self in one district or another of the vast empire. But it is easy to imagine how this self-acting adjustment would fail in a wild region remote from the control of government, where one baron held his sway without a check on his avarice or tyranny. The other source of bad blood was the depredations of the pastoral Mongols, the clansmen of the chief. These hardy sons of the desert, and of the rugged rocks, contemplating from their coigns of vantage the growing wealth of the detested intruders, could not refrain from making raids on their own account and carrying off the produce of the soil, or levying blackmail whenever they saw an opportunity. It is not alleged that all the Mongol depredations were directed by the chief; but as he was the only de facto executive authority in the district the official Chinese magistrate being only too glad to avoid being compromised in the quarrel and he did nothing to prevent the outrages, he must be held primarily responsible. Between the chieftain and his tribesmen the Chinese settlers found their situation becoming every year more unbearable; bad feeling on both sides grew worse continually; until at last, in 1890, the Mongols made a final raid on the cultivators, and set fire to their standing crops. This outrage filled the cup of the Mongol iniquity, and drove the Chinese into a solid combination for defence or for reprisals. There was another enemy whom the Chinese of those regions, and more particularly those who belonged to the Tsai li sect, had reason to dread- an enemy of their own kindred, but none the kinder on that account the Christian communities in the neighborhood. The careless observer might suppose that their common pursuit of virtue would create some bonds of sympathy between the Tsai li and the Christians, but human nature is weak on its sympathetic side. Jealousy rather than love is often the outcome of common aspirations. The Tsai li resent the pretensions of a foreign sect, claiming to introduce as new a morality which they already practise; while the Christians are irritated by a society which is virtuous without their aid. Individuals on either side may be respectful and conciliatory, but the two sects as a whole stand apart. In the course of their common dealings in the market-place, the jealousy of the two sects easily takes an acrimonious turn; and this is intensified to an indefinite degree by the attitude which ChrisVOL. LXXIX. 4079 LIVING AGE. tians usually assume in their intercourse with mere "heathen." For wherever they are numerous the native Christians become bold, and even aggressive, more especially if there is a foreign missionary among them to rally their forces and champion their cause. In a certain section of the district in which the disturbances of last November took place, the Christians form a strong and compact body, and they have been accustomed for years to carry things with a high hand against their pagan neighbors. This they were able to do by working on the fears of the magistrate, who had standing orders from Peking never to allow disputes with the Christians to be heard of. In obedience to these instructions, and to their instinct of self-preservation, the local magistrates were in the habit of deciding such disputes as were brought before them in favor of the Christians, of which favoritism the latter took full advantage. But this course of procedure naturally exasperated the people generally more than it conciliated the Christians. This class of grievances came also at last to a head. Christians were accused of extorting grains from the Tsai li dealers in a time of dearth, and of refusing to redeem long outstanding obligations. Quarrels broke out, with much vituperation on both sides. The bad season, which made it difficult for the debtors to pay, rendered it the more imperative that the creditors should be paid. Recrimination reached a climax in the month of May, 1891, when certain of the Tsai li endeavored to enforce restitution from Christians, who killed one of the claimants with a spear. The next move on the board would naturally be a gathering of the Tsai li for revenge on the Christians; and for this attack accordingly the Christians made extensive preparations, collecting arms and material, and even casting guns within the precincts of their church buildings. The Tsai li called the attention of the local authorities at Pakow (Ping-chuan district) to these war-like preparations, and informed them of the object; but the magistrate was afraid to meddle with such dangerous matters, and resorted to the characteristically Chinese device of accusing the Christians of something of which they were not guilty, but of which he knew everybody would believe them guilty. Instead of reporting the forging of cannon and hammering of swords, he proclaimed that he had searched the premises and found the cellars filled with children's corpses, without eyes or hearts. And so the poor man imagined he had very adroitly made himself safe! Doomed to serve the government in a country with scarcely revenue to bribe a lackey, the magistrate in those outlying regions can in ordinary times do nothing either against a territorial magnate or any organized body. Government was derelict. Such abdication of its functions may well seem to foreigners the expression of the last degree of weakness. Not