The many merchants from abroad, especially those belonging to the peoples allied to the Mongols, also had in every respect a privileged position in China.  They were free of taxation, free to travel all over the country, and received privileged treatment in the use of means of transport.  They were thus able to accumulate great wealth, most of which went out of China to their own country.  This produced a general impoverishment of China.  Chinese merchants fell more and more into dependence on the foreign merchants; the only field of action really remaining to them was the local trade within China and the trade with Indo-China, where the Chinese had the advantage of knowing the language.

The impoverishment of China began with the flow abroad of her metallic currency.  To make up for this loss, the government was compelled to issue great quantities of paper money, which very quickly depreciated, because after a few years the government would no longer accept the money at its face value, so that the population could place no faith in it.  The depreciation further impoverished the people.

Thus we have in the Mongol epoch in China the imposing picture of a commerce made possible with every country from Europe to the Pacific; this, however, led to the impoverishment of China.  We also see the rising of mighty temples and monumental buildings, but this again only contributed to the denudation of the country.  The Mongol epoch was thus one of continual and rapid impoverishment in China, simultaneously with a great display of magnificence.  The enthusiastic descriptions of the Mongol empire in China offered by travellers from the Near East or from Europe, such as Marco Polo, give an entirely false picture:  as foreigners they had a privileged position, living in the cities and seeing nothing of the situation of the general population.

5 Popular risings:  National rising

It took time for the effects of all these factors to become evident.  The first popular rising came in 1325.  Statistics of 1329 show that there were then some 7,600,000 persons in the empire who were starving; as this was only the figure of the officially admitted sufferers, the figure may have been higher.  In any case, seven-and-a-half millions were a substantial percentage of the total population, estimated at 45,000,000.  The risings that now came incessantly were led by men of the lower orders—­a cloth-seller, a fisherman, a peasant, a salt smuggler, the son of a soldier serving a sentence, an office messenger, and so on.  They never attacked the Mongols as aliens, but always the rich in general, whether Chinese or foreign.  Wherever they came, they killed all the rich and distributed their money and possessions.