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CHAPTER V, 



IN SZECHUAN. 



The customs at Kwei-chow — Transit passes — Their effect on the 

 provincial officials — The drought — Anthracite at Kwei-chow — 

 Visit to a mandarin — A concert — Management of the junks. 



KwEi-CHOW-FU, or, for short, Kwei-fu or Kwei-hwan {i.e. 

 " The Kwei-chow Barrier "), as it is more commonly called, 

 is the great Li-kin " barrier," which taxes all the trade 

 passing by the Yang-tse route between the " Four-streams " 

 province, with its population of 40,000,000, and its fertile 

 territory of 200,000 square miles, and Eastern China. The 

 local Li-kin office, or custom-house, used formerly to be, next 

 to that of Canton, the most valuable post of the kind in the 

 empire. The transit tax averages about five per cent, on 

 the value of the goods, which are all carefully examined by 

 gaugers attached to the Ya-men, whereby a delay of three 

 or four days is entailed on every junk passing up or down, 

 their number amounting in the year to over 10,000. Hence, 

 although situated in a poor, mountain district, a large popu- 

 lation finds subsistence, and the town is studded with the 

 numerous mansions of the wealthy officials and their depen- 

 dents. These customs form the main source of revenue of 

 the Szechuan province, the land-tax having been reduced to 

 an almost nominal sum in order to attract immigrants after 

 its depopulation at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and 

 having been never since increased. But now a blight has 



