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""8 CHINA MISSION YEAR BOOK.own with no prospect of an infringement. The aggregate loss thus suffered unintelligently and helplessly by alongsuffering people is quite beyond calculation. In themeantime rumors abound, have abounded, and probablywill abound as to the new and uniform coin which isabout to be minted. It is to be a single coin on a taelbasis. It is two coins both on a dollar basis. China isto have a gold basis. And all one knows is that oneknows nothing, and things are as they ever have been,and apparently ever are to be.H. E. T ang Shao-i was sent on an importantmission all round the globe, where he dispersed theproper number of Imperial gifts, and was everywherereceived with almost royal honors. When Yuan wasdeposed, Yang halted to be reappointed, and resumed histriumphant course. He was reported to have had manyimportant interviews, he was an expert on currencyand other reforms. He returned to China, and exceptfor an initial crop of rumors that has been apparentlythe end of him, and he is said to be in failing health,and no wonder.The body known as the Censorate, which hasserved an important function in China in calling attention to flagrant wrongs in high places, but which has attimes if not invariably been regarded as a kind ofauthorized blackmail department of the government,has recently displayed remarkable activity, but fewknow what the phenomena really connote. The tenureof office seems to grow shorter, and a governor orgovernor-general is often hardly seated before he istransferred elsewhere. There is no continuity either ofpersonnel or of plan ; each incumbent adjusting his actsto his own ideas and ideals. The people are so accustomed to this shuffling that it causes no surprise, but theaggregate effect is an almost universal paralysis of anything like real progress.The railway development of China proceeds despitemany setbacks. The British-built line from Shanghai