China in Decay: a handbook to the Far Eastern question ... With six maps and twenty-one illustrations

Preface

. The object of the present volume is to serve as a handbook to the Far Eastern Question, which has of late come so prominently to the front. It does not aim at competing with the numerous and more com prehensive works which deal with the physical, ethno graphical, and political aspects of the Celestial Empire, but has been written with a view to supplying, in narrative form, a complete record of the various causes which have led up to the existing position in the Far East. It has occurred to me that a book explaining the aims of the different Powers interested in China, and detailing sufficient of the history of that country to enable the reader to appreciate the true significance of the tangled diplomatic relations now attracting so much attention, may serve a useful purpose in bring ing certain facts, not usually appreciated, within the public ken.

The first three chapters, dealing with the country, the people, and the government, are mainly introduc tory. They have been included with a view to enable

PREFACE.

. viii the reader who has not had occasion to make him self acquainted with things Chinese, to appreciate the bearing of the political situations dealt with in the body of the book. Throughout the chapters devoted to the History of Political China, I have refrained as far as possible from comment, preferring to let facts speak for themselves. In the two concluding chapters I have approached my subject from the standpoint of the Englishman who believes that British influence carries with it a benefit quite apart from a mere increase of trade or accession of prestige. I hold that the existence of relations between strange and misgoverned countries and our own, tends to educate the people and to instil into them a desire for knowledge, a craving for progress, and an appreciation of morality, which they could not obtain in any other way, and that in China, more than elsewhere, we have a mission to perform, due, as much to the claim of duty as to that of self-interest.

The absence of an alphabet in the Chinese language, and the consequent lack of any system of spelled sound, renders the writing of place-names a matter of individual opinion. As no two authorities are agreed on this important subject, I do not offer any apology for having spelled the names which figure in the book in accordance with the nearest approach to their true pronunciation of which an Englishman is capable.

PREFACE.

. IX I have to thank Messrs F. M. Wood and T. W. Goodall of the China Inland Mission, and the Rev. J. D. Mullins of the Church Missionary Society, for the loan of several of the photographs which illustrate the following pages. The detailed account of the Yang-tse Valley which forms a part of Chapter XL, has appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette. The portion of Chapter XII. describing the first railway in China, was originally published in Black and White ; and some of the concluding passages of Chapter VI. dealing with the British Record, are extracted from an article contributed by me to the Fortnightly Review. I am under an obligation to the editors of these for permission to reproduce them here. The rest of this volume is new, and has been specially written at the request of the publishers.

ALEXIS KRAUSSE. October 1898. CONTENTS. PAGE Preface ........ vii Chapter I. The Country ..... 3 „ II. The People ...... 22 „ III. The Government . . . . -55 „ IV. Foreign Relations . . . . -75 „ V. The British Record (to the Treaty of Tientsin) ...... 107 „ VI. The British Record (from the Treaty of Tientsin) ...... 139 „ VII. The Russian Record . . . -177 „ VIII. The French Record . . . -203 „ IX. The German Record . . . .223 „ X. Trade in China . . . . -233 „ XI. The British Sphere . . . .267 „ XII. Railways ...... 290 „ XIII. Chinese Politics . . . . -313 „ XIV. The Situation . . . . -333 „ XV. The Future . . . . . .366 Appendix A. Landmarks in Chinese History . . 375 „ B. Bibliography of Authorities . . . 382 Index ......... ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE The Emperor Kwangsu .... Frontispiece. Some Chinese Types .....* 2 Native Junks at Fuchow ...... 7 A Chinese Family ....... 23 Tower used as a Repository for Infants . . -39 Prisoners wearing the Cangue, with their Gaoler . 54 Lepers at Dinner, Pakhoi Leper Asylum . . .61 Street Scene in Peking ...... 74 Ningpo ........ 81 The River Front, Shanghai ..... 106 Bridge at Yuyiao, near Shanghai . . . .117 Wei Hai Wei from the Anchorage . . . .138 Scene of the Massacre at Whasang, 1895 . . . 151 Gateway at Peking ...... 222 Scene on the Yang-tse Kiang ..... 232 View at Hankow ....... 241 House-boat on Yang-tse Kiang . . .** . 278 West Gate, Ningpo ...... 312 Village near Dalensin ..... 332 Street in Hanghow . . . . , .341 Li Hung Chang ....... 367 MAPS.

