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THE SCYTHIANS.

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victorious than not. Six years (B.C. 127) after the death of Wang Kua, they entered Kansuh and Shensi for the third time since the accession of Vouti. It was then that Vouti had recourse to the slower and more extensive plan of forming military settlements in Shensi as a bulwark in that quarter, and of improving the roads from the interior to this extremity of the country.

The Hiongnou Tartars had during these years been prosecuting a war with a people to the south of their territory-a contest which, some time before Vouti made these strenuous preparations on his western borders, reached a conclusion, and one fraught with important consequences to the peoples of the neighbouring states. That tract of country, which on the modern map includes the northwestern portion of Kansuh, Kokonor, and a considerable part of the southern half of Gobi, was then inhabited by a people called Yuchi or Yueti. Lanchefoo and Shachow were towns in their possession, and they acknowledged a king of their own race. Numerous and prosperous as they were, they were no match for the hardier Hiongnou, and in the year B.C. 165 they were not only defeated, but compelled to quit their homes, and to seek elsewhere the independence which they were unable to maintain. The Yuchi retreated along the Tian Shan range to the countries of Trans-Oxiana, where they coalesced with those other warlike tribes which a few centuries later overran the Roman Empire. When the tale of the discomfiture of this people was brought to Vouti, he loudly expressed his commiseration. with their hard fate, and turning to his council he asked, in the spirit of Arthur proposing a quest to his knights, if there were any sufficiently adventurous to follow these wanderers and bring them back. With the promptitude of a Galahad, Chang Keen volunteered to make the attempt, and to track from one end of Asia to the other the relics of this unfortunate race.

Chang Keen set out on his adventurous journey accompanied by one hundred devoted companions, but on his entering the country of the Hiongnou they were all made prisoners. The story affirms that they were kept in a

state of confinement during ten years, and that they then managed to make good their escape, and to continue their journey in search of the Yuchi. After visiting many of the western countries, they reached that of the Yuchi, with whom they lived for one year. The Yuchi could not be induced to go back to China, and eventually, under the name of the Scythians, defeated the Parthians and destroyed the Greek kingdom of Bactria. Chang Keen then returned to China, bringing back a large stock of information concerning the peoples of the other Asiatic kingdoms, but of all Chang Keen's companions only two survived. Chang Keen drew up a memorial describing what he had seen, and throwing light on the geography of Asia. Among the most important of his observations is that insisting on the advantages of the short land route to India through Szchuen, which was, as we have seen, gradually falling into the hands of the Emperor. Vouti then sent several exploring parties in this direction, but they fared badly at the hands of the people beyond the frontier. One party succeeded in penetrating into Yunnan, but another was ignominiously turned back before it had passed the borders of Shensi.

Meanwhile the war with the Tartars was far from languishing. Encouraged by what they considered the weakness of the Chinese, they renewed their incursions and carried them further than before into the heart of the western provinces. Inflated by their success, the Tartars cast aside some of their habitual caution in war, and they were thus taken at a disadvantage by a general whom Vouti had sent with instructions to come to an engagement wherever he might find them. The Tartars fought with the courage of despair, and their king, with the greater number of his troops, cut a way through the Chinese forces. But he left his camp, baggage, wives, children, and more than fifteen thousand soldiers in the hands of Wei Tsing, the Chinese general. This great victory was the most effective blow which had yet been dealt by the Chinese in their long wars with the Hiongnou, and Wei Tsing became the hero of the age. Honours were showered upon him, and when he returned to the capital Vouti went out a day's journey to meet and welcome him. A few months

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after this victory Wei Tsing again engaged the Tartar army, and, although the result remained doubtful, the general confirmed by his skill and intrepidity the good opinions he had already won.

The most important result of these successes was that the Chinese recovered the confidence which a succession of Tartar victories had impaired. Hitherto they had stood always on the defensive, but they felt it was now time to assume the offensive. Vouti's council approved of the proposal to carry the war into the enemy's country. An expedition was accordingly fitted out and the command entrusted to Hokiuping, an experienced officer. It consisted mostly of cavalry. The Tartars were taken completely by surprise when they found the Chinese adopting their own tactics, and offered but little resistance. Hokiuping carried everything before him, and having traversed an extensive portion of the Hiongnou territory returned to China, with a vast quantity of booty, including the golden images used by one of the Tartar princes in his religious ceremonies. Shortly after this adventure, Hokiuping repeated it with a larger force, and with increased success. He advanced as far as Sopouomo in the desert, and on his return boasted that "thirty thousand Tartars" had perished by the sword of his warriors. A great outcry arose among the Hiongnou that these disasters had fallen upon them through the incompetence of their princes, and the wish for, if not the intention to carry out, a rough justice for their demerits was loudly expressed. The two princes inculpated took alarm at these threats, and a large number of their followers made a voluntary surrender to Vouti. At first Vouti was disposed to receive them with great state, but being better advised by his ministers he ordered them to be disarmed on crossing the frontier, and to be dispersed in settlements throughout the border provinces.

