Untitled

THE JEWS AND MOHAMMEDANS. 149
said to form a majority of the population in Kansu, and one-third in several
districts of China proper. To these must be added the Dungans and the other
Mussulmans of Zungaria, Kulja, and Eastern Turkestan, in order to form an
adequate idea of their power and influence in the empire.
All the Chinese Mohammedans are collectively known as Hwei-hwei, a term
formerly applied to the Uigurs, while they call themselves Kiao-mun, or " Religious
people," in contradistinction to the other Chinese, regarded by them as Unbelievers.
The Mongolian epithet Dungan, usually explained to mean " outcasts " or " loafers,"
is restricted to those of the north and north-west, who hold no direct intercourse
with their co-religionists the " Panthays " of Yunnan. Nor do the Chinese
Mussulmans anywhere form a homogeneous ethnical group. Descended from the
Uigurs, Tanguts, and Tatars, they are intermingled in the north and west with
Chinese proselytes, while in Yunnan the Turki and Mongol elements are represented
only by the descendants of the soldiers settled here by Kublai Khan. Since the
accession of the present Manchu dynasty all are obliged to wear the pigtail, and
their women have even been compelled to conform to the barbarous Chinese fashion
of preventing the natural growth of their feet. Nevertheless, Mohammedans can
always be distinguished from the other natives by their haughtv bearing, frank
expression, and in the west by the practice of carrying arms. Abstaining from
alcoholic drinks, tobacco, and opium, they are generally more healthy than their
neighbours, while their spirit of clanship insures for them a material prosperity far
superior to that of the surrounding populations.
According to the unanimous tradition Islam first reached the northern provinces
during the reign of the Emperor Taitsung in the seventh century, when Ibn Hamsa,
related to the Prophet, settled with three thousand immigrants in Shangan, the
present Singan-fu. Being well received, they freely raised their mosques, and
their ministers were invested by the Government with a certain civil authority
over their congregations. About the same epoch others entered Yunnan, and the
Chinese annals of the year 758 speak of Arab pirates who sacked the suburbs of
Canton and plundered the imperial granaries. The communications between the
Yunnan Mohammedans and the rest of Islam have at all times been maintained
either through Canton or more directly through Bhamo and Burmah. The standard
of education being higher in this province, natives are always found capable of
interpreting the Koran and the Arabic prayers recited in the mosques.
At present the northern Hwei-hwei keep up their relations with their western
brethren through Zungaria. Here the Uigurs as well as the Tanguts of Kansu,
formerly Buddhists or Nestorians, were converted to Islam when this religion was
adopted by their fellow-countrymen in the Jagatai
State. Their numbers were
increased by immigrants from East Turkestan, and by the Moslem Mongolians left
in Zungiiria l>y Tamerlane. Thus they gradually acquired the ascendancy in this
part of the empire, where are situated the two cities of Salar (Iluchew) and
Kinkipao, the Mecca and Medina of the Chinese Empire. Some of the Kansu
towns have hundreds of mosques, and their Mohammedan inhabitants have
monopolized the whole trade of the country.