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November 3, 1902.]
LIEUT.-COL. MANIFOLD'S
JOURNEY.
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Lieutenant-Colonel Manifold, I.M.S., lectured before the United Service Institute at. Simla last month on his a returon journey from Poking to Szechueu, made in company with Captain Hunter, R.E. The two travellers left Peking in September last year, immediately after the Chinese had agreed to the payment of the in- demnity, and when the allied forces were still in possession of Peking. British infinence, therefore, stood high and Colonel Manifold and his companion were not wrong in thinking that this would be sufficient to ensure their protee tion, in spite of the disturbed state of the country. The party included Mr. Harris, who acted as interpreter, two trained Roorkee sur- veyors, six Gurkhas, four Indian servants, and twenty mules. For the first hundred miles the route was by train on the recently reconstructed | railway to Paoting-fu. This place they found in an excited state, the current rumour being that the French had evacuated it only because they were compelled to do so by superior Chinese force.
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CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
349
occupying the best land, the Abbots possessing royal party. The funds for building had been extraordinary influence and power besides furnished to a large extent voluntarily by local receiving a large portion of the land revenue. mandarins desirous of winuing Imperial favours. Other features noticed were the respect with One of them, which Colonel Manifold went over, which the nam of General Gordon was still 'which Was like hundreds of others along regarded by the people in this part of China, the route, hail cost a sum equivalent to forty and the extraordinary che lience shown thousand rupees, It contained silk hangings, to the Chinese officials. Colonel Mauifold į four poster beds with mother of pearl inlaying. was fold, in this region. that the Boxer and mirrors, jade plaques and evergreen cry. movement had originated in the resent- santhemums to complete the decorations. ment felt at the extent to which these French missionaries had afforded protection to Chinese criminals who were in the babit of declaring themselves Christians in ord» · to escape punish ment. Whatever truth there may have been in this story, it did not interfere with the infinence exercised by these clerics. Colonel Manifold indeed attributes the friendliness shown to him by the inhabitants and the hospitality extended to him by the mandarins as largely due to his party being taken for one of priests. He con cludes that their recent troubles have impressed the Chinese with the necessity of playing up to the missionarios.
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Beyond Hoan-fu the country was quiet and Colonel Manifold and Captain Hunter accord- ingly separat d. the latter to travel northwards to the band of the Yellow River at Tangkuan, the former to proceed up the Lo Valley to the main road to the Hsian-fu. Mountainous conatry had now been reached, the passes being from 3 to 400 feet high. The sole road leading out of the Wei River valley nad con- veying the whole of the traffic between Peking
and South Western China was here found to pass beneath the walls of the great fortress of Tungkuau, which is of great political importance.
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The Yellow River was afterwards crossul Colonel Mauifold eventually made his way to and Colonel Manifold notices the extraordinary! Isian-fu, the place to which the court fled on destruction of human life aud the devastation the occupation of Poking. Here he met a Colonel Manifold describes the railway as a of the country eansed by this river's periodical ¦ European medical missionary who had acquired magnificent project, which will eventually be changing of its bed. Forty milliou people, he immense influence amongst the people and was continued to Calton, tapping the commerce of heard, had been washed away or starved, owing full of the change for the better which had the great waterways which it crosses a route to its inundations fifteen years ago, the floods came over the mandarins in their attitude and opening up the rich mineral districts of rendering vast areas of cultivated land sterile towards the missionaries, Shansi, which contain some of the finest coal | by covering it with san 1. An immense amount The next big city reached was Sianfu, in the and iron beds in the world. It is actually under of money is being spent in endeavouring to very heart of Western China, where Colonel construction for 250 miles from either end, aud keep the 'stream within its present bed, but, in Manifold fouud an interesting (monument on it is to be regretted that Great Britain has no places, it still spreads over so wide an area that which was engraved in Chinese Evriau charac- share in it, although both its conception and its boats drawing twenty inches can barely navigatefors a record of the introduction of Chistianity inception were due to the genius and persever- it. Where the party crossed the stream was 24 iuto Chian by the Nestorians the inscription ance of an Englishmau, Mr. Kinder, uow miles wide and only as foot deep. On the other stating that the Nestorian Olopwan of the manager of the Peking-Tientsin-Shanhaikwan side was the city of Kaifeng fu, one of the Syrian Church cams from Judaea to China in lines. Mr. Kinder went out to China as ancient capitals of China, situated in a region A. D. 636 “after having escaped great dangers engineer of the Tongshan collierías and com- of gr at fertility. This place has a great ro by son and laud." The party afterward made menced his failway projects in the face of putation for hostility to foreigners, but Colonel their way, by routes hitherto untravelled by immense difficulties by building a tram-line to Manifold was lucky in his treatment, the principal Europeans, across the Chinning range and convey coal to the nearest port. Out of this fact he records being the great curiosity with down to the Yangtze basin. grew the idea of the Peking-Tientsin railway, which his party was regarded. The Governor worked by the Chinese Government as 1 was courtesy itself. Like other Chinese officials China line, but owned and run by British with whom Colonel Manifold came in contact, capital under Britisk supervision and staff he referred to the recent troubles as having with head office in London. This prov-been the work of a few disaffected rebels