Part 7
On December 21, 1911, the line-up was as follows. Yuan, three of the powers and some of the world’s financial syndicates, in favor of a monarchy or war, with a loan to the north, arrayed against the republicans. Wu, ever persistent in demanding a republic, or renewing the war, with a trade boycott in the southern and central provinces, against any foreign nation that loaned the north money. Some of the American journals, surprisingly, opposed the republic. For instance, on the very day that Doctor Sunyacius was named president, the New York _Outlook_ (December 30, 1911), with snap judgment, stated that a Chinese republic could, would and should not be set up at present, and further that “Americans would do well to throw all their influence on the side of a constitutional monarchy”. Nine-tenths of the _Outlook’s_ readers doubtless thought that if Homer could sometimes nod, such surprising retrogressive words as these might be forgiven the generally progressive _Outlook_. Similarly in England, the large London house of Montagu, which has been prominent in very profitable railway loans to China under the Manchu régime, issued a circular stating its “satisfaction” when the republicans lost Hankau to General Feng, under atrocious circumstances of unforgivable massacre and unnecessary arson. _Memoria longa, lingua brevis!_ Some of Britain’s diplomatic force, arguing like the reactionaries of George the Third’s day, said that they favored a monarchy because India might want a greater share in self-government than she had, forgetting that a wide-awake and fully developed India meant greater trade for Britain. Three monarchical nations said that they would favor destroying the American doctrine of the “non-partition of China” and splitting the four dependencies and the eight provinces north of the Yellow River from the rebel provinces.
Now, if ever, was the time for America to act, to give the largest and oldest nation on earth true freedom, and stop massacre and the sowing of eternal hate between the yellow and the white races. If the republican idea was decapitated by three of the monarchical nations willingly, and two of the constitutional nations unwillingly, revulsion would sweep through the camp of the republicans, and foreigners and missionaries would be slain by the mobs, who always act before they think the important second time. This was just what the plotting Manchus had been endeavoring to bring about since October 10, 1911. “Make the republicans, or the mob in their provinces, massacre; that will bring in foreign interference, which will save the Manchu dynasty.” In return, the Manchus promised certain foreign interests almost any concessions which they might ask for. They could loot China, the mineral Eldorado of the ages, and exploit the labor host of a new Goshen. _Perfide!_ ye who are retroactive at this late day after all the lessons of the crowded past, and who love Money more than Man. Hail! American republic, the mother of republics, and hail, too, the germinating Chinese republic! Even Count Okuma, the most liberal of the Japanese, the founder of the enlightened Waseda University, of whom most sympathy was expected with China’s effort for freedom, came out with a pessimistic article at this time, prophesying the “failure of the republic, years of degeneration, and an inevitable new dynasty”. Did he mean that Japan would supply one, after first absorbing two provinces of Manchuria?
Yuan, the dictator, began moving his divisions, the Twentieth, now rid of its reform general, Chang Shao Tsen, being sent from the Lanchow camp to a point north of Tientsin, to split the republicans of the three provinces of Manchuria from joining the republicans of Shangtung. Sunyacius, with Premier Wu Hon Man, of Canton, now left Hongkong for Shanghai, and the world stood back and waited for the lightning to come out of the clouds. The half million Chinese of British Hongkong gave them a rousing send-off, which was at heart approved by the five thousand British merchants and troops of Hongkong, for Hongkong knew what a trade boycott in the southern provinces meant. Canton had now struck a swinging pace, and Premier Wu had sent bodies of troops, particularly his fine artillery and bomb-throwers, to strengthen the two wings of the rebels under Generals Li, Ling and Hsu at Wuchang and Nanking, respectively. Among these troops were one thousand students recruited by the Fong Yuen College at Canton. God send great things to earth! God save liberty for China, and keep progress from slipping back a thousand years!
