Combination has been raised in China to the level of a fine art. Nowhere on earth can be found such perfect cohesion of units against forces which would crush each unit, taken individually, beyond recognition. Every trade, every calling, even the meanest, has its guild, or association, the members of which are ever ready to protect one another with perfect unanimity, and often great self-sacrifice. And combination is the weapon with which the people resist, and successfully resist, any attempt on the part of the governing classes to lay upon them loads greater than they can or will bear. The Chinese are withal an exceptionally law-abiding people, and entertain a deep-seated respect for authority. But their obedience and their deference have pecuniary limits. I will now pass from the abstract to the concrete, and draw upon my note-book for illustrations of this theory that the Chinese are a self-taxing and self-governing people. Under date October 10, 1880, from Chung-king in the province of Ssŭch'uan, the following story will be found in the _North China Herald_, told by a correspondent:— "Yesterday the Pah-shien magistrate issued a proclamation, saying that he was going to raise a tax of 200 _cash_ on each pig killed by the pork-butchers of this city, and the butchers were to reimburse themselves by adding 2 _cash_ per _pound_ to the price of pork. The butchers, who had already refused to pay 100 _cash_ per hog, under the late magistrate, were not likely to submit to the payment of 200 under this one, and so resolved not to kill pigs until the grievance was removed; and this morning a party of them went about the town and seized all the pork they saw exposed for sale. Then the whole of the butchers, over five hundred at least, shut themselves up in their guild, where the magistrate tried to force an entry with two hundred or three hundred of his runners. The butchers, however, refused to open the door, and the magistrate had to retire very much excited, threatening to bring them to terms. People are inclined to think the magistrate acted wrongly in taking a large force with him, saying he ought to have gone alone." Three days later, October 13:— "There is great excitement throughout the city, and I am told that the troops are under arms. I have heard several volleys of small arms being fired off, as if in platoon exercise. All the shops are shut, people being afraid that the authorities may deal severely with the butchers, and that bad characters will profit by the excitement to rob and plunder the shops." Two days later, October 15:—