Chinese Punishment.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 246, 14 March 1888, Page 7

Chinese Punishment.

The " North China Herald " of November 24th says thab persons who doubt the barbarity ot tome of the Chinese punishments "have only to walk into the city of Shanghai this morning, a few minutes' task, and they will find one of the most revolting of these punishments in full operation, and its infliction applauded by all the Chinese who know of it," The criminal, ono Koh, is a hardened ruffian who has passed the greater part of the past 10 years in gaol. The specific offence for which he was being punished was his habit of blackmailing the new prisoners who were put in gaol with him. He was suspended in a cage about sft. high, with his head through the top in n wooden collar, so that he could not reach it with his hands. His feet, which were loaded with chains, were so far from the bottom that he could only just touch it when standing on tiptoe. Here he was condemned to stand, without food or water, just inside the outer gate of the magistrate's yamen, the sport of hundreds, until death put an end to his sufferings. The writer suggests that a photograph of the cage and its occupant would be a telling frontispiece to the Marquis Tseng's recent article on the "Awakening of China." The exhibition is supposed to act as a deterrent ; practically Koh is a popular hero. The writer found him laughing and joking with the mob, and bandying coarse jests with them and the guards. Someone had given him a stone to stand on, and he had got from some other charitable person some rice and water and a pipe. "It may be that the sight is such an amusing one, and the victim is such a witty fellow, to judge by the laughter, with which his sallies are received, that, the bystanders are anxious to prolong the spectacle as much as possible. The people are said to be full of admiration for the magistrate's firm and intelligent administration of justice, but the Shanghai writer views the matter in a different light. " Hero is a nation claiming to take its place with the leaders of civilisation, introduced railways and telegraphs, sending its Ministers to foreign Courts, and asking to be treated as a sister by the Great Powers of the world ; and in one of its foremost cities, administered by an English-speaking official, and within a few yards of foreign settlements provided with all the resources of modern civilisation, a criminal is being slowly done to death with circumstances of cruelty that would not be tolerated in the treatment of a dangerous wild beast in a really enlightened country."

Tremendous excitement was caused in Boston on January 22nd by the publication of a book, written by the Rev. Justin Fulton, attacking the Catholic priesthood. Its contents afe such that several firms refused'to handle it, girls refusecl to. set the type, and. male compositors vsre atone employed. l • , i ! New England and the middle States' were i yisited on January 2&'-;27 by the most , Severe stormexperienced in y6ars/ A snow i blockade existed everywhere,- all railroad ' I transportation stopped, and large towns were without - comfriuhication for three | days, i The 'destruction of, perishable railroad freight, was enormous. , The fabouy movement in' the United States ii losing cohesion. ' The latest manih gestation • off weakness < is ' • d split' between Henry George andPr.t-Mc.Glynn, his former, coHeagufl, on theEtifivq^stipn^ peorge is an out-and-out fret'trader. * " 1 '