scare 



i 9 i2] "War and Waste' 



essays, part of which had been previously printed in 

 The World's Work and The Atlantic Monthly. In 

 this book I discussed war with its accompanying 

 waste of human life and of property, which again 

 involves waste of life, because every dollar of war 

 debt and of interest on war debt adds to the effort 

 and anguish of workers, the incidence of all taxa- 

 tion at last striking the producer. 



I also dealt with a remarkable war scare resting on 

 imagined efforts of Japan to secure Magdalena Bay le r , Ray 

 as a naval base. This remarkably fine landlocked 

 harbor lies in a rainless and uninhabited region on 

 the west coast of Lower California, and the only water 

 within scores of miles comes from a small spring on a 

 neighboring island, which would supply a population 

 of about 500 people. The little village contains 160 

 Mexicans, formerly engaged in gathering orchil, a li- 

 chen used to make a valuable yellow dye before its 

 displacement by aniline products. On Santa Mar- 

 garita, a near-by island bearing ores of magnesite, 

 live (off and on) about 150 more Mexicans. 



In 1912 the only industry at Magdalena Bay was a 

 crab and turtle cannery, the property of a Los Angeles 

 acquaintance of mine, Mr. Aurelio Sandoval, who 

 then held a concession from the Diaz government, 

 afterward canceled during the Revolution. Sando- 

 val's establishment employed about a dozen Japanese 

 and Chinese, besides about 100 Mexicans. The fore- 

 man was a Japanese brought over, as I understand, 

 from the cannery at Sakai near Osaka, an enterprise 

 said to have been killed by Japan's high tariff on tin. 



These facts were amazingly expanded by the 

 Hearst journals in order to make an acrimonious 

 attack on Japan. According to the story, upward of 



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