Plurk paste

CHAPTEE IX
CAMPHOB, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO
Visit to the Camphor Bureau—The camphor industry—Chinese methods improved by Japanese—Future prosperity depends on pacification of aborigines—The opium monopoly—Control of opiumsmoking—Japanese efforts and their success—Comparison with opium regulations in British colonies—The tobacco monopoly—Success of the Government monopolies as a whole—The Taihoku prison—We leave Koshimura and visit Tamsui—Early Spanish occupation of Tamsui and Keelung—Spaniards surrender to Dutch—The British Consulate —A gardener's paradise—A Japanese golf-course.
4 i ON the morning after the dinner-party Koshimura called for us in a Government motor at 9 o'clock. The hour was of his proposing, and it promised to be another strenuous day. We were still confronted with the problem of obtaining money. In Tainan we had, with great difficulty and thanks chiefly to Koshimura 's persuasive powers, extracted a hundred yen from the Bank of Taiwan, but no more. We drove to the head office in Taihoku hoping for better things. But once there we found ourselves up against a stone wall. Although we produced an English letter of credit and a statement from the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation showing a credit in Yokohama, the bank merchants were obdurate. The Bank of Taiwan was not mentioned in the letter of credit, though it contained a list of apparently every other known bank in the world, and this seemed to touch the Taihoku authorities on the raw. They would have none of us. Koshimura 's card and ex
184 THE CAMPHOR INDUSTRY 185
planations produced no effect. Not a yen could we get, even on the strength of being guests of the Formosan Government. Bitterly did I curse the skipper of the Sourabaya, whose economical use of coal had given us no time to make the necessary arrangements in Hong Kong, and left the bank disgruntled, hoping, however, for better luck with the Taihoku agents of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank.
§ 2
After being worsted in our contest with the bank, we made our way to the Camphor Bureau, where we were met by Mr. Yoshioka, to whom I had sat next at dinner the night before. He was most kind, and under his guidance we were able to see the whole process of manufacture.
Camphor is certainly the most interesting of the Formosan industries. The Formosan camphor laurel, from the chips of which the camphor of commerce is obtained, grows upon the eastern hills, either within the area inhabited by the aborigines or upon the borders. As Mr. Davidson suggests, it would be an inviting subject for a statistician "to figure out how many drops of human blood are represented in the few ounces of camphor which the human young lady purchases to keep her dainty garments free of moths, or how many lives are lost that some decrepit old gentleman may be cured of his rheumatic pains." ' For the working of the camphor has always been carried on in the teeth of bitter opposition on the part of the aborigines, who, even now, view incursions into their territory and the felling of their trees with consternation and dismay.
1 The Island of Formosa, p. 398.
.*-. 186 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO Camphor was worked in Formosa long before the coming of the Japanese. During the Chinese occu- pation the industry was so jealously guarded by the authorities that, not content with proclaiming it a Government monopoly, they imposed the deathpenalty for the unauthorized felling of a single tree.
This was no idle threat, for, ineffectual as the Chinese Government was in many ways, it was never lacking in energy when it came to punishing its subjects. It is recorded that in a single year over 200 persons lost their heads for infringing the camphor law; this led to a rebellion, with the result that, although the monopoly was retained, the laws governing it were revised and made more lenient.
In the middle of the nineteenth century the camphor trade attracted the notice of foreign firms, and after many struggles with the authorities the traders obtained the abolition of the monopoly. This gave an immediate impetus to the industry, until the hostilities between the aborigines and the Chinese employed in the manufacture became so violent that the export trade was almost killed. Even though military forces were sent out against the natives, little was accomplished, and sometimes the soldiers met with disaster. In one case a force of 180 Chinese were taken unawares, and all killed with the exception of one boy, who hid in the long grass until the massacre was over. The Chinese methods of obtaining camphor were as wasteful as the methods of the aborigines in planting crops. The trees were felled wholesale and no attempt was made to replant the areas so denuded.
The result was that when the Japanese took over the island they found large tracts of what had once been camphor forests worked out. It was neces-METHOD OF PREPARATION 187
sary to go farther and farther afield, following the ebb of the camphor tide.
The camphor forests which are most easily worked to-day stand on the northern hills, where the trees attain enormous height and girth. The tree is of a different species from that found in Borneo, where deposits of camphor are found in a kind of pocket inside the tree or else distributed throughout the grain in the form of small crystals. The Formosan species appears to be impregnated with camphor, and this is obtained by chipping small pieces from the tree while it is still standing and after it has been felled. The chips are then placed in stoves erected near the timber workings, the camphor vapour given off passes from the chip-retort (which holds about four hundred pounds) through a cooling-box into a condenser and so becomes distilled.
The chips are changed every twenty-four hours. The tiny white crystals formed in the condensing-box are removed and packed in bags, while the camphor oil, a by-product from the chips, is despatched in kerosine-oil tins, over a mountain of which we had to climb to get to the works.
In the old days adulteration had to be guarded against continually, and Mr. Davidson tells a story 1 of how an enterprising Formosan camphor worker, coming upon snow at close quarters for the first time in his life during a severe winter, filled some baskets with it, mixed enough crystals to give it the smell of camphor, and forthwith hurriedly disposed of it to the nearest merchant. The buyer did not discover the fraud until, returning to the vat in which he had dumped his purchase, he found that with the exception of a few pounds it had disappeared. Nowadays, however, adulteration can
1 Op, cit., p. 433. 188 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO easily be detected, and it is not worth a worker's while to try any imposition, no matter how ingenious it may be.
During the early years of the Japanese occupation, the Formosan Government contented itself with levying a tax on the amount of camphor produced, but in 1899 the manufacture was made a monopoly with the twofold object of increasing the revenue and obtaining a firmer control of the valuable camphor forests. The camphor, which only the holders of Government licences may manufacture, is now bought up from the local workers by the monopoly officials at a fixed rate, repacked, and sent down to be re- fined in the Taihoku factory.
It was here that we saw the crude material being cleaned by the huge distilling plant which the Japanese have installed. Great heaps of snowy camphor lay outside the distilling oven, into which they were being shovelled. By means of intense heat the vapour is made to pass again into a condensing chamber and recrystallizes. The flaky crystals are massed together and subjected to hydraulic pressure, and thus are transformed into solid opaque blocks, similar in appearance to those one may buy in miniature at a chemist's shop. These blocks are packed into lead-lined boxes marked with the Government label and are then ready to be exported to the selling agents in all parts of the world. By the time we reached the packing-room our eyes were streaming and we were taking our breath in great gasps, so powerful is the exhalation given off.
Formosa is the greatest camphor-producing country in the world, and now that camphor plays so important a part in the manufacture of celluloid and smokeless gunpowder, to say nothing of its ordinary medicinal uses, the demand is very large. FEESH SUPPLIES 189 The Japanese have much increased the prosperity of the industry since they took it in hand. They have improved the quality of the material, promoted the manufacture of camphor oil, and by a careful control of the supplies have rendered the worker's life less precarious than it was formerly. Consequently, although the exports decreased from 6,800,000 lb. in 1894 to just under 4,000,000 lb. in 1922 1 (on account of the control), the industry is on a sound and stable basis, good prices are obtained, and it is said that the monopoly brings in to the Government coffers an annual revenue of no less than £800,000, The all-important matter of reafforestation has also re- ceived attention, but of course no supplies from this source can be anticipated for several years and the existing camphor resources of the island are naturally becoming less and less every year. There is no immediate danger of their becoming worked out, it is true, but vast supplies still lie within the savage area, unworked, and until the whole of the aborigines have come under Government influence the main problem of the camphor industry cannot be said to have been solved.
§3
Having got outside the camphor factory we wiped our eyes again, and I asked Mr. Yoshioka if we were to be allowed to see the opium factory as well.
Our guide's face immediately assumed that wooden expression which is the sole refuge of those who, speaking a foreign language well, find their proficiency an embarrassment.
"I do not understand," he declared. " Opium factory," I said, breaking into that insensate English one uses when trying to make one's i In 1921 the export was only 915,000 lb. 190 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO tongue intelligible to a foreigner. "Not allowed?" "Not allowed," echoed the Chief of the Camphor Section.
That was all there was to it. Koshimura, ever anxious to do his best for us, murmured something about "special pass," but I thought it more tactful not to press the point. After all, it was their opium factory. There was no earthly reason why they should let me see over it if, for reasons of their own, they didn't want to. They had shown me so much that it would have been churlish to complain.
All the same, I was disappointed. I should have liked to look into that forbidden chamber, for the opium question is a very interesting one, and I had heard so much about it in Formosa that I was anxious to see the methods by which the opium paste is prepared. When the Japanese obtained possession of the island they found opium smoking very prevalent among the Formosans. For years opium had been subject to heavy duties, but that had not prevented its importation, and, moreover, large quantities were smuggled in. The Japanese realized that if the practice were to be allowed to spread it would have a deteriorating effect upon the population, but they also realized, very wisely, that they would lose far more than they would gain by attempting to abolish opium smoking wholesale. Seven per cent, of the population was addicted to the use of the drug, and the danger of incessant friction, increase of smuggling and emigration that would result from prohibition was altogether too great to be run.
It was obvious, however, that some steps must be taken in the matter. Accordingly the Government decided to establish a control over the amount of the drug imported, manufactured, and consumed, OPIUM MANUFACTURE 191
and consequently in 1896 opium was proclaimed a State monopoly. The private importation, the manufacture, and the sale of opium were made punishable by five years' imprisonment or a fine of £500.
The cultivation of the opium poppy was forbidden, and anyone found smoking opium without a licence became liable to three years' imprisonment or a fine of £300. The licences were only granted to confirmed smokers, and by these means it was considered possible to abolish, or at any rate substantially reduce, the practice within a generation, every effort being made at the same time to demonstrate the evils of the drug by educational propaganda.
Having taken the manufacture of the raw opium into their own hands, the authorities were confronted with serious obstacles. They had no one who understood the system of preparation, and they found themselves in the humiliating position of having to learn from the Formosans, who naturally had but a primitive process, simply boiling the raw material in kettles over small charcoal stoves. It was not long, however, before more scientific methods were learnt in British India and Persia and modern machinery was imported. To-day the factory at Taihoku is, I believe, as well equipped as any in the world.
But difficulties of manufacture were not the only ones with which the authorities had to contend. Even greater difficulties were experienced in the registration of the confirmed opium smokers, the only persons to whom licences were granted, for each one, having made his application, had to be examined and certified by a Government doctor. The work of registration was begun in April 1897, and although it was thought at the time that it would be finished in a few months, it was not until September 1900 that 192 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO it was done, the completed register showing 170,000 opium smokers in the island.
Once licences had been granted to these, every effort was made to confine the drug habit to those known to be under its influence. And it was here that almost insuperable obstacles arose. It was a formidable enough undertaking to register all the confirmed smokers in the island, and it was only rendered possible because the smokers knew that they would be faced with the problem of obtaining supplies if they did not declare themselves. There was, however, a large number of Formosans who, although they did not come under the category of chronic takers of the drug, were nevertheless addicted to its use to a more moderate extent, Many of these presented themselves as confirmed smokers, to whom deprivation would mean death. Their claims for licences were in most cases proved by the medical authorities to be unjustified, but there are no ends to which a drug taker will not go to obtain the object of his craving, and the inevitable result of refusal to licence was that, in spite of the penalties to which unauthorized smokers rendered themselves liable, secret smoking became very prevalent.
Moreover, members of a family in which there was one licensed smoker easily acquired the habit, and others, flying to the drug as a relief from pain in times of sickness, also became victims.
This secret smoking increased to such an extent, and would have entailed such wholesale prosecution, that at the end of 1904 the authorities decided that there was nothing for it but to grant licences to those who had acquired the habit in a clandestine manner, and accordingly 30,000 fresh licences were issued. At the same time a new system was introduced, whereby a licensed smoker was required to CONTROL OF OPIUM SMOKING 193
produce a pass-book every time he bought a supply of opium, and, since his daily consumption was known, he could thus be checked from disposing of the drug to others. In spite of this, and in spite, too, of many prosecutions, the further increase of 16,000 licences was found necessary ; but even taking into account these increases, the total number of smokers in 1908 was 42,000 fewer than in 1900, and at the end of 1922 was 42,923. A certain proportion of this decrease is due to the habit having been abandoned, but a greater proportion is due to death, for the death-rate among the opium smokers is nearly twice as high as the rate for the whole island. 1 When the opium regulations were first introduced, licences were granted to Formosans only, that is to the settlers of Chinese descent who had become Japanese subjects on the cession of the island. By 1904, however, the consumption of the drug had been got well under control, and since large numbers of labourers were coming in from South China owing to the increase of private enterprise and development, it was decided that, rather than discourage the Chinese coolie class from immigrating, it would be prudent to grant them also licences for smoking, renewable yearly. Happily the habit is confined to the Formosans and the Chinese; so far as is known it has not spread among the aborigines, and it is a very rare thing to find a Japanese opium smoker.
The Opium Ordinance provides that opium paste for smoking purposes may only be bought (at prices fixed by the Government) from authorized dealers, who are supplied by wholesale agents of the Monopoly Bureau, the appointment of both dealers and agents being very carefully supervised. The manu1 Control of Opium in Formosa, p. 10. 13 194 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO facture of opium-smoking implements and the keeping of premises for smoking are also licensed, and Japanese are prohibited from engaging in anything connected with the trade. The sale of morphine and of opium for medicinal purposes is controlled by the Government, morphine injections and the sale of powdered opium being forbidden except on a doctor's prescription. The opium poppy is now cultivated in Formosa, but the Monopoly Bureau imports the bulk of the raw material from India, Turkey, or Persia; at the factory the latter is crushed, steamed in vats, and boiled, the opium paste so obtained being packed in tins, labelled, and despatched to the wholesale agents. A certain quantity of morphine is also manufactured and, it may be supposed, exported. This seemed to me, although I may be quite wrong, to be rather a "hush" business. In any case I am not in a position to give any details either of the amount of morphine exported or its destination, for, although officials appeared quite prepared to give me all the information I wanted about opium, at the mention of morphine they either became suddenly evasive or singularly dense, and I am inclined to think that it was on this account that my visit to the factory was so definitely discouraged.
In the Report of the Advisory Committee to the League of Nations on the traffic of opium, dated August 8, 1922, it is stated that there were 8,018 lb.
of morphine manufactured in Formosa in 1920, 7,833 lb. in Japan, while 48,689 lb. were imported into Japan. The report declares: "It is clear from the figures supplied by the Japanese Government in its reply to the questionnaire that Japan has been importing, for several years past, quantities of morphine far in excess of the normal legitimate require-OPIUM SMUGGLING 195
ments of Japan itself. . , . After making allowance for the increase in the medical requirements during and after the war, the Committee can feel little doubt that much of this morphine has found its way into China." It is hardly necessary to point out that smuggling to China from Formosa would be a good deal easier than smuggling to China from Japan.
M Whatever mysteries may enshroud its external policy, there can be no doubt that the Japanese have handled the opium question in Formosa itself in a very efficient manner. All the more credit is due to them because they have done so without having had any previous experience in such administration.
The United States Government recognized their success several years ago when, perplexed by the opium problem in the Philippine Islands, they paid the Japanese the compliment of sending commissioners to Formosa to investigate the methods of opium manufacture and to study the regulations dealing with its distribution and control. 1 Opium smoking is now prohibited in the Philippines.
It is improbable that opium smoking will ever be stamped out in Formosa; as the large number of annual convictions for offences against the opium laws show, it is improbable that even secret smoking will be stopped. The love of opium seems to be ingrained in the uneducated Chinese, but the taking of the drug is being kept under control and, while the population of the island is increasing steadily, the percentage of opium smokers amongst it is decreasing.
In my opinion the Japanese have adopted the right 1 Japanese Rule in Formosa, p. 159. 196 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO course in controlling, and in not attempting to abolish, opium smoking. Everyone who has studied the subject knows that opium prohibition in China is little less than a farce. As Mr. Bland says : "The 'opium-abolition' movement has put an end to the bona-fide importation of the Indian drug and checked the transit trade in all its former channels, merely to direct it into new ways, more directly profitable to the mandarin. ' ' Moreover, in the Report of the Opium Committee referred to above the following passage occurs: "The Committee regret they can only come to the conclusion . . . that at the present moment there is a large and widespread cultivation of the poppy in China." Where a habit has become chronic with a certain section of the community, it is surely wiser and more humane to deal with it comparatively. "What I like about the Japanese is that they are not hypercritical sentimentalists. They take human nature as they find it. They impose the control they consider best fitted for the proper administration of their territory and the welfare of its inhabitants, and, while they certainly do keep the opium habit within bounds, they do not hesitate to pocket a large revenue which would otherwise be lost—a clear annual net profit of £100,000. Philanthropy as a revenue-producing proposition should surely be the aim of every civilized State. Yet only too often State philanthropy simply spells large inroads upon the Treasury. I rather fancy that if, on account of the drug habit spreading in England, it is found necessary to establish an Anti-Dope Ministry, it would cost the State a deal of money, instead of producing a comfortable contribution to the income of the country, as it is made to do in Formosa.
1 Japan, China, and Korea, p. 290. POPPY CULTIVATION 197 The Japanese, I take it, know perfectly well that there is only one possible way to stop opium smoking, and that is to stop the cultivation of the opium poppy except on a scale which would be adequate for medical requirements. If there were no poppies there would be no opium and no smokers; as long as there are poppies there will be opium and, in one way or another, smokers will obtain it. The suppression of the poppy is never likely to take place so long as the Government of India leads the way as a producer of raw opium. Vast sums of money are made every year out of the sale of the drug by various Governments, including those of the British Crown Colonies and Protectorates. They cannot afford to abandon this revenue and therefore, as supplies are procurable without difficulty, they maintain the trade, while throwing as much dust as possible in the eyes of those interested in stamping out the traffic in the drug.
