his distress at the loss of his empire, pitied
his subjects, condemned his mandarins to
death, then hacked his daughter's arm in a
high-minded attempt to kill her; and going
out into the imperial garden, hung himself
upon a tree. His prime minister hung
himself, and his wives hung themselves in pious
emulation. The Mantchou Tartar, who with
a seven-pointed charter of grievances had
invaded China, held possession of the throne.
Eighty thousand men, and women, and
children, of the reigning race of Ming,
perished in the lifetime of a generation.

A Tartar dynasty was seated on the throne,
and ordered Chinamen, on penalty of death,
to shave their heads like Tartars, and acquire
a pride in pigtails. Before that time the
Chinese were proud of cultivating long black
hair; and one of the names, says Semedo, by
which China was known among neighbours,
was the Kingdom of the Black-Haired
People. Many resisting the obnoxious order
would not allow their hair to be cut at the
roots, but preferred that the entire head
should be taken with it; nevertheless, in
time the custom spread, and as the Tartar
dynasty retained its seat upon the throne, the
enforced practice of head-shaving came to be
quietly followed as a necessary national
observance.

Until this time, the Tartars have retained
their place; but at this time it is doubtful
how far they retain their power. Here are
men declaring that the race of Ming is not
extinct, and that they will restore it to its old
position; one of the rebel chiefs, throwing his
tail to the winds, and burying his razor,
triumphs in the epithet of hairy. On the
pages of a history of China, dynasty is to be
seen following dynasty two hundred years
make a fair term to the power of a single
race in an empire that is, on the whole, brisk
at rebellion. It will not be wonderful, therefore,
if in our own immediate day the London
newspapers inform us suddenly some morning,
that the young Tartar emperor, Yih-chu, has
been ousted by a rival of pure Chinese blood.
The existing chances are against Yih-chu, and
certainly in favour of the rebels.

The Emperor Taou-kwang, who succeeded
Kia-king in 1821, was troubled like his
predecessor with plots and dissensions in his
empire, but in his reign there occurred the
mightiest event in Chinese history—the war
with England. That war, in its origin, was
not a great matter for boasting, and in its
progress offered so little trouble to the British
arms, was so purely and literally an illustration
of the threadbare proverb about a bull
in a china shop, that it will suffice if Mr. Bull
exalts his horns the least part of an inch in
triumph over what he has been doing. The
introduction into China of European civilisation,
the opening of the country to missionaries
and merchants, has been comfortably looked
upon by European nations as a blessing more
than an equivalent for any losses that the
Chinese may have had. The government of
China has been beaten and beggared, but if
its wits be brightened, what of that? For an
Asiatic state to be well thrashed by Europeans
must conduce greatly to its future good, and
to the total prospects of humanity.

Taking the matter, however, on its own
ground, we are disposed to doubt whether
the evil of the Chinese war will lead to so
much good as our conceit in the character of
Europeans caused us to imagine. No wonders
have happened in the way of commerce with
the external world, and the internal state of
China, since the war, and in consequence of
the war, seems to have become utterly
wretched. We have at hand a work lately
published by our excellent plenipotentiary
Sir John F. Davis upon "China during the
war and since the peace." Depending for
recent facts upon this trustworthy informant,
we propose now to make out as concisely as
we can the chain of events by which the opium
war is connected with the internal distractions
of the Chinese empire, and the struggle
between Yih-chu and Tien-tih, which remains
at this hour, probably, undecided.

Before the war with England the Chinese
were very ignorant of European ways, and
knew little or nothing of European geography.
They had no clearer idea of the distance
between Manchester and Liverpool, than
many of us have of the distance between
Ladak and Penjinsk. At the first coming of
the English with a hostile front, Yukien,
governor of Keang-soo—to the Keang-soo
people our ignorance of their province might
seem very laughable—Yukien declared "I
look upon these enemies as mere bulrushes,
having from my youth upwards read military
treatises, and spread the terror of my name
myriads of miles through Turkistan." If the
English "dare to come to our shores," he
says, "they will be like the moth in the
candle, or the fish in the net." Nobody is to
let himself be disturbed about these robbers,
"who will instantly be put down by the
military."

The lesson taught to the Chinese by contest
with European power, when they themselves
proved to be moths in the candle and fishes
in the net, may, from some points of view, be
considered salutary, but as the examples are
so very rare (if there be any) of benefit that
has accrued to natives by the succumbing of
their country before European power, with all
our self-contentment we may feel a doubt
whether the blessings of war have been
realised by the Chinese, and whether it is not
by quieter and purer methods that the real
influence of civilisation has to be extended.

Some of the Chinese in their ignorance even
conceived the idea of removing the seat of war
to London. "The Russians," said one of their
writers, "are now our friends; their territory
is not very far from the English, and joins
ours. We should, therefore, spend thirty
millions of taels in raising a daring army, and