It is useless, however, to pursue the subject: we have said enough to disclose the utter levity of those who should have realized from the first that the New China is a matter of life and death to the people, and that the first business of the foreigner is to uphold the new beliefs. The Goodnow Memorandum, immediately it was published, was put to precisely those base uses which any one with an elementary knowledge of China might have foreseen: it was simply exploited in an unscrupulous way, its recommendations being carried out in such a manner as to increase one's contempt for the men who were pushing the monarchist plot with any means that they could seize hold of, and who were not averse from making responsible foreigners their tools. FOOTNOTES: [16] It is perhaps of importance to note that Dr. Goodnow carried out all his studies in Germany. [17] The most widely-quoted statement on this subject is the remarkable interview, published in the first week of July, 1915, throughout the metropolitan press, between President Yuan Shih-kai and General Feng Kuo-chang, commanding the forces on the lower Yangtsze. This statement was telegraphed by foreign correspondents all over the world. Referring to the many rumours afloat that titles of nobility would be revived as a precursor to the monarchy the President declared that even if he seized the Throne that would not increase his powers, whilst as for transmitting the Imperial Yellow to his sons none were fitted for that honour which would mean the collapse of any new dynasty. Here General Feng Kuo-chang interrupted with the remark that the people of South China would not oppose such a change ultimately, though they thought it was too early to talk about it just now. Thereupon the President's features became stern and he declared in a heightened voice: "You and others seem still to believe that I harbour secret ambitions. I affirm positively that when I sent my sons to study in England, I privately ordered the purchase of a small estate there as a possible home. If the people of China insist upon my accepting the sceptre I shall leave this country and spend the remaining days of my life abroad." This interview, so far from being denied, has been affirmed to the present writer as being substantially correct. CHAPTER X THE MONARCHY MOVEMENT IS OPPOSED THE APPEAL OF THE SCHOLAR LIANG CH'I-CHAO