March 14, 1890.] 



SCIENCE. 



175 



the Balkash to Constantinople were transferred to the eastern side 

 of the Caspian Sea, and a railroad built east across the desert. 



After the conquest of the Turcomans, difficulties arose between 

 Russia, Afghanistan, and England, and the railroad was con- 

 tinued in a south-easterly direction towards Herat and India. 

 When the Afghanistan boundary was settled, the line of the 

 railroad was turned to the north-east. It was carried tlarough 

 Merv, across the Oxus to Bokhara and Samarcand, nine hun- 

 dred miles from the Caspian. 



The railroad runs for two hundred miles along the foot of the 

 mountains, separating Turkestan from Persia. All the moun- 

 tain-passes in Persia are controlled by the Russians ; and Russian 

 products are taking the place of English in the markets of north- 

 em Persia, Turkestan, Afghanistan, and even Thibet. The in- 

 fluence of Russia in Persia is to-day paramount to that of Great 

 Britain. 



France was formerly a competitor with England for the Empire 

 of India. Defeated there, she has built up for herself a princi- 

 pality in Cambodia, Anam, and Tonquin. 



The Future of Asia. 



England has successfully met and stopped the progress of 

 Russia in Europe, but in vain has she opposed her in Asia. 



Only a few years ago Russia was bounded on the south and 

 east by the Caspian Sea : now her outposts are one thousand miles 

 east of the Caspian, bounded by the Pamir and China, and only 

 Afghanistan separates her from India and the English Empire. 

 They will soon meet among the mountains of Afghanistan as 

 friends or foes. These nations from either extremity of Europe 

 are neighbors in Asia, but are as far apart as the poles in their 

 methods of dealing with conquered Asia. 



The Russians are Asiatic in their origin, and easily adapt 

 themselves to Oriental customs and manners. Their conquest of 

 Asia is a conquest of Orientals by Orientals. After a sojourn in 

 civilized Europe, they return as colonists, as merchants, as in- 

 habitants, where they soon become acclimated. The expansion 

 of Russia in Asia is the natural growth of the parent stem. 



The English are mere sojourners in Asia as officials for a 

 longer or shorter term of years. Every Englishman yearns for 

 the expiration of this contract, and for his English home. The 

 English are of a race entirely foreign, never becoming one with 

 a conquered people, but widely separated in interest, thought, 

 and habit. They instruct the people, send missionaries to them, 

 build railroads and irrigating-canals, substitute low and regular 

 taxation for irregular and exorbitant exactions of all kinds, yet 

 in every act and deed they are conquerors, and not inhabitants. 



The climate of India presents an insurmountable obstacle to 

 the English, and renders English colonies an impossibility. The 

 expansion of England in Asia is like a graft on an uncongenial 

 stem. 



Whether England will maintain her sway in India, notwith- 

 standing all she has done for the prosperity of the country, is a 

 question which Englishmen are discussing. The English are 

 hated by the Hindoos, and it is said even by Englishmen that 

 India would prefer the lawlessness of their old rulers to the 

 order and rule of England. 



Long before the mariner's compass or the invention of gun- 

 powder in Europe, canals were in use in China. For hundreds 

 of years they have intersected the country. Centuries ago they 

 had made great progress in civilization ; but then they came to a 

 stand-still, beyond which they have only recently advanced. 

 For many years the more advanced and intelligent Chinese have 

 tried to introduce telegraphs and railroads into China, without 

 success. But now the party of progress has prevailed, Cliinese 

 steamboats crowd the inland seas and rivers, and a railroad will 

 soon be built from Peking, through Nankin, to China Kiang, 

 600 miles, crossing the two great rivers of China, the Hoang-Ho 

 and the Yang-tse-kiang, follo%ving the line of the Imperial Canal. 

 French, German, and American engineers are waiting at Ticutsin 

 to take the contract, but it will be undertaken and completed by 

 the Chinese. 



Until recently, the carrying trade between the seaports of 

 China, and the commerce between China and Europe, were in the 



hands of English and American merchants; tut the Chinese have 

 bought or driven off the foreign steamers and taken the tusinefs, 

 and now only one English and one American house remain. The 

 Mandarins have recently opened a large depot in London to sell 

 their teas and silks. China has awakened from her long sleep^ 

 and has entered on a new course. Her emigrants are found in the" 

 islands of the Pacific, and are only stopped by our laws from 

 passing the Pacific Ocean and possessing the western coast of 

 America. China, like Japan, has awakened from the sleep of 

 centuries to a new and higher life. 



Europeans have taken possession of the whole continent of 

 America, and have exterminated the aborigines. Not content 

 with America, the Europeans have surrounded Africa with a 

 fringe of white settlements. They have occupied the valley of 

 the Kongo, have worked their way from the Cape of Good Hope 

 north towards the centre of Africa, from Zanzibar west to the- 

 Great Lakes, and from Algeria south towards Timbuctoo. The 

 English have taken possession of Australia and New Zealand, jind' 

 the natives are disappearing as rapidly as they disappeared from 

 America. Over all the islands of the Pacific the flags of Euro- 

 pean nations wave. 



All the northern and western portions of Asia are under Rus- 

 sian rule. Persia and Afghanistan are neutral; Russian influ- 

 ence predominating in Persia, English in Afghanistan. The 

 Queen of England, the Empress of India, has extended her empire 

 over Burmah and the Straits Settlement, down Indo-China to 

 Singapore and the equator. East of the English are the French 

 in Anam and Tonquin. Over the islands of Sumatra and Borneo, 

 Holland and England rule. 



There remain, then, China and Japan. Again and again 

 foreigners have apparently succeeded in affecting an entrance 

 into China and Japan, but as often they have failed, met by a 

 steady, persistent, and inflexible resistance. China and Japan 

 are the only nations in the world that have successfully resisted. 

 the encroachments of Europeans. 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



It is reported from Paris that the engineers sent out to' 

 examine the condition of the Panama Canal found that cnly 

 three- tenths of the necessary work has been done, and that 

 much that has been done will have to be done over if operations- 

 are ever resumed. 



— It is reported that a bridge across the Bosporus is pro- 

 jected by a syndicate of French capitalists. At the points- 

 elected for bridging, the channel is about half a mile wide. 



— Mr. Robert Moore stated at a meeting of the St. Louis- 

 Engineers' Club, March 5, that lignum-vitce ties were being 

 used successfully in Mexico. Their cost was about a dollar 

 each, and they lasted indefinitely. 



— Among the subjects to be discussed by the International 

 Labor Conference at Berlin are the regulation of mine-work 

 with reference to the prohibition of the labor of women and 

 children under ground, the shortening of the shifts in particu- 

 larly unhealthy mines, the insuring of a regular output of 

 coal by subjecting the working of the miners to international 

 rules, the regulation of Sunday labor, and the regulation of the 

 labor of women and children. The question whether there shall 

 be future and periodical conferences of the same nature will 

 also be discussed. 



— The Pan-American Conference has adopted a report recom- 

 mending that the governments represented give their adhesion 

 to the treaties on literary and artistic copyright, trade-marks, 

 and patents adopted by the South American Congress at 

 Montevideo. These treaties, which were subscribed to by the 

 Argentine Republic, Bolivia, Brazil, Chili, Paraguay, Peru,, 

 and Uruguay, provide that authors and inventors shall enjoy in 

 all States the rights accorded them by the laws of the State in 

 which the original publication or grant takes place, but that 

 no State is obliged to recognize such rights for a longer timc- 

 than that allowed in the original State. The conference also 

 recommends the adoption of the metric system by the United 

 States in all official business. 



