CHAPTER IV.

_BEGINNINGS OF REFORM._

Reform Club.--Chinese Ladies' Public Dinner.--High School for Girls.--Chinese Lady Doctors insisting on Religious Liberty.--Reformers' Dinner.--The Emperor at the Head of the Reform Party.--Revising Examination Papers.--Unaware of Coming Danger.--Russian Minister's Reported Advice.

On February 12th, 1896, a newspaper correspondent wrote from Peking: "The Reform Club established a few months ago, which gave such promise of good things to come, and which has been referred to frequently in the public prints in China, has burst. It has been denounced by one of the Censors, and the Society has collapsed at once. The Club has been searched, the members, some fifty or more Hanlin scholars, have absconded, and the printers have been imprisoned. Such is the end, for the present at least, of what promised to be the awakening of China. It was initiated and supported largely at least by three well-known foreigners, two of them well-known missionaries, and it met with much support and encouragement from all classes. Its little _Gazette_ was latterly enlarged and its name changed. One or more translators were engaged to translate the best articles from the English newspapers and magazines, of which some two dozen or more were ordered for the Club. The members contributed liberally, we understand, towards its expenses; and if ever there was hope of new life being instilled into the old dry bones of China, it was certainly confidently looked for from this young, healthy, and vigorous Society. It has been conducted, we believe, with great ability; differences among the leaders have cropped up, but after discussions the affairs of the Club have each time been placed on a more secure and lasting basis. Foreign dinners at a native hotel have been part of the programme; and this element is not to be despised by any means. The Chinese transact nearly all their important business at the tea-shops and restaurants, and certainly a good dinner and a glass of champagne help wonderfully to smooth matters. We regret exceedingly the decease of the Reform Club."

People in general laughed about it a little. There had before been the short statement: "A Censor has impeached the new Hanlin Reform Club, and it has been closed by Imperial rescript."

Thomas Huxley once wrote that "with wisdom and uprightness even a small nation might make its way worthily; no sight in the world is more saddening and revolting than is offered by men sunk in ignorance of everything except what other men have written, and seemingly devoid of moral belief and guidance, yet with their sense of literary beauty so keen and their power of expression so cultivated that they mistake their own caterwauling for the music of the spheres."

It was in this strain Europeans in the East meditated. But on returning to China in the autumn of 1897, I found in Shanghai evidences of progress and reform on all sides. A Chinese newspaper, generally spoken of in English as _Chinese Progress_, was being issued regularly, and newspapers edited by friends of its editor were coming out in Hunan and even in far-away Szechuan. The Chinese "Do-not-bind-feet" Society of Canton had opened an office in one of the principal streets of Shanghai, and was memorialising Viceroys, as also the Superintendents of Northern and Southern trade. Directly on arrival I received an invitation to a public dinner in the name of ten Chinese ladies, of whom I had never heard before. It was to be in the large dining-hall in a Chinese garden in the Bubbling Well Road, the fashionable drive of Shanghai, and by degrees I found all my most intimate friends were invited. We agreed with one another to go, though wondering a good deal what the real meaning of the invitation was, and why we were selected. The hall is a very large one, sometimes used for big balls, with rooms opening off it on either side; and after the English ladies had laid aside their wraps in a room to the right--one or two Chinese gentlemen, who had evidently been superintending the arrangement of the dinner, encouraging them to do so--we asked where our Chinese hostesses were. They were already assembled in the rooms opening off the hall to the left, and I still remember the expression of intense anxiety on the Chinese gentlemen's faces as they saw us leave them and advance to join their womenkind, none of whom spoke any English, nor knew anything of English ways and manners. At first the Chinese ladies did not exactly receive us; but when we began to go round and bow to each lady in turn, after the Chinese fashion, one after another stood up and smilingly greeted us. Then those of us who could talked Chinese, and one or two of the Chinese ladies began to move about, exhibiting the ground-plan of a proposed school for the higher education of Chinese young ladies. And thus gradually we began to understand what it was all about. But on that occasion it was the English ladies who were frivolous, the Chinese who were serious. For they were so elaborately dressed, so covered with ornaments, English ladies were always breaking off and saying, "Oh, do allow me to admire that bracelet!" or "What lovely embroidery!" whilst the Chinese ladies very earnestly pointed at their ground-plan, and looked interrogations. It gradually came out that it was the Manager of the Telegraph Company and his friends who were bent upon starting this school; that this being a new departure they thought it well for the ladies interested to confer with the ladies of other nations accustomed to education; and that, considering who was likely to be helpful, they had asked a few missionary ladies, and all the officers and committee of the Tʽien Tsu Hui ("Natural Feet Society"), thinking that the foreign ladies, who had started that, must be interested in helping Chinese women.

