On this note the pamphleteer abruptly ends.  Having discussed ad nauseam the inadequacy of all existing arrangements, even those made by Yuan Shih-kai himself, to secure a peaceful succession to the presidency; and having again insisted upon the evil part soldiery cannot fail to play, he introduces a new peril, the certainty that the foreign Powers will set up a puppet Emperor unless China solves this problem herself, the case of Korea being invoked as an example of the fate of divided nations.  Fear of Japan and the precedent of Korea, being familiar phenomena, are given a capital in all this debate, being secondary only to the crucial business of ensuring the peaceful succession to the supreme office.  The transparent manner in which the history of the first three years of the Republic is handled in order to drive home these arguments will be very apparent.  A fit crown is put on the whole business by the final suggestion that the Constitutional Government of China under the new empire must be a mixture of the Prussian and Japanese systems, Yang Tu’s last words being that it is best to be honest with the people!  No more damning indictment of Yuan Shih-kai’s regime could possibly have been penned.

CHAPTER IX

THE MONARCHY PLOT

THE MEMORANDUM OF DR. GOODNOW

Although this extraordinary pamphlet was soon accepted by Chinese society as a semi-official warning of what was coming, it alone was not sufficient to launch a movement which to be successful required the benign endorsement of foreign opinion.  The Chinese pamphleteer had dealt with the emotional side of the case:  it was necessary to reinforce his arguments with an appeal which would be understood by Western statesmen as well as by Eastern politicians.  Yuan Shih-kai, still pretending to stand aside, had kept his attention concentrated on this very essential matter; for, as we have repeatedly pointed out, he never failed to understand the superlative value of foreign support in all his enterprises,—­that support being given an exaggerated value by the public thanks to China’s reliance on foreign money.  Accordingly, as if still unconvinced, he now very naively requested the opinion of his chief legal adviser, Dr. Goodnow, an American who had been appointed to his office through the instrumentality of the Board of the Carnegie Institute as a most competent authority on Administrative Law.

Even in this most serious matter the element of comedy was not lacking.  Dr. Goodnow had by special arrangement returned to Peking at the psychological moment; for having kicked his heels during many weary months in the capital, he had been permitted in 1914 to take up the appointment of President of an American University on condition that he would be available for legal “advice” whenever wanted.  The Summer vacation gave him the opportunity of revisiting in