Some Provincial and Local Characteristics; How Chinese See Themselves The Chinese have the reputation of being excellent, judges of characsr, and while this may be open to dispute, they are without doubt unrivalled in picking out the character-Isties or eccentricities of a person, and expressing such in exceedingly apt words or phrases, well remember in the days of the Chinese Labour Corps in France a particularly dour Scotchman was called la kuei pier or the siren, as he reminded his men of the mournful notes which warned them of the aproach of enemy aircraft. of amusements, When asked for tickets, their inva 3 ma take pa tzu a phrase which had better be left untranslated, though the frequency of its use renders in more or less innocuous. The sit tion, however, gave rise to a witty doggerel which says: Ma la ko pa tzu (@ aint) ma la Shih mien piao (s2%%) is the free ticket, How nae shao (WINT) @ head which is flat at the back Tang hn chao (MHM) is a pass-
Few, if any, foreigners resident in China escape the observant eyes of their Chinese associates, and receive some nickname or 50 quet by which they are generally re-erred to, except, of course, in their august presence. The purpose at present, however, is not to discuss the forelener as aten by the Eastern eyes, but, to give some example how the Chinese speak of themselves, especially when referring to people from other provinces, or even of those from the remoter parts of their own province, I mr pea Cee IN yes Ma ta ko pa tzu (Weearey) ma la ko pa tsu (Men from Manchuria), Pich hu nae ($1) do not molest Shen shang tai (®t) on your body you carry T ko ho tzu pao (—Mi&TM) 9 Mauser pistol, (box gun)
The immense the country.
ind the poor com= munications between "the coast and the interior have produced many kinds and types of people, and their natural differences, accentuate ed as they are by variations Innguage and different standards of living, provide ample opportunities for those who delight to portray the characteristics or peculiarities of others, with the result that there 80 ich as descriptions of people and places, Geography plays an important part in these distinctions, and there is a great dividing line between the people of the North and those of the South, lacking in the other.
The Northerners with their perier stature and greater physical strength are prone. to look down upon the Southerners, and to speak of them as small cunning persons, who seek to make up for their Inck of physical strength by stra and underhand methods, and must be carefully watched in any dealings that may take place, The Southerners on. their side, with their quicker intellects and greater natural energy, are inclined to speak of the Northerners as crude and poorly educated people, yough of speech and slow in both thought and action.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.