208 REVIEWS OF RECENT BOOKS 



China and the World War. By W. E. Wheeler. New York. 

 The MacMillan Co., 1918. 



This is a lucidly articulated account of the foreign relations of 

 China, during the four years of the world war. Brief statements of 

 the events leading up to the beginning of the period are furnished, and 

 in a most valuable series of appendices appears the "Black-Dragon" 

 statement of Japanese policy in China as a result of the European war, 

 documents relating to the twenty-one demands made by Japan on 

 China, official statements in relation to the Lansing-Ishii agreement 

 between America and Japan concerning China, a summary of treaties 

 and agreements with reference to the integrity and sovereign rights of 

 China, and the "open door" policy and "equality of opportunities," 

 and a summary of treaties and agreements with reference to Korea. 

 Finally there is an introductory bibliography on China, in which the 

 reviewer is happy to note that a suggested substitution in the list has 

 been adopted. 



We reject a novel if it does not entertain us ; a historical novel 

 must be even more careful to do so ; and the demand for entertainment 

 has caused some modern writers of narrative history to be more 

 concerned about the entertainment than the facts ; or at least they 

 weave about the facts a glowing and sumptuous garment of inter- 

 pretations. In the East, especially, there is so much behind the scenes 

 at which the historian can only guess ; the observable facts often tell 

 little about their causes and their effects ; and the temptation to fill out 

 the picture is most alluring, and has proved the call of Circe to more 

 than one writer. There may be a plot into which the events would fit, 

 if it were known, and there may not be. To confine one's self to the 

 more immediate construction which events will bear may not be 

 romantic, but it is satisfactory to the wayfaring reader, desirous to 

 know where events are leading, and it is the method adopted by 

 Mr. Wheeler. The result may be dry reading to one who is not able 

 from memory and experience to fill in the colours which the picture 

 suggests, but it is most useful. Mr. Wheeler is not without his own 

 opinions as to the meaning of the events he narrates, but he is not so 

 much in love with them as to brandish them in the reader's face, as 

 who would say, "Accept this or confess that you cannot read the signs 

 of the times." The tale is clear, consecutive and complete, and if the 

 reader is of the number of those who prefer making their own opinions 

 to having them made for him by a clever special pleader, he will be 

 correspondingly grateful. 



The atrocious crime of being a young man is something which 

 Mr. Wheeler should not worry over as much as some of his critics. 

 It should be a cause for rejoicing that a young man should begin, as 



