the part of British merchants, who are themselves competitors, can rarely be obtained.
The following is an instance of unfair trading
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on the part of German houses. The soaps manufactured by Messrs A & F Pears were formerly very largely used in China but some German manufacturers shipped great quantities of a fraudulent imitation of their goods, distributed them broadcast and, as they were of a villainous character, they seriously damaged the English soapmakers trade and reputation. Messrs Pears commenced two actions at law in Hongkong against these German pirates and won both, the Judge ordering that all profits which had been obtained from the imitations should be handed over to the plaintiffs, all the latter's costs repaid and the imitations in stock destroyed.
The local papers in Hongkong congratulated Messrs Pears on their achievement as a great gain to British trade generally which had been suffering a long time from similar fraudulent practices. The triumph however was illusory, both the German firms went through the Court, the English house never received a single tael and their trade in China has never recovered its former prestige. I was told in Shangai that English soaps and many other articles of British manufacture were still being counterfeited in Japan, thence exported to China and sold by German houses who have the boxes made and labels printed in Shanghai.
There is no law in China for the protection of trade marks a "chop" (trade mark) can be registered in the Mixed Court and at the Taotai's Yamen and persons infringing it can be charged before the judges of the Mixed Court by whom they may be heavily fined, if not condemned to receive some hundred blows in accordance with the rather rough and ready justice meted out there. A case in point: -
Jernigan, the United States Consul General in Shanghai told me he had procured the conviction at the Taotai's Yamen of a Chinese swindler who had disposed of a quantity of common
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