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THE FIGHT FOR THE REPUBLIC IN CHINA

by

B. L. PUTNAM WEALE

Author of _Indiscreet Letters from Peking_, etc.

With 28 Illustrations

London: Hurst & Blackett, Ltd.
Paternoster House, E.C.

1918







[Illustration: President Li Yuan-Hung.]




PREFACE


This volume tells everything that the student or the casual reader needs
to know about the Chinese Question. It is sufficiently exhaustive to
show very clearly the new forces at work, and to bring some realisation
of the great gulf which separates the thinking classes of to-day from
the men of a few years ago; whilst, at the same time, it is sufficiently
condensed not to overwhelm the reader with too great a multitude of
facts.

Particular attention may be devoted to an unique feature--namely, the
Chinese and Japanese documentation which affords a sharp contrast
between varying types of Eastern brains. Thus, in the Memorandum of the
Black Dragon Society (Chapter VII) we have a very clear and illuminating
revelation of the Japanese political mind which has been trained to
consider problems in the modern Western way, but which remains saturated
with theocratic ideals in the sharpest conflict with the Twentieth
Century. In the pamphlet of Yang Tu (Chapter VIII) which launched the
ill-fated Monarchy Scheme and contributed so largely to the dramatic
death of Yuan Shih-kai, we have an essentially Chinese mentality of the
reactionary or corrupt type which expresses itself both on home and
foreign issues in a naively dishonest way, helpful to future diplomacy.
In the Letter of Protest (Chapter X) against the revival of Imperialism
written by Liang Ch'i-chao--the most brilliant scholar living--we have a
Chinese of the New or Liberal China, who in spite of a complete
ignorance of foreign languages shows a marvellous grasp of political
absolutes, and is a harbinger of the great days which must come again to
Cathay. In other chapters dealing with the monarchist plot we see the
official mind at work, the telegraphic despatches exchanged between
Peking and the provinces being of the highest diplomatic interest. These
documents prove conclusively that although the Japanese is more
practical than the Chinese--and more concise--there can be no question
as to which brain is the more fruitful.

Coupled with this discussion there is much matter giving an insight into
the extraordinary and calamitous foreign ignorance about present-day
China, an ignorance which is just as marked among those resident in the
country as among those who have never visited it. The whole of the
material grouped in this novel fashion should not fail to bring
conviction that the Far East, with its 500 millions of people, is
destined to play an important role in _postbellum_ history because of
the new type of modern spirit which is being there evolved. The
influence of the Chinese Republic, in the opinion of the writer, cannot
fail to be ultimately world-wide in view of the practically unlimited
resources in man-power which it disposes of.

In the Appendices will be found every document of importance for the
period under examination,--1911 to 1917. The writer desires to record
his indebtedness to the columns of _The Peking Gazette_, a newspaper
which under the brilliant editorship of Eugene Ch'en--a pure Chinese
born and educated under the British flag--has fought consistently and
victoriously for Liberalism and Justice and has made the Republic a
reality to countless thousands who otherwise would have refused to
believe in it.

PUTNAM WEALE.

PEKING, June, 1917.




CONTENTS


I.--GENERAL INTRODUCTION

II.--THE ENIGMA OF YUAN SHIH-KAI

III.--THE DREAM REPUBLIC
(From the Manchu Abdication to the dissolution of Parliament)

IV.--THE DICTATOR AT WORK
(From the Coup d'etat of the 4th Nov. 1913 to the outbreak of the
World-war, 1st August, 1914)

V.--THE FACTOR OF JAPAN

VI.--THE TWENTY-ONE DEMANDS

VII.--THE ORIGIN OF THE TWENTY-ONE DEMANDS

VIII.--THE MONARCHIST PLOT
1st The Pamphlet of Yang Tu

IX.--THE MONARCHY PLOT
2nd Dr. Goodnow's Memorandum

X.--THE MONARCHY MOVEMENT IS OPPOSED
The Appeal of the Scholar Liang Chi-chao

XI.--THE DREAM EMPIRE
("The People's Voice" and the action of the Powers)

XII.--"THE THIRD REVOLUTION"
The Revolt of Yunnan

XIII.--"THE THIRD REVOLUTION" (_continued_)
Downfall and Death of Yuan Shih-kai

XIV.--THE NEW REGIME--FROM 1916 TO 1917

XV.--THE REPUBLIC IN COLLISION WITH REALITY: TWO TYPICAL INSTANCES OF
"FOREIGN AGGRESSION"

