censors. It consists of from 40 to 50 members, under two presidents, the one of Tartar and the other of Chinese birth. By the ancient custom of the empire, all the members of this board are privileged to present any remonstrance to the sovereign. One censor is to be present at the meetings of each of the six government boards, without, taking any part in the deliberation, and others have to travel through the various provinces of the empire to inspect and superintend the administration of the chief public functionaries.* Revenue and Population. The revenues of the Chinese government, according to official returns published in the year 1844, are as follows :†— Taels 53,730,218 113,398,057 The above is the net revenue of the country; but the expenditure of collection, and the extortion and fees, make the taxes that are actually levied at least three times as heavy. No statement of the expenditure is given in the official accounts; but from missionary reports, as well as the accounts published in the 'Peking Gazette,' it would appear that there are almost constant deficits, which the governors and high officers of provinces must make good by loans or extraordinary taxation. The amount of land-tax not paid in money is chiefly discharged in rice, wheat and pulse, which is kept by the government in immense granaries in the suburbs of Pekin and Tung-chow. The transport of the mass of grain occupies 64,000 men, with 6,318 vessels, divided into 123 squadrons.‡ The revenues of the various provinces of the empire were stated as follows in the budget of 1843, extracted from the Chinese statistical tables : * Gützlaff, C. F. A., China Opened, London, 1838. † Macgregor, John, Appendices to Commercial Reports, Part 23, London, 1850. Osborn, Capt. Sherard, Past and Future of British Relations in China, London, 1860. The empire is divided into eighteen provinces, the area and population of which, according to the imperial census of 1812, is as follows: The above population, giving 283 souls per square mile throughout the empire, appears to be excessive. In the evidence adduced before the British Parliamentary Committees, in 1830, 1831, and 1832, the area of China was computed at 1,372,452 English statute square miles, and the number of inhabitants at 141,470,000, or 103 to the square mile; to which was added 1,182,000 for the standing army, and 12,000,000 for Tartary. But the information possessed at that period was very obscure with regard to the population. Thibet, Korea, the Mantchoo, and other Tartar and Mongolian states, are computed to have a population of more than 30,000,000, which would increase the whole population of China and its assumed dependencies to nearly 400,000 of inhabitants. Recent reports state the Chinese army to be composed of 600,000 men, scattered over the surface of the empire. There is besides a force of Tartar troops, in the more immediate service of the government, comprising 200,000 men, organised chiefly in the capital and the northern towns. A standing army in the European sense of the word, is, however, not in existence. The soldiers do not live in barracks, but in their own houses, pursuing as chief business some civil occupation, frequently that of day-labourers, and meeting only on certain occasions, pursuant to orders from the military chieftains. Trade and Commerce. By the terms of the commercial treaty signed on August 29, 1842, by the plenipotentiaries of the Queen of Great Britain and the Emperor of China, five ports of the empire were opened to European trade. The five ports comprised those of Canton, Amoy, Foochow foo, Ningpoo, and Shanghai. The total value of imports and exports at the ports of Canton and Shanghai, in each of the years 1860 and 1861, was as follows: The chief articles exported from the ports of Canton and Shanghai are tea and silk. Subjoined are the quantities of the different kinds of tea exported to various countries from the port of Canton, in each of the years 1859 and 1860:— * Moger, Marquis de, Recollections of Baron Gros's Embassy to China and Japan, Lond. 1860. The following number of vessels entered and cleared, with cargoes, the port of Canton in the year 1860: The Chinese do not take European productions and manufactures to the extent that might be expected from so numerous and industrious a people. Still, the exports from the United Kingdom to China are on the increase, for in 1858 they had risen to 4,119,573., exclusive of 6,000,000l. of silver, whereas four years before they were no more than 1,505,4097., which shows, even in this short period, an advance of no less than 173 per cent. Altogether it is computed that no less than 50,000,000l. of British capital are engaged in the trade of China.* The subjoined table gives the quantities and estimated value of the principal and other articles exported from the port of Shanghai, in the year 1860: : * Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, vol. xxx. Art. China. 31,363,880 £10,212,559 |