I have discussed the opium monopoly in Formosa at some length because it seems to me that the authorities there have adopted a policy which might well be followed by their neighbours. In the Federated Malay States, Straits Settlements, Hong Kong, and North Borneo, for example, where there are large numbers of Chinese colonists and labourers, opium is a State monopoly. The Governments import the raw material and sell the manufactured paste to licensed retailers. There the control ends.
There is no limit to the amount which the dealer can buy, smokers are not licensed, and although the dealer may sell only to an adult Chinese, there is nothing to prevent that adult Chinese from buying as much as he wants and passing it on to his friends, for he does not have to produce a pass-book for the 198 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO amount of his purchase to be entered up.
1 So that in this case the control simply amounts to the fact that the Governments as importers are the wholesale merchants, and as such make the greatest profit.
As to this profit, I confess that I am not one of those who think that it is anything about which Colonial Governments need be ashamed. Needless to say, they are not ashamed of it, but the ever- present fear of a bogey who makes it his business to ask awkward questions in Parliament sometimes makes them act as if they were. It is obvious that as long as supplies are available, opium smokers will get them. It is obvious, too, that if the drug is to be sold at all, large profits will be made. If profits are going to be made, it is as well that the Governments concerned should make them, to enable taxation to be kept down. Moreover, a Government monopoly renders difficult many abuses, such as smuggling on a large scale, which would arise if it did not exist. But let us have no hypocrisy about the matter; let it be admitted openly that Government trade in opium is a revenue-producing affair and that the object of any control it imposes is to make money at least as much as to administer effi- ciently. Otherwise, if the decrease in opium smoking were the objective, methods similar to those adopted by the Formosan Government could be introduced without difficulty ; even then, as I have shown, the revenue might still be considerable.
At the present time the Governments of certain Crown Colonies increase the price of opium periodically with the avowed object of decreasing consump1 The Government of Burma, however, protects some of its people in this manner : each Burmese consumer has a pass-book, and the supply he can obtain must not exceed a fixed limit or a certain proportion of his pay. REVENUE FROM OPIUM 199
tion. Incidentally by this means a drop in the revenue is avoided. This would be very well if it achieved its object, for then we should see philanthropy going hand in hand with revenue, but it does not. Experience shows that a drug-fiend will get his drug somehow, whatever the price he has to pay.
The lengths to which he is prepared to go and the sacrifices which he is prepared to make are notorious.
Once a man has been in the habit of smoking a certain amount of opium daily, it is almost impossible for him to decrease his consumption; the tendency is to increase it. He will go without food and proper nourishment, he will steal and cheat and leave his debts unpaid to get that daily ration. The expense of the drug may conceivably deter some smokers who are not confirmed in the habit, but the chronic smoker, to whom the greater proportion of the sales are made, will not be so deterred, or, if he is, he will have ruined himself first. Accordingly, when the price of opium has been raised, the usual result has been that, so far from remaining stationary, the revenue has risen. No normal person who knows anything of Chinese opium smokers would expect it to do anything else; yet when it happens one feels one is expected to form a mental picture of the Colonial Secretary ringing up the Treasury and saying, "Look here, it's an awful thing, but this Excise revenue has gone up again. What on earth are we to do about it? " The whole point is that if there were fewer sentimentalists about, there would be no need for all this cant and throwing dust in people 's eyes, so that the bogey in the House might be less likely to get upon his feet. There is plenty of work for these well-meaning people to do nearer home, and personally I doubt if the percentage of homes ruined by 200 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO opium is so great as the percentage of homes ruined by beer and whisky. To many Chinese a pipe of opium is no more than a whisky-and-soda is to a European; then there is no reason why he should not have it. The chronic smoker will get opium as long as opium exists—so let him have it too. And let the system under which he obtains it be supervised by the authorities. This seems to me to be the attitude of the Colonial Governments who trade in opium. So far, so good; few reasonable people who have lived in the East would quarrel with the view. The trouble is that the matter does not stop there, and this is a point that even the would-be reformers do not always realize: the aborigines of most Eastern countries have quite enough to thank the white man for already in the shape of the diseases that follow in his wake and benefits of civilization, such as gin and whisky. In Formosa the opium smoker, as far as is possible, is isolated, for by the pass-book system it is dimcult for him to infect others. But until the supply of opium to Colonial Governments is rationed and the smokers are all checked in some manner, there is nothing to prevent the habit spreading among the natives (to say nothing, of course, of its spreading among the Chinese), and this is a possibility which seems to be quite deplorable. For this reason alone (if for no other) the stricter regulations in force in Formosa might well be adopted by British Colonies and Protectorates with large Chinese settlements.
§ 5
Details of the salt monopoly have been given already. The remaining department of the Monopoly Bureau is that of Tobacco, which came under State control in 1905. Tobacco is a monopoly in GOVERNMENT MONOPOLIES 201
Japan, with a duty of no less than 355 per cent, on imported foreign tobacco, as everyone who has travelled in the Island Empire knows to his cost, and the monopoly in Formosa is conducted on similar lines. As I have mentioned, the plant is being grown with success in the island, and with the imported leaf (for the local supply is not yet enough for local needs) is made into cigarettes, cigars, and cut tobacco at the Taihoku factory. The industry is a flourishing one, and the annual value of tobacco sold by the Government is over half a million sterling.
When it is considered that from the date of their being taken over to the present time the five industries under State control—salt, camphor, opium, tobacco, and alcoholic liquors—have increased in value to the revenue from £430,000 to £21,000,000, with a clear annual profit of over £800,000/ it will be seen how immensely profitable these Government enterprises are. Over 60 per cent, of Formosa's revenue is derived from State undertakings (of which, besides the monopolies, the railway and forest profits are the most important), and this renders direct individual taxation comparatively light. The proof of a monopoly is in the working; if it can be made to pay and so keep down taxation which would otherwise be necessary, it surely justifies its exist- ence. Formosa undoubtedly owes much of its prosperity to the revenue-producing monopolies, which have helped to provide money to develop it on a large scale.
In a young country such as Formosa, where immense sums are required for opening up the country, 1 Whether this figure includes official salaries and depreciation of plant and machinery is not disclosed, nor what percentage of profit it shows on the capital outlay. 202 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO a monopoly may result in a practical and commercial success, and, if it does, Government authorities can hardly be blamed if they make the most of the colony's resources, rather than wait (perhaps in vain) for enterprising capitalists to come and do it for them.
Whether it is in its highest interests for a State to engage in trade is a question which is certainly open to argument from an administrative point of view. Moreover, it may also be admitted that monopolies tend to act in restraint of trade by increasing the number of officials at the expense of private industry and by removing the stimulus of open competition. Government enterprises are seldom managed so economically as those under private control, and it is possible that greater efficiency and perhaps greater revenue might now be obtained in Formosa by leaving the salt, camphor, tobacco, and liquor industries to private enterprise and taxing them.
In this way the State would not risk heavy losses in lean years, such as the Camphor Bureau must have sustained through the slump in 1921. There is no doubt that the authorities feel they have enough upon their hands at present, for when, in the disastrous period of 1921-2, those with sugar interests tried hard to get sugar monopolized, the Formosan Government refused to take any action.
§ 6
After we had taken leave of Mr. Yoshioka we drove with Koshimura to the Taihoku Prison. Here my wife had to be left behind in an ante-room (a book of picture-postcards was thoughtfully given her to look at) while I went round with Koshimura and a superintendent.
The building is a very fine one, made of stone, THE PRISON 203 and cost £30,000; all the passages and floors are of cement, and there is accommodation for 1,200 prisoners. The system of penal administration appeared humane and up-to-date; the prisoners are set at useful work which brings in revenue to the State, and I saw all kinds of manufactures going on, such as the making of baskets, boots, clothes, and furniture. Corporal punishment, formerly in force even for petty offences, has recently been abolished, and I was told that the death-sentence is only carried out in cases of what one may call aggravated murder, of which there is an average of five a year.
Ninety per cent, of the prisoners were Formosans, and on the day of my visit there were no aborigines undergoing sentence.
Criminal offenders in Formosa are dealt with by Courts presided over by Japanese judges and magistrates, who administer justice under the Japanese Criminal Code and Code of Criminal Procedure.
A code that has been drawn up to suit the requirements of one country, however, does not necessarily suit another, any more than a coat made to fit Brown will fit Jones. These codes are therefore supplemented by local ordinances and regulations, and account of native custom and usage is taken by the Courts. This was particularly advisable in the early days before the Formosans had become accustomed to Japanese rule, for acts such as the murder of female or deformed children by a mother were, according to Chinese customs, considered perfectly legitimate.
It is said that the Japanese Courts are impartial and innocent of 'graft,' though it seems that the Government might do well to pay its judicial officers, who are all Government officials under the authority of the Governor-General, a wage that would lift 204 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO them above temptation. The Chinese, of course, are firm believers in the power of bribery, and Mr.
Takekoshi relates 1 how, when the first Japanese Court was opened in the island, the complainants, finding their proffered bribes declined, promptly withdrew their cases; it appeared obvious to them that the judge had already accepted larger bribes from the other side, and so to have gone on with their cases would, they thought, have been nothing but a waste of time. This attitude has long since been changed, and at the present time the legal system enjoys the confidence of the Formosans, and since, like Pathans and Punjaubi Mahommedans, the Chinese mind dearly loves any form of litigation, they are not backward in bringing their cases into Court.
§ 7
On leaving the Prison we went for a drive round the Botanical Gardens and Taihoku Park, the latter laid out, as Koshimura told us proudly, in European fashion. Then we bade a temporary adieu to our attache and caught the train to Tamsui, where we had been invited to lunch with the Consul and Mrs.
Phipps.
As we parted from Koshimura, we felt like a pair of children who have got away from a governess.
That may sound ungracious, but, kind as our hosts were, we felt sometimes that we should like an hour or so to ourselves. At heart the Britisher is an undisciplined creature and very soon chafes if his day 's amusement is drawn up for him. He finds an irksome restraint in working to a time-table. Unlike many Americans, he dislikes a programme of ordered sightseeing. He wants to wander round on 1 Japanese Rule in Formosa, p. 172. TAMSUI 205
his own account and poke his nose into odd corners.
He likes exploring, and the parts of a foreign town that are most worth exploring are not always the museums and the public parks.
Tamsui is 14 miles north of Taihoku, an hour's run in the train. It is situated at the mouth of the Tamsui River and was once a busy port, but has now been cut out by Keelung, one of the causes of this being that the river has a troublesome bar and can only be entered by ships drawing less than 14 feet of water, even at high tide.
The first European settlers at Tamsui were Spanish, who came early in the seventeenth century.
The Spaniards, although they were in possession of Manila, had been cut out of the Japanese trade by the Dutch, and decided that a station in the north of Formosa would be a convenient halfway house between the Philippines and Japan from which to renew it. Accordingly in 1626, two years after the Dutch had established themselves at Tainan, an ex- pedition was despatched from Manila consisting of two Spanish galleons and a dozen Chinese junks, in which were embarked three companies of infantry and some Dominican friars.
On reaching the northern coast of Formosa the Spaniards discovered the harbour of Keelung, which appeared to suit their requirements in every way. It was given the name of Santissima Trinidad, a fort, San Salvador, was built on an island (now known as Palm Island) at the mouth of the harbour, and the banner of Castile was raised. Seldom had the occupation of territory proved so easy. What was more, the colony was not molested, and the friars set to, zealously making converts among the natives in the usual way. Encouraged by their success, the Spaniards turned their attention three 206 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO years later to Tamsui, built a fort, named San Domingo, on a hill above the river, and established missions.
Although the Spaniards made no attempt to interfere with the activities of the Dutch, asking for nothing better than to be allowed to trade in peace, it is not to be supposed that the Council at Fort Zeelandia watched with any complacency a foreign nation calmly entering the island and building forts, for the policy of the Dutch in the Eastern seas was to secure the whole of the Oriental trade for themselves. It must also be remembered, in justice to them, that the whole island had been complacently ceded to them by the Chinese.1 For several years, however, they were too much concerned with their own affairs to take any active steps to oust the Spaniards from their settlements, and it was not until 1641 that the Governor of Keelung received a peremptory demand from Zeelandia to surrender all possessions in the north of the island. This demand was met with a spirited refusal. The Dutch immediately sent an expedition against the Spanish forts, but the defenders put up so stout an opposition that the attacking party was forced to withdraw without accomplishing its design.
It was obviously only a matter of time before the Dutch came again in stronger force. Yet the authorities at Manila seem to have viewed their Formosan settlements with the same indifference as the Dutch authorities at Batavia viewed theirs, not recognizing them (once they were planted) as convenient outposts for checking the influence of their enemies as well as important trading-centres in themselves.
After the Dutch attack, so far from sending reinforcements, they recalled three of the four companies
i See p. 33. SPANISH FORTS SURRENDER 207
at Formosa for a campaign against the natives of the Philippines. On learning this, the Dutch immediately began to make preparations for a second expedition, and when the Spanish commander sent an urgent appeal for more troops, one ship was despatched from Manila containing a certain amount of provisions and ammunition and the magnificent contribution of eight soldiers.
On August 3, 1642, a Dutch squadron appeared off Tamsui. The Spanish forces were not strong enough to oppose a landing, and without much difficulty the Dutch obtained possession of the suburbs of the town. They occupied a small hill overlooking the fort and captured it after a bombardment of six days, in spite of the gallant resistance made by the Governor and the little garrison. Keelung fell a few days later, and the Dutch then celebrated their first victories over the Spaniards in the Eastern seas. The surrender of both settlements was unconditional, and booty amounting to over a million Spanish dollars fell into the victors' hands. The members of the garrisons, including the missionaries, were taken to Zeelandia and thence to Batavia, where they were kindly treated. They were eventually released and given permission to return to Manila, and all but the Spanish Governor availed themselves gladly of this concession. The Governor, poor man, preferred exile to a dungeon. It did not do to lose battles in those days, however honourably, and he was probably shrewd enough to know that the clearer it became that the surrender was due to the policy of his superior officers at Manila, the more unenviable was his position likely to be.
Every small boy who is told that 'history repeats itself wonders what exactly is meant by that wellworn phrase. He may even turn to an omniscient 208 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO parent for information and is probably met with an evasive reply. But the fate of Spanish and Dutch settlements in Formosa are curious and exact ex- amples of how history can repeat itself even in a few years.
In each case outposts were established, isolated and 'in the air.' In each case they were threatened with attack—the Spanish by the Dutch, the Dutch by Koxinga—and appealed to their headquarters for assistance, saying that they could not hold out for long with the forces at their disposal. In each case the governors concerned were betrayed by their superior officers, who, secure in long-established colonial capitals, recked little of the dangers of their pioneers. Both settlements, after making a gallant resistance, were forced to surrender, and with their surrender the glorious opportunities of founding flourishing colonies in a fertile land were swept away.
Moreover, in each case, although there was talk of retribution and revenge, no steps were ever taken to wipe out the stain on the national prestige.
Having evicted the Spaniards, the Dutch established factories at Keelung and Tamsui. In place of Fort San Domingo at Tamsui they built a massive fort of red brick and stone, with walls 8 feet thick, commanding the river. It was a substantial piece of work and, as the British Consulate, still stands intact to-day.
The first British Consular office in Formosa was opened at Tainan in 1861 ; in the same year, owing to the port's dwindling trade and unhealthy climate, it was transferred to Tamsui, the Vice-Consul's first abode being a hulk in the Tamsui River. In 1865 the Vice-Consul, Mr. Swinhoe, transferred his office to Takow (and, later, to Anping), but the Tamsui Consulate was continued as a subordinate agency, THE BRITISH CONSULATE, TAMSUI
THE TAMSUI RIVEII FROM CI iV-II.ATE. THE BRITISH CONSULATE 209
and in 1867 was established in the old Dutch fort, where it is still located. It was here that we found our host. The building has been kept in a very good state of preservation. One can still see the dungeons and the high-walled yards where prisoners were wont to take their solitary constitutionals, while from the top of the great tower, where now floats the Union Jack in place of the standard of the Dutch East India Company, a magnificent view of the sur- rounding country can be obtained. Also it is a splendid place for a small boy, as the elder Master Phipps found to his great content.
§ 8
The British Consul's house is close to the consulate and on the same hill—a house of red brick, mellow with years, with tiled floors and surrounded by verandas on both stories. Here we spent a delightful afternoon. The Phippses were the first Europeans we had met since leaving Borneo, and their house, so different from the wooden tropical buildings, raised on piles and with roofs of palm-leaf thatch, which we knew so well, had an atmosphere of its own. As we sat in the drawing-room and gloried in the cheery fire that was burning in the grate (we had not seen one since leaving England), we felt that we were at home again.
To the exile in the tropics the merry flicker of a fire is perhaps more symbolical of Home than anything else. In the wilds each of us has his own pet dream. For some it is the bustle of Piccadilly or the stately slope of St. James's Street, for some a backwater on the Thames on a sunny afternoon. But I think that what one longs for most of all, and what one appreciates most when one gets back, is an evening with just enough chill in the air to make one sure 14 210 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO one is well away from the land where it is always summer, a deep arm-chair and oneself therein gazing in contentment into the changing depths of a glowing fire, preferably of logs.
1 ' Surely everybody is aware," wrote de Quincey, "of the divine pleasures which attend a winter fireside—candles at 4 o'clock, warm hearth-rugs, tea, a fair tea-maker, shutters closed, curtains flowing in ample draperies on the floor, whilst the wind and rain are raging audibly without. ' ' That is a wonderful picture which would be nothing but for the image the fire conjures to one's mind. Yet to dwellers in cold countries fires are such ordinary things that they forget how much they owe to Prometheus, who stole fire from Olympus and was condemned by Zeus to be chained to the summit of a lofty mountain, there to be preyed upon by an eagle for countless years. It was the most splendid theft either in myth or in history, even though the price that the unfortunate Prometheus had to pay (and for all I know pays still) was rather stiff, and if they had to light their fires with a flint instead of merely by striking a match people would perhaps appreciate it more. It takes a returning exile from the tropics to appreciate the glories of a fire, and as I spread out my hands to the one in Mrs. Phipps's drawing-room I proposed and sec- onded a hearty vote of thanks to the son of Iapetus.
