The first education on western lines was given by the Roman Catholic missionaries. In 1852 they founded a college for the education of native priests; they also founded and maintained many primary and some higher schools—mainly if not exclusively for the benefit of their converts. The Protestant missions followed the example of the Roman Catholics, but a new departure, which has had a wide success, was initiated by the American Protestant missionary societies in founding schools—primary and higher—and colleges in which western education was given equally to all comers, Christian or non-Christian. Universities and medical schools have also been established by the missionary societies. They also initiated a movement for the education of girls and opened special schools for their instruction.Missionary effort apart, the first step towards western education was the establishment of two colleges in 1861, one at Peking, the other at Canton in connexion with the imperial maritime customs. These institutions were known as T‘ung Wen Kwan, and were provided with a staff of foreign professors and teachers. These colleges were mainly schools of languages to enable young Chinese to qualify as interpreters in English, French, &c. Similar schools were established at Canton, Fuchow and one or two other places, with but indifferent results. A more promising plan was conceived in 1880, or thereabouts, by the then viceroy of Nanking, who sent a batch of thirty or forty students to America to receive a regular training on the understanding that on their return they would receive official appointments. The promise was not kept. A report was spread that these students were becoming too much Americanized. They were hastily recalled, and when they returned they were left in obscurity. The next step was taken by the viceroy Chang Chih-tung after the Chino-Japanese War of 1894-95. The viceroy wrote a book,China’s Only Hope, which he circulated throughout the empire, and in which he strongly advocated a reform of the traditional educational system. His scheme was to make Chinese learning the foundation on which a western education should be imparted.15The book was one of the factors in the 1898 reform movement, and Chang Chih-tung’s proposals were condemned when that movement was suppressed. But after the Boxer rising the Peking government adopted his views, and in 1902 regulations were issued for the reform of the old system of public instruction. A university on western lines was established in that year at Peking, the T‘ung Wen Kwan at the capital being incorporated in it. The new educational movement gained enormously in strength as the result of the Russo-Japanese War, and in 1906 a new system, theoretically almost perfect, was established. The new system comprises the study of the Chinese language, literature and composition, modern sciences, history and geography, foreign languages,16gymnastics, drill and, in the higher grades, political economy, and civil and international law.By 1910 primary and secondary government schools and schools for special subjects (such as agriculture and engineering) had been established in considerable numbers. In every province an Imperial University was also established. The Imperial University at Peking now teaches not only languages and Chinese subjects but also law, chemistry, mathematics, &c. A medical school was founded at Peking in 1906 through the energy of British Protestant missionaries, and is called the Union Medical College. When in 1908, the United States, finding that the indemnity for the Boxer outrages awarded her was excessive, agreed to forgo the payment of £2,500,000, China undertook to spend an equal amount in sending students to America.The general verdict of foreign observers on the working of the new system up to 1910 was that in many instances the teaching was ineffective, but there were notable exceptions. The best teachers, next to Europeans, were foreign or mission-trained Chinese. The Japanese employed as teachers were often ignorant of Chinese and were not as a rule very successful. (See further §History.) A remarkable indication of the thirst for western learning and culture was the translation into Chinese and their diffusion throughout the country of numerous foreign standard and other works, including modern fiction.ThePeking Gazette, which is sometimes called the oldest paper in the world, is not a newspaper in the ordinary sense, but merely a court gazette for publishing imperial decrees and such public documents as the government may wish to give out. It never contains original articles nor any discussion of public affairs. The firstgenuine native newspaper was published at Shanghai about 1870. It was termed theShen PaoorShanghai News, and was aNative press.Chinese speculation under foreign protection, the first editor being an Englishman. It was some years before it made much headway, but success came, and it was followed by various imitators, some published at Shanghai, some at other treaty ports and at Hong-Kong. In 1910 there were over 200 daily, weekly or monthly journals in China. The effect of this mass of literature on the public mind of China is of first-rate importance.The attitude of the central government towards the native press is somewhat undefined. Official registration of a newspaper is required before postal facilities are given. There are no press laws, but as every official is a law unto himself in these matters, there is nothing to prevent him from summarily suppressing an obnoxious newspaper and putting the editor in prison. The emperor, among other reform edicts which provoked thecoup d’étatof 1898, declared that newspapers were a boon to the public and appointed one of them a government organ. The empress-dowager revoked this decree, and declared that the public discussion of affairs of state in the newspapers was an impertinence, and ought to be suppressed. Nevertheless the newspapers continued to flourish, and their outspoken criticism had a salutary effect on the public and on the government. The official classes seem to have become alarmed at the independent attitude of the newspapers, but instead of a campaign of suppression the method was adopted, about 1908, of bringing the vernacular press under official control. This was accomplished chiefly by the purchase of the newspapers by the mandarins, with the result that at the beginning of 1910 there was said to be hardly an independent native daily newspaper left in China. The use of government funds to subsidize or to purchase newspapers and thus to stifle or mislead public opinion provoked strong protests from members of the Nanking provincial council at its first sitting in the autumn of 1909. The appropriation by the Shanghai Taot‘ai of moneys belonging to the Huangpu conservancy fund for subsidizing papers led to his impeachment by a censor and to the return of the moneys.17
The first education on western lines was given by the Roman Catholic missionaries. In 1852 they founded a college for the education of native priests; they also founded and maintained many primary and some higher schools—mainly if not exclusively for the benefit of their converts. The Protestant missions followed the example of the Roman Catholics, but a new departure, which has had a wide success, was initiated by the American Protestant missionary societies in founding schools—primary and higher—and colleges in which western education was given equally to all comers, Christian or non-Christian. Universities and medical schools have also been established by the missionary societies. They also initiated a movement for the education of girls and opened special schools for their instruction.
Missionary effort apart, the first step towards western education was the establishment of two colleges in 1861, one at Peking, the other at Canton in connexion with the imperial maritime customs. These institutions were known as T‘ung Wen Kwan, and were provided with a staff of foreign professors and teachers. These colleges were mainly schools of languages to enable young Chinese to qualify as interpreters in English, French, &c. Similar schools were established at Canton, Fuchow and one or two other places, with but indifferent results. A more promising plan was conceived in 1880, or thereabouts, by the then viceroy of Nanking, who sent a batch of thirty or forty students to America to receive a regular training on the understanding that on their return they would receive official appointments. The promise was not kept. A report was spread that these students were becoming too much Americanized. They were hastily recalled, and when they returned they were left in obscurity. The next step was taken by the viceroy Chang Chih-tung after the Chino-Japanese War of 1894-95. The viceroy wrote a book,China’s Only Hope, which he circulated throughout the empire, and in which he strongly advocated a reform of the traditional educational system. His scheme was to make Chinese learning the foundation on which a western education should be imparted.15The book was one of the factors in the 1898 reform movement, and Chang Chih-tung’s proposals were condemned when that movement was suppressed. But after the Boxer rising the Peking government adopted his views, and in 1902 regulations were issued for the reform of the old system of public instruction. A university on western lines was established in that year at Peking, the T‘ung Wen Kwan at the capital being incorporated in it. The new educational movement gained enormously in strength as the result of the Russo-Japanese War, and in 1906 a new system, theoretically almost perfect, was established. The new system comprises the study of the Chinese language, literature and composition, modern sciences, history and geography, foreign languages,16gymnastics, drill and, in the higher grades, political economy, and civil and international law.
By 1910 primary and secondary government schools and schools for special subjects (such as agriculture and engineering) had been established in considerable numbers. In every province an Imperial University was also established. The Imperial University at Peking now teaches not only languages and Chinese subjects but also law, chemistry, mathematics, &c. A medical school was founded at Peking in 1906 through the energy of British Protestant missionaries, and is called the Union Medical College. When in 1908, the United States, finding that the indemnity for the Boxer outrages awarded her was excessive, agreed to forgo the payment of £2,500,000, China undertook to spend an equal amount in sending students to America.
The general verdict of foreign observers on the working of the new system up to 1910 was that in many instances the teaching was ineffective, but there were notable exceptions. The best teachers, next to Europeans, were foreign or mission-trained Chinese. The Japanese employed as teachers were often ignorant of Chinese and were not as a rule very successful. (See further §History.) A remarkable indication of the thirst for western learning and culture was the translation into Chinese and their diffusion throughout the country of numerous foreign standard and other works, including modern fiction.
ThePeking Gazette, which is sometimes called the oldest paper in the world, is not a newspaper in the ordinary sense, but merely a court gazette for publishing imperial decrees and such public documents as the government may wish to give out. It never contains original articles nor any discussion of public affairs. The firstgenuine native newspaper was published at Shanghai about 1870. It was termed theShen PaoorShanghai News, and was aNative press.Chinese speculation under foreign protection, the first editor being an Englishman. It was some years before it made much headway, but success came, and it was followed by various imitators, some published at Shanghai, some at other treaty ports and at Hong-Kong. In 1910 there were over 200 daily, weekly or monthly journals in China. The effect of this mass of literature on the public mind of China is of first-rate importance.
The attitude of the central government towards the native press is somewhat undefined. Official registration of a newspaper is required before postal facilities are given. There are no press laws, but as every official is a law unto himself in these matters, there is nothing to prevent him from summarily suppressing an obnoxious newspaper and putting the editor in prison. The emperor, among other reform edicts which provoked thecoup d’étatof 1898, declared that newspapers were a boon to the public and appointed one of them a government organ. The empress-dowager revoked this decree, and declared that the public discussion of affairs of state in the newspapers was an impertinence, and ought to be suppressed. Nevertheless the newspapers continued to flourish, and their outspoken criticism had a salutary effect on the public and on the government. The official classes seem to have become alarmed at the independent attitude of the newspapers, but instead of a campaign of suppression the method was adopted, about 1908, of bringing the vernacular press under official control. This was accomplished chiefly by the purchase of the newspapers by the mandarins, with the result that at the beginning of 1910 there was said to be hardly an independent native daily newspaper left in China. The use of government funds to subsidize or to purchase newspapers and thus to stifle or mislead public opinion provoked strong protests from members of the Nanking provincial council at its first sitting in the autumn of 1909. The appropriation by the Shanghai Taot‘ai of moneys belonging to the Huangpu conservancy fund for subsidizing papers led to his impeachment by a censor and to the return of the moneys.17
(X.)