Presently we were summoned to dinner by an intimation, "Chinese ladies to the left, foreign ladies to the right!" "Because of the fire," was added _sotto voce_, for Chinese, in their often triple furs, have naturally a horror of fires; but we refused to be thus summarily separated, as we sat down about two hundred women to a dinner served in the foreign style, with champagne, etc., and were rather alarmed to find our hostesses allowing their little children to drink as freely of champagne as of their own light Chinese wines.

That dinner was the beginning of an interchange of civilities between foreign and Chinese ladies such as had never occurred before. The daughter of Kang, commonly called the Modern Sage, after the title given to Confucius, was naturally one of these ladies. She wore Manchu dress, which puzzled us, as she is Cantonese. Her father had never allowed her feet to be bound, and she had herself written an article against binding, which had appeared in a Chinese newspaper; thus she, like several other Chinese ladies, considered the dress of the Manchus, who never bind feet, the most convenient. The relations of Mr. Liang, editor of _Chinese Progress_, were also present. At the subsequent meetings some of the Chinese ladies pleaded earnestly that Europeans should take shares in the school. They did not want their money, they said, but feared that unless there were European shareholders their Government might seize all the funds. The European ladies, however, could never quite satisfy themselves as to the various guarantees necessary. There were, indeed, many difficulties about starting this new school, as may be seen by the following letter, written by two Chinese lady doctors, who had been asked in the first instance to undertake its management. They had been educated in America, where they had passed all the necessary examinations very brilliantly; and it was the idea of the lustre they had thus conferred upon their own nation in a foreign land, that had first led a wealthy ship-owner, running steamers on the Poyang Lake, to conceive the idea of a school for girls. It had been warmly taken up by the late tutor of the ladies of the Imperial Household, who had been dismissed from his post because of his radical notions, and was thus free to devote himself to advancing education generally. The Manager of the Telegraph Company then became the leader, and the prospectus of the school was published in the _North China Herald_, with the names of the two Chinese lady doctors as its managers. On which they wrote the following letter to the editor, which, as I afterwards ascertained, was _bonâ fide_ written by themselves, not at foreign instigation. They even refused to accept any corrections, saying if they wrote it at all it must be their own letter. It is so striking as the composition of Chinese women, that I am sure I shall be pardoned for giving it _in extenso_.

"SIR,--In your issue of December 24th appeared a translation of the prospectus of a school in Shanghai for Chinese girls; and since our names were given to the public as would-be teachers, we hope you will permit a word of much-needed explanation. If you, Mr. Editor, give such welcome to this sign of progress as is expressed in your editorial, then much more should those of our own people, who may be prepared to appreciate its possibilities. Yet the joy might not be without alloy.

"Several months ago the prospectus was brought to us as yet in an unfinished state, and parts of the first and last clauses referring to the establishment of Confucianism did not appear. Had these been there, we should not have allowed our names to go down as teachers. In making this statement, we realise that we only escape the charge of 'narrow-mindness' by the fact that we decidedly are not foreigners. We love our native China too much to fail to realise the truth in your admission 'that a slavish adherence to Confucianism alone has done far too much to limit and confine the Chinese mind for centuries,' and it is because we are not hopeful of the result 'when reverence for Confucianism is to be combined with the study of Western languages and sciences' that we cannot lend ourselves to the project as it seems to be drifting. It was with the express understanding that there should be entire religious liberty, that we consented to take up this work, and religious liberty would admit all who found moral and spiritual support in Confucianism to avail themselves of it. The tablets, that Confucianism cherished, might be set up by its supporters near the school, but not in the grounds: as might Christian churches be opened, if friends were found to build them. Such a course would conserve liberty of conscience.

"Now, according to the prospectus published in that very excellent Chinese journal _The Progress_, twice a year sacrifices are to be made in this school to posthumous tablets of Confucius and such worthy patrons of the school as may be honoured by a place in its pantheon. Had the statement been made that twice a year days would be set apart as memorial days to these distinguished personages, upon which occasions their lives should be reviewed to us in a manner to inspire young girls by their examples, no one would join more heartily in paying honour to their memory than ourselves. But the idea of sacrifice to human beings seems too blind in the light of this nineteenth century for any participation on our part. We have seen other countries, and learned of the sages of other lands; and although it may be only because of prejudice, yet we can truly say that we honour none as we do our own Confucius. But honour to the best of human beings is not unmixed blessing when it creates an idol and holds the eyes of the devotees down to earth. We do not think it the sentiment that will make the education of women successful or even safe. The educational institutions for women during the time of the Three Dynasties were not of the excellent things that Confucius sought to reestablish. Had he done so, how could he have uttered such words as these?--'Of all people girls and servants are the most difficult to behave to. If you are familiar to them, they lose their humility. If you maintain your reserve, they are discontented' (see _Legge's Classics_). Alas that we have no record that the Master ever turned his attention to a remedy for such a sad state of affairs!