Tamsui, it is true, is almost as far from England as it is possible to get, but so long as there is a season when you can enjoy a fire, you can still recapture the atmosphere of Home. Moreover, in a climate where fires are necessary, children retain their rosy cheeks, and, after you have lived under a yellowing tropical sun, rosy cheeks make England seem very near. But if our hosts' house seemed like a corner of A GARDENER'S PARADISE 211
our own country, their garden was one of the strangest I have ever seen. It sloped steeply down the hill, and one walked from the temperate zone into the tropics. At the top, near the house, were strawberries and nasturtiums and sweet peas ; below were bananas, pommoloes, papayas, and hibiscus. Could any garden do more than grow the products of both hemispheres? It was a gardener's paradise.
It has been proposed to move the British Consulate from Tamsui to Taihoku. Fortunately (as I thought) for the Consul, there are obstacles in the way. The Japanese would prefer to have the Consulate at Taihoku, and, for official reasons, it undoubtedly should be there. But owing to the decadence of Tamsui, property there is worth next to nothing, and were the present building disposed of it would realize but a small fraction of its value.
Suitable premises cannot be leased in Taihoku, and therefore the erection of a new building would mean heavy expenditure which circumstances do not justify.
A Consulate in Taihoku might be more central, but I am sure it would break the heart of any consul's wife to leave that garden, to say nothing of that mellow veranda-girt house which looks out across the Tamsui River. And despite 'the exigencies of the service,' consuls' wives are very deserving of consideration.
After tea we went for a walk over the hills, green and undulating as the swelling downland of Wiltshire. To my surprise we suddenly walked on to a golf-tee. I was just starting an eulogy on the enterprising Britisher who makes a golf-course wherever he goes, when Phipps stopped me.
"Not a bit of it," said he. "It's Japanese." For some reason it had never occurred to me that Japanese played golf, anyhow in Formosa. But 212 CAMPHOR, OPIUM, AND TOBACCO they do. Moreover, they have a nine-hole course at Tamsui on which large numbers from Taihoku come and play—and I learnt that no foreigners are allowed to join their club. This fact struck me with rather unpleasant force. It seemed that the Japanese were not quite so indulgent to the stranger who dwells within their midst as they were to the casual passer-by, but it is only fair to add that since 1922 a new rule has been made and that foreigners are now allowed to play. CHAPTER X
THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA Wo Bet out for the country of the ' savages ' with Koshimura— Toyen—The push-car—Communications in hilly country—Journey to the mountains—Arrival at Kapanzan—The Government station— We put up at the rest-house—The school—Education of aborigines— A Japanized community—The aborigines of Formosa—A friendly people in olden days—Persecution by the Chinese—Their flesh sold in the public market—Japanese efforts to pacify aborigines—The guard-line—Electrified wire entanglements—Punitive expeditions— The problem still unsolved.
§ 1 1WAS particularly anxious, before leaving Formosa, to see something of the aborigines in their own villages, and the officials of the Foreign Section were kind enough to make arrangements for us to visit Kapanzan, a Government outstation in the 1 tamed' savage area. We left Taihoku by train at 10 o'clock one morning and, travelling west, reached Toyen in half an hour. The remainder of the journey was to be made by 'push-car' and, determined to travel light, we had brought only a small suit-case between us. I noticed, however, that Koshimura had beaten us, for he brought no luggage of any kind. So far as I could see, he had solved satisfactorily one of the most difficult problems of travelling, the baggage problem, by taking nothing. How much pleasanter, how much less worrying, a roving life would be if one could only educate oneself up to this standard. There would be no packing and unpacking, no complications caused
213 214 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
by superfluities which get crowded out, no porters, no tips. On the other hand, certainly, no pyjamas and no change of clothes ; but one cannot have everything, and, as I have mentioned, Japanese inns are very helpful about providing kimonos, slippers, and even toothbrushes. So that light travel is made easier for the Japanese, especially as they do not have to shave much. Even on the long journey from Takao to Taihoku, Koshimura's luggage consisted of nothing more than a small attache case, and I noticed that that was mostly full of books.
We were met at Toyen by the usual officials, who had push-cars and coolies ready waiting for us. The push-car is simply a light trolley with brakes. On the flat one coolie can get it along, running behind and shoving until it is well under way, and then getting on until it begins to slow down. Going up hill two coolies are necessary, but it is when you are going down hill that the fun begins and you have all the thrills of a prolonged journey on a kind of private (and rather flimsy) scenic railway.
The track is a very light line of about 18 inches gauge and the sleepers are mere billets of wood. At present only the main towns of Formosa are connected by roads, and the outlying districts, even up to the hills, are linked up by means of these push-car lines, of which there are over 550 miles in the island. Whoever first thought of opening up the country in this manner was a genius, for in a land where there are few horses the push-car line is far more useful than a bridle-path would be, and moreover it forms an admirable method of transporting produce, such as camphor, from the hills.
From Toyen a double track is laid, like a tramline, alongside the road. On the trolleys sedan chairs had been placed for our benefit, and my wife and I TRAVEL BY PUSH-CAR 215
took the first, muffled in rugs (for it was cold), while Koshimura and the suit-case followed in the second.
Thus we set off. We found it a delightful mode of travel.
After a long run across the plains we gradually ascended to the summit of a hill which overlooked the Tamsui River, and then started merrily down the slope at a splendid pace. The track became a single line; there were many sharp turns, and more than once we met a trolley crawling up, but the brakes were good and we always had time to stop and leap off. Once we overtook a string of cars heavily loaded with sugar-cane ; here, too, we had to get out to let the coolie trundle the trolley along the road and put it on the line again beyond the obstruction.
After a run of an hour and a half we reached the banks of the Tamsui, here little more than a stream ; it flows down a wide, stony course and is spanned by a long and rather crazy bridge on piles, constructed by filling large rattan cages with loose stones, an example of ingenious and inexpensive engineering.
To give the coolies a rest we walked up a steep hill on the far side, on the slopes of which is perched the little town of Taikokam. The sub-prefect of Taikokam administers the district as far as Kapanzan. We met his deputy and the district Chief of Police (complete with sword), and then, having had the foresight to bring sandwiches with us, we had what is known as an al-fresco luncheon at a little summer-house in the park. The authorities very kindly sent along a policeman with a supply of tea, cigarettes, and cigars. I thought the devil I knew would be better than the devil I didn 't, and stuck to cigarettes, but Koshimura recklessly helped himself to a Formosan cigar. It may have been my imagina-216 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
tion, but he seemed to become unusually quiet after a few minutes of it, and I noticed that he deposited it half-smoked in an azalea bush when he thought nobody was looking.
The sub-prefect then very kindly placed at our disposal, as guide and interpreter for the rest of our trip, a Japanese sergeant of police who, we were told, had been in the district for thirteen years. He was a smiling, cheerful person, but spoke no English and, as I discovered later, very few words of the native dialect. However, he made us feel important and was better company for Koshimura than the suit-case.
"We left Taikokam at 12.30, and as we were now getting up into the hills we took on another coolie for each trolley, much as trams in the old days used to take on a second horse. The sedan chairs were lashed securely on the framework of the trolleys, so that, as Koshimura observed, they would be less likely to overbalance when going round corners. "We prepared for the worst. We zigzagged up and up, Koshimura 's trolley now in the van, sometimes with a run down, the fertile valley of the Tamsui, far below us, looking, with its closely packed rice-fields of irregular shape, for all the world like a gigantic jig-saw puzzle that had been put together by a clever hand. Up, up we climbed, now winding round the swelling sides of those switchback hills. Leaving the terraced fields, we came to more isolated cultivation—patches of tea and rice, with the little thatched mud-houses of the Formosans clustered here and there upon the slopes. We stopped for tea and bananas at a wayside police-station, whose trim garden was abloom with roses and azaleas, and at last, having climbed 1,500 feet, we reached the little 10 OCR PUSH-CAR.
.Mr. ECoshimura, the Aurhor. and Japanese Police Sergeant.
A WAYSIDE POLIl
-
.TWN. KAPANZAN STATION 217
station of Kapanzan at five o'clock, glad to stretch our legs after our seven hours ' trip.
§ 2
Kapanzan stands on a plateau high above the Tamsui, now nothing but a mountain torrent. The hills all round, covered with a tangle of forest, and here and there with a brown patch of cultivated land, might have dropped out of Borneo. Far below, on the banks of the foaming stream, was another policestation, while high above it on the hillside, like a swift's nest on the side of a cave, was a solitarynative house.
We were lodged in the Government rest-house, which overlooked the deep-cleft valley and was built in the usual Japanese style. Close by was the palace which had been erected some time previously for an expected visit of the Crown Prince, which, however, did not take place.
The Chief of Police took us round the station.
Everything was very neat and clean; the barracks and police quarters were spotless. But what sur- prised us most was to find that, even in this faraway outpost in the hills, there was electric light. We went on to the school for the children of the 'tamed' aborigines. The schoolmaster was one of the police. The children, who were out working in the fields on our arrival, were summoned by a bell and came dashing back. They were all dressed in uniform grey kimonos and peaked caps, and they proceeded to give us an exhibition of musical drill with flags, the singing being in Japanese. Japanese fashion, they bowed profoundly when the parade was over. I only noticed three girls amongst them, one of whom politely brought us some tea.
A few mothers, who are allowed to come and visit 218 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
their offspring, were strolling about, placidly smoking long pipes with tiny brass bowls ; they wore long cloths of brilliant colours hanging from the shoulders to the ankles, and their faces were tattooed in an extraordinary fashion — broad bands running down the centre of the forehead to the bridge of the nose and across each cheek from ear to mouth. They formed a picturesque contrast to their children, who might have been a class of Japanese.
After the parade Koshimura intimated that it was usual for visitors to give a donation to the children, so five yen was produced, on receiving which the eldest boy came up and bowed in the approved Japanese manner. I looked at him.
"My hat," I murmured to myself, "and you the son of a perfectly good headhunter ! ' ' The Japanese are very proud of these schools, of which there are over thirty in the island. They point to them as a sign of progress, as a testimony of their benevolent influence over the 'savages.' To me, however, it seemed pathetic to see these children of nature being, to coin a word, Japanized. They appeared happy enough; they were clean and well cared for. The conditions under which they live are undoubtedly improved, but whether by the process of assimilation (which is admittedly the object of the administration) they do not lose more than they gain is a moot point. Education is not compulsory, but Koshimura told me that although the children did not work on Sundays, they had no other holidays and came to the schools for five years without returning to their villages. This means that they are cut off from their homes during the five most impressionable years of their lives; they lose their own traditions, they forget their customs. In A HOLIDAY FOR THE SAVAGES 219
fact they leave their villages simple up-country native children, and in five years they return Japanese citizens.
At the time I found Koshimura's statement difficult to believe and I was careful to verify it, for I found that our attache, with the best intentions in the world, was occasionally apt to be inaccurate.
This was due, I think, sometimes to his natural dislike for displaying ignorance, sometimes to a desire to give the answer he thought one wanted. For instance, on our arrival at Kapanzan he asserted that my wife was the first foreign woman to visit the station, but on looking through a kind of visitors' book we came across in the rest-house we saw the signatures of several missionary ladies, and probably scores of other foreign women have been there.
Anyhow, although those unfortunate children might have to work for five years on end, on this particular occasion I was determined to get them a day off. Ever since I had been a small boy I had envied the important people who came to visit a school and were able to demand a half-holiday for its scholars. I had always had an ambition to soar to this height of power and benevolence, and at Kapanzan I was able to do so for the first time.
The master promised that my request should be granted, but whether it was or not, or whether, having got a half-holiday, the children appreciated it, I shall never know.
§ 3
Kapanzan lies on the fringe of the 'savage' country, into which we were not allowed to go. Koshimura intimated that if we did go we should probably leave our heads there. I was sceptical about this, but at the same time the area whose inhabitants are 220 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
still wholly outside Government influence is a very considerable one and comprises the greater part of the eastern highlands, where occur most valuable stands of camphor trees.
The inhabitants of these hills, who may be called the aborigines of Formosa, for want of a better word, are descendants of a race which has probably been in the island for at least two thousand years.
Their origin, although doubtful, was almost certainly from the eastern mainland of Asia, and for the most part they are of Malayan stock. At the same time the various groups of which they are now composed did not all reach the island during the same period, and it is also likely that there were immigrations from Polynesia and the east as well.
It is only within recent years that their passion for human heads has begun to wane, and the following legend, told by a Taiyal native, describes how the custom is believed to have begun. I am indebted to Mr. Phipps for it, and give it as he translated it : "Our ancestors formerly lived in the hill-tops, but as their numbers increased there was no longer room for them all, and it was decided that some of them should remove to the plains. They had no means of counting their numbers, but it was arranged that they should divide into two parties and gather on two contiguous hills. Each party was then to shout at the top of its voice, and the one that shouted loudest would send some of its members to the other party and thus secure the greatest possible equality of numbers. They accordingly took up their positions as arranged, and one party led off with a mighty shout. The other party re- plied, but the sound was so feeble that it did not reach the other hill. The leader of the first party accordingly detached some of his number and sent KAPAXZAX STATION.
.. •*! Ut THE FORMOSA!* HILL-. ORIGIN OP HEADHUNTING 221 tliem over to the other aide as agreed. The truth was, however, that the leader of the second party, who was a cunning fellow, had concealed half of his men behind the hill in order to deceive the other side, and when the time came for the second exchange of shouts he called the men out of their hiding-place and this time bade them shout their loudest. The first party then realized the fraud that had been practised, and their leader called upon the men he sent over to the other side to return immediately.
The second leader, however, refused to let them go and sent back word that if they wanted them they could come and 'hunt for their heads.' This message infuriated the first party and led directly to the commencement of the practice of headhunting.
"Our ancestors were the smaller party who re- mained in the hills, and whither the party that stayed in the plains went to we know not. Perhaps they became the ancestors of the present semi-civilized tribes." Before the coming of the Chinese to Formosa there is no question that many of the aborigines were in possession of the fertile western plains and that they only took to the hills at a later date as a refuge from the persecutions of the new settlers. This is the usual and almost inevitable process which takes place when a country has to bear the brunt of successive waves of inhabitants, the numbers of the first-comers being gradually reduced—unless indeed they are powerful enough to withstand invasion, which is not usually the case. Even when the Dutch first came to Formosa there were considerable numbers of the natives in the neighbourhood of Tainan, and the Spaniards found them close to the coast in the north. The Dutch especially appear to have found them a likeable 222 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA people and were at pains to make friends with them by treating them well, promoting new industries amongst them and appointing administrative officers to supervise the affairs of each tribe. Many were converted to Christianity. The Rev. G. Candidius, who was the first ordained Dutch missionary in Formosa and lived in the island from 1627 to 1631, described ' the southern tribes with whom he came into contact as friendly and good-natured, hospitable to foreigners and (except in their methods of warfare) not treacherous. When they were at war with another tribe, they fought according to the usages and customs of their fathers, taking heads from young or old and preferably by stealth; but they did not practise headhunting in an indiscriminate manner or kill any stranger who crossed their path as they are pictured doing in later days.
The next reliable account of the natives is by the Jesuit Father de Mailla, who visited the island in 1714 at the request of the Chinese Imperial authorities. He travelled through the island from north to south, and confirms the fact that the natives had been tractable under the Dutch administration; but he found that those who lived on the plains and had submitted to the Chinese were being robbed and cheated by the petty officials set over them. He gives in detail one particularly barbarous atrocity committed by the Chinese, and this was, in all probability, by no means an isolated case. After the Chinese occupied the island, efforts were made to find gold, of which they had heard many stories on the west coast, but without success. The east of the island was the wholly unknown territory, but a party of Chinese adventurers fitted up a small boat and made their way by sea to the east coast, 1 Formosa under the Dutch, p. 9. CHINESE ATROCITIES 223
where they landed and met with a friendly reception from the natives. They were given houses to live in, were supplied with food, and were allowed to go where they wished. They remained a week with their hosts searching for gold, but could obtain no information as to its presence in the neighbourhood.
Then, just as they were about to abandon their search, quite by chance they found in one of the native houses a few gold ingots, by which, however, the owners seemed to set little store. At once the cupidity of the Chinese was aroused. Instead of bartering for the gold, which they could probably have obtained for next to nothing, they prepared their boat for the return voyage and then invited the natives to a farewell banquet, in gratitude, as they said, for the hospitality that had been shown them. They supplied their unsuspecting guests liberally with arrack and, when they were all drunk, massacred them to a man, seized the coveted gold, and set sail.
No notice was taken of this outrage by the authorities, but it would have been well for the Chinese themselves had the murderers been brought to justice. Tidings of the atrocity spread through the native countryside and retaliation followed. Bands of aborigines invaded the Chinese settlements, killing in cold blood every man, woman, and child they met, burning villages, destroying crops, and looting everything they could find.
From that day the most bitter enmity existed between the natives and the Chinese, and increasing warfare was waged along the native border for hundreds of years. The attitude of the natives towards strangers underwent a complete change, as well it might, and every foreigner, whatever his nationality, was regarded as an enemy. The Chinese 224 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
officials made no serious attempts to conciliate the native districts or to bring about a cessation of hostilities and a peaceful settlement: their only policy was that of extermination. At one period they did go so far as to construct an embankment on the line of what was supposed to be the native border, beyond which the settlers were directed not to go. It is not to be supposed that this action served any useful purpose. It did not prevent a greedy Chinese making an incursion after camphor, or anything else he thought he could get, nor did it prevent the natives making raids upon their selfappointed enemies, even though guards were placed at intervals along the border. But it was an unequal struggle for the natives. They were driven farther and farther into the hills as their fertile territory on the plains and lowlands was wrested from them by the oncoming tide of Chinese settlers, especially by the camphor-workers, who pushed farther inland as the areas near the coast began to be worked out.
A favourite trick of the camphor-workers was to capture a party of natives by a ruse. They then sent for the wives and children, whereupon the men were released and the others detained as hostages until the area of camphor had been worked. It was not surprising that when the natives came upon small parties of Chinese working in the forest they seldom let slip the chance of taking their revenge.
