This paper focuses on the role of Sheng Xuanhuai 盛宣懐 in the complex political changes under the Guang Xu (光緒) Political Reform after the Sino-Japanese War in 1895. It is populary understood that the Political Reform movement was broken down by the refusal of Empresses Dowager, who after the Boxer Uprising changed its conservative policy and agreed to take an unyielding stand against the foreign powers. The general view is based on the mistaken idea that there was no effort made at institutional reform during the two years following the "Hundred Days" of 1898. Political reform during the late Qing period began with a plan to modernize its military forces, which had been defeated by Japan. The edict of 1895, which required the reconstitution of tariffs, was the most important policy for the fiscal reconstruction of the central government. In order to change the tariff rate and increase revenue, diplomatic negotiations to revise the commercial treaty (Treaty of Tientsin, 1858) were begun in the fall of 1899. Then, as the Boxer Uprising broke out in North China, Sheng Xuanhuai took a part in diplomatic negotiations to maintain safety in Yangzu and South-east coast of China. These negotiations prepared the international protocol of 1901 and the Mackay Treaty, which revised tariff rates. It is the conventional understanding that the Guang Xu Political Reform was suddenly started in 1901; however, the analysis in this paper shows that Sheng Xuanhuai, who had contacted Wang Wenshao (), carefully presented the plan of Political Reform. Especially, it attracts our attention that Sheng Xuanhuai's telegram letter (30th Dec, 1900) to Wang Wenshao used the special term 'composing reform plans' one month earlier than the edict of Guang Xu Political Reform, and became a key term of the Guang Xu Political Reform from 1901. The author shows that Sheng Xuanhuai proposed the establishment of an administrator for commerce.

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The traditional financial systems of Piao-hao (票号), Yin-hao (銀号) and Quan-zhuang (銭荘) had a dominant position in the internal financial markets of premodern China. Piao-hao managed by Shansi-bang (山西幇), which were banks of the old style, controlled the market of government financing, and therefore were not a suitable financial mechanism for an industrial society. The first attempt at monetary reform in modern China was made immediately after the Sino-Japanese War. On 19 July 1895, the Emperor Guang-xu (光緒) ordered all provincial governors and generals to submit their plans for reform of the national finance system within one month. Before then, there was no idea of depositing the national income in a central bank. Weng Tong-hu (翁同和) and Wang Wen-shao (), gave concrete support to the plan for establishing a quasi-central bank proposed by Zhang Xuan-hai (盛宣懐). Zhang was strongly opposed to any plan to start a national central bank. He proposed opening a special bank based on private capital which could be made to act as a quasi-central bank. On 7 December 1896, the Emperor Guang-xu accepted Zhang Xuan-hai's plan for a Chinese bank and recognised its right to issue silver coin. The bank, whose Chinese name was Zhongguo-tongshang-yinhang (中国通商銀行 the Chinese Imperial Bank), issued bank notes from 1898. The small-value notes for Five and Ten yuan (元) were in strong demand in the Shanghai market and over one million lian (両) were issued each year after 1905. After 1905, the local banks established by every Shen (省) govenment in mainland China and the Chinese Imperial bank in Shanghai began to play an important role in the money supply system. By contrast, Piao-hao managed by Shansi-bang lost a large share in the market of government financing.

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The Ts'ai-cheng ch'u 財政処 was established in 1903 during the new regime period after the Boxer Incident to be a specialized agency for implementing fiscal reform, and was active over a period of four years. This was the point of departure for China's fiscal modernization, but clespite its great significance in this connection, neither the composition nor the functions of the Ts'ai-cheng ch'u have been made clear. In the present article I deal with the Ts'ai-cheng ch'u's composition, and have attempted individual investigation of the staff menbers assembled there. The staff members assembled at the Ts'ai-cheng ch'u numbered twelve in all, and they may be classified as follows ; there were those who had acquired their expertise in fiscal affairs while serving as officials in the Ministry of Revenue (Hu-pu 戸部) ; and those who had been recommended by Chang Chih-tung 張之洞, Liu K'un-i 劉坤一, Yuan Shih-k'ai 袁世凱 and other enthusiastic promoters of the new regime within the bureaucracy. In general they were young officials of superior ability. Further, the investigation of these staff members reveals two striking characteristics. First, Prince Ch'ing (Ch'ing Ch'in-wang 慶親王) and Ch'u Hung-chi 瞿鴻〓, who had established the Ts'ai-cheng ch'u and subsequently became its heads, stood in a relationship of political antagonism towards each other. Secondly, Na-t'ung 那桐 and other members of the staff were in receipt of strong support from Japan. It would seem that one should pay attention to these two characteristics when examining the functions of the Ts'ai-cheng ch'u. The present article, in accordance with its aim of securing one area of the foundations for the study of the new regime, has gone no further than to elucidate the details of the establishment of the Ts'ai-cheng ch'u, and its composition.

