[VOL II] SHOW-ROOM OF A LANTERN MERCHANT, AT PEKING

SHOW-ROOM OF A LANTERN MERCHANT, AT PEKING.

Cover Image: Show-room of a Lantern Merchant, at Peking / BeiJing China / Drawn by T. Allom Engraved by F F.Walker – ALAMY Image ID:2X4BD3E

*Ancient Chinese history is rich in the use of lamps and lanterns. As carriers of light, lamps and lanterns have continued to develop in tandem with societal progress. By the Qing Dynasty, they had reached their peak in terms of design and craftsmanship. Over an extended period of refinement and due to economic growth, advancements in craftsmanship, and cultural exchanges with both domestic and foreign influences, Qing Dynasty lamps became known for their beauty, intricacy, and meticulous craftsmanship.

“When the earthly lamp which lighted the Chinaman shall now go out,
He’ll feel awhile benighted, and look round in fear and doubt;
But soon the prospect clearing, by cloudless starlight on he’ll tread,
And find no light so cheering as that light which Heav’n will shed.”

T.M.

growth of kingdoms, the date of whose origin is lost in the misty distance of past ages, and which are now so identified with national character, that when the country itself is named, association of ideas suggests the habit simultaneously. Of this peculiar character is the practice of carrying lanterns in China. Every foot-passenger in the streets, on the roads, or any other public avenue, is required, after nightfall, to carry a lantern, which his name and residence are painted; and a violation of the law subjects the offender to arrest by the police, and imprisonment until the mandarin’s leisure allows him to hear and condemn him. Every vehicle in the highways is obliged to set up a national lamp, and the river-surface at Canton, and other cities similarly seated, presents a continuous sheet of light, or fire, from the reflection of the lamps which all boats hang out at dusk.

The effect of this spotted illumination is curious, sometimes even picturesque; but the consequences of the silly habit have frequently proved fatal to the fortunes of the empire. When part of Lord Amherst’s suite were being conveyed in rude carts from the last stage of their journey northward to the imperial capital, each cart was provided with a small paper lantern of a red colour, and these, in such a long train, produced a singular effect. It was twelve at midnight when the party arrived in the suburbs, but even at that unseasonable hour curiosity had kept the Celestial citizens fully awake. Multitudes crowded the way, each holding up his small oval lantern, inscribed according to law, beneath those flickering and dingy glare he sought a peep at the procession. The quantity of light afforded by the concentration of so many lamps was sufficient to discover the stolid countenances of the crowd, and the general character and style of the buildings that were passed. After wandering over numerous bald and shining heads, the eye involuntarily rested on gilded piazzas, extending in front of the houses, and reflecting the rays of ten thousand lights.

Such an employment of this national emblem is innocuous, as much so as the decoration of private houses and public temples by day with the same favourite ornaments; but the art of war in the nineteenth century is conducted on principles too scientifically destructive to leave any valuable opportunity for the future use of paper lanterns. Of this change the Chinese were never aware of until the visit of the Alceste frigate, under the command of Captain Maxwell, to the Bocca Tigris. As the British approached the strong battery of Anunghoy, the whole range of the ramparts appeared to be brilliantly lighted up, and the Chinese commenced a brisk cannonade upon the British men-of-war. One tremendous broadside, poured in with the precision of English gunnery, conveyed a dreadful lesson of experience, and presented death in so many and such horrid shapes, that the guns were immediately deserted—the light of the embrasures in a moment eclipsed. The wisdom of retreating would have been some counterpoise to the folly of their braving a British broadside, had not the unlucky Tartars, instead of blowing out their lights, and escaping in the darkness, foolishly, more patriæ, taken up their respective lanterns, and scampered up the steep side of the hill that overlooks the fort. Is the bird in the wilderness, that puts its head under its wing, that it may not be seen by its pursuers, a more innocent reasoner than the Chinaman who flies with his lighting lantern in his hand, before a British sharp-shooter! And that would have been a fatal night to the garrison of Anunghoy, were it not that the sight of so many bald-headed, longqueue’d renegades, each carrying a huge painted paper balloon, that rendered him an easy mark, in full chase up the hill, was so inconceivably ridiculous, that our brave mariners could not reconcile themselves to the idea of taking a shot, even at the lantern.

