366 PROBLEMS OF HUMAN EVOLUTION 



Little tells us that new patterns in silks are brought out every 

 year, but can it be said that there are any signs of real pro- 

 gress ? Medical science is at very low ebb. M. Simon, who 

 sees everything Chinese through rose-coloured spectacles, finds 

 it admirable that a doctor receives only 2jd., or at most, 5d., for 

 a visit! "Very dear at the price" is the inevitable comment 

 when we read of his qualifications and his methods. He has 

 never dissected, and knows nothing of anatomy. His method 

 of diagnosis is by the pulse, and little else. His pharmacopoeia 

 contains some useful medicaments, but also a number of such 

 things as tigers' bones, serpents' skins, dried centipedes, and 

 toads' skins. A prescription is a very mitrailleuse, containing 

 twenty or thirty ingredients ; some may possibly hit the mark. 

 As to sanitation, there is none. They live amid foul smells ; 

 the water they drink teems with bacteria. But the backward- 

 ness of medical science and the abuse of sanitation has main- 

 tained their physical strength. A Chinaman from childhood 

 upward has by strength of constitution to hold his own against 

 conditions not favourable to life. The doctor does not step in 

 to help him to fight his battles. As we might expect, the infant 

 mortality is great ; only the sound in constitution pull through. 

 Mr Cockburn tells us that he never knew a Chinese family in 

 which ten children attained the age of twenty. When we talk 

 of Chinese stagnation, the word must be understood as applying 

 to their civilisation. As their population thickens it is probable 

 that they grow in power of resistance to all the diseases which 

 bad sanitation brings with it. 



Slavery I have already pointed out how the institution of slavery was 

 one of the chief causes, if not the prime cause, of the decay of 

 the civilisations of Greece and Rome. In China, slavery is very 

 limited in amount. It is true that some rich families have a 

 number of slaves. But rich families are few : the mass of the 

 population are peasants. Thus as the basis of society there is a 

 huge mass of people who have to lead a life of toil and some 

 hardship, and from this class the rich families can recruit their 

 vigour. One of my authorities says that the children of 

 mandarins are often delicate. This is probably due, in part at 



