146 RUDOLPH M. BINDER 



place of Galena, Illinois. The Civil War furnished the opportunity for that 

 great military genius to blossom out and bear excellent fruit. There was, 

 on the other hand, a considerable number of army officers whose chances for 

 distinguishing themselves were much better than those of Grant, but who 

 failed to do so because they lacked the hereditary genius. The opportunity 

 and the genius met in Grant, and the results were splendid. 



The situation is similar in the case of Lincoln. His early record contains 

 nothing particularly extraordinary; he met with several failures. The 

 Civil War furnished him the opportunity to manifest his talent or genius. 

 Without that opportunity he might have made a good but not an extra- 

 ordinary president, perhaps a "Tippecanoe and Tyler too." 



These two cases contain another important truth — genius and talent do 

 not necessarily have to be preceded by genius or talent in the ancestral lines. 

 If the ancestors have been of sound stock, nature has a way of producing at 

 least occasionally extraordinary results by the interweaving of two individ- 

 uals with sound ancestry. 



This methodological introduction is necessary for an understanding of 

 that very gifted family of the Soongs, which is playing such an important 

 role in the life of China today. 



EARLY LIFE OF SOONG 



Little is known about the early life of the founder of the family. His 

 Chinese name is given as Soong Yu-Ju; his later name as Charles Jones 

 Soong; a third variant is Charles Han Kiao-Soong. But Soong is not the 

 real patronym of this man. It was Han. He is supposed to have changed 

 it either because his family disowned him after he became a Christian, or 

 because a wealthy Chinese minister befriended him and he had hopes of 

 being adopted and inheriting his benefactor's property. Be that as it may, 

 some facts are perfectly clear. 



Mr. Soong was born about 1856 on the island of Hainan, south of Canton. 

 His father, a small farmer, died while the boy was still in his teens. After 

 the re-marriage of his young mother, Charles, to give him the name by which 

 he was later known, found himself in a more miserable environment than 

 before, because unfriendliness on the part of his step-father was added to 

 poverty. So the lad made up his mind to leave his home permanently. 

 After some difficulties he finally arrived in Hongkong, where, owing to 

 his unusual intelligence, although uneducated, he was employed by the 

 American captain of an old type trading vessel on the recommendation of one 

 of the pioneer Hainan sailors. His intelligence and industry soon gained 

 for him the favor of Captain Jones who brought the twenty-four year old 



