In history these provinces appear as kingdoms, and their mutual
wars form the staple subject. What feeling of unity can exist so
long as the people are divided by a babel of dialects? More than
once have Tartars employed Chinese to conquer China; and in 1900 a
fine regiment from Wei-hai-wei helped the British to storm Peking.
It may be added they repaid themselves by treating the inhabitants
as conquered foes. Everywhere they were conspicuous for acts of
lawless violence.
Three great arsenals, not to speak of minor establishments, are
kept busy turning out artillery and small arms for the national
army, and the Board of Army Reform has the supervision of those
forces, with
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the duty of making them not provincial, but national. Efforts of
this kind, however, are no proof of a reform spirit. Are not the
same to be seen all the way from Afghanistan to Dahomey? "To be weak
is to be miserable"; and the Chinese are right in making military
reorganisation the starting-point of a new policy. Yet the mere
proposal of a parliament is a better indication of the spirit of
reform than all these armaments.
In the mind of China, wealth is the correlative of strength. The
two ideas are combined in the word _Fuchiang_, which expresses
national prosperity. Hence the treasures hidden in the earth could
not be neglected, when they had given up the follies of geomancy
and saw foreigners prospecting and applying for concessions to work
mines.
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