China: The Asian Civilization - The Wise World Traveler: Becoming a Part of All that You Meet - page 242

so much prized by Europe that the search to find the secrets of porcelain spanned several
centuries. It eluded Europe until 1709. The list multiplies and includes important discover-
ies in medicine (circulation of the blood, diabetes and its treatment), hydraulic engineering
(the Grand Canal, the longest canal in the world, more than 1,000 miles long, begun in the
fourth century BCE), and warfare (the cross bow, artillery, land mines, and grenades).
In architecture, China built spectacular buildings, elaborately decorated inside and out,
with rooflines that seem to defy gravity. [217] In humanist pursuits, the Chinese perfected
the arts of calligraphy and scenic painting. Fiction was published as early as the ninth cen-
tury, and poetry was prized as early as the Han Dynasty (206 BCE). Poets wrote of friend-
ship, love, sorrow, and longing: thus, a poem by a princess married to a decrepit old man to
whom she barely spoke:
My people have married me
In a far corner of the earth,
Sent me away to a strange land….
Always thinking of my own country
My heart sad within,
Would I were a yellow stork,
And could fly to my old home! [218]
THE OLD SYSTEM DIES: FINAL THOUGHTS
By the late nineteenth century, it was obvious to most and painful to those who loved China
that the Middle Kingdom desperately needed reform. The once great military power that
received tributes from all of Asia and the once great center of invention and culture was
now treated with bullying contempt by foreign powers. Where foreign ambassadors seek-
ing audience with the emperor once approached the throne on their knees, foreheads on the
floor (the “kow tow”), they now sent armies into Peking. China's continuing humiliation
was a significant factor in toppling the dynastic system.
And the dawn comes up like
thunder outer China 'crost the Bay!
— Rudyard Kipling, “Mandalay”, 1890
AFTER THE FALL
As a rule, democracies pride themselves on a smooth transition from one set of elected
rulers to the next. In the United States, an incoming President sends a transition team
to work in the office of the outgoing chief executive. When non-democratic regimes