III. Economics
Agriculture and Industry.
China is pre-eminently an agricultural country. The great majority of its inhabitants are cultivators of the soil. The holdings are in general very small, and the methods of farming primitive. Water is abundant and irrigation common over large areas. Stock-raising, except in Sze-ch‘uen and Kwang-tung, is only practised to a small extent; there are few large herds of cattle or flocks of sheep, nor are there any large meadows, natural or cultivated. In Sze-ch‘uen yaks, sheep and goats are reared in the mountains, and buffaloes and a fine breed of ponies on the plateau. Cattle are extensively reared in the mountainous districts of Kwang-tung. The camel, horse and donkey are reared in Chih-li. Forestry is likewise neglected. While the existing forests, found mainly in high regions in the provinces of Hu-nan, Fu-kien and Kwei-chow, are disappearing and timber has to be imported, few trees are planted. This does not apply to fruit trees, which are grown in great variety, while horticulture is also a favourite pursuit.
The Chinese farmer, if his methods be primitive, is diligent and persevering. In the richer and most thickly populated districts terraces are raised on the mountain sides, and even the tops of lofty hills are cultivated. The nature of the soil and means of irrigation as well as climate are determining factors in the nature of the crops grown; rice and cotton, for example, are grown in the most northern as well as the most southern districts of China. This is, however, exceptional and each climatic region has its characteristic cultures.
The loess soil (see §Geology) is the chief element in determining the agricultural products of north China. Loess soil bears excellent crops, and not merely on the lower grounds, but at altitudes of 6000 and 8000 ft. Wherever loess is found theSoils.peasant can live and thrive. Only one thing is essential, and that is the annual rainfall. As, owing to the porous nature of loess, no artificial irrigation is possible, if the rain fails the crops must necessarily fail. Thus seasons of great famine alternate with seasons of great plenty. It appears, also, that the soil needs little or no manuring and very little tillage. From its extremely friable nature it is easily broken up, and thus a less amount of labour is required than in other parts. The extreme porosity of the soil probably also accounts for the length of time it will go on bearing crops without becoming exhausted. The rainfall, penetrating deeply into the soil in the absence of stratification, comes into contact with the moisture retained below, which holds in solution whatever inorganic salts the soil may contain, and thus the vegetation has an indefinite store to draw upon.18There is no one dominant deposit in south China, where red sandstone and limestone formations are frequent. Cultivation here is not possible on the high elevations as in the north, but in the plains and river valleys the soil is exceedingly fertile, while the lower slopes of the mountains are also cultivated. In the north, moreover, but one crop, in general, can be raised in the year. In the centre two and sometimes three crops are raised yearly, and in the south, especially in the lower basin of the Si-kiang, three crops are normally gathered. In the north, too, the farmer has frequently to contend with drought or with rain or floods; in the central and southern regions the weather is more settled.In the north of China wheat, barley, millet, buckwheat and maize are the staple crops. Beans and peas are also cultivated. Rice thrives in north-east Kan-suh, in some districts of Shan-si, in the extreme south of Shan-tung and in parts ofDistribution of crops.the Wei-ho plain in Shen-si. Cotton is grown in Shen-si and Shan-tung. In Kan-suh and Shen-si two crops are raised in favoured localities, cereals in spring and cotton or rice in summer. Tobacco and the poppy are also grown in several of the northern provinces. Rhubarb and fruit trees are largely cultivated in the western part of north China.In the central provinces tea, cotton, rice and ramie fibre are the chief crops. Tea is most largely cultivated in Ngan-hui, Kiang-si, Hu-peh, Hu-nan, Sze-ch‘uen and Yun-nan. Cotton is chiefly grown in Kiang-su, Ngan-hui and Hu-peh. The seed is sown in May and the crops gathered in September. The cotton is known as white and yellow, the white variety being the better and the most cultivated. The poppy is largely cultivated and, in connexion with the silk industry, the mulberry tree. The mulberry is found principally in the provinces of Sze-ch‘uen, Kiang-su and Cheh-kiang. The central provinces are also noted for their gum-lac, varnish and tallow trees.The crops of the south-eastern provinces are much the same as those of the central provinces, but are predominantly rice, the sugar-cane, ground-nuts and cinnamon. Tea is the chief crop in Fu-kien. The sugar-cane is principally cultivated in Kwang-tung, Fu-kien and Sze-ch‘uen. In the south-western provinces the poppy, tea, tobacco and rice are the chief crops. Wheat, maize and barley are also largely raised.While rice does not, unlike tea and cotton, form the principal crop of any one province it is more universally cultivated than any other plant and forms an important item in the products of all the central and southern provinces. Regarding China as a whole it forms the staple product and food of the country. Two chief varieties are grown, that suited only to low-lying regions requiring ample water and the red rice cultivated in the uplands. Next to rice the most extensively cultivated plants are tea and cotton, the sugar-cane, poppy and bamboo. Besides the infinite variety of uses to which the wood of the bamboo is applied, its tender shoots and its fruit are articles of diet.Fruit is extensively cultivated throughout China. In the northern provinces the chief fruits grown are pears, plums, apples, apricots, peaches, medlars, walnuts and chestnuts, and in Kan-suh and Shan-tung the jujube (q.v.). Strawberries are anFruits.important crop in Kan-suh. In Shan-si, S.W. Chih-li and Shan-tung the vine is cultivated; the grapes of Shan-si are reputed to produce the best wine of China. Oranges are also grown in favoured localities in the north. The chief fruits of the central and southern provinces are the orange, lichi, mango, persimmon, banana, vine and pineapple, but the fruits of the northern regions are also grown. The coco-nut and other palms flourish on the southern coast.As shown above, the poppy has been grown in almost every district of China. In 1906 it was chiefly cultivated in the following provinces: Yun-nan, Kwei-chow, Sze-ch‘uen, Kan-suh, Shen-si, Shan-si, Shan-tung, Ho-nan, Kiang-su (northernThe poppy.part) and Cheh-kiang. The poppy is first mentioned in Chinese literature in a book written in the first half of the 8th centuryA.D., and its medicinal qualities are referred to in theHerbalist’s Treasuryof 973. It was not then nor for centuries later grown in China for the preparation of opium.19There is no evidence to show that the Chinese ever took opium in the shape of pills (otherwise than medicinally). The cultivation of the poppy for the manufacture of opium began in China in the 17th century, but it was not until after 1796, when the importation of foreign opium was declared illegal, that the plant was cultivated on an extensive scale. After 1906 large areas which had been devoted to the poppy were given over to other crops, in consequence of the imperial edict aimed at the suppression of opium-smoking (see §History).
The loess soil (see §Geology) is the chief element in determining the agricultural products of north China. Loess soil bears excellent crops, and not merely on the lower grounds, but at altitudes of 6000 and 8000 ft. Wherever loess is found theSoils.peasant can live and thrive. Only one thing is essential, and that is the annual rainfall. As, owing to the porous nature of loess, no artificial irrigation is possible, if the rain fails the crops must necessarily fail. Thus seasons of great famine alternate with seasons of great plenty. It appears, also, that the soil needs little or no manuring and very little tillage. From its extremely friable nature it is easily broken up, and thus a less amount of labour is required than in other parts. The extreme porosity of the soil probably also accounts for the length of time it will go on bearing crops without becoming exhausted. The rainfall, penetrating deeply into the soil in the absence of stratification, comes into contact with the moisture retained below, which holds in solution whatever inorganic salts the soil may contain, and thus the vegetation has an indefinite store to draw upon.18
There is no one dominant deposit in south China, where red sandstone and limestone formations are frequent. Cultivation here is not possible on the high elevations as in the north, but in the plains and river valleys the soil is exceedingly fertile, while the lower slopes of the mountains are also cultivated. In the north, moreover, but one crop, in general, can be raised in the year. In the centre two and sometimes three crops are raised yearly, and in the south, especially in the lower basin of the Si-kiang, three crops are normally gathered. In the north, too, the farmer has frequently to contend with drought or with rain or floods; in the central and southern regions the weather is more settled.
In the north of China wheat, barley, millet, buckwheat and maize are the staple crops. Beans and peas are also cultivated. Rice thrives in north-east Kan-suh, in some districts of Shan-si, in the extreme south of Shan-tung and in parts ofDistribution of crops.the Wei-ho plain in Shen-si. Cotton is grown in Shen-si and Shan-tung. In Kan-suh and Shen-si two crops are raised in favoured localities, cereals in spring and cotton or rice in summer. Tobacco and the poppy are also grown in several of the northern provinces. Rhubarb and fruit trees are largely cultivated in the western part of north China.
In the central provinces tea, cotton, rice and ramie fibre are the chief crops. Tea is most largely cultivated in Ngan-hui, Kiang-si, Hu-peh, Hu-nan, Sze-ch‘uen and Yun-nan. Cotton is chiefly grown in Kiang-su, Ngan-hui and Hu-peh. The seed is sown in May and the crops gathered in September. The cotton is known as white and yellow, the white variety being the better and the most cultivated. The poppy is largely cultivated and, in connexion with the silk industry, the mulberry tree. The mulberry is found principally in the provinces of Sze-ch‘uen, Kiang-su and Cheh-kiang. The central provinces are also noted for their gum-lac, varnish and tallow trees.
The crops of the south-eastern provinces are much the same as those of the central provinces, but are predominantly rice, the sugar-cane, ground-nuts and cinnamon. Tea is the chief crop in Fu-kien. The sugar-cane is principally cultivated in Kwang-tung, Fu-kien and Sze-ch‘uen. In the south-western provinces the poppy, tea, tobacco and rice are the chief crops. Wheat, maize and barley are also largely raised.
While rice does not, unlike tea and cotton, form the principal crop of any one province it is more universally cultivated than any other plant and forms an important item in the products of all the central and southern provinces. Regarding China as a whole it forms the staple product and food of the country. Two chief varieties are grown, that suited only to low-lying regions requiring ample water and the red rice cultivated in the uplands. Next to rice the most extensively cultivated plants are tea and cotton, the sugar-cane, poppy and bamboo. Besides the infinite variety of uses to which the wood of the bamboo is applied, its tender shoots and its fruit are articles of diet.
