Chinese Sketches [Paperback]

Herbert Allen Giles (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2001

Book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1876. Excerpt: ... INQUESTS. Inquests in China serve, unfortunately, but to illustrate one more phase of the folly and ignorance which hopelessly overshadow the vast area of its Empire. For although the Chinese justly regard such investigations as matters of paramount importance, and the office of coroner devolves upon a high functionary-- the district magistrate--yet the backward state of science on the one hand, and the necessity the ruling classes have been under of supplying this deficiency on the other, have combined to produce at once the most deplorable and the most laughable results. Two good-sized volumes of "Instructions to Coroners," beautifully printed on white paper and altogether handsomely got up, are published under the authority of the Government, and copies of this book are to be found in the offices of every magistrate throughout the Empire. It is carefully studied even by the underlings who play only subordinate parts on such occasions, and the coroner himself generally carries his private copy with him in his sedan-chair to the very scene of the inquest. From this work the following sketch has been compiled, for though it has been our fate to be present at more than one of the M lamentable exhibitions thus dignified by the name of inquest, and to have had ocular demonstration of the absurdities there perpetrated, it will be more satisfactory to stick closely to the text of an officiallyrecognised book, the translation of which helped to while away many a leisure hour. The first chapter opens as follows :-- "There is nothing more sacred than human life: there is no punishment greater than death. A murderer gives life for life: the law shows no mercy. But to obviate any regrets which might be occasioned by a wrong infliction of such punishment, the validity of any confession and the...

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 136 pages
• Publisher: IndyPublish.com (April 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1588271285
• ISBN-13: 978-1588271280
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)