Peking to Lhasa : vol.1 / Page 365 (Color Image)

0365	Peking to Lhasa : vol.1

A TENTATIVE PROPOSAL 281

wishes, this state of affairs will continue. The

only remedy is to have Chinese officials strong

enough to enforce discipline, and to have foreign

professors who can feel they are strong enough

to see their orders are obeyed without the risk

of losing their posts. Unluckily, nothing is done,

the scholars get more and more out of hand, and

the foreign instructor becomes more and more an

object of unpitying contempt.

Of course, the worst evil of all is corruption.

This has always existed, but under the Manchus

it was generally organised on fixed rules. In those

days every one, excepting the highest, was under-

paid, and he made up for it by recognised system

of " squeeze ". Sometimes new and ingenious

forms of squeeze were invented by more enter-

prising and astute men, but generally if an official

exceeded the recognised rules there was a riot,

and the culprit suffered. Under the Republic,

corruption has increased beyond all bounds of

decency, the country has been broken up into

countless factions, and each leader of a small

faction has generally only thought of enriching

himself. To carry out his orders each leader has

had to raise soldiers, and these have at last realised

their power. In many cases the leaders have

committed the blunder of not paying their men,

whilst thinking only of making their own fortunes.

Sometimes, to remedy this, they have led their

men to pillage a rich city or town to make up their

arrears of pay or to keep them in a contented

frame of mind. Sometimes when they found

there were no such hopes, the soldiers have gone

off with their rifles, driven by necessity for a means

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