The Chinese atrocities, however, far exceeded any committed by the natives. The latter took heads, it is true, but the former ate and even traded in their victims' flesh. "Impossible as it may seem," says Mr. Davidson, "that a race with such high pretensions to civilization and religion should be guilty of such barbarity, yet such is the truth. After SALE OF HUMAN FLESH 225
killing a savage, the head was commonly severed from the body and exhibited to those who were not on hand to witness the prior display of slaughter and mutilation. The body was then either divided among its captors and eaten, or sold to wealthy Chinese and even to high officials, who disposed of it in a like manner. The kidney, liver, heart, and soles of the feet were considered the most desirable portions, and were ordinarily cut up into small pieces, boiled, and eaten somewhat in the form of soup. The flesh and bones were boiled, and the former made into a sort of jelly. The Chinese profess to believe, in accordance with an old superstition, that the eating of savage flesh will give them strength and courage. To some this may appear as a partial excuse for this horrible custom; but even that falls through, if one thinks that superstitious beliefs are at the bottom of cannibalism as practised by the most savage tribes of the world.
During the outbreak of 1891 savage flesh was brought in—in baskets—the same as pork, and sold like pork in the open markets of Tokoham before the eyes of all, foreigners included; some of the flesh was even sent to Amoy to be placed on sale there." 1
§ 4
In such manner was the friendly disposition of the natives changed by the tyranny and barbarity of the Chinese and by the weakness and inefficiency of the Government. Iron entered into their souls and they killed a Chinese at sight. This was the state of affairs when the Japanese took over the island, and, once they had put down the Chinese rebels and bands of roving brigands who infested the country1 The Island of Formosa, p. 255. 15 226 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA side, they were confronted with the problem of how best to settle the aborigines.
In my opinion, they have not succeeded. In my opinion, the 'savage question' is the one problem in Formosa which the Japanese have failed to solve, and that is because they have not set about solving it in the right way.
Once the Japanese had established law and order in the territory which had been under the influence of the Chinese Government, they turned their attention to the aborigines. A committee for exploring the savage area was formed and a department for dealing with native affairs established. No unauthorized persons were allowed to enter the savage area without special permission, and an ordinance was promulgated forbidding anyone to occupy or lay claim to any land within the native territory without special authority.
The frontier between the savage territory and the rest of the island was only vaguely defined, but it was understood to follow roughly the line of the old embankment constructed by the Chinese. A few small stations were established in the native districts, but the inhabitants, probably misunderstanding the motives of the strangers or mistaking them for Chinese, often raided these posts and killed the garrisons. After this, the policy of the authorities seems to have been for some time to confine the aborigines within their boundaries and to let them work out their own salvation; that is to say, they ignored nearly half their new territory (for the savage area was estimated at 7,000 square miles), containing they knew not what possibilities and hidden wealth.
They soon found it necessary, however, to establish guards along the frontier to protect the camphor-THE GUARD-LINE 227
workers, and they revived the old institution of the Chinese, which had fallen into disuse. The guardline, or aiyn, as reorganized by the Japanese, consisted of outposts of military police; in 1895 it stretched for 80 miles and was extended later to 300. The line was advanced into the native territory when an opportunity arose, and the inhabitants who had been 'suppressed' were then 'tamed'—to use Koshimura's expression. Agricultural implements were given them; they were taught to plant rice instead of the millet which had hitherto formed their staple food ; their sick were attended and supplied with medicine ; salt and other necessaries were exchanged for the game and forest products they brought in.
The guard-line was made by cutting a track through the forest, called the guard-road. It usually followed the summit of a range of hills, the trees being felled for some distance on the native side, to make it possible to give warning of the approach of any aborigines and to afford a field of fire. At strategic points guard-houses, of which there are now over 800, were established and garrisoned, the average distance between each being a quarter of a mile, They were constructed from material on the spot—wood, bamboo, earth, and stone; the walls were loop-holed and surrounded by trenches and palisades. In the Report on the Control of the Aborigines in Formosa, published by the Formosan Government, it is stated : "Where it becomes necessary to perfect the defensive arrangements, wireentanglements, charged with electricity, are used or i mines are run. These have great effect in giving an alarm of the invading savages. Grenades are very often used in the course of fighting. Telephone lines are constructed along the guard-road, and in 228 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
certain important places mountain and field guns are placed. One gun is sufficient to withstand the attack of several tribes." 1 The italics are mine.
The guard-line system is still in force. The guardsmen are paid by the Formosan Government and are recruited from the Formosan Chinese, with a small sprinkling of Japanese. They are provided with uniforms and are paid from 7 to 15 yen sl month. If a guardsman is wounded, he is given a bounty ranging from 40 to 100 yen upon recovery ; and should one be killed in the performance of his duty, his family receive 100 yen as compensation.
There are usually from two to four guardsmen in each house, whilst every fourth or fifth house is a branch superintendent's station under a Japanese or Formosan policeman ; a police inspector, or assistant inspector, is in charge of every four or five branch stations. In districts where barter is officially permitted, an exchange office is attached to the superintendent's station, controlled by an official who is assisted by a native interpreter.
The Formosan guard-line is simply a line of outposts. Beyond the outposts stretches what is looked upon as enemy country. Behind are the Formosan villages which are to be protected. The guardsmen are essentially a fighting force, although for the most part they are a defensive one. They keep watch from their little strongholds day and night; they patrol the line between the guard-house continually.
Neither natives nor Formosans are allowed to pass the line without special permits. "Even the savages who have permission to travel and communicate freely," say Mr. Takekoshi, "are not allowed to approach the lines except at certain fixed points.
i p. 16. A CHOICE OF EVILS 229
The sentinels have full permission to use their rifles whenever their challenge is disregarded." 1 Again the italics are mine.
This state of affairs has existed since the guardline was reorganized by the Japanese until the present time. Under the existing methods of administration it may continue so to exist for many years to come.
Mr. Takekoshi likens the lot of the garrisons of the isolated guard-houses to the life "led by those unfortunates in China, who in olden times were assigned to the garrisons far beyond the Great Wall, where they had ever to be on guard against the ravages of the furious Huns, a constant menace for so many years to the peace and tranquillity of the Middle Kingdom. The hardships they suffered and their lonely existence were a favourite theme with Chinese poets, who loved to descant upon the hard fate of these guardians of the public peace. The life of the Formosan guards is well worthy of being sung by our poets, and would furnish them with many a touching incident. ' ' 2 It is a pathetic picture. But anyhow, the Formosan guards are there of their own free will.
Moreover, they are outside, not inside, that electrified barbed-wire entanglement. Taking it all round, I think I would rather be a Formosan guardsman than a Formosan savage.
§ 5
From time to time, as I have mentioned, the guardline is advanced, and the territory so occupied is then available for development once it has been settled. In some cases the natives have themselves
1 Japanese Rule in Formosa, p. 214.
2 Op. cit., p. 215. 230 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA
realized the advantages of living under settled Government, and then the occupation presents no difficulties. At other times every possible obstacle is put in the way of the advance, and a guerrilla warfare ensues in which the natives usually have the best of it, in spite of the troops equipped with the devices of modern warfare sent against them.
The attacking force has an imperfect knowledge of the territory to be entered ; the country consists of range upon range of steep hills, densely clad with jungle ; transport difficulties are very great, and there is perpetual danger of troops falling into an ambush.
The native warrior on his own ground can make rings round the heavily equipped Japanese soldier, who is unused to jungle work or to climbing hills.
Under such conditions it is not to be wondered that the ordinary guardsman, who, although he wears a uniform, is far from being a trained and disciplined soldier, frequently deserts before an advance takes place.
The attacking force, the strength of which naturally varies with the objective and, when opposition is anticipated, with the estimated numbers of the enemy, consists of a main body, usually under the command of the Chief Police Officer of the Prefecture, a patrol detachment which acts as an advance guard, a transport section, and an engineering section, to which is entrusted the duty of felling jungle, making new guard-houses, roads, erecting telephone lines and wire entanglements.
Even an advance under peaceful terms means a considerable undertaking. For example, one of the most successful, which was made in 1904 and re- sulted in an area of 300 square miles coming under Government influence, involved a campaign of 99 days, the employment of 700 officers and men, and the PUNITIVE EXPEDITIONS 231 expenditure of £5,000. On another, undertaken in 1907 against the Taiyal tribe in the Taikokam district, through which we passed on our way to Kapanzan, stubborn opposition was encountered, and the expedition, which consisted of two forces of 1,000 and 500 men, sustained heavy casualties both among police, trained guardsmen, and baggage coolies.
After an arduous campaign lasting nearly four months, the line was advanced and 90 square miles of new territory were occupied, this time at a cost of £12,600.
In these cases the line was advanced by the police working in conjunction with the Formosan guardsmen. On other occasions, however, it was considered necessary to send Japanese infantry on punitive expeditions against the aborigines, and, since the troops were unaccustomed to the conditions under which they had to fight, they did not always meet with success. In 1898, after a police detachment of an officer and nine men had been murdered on the east coast by the Taruko, a branch of the Taiyal tribe, on account of the violation (as the natives said) of a tribal custom, a battalion of infantry was despatched to take punitive measures, but, owing to the heavy casualties inflicted by the natives, it was forced to withdraw, and the expedition was abandoned. For some years the Taruko continued their activities unchecked until, in 1906, they made a sudden raid and killed the Chief Police Officer of the Kwarenko district and 30 camphorworkers. It was then decided to take operations against them on a large scale. A year later, two cruisers bombarded their villages from the sea, after which they were attacked on land by Japanese troops working in conjunction with a band of 500 'tamed' natives. Forty of the Taruko were killed, six vil-232 THE ABORIGINES OF FORMOSA lages were burnt, and the standing crops were destroyed. 1 As a rule the punitive expeditions, which have been frequent, achieved their objects, inasmuch as a certain number of natives were killed and a certain number of villages were burnt. Sometimes the pacification of the district resulted, but usually it did not, for the natives, having inflicted what casualties they could upon the attacking force, took to the jungle, where they were secure from pursuit. The Japanese, having destroyed everything there was to destroy, then withdrew and matters went on very much as they had gone before. The modern infantry soldier has everything against him under such conditions, the native everything in his favour. Usually the police and guardsmen attained far better results than the military, from the point of view of the Formosan Government.
In some cases the failure of an expedition did more harm than good, for it left the natives defiant and with even less respect for the Government than they had had before ; in other cases, although a display of force was made and certain villages received punishment, the effect was not lasting, since the district could not be occupied, so that lives were lost and considerable expenditure incurred without any useful result. And the fact remains, as even the Formosan Government must itself admit, that in spite of all these efforts and operations, in spite of these expensive expeditions and desultory campaigns extending for nearly thirty years, the natives of the Formosan hills, numbering less than 100,000, are still able to keep the Japanese out of half their colony and prevent them from developing what may yet prove to be the most valuable part of the island.
1 Report of the Control of the Aborigines of Formosa, pp. 34 and 39. THE JAPANESE DEFIED 233 The Japanese showed themselves a match for the Chinese, they were able to beat the Eussians and they captured Tsintau from the Germans, but they are still being defied and excluded from the territory over which they hold nominal sway by the primitive people of the Formosan hills. For that reason I say that the Japanese have failed, and failed utterly, in their endeavours to solve the important question of bringing the natives under their influence. It is easy enough to pick holes in the policy of others, and so far my criticism has been purely destructive, but I shall try to show in the following chapter how, in my opinion, they might have succeeded and how they may still succeed.























CHAPTEE XI
WHEKE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
We dine with Koshimura at the rest-house—An awkward moment —We meet some of the ' tamed savages ' in full dress—We make friends—A Taiyal village—Striking similarities of language and custom between natives of Formosa and Borneo—Probability of their descent from a common stock—Failure of Japanese to bring natives under their influence—Some criticisms—Likelihood of methods successful in Borneo being successful in Formosa—The individual more important than the system—The story of Goho—Need for District Officers who can obtain personal influence over natives.
$ 1 AFTER we had been the rounds of Kapanzan Station we dined with Koshimura on the floor—there was no opportunity of doing anything else. The police sergeant joined us. Koshimura had once confided to me that although he knew it was considered very bad Western tablemanners to make a noise over one's food, he found it extremely difficult to do otherwise, since according to Japanese etiquette the reverse was the custom.
He had, however, acquired some proficiency, but the sergeant had not. Frankly, the sergeant ate boisterously.
Then occurred an incident which even now makes me blush when I remember it. We were given a gnu-nabe, which is a kind of mixed grill and is looked upon as a great delicacy in Japan. It consists of small chunks of meat grilled over a charcoal fire.
The fire is placed beside the table in a brazier and the grilling goes on while one is eating; one simply
234 AN AWKWARD MOMENT 235 helps oneself (from the grill) with chopsticks. The sergeant, Koshimura told us, was an expert griller, and he conducted the ceremony. The result was very good. We helped ourselves, but I have already admitted that I am not an expert with the chopstick.
It is not my weapon. And after I had dropped one small piece of meat three times, my wife burst out laughing at my clumsy efforts.
Koshimura grew red, turned to her, and said very politely : 1 'Ah, Mrs. Rutter, you must not laugh at the way we eat. It is Japanese custom." It was obvious that he was referring to the loud sucking noises of the sergeant, and we got hot all over to think that Koshimura should imagine that our manners were so vile as to laugh at him before his face. In private, admittedly, we might have our little jests at his expense; he probably had his at ours. But not in public. By such threads hang the decencies of social life.
We did our best to reassure Koshimura that I was the butt. I am not sure that he was wholly convinced even then. Either he was not, or he was a very considerate A.D.C., for, when we had eaten as much as we could manage, he moved the table and grill into the adjoining room. There he and the sergeant continued their feast with renewed gusto, the noises of the sergeant blending melodiously with the sizzling of the fat as more meat was added to the grill.
For all that we were glad they were not Chinese.
Everyone who has lived in China knows how a Chinese diner shows his appreciation of a good meal.
He belches. The better the dinner the louder and longer the belch. It sounds unpleasant. To us it is unpleasant. But it is simply the Chinese gentle-236 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED man's way of saying to his host, " Thank you so much for such a delightful evening," and, to his mind, it is just as good a way as ours.
§ 2
The inevitable cold soft-boiled eggs were too much for us at breakfast next morning, and we made a frugal meal of cocoa, biscuits and bananas.
Then the Chief Police Officer appeared with a small party of Taiyal natives in full dress. This was what I had been looking forward to, and somehow I felt I was among friends at once. Among the Japanese, although they were so kind, so courteous, so hospitable, I felt nevertheless that I was among strangers ; but here were people that I knew, people I had met hundreds of times before in the Borneo hills. But for their tattooing and their elaborate style of dress they might have been Muruts, those happy, likeable people among whom I had lived as District Officer in Borneo, in whose houses I had slept, whose feasts I had shared, whom I had gently persuaded to abandon headhunting.
So that there was no awkwardness about my introduction to these Taiyals. Their very name was reminiscent of the Tagals of Borneo. Perhaps in some strange way they felt I was a friend ; anyhow, we soon had them round us, smiling and chattering.
They were finely built and well set up, with a single band tattooed down the centre of the forehead, perhaps slightly taller than the average Murut, but the same colour—that of a fallen leaf—the same ex- pression, the same ways, the same mild manner, friendly without being familiar, deferential without being servile, the manner, in fact, which marks the Malay as one of the pleasantest natives in the world.
They wore their hair long and their dress consisted THE FRINGE OF THE SAVAGE COUNTRY.
i ZibJ THE BLACK FOX 237
of the usual loin-cloth and a sleeveless coat, gaily embroidered with red and blue wool; over this was a long cloth, similar to those worn by the women, stretching from the shoulders to the ankles, a garment not unlike the Malayan sarong, but divided and simply fastened at the top. In addition to this they wore upon the chest a peculiar square-coloured breast-cloth, ornamented with buttons, and upon their heads were closely woven skull-caps of rattan, one with a peak, looking like a jockey's cap, very firm, and some protection, I imagine, from a knife-cut in the spacious days of headhunting.
They were not at all shy, but the thing that really broke the ice was the black fox fur my wife was wearing. I saw them taking note of it, and soon they were jabbering with interest. Each one had to handle it and make a close inspection, murmuring as he did so, little 'wans' of wonder. I have always found that primitive people are far more impressed by the comparative than by the unknown. I have seen a party of up-country natives conducted over a battleship and left quite cold by the experience, while they were lost in admiration at an electric torch.
Anything which is an improvement on what is familiar to them excites their interest at once. The Taiyals use furs in the cold weather and hunt animals to get them : that was the reason why the black fox —head, eyes, and all—caused such a sensation.
I could not, of course, carry on any direct conversation with my new friends, although I would have given much had they been able to speak Malay, the language, I do not doubt, from which their tongue is mainly derived. But long experience with other primitive people has enabled me to keep up a kind of communication by means of smiles and gestures and pantomime, and in this manner, how-238 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
ever ridiculous to an onlooker, to arrive at some degree of mutual understanding. It was not long before we were on very good terms, for once you can make a native laugh, he is your friend—anyhow, until it suits him to be otherwise.
Koshimura seemed to look upon these overtures with some disdain. He adopted that air of aloofness noticeable in a guest who accompanies an enthusiastic pig-keeper round the sties. It was quite obvious that for the life of him he could not see what there was to take an interest in, and he undoubtedly considered me very undignified. The police officer, however, appeared to be on very good terms with the Taiyals, all of whom, by the way, spoke Japanese. After a few words from him they proved quite amenable to being photographed. Even an old grandmother stood the ordeal without the least demur.
