who enter politics as a career, since there is exhibited in this history a complete compendium of all the more vicious traits of Byzantinism. The first acts of President Li Yuan-hung rapidly restored confidence and advertised to the keen-eyed that the end of the long drawn-out Revolution had come. Calling before him all the generals in the capital, he told them with sincerity and simplicity that their country's fortunes rested in their hands; and he asked them to take such steps as would be in the nature of a permanent insurance against foreign interference in the affairs of the Republic. He was at once given fervent support. A mass meeting of the military was followed by the whole body of commissioned men volunteering to hold themselves personally responsible for the maintenance of peace and order in the capital. The dreadful disorders which had ushered in the Yuan Shih-kai régime were thus made impossible; and almost at once men went about their business as usual. The financial wreckage left by the mad monarchy adventure was, however, appalling. Not only was there no money in the capital but hardly any food as well; for since the suspension of specie payments country supplies had ceased entering the city as farmers refused to accept inconvertible paper in payment for their produce. It became necessary for the government to sell at a nominal price the enormous quantities of grain which had been accumulated for the army and the punitive expedition against the South; and for many days a familiar sight was the endless blue-coated queues waiting patiently to receive as in war-time their stipulated pittance. Meanwhile, although the troops remained loyal to the new régime, not so the monarchist politicians. Seeing that their hour of obliteration had come, they spared no effort to sow secret dissensions and prevent the provinces from uniting again with Peking. It would be wearisome to give in full detail the innumerable schemes which were now hourly formulated, to secure that the control of the country should not be exercised in a lawful way. Finding that it was impossible to conquer the general detestation felt for them, the monarchists, led by Liang Shih-yi, changed their tactics and exhausted themselves in attempting to secure the issue of a general amnesty decree. But in spite of every argument President Li Yuan-hung remained unmoved and refused absolutely to consider their pardon. A just and merciful man, it was his intention to allow the nation to speak its mind before issuing orders on the subject; but to show that he was no advocate of the terrorist methods practised by his predecessor, he now issued a Mandate summarily abolishing the infamous _Chih Fa Chu_, or Military Court, which Yuan Shih-kai had turned into an engine of judicial assassination, and within whose gloomy precincts many thousands of unfortunate men had perished practically untried in the period 1911-1916.