Angust 8, 1908.]
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71
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CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT. ¡hey wish, and rightly too, to secure the publicity is given by a Chinese organ introduction of methods more in accord published in English that " Commissioners with modern ideas. It may be argued that have been sent to various foreign countries the Chinese are still a barbarous people, to make special studies in this line [laws and can only be kept in restraint by bar. and their administration] and the know- barous punishments, but to that opinion ledge which
they have accumulated. we can hardly subscribe, especially when should prove of benefit to the country." we remember that in Britain serious crime
Not only the codifying of laws is diminished in consequence of the modi aimed at, but the betterment of the fications in our criminal laws. To take administration. Corruption, it is generally only one example. When highway robbery admitted, is common in China, but how can ceased to be an offence punishable by death, it well be otherwise when officials are in- highway murders decrease in number. adequately paid anl "squeeze" or "dou The reason is obvious. The highway-man, ceurs bave to be reckoned as part of the in the first instance, realising that if his remuneration for the offices which they victim escaped his life was endangered, had hold? Undoubtedly there are many honest practically no option but to add murder patriotic officials in the Empire, but that to robbery. Subsequently when the death does not remove objection to the principle penalty no longer attached to the offence which gives opportunity for irregularities. of robbery there was no incentive to murder, the system must be chauged. A compre- because whether he was convicted of that bensive code of laws and an honest judi- robbery or not his life was still safe. In ciary are not impossibilities, and when like manner it might be inferred that murder these are attained the purity of the Chinese and violence would cease to be so common
adminis.ration should be as seldom im- in China as at pr sent were robberies and pugued as that of Great Britain. piracies and other offences not met with question suggests itself -What system is capital punishment. We do not sy it likely to give such results? The answer is should be done, but the suggestion is supplied by the journal to whien we have perhaps wortb consideration by those already referred. It remarks that too interested.
out of the mind of the Radical orator. The last word on the subject, however, has not yet been spoken. As the work of repatriation proceeds and the demand for native African labour increases we cannot see that, from the humanitarian point of view, the repatriation of the Chinese has been a very satisfying policy to the sup- porters of the Government. We make no reference to the results of the repatria- tion of the superior labour of the Chinese on the output of the mines. That would not appeal to the objectors to Chinese labour. But on humanitarian grounds the Government can already be charged with a worse state of affairs than they were able to allege against the Govern- ment which sanctioned the introduction of Chinese labour in the Rand mines. No one can be less of a partisan on such a question than Lord ROBEET CEOIL, who has evidently been closely studying the question. In a brief but very pointed letter to the Times his lordship supplies a sufficient explana tion of the silence of the supporters of the Government's policy in this matter. In the first place he points out that it takes 75,000 natives to do the work of 50,000 Chinese; and in the second he shows that whilst the Chinese death rate in the mines is only 10 per 1,000 per annum, the average death Unlike the laws of other countries, the rate of the natives is not less than 25. law of China is codided and accessible. But This means, as Lord CECIL points out, that it is archaic, and it is perhape not to much when with Chinese the number of deaths to say that in many cises those wh practise would have been 500, with Africans it will it and obey it do not pretend to under-tand not be less than 1,875, in other it. The fact that it has come down from words, "the
Government policy will their ancestors is enough for them. The result in the loss of 1,375 additional human | old law which has descended to them bas lives every year." What, we wonder, have been preserved mer ly because it was old. those who raved from one end of the But while we do not value law because it Kingdom to the other about the enslavement is old it does not follow that we regard old of Chinese to say to this ? Diligent search law as valueless. By no means. There are fails to discover in the Radical press any laws, the foundations of European legal references now to the "smoking hecatombs systems, which we appreciate perhap‹ all the of slaughtered babes" or to the excessive
more because they have been recoguise death rate among the native African miuers, and obeyed from time immemorial, but or even to the "conditions of slavery Western systems have developed from the under which some 20,000 Chinese are still Greek and Roman Cod-s, where us the working in the mines. No, the "Chinese Chinese system, which was contemporaneous alavery cry-ridiculous as it appeared to with these, but independent, is practically all who know the Chinese and were informed the same to-day as it was in those early days. of the conditions under which they worked Mongol and Manchu adopted the Chinese on the Rand-served a useful purpose in the system of Government aud ethics as they election campaigo, but the Government and found them and proclaimed them incapable its supporters recognise that a revival of of improvement. That time has passed, interest in the conditions at the South and the opinion is now freely express-d that African mines can do them no good now, improvement is necessary and desirable. but would, in all probability, do them great harm. And so they are discreetly
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silent on the matter.
