Page:"Round the world." - Letters from Japan, China, India, and Egypt (IA roundworldletter00fogg 0).pdf/114

 pervades the whole literati, as a class.

Now we look upon the Chinese as barbarians, but is not this system of government appointments an improvement on that of our own enlightened land, where party service, personal favor and political considerations, and sometimes beer and whisky, are the open sesame to official positions, regardless of merit or qualification. When Mr. Jencke’s civil service bill shall become a law, as in time it certainly must, we may hope for a reform that will place us in this respect almost on a par with the “Heathen Chinee.”

No event connected with China during the present generation has created so much interest in foreign lands, or raised such great expectations which were doomed to disappointment, as the great Tai-ping rebellion. It commenced in 1850, and after a struggle of fourteen years duration, which nearly overthrew the Manchu dynasty and destroyed millions of lives, it was only put down at last by the help of foreign bayonets. It rendered desolate some of the richest and most fertile portions of the empire, leaving behind it tracts hundreds of miles in extent, marked with blackened walls and heaps of ruins, uncultivated fields and depopulated towns and cities. It originated with a man who had received from a native teacher near Canton some imperfect ideas of Christianity, and at first it seemed that he was to be the instrument of a great religious reform and the downfall of paganism. Having overcome a greater portion of Southern China the Tai-pings swept northward, and after a siege of two years captured Nanking, the second great city and ancient capital of the empire. In this contest the loss of life was frightful, as no prisoners were taken on either side. The professed object of the rebellion was the destruction of the Tartar dynasty and the restoration of the ancient Chinese race to the government of the empire. They allowed their hair to grow, repudiating the Manchu custom of shaving the front part of the head and cultivating the queue, and so were called “Long-hairs,” this being a synonym for rebels. In the meantime the early promise that the success of the rebellion would result in a more beneficent government, with modern ideas and a Christian civilization, had faded away. The leader announced himself the brother of Jesus Christ, and his followers became more and more erratic and fanatical, until they