caused the accused men, dressed in the black clothes of criminals,
to be led into a large barn, and arranged around it, face to the wall.
Having then told them that an accusing angel would shortly come among
them, and mark the back of the guilty man, he went outside and had the
door shut, and the place darkened. After a short interval, when the door
was thrown open, and the men were summoned to come forth, it was seen
directly that one of the number had a white mark on his back. This
man, in order to make all secure, had turned his back to the wall, not
knowing, what the magistrate well knew, that the wall had been newly
white-washed.

As to the punishment of crime by flogging, a sentence of one or two
hundred--even more--blows would seem to be cruel and disgusting;
happily, it may be taken for granted that such ferocious sentences
are executed only in such cases as have been mentioned above. An acute
observer, for many years a member of the municipal police force in
Shanghai, whose duty it was to see that floggings were administered to
Chinese criminals, stated plainly in a public report that the bamboo is
not necessarily a severe ordeal, and that one hundred blows are at times
inflicted so lightly as to leave scarcely a mark behind, though the
recipient howls loudly all the time. Those criminals who have money
can always manage to square the gaoler; and the gaoler has acquired a
certain knack in laying on, the upshot being great cry and little wool,
very satisfactory to the culprit. Even were we to accept the cruellest
estimate in regard to punishment by the bamboo, it would only go to show
that humanitarian feelings in China are lagging somewhat behind our
own. In _The Times_ of March 1, 1811, we read that, for allowing French
prisoners to escape from Dartmoor, three men of the Nottingham militia
were sentenced to receive 900 lashes each, and that one of them actually
received 450 lashes in the presence of pickets from every regiment in
the garrison. On New Year's Day, 1911, a eunuch attempted to assassinate
one of the Imperial Princes. For this he was sentenced to be beaten to
death, some such ferocious punishment being necessary, in Chinese eyes,
to vindicate the majesty of the law. That end having been attained, the
sentence was commuted to eighty blows with the bamboo and deportation to
northern Manchuria.

The Chinese woman often, in mature life, wields enormous influence over
the family, males included, and is