Tszliu-ehing,
which means “Flowing Well.” Its
origin is lost in antiquity, being first
mentioned in the reign of the Minor
Han dynasty in Szechwan, A. D.
221-205.
With Its forest of derricks, it re¬
sembles an oil boom town. The wells
have been drilled by foot power to a
depth of 2.400 feet for brine, and
about 2,800 for natural gas, which is
used exclusively for the evaporation
of tiie brine.
Salt is the unfailing source of gov¬
ernment revenue and its production
is guarded most Jealously to prevent
monopoly. The proprietor of tiie salt
well cannot own a gas well or evap¬
orating plant Likewise, the owner of
the gas well or evaporating plant can
not engage in the other branches of
tiie Industry, thus making each de
pendent upon the other and prevent¬
ing family or government control.
There are no flowing wells now, the
brine being lifted in bamboo buckets
about 50 feet in length, and 4 to 5
inches in diameter. The power is sup¬
plied by water buffaloes, hitched in
fours to a 60-foot horizontal drum,
about which the rope fastened to the
bucket winds as the animals are beat
en around the circle at a wild gallop,
The magnitude of the industry may
be gleaned from the fact that every
family demands Its weekly pound of
salt, and that many tons are exported
each month to other provinces.
lieturning once more to the Big road
and passing without comment Its
towns and cities, located about ten
miles apart, one conies to Chengtu, the
Perfect capital, a vice-regal city of
half a million people, ruling over
Szechwan and Tibet. It is surround
ed by n finely constructed brick wall,
35 to 40 feet in height, with a thick
ness at the top of 20 feet and a cir¬
cumference of more than nine miles.
Chengtu is an ancient capital, its
first recorded wall being built 2,315
years ago. Marco I’olo described it
as a trinity of cities beautifully em
beliislied. Its approaches were carved
marble bridges Which spanned Its
moat. Its wall, nearly 20 miles in
circumference, inclosing a population
of more than a million, was surround
ed by rows of hibiscus trees, which
in autumn bloom made it the
hroklered City.” a name that has long
outlived the wall ami its trees. Some
conception of tiie toil required to erect
such a wall may be gained from the
historical records, which state that the
construction of one of Its extensions,
eight miles in length, required an
army of 100,000 men and 9.000.000
days’ work.
Ancient Irrigation System.
Chengtu has given its name to the
plain on which it stands. This plain
is said to have one of the finest and
most ancient systems of irrigation in
the world. It was perfected about
200 B. C. by Li Ping, who has since
become the patron saint of Chengtu
—the only instance, perhaps, where
a civil engineer has become a patron
saint. He divided the Min into three
great delta systems of rivers atul
canals, which radiate to all parts of
the SO-mile plain. The waters are
united again in two main streams,
which leave the southwest and south¬
east borders of the plain by the Min
and the Lin rivers. He left tiie peo¬
ple this motto for regulating the
canals: “Keep the banks low and
the bottom clean”; and this wise coun¬
sel has prevented the disastrous floods
of ancient times, while furnishing a
never-failing supply of mountain water
for the fields.
Ft is not, however, this fertile plain,
with its irrigation and teeming mil¬
lions; nor tiie city, with its ancient
culture and modern shops; nor yet tiie
wail that claims chief consideration,
but a modern institution, the Christian
college, rising just beside it; for, in¬
teresting as is Old China, with its
walled-in peoples and civilization, it
holds no such world significance as
the China of today, which such insti¬
tutions have in large measure made
possible.
When your
Children Ciy
It
Castoria is a comfort when Baby is
fretful. No sooner taken than the little
one is at ease. If restless, a few drops
soon bring contentment. No harm done,
for Castoria is a baby remedy, meant
for babies. Perfectly safe to give the
youngest infant; you have the doctors’
word for that! It is a vegetable pro¬
duct and you could use it every day.
But It’s in an emergency that Castoria
means most. Some night when consti¬
pation must be relieved—or colic pains
—or other suffering. Never be without
it; some mothers keep an extra bottle,
unopened, to make sure there will al¬
ways be Castoria in the house. It is
effective for older children, too; read
the book that comes with it.
CASTORIA
Must Move Whole City
to Reach Herculaneum
What to do witli the city of Resina,
the heart of which is exactly over the
dead heart of Herculaneum, is the
problem that is bothering the excava¬
j tors of tiie ancient city. The excava¬
j tions, under the direction of Professor
Ventimiglia, have reached a point
where the present Inhabitants are in
the way.
! Fully 15.000 people are on the site
of the city that was overwhelmed by
the great Vesuvius eruption nearly
2,000 years ago. New homes must lie
found for them, property owners must
be compensated, and churches, cafes
j and tenements must be carted piece¬
j meal away.
Already Professor Ventimiglia is
i having houses at the edge of the city
j removed, one at a time, but tiie prob¬
| lem of the disposition of the heart of
the city is still to be solved.
; Favor American Machete*
: Machetes, heavy knives which orig¬
j inated In tiie tropics and were widelly
used in South America for virtually
! every conceivable cutting purpose, are
i most popular in Brazil when of Amer¬
ican make. About 1,500 are bought
: monthly and hardware dealers stock
sharp, clean machetes imported from
I the United States.
How About the Rest?
He—You liked my new book?
[ She—I did—those quotations from
I Tennyson and Longfetlow were mar¬
j velous.
!
| | Second sight is the only cure for
i a case of love at first sight.
j
:
I
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