have seen in China, and its magnificent costly decorations con- veyed some notion of Pun-ting-qua's great wealth, which had been quietly absorbed by the authorities.
Among the charities in Canton there is a Leper Village. These sort of asylums for plague-stricken men and women are found in various quarters of the Empire, but as I only visited one place of the kind, I shall reserve what I have to say about them for a future page. There are also institutions for the aged and infirm, and a foundling hospital, in which the poor children, who may be left at its door, are nursed on the slen- derest fare. Dr. Kerr gave some interesting details as to the management of this hospital, in the "China Review." One wet nurse, so he tells us, has at times as many as three infants to feed, and she must herself be reduced to starvation allowance, as her pay is only about eight shillings a month. Many of the nurslings die, as might be expected, while those who survive are sold for about three shillings apiece. It is mostly female children who are brought to this benevolent institution, for girls are esteemed nothing but encumbrances to poor parents in China, the reproach of their mothers, who ought to give birth to boys alone. These foundlings are bought by the wealthy and brought up as servants or concubines ; or else they are disposed of to designing hags, who purchase them on speculation and reserve them for a more miserable fate. This custom of investing in girls as speculative property, and of rearing them carefully till their personal attractions will command a high market value, is one of the worst aspects of that traffic in slaves which is carried on without shame or concealment all over Chinese soil. The evil might be mitigated if we could but persuade the Chinese Government to encourage female emigration by any means in their power, more particularly to
