Bisbee daily review., 1908-11-24
AN EXTRAORDINARY WOMAN.

WOMAN.
 The dowager empress Of China. like Catharine of Russia, was a chapter out of the Arabian Nights. Neither would have been possible except in an Oriental environment
 One was the daughter of a starving Cantonese who sold her into slavery. The other had a serf for a mother and presumably Lithuanian peasant for a father. The one fell into the hands of . Tartar general in command of the troops in the province. and event ually passed into the harem of the emperor of China as a concubine of the third class. The other fell into the hands of the Russian general who captured Marienburg and became the mistress of Peter the Great and his most trusted adviser.
 The former established her son on the Chinese throne and as dowager empress ruled nearly 400. 100000 sub iects for almost half a century through two puppets called emperors. The latter induced Peter to marry her and to proclaim her empress. After his death she ascended the throne of Russia in her own right
 Two great romances of two great empires. yet Tsu Hsi was even a more striking figure than her Russian prototype. She deserves comparison not with one Catha"tne but with three with Catherin l., whom she resem- bled in the manner of achieving sover- eighty; with Catharine IL, whom she resembled in mental vigor and admin istrative talent, and with Catharine de- Meaici, whom she emulated in cruelty, in genius fer intrigue and in unbending opposition to liberalism and progress.
 An extraordinary woman, 1t is bet ter for China and better for ciViliga- ton that she Is dead, whatever may have been the mqpuer of her taking on. Her reactionary policies were a grave menace to the integrity of the empire, because they constituted a continuing invitation to foreign inter ference. For the same reason they were an equally grave menace to the peace of the world, says the New York World.
 It Is not conceivable that the Chun rSgime can show the capacity for re- sistance to the great Chinese reform movement which characterized the rule of Tsu Hsi. But for all that there will be no EuCden awakening of China" after the manner of Japan. The Chinese are an intensely conserv- aSive people Many thousands of them have lived h this country for years, isolated In the midst Of the most intense and most strenuous of western civilization; yet it has in no way affected their manners, their GUS toms, their way of living or their hab- its of thought. Even their dead are sent back to China to lie with the bones of their ancestors.
 If the United States in forty years has not been able to make an impres- sion on 10000 Chinese cut off from contact with their own countrymen, it is idle to suppose that any man now living will last long enough to see the ceuturies-old customs and hab, it's of 3So, 900, 900 Chinese greatly af- fected by external influences or any kind.
 China win not soon be modernized, and there is no good reason why it need be; but it is decidedly in the interest of the United States and Great Britain in particular that the empire should have central govern meut sufficiently strong to maintain itself and resist foleign aggressions, and sufficiently progressive to meet the aims and aspirations of the most enlightened members of truly re- mArkable people.
 If the members of the golf cabinet