years
and to prove himself one of the best and greatest of the emperors of
China.

We cannot close without a mention of the final events in the career of
Wou Sankwei, to whom China owed her Manchu dynasty. Thirty years after
he had invited the Manchus into the country, and while he was lord of a
large principality in the south, he was invited by the emperor to visit
Peking, an invitation which he declined on the plea of old age, though
really because he feared that Tartar jealousy of his position and
influence lay behind it.

Envoys were sent to him, whom he treated with princely courtesy, though
he still declined to visit the court, and plainly stated his reasons.
The persistence of the emperor at length drove him into rebellion, in
which he was joined by others of the Chinese leaders, and for a time the
unwisdom of Kanghi in not letting well enough alone threatened his
throne with disaster. One by one, however, Wou's allies were put down,
until he was left alone to keep up the war. The Manchus hesitated,
however, to attack him, knowing well his great military skill. But
disunion in his ranks did what the Tartar sword could not effect. Many
of his adherents deserted him, and the Chinese warrior who had never
known defeat was brought to the brink of irretrievable disaster. From
this dilemma death extricated him, he passing away at the head of his
men without the stigma of defeat on his long career of victory. In the
end his body was taken from the tomb and his ashes were scattered
through the eighteen provinces of China, to testify that no trace
remained of the man whom alone the Manchus had wooed and feared.

_THE CAREER OF A DESERT CHIEF._

In looking upon a modern map of the empire of China, it will be seen to
cover a vast area in Asia, including not only China proper but the wide
plains of Mongolia and the rock-bound region of Thibet. Yet no such map
could properly have been drawn two hundred years ago. Thibet, while a
tributary realm, was not then a portion of China, while the Mongolian
herdsmen were still the independent warriors and the persistent enemies
of China that they had been from time immemorial. It is to the Manchu
emperors that the subjection of these countries and their incorporation
in the Chinese empire are due. To-day the far-reaching territory of the
steppes, the native home of those terrible horsemen who for ages made
Europe and Asia tremble, is divided between the two empires of Chin