HOW MANDARINS ARE MADE
The literature of no country is so abundant in noble sentiments as that of China. Happy, indeed, would be the people who should be governed according to the precepts of Confucius, of Mencius, and of Lao Tsŭ! The highest moral and political principles are in every mouth, at the tip of every pen. From the first day of his entering school the Chinese boy learns unctuously to recite the most virtuous precepts of the sages, yet learning is the one road to fortune through robbery, peculation, and extortion in their most refined shapes. With every rise in rank the opportunities of robbing the “Hundred Names” and defrauding the state are multiplied in a ratio increasing like the value of carats in diamonds: the wealth amassed by some of the great mandarins must be something fabulous. Take as an instance the war with Japan. The Chinese soldier, when properly led and fairly treated is an excellent fighting man. It is difficult to believe that the sons of the braves who under Tsêng Kwo Fan and San Ko Lin Sin, so stubbornly defended the bridge against the French and English in 1860, could have been driven from an impregnable position like Fort Arthur by the Japanese some thirty years later. But what troops could fight without food, arms, ammunition? Food, arms, ammunition, and pay had all found their way into the pockets of the mandarins. Would the brigade of Guards itself have stood to be mown down without being able to fire an effective shot in return? I was told on high authority that at the famous naval battle of the Yalu, which some experts have quoted as an object lesson in the naval warfare of the future, on the Chinese side only three live shells were fired, one of which disabled the Japanese flagship, and sent her steaming away into space. The comparison of the bankers’ books of some of the great mandarins before and after the war would be an interesting study.
The mandarins—one is compelled to use the old Portuguese word for want of a better—are recruited from two classes: the hereditary nobility, and those who obtain office nominally by examination, but often by purchase.
The hereditary nobility is composed of the members of the Imperial family with the five ranks, Kung, Hou, Po, Tsŭ, Nan,—which it has been the fashion to translate by duke, marquis, earl, viscount, baron.
The highest rank in the Imperial family is that of Chin Wang—“related prince,” or as we should say “Prince of the Blood.” In some cases this title is continued from generation to generation; in others there is a sliding scale downward through the ranks of Pei Lo and Pei Tsŭ to that of Kung or duke, below which members of the Imperial family do not descend.
In the same way with subjects, the rank of Kung is sometimes transmitted; in others the son of a Kung becomes a Hou, the son of a Hou a Po, and so on. The inheritor of a title must be the eldest son of the one legitimate wife, and not of a secondary wife, for although polygamy exists in China, there is, except in the case of the Emperor’s family, only one legitimately married wife, nor in her lifetime can there be another. The younger sons of nobles, even of the Imperial family, have no rank either by right or by courtesy; but the latter are generally raised to rank by being appointed general officers. Patents of nobility cannot be bought, at any rate not in theory.
The representative of the eldest branch of a family can, in the event of his being childless, adopt the child of a younger branch, and the child so adopted inherits the title. It sometimes happens that a younger brother who has become rich will bribe his eldest brother to adopt his child to the exclusion of the lawful heir and his issue.
The sovereign is, as with us, the fountain of honour, and it is he who confers these titles of nobility, which are accompanied by grants of land. As a general rule the land assigned to a Kung or a Hou would not exceed a circumference of 100 li = 33 miles, to a Po 70 li, and to the two lesser ranks 50 li.
Conspicuous among the nobles of China are the Pa Ta Chia, “the Eight great Families.” These are the descendants of the eight Princes who, waiving any claim to the throne, followed the reigning dynasty from Manchuria. Their rank remains unchanged for all generations. The representative of one of these, the Prince of I, was famous in the war of 1860. A year later, at the time of the Prince of Kung’s coup d’état, he fell into disgrace, and was “presented with the white kerchief” (made to commit suicide).
But the Imperial family and the hereditary nobles at Peking, valuable instruments of obstruction as they doubtless are, form but an infinitesimal portion of that colossal octopus of fraud and corruption which strangles the whole vast empire in its tentacles. The myriads of officials, from the exalted viceroys down to petty bloodsuckers of a rank about equal to that of a parish beadle, are either drawn from the so-called graduates of the examination halls, or have obtained their promotion by purchase—of the latter mode of reaching distinction there is nothing to be said; it is beautifully simple. But the examination system is very complicated and deserves some notice.