e quite impossible for me to follow the consecutive history
of China from 2637 B.C. down to the present time; it would be an
infliction upon you, and I shall only mention some of the principal
events. Our authority in these remarks numbers the Chinese army at three
hundred and fifty thousand; the Year Book makes it double this number.
Judged by a European standard, it does not amount to much outside of
mere numbers; though in addition to it there is a sort of militia,
camped in the several provinces, more in the nature of police than
soldiers, of twice as many men as the imperial army.

"The first great war in China was the Tai-Ping rebellion, which the
older of you can remember. It began in 1851, and was continued for
nearly twenty years. Its leader was Hung, a poor student, who studied up
a new religion, which was certainly an improvement upon those of the
people, for it recognized the Great God, and Christ as the Elder
Brother. A strict morality and the keeping of the Sabbath were required
of its adherents, and idolatry and the use of opium were forbidden.

"Hung incited the rebellion; and its object was to overturn the ruling
dynasty of the Manchus, and place himself on the throne. It was at
first very successful in its progress, and it looked as though the
imperial cause was doomed. In 1855 the rebels, for the want of
sufficient re-enforcements in an attempt to capture Pekin, were
compelled to retreat to Nanking, and then the decline of the
insurrection began. A body of foreigners under an American by the name
of Ward joined the imperialists, and rendered important service; but he
was killed in battle in 1862. He was succeeded by one of the
subordinates, who became General Burgevine; and he was quite as
successful as General Ward had been. The new general fell out with the
government, and retired. By the influence of British residents at
Shang-hai, who had organized an effective army, General Charles George
Gordon, of whom you heard in Egypt, was placed in command. He captured
Nanking, and the rebellion was suppressed in 1865.

"You have been informed of the movements of the Portuguese, English,
French, Dutch, and Spaniards to obtain territory in the East from 1497,
when Vasco da Gama doubled the Cape of Good Hope. All of them
established colonies; and in 1516 they began to send their ships to
China, whose people did not receive them kindly. This was in the early
days of the Manchu rulers, who claimed to be super