30th Dec.
We called attention a little while ago to the coming Famine; but Famine is not the only calamity that China has had long and bitter perience of in the past and is still to suffer from.
China, like Venus in this at rose from the waters. The cani reliable history shows the hero Vu rescuing the land in nine long years of toil from the overwhelming floods. But however much he may deserve his immortality, his work was not and could not be final, and every succeeding dynasty for these 4,000 years has had to wrestle with, or play with the same great problem. And the terrible thing is that the enemy is to-day as mighty and as relentless as ever, a Chinese Sphinx, never answered, always devouring.
The Yellow River—one of the great rivers of the globe,—has changed its course through hundreds of" mile times, and is willing and onslow ye it again at any perhaps 500 miles from its present month, But what might be done without much objection by the Amazon in Brazil or y the Mississippi of 200 4 or even by the Yellow River in its yerth. cannot be done now, when 400 millions crowd the land, without being felt throughout the world as a great disaster; there is a difference between an elephant rolling through a jungle and the same elephant rolling through a Sunday School. Every time the River either moves or makes an attempt to move into another course, it destroys lives by the thousand, the hundred thousand, or the million; it sweeps -away thousands of villages and—impoverishes the country by wholesale destruction of crops and other results of labour, It is kept in its present bed with great difficulty and not without almost annual breaches that are the min of the affected districts.
No one can justly blame the Chinese: fir not "having long ago effectively regulated this great river: it no doubt been beyond their power; modern engineering science may find this one of the most difficult {works yet attempted, and may fail to; make a perfect job of it. But having allowed all this the question remains—Has the Chinese Government done all it could do and all it ought!to do? Without completely curing, thas it done its best to mitigate the vil; and is it ready now to use the {most modern resources? Alas! it is known to everyone that the difficulty is not being approached in any new and enlightened manner. As, in spite jof every warning, the Famine may come and find as numerous a prey and {as unprepared as ever, so Flood may come next year and find all things as they have always been.
Last year it looked well to do something. The breaches were worse than usual; the distress more widespread; missionaries appealed for aid, j; and the Chinese both appealed earnestly and contributed liberally to the relief of their countrymen. With great flourish of trumpets a great man went down from Peking to Chinanfu to look at the river. A competent foreign Civil Engineer made a rough survey and sent ina Report which was printed in our columns in May last in an English translation. "Phere is one touching phrase at the end of that Report, where the Engineer says he regards the native officials with "heartfelt feelings." No foreigner who has dealings with them feels otherwise. The estimate of required expenditure amounted, of course, to millions of taels, and the [great man is said to have remarked that China, alas was very poor, Who can hear such a remark without heartfelt feelings"? The whole civi-ised world should thrill with indignation at such speech. If Chinois so poor how come her great men to be so enormously rich,—where does the money come from? But no country can be too poor to protect its own people, its very life lies in its doing so. Besides which, as everyone knows including the Chinese themselves, the proper regulation of the Yellow River would result in a permanent enrichment of the country.
What is going to be dene? quite safe to prophesy that, if China could be left to herself, the breaches would be repaired with millet stalks, and the river would continue to break out where it could, and the people would be starved or drowned y the thousand, till one day the river would find itself going up hill and would insist on an easier course elsewhere and millions of lives would be sacrificed. Has a mile of telegraph wire been laid yet for the purpose of warning all the population exposed to danger? Who is responsible for all these things? Mr. Gundry in the Fortnightly Review speaks of the Chinese official who cuts off a.j thousand heads while he quotes Mencius on the sanctity of human life; is it any better if the thousands are only.left to drown or starve As will be seen by various news from Shantung the Government pursues its suicidal policy. Distress and fear make men desperate; even a Chinese worm will turn when trodden on. Insurrection, in which foreigners are bound to suffer, must lead to foreign intervention; hence it may come to pass that, what China will not do for herself must be done by others for her, and foreigners not only lay her railways but also regulate her rivers.
But everyone that wishes well to China will wish from the bottom of his heart that she would be wise in time, would set herself humbly and earnestly to: the great problems, leaving minor things till later, and would strengthen herself not by vain additions to fleet or army, but by showing to the world a serious intention to enter on the path "of Reform.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.