Apr. 24.
YESTERDAY, as the result of a recent journey through Central China, Mr. Rodney Gilbert said that ''a great wave of conservatism is sweeping the country.' Get together a group of scholars, soldiers and officials, he said, and talk of democracy's blessings and they acquiesce more or less politely; but say boldly that the Republic is a failure and the Imperial system the only safeguard of peace and order and you will be greeted with vociferous applause. In flat contradiction of this is the article which we reproduce to-day by. Sir Edmund Backhouse, Is the Monarchy dead in China? He tells us that the science of Chinese statecraft has always been to let tha country govern itself; and the first signs of decay in every dynasty have been excessive efforts at centralization. Yuan Shih-kai's attempted usurpation, he says will find no imitators.
Between these speculations as to China's destiny we are all
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.