necessarily so, however. It is rather the hereditary policy of laissez-faire, the wasteful Oriental economy of force. And as a debased currency may serve indifferently well the internal needs of a country, while its weakness is only discovered in international commerce, so the slackness of administration which systematically allows abuses to drift into acute crises, and yet suffices for the conduct of affairs at home, is a political currency which will not pass in the intercourse of nations. That is the criterion which exposes and discredits the traditional methods of the Chinese government, and reveals their danger. Thus, then, three powerful factions, accustomed to settle their business at first hand, confronted each other; the elemental forces of society, with their jagged edges opposed, and no moderating medium between; a region where law and government were in chronic abeyance. Such was eastern Mongolia in the autumn of 1891, and the inevitable explosion was but a question of time and opportunity. În fine, the people resolved to take up arms, the smaller sects, such as the Kintan or Golden Egg, and certain of the Taoists, making common cause with the Tsai li. It was an opportunity for the discharge of accumulated bile in the body social, when the grievances of a generation might be all liquidated, and consequently the levy was of a very composite character. Whether the fatal resolution was inspired from above or enforced from below, leaders and people were alike compromised. Yang, the chief leader, indeed, tried to keep himself out of sight; but it was from his resources the movement was fed, and his were the counsels by which it was directed, as Li Kwan's were the hands which executed his behests. Ominous threats of further ravages by the Mongol prince are said to have stirred the Chinese to prompt action, so as to anticipate the attack of the enemy. Once immersed in the conspiracy, the leaders of the Tsai li seem to have become inspired with grandiose ideas. Having first enlisted the services of their coreligionists in distant Kirin, they, through them, invoked the assistance of the formidable bands known there as the Chima-tsai, or mounted robbers, who were induced by the prospect of extensive pillage to throw in their lot with the Tsai li. The development of the movement showed that the leaders dreamed of results more permanent than could be expected from a mere border foray. The plan of campaign was bold and comprehensive. The two points of attack were, first, the palace of the Mongol prince, Naohan, known as Pei tzŭ Fu or Prince's Castle, near Chaoyang; and next, the establishments of the Christians at Pakow, within the Ping-chuan magistracy. The two points are a hundred miles apart. Both are within the official prefecture of Jêho, the town of Chaoyang being in the extreme northeast, where the Jêho borders the Fêngtien, or Moukden, prefecture; and Pakow, not far from the city of Jêho, the centre of the prefecture. The whole country is mountainous aud bleak, sparsely peopled, poor, and in winter intensely cold; and its wild tracks being only known to the natives, it was reckoned impassable for troops unacquainted with the defiles. The attack was originally planned for the severest season of the year, January, the time when troops were the least likely to be encountered. The calculation was not very wide of the mark, for even in the comparatively mild months of November and December, the casualties from frostbite and sheer cold were heavy. But they were really the only losses worth speaking of suffered by the imperial troops. As so often happens, however, in such cases, some accident-of which various accounts are given, perhaps all more or less true — brought on a premature collision which forced the conspirators to precipitate the crisis. They were probably too deeply compromised to draw back if they had wished, but the leaders were sustained by a profound delusion as to the relative resources of the parties. They were no doubt thoroughly acquainted with the Mongol strength, and they had also taken accurate account of that of their Christian countrymen. The Chinese gov ernment had almost ceased to be reckoned with. Anxious only to save their own skins, the magistrates were cowering before the Mongols at one place and before the Christians at another; and the Tsai li perhaps scarcely understood how far the self-effacement of these officials | rising occurred in that same locality, was the result of their standing instruc- which probably did more than anything tions not to embroil the government with else to rouse the anger and the fear of the either of its protégés. Absorbed in con- imperial family. It happened that the templating the objects which pressed on Mongol prince, Po-yen-nê-mo-hu, the comthem, they were oblivious of, or perhaps mander of the Peking field force, son of their imagination failed to rise to the con- the famous San Ko lin-sin, who resisted ception of, the power which must event- the allied forces in their march on Peking ually be brought against them. For as in 1860, was present in the neighborhood the country had been so long and so sys- on some mission connected with the tematically left to its own devices, it was graves of his family, and he had with him not unnatural for them to expect that it a considerable escort. Being a