By George B. Smyth President of the Anglo-Chinese College, Province of Fukien, China GEORGE B. SMYTH President of the Anglo-Chinese College. IN the attempt to put in China, and in the N the attempt to put down the recent out efforts now being made to restore peace to that distracted Empire, every American has reason for pardonable pride in the position taken by his country. Her counsel was for prompt action in the face of armed opposition; her word now is for healing, for measures of restoration, with no desire for vengeance or seizure of territory. When this terrible crisis is over, and the Chinese people have time to look back on the events of those dreadful days, they will see new reason for the confidence with which they were learning to look toward this country. That they were coming to look to her as to no other in the West there is abundant evidence, and none greater than the regularity with which the Chinese authorities placed the direction of their efforts to introduce the new education almost entirely in the hands of Americans. This chapter in the history of China' should be of interest to us, showing as it does how steadily the intellectual leadership of the new movement in the Empire was being accorded to our countrymen. A brief account of their work, therefore, cannot but be interesting to Americans who believe in the worth of their civilization, and hail with joy every legitimate effort to spread it abroad. It was after its defeat by the allied British and French armies in 1860 that the Government of China awoke for the first time to the necessity of acquiring some knowledge of the West and its civilization. By the treaty which followed that humiliating experience, provision was made for the establishment of diplomatic intercourse with Western States, and for the residence of Foreign Ministers at the capital. In the British treaty it was specifically provided that English despatches to the Chinese Government should, for a period of three years, be accompanied by a Chinese translation, and that within that time the Government would be expected to provide a corps of competent interpreters for itself. To meet this obligation, a class for teaching English was opened in 1862, and classes in French and Russian were begun in the following year. With its prejudice against foreigners, the Government endeavored to find among its own people competent teachers of these languages, but at that time there were no such men in China, and it was compelled at last to invite those whom it disliked so much. The first instructor in the English department was an English missionary who afterwards became Bishop of Hongkong, and he was succeeded by another Englishman, Mr. John Fryer, who translated a great number of scientific books for the Government, and is now Professor of Chinese in the University of California. On the latter's resignation in 1869 the post was, on the recommendation of Mr. Burlingame, the American Minister, and Mr. Wade, the British Chargé d'Affaires, offered to the Rev. Dr. W. A. P. Martin who went to China as a missionary of the American Presbyterian Church in 1850. He accepted the position, and held it for over twenty-five years, resigning it at length only on account of ill health. The school, which was for some years only a training-school for interpreters, was called by the truly Chinese name of Tung-wenKuan, or "Hall of Combined Learning." In 1865, feeling that the time had come when China needed other kinds of foreign learning besides languages, the Government raised the school to the rank of a college by adding a scientific department and admitting a class of students of higher attainments in Chinese scholarship than those who had previously been received, and Dr. Martin was continued in the presidency. Of course this step met with serious opposition from the bigoted adherents of the old system. They were especially incensed at the suggestion that the cadets of the famous Hanlin Academy, the very highest highest embodiment of Chinese learning, should attend the new college. They re Government, just as are the cadet West Point and Annapolis, though no liberally. All are professedly in train for the diplomatic and consular servi It is true that this purpose has been so what lost sight of in recent years; ind Dr. Martin once told me that not m than one in ten of the graduates rece official employment. But this is the in China, where relationship to a Mini going abroad is a much stronger clain a diplomatic appointment than gradua from any college. In that country prejudices die hard; the claims of bl still surpass all others. But the et was a commendable one, and, though Tung-wen-Kuan has not sent many Mi REV. YOUNG J. ALLEN, D.D. garded it as an indignity to the scholarship of the Empire. They even enlisted the forces of superstition in their bitter opposition. A severe drought which occurred at the time was attributed by one of the censors, in a memorial to the throne, to the new college, an abomination which he declared should be removed before the heavens would send down rain. But Prince Kung and the Progressives carried the day. The College is well organized, and has, according to the latest catalogue, nine foreign and four Chinese professors. Four languages are taught English, French, German, and Russian. There are also departments of mathematics, physical science, and medicine. The number of students is limited to a hundred and twenty, and they are all paid by the ters or Consuls to West, it has, under accomplished Presid done work worth all cost. Among others, of its graduates ha brilliant career in Eur as Chargé d'Affaire the Chinese Legation Paris, and two beca tutors in English the Emperor Kuang 66 The indirect influe of the College," says Martin in his most teresting volume, Cycle of Cathay,' the leading officials the Empire, and thro them on the instituti of the country, has been not inconsic able. Its principal achievement in last-named direction is the introduct (though limited) of science into the c service examinations. This measure, creed in 1887, had been under deliberat for twenty years; governors and vicer had recommended it, but it was not ado ed until the Government obtained throu our College some conception of the natu and scope of modern science." A gre deal of attention has been given to tra lation, and the list of subjects on whi valuable books have been rendered in Chinese is astonishing. It embraces intnational law, political