economic or financial experts, while for the staffing of the other
departments no special qualification was demanded besides the passing of
the state examinations. In addition to these, at the end of the T'ang
period a new department was in preparation, a sort of Privy Council, a
mainly military organization, probably intended to control the generals
(section 3 of the table on page 83), just as the state secretariat
controlled the civil officials. The Privy Council became more and more
important in the tenth century and especially in the Mongol epoch. Its
absence in the early T'ang period gave the military governors much too
great freedom, ultimately with baneful results.

At first, however, the reforms of A.D. 624 worked well. The
administration showed energy, and taxes flowed in. In the middle of the
eighth century the annual budget of the state included the following
items: over a million tons of grain for the consumption of the capital
and the palace and for salaries of civil and military officials;
twenty-seven million pieces of textiles, also for the consumption of
capital and palace and army, and for supplementary purchases of grain;
two million strings of money (a string nominally held a thousand copper
coins) for salaries and for the army. This was much more than the state
budget of the Han period. The population of the empire had also
increased; it seems to have amounted to some fifty millions. In the
capital a large staff of officials had been created to meet all
administrative needs. The capital grew enormously, at times containing
two million people. Great numbers of young members of the gentry
streamed into the capital for the examinations held under the Confucian
system.

The crowding of people into the capital and the accumulation of
resources there promoted a rich cultural life. We know of many poets of