"It is very difficult to be polite in Chinese," said the Sinologue solemnly. That seemed final. But she asked another Sinologue. "No, I should not say _Man man tso_. Not _Man man tso_," said he dreamily. "Not to a teacher--who comes every day."
"But what do you say?" asked she in desperation.
"Well, it is very polite to say _Shao pei_--I don't go to the door with you, you know; I only go a few steps with you. That is the polite thing to say after a call from a mandarin."
"But surely it would be polite to go to the door?"
"Well, I think anywhere it would be _polite_."
"Yes, but not--not from a lady. It would not be expected."
"A--h! yes! then I can say _Shao pei_." However, she did not feel quite satisfied, and she watched her opportunity.
Next time she heard a Sinologue converse with a Chinaman, she listened to hear what he would say in parting. Alas! it was not _Man man tso_, it was not _Shao pei_.
"What was that you said to him in taking leave?"
"Oh--I didn't say anything,"--with the instinctive horror of being detected in possibly a false tone.
"Yes--yes, you said something as you turned away and took leave. And I do so want to know what it was, that I may know what to say."
"Oh, I said----" mumbling very much, so that it was impossible to hear what he said. "I don't think it was the thing to say to a man of his station and quality. I think I should have said---- Let me see--I really don't know what was the right thing for me to say."
And so now she is giving it up--giving up being polite in Chinese, giving up ever ascertaining the value of money or the price of anything. For how can things have fixed prices where money has none? There is only one comfort to her soul: if any one looks offended, or if a too sensitive conscience makes her fear she has given cause of offence, she promptly says _Tetsui_--"I am to blame, I apologise." No one has yet made distinctly evident that he does not understand her, nor has any Sinologue yet told her she is wrong. _Tetsui_ is therefore the one golden word for her. And while she is in China she foresees she must live in one constant state of being to blame.
In this manner I at the time recorded my first impression of the coinage and language of China. But the matter of payment is even more complicated than I then fancied. The only coinage of China is copper cash, of which about forty go to a penny. They are round, with a hole in the middle, and generally about a thousand are strung on two strings and tied together; and when carried, hanging over the shoulder, they look like so many snakes. But I say about a thousand advisedly; for there are generally a number of small and comparatively worthless cash in every string, the average amount of these varying in different parts. The lumps of silver with which my friends threatened me are made up into what are called "shoes," but what look like very large coarse thimbles. These are of various degrees of purity, and their purity has to be tested before they are weighed or broken up. In Chungking there were three different degrees of purity in different parts of the city; therefore it made quite a considerable difference whether you agreed to pay a sum of money in the upper, lower, or middle town. And the result of so much difficulty about payment is that every one is in debt to every one else, keeping a sort of running account going.