So far, the strongest move in the rebellion was the declaration of Foreign Minister Wu Ting Fang that if Britain joined the three monarchical powers in loaning Yuan money, a trade boycott would be instituted in the southern and central provinces against foreign trade, of which Britain held the largest share. This won Hongkong, and Hongkong was able to hold British diplomacy on Downing Street, London, and indirectly on Legation Street, Peking. It was a master move, as brilliantly effective as Napoleon’s Berlin Decree of November 21, 1806, blockading British commerce, and only for it the rebellion would have been swamped by four of the six nations arming and provisioning Yuan, the Manchu and the north. Whatever comes in the next few years, this cry surely is forever in the heart of Lincoln’s and Washington’s America: “Long live the republican idea of distributed wealth and distributed liberty in good old China, America’s yellow brother across the narrowing purple Pacific.” On Christmas day, 1911, the steamship _Cleveland_, from New York and San Francisco, with five hundred American world tourists, arrived at Hongkong. The republican army immediately invited them to Canton to see their barracks at the Five Hundred Genii Temple and elsewhere, the resolution saying: “as America was the first country to become a republic.” Auspiciously on December 26th, Sun Yat Sen arrived at Shanghai, two war-ships escorting his launch up the river from the Wusung bar. He immediately took an automobile at the bund wharf and proceeded to Wu’s residence, where conferences were held, and Nanking decided on as the provisional capital of the fighting republic. The republican Chinese were delighted that the Americans had eleven war-ships at Shanghai.
On December 26th, Yuan and the Manchu princes wired Tang Shao Yi from Peking that they would leave the decision as to a form of government to a national convention of the twenty-one provinces, the delegates to meet as soon as possible. The harmony which prevailed in the conferences at Shanghai between Sun, Wu and Li’s representatives was delightful to those interested in Chinese progress. The harmony which prevailed between the missionaries and the revolutionists was also inspiring. In a village of Hupeh province (Taiping) the people insisted that Mr. Landahl, of the Netherlands Mission, should head the local Safety League which was maintaining order, and they pushed that astonished gentleman to the head in the successful pursuit of notorious pirates who were injuring the causes of both revolutionists and imperialists. One notorious brigand of Honan province, named Wang, collected a band of 2,000 robbers, and at Harbin in Manchuria a band of Hunghutz captured an imperial treasure train with half a million of money. Vast preparations should now have been made to protect Chinese and foreigners in the north from massacre, if the National Assembly should on convening declare for a republic. There could not but be bitterness when only 17 million Manchus abdicated the rule of 400 millions Chinese, and the widest and most absolute throne the earth has known, wider than Pharaoh’s, Alexander’s, Xerxes’, Cæsar’s, Charlemagne’s, Baber Mogul’s, or Tsar’s. The problem of ruling 17 million Manchu discontents was a greater one than the long dominion which the subsidized Manchus had enjoyed over 400 millions of disunited and supine Chinese. The republic of China has mighty problems before it. Let all the world help her; above all, let education, hope and creature comforts be bestowed as quickly as possible. There is glorious altruistic work ahead of everybody for the whole of one’s life.
As the republicans solidified their government about Nanking, the enemies of China--the land-grabbing nations--who forgot their old antipathies and quarrels and acted in accord in their scheme of aggrandizement, prepared to strip her of her vast dependencies, Russia towering over Turkestan, Mongolia and Northern Manchuria, and Japan gathering about Lower Manchuria, a secret treaty between the two having been effected. No place was to be reserved for the great Chinese people to accommodate their emigration, as the size of farms should be necessarily increased throughout the land. The American and British doctrine of the “non-partition of China” was to be struck down. America, Britain and China will remember, for a Chinese republic can yet gather an army of millions to take these provinces back, and American and British naval forces, as a world’s altruistic police, can, if necessary, stand at the doors of the Baltic and Black Seas and remind Russia of her broken promises and greed. What a conflict there will yet be, won either by a swamping emigration, or by an engulfing army, as Russia, Japan and China come nearer together in the old Chinese dependencies of Turkestan, Mongolia and Manchuria. Mongolia, with her capital at Urga, and Turkestan, with her capital at Kashgar, practically seceded on December 29th under Russian intrigue. Religious Khans and Lamas, named by Russia, drove the Chinese ambans out and took charge, a Russian railway policy to break across country and control Peking being at once planned. The Manchu dynasty, with a following of from ten to seventeen million Manchus, sheltered in either Mongolia, Pechili province, Shangtung or Manchuria, under the egis of either Russia, Japan, or other nations, will always be a covert weapon for intrigue, which the bureaucrats of those nations can use against a Chinese republic.
