ould these be lacking as among many of the laboring classes, a scroll
with a part of the genealogy is displayed and the spirits of the departed
are appeased and honored by the burning of incense and the mumbling of
incantations. While strict attention is paid to the religious observance to
the dead, at New Year's the most punctilious ceremony is rendered to the
living.

After the family have paid their respects to one another the younger male
members go from house to house "kowtowing" to the elders who are there to
receive them. The following days are devoted to visits to relatives living
in the neighboring towns and villages, and this continues, an endless
routine, until fourteen days later the Feast of the Lanterns puts an end to
the "epoch of national leisure."

The Chinese are inveterate gamblers and at New Year's they turn feverishly
to this form of amusement which is almost their only one. But they also
have to think seriously about paying their debts for it is absolutely
necessary for all classes and conditions of men to meet their obligations
at the end of the year.

Almost everyone owes money in China. According to the clan system an
individual having surplus cash is obliged to lend it (though at a high rate
of interest) to any members of his family in need of help. However, a
Chinaman never pays cash unless absolutely obliged to and almost never
settles a debt until he has been dunned repeatedly.

The activity displayed at New Year's is ludicrous.

Each separate individual [says Dr. Smith] is engaged in the task of
trying to chase down the men who owe money to him, and compel them to
pay up, and at the same time in trying to avoid the persons who are
struggling to track _him_ down and corkscrew from him the amount of his
indebtedness to them! The dodges and subterfuges to which each is
obliged to resort, increase in complexity and number with the advance
of the season, until at the close of the month, the national activity
is at fever heat. For if a debt is not secured then, it will go over
till a new year, and no one knows what will be the status of a claim
which has actually contrived to cheat the annual Day of Judgment. In
spite of the excellent Chinese habit of making the close of a year a
grand clearing-house for all debts, Chinese human nature is too much
for Chinese custom, and there are many of these postponed debts which
are a grief of mind t