Qingchuan Pavilion, Xiaodongmen, Tan Hualin – what was Wuhan like 126 years ago? Han Han, an associate professor at the National Institute of Cultural Development at Wuhan University, accidentally obtained a copy of "Yangtze River Chronicle" while traveling in Italy, which took half a year to translate into Chinese. The author, Mrs. Foster, an Englishman, observes the folk customs, business conditions and social phenomena of Wuhan at close range through the technique of white painting, so that the customs and customs of Wuhan 126 years ago jumped on the paper.
Professor Tu Wenwen, vice president of the China Urban History Research Association and dean of the Wuhan Research Institute of Jianghan University, said that "Yangtze River Chronicle" is an intuitive feeling of missionaries about the city, which belongs to descriptiveness and has certain historical value for the study of Wuhan city. In a recent interview with the Yangtze River Daily, Han Han introduced the relevant situation of the "Yangtze River Chronicle."
The peach farmer stuffed the peaches to show the doctor's gratitude
Han Han shows "Yangtze River Chronicle". Photo by Zhan Song, reporter of The Yangtze River Daily
A peach farmer who sold peaches, carrying a load of peaches to sell at the Hankou wharf, suddenly found that there was a doctor wearing a white coat in the crowd not far away, he immediately put down the pick, held up a dozen peaches with both hands and ran quickly to the crowd, stuffing the peaches in his hands into the hands of the doctor. "Doctor, I am your patient, and you must accept it." The doctor fixed his eyes on the peach farmer in front of him, and there were no peaches that had been picked up. After some pushing and shoving, the doctor had to leave a few peaches.
It turned out that this peach farmer could not see clearly with his eyes because of an eye disease, and it was cured by this doctor half a year ago. The foreign doctor, Ma Genji, from a hospital in Hankou and an experienced ophthalmologist, was recognized by Tao Nong just this time.
Mrs. Foster recorded the small story she saw on the streets of Wuhan and put it in "Yangtze River Chronicle". The Yangtze River Daily reporter found that in writing, Mrs. Foster used the white painting technique, without any comments, and used a series of small stories to tell the Story of Wuhan a hundred years ago.
In addition to the sights and stories of Wuhan City, there are also accounts of major events in the book. Like a major flood, many Wuhan citizens were displaced, and the people of Hankou crowded on the roof of the city tower of Dazhimen.
The old photo of Harukawakaku is still clearly visible
Tan Hualin in "Yangtze River Chronicle". Photo by Zhan Song, reporter of The Yangtze River Daily
The Hankou Trade Union in "Yangtze River Chronicle". Photo by Zhan Song, reporter of The Yangtze River Daily
HarukawaKaku in "Yangtze River Chronicle". Photo by Zhan Song, reporter of The Yangtze River Daily
"Two thousand years ago, when the ancient Britons hunted in our forests and the Druids made sacrifices to appease the wrath of the gods, China was one of the civilized nations. Among the people dressed in silk satin, the dragon and phoenix lived in the jade of Qionglou; their children could read and write well, and were proficient in the classic meanings of their country. The Chinese emperor lived in a palatial palace, and the officials behaved politely. Thus China had long been ahead of Britain, and before europeans could invent it, gunpowder, the nautical compass and the printing press were already in China. Published in 1899, "The Chronicle of the Yangtze River" has turned yellow and discolored, and on the cover is a fisherman playing fishing in a net on the Yangtze River, and Mrs. Foster writes about her respect for Chinese culture at the beginning.
The work contains 13 chapters detailing the folklore, customs and urban layout of Wuhan in the late Qing Dynasty, including 64 precious photographs and steel engravings. In these photographs, the roofs of Harukawa-kaku, Kameyama, and Tanhualin Church are clearly visible. Especially Harumina Pavilion and Tan Hualin, the history has gone through a hundred years, and the wind and things are still the same.
"From the current point of view of Wuhan, far beyond Mrs. Foster's expectations, looking back at history, we can clearly see the great progress of the Chinese people." Han Han was relieved to say that knowing Wuhan's past would make her love For Wuhan and her future even more.
What is the goblet on Zhang Zhidong's table?
