Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 2.djvu/67

appointment. He is so much identified with the soul of "empire," that the Emperor or Government itself is elegantly styled hien-kwan, or "the district magistrate." He is judge in the first instance in all matters whatso- ever, civil or criminal, and also governor of the gaol, coroner, sheriff, mayor, head-surveyor, civil service examiner, tax-collector, registrar, lord-lieutenant, ædile, chief bailiff, interceder with the gods; and, in short, what the people always call him "father and mother officer." He cuts a very different figure in a remote country district from that accepted by him in a metropolis like Canton, where he is apt to be overshadowed by innumerable civil and military superiors; just as in London the Lord Mayor is outshone by the Court and the Cabinet Ministers. In his own remote city he is autocratic and everybody. He has no technical training whatever, except in the Chinese equivalent for "Latin verse;" he has a permanent staff of trained specialists who run each department for him, share the plunder with him, and keep themselves well in the background. If a weak man, he is at the mercy of these tools, and also of his "belly-band," i. e. the man who advances the money for him first to secure and then to reach his post. But, if a strong man, he soon transforms all these into contributory "suckers," of the sponge he personally clutches.

The "value" of every hien in the Empire is of course perfectly well known; but although there is bribery and corruption at Peking as well as in the provinces, the solid basis of government is not really bad, and from my experience of Chinese officials I should say that the majority of them are men no worse than American "bosses," that is, mere hacks of a corrupt growth, with as much "conscience" as their system vouchsafes. Purchase of official rank, and even of office, has been sadly on the increase since China began to get into