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90. The Chinese villager does not set great store by cleanliness, or better housing; he finds himself entirely unable to understand our aims and ideas, and our dismal condi- tion of unrest: he frankly dislikes our iconoclastic spirit, our want of imagination, and our blindness to all the forces of nature: be fears the inquisitions of the Police, and dreads the hought of the Sanitary Board; but he does recognise some solid advantages from British rule-chiefly in the security of life and property, and the greater prosperity which has accrued from restrictions placed on gambling and opium smoking.
91 The domestic life of the villager does not differ much from that of Chinese in other parts of China, nor has it altered much during the few years of British occupation : if anything, it falls rather behind the general standard of freedom and enlightenment in the Canton province.
For this South corner of the San On District, which is now the New Territory, was a remote and rugged country, far from the seat of government and learning in Canton, and (before the cession of Hongkong) little touched by external influence and even now the customs and habits of the people are probably little changed from what they were a hundred years ago.
92. A Chinese community like that of the New Territories is by its structure and its long habit of decentralised government very easy to administer. But its old established customs and institutions must not be lightly changed or affronted, and necessary innovations have to be introduced with the greatest delicacy.
In the New Territories as elsewhere continuous descent in the male line is the para- nount object in the life of the Chinese, and the necessity for this is the foundation for many of their habits and customs: respect for age and experience is their second characteristic. The father of the family is the supreme head, and his sons come next in position and estima- tion: the mother of the family reigns supreme, by virtue of her years and her share in the continuance of the family, over the feminine establishment, and often proves a tyrant to her daughter-in-law. It is the object of every living male to provide himself with an heir; if he dies before marriage or has no male issue, he must be provided with an heir by adoption.
93. As a rule in the Territory, the villager has only one wife, with a concubine occasion- ally added owing to the barrenness of the first wife: but there are a few rich residents who can afford larger establishments. Marriages are arranged by the parents of the two parties, and a certain money consideration passes to the father or relations of the bride: the average ages of marriage are about 19 and 17 for man and wife respectively but among the poorer Hakka population the practice of infant betrothals is common. The girl in such case is regarded as belonging to her destined husband's family, but continues to reside with her parents, until she is of an age to cohabit with her husband: unless her parents die first, when she enters the house of her future husband as an "expectant" wife. The large proportion of seagoing folk among the population leads to a number of betrothals not being carried through, and it has become usual to fix seven years as the limit of time that a girl é; she can then give six months notice to the relations of the latter, and if nothing
eard of him, she can arrange a marriage with someone else. The greatest trouble to ministration has come from runaway wives. The loosening of the bonds of custom and the dermining of male authority which are inevitable results of our rule, have left the injured husband in a difficult position. By the Ordinances providing penalties for harbouring married women, he has obtained some redress, but the evil has not been remedied.
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94. The Chinese point of view which regards the woman as a chattel, and recognises the right of a husband to sell or mortgage his concubine and a father his daughter, is one that may appear repulsive to the Western conscience: but both steps are according to Chinese ideas fully justified on grounds of infidelity and of poverty respectively; and it is likely to be long before the social position of women enables them entirely to escape this fate.
But hereditary slavery, equivalent to our old "villeinage", has been abolished in China by Imperial Edict on several occasions and is now practically extinct, so far as the New Territories are concerned. The abandonment or poisoning of young children is still not unknown in some parts; it is sometimes due to the disease or deformity of the infant, but more often to jealousy between the wives of the establishment.
95 The desire for posterity already mentioned is connected with that ancestor worship which is the first religious duty of the Chinese; and it is the chief duty of the male heir to provide for this; in the 3rd moon, and sometimes in the 9th, he visits the ancestral grave and worship there; presenting copious supplies of rice and pork and other delicacies which the ancestor consumes in the spirit only, and he and his relations then devour in the flesh.