University of Nanking - Linguist Yearbook (Nanking, China)

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fgrove of trees, the largest in the vicinity of Nanlcing. On October OUR TRIP TO PAO HWA SHAN 79 -as this. The historic resting place of the iirst emperor of the Ming dynasty--Hung WVL1 U368-98D was visited. The royal way to the tomb lined on each side by massive animals, elephants, camels, horses and others,carved in stone aroused our curiosity. Set, as they are in 'the common places of peasant farming, they seemed to recall a -glorious past, about whicl1 we want to know more. s KN Attention! Ready for a 'l1ike Then there was Spirit Valley where rests an ancient temple in a .21 we took the wall. Mounting the massive city wall that surrounds Nankingat the I-Ian Si Men gate we walked along the top to the South 'Gate, Nan Men. From the wall the ancient city of Nanlcing' spread out before us. The curved oriental roofs of the public buildings discernable in the film of haze at once distinguished the landscape from one of the Occident. This wall is 21 miles in length, is IO to 20 feet wide and from I5 to 50 feet high. It is constructed entirely of large, dark grey burned brick. Not sufficient wood material exists in the region to burn so large a number now. It would appear that about 500 years ago when the wall was constructed that the mountains and hills must have borne a heavier cover of trees than at present, for coal was not in use then, to supply sufficient fuel for the burning. Then there were numerous temples visited, such as Kuling An and the Monastery, Buh Gy Go, the Temple of Confucius and others. OUR TRIP TO PAO HWA SHAN. Saturday, November 25, was finally fixed for the visit to the celebrated monastery at Pao I-Iwa Shan. The weather man had a grouch. If we had tried to pick a very disagreeable day we could not have succeeded better. But despite wind and weather we went

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78 ll THE LINGUIST . OUR ACTIVITIES OUTSIDE THE CURRICULUM Some of our friends in the Homeland have asked in their letters what we can find to do outside school hours. The difficulty is to find enough time for the things to be done. In a city of so many different types of schools as is Nanking, no lack of work exists for those who are willing to help. Calls are continually coming in from some school. institutional church or other, whose staff is underxnanned to request the Language School students to assist in some way or to teach English. And the Language school students have responded gen- erously. A complete list of the institutions assisted need not be given here. But the following activities gives an idea of the type of work done. Several of our young women have given one or more hours per week to teaching at the Y. M. C. A. and the Y. XV. C. A., the Methodist Girls' School, The Quakerage and several similar in atitu- tions. Three of our young women have been teaching English to the wife of the Provincial Military Governor. Several of our students have taught at the University of Nankingg ten have assisted in the Middle School of the National Southeastern University. A number of Bible and Sunday School classes have been organized and instructed by our students. A very commendable piece of work in the form of a much needed dispensary has been instituted under the auspices of the Adult Bible class. Semi-weekly clinics are held with Dr. C. I-I. Voss in charge, assisted by Dr. R. Peterson and Dr. WVm. Ankency and two graduate nurses the Misses Dunlap and Gerhling. Other members of the class conduct evening classes and church services for the same group of persons who are treated in the clinic. A regular schedule has been made outg certain evenings of the week are given over to instructing the young people and other evenings to evangelistic meetings and preaching services. Rev. L. E. Blackman has charge of the Evangelistic work and is ably assisted by a native preacher Rev. Wang, who also conducts classes for the young people in the afternoons. Mr. Earl Otto has charge of the educational work. SIGHT SEEING Let us not leave the impression, that we do nothing but work, teach and study. We are far too human and fun-loving for that. The old saw, All work and 'l' 'l' if is just as true in China as elswhere. Many 'interesting places exist about Nanking and we have availed ourselves of the opportunity to see some of them. Saturday has been the usual day for these hikes and sight seeing. Almost every Saturday a party has made a hike or trip. Space does not permit me to describe them all. The brief accounts of a few will afford a glimpse of the year's sightseeing. MING TOMBS , On Chinese Independence day, October Io, a group of hikers left Meigs Hall for Purple Mountain, Ming tombs and Spirit valley. The young women live in Meigs I-Iallg they are the life of any party such

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80 'THE LINGUIST sixty seven strong, including our Dean and his mcther Mrs. Keen and Dr. Reichelt, an authority on temples and ceremonies and other things Buddhistic, who acted as our official guide. After a train ride of two hours and aclimb over' a Chinese highway CFootpathJ for six miles we reached the monastery set in a rambling grove of trees high up on a mountain ridge. After the lunch in the refectory-an experience to many of us-one of the chief priests conducted us from one hall and courtyard to another. Dr. Reichelt interpreted and explained. ' The Monastery of Pao I-lwa Shan is one of the oldest and most noted of the Buddhisqmonasteries in China. Some ofthe buildings are said to be about two thousand years old. At the time of our visit some six hundred monks and priests were quartered there. At certain times of the year especially during the ordination ceremonies- of the priests, two thousand and more priests assemble at this one place. We were shown the ordination platform, said to beagift direct from Heaven, where the candidates are required to recite whole volumes of Buddhist literature from memory without a mistake- X1Vhen the candidate to the priesthood accomplishes this task his head is shaved and the nine or twelve holes are burned in the top of his head, which is a sign that he is a full fledged member of Buddha and is on his way to Nirvana. XVe saw some ofthe priests in their living quarters, which are small, dark and smelly. In such places they study and memorize their manuscripts. Further in our rounds we came to the great kitchen where enormous quantities of rice are cooked. It was a cold day with llurries of snow and there was much stamping of feet to keep warm. But we thanked the courteous priest for his kindness set out forthe six mile hike to the station- And the train was two hours late. But it was great day, not to be forgotten. And the lessons of it will linger in our minds. For the task that lies before us was made clearer by the moreimtimate glimpses into the strength of the Buddhist order and into the devotion of its adherents. Yet despite the persistence of Buddhism, it has failed to save the people or the civilization. 5 '., ,, :fgpfliii f p ,tglll aM'e'Z if 45321 H ,pf L fan- H w