"One there was who never spoke in disparaging tone to or of women. Only His sustaining counsel could give us courage to start out upon the pathway, slippery as it must needs be in the present stage of China's civilisation, along which educated women must needs pick their way. We do not feel that we should be doing our country-women best service in starting them out with only a Confucian outfit.

"This prospectus is, no doubt, intended to be a working-plan that will carry the co-operation of the largest number. We realise it is easier to see its inconsistencies than to unite opposing factions. Doubtless it embraces a truly progressive element in the land which has compromised under the proposed cult. The articles at first brought to us contained two sections aimed against concubinage and girl-slavery. When we reflect upon these destroyers that have fixed upon the vitals of Chinese home life, and then read the substitution of the words referring to Shanghai girls, 'especially in the Settlements,' Mencius' words recur to us (see _Legge's Classics_): 'Here is a man whose fourth finger is bent and cannot be stretched out straight.... If there be any one who can make it straight, he will not think the way from Tsin to Tsʽoo far to go.... When a man's finger is not like that of other people, he knows he feels dissatisfied; but if his mind differs, he feels no dissatisfaction. This is called "Ignorance of the relative importance of things!"' We fear the day of our Chinese deliverance is not quite at hand.

"The Spirit that can mould the hearts of men has been abroad and wrought in the hearts of many, or they would not so ardently desire something progressive; but we regret to see it quenched even in a reviving flood of Confucianism. Let us intreat you, friends of China's progress, to lend your influence to the leaders of our people, that they strive not to bottle the new wine (spirit) of progress in old bottles, 'else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish.'

"MARY STONE, of Hupeh, "IDA KAHN, of Kiangsi.

"KIUKIANG, _December 27th, 1897_."

Somehow, however, all difficulties were surmounted, and in June, 1898, I had the pleasure of writing the following account of the first high school for girls opened in China:

"Turning off to the left from the long green avenue but a few minutes before arriving at the Arsenal, the visitor comes upon the pretty conglomeration of buildings in which the much-talked-of Chinese young ladies' school has now actually been opened. There are the usual Chinese courtyards, with somewhat more than the usual fantastic Chinese decoration, ornamental tiles making open screens rather than walls, through which the wind can blow freely, yet at the same time giving a feeling of privacy; as also writhing dragons and birds and beasts. It is quite Chinese, and very pretty and æsthetic. But the windows are foreign, and there is no house in the European settlement more airy, nor perhaps so clean.

"But the matter of interest is not the building, nor the furniture, but the teachers and the taught. There they stood, the sixteen young girls, who are the first promise of the regeneration of China; and judged as young girls they certainly promised remarkably well. It is natural to suppose that several of them are the children of parents of more than ordinary enlightenment. But whether they are or not, they certainly looked it. Their manners were naturally very superior to those of the girls one is accustomed to see in Chinese schools. They were readier to laugh and see a joke. But if some of those girls do not decidedly distinguish themselves in the years to come, it will be the fault of their instructors, or I am no physiognomist. They were busy with reading-books, and the teacher, a nice quiet-looking Chinese woman, had not the least idea of showing them off, so it was hard to test them. She said she could not say yet herself which were the brightest girls. Several had natural feet, and most of the others were eager to state they had "let out" their feet. None were the least smartly dressed, but several had very well-dressed hair, and were very neatly shod. One girl had the Manchu shoe without that objectionable heel in the middle, that must make walking on it like walking upon stilts.

"The bedrooms were all upstairs, four girls in a room, and nothing could have looked cleaner and neater than the arrangements: white mosquito curtains round the bed, a box under each for the girl's clothes, a stool for her to sit upon; one shining wardrobe amongst the four; a washstand with rail at the back on which to hang towels, and a looking-glass in the centre. The teachers had rooms to themselves. The teacher of sewing was upstairs, with only too exquisitely fine work all ready to spoil the poor girls' eyes and exercise their patience. There was another lady, who has been teaching drawing in the Imperial Palace, painting for the Empress there. Whether she is only on a visit to recover her health, or is now teaching drawing in this school--they have a drawing mistress--I did not quite make out. But she is the sort of woman whom one seems to know, by her clever, thoughtful, extremely observant face, before ever speaking to her; and when I found she was from Yunnan, we sat and chatted about 'Mount Omi and Beyond' in quite a friendly way. One of Miss Heygood's Chinese pupils is to come in on Monday and begin teaching English, as they think a Chinese teacher will do for a beginning. Probably she will understand Chinese difficulties better than any of us could. But it is a question whether her pronunciation can be quite satisfactory.

