River of Smoke it-2

by Amitav Ghosh

  Bahram shook his head. You are putting too much on my shoulders, Zadig Bey. I can only speak for myself – not for anyone else. Certainly not for all of Hindusthan.

  But you will have to do it Bahram-bhai, said Zadig. And not just for Hindusthan – you will have to speak for all of us who are neither British nor American nor Chinese. You will have to ask yourself: what of the future? How do we safeguard our interests in the event of war? Who will win, the Europeans or the Chinese? The power of the Europeans we have seen at work, in Egypt and in India, where it could not be withstood. But we know also, you and I, that China is not Egypt or India: if you compare Chinese methods of ruling with those of our Sultans, Shahs and Maharajas, it is clear that the Chinese ways are incomparably better – government is indeed their religion. And if the Chinese manage to hold off the Europeans, what will become of us, and our relations with them? We too will become suspect in their eyes. We who have traded here for generations, will find ourselves banned from coming again.

  Bahram laughed. Zadig-bhai you’ve always been too much of a philosopher; I think it’s because you spend so much time staring at those clocks of yours – you look too far ahead. You can’t expect me to make decisions based on what might happen in the future.

  Zadig looked Bahram straight in the eye. But there is another question too, isn’t there, Bahram-bhai? The question of whether it is right to carry on trading in opium? In the past it was not clear whether the Chinese were really against it. But now there can be no doubt.

  There was something in Zadig’s voice – a note of disapproval or accusation – that made Bahram smart. He could feel himself growing heated now and having no wish to provoke a quarrel with his old friend, he forced himself to lower his voice.

  How can you say that, Zadig-bhai? Just because an order has come from Beijing does not mean that all of China is for it. If the people were against it, then the opium trade wouldn’t exist.

  There are many things in the world, Bahram-bhai, that do exist, despite the wishes of the people. Thieves, dacoits, famines, fires – isn’t it the task of rulers to protect their people from these things?

  Zadig Bey, said Bahram, you know as well as I do that the rulers of this country have all grown rich from opium. The mandarins could stop the trade tomorrow if they wanted to: the reason they have allowed it to go on is because they make money from it too. It’s not in anyone’s power to force opium on China. After all, this is not some helpless little kingdom to be kicked around by others: it is one of the biggest, most powerful countries on earth. Look at how they constantly bully and harass their neighbours, calling them ‘barbarians’ and all that.

  Yes, Bahram-bhai, said Zadig quietly. What you say is not untrue. But in life it is not only the weak and helpless who are always treated unjustly. Just because a country is strong and obdurate and has its own ways of thinking – that does not mean it cannot be wronged.

  Bahram sighed: he realized now that one of the ways in which Canton had changed for him was that he would not be able to speak freely to Zadig any more.

  Let’s talk about other things, Zadig-bhai, he said wearily. Tell me, how is business?

  *

  From the deck of the Redruth the island looked like a gigantic lizard, with its immense, rearing head thrust into the sea and its mountainous spine curving into a curling tail.

  The brooding peaks and cloud-wreathed crags were like a magnet to Paulette from the start. The attraction was difficult to explain for there was little of interest to be seen on those desolate scrub-covered slopes. The vegetation was sparse and lacking in interest: such trees as there may once have been had been hacked down by the people who lived in the impoverished little villages that were scattered around the island’s rim. They had done a thorough job of it too, for almost nothing remained now but a few stunted trunks and wind-twisted branches. Apart from that, the slopes seemed to offer nothing but scree and scrub – and the two were sometimes almost indistinguishable in colour, now that the greenery had turned a dull autumnal brown.

  To the north of the bay where the Redruth was anchored lay several villages, on the shores of the promontory of Kowloon. A couple of times a day bumboats would paddle across the channel to offer provisions: chickens, pigs, eggs, quinces, oranges, and many different kinds of vegetable. The boats were mostly rowed by women and children, and except when it came to the matter of bargaining, the villagers were usually quite friendly. But when on land their attitude changed; they had had bad experiences with drunken foreign sailors and as a result they were apt to treat landing parties with suspicion and even outright hostility. The few foreigners who had rowed over to Kowloon had had an uncomfortable time of it, being followed everywhere with chants of gwai-lou, faan – gwai and sei-gwai-lou!

