The Awakening of China

PART I. The Empire in Outline

THE EMPIRE IN OUTLINE

I. China Proper II. A Journey Through the Provinces--Kwangtung and Kwangsi III. Fukien IV. Chéhkiang V. Kiangsu VI. Shantung VII. Chihli VIII. Honan IX. The River Provinces--Hupeh, Hunan, Anhwei, Kiangsi X. Provinces of the Upper Yang-tse--Szechuen, Kweichau, Yunnan XI. Northwestern Provinces--Shansi, Shensi, Kansuh XII. Outlying Territories--Manchuria, Mongolia, Turkestan, Tibet

PART II

HISTORY IN OUTLINE, FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

XIII. Origin of the Chinese XIV. The Mythical Period XV. The Three Dynasties XVI. House of Chou XVII. The Sages of China XVIII. The Warring States XIX. House of Ts'in XX. House of Han XXI. The Three Kingdoms XXII. The Tang Dynasty XXIII. The Sung Dynasty XXIV. The Yuen Dynasty XXV. The Ming Dynasty XXVI. The Ta-Ts'ing Dynasty

PART III. China in Transformation

CHINA IN TRANSFORMATION

XXVII. The Opening of China, a Drama in Five Acts--God in History--Prologue ACT 1--The Opium War (Note on the Tai-ping Rebellion) ACT 2--The "Arrow" War ACT 3--War with France ACT 4--War with Japan ACT 5--The Boxer War [Page xiii] XXVIII. The Russo-Japanese War XXIX. Reform in China XXX. Viceroy Chang XXXI. Anti-foreign Agitation XXII. The Manchus, the Normans of China

APPENDIX

I. The Agency of Missionaries in the Diffusion of Secular Knowledge in China II. Unmentioned Reforms III. A New Opium War

INDEX

PART I. The Empire in Outline

THE EMPIRE IN OUTLINE

CHAPTER I

CHINA PROPER

Five Grand Divisions--Climate--Area and Population--The Eighteen Provinces

The empire consists of five grand divisions: China Proper, Manchuria, Mongolia, Turkestan, and Tibet. In treating of this huge conglomerate it will be most convenient to begin with the portion that gives name and character to the whole.

Of China Proper it may be affirmed that the sun shines nowhere on an equal area which combines so many of the conditions requisite for the support of an opulent and prosperous people. Lying between 18° and 49° north latitude, her climate is alike exempt from the fierce heat of the torrid zone and the killing cold of the frigid regions. There is not one of her provinces in which wheat, rice, and cotton, the three staples of food and clothing, may not be cultivated with more or less success; but in the southern half wheat gives place to rice, while in the north cotton yields to silk and hemp. In the south cotton is king and rice is queen of the fields.

Traversed in every direction by mountain ranges of moderate elevation whose sides are cultivated in [Page 4] terraces to such a height as to present the appearance of hanging gardens, China possesses fertile valleys in fair proportion, together with vast plains that compare in extent with those of our American prairie states. Furrowed by great rivers whose innumerable affluents supply means of irrigation and transport, her barren tracts are few and small.

A coast-line of three thousand miles indented with gulfs, bays, and inlets affords countless harbours for shipping, so that few countries can compare with her in facilities for ocean commerce.

As to her boundaries, on the east six of her eighteen provinces bathe their feet in the waters of the Pacific; on the south she clasps hands with Indo-China and with British Burma; and on the west the foothills of the Himalayas form a bulwark more secure than the wall that marks her boundary on the north. Greatest of the works of man, the Great Wall serves at present no other purpose than that of a mere geographical expression. Built to protect the fertile fields of the "Flowery Land" from the incursions of northern nomads, it may have been useful for some generations; but it can hardly be pronounced an unqualified success, since China in whole or in part has passed more than half of the twenty-two subsequent centuries under the domination of Tartars.

With an area of about 1,500,000 square miles, or one-half that of Europe, China has a busy population of about four hundred millions; yet, so far from being exhausted, there can be no doubt that with improved methods in agriculture, manufactures, mining, and transportation, she might very [Page 5] easily sustain double the present number of her thrifty children.

Within this favoured domain the products of nature and of human industry vie with each other in extent and variety. A bare enumeration would read like a page of a gazetteer and possibly make no more impression than a column of figures. To form an estimate of the marvellous fecundity of the country and to realise its picturesqueness, one ought to visit the provinces in succession and spend a year in the exploration of each. If one is precluded from such leisurely observation, undoubtedly the next best thing is to see them through the eyes of those who have travelled in and have made a special study of those regions.