man of would continue to be so left. martial spirit like his father, he resolved to avenge the massacre of his brother chieftain, and, full of his personal prestige and confident of the prowess of his retainers, he fell upon the victorious Chinese band while their triumph was still fresh. They defeated and massacred him with his whole company. So appalled were the Peking court by this disaster to one of the imperial chamberlains, whose presence was so familiar about the palace, that they dared not divulge the plain fact, but gave out that the prince had died a natural death. It was probably to this untoward incident that the rebels owed their prompt suppression. The auxiliaries which came down from Kirin brought their families and impedimenta with them, as if they meant to stay. Perhaps they had found the conditions of life in the far North not so luxurious but that they were willing to sacrifice them for even the chance of amelioration nearer to the fringe of the settled country. The first body that moved from Kirin province were intercepted by the military commandant there, and cut to pieces. But the second levy eluded him, and marched to the rallying point. The whole force was now organized by Yang and Li, whose names were inscribed on the banners, and to whom fealty was sworn for that and any ulterior enterprise to which they might lead the band. The mixed force necessarily included a very large proportion of unarmed rabble, and of volunteers who had no aim beyond personal plunder. The assault on the Mongol prince was sudden and fierce; he himself was despatched, and his whole family, in true Oriental fashion, exterminated. His palace was of course wrecked and looted. Blood was up, and the boats burned. In the flush of victory the insurgents sought out all the Mongols they could find, and the distinction, owing to the use of Chinese dress and language, not being always clear, the Mongols were tracked by the infallible finger-posts of the Lama temples. This imparted to the movement an iconoclastic character, which, however, was quite adventitious. It was now the turn of the more westerly division of the insurgent force to make the attack which had been allotted to them against the Christians at Pakow. It was carried out a few days after the capture of Chaoyang. The local magistrate, feeble at all times, was of course paralyzed before such a howling mob, which has been estimated at fifteen hundred strong; and he is accused of giving his sanction to the massacre of the Christians, which, however, in no case he could have prevented. The truth seems to be that the magistrate feigned to fraternize with the rebels in order to disarm them against himself and the official buildings, and lead them into a trap, the more effectually to exterminate them when assistance should arrive. The Christians at any rate were overpowered, notwithstanding the stores of arms which they were reported as having provided for themselves in their religious houses, and were undoubtedly pillaged and severely massacred. According to all accounts, the Christians were handled badly enough. The victorious band then marched on and entered the unwalled town of Chaoyang. There was there a solitary English missionary, Mr. J. Parker, who was glad to make his escape with the magistrates of the town they having no force what-sitive conscience of the supreme governever to withstand the invasion and who is the only European witness of any of the occurrences in that region. Chaoyang was occupied by the rebels on the 14th November. An entirely fortuitous episode of the The Nemesis was promptly afoot. The senment was reached by two avenues. Mongol tribes on the Chinese frontier are the special wards of the Chinese emperor, for obvious political reasons; and the murder of the two princes could not go unavenged. The Christian communities, too, are now as the apple of their eye to with Chinese troops, and which rendered them for the occasion invincible. No doubt the memory of their prompt and decisive action will discourage any tendency to insurrection in those regions for some years to come. To the general Yeh seems to have fallen the chief honor of hunting out the fugitives in the ravines of that rugged country; and he had the good fortune to be apprised, by treachery, of the retreat of the real responsible leaders, Yang and Li. It is said he parleyed with them, and induced them to surrender to him on the promise that if they would only come with him to Tientsin and give a full and true account of the revolt to the viceroy there, they would then be set at liberty. It would be hard to believe that this timehonored ruse for getting possession of the persons of Oriental fugitives could possibly have been resorted to, were it not that authentic Chinese history is full of incidents of that kind, where faith is never kept, except when it suits the policy of the government, and yet the trick seems never to lose its freshness. Three captives were brought down to Tientsin, Yang and his son, and Li Kwan. They were kept about two weeks by the city magistrate, their case was referred to the emperor, the emperor relegated the whole matter to Li Hungchang and the provincial judge; and the two were executed, nominally by the slow process applicable to the crime of parricide, but actually they were despatched promptly, the