THE TERRIBLE FAMINE IN CHINA.*
By C. L. Gregory
[The following account of the famine in China, which I clip from the N. Y. Sun, may be of interest to the readers of the REVIEW. The frequency of famines and pestilences, of perils by sea and perils by land, should awaken all, especially those who have received the third angel’s message in the love of it, to the momentous fact that the end draweth nigh, aye, is even at the doors. C. L. Gregory.] The dearth in China, which is perhaps the widest-spread and the most fearful scourge that has befallen humanity for the last two hundred years, began first in the autumn of 1875. Its immediate cause was the long absence of rain, but the phenomenon to which it was and still is primarily due is the gradual desiccation of the vast plains of Chihli and Shantung, a process which, commencing in the table-lands of Central Asia, has now reached the densely populated northern provinces of China. For the last two years I have been in constant communication with the famine-stricken districts, and the letters I have received from day to day can only be described as sickening. Fancy a tract of country larger than thirteen Switzerlands a prey to want that138it is well-nigh impossible to relieve. The people’s faces are black with hunger; they are dying by thousands upon thousands. Women and girls and boys are openly offered for sale to any chance wayfarer; when I left the country a respectable married woman could easily be bought for $6, and a little girl for $2. In cases, however, where it was found impossible to dispose of their children, parents have been known to kill them sooner than witness their prolonged sufferings, in many instances throwing themselves afterward down wells, or committing suicide by arsenic. Corpses lay rotting by the highway, and there was none to bury them. As for food, the population subsisted for a long time on roots and grass; then they found some nourishment in willow-buds, and finally ate the thatches off their cottages. The bark of trees served them for several months, and last July I received specimens of the stuff to which the unhappy creatures had been by that time reduced. The most harmless kind was potato-stalks, tough, stringy fibers, which only the strongest teeth could reduce to pulp, and which entirely defied all my attempts at deglutition. The other description of “food”—I have seen it myself—was red slatestone. This substance, when rolled about the mouth and chewed, will eventually split into small splinters, which can be swallowed after practice. To such frightful extremities have the famine-stricken people in China been put. The chief assistance which has hitherto been proffered has come from foreigners in the open ports, the missionaries, both Protestant and Catholic, acting as their almoners. Many wealthy Chinese have also given liberally; but the misery increases, and more help is urgently required. The sight of so much self-sacrificing labor by the missionaries throughout these troubles has filled the Chinamen with astonishment. It has opened their eyes entirely. It is well that their friendship and gratitude should be cemented by further deeds of mercy.—Frederick H. Balfour, in the Spectator.