architecture of the Chinese, that in the appears to be a general defect in the construction of their buildings, the base is the part which receives the least attention, and upon which the smallest expenditure is bestowed. Millions upon millions of people in China never in the whole course of their lives see a mountain, or avena hill. Where there are no mountains, stone is sure to be very expensive, and for building purposes, so far as the bulk of the population is concerned, may be said to be practically unknown. The next best substitute is brick, and owing to the high price of fuel, Chinese bricks are almost certain to be very imperfectly baked. The mud of which they are com] is thrown loosely into the mold, the surface is scraped to a rough level, and when the brick is sufficiently sun-dried to bear transportation, it is placed in the kiln. Owing to the fact that it has not been pressed, and that it has been only half burned, the completed brick is full of cavities, and is almost as porous as ge. WI ver the soil is ly ted. the great plains, the soda is drawn up by capillary attraction into the bricks, and also into the structure above, which gradually scales away, at the base, till it comes to resemble a wall of cheese which has been persistently nibbled at by rats. To count-erect these results, various substances such as straw, thin ete., are introduced above the foundation, but these are merely palliatives, and do very little to hinder the disintegration, which is often so rapid, that in a few ears it becomes m to renew the foundation a little at a time without disturbing the wall above. Besides the inherent defect of the bricks, Chinese builders almost invariably add two others, too shallow an excavation for such foundation as there is, and the use of a very insufficient quantity of lime. It is not uncommon to see a brick wall laid almost upon the surface of the ground and not unfrequently with no lime at all, in situations where a foreign contractor would dig a trench, five feet deep and use lime by the ton.' The object which the foreign builder has in view is durability, the object which the Chinese builder has in view is economy of materials. Whoever wishes to see an example of this defective construction on an immense scale, in a situation where one would have looked for more thorough work, has but to walk for a few miles along the base of the wall surrounding the Imperial city in Peking. It would seem as if the only Chinese structures which are sure to be adequately built, are the pawn-shops, vant or it is irrelevant. Each of these terms has come to have a more or less well settled and technical meaning, and the numerous rules governing the reception of evidence, reduce the conduct of a strongly contested suit in a modern court, to a species of chess game, in which, while the moves can not be foreseen they must all be in accordance with the strict rules which govern the game, and which will never be soever. Contrast all this, with the peo set aside by any judge for any person whatceedings in a Chinese court law, even when (de and wishes todo ins ought tobe done. (as sometimes the magistrate is All sorts of evidence is admitted, there is nothing so irrelevant as to be on that account excluded, wide areas which ought to be traversed to get at collateral facts. are not only not traversed, but are not thought of by anyone whatever, and it will not be strange if the case is decided at last, on some minor side issue, to the
of the matter upon which the trial began. utter ignoring and disappearance from view In making these comments upon Chinese legal proceedings, forcible illustrations of the justice of which will occur to every reader, we do not wish to be understood as referring to the difficulty of securing an upright magistrate, and a fair trial. topic is susceptible of the most ample treat ment, but what we have now to say relates to the proposition, that such is the constitution of the Chinese mind, that no matter how upright the magistrate, if " British appellate court had the opportunity of revising the proceedings of a Chinese trial, there would not be enough left of those which are in reality a kind of treasure: pr ings to make @ gun-wadding houses in which security is of capital Anexcellentexample of the Chinese disreimportance. gard for foundations, is found in their his!
is general characteristic of Chinese ies. Instead of treating of the prehistoric architecture, which does so much to prevent riod of their race, asa territory which can-the preservation of ancient buildings is not beexplored with certainty andinregardto analogous to an intellectual fact in the which no positive affirmations can be made, Chinese nature. The Chinese show a con-it appears "that ancient Chinese writers, spicuous lack of mathematical training. of a period antecedent to the foundation of hey do not start from simple postulates the Han dynasty, indulged an exuberant and unfold a connected series of truths, each one of which is at once felt to be connected with what has gone before by a link dynastic rulers, to occupy the myriads fancy in the enumeration of long lines of of ages, which it was fabled, had that cannot be broken. It is difficult to since the powers of Heaven and Barth imagine a Chinese examination for the had first united to luce man as the degree of Flourishing Talent, or that of esser of the soil of China." Mr. Selected Man, of which questions on the fayers, from whom this observation is science of should form a constituent quoted, proceeds to remark, that ''no part. It is hard to conceive of Chinese minds consciously compelling themselves actual weight is attached even ty Chinese writers to the statements handed down by to formulate the laws of Identity, of Contradiction and of Excluded Middle, yet it the fabulists of antiquity regarding prehistoric epochs and dynastic lines. It is is quite certain that a complete recogitition only in the next grand division of legend-of the proposition that 'A equals A,' and ary record—the age of Yao and Shun and that is is not not-A,' would nee end at their successors—that a claim to anything one blow to a large part of what every Chinese supposes "hilt to believe on resembling authenticity is set up; and even. hero the sterner requirements of European certain subjects. The reason why Chinese criticism demand proofs which native his-unite so cheerfully the belief in absolute torious are content to forego." How dif-contradictories, is not because they are not ferent is this spirit from that of Occidental amenable to the laws of thought which exactitude, it is needless to point out. rule the rest of mankind, but because owing There is a story of a Newfoundland farmer to vicious mental processes of obscuration, who boasted.of the density of the fogs in these contradictories have no opportunity his country, and, in proof, affirmed that he of being recognized as such. The Chinese had a party of men at work shingling a have no instinct of definition, in our strict barn, and the fog was so thick at the sense of delimitation, the selection of time, that they unwittingly shingled forty certain predicates which are affirmed, and feet into it, before they discovered their. the negativing of all others. They are mistake The Chinese have shingled back-not analytical, and it is often exceedingly ward into the fogs of antiquity, for some difficult to conjecture the process by which thousands of years, and have never detected they have arrived at certain conclusions, the point where the roof of history, and or even to understand the steps of the the fog of myth unite. No wonder that process if we happen to succeed in dis-one of their sayings declares that rather covering some of them. They constantly than to believe all that is in the buck of take for granted the very things which History, it would be better that there were to our thought require the most rigid no book of History. roof, and expend much ingenuity in ela-That which is true of the historical ting non sequiturs, which are of no horizon of the Chinese, is yet more con-nee Sha x consider ale basis on tell of the laws of evid-probative Li peetips Modern Jan \dence has developed an interesting an which religions of the empire supped to. tut Tack "abd Buddhism have each histories of their own, and these histories are no doubt known to is direct, or it is circumstantial, a select few within the inner circles of their it is admissible or inadmis it is rele-Priesthood, But generally speaking eveq
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.