308 THE EAST CHINESE RAILWAY. 



than in all the others combined that Russia is asserting 

 her intentions of becoming an active industrial force in 

 the affairs of the Orient," he would have given a more 

 strictly accurate idea of the existing conditions if he 

 had substituted for "Russia" the words "Russian 

 Government." 



South of Kharbin spread masses and masses of millet, 

 extending mile after mile as far as the eye can see. 

 Little else, in fact, is visible, — occasional clumps of trees 

 looking like little green dots in a bronze-brown sea, and 

 the villages themselves being half-buried in the sur- 

 rounding crops. For two days and nights we steam 

 through crops such as are in all probability to be 

 seen nowhere else in the world, passing Mukden, the 

 capital of the country ; Ta-Shih-Chiao, the junction 

 for Niuchwang and Peking, where only so lately as 

 August the line had been washed away by floods, and 

 all traffic suspended for nine days in consequence ; to 

 pull up at length on the shores of the Pacific at 

 Dalni, striving so desperately to become a thriving 

 commercial port, or at the great military and naval 

 base of Port Arthur. 



Dalni, as the Russians have christened the town 

 which they have built on the bay of Taliewan, has all 

 the appearance of a modern town, and does credit to its 

 creators and owners, the Russian Ministry of Finance. 

 A few years ago there was nothing. The order went 

 forth that there must be a town, and a town accord- 

 ingly was put in hand. Houses were built, brick 

 houses such as you would expect to see in any 

 modern watering-place, except for their roofs, which 

 show a tendency tow^ards the curves which distin- 

 guish Chinese architecture ; streets were laid out 

 and paved, harbour works were begun, offices, shops, 

 and a magnificent electric station, fitted by a Buda- 



