erals, who warned him that "in war we should never despise an
enemy," and marched in person at the head of his advance guard to find
the Tartars. Meha, who had been at all these pains to throw dust in the
Emperor's eyes and to conceal his true strength, no sooner saw how well
his stratagem had succeeded, and that Kaotsou was rushing into the trap
so elaborately laid for him, than by a skilful movement he cut off his
communications with the main body of his army, and, surrounding him with
an overwhelming force, compelled him to take refuge in the city of
Pingching in Shensi.

With a very short supply of provisions, and hopelessly outnumbered, it
looked as if the Chinese Emperor could not possibly escape the grasp of
the desert chief. In this strait one of his officers suggested as a last
chance that the most beautiful virgin in the town should be discovered,
and sent as a present to mollify the conqueror. Kaotsou seized at this
suggestion, as the drowning man will catch at a straw, and the story is
preserved, though her name has passed into oblivion, of how the young
Chinese girl entered into the plan and devoted all her wits to charming
the Tartar conqueror. She succeeded as much as their fondest hopes could
have led them to believe; and Meha permitted Kaotsou, after signing an
ignominious treaty, to leave his place of confinement and rejoin his
army, glad to welcome the return of the Emperor, yet without him
helpless to stir a hand to effect his release. Meha retired to his own
territory, well satisfied with the material results of the war and the
rich booty which had been obtained in the sack of Chinese cities, while
Kaotsou, like the ordinary type of an oriental ruler, vented his
discomfiture on his subordinates.

The closing acts of the war were the lavishing of rewards on the head of
the general to whose warnings he had paid no heed, and the execution of
the scouts who had been misled by the wiles of Meha.

The success which had attended this incursion and the spoil of war were
potent inducements to the Tartars to repeat the invasion. While Kaotsou
was meditating over the possibility of revenge, and considering schemes
for the better protection of his frontier, the Tartars, disregarding the
truce that had been concluded, retraced their steps, and pillaged the
border districts with impunity. In this year (B.C. 199) they were
carrying everything before them, and the Emperor, either unnerved by
recent disaster or ap