whom ed so great a success that Mr. Kinder proposed the Emperor had now punished. The people the construction of a great trunk line across generally, however, appeared to realise that the China to be run ou the same methods. He allis had occupied Peking and had inflicted actually commenced work upon the project but heavy punishment upon the Chinese nation. In the remotest villages, where no foreigners had money was not forthcoming and the concession for the northern half was ultimately acquired ey by a combination of the Russo-Chinese Bank, which is little else thau a Russian state couceru financed for political purposes, and of a Belgian and French syndicate. Mr. Kinder thus had the mortification of seeing his project handed over to foreign rivals. The Russians were SO impressed however with what he had dous that they carried off his little hand-made engine, the first that ran on his tram-line and have deposit- ed it in the St. Petersburg Museum, as a memento of an era in the history of the Far East. The Northern section of the railw y Further on Colonel Manifold entered the from Peking to Hankow will take, Col. Manifold Loess country which owes its fertility to deposits thinks, some seven years to build owing to of yellow loam, sometimes a thousand feet thick, the heavy bridging nec.ssary, The South-supposed to have been formed by ages of dust
Hanhow era section from
to Canton is blown from Central Asia. vastly easier. The highest point it has to cross on its way to the sea is only a thousand feat high, and this with easy grading. The concession for the southern section was given with British aproval, to an American syndicate, which has commenced work both from Canton and from the Tungting Lake on the Yangtsza, about a hundred miles from Hankow. Forty per cent, of the shares. however, are said to be in Belgian hands, which in China, too often means that France and Russia are palling the strings. Colonel Manifold looks upon this railway as of enormous importance in connection with the future development of the c
(c.antry for whoever controls it will influence also the great hinterland it traverses. The fact that this line is not British means, be- sides, that several millions worth of rolling stock will be purchased for it during the next ten years elsewhere than in England.
From Paoting the party marched fifty miles to Chinting a town of some 6a,000 inhabitants. which contains the remains of a fine Buddhist monastery, also a large Christian community. Proceeding onward to Weihui they came across numbers of French Roman Catholic churches
man
Of the Yangtsze region Colonel Manifold speak; enthusiastically alike as regards its great agricultural and mineral wealth, its numerous industries and dense population. He says it is now a case of waking up the British capitalist and investor to the advantages of developing it. He holds that if capital and enterprise
there are forthcoming
will ba no only difficulty in establishing British preponderance this marvellous region to which before been, the elders used to ask Colonel guubo.ts already have access for two
thousand miles up the river. He
alls : Majifold about it and there was none of the self- deception which was so noticeable after the ← Gunboats alo e will not develop trade in a
sane was honestly believed country, and no Japanese war when it
wants a yard of throughout the length and breadth of China Chinese territory to pass out of the hauds of that the Emperor had accepted the submission the Chinese, but we do want to see our mer- of the barbarians and permitted them to depart cantile interest firmly established and big uupunished. Colonel Manifold also noticed euterprises, in British hands, opening up this that wherever he went the people contrasted rich Upper Yangtsze country at once; a conatry the humanity of the British, Japanese and sa rich in resources and population that enter- American troops with the brutalities they had prises once started must pay. It is capable of been subjected to by the other allies.
a development that would cause it to lake fen Не times the trade that it does now from us." added the warning that "if enterprise is not forthcoming soon there is great danger that wa may find other nations have established railways and mining interests so firmly in the richest portions of this region, that they will be able to assert a right of developing them entire y in their own interests, and k ep us excluded."
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The deposit is intersectell by crevices miles in length, which make travelling difficult, but is of extraordinary agricultural value, producing two and sometimes three crops in the year, and supporting an enormous population which lives
During the 24 hours ended at 8 a.m. on the largely in excavations in the loess. The subter- ranean dwellings are comfortably furnished 22nd ult., 1.201 cases of cholera and 617 deaths were reported from the provinces in the Philip- inside, warm in winter and cool in summer.
Manila reported one casa and The roads were found to be narrow tracks sunk pine Islands.
one death. The total number of cases reported deep into the soil, and it was impossible to travel over the land
was 95,070, with on either side. This up to 8 a.m., October 22 subjected the party to more danger than would | 63,914 deaths; mortality, 65 per cent, otherwise have been the case from the bands of soldiery who formed the escort of the Court. then on its way back to Peking. These sol·li-rs were often to be met unexpectedly and were far from friendly, but the party came to no particular harm from them, though it was necessary, on one occasion, to halt for some days on the banks of the Yellow River. Colonel Manifold and his companious were ultimately allowed to skirt the town of Hoan-fu and were accommodated. on the further side, in the very rest-house the Dowager Empress had last rated. These rest- houses were dotted four miles from each other along the road, for the accommodation of the
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which U.S. gunboat Frolic ashore ou a reef off the north-east end of Cebu Island, has been successfully floated and was to arrive at Manila in a few days, in tow of the Naval ocean tug Piscataqua, which was des. patched to her assistance. The small gunboat Isla de Cuba, which was on station at Cebu, stood by the Frolic until she was bauled off the reef and then went directly to Cavite. The extent of damage sustained by tho Frolic is at present mere conjecture, but when she is hauled out on the railway, a thorough examination will be made.