On December 29th, the military convention at Nanking--one vote to a province--voted unanimously for Sun Yat Sen as the first president of the provisional republic, until elective assemblies could meet. The civil delegates from fourteen of the provinces, meeting at Shanghai, also agreed on Sun Yat Sen as provisional president. The armistice was now extended, President Sun calling upon the imperialists to respect the neutral zone between the opposing armies. The rise of President Sun was astounding and his task immense. From an impoverished propagandist and exile, wandering over the earth for a whole lifetime, with the Bible in one hand and _Progress and Poverty_ in the other, he suddenly became the head of the largest nation upon the earth, and the government of that nation he was expected to change from being the most absolute monarchy into the freest of republics. His career is the most inspiring example that was ever presented to reformers in the world’s history. They say of typhoons and of troubles, that when things are at their worst, only a change for the better can be looked for, and so it has been with President Sun’s career.
At the peace conferences at Shanghai, the imperialists pressed for some northern city as the venue of the convention of provincial delegates, and the republicans pressed as strongly for Shanghai, because in distinction from Peking, it was removed from Russian influence. Yuan refused to disband his army and gave notice that if the republicans advanced, he would order an attack. The imperialists then tried to get the republicans to agree to pay the northern troops a sum of money in return for laying down their arms, but the republicans wisely refused to provision the imperialists in this way for a continuance of the fighting. They did, however, offer to pay for the surrender of artillery and ammunition. Yuan held many fruitless conferences with the Manchu princes and dowager, offering to continue the war if they would give up their hoards, but of the hundreds of millions of dollars of their wealth, all he could get was a subscription of $100,000 from the old lion, Prince Ching, who has been the mentor of the Manchus since Prince Kung died in the 60’s. The whole of the south, in emulation of the Christian president, Doctor Sun (Sunyacius), began cutting off their queues and wearing khaki, as a sign that servility to the Manchus was ended. Committees of persuasion, the members of which carried shears, operated even in Yaumati and Kowloon (mainland sections of Hongkong colony). The Chinese were approached and asked to go to the barbers. If they refused, shears were drawn and the ancient badge of servitude to the Manchu, the queue, was severed. The Chinese of Bangkok, Siam, were humorous in their methods. The republican tri-color was hoisted to the peak, and two hundred sheared queues were hoisted under it, up the flagpole! Doctor Sun, president, named the following as his provisional cabinet:
Vice-President, General Li Yuen Heng, commander of the republican left wing;
Premier, Hwang Hing, organizer in Japan of the rebellion;
Minister of Justice, Wu Ting Fang, formerly Minister to the United States, and reformer of the Chinese penal code;
Minister of Communications, Posts and Commerce, Wen Tsung Yao, American educated, formerly Amban in Tibet, unusually able official;
Colonial Secretary, Fung Chi Yueh, represented Sun in the United States;
Secretary of State, Wu Hon Man, President Canton Assembly;
Ministers of Finance, Chin Tao Chen, and M. Y. Sung, Manager Chung Hua rebel bank. I know both well.
Minister of Navy and Marine, General Hwang Hing, second in command at Hankau, and Sun’s personal representative while he was absent in America and England;
Foreign Minister, Wang Chung Wei, American educated;
Chief of Staff, General Hsu, the victor of Nanking.
