The boy travellers in the Far East : adventures of two youths ... - Library

HALL OF EXAMINATIONS. 415
three montlis more the tliird joints go. We saw lepers in all the stages
of the disease—some with the first joints of tlie
hands gone, others who had lost the second
joints, and others the third ;
while others, again,
had lost the hands at the M'rists. There seems
to be no cure for most of the forms of the lep-
rosy ; and when a man is attacked with it, he
must go at once to the hospital, no matter
whether he is rich or poor. And when he has
gOTie there, he generally remains till death re-
lieves him from his sufferings.
" One of the curious places we saw was the
Hall of Examinations. This is a large enclosed
space, having rows on rows of little cells, where
the candidates for the literary degree are ex-
amined once in every three years. There are
eleven thousand of these cells, and each cell is
just large enough for one man to occupy. The
candidates are put in these cells, and each njan
A LITER.IKY STUDENT.
is furnished with a sheet of paper and a pen.
He must write on the paper any given page of the Chinese boohs called
•The Class assies without mistake or alteration, and he is not allowed to try a
A I.ITEltAUY GEADUATK IN HIS ROBES OF
HONOR.
second time until the next examination
comes round. There are men
who keep) on trying all their lives for
the degree, and they tell of one man
who succeeded after he was eighty
years old. The candidates try all
sorts of tricks to smuggle in co2>ies
of the books on which they are to
he examined, and also extra sheets of
]iaper ;
but they are carefully search-
ed, and everything of the sort is
taken awa}' from them.
"There is a story in Pidgin-Eng-
lish verse of how a Chinese student
befriended an American, who was a
])hotographer by profession. Tlie
American believed that one good tni'u
deserved another, and so, wdieu the