XVI.--CHINA AND THE WAR

XVII.--THE FINAL PROBLEM:--REMODELLING THE POLITICO-ECONOMIC
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CHINA AND THE WORLD

APPENDICES--DOCUMENTS AND MEMORANDA




ILLUSTRATIONS

President Li Yuan-Hung

The Funeral of Yuan-Shih-kai: The Procession passing down the great
Palace Approach with the famous Ch'ien Men (Gate) in the distance

The Provincial Troops of General Chang Hsun at his Headquarters of
Hsuchowfu

The Funeral of Yuan Shih-kai: The Catafalque over the Coffin on its
way to the Railway Station

The Funeral of Yuan Shih-kai: The Procession passing down the great
Palace Approach with the famous Ch'ien Men (Gate) in the distance

An Encampment of "The Punitive Expedition" of 1916 on the Upper
Yangtsze (_By courtesy of Major Isaac Newell, U.S. Military Attache_.)

Revival of the Imperialistic Worship of Heaven by Yuan Shih-kai in
1914: Scene on the Altar of Heaven, with Sacrificial Officers clothed
in costumes dating from 2,000 years ago.

A Manchu Country Fair: The figures in the foreground are all Manchu
Women and Girls

A Manchu Woman grinding Grain

Silk-reeling done in the open under the Walls of Peking

Modern Peking: A Run on a Bank

The Re-opening of Parliament on August 1st, 1916, after three years of
dictatorial rule

The Original Constitutional Drafting Committee of 1913, photographed
on the Steps of the Temple of Heaven, where the Draft was completed

A Presidential Review of Troops in the Southern Hungtung Park outside
Peking: Arrival of the President

President Li Yuan-Hung and the General Staff watching the Review

March-past of an Infantry Division

Modern Peking: The Palace Entrance lined with Troops. Note the New
Type Chinese Policeman in the foreground

The Premier General Tuan Chi-Jui, Head of the Cabinet which decided to
declare war on Germany General Feng Kuo-chang, President of the
Republic The Scholar Liang Chi-chao, sometime Minister of Justice, and
the foremost "Brain" in China

General Tsao-ao, the Hero of the Yunnan Rebellion of 1915-16, who died
from the effects of the campaign

Liang Shih-yi, who was the Power behind Yuan Shih-kai, now proscribed
and living in exile at Hong-Kong

The Famous or Infamous General Chang Hsun, the leading Reactionary in
China to-day, who still commands a force of 30,000 men astride of the
Pukow Railway

The Bas-relief in a Peking Temple, well illustrating Indo-Chinese
Influences

The Late President Yuan Shih-kai

President Yuan Shih-kai photographed immediately after his
Inauguration as Provisional President, March 10th, 1912

The National Assembly sitting as a National Convention engaged on the
Draft of the Permanent Constitution. (Specially photographed by
permission of the Speakers for the Present Work)

View from rear of the Hall of the National Assembly sitting as a
National Convention engaged on the Draft of the Permanent
Constitution. (Specially photographed by permission of the Speakers
for the Present Work)




CHAPTER I

GENERAL INTRODUCTION


The revolution which broke out in China on the 10th October, 1911, and
which was completed with the abdication of the Manchu Dynasty on the
12th February, 1912, though acclaimed as highly successful, was in its
practical aspects something very different. With the proclamation of the
Republic, the fiction of autocratic rule had truly enough vanished; yet
the tradition survived and with it sufficient of the essential machinery
of Imperialism to defeat the nominal victors until the death of Yuan
Shih-kai.

The movement to expel the Manchus, who had seized the Dragon Throne in
1644 from the expiring Ming Dynasty, was an old one. Historians are
silent on the subject of the various secret plots which were always
being hatched to achieve that end, their silence being due to a lack of
proper records and to the difficulty of establishing the simple truth in
a country where rumour reigns supreme. But there is little doubt that
the famous Ko-lao-hui, a Secret Society with its headquarters in the
remote province of Szechuan, owed its origin to the last of the Ming
adherents, who after waging a desperate guerilla warfare from the date
of their expulsion from Peking, finally fell to the low level of
inciting assassinations and general unrest in the vain hope that they
might some day regain their heritage. At least, we know one thing
definitely: that the attempt on the life of the Emperor Chia Ching in
the Peking streets at the beginning of the Nineteenth Century was a
Secret Society plot and brought to an abrupt end the pleasant habit of
travelling among their subjects which the great Manchu Emperors
K'ang-hsi and Ch'ien Lung had inaugurated and always pursued and which
had so largely encouraged the growth of personal loyalty to a foreign
House.