Fruit is extensively cultivated throughout China. In the northern provinces the chief fruits grown are pears, plums, apples, apricots, peaches, medlars, walnuts and chestnuts, and in Kan-suh and Shan-tung the jujube (q.v.). Strawberries are anFruits.important crop in Kan-suh. In Shan-si, S.W. Chih-li and Shan-tung the vine is cultivated; the grapes of Shan-si are reputed to produce the best wine of China. Oranges are also grown in favoured localities in the north. The chief fruits of the central and southern provinces are the orange, lichi, mango, persimmon, banana, vine and pineapple, but the fruits of the northern regions are also grown. The coco-nut and other palms flourish on the southern coast.
As shown above, the poppy has been grown in almost every district of China. In 1906 it was chiefly cultivated in the following provinces: Yun-nan, Kwei-chow, Sze-ch‘uen, Kan-suh, Shen-si, Shan-si, Shan-tung, Ho-nan, Kiang-su (northernThe poppy.part) and Cheh-kiang. The poppy is first mentioned in Chinese literature in a book written in the first half of the 8th centuryA.D., and its medicinal qualities are referred to in theHerbalist’s Treasuryof 973. It was not then nor for centuries later grown in China for the preparation of opium.19There is no evidence to show that the Chinese ever took opium in the shape of pills (otherwise than medicinally). The cultivation of the poppy for the manufacture of opium began in China in the 17th century, but it was not until after 1796, when the importation of foreign opium was declared illegal, that the plant was cultivated on an extensive scale. After 1906 large areas which had been devoted to the poppy were given over to other crops, in consequence of the imperial edict aimed at the suppression of opium-smoking (see §History).
Mining.—The mineral resources of China are great, but the government has shown a marked repugnance to allow foreignersto work mines, and the mineral wealth has been very inadequately exploited. Mining operations are controlled by the Board of Commerce. In 1907 this board drew up regulations respecting the constitution of mining and other companies. They contained many features against which foreign powers protested.
Coal, iron, copper and tin are the principal minerals found in China; there are also extensive deposits of coal and other minerals in Manchuria. In China proper the largest coal measures are found in Shan-si, Hu-nan, Kwei-chow and Sze-ch‘uen.Coal.There are also important coalfields in Chih-li, Shan-tung, Shen-si, Ho-nan, Yun-nan, Hu-peh and Kwang-tung—and almost all of the seven other provinces have also coal measures of more or less value. The lack of transport facilities as well as the aversion from the employment of foreign capital has greatly hindered the development of mining. Numerous small mines have been worked for a long period by the natives in the province of Hu-nan. There are two principal local fields in this province, one lying in the basin of the Lei river and yielding anthracite, and the other in the basin of the Siang river yielding bituminous coal. Both rivers drain into the Yangtsze, and there is thus an easy outlet by water to Hankow. The quality of the coal, however, is inferior, as the stratification has been much disturbed, and the coal-seams have been in consequence crushed and broken. The largest coalfield in China lies in the province of Shan-si. Coal and iron have here been worked by the natives from time immemorial, but owing to the difficulty of transport they have attained only a limited local circulation. The whole of southern Shan-si, extending over 30,000 sq. m., is one vast coalfield, and contains, according to the estimate of Baron von Richthofen, enough coal to last the world at the present rate of consumption for several thousand years. The coal-seams, which are from 20 to 36 ft. in thickness, rest conformably on a substructure of limestone. The stratification is throughout undisturbed and practically horizontal. As the limestone bed is raised some 2000 ft. above the neighbouring plain the coal-seams crop out in all directions. Mining is thus carried on by adits driven into the face of the formation, rendering the mining of the coal extremely easy. The coalfield is divided into two by a mountain range of ancient granitic formation running north-east and south-west, termed the Ho-shan. It is of anterior date to the limestone and coal formations, and has not affected the uniformity of the stratification, but it has this peculiarity, that the coal on the east side is anthracite, and that on the west side is bituminous. A concession to work coal and iron in certain specified districts in this area was granted to a British company, the Peking Syndicate, together with the right to connect the mines by railway with water navigation. The syndicate built a railway in Shan-si from P‘ingyang to Tsi-chow-fu, the centre of a vast coalfield, and connected with the main Peking-Hankow line; lines to serve coal mines have also been built in Hu-nan and other provinces. The earliest in date was that to the K‘aip‘ing collieries in the east of the province of Chih-li, the railway connecting the mines with the seaport of Taku. The coal at K‘aip‘ing is a soft bituminous coal with a large proportion of dust. The output is about 1,500,000 tons per annum. A mine has also been opened in the province of Hu-peh, about 60 m. below Hankow, and near the Yangtsze, in connexion with iron-works.Iron ore of various qualities is found almost as widely diffused as coal. The districts where it is most worked at present lie within the coalfield of Shan-si, viz. at Tsi-chow-fu and P‘ing-ting-chow. The ore is a mixture of clay iron ore andIron.spathic ore, together with limonite and hematite. It is found abundantly in irregular deposits in the Coal Measures, and is easily smelted by the natives in crucibles laid in open furnaces. This region supplies nearly the whole of north China with the iron required for agricultural and domestic use. The out-turn must be very considerable, but no data are available for forming an accurate estimate. The province of Sze-ch‘uen also yields an abundance of iron ores of various kinds. They are worked by the natives in numerous places, but always on a small scale and for local consumption only. The ores occur in the Coal Measures, predominant among them being a clay iron ore. Hu-nan, Fu-kien, Cheh-kiang and Shan-tung all furnish iron ores. Iron (found in conjunction with coal) is worked in Manchuria.Copper is found chiefly in the provinces of Kwei-chow and Yun-nan, where a rich belt of copper-bearing ores runs east and west across both provinces, and including south Sze-ch‘uen. The chief centres of production are at the cities of Tung-ch‘uen-fu,Copper, tin, &c.Chow-t‘ung and Ning-yuen. The mines are worked as a government monopoly, private mining being nominally prohibited. The output is considerable, but no statistics are published by government. Rich veins of copper ore are also worked near Kiu-kiang. Tin is mined in Yun-nan, the headquarters of the industry being the city of Meng-tsze, which since 1909 has been connected with Hanoi by railway. This is an important industry, the value of tin exported in 1908 being £600,000. Tin is also mined in Hai-nan and lead in Yun-nan. Antimony ore is exported from Hu-nan; petroleum is found in the upper Yangtsze region. Quicksilver is obtained in Kwei-chow. Salt is obtained from brine wells in Shan-si and Sze-ch‘uen, and by evaporation from sea water. Excellent kaolin abounds in the north-eastern part of Kiang-si, and is largely used in the manufacture of porcelain.The Chinese government has opened small gold mines at Hai-nan, in which island silver is also found. A little gold-washing is done in the sandy beds of certain rivers, for instance, the Han river and the upper Yangtsze, above Su-chow (Suifu),Precious metals.which here goes by the name of the “Goldsand” river. The amount so extracted is extremely small and hardly pays the labour of washing, but the existence of gold grains points to a matrix higher up. The whole of south-western China has the reputation of being highly metalliferous. Gold is obtained in some quantities on the upper waters of the Amur river, on the frontier between China and Siberia. The washings are carried on by Chinese. Gold has also been found in quartz veins at P‘ing-tu, in Shan-tung, but hardly in paying quantities. There are silver mines in Yun-nan.Manufactures.—The principal native manufactures before the competition of western nations made itself felt were—apart from the preparation of tea and other produce for the market—those of porcelain and silk. The silks and gauzes of Su-chowSilk and porcelain.and Nanking in the province of Kiang-su, and those of Hang-chow in Cheh-kiang, are highly esteemed throughout China. Silk-weaving is still carried on solely in native looms and chiefly in the cities named. The greater part of the silk spun is used in China, but a considerable export trade has grown up and 27% of the world’s supply of raw silk is from China. The reeling of silk cocoons by steam-machinery is supplanting native methods. There are filatures for winding silk at Shanghai, Canton, Chifu and other cities.The most famous porcelain came from the province of Kiang-si, the seat of the industry being the city of King-te-chen. Imperial works were established here about the yearA.D.1000, and the finest porcelain is sent to Peking for the use of the emperor. At one time 1,000,000 work-people were said to be employed, and the kilns numbered 600. The Taiping rebels destroyed the kilns in 1850. Some of them have been rebuilt. “Activity begins to reign anew, but the porcelain turned out is far from equalling in colour and finish that of former times. At the present day King-te-chen has but 160 furnaces and employs 160,000 workmen.”20The common rice bowls sold throughout China are manufactured here. The value of the export sales is said to be about £500,000 yearly.The spinning and weaving of cotton on hand-looms is carried on almost universally. Besides that locally manufactured, the whole of the large import of Indian yarn is worked up into cloth by the women of the household. Four-fifths of the clothingCotton, &c.of the lower classes is supplied by this domestic industry. Of minor industries Indian ink is manufactured in Ngan-hui and Sze-ch‘uen, fans, furniture, lacquer ware and matting in Kwang-tung, dyes in Cheh-kiang and Chih-li, and varnished tiles in Hu-nan. Paper, bricks and earthenware are made in almost all the provinces.Of industries on a large scale—other than those indicated—the most important are cotton-spinning and weaving mills established by foreign companies at Shanghai. Permission to carry on this industry was refused to foreigners until the right was secured by the Japanese treaty following the war of 1894-95. Some native-owned mills had been working before that date, and were reported to have made large profits. Nine mills, with an aggregate of 400,000 spindles, were working in 1906, five of them under foreign management. There are also four or five mills at one or other of the ports working 80,000 spindles more. These mills are all engaged in the manufacture of yarn for the Chinese market, very little weaving being done. Chinese-grown cotton is used, the staple of which is short; only the coarser counts can be spun.At certain large centres flour and rice mills have been erected and are superseding native methods of treating wheat and rice; at Canton there are sugar refineries. At Hanyang near Hankow are large iron-works owned by Chinese. They are supplied with ore from the mines at Ta-ye, 60 m. distant, and turn out (1909) about 300 steel rails a day.Commerce.The foreign trade of China is conducted through the “treaty ports,”i.e.sea and river ports and a few inland cities which by the treaty of Nanking (1842) that of Tientsin (1860) and subsequent treaties have been thrown open to foreigners for purposes of trade. (The Nanking treaty recognized five ports only as open to foreigners—Canton,21Amoy, Fu-chow, Ning-po and Shanghai.) These places are as follows, treaty ports in Manchuria being included: Amoy, Antung, Canton, Chang-sha, Dairen, Chin-kiang, Chinwantao, Ch‘ungk‘ing, Chifu, Fu-chow, Funing (Santuao), Hang-chow, Hankow, I-ch‘ang, Kang-moon, Kiao-chow, Kiu-kiang, K‘iung-chow, Kow-loon, Lappa, Lung-chow, Mengtsze, Mukden, Nanking, Nanning, Ning-po, Niu-chwang, Pakhoi, Sanshui, Shanghai, Shasi, Su-chow, Swatow, Szemao, Tatungkow, Tientsin, Teng-yueh, Wen-chow, Wu-chow, Wuhu, Yo-chow.The progress of the foreign trade of China is set out in the following table. The values are given both in currency and sterling, but it is to be remarked that during the period when silver was falling, that is, from 1875 to 1893, the silver valuation represents much more accurately variations in the volume of trade than does the gold valuation. Gold prices fell continuously during this period, while silver prices were nearly constant. Since 1893 silver prices have tended to rise, and the gold valuation is then more accurate. The conversion from silver to gold is made at the rate of exchange of the day, and therefore varies from year to year.Table of Imports and Exports, exclusive of Bullion.Year.Imports.Exports.Value inTaels.Equivalent inSterling.Value inTaels.Equivalent inSterling.187566,344,000£19,903,00077,308,000£23,193,000188584,803,00022,618,00073,899,00019,206,0001890113,082,00029,213,00096,695,00024,980,0001895154,685,00025,136,000154,964,00025,181,0001898189,991,00028,498,000170,743,00025,612,000*1904344,060,00049,315,000239,486,00034,326,000*1905447,100,79167,065,118227,888,19734,183,229* This marked increase is partly owing to a more complete presentation of statistics; in 1903 an additional number of vessels were placed under the control of the imperial maritime customs.In 1907 the net imports were valued at £67,664,222 and the exports at £42,961,863. In 1908 China suffered from the general depression in trade. In that year the imports were valued at £52,600,730, the exports at £36,888,050. The distribution of the trade among the various countries of the world is shown in the table which is given below. Hong-Kong is a port for trans-shipment. The imports into China from it come originally from Great Britain, India, Germany, France, America, Australia, the Straits Settlements, &c., and the exports from China to it go ultimately to the same countries.Imports into China.(000’s omitted.)Imports from1875.1880.1885.1890.1895.1905.1908.United Kingdom£6340£6382£6396£6,357£5,518£1,971£9,647Hong-Kong82828829940418,61514,33122,24020,033India4451603943062,6612,7535,2204,066Other British possessions396346542571732963. .United States30435188494982711,5385,499Continent of Europe (except Russia)2306716716381,2274,295†3,332Russian Empire. .. .. .231309302422Japan746102114041,9092,7949,1977,000Exports from China.(000’s omitted.)Exports to1875.1880.1885.1890.1895.1905.1908.United Kingdom£8749£8125£5864£3383£1718£2,710£1,673Hong-Kong3824484442328507565112,21812,281India72323157273449408545Other British possessions948874818886586647. .United States230229062213210924994,0553,176Continent of Europe (except Russia)252437601948300434404,697†7,128Russian Empire133912601293228825351,4191,123Japan586642398124824085,3204,949† Germany, France, Belgium and Italy only.The chief imports are cotton goods, opium, rice and sugar, metals, oil, coal and coke, woollen goods and raw cotton, and fish. Cotton goods are by far the most important of the imports. They come chiefly from the United Kingdom, which also exports to China woollen manufactures, metals and machinery. China is next to India the greatest consumer of Manchester goods. The export of plain cotton cloths to China and Hong-Kong has for some years averaged 500,000,000 yds. per annum. The only competitor which Great Britain has in this particular branch of trade is the United States of America, which has been supplying China with increasing quantities of cotton goods. The value in sterling of the total imports into China from the United Kingdom long remained nearly constant, but inasmuch as the gold prices were falling the volume of the export was in reality steadily growing. The imports into England, however, of Chinese produce have fallen off, mainly because China tea has been driven out of the English market by the growth of the India and Ceylon tea trade, and also because the bulk of the China silk is now shipped directly to Lyons and other continental ports instead of to London, as formerly was the rule. The growth of the import of Indian yarn into China has been very rapid. In 1884 the import was 35,000,000 ℔ and in 1904 it reached 217,171,066 ℔. The imports into China from all countries for 1908 were as follows:—Opium£4,563,000Coal and coke1,124,000Cotton goods14,786,000Oil, kerosene2,666,000Raw cotton232,000Rice3,543,000Woollen goods717,000Sugar3,514,000Metals2,956,000Fish, &c.1,028,000The principal exports from China are silk and tea. These two articles, indeed, up to 1880 constituted more than 80% of the whole export. Owing, however, mainly to the fall in silver, and partly also to cheap ocean freights, it has become profitable to place on the European market a vast number of miscellaneous articles of Chinese produce which formerly found no place in the returns of trade. The silver prices in China did not change materially with the fall in silver, and Chinese produce was thus able to compete favourably with the produce of other countries. The following table shows the relative condition of the export trade in 1880 and 1908:—Exports of1880.1908.Silk£9,750,000£11,055,000Tea11,774,0004,384,000Miscellaneous4,058,00021,448,000Total£25,582,000£36,888,000In the miscellaneous class the chief items of exports in 1908 were beans and beancake, £3,142,000; raw cotton, £1,379,000; hides, £1,028,000; straw braid, £1,002,000; furs and skin rugs, £760,000; paper, £458,000; and clothing, £177,000. Sugar, tobacco, mats and matting are also exported. The export of all cereals except pulse is forbidden. Of the tea exported in 1908 the greater part went to Russia and Siberia, the United States and Great Britain. There is a regular export of gold amounting on an average to about a million sterling per annum. A part of it would seem to be the hoardings of the nation brought out by the high price of gold in terms of silver, but a part is virgin gold derived from gold workings in Manchuria on the upper waters of the Amur river.Customs duty is levied on exports as well as imports, both being assessed at rates based on a nominal 5% ad val.Shipping and Navigation.—Besides the over-sea trade China has a large coasting and river trade which is largely carried on by British and other foreign vessels. During the year 1908, 207,605 vessels, of 83,991,289 tons (86,600 being steamers of 77,955,525 tons), entered and cleared Chinese ports.22Of these 28,445 vessels of 34,405,761 tons were British; 33,539 of 11,998,588 tons, Chinese vessels of foreign type; 103,124 of 4,947,272 tons, Chinese junks; 5496 vessels of 6,585,671 tons, German; 30,708 of 18,055,138 tons, Japanese; 653 of 998,775 tons, American; 3901 of 5,071,689 tons, French; 1033 of 980,635 tons, Norwegian.Of vessels engaged in the foreign trade only the entrances during the year numbered 38,556 of 12,187,140 tons, and the clearances 36,602 of 12,057,126 tons. The nationality of the vessels (direct foreign trade) was mainly as follows:—Nationality1908.Entrances.Clearances.No.Tons.No.Tons.British4,5694,678,0944,6144,754,087German8911,195,7759281,124,872Norwegian255254,211259255,295French468629,680468616,883American136440,602131439,947Japanese2,1872,587,8182,0462,461,132Chinese29,7752,001,87227,8881,915,258The tonnage of the Dutch, Austrian and Russian vessels cleared and entered was in each case between 102,000 and 127,000.Communications.External communication is carried on by ancient caravan routes crossing Central Asia, by the trans-Siberian railway, which isincreasingly used for passenger traffic, but chiefly by steamship, the steamers being almost entirely owned by foreign companies. There is regular and rapid communication with Europe (via the Suez canal route) and with Japan and the Pacific coast of America. Other lines serve the African and the Australasian trade. The only important Chinese-owned steamers are those of the Chinese Merchants’ Steam Navigation Company, which has its headquarters at Shanghai.Internal communications are by river, canal, road and railway, the railways since the beginning of the 20th century having become a very important factor. In 1898 the Chinese government agreed that all internal waterways should be open to foreign and native steamers, and in 1907 there were on the registers of the river ports for inland water traffic 609 steamers under the Chinese flag and 255 under foreign flags.Railways.—A short line of railway between Shanghai and Wusung was opened in 1875. The fate of this pioneer railway may be mentioned as an introduction to what follows. The railway was really built without any regular permission from the Chinese government, but it was hoped that, once finished and working, the irregularity would be overlooked in view of the manifestThe Pioneer Line destroyed.benefit to the people. This might have been accomplished but for an unfortunate accident which happened on the line a few months after it was opened. A Chinaman was run over and killed, and this event, of course, intensified the official opposition, and indeed threatened to bring about a riot. The working of the line was stopped by order of the British minister, and thereupon negotiations were entered into with a view to selling the line to the Chinese government. A bargain was struck sufficiently favourable to the foreign promoters of the line, and it was further agreed that, pending payment of the instalments which were spread over a year, the line should continue to be worked by the company. The expectation was that when the officials once got the line into their own hands, and found it a paying concern, they would continue to run it in their own interest. Not so, however, did things fall out. The very day that the twelve months were up the line was closed; the engines were dismantled, the rails and sleepers were torn up, and the whole concern was shipped off to the distant island of Formosa, where carriages, axles and all the rest of the gear were dumped on the shore and left for the most part to disappear in the mud. The spacious area of the Shanghai station was cleared of its buildings, and thereon was erected a temple to the queen of heaven by way of purifying the sacred soil of China from such abomination. This put a stop for nearly twenty years to all efforts on the part of foreigners to introduce railways into China. The next step in railway construction was taken by the Chinese themselves, and on the initiative of Li Hung-chang.China’s first efforts.In 1886 a company was formed under official patronage, and it built a short line, to connect the coal-mines of K‘aip‘ing in Chih-li with the mouth of the Peiho river at Taku. The government next authorized the formation of a Native Merchants’ Company, under official control, to build a line from Taku to Tientsin, which was opened to traffic in 1888. It was not, however, till nine years later, viz. in 1897, that the line was completed as far as Peking. A British engineer, Mr Kinder, was responsible for the construction of the railway. Meantime, however, the extension had been continued north-east along the coast as far as Shanhai-Kwan, and a farther extension subsequently connected with the treaty port of Niu-chwang. The money for these extensions was mostly found by the government, and the whole line is now known as the Imperial Northern railway. The length of the line is 600 m. Meanwhile the high officials of the empire had gradually been brought round to the idea that railway development was in itself a good thing. Chang Chih-tung, then viceroy of the Canton provinces, memorialized strongly in this sense, with the condition, however, that the railways should be built with Chinese capital and of Chinese materials. In particular, he urged the making of a line to connect Peking with Hankow forThe era of concessions.strategic purposes. The government took him at his word, and he was transferred from Canton to Hankow, with authority to proceed forthwith with his railway. True to his purpose, he at once set to work to construct iron-works at Hankow. Smelting furnaces, rolling mills, and all the machinery necessary for turning out steel rails, locomotives, &c., were erected. Several