After selling the medical attendant his feet he admitted that he had purposely performed the amputations himself, starting about a year previously.

He had fastened cords about his ankles, drawing them as tightly as he could bear them, and increasing the pressure every two or three days.

For a fortnight his pain was extreme, but when the bones were bared his pains ceased.

At the end of a month and a half he was able to entirely remove his feet by partly snapping and partly cutting the dry bone.

Such cases appear to be quite common in China, and by investigation many parallels could elsewhere be found.
The Chinese custom of foot-binding is a curious instance of self-mutilation.