Map of the Chinese Empire at commencement of Volume. Map of the Russian Sphere . . . . I75 Map of the French Sphere . . . 202 Map of the Yang-tse Kiang .... 266 Railway Map of China .... to face page 290 Map of China .... at end of Volume. si. I'tiilip &Son, LonAjm &.Livfrf,ool Cliapman &HaLl, Limited „. SOME CHINESE TYPES. DECAY.

Chapter I. The Country

China, the oldest country in the world, boasting, as it does, a civilisation which dates from before the Abra hamic era, stands to-day an anomaly among nations, an entity built up of contradictions. Resulting from the systematic evolution of a series of ideas which are foreign to the appreciation of the Western mind, the rationalism of the Chinese intelligence runs counter to all the known systems of modern philosophy. As a human entity the Celestial stands alone : a creature without a fellow. His abilities are above the average, and his intelligence is acute, but his individuality belongs to an order of its own, and his aims are un directed by any train of thought to which we are accustomed. The Chinaman unites in his attributes a marked ability, a respect for the law and a love of peace, with an utter lack of honesty, truth, or affection ; while his regard for learning and his appreciation of the Arts are accompanied by a fatalism without religion, and an exclusiveness tempered only by the love of gain.

As with individuals, so with the nation at large. China, the fourth largest country in the world, is an Empire only in name. The numerous provinces and dependencies which go to build up the region nominally beneath the rule of the "Son of Heaven" are but a series of federated kingdoms ruled with despotic sway by viceroys or governors, and, despite the fact that many portions of the country are more densely populated than any other part of the world, and that China proper is teeming with agricultural and with mineral wealth, the " Empire " is in a constant state of poverty, and its people often in a condition of absolute starvation. It is nearly four hundred years since Europe first came into contact with Cathay. And yet the knowledge which has been obtained as to the rationale of its inhabitants is infinitesimal.

The country has been tentatively explored, yet remains unknown ; and to-day, while China has emerged by force of circumstances from its retirement in the farthest east, and has become the cynosure of all countries as the area of future exploitations and the coming market of the world, we remain in ignorance of the land and the people, and vainly conjecture as to the circumstances of each. Our knowledge of China, such as it is, is due to the efforts of a few missionaries and daring enthusiasts. The country has never been satisfactorily surveyed, nor have its resources been explored. The interior is to-day a sealed book, except in the case of a few chosen places, where, the foreigner, unasked and unwanted, is tolerated — and that with every mark of disapproval — under the sanction of a series of treaties obtained at the cannon's mouth.

And while we remain in ignorance of the realities of this remarkable land, we find ourselves imperceptibly drawn into fierce competition with other nations over the allotment of rights which do not exist, and the partition of territory which is unknown. After being kept waiting on the fringe of China for three hundred years, we find ourselves confronted by the action of rival powers, which promptly take measures for achieving in as many days that in which we have failed, and fearing to be bereft of the little we have secured, the British Government is driven to join in the scramble, in the hope of securing a share of the good things going. And so the eyes of Englishmen have been turned towards the Celestial Empire, which has become the focus of the political question of the hour, and one is, at the very outset, struck by the fact that our knowledge of the subject involved is so slight as to render an intelligent appreciation of the merits of the position no easy matter.

China, with its dependencies, occupies nearly a third of the Asiatic Continent. Nominally one vast kingdom, the territories comprised have the cohesion of neither race, nor constitution, nor religion. The people of Manchuria are the opposites of those of Tibet, nor is there aught in common between the men of Hunan and those of Kansu. In accordance with the para doxical principle which underlies most things Chinese, the Empire is itself a dependency of a subject state, since .the Emperor is a descendant of the Manchu insurgents who conquered the eighteen provinces of China proper in 1644.* To give a general idea, the land may be spoken of as a vast slope stretching from the table-lands of Tibet and the Koko Nor to the Pacific Ocean. In the territory comprised in this far-reaching expanse, which covers an area of 4,218,401 square miles, there is to be found every description of physical feature and climate, from the snow-clad mountains of Yunnan to the alluvial plains of the maritime provinces, and from the tropical region of Kwangtung to the temperate margin of the Gulf of Pechili.