years were wasted over this preliminary work, and over £1,000,000 sterling was spent, only to find that the works after all were a practical failure. Steel rails could be made, but at a cost two or three times what they could be procured for in Europe. After the Japanese War the hope of building railways with Chinese capital was abandoned. A prominent official named Sheng Hsuan-hwai was appointed director-general of railways, and empowered to enter into negotiations with foreign financiers for the purpose of raising loans. It was still hoped that at least the main control would remain in Chinese hands, but the diplomatic pressure of France and Russia caused even that to be given up, and Great Britain insisting on equal privileges for her subjects, the future of railways in China remained in the hands of the various concessionaires. But after the defeat of Russia by Japan (1904-1905) the theory of the undivided Chinese control of railways was resuscitated. The new spirit was exemplified in the contracts for the financing and construction of three railways—the Canton-Kowloon line in 1907, and the Tientsin-Yangtsze and the Shanghai-Hangchow-Ning-po lines in 1908. In the first of these instances the railway was mortgaged as security for the loan raised for its construction, and its finance and working were to be modelled on the arrangements obtaining in the case of the Imperial Northern railway, under which the administration, while vested in the Chinese government, was supervised by a British accountant and chief engineer. In the other two instances, however, no such security was offered; the Chinese government undertook the unfettered administration of the foreign capital invested in the lines, and the Europeans connected with these works became simply Chinese employés. Moreover, in 1908 the Peking-Hankow line was redeemed from Belgian concessionaires, a 5% loan of £5,000,000 being raised for the purpose in London and Paris. In that year there was much popular outcry against foreign concessionaires being allowed to carry out the terms of their contract, and the British and Chinese corporation in consequence parted with their concession for the Su-chow, Ning-po and Hang-chow railway, making instead a loan of £1,500,000 to the ministry of communications for the provinces through which the line would run. A double difficulty was encountered in the construction and management of the railways; the reconciliation of the privileges accorded to foreign syndicates and governments with the “Recovery of Rights” campaign, and the reconciliation of the claims of the central government at Peking with the demands of theAdministration.provincial authorities. As to the foreigners, Great Britain, France, Germany, the United States, Russia and Japan, all had claims and concessions, many of them conflicting; while as between Peking and the provinces there was a quarrel mainly concerned with the spoils and “squeezes” to be obtained by railway construction; in some instances the provinces proved more powerful than the central government, as in the case of the Su-chow-Ning-po line, and notably in the matter of the Tientsin-Pukau (Nanking) railway. In that case the provincial authorities overrode the central government, with the result that “for wholesale jobbery, waste and mismanagement the enterprise acquired unenviable notoriety in a land where these things are generally condoned.” The good record of one or two lines notwithstanding, the management of the railways under Chinese control had proved, up to 1910, inefficient and corrupt.23Nevertheless, so great was the economic development following the opening of the line, that in Chinese hands the Peking-Hankow railway yielded a profit.The main scheme of the railway systems of China is simple. It consists of lines, more or less parallel, running roughly north and south, linked by cross lines with coast ports, or abutting on navigable rivers. One great east and west line willThe Railway systems.run through central China, from Hankow to Sze-ch‘uen. Connexion with Europe is afforded by the Manchuria-trans-Siberia main line, which has a general east and west direction. From Harbin on this railway a branch runs south to Mukden, which since 1908 has become an important railway centre. Thence one line goes due south to Port Arthur; another south-east to An-tung (on the Yalu) and Korea; a third south and west to Tientsin and Peking. A branch from the Mukden-Tientsin line goes round the head of the Gulf of Liao-tung and connects Niu-chwang with the Mukden-Port Arthur line. By this route it is 470 m. from Peking to Niu-chwang.From Peking the trunk line (completed in 1905) runs south through the heart of China to Hankow on the Yangtsze-kiang. This section (754 m. long) is popularly known as “the Lu-Han line,” from the first part of the names of the terminal stations. The continuation south of this line from Hankow to Canton was in 1910 under construction. Thus a great north and south connexion nearly 2000 m. long is established from Canton to Harbin. From Mukden southward the line is owned and worked by China.A railway (German concession) starts from Kiao-chow and runs westward through Shan-tung to Chinan Fu, whence an extension farther west to join the main Lu-Han line at Cheng-ting Fu in Chih-li was undertaken. Westward from Cheng-ting Fu a line financed by the Russo-Chinese Bank runs to T‘ai-yuen Fu in Shan-si.Another main north and south railway parallel to, but east of, the Lu-Han line and following more or less the route of the Grand Canal, is designed to connect Tientsin, Su-chow (in Kiang-su), Chin-kiang, Nanking, Shanghai, Hang-chow and Ning-po. The southern section (Nanking, Shanghai, &c.) was open in 1909. This Tientsin-Ning-po railway connects at Chinan-Fu with the Shan-tung lines.A third north and south line starts from Kiu-Kiang on the Yangtsze below Hankow and traversing the centre of Kiang-si province will join the Canton-Hankow line at Shao-Chow in Kwang-tung province. The construction of the first section, Kiu-Kiang to Nanchang (76 m.), began in 1910.In southern China besides the main Canton to Hankow railway (under construction) a line (120 m. long) runs from Canton to Kowloon (opposite Hong-Kong), and there are local lines running inland from Swatow and Fuchow. The French completed in 1909 a trunk line (500 m. long) from Haiphong in Tong King to Yun-nan Fu, the capital of Yun-nan, some 200 m. being in Chinese territory. The French hold concessions for railways in Kwang-si and Kwang-tung.The British government has the right to extend the Burma railway system through Yun-nan and north to the Yangtsze.There are local lines in Hu-nan and Ho-nan which connect with the trunk line from Canton to Peking. The Peking-Kalgan line (122 m. long) is a distinct undertaking. The Chinese propose to continue it another 530 m. north-westward to Urga in Mongolia, and an eventual junction with the trans-Siberian railway in the neighbourhood of Lake Baikal is contemplated. This line would greatly shorten the distance between Moscow and Peking.In 1910 there were open for traffic in China (not reckoning the Russian and Japanese systems in Manchuria,q.v.) over 3000 m. of railway, and 1500 m. of trunk lines were under construction.China is traversed in all directions by roads. Very few are paved of metalled and nearly all are badly kept; speaking generally, the government spends nothing in keeping either the roadsRoads, rivers, and canals.or canals in repair. The roads in several instances are subsidiary to the canals and navigable rivers as a means of communication. The ancient trade routes were twelve in number, viz.24:—1. The West river route (W. from Canton).2. The Cheling Pass route (N.W. from Canton).3. The Meiling Pass route (N. from Canton).4. The Min river route (N.W. from Fu-chow).5. The Lower Yangtsze route (as far W. as Hu-peh and Hu-nan).6. The Upper Yangtsze route (from I‘chang to Sze-ch‘uen).7. The Kwei-chow route.8. The Han river route (Hankow to Shen-si).9. The Grand Canal (already described).10. The Shan-si route.11. The Kiakhta route.12. The Manchurian route.Of the routes named, that by the West river commands the trade of Kwang-si and penetrates to Yun-nan (where it now has to meet the competition of the French railway from Tong King) and Kwei-chow. The Cheling Pass route from Canton is so named as it crosses that pass (1500 ft. high) to reach the water-ways of Hu-nan at Chen-chow on an affluent of the Siang, and thus connects with the Yangtsze. The trade of this route—whence in former times the teas of Hu-nan (Oonam) and Hu-peh (Oopaek) reached Canton—has been largely diverted via Shanghai and up the Yangtsze. The Canton-Hankow railway also supersedes it for through traffic. The route by the Meiling Pass (1000 ft. High) links Canton and Kiu-kiang. This route is used by the King-te Chen porcelain works to send, to Canton the commoner ware, there to be painted with florid and multicoloured designs. The Min river route serves mainly the province of Fu-kien. The Lower Yangtsze is a river route, now mainly served by steamers (though the salt is still carried by junks), and the Upper Yangtsze is a river route also, but much more difficult of navigation. The Kwei-chow route is up the river Yuen from Changte and the Tung-t‘ing lake. The Han river route becomes beyong Sing-nagn Fu a land route over the Tsingling mountains to the capital of Shen-si, and thence on to Kan-suh, Mongolia and Siberia. The Shan-si route from Peking, wholly by road, calls for no detailed account; the Manchurian route is now adequately served by railways. There remains the important Kiakhta route. From Peking it goes to Kalgan (this section is now served by a railway), whence the main route traverses Mongolia, while branches serve Shan-si, Shen-si, Kan-suh, Turkestan, &c. By this route go the caravans bearing tea to Siberia and Russia. Other routes are from Yun-nan to Burma and from Sze-ch‘uen province to Tibet.The government maintains a number of courier roads, which, like the main trade roads, keep approximately to a straight line. These courier roads are sometimes cut in the steep sides of mountains or run through them in tunnels. They are, in the plains, 20 to 25 ft. wide and are occasionally paved. The chief courier roads starting from Peking go to Sze-chu‘en, Yun-nan, Kweilin (in Kwang-si), Canton and Fu-chow. Canals are numerous, especially in the deltas of the Yangtsze and Si-kiang.In the centre and south of China the roads are rarely more than 5 ft. broad and wheeled traffic is seldom possible. Bridges are generally of stone, sometimes of wood; large rivers are crossed by bridges of boats. In the north carts drawn by ponies, mules or oxen are employed; in the centre and south passengers travel in sedan-chairs or in wheelbarrows, or ride on ponies. Occasionally the local authorities employ the corvée system to dig out the bed of a canal, but as a rule roads are left to take care of themselves.Posts and Telegraphs.—Every important city is now connected by telegraph with the capital, and the service is reasonably efficient. In 1907 there were 25,913 m. of telegraph lines. Connexion is also established with the British lines in Burma and the Russian lines in Siberia. The Great Northern Telegraph Company (Danish) and the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company (British) connect Shanghai by cable with Hong-Kong, Japan, Singapore and Europe. An imperialpostal servicewas established in 1896 under the general control of the maritime customs.25By an edict of November 1906 the control of the postal services was transferred to the Board of Communication. The Post Office serves all the open ports, and every important city in the interior. There were in 1910 some 4000 native post-offices, employing 15,000 persons, of whom about 200 only were foreigners. The treaty powers however, still maintain their separate post offices at Shanghai, and several other treaty ports for the despatch and receipt of mails from Europe. During the years 1901-1908 mail matters increased from ten millions to two hundred and fifty-two millions of items; and the 250 tons of parcels handled to 27,155 tons. In postal matters China has adopted a most progressive attitude. The imperial post conforms in all respects to the universal Postal Union regulations.
