The Daily News. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 20. CHINA'S LONG SLEEP.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 215, 20 December 1910, Page 4

The Daily News. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 20. CHINA'S LONG SLEEP.

Tie eyes of statesmen, business men, military men and people of all sorts have lately been turned to China. In the Western sense (and most westerners say it patronisingly) ohina « waking . up „ A representative Chinese who lately returned to-this country after spending a vacation in the land of his birth, said he believed China would become the greatest commercial nation in the world with the help of the American people. As a rival in any matter—commercially, aggressively or in any other way—the potentialities of the great Empire are beyond the conception of any small group of people, who cannot possibly conclude what the outcome would be if the whole nation concentrated in an effort to capture trade or territory. In his already .famous book, "The Chinese," Mr. J. S. Thomson quotes from an article emanating from the Young Chinese Party thus: "Oh, White Faces and red-bristled barbarians, when we of the Flowery Land shall march forth to war, then shall you be smashed, even as are drugs in a mortar." It is interesting to wonder what would become of tie few "red-bristled barbarians" in this-country if. the hordes of the East did take it into their heads to "march forth to war." Mr. Thomson's comment on this cheerful threat is: "The East has always been like the Thibetan glaciers: when any movement warms it, it moves in a mass, and therein has been its danger to opponents since the time of Kublai Khan." There is a new spirit in China, and the old superstitions are being, upset. It has been seen that even the sacred pigtail is going. It is possible the new spirit germinated as a result of the Eusso^Japanese war, "but it certainly has been augmented and strengthened by the actions of European Powers. Kowloon is held by Great Britain, Port Arthur by Japan, Kaio-chou by Germany, Macao by Portugal, Shanghai by three foreign Powers, and Kwang Chow by' France. The European Powers claim the rights of having their subjects who have broken Chinese rules tried by their own courts. China does not love the foreign devil for this, and is also beginning to be decidedly averse to the enormous and lucrative concessions which have been obtained by Europeans at trifling cost. The Young Chinese Party is, of course, the result of Western education, and so these awakened Chinese keep on sending delegations to Pekin demanding a constitution, upper and lower houses of Parliament, juries, freedom of speech, a free press, schools, factories, foreign books, a reasonable criminal code, pardon of. political exiles, advanced railway policies, and a coherent foreign and maritime policy. The Young Chinese Party has leamt all its new ideas in European schools, and among its other wants it desires that the innumerable secret societies in th* Empire shall be merged into political parties. In every tea-house there used to be pasted up the edict: "Do not talk politics. By order." Everybody talks politics now, despite the bills, and fewer heads fall into the basket that used to be the case. Already the Young Chinese have compelled the exclusive Manchus to abandon many ageold privileges. Mixed marriages between Manchus and Chinese are now permitted, and Manchu generals who used to exercise powers equal to Civil Governors of provinces have been deposed. The system of education which lasted for thirteen hundred years is disappearing before the Young Chinese Party. Every village is now trying hard to obtain a day school, and these will conform to the new standard set by the education boards. The new text-books which are gradually being used throughout China use illustrations to the greatest advantage. All the books and maps and globes are prepared in Japan, and thousands of Japanese teachers are employed, a large number being professors of the English language. China sends about thirty thousand scholars to Japan every year. When in 1908 America made the splendid diplomatic move of waiving its rights to the full Boxer indemnity, taking merely half, Ohina enthusiastically replied by recruiting scholars to go to American colleges. China has even begun to edueate its women, and many are going abroad. But perhaps the point of greatest interest to the Westerner is that China has at last decided to take in hand the development of her own great resources. The new railway system of China will revolutionise trade and travelling. Although China is peopled by the most industrious folk in the world, who cultivate .every available bit of land to the last inch, she has millions of acres of undeveloped country which will some day blossom under irrigation. It has been claimed that China, instead of supporting four hundred millions, could comfortably sustain eight hundred millions. To illustrate the common spirit that is animating China in its new development, it is only necessary to say that the shares of the Yuet Han railway were only three dollars each, thus being within easy reach of the poorest Chinese, and that the meeting of shareholders aggregated 30,000 people. Among the most wonderful work done by the Young Chinese Party is the antiopium crusade. Ohina has been spending annually twenty-five million pounds in this terrible drug, but the means to fight it are developing so fas.t that there is real hope that opium will be utterly wiped out. Millions of pamphlets and caricatures are scattered broadcast, the anti-1 opium lecturers exhibiting distorted and I 'stupified victims. Here is a,fine extract i from Mr. Thomson's book picturing the scene at an anti-opium lecture:— I

The procession stopped for the Burning of the Pipes anil the vow of abstinence from opium. Every man carried the evidence of his contrition ami the vessel of his shame. Xut-oil Jumps of best hammered Nanking brass work; trays of gorgeous Xingpo lacquering; ivory and ebony smoking pipes of best Cantonese carving; jars of fuel for the lamps from Manchuria; cups of opium treacle from Macao and Ypanan; the bunml crooked toasting pins with their precious jewel heads —were all cast on an oil-soaked pyre, the 'base of which was made from the lounges and tables contributed bv a converted opium-shop proprietor. One student withdrew his ebony pipe. There was a sigh and audible prayers begging him to '"be a man. 1 ' But the doubters had not read the vehement lire in his eye. He drew a saw from a nail, cut the costly pipe in two, as though it were | cheap white wood, and cast tlu> demolished ca-use of his sorrow on the heap, to the plaudits of the crowd, who, from even the roof of the compound buildings, added to this pile of forsaken idols. , . . A mandarin on behalf of the approving officials .... stepped forth, and all drew back. A singing girl broke through the unconsciously formed circle, and asked to be allowed to add her pipe ami powder-puff. Then there was no more delay. Oil was called for, and poured from kongs until the stock was soaked, when the flame was touched to seal a company of the people in a vow to the heavens that they would chain themselves no more to the leprous past. And if tens of millions of Chinese can cut adrift from their most fascinating sin, what cannot China do when she makes up her mind? And China is new and awake because of the interference of European nations and their greed for gold.