  On Hong Kong, by contrast, visitors could be sure of being left alone since it was so sparsely inhabited. The stretch of land that lay closest to the Redruth for instance was empty of habitation. The nearest hamlet was a good distance away: it was not much more than a clump of dilapidated little hutments, surrounded by rice fields. Although there was little there to attract mainlanders, the island offered something of inestimable value to the foreign ships: good clean drinking water, which was to be had in abundance from the many clear streams that came tumbling down from the island’s peaks and crags.

  Once every day, and sometimes more, a gig, loaded with empty barrels, would make the journey over from the Redruth to the narrow strip of pebbled beach that ran along the bay. Paulette would often accompany the sailors and while they were filling their barrels and washing their clothes she would wander along the beach or climb the slopes.

  One day she followed a stream for a good half-mile, clambering up the steep, boulder-strewn nullah that guided it down from the peak. It was hard going, with little reward, and she was about to turn back when she looked ahead and spotted a hollow in the hillside, some hundred yards further up. There were white smudges on its sides, and on looking more closely she saw that a cluster of flowering plants was growing inside. She took off her shoes and pressed on, climbing over an escarpment of jagged rock and tearing her skirt in the process. But it was well worth it for she soon found herself looking at a bunch of exquisite white blooms: she had seen their like before, in Calcutta’s Botanical Gardens: they were ‘Lady’s Slipper’ orchids – Cypripedium purpuratum.

  She went bounding down in delight and the next day she brought Fitcher with her. This time they went higher still and were rewarded with another find, hidden between two boulders: a pale red orchid. It was new to Paulette but Fitcher identified it at a glance: Sarcanthus teretifolius.

  They had climbed a fair distance now and when they sat down to catch their breath Paulette was startled by the splendour of the vista below: the tall-masted ships looked tiny against the blue band of the channel; beyond lay the crags of the Chinese mainland, stretching into the hazy distance.

  ‘You are so fortunate, sir,’ said Paulette, ‘to have wandered in the forests and mountains of China. How thrilling it must be to botanize in these vast and beautiful wilds.’

  Fitcher turned to her with a startled expression. ‘Wander? What can ee be thinking of? Ee don’t imagine, d’ee, that I was collecting in the wild in Canton?’

  ‘Were you not, sir?’ said Paulette in surprise. ‘But then how did you find all those new plants? All your introductions?’

  Fitcher gave a bark of a laugh. ‘In nurseries – just as I would have at home.’

  ‘Really, sir?’

  Fitcher nodded: traipsing through forests was out of the question in China since foreigners were not allowed to venture beyond Canton and Macau. The only Europeans who had seen anything of the flora of the interior were a few Jesuits, and a couple of naturalists who had had the good fortune to accompany diplomatic missions to Peking. Every other would-be plant-hunter was confined to those two southern cities, both of them populous, bustling, noisy places, in which nothing ‘wild’ had existed for centuries.

  ‘But wha
t about Mr William Kerr?’ said Paulette. ‘Did he not introduce the “heavenly bamboo” and Begonia grandis and the “Lady Banks Rose”? Surely they did not come from nurseries?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Fitcher. ‘They did.’

  Everything that Billy Kerr had collected, said Fitcher, indeed most anything that any plant collector had obtained in China – all the begonias, azaleas, moutans, lilies, chrysanthemums and roses that had already transformed the world’s gardens – all these floral riches had come from just one place: not a jungle, nor a mountain, nor a swamp, but a set of nurseries, run by professional gardeners.

  Paulette, who had been listening in rapt attention, let out a gasp. ‘Is it true, sir? And where are they, these nurseries?’

  ‘On the island of Honam, opposite Canton.’

  At the western end of the island there was a stretch of well-watered ground, said Fitcher. That was where the nurseries were: foreigners called them the ‘Fa-Tee Gardens’. It cost eight Spanish dollars to get a chop to go there – and they were only open a few days in the week.

  ‘And what are they like, sir, these nurseries?’