"A good deal of the furniture was foreign, and it seemed to be all foreign in the long reception-room, to be eventually used as a class-room, where on Wednesday, June 1st, a large company of foreign ladies sat down to a most excellent Chinese dinner, with knives and forks for those who wanted, and champagne served freely. The two previous days gentlemen had been received, and June 2nd was to be exclusively for Chinese ladies. One of the daughters of Mr. King, Manager of the Telegraphs, presided at one end of the table at which I was, and his daughter-in-law sat at the other end. There was another table in an adjoining room. Mrs. Shen Tun-ho and Mrs. King Lien-shan had cards printed in English with 'Chinese Girl School Committee' in the corner. Mrs. Mei Shen-in had on hers, 'Native Director of Chinese Female School.'

"It is difficult for ladies to decide what guarantee is obtainable that any money they may contribute will be well used, and not diverted from the purpose for which it is intended. But if some of the active business men of Shanghai can make the necessary inquiries on these heads, certainly what was to be seen on June 1st sufficiently spoke for the great energy and care displayed by the Ladies' Committee, and Mr. King, who is understood to be the prime mover in the matter. Every detail seemed to have been well seen after. Even baths and a bath-room are provided. Each girl is only to pay six shillings a month; and this being so, it is not to be wondered at that already another house is being secured, and there are promises of sufficient girl pupils already to fill it. There is also talk of opening another girls' school."

And now in 1899 I hear that already a third school for girls has been started by Mr. King, whose energy in the matter is the more to be admired when it is considered that he is so deaf all communication with him has to be carried on in writing. But, alas for China! Mr. Timothy Richard, the inspiring secretary of the Society for the Diffusion of Christian and General Knowledge, has had to take over the schools and put in a European manager, to save them from the Empress Tze Hsi's grasping fingers.

But a few days after the ladies' dinner--a very merry one--we were invited by three Chinese gentlemen to meet the Mr. Wên before mentioned as late tutor to the ladies of the Imperial Household. There were only four other Europeans, and a little party of Chinese men, all members of the Reform party. It is perhaps as well not to give their names, two of that little company being at this moment under sentence of death themselves, together with all their relations. When last heard of they were hiding, but some of their relations had been seized. The dinner was a very sad one. They had evidently invited Europeans as a drowning man catches at a straw, to see if they could devise anything to save the Chinese people. But to each suggestion made they said it was impossible. There was nothing--nothing to be done at Peking. Corruption prevailed over everything there. There was nothing--nothing to be done with the various Viceroys. There was nothing to be done by an appeal to the people. The only thing was to go on writing and writing, translating from foreign languages, and thus gradually educating the people in what might be useful to them. The memory of that dinner cannot easily pass from those present. Some of us walked away together too sad for words, and all that evening a great cloud of depression rested over us. For we felt we had witnessed despair; and when a Chinaman, usually so impassive, gives way, it makes the more impression.

But then happened the astonishing, as always occurs in China; and when next heard of, the Emperor of China himself, the youthful Kwang-shü, was at the head of the Progress party. All that has been told of Kwang-shü has always been very interesting and pleasing. Chinese people all speak well of him, and say he wishes for his country's good. But then they shrug their shoulders, for they have always maintained he has no power. At one time he was said to be studying English, at another reading Shakespeare in translation. On the occasion of the Empress Tze Hsi's sixtieth birthday all Christian women in China were invited to subscribe for a handsome copy of the New Testament, which was eventually presented to her in a silver casket beautifully chased with a fine relief of bamboo-trees. The Chinese version was specially revised for this presentation, in which Christian Chinese women took the greatest interest. No sooner had the book been presented than the Emperor sent an eunuch round to ask for a copy of the same volume. There was not as yet any copy of quite the same version, and the one sent was in the course of a few hours returned with several comments, understood to be in the Emperors own handwriting, pointing out the differences, and asking that the same version might be sent to him. He at the same time applied for copies of the other books prepared by Europeans for the instruction of Chinese.

