།
April 20, 1907.1
CHINA ÖVERLAND TRADE REPORT. bits of the Chinese, who relentlessly tear off | law-abiding travellers therein. It is such the surface of the soil every particle of a good thing, in theory, that it is a wonder cover, even in their insane dislike of grass the Keir Hardies of other countries have tearing up by the roots every green blade, never advocated its adoption elsewhere. causes the entire surface of the land to be Possibly its theoretical aspect of perfection swept by the strong gales to which Northern has not been brought to their notice, or it China is constantly subjected, with the may be that there are so many equally good result that the whole surface of the less is ideals going abegging that its turn has not being rapidly wind-denuded. A moderate yet coine. In practice, it has regretfully to estimate of the loss from this cause edeu-be admittel, the Chinese Censorate is and lates the daily loss to the province of has always been a hollow fraud, a whited Chihli during the continuance of a dust sepulchre. It has not tended to official storm, which often lasts from five days to a righteousness, but it has piled extra stones week, at 150,000 000 tons. Se fine is this upon the cairn of corruption. One of its dust that these North-Chinc dust latest manifestations is in connection with storms are occasionally felt is far east as the Japanese-modelled constabulary of Yokohama.
Peking The new police organization of the Chinese capital has been regarded as one of the symptoms of Chinese reform in being. There is little doubt that it is an actual reform, though at present better in intention than performance. The Censors do not seem to think so, however, and for the third time they have denounced to the Turone the Commissioners who rule the new organization and exercise magisterial functions.
Incapacity and avarice the charge which the virtuous Censors have levelled against the chiefs of the gender. merie, and in reply the Ceusors are accused of jealousy and spite." It seems that the creation of two Commissioners of Metro politan Police with magisterial functions has taken away three-fourths of the power of the Censors, who have hitherto had invested in | two Commissioners of Gendarmeris. Prior to them the magisterial functions now held by the
this Peking was divided for magisterial and other conveniences, into
five
"oities sections, in each of which was a Censor, who beld the designation of "Superintendent of Police" of his "City" or section and tried all police o ses brought to him. Cases of im. portance requiring to go before the higher inquiry courts were handed over by him "after due
Contrary to RICHTHOFEN's hypothesis that the body of the loess of China is continually growing under the action of the dust storms, all our evidence, and it is abundant, goes to show a very rapid disappearance under eolian a-tion. Colonel WINGATE, who acknowledges that he is no geologist. makes a few lines Lower down a startling admission. The less formation," he tells us,
is not ensily accounted for. I have seen vertical walls of it at an elevation of 5,000 feet above sea level, with extensive beds of water-woru houlders, stones and shingle buried in the middle. How did
11
bey come there? RICHTHOFEN and his followers ask usto believe they were blown!" A reluctance to believe
10 any recent geological interchange of ocean and con- tinent is at the root of the mental difficulty ; wligh ouly exists in the imagination.
THE CHINESE CENSORATE.
(Daily Press 17th April).
It is a common experience of mankind, and a continual disillusioning of reformers, that the best ideals of applied theory fail to yield wholly satisfactory results in actual practice. There is always the rift in the lute, the sudden jerk when the unfelt tether of humanity is stretched, and the
more
(
"
"
18
or
Peking, or to the Censorate-usually after the to the Court of the Governor of victim had been equeezed dry. The creation of Commissioners and sub-Commissioners of Gendarmerie has, therefore taken away the "Rice-bowl of Censors who have lost their most lucrative means of support.