  Fitcher opened and closed his mouth several times as he pondered this. ‘They’re a maze,’ he said at last, ‘like the mizzy-maze at Hampton Court. Every time ee think ee’ve seen everything, ee’ll find that ee’ve scarcely begun. Ee’re just wandering around, gaking at what ee’re allowed to see, mazed, like a sheep in a storm.’

  Paulette clutched her knees and sighed. ‘Oh I wish I could see them for myself, sir.’

  ‘But that ee won’t,’ said Fitcher. ‘So ee may as well put it out of eer mind.’

  Eight

  Nov 14, Markwick’s Hotel

  Dearest Puggly, don’t you hate it when people write letters from faraway places without telling you about their lodgings? My brother, when he went to London, wrote not a word about his quarters which drove me quite to distraction – for silly painterly fellow that I am, I can see nothing until I see that. And it strikes me now that I am guilty of the same thing – I have told you nothing at all about my room.

  Well, my dear Lady Puggleminster, you shall know all about Mr Markwick’s hotel: it is right in the heart of Fanqui-town, half-way between our two principal thoroughfares, which are known, conveniently, as Old China Street and New China Street. Although they are called streets you must not imagine them to be wide or extensive roadways, like Chowringhee or the Esplanade. Fanqui-town’s streets go no further than the width of the enclave, which measures only a few hundred feet. I am not sure our streets should even be known by that name, for they are like a set of parallel mews, running between the factories: they lead from the Maidan to the outer boundary of the enclave, which is marked by a busy roadway called Thirteen Hong Street.

  Within the enclave there are only three streets and one of them is actually a tiny gali, like you might see in Kidderpore. It is called Hog Lane and it is so narrow that two men can scarcely pass abreast without rubbing up against each other – and I must say Puggly dear that one is sometimes witness there to the most unseemly sights. The passageway is lined with ill-lit dens and foul-smelling shacks: they serve brews that go by such names as ‘hocksaw’ and ‘shamshoo’ (the latter, I am told, is doctored with opium and flavoured with the tails of certain lizards). These dens are very popular among the sailors and lascars who come up to Fanqui-town on their shore-leave days. Having spent weeks at anchor in Whampoa the poor fellows are half crazed with boredom and so eager to spend their drink-penny that they do not even take the trouble to sit down while they imbibe. Indeed no chairs or benches are provided for them, but only ropes, strung up at the height of a man’s chest. The function of these peculiar articles of furniture (for such indeed they are) was revealed to me when I saw a half-dozen seafarers hanging from them, with their arms flung over, dribbling vomit from their mouths. The ropes serve to keep them upright after they have cast up their accounts – should they fall on the floor they would probably drown in their own regurgitated swill. Some of these liberty-men spend the whole of their shore-leave in this fashion, swaying on their feet, their bodies slumped over the ropes and unconscious to the world.

  I need scarcely add that drink is not all that is offered in these dens. One has only to step into the Lane to be besieged by ponce-shicers. ‘Wanchi gai? Wanchi jai? What kind chicken wanchi? You talkee my. My savvy allo thing; allo thing have got.’

  You must not imagine, my dear Miss Pugglemore, that your poor Robin would ever dream of availing of these offerings. Yet it would be idle to deny that there is something strangely thrilling about a place where every desire can be provided for and every want met (though not perhaps always to complete satisfaction: just yesterday, as I was walking by, a sailor disappeared into the shadows of Hog Lane with a creature that looked like a painted hag. A moment later the nautical knight let out a dreadful yell: ‘God help me shippies! A travesty has me in hand, and it’ll be down the chute with my fore-tackle if I’m not cut loose!).’

  New China Street is positively genteel in comparison to Hog Lane, although it is only a clamorous, crowded gali, like those around Calcutta’s Bow Bazaar: here too shops are stacked upon shops; here too touts will tug at your clothes until you begin to wonder what their intentions are. The older fanquis are not daunted by this and will clear a path by laying about with their whangees – but since I cannot conceive of carrying one I generally try to stay clear of this street.

