St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1895-01-12
PAY OF CHINESE SOLDIERS.

Aucy Receive Inelf wages In silver 0U(
Exchange 1t for Coin.
The Chinese soldier receives his pay
once month only and Chinese months
it may be remembered, are much long
err than those we are accustomed tc
reckon by. On the eve of the pay day
the captain of company. together
with his sergeant-major, goes and re-
ceives the amount of money requisite
to pay his company from his next su-
perior officer.
This is not paid to him in jingling
coins. but in pure silver, which, how.
ever, has been broken into somewhat
irregular pieces. The whole of the
night preceding pay day is occupied in
weighing out for each man the required
quantity of silver, and this occupation,
rs may be imagined. is very tedious
one and only successfully accomplished
by infinite care, for here a piece the
size of a pins head has to be Clipped
of, and there piece of large dimen-
sions has to be added to make up
weight, and any deviation one way or
the other means the loss of perhaps q
days pay or more to some poor defend
er Of the Celestial empire.
When the process of melting ont is
accomplished the silver is carefully
wrapped in paper, upon which is writ
ten the name of the intended recipient.
On the following afternoon the COM
pany is mustered and the sergeant
major divides the money, commencing
with the first man in the company and
going on to the last. When this division
is concluded the question is asked in
stentorian tones: HAS any one else .
claim?" and the customary mo" hav-
ing promptly been given, the men are
then dismissed.
Each one now repairs to the nearest
bridesmaids shop, where he exchanges
his silver. For one tael he receives
sixteen hundred small coins called
cash" perforated in the center so rs
to allow of being threaded on a string,
and having received the proper amount,
turns homeward with cheerful mien,
but nearly sinking beneath this bur
den.
The private receives three and half
taels, equal to nineteen shillings,
monthly, out of which he has to pro-
vide himself with clothes and food.
This to us, no doubt, seems very in
significant sum, but we must remember
that the whole of Chinese soldiers
subsistence only costs him about one
tael, for he lives on rice, absolutely
nothing but rice. His clothes, too,
also cost but trifle.-Chicago Tribune.
- ExyptI.n C,eometrv.
The Ahmes papyrus doubtless repre-
sents the most advanced attachments
of the Egyptians in arithmetic and
geometry. 1t is remarkable that they
should have reached 50 great proficien-
cy in mathematics at 50 remote q period
of antiquity. But strange indeed is
the fact that, during the next two
thousand years they should have made
no progress whatsoever in it. All the
knowledge Of geometry which they
possessed when Greek scholars visited
them, six centuries b c., was doubtless
known to them two thousand years
earlier, when they built those stupen-
dous and gigantic structures the pyrar
midk An explanation for this stsgna-
ton Of learning has been sought in the
fact that their early discoveries IN
mathematics and medicine had the
misfortune Of being entered upon their
sacred books. and that, in after ages.
it was considered heretical to augment
Or modify anything therein- Thns the
books themselves closed the gates to
prOgres&-History Of Mathematics
CAjori