by the Foreign Commissioners has met with scant appreciation at the hands of the Chinese, and although it supplies the most important item of revenue of the Central Government, has led to no reform in other branches of the administration. Corruption is still the rule, sapping the strength of every modern effort, whether in re-organising the army, founding, arsenals, or the purchase of a fleet.
In justice, however, it must be recorded that the ruling classes are not wholly corrupt. There are exceptions; men in authority who are famed for honesty rather than for stores of ill-gotten gain, and men like the Viceroy of Hupeh and Yunan, Ching-Chi-tung, who, in a patriotic attempt to benefit his country, squandered his fortune in founding gigantic iron and steel works, which were to provide the railroad plant of a line from Hankow to Peking. The works were to be managed entirely by Chinese, while the foreigner was to look on with mingled envy and apprehension. But, as might have been foreseen, for lack of knowledge the project had to be abandoned. It may be noticed that this Viceroy, so it was said, was not wholly unacquainted with the promoters of the pseudo-republican rising in Formosa, which gave the Japanese some trouble when they entered into possession of that island. Since the close of the war with Japan, reforms are in the air, just as they were a quarter of a century ago. A new fleet is to be purchased, and the Chinese navy organised under a British officer, Commander Dundas, R.N. The army too, is to be re-modelled by English and German officers. It is to be supposed before this step was taken, that a suitable guarantee was obtained that the officers in question will be accorded better treatment by the Chinese Government than fell to the lot of Captain Lang, who became simply a naval instructor, subordinate to the native officials, who embraced every oppor-
