30 JUNE 1900, Page 20

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

THE STRENGTH OP CHINA. TIENTSIN has been "relieved," whatever that much- employed word may mean, and Admiral Seymour has been rescued with his force, but nevertheless if we were asked to suggest a maxim which should be obligatory on all Foreign Ministers it would be this : Despise no one, not even an Empress of China with three hundred millions of subjects.' A foolish contempt has been the foundation of recent European policy in China, and Europe has now to pay for it,—it may be a bitter price. Just think of the mass of illusion, all of it accepted as axiomatic truth, which the events of the past month have dissipated. It was supposed that the proudest Court in Asia regarded the incessant aggressions on its indepen- dence, aggressions often dictated by obvious or admitted greed of cash, with despairing humility, with no idea Of revenge, and with no hope of preparing counterblows. We now know that the Empress and her Manchu coun- sellors regarded those aggressions with furious though suppressed rage, that they were prepared to brave Europe rather than not punish them, and that they had in pro- found secrecy summoned their only experienced general, Tung, who has been crushing Mahommedans in the West, had imported Krupp guns, shells, and rifles, had collected seventy thousand of their best troops, and stood ready when the hour arrived to dismiss the Legations, to shell the whole fleet of Europe at Taku, and to defend Pekin by force of arms. It was supposed that the people at large were utterly indifferent to the insults pressed upon their Empire, that they hardly knew of the foreign pressures, and that when they did know they regarded them as affairs of Pekin and not of China. We now know that hatred of the foreigner for his arrogance was diffused through all the Chinese provinces, that a secret society of " respect- able " men had been formed everywhere to give expression to that hatred, and that the populace in the North was excited to the point not only of committing murder, but of running the risk of death. It was supposed that there was no man in the Empire except the Empress, and it is now perceived that she has beside her Princes who are audacious, generals who can plan successful ambus- cades, -statesmen who arranged a national explosion in such secrecy that, as Mr. Brodrick admitted, the British Ambassador had no suspicion of its approach. Above all, it was supposed—this was an article of faith—that the Chinese would not fight. Look, it was said, how they fled before the Japanese. Surely any European force, half a regiment, will scatter any Chinese " army " ? It is now known that though Chinese soldiers fight badly, they died in heaps in the Taku forts ; that they " repulsed " six hundred Russians and Americans with heavy loss ; that they knew how to surround, so as to drive to despair, a Europe in division ; that though unable to win a pitched battle, they are able to harass, to intercept, to maintain contests behind walls and entrenchments, which, as they can spend a thousand lives for our one, are in the aggregate most embarrassing and to their enemies most costly. Any single Power, it was said, even Italy, for instance, could defeat China, and now all Europe in combination is chal- lenged to reach Pekin, only a hundred miles from the sea, and recognises that the task is a formidable, and may be an exhausting, one.

Europe is right in its second thoughts, and we do not wonder at the worried hesitation which all the Powers reveal in their official utterances, at the vague" tentatives" put forward as to the force which will be required, or at the obvious eagerness to leave some loophole open through which the Empress may retreat and enable the Powers to pose as her affronted but not implacable "friends." Nothing is so tranquil or so easy to cleave as the water in a reservoir while the wall stands, and nothing so dangerous or so irrepressible when the wall is broken. The men who rule China, among whom the resolute and tiger-spirited Empress must be counted, know well that there are forces within the huge Empire which they can use though they hate using them, and we do not doubt that now they have resolved on defiance they are drawing them to Pekin for their defence. There are cavalry in Tartary such as those who nearly checked Lord Elgin. Tung has evidently brought some of his men from the West. and there are thousands more to arrive. It is a month since we read an order to send the soldiers of Hunan the best fighters in the Empire. to Pekin, and behind them are the Black Flags, whom French soldiers in Tonquin have ceased to despise. A whole corps d'armie is reported to be in motion in Shantung, thousands of adventurers are swarming up from the cities of the South, and around them all, every- where are the armed ruffians whom the "Boxers" employ to pillage, to burn, and when they see a chance, to fight. None of them all, except Tang's men, are good troops according to the ideas of Europe, but they will all if armed try to fight, they are all competent to kill stragglers, they are all skilled in ditch-digging, bridge-breaking, and stockade-rearing, and a large proportion of them will seriously defend high walla. To march on a host of this kind with an army of less than fifty thousand men per- fectly equipped and well provisioned will be most unwise, and to despatch such a force, with no one of the nations in it clearly predominant, will involve much delay, a serious effort, and expense that Parliaments must sanction. They have to garrison Pekin when the work is done if the Government remains, and if it flies, as it contemplates doing, they will have to choose between the alternatives of being rather ridiculous, or of reaching Seam, of all places in China the one best adapted for defence, and seven hundred and fifty miles from any available base.

Is there any alternative to this disgusting necessity ? There may be one, and the keenest minds in Europe are anxiously hunting for it, but it is hard to see where it is to be found. Europe will neither pocket its pride nor surrender the hope of quiet commerce with China, and without a decent central government of the .Empire neither can pride be soothed nor trade be rendered profit- able and large. We do not mean that the government must be a, "reformed" one. Reforms imposed by foreign dictation do not last unless the foreigners remain to see them executed, and a condominium of eight Powers appointed to rule China is unthinkable. We greatly doubt, moreover, whether the " Reformers " have any solid foothold in China,—whether, that is, they are nearer success than "Young Turkey" or "Young India," or any other of the numerous debating societies full of " gas ' and good intentions which seem so important every- where except at home. But a rational government there must be, a government which will enforce order and keep pledges, and treat foreigners as guests instead of intru- sive "devils," or China must be shut up. We can see no way of securing such a one until the force of the Con- servative party, which is essentially the anti-foreign party, is broken by war and its chiefs sent into banishment, and that is, as we have said, a task which will burden even Europe. It will be no easier if we enter on it lightly, if we fancy that any Chinaman alive loves the European, or if we go on dreaming that three hundred millions of hostile or suspicious persons, however much "fossilised," can throw no obstacle in the way of the march of fifty thousand. Cortez conquered Mexico, but he did not find it easy work, and in arms, in discipline, in courage, and in comparative numbers the Mexicans were the inferiors of the Chinese. Europe may be most wise in pretending that it is not at war with China, but it will have to occupy the Chinese capital and devise a new governing machine for China all the same.