10th June, Ir is well known to those who have the smallest acquaintance with China that one of the principal industries as well as one of the chief amusements of the Chinese is: that of burying one another, It is indeed proverbial that any kind of earth will answer for burial purposes, yet while this is an indisputable proposition, it is to be understood in the sense that when worst comes to worst a dead man can be disposed of with very little ceremony. On the other hand everyone knows that the rich in China have samples of earth sent in to them on trays—like specimens of different brands of sugar—and that from these a burial soil is selected. 'T'his is what we have read in the books, and therefore we are bound to necept it with unquestioning faith. We have heard, too, of the geomancer, who is an expert, and a very costly one. He shows where the powers of nature are harmonise in some single and felicitous spot, and he plays a great part in the economy—or rather in who have either perused the fascinating volumes of Mr. Doolittle on the Social Life of the Chinese, or have used their own eyes to some purpose, have been struck with the fact that a Chinese funeral is the culmination of Confucian civilisation, It is not in the least ne+ cessary that the deceased should have beea a scholar, or in any way connected with a scholar. Usage requires that he should assume such a rule for the time, and if he belongs to an " upper genera~ tion" the funeral must be elaborate. "When old folks die the rest feed high" (Sti lao ti chih -hao ti). Invitations must be issued upon an enormous scale, and everybody who is in. the least degree related of even connected must either appear, or have a proxy. many cases no excuses whatever are valid. Phere are always as many female
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.