ly cut short by the entrance of six or eight sturdy
men from the nearest guild, who, armed with the necessary ropes and
poles, bear away the coffin through flame and smoke with the utmost
gentleness and care.

PAWNBROKERS

Few probably among our readers have had much experience on the subject
of the present sketch--a Chinese pawnshop. Indeed, for others than
students of the manners and customs of China, there is not much that
is attractive in these haunts of poverty and vice. The same mighty
misery, which is to be seen in England passing in and out of
mysterious-looking doors distinguished by a swinging sign of three
golden balls, is not wanting to the pawnshop in China, though the act
of pledging personal property in order to raise money is regarded more
in the light of a business transaction than it is with us, and less as
one which it is necessary to conceal from the eyes of the world at
large. Nothing is more common than for the owner of a large wardrobe
of furs to pawn them one and all at the beginning of summer and to
leave them there until the beginning of the next winter. The
pawnbrokers in their own interest take the greatest care of all
pledges, which, if not redeemed, will become their own property,
though they repudiate all claims for damage done while in their
possession; and the owner of the goods by payment of the interest
charged is released from all trouble and annoyance.

Pawnshops in China are divided into three classes, one of which has
since the days of the T'ai-p'ings totally disappeared from all parts
over which the tide of rebellion passed. This is the _tien tang_,
where property could be left for three years without forfeit, and to
establish which it was necessary to obtain special authority from the
Board of Revenue in Peking. At present there are the _chih tang_ and
the _ssu ya_, both common to all parts of China, and to these we shall
confine our remarks. The former, which may be considered as the
pawnshop proper, is a private institution as far as its business is
concerned, but licensed on payment of a small fee by the local
officials, and regulated in its workings by certain laws which emanate
from the Emperor himself. A limit of sixteen months is assigned,
within which pledges must be redeemed or they become the property of
the pawnbroker; and the interest charged, formerly four per cent., is
now fixed at three per cent. _per month_. Before the license
above-mentioned can be obta