by Bangqing Han
Whatever their geographical origin, one factor that featured prominently in the supply of prostitutes was poverty: the sale of female children was a frequent occurrence among desperately poor families, and in years of flood and famine little girls were sold openly on the streets; most of them ended up as servant girls or prostitutes. While some girls were sold by their relatives, others were kidnapped by gangs that specialized in human trafficking. Other factors, however, including family background and personal choice, also led girls into prostitution. The courtesans in sing-song houses were mostly daughters of courtesans and brothel owners who were introduced to the trade from childhood (such as Twin Pearl, Water Blossom, and Aroma), girls sold to brothel owners (such as Green Phoenix, Twin Jade, and River Blossom), or women who voluntarily joined the profession (such as Second Jewel and Flora Zhang). Women in the last group normally started business as free agents who rented rooms in a brothel, but when they ran into debt,14 they would end up in situations little different from girls who had been sold.
For both the young apprentice and the sing-song house, the transition from virgin courtesan to one who offered sexual service was an important occasion. The event was treated like a mock wedding, with large red candles lit in the courtesan’s room. Hence the sing-song house term for the deflowering of a virgin courtesan was “lighting red candles.” The client, who had to pay a substantial amount of money for the privilege, was chosen by the madam with a view to establishing a relatively long term relationship. It was also well known, however, that such occasions were often used to swindle clients. One of the usual ways of doing this was to line up two or more inexperienced clients for defloration and try to pass the courtesan off as a virgin several times over. Another common practice was for the courtesan to arrange for her favorite client to enjoy her services as soon as the defloration night was over so that he would not have to pay the hefty fee.15
While a popular courtesan normally had two or three regular clients and was not supposed to show that she favored any one above the others,16 it was only human nature for her to have preferences, so it is not surprising that courtesans also had romantic attachments. Besides favoring certain clients, they were also known to have relationships with actors, something that was decidedly discouraged and could ruin their careers. In this novel, even the most businesslike of courtesans—Green Phoenix—plays tricks on the house in order to benefit her favorite client,17 while the willful Little Rouge comes to ruin because of her liaison with an actor.
With looks and youth being vital factors in determining a courtesan’s popularity, the length of a courtesan’s career was limited. Normally, there were two exit paths for those who were reasonably good in the business: marrying or setting up their own sing-song house. Since courtesans were used to comfortable surroundings, and the men they met were mostly their clients, marriage for the majority meant becoming a client’s concubine. Though such an arrangement could be for life, there were many cases of courtesans leaving their husbands to return to the trade. Some no doubt made that decision because they could not get along with their husbands’ families; others just missed the relative freedom they had compared with the restrictions placed on a married woman in a large household. As long as their husbands consented to their leaving, they could return to the trade, although some did so without such consent.
Those who wanted to set up their own establishments had to find the necessary funding to buy their own freedom, purchase young apprentice girls, rent a house and all the furnishings, and hire the required staff. Without the generous financial help of their regular clients, at least in the initial stages, such an enterprise was quite impossible.
As for courtesans who were unlucky in business or who became heavily indebted through drug habits and other indulgences, the ending could be extremely miserable. As they lost their looks and popularity, they went down the rungs of the prostitution ladder until they ended up destitute in the streets.
The Owner and the Coterie
The majority of owners of sing-song houses were madams with long experience in the business. Most of them started life either as courtesans or as maids, and as they grew older they bought young girls and set up their own establishments. The family atmosphere of the sing-song houses centered around the madam who was “Mother” to all the girls who worked for her, whether they were her real daughters or just girls she had purchased. One way the madam had of showing ownership was brand-naming: a newly bought girl was given a new name that tied her to the madam and the brothel: the madam’s family name, followed by a personal name that included a word that appeared in the names of the other girls in the house, the same way that real sisters in normal families were named.
Since many courtesans were sold to the sing-song houses as little orphaned girls, the feelings they had for the madam and the house could be somewhat complex, particularly if the madam was not overly exploitive or abusive. The madam, on her part, always stressed the fact that she treated girls sold to her the same as her own daughters. This was of course seldom true, but the fact that young purchased girls represented a long-term investment that might produce very handsome returns over a decade or more did give their owners an incentive to maintain a good relationship with them. Moreover, owners were responsible for members of their houses. If a girl was pushed too hard, she might take the drastic step of ending her life. Should this happen, the madam not only lost out financially but could find herself faced with an investigation and legal consequences.
Maids played a crucial part in the life of a sing-song house. They were familiar with all the daily routines and etiquette and accompanied the courtesans on all party calls as well as helping them entertain at home. The working relationship between courtesan and maid is perhaps best symbolized by this practice: the maid carried the courtesan’s personal silver water pipe and nutmeg box—items essential to entertaining guests at home and at parties—hence, wherever the courtesan went, the maid followed. A maid was usually the best person to smooth over lovers’ tiffs and was often required to intercede during negotiations or quarrels by either suppressing an impetuous courtesan or speaking up for one who failed to stand her ground.18 Though some maids were employees, others had money invested in the establishments or courtesans they worked for. Thus the hierarchical relationship between courtesan and maid could be even more complex than that between madam and courtesan. As a shareholder in the courtesan’s business, the maid, despite her apparently inferior position, could put considerable pressure on the courtesan. This could be one of the reasons that maids had a bad reputation. In addition to being deemed vulgar and ugly, they were also said to be rampantly promiscuous—this despite the fact that most maids were married women.
