ANCIENTBEFORE CHRIST WAS BORN.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8004, 6 May 1904, Page 1

ANCIENTBEFORE CHRIST WAS BORN.

*HTB HIDDEN UND OF SHENSI IN NORTHERN ASIA. • $k*pd i» " » grey land of dim begin- - Sings.-" Mo»t of it is in the plain of northr «m j|flb» wpamted from the valfoye of the Wrth by well-mgh impenetrable moun- . t&». It is far from the world's highwaya, >«od itoi* peopled with, a race that has long t&rott apart and that is a part- of oldest ,' t CUn». 'Very few foreigners have ever enIke* ffiinaij for it is a part of the Celestial flgngdom wbeze the hatred of "the foreign; \ Übviff" ift bitterest and most intense. k f - Tb& Prancis H. Nichols, author of , PU&rough Hidden Sheasij" was enabled to ' Explore this terra incognita and reach /fiiaa, its capital, was due to the fact that lie mi made custodian of it fund raised, by Christians for the relief of eufUerea from famine in Scensi. From the authorities he obtained credentials vhieh enabled him to not only travel unißiahßtod, but assured him of such comfort wad safety as he «oul4 expect. *He ' succeeded in penetrating to ,- tfftan, which was selected as : a of . x<efuge for the Empress fjhnrqgeT Tez-Hi and Emperor Kwang Bu Coring tbair enforced exiie^ and describes lt)hD~ciiy; whose beginnings are so far back *hat ibete are no records. No one knows ■ Where or by whom Sian was founded. It ,;»rw ft flourishing town when Fu-hi was * |twm, aod Fu-hi stands at the beginning of - jOn^nese mythical history. Hawng-li, the " Yellow Emperor," whose reign began jBt.G. 2697j made Sian bis capital. He injfeoled bows and arrows and: carts, and the i&Haese calendar ; his wile invented silk Jipearing. In B.C. 2286^ Yu, a prominent fignte hi the early history of Sian, underiral: to stem an Inundation of the Yellow ffuvvr and , the Wei Ho 2 which had overjhmed nearly all Shensi. Yu got his. idea .©fa- df&inage system from the markings " fiu 19w back of a turtle, and in eight years /turned the water back into its original fcbaimtfls. MWITH OF ITS PBO3PEBITT. In tbe reign of Chung, who has been •ealfed tbe Napoleon of China^ who built Jbhe great wall and cut canals and solidified* ,ißie pwmnces that make up the empire, of and who lived .B.C. 246, Sian reaohJ cc( ut aeoith of its power and prosperity. wxnn B.C. 206 to A.D. 25 was China's pEUasbetban age." Chung's grave is near > X&to«a« where are stone bridges whose !pM «m once twenty, feet above the ' miter, bat wbich^ by the gradual, deposit ! Nff ted from the water that flows under Jbam aetoas the level, arid plain £ are now < &M&J two feet out of water. * $H*n atands on an alkali plain, that if ' <jwif tod prodnoea ri cheat crops, but with--«bs water is a desert It is- a walled' city. ' •'Compared with their great height and o^nttent condition," says Mr Nichok, "the tM&« of Pekin are straggling and insigniaoaat. Bian's walle are about" fifteen miles iong. they were rebuilt in their present ions m 1368. At no point are they less fban thirty and near the gates the distance feom the ground to the roadway 1 -«n top » folly seventy feet. Th 6 towers .. >n^bioh,.«urmoiHit the. walls are. enormous ■Hsotare's, each containing* four or five '•tarejrm witk aixty or ' seventy windows tiwovgb wbick - archers could shoot at an attacking force advancing upon the city ' from the plain. . . The majority of Chinese citisc no longer take as much inteiest in their walla as formerly, and a tendency to let them become dilapidated is observed, but the people of Sian still pay an enormous tax every year to keep then* defences in repair." ira nriQvs chabm. ; ' Vnmaag tbe centories Sian, lias been. ibejriegei and taken and sacked: and rebuilt tuoei without number. Within its walls' kings have 'been assassinated and 1 dynasties overturned, but the old city has lived on. It ia •tibrs eternity of things that gives to Jftan a stnoige faaoinatioß. The. Sianese iiave a way of referring to lapses of time that seexne iardly human. Things tJkt fcapppned two centimes before Christ they refer to lv familiarly as though, ihey occurred fifty < ijemxs ago." , A ourio dealer tried" to sell Mr Nachola «ome pteoes of bakea clay ihe said were - brick* from tbe palaoe of Chung (B. C. < /C 46). He atfbed a Soon, man if he thought 'tbey were genuine. "They are probably - counterfeifai/' he replied, <? but even if tibey - am zeal they are not old enough to' be inter- ' ertmg." 