so Lin to Peking. The
latter saw Tuan, told him that he was surrounded by evil advisers,
demanded that he cut loose from little Hsu and the Anfu Club, and
declared open war upon little Hsu--the two had long and notoriously
been bitter enemies. Even then people had great difficulty in
believing that anything would happen except another Chinese
compromise. The president was known to be sympathetic upon the whole
with the Chili faction, but the president, if not a typical Chinese,
is at least typical of a certain kind of Chinese mandarin,
non-resistant, compromising, conciliating, procrastinating, covering
up, evading issues, face-saving. But finally something happened. A
mandate was issued dismissing little Hsu from office, military and
civil, dissolving the frontier defense corps as such, and bringing it
under the control of the Ministry of War (usually armies in China
belong to some general or Tuchun, not to the country). For almost
forty-eight hours it was thought that Tuan had consented to sacrifice
little Hsu and that the latter would submit at least temporarily. Then
with equally sensational abruptness Tuan brought pressure to bear on
the president. The latter was appointed head of a national defense
army, and rewards were issued for the heads of the chiefs of the Chili
faction, nothing, however, being said about Chang Tso Lin, who had
meanwhile returned to Mukden and who still professed allegiance to
Tuan. Troops were mobilized; there was a rush of officials and of the
wealthy to the concessions of Tientsin and to the hotels of the
legation quarter.

This sketch is not meant as history, but simply as an indication of
the forces at work. Hence it is enough to say that two weeks after
Tuan and little Hsu had intimidated the president and proclaimed
themselves the saviors of the Republic, they were in hiding, their
enemies of the Chili party were in complete control of Peking, and
rewards from fifty thousand dollars down were offered for the arrest
of little Hsu, the ex-ministers of justice, finance and
communications, and other leaders of the Anfu Club. The political
turnover was as complete as it was sensational. The seemingly
impregnable masters of China were impotent fugitives. The carefully
built up Anfu Club, with its military, financial and foreign support,
had crumbled and fallen. No country at any time has ever seen a
political upheaval more sudden and more thoroughgoing. It was not so
much a defeat as a di