From that day onwards for over a century no Emperor ventured out from
behind the frowning Walls of the Forbidden City, save for brief annual
ceremonies, such as the Worship of Heaven on the occasion of the Winter
Solstice, and during the two "flights"--first in 1860 when Peking was
occupied by an Anglo-French expedition and the Court incontinently
sought sanctuary in the mountain Palaces of Jehol; and, again, in 1900,
when with the pricking of the Boxer bubble and the arrival of the
International relief armies, the Imperial Household was forced along the
stony road to far-off Hsianfu.

The effect of this immurement was soon visible; the Manchu rule, which
was emphatically a rule of the sword, was rapidly so weakened that the
emperors became no more than _rois faineants_ at the mercy of their
minister.[1] The history of the Nineteenth Century is thus logically
enough the history of successive collapses. Not only did overseas
foreigners openly thunder at the gateways of the empire and force an
ingress, but native rebellions were constant and common. Leaving minor
disturbances out of account, there were during this period two huge
Mahommedan rebellions, besides the cataclysmic Taiping rising which
lasted ten years and is supposed to have destroyed the unbelievable
total of one hundred million persons. The empire, torn by internecine
warfare, surrendered many of its essential prerogatives to foreigners,
and by accepting the principle of extraterritoriality prepared the road
to ultimate collapse.

How in such circumstances was it possible to keep alive absolutism? The
answer is so curious that we must be explicit and exhaustive.

The simple truth is that save during the period of vigour immediately
following each foreign conquest (such as the Mongol conquest in the
Thirteenth Century and the Manchu in the Seventeenth) not only has there
never been any absolutism properly so-called in China, but that apart
from the most meagre and inefficient tax-collecting and some
rough-and-ready policing in and around the cities there has never been
any true governing at all save what the people did for themselves or
what they demanded of the officials as a protection against one another.
Any one who doubts these statements has no inkling of those facts which
are the crown as well as the foundation of the Chinese group-system, and
which must be patiently studied in the village-life of the country to be
fitly appreciated. To be quite frank, absolutism is a myth coming down
from the days of Kublai Khan when he so proudly built his _Khanbaligh_
(the Cambaluc of Marco Polo and the forebear of modern Peking) and
filled it with his troops who so soon vanished like the snows of winter.
An elaborate pretence, a deliberate policy of make-believe, ever since
those days invested Imperial Edicts with a majesty which they have never
really possessed, the effacement of the sovereign during the Nineteenth
Century contributing to the legend that there existed in the capital a
Grand and Fearful Panjandrum for whom no miracle was too great and to
whom people and officials owed trembling obedience.

In reality, the office of Emperor was never more than a
politico-religious concept, translated for the benefit of the masses
into socio-economic ordinances. These pronouncements, cast in the form
of periodic homilies called Edicts, were the ritual of government; their
purpose was instructional rather than mandatory; they were designed to
teach and keep alive the State-theory that the Emperor was the High
Priest of the Nation and that obedience to the morality of the Golden
Age, which had been inculcated by all the philosophers since Confucius
and Mencius flourished twenty-five centuries ago, would not only secure
universal happiness but contribute to national greatness.

The office of Emperor was thus heavenly rather than terrestrial, and
suasion, not arms, was the most potent argument used in everyday life.
The amazing reply (_i.e._, amazing to foreigners) made by the great
Emperor K'ang-hsi in the tremendous Eighteenth Century controversy
between the Jesuit and the Dominican missionaries, which ruined the
prospects of China's ever becoming Roman Catholic and which the Pope
refused to accept--that the custom of ancestor-worship was political and
not religious--was absolutely correct, _politics in China under the
Empire being only a system of national control exercised by inculcating
obedience to forebears_. The great efforts which the Manchus made from
the end of the Sixteenth Century (when they were still a small
Manchurian Principality striving for the succession to the Dragon Throne
and launching desperate attacks on the Great Wall of China) to receive
from the Dalai Lama, as well as from the lesser Pontiffs of Tibet and
Mongolia, high-sounding religious titles, prove conclusively that
dignities other than mere possession of the Throne were held necessary
to give solidity to a reign which began in militarism and which would
collapse as the Mongol rule had collapsed by a mere Palace revolution
unless an effective _moral_ title were somehow won.

