feats, Tae-tsung died, in 997, leaving behind him a character only less honorable than that of his predecessor, inasmuch as he paid less constant and minute attention to the internal order of the empire and the indi vidual welfare of his subjects.

ence.

Chin-tsung now succeeded to the empire, a prince whose character and conduct strangely contrasted with those of his two immediate pre decessors. The bonzes or priests, were the only persons who had reason to like him; and even their liking, excited though it was by personal advantage, must have been mixed with no slight feeling of contempt. There was no tale that they could tell him which was too extravagant for his implicit belief; no command too absurd for his unqualified obediEvery morning the imperial zany was busied in relating his overnight dreams, and it need scarcely be said that the bonzes took especial care to interpret those dreams so as to tend to confirm the weak-minded and hypochondriac monarch in his fatuous course, and to make that course as profitable as possible to themselves individually, and as favourable as possible to their order at large. The warlike and shrewd Tartars speedily perceived the difference betwixt an emperor who divided his time between dreaming and listening to the interpretations of his dreams—leaving the empire and its vast complicated interests to the care, or carelessness of eunuchs and time-servers—and the warlike and clear-headed emperors with whom they had to deal during the two preceding reigns. They poured in upon the empire with a fury proportioned to the ineffective resistance they anticipated, and their shrewd conjectures were amply justified by the event. Resistance, indeed, was made to them on the frontiers; but instead of their being driven beyond the frontiers with a message of mourning to thousands of Tartar families, their absence was purchased. Great stores of both money and silk were paid to them by order of the Chinese court, which, like the Roman, when Rome had berome utterly degenerate, was fain to purchase the peace it dared or could not battle for. Ying-tsung, Shin-tsung, and Hwuy-tsung, the three immediate successors of the weak prince of whose reign we have just spoken, followed his impolitic policy of purchasing peace. We emphati cally say impolitic, because common sense tells us to yield tribute once, is to encourage the demand of it in future. The tribute once secured, the hardy and unprincipled Tartars again returned to the charge, to be again bought off, and to derive, of course, renewed assurance of booty whensoever they should again think proper to apply for it. Hwuy-tsung, the third of the emperors named above, having a dire perception of the error committed by himself and his three immediate predecessors, determined to adopt a new course, and instead of bribing the "barbarians" who so cruelly annoyed him, to hire other barbarians to expel them, thus adding to the folly of buying peace the still farther folly of giving the clearest insight into the weakness of his condition, to those who, being his allies as long as they received his wages, would infallibly become his enemies the instant he ceased to hire them.

This prince engaged the warlike tribe of Neu-che Tartars in the defence of his territory. They ably and faithfully performed what they had engaged; but when they had driven out the Nien-cheng Tartars they flatly refused to quit the territory, and made a hostile descent upon the provin ces of Pecheli and Shansi, which they took possession of. At the same time the Mongols were pouring furiously down upon the provinces of Shan-tong and Honan; and the terrified and unwarlike emperor saw no other means of saving his dominions, than by coming to immediate terms with his late allies and present foes, the victorious and imperious Neu-che Tartars. He accordingly went to their camp, attended by a splendid ret inue of his chief officers, to negotiate not only for a peace, but also for their active and prompt aid against the Mongols. But the emperor haj

so long left the affairs of the empire in the hands of intriguers and venal sycophants, that he was not sufficiently acquainted with his actual position to take even ordinary precautions; he was literally sold by his ministers into the hands of Ins enemies; and on reaching the Tartar camp, he found that he was no longer a powerful prince treating for peace and alliance with an inferior people, but a powerless prisoner of war, in the hands of his enemies, and abandoned by his friends. ́ Abandoned he indeed was, by all save his son. That spirited prince, faithful to his fallen father, and indignant at the treachery practised against him, put the ministers to death, and gathered an immense force against the Mongols, who, in the meantime, had been making the most rapid and terrible advances. Rapine and fire marked their path whithersoever they went. The emperor's gallant son made admirable but useless efforts to approach them. Leaving devastation and misery in their rear, they rapidly approached the capital, laid siege to the imperial palace itself, butchered thousands of the inhabitants, including some of the imperial family, and sent the rest into captivity.