The subject of adopting the Christian calendar was discussed and decided on, though it was decided to please Chinese pride by letting the republican bank-notes, issued in December, stand. These notes went back to mythological times, and named 1911 as the 4609th year since the first Emperor Huang Ti! The custom of dating the year with each Manchu emperor’s succession was of course at once discarded in fourteen of the rebelling provinces. President Sun assumed charge at Nanking and immediately collected a strong garrison in the old capital of China. In his former work, _The Chinese_, the author strongly recommended the change of the capital of China farther south so as to be nearer the center of China, closer in touch with the majority of the people who popularly desire the change, and safely removed from Russian influence and possibility of attack by Mongolian railway. Preparations were at once made to bring finance, education, army, navy and a federal government under the control of the coming parliament, the provincial parliaments already being in tentative operation in half of the provinces. We have already quoted the text of notes issued by the republican government of Kwangtung province. Dictator Yuan, at Peking, in a temporary huff, wired that he would not recognize Tang Shao Yi as his representative any more at the Shanghai and Nanking conferences, and that he would only confer by telegram. He demanded that Peking, and not Nanking, should be named as the meeting place of the proposed national assembly, which was to select the form of government. This really broke up the peace conferences, and Wu Ting Fang so informed the foreign governments.
Yuan then called upon the Manchu princes and royalty for money, saying that if they would draw two millions a month for six months from their foreign banks, he could carry on the war. Fearing that the republicans would send an army by sea from Shanghai to Chin Wang Tao (where the Great Wall and Peking railway meet the sea, and the only ice free port in the north) to break Manchuria from the north, and march on Peking, Yuan sent an army to Chin Wang Tao, but several of the Chinese regiments rebelled. The republicans had arranged for such a transport service, as they had seized the ships of the government steamship line, the China Merchants’ Steamship Company. At the Lanchow camp east of Peking, several Chinese regiments also rebelled, and there was much bloodshed in putting down the riots. Yuan had five strong northern armies, one under General Feng at Hanyang, one under Chang the Second north of Nanking on the railway, one under Sheng Yun operating in Shensi and Shansi provinces, and an army in both Shangtung and Honan provinces. It looked as though the war would continue, the republican strength being mainly in that they threatened, if successful, to repudiate any loans made after January 1, 1912, by foreigners to the Manchus. Hongkong now sent the One Hundred and Twenty-sixth Indian Regiment of Baluchis, a battalion of the Yorkshires and a battery of English garrison artillery to Shameen Island, Canton, to protect the famous foreign settlement and assist President Wu, of Canton, in maintaining order. The island was fortified with sand-bags and barbed wire entanglements. The Hongkong Chinese were enthusiastic for a republic, and the British government did not prohibit their rejoicing. Their processions included the use of automobiles and brass bands. What a changed Hongkong, which used to hide its head in a monster dragon and parade the streets!
President Sun now informed foreigners that while he could employ them in all the remainder of China’s development, he could not do so in the republican army, as the republicans desired to be free of suspicion, and did not want to create foreign entanglements or embarrassments. The foreign nations divided up the Tientsin-Peking railway, and foreign men of war, independent of the republican navy, patrolled the whole rebel front from Shanghai to Hankau. Germany despatched another full regiment to Tsingtau in addition to the large garrison already there, America alone up to January 7, 1912, had held her troops at Manila. When the imperialists were evacuating Hanyang on January 4th, a regiment broke parole, necessitating an attack by General Li’s republicans, which attack was promptly and effectively sent in. On the right wing the republicans advanced up the Nanking-Tientsin railway, forcing General Chang the Second to withdraw to the north. President Sun was now active in appeals to the foreigners for recognition of the republic, his manifesto of January 5th, reading as follows:
1. Treaties of Manchus up to October 13, 1911, will be observed.
2. Concessions granted by Manchus up to October 13, 1911, will be respected.
3. Foreign loans and indemnities incurred by Manchus up to October 13, 1911, will be recognized.
4. Foreigners and their property will be protected by the republic.
5. Manchus and their property will be protected by the republic.
6. We will remodel laws; revise civic, criminal, commercial and mining codes; reform finances; abolish restrictions on trade and commerce; insure religious toleration; and cultivate better relations with foreign peoples and governments.
