MUKDEN, THE MANCHU HOME 



301 



grand cross-roads, where 

 city life centers and gay 

 street signs are thickest ; 

 each keep a soHd old three- 

 story tower with faded red 

 columns and shabby old 

 green-tiled roof. 



Order of the most rigid 

 kind is maintained in ]\Iuk- 

 den streets by flat-chested 

 police and sentries, who 

 wear top boots and semi- 

 foreign uniforms, their 

 queues coiled in psyche 

 knots under the brims of 

 their girlish sailor hats or 

 upturned turbans. Rifle in 

 hand, they have taught the 

 public that street traffic is 

 no longer a go - as - you - 

 please affair, and the husky 

 Manchurian cart driver fol- 

 lows the rules of the road 

 as abjectly as the lately- 

 tamed cab driver of New 

 York. The local levies have 

 learned military style and manners from 

 two grand armies of occupation and re- 

 occupation, and the people learned well 

 their lesson that the man with the gun 

 was not to be trifled with. When they 

 severely nod the traffic to right and left, 

 the carters no longer bellow and bluster, 

 but obey. 



A SPLENDID RACE OF STALWART MEN AND 

 HANDSOME WOMEN 



Once through the deep-vaulted gate- 

 way of the Tartar city or citadel, color 

 and picturesqueness surround one, ana 

 the streets are moving pictures of Man- 

 chu life — the life of brave horsemen and 

 strong northmen, of bold hunters and 

 fighting tribesmen, but lately come from 

 nomad life on broad, dry plains to this 

 permanent camp with its high brick 

 walls. The Shantung people, in their 

 dull clothing, are not numerous enough 

 to spoil the picture. 



These hearty INTanchns. descended 

 from northern Tungusic Tartar tribes, 

 are a dififerent people from the soft, 

 sleek, languid, lemon-tinted yellow nlen 



WHrrE FOX AND SABLE SKINS (SEE PAGE 302 ) 



of the steamy rice fields of the south — 

 the common Chinese of commerce, the 

 strictly-excluded, emigrating Cantonese 

 who alone are known in the outer world. 

 Their cold, dry northern winter has 

 made men of these Manchus, given them 

 backbone, brawn and "sand," sinews and 

 muscles of iron. 



Their women, when protected, are 

 creamily instead of greenishly yellow. 

 The Manchu women walk free and un- 

 trammelled on their natural feet, and 

 their fine j\Ianchu eyes are set straight 

 in their heads, their eyelids not caught 

 together at the corners. They, with 

 their long robes of brilliant colors and 

 their tremendous head-dresses, add the 

 last, best touches to the brilliant pageant 

 of street life — streets whose carved and 

 gildefl shop fronts, with gold and ver- 

 milion "beckoning board'^," arc as gay 

 as any in south China. 



THE GORGEOl'S SHOP SIGNS 



Mukden's streets have an additional 

 glory in the shop signs, that make gor- 

 geous cornices, shoot from the door- 