Coal, iron, copper and tin are the principal minerals found in China; there are also extensive deposits of coal and other minerals in Manchuria. In China proper the largest coal measures are found in Shan-si, Hu-nan, Kwei-chow and Sze-ch‘uen.Coal.There are also important coalfields in Chih-li, Shan-tung, Shen-si, Ho-nan, Yun-nan, Hu-peh and Kwang-tung—and almost all of the seven other provinces have also coal measures of more or less value. The lack of transport facilities as well as the aversion from the employment of foreign capital has greatly hindered the development of mining. Numerous small mines have been worked for a long period by the natives in the province of Hu-nan. There are two principal local fields in this province, one lying in the basin of the Lei river and yielding anthracite, and the other in the basin of the Siang river yielding bituminous coal. Both rivers drain into the Yangtsze, and there is thus an easy outlet by water to Hankow. The quality of the coal, however, is inferior, as the stratification has been much disturbed, and the coal-seams have been in consequence crushed and broken. The largest coalfield in China lies in the province of Shan-si. Coal and iron have here been worked by the natives from time immemorial, but owing to the difficulty of transport they have attained only a limited local circulation. The whole of southern Shan-si, extending over 30,000 sq. m., is one vast coalfield, and contains, according to the estimate of Baron von Richthofen, enough coal to last the world at the present rate of consumption for several thousand years. The coal-seams, which are from 20 to 36 ft. in thickness, rest conformably on a substructure of limestone. The stratification is throughout undisturbed and practically horizontal. As the limestone bed is raised some 2000 ft. above the neighbouring plain the coal-seams crop out in all directions. Mining is thus carried on by adits driven into the face of the formation, rendering the mining of the coal extremely easy. The coalfield is divided into two by a mountain range of ancient granitic formation running north-east and south-west, termed the Ho-shan. It is of anterior date to the limestone and coal formations, and has not affected the uniformity of the stratification, but it has this peculiarity, that the coal on the east side is anthracite, and that on the west side is bituminous. A concession to work coal and iron in certain specified districts in this area was granted to a British company, the Peking Syndicate, together with the right to connect the mines by railway with water navigation. The syndicate built a railway in Shan-si from P‘ingyang to Tsi-chow-fu, the centre of a vast coalfield, and connected with the main Peking-Hankow line; lines to serve coal mines have also been built in Hu-nan and other provinces. The earliest in date was that to the K‘aip‘ing collieries in the east of the province of Chih-li, the railway connecting the mines with the seaport of Taku. The coal at K‘aip‘ing is a soft bituminous coal with a large proportion of dust. The output is about 1,500,000 tons per annum. A mine has also been opened in the province of Hu-peh, about 60 m. below Hankow, and near the Yangtsze, in connexion with iron-works.
Iron ore of various qualities is found almost as widely diffused as coal. The districts where it is most worked at present lie within the coalfield of Shan-si, viz. at Tsi-chow-fu and P‘ing-ting-chow. The ore is a mixture of clay iron ore andIron.spathic ore, together with limonite and hematite. It is found abundantly in irregular deposits in the Coal Measures, and is easily smelted by the natives in crucibles laid in open furnaces. This region supplies nearly the whole of north China with the iron required for agricultural and domestic use. The out-turn must be very considerable, but no data are available for forming an accurate estimate. The province of Sze-ch‘uen also yields an abundance of iron ores of various kinds. They are worked by the natives in numerous places, but always on a small scale and for local consumption only. The ores occur in the Coal Measures, predominant among them being a clay iron ore. Hu-nan, Fu-kien, Cheh-kiang and Shan-tung all furnish iron ores. Iron (found in conjunction with coal) is worked in Manchuria.
Copper is found chiefly in the provinces of Kwei-chow and Yun-nan, where a rich belt of copper-bearing ores runs east and west across both provinces, and including south Sze-ch‘uen. The chief centres of production are at the cities of Tung-ch‘uen-fu,Copper, tin, &c.Chow-t‘ung and Ning-yuen. The mines are worked as a government monopoly, private mining being nominally prohibited. The output is considerable, but no statistics are published by government. Rich veins of copper ore are also worked near Kiu-kiang. Tin is mined in Yun-nan, the headquarters of the industry being the city of Meng-tsze, which since 1909 has been connected with Hanoi by railway. This is an important industry, the value of tin exported in 1908 being £600,000. Tin is also mined in Hai-nan and lead in Yun-nan. Antimony ore is exported from Hu-nan; petroleum is found in the upper Yangtsze region. Quicksilver is obtained in Kwei-chow. Salt is obtained from brine wells in Shan-si and Sze-ch‘uen, and by evaporation from sea water. Excellent kaolin abounds in the north-eastern part of Kiang-si, and is largely used in the manufacture of porcelain.
The Chinese government has opened small gold mines at Hai-nan, in which island silver is also found. A little gold-washing is done in the sandy beds of certain rivers, for instance, the Han river and the upper Yangtsze, above Su-chow (Suifu),Precious metals.which here goes by the name of the “Goldsand” river. The amount so extracted is extremely small and hardly pays the labour of washing, but the existence of gold grains points to a matrix higher up. The whole of south-western China has the reputation of being highly metalliferous. Gold is obtained in some quantities on the upper waters of the Amur river, on the frontier between China and Siberia. The washings are carried on by Chinese. Gold has also been found in quartz veins at P‘ing-tu, in Shan-tung, but hardly in paying quantities. There are silver mines in Yun-nan.
Manufactures.—The principal native manufactures before the competition of western nations made itself felt were—apart from the preparation of tea and other produce for the market—those of porcelain and silk. The silks and gauzes of Su-chowSilk and porcelain.and Nanking in the province of Kiang-su, and those of Hang-chow in Cheh-kiang, are highly esteemed throughout China. Silk-weaving is still carried on solely in native looms and chiefly in the cities named. The greater part of the silk spun is used in China, but a considerable export trade has grown up and 27% of the world’s supply of raw silk is from China. The reeling of silk cocoons by steam-machinery is supplanting native methods. There are filatures for winding silk at Shanghai, Canton, Chifu and other cities.
The most famous porcelain came from the province of Kiang-si, the seat of the industry being the city of King-te-chen. Imperial works were established here about the yearA.D.1000, and the finest porcelain is sent to Peking for the use of the emperor. At one time 1,000,000 work-people were said to be employed, and the kilns numbered 600. The Taiping rebels destroyed the kilns in 1850. Some of them have been rebuilt. “Activity begins to reign anew, but the porcelain turned out is far from equalling in colour and finish that of former times. At the present day King-te-chen has but 160 furnaces and employs 160,000 workmen.”20The common rice bowls sold throughout China are manufactured here. The value of the export sales is said to be about £500,000 yearly.
The spinning and weaving of cotton on hand-looms is carried on almost universally. Besides that locally manufactured, the whole of the large import of Indian yarn is worked up into cloth by the women of the household. Four-fifths of the clothingCotton, &c.of the lower classes is supplied by this domestic industry. Of minor industries Indian ink is manufactured in Ngan-hui and Sze-ch‘uen, fans, furniture, lacquer ware and matting in Kwang-tung, dyes in Cheh-kiang and Chih-li, and varnished tiles in Hu-nan. Paper, bricks and earthenware are made in almost all the provinces.
Of industries on a large scale—other than those indicated—the most important are cotton-spinning and weaving mills established by foreign companies at Shanghai. Permission to carry on this industry was refused to foreigners until the right was secured by the Japanese treaty following the war of 1894-95. Some native-owned mills had been working before that date, and were reported to have made large profits. Nine mills, with an aggregate of 400,000 spindles, were working in 1906, five of them under foreign management. There are also four or five mills at one or other of the ports working 80,000 spindles more. These mills are all engaged in the manufacture of yarn for the Chinese market, very little weaving being done. Chinese-grown cotton is used, the staple of which is short; only the coarser counts can be spun.
At certain large centres flour and rice mills have been erected and are superseding native methods of treating wheat and rice; at Canton there are sugar refineries. At Hanyang near Hankow are large iron-works owned by Chinese. They are supplied with ore from the mines at Ta-ye, 60 m. distant, and turn out (1909) about 300 steel rails a day.
