4o6 THE POFULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



ness of sensibility is not a race trait, but a consequence of the involun- 

 tary simplicity and temperateness of life of the common Chinese. 



One doctor remarks that at home it is the regular thing for a 

 nervous chill to follow the passing of a sound into the bladder, whereas 

 among his patients it seldom occurs. Another comments on the rarity 

 of neurasthenia and nervous dyspepsia. The chief of the army medical 

 staff points out that during the autumn maneuvers the soldiers sleep 

 on damp ground with a little straw under them without any ill effects. 

 I have seen coolies after two hours of burden-bearing at a dog trot 

 shovel themselves full of hot rice with scarcely any mastication, and 

 hurry on for another two hours. A white man would have writhed 

 with indigestion. The Chinese seem able to sleep in any position. I 

 have seen them sleeping on piles of bricks, or stones, or poles, with a 

 block or a brick for a pillow and with the hot sun shining full into the 

 face. They stand a cramped position longer than we can and can 

 keep on longer at monotonous toil unrelieved by change or break. 



But there is another side to the comparison. There is little pneu- 

 monia among the Chinese but they stand it no better than we do, some 

 say not so well. There is much malarial fever and it goes hard with 

 them. In Hong Kong they seem to succumb to the plague more read- 

 ily than the foreigners. Among children there is heavy mortality from 

 measles and scarlet fever. In withstanding tuberculosis they have no 

 advantage over us. While they make wonderful recoveries from high 

 fevers they are not enduring of long fevers. Some think this is because 

 the flame of their vitality has been turned low by unsanitary living. 

 They have a horror of fresh air and shut it out of the sleeping apart- 

 ment, even on a warm night. In the mission schools, if the teachers 

 insist on open windows in the dormitory, the pupils stifle under the 

 covers lest the evil spirits flying about at night should get at them. 

 The Chinese grant that hygiene may be all very well for these weakly 

 foreigners, but see no use in it for themselves. It is no wonder, there- 

 fore, that their school girls can not stand the pace of American school 

 girls. Often they break down, or go into a decline or have to take a 

 long rest. In the English mission schools with their easier pace the 

 girls get on better. 



Here and there a doctor ascribes the extraordinary power of resist- 

 ance and recuperation shown by his patients entirely to their diet and 

 manner of life and denies any superior vitality in the race. Other 

 doctors practising among the city Chinese insist that the stamina of the 

 masses is undermined by wretched living conditions, but that under 

 equal circumstances the yellow man has a firmer hold on life than the 

 white man. 



From the testimony it is safe to conclude that at least a part of the 

 observed toughness of the Chinese is attributable to a special race vital- 



