in the distant interior, that the missionaries are doing far more good than harm, and that they should have the moral support of the American people in the continuance of their labors.

There are incompetent missionaries as there are incompetent business men. They have faults. These should and will be corrected and the work will go on. Missionaries will be a help and not a hindrance in the regeneration of China. The commercial spirit leading to ruthless territorial aggrandizement, manifested by the European powers, must bear the responsibility for the Boxer outbreak as much as the zeal of missionary evangelization.

Such men as Li Hung Chang, Sheng Liu Kin Yi, and Chang Chi Tung have told me unofficially that they had no objection to Christian missionary work where it was carried on by worthy men, but complained that too often indiscreet and incompetent men were in charge who excited hostilities and caused trouble for the majority of the missionaries who were qualified and successful.

This discussion of religions, into which I have gone to some length, although cursorily, began with a consideration of the character of the teachings of Confucius, who lived in the illustrious Chow Dynasty period. From the date of its ending, in 255 B. C., we pass on rapidly down through the long historical corridor of succeeding and changing Chinese dynasties. Some we admire; some we abhor. Some we praise; some we decry, but it is the same old story of ups and downs, great and little men, good and bad men, until we grow almost weary of the tale, and are constantly reminded that in the dim future these present days of critical negotiations at Pekin may seem of little importance. Let us hope that their conclusion and results may warrant a higher measure of praise than we can bestow on many of the crises of the limitless but fascinating past.

THE GREAT WALL

During the Tsin dynasty, which succeeded the Chows, the major portion of the great wall of China was constructed. This was approximately 240 B. C., but some 250 or 300 miles of the wall were added nearly 18 centuries later, in 1547 A. D., by an emperor of the celebrated Ming dynasty. Let us remember what this means. A wall begun at one time two centuries before Christ was completed nearly sixteen centuries after Christ. Can anything better illustrate the great age and astonishing conservatism of China than this simple record? What are the sixty years of China's present modern foreign relations—one cycle of Cathay-in comparison with these eighteen centuries which history tosses up and off for our study as if only eighteen days!

The builder of the wall was, however, a great man. Some call him the Napoleon of Asia. Chung was his name, or Hwang-ti, as he called himself. He built magnificent palaces, constructed roads, dug canals, and did all in his power to make his kingdom mighty and prosperous, but was guilty of one unpardonable offense. Wishing to go down to posterity as the first king of China, he ordered the destruction of all the old records and libraries, and decapitated hundreds of scholars. For this he was never forgiven by the Chinese people, and few praises are now sung in his honor. Fortunately for China sufficient records were preserved, and literary men survived to replace later the destroyed records, legends, and histories. He was succeeded by the Han dynasty, which held sway from 206 B. C. to 225 A. D.

RELATIONS WITH THE ROMANS

The Han dynasty, that started before the Christian era and reigned into it over two centuries, saw the first commercial relations established with the Roman

Empire. The latter even sent an embassy to China, and presents were exchanged. Ptolemy and Pliny wrote of the Seres, a name which described the Chinese; and China was distinguished at times far apart by Sin, Chin, and Sinae. "The reign of the Seres was a vas, populous country, touching on the east the ocean and the limits of the habitable world, and extending west nearly to Imaus and the confines of Bactria,' says Yule, adding, "It seems probable that relations existed from the earliest times between China and India, and possibly, too, between China and Chaldea. The 'Sinim' of the prophet Isaiah is by many taken to mean China, and the Ptolemys 'Sinae' are generally understood to have been the Chinese."

"

In the forty-ninth chapter, twelfth verse, the great prophet says, Behold, they shall come from far: and, lo, these from the north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim."

I referred to the honesty of the Chinese; that same story was told in Europe twenty centuries ago. Therefore the reputation of the Chinese for integrity, in spite of all that is said against them, has some good foundation. Justinian was the next great western writer who discussed the Chinese; and then Marco Polo, returning from the magnificent court and mighty empire of the imperial conqueror Kublai Khan in the thirteenth century, awoke the world to its first actual appreciation of the extent and power of Cathay.

