This naturally aroused the resentment of the republicans, but it also annoyed the generals belonging to the gentry, who had the same ambition.  Thus there were disturbances, especially in the south, where Sun Yat-sen with his followers agitated for a democratic republic.  The foreign powers recognized that a divided China would be much easier to penetrate and annex than a united China, and accordingly opposed Yuean Shih-k’ai.  Before he could ascend the throne, he died suddenly—­and this terminated the first attempt to re-establish monarchy.

Yuean was succeeded as president by Li Yuean-hung.  Meanwhile five provinces had declared themselves independent.  Foreign pressure on China steadily grew.  She was forced to declare war on Germany, and though this made no practical difference to the war, it enabled the European powers to penetrate further into China.  Difficulties grew to such an extent in 1917 that a dictatorship was set up and soon after came an interlude, the recall of the Manchus and the reinstatement of the deposed emperor (July 1st-8th, 1917).

This led to various risings of generals, each aiming simply at the satisfaction of his thirst for personal power.  Ultimately the victorious group of generals, headed by Tuan Ch’i-jui, secured the election of Feng Kuo-chang in place of the retiring president.  Feng was succeeded at the end of 1918 by Hsue Shih-ch’ang, who held office until 1922.  Hsue, as a former ward of the emperor, was a typical representative of the gentry, and was opposed to all republican reforms.

The south held aloof from these northern governments.  In Canton an opposition government was set up, formed mainly of followers of Sun Yat-sen; the Peking government was unable to remove the Canton government.  But the Peking government and its president scarcely counted any longer even in the north.  All that counted were the generals, the most prominent of whom were:  (1) Chang Tso-lin, who had control of Manchuria and had made certain terms with Japan, but who was ultimately murdered by the Japanese (1928); (2) Wu P’ei-fu, who held North China; (3) the so-called “Christian general”, Feng Yue-hsiang, and (4) Ts’ao K’un, who became president in 1923.

At the end of the first world war Japan had a hold over China amounting almost to military control of the country.  China did not sign the Treaty of Versailles, because she considered that she had been duped by Japan, since Japan had driven the Germans out of China but had not returned the liberated territory to the Chinese.  In 1921 peace was concluded with Germany, the German privileges being abolished.  The same applied to Austria.  Russia, immediately after the setting up of the Soviet government, had renounced all her rights under the Capitulations.  This was the first step in the gradual rescinding of the Capitulations; the last of them went only in 1943, as a consequence of the difficult situation of the Europeans and Americans in the Pacific produced by the Second World War.