Unlike The Houses Of The Poor On Shore, The House
Boats Are Models Of Cleanliness, And Space Is Utilized And Economized
By Adaptations More Ingenious Than Those Of A Tiny Yacht.
These boats,
which form neat rooms with matted seats by day, turn into beds at
night, and the children
Have separate "rooms." The men go on shore
during the day and do laborer's work, but the women seldom land, are
devoted to "housewifely" duties, and besides are to be seen at all
hours of day and night flying over the water, plying for hire at the
landings, and ferrying goods and passengers, as strong as men, and
clean, comely, and pleasant-looking; one at the stern and one at the
bow, sending the floating home along with skilled and sturdy strokes.
They are splendid boat-women, and not vociferous. These women don't
bandage their feet.
Their dress is dark brown or blue cotton, and consists of wide trousers
and a short, loose, sleeved upper garment up to the throat. The feet
are big and bare, the hair is neat and drawn back from the face into a
stiff roll or chignon, and they all wear jade-stone earrings. You see a
woman cooking or sewing in most housewifely style in one of these
"slipper boats;" but if you hail it, she is plying the heavy oar in one
moment, and as likely as not with a wise-looking baby on her back,
supported by a square piece of scarlet cloth embroidered in gold and
blue silks.
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