Nor is the diMeulty confined entirely to the lower classes of officials. The majority of men whom T met in charge of reconstruction work struck me as Keen experts who ware really anxious to get_on with the job on hand. Yet even they often had their hands tied from above. "Owing political of provincial jealousies and vested Interests, such and such motor and could not' be put through, this cop-line not eonnecled up or that ferry not installed.
On the whole, with the exception of one or two provinees—and there the exceptions are due to exceptional personalities—my various travels in the Interior incline me to the view, that the firmer the control of the Central Government over a province, the greater has been the progress it thas made. That is not necessarily due {o the appointees of the Central Government being always the belter men. But the point is that men born and bred in the province over which they are. ruling cannot easily disregard family. and clan tes oF provincial vested interests. They are but human and have to temper their. policy to the claims of blood and friendship.
"A higher official, on the other hand, who is imposed from without en the province by the mandate of the Cen-{ral Government suffers under such handicap. He has no such ties to consider and can carry out the government's orders, without having fo fear being ostracized as a traitor to the province. The Manchu regime recognized the importance of this point. Under their aystem the civil service was one single homogeneous the Meche a Tie Beer ate jewtnis ts the contciuding ones" administration extending over the whole of the eighteen provinces, but with the important proviso that no oMfclal could serve in his own prov-Ince. To some such system the: government of China will one day have return—though perhaps ina modified form—if it is ever to have 4 completely unlied and properly Aisciplined administration,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.