ported by strikes which interfere with the means of living and the material prosperity of the people, that the tyrannical mandarin is checked, and indeed often ruined for life, though only at the cost of ruin to a certain number of others. I may remark in passing, that we are here considering in local politics the operation of a general principle of Chinese sociology, domestic and social, not less than political. A member of a family or of a society will commit suicide in order thereby to involve in ruin some other member of the family or society as a punishment for injuries not otherwise to be punished. I have not space or time to show why the injuries are, in the cases referred to, not otherwise to be redressed, nor how the suicide operates as a punishment.*

* In Huc's Empire Chinois, Tome II. chap. 7, page 310 the "how" in the case of two members of a society, is sufficiently explained. In the case of two members of a family (by far the most frequent description of these suicides I believe) the "how" is somewhat similar. In both cases the Imperial law, supported by public opinion, acts to punish.

The following perfectly authentic tale which was related to me by a Catholic Chinese illustrates the text by showing how, not suicide by an individual but a heavy sacrifice on the part of a family, can check tyranny in a society. It is at the same time instructive in other points.

It occurred in a locality where Christianity had existed among a portion of the inhabitants for several generations, and where, consequently, among the members of the Christian community were to be found, as in Roman Catholic countries in the west, some who, as the Chinese catholics say, "puh show kwei keu-neglected the ordinances," that is to say men who, Christians by birth, and openly declaring themselves to be Christians, were not pious or indeed at all disposed to render obedience to the priest. One of them was a man-we will call him Chang-noted for his turbulent disposition and for having a large family of able bodied sons trained in their father's turbulent habits. Now it so happened that the Te paou or constable and informing officer of that particular locality took it into his head to avail himself of the amenability of the Christians as such, to the penal code, in order to extort money from them; taking care, however, not to interfere with Chang or his sons. This proceeding became at length so vexatious, that at the end of a consultation in the Chapel the Priest (a western foreigner) was reluctantly compelled to agree to an application being made to the turbulent Chang, from whom, as a non-observer of ordinances he had hitherto kept duly aloof. Chang, though he thought religion a bother, fired up when he heard that the Christians, he being one, were selected as victims by the Te paou, and was besides not displeased to make himself valued by his co-religionists and the priests who had hitherto regarded him with little esteem. He directed his sons to seize the Te paou on the first con

The fact is so certain that the threat of suicide backed by an evident intention on the part of the threatener to carry it out if unheeded, often checks domestic and social tyrannies. There is a kind of parallel in the duel over a handkerchief which a man little acquainted with pistols might, in the days of duelling, offer the dead shot and habitual bully.

The above described is the only peaceable means open to the Chinese people of checking oppressions of the mandarins. The reader will perceive that their ultimate efficiency depends on the existence of an authority superior to the oppressors, not less than to the oppressed, the Emperor; whose punishments are eventually brought down on all parties. But when the Emperor himself commits tyrannies, or his chosen advisers and agents, in his name, and with his unreserved support, then nothing remains but a resort to force. Even these appeals to force are, however, at first not rebellious movements, but merely local insurrections, having for their ultimate object the death of certain tyrannical mandarins. Some few men literally sacrifice their lives-I beg the reader to note this well-for the good of the community. They head a rising against the oppressors, continue to oppose whatever force is moved against them until it is settled by negotiation that no attempt shall be made to prolong the oppressions, and then, instead of flying, they in their quality of ringleaders delibevenient opportunity, and bring him to their house. As soon as this was done, Chang had the doors closed, and after exposing to him the causes of his seizure ordered his sons to kill him. The Te paou understanding at once the position of affairs,-seeing that he had carried his annoyances so far that a sacrifice would be made to put him out of the way and that he really was going to be killed-threw himself in terror before Chang, performed the ko tow, and making abject submission, protested no Christian should in future be annoyed if he was only spared. Chang according to my informant addressed him much as follows; "Well, you shall be let off this time, you've had a good fright; and you know too there was good cause for fright. You will remember when you think again of oppressing the Christians that I, Chang, am also a teen choo kiau ti. I don't care about your promises. You will not oppress them any more, that I know; for if I hear of your beginning again, I will order one of my boys there to seek you out and kill you at once. He will have to die for it, of course, but I have plenty of sons, and you shall be put an end to." From that day forth the Te paou never in any way molested a Christian.

