Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1899 American Edition.djvu/816

 4(30 CHINA

to the der^ree by the Literary Chancellor. For the higher degree, examina- tions are held in each provincial capital once in three years, and the successful candidates are subjected to a third and a fourth examination, those who finally emerge being divided into four classes to wait for appointments to offices of different grades. There are, however, other means (e.g. military service) by which such appointments may be obtained. In 1887, for the first time, mathematics were admitted with the Chinese classics among the subjects ot examination, and schools for the propagation of Western science and litera- ture are now on the increase. The * Tung Wen Kwan,' or College of Foreign Knowledge, at Peking, is a Government institution, where the English, French, German, Japanese, and Russian languages, and mathematics, chemistry, physio- logy, &c., are taught by European, Japanese, and American professors, while the Chinese education of the pupils is entrusted to Chinese teachers. There are, besides, numerous Catholic and Protestant mission schools and colleges at Shanghai and other ports, where the English language and lower branches of Western science are taught. The Chinese Government has of late years established naval and military colleges and torpedo schools in connection with the different arsenals at Tientsin, Nanking, Shanghai, and Foochow, in which foreign instructors are engaged to teach such young Chinese as intend to make their career in the army or navy of their country Western modes of warfare, besides Western languages and literature. Ten Chinese news- papers are published at Shanghai, and the success they have achieved has led to the establishment of others at some of the other treaty ports.

Finance.

No general statement of the revenue and expenditure of China is made public, and such estimates as have been formed by Europeans are founded on financial reports of provincial governors published in the Peking Gazette. Except the foreign maritime and a few native customs, the entire revenue is collected by provincial agents. The Board of Kevenue at Peking issues annually to each of the provincial governors a statement of the amount required from his province for the following year, and Avhen to this amount is added the sum necessary for local administration, civil and military, the revenue to be provided by each collector is ascertained. The amount actually levied, however, greatly exceeds this, and the surplus, which may amount to 50 or 70 per cent, of the total, disappears in the form of costs, or in presents to official superiors, or remains in the hands of the collectors. The following estimate, taken from a report by Consul Jamieson of Shanghai, is based on figures for the three years preceding the Japanese war, and shows the sums accounted for by the provincial authorities : —

Sources of Revenue

Amount

I Taels

Land tax, silver i 25,08S,000

gi-ain ; 6,562.000

Salt duty and likin 13,659,000

Likin on merchandise 12,952,000

Foreign maritime customs (1S93) 21,989,000

Native custom-houses 1,000,000

Duty and likin on native opium 2,229,000

Miscellaneous duties 5,550,000

Total

88,979,000