towards his neighbour, was nothing more than an unprincipled ruffian; and he insinuated that it had been such a ruffian, in fact, not an emperor in the true sense of the term, who had perished in the case they were discussing.  Another and most important point to be remembered in any attempt to discover the real secret of China’s prolonged existence as a nation, also points in the direction of democracy and freedom.  The highest positions in the state have always been open, through the medium of competitive examinations, to the humblest peasant in the empire.  It is solely a question of natural ability coupled with an intellectual training; and of the latter, it has already been shown that there is no lack at the disposal of even the poorest.  China, then, according to a high authority, has always been at the highest rung of the democratic ladder; for it was no less a person than Napoleon who said:  “Reasonable democracy will never aspire to anything more than obtaining an equal power of elevation for all.”

In order to enforce their rights by the simplest and most bloodless means, the Chinese have steadily cultivated the art of combining together, and have thus armed themselves with an immaterial, invisible weapon which simply paralyses the aggressor, and ultimately leaves them masters of the field.  The extraordinary part of a Chinese boycott or strike is the absolute fidelity by which it is observed.  If the boatmen or chair-coolies at any place strike, they all strike; there are no blacklegs.  If the butchers refuse to sell, they all refuse, entirely confident in each other’s loyalty.  Foreign merchants who have offended the Chinese guilds by some course of action not approved by those powerful bodies, have often found to their cost that such conduct will not be tolerated for a moment, and that their only course is to withdraw, sometimes at considerable loss, from the untenable position they had taken up.  The other side of the medal is equally instructive.  Some years ago, the foreign tea-merchants at a large port, in order to curb excessive charges, decided to hoist the Chinese tea-men, or sellers of tea, with their own petard.  They organized a strict combination against the tea-men, whose tea no colleague was to buy until, by what seemed to be a natural order of events, the tea-men had been brought to their knees.  The tea-men, however, remained firm, their countenances impassive as ever.  Before long, the tea-merchants discovered that some of their number had broken faith, and were doing a roaring business for their own account, on the terms originally insisted on by the tea-men.