Nor was the Manchu military Conquest, even after they had entered
Peking, so complete as has been represented by historians. The Manchus
were too small a handful, even with their Mongol and Chinese
auxiliaries, to do more than defeat the Ming armies and obtain the
submission of the chief cities of China. It is well-known to students of
their administrative methods, that whilst they reigned over China they
_ruled_ only in company with the Chinese, the system in force being a
dual control which, beginning on the Grand Council and in the various
great Boards and Departments in the capital, proceeded as far as the
provincial chief cities, but stopped short there so completely and
absolutely that the huge chains of villages and burgs had their historic
autonomy virtually untouched and lived on as they had always lived. The
elaborate system of examinations, with the splendid official honours
reserved for successful students which was adopted by the Dynasty, not
only conciliated Chinese society but provided a vast body of men whose
interest lay in maintaining the new conquest; and thus Literature, which
had always been the door to preferment, became not only one of the
instruments of government, but actually the advocate of an alien rule.
With their persons and properties safe, and their women-folk protected
by an elaborate set of capitulations from being requisitioned for the
harems of the invaders, small wonder if the mass of Chinese welcomed a
firm administration after the frightful disorders which had torn the
country during the last days of the Mings.[2]

It was the foreigner, arriving in force in China after the capture of
Peking and the ratification of the Tientsin Treaties in 1860, who so
greatly contributed to making the false idea of Manchu absolutism
current throughout the world; and in this work it was the foreign
diplomat, coming to the capital saturated with the tradition of European
absolutism, who played a not unimportant part. Investing the Emperors
with an authority with which they were never really clothed, save for
ceremonial purposes (principally perhaps because the Court was entirely
withdrawn from view and very insolent in its foreign intercourse) a
conception of High Mightiness was spread abroad reminiscent of the awe
in which Eighteenth Century nabobs spoke of the Great Mogul of India.
Chinese officials, quickly discovering that their easiest means of
defence against an irresistible pressure was to take refuge behind the
august name of the sovereign, played their role so successfully that
until 1900 it was generally believed by Europeans that no other form of
government than a despotism _sans phrase_ could be dreamed of. Finding
that on the surface an Imperial Decree enjoyed the majesty of an Ukaze
of the Czar, Europeans were ready enough to interpret as best suited
their enterprises something which they entirely failed to construe in
terms expressive of the negative nature of Chinese civilization; and so
it happened that though the government of China had become no
government at all from the moment that extraterritoriality destroyed the
theory of Imperial inviolability and infallibility, the miracle of
turning state negativism into an active governing element continued to
work after a fashion because of the disguise which the immense distances
afforded.

Adequately to explain the philosophy of distance in China, and what it
has meant historically, would require a whole volume to itself; but it
is sufficient for our purpose to indicate here certain prime essentials.
The old Chinese were so entrenched in their vastnesses that without the
play of forces which were supernatural to them, _i.e._, the
steam-engine, the telegraph, the armoured war-vessel, etc., their daily
lives could not be affected. Left to themselves, and assisted by their
own methods, they knew that blows struck across the immense roadless
spaces were so diminished in strength, by the time they reached the spot
aimed at, that they became a mere mockery of force; and, just because
they were so valueless, paved the way to effective compromises. Being
adepts in the art which modern surgeons have adopted, of leaving wounds
as far as possible to heal themselves, they trusted to time and to
nature to solve political differences which western countries boldly
attacked on very different principles. Nor were they wrong in their
view. From the capital to the Yangtsze Valley (which is the heart of the
country), is 800 miles, that is far more than the mileage between Paris
and Berlin. From Peking to Canton is 1,400 miles along a hard and
difficult route; the journey to Yunnan by the Yangtsze river is
upwards of 2,000 miles, a distance greater than the greatest march
ever undertaken by Napoleon. And when one speaks of the Outer
Dominions--Mongolia, Tibet, Turkestan--for these hundreds of miles
it is necessary to substitute thousands, and add thereto difficulties
of terrain which would have disheartened even Roman Generals.

