sold in Europe and America
are known as "china." Straw carpet, or matting, and fans for export are
also important exports.

The mill system of manufacture is rapidly gaining ground, however, and
foreign companies find it economical to carry the yarn made in India
from American cotton into China to be made into cloth. In the vicinity
of Shanghai alone there are nearly three hundred thousand spindles. This
phase of the industry is due largely to the factor of cheap labor; the
Chinese skilled laborer is intelligent; he does not object to a
sixteen-hour working-day at wages varying from five to twenty cents.

There is no great localization of industrial centres, as in the United
States and Europe. Each centre of population is practically
self-supporting and independent from an economic stand-point. The
introduction of western methods, however, is gradually changing this
feature.

All industries of a general character are hampered for want of good
means of transportation. The empire is traversed by a network of unpaved
roads; but although these are always in a wretched condition, an
enormous traffic is carried over them by means of wheel-barrows,
pack-animals, and by equally primitive methods.

The numerous rivers form an important means of communication. The
Yangtze is now available to commerce a distance of 2,000 miles, and the
opening of the Si Kiang (West River) adds a large area that is
commercially tributary to Canton and Hongkong. The most important
water-way is the Grand Canal, extending from Hang Chow to Tientsin. This
canal is by no means a good one as compared with American and European
standards. It was built not so much for the necessities of traffic, as
to avoid the numerous pirate vessels that infest the coasts. Junks,
row-boats, house-boats, and foreign steam craft are all employed for
traffic. The internal water-ways aggregate about fifteen thousand miles
in length.

[Illustration: A TEA-PLANTATION--PICKING THE LEAVES]

[Illustration: PREPARING THE LEAVES FOR ROASTING]

[Illustration: TEA-BALES FOR EXPORT THROUGH RUSSIA]

Of railways there were less than three hundred and fifty miles at the
close of the century, the most important being the line from Tientsin to
Peking. About five thousand miles are projected and under construction
by American and European companies. A branch of the Transsiberian
railway is under construction to Port Arthur. Telegraph and telephone
lines have become popular and hav