affairs. These are subdivided into twenty provinces,
each administered by an administrator of native affairs by whose side is
the provincial council consisting of natives and occupied with the
discussion of ways and means and questions of public works. The
provinces are divided into cantons and subdivided into communes. The
commune forms the basis of the native social system. Its assembly of
notables or municipal council forms a sort of oligarchy, the members of
which themselves elect individuals from among the more prominent
inhabitants to fill vacancies. The notables elect the provincial
councillors in the proportion, usually, of one to every canton, and
their delegates elect the chief of the canton, who voices the wishes of
the natives to the government. Local administration, e.g. supervision of
markets, policing, land-transfer, &c., are carried on by a mayor and two
assistants, to whom the municipal council delegates its powers. The same
body draws up the list of males liable to the poll-tax and of the lands
liable to land-tax, these being the chief sources of revenue. There are
French tribunals of first instance in nine of the chief towns of the
colony, and in four of these there are criminal courts. These administer
justice in accordance both with French law and, in the case of natives,
with Annamese law, which has been codified for the purpose. Saigon has
two chambers of the court of appeal of French Indo-China and a tribunal
of commerce. Primary instruction is given in some six hundred schools.
Cochin-China is represented in the French chamber by a deputy. The
capital is Saigon (q.v.); of the other towns, Cholon (q.v.), My-Tho,
Vinh-Long and Chau-Doc are of importance.

In 1904 the budget receipts amounted to L495,241 (as compared with
L474,545 in 1899). To this sum the land and poll-tax and other direct
taxes contributed L374,630. The main heads of expenditure, of which the
total was L467,328, were as follows:--

Government L87,271
Administration 62,725
Public Works 40,454
Transport 38,173
Public Instruction 36,009
Topography and Surveying 32,036

_History._--The Khmer kingdom (see CAMBODIA), at its zenith from the 9th
to the 12th centuries, included a large portion of the modern colony of
Cochin-China, the coastal portion and perhaps the eastern region being
under the dominion of the empire of Champa, which broke up during the