CHINA. 



99 



stricken districts, in February, 1878, described 

 the condition there by saying tnat the people 

 were "dying by thousands upon thousands. 

 Women and girls and boys are openly offered 

 for sale to any chance wayfarer. When I left 

 the country, a respectable married woman 

 could be easily bought for six dollars, and a 

 little girl for two. In cases, however, where 

 it was found impossible to dispose of their chil- 

 dren, parents have been known to kill them 

 sooner than witness their prolonged sufferings, 

 in many instances throwing themselves after- 

 ward down wells, or committing suicide by ar- 

 senic. Corpses lay rotting by the highway, 

 and there was none to bury them. As for 

 food, the population subsisted for a long time 

 on roots and grass; then they found some 

 nourishment in willow-buds, and finally ate the 

 thatches off their cottages. The bark of trees 

 served them for several months, and last July 

 I received specimens of the stuff the unhappy 

 creatures had been by that time reduced to. 

 The most harmless kind was potato - stalks, 

 tough, stringy fibers, which only the strongest 

 teeth could reduce to pulp, and which entirely 

 defied all my attempts at deglutition. The oth- 

 er description of ' food ' I hardly expect cre- 

 dence, but I have seen it myself was red slate- 

 stone. It appears that this substance, when 

 rolled about in the mouth and chewed, will 

 eventually split into small splinters, which can 

 be swallowed after practice. To such fright- 

 ful extremities have the famine-stricken people 

 in China been put." At the end of December, 

 1877, tli3 famine region in the province of Shan- 

 si was estimated to include a population of 

 nearly ten millions needing relief. The foreign 

 residents, the Christian missionaries, and the 

 Government engaged in undertakings for the 

 relief of the suffering ; societies were formed 

 to collect money and grain for the sufferers ; 

 provision was made for the collection and ac- 

 commodation in places of refuge of persons 

 who wandered from their homes ; and the peo- 

 ple of Europe and America were invited to 

 help. Early in February a decree was pub- 

 lished granting postponements of taxation in 

 many hundred townships of the province of 

 Shantung, in consequence of the suffering ex- 

 perienced through " flood, drought, locusts, al- 

 kalization of the land," etc. It was stated in 

 April that the largest number of victims and 

 the earliest victims to the famine had been 

 opium-smokers. Multitudes of starving people 

 were flocking to Tai-Yuen-fu, the capital of 

 Shansi, and a daily mortality of nearly 400 was 

 reported in the city. Many died from sheer 

 starvation, others from repletion after long fast- 

 ing, many from the intense cold; and some 

 were eaten by wolves. The distress in north- 

 ern Honan was quite as grievous at the opening 

 of the spring. 



The severity of the famine and the urgency 

 of the appeals for help awakened public sym- 

 pathy abroad, and subscriptions were opened 

 and liberally sustained in the principal cities 



of Europe and the United States. The foreign 

 residents and the missionaries residing in Chi- 

 na, particularly the English residents and mis- 

 sionaries, were made the agents for distributing 

 the relief, and did such evident service to the 

 suffering people as to direct general attention 

 to their benevolent work, and call forth ex- 

 pressions of appreciation and gratitude. The 

 Viceroy of the province of Chihli accepted the 

 invitation of the British consul at Tientsin to 

 dine with him on her Majesty's birthday the 

 first instance of the kind recorded proposed 

 the health of the Queen, and in a courteous ad- 

 dress referred with feeling to the efforts which 

 had been made by foreigners to relieve the dis- 

 tress. The Viceroy of Shansi addressed to Mr. 

 Forrest, the English consul at Tientsin, a letter 

 of thanks for what had been done by foreign- 

 ers in the matter of administering relief ; and 

 Mr. Forrest, writing to the committee of the 

 relief fund in Shanghai, said that the distribu- 

 tion of funds, as conducted, would do more 

 really to open China to the English than a 

 dozen wars. In one instance, in the province 

 of Honan, the relief proffered by one of the 

 committees was refused; and in another in- 

 stance two Chinese district officers, appointed 

 to assist the committee, were detected in steal- 

 ing from the funds. 



A letter was published in November by the 

 British Foreign Office which had been received 

 from the Chinese Government, expressing its 

 thanks to the English in all parts of the world 

 for their subscriptions in aid of the sufferers by 

 the famine, and "for the generous relief afford- 

 ed by them in time of great calamity." A ban- 

 quet was given at Hong-Kong to the newly 

 appointed Ambassador to England and France, 

 November 29th. The Ambassador made an 

 address in which he said that the impartial and 

 excellent government given to Hong-Kong had 

 cemented the friendly feeling between Eng- 

 land and China, and added that he regarded 

 the friends and enemies of England as the 

 friends and enemies of China. The rains be- 

 gan to fall in June, and continued at intervals 

 through the summer and fall, producing a steady 

 mitigation of the distress. 



An edict issued by the Emperor on the 

 29th of March expressed dissatisfaction at the 

 supineness of his household officers in effect- 

 ing economies. Prince Kung was ordered to 

 be handed over to the Imperial Court, and the 

 other members of the Grand Council to the 

 Board of Punishments, for the adjudication of 

 penalties, because they had failed to suggest 

 remedies for the existing state of distress. In 

 a later decree these officers were deprived of 

 their rank, but allowed to retain office. 



A relief hospital for refugees from the fam- 

 ine at Tientsin, containing four thousand wo- 

 men and children, was burned on the 6th of 

 January. The gates of the yards were locked, 

 preventing the immediate escape of the inmates, 

 and fourteen hundred persons were burned to 

 death. The two deputies who were in charge 