Both the shape and material of which lanterns are formed, differ considerably.Every mathematical figure—the sphere, square, pentagon, hexagon, and many others,with a considerable number of sides—is enlisted in their manufacture; the frames may be of wood, ivory, or metal, and the designs and patterns of the most costly evidence a very accomplished and practised taste in what is generally styled scroll-work. Glass is rarely used in lanterns, or indeed for any other purpose than as mirrors, but the number of substitutes is endless. Amongst them are to be reckoned horn, silk, oyster-shells, paper, thread-netting or gauze, the latter coated with a tenacious varnish made from the gigartina tenax, a marine fucus found in the Indian archipelago.

The manufacture of lanterns is of course a profitable business, and it is difficult to determine to which part in the process the greater share of admiration belongs—the size and perfection of the horn, which is made with a simple pair of pincers, an iron boiler, and a small stove; or the richly-painted and embroidered panes that fill the frame-work. A lantern-painter is an artist of no mean rank: he possesses a very extensive knowledge of design, and is a master of colouring. None but the most agreeable subjects, whether landscape or figure, and the most gaudy colours, are considered appropriate on the panes or the panels of a lantern. And this is the uniform sentiment, although the ornament may be intended to light a hall of Confucius, or a temple of idolatry.

A lantern merchant’s show-room is a fashionable lounge: and, as there is no limit to the number of these articles with which an apartment of ceremony may be adorned, to save its capacity only, a continual consumption appears to be going on, and rivalry amongst this class of decorators is for ever active. The patterns painted on the lantern-panes vary with the season, like those of silk and cotton manufacturers in Europe; and, it is only an act of domestic duty on the mandarin’s part to visit the show-rooms at the proper period, select the newest pattern, and purchase it for the apartments of his wife and daughters.

In one of the cases of the Chinese exhibition, held for some years at Hyde Park Corner, was a superb lantern, used in China only on occasions of state, which the curator（*W. B. Langdon, Esq.） describes as follows: “It is ten feet in height, and four in diameter at both extremities. The frame is richly carved and gilt, and covered with crimson and white silk, adorned with the most costly and beautiful embroidery. The tassels and beadwork that depend from the bottom, and from a projecting portion of each corner of the upper part, are in keeping with the rest. There are no less than two hundred and fifty-eight crimson silk tassels, pendent from various parts. In short, this national lantern is as magnificent as carving, gilding, silks, embroidery, and bead-work can make it.”

From the opacity of the material used in the panes, from the superfluity of ornament spread over them, and also from the very inartificial construction of the lanterns themselves, these costly contrivances afford but a poor imperfect light. The lamp consists of a cotton wick, immersed in a cup of oil, and there is no provision for increasing the quantity of light, except by the addition of an increased number of wicks. The oil in general use is of excellent quality, giving out but little smoke, and burning freely. It is obtained from the ground-nut, arachis hypogea, a native of China, and it is a substitute for butter amongst the poorer classes.

The use of lanterns is assuredly very ancient, necessity having taught their convenience amongst the earliest inventions of social economy; and, although we can trace back their history through Rome and Athens, still, how modern do such annals appear, placed in competition with those of China! It may, however, be a gratification to the inquisitive to be told when lanterns were first distinctly spoken of, by those nations which we have been accustomed to call ancient, and where original specimens have been found. The Greek poet Theopompus, and Empedocles of Agrigentum, are believed to have been the first to mention such inventions as existing in their countries; and such useful articles have also been discovered in the ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii. It is said that the games of the Roman circus were enacted by the light of lanterns, and that the dim character of their rays shed an appropriate light on the sacred orgies of the Greeks. Plutarch asserts that they were used in augury. Had the Tartars, who fled from the fire of the Alceste, condescended to study Roman history, they would have understood the management of the military lantern much better. When the Roman legions moved by night, lanterns were carried before them upon the top of a halbert, and these were so constructed as to throw the light only in that direction which the carrier thought it prudent to select.

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