128 



CHINA. 



national custom. After the failure of the ne- 

 gotiations of M. Tricou at Shanghai, the direc- 

 tion of the Tonquin business passed out of the 

 hands of Li and the peace party into those of 

 Prince Kung and the anti-foreign court party, 

 who opposed a bolder and more resolute re- 

 sistance to the demands of France. 



Canton Riots. In September serious anti- 

 European riots broke out in Canton. The 

 Chinese are accustomed to see crimes punished 

 with extreme severity, while the foreign con- 

 suls are loath to enforce rigorously the laws of 

 their own countries when dealing in the exer- 

 cise of extra-territorial jurisdiction with acts of 

 violence committed upon Chinamen by Euro- 

 peans. The populace of Canton were already 

 excited to a dangerous pitch by the news of 

 the French repulses in Tonquin and the war- 

 like attitude of the Peking Government, when 

 two flagrant instances of shielding Europeans 

 from justice wrought them into fury. An 

 Englishman, an official in the Chinese custom- 

 house, fired a gun into a crowd of Chinese who 

 were making a disturbance, killing one native 

 and wounding two others. The Chinese were 

 excited over a rumor that this man, whose 

 name was Logan, was being screened, and, as 

 in many previous similar cases, would escape 

 the consequences of his crime. A day or two 

 later a Portuguese sailor from a British ship 

 killed a Chinaman. In this case the consul re- 

 fused to arrest. When the embittered people 

 saw the vessel depart with the homicide on 

 board, September 10th, they pushed in a great 

 crowd to the foreign quarter and attacked 

 stores and houses. The merchants armed 

 themselves with rifles, and fired a volley into 

 the crowd, killing five and wounding many 

 others. This rendered the mob more desper- 

 ate, and they plundered and set fire to four- 

 teen warehouses, English, German, French, 

 and American, and four dwellings, and only 

 ceased upon the arrival of the Chinese troops. 

 Tumultuous crowds gathered the next day, but 

 committed no further acts of violence. The 

 foreign residents had fled on board vessels in 

 the harbor. After the arrival of two British, 

 one French, and five Chinese gunboats, they 

 returned to their homes. The Chinese author- 

 ities thereafter preserved order in Canton, but 

 the irritation continued. The condemnation of 

 Logan to seven years' imprisonment for man- 

 slaughter was to the minds of the Chinese 

 equivalent to his escape. 



Floods. China suffered in 1883 from inunda- 

 tions which caused great suffering and loss of 

 life. The Yellow river burst through the em- 

 bankments and overflowed the lower country 

 over hundreds of square miles. The country 

 surrounding Tientsin and lying between that 

 city and the capital was also flooded by the 

 overflow of the rivers. The Government made 

 considerable grants of rice to the homeless and 

 starving peasantry, and encouraged private do- 

 nations by, offers of brevet rank. A scheme 

 for the improvement of the protective works 



CHRISTIANITY, GROWTH OF. 



on the Yellow river has been adopted by the 

 Government. The execution of a more thor- 

 ough system of stream regulation for the Yel- 

 low river in accordance with the principles o] 

 modern engineering would avoid for the future 

 the periodical disasters in this country which 

 have occurred since early times. 



CHRISTIANITY, Growth of. On the day oi 

 Pentecost, the number of converts to Chris- 

 tianity was 3,000. At the end of the first cen- 

 tury the number had reached 300,000. In the 

 year 323, when the Emperor Constantine was 

 converted and began to encourage Christianity 

 and suppress heathenism, the number of Chris- 

 tians was 10,000,000 ; at the latter part of the 

 sixth century, 20,000,000; at the close of the 

 eighth century, 30,000,000. During the next 

 two centuries the growth was 20,000,000, mak- 

 ing 50,000,000 at the close of the tenth cen- 

 tury. Then from the close of the tenth to the 

 close of the eleventh century the gain was 

 20,000,000, making the number, at that date, 

 70,000,000. The next hundred years witnessed 

 a growth of 10,000,000. Thus, for about thir- 

 teen hundred years there had been a steady 

 gain, and the number now reached 80,000,000. 

 But during the next century there was a de- 

 cline of 5,000,000 ; then followed, for the same 

 period, a similar gain, making the number at 

 the close of the fourteenth century the same 

 as at the close of the twelfth, viz., 80,000,000. 

 In the days of Luther the number reached 

 100,000,000. Thus, from the tenth to the fif- 

 teenth centuries the number of Christians had 

 doubled. At the close of the eighteenth cen- 

 tury the number had again doubled, i. e., be- 

 came 200,000,000. From 1800 to 1880 the 

 number again doubled, reaching 400,000,000. 

 Hence we see that the last three periods in 

 which Christianity doubled were 500 years, 

 300 years, and 80 years, respectively. These 

 figures include all nominal Christians, compris- 

 ing the Greek, the Roman Catholic, and the 

 Protestant churches. From 1800 to 1880 it is 

 estimated that the Greek Church gained 25 per 

 cent., the Roman Catholic Church 80 per cent., 

 and the Protestant 170 per cent. 



In 1792 William Carey originated the mod- 

 ern foreign missionary movement. He became 

 a- great Oriental scholar, and lived to see the 

 Bible, in whole or in part, spread among the 

 people of India in forty dialects. He aroused 

 an active missionary spirit among the English 

 Baptists, and his dictionaries, grammars, and 

 other works, in the Bengalee, Sanskrit, and 

 other tongues of India, not only prepared the 

 way for the rapid spread of the gospel, but also 

 brought him distinguished honor from the Brit- 

 ish Government. Since the days of Carey, 

 Christianity has advanced in India, China, 

 Japan, Africa, and in other fields, with re- 

 markable rapidity. The number of Christ's 

 followers at this date (1883) is. without doubt, 

 450,000,000. The converts in foreign fields are 

 now numbered by hundreds of thousands, and 

 are gaining rapidly every year. In 1830 there 