economy, chemist natural philosophy, physical geograph history, French and English codes of la anatomy, physiology, materia medica, an diplomatic and consular guides. TI most famous translations have been made by Dr. Martin himself. His rendering of Wheaton's "International Law" marked an epoch in the history of China. But it was not by books alone that this distinguished man taught. Through his position he was in constant contact with the highest officials in the Empire, and through them, and particularly through the younger men, he has exercised a great and ever-widening influence. The recent upheaval against foreigners does not show that that influence was useless. This outbreak, terrible though it is, is almost entirely confined to the North, is due to especially aggravating causes, and was fostered by a set of intensely reactionary officials whom that evil genius of China, the Empress Dowager, had raised to power. There is, in spite of all this, a large and growing body of reformers in the country, and through some of them the work of Dr. Martin lives and is effective. With the exception of Sir Robert Hart, the Inspector-General of Customs, no other foreigner has been so highly regarded by the Chinese. His great learning has won him respect throughout the whole Empire. Well do I remember a Chinese gentleman saying, when I was in Peking some years ago, "Ding-Kuan-Si," the name by which Dr. Martin is known throughout the East, "is equal to our Hanlins." This is the highest compliment possible to pay any one in China. In the distant South he is equally well known and honored. There his name is never mentioned but with respect. One of his books, a treatise on the evidences of Christianity, has had an immense circulation both in China and Japan, and has been reprinted many times. Dr. Martin has been equally distinguished for that rare quality, tact, and his great influence has been invariably exerted for the promotion of good will between China and the West, and the advancement of every enterprise conducive to the welfare of the Chinese people. Americans may think of the career of such a man with pride. I have been in many parts of China, but in no place in which, through the respect felt for Dr. Martin, being his countryman was not a recommendation. For over a quarter of a century he has represented in the old capital, before the proudest and most exclusive government in the world, whatever is best and noblest in American civilization. I have said that a few years ago he was compelled to resign the presidency of the Tung-wen-Kuan because of ill health, and return to America. But the old passion possessed him, and he went back to China, where, at his own expense, he joined the well-known American missionary, Gilbert Reid, in efforts to promote the reform movement at the Capitol, and to found the International Institute in which that gentleman was so deeply interested. But the Emperor wanted him, and when, in 1898, he issued the famous decree on the new education, and ordered the establishment of the Imperial University at Peking, the presidency of it was offered to our distinguished countryman. Dr. Martin accepted the post, and when, soon afterwards, the Empress Dowager dethroned the young Emperor and began the revocation of his reform decrees, she allowed the one which founded the new University to stand. What its future will be cannot now be predicted, but America will always think with pride of the fact that when the Emperor of China began the great historic movement whose object was to give his country her rightful place among the nations, and decreed the founding o complete national system of education Western lines, the man called to the w highest post was one of her own citize The next American called to a pro nent position in the new educational mo ment in China was Mr. C. D. Tenr President of the Imperial Tientsin U versity. About fifteen years ago gentleman went as a missionary of American Board of Commissioners Foreign Missions to the Province Shansi. He afterwards left the miss and went to Tientsin, where he opene private school for teaching English young Chinese of position. He was s employed as a private tutor for Li-Hu Chang's sons, and when, some time la the great Viceroy founded the Tient University, he offered Mr. Tenney presidency. The special work of t institution is engineering, the training young men to work and superintend various railways, mining and other er neering enterprises of the Governme There is, or was before the recent up ing, an able corps of American profess from Cornell and other colleges. Mr. Tenney is a great educator, and enjoyed the unbounded confidence of the highest officials in the province of Chili, where Tientsin is situated. He is a man of great independence of character, and, knowing how painful had been the experience of some of the foreigners who had accepted positions under Chinese officials, he stipulated in accepting the presidency that he should be the head of the University in fact as well as in name, and that no discrimination of any kind should ever be attempted against Christian students because of their faith. The strength of his position with the new Viceroy, LiHung-Chang's successor was severely tested a few years ago, and he came off victor. The head Professor of Chinese, who was bitterly anti-Christian, made some slighting remarks about the Christian students, and discriminated against them in the examinations. Mr. Tenney, on these facts being established, dismissed him. The Professor was furious, and appealed to the Viceroy, with the assistance of his friends and some anti-foreign officials. But such was the Viceroy's confidence in Mr. Tenney's administration that he sustained him in every particular. Since that day no man has been bold enough to attempt persecution of Christians in the Imperial University of Tientsin. The President of the Kiangnan College, founded three years ago at Shanghai by Liu-Kung-Yi, Viceroy of the Kiangsu Province, and the well known ShengTaotai, Director-General of Government railways and telegraphs, is an American, the Rev. John C. Ferguson, who was for some years President of the Methodist University at Nanking. Mr. Ferguson is a graduate of Boston University, and went to China fourteen years ago as a missionary of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He soon became a proficient speaker of Chinese, and by his judgment and tact won for his work as an educator the favor |