ake good the gaps in the National Finance, now slowly destroyed the
credit of the Central Government and made the suspension of specie
payment a mere matter of time. By the end of February the province of
Kueichow was not only officially admitted by the Peking Government to be
in open revolt as well as Yunnan, but rebel troops were reported to be
invading the neighbouring province of Hunan. Kwangsi was also reported
to be preparing for secession whilst in Szechuan local troops were
revolting in increasing numbers. Rumours of an attempted assassination
of Yuan Shih-kai by means of bombs now circulated,--and there were many
arrests and suicides in the capital. Though by a mandate issued on the
23rd February, the enthronement ceremony was indefinitely postponed,
that move came too late. The whole country was plainly trembling on the
edge of a huge outbreak when, less than four weeks later, Yuan Shih-kai
reluctantly and publicly admitted that the game was up. It is understood
that a fateful interview he had with the British Minister greatly
influenced him, though the formal declaration of independence of Kwangsi
on the 16th March, whither the scholar Liang Ch'i-chao had gone, was
also a powerful argument. On the 22nd March the Emperor-elect issued the
mandate categorically cancelling the entire monarchy scheme, it being
declared that he would now form a Responsible Cabinet. Until that date
the Government Gazette had actually perpetrated the folly of publishing
side by side Imperial Edicts and Presidential Mandates--the first for
Chinese eyes, the second for foreign consumption. Never before even in
China had such a farce been seen. A rapid perusal of the Mandate of
Cancellation will show how lamely and poorly the retreat is made:

DECREE CANCELLING THE EMPIRE (22ND MARCH)

After the establishment of the _Min Kuo_ (_i.e._ the Republic),
disturbances rapidly followed one another; and a man of little
virtue like me was called to take up the vast burden of the State.
Fearing that disaster might befall us any day, all those who had the
welfare of the country at heart advocated the reinstitution of the
monarchical system of government to the end that a stop be put to
all strife for power and a regime of peace be inaugurated.
Suggestions in this sense have unceasingly been made to me since the
days of Kuei Chou (the year of the first Revolution, 1911) and each
time a sharp rebuke has bee