THE progress and temporary settlement of the foreign question so completely overshadows every other event during Taoukwang's reign that it is difficult to extract anything of interest from the records of the government of the country, although the difficult and multifarious task of ruling three hundred millions of people had to be performed. Judged by the standard of a Chinese ruler, this Emperor undoubtedly came up to the requirements of his exalted office in his sense of how much his subjects required of him, and also in his manner of giving expression to their wishes. But his want of energy, or perhaps of the necessary knowledge, rendered him unable to properly supervise his own orders, or to sufficiently impress on his officers that they must be carried out without subterfuge. More than one fact went to show that the bonds of constituted authority were loosened in China, and that men paid only a qualified respect to the Imperial edict. Bands of robbers prowled about the country, and even the capital was not free from their presence. While one band made its headquarters within the Imperial city, another established itself in a fortified position in the central provinces of China, whence it dominated a vast region. The police were helpless, and such military forces as existed were unable to make any serious attempt to crush an opponent who was stronger than themselves. The foreign war had led to the recruiting of a large number of braves, and the peace to their sudden disbandment, so that the country was covered with a large number of desperate and penniless men, who were not particular as to what they did for a livelihood. It is not surprising that the secret societies began to look up again with so promising a field to work in, and a new association, known as the Green Water Lily, became extremely formidable among the truculent braves of Hoonan. But none of these troubles assumed the extreme form of danger in open rebellion, and there was still wanting the man to weld all these hostile and dangerous elements into a national party of insurgents against Manchu authority, and so it remained until Taoukwang had given up his throne to his successor.

In Yunnan there occurred, about the year 1846, the first simmerings of disaffection among the Mahomedans, which many years later developed into the Panthay rebellion, but on that occasion the vigour of the Viceroy nipped the danger in the bud. In Central Asia there was a revival of activity on the part of the Khoja exiles, who fancied that the discomfiture of the Chinese by the English and the internal disorders, of which rumour had no doubt carried an exaggerated account into Turkestan, would entail a very much diminished authority in Kashgar. As it happened, the Chinese authority in that region had been consolidated and extended by the energy

and ability of a Mahomedan official named Zuhuruddin. He had risen to power by the thoroughness with which he had carried out the severe repressive measures sanctioned after the abortive invasion of Jehangir, and during fifteen years he increased the revenue and trade of the great province entrusted to his care. His loyalty to the Chinese government seems to have been unimpeachable, and the only point he seems to have erred in was an over-confident belief in the strength of his position. He based this opinion chiefly on the fact of his having constructed strong new forts, or yangyshahr, outside the principal towns. But a new element of danger had in the meantime been introduced into the situation in Kashgar by the appointment of Khokandian consuls, who were empowered to raise custom dues on all Mahomedan goods. These officials became the centre of intrigue against the Chinese authorities, and whenever the Khan of Khokand determined to take up the cause of the Khojas he found the ground prepared for him by these emissaries.

In 1842 Mahomed Ali Khan of Khokand, a chief of considerable ability and character, died, and his authority passed, after some confusion, to his kinsman, Khudayar, who was a man of little capacity, and indisposed to meddle with the affairs of his neighbours. But the Khokandian chiefs were loth to forego the turbulent adventures to which they were addicted for the personal feelings of their nominal head, and they thought that a descent upon Kashgar offered the best chance of glory and booty. Therefore they went to the seven sons of Jehangir and, inciting them by the memory of their father's death as well as the hope of a profitable adventure, to make another attempt to drive the Chinese out of Central Asia, succeeded in inducing them to unfurl once more the standard of the Khojas. The seven Khojas-Haft Khojagan-issued their proclamation in the winter of 1845-6, rallied all their adherents to their side, and made allies of the Kirghiz tribes. They did not at once resort to vigorous action, but hung on the frontier during the winter, and when they did not advance Zuhuruddin seems to have thought that they and their forces would melt away with the snows of the Pamir. The Khoja forces were, moreover, not a very formidable-looking body; but on the other hand, the Chinese garrison was very weak, and distributed over a wide area. The Khokandian agents reported that the people of Kashgar were ripe for revolt, and the inaction of Zuhuruddin even raised a suspicion of his fidelity. The chances of success were not as unequal as they appeared on the surface to be, and only the miserable incapacity of the Khojas prevented their attaining a greater success than they did. When the Mahomedan forces left the hills they advanced with extreme rapidity on Kashgar, to which they laid siege. After a siege of a fortnight they obtained possession of the town through the treachery of some of the inhabitants, but the citadel or yangyshahr continued to hold out, and their excesses in the town so alienated the sympathy of the Kashgarians, that no popular rising took place, and the Chinese were able to collect all their garrisons to expel the invaders. The Khojas were defeated in a battle at Kok Robat, near Yarkand, and driven out of the country. The affair of the seven Khojas, which at one time threatened the Chinese with the gravest danger, thus ended in a collapse, and it is remarkable as being the only invasion in which the Mahomedan subjects of China did not fraternise with her enemies. Notwithstanding the magnitude of his services as an administrator, Zuhuruddin was disgraced and dismissed from

his post for what seemed his culpable apathy at the beginning of the campaign.

