The Marble times and Crystal silver lance., 1900-11-09

New York Tribune: A general war
in China no matter how large the
number of victims. would cost the life
insurance companies of the world a
great deal less than war in any other
country of Importance. AS conse-
quence. Mongolian wives and children
have little chance Of receiving lnsur-
ance money should their bread winners
be numbered among the unfortunate.
The Chinese have never made any
great effort to insure their lives. 1t is
true, but those VINO tried found 1T al
most as difficult as does the American
negro. 1t is not the color that the in
surance companies object to, nor do
they consider either race especially
prone to suicide. but there are natural
objections to their being considered
good risks.
There are, but three American life
insurance companies which have writ
ten any business in all Asia. one OF
these nss placed most of its policies
in India, another has made special
effort in China. but most of the poll
cies are written on the lives of white
residents. The total number OF poll
cies written by American companies
for all Asia was only 6,172 insuring
the holders to the extent of $13,5S3, l4l,
and on which they paid total pre-
MUM of S7S0,5 Statistics are not
given of the number of policies held in
China, but the percentage is small and
the number of policies held by Chinese
smaller still.
Although China is prolific in clubs
and secret societies.. none Of them
have life insurance departments. The
fraternal societies for the purpose Of
assistance during sickness and insur-
ance against death is unknown in the
empire. The societies are mostly po-
litical and too much wrapped up in In
trigues to bother with insurance mat
ters. Some of the socieIles mix in re-
ligion to the extent of having minia-
ture joss house in connection with
their meeting Goons, but do not depart
further from the social or political idea
which the society is supporting. The
members usually say long prayers be-
for embarking on any new business en-
terprise. or taking a new move in the
tangled game of Chinese politics, and
they never fail to present the clubs
particular god with costly offering
when any such undertaking is brought
to a successful conclusion.
Few of the Chinese living in Amer
lea have taken out insurance on theiI
lives The rich merchants who could
afford it think they do not need to look
out for posterity in any such fashion,
and. of course, the poor Chinese can
not take out endowment policies. 1t
ia for the benefit of the poorer classes
that a mutual insurance society has
RECENTLY been formed in San Francisco.
1t is not well under way as yet, and
the Chinese of this city do not seem to
he ACQUAINTED with the details of the
scheme. 1t is said to be modelled to
certain extent after well-known in
surance order.
The first Chinese policy to be writ
ten in this country was issued about
ten years ago to a rich Mongolian mer-
chant who lived in Montana. The
company did not care to take the risk,
and SO informed the hustling agent
whd had secured 1t. As soon as the
Chinese found that they did not con-
slider him desirable he wanted an In
surance policy worse than anything
else on earth. He told the, agent that
he lust had to have 1t. After much
correspondence the company said 1t
would write the policy for an extra
premium, and named figure SO high
that the Chinese would not have con-
sidered 1t for q moment under ordi-
nary circumstances. Al 1t was. he ac-