I was very anxious to procure some native clothes and weapons, and since Koshimura assured me that it would be impossible to buy anything from the Taiyals themselves, we went over to the Exchange, an excellent institution established by the Government to give the aborigines an opportunity of bartering their manufactures and produce for articles they require themselves. Unfortunately the supply had run low and there was little to be had but one of the rattan skull-caps, a string carrying-bag—of the same pattern as those in which heads used to be brought home in triumph after a successful raid— and a pair of bamboo earring-tubes, which the Chief of Police insisted on giving my wife as a present.
The Taiyals, however, soon saw what we were looking for, and in spite of Koshimura 's gloomy prophecy, it was not long before an old man came forward with his rattan cap, which changed hands for *.
A TAIYAL GKAXDMOTnr.E. A MERRY HAGGLE 239
1£ yen. Then one of the young bloods produced his cutting-knife, in a sheath of wood painted vermilion, for which he asked 5 yen. The idea of paying a native his first price is unthought of to anyone who has lived east of Suez, but Koshimura was not helpful in trying to strike a bargain. In such cases he never was, and since the wealthy Japanese are very openhanded with their money, I suppose he considered it unseemly to chaffer with a native. However, since I was neither wealthy nor Japanese, I made no bones about it, and after a merry haggle in pantomime, the price was lowered by 50 sen. On that figure the Taiyal warrior stood firm, and he was sufficiently 'tamed' to know that as it was the only one in the market I should buy it, which I did.
After that a quantity of superfluous possessions were brought up for inspection. One of the square chest-protectors changed hands, and the old granny Stripped herself of her brass bangles in her desire to make an honest yen. We parted on the best of terms. I would have given much to have stayed longer with the Taiyals and to have made an expedition inside the guard-line to meet some of their brothers who were less 'tamed.' But even had I had time to do this, it would, as Koshimura assured me, have been 'not allowed.' And in any case we had to get back. We had our boat to catch in two days' time, and that evening Koshimura was anxious to take us to the great annual wrestling competition which was beginning in Taihoku that afternoon. So, saying good-bye to the courteous Chief of Police, we got aboard our trolleys and set our faces towards the plains.
§ 3
I was, however, intent on at least seeing the Tai-240 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
yals in their own houses. So a couple of miles outside Kapanzan we left the trolleys and walked along a winding path which led through the terraced ricefields to a native village. We were accompanied by a Japanese policeman who spoke the language, put at our disposal by the obliging Chief of Police. Like most guides, he was not certain of the way and had to get assistance from the trolley coolies, but we reached the village at last. The houses, of which there were three, a short distance apart, were little more than shacks, built on the ground with the earth as floor; they had thatched roofs and walls of split bamboo, and they were no less dirty than their oc- cupants.
About a dozen of the villagers—men, women, and children—came out to meet us. They were all very friendly and submitted to being photographed without a murmur. I was able to buy a good specimen of a sleeveless coat, beautifully worked, for 3 yen.
These coats are made of grass-cloth, exactly similar in cut and pattern to the tree-bark coats worn by the Borneo Muruts. They were worn by most of the men, but the majority of the women had adopted tunics of Chinese cut.
Before we left Koshimura suggested that, since the natives believed that if they had their photographs taken they died young, it was usual to give them a few yen as compensation. I had already disbursed largesse as 'drink money' to our friends at Kapanzan, who were also alleged to be under the apprehension of an early demise, and I began to feel that Koshimura had really got the thing on the brain.
Superstitious prejudices of natives are things to be respected, and no one respects them more than I, but this was merely a crude method of extortion. None of the Taiyals had ever seen a camera before they ... VtJBLT-"
THE TAIYAL VILLAGE.
240]
SOME OF THE INHABITANTS. SPOILT NATIVES 241
became 'tamed,' and, had the fears Koshimura attributed to them been deeply rooted in their hearts, it is not likely that the prospect of a few ym would have induced them to accept the prospect of death with such complacency.
It seems a pity that the Formosan Government should encourage their natives to look for pecuniary reward from every visitor. It does not hurt the passing traveller to be fleeced a little, but it does hurt the natives to be turned into a race of beggars.
No native is proof against being spoilt in such a manner, and the more he is given the more he is apt to try to get. The people of the Borneo hills would never expect to be given money for being photographed; the most one would do would be to throw the children a few coins to scramble for, or, after a night's, lodging, present someone with an empty bottle or a disused tin.
M In the course of asking some questions at the village through the policeman, I discovered that two of the Taiyals' numerals—pitoh, 'seven,' and opod, 'ten'—were identical with Borneo dialects. It seemed, then, that the similarity of the Taiyals to the hill-people of Borneo which had struck me so forcibly a few hours earlier was something more than mere coincidence.
At the time I had no opportunity of following up this language clue, for other words I heard were unfamiliar to me, and I could obtain no dictionary of native languages at Taihoku. I have since found, however, in the first appendix to The Island of Formosa, a comparative vocabulary of nine native Formosan dialects. In each list there are to be found 16 242 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED words which are in common use among the Borneo people, and in most cases these words are distinct from the present Malay forms. For instance, the Taiyal words for 'star,' mintoyan, becomes in Murut rembituan; in the Bunun dialect atsu, 'dog,' corre- sponds to tasu in Murut; adao in the Tsarisen and Paiwan dialects to the Murut adau; the words for 'father' and 'mother' in Bunun, tama and Una, are tama and ina in Murut ; while the numerals in Botel Tobago, the little island a few miles to the southeast of Formosa, are identical with those found in the Borneo dialects. In Appendix I of this book will be found a list of 38 words in Formosan and Borneo tongues, showing, in my opinion, how closely related the languages of both peoples must be, although the north coast of Borneo is 1,200 miles from the south coast of Formosa. Throughout both languages the consonant 'v' crops up (often being interchangeable with 'b'), although it does not occur in Malay, and, as one would expect, the dialects of the tribes in the south resemble the Borneo dialects more closely than do those of the tribes living in the north.
Several words are found which are common both to Malay and the Borneo dialects—such as mata, 'eye,' kaki, 'foot,' and api, 'fire.' On the other hand, there are some words which have no counterpart either in the Malay or the Borneo languages, and the dialects of the island often differ widely from each other. This is inevitable, for hills and headhunting both make for isolated communities, and the same thing occurs in Borneo, where the words in use in villages only a day's march apart will often vary greatly. Moreover, in Formosa it is necessary to allow for considerable Polynesian influence, and Mr.
Pickering has pointed out that some tribes have a language reminiscent of Mexican or Aztec, many of THE TRIBES 243
their words ending in tl, as for instance lukatl, 'deer,' hutl hutl, i beads,' ktvangoritl, 'the neck.' 1 The aborigines of Formosa fall into nine main groups, among which there are to be found considerable variations in custom as well as in language.
The strongest tribes are the Taiyals in the north, who number about 31,000, the Bununs, who occupy the centre of the island and number 16,000, the Ami, whose territory extends in a narrow strip along the east coast from Kwarenko to Pinan, numbering 37,000, and the Paiwan, of whom there are 41,000, in the extreme south. Other tribes are the Tsarisen, Saisett, Tuou, Piyuma, and the Yami of Botel Tobago, the total native population, according to the latest Formosan Government figures, amounting to some 130,000.
It is not my intention to attempt to give a detailed account of these people : that has been done quite re- cently by Mrs. J. B. Montgomery McGovern, who gives an admirable description of them in her book Among the Headhunters of Formosa. But the origin of the Formosan natives has been the subject of much speculation, and as I do not think any traveller has noted the close relationship between them and the so-called Borneo aborigines, it may not be out of place to note, as well as the similarities of language, the similarities of custom which do exist.
First, although both races were headhunters in their primitive state, neither were cannibals, and, like a Murut in days of old, a Taiyal youth still has to obtain a head before he can hope to gain the affections of the girl he wishes to make his wife or re- ceive his first tattoo marks, the sign of manhood. In both countries headhunting is on the wane. In North Borneo it is almost a thing of the past, but in For1 Pioneering in Formosa, p. 74. 244 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
mosa the return of the warriors with their trophies is still hailed with feasting and dancing, as it used to be in Borneo ; ceremonies are performed by priest- esses and heads are kept in a special house, and, most peculiar parallel of all, while the warriors are on the war-path their women must abstain from weaving.1 The reason given by the Borneo people for this custom is that changing movement of the women's hands would cause the men to lose their way in the forest. Omens, especially those noted from the calls and the flight of birds, are scrupulously observed; priestesses are common among both peoples ; respect for elders is universal, and aid, meaning 'grandfather,' is a word found in both languages. There is among the Tsarisens, as among the Dusuns of Borneo, a curious veneration for sacred jars. Both people remove the lateral incisors of the upper jaw and pluck out superfluous hairs with tweezers; both keep dogs for hunting purposes, look upon them as valuable possessions, and treat them well; both use poisonous jungle creepers for stupefying fish in the reaches of a river.
Women have far more freedom both among the Formosan and Borneo pagans than among most primitive peoples; they may choose their own husbands, they may possess land, they often acquire con- siderable political power, and in some cases become chiefs; marriage between near relations is strictly forbidden, and this prohibition extends even to second and third cousins; adultery is, by native custom, punishable with death, though in North Borneo this penalty is no longer exacted. Upon death a corpse is sometimes kept for several days on a platform made of split bamboo and is then buried under or near the house, and the spirits of the dead * Vide Among the Headhunters of Formosa, pp. 109 et seq. AN ANCIENT CUSTOM 245
are believed to take up their abodes in the summits of the highest mountains in the land.
In olden days the Borneo tribes had a peculiar practice called sumungup. A prisoner or slave was placed in a bamboo cage and prodded with spears and knives until he died ; each prod was accompanied by a message to be given to a departed relative when he should reach the land of the shades. Mrs.
McGovern describes an exactly similar custom among the Piyuma of Formosa: "On a festival day, held annually, a monkey—one of those with which the Formosan woods are filled—is tied before the bachelor dormitory, and killed by the young men with arrows. . . . The old people of the Piyuma tribe explain that in the 'good old days of old,' when their tribe was a large and powerful one, a prisoner, captured from some other tribe, was always sacrificed on these festal occasions, but now they . . . have to be satisfied with an inferior substitute. It seems that one of the reasons why a monkey is considered so particularly inferior a substitute for a man is that the former can at its death bear no message to the spirits of the ancestors of those who slay it. In the good old days every arrow that was shot into the body of the man bore with it a message to the spirit of the ancestor of the man who shot the arrow. Apparently it was regarded as an obligation, one that could not be evaded, on the part of the victim, to deliver this message—rather these many messages— immediately upon arrival in the spirit-world. ' ' 1 Such examples of similarity of custom could be multiplied, and perhaps the most profitable field for the anthropologist is to be found in the little island of Botel Tobago, which lies 37 miles north-east by east of the most southern cape of Formosa, for its 1 Op. ci*., pp. 118 and 119. 246 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
inhabitants, the Yami, are more likely to have preserved the characteristics their ancestors brought with them from the land of the emigration. As I have mentioned, their numerals correspond almost exactly with those of the Borneo tribes, and they have many customs in common with the Muruts, although Mr. Davidson has noticed that a Polynesian influence has been at work amongst them and that the boats they make are exactly similar in design and ornamentation to those made by the natives of the Solomon Islands.1 Such influence is probably a late one, coming from Polynesians who, blown far out of their course, landed shipwrecked upon the island shores. The natives themselves have traditions to this effect, and in this connexion it is interesting to note that Mr. R. Swinhoe, the first ethnological authority on the Formosan tribes, writing in 1863, stated that the inhabitants of Botel Tobago had no boats or canoes.8 Enough has been said to show that there are at least probabilities for supposing that the pagans of Formosa and North Borneo sprang from a common stock. "Whence did they come, these wanderers who have preserved their language and customs through so many centuries of change and varied fortune?
Perhaps they travelled from the north-west, from Upper Burma, the Abor or the Naga country, filtering through the Malay Peninsula and Cochin China, driven always, like leaves before the wind, by some stronger invading race. Even when by some means they crossed those stormy seas and reached those far lands, till then peopled perhaps only by the birds and animals of the forest, or possibly by an older Negrito stock, they were not allowed to remain long 1 The Island of Formosa, p. 586.
2 Notes on the Ethnology of Formosa. PRIMITIVE UTOPIA 247
in peace, for they were driven by fresh invaders from the fertile plains they had found into the inhospitable jungle hills—in Formosa by the Chinese, in Borneo by the purer Malayan peoples—to those mountain fastnesses which, as their last strongholds, they hold like sanctuaries to-day.
There they live, a hill-race who have long forgotten that they were once sailors and roved the seas, less known perhaps than any other primitive people in the world, separated by a thousand miles of sea and two thousand years of time, yet their customs and social life upon the same level of the human scale—for they are far advanced from sav- agery, although they may still hunt human heads.
They cultivate the land, they live in houses, they use iron and make weapons, they have an artistic instinct for decoration, and they are sensible to the charms of music of a kind. They live in simply organized communities where theft and other crime as we know it is almost unheard of, each village living as one family, as a tiny state of its own, holding all things in common, sharing good fortune and ill fortune too—the Utopia of the practical socialist.
I have dealt at some length upon the similarities of language, custom, and mode of life which exist among the Formosan and the Borneo pagans, not only because, to the best of my belief, they have not been pointed out before and are therefore of some value to anthropologists and ethnologists, but also because it seems not unreasonable to suppose that the administrative methods which have been found effective in dealing with the Borneo tribes would be as effective if applied to those of Formosa. Given similar people living under similar conditions and 248 TVHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED in similar country, it is not too much to expect that the same results might be obtained from the same form of government.
Hitherto the methods of the Japanese in dealing with the natives of Formosa have not been successful, as they themselves admit. This lack of success is, for Japan, a very serious matter, for she does not possess so much superfluous territory that she can allow 100,000 pagans to keep her out of 7,000 square miles of country, which, besides allowing for ample native reserves, could support a thriving agricultural population, to say nothing of its vast stands of valuable camphor-trees and its possible mineral wealth.
Yet this is the position in Formosa to-day: the Japanese are defied by the native tribes, and inside the electrified barbed-wire entanglement with which they have surrounded these children of the forest they can only venture with their lives in their hands.
It is a humiliating position.
According to their lights, the Japanese have done their best. They have spared no pains to bring this region of swelling jungle hills under their influence.
They have spent large sums of money. They have sacrificed many lives. They have tried both the method of 'suppressing' the uncompromising headhunters and that of ' developing' them alternately. They have not treated them barbarously, as the Chinese did ; on occasions they have been unduly severe—Mrs. McGovern, for example, mentions bombs being dropped from aeroplanes on defenceless villages 1 —but once the natives have come under Government influence they have treated them well, even though they persist in the 'assimilation' principle. The trouble is that after nearly thirty 1 Op. cit., p. 90. LACK OF SYMPATHY 249 years there are so many natives who refuse to come to any sort of terms.
The Japanese have met with extraordinary suc- cess in every commercial, industrial, economic, and scientific enterprise they have undertaken in Formosa. Why have they failed in this one essential thing, the settlement of the native population?
I believe the chief reason is lack of sympathy.
When the Japanese first came to Formosa they were quite inexperienced in matters of colonial administration. They were confronted with problems they had never been called upon to solve before. Most of these they learnt to solve, simply because they were not too proud to learn from others how to solve them. Some might say that they sent commissions and individuals to pick the brains of other Governments, but the fact remains that they learnt what they wanted to know and, what was more, put their knowledge into practice.
But there was one thing they did not learn, and that was how to deal with primitive people, whom oppression had rendered intractable and truculent, such as those of the Formosan hills. Perhaps it was because they had so many other things to learn that this one was overlooked. Perhaps they thought it needed no learning. I am inclined to think that they underestimated its importance and despised the problem. They had an army; a battalion or so could deal with a handful of natives ; that, I imagine, was what they must have thought. They made the mistake of underrating not only the strength, but also the indomitable character of those pagans with whom they had to deal. In fact, they never looked upon them as anything but a nuisance.
I talked to many Japanese officials on thig subject when I was in Formosa, and they all gave me the 250 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
same impression, they all looked at the question from the same point of view. The natives were an obstacle in their way; they despised them as 'savages,' even though by then they had come to learn that savages can be a power to be reckoned with. They seemed to have no faculty for making friends with the native tribes: the thing never seemed to enter into their heads.
Working-class people, when they have got on in the world, not infrequently look down upon those who were once their equals, while persons whose station in life is above both would not think twice of talking to either in a friendly way. This, and I say it without any intention of giving offence, has been the position of the Japanese. They have not been a ruling race long enough to unbend to those who come under their sway. One may see exactly the same thing when a European labourer or mechanic who has had no previous experience of handling men goes to a good position in the East and finds himself in charge of a number of natives. There is always the danger that he will look upon them as 'blacks' or 'niggers' and will treat them, not perhaps with actual cruelty, but as creatures so far beneath him as to have no claims upon his sympathy or consideration.
And I say deliberately that, even if the Japanese have not treated their Formosan natives with actual cruelty, they have not treated them with sympathy.
Even those with whom they have come to terms they are 'assimilating'; they are teaching them the Japanese language and instilling into them Japanese customs, not realizing that these pagans for whom they have made themselves responsible have a perfectly good language and perfectly good customs of their own. If you wound the individuality of a A COMPARISON 251
race, you wound its very heart, and its death is only a matter of time. The Formosan Government makes its natives learn Japanese rather than send trained administrators to learn the native tongue; they are destroying the spirit of the pagan race rather than fostering it. That is why the pagans are slow to surrender to Japanese influence ; that is why the Japanese have failed.
§ 6
It may be of interest to see how, if the Formosan Government adopted other measures, it might achieve better results. It is, I admit, easy enough to dogmatize as to how a country or a people should be governed, but I can claim to have some qualifications for making suggestions on this subject, inasmuch as I served for some years a Government which was confronted with exactly the same problems as those with which the Japanese are confronted in Formosa to-day. In my small way I did something to help to solve them, as a cog in the machine, not by any brilliant inspiration on my own part, but working on lines that were the outcome of a proved and successful policy.
When the British North Borneo Company acquired its territory, the size of Scotland, forty-four years ago, the country was in very much the same condition as the Japanese found the hills of Formosa.