Besides madams, courtesans, and maids, the sing-song houses had to employ a substantial staff including servant girls, menservants, and sedan-chair bearers. The great majority of servant girls and menservants originated from the countryside and regions around Shanghai. Since job hunting was done almost entirely through personal references and family connections, positions of servant girls and menservants were often filled by the relatives of people who were already working in the brothels. Though the positions were lowly and the pay was low, because of their constant contact with clients these employees received tips on a regular basis. In addition to tipping at the end of each season, clients who spent the night at the brothel were also expected to tip all the servants.
While some sources say that servant girls openly offered sexual services to brothel clients, such a possibility is only hinted at in this novel. Han Bangqing seemed to be of the opinion that no refined client would lower himself to accepting the services of a servant girl (the unrefined, however, were quite another matter).19 In terms of prospects, a servant girl could aspire to becoming a maid after she had learned the necessary grooming skills and knowledge of the trade.
Menservants in the brothels were called by a special term: xiangbang, or helpers. They were responsible for keeping an eye on the front doo
r, announcing the arrival of clients, bringing hot water for tea, serving hot towels, setting tables for dinner, running errands, delivering invitations and call chits, and so on. Menservants were often looked down upon as lacking both brains (if literate, they could be bookkeepers) and physical strength (required for sedan-chair bearers). In the tabloid papers specializing on gossip about brothels, they were frequently accused of indulging in illicit relationships with servant girls and courtesans.
Sedan-chair bearers or ricksha pullers were essential to a sing-song house as courtesans were not supposed to go anywhere on foot. Virgin courtesans were sometimes carried on the backs of menservants to answer party calls, but by far the most frequently used means of transport was the sedan chair. Other employees in the brothel included a cook (homemade food was one element that contributed to the mock-family atmosphere of sing-song houses) and a bookkeeper responsible for accounts and records. They, however, had little direct contact with the clients.
Life in a Sing-song House
The Chinese year followed the lunar calendar, with each year starting in late January or early February. In the brothels, the fiscal year was divided into three seasons, each marked by a major Chinese festival: Dragon Boat Festival in the fifth month (usually early June), Midautumn Festival in the eighth month (usually mid- to late September), and Chinese New Year. At the end of each season, a ceremony was held to honor the money gods by burning paper ingots and incense as offerings. This was also the time for the brothel to audit its books, the maids and servants to be paid, and clients to settle their accumulated bills. On the day of the ritual, a regular client of a courtesan was duty-bound to give a sumptuous dinner party in her room. Since failure to attract such parties was not just a serious loss of face for the girl but might well bring on the wrath of the brothel owner, these could be trying times for the less popular courtesans. (In this novel, there is an example of how a second-class girl relies on her better-connected sister to arrange for a dinner party on such an occasion.) For courtesans who were in demand, however, these were extremely busy times. In addition to parties hosted by their regular clients, they also had to attend those given by their clients’ friends.
Besides the festivals marking the end of the three seasons, second-class houses had another special day in the year: the Chrysanthemum Festival in autumn. This was the only occasion when they could attract wealthy clients (normally too snobbish to visit a second-class house) to give parties on their premises. Pots and bowls of chrysanthemums were piled in a hill formation in the central courtyards where banquets were served.20 Though chrysanthemum viewing was part of the literati tradition in China, the origin of this practice in second-class brothels is unknown.
Another familiar ritual in brothel life was the recitation of Buddhist and Taoist texts, called “treasure scrolls.” This was done on special occasions, such as the birthday of a leading courtesan, and also to ward off evil and cure diseases.
The day in a brothel started late for everyone except the servant girls, who had to do the washing and cleaning before others were on the move. Courtesans normally did not get up till noon, when the maids would comb their hair and help them dress for the day. Until clients began to arrive, they would smoke, sew, play solitaire domino games, or just take naps to while away the time. The working day for a popular courtesan began soon after late breakfast, with clients coming for tea parties or taking them out on trips. At the arrival of a client for a daytime tea party (called “adding teacups”), the courtesan and her coterie were immediately mobilized. Tea was prepared by a servant girl with hot water brought in by a manservant. The courtesan then offered melon seeds and sweetmeats to the client while the maid readied the courtesan’s water pipe for the client’s use.21 Smoking—whether tobacco or opium—was one of the core entertainments for brothel clients. Those who were interested in opium were invited to lie down on the opium divan and smoke opium pellets that the courtesan would roast for him.22 In the case of regular clients who had a long-term relationship with the courtesan, the maid or young virgin courtesans in the house would take over this duty.
