At home, the eunuchs gave an immense deal of trouble by their restless spirit of intrigue; besides which, for nearly twenty years the Imperial power was in the hands of a famous usurper, named Wang Mang (pronounced Wahng Mahng), who had secured it by the usual means of treachery and poison, to lose it on the battle-field and himself to perish shortly afterwards in a revolt of his own soldiery.  But the most remarkable of all events connected with the Han dynasty was the extended revival of learning and authorship.  Texts of the Confucian Canon were rescued from hiding-places in which they had been concealed at the risk of death; editing committees were appointed, and immense efforts were made to repair the mischief sustained by literature at the hands of the First Emperor.  The scholars of the day expounded the teachings of Confucius as set forth in these texts; and although their explanations were set aside in the twelfth century, when an entirely new set of interpretations became (and remain) the accepted standard for all students, it is mostly due to those early efforts that the Confucian Canon has exercised such a deep and lasting influence over the minds of the Chinese people.  Unfortunately, it soon became the fashion to discover old texts, and many works are now in circulation which have no claim whatever to the antiquity to which they pretend.

During the four hundred years of Han supremacy the march of civilization went steadily forward.  Paper and ink were invented, and also the camel’s-hair brush, both of which gave a great impetus to the arts of writing and painting, the latter being still in a very elementary stage.  The custom of burying slaves with the dead was abolished early in the dynasty.  The twenty-seven months of mourning for parents—­nominally three years, as is now again the rule—­was reduced to a more manageable period of twenty-seven days.  Literary degrees were first established, and perpetual hereditary rank was conferred upon the senior descendant of Confucius in the male line, which has continued in unbroken succession down to the present day.  The head of the Confucian clan is now a duke, and resides in a palace, taking rank with, if not before, the highest provincial authorities.

The extended military campaigns in Central Asia during this period brought China into touch with Bactria, then an outlying province of ancient Greece.  From this last source, the Chinese learnt many things which are now often regarded as of purely native growth.  They imported the grape, and made from it a wine which was in use for many centuries, disappearing only about two or three hundred years ago.  Formerly dependent on the sun-dial alone, the Chinese now found themselves in possession of the water-clock, specimens of which are still to be seen in full working order, whereby the division of the day into twelve two-hour periods was accurately determined.  The calendar was regulated anew, and the science of music was reconstructed; in fact, modern Chinese music may be said to approximate closely to the music of ancient Greece.  Because of the difference of scale, Chinese music does not make any appeal to Western ears; at any rate, not in the sense in which it appealed to Confucius, who has left it on record that after listening to a certain melody he was so affected as not to be able to taste meat for three months.