reliefs etc. (Vide separate notices on individual species, and also the Author’s Chinese Metaphorical Zoology, Journal, N. C. B. Royal Asiatic Society, 1919, p. 26.)
Birth
(生子)
The birth of a child, particularly a son, is regarded by the Chinese as a highly fortunate event (喜事), on which great importance is placed owing to the necessity for the continuity of the worship of the family ancestors, which is the underlying principle of the system of Chinese ethics (vide ANCESTRAL WORSHIP). The youthful scion of the race is therefore regarded as the apple of the eye, and protected by all manner of talismans and safeguards against the spirits of evil everywhere said to be intent on encompassing the death of unsuspecting infants (vide CHARMS).
In early ages it was the custom to announce the birth of a son by hanging a bow at the door; and the emblem of male supremacy, a valuable malachite ornament (障), like a marshal’s bâton, was given to him to play with. The arrival of a daughter into this vale of tears was regarded as of secondary importance, and a curved tile, used as a weight for the spindle, and constituting the emblem of the female, was considered suitable as a plaything in her case. It is probable that these emblems are connected with an ancient form of phallic worship, which forms the basis of so many religions.
On the hundredth day after the birth of a male infant, a tray containing various small articles of apparel, toilet, etc., used by males and females, is placed before him, and, whatever article the child grasps is considered to indicate his character in after life.
The following customs connected with the birth of children are prevalent in Foochow. When a family has a daughter married since the fifteenth day of the previous year, who has not yet given birth to a male infant, a present of several articles is sent to her by her relatives on a lucky day between the fifth and fourteenth of the first month. The articles sent are as follows: a paper lantern bearing a picture of the Goddess of Mercy, KUAN YIN (q. v.), with a child in her arms, and the inscription,“May Kuan Yin present you with a son” (觀音送子), oysters in an earthenware vessel; rice-cakes; oranges; and garlic. The oysters (螺), having the same sound, dì, in the local dialect, as “younger brother” (佛) signify “May a younger brother come.” The earthen vessel xiāo (碑), stands for “to come” in the patois. The cakes, gāo (糕), represent “elder brother” (哥), and imply “May you have more than one son.”The oranges, jú (佶), stand for the word “speedily” (急); and the garlic, suàngēn (蒜根), for “grandchildren and children” (孫兒). In the second year, if there are still no children in spite of all these auspicious arrangements, a lantern is presented bearing a device and the inscription,“The child seated in the tub” (孩兒坐盆), a reference to the wooden tub which generally receives the Chinese baby at the time of birth. In the third year an orange-shaped lantern (梧燈) is sent. An offering of sugar-cane, which is long and in many sections (節節高), signifies “many elder brothers” (as many as the sections); flowers of the rape (油菜花), having “many seeds” (多子) imply “many sons”; beancurd, dòufû (豆腐), has the same sound as “sure to have” in the local parlance, and infers that a son is certain to arrive eventually. From such origins many of the common Chinese emblems are derived. A piece of porcelain, scroll, or silk bed-spread, decorated in various colours with the pleasing design of the hundred infants (百子圖), will also express the hope for the blessing of numerous offspring, and at the same time there is an allusion to the golden age of Yao and Shun, when the people of China lived in such prosperity that scholars, farmers, and merchants alike felt as light-hearted as little children. There are actually only 99 children in the design, in reference to Wén Wáng (文王), Duke of Zhōu, 1231–1135 B.C., who had 99 children of his own, and adopted one more, whom he found in a field after a thunderstorm.
Bodhi Tree
(菩提樹)
The Bôdhi or Bo Tree, Sanskrit, Bôdhidruma, the Tree of Intelligence, was a pippala or peepaul-tree (Ficus religiosa, Willd.), and is so called because under it SHÂKYAMUNI BUDDHA (q. v.), the Indian prince, seeking to be emancipated from the sorrows and agonies of life and the evanescence of worldly pleasures, first attached Bôdhi (Enlightenment). Shâkyamuni spent a penance of seven years under its shade before he became a Buddha. Hence it is also known as the Tree of Meditation (思惟樹). The original tree grew near Gaya in Bengal, and “a slip of it was taken and planted in the sacred city of Amarapoora in Burmah, 288 B.C. This is said to be still in existence.”21
As the founder of Buddhism sat and and reflected under the spreading boughs, “peace came to his mind with the conviction that man is tormented by greed for gain or by sorrow for loss simply because he is held captive within the narrow limits of self-interest, and that beyond this captivity stretches out a vast expanse of universal life. But life itself never dies, since it persists in the lives of those who have grasped the truth and found the real life in that which is common to all.”22
Buddhism is said to have been introduced into China from India in the reign of the Emperor Míng Dì (明帝), A.D. 58–76 of the Eastern Hàn Dynasty. It is fundamentally a religion of meditative training, charity, gentle words, benevolence, and common benefit, though in China it has undergone considerable modifications (vide SHÂKYAMUNI BUDDHA).
Bó Gû Tú
(博古圖)
A well-known work in twenty volumes, containing about 900 plates of bronze vases, tripods, bottles, mirrors, etc., used or made during the Shāng, Zhōu and Xià Dynasties. It was from this publication that Mr. P. P. Thoms compiled his work, A Dissertation on the Ancient Chinese Vases of the Shang Dynasty from 1743 to 1496 B. C., illustrated with 42 Chinese wood engravings, London, 1851. Mr. Thoms also wrote on this subject in the Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, Nos. 1 and 2, in 1834. Mr. Thoms remarks in his book that “in the early periods of Chinese history, a custom seems to have prevailed of interring with the dead honorary vases, which reposed with them for ages; but during the civil wars, more particularly that about A.D. 200, the graves of the ancient monarchs and eminent statesmen were dug up and their ashes dispersed; then there were many of these ancient relics discovered, and a new order of things having been established, they have been preserved to the present period. Regarding them merely on account of their symmetry and style of ornament, they cannot fail to be interesting to all who attach a value to what is ancient; while their inscriptions establish, unquestionably, the fact that the present Chinese written character is derived from hieroglyphical representations.” The Bó Gû Tú contains illustrations and much valuable information concerning the symbolic meaning of various forms of ornament. It was compiled by Wáng Fú (王髓), an archaeologist and art critic of some repute.
Books
(書)
Professor F. Huberty James, of the Imperial University of Peking, wrote of Chinese literature in 1899:“It is the legitimate offspring of the ultra-oriental mind, the expression of the Chinese heart, the story of the home-life, school-life and national life of half the population of Asia. It is the precious, though fragmentary, record of the hopes and fears, the doubts and convictions, the struggles and labours, the victories and defeats, the songs and laments, the dreams and visions, the feasts and fasts, the vanities and realities, alternately blessing and cursing, musing or deluding, inspiring or depressing the souls of countless millions of pilgrims on their passage through this world to the vast and wondrous future.”
Scholastic acquirements have always been deeply venerated in China, and the written character is regarded as sacred; it is therefore considered in accordance with propriety that all waste paper