Toward evening, courtesans had to prepare for dinner parties held in their own rooms and answer banquet calls from clients attending parties elsewhere. For the latter, call chits made of red paper were delivered by hand, with the courtesan’s name and the location of the party clearly written. Since a courtesan was supposed to entertain but not to eat at dinner parties, she had to have a simple meal before she started her evening rounds. At parties, first-class courtesans would entertain their clients with song and music as well as conversation; some courtesans were even trained to perform excerpts from operas. In most cases, however, the consumption of alcohol remained the core entertainment, and various kinds of drinking games were played. By far the most popular was the extremely noisy finger game that features prominently in this novel: Two opponents would each stick out as many fingers of one hand as they liked, at the same time shouting out what they guessed to be the total number of fingers in a formulaic way. The person who guessed correctly was the winner, and the loser had to drink a penalty cup of wine. While courtesans were not supposed to eat at parties, they and their maids were expected to drink at least some of the penalty wine on behalf of their clients. While literary games also featured in parties among the educated elite, they could not rival the finger game in popularity.
A sought-after courtesan could find herself answering three to four party calls a night in addition to hosting a dinner party in her own room. It was therefore normal for her to retire to bed (sometimes with a client) only in the small hours of the morning. The sedan-chair bearers naturally had to take her to all the parties. As the maids were responsible for attending to the courtesans and their clients and the servants girls for cleaning up, they had to wait till the courtesans retired before they could go to bed.
Call chit for a courtesan called Lin Xin issued from the Meiyuan Restaurant on Fourth Avenue.
The Physical Environment
The better sing-song houses were quite spacious, with rooms spread over several stories. Rooms on the upper floors were considered the best and therefore reserved for the use of courtesans, while rooms on the ground floor and mezzanine were used by maids, servants, and the madam. The kitchen and other service areas were at the back of the house.23 Most of the second-class houses were three stories high and partitioned into a far larger number of rooms than were first-class houses because they normally had a larger number of girls.
Regulations required that a lantern be hung outside the entrance of a brothel as a mark of identification. Since the high-class brothels congregated in a dozen lanes in the western part of Fourth Avenue, this actually created a rather festive atmosphere at night. Doors within the sing-song houses were normally left open throughout the day. To provide some privacy, curtains were hung over the room doors. Depending on the weather, the curtains were made variously of thin cotton or quilted material. At the arrival of a client, menservants would loudly announce it at the front door or in the courtyard, and the client would always head straight for the room of his regular courtesan. A maid or servant girl would accompany him and lift the door curtain for him to enter.
Each courtesan had her own room in which all the daily activities and entertainment, including dinner parties, were held. The standard furnishing for a courtesan’s room included a bed with embroidered curtains, an opium couch, a dressing table, side tables, a dining table (on which a large round tabletop could be placed to create extra seating for parties), a considerable number of chairs, paintings and calligraphy scrolls on the walls, and elaborate lamps or chandeliers. The bed, instead of occupying a corner or one end of the room, served as a partition: the space behind the bed was curtained off as the lavatory area. Trunks for storing clothes and other essentials were also placed here. A back door, used only by members of the house, including the madam, led to the passageway outside. The high-class houses also had an upstairs parlor where larger-scaled banquets or mah-jo
ngg parties were held. Additionally, there had to be a spare room for the popular courtesan who might well have to entertain more than one overnight client.
Etiquette and Manners
One interesting rule about sing-song houses was that once a man patronized a certain girl, her house had the right to send someone to his home or place of business and invite him to visit again. Even if such attempts proved inconvenient to the client, it was not considered harassment. After settling his bills for the season, however, the client would be free to take his patronage elsewhere.
People hosting dinner parties, whether in a sing-song house or a restaurant, were expected to have written invitations delivered by hand to their guests not once but twice. The first was an invitation card listing the day and venue for the party; the second, a note to “hurry the guest,” was sent after the host had arrived at the venue. It was normal practice for guests to set off only after they had received the second note.
When friends met in a sing-song house, the normal rules of manners and etiquette applied. Everyone had to stand up as soon as another guest entered the room. There were three different gestures of greeting. The first, referred to as an “informal salute” (or simply “salute”) in this novel, involved forming a fist with one hand, wrapping the other hand over it, and then slightly moving the joined hands back and forth a couple of times. It is the normal gesture for saying “hello” and “good-bye” as well as “thank you” and was the commonest used among friends. The second gesture involved bowing while performing the “salute.” In cases when someone wanted to acknowledge deep gratitude, the joined hands were raised above the head, and the person bowed as he brought his hands down. In this translation, the term “formal salute” is used to describe this form of greeting. The third gesture of greeting was derived from Manchu practice and used only by some inferiors to greet their employers or elders on very formal occasions. The person performing it knelt on one knee, with head bowed and one hand touching the ground. Finally, there was the kowtow, which was performed as part of certain rites and on special occasions.