The fate of this people seemed a bitter one to Vouti, when it was told to his sympathetic ear, and, in the spirit in which King Arthur sent out his Round Table Knights on romantic quests, he turned to his council and asked if any among them was daring enough to follow the track of these wanderers and bring them back to the land they had lost. One of them, Chang Keen, volunteered to take up the difficult quest and to traverse Asia from end to end in search of the fugitive tribes.
This knight of romance was to experience many adventures before he should return to his native land. Attended by a hundred devoted companions, he set out, but in endeavoring to cross the country of the Heung-nou the whole party were made prisoners and held in captivity for ten long years. Finally, after a bitter experience of desert life, the survivors made their escape, and, with a courage that had outlived their years of thraldom, resumed their search for the vanished tribes. Many western countries were visited in the search, and much strange knowledge was gained. In the end the Yuchi were found in their new home. With them Chang Keen dwelt for a year, but all his efforts to induce them to return were in vain. They were safe in their new land, and did not care to risk encounter with their old foes, even with the Emperor of China for their friend.
Finally the adventurous envoy returned to China with two of his companions, the only survivors of the hundred with whom he had set out years before. He had an interesting story to tell of lands and peoples unknown to the Chinese, and wrote an account of his travels and of the geography of the countries he had seen. Chang Keen was subsequently sent on a mission to the western kingdom of Ousun, where he was received with much honor, though the king declined to acknowledge himself a vassal of the ruler of China. From here he sent explorers far to the south and north, bringing back with him fresh information concerning the Asiatic nations.
Of the Yuchi later stories are told. They are said to have come into collision with the Parthians, whom they vanquished after a long-continued struggle. They are also credited with having destroyed the kingdom of Bactria, a far-eastern relic of the empire of Alexander the Great. Several centuries later they may have combined with their old foes to form the Huns, who flung themselves in a devastating torrent upon Europe, and eventually became the founders of the modern kingdom of Hungary.
THE "CRIMSON EYEBROWS."
With the opening of the Christian era a usurper came to the Chinese throne. In the year 1 B.C. the emperor Gaiti died, and Wang Mang, a powerful official, joined with the mother of the dead emperor to seize the power of the state. The friends and officials of Gaiti were ruined and disgraced, and in the year 1 A.D. a boy of nine years was raised to the throne as nominal emperor, under whose shadow Wang Mang ruled supreme. Money was needed for the ambitious upstart, and he obtained it by robbing the graves of former monarchs of the jewels and other valuables buried with them. This, from the Chinese point of view, was a frightful sacrilege, yet the people seem to have quietly submitted to the violation of the imperial tombs.
Five years passed away, and the emperor reached the age of sixteen. He might grow troublesome in a year or two more. Wang Mang decided that he had lived long enough. The poisoned cup, which seems to have been always ready in the Chinese palace, was handed to the boy by the usurper himself. Drinking it unsuspiciously, the unfortunate youth was soon lying on the floor in the agonies of death, while the murderer woke the palace halls with his cries of counterfeit grief, loudly bewailing the young emperor's sad fate, and denouncing heaven for having sent this sudden and fatal illness upon the royal youth.
To keep up appearances, another child was placed upon the throne. A conspiracy against the usurper was now formed by the great men of the state, but Wang Mang speedily crushed plot and plotters, rid himself of the new boy emperor in the same arbitrary fashion as before, and, throwing off the mask he had thus far worn, had himself proclaimed emperor of the realm. It was the Han dynasty he had in this arbitrary fashion brought to an end. He called his dynasty by the name of Sin.
But the usurper soon learned the truth of the saying, "uneasy lies the head that wears a crown." The Tartars of the desert defied his authority, broke their long truce, and raided the rich provinces of the north, which had enjoyed thirty years of peace and prosperity. In this juncture Wang Mang showed that he was better fitted to give poison to boys than to meet his foes in the field. The Tartars committed their ravages with impunity, and other enemies were quickly in arms. Rebellions broke out in the east and the south, and soon, wherever the usurper turned, he saw foes in the field or lukewarm friends at home.