The most noteworthy characteristic of China proper is the remarkable system of rivers, which provides a ready means of communication in nearly every direc tion ; and it is a curious instance of the want of logic inherent in the Chinese mind, that these natural high ways are so rarely utilised as boundaries of the different districts into which the country is divided. The eighteen provinces comprised in the kingdom of China, known also as the " Flowery Land " and the " Middle State," may be conveniently divided into four divisions. On the north are Kansu, Shensi, Shansi, and Chili. Inland, forming central China, are Sechuan, Hupeh, Honan, Anwei, Kweichau, Hunan, and Kiangsi. On the southern border are Yunnan and Kwangsi, and on the east are the maritime provinces Shan tung, Kiangsu, Chekiang, Fukien, and Kwangtung.

The smallest of these, Fukien, is rather bigger than * The Chinese Empire comprises (i) China proper, consisting of eighteen pro vinces, (2) Manchuria, (3) Mongolia, (4) Tibet, (5) Turkistan, (6) Jungaria. Ireland ; and the most extensive, Sechuan, is nearly half as large again as the British Isles. In its physical aspect, China proper may be divided into two spheres. On the north and east sides the land is generally level and productive. On the west and south it is much cut up by mountain ranges, some of them of great NATIVE junks at fuchow. height, bare, and precipitous. The mountainous districts are rich in mineral deposits, and teem with natural produce, while the low-lying lands comprise a soil so fertile as to produce in many districts three crops in the year. The rivers of China are of the utmost importance to the Empire, inasmuch as they afford what is practically the only means of communication between the different territories.

Roads are few and bad, the highway consisting, in most instances, of the merest track, and in the alluvial lands and those districts in which the loess beds* are situated, the paths are often knee-deep in mud. The great rivers, however, with their numerous tributaries and canals, traverse the Empire in every direction, and afford a cheap and ready means of transport, which has rendered the vast trade of the country possible. The rivers of China are known by a variety of names, each one receiving various appella tions in different portions of its course. The word river is represented by two distinct terms : those in the north being called Ho, and those in the south Kiang or Chiang. Thus Hoang Ho signifies Hoang River, and the Yang-tse Kiang, Yang-tse River, facts which serve to exhibit the ignorance of persons who refer to the Yang-tse Kiang River, and thus show that they are unaware of the signification of the words they use.

The most important of the rivers of China are the Yang-tse, the Hoang, the Si, the Pei, and the Min. The Yang-tse Kiang ranks third in size among the rivers of the world. It rises in the table land of Tibet, and, after a tortuous course, enters China near Batang, whence it traverses the provinces of Sechuan, Yunnan, Hupeh, Anwei, and Kiangsu. Its total course covers more than 4000 miles, and it is navigable by large vessels for more than 1000 miles from its estuary. The Yang-tse Kiang receives a * The loess is a form of tertiary deposit, in appearance a brown, porous earth, easily pulverised, which covers the ground to an immense depth in the north-west of China. This earth possesses a fertility which is practically inexhaustible. number of tributaries, of which the Kia-ling and Han are the most important.

It also affords communication with two lakes of considerable extent. The most re markable feature in connection with the Yang-tse is the extraordinary variation in its level, which alternates as much as ioo feet in the higher reaches, where the banks narrow, and confine the stream within a series of remarkable gorges, and 50 feet at Hankow, where the river is more than a mile wide. These phenomena are due to the summer melting of the snows on the Tibetan plateau, where the river takes its rise at a height of more than 1 5,000 feet, and the water rushes down in a flood, which at times submerges the country over a breadth of 20 miles. The same extremes are to be noted in the other rivers which rise on the great table land, known as the " roof of the world," especially in the case of the Hoang Ho or Yellow River, which has long since earned for itself the title of "China's Sorrow."

