Children of China

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C. Campbell Brown. Children of China

Children of China

Table of Contents

CHAPTER I. THE INVISIBLE TOP

CHAPTER II. CHINESE BABIES

CHAPTER III. THE CHILDREN’S HOME

CHAPTER IV. SCHOOL DAYS

CHAPTER V. GIRLS

CHAPTER VI. GAMES AND RIDDLES

CHAPTER VII. STORIES AND RIMES

CHAPTER VIII. RELIGION

CHAPTER IX. FESTIVALS

CHAPTER X. SUPERSTITIONS

CHAPTER XI. REVERENCE FOR PARENTS

CHAPTER XII. FAITHFULNESS

CHAPTER XIII. THE CRY OF THE CHILDREN

CHAPTER XIV. MINISTERING CHILDREN

CHAPTER XV. THE CHILDREN’S KING

Footnote

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C. Campbell Brown

Published by Good Press, 2021

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CHAPTER XV THE CHILDREN’S KING

In winter time little King Baby is rolled in clothes until he looks like a ball, though his feet and part of his legs are usually bare. When asleep he is laid in a bamboo cradle, on rough rockers which loudly thump the floor. A red cord is tied to his wrist, lest he should be naughty when grown up, and people should say, “They forgot to bind your wrist when you were little.” Ancient coins are hung round his neck by a string to drive away evil spirits and to make him grow up an obedient child. When he is a month old, friends and relatives bring him presents, a feast is made and Master Tiny has his head shaved in front of the ancestral tablets, which stand on a narrow table at the back of the chief room of the house. The barber who takes off the black fluff from the little round head, receives a present of money; baby, for his part, becoming the proud possessor of a cap, with a row of gilded images in front, which is presented to him by his grandmother, together with a pair of shoes[2] having a pussy’s face worked upon each toe in the hope that “he may walk as safely through life as a cat does on a wall.” Baby-boy also receives what is called his ‘milk-name,’ which serves him until he goes to school. Some of the names given to babies sound strange: Dust-pan, Pock-marked Boy, Winter Dog, One Hundred and Ten. Ugly names are sometimes given, in the hope that the spirits may think that babies so called are not worth troubling about and thus may leave them to grow up unharmed. In the same way an ear-ring is put in a little boy’s ear, and he is called Little Sister to make the demons imagine that he is only a girl, and so not worthy of their notice, or his head is clean-shaved all over, and he is dressed like a monk for the same purpose.

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