The natives had long been oppressed by the coast Malays, they were suspicious of strangers, they waged unceasing warfare amongst themselves.
There was no semblance of organized Government.
The cheapest thing in Borneo was human life. The country was a tropical wilderness; there were no roads and, save for the clearings of the native tribes, the jungle was everywhere. Yet a handful of Euro-252 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
pean officers and a small force of Indian and native military police, with no wealthy Treasury behind them, within ten years had brought the greater part of North Borneo under Government influence and so administered the native tribes that the jungle paths were as secure as the pavements of Pall Mall. Today the headhunters have ceased to raid and live at peace. The natives thrive and increase; they are treated with sympathy and understanding; their rights and customs are respected. They look upon their District Officer as their guide, philosopher, and friend. They bring him their cases to try, they go to him for medicine, they even ask him for advice about their erring wives. All this has needed patience, tact, and courage to accomplish, but it has been done.
Given the right men to do it, I believe that it could be done in Formosa to-day.
The Japanese did make some experiments in this direction soon after the occupation, but unfortunately they did not go far enough. Officers were established along the native border so that they might get into close personal touch with the tribes, learn their language and customs, and gain their confidence. But instead of making these posts attractive and well paid and entrusting them to men of proved administrative ability, the Government apparently considered them of minor importance and to fill them appointed subordinate officials whose status and pay were little better than clerks '. Moreover, the officers were continually moved and were given no powers over the police, who acted as a separate body entirely, and finally, since the experiment did not turn out a success, it was abandoned in 1898, and the control of native affairs has been in the hands of the police department ever since.
This, obviously, was not the way in which the THE PAGAN MIND 253 problem could be solved. From all accounts the Japanese police treat the natives well. They live among them, speak their language, and are liked and respected. But a constable cannot do what a seniorgrade officer could do, and in dealing with native races it is not so much the system which counts as the man. Natives are little more than children; in fact, when dealing with them one is dealing with a race in its infancy. So that a native should be treated not as a 'savage,' but rather as a child. He has the same quick prejudices, the same instinctive likes and dislikes, the same fears and superstitions and wild terrors as a child ; he is as easily moved to hatred or resentment or sudden mistrust as he is to laughter or affection. His mind is wax, quick to receive impressions ; he will meet cunning with cunning and courage with respect, and he expands to sympathy as a flower to the sun. Discipline, as we know it, is alien to him and must be enforced gradually. He resents compulsion; threats provoke him, and trickery arouses his hatred. And how can he look upon a rnine or an electrified wire as anything but a trick?
I am no believer in the pampering of the native.
I do not even believe in calling him my 'little brown brother,' for the simple reason that I do not think he would like me the better or respect me the more if I did. A native appreciates justice and firmness ; these are the foundations on which to build ; but one must use the mortar of humanity. This is all the more necessary with the Formosan, who has been so barbarously treated by the Chinese for centuries that he is become like a baited dog, ready to turn even upon those who would be his friends.
Even so there is evidence to show that the Formosan pagans, when approached and treated in the 254 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
right way, are not the uncompromising people the Japanese sometimes makes them out to be. There is the evidence of the Dutch and other Europeans to show that in the past they were tractable in their dealings with white men, and Mrs. McGovern mentions that the period of Dutch rule is still held by them to have been a kind of Golden Age.1 There have been occasions when even a Chinese has won their affection, as the following story will show. A century ago a Chinese named Goho lived among the headhunting tribes who inhabited the foothills of Mount Ari, and became familiar with their language and customs. So great was his influence amongst them that he was appointed by the Chinese Government to supervise the native affairs of the district in an official capacity.
From time immemorial it had been the custom of the tribes to offer up a human sacrifice to their god at an annual festival, and hitherto former Chinese officials had found it convenient to humour the natives, by handing over to them a criminal for their victim. But Goho, less callous than his predecessors, set his face against this practice and determined to wean the natives from their barbarous ways. Every year for forty years he dissuaded them from their purpose by giving them presents, such as pigs and cattle, instead of a criminal, hoping that in time he would cure them of their passion for human heads. But at last the instincts of their fathers came surging again within them. Pigs were well, cattle were well, nevertheless they must have for their sacrifice a mortal man, and going to Goho, they vowed that, deep as their respect for him was, if he did not supply them with a victim they would seize one of the Chinese and sacrifice him to their
1 Op. cit., p, 53. THE STORY OF GOHO 255 god. Goho realized, bitterly enough, that the time had come when they would be no longer denied, and at last he promised them that they should have their way.
' 'Go," said he, " to-morrow to the forest, and there you will see a man clothed in a red robe, with a red hat upon his head, and a red cloth over his face.
When you see him, strike; for he is to be your victim. ' ' On the following day the natives went to the forest as they had been told, and there they saw the man dressed in red, his face covered by a red cloth.
Mad with the blood-lust, they struck at him. And as the head rolled away from the shoulders the cloth fell from the face, and then they saw that it was no other than Goho himself whom they had slain.
It is said that the tribe were so filled with remorse at having killed the one Chinese who had ever been their friend that they resolved never again to sacrifice a human being and never to take another human head—an oath which has been kept faithfully to this day. A shrine was built over Goho's grave and the anniversary of his death is still remembered.
The shrine was rebuilt some years ago, the Formosan Government contributing to its construction, and the present inscription was written by Baron Goto, a former Civil Governor of Formosa, ending with the words, "May this stone tell of Goho so long as Formosan hills are green," while at the entrance of the shrine hangs a tablet written by GovernorGeneral Sakuma in 1913: "A candle, while con- suming itself, gives light to others." Goho was an extreme example of the statement that it is the man, and not the system, which counts in dealing with a primitive race. In later years, too, it has been demonstrated that, once their confidence 256 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
has been won, the Formosan tribes can be as friendly as the Muruts of Borneo are to-day. Mr. Pickering relates how during his wanderings in Formosa he visited and held communication with some twenty tribes of aborigines, and in every instance found them hospitable and well disposed. More than that, he was able to win their regard. "Some twelve years after I had been settled in Singapore," he says, "a gentleman one day called at my office, and informed me that he had been stationed at the South Cape of Formosa, to erect a lighthouse there.
During this residence he had made the acquaintance of the savages and the Chief of the district. Upon hearing that he was returning to England, a deputation of more than a hundred of the inhabitants waited upon him, and entreated him to find out ' Pi-ki-ling, ' and beg him to come back to Formosa and fulfil his promise of returning to visit them again. ' ' 1 Quite recently Mrs. McGovern was able to go about amongst them in spite of the warnings of the Japanese authorities, and, so far from being harmed, was hailed on one occasion as she appeared from the bed of a flooded stream to some of the Taiyal tribe (who to this day pray to the spirits of the Great White Fathers of Long Ago—the Dutch) as "the spirit of one of the beloved white rulers of old, returned from the elements." 3 It seems clear that the Formosan aborigines are amenable to right treatment even when administered by an Asiatic. It is even clearer that they are prejudiced in favour of the white races. If the Formosan Government asked to-morrow for twenty young Englishmen with experience of administering native races, they would get the men to send into 1 Pioneering in Formosa, p. 165.
2 Among the Headhunters of Formosa, p. 83. ONE SUGGESTION 257 the Formosan hills. They would probably have thousands to choose from, and I believe that in this way the whole of the 'savage' area could be settled in five years.
But the solution does not lie there. Japan is too proud now to allow another race to do for her what she has failed to do herself. And rightly, for every nation must solve her own problems.
Mr. Takekoshi has a different solution to offer.
Speaking of the aborigines, he says: "We cannot afford to wait patiently until they throw off barbarism, and spontaneously and truly entertain towards us feelings of friendship and goodwill. It is far better and very necessary for us to force our way into the midst of their territories and bring all the waste under cultivation. But how can this be best accomplished? It may be done either by pushing forward the present guards step by step, or by the method now adopted by Great Britain in British North Borneo and also in Rhodesia, of granting certain privileges to some private company and giving them for a certain fixed time the right both of administration and of legislation. ... I must earnestly wish, therefore, that a chartered company could be organized after the British model to take up the cultivation of the savage districts in Formosa under the auspices of the Governor-General, and that for a certain fixed period, say for twenty or thirty years, this company be granted full powers to govern, to work the mines, to fell timber, to engage in agricultural industries, and also to construct harbours and build roads for facilitating internal communication. To this company also should be assigned the duty of educating and instructing the savage tribes, and it should have full liberty to take whatever action might be necessary in case any of the savages 17 258 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED
offered resistance. If it be deemed unwise to en- trust the whole of the savage districts to a single company, the territory might be split up into two or even into three sections and be given to as many different companies." 1 I have quoted these suggestions at length because, coming from a Japanese, they are particularly interesting. But how does Mr. Takekoshi suppose that a Japanese Chartered Company is going to succeed where the Japanese Government has failed? Why should the door suddenly be opened to a company whose normal object must be dividends, when it is shut fast in the face of a Government which has no mercenary motives beyond the legitimate one of opening up its territory to peaceful trade ! A Chartered Company may make good, but it is always open to suspicion. It may succeed, as the British North Borneo Company has succeeded, but the odds are always against it. A Crown or Imperial Government, with all the force of its credit and authority behind it, has a far easier task in opening up an unknown country than a company can ever have.
And were such a charter given, what a confession of weakness it would be! What an admission of failure! What evasion of responsibilities! No, Mr.
Takekoshi, the solution does not lie there.
The task which Japan has begun she must bring to a conclusion. She can only bring it to a successful conclusion by getting her best men, sending them to another colony, such as North Borneo, the Federated Malay States, or the Philippine Islands, where similar conditions prevail, to learn proved and tested methods of administration, and once they have learnt their lesson, send them to serve as District Officers to govern the native districts of Formosa.
1 Japanese Rule in Formosa, pp. 230 et seq. NEED OF DISTRICT OFFICERS 259
They must be volunteers, for there can be no pressure for such service. They will have to sacrifice comfort, perhaps health, some of them perhaps even their lives. But theirs will be work worth the doing and they will have their reward. They will learn to live amongst these primitive people, speaking their language, becoming acquainted with their customs, gaming their trust, and teaching them the benefits of living under a just and benevolent administration. They will travel across those jungle hills from village to village, as a District Officer travels in Borneo, attended only by a policeman or two, sleeping in the native houses, trying cases, adjusting disputes, and making friends. They will find a way of settling the existing headhunting feuds by the payment of blood-money, inducing age-long enemies to make peace by swearing solemn oaths in their own fashion—oaths which, once sworn, they will find will not be lightly broken, for even a pagan knows how to keep his word. They must respect native prejudices and traditions ; they must see to it that their people are not exploited—that their rights are recognized and safeguarded and, if the districts are opened up, that native reserves are made and that their lands and other property are not wrested from them by unscrupulous traders or speculators.
Wherever they go they must plant seeds of confidence, and gradually good feeling will spring up and they will find that these once truculent natives will come to them not only to have wrongs put right, but to ask their advice on the little troubles of every day.
I do not pretend that it is likely to be plain sailing. There will be failures, there will be disappointments, there will be dangers. There may be outbreaks of headhunting; there may be native 260 WHERE THE JAPANESE HAVE FAILED risings which will be troublesome to put down. But in the end I am confident that the right men will succeed, just as I am confident that by this means alone, short of the extermination of the aborigines, can the land be given peace.
Once the foundations of such an administration have been laid, let the Government abandon the policy of ' assimilation.' Assimilation in the long run means nothing but the fading of a native race, and the object should be to make it bloom.
Let education, anyhow at first, be voluntary ; let the natives preserve their own language, their own ways, their own ideals. Let Native Courts be established under the supervision of the District Officers to deal with cases involving breaches of native law and custom: as far as is consistent with humanity let the people be judged by their own standards rather than by those of an alien race. Let a police force be recruited from the native tribes, so that each policeman, with his uniform and his rifle, forms a bond between the Government he serves and the village from which he comes. Let native chiefs be chosen from the tribes and set up by the District Officer in position of authority; but let the District Officer be careful whom he trusts, lest he give power into the hands of the wrong man : for among so primitive and so impressionable a people one traitor in authority may undo the work of years. Above all, let him remember that these brown people of the hills have a tribal spirit and tribal traditions of their own, and let him be glad that they should keep them, for they will be happiest, and so most easily governed, when they are allowed to live their own lives once they are at peace.
Thus may the District Officer come to know and to understand—and perhaps to love—the people he is A GROUP OF TA1YAI, 'SAVAGES.
260]
AN OLID I HDtESE GATEWAY EN TAIHOKU.
Showing part of the wall tint formerly -THE REMEDY 261
sent to rule; thus may he have his finger upon the district's pulse until he is so in tune with its beating that, like a mechanic with his engines, he can tell byinstinct if anything is going wrong.
All this is not visionary ; it is not Utopian. It has been done, and it is being done. I shall never believe that Japan cannot find the men who would do it too. And it will be well for those simple people of the Formosan hills and well for the Japanese themselves when the Imperial Government realizes that one good District Officer who can dominate and influence his natives in the right way is worth more than a battery of field guns and a hundred miles of electrified wire. CHAPTER XII
THE END OF THE JOURNEY
Return to the plains—Koshiinura goes sick—A call from Mr. Yoshioka—Japan's women pioneers—Koshimura recovers on drinking a bottle of sake—A visit to the garrison—Parting calls—We are ' seen off ' from Taihoku—Departure from Keelung—The America Maru— The hero of Tsintau—Arrival at Kobe—Koshimura's long arm—Last reflections.
§ 1 OUR journey from Kapanzan to the coast, being mostly downhill, was accomplished in much shorter time than the ascent had been. We went careering down the slopes at a splendid speed. The brakes acted well, and they needed to, for the greater part of the way there was only a single track and often we came upon another trolley as we were rounding a sharp bend. On one of these occasions Koshimura, perhaps in the hope of getting some of his own back after the dinner incident, cheered us con- siderably by telling us that an important Government official had recently been flung off his push-car in a collision and killed. Koshimura seemed to find it amusing. He was in the second trolley.
At Taikokam we changed cars, and went on with one coolie apiece, leaving behind the police sergeant. We lunched by the wayside off the remains of the previous day's sandwiches, which we had thriftily preserved in case of emergencies. Koshimura, who said he had a bad cold coming on, refused to join us and, like Achilles, moped alone.
When we reached Toyen we found we had an hour to wait for the train, and, leaving Koshimura and his
262 A FRIENDLY CALL 263
cold in the station waiting-room, wandered round the town, accompanied by a police officer who spoke no English and by an admiring crowd of small children who had obviously never seen any human beings like us before.
The town was uninteresting, but we amused ourselves by watching Japanese playing tennis (with a soft ball, as is the custom) in the park. On the way back to the station we passed some baseball players going off for a match with a neighbouring team. I don't know how good they were at baseball, but they had dressed the part and looked toughs indeed. I thought I saw one of them even chewing gum.
Koshimura was now getting lower and lower. Although it had turned out a grilling day, he had muffled himself up in his overcoat. "We were very sorry for him, but he was much more sorry for himself. He relapsed into silence and looked like a sick bird. It would have been cruel to have dragged him to the wrestling show, and since I had seen Japanese wrestling many times before, it was decided on our arrival at Taihoku to spend a quiet evening at the hotel.
After dinner I had settled down in a dressinggown to write some letters in my room when I was told that Mr. Yoshioka had come to call. Hurriedly I dressed again and went down. He had dropped in for a friendly chat, he said. I was very pleased to see him—and rather flattered that he should have taken the trouble to come—and over some whiskiesand-sodas we had a long talk. He appeared to be intensely interested in everything English. He took in The Daily Mail, The Times Weekly Edition and all the supplements, and he also read several of the heavy reviews. He was a man of broad opinions. 1 1 Mr. Yoshioka is now Governor of Tainan Province. 264 THE END OF THE JOUENEY We had an interesting discussion on the subject of those little ladies, members of what Mr. Kipling has called the oldest profession in the world, who for so many years have been one of Japan's principal exports to foreign countries. The thing had gone too far, he admitted, and was bringing Japan into disrepute, if indeed it had not done so already.
Only a few months before there had been a case of an English sailor who, in one of the China ports, had mistaken the wife of a Japanese consul for a dweller in Red Lamp Street, and had (not unnaturally) addressed her in terms of endearment. The sailor could hardly be blamed, but it was a shameful thing for the Empire that such mistakes should be natural. So now, I learnt, the little people were being ' recalled.' 1 ' They have played their part, ' ' said Mr. Yoshioka.
' 'They have been Japan's pioneers. "Where they went first, we followed. They showed the way. Now it is time they came back." It seemed a very sensible and dispassionate point of view. But I could not help thinking of many exiles' bungalows in the East where (all unbeknown to maiden aunts at home) the absence of the little 'housekeeper' would be mourned when the clip-clap of her slippers on the boarded floor was heard no more after her 'recall.'
§ 2
[When we had parted with Koshimura we had been afraid we had seen the last of him and that he would take to his bed for a week at least. But, to our surprise, he appeared next morning smiling, full of beans and apologies. He was quite fit again, he said.
On his return home the previous night he had drunk A CURE FOR COLDS 2G5
a bottle of sake, which seemed to be a panacea for all his ills. ''After one bottle," he told me with engaging frankness, "my face becomes red and I cannot walk directly.
' ' But he further asserted that one bottle never failed to cure his colds. And that was the main thing, though it was reminiscent of the recipe of an 'old hand' of Kobe who used to assert that if you went to bed with a bottle of whisky, drank till you could see four bedposts at the bottom of the bed, and then went to sleep, in the morning your cold would be gone.