CHAPTER III.

Kaou-tsung II. at this period reigned over the southern provinces. When the barbarians overran the northern parts of the empire, he made noble and able attempts at beating them off from his dominions; but they were far too warlike and numerous for his limited resources. To the northern provinces and to the captive emperor he was unable to afford any assis tance by force of arms, nor could his humblest and most tempting offers to the savage foes induce them to liberate a prisoner or evacuate a rood of land. All that he was able to gain from them was permission to retain his own rule in peace, on paying an annual tribute and acknowledging his subjection.

In 1104 the celebrated Genghis Khan was at the head of the Mongol Tartars. At the outset of this warrior's career his people revolted from him, excepting only a very few families, on the ground of his being, at the death of his father, too young to rule a numerous and extremely warlike people. But the youth displayed so much talent and courage, and his earliest essays as a warrior were so entirely and strikingly successful, that the tide of opinion speedily turned in his favour; and an old and venerated Mongol chief having, in a public assembly of the people, prophesied that the youth, then known by his family name of Temujin, would, it supported as he deserved to be, prove to be the greatest of their khans— Genghis Khan (the Mongols words for the greatest king) was immediately made the youth's name by acclamation, and the bold but barbarous and vacillating people as unanimously submitted to him now, as formerly they had seceded from him. It was to this chief, who had already made his name a name of terror far beyond the banks of the Selinga, the native abode of his fierce race, that Ning-tsung, the then emperor of China, applied for aid to drive out other Tartars, by whom, as well as by native malcontents, the nation was very sorely oppressed at that period.

Genghis Khan, already inured to conquest and thirsting for extended dominion, eagerly complied with the impolitic request of Ning-tsung. During the reign of that monarch, and Le-tsung, by whom he was, at his death in 1225, succeeded, the Mongols passed from triumph to triumph, the unhappy natives suffering no less from the barbarians who were hired to defend them than from the other barbarians who avowedly entered the empire for purposes of rapine and bloodshed. Le-tsung, a prince whose natural indolence was increased by his superstitious attachment to the

most superstitions priests in his empire, was a voluntary prisoner in hit palace. The atrocities committed in what the Mongols seemed bent upon making a war of extermination, were dreadful; the most authentic accounts speaking of the slaughter among the people as amounting to hundreds of thousands. Genghis Khan dying, was succeeded by a grandson named Kublai; and Le-tsung also dying, was succeeded by Too-tsung. This last named prince was as debauched as his predecessor had been su perstitious; and wholly taken up with the gratification of his shamefu sensuality, he saw, almost without a care or struggle, the Mongols under Kublai proceeding with their ravages, and Kublai at length become mas ter of the northern provinces. Thus far successful, it was not likely the conquering chief would forbear turning his attention to the southern provinces; which, as we learn from Marco Polo, was considered by far the most wealthy and splendid of the kingdoms of the east. The very wealth of the southern empire, and its comparatively long exemption from war, rendered pretty certain that it would easily be overrun by him who had conquered the hardier and more experienced warriors of the north. Province after province and city after city was taken, without the experience on the part of the Mongols of anything approaching to a severe check. With rapid and sure steps they approached the city of Kinsai, the capital and royal residence, and wealthy to an extent not easily to be described. The then emperor, Kung-tsung, seems to have despaired of successful defence against a foe so long victorious, and to have sup posed his empress could more successfully appeal to a victor's mercy than he could to the fortunes of war. He accordingly got together all the treasure that could be at all conveniently embarked on board his fleet, gave the command of it to his most experienced naval commander and put out to sea. The fact of the defence of Kinsai being committed to a beautiful woman, did not prevent Kublai from ordering his generals to use their utmost exertions in bringing the siege to a speedy conclusion. Such orders ensured an activity which reduced the garrison to most alarming distresses; but the empress consoled herself under every new disaster by a prophecy which had been made by a court astrologer—a kind of cheat very popular with most of the Chinese monarchs—that Kinsai could only be taken by a general having a hundred eyes. As such a specimen of natural history was by no means likely to appear, the empress allowed nothing to daunt her, until, on enquiring the name of a general whom Kublai had entrusted to make a new and vigorous assault on the city, she was told, that it was Chin-san ba-yan. These words—which mean the hundred-eyed—seemed in such ominous agreement with the requirement of the prophecy, that the empress allowed her hitherto high courage to give place to a superstitious horror, and she immediately surrendered the city, on receiving from Kublai assurance, which he very honourably fulfilled, of treatment and an allowance in conformity with her rank.

