China and the West

Letter from John Dewey to Dewey children
Tientsin Jan 1 1920
We have got as far as this, both in time and space. We didnt go to the tomb of Confucius after all, as the connections were bad. Slow trains we knew, and when the guides found out they were also only thrid class, they rather withdrew the idea, and mamma hadnt wanted to go anytime, thinking the absent pilgrims and not the tomb the sight to see; while as for me I would willingly have been a present pilgrim if the only one. But we are now deluding ourselves with the prospect of going next spring when we not only see the pilgrims but also climb the sacred mountain. Aise from the exitement of not going and not lecturing, we had a luncheon and exhibition of old Chinese physical exercises with and by General Ma Liang. He is a story by hiself even more so than the Mohammadan meal and the show he gave us, too long to be tucked in, so Ill let it go now, save that the exercises are the original of the Japanese Jiu jitsu, which like everything else Japanese seems to have come from China. However Im bound to ay they have improved on the original a good deal, tho what we saw was well done, including the sickening conclusion, when eight or ten bricks were laid on a mans head and smahed with another brick, and a big paving stone at least four inches think, nearer six, was smashed with a big sledge hammer on the chest of one of the athletes, in fact two in succession one on the east chest and one on the west. He was stripped to the waist with a temperature of about 15 F, and the stone was fairly covered with the thick frost you see on the under side of the stones when they are frozen into the ground. The sight of the rough cold thing on a mans vare skin was almost enough for me, to say nothing of having it broken into four pieces on me. We were also taken to a show, thetre four or five plays acted by school boys of between twelve and sixteen, wh poor boys who are taught regular lessons half a day and plyacting the ot[h]er half, supported by the public, and shows are free. It was more interesting than the professional acting we saw at first, we havent been to a professional in Peking. The first was a moral play with a spoken moral at the end, namely not to take a concubine. Good advice of course, but probably not so much needed by these poor boys as by the millionaire officials. The queerness of the method of teaching the moral to little boys didnt seem to strike anybody. The play began with in a brothel, with the old man coming in to look over the girls, to pick out the one he wanted to buy—four or five were paraded before him. Of course she has a lover who is an habitue of the brothel and who is smuggled into the buyers house as her brother, and for whose sake the lady concubine attempts to poison him [in ink] her husband, [in ink] and a general suicide etc at the end—that is, next to the end, just before the Moral. The others were scenes adapted from the old historic folklore, and one were more interesting, especially as one twelve year old boy has real talent. He could make a lot of money on the vaudeville stage in U S; its funny how similar methods are, barring the ftone they sing in.
Jan 2, still '20.
Yesterday we had a day off. Except that in the morning we had a visit from a delegation of students repreentatives of the Students Unions. They and not the officials invited us here. There were four boys and three girls, the latter all from the Anglo-Chinese School, methodist. They all spoke some english, the girls very good, an[d] they were very chatty, more conversational and less selfconscious Lucy says than any of the Peking girls she has seen. It was quite extraordinary—this joint delegation. Suh Hu says that the afternoon before he visite[d] the Union headquarters ad found in each room a committee composed of boys and girls working togther, quite free from any consciousness, a sight which he says is the most encouraging he has yet seen in China. Only here and in Shanghia are such things possible. Why we also heard so much about Turkish women and so little about Chinese orietnalism, unless it was the sightseer's eye for the picturesque veil.
Yesterday morning's paper said that the Minister of Interior Chancellor Tsai had resigned, owing to the failure of mediation negotiations. Suh Hu [Hu Shi] came in late last night, had spent part of the day with others hunting for Tsai who had disappeared from Peking, presumably to Tientsin; that all the principals of the schools from elementary up had resigned and that educational chaos reigned supreme; also that one reason General Wu, the government mediator offered for the teachers going back to work was the impending attempt to restore the monarchy. Hu was quite excited last night, as yesterday was the day set according to rumors, but this morning paper hadnt a word about it. Just what is going to happen to my lectures now I dont know, but I hope some way will be foun[d] to resume them without waiting an endless time which will mean I will never finish and earn my salary in Peking.
This afternoon mamma and I both speak at the same meeting, which is also the first time for that arrangment. It is the difference between the younger generation and the old. At a recent meeting, Xn, in Shanghai, the Chinese proposed and amalgamation of the Y M C A and Y W C A—it would be interesting to see the fluttering in the male dovecotes. But it is one of many signs that the younger generation of Chinese is ready to go further than the alleged liberal westerner, who has his obssessions as to what the Chinese will and will not stand for—to say nothing of their own inner feelings as to what they will stand for themselves. In the past from combined timidty and politeness the Chinese have hesitated to tell their Xn confreres just what they thought and wanted, but the nationalist feeling is grwoing so rapidly that that wont last much longer. Its only fair to say that some of the missionary element would gladly abdicate when they saw the Chinese disposed to take || responsibility, while the Y M C A is already organized with the Chinese in at least nominal control, and with all the facilities for actual control.
Peking Home, Jan 4
When we get back here and find all the rented things gone and our own here and to be chased after, we realize that few millionaires have naything on us in the way of furnsihed houses, what with our palce at 2880, our country mansion at Huntington, our spring residence on Russian Hill and our winter resort here. Whether mama will be able to find another to furnish before we leave China I dont know…
Dad