312  THE  CHINESE  EMPIRE
small  in  the  past  few  years,  but  in  1896  was  valued  at
Tls.1,617,401,  and  in  1900  at  Tls.1,032,471  ;  in  the  former
year  the  greater  part  was  tea  leaf,  78,297  piculs,  and
in  the  latter  year  brick  tea,  70,905  piculs.  The  foreign
goods  going  from  Hankow  under  transit  pass  in  1905  Into
Shensi  were  valued  at  Tls.825,540,  and  into  Kansu  at
Tls.26,319.
9.  The  Grand  Canal  furnishes  an  inland  water  route
from  Hangchow  to  Tientsin,  a  distance  of  900  miles,  cutting
through  the  flat  alluvial  plains  and  intersecting  the  provinces
of  Chekiang,  Kiangsu,  Shantung,  and  Chihli.  The  oldest
section,  from  the  Yangtze  to  the  Hwai,  was  opened  for
traffic  B.c.  486,  and  is  therefore  2,400  years  old.  The  next
section  to  be  made  was  that  from  the  Yangtze  at  Chinkiang
to  Hangchow,  which  was  constructed  between  a.d.  6o5
and  617,  and  this  section  was  much  improved  by  the
Southern  Sung  Emperors,  who  had  their  capital  at  Hangchow. ­
  Kublai  Khan  (a.d.  1260-1295),  besides  beginning
(but  not  completing)  the  canal  from  Kiaochow  intended
to  cut  off  the  mountain  mass  of  Shantung,  improved,
deepened,  straightened,  widened,  and  extended  the  Grand
Canal  under  the  supervision  of  the  famous  mathematician
Kwo  Show-king  as  engineer  ;  by  him,  the  capital  having
for  the  first  time  been  established  at  Peking,  the  water-way
was  extended  to  the  north  from  the  then  course  of  the
Yellow  River,  where  it  was  joined  by  the  Grand  Canal  at
Tsingkiangpu,  over  the  summit  level  skirting  the  higher
land  of  Shantung,  until  it  joined  the  Wei  River,  which,
improved,  became  then  the  Grand  Canal  to  Tientsin-Succeeding
  Emperors  of  the  Ming  and  Tsing  Dynasties,
until  within  the  past  fifty  years  of  material  national  decadence, ­
  have  spared  no  effort  to  maintain  the  canal  as  a
navigable  water-way  ;  even  when,  in  1853,  the  Yellow  River
took  its  last  plunge  to  the  north-east  and  cut  the  canal
farther  to  the  north,  the  crisis  was  met  and  the  intersection
of  the  two  streams  duly  provided  for.  Starting  from
Hangchow  the  canal  goes  by  Kashing  to  Soochow,  a  distance
of  100  miles,  and  thence  by  Wusih  and  Changchow  through