Another indication of the weakness of the Chinese executive was furnished in the piratical confederacy which established itself at the entrance of the Canton river, and defied all the efforts of the mandarins until they enlisted in their behalf the powerful co-operation of the English navy. The Bogue had never been completely free from those lawless persons who are willing to commit any outrage if it holds out a certain prospect of gain with a minimum amount of danger, and the peace had thrown many desperate men out of employment who thought they could find in piracy a mode of showing their patriotism as well as of profiting themselves. These turbulent and dangerous individuals gathered round a leader named Shapuntsai, and in the year of which we are speaking, 1849, they controlled a large fleet and a well-equipped force, which levied blackmail from Foochow to the Gulf of Tonquin, and attacked every trading ship, European or Chinese, which did not appear capable of defending itself. If they had confined their attacks to their own countrymen, it is impossible to say how long they might have gone on in impunity, for the Empire possessed no naval power; but, unfortunately for them, and fortunately for China, they seized some English vessels and murdered some English subjects. One man-of-war under Captain Hay was employed in operations against them, and in the course of six months fifty-seven piratical vessels were destroyed, and a thousand of their crews either slain or taken prisoners. Captain Hay, on being joined by another man-of-war, had the satisfaction of destroying the remaining junks and the depôts in the Canton river, whereupon he sailed to attack the headquarters of Shapuntsai in the Gulf of Tonquin. After some search the piratical fleet was discovered off an island which still bears the name of the Pirates' hold, and after a protracted engagement it was annihilated. Sixty junks were destroyed, and Shapuntsai was compelled to escape to Cochin China, where it is believed that he was executed by order of the King. The dispersion of this powerful confederacy was a timely service to the Chinese, who were informed that the English government would be at all times happy to afford similar aid at their request. Even at this comparatively early stage of the intercourse it was apparent that the long-despised foreigners would be able to render valuable service of a practical kind to the Pekin executive, and that if the Manchus wished to assert their power more effectually over their Chinese subjects they would be compelled to have recourse to European weapons and military and scientific knowledge. The suppression of the piratical confederacy of the Bogue was the first occasion of that employment of European force, which was carried to a much more advanced stage during the Taeping rebellion, and of which we have certainly not seen the last development.

One of the last acts of Taoukwang's reign showed to what a depth of mental hesitation and misery he had sunk. It seems that the Chinese New-year's day-12th February, 1850-was to be marked by an eclipse of the sun, which was considered very inauspicious, and as the Emperor was especially susceptible to superstitious influences, he sought to get out of the difficulty and to avert any evil consequences by decreeing that the new year should begin on the previous day. But all-powerful as a Chinese Emperor is, there are some things he cannot do, and the good sense of the Chinese revolted against this attempt to alter the course of nature. The

Imperial decree was completely disregarded, and received with expressions of derision, and in several towns the placards were torn down and defaced. Notwithstanding the eclipse, the Chinese year began at its appointed time. Some excuse might be made for Taoukwang on the ground of ill-health, for he was then suffering from the illness which carried him off a few weeks later. His health had long been precarious, the troubles of his reign had prematurely aged him, and he had experienced a rude shock from the death, at the end of 1849, of his adopted mother, towards whom he seems to have preserved the most affectionate feelings. From the first day of his illness its gravity seems to have been appreciated, and an unfavourable issue expected. On 25th February, a grand council was held in the Emperor's bedchamber, and the Emperor wrote in his bed the following Vermilion Edict, proclaiming his fourth son his heir and chosen successor : "Let Yihchoo, the Imperial fourth son, be set forth as the Imperial Heir Apparent. You princes and high officers, why wait for our words? Assist and support him with united hearts, and do you all regard whatever pertains to the concerns of the country and the public as of high imporTaoukwang survived this imtance, without sympathy for aught else." portant act only a very short time, but the exact date of his death is uncertain. There is some reason for thinking that his end was hastened by the outbreak of a fire within the Imperial City, which threatened it with destruction. The event was duly notified to the Chinese people in a proclamation by his successor, in which he dilated on the virtues of his predecessor, and expressed the stereotyped wish that he could have lived a hundred years.

