The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1901-02-18
THE CHINESE PROBLEM.

AHe CHlIleSe question instead OF get
ting smaller, grows greater Informa-
ton upon the situation is almost i'm
possible to obtain. Probably no set of
people can get more accurate informa-
ton than we of these Islands, but we
find it difficult to piece together the
many conflicting reports, and we are
upon the main highway from the far
East to the Far West
There are terrible stories told of what
has been done in China. Are they true
or are they not? The scenes are vouch-
ed for by DR.. E. j. Dillon who accom-
panied the allied forces on their march
TO Picking. DR.. Dillon had before in
yestigated the atrocities in Armenia.
DR.. Dillon is strong in his invective and
he marshals his statements in over
Whelming force. One may quote from
him. He says;
surely, one needs not be puritanical
or hysterical to condemn the wholesale
favishing, sometimes to death, of terri
hed FEMALES between the ages of six
and sixty by clodhopping, british SOL
oilers who misrepresent alike Christian
lty and civilization"
He describes vividly the ravishing
and bayoneting Of three daughters of a
Chinese of the upper class, also of the
outrage Of a wife and six-year-old
daughter before the eyes of the hus-
band and father, and then adds;
81 knew of others whose wives and
daughters hanged themselves on trees
or drowned themselves in garden-wells
n ne oh, Lot
Chinese women honestly believe that
no more terrible fate could overtake
them than to fall alive into the hands
of Europeans and Christians. And it is
to be feared that they were right Bud
dhism and Confucianism have their
martyrs to chastity, whose heroic feats
no martyrology will ever record. Some
or those obscure, but right-mnded girls
and women hurled themselves into the
river and, finding only three feet of
water there, kept their heads under the
surface until death had set his seal on
the sacrifice of their life. This suicidal
frenzy was catching. 1t sometimes
spread like wildfire, and the military
authorities felt bound to stop il bV
force. number of soldiers, possibly
with one or other of the would-be cri-
mlnals among them, were sent to the
rescue. And they succeeded in saving
the lives of many. But they complain
that some of the women We're logged
ly resolved to die. In the water thew
offered a strong and often successful
resistance to the efforts of their would
be saViours. Some, having been taken
out of the river safe and sound, plung-
ed in second time, and found a merci-
tul end. l have spoken to some of the
men who took part in the work of res
cuing those faithful wives and modest
daughters, and they extoled their hero
ism TO the skies But large number
or lll-starred women fell alive into the
hands of the allied troops. 1 saw some
of them in Picking and Tung-tschau
but already dead, with frightful gashes
IN their breasts, or skulls smashed in,
ana one with horribly mutilated body,
There is lady missionary in Picking
who in company with a female colleague
busted herself to my knowledge, for
months, in shielding Chinese women
and girls from being raped by Christian
and European soldiers and the work
was anything but easy, though I have
reason to believe that it has proved
eminently successful. Even In the
broad daylight, soldiers hung about the
refuge, and employed various devices
and tricks to get hold of the women
whom they ought to have been first to
protect"
If this is true, it is the most scathing
rebuke ever passed upon Christian civil
lization. If this is true Christianity is
sham, for it has fostered as ravening
wild beasts in man as ever paganism
did. But one doubts the truth. One
cannot believe that the troops of any
civilized nation would behave as has