When the report is heard of the intention to demolish still more of the city walls of China deep and genuine regret is bound to find expression, if indeed something very much stronger does not find utterance. It is possible as a matter of fact that the generation proposing the scheme finds itself roundly accused of vandalism, as the proposers of similar measures elsewhere have been labelled. And were it not for certain considoratious peculiar to China's present condition the title would be well deserved. At present two proposals are afoot, one to pull down the city wall of Wuchang and the other the wall of Nanning, the provincial capital of Kuangsi in the south, and we should like to hear something of the special circumstances attending their cases before coming to a conclusion. For we must bear in mind the case of our neighbouring city of Nanking in 1913 when a serious suggestion was made that the wall should come down. Nanking had been subjected to a siege in 1911, when Chang Benn commanded the defences, and again in 1913 when the same character led the successful attacking force, and on each occasion the civilian populace suffered dreadfully. Not only did the contending troops loot the place but much personal injury was inflicted. The populace became wearied of living in a walled city whose defences, in the condition of China's armies, were extremely formidable, and' they concluded that if Nanking became an open city, without walls, their lives would be free from the attentions of the military. That argument, however, is scarcely sound, for barbed wire and earthworks are more effective defences against modern methods of attack than are walls, and any energetic commander could speedily put any town he wished into a condition to withstand siege. The lot of the civilian populace would be even worse in these conditions, for forced labour on the defences would almost certainly be a feature of the case. The arguments for preserving these great memorials of the past
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.