This river, rising in close proximity to the Yang-tse, takes a more northerly course, and after skirting the Mongolian plateau, passes through the great plain of China and enters the sea in the Gulf of Pechili. It has a course of nearly 3000 miles, and is quite unnavigable, except over a portion of its lower reaches, and, even here, vessels are hindered from ascending the stream by shoals and other difficulties. This river is peculiarly subject to floods, which submerge whole provinces, and it has more than once entirely changed its course, which is to-day some 300 miles north of the bed it occupied in 1854. The last occasion in which the Hoang Ho escaped its banks was in 1887, when, owing to an embankment giving way, whole towns and villages were destroyed, hundreds of thousands of people were drowned, and several millions rendered destitute.

A great plain, half as large as Scotland, and densely populated, was sud denly, without warning, turned into a raging sea. The Governor of Honan, the province most affected, stated, in his official announcement of the visita tion : — " Nearly all the people have been drowned in the districts reached by the water,"* and the Peking correspondent of The Times placed the number drowned at not less than a million. The final estimate issued, with official sanction, and generally accepted, gives 1,600,000 as the number of people swept away»; 5,000,000 as being rendered destitute. The Si Kiang or West River, which rises in Yunnan, is navigable for big steamers over a course of 350 miles above Canton, and is rapidly becoming one of the most important trade routes in South China. The Pei Ho, known also as the Peking River, is navigable as far as Tung Chow, 140 miles from the sea, and is the main route between the northern capital and the rest of the Empire.

The Min Kiang is a much smaller river than the above-named, but ranks high as a trade route, being the approach to the important city of Fuchow, and the centre of the southern tea trade of China. In addition to these waterways, there are two others, which, like the Hoang and the Yang-tse, rise in Tibet, and flow through a portion of South-Western China. They are the Sal ween and the Mekawng. Neither is navigable within the Chinese frontier. The former, after crossing the * Peking Gazette, 28th October 1887. Chinese frontier at Kunlon, flows through Burma, until it empties itself into the Bay of Bengal, while the latter passes by Kiang Hung into Siam, and serves as the boundary between that country and French Indo China, until it reaches Cambodia, and loses itself in the China Sea. The most important adjunct to the rivers named was the Grand Canal, an undertaking completed more than six hundred years ago by the Emperor Chitsou, and intended to place Peking in communication with Hang chau and Canton.

This undertaking, which, in daring, ranks second only to the Great Wall, runs its course from Tientsin to Chinkiang, and thence to Hangchau, crossing on its way both the Hoang Ho and the Yang tse Kiang. The total distance traversed is rather over 600 miles. This wonderful engineering feat has, of late years, been suffered to fall into a very bad state of repair, and, partly owing to the change in the course of the Yellow River, partly on account of the improve ment effected in steam communication by sea, the canal is used only by small junks, which are, with infinite labour, and in the face of many difficulties, propelled or hauled along its course. Closely allied to the question of internal waterways is that of seaports, and in this respect the coasts of China are exceptionally well equipped.

The whole seaboard from north to south is indented by a suc cession of deep bays and land-locked harbours, unsur passed in the security they afford to shipping, and the facilities they provide for the loading and unloading of merchandise. Commencing in the Liao-tong peninsula, DECAY. 12 the southernmost province of Manchuria, we have the remarkable harbours of Talienwan and Port Arthur. Just round the southernmost point of this promontory, known from its shape as the " Regent's Sword," is the shelter afforded by Port Adams and Society Bay. Across the gulf, one hundred miles away, is the road stead of Chifu and the bay of Wei Hai WTei, while beyond the projecting cape of Shantung are the in closed harbours of Ting-tse and Kiao Chou. Passing the estuary of the Yang-tse, and the Woosung River, with its port of Shanghai, we reach Nimrod Sound, the approach to Ningpo hard by Sanmoon Bay, which is in itself a harbour capable of sheltering the navies of the world.

From this point to the southern border of the Empire the coast line teems with creeks and bays of the first class. Bullock Harbour, Namkuan Harbour, the Samsah inlet, and the entrance to the Min River are all especially favoured; and the harbours of Hing hua, Amoy, Tung San, Swatow, Mirs-bay, Bocca Tigris, Sui-tung, and Pakhoi are among the finest shelters for shipping in the world. The roads of China are, as already stated, the worst in existence. When paved, they consist of blocks of stone imbedded loosely in the surface of the ground. The stones are frequently abstracted by the people for their own use, and in the hilly districts the tracks are utterly neglected, and never, under any circumstances, repaired. There are in different direc tions certain well-known caravan routes, which are largely patronised by traders, and, in a sense, may be regarded as public highways.

