The Fight for the Republic in ChinaPutnam Weale, B. L. (Bertram Lenox)
History
The Fight for the Republic in China
Putnam Weale, B. L. (Bertram Lenox)
China -- History -- Republic, 1912-1949; China -- Politics and government
6. If a volunteer is not qualified for duty Chang Yao-Ching and his
associates shall have the power to dismiss him. All volunteers are
subject to the orders of Chang Yao-Ching and his associates and to
their command in the battlefields.
7. When volunteers are required to attack a certain selected place
it shall be their duty to do so. But the necessary expenses for the
undertaking shall be determined beforehand by both parties after
investigating into existing conditions.
8. The volunteer force shall be organized after the model of the
Japanese army. Two Japanese officers recommended by the Europe and
Asia Trading Company shall be employed.
9. The Europe and Asia Trading Company shall have the power to
dispose of the public properties in the places occupied by the
volunteer force.
10. The Europe and Asia Trading Company shall have the first
preference for working the mines in places occupied and protected by
the volunteer force.
And here ends this extraordinary collection of papers. Is fiction mixed
with fact--are these only "trial" drafts, or are they real documents
signed, sealed, and delivered? The point seems unimportant. The thing of
importance is the undoubted fact that assembled and treated in the way
we have treated them they present a complete and arresting picture of
the aims and ambitions of the ordinary Japanese; of their desire to push
home the attack to the last gasp and so to secure the infeodation of
China.
CHAPTER VIII
THE MONARCHIST PLOT
THE PAMPHLET OF YANG TU
A shiver of impotent rage passed over the country when the nature and
acceptance of the Japanese Ultimatum became generally known. The
Chinese, always an emotional people, responding with quasi-feminine
volubility to oppressive acts, cried aloud at the ignominy of the
diplomacy which had so cruelly crucified them. One and all declared that
the day of shame which had been so harshly imposed upon them would never
be forgotten and that Japan would indeed pay bitterly for her policy of
extortion.
Two movements were started at once: one to raise a National Salvation
Fund to be applied towards strengthening the nation in any way the
government might decide; the other, to boycott all Japanese articles of
commerce. Both soon attained formidable proportions. The nation became
deeply and fervently interested in the double-idea; and had Yuan
Shih-kai possessed true political vision there is little doubt that by
responding to this national call he might have ultimately been borne to
the highest pinnacles of his ambitions without effort on his part. His
oldest enemies now openly declared that henceforth he had only to work
honourably and whole-heartedly in the nation's interest to find them
supporting him, and to have every black mark set against his name wiped
out.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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