128 Across the China-Tibet Frontier 
Chao was not content with securing safety along the main 
road across Ssii-chuan as far as the Tibetan frontier, but 
must needlessly push on to Lhasa, an unjustifiable pro- 
cedure, since he had no money. To meet his requirements 
he seized the funds of the railway syndicate to pay for this 
vainglorious adventure, and it was owing to this that the 
dissatisfied people of Ssii-chuan rose in the capital shortly 
after I left Batang. 
Meanwhile Chao had accomplished much, having estab- 
lished the telegraph line and postal communication between 
Batang and Lhasa, though it is easy now to see the 
tremendous nature of the task undertaken by the Warden, 
and the folly of embarking on such an ambitious adventure 
with so much discontent behind him. Far Western China 
and Tibet are so completely severed from China proper 
in community of interests, by geographical and physical 
barriers, by race and creed, that an independent western 
China seems inevitable. As an active colonising power, 
China has proved herself a failure, owing to her haughty 
attitude, her lack of sympathy with the natives with whom 
she comes in contact, and her unique methods of admini- 
stration. As an indirect colonising force, however, by 
means of passive absorption, the Chinese, owing to their 
extraordinary adaptibility and virility, are unsurpassed. 
Chao was murdered soon after he became Viceroy of 
Ssii-chuan ; the grim old Warden of the Marches who had 
not scrupled to slay and hammer with wooden clubs those 
who thwarted or opposed him, who had intrigued with the 
Tibetans to set up independent government in Tibet, who 
had harried the lamas and razed their monasteries to the 
ground, was the victim of conflicting interests. He paid 
the penalty of the autonomy enjoyed by the great western 
province of Ssii-chuan throughout the Tibetan campaign, 
being ultimately murdered by his own soldiers. 
While in Batang I was privileged to see one of the 
minor Tibetan princes who a couple of months previously 
had received 1500 blows by order of the Viceroy for 
misgovernment. The wounds were now almost healed, 
though the man showed us a round hole the size of a 
crown piece in his thigh, and was scarcely able to walk. 
As a rule 1500 blows such as the soldiers give with heavy 