Taoukwang was in his sixty-ninth year, having been born on 12th September, 1781, and the thirty years over which his reign had nearly extended were among the most eventful, and in some respects the most unfortunate, in the annals of his country. When he was a young man, the power of his grandfather, Keen Lung, was at its pinnacle, but the misfortunes of his father's reign had prepared him for the greater misfortunes of his own, and the school of adversity in which he had passed the greater portion of his life had imbued him only with the disposition to bear Yet Taoukwang was not calamity, and not the vigour to grapple with it. without many good points, and he seems to have realised the extent of the national trouble, and to have felt acutely his inability to retrieve what had been lost. He was also averse to all unnecessary display, and his expenditure on the Court and himself was less than that of any of his predecessors or successors. He never wasted the public money on his own person, and His habits were simple and manly. As a young that was a great matter. man he had given himself up to military exercises, and even after he became Emperor, he pursued his old partiality for active exercises, such as archery and riding. To preserve his physical vigour he took "strengthening pills," composed probably of the famous gensing, which is sent annually to the capital from Manchuria, but their only apparent effect was to destroy his teeth, and thus greatly detract from his personal appearance. Although Taoukwang's reign had been marked by unqualified misfortune, he seems to have derived consolation from the belief that the worst was over, and that as his authority had recovered from such rude shocks, it He had managed to extricate was not likely to experience anything worse. himself from a foreign war, which was attended with an actual invasion of a most alarming character, without any diminution of his authority. The

symptoms of internal rebellion which had revealed themselves in more than one quarter of the Empire had not attained any formidable dimensions, and seemed likely to pass away without endangering the Chinese constitution. Taoukwang may have hoped that while he had suffered much he had saved his family and dynasty from more serious calamities, and that on him alone had fallen the resentment of an offended Heaven. The experience of the next fifteen years was to show how inaccurately he had measured the situation, and how far the troubles of the fifteen years following his death were to exceed those of his reign, for just as he had inherited from his father, Kiaking, a legacy of trouble, so did he pass on to his son an inheritance of misfortune and difficulty, rendered all the more onerous by the pretension of supreme power without the means to support

it.

The accession of Prince Yihchoo-who took the name of Hienfung, which means "great abundance," or "complete prosperity "-to the throne threatened for a moment to be disturbed by the ambition of his uncle, Hwuy Wang, who, it will be remembered, had attempted to seize the throne from his brother Taoukwang. This prince had lived in retirement during the last years of his brother's reign, and the circumstances which emboldened him to again put forward his pretensions will not be known until the state history of the Manchu dynasty is published. His attempt signally failed, but Hienfung spared his life, while he punished the ministers, Keying and Muchangah, for their supposed apathy, or secret sympathy with the aspirant to the Imperial office by dismissing them from their posts. When Hienfung became Emperor he was less than twenty years of age, and one of his first acts was to confer the title of Prince on his four younger brothers, and to associate them in the administration with himself. This was a new departure in the Manchu policy, as all the previous Emperors had systematically kept their brothers in the background. Hienfung's brothers became known in order of their ages as Princes Kung, Shun, Chun, and Fu, and as Hienfung was the fourth son of Taoukwang, they were also distinguished numerically as the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth princes. Although Hienfung became Emperor at a time of great national distress, he was so far fortunate that an abundant harvest, in the year 1850, tended to mitigate it, and by having recourse to the common Chinese practice of "voluntary contributions," a sufficiently large sum was raised to remove the worst features of the prevailing scarcity and suffering. But these temporary and local measures could not improve a situation that was radically bad, or allay a volume of popular discontent that was rapidly developing into unconcealed rebellion.

An imperial proclamation was drawn up by the Hanlin College in which Hienfung took upon himself the whole blame of the national misfortunes, but the crisis had got far beyond a remedy of words. The corruption of the public service had gradually alienated the sympathies of the people. Justice and probity had for a time been banished from the civil service of China. The example of the few men of honour and capacity served but to bring into more prominent relief the faults of the whole class. Justice was nowhere to be found; the verdict was sold to the highest bidder. The guilty, if well provided in worldly goods, escaped scot-free; the poor suffered for their own frailties as well as the crimes of wealthier offenders. There was seen the far from uncommon case of individuals sentenced to death obtaining substitutes for the capital punishment. Offices were sold