Cleveland High School - Beacon Yearbook (St Louis, MO)

Page 14 text:

first and most important festival of the year is the New Year's festival. This festival is equivalent to our Christmas, and everyone except the beggars are gay. Much feasting is done on this holiday. There is also a great deal of noise making. This feast lasts for about two weeks. At the end of two weeks comes the Feast of the Lanterns, one of the most beau- tiful of all Chinese ceremonies. The Dragon Boat festival, which is held on the fifth day of the fifth moon, is another exciting occasion. Daring boat races are held in boats decorated in honor of the dragon god. Great crowds gather to watch the races, which frequently end disastrously. The Chinese men and women both wear trousers. The men wear shorter gowns than the women. If you were among the poorer people of China, you would wear coarse cloth. The rich wear very fine silk. In winter, all Chinese wear much clothing, which of course makes them look very stout. In the summer, the people wear as little clothing as possible. China and the customs of the people are most interesting, but very primitive. It is an appropriate time to bring to our attention the great .need of China for help and education in the modern ways of living. The boy of China does not have the opportunities of the American boyg and, I believe as one of our allies all the western world should do its utmost to help China develop into the modern nation it can and should be. RONALD HERTEL - Term One. 'v ,Il I C 10 n

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,7Ae Adforg of Cjlainoz The Chinese claim a history that reaches back fifty centuries or more. There are no monuments, pyramids or other landmarks to prove conclu- sively the antiquity of the nation, so not until about 1125 B.C. can their history be regarded as really authentic. With the Chow dynasty which began to reign in 1122 B.C. better times dawned for the country. The people changed from a wandering people and began cultivating the soil, at which pursuit they are still engaged today. A feudal system grew up, the great land-owners acquir- ing so much land that the country was practically made up of separate states. Each state became so jealous of its rivals that there was constant strife. This so disturbed the empire that finally, in the third century B.C., the Chow dynasty was overthrown by the Chin dynasty from which China takes its name. Though this dynasty ruled for less than half a century it accomplished certain notable things. Among these were the Great Wall of China, which is the most stupendous structure ever built by man, and the feudal system was abolished. The emperor who performed this latter service was so anxious that his own reign should go down in history as the beginning of the empire that he had all the literature dealing with previous ages destroyed and put many hundreds of learned men to death. After the overthrow of the Chin dynasty many other dynasties reigned, some doing much good, others fomenting strife and bloodshed. There were ages of invention and literary activity. Printing was invented in the tenth century A.D. and the practice of bindingthe feet of women was introduced about the same time. In the thirteenth century the Mongols swept over the country under Genghis Kahn and under Kublai Kahn, grandson of that conqueror, estab- lished a firm rule. Never before had China known such splendor and prosperity as it knew then. This dynasty was overthrown in 1368 by the Ming dynasty which reigned for 300 years. During the latter part of the Ming rule there was much rebellion and finally in 1643 the Manchus were invited into the country to establish order. Their object accomplished, the Manchus refused to leave the country but set up a dynasty which lasted 300 years until the establishment of the republic. For two cen- turies internal progress went on slowly, as progress always moves in China, and still the outside world knew little of the great nation with its mixture of advanced civilization and its hatred of anything new. The first sharp dispute between China and the-:outside world was over the opium question. In the latter part of the seventeenth century the Chinese government had declared opium traflic illegal but when these decrees were enforced they met with protest from the British government for the opium trade was worth millions of dollars annually to Great Britain. Finally in 1840 war broke out and at its close China was compelled to sur- render the island of Hong Kong, pay an indemnity of twenty-one million dollars and open to British trade five of its chief ports. Soon after, war again broke out and in 1860 by the treaty of peace, Great Britain secured increased trading privileges and the promise of toleration for the Chris- tian religion. 12