rately surrender, and heroically yield up their lives as that expiation on which autocracy must insist before it dares to give up the struggle. There is neither hope nor thought of overturning the dynasty in these risings; one of which took place under the eyes of foreigners at Ningpo within the last few years. They are in the best of times not unfrequent in China. But when the necessity for them becomes very frequent, the people are naturally led to think of resistance by force unaccompanied by the self-sacrifice of nobler minded individuals. In that case these same men-the very people who are most likely to be the first in incurring oppression by being most prompt to refuse compliance with tyrannical demands—instead of organizing and heading some such local insurrection as has just been described, take vengeance as far as they can with their own hands and then become outlaws -bandits or pirates-having more or less of the sympathy of the public, upon whom they from the first levy black mail rather than plunder of all their property, as mere robbers would. This is one way in which prolonged resistance to the general government takes place, resistance unaccompanied by any intention of an eventual self-sacrifice, that would indeed in this case serve no purpose. Another way is as follows. A man, originally a mere thief, burglar or highwayman, whose sole object was the indiscriminate plunder of all who were unable to guard against him, finds it possible, in the state of general apathy to public order produced by continued oppression, to connect himself with a few fellow thieves, &c. and at their head to evade all efforts of the local authorities to put him down. As his band increases, he openly defies these authorities, pillages the local custom houses and treasuries, levies a tax on passing merchandize and a black mail from the wealthier residents, but refrains from plundering any one outright, and while, by exempting the great bulk of the population from all exactions, he prevents the rise of a general ill feeling towards him, he as the scourge of the oppressors gains the latent or conscious sympathy of all classes. Now, these captains of bandits, whatever their origin, do not, it is

true, while their followers amount merely to a few hundreds, choose to make themselves ridiculous or to rouse the general government to more serious efforts against them, by issuing dynastic manifestoes or assuming the state of royalty. But when they begin to count their followers by thousands, forming a regularly governed force they declare openly against the hitherto reigning sovereign, whom they denounce as a usurper. And from the very first, when merely at the head of a small band, no Chinese, acquainted with the history of his country, can refuse to see in such a man a possible, if not probable, founder of a dynasty. More than one Chinese dynasty has been founded by men like this; the Ming dynasty which preceded the present was so founded; and—what is really very important as an historical example-the greatest of all native Chinese dynasties, that of Han, was so founded. If the reader will refer to Du Halde he will find the founder of the Han dynasty described as a "private soldier" who became a "freebooter" and "captain of a troop of vagabonds."

The misconception that exists among foreigners in China on this subject, and the consequent differences of opinion manifested by Hong Kong journals and their correspondents, as to whether the various bodies now in arms against the government are rebels, or mere robbers and pirates, forms another example of the thraldom in which language holds us; and of the confusion and mischief that may arise from mistaking the meaning of a single word. The word in this case is tsih, that applied by the Chinese to the bodies of men just alluded to. Now in the least imperfect of Chinese dictionaries, that of Morrison, this word is explained to mean, robber or bandit. These English words are, however, but a portion of the meaning of the Chinese one; which is very comprehensive, signifying all persons who set the authorities at defiance by acquisitive acts of violence. And, as the object which it is sought to acquire may be a bag of money or may be the empire; it follows that this one word, tsih, is in fact equivalent to the three words, robber, bandit and rebel.

As it can, like all other Chinese words, be used in every part of speech, it also means to rob, robbery, &c. to rebel, rebellion, &c.

Morrison expressly warns those who use his dictionary that it has many shortcomings. Nevertheless translators keep on rendering tsih by robber or bandit only; though it leads them into the glaring absurdity of employing these terms of men who have assumed the state of sovereigns and have fought pitched battles at the head of armies that would be considered large in Europe. About one seventh of the whole Penal Code of China is occupied by one section treating of attempts to take possession of the property of others, from the theft of a small sum of money up to the attempt to seize the Empire by a person who "assumes a dynastic designation, enrols troops, and perhaps styles himself a sovereign prince." This whole section is entitled Tsih taou. Now taou is the real Chinese term for robbery and theft;* while tsih refers to the larger class of crimes, the different degrees of rebellion, treated of in the section. Tsih means therefore to rebel, rebel and rebellion. Its mistranslation into "robbers," "bandits," has been, and is likely to be the cause of a mistaken and most mischievous interference in Chinese internal politics.

From the above the reader will be able to see how it is. that most foreigners in China have fallen into the error of ridiculing the Chinese authorities for inducing large bodies of men to lay down their arms by bestowing on the leaders and older adherents, military and naval commissions, and by dismissing the rest with a little money. So long as the tsih are but leaders of small robber-bands or private captains of isolated rovers, the Chinese government, like Christian governments of the Occident, endeavour to put them down by force. But when these same tsih have become heads of

The definite and distinctive technical forensic term for robbery is keang taou, forcible taou; that for theft tsee taou, secret taou. I must again remind the reader that the Chinese Penal Code now in force is strictly national, not dynastic; being the latest development of a written statute legislation that has been growing for more than 2000 years.