notice of the Chinese people, however slight or general in character,
could very well attain its object unless accompanied by some more
detailed account of their etiquette than is to be gathered from the
few references scattered over the preceding pages. Correct behaviour,
whether at court, in the market-place, or in the seclusion of private
life, is regarded as of such extreme importance--and breaches of
propriety in this sense are always so severely frowned upon--that it
behoves the foreigner who would live comfortably and at peace with
his Chinese neighbours, to pick up at least a casual knowledge of an
etiquette which in outward form is so different from his own, and yet in
spirit is so identically the same. A little judicious attention to these
matters will prevent much unnecessary friction, leading often to a
row, and sometimes to a catastrophe. Chinese philosophers have fully
recognized in their writings that ceremonies and salutations and bowings
and scrapings and rules of precedence and rules of the road are not of
any real value when considered apart from the conditions with which they
are usually associated; at the same time they argue that without
such conventional restraints, nothing but confusion would result.
Consequently, a regular code of etiquette has been produced; but as this
deals largely with court and official ceremonial, and a great part of
the remainder has long since been quietly ignored, it is more to the
point to turn to the unwritten code which governs the masses in their
everyday life.

For the foreigner who would mix easily with the Chinese people, it is
above all necessary to understand not only that the street regulations
of Europe do not apply in China; but also that he will there find a set
of regulations which are tacitly agreed upon by the natives, and which,
if examined without prejudice, can only be regarded as based on common
sense. An ordinary foot-passenger, meeting perhaps a coolie with two
buckets of water suspended one at each end of a bamboo pole, or carrying
a bag of rice, weighing one, two, or even three hundredweight, is
bound to move out of the burden-carrier's path, leaving to him whatever
advantages the road may offer. This same coolie, meeting a sedan chair
borne by two or more coolies like himself, must at once make a similar
concession, which is in turn repeated by the chair-bearers in favour of
any one riding a horse. On similar grounds, an empty sedan-chair must
g