Chapter 4: Elegant And Customary Walking on the Four Roads
Deformed prosperity, deformed population. So in such a Shanghai, there is a more deformed place, shanghai called the Four Roads. To use an old saying to describe this place, in fact, it is more accurate, the big custom is the big elegance. Conversely, Daya may also be a big custom. In 1842, the British forced the Qing government to sign the Treaty of Jiangning, which humiliated the country with ships and cannons, and Shanghai became a port port. Then, in 1843, Madus, a missionary of the London Missionary Society in England, began to preach here, and the place where he was located was called "Evangelistic Street". He opened the "Mohai Bookstore" on Wangping Street near the Fourth Horse Road and hired a group of Luotuo literati, known as "Binghua Pen scholars", to preach and learn. Therefore, when talking about Shanghai culture, we must talk about Madus and "Binghua Penman". Among this group of "Binghua pen scholars", there are several figures who have learned between China and the West and opened up the mountains for China's modern culture, such as Wang Tao and Li Shanlan, and with their foundation, the "Mohai Bookstore" has become the source of Haipai culture. Since then, these "Binghua penmen" have radiated from the "Mohai Library", so that countless newspapers, bookstores, and printing houses have arisen on The Fourth Road, which is only 1453 meters long, and on the nearby Wangping Street. With the rise of the Second Racecourse Hall, which extended the British Concession to The Middle Tibet Road, when the Ministry of Works named the new Fourth Horse Road, the British named Matthew, one of the five directors of the Bureau, suggested changing it to Fuzhou Road. But stubborn Shanghainese still refer to this as The Fourth Road.
Starting at the intersection of Jiangxi Road and Fuzhou Road, there are three buildings of very similar shape and height, all built in the 1930s. On the southeast side of the road is the Hamilden Building, on the northeast side is the Metropolitan Hotel, and on the southwest side is the Construction Building. On April 30, 1872, the British businessman Anast Meicha founded shenjiang xinbao, the oldest Chinese newspaper in modern China, in the area of the third road of Wangping Street on Fuzhou Road. At that time, a group of main writers integrated Chinese and Western media into one, forming a media with local characteristics in Shanghai. Founded in March 1919, the site of the Jing Pao museum is located on the Fourth Road near Henan Middle Road. Four poster men and penmen gathered here. There are more than 100 large and small books and newspapers on the four roads, and the four major newspapers in Shanghai, "Declaration", "News Daily", "Times", and "Shenzhou Daily", are all printed and distributed from here; China's three major bookstores, the Zhonghua Bookstore, the Commercial Press, and the World Bookstore, also publish books here. The pattern of Fuzhou Road Cultural Street was formed.
But what makes The Fourth Road more famous is the fat powder culture, which is very different from the Daya culture mentioned above, that is, brothels. It is said that the prosperity of prostitution in Shanghai began after the Taiping Army occupied the land of Eastern Wu and banned prostitution. The prostitutes of Ning, Su and Yang run to Shanghai and enter the concession, mostly distributed in the middle section of the Four Roads, centered on Huileli in the north of the road and Tongqingli in the south of the road, from Zhongheli in the east to Daxingli in the west, from Gongyangli on the third road in the north to Qingyunli on the fifth road in the south, forming a bright and bright color. The four roads, the cultural shrines of the eastern section, and the flowers and willow warblers in the western section are so discordant but quite harmoniously blended together. Even the "Binghua Penman" in the "Ink Sea Library" is here and happy. Three-inch hair cone porridge food, red sleeves add incense to the night to translate the scriptures, this is the wind flow that can only be found on the four roads, and it is also the story of Shanghai.
At the end of the 19th century, the concession authorities filled in a stinky ditch to expand the road, and between the three roads of Yuqiaqing Road, the fourth road in this area became increasingly prosperous. Some of the families built their own two rows of old-fashioned local houses, named Jinhuili, also known as Huixiangli. Due to the expansion of the French Concession and the public concession, some coachmen, traders, and prostitutes who originally lived in the county town also moved in succession. In 1904, Liu Jingde, a wealthy merchant in Nanxun, Zhejiang Province, bought the real estate of Huijinli, and he demolished the original two rows of local houses and turned them into old-fashioned Lane houses, named Huileli. In 1912, the Ministry of Works bureau again filled in the nichengbang road, and this area became a golden treasure land where merchants gathered, and brothels were also popular, gradually becoming a full circle with Wuma Road (Guangdong Road) and Liuma Road (Beihai Road). In 1924, Liu Jingde funded the demolition of part of the house in Laohui Leli along Fuzhou Road and turned it into a Shikumen house, the exact location of which is from Yunnan Road in the east, YuQiaqing Road in the west, Sanma Road in the north, and Sima Road in the south and named Xinhui Leli, the lane is located in Lane 726 of Sima Road, the main lane is symmetrical to the left and right, and the lane is a simple archway, which reads: East Lane, West Lane. Each horizontal lane is left, right, three, and four horizontal lanes have a total of 28 buildings, all of which are new-style shikumen, and each house is a one-hall house and two-compartment room, and the entrance door has a patio. Liu Jingfu rented out Xinhuileli at a high rent, and from the 1920s to the 1940s, the area around Huileli became a well-known and weathered place in Shanghai Beach.
Immediately adjacent to the three roads is the back lane, commonly known as the old club Leli, which is also two connected lanes. Most of the brothels there are low-level brothels such as the Guide Society and the Pheasant Hall, such as the "Swan" of the second, the "Meixing" of the fourth, and the "Yellow Cat" of the eighth.
