Since arriving in Szechuan, I have found that the Szechuanese way of construction is the most economical. Kiln fired bricks are often used to make the four corner pillars. The four brick pillars with wooden joists to support the roof give an impression of isolated fragility. When tiles are laid on the roof, bamboo slats are put on as walls. After mud and mortar have been spread over the chinks and interstices between the bamboo slats, the structure bears close resemblance to a house, particularly when you view it from afar. The cottage I am occupying belongs structurally to this type of architecture. It goes without saying that this building has the necessary brick pillars and the walls of bamboo slats. In a word, it has all the attributes of a house.

Speaking of houses, my personal experience cannot be said to be a scanty one. The so-called beehive style, a residence with many courts connected by corridors, tenements in modern cities, of the one room to a floor and three rooms to a floor types, small upstairs room in the back, straw huts, grand mansions, and skyscrapers--I have had some experience with each of these varieties. Wherever I have lived for any length of time, I grew to be fond of my house, however modest or pretentious it might be. In time the attachment became so strong that, unless I was left with no choice, I hadn't cared to move away. When I first came to this cottage, I entertained no extravagant hope for it, considering it merely a shelter from the elements. Having now lived in the cottage for more than two months, in my usual way I have come to be attached to it. I am not unaware of the fact that it doesn't actually protect me from the ravages of rain and storm, for the cottage, though equipped with the necessary space for windows, boasts no window panes. When there is a stiff breeze, my cottage assumes the airiness of a pavilion. Light filters through cracks left between tiles on the roof, giving the cottage a sieve-like atmosphere. Although it affords inadequate protection in inclement weather, my cottage has an individuality of its own and I like a thing with individuality.

My cottage is situated half way up a hill. There are over seventy steps cut into the hillside between the road and the cottage door. Far below are curving terraced fields of paddy. In the distance, on a clear day, you will see green hills on the horizon. To the sides, there are corn fields, bamboo groves, fish ponds, and reservoirs of night soil. Behind the cottage, the slope is covered with briars and bramble. In spite of the isolation of the cottage callers knock at the cottage door on moonlit nights and even on stormy days. Friendship will bridge any distance. Distance will bring out in clearer relief the amicability of the callers. Even after mounting the more than seventy steps to arrive at the cottage, the callers must be prepared for another climb. For, inside the cottage, the floor is laid more or less in line with the natural incline of the hill side. Callers may be surprised at the sloping floor, but as for me, familiarity breeds callousness--I am now scarcely aware of the fact. Going from my study to the dining room is up-hill work. After a meal, one leaves the dining room by going down-hill-not an inconvenient arrangement from any point of view.

Of the six rooms in the cottage, I occupy only two. The bamboo slats and mortar having a way of disliking each other's company, and door and window frames being innocent of doors and windows, communication between my part of the cottage and those of my fellow tenants flows unimpeded. Whether my neighbor is celebrating uproariously, reading aloud some favorite stanza, or whispering love's yearning not to mention snoring, sneezing, musically lapping up his soup, angrily tearing up some bill or throwing away his shoes--all these sounds ripple through the door or window spaces to break the monotony of my solitary peace. At night, one is kept awake by hearing the rat drinking the vegetable oil in one's lamp, upsetting the lamp when it tries to drain it of its last drop, rolling a walnut along the tilting floor, climbing up the side of the mosquito net, or just whetting and grinding its teeth against a door jamb or a table leg. Vis-a-vis rats, I must confess shamefacedly that I am helpless. Foreigners often observe that "What can I do?" is a typical excuse for camouflaging the do nothingism of the Chinese race. The fact is that I did a number of things against the rats. I pasted paper on the window frame which the rats found to be no obstacle to their progress. Doors were closed, but the rats soon gnawed holes in them. There is just nothing that one can do against them. Even foreigners in Szechuan have been known to have given up their struggle against rats. And mosquitoes wreck greater havoc than the rats. I don't know of any threat as great from mosquitoes elsewhere. I now find the old saying "mosquito in swamps fly thunderously" to be literally true. Of an evening; the room is just full of flying mosquitoes, without anyone to regulate the traffic. These are black in color, gargantuan in size, and steely in frame. While mosquitoes have closed their season in other quarters, they seem to be especially active in my cottage. Visitors who were alightly careless of their ferocity have been known to nurse injured legs whereon mounds of bites have appeared. I take all this in my stride. For I know with some assurance that, if winter comes, can the departure of mosquitoes be far behind? As for next summer, who am I to be given to know whether or not I shall stay on in this same cottage?

My cottage is at its best on moonlit nights. The situation of the cottage is slightly elevated wherefrom one may see the moon rise sooner than other people. To see the moon rise from a hilltop; rushing up as a vermilion disk and, an instant later, shedding its bright light to flood the countryside, causing the firmament to become spotless, when all is quiet except for the barely audible bark of a distant dog-- would make all my visitors respect the silent tranquility. When the moon rises high, its light will filter through the foliage of the two pear trees in the yard. With the absolute silence almost shouting at you and the spotted ground under the trees staring at you, the atmosphere appears angelic. When my company has departed and on my going to bed, moonlight will faithfully follow me to share my solitary splendor. There is a different kind of air when there is a slight drizzle. Looking out from the window frame, there is a blurred impression of mist and cloud, much after the fashion of Mi Nan-kung's landscape paintings. Should there be any heavier downpour, I lose my ease and comfort, for the ceiling is likely to develop spots first of all. Then the spots spread, and the ceiling starts to drip. In the end, the lime and mud tumble down like an avalanche. After the crash, the room is flooded with debris and disaster beyond rescue and hard to repair. This has happened to my cottage a few times.

The furniture in my part of the cottage may deservedly be said to be simple and frugal. My efforts have been directed to keep it clean and spotless. I am not of the famous, so you don't expect to find photographs of the illustrious hanging on my walls. I do not practice dentistry, so you don't expect me to have any doctoral diploma enshrined in a gold frame. I am not even versed in the tonsorial arts, so you don't find any scenes from the West Lake in tapestry or pictures of movie stars in my sitting cum-dining room. I have a bed, a desk, and a chair, in my study-cum-bed room. Having the wherewithal to read, to write, and to sleep, I crave for little more. Though the furniture is simple, I like nothing better than shuffling it around. In the West, ladies are sometimes ridiculed for being over fond of changing the furniture around. It is alleged that this is one proof that woman by nature is fickle. Without discussing the justice of the allegation, I must admit that I like change. In the old fashioned households in China, the furniture is always arranged in a set pattern a square table in the foreground with a chair on each side. On either side of the hall, there are two chairs with a little tea table between them. My view is that to be over furnished is a grievous sin and to maintain symmetry in the arrangement of furniture is a betrayal of taste. There is nothing novel in the furnishing of my part of the cottage but each piece is arranged to my own taste. On entering the room one can not fail to know that I occupy it. I fully concur in the views on interior decoration of Lee Yu.

I don't own the cottage, I am merely one of its tenants. Considering that we are all transients in the universe, and that life is but transient so long as I occupy a part of the cottage that part may be said to be mine. While I cannot claim ownership of the cottage, all the bitter-sweet experiences that I went through in the cottage are mine. As has been well said by the poet Liu Ke-chuang "To be a transient is like home, while at home life is, after all, still transient." At the moment I occupy part of the cottage, therefore, the cottage is my home. I have to admit that I haven't quite made up my mind as to whether or not it is more like a hotel than a home.

The following sketches are random notes I jotted down for my own amusement when time lay heavy on my hands, without plan or design. I call it "Sketches of a Cottager" to indicate where I did the writing.