t,--unconstitutional because the Nanking Provisional
Constitution under which the country was still governed pending the
formal passage of the Permanent Constitution through Parliament, only
provided for the creation of Parliament as a grand constitutional
Drafting Committee but gave no power to the Chief Executive to dissolve
it during its "life" which was three years. As we have already shown,
the period between the _coup d'etat_ of 4th November, 1913, and the
re-convocation of Parliament on 1st August, 1916, had been treated as a
mere interregnum: therefore until 1918, if the law were properly
construed, no power in the land could interrupt the Parliamentary
sessions except Parliament itself. Parliament, in view of these
threatening developments, had already expressed its willingness (a) to
reconsider certain provisions of the draft constitution in such a
conciliatory manner as to insure the passage of the whole instrument
through both houses within two weeks; (b) to alter the Election Law in
such fashion as to conciliate the more conservative elements in the
country; (c) to prorogue the second session (1916-1917) immediately
these things were done and after a very short recess to open the third
session (1917-1918) and close it within three months, allowing new
elections to be held in the early months of 1918,--the new Parliament to
be summoned in April, 1918, to form itself into a National Convention
and elect the President for the quinquennial period 1918-1923.

All these reasonable plans were knocked on the head on Sunday, the 10th
June, by the sudden report that the President having been peremptorily
told that the dissolution of Parliament was the sole means of saving the
Republic and preventing the sack of Peking, as well as an open armed
attempt to restore the boy-emperor Hsuan Tung, had at last made up his
mind to surrender to the inevitable. He had sealed a Mandate decreeing
the dissolution of Parliament which would be promulgated as soon as it
had received the counter-signature of the acting Premier, Dr. Wu
Ting-fang, such counter-signature being obligatory under Article 45 of
the Provisional Constitution.

At once it became clear again, as happens a thousand times during every
year in the East, that what is not nipped in the bud grows with such
malignant swiftness as finally to blight all honest intentions. Had
steps been taken on or about the 23rd May to detain forcibly in Peking
the ringleader of the rec