CHAPTER VI

KAIFENGFU, ACROSS THE YELLOW RIVER AND ON TO

PEKING

OUR carts clattered forward, the people stared, we passed the gates. "Aho!" called the cityguards, rushing up hurriedly, "a Western guest; stop, stupid carters!" For the carters it was a peremptory order; for myself an intimation that so-called Western guests are under close scrutiny; so we duly stopped. The sergeant of the city guard hurried up to me, and with a deep bow, "Pardon me, your Excellency, our own Excellency, the Viceroy (this was a polite lie, for he is but a provincial Governor), expressly handing to our care foreign gentlemen, requests that you will give a card so that official quarters may be prepared." I smiled and understood. This was the reflex action of those numerous sententious Imperial edicts issued since the great tribulation of 1900, calling on Viceroys, Governors, and all provincial officials to remember their manners towards the white man and "to protect." I was being protected.

A Chinese official card was dug out of a twelve

inch Moukden card-case. "This for the Viceroy, Excellency," said the attentive sergeant, holding out his hand for more. Another was dealt to him. "This for the provincial Treasurer; there are yet the Judge, the city Governor, the Chief of Police, and the Records to be remembered." I handed him despairingly half-a-dozen - luckily cards are cheap in China, for the red paper of which they are made is thin, and you may have a thousand for the same price as a hundred in the West. Then we clattered on, only to be halted once more to know what our city address would be. "City address! ask at the inns," I replied.

On we drove down street after street with the city crowds, which never lack in China, staring us out of countenance. Half-an-hour passed and I became angry. "Where are you taking us to?" I asked of the carters. "To the inns, to the inns; do you not know that the city walls are thirty-eight li long, and that this is no village?" So on we drove until the streets finally narrowed down, and the mud left by the rains changed from brown to dark brown, and from dark brown to the indescribable Chinese city black, distinguished amongst all the muds of the earth for its devastating and indescribable stench. Yes, this was the inner city, and since China is a century or two behind the rest of the world, the inns still cluster around the Government offices, so that men seeking preferment have but a step to go from where they lodge to the back doors of the office-holders. Alas! I had arrived in the very

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season when such gentry are thickly gathered, for at each door there was the same cry not a room, not a bed. At last, arriving at one place of imposing appearance (after the wretched inns on the country roads), I peremptorily demanded the best rooms, or else I would really invoke the help of the Governor. Fluent vernacular and this invoking of the higher authorities proved miraculous; I was offered accommodation fit for servants. Protesting, I was met with the glib statement that a great man travelling to Peking had engaged all the best. "Show me the great man," I exclaimed, determined to be properly treated. My angry voice had, however, brought him forth without any calling, and soon I was assuring an independent Prefect of Southern Honan that I would gladly take half his accommodation. The Prefect, being a Chinese gentleman, bowed and accepted me, and at last after this wearying delay I could rest in peace.

Kaifengfu is a city of more than mediocre importance. Placed strategically but a few miles from the banks of the Yellow River, with a triple dyke system of mighty earth-works protecting it from the dread water attacks, it has often been a city of refuge for the Emperors of China. Once from A.D. 960 to 1129 it was the capital of China. Then northern China, the real North which only begins across the Yellow River, was overrun by marauding Kin and Kitan Tartars, and Chinese dynasties, which succeeded one another with some rapidity, sought refuge by placing the broad and swift-flowing river, called

"China's sorrow," between them and their enemies. Since those far-off days it has sunk in importance, but the vast extent of its walls, its still existing Imperial Palaces, and the pride of its scholars, are still fruitful themes in the provinces. During the 'fifties, the Taipings on their march to Peking came across Kaifengfu, and finding the city obdurate and disinclined to open its gates to long-haired rebels, made an attempt to carry it by direct assault. The attack was repulsed with heavy loss. Then the cruel rebel leaders turned their eyes and thought of the treacherous Yellow River. "Let us cut the dykes and flood them out like rats," they said. The dykes were duly cut and the city half swamped. Then it capitulated, and the vast mounds and desolate wastes of sand which still surround its walls for many miles testify eloquently to the ravage committed half a century ago.

Not many miles below the city you may see another interesting sight. It was at this point that the Yellow River a few decades ago changed its channel, so that instead of flowing into the sea through the province of Kiangsu, it swung north, and emptied itself into the shallow Gulf of Pechili, many hundreds of miles away from its former mouth. Had Kaifengfu been but a score or two miles lower down it would then have been blotted out of existence like so many thousands of villages and towns in that terrible year.

In the morning I was early afoot sight-seeing and official-calling. Here, issuing from the doors of the

"Inn of Bounteous Prosperity," everything is close at hand; and a few steps brought me to the vast courtyards of the Provincial Governor, the Provincial Treasurer, and other important magnates. But more interesting than these things were the streets, not on account of their shops, their crowds or their curiosities, but on account of their armed guards. In the old days of but four years ago, you might wander to your heart's content over all the length and breadth of China and, excepting in the camps, never see an armed red-coat. Now how different! Here in Kaifengfu gay bugling had involuntarily heralded my entry into the city; guards and soldiers had lounged in great numbers at the gates; and now, in the inner city, a rifle-armed sentry stood at every street corner. Nor were these soldiers or the arms they carried of the old make-believe régime. Each man was a tall well-built fellow, clad in a good new tunic and a dark blue turban, with ammunition pouches and a bayonet at his side, and a very modern Mauser rifle on his shoulder. Each man also stood for that new and little-understood thing, Re-armed China, and each carried the lesson of the Boxer year on his shoulder- that a rifle to be useful must be kept spotless and perfectly sound, and must be provided with plenty of suitable ammunition. Half a dozen times I stopped in front of these saluting street sentries, and after some mild banter examined rifles, bayonets, and ammunition pouches. Everything was spotless and in first-rate order, and each man had twenty clips of Mauser