  By comparison with our other roadways Old China Street is a haven of cleanliness and quiet: it is in fact more an arcade than a roadway, being lined with shophouses. Some of the shophouses are quite tall but they are dwarfed by the walls of the factories that flank the street. The gap overhead is covered with a kind of matting, which is laid down so artfully that below, at the level of the street, it is always cool and shady, like a pathway in a forest. As for the shops, they are utterly beguiling and their wares are laid out in the most charming fashion, on shelves and in glass-topped cases. There are shops for lacquerware, pewterware, silk and souvenirs of all kinds (the most ingenious of these are some amazing multi-layered balls, carved out of whole blocks of ivory, with the outer shell enclosing others of diminishing size). The name of every merchant is written above the door, in English and Chinese, and there is always a sign to mark his calling: ‘Lacquer merchant’, ‘Pewter Seller’, ‘Ivory Carver’ and the like. Many other banners, pennants and painted signs are strung above the shops and when there is a breeze the whole street shimmers and flutters with colour. It is quite wonderfully picturesque.

  The shopkeepers are, to my mind, even more diverting than their shops. One of my favourites is Mr Wong, the tailor; he is so friendly, and so eager to show off his wares that it seems cruel to go by without stopping for a cup of tea. He is a most antic creature: this morning, while I was sitting there he rushed out to wave to a group of sailors. ‘Hi! You there Jack!’ he shouted. ‘You there Tar! Damn my eyes! What thing wanchi buy?’

  The sailors were several sheets to the wind and one of them shouted back: ‘What do I want to buy? Why you mallet-headed porpoise, I want to buy a Welsh wig with sleeves on it.’

  Mr Wong never doubts that he has every article of clothing a fanqui could possibly want, so he pointed at once to a green gown. ‘Can do, can do! Look-see here,’ he cried. ‘Have got what-thing Mister Tar wanchi.’

  At this the sailors went into convulsions of laughter and one of them cried out: ‘Damn my eyes! That thing is no more a Welsh wig than you are the Queen of England!’

  Mr Wong, I need hardly say, was quite crushed.

  At the far end of Old China Street, on the other side of Thirteen Hong Street, is the Consoo – or ‘Council House’. It is built in the style of a mandarin’s ‘yamen’ which is an elaborate kind of daftar. It is surrounded by a high wall, beyond which rise the upswept roofs of many halls and pavilions. The buildings are graceful in appearance, yet most fanquis regard the Consoo House with an apprehension that borders on dread – for that is wh
ere they are summoned when the mandarins wish to call them to account!

  But why, in heaven’s name, am I rattling on about the streets and the Consoo House when I meant to tell you about Markwick’s Hotel? Well, it is not too late! Without another word I shall seize you by the hand – there! – and lead you towards my room.

  Mr Markwick’s Hotel is in the Imperial Factory which is one of the most interesting of the Thirteen Hongs. It is so called because it was once linked to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and even though there are few Austrians to be seen in it now, the double-headed eagle of the Hapsburgs is still affixed to the gateway (for which reason the factory is known to locals as the ‘Twin-Eagle Hong’).

  Mr Markwick runs his hotel in partnership with his Friend, Mr Lane. They both came out to China as boys, to work for the East India Company (Mr Markwick was a steward and Mr Lane a butler) and they have been Friends forever. They are a curious couple and look as though they belong in some childish ditty, for Mr Lane is short and fat and rather jolly, while Mr Markwick is tall and lugubrious and seems always to be sniffing, even when he is not. On the ground floor of their premises they run a shop where they sell all kinds of European goods and products: Hodgson’s ale, Johannisberger wines, Rhenish clarets, umbrellas, watches, sextants and such like. They also run a coffee room, which is considered a great curiosity by the enclave’s Chinese visitors; and of course there is a dining room too, and the fare it provides is most interesting, for Mr Markwick is a dab hand at adapting Chinese dishes for European tastes. One of his offerings is called ‘chop-shui’ and it is so popular amongst the seafaring tribe that he has been offered vast sums of money for the recipe, but he will not, on any account, part with it. He also sells a delicious sauce of his own invention, flavoured with Chinese condiments: it is known as Markwick’s ketjup and old China hands cannot live without it.