In the book, the goblet on the table next to Zhang Zhidong, the governor of Huguang, is quite eye-catching. Photo by Zhan Song, reporter of The Yangtze River Daily
Han Han introduced that at that time, the camera pixels were not high, and it belonged to lithograph chromatic printing in printing, and the pixels were further attenuated, but this was already the most advanced printing level at that time. The cover of "Yangtze River Chronicle" not only has a red-skinned version, but also a green-skinned version and a gilded version, indicating that it has been republished many times.
In the "Chronicle of the Yangtze River", there is a photo of Zhang Zhidong, the governor of Huguang, which is quite eye-catching. Zhang Zhidong was sitting precariously in civilian clothes, two bookchildren behind him holding goblets, and on the table next to him were also placed goblets filled with liquids. "It can be concluded that the goblet is filled with either foreign wine or coffee, and perhaps he is receiving foreign guests, which shows that the life of Zhang Zhidong, the leader of the western affairs movement, is also civilized." Han Han analyzed that Mrs. Foster should have had contacts with Zhang Zhidong, she admired Zhang Zhidong's establishment of Hanyang Iron Works, although there were no photos, but in the text expression, she praised the largest iron factory in Asia, believing that the iron factory was the most beautiful skyline in the city. It can be seen that as one of the cities with the most industrial heritage in the world, Wuhan has a deep industrial history.
In 1897, Mrs. Foster, who lived with her husband in Wuhan, founded Yixun Academy in Wuchang Tan Hualin. According to records, Yixun Academy changed several times, that is, it was later Wuhan Twenty-one Middle School.
The pen and ink of Wuhan in the water occupies more than half
The customs and customs of Wuhan in "The Chronicle of the Yangtze River". Photo by Zhan Song, reporter of The Yangtze River Daily
Han Han's acquisition of the Yangtze River Chronicle was an accident. Han Han told the Yangtze River Daily reporter that in 2015, when he was traveling in Italy, he happened to see the book in a used bookstore in Milan, which cost 7 euros. The title page states that the book is not for sale, and is a New Year's gift from Mary Amy and George Meadhawk to a school in January 1899, and the two donors donated a total of 6 books to the school, the fifth of which he collected, and whether the 6 books are all "Yangtze River Chronicles" is currently untested.
Han Han searched and found that at present, the book is only collected by the British Library, and a few university libraries in the United States can provide electronic versions of the literature, and in the English, French and Italian academic circles, the book has been mentioned 7 times by different scholars since its publication. The 2016 book Female Traveller, published in English, describes the book as follows: "There is no doubt that this work is very rare due to its age; we have not found a paper version of it in the UK, and the book has not been recorded by Chinese, and in the worldcat (international library system), there are currently only two copies on paper, at Yale University and the University of California, Berkeley. ”
"Although it is called 'Yangtze River Chronicle', the pen and ink about Wuhan accounts for most of it, and shanghai, Nanjing, Wuxi and other cities in the Yangtze River Basin have only a small part of the content." A total of 210 pages and 120,000 words, "Yangtze River Chronicle" introduces the customs and customs of Wuhan in the late Qing Dynasty and the changes in modern society with a large amount of ink, and Han Han believes that this book is a new historical material for the study of Wuhan's urban history, but some of the wording is more extreme and the position is also biased.
Cover of "Yangtze River Chronicle".
Dialogue >>>
The author's descendants had the opportunity to come to Wuhan
You will be amazed at the magnificence of Wuhan today
Reporter: In Mrs. Foster's "Yangtze River Chronicle", why does the pen and ink used in Wuhan exceed other cities a lot?
Han Han: Mrs. Foster has a Chinese name, fu zhai. In this book, Wuhan accounts for most of the pen and ink, because she mainly lives in Wuhan, and her husband Fu Shide is a pastor sent to Wuhan by the British Christian "London Mission", and both husband and wife live in Wuhan. Fooshid submitted a report to the British Parliament at the time on the Chinese of opium cruelty, advising the British government to ban the sale of opium to China on humanitarian grounds, and listed his shocking observations in Wuhan. The British authorities ignored the report. The report is currently in the Cambridge University Library, and I've had the pleasure of reading the full text.
Reporter: At that time, what kind of development position was Wuhan in the whole country?
