90 FENSIANG-FU AN INLAND TOWN 



" Reason ! reason I " screamed her visitor, " never 

 mind about reason ! Just listen to what I say ! " 

 which goes to prove that feminine nature is much 

 the same all the world over. 



Mr. Steevens taught in the Prefectural Normal 

 College for over a year, and was much interested 

 in educational work. The old ladies in the 

 yamen were on very friendly terms with his wife, 

 who often visited them. They had abandoned 

 gaily- coloured garments and dressed in more sober 

 colours. They had also agreed to unbind their 

 feet, and though of course the deformed members 

 could never regain their natural growth, their 

 owners, who had formerly never stirred without the 

 aid of a maid, skipped gaily about without any 

 extraneous assistance, in shoes of foreign model. 



One of the high officials, the prefect of the 

 city, who held office a few years before our visit, 

 had been a most enlightened man, and joined 

 strongly in the anti-foot-binding crusade. He was 

 in the habit of going round to fairs and inveighing 

 against the ills of the practice. On one occasion 

 he was getting very worked up, shedding coats 

 in all directions, and exhorting his hearers to make 

 their womenfolk abandon the habit. 



" All the ailments from which your wives suffer 

 come from this curse," he exclaimed, " and they 

 do suffer, do they not, from many ailments ? " 

 He repeated this two or three times to give it 

 emphasis, and inadvertently caught the eye of a 

 countryman who thought he was being addressed. 

 On its third repetition he roared out, " No, she 

 doesn't ! My old woman's as sound as a bell ! " 

 which rather disconcerted the speaker. 