The Roman Empire was often described by early Chinese historians as a nation with which China enjoyed trade exchange. The land of Tatsin-Kwoh was the name of this European kingdom in Chinese terminology.

While Rome was in the height of her glory and preparing the way for her downfall the Han dynasty was sailing on the flood tide of prosperity, great wars, territorial aggrandizement, and splendid material progress. When we

consider that such an eventful period is included in the records of Chinese history, we wonder that we have not given it more attention in our study of former civilizations. In those days we are told that temples and palaces were erected larger and grander than those of contemporaneous Rome and Greece; canals were dug of sufficient depth to float ponderous junks; walls were built that reached over high mountain tops; roads were opened that connected capitals and trade centers; wars were waged that killed millions of men, and peace and strife alternated from decade to decade. There was bloody civil contention among the feudal chieftains at one time, and then again a war of the entire united empire against a foreign enemy. The present Boxer uprising would have been treated in those martial days as an amusing incident, and no foreigner would have been spared to tell the tale and write lurid accounts for the magazines.

The contemplation of China's wonderful past suggests at once the question, Why, if such great deeds were done and such splendid buildings, palaces, and roads were constructed, are there not more tangible evidences remaining of these and later glorious periods? The answer is simple and conclusive. First, every new emperor, or the founder of each new dynasty, who was not friendly to his predecessor seemed prompted by an immediate and overwhelming desire to destroy all the signs of his predecessor's work and power, and proceeded to raze not only to the ground but obliterate all monuments of former glory. Secondly, there are remaining, even against such adverse conditions, more monuments of the past than are generally remembered in a discussion of this subject, such as the great wall, the Ming tombs, the Temple of Heaven, the Grand Canal, paved roads, great arched bridges, porcelain pagodas, and numerous lesser signs, like the Nestorian Monument.

Students of China will await, moreover, the new life in the empire and the opening of the interior in the hope that excavations in interior cities and the bringing to light of old records may tell us more than we now know and better explain and illustrate the conditions of the dazzling past.

China's famous competitive examinations were begun under the Hans; a penal code, the model of all subsequent ones, was drawn up, and, as before recorded, Buddhism was first introduced from India. The limits of the empire were extended until under the Western and Eastern Han dynasties they included Szechuan, Yunnan, and Fukien.

Romance tells its story of these times in the great Chinese historical novel entitled The History of the Three States, which immortalizes in a halo of glory that period, which was at its height about three centuries after the birth of Christ. Every Chinese delights in this graphic story of valorous deeds.

We now pause at the threshold of the illustrious Tang dynasty, that shaped Chinese destinies for three hundred years, A. D. 618-907. To reach this period we pass the Tsin and Eastern Tsin dynasties, that succeeded the Hans and ruled for one hundred and fifty years with another group of fifteen monarchs. A few lesser dynasties followed, and then the first Tang began his beneficent sway. During this dynasty Korea became an acknowledged dependency of China, Siam sent tribute-bearers, and Persia sought aid from the Chinese Emperor in a war with other lands. was one of the Tangs that welcomed the Nestorians. The canal system of China was extended, libraries were built, schools opened, and the people

It

were occupied peacefully and happily with agricultural pursuits for unusually long periods. The Hanlin Library and College was founded in 755, the writings of Confucius were newly annotated and revised, and poets, essayists, and historians thronged the courts of the emperors in place of eunuchs and concubines. But if preceding dynasties had been disgraced with beautiful and dissolute but powerful women, who controlled the empire by controlling their emperors and ministers, the Tangs had likewise the cruel and immoral but brilliant and able Empress Wu. She ruled China with a rod of iron and to the benefit of the people for fifty-four years.

Arab travelers who visited China in those days returned with stories of copper money, rice wine, and the use of tea as a beverage. Envoys of the Pope at this period sought to know more of China, and Mohammedanism also then first gained extensive entrance into China and became a factor in its development.

