ing-up of the country by internal
reform and not by external pressure has as yet hardly commenced in
immense areas of the Empire far removed from the imperial city of
Peking. And the mere fact that the Chinese propose such an absurd
program as that which plans the building of all their railways without
the aid of foreign capital is sufficient to react in an unwholesome
manner economically.[BH][BI]

I cannot but admit that, whilst in most parts of my journey there are
distinct traces of reform--I speak, of course, of the outlying parts of
China--and some very striking traces, too, and a real longing on the
part of far-seeing officials to escape from a humiliating international
position, it is distinctly apparent that in everything which concerns
Europe and the Western world the people and the officials as a whole are
of one mind in the methods of procrastination which are so dear to the
heart of the Celestial, and that peculiar opposition to Europeanism
which has marked the real East since the beginning of modern history.

* * * * *

And now lovely, lovely Burma!

I had not been in Burma two minutes before the very box containing the
clothes into which I must change before I could enter into the social
life of Bhamo swung from the broken pole of one of my coolies, and
rolled rapidly towards the river. It was recovered after great trouble.

Thick jungle land lay out before me, fleecy clouds in the dense blue sky
hung lazily over the green hills, the heavy air was pregnant with that
delicious ease known only in the tropics--all was still and sweet. The
river flowed grandly from the interior through magnificent forest
country, receiving on either shore the frequent tribute of other minor
streams, and its banks were marvelous cliffs of jungle--tangles of giant
trees on crowding underwood, clinging vine and festooning
parasite--rising sheer from the water's brink. Now long clusters of
villages, deep in the shade of palm and fruit trees; now wide expanses
of grass-grown meadow, where the grazing grounds dip to the river, and
where the only echoes of China are the resting pack-horse caravans--the
banks cut into huge trampled clefts by the passage of the kine trooping
down to drink. Occasional wooded islands broke the monotony of the
river, and were just discernible from the magnificent English roads
which skirted the hills high up from the river, and yellow sandspits and
big wedges of granite