Han Han: At that time, Wuhan, as an emerging city, should belong to the "first-class and second-tier" cities in China, and the "first-class" lies in the fact that Wuhan is an important town along the river, and the Yangtze River is an important economic belt in China in modern times. The Hanyang Iron Works established by Zhang Zhidong was a "unicorn" enterprise in China at that time, and it was not controversial that Wuhan was among the first-class cities. Fu Zhai thought the same thing, and in the book she described Zhang Zhidong and the influence of his iron works at the time. The "second line" is because Wuhan is not close to the sea, not one of the first "five ports of trade" and one of the first cities to open ports, so there is still a big gap between foreign exchanges and economic and trade exchanges with Shanghai, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and other cities at that time. However, it is worth mentioning that Wuhan, with the waterway of the Yangtze River and the Han River, formed a channel of communication between the cities in The hinterland of China and the Western world at that time. As recorded in the book, many Western travelers to China went from Wuhan to Changsha, Hengzhou (i.e., Hengyang) and Ankang.
Reporter: What are the differences between the folk customs, business conditions and social phenomena of Wuhan described in the book and wuhan now?
Han Han: As far as I know, the folk customs, business conditions, and social phenomena in Wuhan at that time were of course quite different from those of now. As recorded in the book, at that time, Wuhan had a "beggar gang" group running rampant in the city, and every flood would bring a large number of victims and even displaced people, and the economy of Wuhan in the late Qing Dynasty was not developed, and the Wuchang and Hanyang areas still had a large number of handicrafts based on the traditional small-scale peasant economy, which was generally relatively backward. However, the spirit of the people of Wuhan who endure hardships and stand hard work and dare to fight has been passed down to this day, and the book records the hard work of some businessmen at that time, getting up early and getting dark, which is easy to think of the "flat burden" and "blind man" of Hanzheng Street, some pioneers of the early reform and opening up of the Wuhan market economy.
Reporter: How did the author embody the corruption in late Qing society?
Han Han: In the late Qing Dynasty, China fell into a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society, and social contradictions reached the extreme, and Wuhan was certainly no exception. The author uses cold ink to describe the social problems caused by this polarization, on the one hand, the displaced people are living in the broken shed on the gate of Dazhimen, on the other hand, the Eight Immortals Table Flowing Water Mat, the "Zhumen Wine Meat Smell" of sea cucumber shark fin wine. The "London Mission" was an influential overseas Chinese organization in China at that time, and the author and his wife were the guests of many local officials and local squires, so some of her descriptions I think are basically credible.
Reporter: Are Mrs. Foster's descendants still related to Wuhan?
Han Han: It's a pity that at present, I have not made any contact with Mrs. Foster's descendants, and I hope that they will have the opportunity to come to Wuhan to see. If their descendants are willing to travel to Wuhan, they will be surprised by the magnificence of Wuhan today.
Reporter: As a Wuhan native, how do you evaluate this old book from more than 100 years ago?
Han Han: Our family has been rooted in Wuhan for more than 70 years, and I am full of feelings for the city of Wuhan. This "Yangtze River Chronicle" was translated by me during the prevention and control of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, and it has a very different life experience for me. Therefore, I believe that from the former "Yanjiang New City" to the "Oriental Chicago" to the "Hero City", the future of Wuhan in the new era can be expected, and now Wuhan, as an international metropolis, has received countless international travelers, and they have praised Wuhan on social media, which I think Mrs. Foster never expected.
Reporter: What are the difficulties in translating and publishing "Yangtze River Chronicle"?
Han Han: Because I came from a background in literature and history, and I also briefly did religious research and published English academic monographs, the translation and collation work was relatively smooth, one of the difficulties was that it involved a large number of folk letters and poems, I needed to restore it to the literary language, and the other was that many Western travelers at that time had Chinese names after coming to China, and I needed to examine their Chinese names one by one. After the translation, the publisher, Wuhan Publishing House, invited Professor Su Yan of Central China Normal University to proofread the translation, which has been finalized. In today's era of "best-selling is king", I am particularly touched by their willingness to publish this dusty book on the history of Wuhan city.
(Yang Jiafeng, reporter of Yangtze River Daily)
【Editor: Deng Laxiu】
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