1%« officials of the city declared that before the famine Sian bad a population of a million. Mr Nichols thinks "these figures wn exaggeration, and that its inhabitants probably number about 700,000 at present. ; 45ian is an exception t-o the usual rule of Oriental dtiea in that Jtfe streets are tegular-. ly laid out, 'intersecting at right angles, and ntirly wide. There are no eiderwalks, but the principal streets are paved with stone tdooxs much worn and furrowed, from cen- - taries of use. In the centre of the city is * ptfolic wplare, where a ifaar is continuously in profftess from sunrise to sunset, the aides of toe square being lined with ' booths «nd tents of peddlers, jugglers, fortune-tell-ers and amusement-makers of every description known to the Siansse. \ fXHOVS A» ITS BANKS. ' "Sian," says Mr Nichols, "has long been famous all over China for its banks. On a street that extends half a mile west from t&e poblio square are nearly a score of banks wibere businefie amounting to many rasillions el taelft 'is handled annually. Banks like these of the present have existed! in Sian for tfeor&ands of years, and yet the system ia which the business has always, been conducted is very similar to that of the United States." • v There, are 7,000,000 people in Shensi, and for 5000 yeans they have gob along without * post office. There is in tie entire province no provision for sending or receiving letters. Waen a merchant in Sian wants to communicate with, a correspondent in Hankow, he pays * muleteer of a caravan to carry his .. Miter to its destination. Missionaries - sometimes Sure a courier to carry their maQ. to: the nearest post office in. an adjoining province, 300 mites away. Shenaj is unalter•biy opposed to post offices. Sian has been youpded <« the subject by tbe Foreign Office at Pekin, and lias replied strongly in the ftagative. A post office would bring them in touch with the foreigner to a certain, extent ij. and is^heref ore dangerous. •■ bNE TELEGRAPH WIBB. The only institution of foreign origin is th* telegraph office. The single wire of ; A* Chinese imperial- telegraph enters the etty; and over it are transmitted Government edict* and orders to mandarine, but •part from tiiese two messages a month is a large besmear for an interior town of 200,000 people. Tie telegraph at Sian was made popular during the exile of the- court, the Empress Dowager being able through its veani to scold Li Hung Chang and. Prince: , Chinj ia Pekin, and ihe fact that the"Scm of Heaven " used it has given the telegraph: a, popularity with merchants and bankers it ntrer before enjoyed. , There age no saloons, no "dm*," no ■iom, no baonts of criane, no randeßvdus of gt&a dissipation in Sian— aewwding to i Mr^Aob. I "Placet of this character exist in China j I aa^F in fore^n ooscessioos, treaty ports,

j where they are beyond the reach of Chinese 1 law." He quotes the remark of an old Mohammedan tea, merchant of Sian with whoim he became acquainted, who, talking about re? ligions, said- : " For my part, I should rather lite to see the Christians overthrow the idols and convert China "to the worship of 'One 1 God,' but- the trouble is. that if Sian ■ wer^ a Christian city it would) be as bad as Shanghai," as the saddest commentary he ever heard on Christian civilization.