The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-10-01

while in a large percentage of cases outsiders contrive to suppress the im- mediate execution of the menace every one recognizes that the trouble is only temporarily patched up, and may break out in an aggravated form at any time If the accusations presented in Chinese courts were confined to anything like the facts in the case there would be no case at all for nine-tenths of them. Therefore 1t is considered indispensable to blend with the real grievance from seventy to ninety-five per cent of tic- tion. The plaintiff does this as routine practice. So does the defendant. When the magistrate happens to feel in good humor he calls up the case, or quite as likely he does so when he is in a very bad humor which bodes i'll for one side, and not infrequently for both. The first part of a Chinese trial is likely to be something like the proceedings in one of our own courts. great deal of formality and an apparent respect for the majesty of the law and especially for it's representative, the district mag istrate, who is the Chinese unit of gov ernment. But it is not long before all resemblance to Occidental procedure fades into thin air. There are no law yers to protect the clients. If there really is any law bearing on the case in hand, no one but experts such as the yamen secretaries knows what it is. The magistrate is himself civil and criminal judge, jury and practically the Appellate court There is no manner of restraint upon him in his mode of ask ing questions, in the subject of his in- quiries or in his treatment of the prin- cipals or witnesses. The greater part of the matter brought into a Chinese lawsuit would be entirely ruled out of any British court as totally irrelevant to the main issue. But in a Chinese case there often is no main issue, or is- sue of any kind, except the impatient shout of the official: "Get out with you!" (hsia-ch'fi la), whereupon all the parties retire and not improbably not one of them has the smallest idea where the case has now got to. Neither, per- haps, has the magistrate, but for the time he has had enough of it, and wants to smoke pipe or two of opium, and will hear them again when he has a more convenient season.
 But before the case has been dis
 
 missed the respective parties have by no means been idle. Each of them has told falsehoods enough to shock a con- pany prospectus maker, and as each party delivers himself of these fabrica- tions the other finds it impossible to re- strain himself, and hoarsely bawls
 That is lie!'' To this 1t is necessary to reply which is done with volubility greatly in contrast to the quiet of the preliminary stages when each replied in few monosyllables only. From | ejaculatory interruptions giving the other party the lie, it is but stage to angry colloquies of some length, in | which each party struggles to be heard, each reviles the other vociferouslN, and neither party is interrupted or reptoved | by the magistrate, who is now engaged in the process of making up his mind on the basis of what he sees and hears as | to which side has the most of Ii, or req son. In the worst stages of a case it often happens that the magistrate him. | self does the reviling, and, Chinese hu- man nature being what it is, it also | sometimes occurs that the worsted par 1 ty in the suit reviles the magistrate all l though this is rash, for he may beat | them severely for so doing, and then | decide the case against them.-North | China Herald.