EMPRESS'S HOARD.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20, 24 January 1912, Page 3

EMPRESS'S HOARD.

HUGE STORE OF GOLD IN PEKIN. THIRTY VEals' TRIBUTE. In recent cable messages mention was made of the Chinese Imperial treasure. From the London Times we take the following : — The fate of the colossal hoard of gold stored in' the Imperial Palace at Pokin is being eagerly discussed by the revolutionaries and the supporters of the Throne. For thirty years treasure has been poured into Pekin, and none has left the palaco till now. "Rather more than a fortnight ago," writes the Pekin correspondent of The Times, " gold' to the weight of 79,000 taels, and worth nearly ,£400,000, portion of the palaco treasure, was, through the agency of v the Ministry of Finance, offered for sale to the foreign banke. A considerable amount 'was purchased by the Deuteche-Asiatische Bank and transmitted to Europe by parcel post, registered and insured, as. is customary in transmitting money from Pekin to London. A portion was also, purchased by the Yokohama Specie Bank, a -small amount by the Hong Kong and Shanghai ' Bank, and a still smaller amount by the Bauque de l'lndo-Chine. The balance, amounting approximately to nearly £125,000, has now been purchased by the Russo-Asiatic Bank. " Considerable interest attaches to the sale, because the amount 6old was only al email portion of the large amount hoarded in the palace. The question in, shall the palace be compelled to disgorge the balance? During the foreign military occupational Pekin in the year following the Boxer outbreak of 1900, the ( palace treasure was guarded by foreign troops. There is strong reason for 'Believing that this hoarded treasure amounted in value to nearly nine millions sterling ; the whole of it was restored to the Chinese intact. "THE PALACE LOOTED." "On the return of the Empress Dowager from her flight to Sianfu the palace treasure was largely added to, for the wily 'Old Biiddna' displayed no gratitude for the services rendered to her by the foreign Powers in protecting her Treasury, but, pleading that the palace had been looted in the absence of the Court, reaped a rich harvest of money contributions from the patriotic and from the purchasers of title and officft in all parts of the Empire. It is quite certain that the' gold and silver now stored in the palace must be sufficient to meet all Ohina'^ foreign obligations , for several years to come. The gold just sold was packed in scaled box^s, with inscriptions showing that they had | been remitted by the. Canton Hoppo iv the seventies. They had never b?c!) opened. No treasure remitted to Pekin during the past thirty years has ye£ been touched." <. The Times correspondent says that surely this is treasure of State, and lie argues that* it should bfr made available for meeting China's foreign obligations. "Th« Chincßo Gov<;irnui«nt," 'he I concludes, "is asking for a suspension of , the sinkin? fund of foreign loans, -yet 1 there is abundance of money in the I Palace — that ie to say, in the Imperial Treasury — to meet all its obligations. There is greater w«alth in the Palace Treasury than was found at Yildiz after the fall of Abdul Hamijl. Is it to be appropriated/ by the new Government as was the treasure of the deposed Sultan ? That is a question which is bound to engage the attention of the foreign Legations in tho immediate future."

The longevity of artists is almost proverbial, and the case" of Thomas Robert Macquoid, who, at the age of 92, is still painting, is remarkable, but not unparalleled. T. S. Cooper, R.A., exhibited at the Royal Academy for several years after passing his ninetieth birthday ; John Maseey Wright, a watercolour artist, born in 1773, was fully occupied and in active work iip to th« time of his death at the age of 93. Most notable, however, was Titian, who, born in 1477, lived just one year short of a century, and continued to paint picture* until the very last. ■', Tha net outlay (after the sale of mahure) for street cleaning in Palmers- [ \9& North Ipr jhe past year- jvas, £26& J