Sa-yan-fu, which was a far stronger city than the capital, and against which no superstitious influence was brought, held bravely out against the efforts of the Mongols for upwards of three years. Marco Polo and his brother Nicolo, the Italian travellers and traders, anxious to ingratiate themselves with the formidable and prosperous Kublai, supplied him with be sieging engines which threw stone bulls of the tremendous weight of one hundred and twenty pounds. Such missiles soon made practicable breaches in the hitherto impregnable walls. The town was stormed, and Kublai, enraged at its long and obstinate resistance, gave it to the mercy of his troops.

The fugitive emperor found in some distant and strongly fortified islets, a shelter for his treasure, but not that safety for himself which he had sought with so much sacrifice of dignity and character. He had not long

been at his post of security, when he was seized with an illness which speedily terminated his life. The empress, who seems to have been altogether as brave and adventurous as her husband was timid, strengthened the fleet at Yae islands, under the command of the emperor's favourite admiral, Low-sewfoo, proclaimed Te-ping, her son, emperor, and repaired with him on board the fleet. The Mongol fleet, after attacking Canton, hove in sight of the imperial fleet, when a tremendous action commenced and continued for an entire day. The Mongols, though even their loss was dreadful, were victorious, and the Chinese or imperial fleet was so much shattered that Low-sew foo found it impossible to get his crippled vessels through the straits. Dreading the very worst from the resentment which Kublai was likely to feel at this new resistance on the part of the empress, that brave but unfortunate woman committed suicide by jumping overboard. Her terrible example was followed by several of her principal attendants, including the admiral, who leaped overboard with the young emperor in his arms. So disastrous a day as this could not fail to be decisive; all the comparatively small part of the south that had hitherto held out was quickly overrun, and the whole empire was now under a Mongol emperor concentrated into one. Under the title of Shi-tsu, Kublai ascended the imperial throne in 1279, and in so doing laid the foundation of the Yuen dynasty.

Shi-tsu having obtained the mighty and vast empire of China, now de termined to use its resources in adding Japan ta his already unwieldy possession. But this time he was fated to a fortune very different from that which usually attended him. The Japanese, instead of shrinking at the approach of a force that from its previous successes might well have made them pause as to the prudence of resistance, fortified their forts in the strongest manner time would admit. One being at length taken, the resistance of the garrison was punished by the butchery of every man, without exception, eight of the number being beat to death with clubs. The real reason of this cruel distinction being awarded to the eight unhappy persons was, most likely, that they were distinguished in their rank or the zeal and determination of their resistance. But the fondness that exists for the marvellous has caused this occurrence to be attributed to the somewhat inexplicable mechanical impossibility of putting them to death by decapitation, on account of iron chains which they wore round their necks. Before the terror such barbarity might possibly have carried into the hearts of the other garrisons, had time to produce weakness or treachery, a tremendous storm arose by which a great portion of the Tartar, or rather Tartar-Chinese, fleet was wrecked. The extent of the injury so alarmed the commanders, that they hastened home with the remainder of their ships, abandoning many thousands of their followers to the vengeance of the Japanese. Shi-tsu died in 1295; and it was not until his grandson, Tching-sung, ascended the throne, and began to imitate the ambitious and warlike conduct of his great predecessor, that any thing worthy of even casual mention occurred in the history of the subjugated people of China.