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日清戦争は近代日本における中国観激変の転換点ともいわれた．日清戦争後に設立された民間団体東亜同文会は，日中関係に多大な影響力を持ち，日本全体の中国観形成に重要な役割を担った．本稿は，同会が発行した雑誌『東亜時論』を対象とし，そこに見られる中国時局観について，特に，「中央政府」と「地方有力者」を分ける視点を軸に検討した．

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At the end of nineteenth century, the Qing Dynasty form of governance was brought out from "behind the curtain" (chuiliang tingzheng 垂簾聴政) and directly assumed by Emperor Guangxu 光緒, while the Empress Dowager Cixi 慈禧 continued to enjoy a certain amount of political power. However, under the policy making mechanism shared by the Emperor and his mother, such empirical questions as how policy was actually decided, in what ways court retainers participated in the process and the interaction between the emperor and dowager when making policy decisions as yet remain unclear. The author's research to date, based on analysis of the diaries and correspondence of the central figures in the policy making process, indicates that imperial audiences, the submission of memorials and court retainer councils were the three main means for the opinions of the Empress Dowager during her reign "behind the curtain" to be integrated with those of court retainers. Building upon these findings, the present article attempts to reconstruct the decision making process during the direct rule of Emperor Guangxu using the same kind of source materials and analytical methodology. More specifically, the author turns to the two diaries written by Weng Tonghe 翁同和, entitled Weng Tonghe Riji 翁同和日記 and Suishouji 随手記, to examine the case of the dispatch of Li Hongzhang 李鴻章 to Japan as the plenipotentiary negotiator over the issue of ending the 1st Sino-Japanese War, and describe the process leading up to the decision to grant Li the authority to negotiate the conditions of the cession of Chinese territory to the Japanese. This case shows that court retainers considered the major venue for decision making to be direct audiences with the Emperor, supplemented by councils held in the Chuangxin Dian 伝心殿 hall. It was here that they debated and ironed out the direction they thought should be taken in recognizing territorial cession, from where they approached the Emperor to bring him over to their side. Meanwhile, the Emperor, from the very beginning of the process, used the presence of Weng Tonghe at these meetings to inject his own ideas into the general debate. Then, at the stage when cession became inevitable, the final decision was left to the Empress Dowager. However, Cixi refused to make the decision for reason of illness, thus forcing the Emperor to decide the matter on his own. It is at this point that we can observe the existence of maneuvering between the Emperor and his mother, in order to avoid responsibility for making the final decision, after the fateful audience with court retainers convinced the Emperor to approve the territorial cession. Furthermore, from their words and actions, the author concludes that it was the Emperor Guangxi and Empress Dowager that made the actual decisions concerning government policy.

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The pupose of this paper is look at the events surrounding the Yihetuan 義和団 Incident in the light of the communications revolution touched off by the invention of the telegraph during the late Qing period and consider the overall political transformation brought about by this technological breakthrough. During the Yihetuan Incident, communication between the capital and the provinces became very difficult due to the destruction of the telegraph lines around Beijing by the Yihetuan. The speedy transmission of information had taken on utmost importance: for example, in the conclusion of a mutual defense agreement between the southern provinces and foreigh countries, there was fear of contradictions arising from the central government already having declared war on them. This possible conflict of interest was easily dissolved by telegraph messages sent from Baoding 保定 via Shangi 山西. Just after this event, the Yihetuan began to tear down telegraph lines in Shangxi, thus pushing the Qing empire to verge of destruction. During the occupation of Beijing by the allied forces of the eight world powers, the telegraph network was put under their control. Under this state of affairs, the lack of telegraph facilities for communication concerning peace ne-

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Both Higashi Honganji (Otani) sect and Nishi Honganji sect of Shin Buddhism in Japan started to send their preachers to the interior of south China in the late 1890s. By getting the announcement of permission by local authorities in Fujian province, both sects of preachers hired the local Chinese as directors (董事) to persuade Chinese inhabitants to participate in their sects. Accordingly they succeed in increasing the number of Chinese participants rapidly. However the main purpose of Chinese particpants who were living in unstable and disorder areas, was not faith in Japanese Buddhism, but the expectation of protection by Japanse preachers and Japanese government. They paid large sums of money to Japanese preachers and Chinese directors in order to become members.

In the late year of 1904, Chinese central government started to suppress Japanese Budhhist preachers in the inner south China in the midist of burgeoning Chinese nationalism. Japanese preachers faced difficulties.

Some of them, such as Takeda Ekyo of Otani sect in Amoy (Xiamen), Miyamoto Eiryu of Nishi Honganji sect in Swatow (Shantou) moved to Siam in 1907 in search of overseas Chinese who were immigrants from south China. Siamese Minister of Interior, Prince Damrong declined to write a letter of introduction to local authorities, but allowed Japanese Buddhist propagation by citing the freedom of religion in Siam. Japanese preachers used the same method employed in south China to propagate Japanese Buddhism. They hired the local Chinese dirctors and advertised Japanese protection as saling point to persuade overseas Chinese, who have no one to rely on in Siam. They succeeded to gain a large number of participants and to collect a good amount of cash.

These Japanese activities were known to King Chulalongkorn (Rama Ⅴ) in February 1908. He ordered to extinguish Japanese Buddhist propagation as he was suspicious that the Japanese would gain the support of oversea Chinese contray to Siamese interest. Within one year and half Japanese Buddhist propagation in Siam was exterminated.

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