Among the most important of these is the great caravan route from Peking, across the Gobi Desert to Urga and Kiakhta. There are also tracks from Peking to Shan Hai Kuan on the Manchurian frontier ; to Paoting and the rich Shansi province ; and the central Asiatic caravan route via Sigan in the great loess country. Apart from these, the trade of China is, with few exceptions, con ducted by means of the waterways. The most important of the dependencies of the Chinese Empire is Manchuria, a country about three times the size of Great Britain, and containing a population estimated at twenty-two millions. The people are mostly Chinese, the Manchus, who entered China in the 17th century, having become absorbed in the race they conquered, while the country they formerly owned has become repopulated by Chinese immigrants, with a sprinkling of Mongols and Koreans.

The country is extremely mountainous, except on the north-west, where the ranges of hills give way to a series of plains which merge into the Mongolian desert. It is covered in many parts with dense forests, and cut up by a large number of fine rivers, mostly connected with the Amur, which separates the northern provinces of Manchuria from Siberia. Mongolia, a vast territory, which comprises one and a quarter million square miles of territory, mostly desert, on the northern borders of China proper, is an unpro ductive region, peopled by about two million nomads, of indolent habits and low intelligence. Tibet, the most mountainous country in the world, with an average altitude of fifteen thousand feet, com- DECA Y. 14 prises nearly a million square miles of hill and valley, interspersed with table-lands, which are mostly covered with snow.

Its population is estimated at six millions, among whom are nearly one hundred thousand lamas or priests, who are supported by the Government. Tibet is the head centre of Buddhism, and the Dalai lama, who resides at Lhassa, is the high priest of the cult. Besides the mountains, the most notable feature of Tibet is the large number of important rivers which rise within its borders. Among the more notable of these are the Indus, Sutlej, and Brahmapootra on the west, and the Yang-tse, Salween, and Mekawng on the east. Though the country is nominally ruled by the Emperor of China, it is questionable whether the Peking Government exercises more than a nominal sway over Tibet, which has only admitted the suzer ainty of the Chinese since 1648. Intercourse with the eighteen provinces is maintained by caravans, the route between Lhassa and Peking being by Sigan, Lanchau, and Sining, and the journey occupies four months.

Tibet is probably the least known country in the world. The interior is rigorously closed to foreigners, and the information available respecting the capital is of the vaguest. Chinese Turkestan, a large and little-known territory, situated on the extreme west of the Chinese Empire, and wedged between Mongolia and Tibet, consists largely of desert. Owing to the great distance which separates the dependency from Peking, communication is slow, and the governmental influence weak. Jungaria, the last and smallest of the outlying Chinese provinces, is practically an appanage of Turkestan, which it closely resembles. It comprises the district of Hi or Kuldja, so long a bone of contention with Russia, and was the scene of the Mahommedan rising of 1871. It covers an area of less than 150,000 square miles, with a population of approximately half a million.* The bonds by which these dependencies are united to China proper are of the slightest.

They are the last of a number of States which at one time acknowledged the suzerainty of the Chinese throne, but to-day have become the vassals of other powers. The modern history of China is indeed but a record of the loss of empire. On every side the Celestial Kingdom has been mulcted in territory ; and in addition to being bereft of regions which were once her own, and which rendered tribute to her treasury, she finds herself surrounded by Western powers exerting an unwelcome but increas ing influence over the government of what remains. I shall have a good deal more to say on this subject further on. For the present, I revert to my initial subject-matter, with a view to placing the reader in possession of a sufficiently comprehensive account of the main landmarks in the China of to-day. * The following recapitulation of the area and population of the Chinese Empire may be of utility to the reader.

