Resuming the narration where it had reached this remote province of
the Empire, it is a suitable opportunity to explain that this same Sir
Philip is here greeted on every side with marks of deferential
submission, and is undoubtedly an official of high button, for
whenever the inclination seizes him he causes prisoners to be sought
out, and then proceeds to administer justice impartially upon them. In
the case of the wealthy and those who have face to lose, the matter is
generally arranged, to his profit and to the satisfaction of all, by
the payment of an adequate sum of money, after the invariable custom
of our own mandarincy. When this incentive to leniency is absent it is
usual to condemn the captive to imprisonment in a cell (it is denied
officially, but there is no reason to doubt that a large earthenware
vessel is occasionally used for this purpose,) for varying periods,
though it is notorious that in the case of the very necessitous they
are sometimes set freely at liberty, and those who took them publicly
reprimanded for accusing persons from whose condition on possible
profit could arise. This confinement is seldom inflicted for a longer
period than seven, fourteen, or twenty-one days (these being lucky
numbers,) except in the case of those who have been held guilty of
ensnaring certain birds and beasts which appear to be regarded as
sacred, for they have their duly appointed attendants who wear a garb
and are trained in the dexterous use of arms, lurking with loaded
weapons in secret places to catch the unwary, both by night and day.
Upheld by the high nature of their office these persons shrink from no
encounter and even suffer themselves to be killed with resolute
unconcern; but when successful they are not denied an efficient
triumph, for it is admitted that those whom they capture are marked
men from that time (doubtless being branded upon the body with the
name of their captor), and no future defence is availing. The third
punishment, that of torture, is reserved for a class of solitary