Looking to Europe, we find that England was then divided among the Saxon princes, and France and Gerinany were in that chaotic state which preceded the reign of Charlemagne. The discovery of printing is ascribed to this period, or about A. D. 581, nine centuries before Caxton introduced printing into England. In the siege of Tai-yuen, in the eighth century, gunpowder was used in cannon that threw 12-pound stone shot some 300 paces. After twenty emperors had reigned and China began to see the approach of a modern period of history, the Tang dynasty ended with a desolate land, ruined towns, and the capital razed to the ground by fire and vandal conquerors.

T

O obtain an idea of the important role the dikes have played in the development of the Netherlands, and of the problems with which the inhabitants of that country have had to contend, it is necessary in the first place to understand how the soil of the Netherlands was formed, and what the peculiar conditions are that have rendered the existence of this unique little country possible. A few words concerning the geology of the region, which dates back to a time by no means remote, will therefore be of interest.

Geologically speaking, a large portion of the Netherlands may be said to have been formed only yesterday. This portion, which comprises the western and most interesting half of the kingdom, owes its origin to the alluvial deposits brought there by three large rivers-the Rhine, the Meuse, and the Scheldethe estuaries of which unite to form what at first glance appears to be a delta. The large amount of sediment discharged by these rivers, together with the action of tides and currents in the North Sea, were the primary causes of the formation of extensive series of sandbanks and bars off the coast, and as these banks grew higher and finally became exposed to the action of the wind at times of low water, there came into existence sandhills, commonly known as dunes. The coast in those days partook much of the nature of a "haff," such as is found today on the German coast on the Baltic Sea, or along our own coast, notably at Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds. A long tongue of land running parallel with the coast inclosed a body of shallow water into which discharged

the three rivers. It is natural to suppose that after the formation of this haff, sedimentation progressed rapidly. Heavy deposits of clay gathered in its quiet waters, and later, as the haff grew more shallow and aquatic vegetation be

THE NETHERLANDS DURING THE

FIRST CENTURY

LAKE FLEVO

came luxurious, extensive marshes came into existence, and the great peat beds which cover so large a part of the area of Holland at the present day were formed.

Interesting as are the successive steps in the formation of the country during those early days, space will not permit here to treat of them at length. Suffice it to be said that after the general level of the deposits had reached that of the sea, there arose vast forests, which at one time covered almost the entire country

of the Netherlands. The rivers found their way to the ocean through numerous tortuous channels, but there remained in the center of the country a small lake, called by the Romans at a later period "Lake Flevo." Thus the soil of the Netherlands, having been formed in part by alluvial deposits and in part by the formation of peat beds, cannot be called a delta formation, in the strict sense of that physiographic term, however much its appearance in a general way may resemble that of a delta.

The earliest records make mention of this region as a low, marshy, and heavily timbered area, protected against the tides of the North Sea by ridges of sandhills, and subject to flooding by both fresh and salt waters.

THE FIRST DIKE-BUILDERS IN HOLLAND

The first inhabitants of this inhospitable region were nomadic tribes of Germanic origin, known as the Catts and the Caninefates, and they must be regarded as the pioneers of dike-building. Though dwelling at first on the higher eastern lands of older formation, it is known that they finally settled in the lowlands, where, exposed to the constant danger of inundations, they soon learned to protect their lives and property by the building of levees.

Perhaps Holland in those days was not as undesirable a piece of land as it might prove in these days. At any rate, as early as 400 years before the commencement of this era, the Romans had begun its conquest, and were undertaking a number of improvements, the magnitude of which leave no doubt as to the value they put on their new acquisition. About 10 B. C. the Roman general Claudius Drusus, in order to relieve the Rhine of a part of its burden, connected it with the Ijsel by means of an artificial canal, which may safely be said to have been the first canal dug by the hand of

by ice jams on the rivers. This same levee was completed some years later by general Paulinius Pompeus, and extended to the mouth of the Rhine at Katwijk, where there existed a gap in the dunes through which the Rhine discharged into the sea.

At some distance from its mouth, on the inland side of the dunes, the Romans constructed a large castle, known as Castle te Britten, and on an island in the estuary they erected a light-house, which bore the name of General Caligula. The castle is of interest because from the present location of its ruins important