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This foul murder illustrates the character of the new race and men who aspired to rule over China. The Tartar successes did not end here, for a few years later they made a fresh raid into China, capturing Hwaiti's brother and successor, Mingti, who was executed, twelve months after his capture, at Pingyang, the capital of the Tartar Hans.

An army was hastily assembled and marched to arrest the progress of the Japanese invader, who had by this reached Pingyang, a town 400 miles north of Fushan. An action was fought outside this town. The advantage rested with the Japanese, who succeeded in destroying a Chinese regiment. After this a lull ensued in the campaign, and both sides brought up fresh forces.

As it was, the battle proved decisive, for not a Chinaman paused until he had reached the other side of the Yalu River, which forms the northwest boundary of Corea. On the very day of the fight at Pingyang, a number of Chinese war vessels, under the command of Admiral Ting, were transporting troops to the mouth of the Yalu, where the Chinese were assembling a second army.

Fashiba came over from Japan with further supplies and troops to assist his general, Hingchang, while on the Chinese side, Li Jusong, the captor of Ninghia, was placed at the head of the Chinese army. A second battle was fought in the neighborhood of Pingyang, and after some stubborn fighting the Japanese were driven out of that town.

On September 15, the Japanese army in Corea was strong enough to detach a corps of 14,000 men to attack the Chinese position at Pingyang, a town on the northern banks of the Paidong River. The passage of the river was difficult, and the Chinese might have overwhelmed the Japanese when crossing it, but they took no measures to this end, and the battle began at sunrise on the day just named.

After these reverses the enfeebled Tsin rulers removed their capital to Nankin, but this step alone would not have sufficed to prolong their existence had not the Lin princes themselves suffered from the evils of disunion and been compelled to remove their capital from Pingyang to Singan.

They marched westwards for some distance along the southern bank of the Hwangho, turned suddenly north at Yuenking, and on reaching Pingyang they again turned in an easterly direction, and secured the Lin Limming Pass which leads into the Metropolitan province of Pechihli.

After the battle of Pingyang, the Japanese army halted, and it was not until after they received re-enforcements under Marshal Yamagata that they resumed their forward movement. On October 10 their advance guard reached the Yalu, a river broad and difficult of passage, behind which was stationed a considerable Chinese army, which, however, after a nominal resistance, soon retreated.