The expeditions of Hokiuping were only intended as the forerunners of an invasion on a large scale of the Hiongnou country. A considerable army, divided into two columns, was collected, and the generals Wei Tsing and Hokiuping were each appointed to a command. Both advanced boldly VOL. I.

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into the desert, and fought the Tartars in several engagements on its northern side. The Chinese appear to have been uniformly successful, and to have inflicted much loss. on the Hiongnou; but they did not return from their campaign in the desert without having themselves suffered some loss both in men and horses. The Tartars also were only cowed for the time, and not permanently overthrown. Shortly after this war, in which he had taken so prominent a part, Hokiuping died. He was the most popular of all the generals with the private soldiers, who marched with confidence under his orders, because he always vanquished the enemy. As his countrymen naively put it, his loss was the greater because he never suffered a check, and on that ground they claim for him a place among the great captains of his time.

Chang Keen, whose adventurous journey has been already mentioned, was entrusted about this time with a diplomatic mission to the court of the neighbouring kingdom of Ousun.* At one time this prince had been tributary to Hiongnou, but he had shaken off their yoke, and was now an independent king. Chang Keen was sanguine enough to expect that this prince, rejoicing in his new-found liberty, would raise no objection to becoming the vassal of Vouti; but in this view he was disappointed. Chang Keen resided some time in Ousun, where he was honourably entertained, and from this place he sent explorers into the surrounding countries, both to the south and also to the north. Vouti, on learning that Chang Keen had failed in the main object of his mission, caused two fortified cities to be built on the Shensi frontier, thus affording protection to the traders who were beginning to carry on commercial relations with the peoples of this region, at the same time that he provided against possible contingencies in future wars with the Tartar tribes. By this step he cut off the communications between the Hiongnou and the peoples of the Kiang Valley. It was well that he did so, for his struggle with the former was on the point of being renewed. In the year B.C. 114 the Tartar king died, and his son Ouwei succeeded him; but the contest was for * Ousun was a state south of Kokonor.

TWO NEW PROVINCES.

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a brief space postponed in consequence of the exhaustion of the Tartars, and of Vouti's attention being engaged by other matters which cannot be passed over without some notice.

The war with the people of Fuhkien, when the Prince of Nanyuei was relieved from his embarrassment, has already been described, and the relations of that principality with the Emperor remained fairly satisfactory during the lifetime of Prince Chowhow, but his son and successor indulged excesses which speedily led to his death. There then ensued a period of disturbance which finally broke into open war, and Vouti, seeing that the time had come to assert his authority, put forward his claims to the possession of Nanyuei. The Imperial troops entered the province from four sides, stamped out all resistance, and conquered the province which was thereupon divided into nine departments. The province of Fuhkien at last shared the same fate. Its inhabitants were carried away, and it was converted into a vast desert. These two wars occupied Vouti's attention during four years, but they left him much stronger within his frontier, and able to devote his full attention to foreign affairs.

It was, therefore, with increased confidence and strength that the Chinese commenced the new Tartar war (B.C. 110). For the first time Vouti took the field in person, although the active command was divided between twelve lieutenantgenerals. Having assembled a large army of nearly two hundred thousand men in Shensi, Vouti sent an ambassador to the Tartar chief calling upon him to surrender all prisoners and plunder, and to recognize China as the dominant country in Eastern Asia. The Tartar's only reply was to imprison the ambassador, and to hurl his defiance at the head of the Emperor, who, for some reason that it is now impossible to discover, refrained from prosecuting the campaign on this occasion, making instead a grand tour through the northern and central districts of his dominions. One of the last acts of the year was the reincorporation of the northern province of Leaoutung, which, after the fall of the Tsins, had been permitted to acquire for a time its former independence. This result was not attained without some difficulty, but it was attained; and the difficulty and the loss counted even then

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