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A System of Geography, Popular and Scientific
A System of Geography Popular and Scientific Author:James Bell Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: 117 four provinces he already possessed, Petchelee, Shantong, Shansee, and Lyautong, would annually produce, under a mild administration, 500,000 ounces of s... more »ilver, 400,000 measures of rice, and 800,000 pieces of silk, and that it was a much wiser measure to preserve an industrious population, and reap the fruit of their toils, by moderate taxation, than to massacre them. His advice was adopted, and the counsels of this friend of hia country and of mankind saved the lives of unoffending and industrious millions. It is a perfect refreshment to one wearied out will) the sanguinary tales of victory, blood, conquest, and destruction, to find such a character. It is one of those green spots in the desert of detailed warfare, which delights from contrast to the surrounding cheerless waste. The counsels of this man, who for 30 years was the prime minister of Zengis and Oktay, that at length humanized the victors, and made them, of savages, civilized, and inspired them with a love of the science and arts of their conquered subjects; and the reign of Kuhlay Khan is the only bright spot in the gloomy annals of the Mongols. Yet this great prince became a convert to the atheistical system of Boodh, and a dupe of the Tibetian lamas and Chinese bonzas. His successors on the throne of Khan-Baligh polluted the palace with a crowd of eunuchs, (the usual bane of oriental despots), physicians, and astrologers, whilst 13 millions of their subjects perished by famine in the southern provinces of China in 1334, in the reign of the last Mongol emperor, Shun-tee In 1352, Hong-voo, the founder of the Ming dynasty, commenced a successful rebellion in the province of Kyanggnan. His original name was Choo, a man of low origin, and a servant of a Bonzaic monastery, but one whose character admirably fitted ...« less