of the Manchu Dynasty, that he himself was half-convinced, the last argument necessary being the secret promise that he should become the first President of the united Republic.  In the circumstances, had he been really loyal, it was his duty either to resume his warfare or resign his appointment as Prime Minister and go into retirement.  He did neither.  In a thoroughly characteristic manner he sought a middle course, after having vaguely advocated a national convention to settle the matter.  By specious misrepresentation the widow of the Emperor Kwanghsu—­the Dowager Empress Lung Yu who had succeeded the Prince Regent Ch’un in her care of the interests of the child Emperor Hsuan Tung—­was induced to believe that ceremonial retirement was the only course open to the Dynasty if the country was to be saved from disruption and partition.  There is reason to believe that the Memorial of all the Northern Generals which was telegraphed to Peking on the 28th January, 1912, and which advised abdication, was inspired by him.  In any case it was certainly Yuan Shih-kai who drew up the so-called Articles of Favourable Treatment for the Manchu House and caused them to be telegraphed to the South, whence they were telegraphed back to him as the maximum the Revolutionary Party was prepared to concede:  and by a curious chance the attempt made to assassinate him outside the Palace Gates actually occurred on the very day he had submitted an outline of these terms on his bended knees to the Empress Dowager and secured their qualified acceptance.  The pathetic attempt to confer on him as late as the 25th January the title of Marquess, the highest rank of nobility which could be given a Chinese, an attempt which was four times renewed, was the last despairing gesture of a moribund power.  Within very few days the Throne reluctantly decreed its own abdication in three extremely curious Edicts which are worthy of study in the appendix.  They prove conclusively that the Imperial Family believed that it was only abdicating its political power, whilst retaining all ancient ceremonial rights and titles.  Plainly the conception of a Republic, or a People’s Government, as it was termed in the native ideographs, was unintelligible to Peking.

Yuan Shih-kai had now won everything he wished for.  By securing that the Imperial Commission to organize the Republic and re-unite the warring sections was placed solely in his hands, he prepared to give a type of Government about which he knew nothing a trial.  It is interesting to note that he held to the very end of his life that he derived his powers solely from the Last Edicts, and in nowise from his compact with the Nanking Republic which had instituted the so-called Provisional Constitution.  He was careful, however, not to lay this down categorically until many months later, when his dictatorship seemed undisputed.  But from the day of the Manchu Abdication almost, he was constantly engaged in calculating whether he dared risk everything on one throw of the dice and ascend the Throne himself; and it is precisely this which imparts such dramatic interest to the astounding story which follows.