Or,
THE REFORM MOVEMENT IN CHINA.
"
(Daily Press, 4th August.) Contemporaneous with the movement to put her army on a proper basis and to establish a navy, China has shown a desire to remodel her judiciary and to ensure purity of administration. The subject has long been under consideration, and we remember that Wu TING FAMG, the pre- sent Chinese Ambassador at Washington, a gentleman with a thorough knowledge of Western methods, submitted a proposal which embraced a revised code of criminal laws. That, however, only applied to one section of the law, perhaps the most need ful of reform from the outsider's point of view, and did not pretend to take any cognisance of the other sections which are
Without attempting a discussion on any theory of jurisprudence subject which presents too many subtleties for any but the trained legal mind to grasp--it may be indicated that the law of China is based on the patriarcal theory, The unit in China is not the individual but the family and the law is so framed as to be adjusted to a system of small independent corporations. As Mr. DYER BALL points out," a family is respons- ible for the good behaviour of its members, & neighbourhood for its inhabitants, and an official for those governed by him." To replace this system by one based on a Western model making the individual responsible would involve changes of too radical a nature to be appreciated by a conservative people like the Chinese. It would be subversive of the existing social system, and to submit a scheme involving that proposition would be for its promoters to court defeat. At the same time it must not be overlooked that the principle of the respousibility of the individual has been extended very materially since the Code was
The
British “Coloni 1 Administration allows a good deal of latitude in the interpretation of the law and is also adapted to local con- dition, by Orders in Council specifying modifications which experience shows to be expelient." In conclusion, it is interesting note that LI YAO CHUN, having returned from Japan, whose legal system be W £8 studying, has been instruct- ed to procee l to British Colonies, especially
those where Chinese
LO
}
read-ni, to take not. of the method in ope.ation there. in the reputation of the British Colonial Bench, ads the jour- nal in question," is found to be realy up to standard and if LI YAO CHNU can instil lessons of hou esly and impartiality into the juici.ry of China a great and good work will have been done for this country by his voyage of inspection." And so bay ye
RANDOM REFLECTIONS.
It seems imposs.ols to get away from typhoons these days, but don't let as worry too much. After all, they have their humorous side. I was told the other day of a lady who listened breath-
say to the tale of the tile which was torn from the roof of a house at the Peak, carried upwards for about two or three hundred yards, bedroom window. "What happened after that?" and then smashed through a pane of glass in s she demanded. The story teller gave her look-and it was such a look-and added- "Oh, it chased a man round the room." She didn't ask to be further enlightened.
The drowsy husband, the m in who could sleep through all the uproar of Monday night and wife by his side, is to be envied. The story Tuesday morning and in spite of the nervous
goes that in one of the houses which suffered by the typhoon a lady tried to rouse her sleeping spouse by telling him that the wind fhad got
inside the house. "Of course," he muttered,
16
'you can't keep it out." A minute later she nudged him and whispered: **The wall is falling, dear." "Nonsense," was the testy should, she lay quiet for a second or two but on response, go to sleep." As a dutiful wife hearing the noise which told her that what she feared had happened she turned again to her husband with the inpressive words * The wall has fallen, dear!” “Just your fancy" came the answer from the semi-couscious suusbaud, who turned over on his side with the obviʊna intention of resuming his sɛumber. Uneasy and
no less bulky. Humanitarians interested | origiually framed, and progress, nece-s trily / anxiqas lay the nervous wife till a gentleman
in China are most auxious to see torture abolished, and while admitting the value of the various pugishments inflicted within the Empire at the time they were instituted
slow, may reasonably be anticipated on similar lines.
A most hopeful feature of the budding reform movement is the fact to which
entered the room.
54
Bless, my vul,” he
exclaimed, " are you pair comfortable in Bed and the house collapsing?" “I'm not con fortable," replied the lady, glad of the oppor tanity to express her feelings, “hat he layang pan
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