It will be noted that President Sun does not here take up that difficult question, the nationalization of railways, the premature forcing of which by the five banking nations on the Manchus largely precipitated the preliminary revolution in Szechuen province in September, 1911. When the republican finances will permit just compensation of provincial owners of railways, the nationalization of trunk railways will be a proper and opportune project, but confiscation of railways by a promissory note at sixty per cent. of investment, as was offered by the Manchus to the Kwangtung province owners, can only bring revolt. By the end of the first week in January, 1912, certain of the banking groups and powers, fearing that there would be a long civil strife, attacked the American doctrine of the “non-partition of China” and canvassed for two Chinas, the northern section to be retained by the Manchu monarchy, or a republic with Yuan at the head. Even this would bring its difficulties. To mention one of a thousand, where would the dividing line be, the Yellow River or the Yangtze River? The feeling of the republicans on this division can be gaged by asking what was the feeling of the Americans on the subject of secession. On January 8th the republicans approved a heavy bond issue, based on internal revenue (the customs being already pledged by the Manchus for foreign loans made before October 13, 1911, which loans the republicans recognized), and bearing eight per cent. It was also decided to put the currency on a gold basis, and though one-dollar, fifty-cent and subsidiary silver coins would be issued, they were to be only tokens, and their face value was to be secured by a gold reserve, as in the case of America’s and Japan’s silver coinage, which is only a token system.
On January 12, 1912, Major-General Franklin Bell despatched on the transport _Logan_ from Manila the First Battalion of the Fifteenth Infantry, under Major Arrasmith, to take care of that part of the Peking-to-the-coast railway allotted to the Americans. This was a confession of two things: first, that the Manchus might not be able to restrain the “Boxer” mobs in the north, and second, that it was expected that the republicans would be able to come north with their three old and two new armies when hostilities should be opened. Part of General Bell’s thrilling and characteristic American speech to the troops should be quoted: “The Chinese are worthy of a square deal. Treat them in a worthy way.” The expedition was a trying one, and was provided with cords of fire-wood. The enervated troops left the hot humid climate of Manila for the cold windy climate of North China. The news that came from the Lanchow camp at this time was most distressing, to the effect that Yuan’s imperialists were massacring and torturing republicans by the fiendish lin chee (cutting into a thousand pieces, the victim being placed in a cage). Men who had adopted the republican badge of the New China by cutting off their queues were being slain. Even the Red Cross attendants were attacked. Clearly the Manchu troops at Lanchow had gone out of hand and become a mob. The American Bishop Bashford now telegraphed from Shanghai to Dictator Yuan, urging the Manchus to abdicate for humanity’s sake. General Hwang Hing, minister of war, was now arranging for five republican armies to march north and converge on Peking. These armies were:
General Li, with the left wing, from Hankau to Peking, through Honan province.
Generals Hsu and Ling, with the right wing, from Nanking, through Kiangsu and Shangtung provinces, along the railway.
A new army, by transport and cruisers, from Shanghai to Chifu, or some northern port.
A new army of Canton and Hupeh troops to march north in General Li’s rear.
The combined republican forces of Shensi and Shansi provinces to march northeast.
The Chinese are exceedingly excitable when aroused from their usually placid state. This is because their experience is limited, and they have not yet learned to adapt themselves rapidly to new conditions. They therefore commit suicide in surprising numbers under the sudden pressure of anger, shame, poverty, trouble, uncertainty and fear. At this time of revolution, especially in the northern provinces of Shensi and Shansi where the republicans were strongly opposed, many officials, widows of soldiers and the poor, jumped into wells, swallowed balls of opium, or begged their friends to strangle them.