15
"
a
or less painful recognition of the The mistake was in ever allowing these existence of ignored limitations. China is Censors to take extra-Censorial duties, an empire of worthy ideals and of unworthy giving them opportunities for " squeeze practices, of immaculate philosophy and and exaction which as censors only they palpitating passions. It is not alone in would not or should not have had. As a this. Every publicist in every community Censor is a man and a Chinaman, or becomes aware of it at some time or other, Manchu and a mandarin presumably, he and has to resist, if he be concerned for should never have been permitted, in view the well being of his kind, the temptation of the theory of his position, to aim at fees to the pessimistic hopelessness of con-
or payment by results. It is quite evident cluding that all is vanity and vexation that the model has been departed from, and of spirit. The Chinese Censor, for instance, the Censors not a whit better than the is a most praiseworthy institution in theory, censored. It is rather arousing, because and much more capable of usefulness typically mandarinesque, to find the com- than the sculptured depository of anony-
mandant general of the gendarmerie mous complaints used by old-time Vene. alluding to the "useless and decrepit tiaus, or than the letter-boxes of the organization" of the Censorate regime, and well-meaning, but in many ways mistaken, it is certainly impressive to learn that the ex-Vicer y SHUM. Officials being mortal Throue shelved the Censors' memorials on and human, though necessary, what more
the strength of representations that "since excellent idea could be conceived than the policing of the streets of Peking by the to appoint a body of super-officials whose duty it would be to watch them and their conduct in the interests of the general public, and to praise or denounce as occasion seemed to warrant ? With the consciousness that such Argus-eyes were upon him always, every official might| be expected to walk carefully in the way in which he should go. The Censorate of China in theory 18
sort of official conscience, a mouitor to approve or dis. approve at the right moment, conducing to probity and fair-dealing. It members were to be the policemen of mandarin thoroughfares, a restraint upou all tendency to disorder, and a moral support to all
Н
now gendarmerie crimes have lessened by two-fifths, whilst the number of arrests has been seven to every two made by the old time police of the censors." That there
|
AMERICAN SOLUTION OF A
WORLD PROBLEM.
44
(Daily Press, 18th April.) A PROBLEM which has eluded the researches of all previous scientists and philosophers," and which is now reported to be solved, is not a malter we can afford to ignore. It is of "local interest," more- over, because it is of universal interest. To come to the point at once, we allude to the alleged discovery of five physicians of Massachusetts, that the soul of man is sufficiently material to possess the phen- omenon of avoirdupois. The formula, ia fact, of these investigators, may be tersely phrased inte this, that sixteen souls equal one pound. It is not an irreverent joke, Although the statement comes from New York. It is not a silly season invention of yellow journalism. It is, Dr. DUNCAN MACDOUGALL of Boston, the wo are told hy deliberate verdict following a series of reverent and earnest investigations, "to determine the existence or non-existence of a soul in the human body, and to determine also whether the departure of that soul from the human body is
attended by any m»nifestation of nature that can be made evident to the material senses. 14 It has long been a clinching argument of materialistic mockers surgical dissectors of the human body have at religion that never found any sign of a soul. Here we have five doctors, "of the highest pro- fessional standing." who after studying the problem for six years, have declared the human soul to be "an actual material thing,” weighing, as we have already indicated, about one ounce. As summarised by the New York correspondent of the London Daily Telegraph, these Boston scientists discovered that "the difference between the weight of a live human body and a body the moment after death, or when the soul has quitted it,' was from half an ounce to one ounce. This was announced to be proof, upon scientific principles," that there could be no other possible explanatiou than that the difference was the weight of the departed soul. In every case, it was moreover averred, the loss of weight wasS shown "after all known scientific deductions had been taken into consideration."
"
|
Both men, and women have bewn the sabjsota of experiments.
The methods of finding th ́. result, as followed by the doctors, was to place the dying patien's in a bed upon one of the platforms of a pair of sosies, made expressly for the parpose. These scales were so delicately constructed as to be sensitive to the weight of len than one-tenth of an ounce. It was the desire of Dr. Duncan Macdougall to give no publicity to the facts until they were established beyond all doubt, but in an interview be virtually confirmed all the foregoing. What the soul is the doctor hesitates to defne, the
investigators only being acquainted with the
soul in so far so the fitting of the same left the dead body so much lighter.
Three cum ia particular Dr. Macdougall cited The first, no ordinary tuberculosis patient, who was dying, was placed on the scales at the instant of death. The body lost one ounce in weight. The second test was that of another tuberculosis patient, sad the result was the same. The third test was that of a phleɛmatie man, słow in thought ani sotion, and it was alleged that the soul left slowly. The soulon show no lose for one minute, and then the body 1 sans oue nanos.
should be more than three times the num- ber of arrests after crime has lessened by two-fifths is one of those statistical phenomena calculated to convince even the In nearly all the most widely-circulated DowAGER-EMPERSS that the old order newspapers of America on March 11th last, changing, giving place to the new, is not the Telegraph's correspondent telegraphed, altogether bad beca100 revolutionary this extraordinary report occupied a most When railways and enlightenment prevail¦ prominen: p'ace. It is not to be wondered in Chins, the best censorate, that of the : åt. Such a vital discovery could-not_re. public itself, will be constituted automati-ceive too much prominence. Onos accepted cally, and we may expect to hear loss of as a fact, it would have the most profound these Gilbertian recriminations.
influence on the religions of the world,
1
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.