Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1894-10-27

| tlSm reignS supreme. met, While was IN
| Canton, the Jay Gould OF China. His name
| is How Qua, and he is worth SJ0,0OO,O00 He
was keeping 400 relatives, and his sisters
! and his cousins and his aunts to the third
and fourth generation were sucking the life
| blood out OF his big income lie was, L
! judge, about forty years old, and as an
/ instance of how strong family authority is
he obeys his mother today in all matters of
society obligations, and upon being asked
by Consul Seymour to dinner not long ago
| he replied
Il don't know whether can go or not.
must go first and ask my mamma
L. afterward met his mamma. She was an
old lady, whose eyes shone az brightly as
the diamonds which decorated her cap and
whose feet were no bigger than the fists of
a baby. She ruled the whole 400 of How
Qua s relatives, and she was probably the
head of the How Qua clan.
The Oldest Society.
These clans of China are very much like
those of Scotland. Every family keeps its
pedigree, and the reason why the Chinese
want to be carried to their own country is
that they will be buried with their families
The clans have their feuds, just like some Of
the mountain families of kentucky, and
they lay for each other with bows and guns.
Every family has it's ancestral hall in the
town or village near where it lives, where
all the different members of the family meet
and worship their ancestors. The members
OF clan combine together 10 punish those
who have injured the family, and there are
said to be families who make a business of
matchmaking and stealing. There are in all
emma about 400 clans and the 4OO,U0,O00 or
0OO,OO0.O00 which make up the Chinese peo-
pie belong to these,
The secret societies are run, however in
dependent of the clans, and the Koloa Hui
Is only one of large number of them. The
Oldest society in China is the Triad Society,
known as the Sam Hop Wui. This is said
to have been the cause of the TAPPING re-
bellion, which lasted for years, and cost
fnT mil
the south and spread all over the empire
and had 1t not been for Chinese Gordon and
Ii Hung Chang the Tartar dynasty would
certainly have been overthrown. The head
of this rebellion was Chinaman who gave
out that he was the younger brother of
Jesus Christ and had been sent to this
world to reform China. The Triad Society
has its lodges, and there are flags, banners
and umbrellas connected with IL. 1t holds
its regular meetings, and ii forces members
to join its organization If they are not
amenable TO persuasion. 1t has the power
of life and death over it's members and the
members mix their own blood with wine
and swear to uphold the order to the death
Among the puDishments for treason to the
order is the having the ears chopped off or
the head cut off, and the divulgence of the
secrets of the order is death. The members
have their own signs and passwords. You
can tell, 1t is said, whether man belongs
to the order by the way he enters the house,
and | am told that they stop a moment at
the door and put the left foor first. In sit
ting down they point their toes together
and keep the heels apart, and they have
way OF raising their trousers legs which is
known only to the brethren. They are
bound to help any of the order who get into
trouble, and they have secret signs by
which they can mark their houses so that
their families will escape in case of revoIu-
ton. AT dinner the arrangement of the
cups on the table allows their callers who
belong to the order to know that they are
members and there are thousand little
things which no one else would notice which
enable them to recognize each other.
Hostility to the Government.
The Triad Society and Koloa Hui are very
much like the highbinders of San Fran
cisco. They swear to defend each other
against the police, to hide each others
crimes, and they are ready to Kill for the
sake OF the order at the command of its
leaders. Their main grievance is against
the government, and they have published
manifestos against it, and are doing so now
Some of the chiefs of the order are said to
be travelling around the country as doctors,
and they are carrying the news OF the
Chinese defeats, and are gathering in men,
bers wherever they go. Their motto is
Drive out the Tartar" and it IS said that
one branch OF the Triad Society dates back
to 1864 a. D., or twenty years after the con-
quest. They have been working to over
throw the government ever since, and they
have a great hatred of anything which is
not purely Chinese. 1t is safe to say of
the hundreds of millions in China that out
side of the government officials there are
not hundred thousand Chinese who would |
fight for the emperor. They keep him be- |
cause they must have a ruler of some Kind |
but they know he is Tartar, and they hate |
him. In every Chinese state capital there is |
Manchu army well as a Chinese army |
and the Tartars are neither admired rOr |
loved. The emperor, in fact, is like Humpty |
Dumpty. He sits on the wall, and If he |
should fall, all of his horses and all of his |
men can never put Humpty Dumpty up |
again.
1t will be surprising to many Americans |
to know how cheaply the government of |
China is run. Taxes are lower perhaps than |
in any other semi-civiiZed country on the |
globe. The principal source of revenue is |
the land tax, and this varies from 10 to 66 |
cents an acre The emperor nominally owns |
all the land, but in reality the people have |
as much of a right to their farms as we |
have and they buy and sell their real es- |
tate, giving deeds for the same i took a |
photograph of Chinese deed, by which a |
missionary had bought some land at Nan |
king, and which he was carrying to Shang- |
hal to be recorded at the American CONSUL
ate, during my trip with him down the |
Yang-tse-k iarg.
1t was as big as four pages of this |
newspaper, and was covered with stamps, |
China pays no tax on liquors. and It |
is said that the taxes do not amount to |
10 cents per head of the population. A |
large part of the revenue is collected from |
the taxing Of salt, and there are import and |
export taxes collected on goods passing up |
and down the rivers. / saw customs boats |
everywhere, and the river police Is quite |
extensive. The people understand very
we'll just how much taxes they ought to |