And it takes
very little to light the fuse and to cause a terrible explosion here, in
common with other places in this province. A man might be quite safe one
day and lose his head the next if he did not, at times when the
rebellious element is apparent, conform strictly to the general wishes
and accepted customs of the people among whom he is living.
No, we cannot afford to laugh. We must seek the opinion of those people
who were confined within the walls of Chao-t'ong city--the silence of
their own homes broken up by the distant uproar of a frantic chorus of
yells and angry disputations, sounding, as it were, their very
death-knell, as if they were to form a manacled procession dragging
their chains of martyrdom to their own slow doom--before we show
contempt for the opinion of those who would tell the truth. There is
more of Boxerism in the far-away interior parts of China than we know
of.
Even as late as the middle of January of the year 1910 there was no
rumor of any uprising. About this time, however, to supply a serious
deficiency in the revenue caused by the dropping of the opium tax, since
that drug had ceased to be grown, a general poll-tax was levied, which
the people refused to pay, and at the same time they demanded that they
be allowed again to grow the poppy.
Pages:
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158