112
TIENTSIN
city his chief residence and the centre of his many experiments in military and naval education, it came to be regarded as the focus of the new learning and national reform. The foreign affairs of China were practically directed from Tientsin during the two decades 18/4-94.
The city will ever be infamous to Europeans from the massacre of the French Sisters of Mercy and other foreigners on June 21st, 1870, in which the most appalling brutality was exhibited; as usual the political agitators who instigated the riot got on.
The Roman Catholic Cathedral Church, which was destroyed on that occasion, has since been rebuilt, and the new building was consecrated in 1897. The building occupies a commanding site on the river bank. All the missions and many of the foreign hongs have agencies in the city.
The population is reputed to be 950,000, but there is no statistical evidence to justify such large figures. The area of the city is far less than that of the Portsmouth boroughs with their 160,000, and the houses without exception are one storied. The suburbs, however, are very extensive, and there is the usual vagueness as to where the town begins and ends. The city walls are quadrate and extend about 4,000 feet in the direction of each cardinal point. The advent of foreigners has caused a great increase in the value of real estate all over Tientsin, and as new industries are introduced every year, the tendency is still upward.
Li Hung-chang authorised Mr. Tong Kin-seng to sink a coal shaft at Tong Shan (60 miles N.E. of Tientsin) in the seventies; this was done and proved the precursor of a railway, which has since been extended to Shan Hai Kwan for military purposes, and in 1897 the line to Peking was opened. About 260 miles in all are open to goods and passenger trafic. As usual the railway has brought all sorts of foreseen and un- foreseen contingencies with it. Farmers up near Shan Hai Kwan are supplying fruit and vegetables to Tientsin; coal has come extensively into Chinese household use; the foreign residents are developing a first-rate watering place at Pei Ta Ho on the Gulf of Pe-chi-hi; and all the various industries of the city have been stimulated. Brick buildings are springing up in all directions and the depressing looking adobe (mud) huts are diminishing.
The Foreigners live in the three concessions, British, French, and German, which fringe the river below the City and cover an area of less than 500 acres. The Japanese are now (1839) taking up a concession in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of Shimonoseki. very extensive ounding operations are going on throughout the conces- sions, which have excellent roads, with police, oil-gas lamps, etc., etc. The British Municipanty nas a handsome Town Hall, completed in 1889; adjoining there is a well kept paone garden, opened in the year of Jubilee and styled Victoria Park. An excel- lent recreation ground of ten acres is also being developed, and three miles distant there is a capitai ace course. There are two hotels (the Astor House and Globe), three clubs (Tientsin Club, Concordia, the latter chiefly German, and the Harmony); a theatre, an excellent liorary, three churches (toman Catholic, Anglican, and Union), and no public-nouses.
Distilling is one of the largest local industries; it is chiefly from kowliang (sorgnum) or muilet. Although a spirit, it is called "wine," and is exported to the south in large quantities. The manufacture of coarse unrefined sait by the evaporation of sea water is also carried on near Taku; the produce is stacked along the river bank just below the native city and sometimes gives of very offensive smells, rendering life a Durden. The trade in salt is a Government monopoly. Carpets, shoes, glass, coarse earthen ware, and fire-works are also made in large quantities in the city, bat Tientsin is at present essentially a centre for distribution and collection rather than for manu- facture. fae exports include coal, wool (from Kokonor, Kansuh, etc.), bristles, straw braid, goat skins, and a few furs, wine, etc. The export trade is a recent creation and is largely due to foreign initiative. Wool cleaning and braid and bristle sorting are the chier industries in the foreign hongs except those of the Russians, who are exclusively engaged in the transit of tea. The imports are of the usual miscellaneous nature; tea for the Desert and Siberia, mineral oil, matches, and needles figure next to piece goods,
The fine arts are unknown to the Tientsinese except in the shape of cleverly made mud-figures; these are painted and make really admirable statuettes, but are difficult to carry away, being remarkably brittle.
The export coal trade is rapidly expanding, 193,353 tons having been cleared in 1897. The
general trade is increasing by leaps and bounds, and no wonder, as Tientsin is practically the only sea outlet for the entire trade of the provinces of Chilli, Shansi, Shensi, Kansuh, and part of Honan, with a population not far short of 100,900,000. The total net value of the trade in the years 1895-6-7, less re-exports, was Tls.