46

CHAPTER  III

THE  GOVERNMENT
The  government  of  China  is  an  autocratic  rule  superposed
on  a  democracy  ;  but  “  the  East  is  East  and  the  West  is
West,”  and,  having  applied  Occidental  terminology  to  an
Oriental  system,  it  becomes  necessary  to  define  the  terms-When
  the  Mongols  under  Kublai  Khan  in  the  thirteenth
century  invaded  and  conquered  the  country,  they  became
the  dominant  power  and  de  facto  rulers  of  the  Empire  ;  but
the  daily  life  of  their  subjects  went  on  as  before,  they  made
no  change  in  domestic  and  local  institutions,  and  their
refusal  to  be  absorbed  in  the  sturdy  organisation  of  the
Chinese  people,  combined  with  the  pressure  of  heavy  tribute
and  the  evils  of  an  irredeemable  paper  currency,  led  to  their
expulsion  within  a  century  from  the  first  accession  of
Kublai  to  the  throne.  The  native  dynasty  of  the  Ming»
which  then  succeeded  in  the  fourteenth  century,  introduced
a  better  system  of  government,  based  on  learning  and  statesmanship, ­
  but  made  no  change  in  its  external  form  ;  and  the
relations  between  ruler  and  subject  remained  unaltered.
The  Manchu  Dynasty  of  the  Tsing,  coming  to  power  in  the
seventeenth  century,  was  based  primarily  on  force  of  arms  i
but  even  their  conquests  were  effected  by  armies  composed
as  much  of  Chinese  troops,  stiffened  by  Manchu  battalions
and  led  by  Manchu  officers,  as  of  the  all-conquering  Manchu
bowmen.  In  their  civil  government  the  Tsing  Emperors
and  their  Manchu  advisers  had  the  wisdom  to  recognise
that  their  own  people,  unlettered  and  without  the  training
of  generations  in  the  science  of  governing,  were  unequal  t°
the  task  of  providing  an  administration  which  could  stand