Now the old Chinese, accepting distance as the supreme thing, had made
it the starting-point as well as the end of their government. In the
perfected viceregal system which grew up under the Ming Dynasty, and
which was taken over by the Manchus as a sound and admirable governing
principle, though they superimposed their own military system of Tartar
Generals, we have the plan that nullified the great obstacle. Authority
of every kind was _delegated_ by the Throne to various distant governing
centuries in a most complete and sweeping manner, each group of
provinces, united under a viceroy, being in everything but name so many
independent linked commonwealths, called upon for matricular
contributions in money and grain but otherwise left severely alone[3].
The chain which bound provincial China to the metropolitan government
was therefore in the last analysis finance and nothing but finance; and
if the system broke down in 1911 it was because financial reform--to
discount the new forces of which the steam engine was the symbol--had
been attempted, like military reform, both too late and in the wrong
way, and instead of strengthening, had vastly weakened the authority of
the Throne.

In pursuance of the reform-plan which became popular after the Boxer
Settlement had allowed the court to return to Peking from Hsianfu, the
viceroys found their most essential prerogative, which was the control
of the provincial purse, largely taken from them and handed over to
Financial Commissioners who were directly responsible to the Peking
Ministry of Finance, a Department which was attempting to replace the
loose system of matricular contributions by the European system of a
directly controlled taxation every penny of which would be shown in an
annual Budget. No doubt had time been vouchsafed, and had European help
been enlisted on a large scale, this change could ultimately have been
made successful. But it was precisely time which was lacking; and the
Manchus consequently paid the penalty which is always paid by those who
delay until it is too late. The old theories having been openly
abandoned, it needed only the promise of a Parliament completely to
destroy the dignity of the Son of Heaven, and to leave the viceroys as
mere hostages in the hands of rebels. A few short weeks of rebellion was
sufficient in 1911 to cause the provinces to revert to their condition
of the earlier centuries when they had been vast unfettered agricultural
communities. And once they had tasted the joys of this new independence,
it was impossible to conceive of their becoming "obedient" again.

Here another word of explanation is necessary to show clearly the
precise meaning of regionalism in China.

What had originally created each province was the chief city in each
region, such cities necessarily being the walled repositories of all
increment. Greedy of territory to enhance their wealth, and jealous of
their power, these provincial capitals throughout the ages had left no
stone unturned to extend their influence in every possible direction and
bring under their economic control as much land as possible, a fact
which is abundantly proved by the highly diversified system of weights
and measures throughout the land deliberately drawn-up to serve as
economic barriers. River-courses, mountain-ranges, climate and soil, no
doubt assisted in governing this expansion, but commercial and financial
greed was the principal force. Of this we have an exceedingly
interesting and conclusive illustration in the struggle still proceeding
between the three Manchurian provinces, Fengtien, Kirin and
Heilungchiang, to seize the lion's share of the virgin land of Eastern
Inner Mongolia which has an "open frontier" of rolling prairies. Having
the strongest provincial capital--Moukden--it has been Fengtien province
which has encroached on the Mongolian grasslands to such an extent that
its jurisdiction to-day envelops the entire western flank of Kirin
province (as can be seen in the latest Chinese maps) in the form of a
salamander, effectively preventing the latter province from controlling
territory that geographically belongs to it. In the same way in the
land-settlement which is still going on the Mongolian plateau
immediately above Peking, much of what should be Shansi territory has
been added to the metropolitan province of Chihli. Though adjustments of
provincial boundaries have been summarily made in times past, in the
main the considerations we have indicated have been the dominant factors
in determining the area of each unit.

Now in many provinces where settlement is age-old, the regionalism which
results from great distances and bad communications has been greatly
increased by race-admixture. Canton province, which was largely settled
by Chinese adventurers sailing down the coast from the Yangtsze and
intermarrying with Annamese and the older autochthonous races, has a
population-mass possessing very distinct characteristics, which sharply
conflict with Northern traits. Fuhkien province is not only as
diversified but speaks a dialect which is virtually a foreign language.
And so on North and West of the Yangtsze it is the same story,
temperamental differences of the highest political importance being
everywhere in evidence and leading to perpetual bickerings and
jealousies. For although Chinese civilization resembles in one great
particular the Mahommedan religion, in that it accepts without question
all adherents irrespective of racial origin, _politically_ the effect of
this regionalism has been such that up to very recent times the Central
Government has been almost as much a foreign government in the eyes of
many provinces as the government of Japan. Money alone formed the bond
of union; so long as questions of taxation were not involved, Peking was
as far removed from daily life as the planet Mars.

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