Tching-sung is better known in Europe as Timour the Tartar, or Tamerlane, whose treatment of his opponent Bajazet has been made the subject of so many dramas and tales. His name of Timour (the iron) seems to have been exactly suited to his energetic, untiring, and unsparing nature. Fixing the imperial residence at Samarcand, he appears to have formed lie project of carrying on the work of subjugation to the utmost possible exant in all directions. Persia, Georgia, and Delhi, speedliy felt and succumbed to his power; he drove the Indians quite to the Ganges, and utterly destroyed Astracan and other places in that direction. Bajazet, the Ottoman monarch, seems to us to have had the most just cause imaginable to arrest the course of a man who was evidently deter

mined upon making himself, if possible, the sole monarch of the east But the Ottoman was far inferior to the Tartar in that strength which is as important to success as even a good cause itself. We are assured that while Bajazet had only 120,000 men, his opponent brought 700,000 into the field. Probably the force of Tamerlane has been much exagge rated, though there can be no doubt the army of Bajazet very greatly ex ceeded that of his opponent. The day on which this tremendous battle was fought was sultry in the extreme, yet so obstinate were both parties, that the contest continued from the morning until a late hour at night. The comparatively small army of Bajazet was in the end completely routed, and the unfortunate monarch himself taken prisoner. The conduct of Tamerlane on this occasion was such as would cast disgrace on the most signal courage and talents. Instead of allowing the sympathies of a brave man to soften him towards his singularly brave though unfortu nate opponent, he had him put into an iron cage and carried from place to place with him in all his excursions, exhibiting him as one would a wild beast, and at the same time displaying on his own part a temper far more like that of a wild beast than a brave and successful warrior. The unfortunate Bajazet lived in this most pitiable condition until the year 1303, when he died, as tradition says, and as was most likely, of a broken

heart.

Tamerlane during his various and extensive expeditions had committed the internal government of his empire to certain princes of his househis grandsons and nephews. Their authority and character being far less respected and feared than his own, several insurrections took place, and Tamerlane, or Tchin-sung, now marched towards China with the avowed determination of inflicting severe chastisement; but as he was advancing with forced marches for that purpose, he was seized with an illness which terminated both his prospects and his life in 1305. His descendants kept up a perpetual scramble for the empire, in which they contrived the utter ruin of the high character they owed to him. A se ries of revolts and intrigues followed each other during the strifes of succeeding emperors and pretenders; and the next event necessary to give any account of, is an embassy sent from Persia to China in the reign of Yung-lo, also called Ching-tsoo. The account of this embassy is the more interesting, because it gives us considerable insight into the manners and state of society in China at that time, and mentions what Marco Polo does not—tea, to which, more than aught else, China owes its importance in the eyes of the modern inhabitants of Europe. Even at this early pe riod the Chinese seem to have had all the modern jealousy of the entrance of strangers into the so-called "Celestial Empire." Before the embassy in question was allowed to set foot upon the boundaries of the empire, an exact list of all persons belonging to the embassage was required, inclu ding the humblest attendants, and the ambassadors-in-chief were called upon to swear to the truth and exactness of the list. Chinese jealousy being satisfied thus far, the embassage commenced its toilsome journey of one hundred days towards the capital. It is only fair to add, however, that after their first suspicion was formally and officially silenced, there seems to have been a most liberal hospitality shown in the way of substantial good fare, accompanied by an unstinted supply of excellent wines.

The capital of China, Cambulu, now known far better by the name of Pekin, is spoken of as being even at that time a city of great magnitude and opulence. It would seem not unlikely that the silly absurdity of the Chinese, in speaking of such people as the English, Dutch, and other highly civilized Europeans, under the opprobrious name of outside barbarians, is an absurdity which others besides the Chinese are unfortu tely guilty of The way in which modern writers allow themselves to