What was the foreign response--the official response? In every transaction into which it was possible to import them, reaction and obscurantism were not only commonly employed but heartily recommended. Not one trace of genuine statesmanship, not one flash of altruism, was ever seen save the American flash in the pan of 1913, when President Wilson refused to allow American participation in the great Reorganization Loan because he held that the terms on which it was to be granted infringed upon China's sovereign rights. Otherwise there was nothing but a tacit endorsement of the very policy which has been tearing the entrails out of Europe--namely militarism. That was the fine fruit which was offered to a hopeful nation--something that would wither on the branch or poison the people as they plucked it. They were taught to believe that political instinct was the ability to misrepresent in a convincing way the actions and arguments of your opponents and to profit by their mistakes--not that it is a mighty impulse which can re-make nations. The Republic was declared by the actions of Western bureaucrats to be a Republic _pour rire_, not a serious thing; and by this false and cruel assumption they killed Yuan Shih-kai. If that epitaph is written on his political tombstone, it will be as full of blinding truth as is only possible with Last Things. FOOTNOTES: [20] The incident of Chen-chiao is very celebrated in Chinese annals. A yellow robe, the symbol of Imperial authority, was thrown around General Chao Kuang-ying, at a place called Chen-chiao, by his soldiers and officers when he commanded a force ordered to the front. Chao returned to the Capital immediately to assume the Imperial Throne, and was thus "compelled" to become the founder of the famous Sung dynasty. The "incident of Yuyang" refers to the execution of Yang Kuei-fei, the favourite concubine of Emperor Yuan Tsung of the Tang dynasty. The Emperor for a long time was under the alluring influence of Yang Kuei-fei, who had a paramour named An Lo-hsan. The latter finally rebelled against the Emperor. The Emperor left the capital and proceeded to another place together with his favourite concubine, guarded by a large force of troops. Midway, however, the soldiers threatened to rebel unless the concubine was killed on the spot. The clamour was such that the Emperor was forced to sacrifice the favourite of his harem, putting her to death in the presence of his soldiers. CHAPTER XIV THE NEW RÉGIME,--FROM 1916 TO 1917