Commerce.
The foreign trade of China is conducted through the “treaty ports,”i.e.sea and river ports and a few inland cities which by the treaty of Nanking (1842) that of Tientsin (1860) and subsequent treaties have been thrown open to foreigners for purposes of trade. (The Nanking treaty recognized five ports only as open to foreigners—Canton,21Amoy, Fu-chow, Ning-po and Shanghai.) These places are as follows, treaty ports in Manchuria being included: Amoy, Antung, Canton, Chang-sha, Dairen, Chin-kiang, Chinwantao, Ch‘ungk‘ing, Chifu, Fu-chow, Funing (Santuao), Hang-chow, Hankow, I-ch‘ang, Kang-moon, Kiao-chow, Kiu-kiang, K‘iung-chow, Kow-loon, Lappa, Lung-chow, Mengtsze, Mukden, Nanking, Nanning, Ning-po, Niu-chwang, Pakhoi, Sanshui, Shanghai, Shasi, Su-chow, Swatow, Szemao, Tatungkow, Tientsin, Teng-yueh, Wen-chow, Wu-chow, Wuhu, Yo-chow.
The progress of the foreign trade of China is set out in the following table. The values are given both in currency and sterling, but it is to be remarked that during the period when silver was falling, that is, from 1875 to 1893, the silver valuation represents much more accurately variations in the volume of trade than does the gold valuation. Gold prices fell continuously during this period, while silver prices were nearly constant. Since 1893 silver prices have tended to rise, and the gold valuation is then more accurate. The conversion from silver to gold is made at the rate of exchange of the day, and therefore varies from year to year.
Table of Imports and Exports, exclusive of Bullion.
* This marked increase is partly owing to a more complete presentation of statistics; in 1903 an additional number of vessels were placed under the control of the imperial maritime customs.
In 1907 the net imports were valued at £67,664,222 and the exports at £42,961,863. In 1908 China suffered from the general depression in trade. In that year the imports were valued at £52,600,730, the exports at £36,888,050. The distribution of the trade among the various countries of the world is shown in the table which is given below. Hong-Kong is a port for trans-shipment. The imports into China from it come originally from Great Britain, India, Germany, France, America, Australia, the Straits Settlements, &c., and the exports from China to it go ultimately to the same countries.
Imports into China.(000’s omitted.)
Exports from China.(000’s omitted.)
† Germany, France, Belgium and Italy only.
The chief imports are cotton goods, opium, rice and sugar, metals, oil, coal and coke, woollen goods and raw cotton, and fish. Cotton goods are by far the most important of the imports. They come chiefly from the United Kingdom, which also exports to China woollen manufactures, metals and machinery. China is next to India the greatest consumer of Manchester goods. The export of plain cotton cloths to China and Hong-Kong has for some years averaged 500,000,000 yds. per annum. The only competitor which Great Britain has in this particular branch of trade is the United States of America, which has been supplying China with increasing quantities of cotton goods. The value in sterling of the total imports into China from the United Kingdom long remained nearly constant, but inasmuch as the gold prices were falling the volume of the export was in reality steadily growing. The imports into England, however, of Chinese produce have fallen off, mainly because China tea has been driven out of the English market by the growth of the India and Ceylon tea trade, and also because the bulk of the China silk is now shipped directly to Lyons and other continental ports instead of to London, as formerly was the rule. The growth of the import of Indian yarn into China has been very rapid. In 1884 the import was 35,000,000 ℔ and in 1904 it reached 217,171,066 ℔. The imports into China from all countries for 1908 were as follows:—
The principal exports from China are silk and tea. These two articles, indeed, up to 1880 constituted more than 80% of the whole export. Owing, however, mainly to the fall in silver, and partly also to cheap ocean freights, it has become profitable to place on the European market a vast number of miscellaneous articles of Chinese produce which formerly found no place in the returns of trade. The silver prices in China did not change materially with the fall in silver, and Chinese produce was thus able to compete favourably with the produce of other countries. The following table shows the relative condition of the export trade in 1880 and 1908:—
In the miscellaneous class the chief items of exports in 1908 were beans and beancake, £3,142,000; raw cotton, £1,379,000; hides, £1,028,000; straw braid, £1,002,000; furs and skin rugs, £760,000; paper, £458,000; and clothing, £177,000. Sugar, tobacco, mats and matting are also exported. The export of all cereals except pulse is forbidden. Of the tea exported in 1908 the greater part went to Russia and Siberia, the United States and Great Britain. There is a regular export of gold amounting on an average to about a million sterling per annum. A part of it would seem to be the hoardings of the nation brought out by the high price of gold in terms of silver, but a part is virgin gold derived from gold workings in Manchuria on the upper waters of the Amur river.
Customs duty is levied on exports as well as imports, both being assessed at rates based on a nominal 5% ad val.
Shipping and Navigation.—Besides the over-sea trade China has a large coasting and river trade which is largely carried on by British and other foreign vessels. During the year 1908, 207,605 vessels, of 83,991,289 tons (86,600 being steamers of 77,955,525 tons), entered and cleared Chinese ports.22Of these 28,445 vessels of 34,405,761 tons were British; 33,539 of 11,998,588 tons, Chinese vessels of foreign type; 103,124 of 4,947,272 tons, Chinese junks; 5496 vessels of 6,585,671 tons, German; 30,708 of 18,055,138 tons, Japanese; 653 of 998,775 tons, American; 3901 of 5,071,689 tons, French; 1033 of 980,635 tons, Norwegian.
Of vessels engaged in the foreign trade only the entrances during the year numbered 38,556 of 12,187,140 tons, and the clearances 36,602 of 12,057,126 tons. The nationality of the vessels (direct foreign trade) was mainly as follows:—
The tonnage of the Dutch, Austrian and Russian vessels cleared and entered was in each case between 102,000 and 127,000.
Communications.
External communication is carried on by ancient caravan routes crossing Central Asia, by the trans-Siberian railway, which isincreasingly used for passenger traffic, but chiefly by steamship, the steamers being almost entirely owned by foreign companies. There is regular and rapid communication with Europe (via the Suez canal route) and with Japan and the Pacific coast of America. Other lines serve the African and the Australasian trade. The only important Chinese-owned steamers are those of the Chinese Merchants’ Steam Navigation Company, which has its headquarters at Shanghai.
Internal communications are by river, canal, road and railway, the railways since the beginning of the 20th century having become a very important factor. In 1898 the Chinese government agreed that all internal waterways should be open to foreign and native steamers, and in 1907 there were on the registers of the river ports for inland water traffic 609 steamers under the Chinese flag and 255 under foreign flags.
Railways.—A short line of railway between Shanghai and Wusung was opened in 1875. The fate of this pioneer railway may be mentioned as an introduction to what follows. The railway was really built without any regular permission from the Chinese government, but it was hoped that, once finished and working, the irregularity would be overlooked in view of the manifestThe Pioneer Line destroyed.benefit to the people. This might have been accomplished but for an unfortunate accident which happened on the line a few months after it was opened. A Chinaman was run over and killed, and this event, of course, intensified the official opposition, and indeed threatened to bring about a riot. The working of the line was stopped by order of the British minister, and thereupon negotiations were entered into with a view to selling the line to the Chinese government. A bargain was struck sufficiently favourable to the foreign promoters of the line, and it was further agreed that, pending payment of the instalments which were spread over a year, the line should continue to be worked by the company. The expectation was that when the officials once got the line into their own hands, and found it a paying concern, they would continue to run it in their own interest. Not so, however, did things fall out. The very day that the twelve months were up the line was closed; the engines were dismantled, the rails and sleepers were torn up, and the whole concern was shipped off to the distant island of Formosa, where carriages, axles and all the rest of the gear were dumped on the shore and left for the most part to disappear in the mud. The spacious area of the Shanghai station was cleared of its buildings, and thereon was erected a temple to the queen of heaven by way of purifying the sacred soil of China from such abomination. This put a stop for nearly twenty years to all efforts on the part of foreigners to introduce railways into China. The next step in railway construction was taken by the Chinese themselves, and on the initiative of Li Hung-chang.China’s first efforts.In 1886 a company was formed under official patronage, and it built a short line, to connect the coal-mines of K‘aip‘ing in Chih-li with the mouth of the Peiho river at Taku. The government next authorized the formation of a Native Merchants’ Company, under official control, to build a line from Taku to Tientsin, which was opened to traffic in 1888. It was not, however, till nine years later, viz. in 1897, that the line was completed as far as Peking. A British engineer, Mr Kinder, was responsible for the construction of the railway. Meantime, however, the extension had been continued north-east along the coast as far as Shanhai-Kwan, and a farther extension subsequently connected with the treaty port of Niu-chwang. The money for these extensions was mostly found by the government, and the whole line is now known as the Imperial Northern railway. The length of the line is 600 m. Meanwhile the high officials of the empire had gradually been brought round to the idea that railway development was in itself a good thing. Chang Chih-tung, then viceroy of the Canton provinces, memorialized strongly in this sense, with the condition, however, that the railways should be built with Chinese capital and of Chinese materials. In particular, he urged the making of a line to connect Peking with Hankow forThe era of concessions.strategic purposes. The government took him at his word, and he was transferred from Canton to Hankow, with authority to proceed forthwith with his railway. True to his purpose, he at once set to work to construct iron-works at Hankow. Smelting furnaces, rolling mills, and all the machinery necessary for turning out steel rails, locomotives, &c., were erected. Several years were wasted over this preliminary work, and over £1,000,000 sterling was spent, only to find that the works after all were a practical failure. Steel rails could be made, but at a cost two or three times what they could be procured for in Europe. After the Japanese War the hope of building railways with Chinese capital was abandoned. A prominent official named Sheng Hsuan-hwai was appointed director-general of railways, and empowered to enter into negotiations with foreign financiers for the purpose of raising loans. It was still hoped that at least the main control would remain in Chinese hands, but the diplomatic pressure of France and Russia caused even that to be given up, and Great Britain insisting on equal privileges for her subjects, the future of railways in China remained in the hands of the various concessionaires. But after the defeat of Russia by Japan (1904-1905) the theory of the undivided Chinese control of railways was resuscitated. The new spirit was exemplified in the contracts for the financing and construction of three railways—the Canton-Kowloon line in 1907, and the Tientsin-Yangtsze and the Shanghai-Hangchow-Ning-po lines in 1908. In the first of these instances the railway was mortgaged as security for the loan raised for its construction, and its finance and working were to be modelled on the arrangements obtaining in the case of the Imperial Northern railway, under which the administration, while vested in the Chinese government, was supervised by a British accountant and chief engineer. In the other two instances, however, no such security was offered; the Chinese government undertook the unfettered administration of the foreign capital invested in the lines, and the Europeans connected with these works became simply Chinese employés. Moreover, in 1908 the Peking-Hankow line was redeemed from Belgian concessionaires, a 5% loan of £5,000,000 being raised for the purpose in London and Paris. In that year there was much popular outcry against foreign concessionaires being allowed to carry out the terms of their contract, and the British and Chinese corporation in consequence parted with their concession for the Su-chow, Ning-po and Hang-chow railway, making instead a loan of £1,500,000 to the ministry of communications for the provinces through which the line would run. A double difficulty was encountered in the construction and management of the railways; the reconciliation of the privileges accorded to foreign syndicates and governments with the “Recovery of Rights” campaign, and the reconciliation of the claims of the central government at Peking with the demands of theAdministration.provincial authorities. As to the foreigners, Great Britain, France, Germany, the United States, Russia and Japan, all had claims and concessions, many of them conflicting; while as between Peking and the provinces there was a quarrel mainly concerned with the spoils and “squeezes” to be obtained by railway construction; in some instances the provinces proved more powerful than the central government, as in the case of the Su-chow-Ning-po line, and notably in the matter of the Tientsin-Pukau (Nanking) railway. In that case the provincial authorities overrode the central government, with the result that “for wholesale jobbery, waste and mismanagement the enterprise acquired unenviable notoriety in a land where these things are generally condoned.” The good record of one or two lines notwithstanding, the management of the railways under Chinese control had proved, up to 1910, inefficient and corrupt.23Nevertheless, so great was the economic development following the opening of the line, that in Chinese hands the Peking-Hankow railway yielded a profit.
