Ir there is one subject more than another on which the foreign residents in Shanghai plume themselves, it is their exemption from all rale and authority, The Shanghailander is not as other men are. The rest of the human race are subject to some known form of Government, but it i. the glory of Shanghai that it is a cosmopolitan Settlement, and that in a larger measure than in other places mon and women and children may here do pretty much what each regards as right in his or ber own eyes. The marvel is that for a considerable number of years things have gone on as well as they have, and that, considering the variety of incongruous elements here brought together, there should be so little irritation and friction, and such a general smoothness in the motion of the social machinery. One of the causes which has contributed to keep matters going in this oddly constituted Society is undoubtedly the institution of the painful, but necessary process of supersession. This has over been one of the great safeguards of Shanghai; indeed, if it did not exist we should find that chaos had come again, and that a state of absolute social anarchy prevailed. It very nearly reaches this point, and we are often at a loss to know if the exiating system will continue to exist, when suddenly the disturbing element made aonsiblo of the presence of the mysterious and influential power which lives at the book of the wildest apparent chaos—viz., the power of supersession. The unbearable one is firmly, heavily, and publicly sat upon and the difficulty is of the social machine roll on again. It is difficult to say how the determination to inflict the chastisement is resolved on. There is a strange absence of any power of combination in Shanghai, and, as we have hinted, there are absolutely no leaders. Ina Colony the influence of Government House is brought to bear on a social transgressor, and he is ostracized by exclusion from the inner circle. Here there is no inner circle and no possibility of the ostracising process being attempted, but the right of supersession does away with the necessity of this pointed and damaging exclusion. Just at the right time, when the Bore or the Impostor thinks he will have it all his own way, a pressure is suddenly applied, either at public meeting or large dinner-party, the aggressor brought to his bearings and the equal brim restored. Thoro is, of course, nspoot in which suporossion may be viewed, which is not so pleasant to contemplate, It may be regarded sometimes not as safeguard of existing institutions, but as an offensive and tyrannous development of the egotism of the individual. We have many instances of this abuse of the only power we have at our command to check objectionable persons and pernioious plans, and this application of the process of supersession is to be deprecated. There can hardly be a strong Pablic Opinion, properly so-called, in a community like this; but unfortunately there is much prejudice, and there is consequently a tendency to run persons down, and to uso social advantages harshly at the bid of a knot of persons who have "a down," as it is called, upon a particular individual. But to the credit of the community be it said, these attempts are never persisted in long. The effort to enrib a newcomer is never successful, if there is any stuff in the newcomer the English love of fairplay comes out in a strong resistance to attempts at the process of supersession when the intended victim has only the venial faults natural to a state of griffinhood. There is al a desire to stand up against anything like injustice, and a plucky defence is generally forthcoming against a mean attempt "to supersess " a fresh arrival who, in the language of the stable, might be charac terized as "a griffin and likely."
It is when impunity and the weakness of the mass of humanity have allowed bore to develope into a dictator, that
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.