slicing being done after they had received the coup-de-grâce. Before the sentence was carried out, the prisoners were brought up once before his Excellency the viceroy, and permitted to speak. Yang, the elder, an educated man of grave aspect, made a short but impressive speech in the hearing of the subordinate officials at the viceroy's yamen. He did not attempt to palliate the crime of insurrection, but said since the government had deigned at last to give some attention to his part of the country, they might by a closer investigation discover the true history of the rising, and then it would appear that his guilt was not so heinous as now appeared. He warned the government against allowing his enemies to abuse their triumph over his long-suffering people; and finally declared that, if by his death peace might be purchased for his unhappy country, he cheerfully made the sacrifice. committed, the resistance of the rebels to the imperial troops at all points is magnified by Yang beyond recognition. He is even made to swell the total numbers of his adherents to twenty thousand. The truth is, there was no resistance and no fighting, but much reckless slaughter of unarmed and mostly innocent people. The final official summing-up of the episode has now appeared in the Peking Gazette. A Chinese official statement is always a conventional composition, resembling the actual facts no more than the red or gold lions of heraldry resemble the animal as he exists in the African plains, or even in the Regent's Park menagerie. The substance of the report The age of Yang is given in his deposinow published in the Peking Gazette, tion as fifty-one, though he was popularly which is in the form of a memorial to reckoned as sixty, owing to his white Li Kwan gave his age as the throne from the viceroy, Li Hung-moustache. chang, is the depositions of the two lead- thirty-five. ers who were executed on 20th February. How much of what has been put in their mouths the two morituri actually said is quite uncertain; but under the compli cated system of distribution of justice From The Cornhill Magazine. prevalent in China, even the declarations FIVE VOICES FROM AN OLD MUSIC-BOOK. of dying men are matters of bargain and social adjustment. This is a part of their business which Chinese officials understand very well indeed - how the inflexible majesty of the law may be vindicated with the least amount of disturbance to their own convenience. The Chinese official is extremely reluctant to take life, and when obliged to do so, he takes care to cover the act by an indefinite amount of redundant justification, which carries the record of the case far beyond the region of fact. This seems to explain the character of the judicial investigation by the provincial judges of the province of Chihli into the guilt of the leaders, Yang and Li. First, the son of Yang is let off, although taken with his father, because he was declared to have been given for adoption to another family, and to have, moreover, been ignorant of the insurrectionary designs of his father. The brothers and nephews of Yang Yueh. chen are held in custody until the fate of the Mongol prince, Nao-han, is ascertained; while as to his mother and other relatives, inquiries are to be made as to whether they be alive or not, and if alive, they are also to be dealt with according to the fate, yet to be ascertained, of the Mongol prince. For the sake of saving alive the family of Yang, the daring fiction is thus introduced into his deposition that the prince, Nao-han, with his son, escaped, while all the inmates of his palace were put to death, and is only missing, not slain. But since it was predetermined that Yang himself should be executed, his personal guilt is piled mountains high by his own confession. And in order to justify the campaign of six to eight thousand well-armed troops, and the slaughter they IN TWO PARTS. PART I. Angry sounds are crying Harsh reproaches - cruel tauntings; And ever and anon a low faint sighing. A SHORT time ago a kind friend of mine put an old manuscript music-book into my hand. "Take it," he said, "and look at it, and read the songs.' And as I did so he told me the history of the lady to whom it had belonged. It was so sad, so touching, that as I am turning over the faded leaves I fancy I can hear the voices even now that once sang from these yellow pages. There is one voice, the principal one, crying out shrill and clear: "Oh, dear! How he does keep one waiting! What would he say if we only kept him three minutes!" This voice belongs to a young girl, tall and slight, with quick flashing blue eyes. She is standing in her riding-habit by the hall door, impatiently playing with her riding-whip. She makes a pretty picture standing there with the big door behind her casting a heavy shadow; inside, there is a great stone hall where grim, gaunt figures in armor, with rude, quaint weapons in their hands, are keeping a ghostly watch. Sticks, and whips, and bludgeons hang on the walls; they are enough to lay about the shoulders of the whole county, as I have no doubt they did once upon a time, if they had only the gift of speech to tell us their histories. Then another voice comes, nervous and rather slow, very unlike the first quick one. "Are you ready, dear? I saw the horses from my boudoir, and I know how |