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In her employer's house the girl is set to ordinary domestic dutian they are absorbed into the husbands' families, and, among the She may have to do no more than attend on one of the daughters it is not a long step to anticipate the realisation of a girl's money the house, or she may have a full share of the housework; but, qvae (including the payment which is a regular part of the marriage so, the work will generally be less arduous than in her parents' ement) when circumstances make it necessary to part with her and will at least earn board, lodging and clothing, and the chand
ore she has reached marriageable age. of kindly treatment will be no less than in a home where she is ont a very troublesome superfluity. As she grows up the custom is cle that the employer is supposed to assist in finding a suitable husband When married, the girl joins her husband's family in the usual unatuta with no stigma of slavery upon her.
An
And action of this nature by no means necessarily connotes any
of parental affection. The life of poverty is a terrible ons. mouth (and extra mouths arrive in direct proportion to increased erty) means so much less for the others, and it may be, and often the best that even fond parents can do for those who can be best by the same transaction to ameliorate their own condition for
time being.
The responsibility of the employers is by no means a dead lettered to part with them by deed of gift" into better circumstances, though the view taken of it ranges from including proper attention to & mui tsai's education to just her fair treatment as a domestic servant, and neighbours are always ready to take more careful notice of the treatment of a mui tsai than of an own child. The custo gives obvious openings for abuse, and it is not surprising that advantage is taken of them; but the efforts to suppress malpractices and the prominence given to cases that are brought to light can very easily proper custom is to keep in some kind of touch with the girls and strain the perspective by obscuring the wide background where the system is only beneficial.
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The statement is often seen that the mui tsai custom is forbidden by law in China. The status of the real slave-no puk-was abolished during the Empire. The widening of "no puk
to include " mui tsai " appears to be a confusion of ideas amongst Europeans. The status of either is very distinct and different from that of the other in the Chinese mind, and it would be interesting to know the grounds on which the European statement rests. There may be some forgotten edict dealing with the question-if so, it has no effect on the custom
Parents take as a rule such precautions as may be possible to are proper treatment of the girls they have parted with. The etion of protection for boys does not arise in the same degree. have a voice, or at least an interest, in their ultimate marriage, for ich the new family becomes partly responsible; but the circum- nees distances, difficulties of travel, inability to write, want of tal facilities-have all combined to thin down the custom to nishing point. In the widespread disasters and troubles of the last years parents would commonly send their children—even boys— By in the hope of better things. In the absence of someone from district to take them and dispose of them, it was not difficult to an outsider. In either case, there was little possibility of keeping touch. The children had to be taken far away to districts which re rich enough to take them and support them; but even this was
and the only practical executive effort towards the suppression offerable to the certain death that awaited them at home. The the system (as apart from its abuses)-that of Chan King Wa, referred to later, claimed no legislative authority. It would be matter for surprise to learn that Chan had omitted such strong support for his case if it had been available.
LL
With this general preliminary explanation of the position of the mui tsai" it must be borne in mind that the system, in some foru or other, is common to all parts of China, and is, in fact, an almost necessary result of the conditions that obtain there. Though it may be a rich country, the vast majority of the population lives in circum stances of grinding poverty, and, even in the stage above, where a reasonable hand-to-mouth existence should be normally possible. the ever-recurring troubles of flood, drought, civil war, piracy and robbery make the matter of a single extra mouth in the family one of life and death.
The religion of China-ancestor worship, with the duty of observing it in the hands of the male succession exclusively at once marks the female mouths as those to be most easily dispensed with. Girls belong even to prosperous families only to the time of their marriage,
and of the migration after the adjacent big cities and richer districts ye been supplied is South, to the nearer countries where emigrant inese have done so well, and on this journey Hong Kong is almost und to come into the picture as a port of call, if not as the home of any prosperous and charitable Chinese.
The charitable view of the whole question is of importance, and ould not be forgotten. The actual payment of money in the trans- tion of the deed of gift does not shock the conscience of Chinese, as e reasons that have led to the sale of a child are always borne in ind. Abuses of the whole system and ill-treatment of mui-tsai e as much abominated by the better Chinese as by the better ropeans; but the payment of a sum of money for the deed of gift ag at least a flavour of charity for its ultimate reason, and in itself apart from its abuses is not viewed as in any way immoral or Tong The custom covers all the best Chinese-the most European- ed and the most thoughtful-in Hong Kong as elsewhere, and the stem, generally speaking, is viewed as working for the good of the i-tsai themselves. Their total numbers would reach a very large gure, much too big for any charitable institution or even for tho
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