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. The country was
filled with all kinds of rumours, and every one had to be very
careful of all their conduct, and of everything they said, lest
they be arrested for sympathizing with the enemy.'
" 'But, Yin-ma, did you ever see any of these paper images
transformed into soldiers?'
" 'No, I never did myself, but there was an old woman lived near
our place, who was said to be in sympathy with the rebels. One
night my father saw soldiers going into her house and when he had
followed them he could find nothing but paper images. You may not
have anything of this kind happen in America, but very many
people saw them in those terrible days of pillage and bloodshed
here.' "
Such stories are common in all parts of China during every period
of rebellion, war, riot or disturbance of any kind. The people go
about with fear on their faces, and horror in their voices,
telling each other in undertones of what some one, somewhere, is
said to have seen or heard. Nor are these superstitions confined
to the common people. Many of the better classes believe them and
are filled with fear.
As the Tai-ping rebellion broke out when Miss Chao was about
fifteen or sixteen years of age, she would hear these stories for
two or three years before she entered the palace. After she had
been taken into the Forbidden City she would continue to hear
them, brought in by the eunuchs and circulated not only among all
the women of the palace, but among their own associates as well,
and here they would take on a more mysterious and alarming aspect
to these people shut away from the world, as ghost stories become
more terrifying when told in the dim twilight
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