Bulletin of Catholic University of Peking

CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF PEKING 51

mind and he volunteered to be responsible to the throne for the management of these exiles. They were to remain within .the above confines and were to receive the death penalty if found outside. They were divided into three settlements. They could have no dealings with the outside world. They were allowed to get wives from their homes in Shansi, but could not intermarry with the people of the surrounding regions.

They were constantly reminded of their crime and that the privilege of living was granted them because of the extreme clemency of the Manchu house. This was their penal-settlement for 268 years. By 1899 they had increased from three- hundred to four thousand souls. As the population grew, they terraced the mountain-sides higher and higher, until, finally, every available foot yielded its quota of grain. Because tillable land was not sufficient to sustain the population, walnut trees

were planted on mountain-sides tco — steep to produce other crops, and in this way the food supply was substantially augmented. _ :

For many years walnuts from this region: have been carried on men’s backs to Mentoukou and shipped from | thence to the California ccast. The consumers know as little of the cloud of guilt and disgrace which overhangs the region of production, as they do of the exigency which demanded their production. No maps show any trace of Cho Chou San P’o, the local name given tothatregion. Politically, this group of people is non-existent and therefore the name “‘Lest Tribe”’ 1S appropriate.

Dr. W. S. Ament, a veteran missionary of Northern China, had heard of the existence of this banished colony, and had read the meagre facts about it in the official history of Cho Chou. In the spring of 18¢9, he determined to set out to find this colony

Cho Chou San P’o. Another view showing the terracing of the mountains.