HISTORY OF ASIA GENERAL SURVEY 101 



old man, the champion of the Asiatic World to repel the common 

 enemy? 



It is fair to believe, in reviewing the history of the past and in 

 studying the various aspects of present politics, that Japan would 

 prefer the second of these parts, more in accordance with her tra- 

 ditions and her aspirations. 



It is evident that two nations in full progress, operating in the 

 same field of action, would fatally meet some day. If Russia needs 

 a port free from ice in the Eastern Sea, Japan has a no less imperi- 

 ous necessity of finding room for its population in excess. From five 

 thousand four hundred and forty- three in 1880, the number of the 

 Japanese living out of their country increased in 1902 to one hun- 

 dred and thirty-nine thousand five hundred fifty- three, scattered 

 chiefly between Korea, Canada, the United States, the Hawaiian 

 Islands, etc. 



The Treaty of Shimonoseki (April 27, 1895), signed after a glorious 

 war with China, had given to Japan the southern portion of Man- 

 churia, including Port Arthur. The triumph of the Emperor of the 

 Rising Sun made of an Asiatic potentate like the Mikado a sovereign 

 whose voice was heard in the whole of the world; from a local power, 

 Japan took rank among the great powers of the globe. In the con- 

 quest of Manchuria, Germany, France, and Russia perceived a danger 

 to European influence in the Far East, and by a convention on No- 

 vember 8, 1895, obtained the retrocession of Liao-tung by Japan to 

 China. It was no doubt a severe wound to the amour propre of the 

 victor. 



In the mean time Russia continued to increase her means of action 

 and to strengthen her position in the Far East by the creation at the 

 end of 1895 of the Russo-Chinese Bank, by conventions regarding the 

 Manchurian Railway, and by the signature in 1896 at St. Petersburg 

 by the Viceroy Li Hung-chang of a treaty still secret. 



After the massacre of two of her missionaries, Germany having 

 taken possession of Kiao-chow on November 14, 1897, Russia shortly 

 after obtained the cession by lease of Port Arthur (December, 1897). 

 England, in gaining a settlement at Wei-Hai-Wei and France at 

 Kwang-chow-Wan, seemed to begin the partition of the Chinese 

 Empire. At one moment the old Manchu world seemed to awaken 

 to the danger; at one moment the Emperor Kwang-siu had no doubt 

 the real instinct of the situation. He had shown dignity and bravery 

 when he refused to fly to the west, as was suggested to him by his 

 timorous ministers at the time the Japanese threatened his capital 

 in 1895. 



The demands of the foreigners who appeared to seek the dismem- 

 berment of the Empire and threatened to make a new Poland of 



