THE YANG-TSE-KIANG.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 4332, 16 April 1901, Page 4

THE YANG-TSE-KIANG.

Eecent cable hews shows that British diplomacy in China, has been successfully directed towards the end of securing tbs co-operation of the powerful Yangtse*Viceroys in supporting the policy of maintaining the integrity of the Celestial Empire. An interesting booh, just added to the Parliamentary' 1 Library, gives an account of the travels of Mr-, Bishop (better known as Miss Bird) up the Tang-tse-Eiang river and its tributaries, for two thousand miles, to the borders of Tibet.’ At this crisis in Chinese affairs the information contained in this book will be read with much interest. ;The lady showed great endurance and - 'courage,' and passed through

rams unpleasant cxpeirente- a part of tho journey being withrul pean (attendance. In spite of a severe blow on her bead from a stone, from wlin.i she suffered for twelve month-, -be continued her iornney to borne overlain... and returned by boat on the river 'o Hankow, where she took steamer to Shrnr'bm. Clvswy tins rr. ci . ..i n . (- Uibuhuie: , m of the nUiio t importance to European trade, as the tc.n'.oi' . watered by B and rmr.i .-•!.•«> large A reran;. that tl o ■ info it i ; ivid ,o ( ■ tain one hundred end .c-glity million'- of i people, acti'-cly cr.gpg.cd in prr.dvr 1 ion

and transport. anti it- is tm' oni,\ opening to the fertile province cf Sr.e-ehnau. with : erne seventy iiuiimns of peauK'. Thai tho Chinese cf these vr-ricur. n verv Pe-v is evidenced by tee tact ll.it a weaver, working from early in tho morning till late at night, only emu. eighteenpenee a-woe’;; but they me verv inunetriouc, and far tbc most part orderly—only in norm cf ibo cities lieetiming much exerted by tho appcaruuco of a. ''foreign devil.'’ There is good steam eommuuieatii'-n fur six liniidn.nl miles from Shanghai to Hankow, and preparation.-, are being made to surmount the rapids which block the way to 1 chang. some four hundred miles further, by stcrn-whcclers. At prevent an enormous number of trackers arc at work drugging up junks, with occasional sevoie loss of life. Sumo idea oi 11: o trade of the river may be gamed irom the statement that there arc seven thousand junks upon it. ?drs Bishop, on the whole, gives a fairly favourable- account. of the Mandarins, and is wry appreciative of tlu* Christian missionaries, though tho latte,- make mistakes, and she is doubtful of the propriety of women being attached to the'missions in remote districts. There were, in IBS)!), two thousand live hundred missionaries in China and some two huntsred and thirty thousand converts, of which latter Romo eighty thousand were Protestants. Tho Medical Mission cho regards with unqualified approval, and in some ol tho largo cities its influence has produced quite a, favourable slain of feeling towards foreigners. Opium is a terrible. euKC, and seventy or eighty per vent, of the population ir. said to he enslaved to it- Besides the imports of the drug, to the value of over two millions storting, tho poppy is grown over immense areas. One can understand, when noting the magnitude of the trade done on .this river, And centring in Shanghai though the up-country merchant;; are nearly all Chinese-that the viceroys of the southern provinces are inclined to bo favourable to tho British, who supply so many millions in cash for products, and aro on friendly relations with the Chinese merchants. Much more trade might be done, in Mrs Bishops opinion, if wo studied more the requirements of the Chinese. Tho Japanese are, alive to the importance of tho trade. Undoubtedly the "open door” to the Yang-tso-Kians- if a matter worth ensuring by the most’ strenuous efforts.