The Peking Government had the advantage of being recognised by foreign nations, a condition which would continue while it remained in possession of the capital and any considerable region surrounding it. It had almost all of the modern drilled army, and a great {190} majority of the trained officers. It had better military equipment. The Government still controlled the Imperial railways of North China, the Peking-Hankow Railway, and the Tientsin-Pukou Railway over the greater part. Thus it would be able to concentrate troops at any given point along or north of the Yangtze more easily than the Revolutionists. Moreover, the Imperial troops were accustomed to and equipped to endure a cold climate, and winter had the northern part of the country in its grip. What forces the Revolutionaries could put in the field north of the Yangtze River was not definitely known. Except a few thousand trained troops, any army assembled for the purpose of advancing upon Peking or resisting an advance of the Imperial Army would be composed of raw recruits officered in the main by inexperienced men. Such an army would be ill provided to undertake a winter campaign in the north. Without further analysis the mooted march of a Revolutionary Army to Peking could be dismissed as visionary, unless it was assumed that the Imperial Army was disloyal and would desert the Government. There was now no very tangible basis for such an expectation. Yuan Shih K'ai, the creator of the new army which had always been loyal to him, still held the respect of the soldiers. It was one thing for the new army and its leaders to be dissatisfied with the old order of things at Peking: it was quite another to assume that it was dissatisfied with the form of government proposed by Yuan Shih K'ai, its former and present commander. The army knew Yuan, and what to expect from him. It did not know the Revolutionary leaders, except one here and there, and it did not know what treatment it would receive from a Revolutionary Government after what had happened. If it were assumed that the Northern Army would remain loyal to Yuan Shih K'ai, an early occupation of Peking by the Revolutionists was practically impossible. This was a task which would require a campaign of a year {191} or perhaps more--if it could ever be accomplished. The Imperialists might not have been able to penetrate south of the Yangtze, but they would have had no great difficulty in holding the territory under their control. And in the event of schisms and disintegration of the Republicans, the Government should have been able in time to recover its dominion in all the provinces. This was a phase which the Revolutionists had to consider. Hitherto the processes of disintegration and discontent had worked almost altogether in their favour.