However, the 28 houses in Xinhui Leli were magnificent, and all but one of them opened a "Qianyuan Pharmacy", and all the others opened brothels. Whenever the lanterns are first lit, large and small red lanterns are hung all over the alley, and some are changed to neon lights, and their shapes are round, square, and octagonal, and the names of prostitutes are written on them. A lantern was fully written with the prostitute's name. It is said that Sai Jinhua also hovered here in that year, attracting a large number of Shanghai literati to come and witness the style of the former Suzhou "Flower Country Champion".
In the isolated island of Shanghai, almost all the prostitutes here are the leaders of the Japanese army and the puppet government, and the merchants of the rich side are Jia Juhao. After the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the brothels in Huileli developed into their heyday, and it became a place for the Kuomintang to receive large members for fun. There are huge color plates towering at the mouth of the big lane, loaded with countless electric lights, dazzling and dazzling, and competing with the famous advertising lights such as 'red, jade, incense, and qin' in the lane. The tricycles and self-chartered cars in the lane are endless. There are signs hanging in front of each house, and each house has a little name. Of course, brothels are also divided into three, six, nine and so on. The line is divided into Shuyu, Changsantangzi, Yi'er, Bacon Estate, Pheasant and so on. It is said that the most different thing between Shuyu and Changsan is that the girls of Shuyu must all be able to sing songs, which is a necessary condition, when the guests first arrive to know the girl, the girl must first sing a paragraph to the guests, which is called "hall singing", in order to flaunt the high value of the gentlemen here (the maids), they call themselves "Shuyu", the prostitutes call "Sir", it seems that the art is not sold, in fact, it is not necessary, just to see the wealth and value of the guests. It has been a long time, and the friendship between the guest and the girl has been quite tacit, and the girl is willing to stay. And the long three, the starting price here is generally three yuan for tea (silver ocean), three yuan for wine, and three yuan for staying overnight, so it is called "long three". Long three cousins. You don't have to sing. It is easier to stay, but it also takes a considerable amount of time, and after getting acquainted with each other, it is possible to set up a table. It is not very simple, "playing tea wai" is the first step. When the "Long Third" played the tea fence, as soon as the outfield saw a living guest coming, he shouted loudly "Guest arrived" and used the tea bowl in the hall to make a bowl of tea to indicate reception. Playing tea wai does not need to pay immediately, but must have a familiar customer to accompany the line, after playing tea wai, the prostitute will become a prostitute's friend, both can play casually, but also at any time "call the bureau" to answer the call. "Calling the game" is the second step. There are liquor bureaus, card games, and drama games, mainly liquor bureaus. A prostitute calls a servant or a tavern running hall to deliver tickets to a brothel. The bureau ticket is to write the name of the prostitute on the business card of the prostitute who is good, and the prostitute receives the ticket and immediately responds to the call to "get out". Prostitutes are out rain or shine and cannot be pushed away.
"Eating flower wine", or "making flower heads", is the third step. After a period of interaction between the prostitute and the prostitute, he set up a banquet in the brothel and invited his friends to the scene. After serving wine, the prostitute made love to the prostitute. These various sets of rules are the wealth collection of brothel owners and bustards. ChangsanTangzi has always been a place for the lascivious pleasures of dignitaries, rich merchants, and rogue tycoons. Before the war, if Mr. Du asked for 'flower wine' once in Changsantangzi, it would cost five hundred to one thousand yuan based on the silver dollars at that time. Because the consumption of the Changsantangzi is getting higher and higher, and the number of patrons who come and go is also many scholars, over time, many people will confuse the highest-level shuyu with the Changsantangzi. In the end, even the Ministry of Works issued flower photos, and many of the changsantangzi were directly written into books. The most famous anecdote in Xinhui Music is related to a great monk in modern Chinese history, his name is Li Shutong, that is, Master Hongyi, who later became a great monk. He lived in Shanghai in his youth, and was also a frequent visitor to the fireworks field, his literary name was also a social circle spread far away in Shanghai at this time, becoming a famous talent, all of whom were the middle figures in the poetry and wine collection of the literati at that time, and Li Shutong was not an ordinary literati, and the occurrence of "Gengzi Indemnity" made this generation of celebrities in The history of Chinese culture have not forgotten their homeland, and they are also attached to sound. He once wrote this poem in his dealings with a famous prostitute, Xie Qiuyun:
The ups and downs remember the past, repent of the hue causes of the scene;
Ten days of yellow flowers see the shadow, a bent eyebrow lazy voyeuristic.
Ice silk dies first, and the garden is cold and dreamy;
The world is full of tears, for whom to worry for whom?
The prosperity of Huile has formed a service network of eating, drinking, playing and enjoying that adapts to this high consumption. There are Atlantic Cuisine Society, Chinese and Western Cuisine Society, Wanshoushan Restaurant, Indian Restaurant, Queen Cafe, etc.; for accommodation and entertainment are Yangzi Hotel (with dance hall), Yi poinsettia Hotel, Juelu Hotel (with dance hall, marble room, café, etc.), Great China Hotel Tian toad Stage, Queen Grand Theater, etc. In addition, there are pharmacies, flower willow doctor clinics, carpentry shops for brothels to rent, pawnshops, car dealers, laundry workshops, photo studios, barber shops, and fruit shops. There are also more than ten companies that sell drugs, massage parlors, etc., all kinds of people, etc., and there are a mixture of fish and dragons.