The main scheme of the railway systems of China is simple. It consists of lines, more or less parallel, running roughly north and south, linked by cross lines with coast ports, or abutting on navigable rivers. One great east and west line willThe Railway systems.run through central China, from Hankow to Sze-ch‘uen. Connexion with Europe is afforded by the Manchuria-trans-Siberia main line, which has a general east and west direction. From Harbin on this railway a branch runs south to Mukden, which since 1908 has become an important railway centre. Thence one line goes due south to Port Arthur; another south-east to An-tung (on the Yalu) and Korea; a third south and west to Tientsin and Peking. A branch from the Mukden-Tientsin line goes round the head of the Gulf of Liao-tung and connects Niu-chwang with the Mukden-Port Arthur line. By this route it is 470 m. from Peking to Niu-chwang.
From Peking the trunk line (completed in 1905) runs south through the heart of China to Hankow on the Yangtsze-kiang. This section (754 m. long) is popularly known as “the Lu-Han line,” from the first part of the names of the terminal stations. The continuation south of this line from Hankow to Canton was in 1910 under construction. Thus a great north and south connexion nearly 2000 m. long is established from Canton to Harbin. From Mukden southward the line is owned and worked by China.
A railway (German concession) starts from Kiao-chow and runs westward through Shan-tung to Chinan Fu, whence an extension farther west to join the main Lu-Han line at Cheng-ting Fu in Chih-li was undertaken. Westward from Cheng-ting Fu a line financed by the Russo-Chinese Bank runs to T‘ai-yuen Fu in Shan-si.
Another main north and south railway parallel to, but east of, the Lu-Han line and following more or less the route of the Grand Canal, is designed to connect Tientsin, Su-chow (in Kiang-su), Chin-kiang, Nanking, Shanghai, Hang-chow and Ning-po. The southern section (Nanking, Shanghai, &c.) was open in 1909. This Tientsin-Ning-po railway connects at Chinan-Fu with the Shan-tung lines.
A third north and south line starts from Kiu-Kiang on the Yangtsze below Hankow and traversing the centre of Kiang-si province will join the Canton-Hankow line at Shao-Chow in Kwang-tung province. The construction of the first section, Kiu-Kiang to Nanchang (76 m.), began in 1910.
In southern China besides the main Canton to Hankow railway (under construction) a line (120 m. long) runs from Canton to Kowloon (opposite Hong-Kong), and there are local lines running inland from Swatow and Fuchow. The French completed in 1909 a trunk line (500 m. long) from Haiphong in Tong King to Yun-nan Fu, the capital of Yun-nan, some 200 m. being in Chinese territory. The French hold concessions for railways in Kwang-si and Kwang-tung.The British government has the right to extend the Burma railway system through Yun-nan and north to the Yangtsze.
There are local lines in Hu-nan and Ho-nan which connect with the trunk line from Canton to Peking. The Peking-Kalgan line (122 m. long) is a distinct undertaking. The Chinese propose to continue it another 530 m. north-westward to Urga in Mongolia, and an eventual junction with the trans-Siberian railway in the neighbourhood of Lake Baikal is contemplated. This line would greatly shorten the distance between Moscow and Peking.
In 1910 there were open for traffic in China (not reckoning the Russian and Japanese systems in Manchuria,q.v.) over 3000 m. of railway, and 1500 m. of trunk lines were under construction.
China is traversed in all directions by roads. Very few are paved of metalled and nearly all are badly kept; speaking generally, the government spends nothing in keeping either the roadsRoads, rivers, and canals.or canals in repair. The roads in several instances are subsidiary to the canals and navigable rivers as a means of communication. The ancient trade routes were twelve in number, viz.24:—
1. The West river route (W. from Canton).
2. The Cheling Pass route (N.W. from Canton).
3. The Meiling Pass route (N. from Canton).
4. The Min river route (N.W. from Fu-chow).
5. The Lower Yangtsze route (as far W. as Hu-peh and Hu-nan).
6. The Upper Yangtsze route (from I‘chang to Sze-ch‘uen).
7. The Kwei-chow route.
8. The Han river route (Hankow to Shen-si).
9. The Grand Canal (already described).
10. The Shan-si route.
11. The Kiakhta route.
12. The Manchurian route.
Of the routes named, that by the West river commands the trade of Kwang-si and penetrates to Yun-nan (where it now has to meet the competition of the French railway from Tong King) and Kwei-chow. The Cheling Pass route from Canton is so named as it crosses that pass (1500 ft. high) to reach the water-ways of Hu-nan at Chen-chow on an affluent of the Siang, and thus connects with the Yangtsze. The trade of this route—whence in former times the teas of Hu-nan (Oonam) and Hu-peh (Oopaek) reached Canton—has been largely diverted via Shanghai and up the Yangtsze. The Canton-Hankow railway also supersedes it for through traffic. The route by the Meiling Pass (1000 ft. High) links Canton and Kiu-kiang. This route is used by the King-te Chen porcelain works to send, to Canton the commoner ware, there to be painted with florid and multicoloured designs. The Min river route serves mainly the province of Fu-kien. The Lower Yangtsze is a river route, now mainly served by steamers (though the salt is still carried by junks), and the Upper Yangtsze is a river route also, but much more difficult of navigation. The Kwei-chow route is up the river Yuen from Changte and the Tung-t‘ing lake. The Han river route becomes beyong Sing-nagn Fu a land route over the Tsingling mountains to the capital of Shen-si, and thence on to Kan-suh, Mongolia and Siberia. The Shan-si route from Peking, wholly by road, calls for no detailed account; the Manchurian route is now adequately served by railways. There remains the important Kiakhta route. From Peking it goes to Kalgan (this section is now served by a railway), whence the main route traverses Mongolia, while branches serve Shan-si, Shen-si, Kan-suh, Turkestan, &c. By this route go the caravans bearing tea to Siberia and Russia. Other routes are from Yun-nan to Burma and from Sze-ch‘uen province to Tibet.
The government maintains a number of courier roads, which, like the main trade roads, keep approximately to a straight line. These courier roads are sometimes cut in the steep sides of mountains or run through them in tunnels. They are, in the plains, 20 to 25 ft. wide and are occasionally paved. The chief courier roads starting from Peking go to Sze-chu‘en, Yun-nan, Kweilin (in Kwang-si), Canton and Fu-chow. Canals are numerous, especially in the deltas of the Yangtsze and Si-kiang.
In the centre and south of China the roads are rarely more than 5 ft. broad and wheeled traffic is seldom possible. Bridges are generally of stone, sometimes of wood; large rivers are crossed by bridges of boats. In the north carts drawn by ponies, mules or oxen are employed; in the centre and south passengers travel in sedan-chairs or in wheelbarrows, or ride on ponies. Occasionally the local authorities employ the corvée system to dig out the bed of a canal, but as a rule roads are left to take care of themselves.
Posts and Telegraphs.—Every important city is now connected by telegraph with the capital, and the service is reasonably efficient. In 1907 there were 25,913 m. of telegraph lines. Connexion is also established with the British lines in Burma and the Russian lines in Siberia. The Great Northern Telegraph Company (Danish) and the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company (British) connect Shanghai by cable with Hong-Kong, Japan, Singapore and Europe. An imperialpostal servicewas established in 1896 under the general control of the maritime customs.25By an edict of November 1906 the control of the postal services was transferred to the Board of Communication. The Post Office serves all the open ports, and every important city in the interior. There were in 1910 some 4000 native post-offices, employing 15,000 persons, of whom about 200 only were foreigners. The treaty powers however, still maintain their separate post offices at Shanghai, and several other treaty ports for the despatch and receipt of mails from Europe. During the years 1901-1908 mail matters increased from ten millions to two hundred and fifty-two millions of items; and the 250 tons of parcels handled to 27,155 tons. In postal matters China has adopted a most progressive attitude. The imperial post conforms in all respects to the universal Postal Union regulations.