Five hundred years ago there was a somewhat {257} analogous situation. The Emperor of the time, Hwei-ti by name, was but a stripling, and utterly incapable of guiding the ship of state through the stormy seas of Court intrigue. His uncle, Prince Yen, the Yuan Shih K'ai of his age, had for years been drilling his soldiery, accumulating war stores, and in every way preparing to seize the reins of power. In 1400 A.D. the time seemed ripe; and in August of that year Yen led forty thousand picked men into Shangtung. No less than three hundred thousand loyalists were sent to oppose him; but the better trained and more skilfully led rebels, though numerically so inferior, utterly routed the badly-placed horde led by General Ping-Wen. This was but the beginning of a four-years relentless war, waged mostly in the northern and eastern provinces--Shangtung, Chihli, Anhwei and Kiangsu--leading to the flight of Hwei-ti to Szechuen (where he became a Buddhist priest) and the proclamation of Prince Yen as Emperor under the title of Ch'eng Tsu. This Revolution in no way affected the Dynasty, which, in spite of internal uprisings and external depredations by Mongols and Japanese, ran for another 250 years in unbroken succession. Nevertheless during the whole of this period the history of China is one long chapter of domestic trouble, corruption and decadence alike of ruler and ruled, whilst over all Court life the deadly upas-tree of eunuchdom cast its blasting shadow. There were always rebellions, always the argument of the naked sword in the settlement of differences--and always the emerging from one cloud of trouble to enter but another, and that of a deeper darkness. Then came the end. A rebellion that shook the Empire to its centre and brought about the end of the Ming Dynasty broke out in Shensi, and quickly spread through the neighbouring provinces, until not only Shensi, but Shansi, Honan, and Hupeh were involved. Like the Revolution that {258} threatens to be the end of the present Dynasty, and has already foreshadowed the great and momentous changes to be, this rebellion was conceived and carried out by a "General Li"--Li Tsi-cheng by name. For some few years the Government was able to keep the upper hand--indeed, in 1634 it seemed as if the generalissimo of the rebel forces was hopelessly involved in a mountainous cul-de-sac, and that his extermination was but a question of time. Not knowing the strength of the rebel army, the commander of the Imperial forces granted terms of capitulation. Li brought away his forces to the number of thirty-six thousand with only the loss of their arms, much to the chagrin of the Imperial leader.