80th June, Ir has long been noticed by the generation of Chinese who hap, to be in power, that when they send their promising youths to foreign lands to be educated, results are liable to follow which are not only not "nominated in the bond," but which are unwelcome and intolerable. It was a somewhat premature discovery of this disagreeable fact which led early in the eighties to the recall of the Chinese who had been sent to America, Upon their arrival in China the disease was found to be even more deeply seated than was supposed, and the subsequent educational career of these youths was embittered by the harshness of conservative ani indignant Taotais, and by a general Inck of sympathy with the new cult, The policy of sending Chinese to Japan to be educated is of long standing, and has been alternately favoured and denounced. It is now more popular and more inevitable than ever, yet it is well known that the Empress Dowager and many high officials look upon the expedient one bristling with potential dangers. No amount of the most rigid quarantine can exclude what is borne to us in the air, and Japanese air during the past year and a-half has been heavily charged with much that is new in China, and as undesirable us new. It is not a recent phenomenon only that Chinese students in Government schools not infrequently take the bit in their teeth, and run away with all the proprieties, Sometimes the occasion is an obnoxious instructor, sometimes it may be an undesirable study—perhaps an unpopular bill of fare. Occasion lly a provincial institution has to b: close! up altogether, to eliminate the troublesome malcontents—and is perhaps reopened later under different auspices, With the growing consciousness of their own' power, the students scatiéred throughout China will tend to become increasingly unified in thought and feeling. Many of them have a strong national feeling which they readily mistake for patriotism, from which it differs in vital ways, These young people want to stand up for China, and want Ohina to stand up for herself, though neither the students nor the country have any clear idea as to the real nature of China's wrongs and ills. They know that she is big, and old, and that she ought to be wise and strong. They naturally wish to have her ceiving hat she is in reality neither, so, though they cannot help per How to remedy this gives them pause, as it has long done to some of the rest of us.
But their strong feelings must have vent, and this is often found in the newly introduced college paper, or the yet more recent college " caucus." Here one finds intense sion under very little control and an ill-regulated or quite unregulated expression of erade opinions, the resultant of @ variety of composite forcea, The personal influence of leaders counts for much, and the contagion of blind enthusiasm is often practically irresistible. During the past two months these phenomena have bean repeatedly exhibited in connection with the discussion of the American Exclusion laws. Students have held meetings, have passed resolutions, have had conferences with their instructors, have written reams of letters, and have even gone out ona "sympathetic strike," all 02 account of conditions in a distant land of which ayeer ago they never heard, for which five years ago nobody cared, and in regard to which they have even to-day no exact knowledge, and for the cure of which they have in mind no remedy. Under a purely Chinese regime these youths would be reprimanded and told to hold their tongues, But in the new atmosphere which they are now breathing they are likely to resent control, which, to be efficient, must be wise, firm, and prompt, Heno>- forth, we take it, the heads of Chinese educational establishments, whether for young men or young women, will find their task increasing in difficul ty. The cultivation of the talent for talk and for destructive criticism, while the talent for prudent action is yet in embryo, is a serious danger.
China has long since found reason to try to suppress all Secret Societies, although it has always failed to achieve the result. It will be un evil day if the Government feels impelled to strangle its schools,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.