The Mirror of Kong Ho | Page 3

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THE MIRROR OF KONG HO By Ernest Bramah
Etext prepared by John Bickers, [email protected].

THE MIRROR OF KONG HO
BY ERNEST BRAMAH

A lively and amusing collection of letters on western living written by
Kong Ho, a Chinese gentleman. These addressed to his homeland, refer
to the Westerners in London as barbarians and many of the aids to life
in our society give Kong Ho endless food for thought. These are things
such as the motor car and the piano; unknown in China at this time.

INTRODUCTION
ESTIMABLE BARBARIAN,--Your opportune suggestion that I
should permit the letters, wherein I have described with undeviating
fidelity the customs and manner of behaving of your accomplished race,
to be set forth in the form of printed leaves for all to behold, is
doubtless gracefully-intentioned, and this person will raise no barrier of
dissent against it.
In this he is inspired by the benevolent hope that his immature
compositions may to one extent become a model and a by-word to
those who in turn visit his own land of Fragrant Purity; for with
exacting care he has set down no detail that has not come under his
direct observation (although it is not to be denied that here or there he
may, perchance, have misunderstood an involved allusion or failed to
grasp the inner significance of an act), so that Impartiality necessarily
sways his brush, and Truth lurks within his inkpot.
In an entirely contrary manner some, who of recent years have gratified
us with their magnanimous presence, have returned to their own
countries not only with the internal fittings of many of our palaces
(which, being for the most part of a replaceable nature, need be only
trivially referred to, the incident, indeed, being generally regarded as a
most cordial and pressing variety of foreign politeness), but also--in the
lack of highly-spiced actuality--with subtly-imagined and truly
objectionable instances. These calumnies they have not hesitated to
commit to the form of printed books, which, falling into the hands of
the ignorant and undiscriminating, may even suggest to their
ill-balanced minds a doubt whether we of the Celestial Empire really
are the wisest, bravest, purest, and most enlightened people in
existence.
As a parting, it only remains to be said that, in order to maintain
unimpaired the quaint-sounding brevity and archaic construction of
your prepossessing language, I have engraved most of the remarks
upon the receptive tablets of my mind as they were uttered. To one who

can repeat the Five Classics without stumbling this is a contemptible
achievement. Let it be an imposed obligation, therefore, that you retain
these portions unchanged as a test and a proof to all who may read. Of
my own deficient words, I can only in truest courtesy maintain that any
alteration must of necessity make them less offensively commonplace
than at present they are.
The Sign and immutable Thumb-mark of, Kong Ho
By a sure hand to the House of one Ernest Bramah.

THE MIRROR OF KONG HO

LETTER I

Concerning the journey. The unlawful demons invoked by certain of
the barbarians; their power and the manner of their suppression.
suppression. The incredible obtuseness of those who attend within
tea-houses. The harmonious attitude of a person of commerce.
VENERATED SIRE (at whose virtuous and well-established feet an
unworthy son now prostrates himself in spirit repeatedly),--
Having at length reached the summit of my journey, that London of
which the merchants from Canton spoke so many strange and
incredible things, I now send you filial salutations three times increased,
and in accordance with your explicit command I shall write all things to
you with an unvarnished brush, well assured that your versatile object
in committing me to so questionable an enterprise was, above all, to
learn the truth of these matters in an undeviating and yet open-headed
spirit of accuracy and toleration.
Of the perils incurred while travelling in the awe-inspiring devices by
which I was transferred from shore to shore and yet further inland,