To more than half of the provinces I can offer myself as a guide. I spent ten years at Ningpo, and one year at Shanghai, both on the southern seacoast. At the northern capital I spent forty years; and I have recently passed three years at Wuchang on the banks of the Yang-tse Kiang, a special coign of vantage for the study of central China. While residing in the above-mentioned foci it was my privilege to visit six other provinces (some of them more than once), thus gaining a personal acquaintance with ten out of the eighteen and being enabled to gather valuable information at first hand.

A glance at the subjoined table (from the report of the China Inland Mission for 1905) will exhibit the magnitude of the field of investigation before us. The average province corresponds in extent to the average state of the American Union; and the whole exceeds [Page 6] that portion of the United States which lies east of the Mississippi.

CHINA PROPER

--------------------------------------------- PROVINCES | AREA | POPULATION | SQ. MILES | -------------------|-----------|------------- Kwangtung (Canton) | 99,970 | 31,865,000 Kwangsi | 77,200 | 5,142,000 Fukien | 46,320 | 22,876,000 Chéhkiang | 36,670 | 11,580,000 Kiangsu | 38,600 | 13,980,000 Shantung | 55,970 | 38,248,000 Chihli | 115,800 | 20,937,000 Shansi | 81,830 | 12,200,000 Shensi | 75,270 | 8,450,000 Kansuh | 125,450 | 10,385,000 Honan | 67,940 | 35,316,000 Hupeh | 71,410 | 35,280,000 Hunan | 83,380 | 22,170,000 Nganhwei(Anhwei) | 54,810 | 23,670,000 Yünnan | 146,680 | 12,325,000 Szechuen | 218,480 | 68,725,000 Kiangsi | 69,480 | 26,532,000 Kweichau | 67,160 | 7,650,000 -------------------|-----------|------------- Totals | 1,532,420 | 407,331,000

CHAPTER II. A Journey Through the Provinces--Kwangtung and Kwangsi

A JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROVINCES--KWANGTUNG AND KWANGSI

Hong Kong--A Trip to Canton--Macao--Scenes on Pearl River--Canton Christian College--Passion for Gambling--A Typical City--A Chief Source of Emigration

Let us take an imaginary journey through the provinces and begin at Hong Kong, where, in 1850, I began my actual experience of life in China.

From the deck of the good ship Lantao, which had brought me from Boston around the Cape in one hundred and thirty-four days, I gazed with admiration on the Gibraltar of the Orient. Before me was a land-locked harbour in which all the navies of the world might ride in safety. Around me rose a noble chain of hills, their slopes adorned with fine residences, their valleys a chessboard of busy streets, with here and there a British battery perched on a commanding rock.

Under Chinese rule Hong Kong had been an insignificant fishing village, in fact a nest of pirates. In 1841 the island was ceded by China to Great Britain, and the cession was confirmed by the treaty of Nanking in August, 1842. The transformation effected in less than a decade had been magical; yet that was only the bloom [Page 8] of babyhood, compared with the rich maturity of the, present day.

A daily steamer then sufficed for its trade with Canton; a weekly packet connected it with Shanghai; and the bulk of its merchandise was still carried in sailing ships or Chinese junks. How astounding the progress that has marked the last half-century! The streets that meandered, as it were, among the valleys, or fringed the water's edge, now girdle the hills like rows of seats in a huge amphitheatre; a railway lifts the passenger to the mountain top; and other railways whirl him from hill to hill along the dizzy height. I Trade, too, has multiplied twenty fold. In a commercial report for the year ending June, 1905, it is stated that in amount of tonnage Hong Kong has become the banner port of the world.

Though politically Hong Kong is not China, more than 212,000 of its busy population (about 221,000) are Chinese; and it is preëminently the gate of China. By a wise and liberal policy the British Government has made it the chief emporium of the Eastern seas.

We now take a trip to Canton and cross a bay studded with islands. These are clothed with copious verdure, but, like all others on the China coast, lack the crowning beauty of trees. In passing we get a glimpse of Macao, a pretty town under the flag of the Portuguese, the pioneers of Eastern trade. The oldest foreign settlement in China, it dates from 1544--not quite a half-century after the discovery of the route to India, an achievement whose fourth centenary was celebrated in 1898. If it could be ascertained on what [Page 9] day some adventurous argonaut pushed the quest of the Golden Fleece to Farther India, as China was then designated, that exploit might with equal appropriateness be commemorated also.

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