"22 THIRTY THOUSAND MILES IN CHINA 



.arrived hours before. On the other hand in some places we 

 were readily accommodated even on arriving late in the night. 

 One difficulty encountered frequently throughout Shensi 

 and Szechwan during the winter of 1915 and the Spring of 

 1916 was the prevalence of large numbers of soldiers not only 

 along the main routes but often also in out of the way places. 

 Since they were not in camps, but were quartered on the 

 villages and towns inn-space and even house or shop-space 

 available for us was difficult to find and under such circum- 

 stances we secured accommodation only by applying to the 

 officer in command who always did what he could for us, even 

 moving a small company of soldiers to make room for us, 

 but as a rule the individuals so dislodged were not over 

 friendly. The ranks of the Chinese army as a rule are not 

 composed of the very best material. 



The Outlook. 



Doubtless there will be -within a reasonably short period 

 tremendous development of railways in China and they in 

 turn will have a tremendous welding effect upon the country. 

 It is necessary that within her borders there should be devel- 

 oped well equipped technical schools in which the Chinese 

 may be taught the arts and sciences necessary for the con- 

 struction and maintenance of railways and other works. 



There is hardly space to refer in detail to the develop- 

 ment of the postal system or telegraph lines in China, 

 except to point out the tremendous success with which the 

 postal system has been developed in that full-fledged post 

 offices with the various departments are in operation all over 

 the country and at lower rates than in Europe and America. 



Telegraph lines connect all provincial capitals with 

 Peking and this system is being extended. It is not thorough- 

 ly understood as yet by all the people just how these things 

 work and I am reminded of two instances which have come 

 under my own observation to illustrate this. 



An old man in Shantung hearing of the function of the 

 line of wire that ran across his fields declared that men who 

 could devise such a method for the transmission of intel- 

 ligence could do anything; whereupon one of his neighbours 

 remarked that he did not think much of it, for he himself 

 had sat for two weeks watching that line very closely and had 

 not yet seen anything go by. 



The other instance was of Hunan carrying coolies tossing 

 their worn out straw sandals on the telegraph lines to secure 

 for themselves a fleetness of foot equal to the speed of the 

 electric message. 



