GUILDS

In every large Chinese city are to be found several spacious buildings
which are generally reckoned among the sights of the place, and are
known by foreigners under the name of guilds. Globe-trotters visit
them, and admire the maximum of gold-leaf crowded into the minimum of
space, their huge idols, and curious carving; of course passing over
those relics which the natives themselves prize most highly, namely,
sketches and scrolls painted or written by the hand of some departed
celebrity. Foreign merchants regard them with a certain amount of awe,
for they are often made to feel keenly enough the influence which
these institutions exert over every branch of trade. They come into
being in the following manner. If traders from any given province
muster in sufficient numbers at any of the great centres of commerce,
they club together and form a guild. A general subscription is first
levied, land is bought, and the necessary building is erected.
Regulations are then drawn up, and the tariff on goods is fixed, from
which the institution is to derive its future revenue. For all the
staples of trade there are usually separate guilds, mixed
establishments being comparatively rare. It is the business of the
members as a body to see that each individual contributes according to
the amount of merchandise which passes through his hands, and the
books of suspected defaulters are often examined at a moment's notice
and without previous warning. The guild protects its constituents from
commercial frauds by threatening the accused with legal proceedings
which an individual plaintiff would never have dared to suggest; and
the threat is no vain one when a mandarin, however tyrannical and