Directory_and_Chronicle_1903 — Page 611

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PEKING

considered the chief city of the Empire until, in 1421, Yung Lo, the third Emperor of the Ming dynasty, again held his court at Peking, since which date it has remained the capital of China.

The present city of Peking is divided into two portions, the Northern or Tartar city and the Southern or Chinese. The former is being gradually encroached upon by the Chinese, and the purely Manchu section of the capital will soon be very limited. The southern city is almost exclusively occupied by Chinese. The general shape of Peking may be roughly represented by a square placed upon an oblong, the former standing for the Tartar and the latter for the Chinese city. The whole of the capital is, of course, walled. The walls of the Tartar city are the strongest. They average 50 feet in height and 40 feet in width, and are buttressed at intervals of about sixty yards, The parapets are loop-holed and crenelated. They are faced on both sides with brick, the space between being filled with earth and concrete. Each of the gateways is surmounted by a three-storied pagoda. The walls of the Chinese city are about 30 feet in height, 25 feet thick at the base, and 15 feet wide on the terre plein. The total circumference of the walls round the two cities slightly exceeds twenty miles.

The Tartar city consists (Dr. Williams tells us) of three enclosures, one within the other, each surrounded by its own wall. The innermost, called Kin-ching or Prohibited City, contains the Imperial Palace and its surrounding buildings; the second is occupied by the several offices appertaining to the Government and by private residences of officials; while the outer consists of dwelling-houses, with shops in the chief avenues. The Chinese city is the business portion of Peking, but it presents few features of interest to sight-seers, while the enclosure known as the Prohibited City is, as its title denotes, forbidden to all foreign visitors. The numerous temples, the walls, the Foreign Legations, and the curio shops are the chief attractions to the tourist. The streets of the Chinese metropolis are kept in a most disgraceful condition. In the dry season the pedestrian sinks deep in noxious dust, and in wet weather he is liable to be drowned in the torrents that rush along the thoroughfares, where the constant traffic has worn away the soil. 1899 saw the innovation of Legation Street being cleansed, levelled and macadamised -the greatest urban improvement in three centuries. Experts say that the money lost in time, wear and tear of men, mules and carts every year is greater than the prime cost of mac ulamising all the main thoroughfares. The congestion of the traffic and the person- al discomfort of cart-transit are inconceivable to people who have not experienced them. There is an air of decay about Peking which extends even to the finest of the Temples and Palaces, and which powerfully impresses every visitor as symbolic of the decadence of Empire. The population of Peking is not accurately known, but according to a Chinese estimate, which is probably much in excess, it is 1,300,000, of whom 900,000 reside in the Tartar and 400,000 in the Chinese city. There is no direct foreign trade with Peking, and the small foreign population is made up of the members of the various Legations, the Maritime Customs establishments, the professors of the College of Peking, and the missionary body. In August, 1884, the city was brought into direct telegraphic .communication with the rest of the world, by an overland line to Tientsin vid Tungchow. The year 1899 witnessed two other innovations, which would have been regarded as impossible ten years ago, viz: the erection of large two-storied buildings on prominent sites for the Austrian Legation and the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. These are breaks with immemorial tradition that the feng-shui must resent elevation in houses other than those of the immortal gods and the son of heaven. A railway line to Tientsin was opened in 1897.

The year 1900 was the most memorable year in the history of Peking from the fact that for the first time in the history of civilization during two thousand years a dastardly and deliberate attempt was made by a responsible government to violate the anctitas legatorum. The Chinese have made characteristic efforts to escape the responsibility for this turpitude; but the formal complicity of the leading men in the Government and of the Empress Dowager with the Boxer sedition has been proved up to the hilt, and endless Imperial Edicts remain to show that the Government as such was heart and soul committed to the anti-foreign and anti-Christian aims of the Reactionary Party. Reference is made elsewhere to the progress of the Boxer agitation : enough to say here that the I-Ho-Chüan or Boxers arrived in force rid Pao-ting-fu on June 13th, and between that day and the 19th began their policy of plunder, destruction and murder. All the buildings outside of the Legation cordon in the Chinese and Manchu cities, including all the Missionary premises and native preaching stations, as well as

the residences of all who were known or even suspected of being in any way connected with foreigners were destroyed. These people themselves were ruthlessly murdered. The most interesting building

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