The frequent edicts of the throne, published in the Peking _Gazette_, at once became laws, such as: “It is prohibited to smoke opium;” “It is prohibited to bind feet,” etc. Law will now be enunciated as in America, by the central and provincial legislatures of the new republic. A sort of martial law now prevails, and the provinces, after a quick drum-head trial, are shooting or lopping off the heads of pirates and mutinous soldiers in great numbers. Decapitation, flogging, torture, strangling, stocks, cangue, etc., will all probably be retained, as the Chinese are stolid when it comes to bearing pain, and the criminal classes must be treated with severity. Linchee, or Ling Chih (cutting into a thousand pieces) may be discontinued and shooting substituted. If, however, Confucianism remains as the leading religion, decapitation will be continued. The Confucians loathe the severing of the head, and this punishment is a powerful deterrent of crime. Imprisonment in a modern jail is no punishment for a hard-working Chinese, and something else must be substituted, such as the state impressing the convict’s free labor, to offset the convict’s family becoming a charge on the clan or state. It has been found in Yunnan City, Kweilin City and elsewhere that a modern jail, with good food and sanitary conditions, induces the poor wretches to commit crimes so as to achieve permanent incarceration as quickly as possible! As in the French system, the old-style Chinese judge is also often the prosecutor, and witnesses and accused are made to fight it out in the hearing of the judge, so that as the frequent “lie” is passed, the truth may jump from the tossed bag! (_Confronter les témoins à l’accusé._) The twenty-eight volumes of the Manchu code cover general, civil, finance, military, criminal and public works law.