Before our trip to Kapanzan I had asked our friend the Staff Major if it would be possible for me to go over the Taihoku Barracks and to see a Japanese regiment on parade. He replied that I could not do so without the Commander-in-Chief's special authority, but that he would ask the Colonel to cable to Tokyo for permission. At the time I imagined that this was merely a polite and rather elaborate way of refusing my request, and thought no more about it. But Koshimura now informed me that the necessary sanction had been received, and a few minutes later the Major called for me in his car. I was taken to Headquarters and introduced to Colonel Suzuki, the commanding officer of the regiment stationed at Taihoku. Nearly all his officers appeared as well. There was no parade, unfortunately, as there was a holiday for the wrestling (about which the whole town was mad), but we went round the lines. Everything was very smart and soldierly, and the men fairly leapt to attention when the Colonel appeared. The barracks were brick buildings on modern lines. I noticed that every man had a bed, and the men's boots (the first thing any-266 THE END OF THE JOURNEY one who has been an infantry soldier looks at) seemed fairly good. The packs were smaller than onrs and made of dog 's skin : there must be a wholesale slaughter of dogs going on somewhere in the Island Empire.
The officers ' mess was rather cheerless ; one missed those deep and comfortable arm-chairs that are found in our own. We watched a Hotchkiss gun team at work, and I rather disconcerted the Major by asking the weight of the gun. The bayonet-fighting squad, armed with dummy rifles of wood, was excellent, and the men went all out at each other, yelling as loud as they could ; I was told that they put in a great deal of practice at night over rough ground. I was also taken round the lines of the mountain battery ; the officer in charge was needlessly apologetic about his horses.
Everyone came to see me off, and had I been the Commander-in-Chief himself I could not have been treated with greater deference. Having in other days attended (and cursed very heartily) many inspections of distinguished visitors, I was immensely tickled at being, for once, on the other side. Moreover, it was good to be among soldiers again, and I think I pleased the Colonel by telling him so.
§ 3
Having left the Military Headquarters, I was again confronted with the problem of obtaining money to pay for our hotel bill and tickets to Japan. The Bank of Taiwan remained uncompromising, and even the genial hotel manager seemed rather dubious when it was suggested that he might cash an English cheque—small blame to him, for he would have had to wait three months before it could have been cleared. Finally, I betook myself to the offices of A QUESTION OF MONEY 267 Messrs. Samuels & Co., the Formosan agents of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank. I think the manager must have liked my open, honest face : anyhow, much to my relief, he agreed to hand over a wad of yen on the strength of the letter of credit, although the name of his firm was not given as a 'correspondent.' I mention these very personal matters merely to show how easy it is for a traveller to get stranded in Formosa. The best way to avoid trouble is to obtain a plentiful supply of Japanese money before sailing.
The remainder of the morning was taken up in getting Japanese and U.S.A. visas on our passport and saying good-bye. Koshimura relieved me of my remaining six cards for various dignitaries and then came to lunch. Afterwards we walked over to the station to catch the train for Keelung, where we were to embark on the Osaka Shosen Kaisha's America Maru for Kobe. We were saved any trouble with our luggage, as the excellent hotel manager went ahead with it himself and personally saw it into our cabin for us. Managers of hotels in Liverpool or Southampton would achieve much popularity if they followed this example of seeing to their guests' comfort, even though they might be kept rather busy.
Koshimura had told us that a few people were coming to the station to see us off, but when we ar- rived we found assembled everyone we had met in Taihoku, including Mr. Suyematsu. It was extraordinarily kind of them, we felt, but rather like the final curtain of a revue when everyone troops in.
At the best of times being 'seen off,' either from railway-stations or from clocks, is an ordeal, but being seen off by a large party of Japanese officials, the majority of whom speak indifferent English and 268 THE END OF THE JOUENEY
some none at all, is something worse. However, we shook each warmly by the hand, and then prayed that the train would start on time and so save an anticlimax. Of course it did nothing of the sort, so that we had to start talking once more and then said goodbye all over again, during which time I was introduced to Lieut.-General Horinchi, the Japanese Commander at Tsintau in 1914, who, I was told, was to be our fellow-passenger to Japan. Then the train started at last, and we left our friends waving and bowing upon the platform.
The General sat next to us on the way to Keelung.
He had come to Formosa on a semi-official visit only, but he was in full uniform, as befitted the hero of Tsintau. He spoke no English, but very fluent and very bad French, with what I imagine was a strong Japanese accent. As my own French is execrable, we managed to understand each other, but my wife, who speaks the language as it ought to be spoken, did not fare so well.
Keelung, so called after a Chinese Emperor of the eighteenth century, is eighteen miles east of the capital, an hour's run in the train. Its harbour is not, and never can be, a really good one, being too small and too exposed, but the Japanese have done their best with it and have concentrated on making it the chief port of Formosa. They have dredged it, removed an island which blocked the inner harbour, and built a long breakwater at the entrance, costing nearly a million sterling, to protect it from the storms which the north-east monsoon brings sweeping in. The harbour now affords a good anchorage not only for merchant vessels, but for a naval squadron and transports, besides allowing large steamers to be moored alongside the wharves.
There are concealed batteries on the surrounding GOOD-BYE TO KOSHIMURA 269
hills and photography is 'not allowed.' The Japanese are always very fussy about cameras near their fortifications, and before we had started Koshimura had particularly requested my wife to pack hers away.
The station adjoins the wharf, and we walked on board the America Mara. Koshimura came with us to see that we had what we wanted. I persuaded him, against his better judgment, to have a weak whisky-and-soda, and then he bade us good-bye with many protestations of goodwill. The last we saw of him was his slight figure, in his braided tunic and trousers rather baggy at the knees, waving a handkerchief on the quay as the America steamed slowly out. We felt that we had parted from a friend. For if I have occasionally alluded to his idiosyncrasies—or what seemed idiosyncrasies to us —I have only done so in a good-humoured way with intent to create a picture of him rather than a caricature. He had been of the greatest service to us and his help had been invaluable. He was an untiring staff-worker, and the arrangements and itineraries he had drawn up had always been so well worked out that there had never been a hitch throughout the trip. Koshimura is one of those young men of whom one says (usually after they have become successful) 'he will go far.' "We owed him much, for apart from his official services we learnt from him many things about Formosa and Japan, and I like to think that he, on his side, was able to polish up his English on us.
* 4
We found the America Maru a better boat in every way than the Sourabaya and were very comfortable.
The cabins were good and the food was excellent. 270 THE END OF THE JOUENEY We were the only foreign passengers, but both foreign and Japanese meals were provided, for which we praised the fates. At our table sat eight other Japanese; usually nobody spoke a word, although we all bowed ceremoniously to each other both on coming to our seats and leaving them. Eating in a dead silence is bad enough, but trying to make conversation with a silence encompassing you, as a fog surrounds an arc-lamp, is dreadful. I tried to talk to my neighbour, but he spoke no English, and I was amused to see that, having endured Western food and cooking for two days as part of his education, he finally gave it up in disgust and went back to Japanese instead.
I had many long talks with the General. As we were making the open sea after leaving Keelung Harbour I heard a laugh at my elbow and was startled to find him leaning over the rail beside me, dressed in a kimono and a villainous-looking cap. It was such a transformation from his be-medalled uniform that for a moment I did not recognize him.
But he too preferred Japanese ways. He was an unassuming old gentleman, with a habit of punctuating his sentences by expectorating very heartily over the side of the ship. As he said he was tres faible we gave him some Mothersill, with which he was so delighted that he gave my wife a packet of picturepostcards in return. He told me that he lived very simply in Japan, and he was so entirely devoid of military pomposity and so ingenuous and simple that he reminded me of the Eoman generals of old, who, having won their battles, returned to their farms to lead the simple life again. I could almost picture him planting his own padi field. He had a great admiration for the French, with whom, many years previously, he had learnt his soldiering : that was in THE ISLE OF KINDNESS 271
the days before the Japanese military authorities began to study German methods. He always seemed in the best of spirits—somehow or other all Japanese do. It is a great national gift, and the unruffled and smiling front which they always seem to show the world is probably one of the secrets of their success. For it takes a man to crack jokes (and laugh at them) when a high sea is running and one is tres faible.
Thus, after three pleasant, uneventful days we reached Kobe. Here we found Koshimura's long arm still with us, for the Osaka Shosen Kaisha's agent, having been warned of our arrival by a wireless message from Taihoku, came off to bring us away from the ship in a special launch and saw our luggage safely landed.
So ended what must most certainly be the most splendid trip we can ever hope to have. We carried awT ay with us from what should be called the Isle of Kindness the most happy memories of its smiling plains and sun-kissed mountains, of its prosperous undertakings and of its courteous and bowing officials. And when afterwards, sitting in a deep arm-chair in the great hall at the Oriental Palace Hotel of Kobe, I counted up the visiting-cards I had acquired, I found that there were a hundred and twenty-nine. BIBLIOGRAPHY
The more important works relating to Formosa in the
English language
1 Aborigines of Formosa, The,' Geog. Journal, vol. xiv, 1899.
Aborigines, Report on the Control of the, in Formosa.
Bureau of Aboriginal Affairs, Government of Formosa, 1911.
Allen, H. J., ' Notes of a Journey through Formosa from Tamsui to Taiwanfu,' Proc. R.G.S., vol. xxi, 1866, and Geog. Mag., 1877.
Anderson, Captain L., A Cruise in an Opium Clipper.
Chapman & Hall, 1891.
Anson, A Voyage Round the World. 1748.
Arnold, J. H., ' The Ascent of Mount Morrison (Niitaka Yama),' J.N.C. Br. R.A.8., vol. xl, 1909.
' The Peoples of Formosa,' Smithsonian Misc. Coll., No. 1860, 1909.
Astley, J., New General Collection of Voyages and Travels, vols, iii and iv, 1745-47.
Augustus, M., Memoirs and Travels, trans, by W. Nicholson, vol. viii, 1893.
Baber, E. C. See under Lacouperie.
Barclay, Rev. T., ' Formosa Mission of the English Presbyterian Church,' China Handbook. 1896.
Box, Captain B. W., The Eastern Sea : being a Narrative of the Voyage of H.M.S. ' Dwarf ' in China, Japan, and Formosa. 1875.
Beazeley, M., ' Notes of an Overland Journey through the Southern Part of Formosa in 1875 from Takou to the South Cape,' Proc. R.G.S., vol. vii, 1885.
' A Sketch of Formosa,' China Review, vol. xiii, 1885.
Benyowsky, M. A. Count, Memoirs and Travels in Siberia, Kamtschatka, Japan, the Liukiu Island, and Formosa, trans, by Wm, Nicholson, vol. viii, 1893.
Boulger, D. C, History of China, vol. iii. Allen, 1882-6.
Bridge, C, ' An Excursion in Formosa,' Fortnightly Review, vol. xx, 1876.
272 BIBLIOGRAPHY 273
Brinckley, F., ' Formosa,' Encycl. Brit., Suppl. xxviii, 1902.
Japan (12 vols.) Jack, 1903-4.
Bullock, T. L., ' Formosa Dialects and their Connection with Malay,' China Review, vol. hi, 1874.
Chronological History of Voyages and Discoveries in the South or Pacific Ocean, vol. vi, 1803-17.
Campbell, Rev. W., The Gospel of St. Matthew in SinhangFormosa. Kegan Paul, Trench, Triibner & Co., 1888.
' Formosa Under the Japanese : being Notes of a Visit to the Taichu Prefecture,' Scottish Geog, Mag., 1902.
An Account of Missionary Success in Formosa, 2 vols. Kegan Paul, 1886.
The Articles of Christian Instruction in Favorlang— Formosan, Dutch, and English. Kegan Paul.
' Past and Future of Formosa,' Scottish Geog. Mag., August, 1896.
Formosa under the Dutch. Described from Contemporary Records. Kegan Paul, 1903.
Sketches from Formosa. Marshall, 1915.
Candidius, Rev. G., ' Short Account of the Island of Formosa,' Churchill's Collection, vol. i, 1744.
Carroll, C, ' Rambles among the Formosan Savages,' The Phoenix, vol. i, 1871.
Chamberlain, B. H., and W. B. Mason, A Handbook for Travellers in Japan, including the Whole Empire from Yezo to Formosa. Murray, 1903 (7th Edn.).
Clark, J. D., Formosa. Shanghai, 1896.
Collingwood, Dr. C, ' The Sulphur Springs of North Formosa,' Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xxiii, 1867.
' A Boat Journey Across the Northern End of Formosa,' Proc. R.G.S., vol. ii, 1867.
' On the Geological Features of the Northern Part of Formosa and the adjacent Islands,' Journ. Geol.
Soc, vol. xxiv, 1868.
' Visit to the Kibalan Village of Sau-o Bay, North-east Coast of Formosa,' Trans. Ethnol. Soc, vol. vi, 1868.
Rambles of a Naturalist on the Shores and Waters of the China Sea. Murray, 1868.
Colquhoun, A. R., ' The Physical Geography and Trade of Formosa,' Scottish Geog. Mag., vol. iii, 1887.
18 274 BIBLIOGRAPHY Colquhoun, A. R., and J. H. Stewart-Lockhart, ' A Sketch of Formosa,' China Review, vol. xiii, 1885.
The Mastery of the Pacific. Heinemann, 1897.
Two on their Travels. Heinemann, 1902.
Corner, A., ' A Journey to the Interior of Formosa,' Proc. E.G.S., vol. xix, 1875.
' A Tour through Formosa from South to North,' Proc. R.G.S., vol. xxii, 1878.
Dampier, Captain W., A New Voyage Round the World, 4 vols. 1729.
Davidson, J. W., The Island of Formosa, Past and Present.
Macmillan, 1903.
' A Review of the History of Formosa and a Sketch of the Life of Koxinga,' Trans. A.S. of J., xxiv, 1896.
Denham, Captain. See under Gully.
Dodd, S., 'A Few Ideas on the Probable Origin of the Hill Tribes of Formosa,' Journ. Sts. Br. R.A.S., vols, ix and x, 1882.
' A Glimpse at the Manners and Customs of the Hill Tribes of Formosa,' Journ. Sts. Br. R.A.S., vol. xv, 1885.
' Formosa,' Scottish Geog. Mag., vol. xi, 1895.
Forbes, F. B., and Hemsley, W. B., ' An Enumeration of all the Plants known from China Proper, Formosa, Hainan, Corea, the Luchu Archipelago, and the Island of Hong Kong,' Journ. Linn. Soc. Botany, vol. xxiii, 1866.
Gordon, Lieutenant, ' Observations on Coal in the Northeast Part of the Island of Formosa,' Journ. R.G.S., vol. xix, 1849.
Gould, John, ' Description of Sixteen New Species of Birds from the Island of Formosa,' Proc. Zool. Soc, vol. iii, 1862.
Gray, J. E., ' Notes on Theonella, a New Genus of Coralloid Sponges from Formosa,' Proc. Zool. Soc, 1868.
Guillemard, F. H. H., The Cruise of the ' Marchesa' 2 vols., Murray, 1886.
Gully, H., and Captain Denham, Journals kept by, during a Captivity in China in the year 1842. Chapman & Hall, 1844.
Guppy, H. B., ' Some Notes of the Geology of Takow, Formosa,' Journ. North China Br. R.A.S., vol. xvi, 1881. BIBLIOGRAPHY 275 Habersham, A. W., My Last Cruise, being an Account of Visit to the Malay and Loochoo Islands, the Coast of China, and Formosa. Philadelphia, Lippincott, 1857.
Henry, A., ' A List of Plants from Formosa, with some Preliminary Remarks on the Geography, Nature of the Flora, and Economic Botany of the Island,' Trans. Asiat. Soc. Japan, vol. xxiv, 1896.
Hobson, H. E., ' Fort Zeelandia and the Dutch Occupation of Formosa,' Journ. North China Br. R.A.8., 1876.
Holt, H. F., ' Report of Recent Earthquakes in Northern Formosa,' Journ. Ceol. Soc, vol. xxiv, 1868.
House, E. H., The Japanese Expedition to Formosa in 1874. Tokyo, 1875.
Honda, De S., ' Ascent of Mount Morrison,' Geog. Journ., 1896, p. 68.
Hughes, T. F., ' A Visit to Tok-i-tok, Chief of the Eighteen Tribes of Southern Formosa,' Proc. R.O.S., 1872.
Hughes, Mrs., Notes of a Six Years' Residence in Formosa.
London, 1881.
Jeffreys, W. H., and Maxwell, J. L., The Diseases of China, including Formosa and Korea. Bale & Danielsson, 1910.
Johnston, J., China and Formosa : the Story of the Mission of the Presbyterian Church of England. Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., 1897.
Keane, Captain Sir. J., Bt., ' The Japanese in Formosa,' Blackwood's Mag., 1904, pp. 159-74.
Kleinwachter, G., ' Researches into the Geology of Formosa,' Journ. North China Br. R.A.S., vol.
xviii, 1883.
' History of Formosa under the Chinese Government,' China Review, vol. xii, 1884.
Kirjassoff, ' Formosa the Beautiful,' Nat. Oeog. Mag., 1920, pp. 247-92.
Kopsch, H., ' Notes on the Rivers of North Formosa,' Proc. R.G.S., vol. xiv, 1870.
Krausse, A., The Far East, its History, its Question.
London, 1902.
Lacouperie, T. de, ' Formosa : Notes on MSS., Languages, and Races, including a Note on Nine Formosan MSS. by E. Colborne Baber,' Journ R.A.S., vol.
xix, 1887. 276 BIBLIOGRAPHY Lacouperie, T. de, ' A Native Writing in Formosa,' Academy, April 9, 1887.
Le Gendre, C. W., Is Aboriginal Formosa Part of the Chinese Empire ? Shanghai, Lane, Crawford, 1874.
Mackay, Rev. Dr. G. L., From Far Formosa : the Island, its People and Mission. Oliphant Anderson, 1896.
Man, Alex., ' Formosa : an Island with a Romantic History,' Asiatic Quarterly Review, July 1892.
Mans, L. M., An Army Officer on Leave in Japan, including a Description of Formosa. Chicago, 1911.
Manson, Dr. P., ' A Gossip about Formosa,' China Review, vol. ii, 1873.
Matheson, H. C, ' Railways in China : the Formosan Government Railway,' Proc. Inst. Civ. Engineers, vol. cix, 1892.
McGovern, J. B. M., Among the Headhunters of Formosa.
Fisher Unwin, 1922.