In 1894 he took one of those sudden steps that a little recall some actions of the German Emperor, and signified his intention to look over each essay and poem himself, and place the competitors at the Peking examination according to their excellence. It may be imagined what was the astonishment and consternation of the examining board of high Ministers of State, who had just examined them, and marked out the standing of each man according to their own inclinations. There were two hundred and eight competitors, and it took the Emperor three whole days to look over the papers. At the end of that time the list was turned nearly upside-down, for three men placed amongst the last by the examining board were now marked out by the Emperor as among the six entitled to the highest honours. Amongst the competitors was the lately returned Minister to the United States, Spain, and Peru. He had a brevet button of the second rank; and having lately received the post of Senior Deputy Supervisor of Instruction to the Heir Apparent, he had to present himself as a competitor--notwithstanding his years and previous services abroad. In the list of the examining board he stood amongst the first thirty, and was recommended to a higher post of honour. In the Emperor's list he was placed in the third class; and in the decree classifying the essayists, in which the Emperor stated definitely that he had done so after himself looking over each paper, this ex-Minister was ordered to take off his brevet second-rank button, being degraded from the post of Deputy Supervisor to that of Junior Secretary of the Supervisorate. There were many other changes made of the same nature.

Naturally such an action did not tend to establish the youthful Emperor in the good graces of the more corrupt of his counsellors. But it showed energy and initiative, uncommon in Chinamen, also a desire to do his duty and right wrongs. It is certainly unfortunate for himself that he did not from the outset set to work to make to himself friends of the mammon of unrighteousness. But brought up from his earliest years as an Emperor, it is not unnatural that he should have expected all people to bow down before his will as soon as he asserted it. And it is a little unreasonable to expect from a young man, palace born and bred, who never even once had taken a country walk or ride, or enjoyed liberty of any kind, the character of a Bismarck or a Napoleon. That his advisers were equally unaware of the dangers awaiting him is shown by their having taken no precautions even to save themselves. It was indeed Kwang-shü who advised Kang to fly from Peking, not Kang who advised Kwang-shü to be careful. And that the plot that dethroned the young Emperor was kept carefully secret is also shown by the British Minister, a man of experience, and who has travelled about the world, and is of course amply provided with all the necessary means for obtaining information, being actually absent from Peking at the time, which naturally he never would have been had he known the crisis was imminent. The German and American Ministers were also absent, and, more remarkable still, Sir Robert Hart, Inspector-General of Chinese Imperial Customs. The moment was indeed probably chosen in consequence by the Empress.

Surrounded by temptations--his aunt and adopted mother is openly accused of having tried to teach him to take delight in cards and wine, and it is one of her duties both to select a wife for him and to surround him with concubines--the young man seems to show rather the disposition of an anchorite. All testimonies agree that he is not of a vigorous physique: indeed, bred and nurtured as he has been, how could he be? In health, as in many other ways, he always recalls to me our own Prince Leopold, the late Duke of Albany.

It is greatly to be regretted that when that very amiable, gentle-looking young man, now Czar of Russia, was in China, he and the young Emperor of China did not meet. Both apparently have aspirations, both are weighted by a weight of empire no one man can sustain single-handed, both surrounded by powerful, unscrupulous men, who will not hesitate to wield their well-intentioned and apparently sincere nominal rulers to their own advantage, as also possibly to the destruction of those nominal sovereigns.

There is a curious tale told that a late Russian Minister at Peking acquired a great influence over the Chinese Emperor by speaking to him after this style: "There are but few countries now that are regulated in accordance with the principles of decorum. In England and Germany it is true there are emperors, but in England it is six-tenths the people's will and only four-tenths the sovereign's. In Germany it is rather better: there it is six-tenths the Emperor and four-tenths the people. As to France and America--dreadful--dreadful! Only China and Russia are properly constituted countries, where the Emperor governs and the people obey, according to the will of Heaven. What friends, then, ought not these two countries to be, and how terrible for Russia it would be if China were to fall, for then she would stand alone, the one properly constituted empire in the world! Equally, how dreadful it would be for China if Russia were to fall away! As for us, we cannot feel easy about China. We remember that after all your Imperial Majesty's is an alien dynasty, governing over a people of another race, the Chinese, and your capital is so near the frontier you could easily be pushed over the border. Your Imperial Majesty should really take precautions to establish yourself more safely. Now, all positions of high honour are in the hands of Chinese, who might easily band together and depose the reigning dynasty. As each high position falls vacant, Chinese should be replaced by Manchus; then alone would you be safely established on the throne of your ancestors, and Russia could feel safe, knowing China to be so."

Thus and much more. Such conversations can be easily overheard and repeated by the crowds of attendants always present at interviews in China. It was repeated to me in June, 1898. I did not know if correctly or not. I do not know now. But for the last year high post after high post has been conferred upon Manchus, than which no policy could be more unwise, for it is calculated to exasperate the Chinese; nor have the Manchus, who have long ago lost their manliness, living as pensioners of the Court, any longer the capacity for government.