Eng. sq. miles. Population. China proper, . . . 1,336,800 386,000,000 Manchuria, .... 362j3QO 7,500,000 Mongolia, .... 1,288,000 2,000,000 Tibet, 651,500 6,000,000 Turkestan, .... 431.800 600,000 Jungaria, .... !47j900 600,000 4,218,300 402,700,000 DECAY. 1 6 As micht be expected in the case of a country so ill provided with roads as is China, the places at which foreio-ners have come into communication with the natives are for the most part situated either on the coast line or on the banks of the great rivers. In order that the reader may the better appreciate the events to be dealt with further on, I append a few brief references to the more important of the cities, which play a part in the political evolution of China. At different periods in her history, China has known three capitals in different portions of her Empire.

For upwards of a thousand years, the seat of Government was at Sigan, in the fertile Wei valley, which crosses the province of Shensi. In the year 420 a.d., the imperial residence was transferred to Kienkang on the Yang-tse, which thenceforth became known as Nanking, the southern capital, and there, within one of the largest cities of the Empire, surrounded by strong walls, the court was held for more than eight centuries. In 1260, the Mongol Emperor Chitsou, better known as Kublai Khan, removed from the southern capital, and chose as his resting-place the city of Cambaluc, which came to be re-named Peking or northern capital. The city stands in the middle of an extensive plain, 12 miles north-west of Tung Chow on the Pei Ho, and 160 miles from the Gulf of Pechili. It is reached by a road from Tung Chow, the town which marks the limit of the navigation on the Pei Ho.

It is surrounded by walls 50 feet high and 60 wide, and entered through strong gates, all of which are closed at night. The city consists of three divisions : the Chinese city, the Tartar city, and the " Purple Forbidden city " sacred to the Emperor and his immediate retinue. The latter is strictly guarded, and is rarely entered by any under the rank of first mandarin or viceroy. The Chinese and Tartar cities are very large, and, like all the other towns in the Empire, very dirty. The population is estimated at about a million. The streets are fairly typical, being gaily decorated but filthy to a degree, and the condition of the streets, owing to an utter lack of either drains or supervision, is such as to disgust the visitor, and prevent his going out except in a closed chair. The most striking feature of Peking is the dust which permeates every quarter, and finds its way through every interstice.

Despite the un pleasantness of this nuisance, it is said to serve a useful purpose in acting as a disinfectant, an impor tant desideratum mid such surroundings as those to be found in the Chinese capital. The most important cities in the north of China, after Peking, are Tientsin, Paoting, Tai Yuen, Sigan, Tsinan, and Chifu. In central China, inland, are Cheng tu, Nanchang, Changsha, and Talifu ; and on the Yang tse Kiang, Chungking, Ichang, Shaszi, Hankow with Wuchang, Nanking, Chinkiang, Shanghai, Hang chau, Ningpo, and Fuchow. In the south are Yunnan, Nanning, Wuchau, Canton, Amoy, and Swatow. Of these, Peking and Nanking, the two capitals, possess an interest which is mainly historical. Of the commercial centres the chief are Shanghai, Hankow, and Tientsin, being the main trade centres of south, central, and north China, respectively.

Hongkong, B which is British territory, and totally free from Chinese interference, is in reality the great forwarding centre for the foreign trade of China, and it is from Victoria, the capital, that the markets throughout the length and breadth of the land are supplied. It remains to speak of the produce of the country. As will have been gathered from the foregoing, China is well supplied both with agricultural and with mineral wealth. Foremost among the articles for which the Empire has long been famous, are tea, silk, wax, cotton, and rice, and these are produced in various parts of the empire. The production of tea, though declining alike in quantity and quality, is yet considerable, and the culture of the plant and its preparation find occupation for the people in half-a-dozen provinces.

The best growths are produced in the western and southern provinces, bordering on the Yang-tse. The finest black tea comes from Hupeh and Hunan, a second quality hailing from Fukien, while the choicest green tea is grown in Chekiang and Anwei. Both kinds of plant prove prolific in the climate of Sechuan and Kwangtung. A considerable proportion of the leaf produced is utilised in the preparation of brick tea, which is largely exported to Mongolia and Tibet, where it is highly appreciated on account of its portability and keeping qualities. Within the limits of the Empire, tea is practically the national drink. It is not taken, as with us, at special meals, but is used as a beverage, and kept available and ready for use at all times and in every household, excepting only the very poorest. Next in importance to tea is the production of silk, which owes its origin to Chinese ingenuity.