Moody, C. N., The Heathen Heart. Edinburgh, 1897.
Morrison, G. J., 'A Description of the Island of Formosa,' Geog. Mag., 1877.
'Old Cathay,' 'Formosa,' Joum. N.C. Br. R.A.S., 1919, pp. 158-61.
Opium, Control of, in Formosa. Sanitary Bureau, Government of Formosa, 1909.
Parker, E. H., ' Cannibalism in Formosa,' China Review, vol. xvi, 1888.
Perkins, N., Report on Formosa. London, 1896.
Pfeiffer, Dr. L., ' Description of Thirteen New Species of Landshells from Formosa,' Proc. Zool. Soc, 1865.
Phillips, G., 'The Life of Koxinga,' China Review, vol.
xiii, 1885.
' Notes on the Dutch Occupation of Formosa,' China Review, vol. x, 1882.
Pickering, W. A., Pioneering in Formosa, being Recollections of Adventures among Mandarins, Wreckers, and Headhunting Savages. Hurst & Blackett, 1898.
Playfair, G. M. H., ' Notes on the Language of the Formosan Savage,' China Review, vol. vii, 1869.
' Proposed Administrative Changes in Formosa,' Joum. N. Ch. Br. R.A.S., vol. xxi, 1886.
Psalmanasaar, G., An Historical and Geographical Description of Formosa, an Island subject to the Emperor of Japan. London, 1704.
Memoirs of Psalmanasaar. Dublin, 1765. BIBLIOGRAPHY 277
Ravenstein, E. G., ' Formosa,' Geog. Mag., 1774.
Schetlig, A., 'On the Natives of Formosa,' Trans. Ethnol.
Soc, vol. vii, 1868.
Schumacher, —, ' Mountain Dwellers of Formosa,' Geog.
Journ., vol. xii, 1899.
Shore, H. N., The First Flight of the ' Lapwing ' : a Naval Officer's Jottings in China, Formosa, and Japan.
1881.
Sibelliues, M. C., Of the Conversion of Five Thousand and Nine Hundred East Indians in the Isle of Formosa, near China, to the Profession of the True God in Jesus Christ by means of M. Ro Junius, a Minister lately in Delph in Holland. London, 1650.
Steere, J. B., ' The Aborigines of Formosa,' China Review, vol. iii, 1875, and Journ. Amr. Geog. Soc., vol. vi, 1876.
Swinhoe, R., ' Notes on Some New Species of Birds found in the Island of Formosa,' Journ. N. Ch. Br.
R.A.S., vol. i, 1859.
' Narrative of a Visit to the Island of Formosa,' J.N.C. Br. R.A.S., vol. i, 1859.
Notes on the Ethnology of Formosa. F. Bell, 1863.
' Notes on the Aborigines of Formosa,' Brit Assoc.
Report, 1855.
' Notes on the Island of Formosa,' Proc. R.G.S., vol. viii, 1864.
' On the Mammals of the Island of Formosa,' Proc. Zool. Soc, vol. xii, 1863.
' List of the Formosan Reptiles,' Ann. of Nat. Hist., vol. xii, 1863.
' The Ornithology of Formosa or Taiwan,' J.N.C.
Br. R.A.S., vol. v, 1863.
Taintor, E., 'The Aborigines of Northern Formosa,' J.N.C. Br. R.A.S., vol. ix, 1875.
Takekoshi, Y., Japanese Ride in Formosa, trans, by G.
Braithwaite. Longmans, Green, 1907.
Taylor, G., ' Comparative Table of Formosan Languages,' China Review, vol. vii, 1879.
' Savage Priestesses in Formosa,' China Review, vol. xiv, 1886.
' The Aborigines of Formosa,' China Review, vol. 278 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Taylor, G., ' Folklore of Aboriginal Formosa,' Folklore Journ., vol. v, 1887.
' Formosa : Characteristic Traits of the Island and its Aboriginal Inhabitants,' Proc. R.G.S., 1889.
Terry, T. P., The Japanese Empire, including Korea and Formosa. Constable, 1914.
Thomson, J., ' Notes of a Journey in Southern Formosa,' Journ. R.G.S., vol. xliii, 1873.
The Straits of Malacca, Indo-China, and China.
London, 1875. (Comparative Tables of the Language of Formosa, Philippine Islands, New Zealand.) Tregear, E., Dictionary of Maori and Polynesian Languages. (Includes notes on Formosan dialects.) Wellington, Lyon, 1891.
Turner, Sir William, ' A Contribution to the Craniology of the Natives of Borneo, the Malays, the Natives of Formosa, and the Tibetans,' Edinburgh Trans. B.
Soc, 1907.
Tyzack, D., ' Notes on the Coal-fields and Coal-mining Operations in North Formosa,' Trans. North England Inst. Eng., vol. xxxiv, 1885.
Wallace, A. R., Island Life, or the Phenomena and Causes of Insular Faunas and Flora, including a Revision and Attempted Solution of the Problem of Geological Climates, pp. 371-9. Macmillan, 1880.
White, F. W., ' A Brief Account of the Wild Aborigines of Formosa,' Trans. Ethnol. Soc, vol. vii. APPENDIX I The following words are given to show the affinity between the Malay, Murut (North Borneo), and Formosan native languages. The Formosan words are taken from Appendix I of The Island of Formosa. The fourth column shows the equivalents in the Bunun dialect which, speaking generally, appears to be the nearest akin to Murut, and in the fifth column will be found the closest equivalent to the Murut words in any of the nine main dialects.
Out of this list of 38 words, which have not been specially chosen, 19, or 50 per cent., in the Bunun dialect and 30, or 80 per cent., in the general list, are found in Borneo.
On the other hand, only 5, or 13 per cent., in the Bunun list, and 14, or 36 per cent., in the general list are pure Malay.
English. 280 APPENDIX I
English. APPENDIX II 281
1915-16 1916-17 1917-18 1918-19 1919-20 1920-21 1921-22 1922-23
Revenue.
£4,564,000 5,576,000 6,542,000 8,050,000 10,017,000 12,027,000 11,203,000 10,600,000 (Budget)
Expenditure.
£3,825,000 4,268,000 4,616,000 5,533,000 7,232,000 9,533,000 9,451,000 10,600,000 (Budget)
These and the succeeding figures are calculated at Y 10 = £1 sterling.
APPENDIX III ITEMS OF REVENUE AND EXPENDITURE, 1923-4
(BUDGET) 282 APPENDIX III
Hospitals .....
Central Investigation Institute Education .....
Reformatory ....
Communications ....
Expenses for Government Railways Monopoly Bureau Forests improvement, etc. Adjustment Fund of Loans transferred to special % Other Expenses ....
Reserve Fund ....
Total ....
Extraordinary : Expenses for public works Expenses for social enterprise Expenses for encouragement of industries Subsidies .....
Starting of enterprise of expenses for Wine monopoly ....
Total ....
Total Expenditure
£107,925 94,648 240,955 2,603 354,281 1,053,880 3,010,308 304,977
411,510 231,271 200,000
7,925,722
1,304,459 8,336 129,924 544,262
75,650
2,062,632
9,988,354
APPENDIX IV ITEMS OF EXPORTS AND IMPORTS FROM 1897 TO 1922
1897: Foreign Countries Japan proper 1915: Foreign Countries Japan proper Total 1916: Foreign Countries Japan proper
Total 1917: Foreign Countries Japan proper
Total 1918: Foreign Countries Japan proper
Total 1919: Foreign Countries Japan proper
Total 1920: Foreign Countries Japan proper
Total 1921: Foreign Countries Japan proper
Total 1922: Foreign Countries Japan proper .
APPENDIX IV
Exports. Imports.
£1,543,027 6,019,289
3,165,247 8,061,981
4,021,579 10,549,689
3,339,400 10,560,050
3,562,228 14,188,554
3,517,294 18,081,611
2,354,162 12,889,687
3,056,348 12,730,148
£l,278,-.77 4,058,749
1,543,003 4,952,462
2,109,937 6,774,450
3,355,451 7,059,135
6,413,276 9,052,676
6,036,673 11,204,084
4,043,329 9,352,116
3,692,187 8,217,343
283
Total.
£2,821,205 10,078,038
12,899,243
4,708,251 13,014,443
17,722,694
6,131,516 17,324,139
23,455,655
6,694,852 17,619,186
24,314,038
9,975,504 23,241,230
33,216,734
9,553,967 29,285,696
38,839,562
6,397,491 22,241,804
28,639,295
6,748,436 20,947,493
Total 27,695,929
INDEX
Aborigines : akin to Borneo tribes, 243-7 customs, 243-6 dress, 218 expeditions against, 230-3 headhunting, 30, 220-1, 243, 244 language, 241-3 legends, 220-1, 254-5 methods of agriculture, 120, 142 oppression by Chinese, 36, 222, 223, 224, 225 origin, 220 schools, 217, 218, 219 territory, 30 treatment by Dutch, 72, 221-2 treatment by Japanese, 226, 248-61 tribes, 243 work gold, 159 Administration, 58-61, 148, 150- 1, 156, 161, 165, 248-61 Agriculture, 120, 132-44, 158 Akamatsu, Major, 145, 169, 170, 180, 265, 266 Ako, 50 Alcohol, 55, 201 America Maru, 267, 269 Amoy, 74, 137 Anping, 29, 88, 102, 103 Ann, S.S., 37 Area, 28, 226 Ari, Mount, 119, 121, 122 Australia, 53, 175, 177
Banks, 162-3 Barclay, Rev. Thomas, 97 Batavia, 74, 78, 81, 83, 84, 87, 104 Beer, Formosan, 123 Borneo, North : administration of natives, 251-2 camphor, 187 development, 163-4 Japanese settlers, 16, 141, 172- 4, 179 visit, 171 natives, 241, 243-7 opium, 197 tobacco, 142 Botel Tobago, 143, 245
Brigands, 44, 154, 156 British North Borneo Company, 163, 164, 251, 258
Caouw, Jacob, 81, 83-5 California, 176, 177 Campaigns, Japanese, 39-40, 41-4 Campbell, Rev. William, 98 Camphor, 120, 121, 185-9, 224 Candidius, Rev. G., 222 Cheng Ching, 33 Chinese : administration, 36, 154, 156 cede Formosa to Dutch, 33 Japan, 41 development, 41 early expeditions, 30 early settlers, 31, 32, 36-7, 73, 75 pay indemnity to Japan, 40 treatment of aborigines, 36, 222, 223, 224, 225 Civil Service, 58-61 Clenk, Hermanus, 80, 81, 82 Climate, 49, 141 Coal, 159, 160 Coconuts, 49, 142 Coffee, 141 Copper, 159, 160 Consulate, British : at Anping, 102, 103, 208 at Tainan, 208 at Takao, 102, 208 at Tamsui, 208, 209, 211 Coyett, Frederick, 73-5, 77-8, 80-3, 85-8
Daily Mail, The, 263 Denn, Baron, 148 de Mailla, Father, 222 Development, 44, 153-8, 162, 163, 165, 166 Director-General, 58, 148, 167, 168 Dodd, Mr. John, 160 Dogs, 129 Dutch : attacked by Koxinga, 75-86 attack Spanish Settlements, 33, 206-8 285 286 INDEX
Duteh (cont.) ' build Forts at Tainan, 33, 70- 71 East India Company, 32, 70, 74, 87, 104 surrender to Koxinga, 87 trade, 72, 74 treatment of aborigines, 72, 221-2
East India Company, Hon., 33 Eda, Mr., 68-9, 101, 110, 115 Education, 91-9, 154, 157, 217, 218, 219 Eliot, Sir Charles, 131 Expeditions, punitive, 230-3 Exports : camphor, 189 general, 162 rice, 133 salt, 106 sugar, 55 tea, 138 timber, 121
Fibres, 143 Foreign section, 213 Formosans : as agriculturists, 132-3, 138 numbers, 94 opium smokers, 190 oppose innovations, 93, 155 political conditions, 150 F.M.S., 197 French, 40
Gardens, 126-7, 141, 211 Geographical features, 28, 29 Germany, 149 Gold, 159, 222-3 Golf, 211-2 Governor-General, 16, 58, 60, 148, 149 Government Offices, 147 Guard-Line, 227-9
Harbours, 29, 47, 154, 158, 268 Hambroek, Mr., 79, 80 Hawaian Islands, 28, 63, 176 Headhunting, 30, 220-1, 243, 244 Hearn, Lafcadio, 20, 63 Hokuto, 161 Hong Kong, 17, 21, 25, 26, 27, 47, 49, 158, 160, 197 Hotel, 21, 22, 24 Horinchi, Lieut.-General, 268, 270, 271 Hospitals, 98, 152, 154, 158 Hosui, Mr., 145, 167, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172
Hotels, 21, 22, 24, 63, 113-5, 145-6, 167
Imports, 162 Indigo, 141, 143 Inns, 63-8, 109, 113-5, 131 Irving, Mr. G. C, 16, 46
Java, 53, 158 Justice, 156, 203-4
Kagi, 119, 123-5 Kamada, Mr., 145, 169 Kapanzan, 213, 217, 219 Kapok, 143 Keelung : blockaded by French, 41 captured by Japanese, 41 origin, 29 harbour, 268, 269 Spanish Settlements, 33, 205-8 steamers from, 158 tea export, 137-8 Kitashirakawa, H.I.H. Prince, 44, 101 Kobe, 158, 179, 271 Kohara Estate, 16, 141, 172 Korea, 106, 165, 175 Koshimura, Mr. C, 46, 48, 49, 61-2, 66, 90, 107, 111, 114, 124, 127, 153, 213, 215, 234-5, 238, 262, 263, 269 Koxinga : attacks Dutch, 75-87 birth, 70 character, 87-90 death, 88 defeated by Tartars, 74 drives out Dutch, 33, 88 encourages salt making, 104 sugar industry, 52 shrine, 70, 89 Kudat, 19 Kwarenko, 58, 231, 243
Labour, Japanese, 16, 173, 177 Land tenure, 133-4 Le Gendre, General, 38 Liu Tung-fu, 42-3 Loo-choo Islands, 158
Macao, 32, 74 Mackay, Dr., 98 Malays, 30 Manila, 205, 206, 207 Minerals, 158-61 Missions, 95, 96, 97-9, 222 Monopolies, 104-6, 188, 191, 200-2 Mori, Mr., 151 INDEX 287
Morphine, 194-5 Morrison, Mount, 29 Mountains, 29 Murota, Mr., 169 Museums, 130, 151
Niitaka, Mount, 29 N.Y.K., 158 Oil, 159, 160 Opium, 189-200 O.S.K., 17, 22, 158, 267
Parks, 107, 131, 153, 204 Phipps, Mr., G. H. 68, 168, 169, 172, 180, 181, 183, 209-11, 220 Philippine Islands, 28, 175, 195 Pirates, 31 Police, 59, 228 Population, 69, 94, 128, 148, 151, 156 Portuguese settlers, 32 Prefectures, 58 Pescadores, 32, 41, 158 Press, Formosan, 129, 151, 152 Prisons, 156, 202, 203 Provinces, 58 Provintia, 73, 77, 99 Psalmanasaar, 34-6 Push-cars, 214, 215, 216, 262 Railways, 115-9, 121, 154, 157 Rainfall, 134, 142 Republic, Formosan, 41-4, 156 Revenue : camphor, 189 general, 162 monopolies, 201 opium, 196 rice, 133 salt, 106 sugar, 55 tea, 138 timber, 121 Rice, 131-3 Rivers, 29, 30, 131-2, 159 Roads, 154, 157, 164, 214 Rover, 38 Sakakibara, 65, 101, 102, 110, 111 Salt, 103-4, 105, 106 Samuels and Company, 267 Sandakan, 17, 18 San Francisco, 19, 26, 119 Sanitation, 154, 156 Savages, see Aborigines.
Schools, 91-9, 154, 157, 217-9 Shanghai, 158 Silver, 161 Soap Tree, 143
Sourabaya Mam, 17, 18, 19, 21, 22, 26, 27, 47, 185 Spanish Settlements, 33, 205-8 Spectator, 175 Steamship Communication, 158 Straits Settlements, 197 Sugar, 50-6, 131, 141, 162, 202 Sulphur springs, 160 Suyematsu, Mr., 168-70, 171, 179, 267 Suzuki, Colonel, 265, 266 Swinhoe, Vice-Consul Mr. R., 29, 208, 246
Taichu, 126, 131, 138 Taihoku : arrival, 145 barracks, 265 captured by Japanese, 42 description, 147-63 divisions, 151 name, 40 opium factory, 191 population, 151 prison, 202 tea market, 135-6 Taikokam, 215, 231, 262 Tainan : arrival at, 63 captured by Japanese, 42 Dutch build forts, 33 Japanese settlement, 31 mission, 95 population, 69 Taipeh, 40 Taiyal tribe, the : at Kapanzan, 236-9 expedition against, 231 language, 241-3 legends, 220-1 numbers, 243 village, 240 Taiwan, 32, 36 Bank of, 162-3, 184, 266 Takao, 15, 27, 28, 47-9, 99, 158 Tamsui : British Consulate, 208, 209, 211 golf course, 211 mission, 98 port, 205 river, 215, 217 Spanish Settlement, 33, 205-8 Tartars, 34, 36, 70, 72, 74, 82-3 Tea, 134-40, 151 Telegraphs, 157 Thales, S.S., 42, 43 Timber, 119-23, 158 Times, The, 263 Tobacco, 141-2, 153, 200-1 288 INDEX
Tokitok, 38 Toyen, 213, 214, 262 Tsintau, 233, 268 Twatutia, 136
United States : baggage checking, 118 Consul, 38, 147, 148 firms, 148 immigrants, 177 marines, 38 opium control, 195 ships of, wrecked, 37, 38
United States (cont.) : tea exported to, i38 Wade, Sir Thomas, 40 Western Customs, Japanese adop- tion of, 68-9, 112, 128.
152, 180-3
Yoshioka, Mr., 145, 169, 185, 189 263, 264
Zeelandia, 71, 78-9, 85, 86-7 102
.