Class ^lii^Ji Book Copyright 1^? _. COEOJIGHT DEPOSm THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Phofoqraph from Broirn Brvthfi-s, N. r. ADMIRAL HEIHACHIRO TOGO. Photograph from Brown Broth em, N. Y. FIELD MARSHAL IWAO GYAMA. Factors in the Mastery of the Far East. THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST THE STORY OF KOREA'S TRANSFORMATION AND JAPAN'S RISE TO SUPREMACY IN THE ORIENT BY ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN AUTHOR OF " NEW FORCES IN OLD CHINA," " THE CHINESE REVOLUTION," " THE NEW EKA TS THE EHttlPPINES," " RUSSIA IN TRANSFORMATION," KTC. ILLUSTRATED REVISED EDITION NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1921 •|«y % ^l ^v*^ e.1 I > ^''■^.\,\ Copyright, 1919, 1921, by CHARLES SORIBNER'S SONS Published March, 1919 Revised Edition, October, 1921 OCl 19 1921 PRINTED AT THE SCRIBNEE PRESS NF.W YORK, tr. R. A. •g)C!.A624861 PREFACE The problems that centre in the Far East had assumed large proportions before the outbreak of the European War in 1914. Since then they have attained a magnitude that renders them of even more profound significance to the world. A new alignment of races is developing. I have discussed in other volumes the relations of China and the Philippine Islands to this movement, and I now turn to Korea and Japan. The general idea of this book is that the Korean Peninsula is the strategic point in the mastery of the Far East. I, therefore, first describe the coimtry and people, and then discuss the struggle between China and Japan for the possession of Korea, and its culmination in the China-Japan War; the diplomatic and military struggle between Russia and Japan for the coveted prize, and its culmination in the Russia- Japan War; the supremacy in the Far East that Japan won by her victory in that mem- orable conflict; the poHcies and methods of Japan in govern- ing a subject people; the characteristics of Japan as the Imperial Power in Asia and a world-power of the first mag- nitude; and the place and influence of Christian missions as one of the most potent of the enhghtening and recon- structive forces which are operating in the Far East and which hold the promise of a better world order. The materials for this volume were gathered during two journeys to the Far East and in the studies and corre- spondence of many years. Some sharply controverted ques- tions have been necessarily discussed, and the author cannot reasonably anticipate inomunity from the criticisms of those who will differ with him. He can only say that he has sought to be fair and just. Any one who tries to keep in the middle of the rather tortuous road that runs between those who regard the Japanese as a model people and vi PREFACE those who regard them as "varnished savages," and be- tween those who assert that the Koreans are ''afflicted saints" and those who assert with equal vehemence that they are "the most contemptible people on earth," must expect to be assailed from both sides. While the Japanese have rightly restored the ancient name of the country, Chosen, and have adopted their own spellings of the names of several cities and other places, I have followed the advice of the publisher in adhering to the names that have been sanctioned by long usage in Western lands. The changed terminology has not yet be- come sufficiently famihar in North America and Great Britain to enable many English readers to recognize Seoul in Keijo and Pyengyang in Heijo, or to know that when a time-table schedules the arrival and departure of trains at Nandaimon, the railway-station in the capital is meant. 156 Fifth Avenue, New York, January 1, 1919. PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION Later developments in Far Eastern affairs are but a fur- ther manifestation of the fundamental causes and move- ments that were discussed in the first edition. The most outstanding additional event is the Korean Independence Movement (cf. pages 374-375). I regret that some pas- sages in the earlier edition have been used to justify the course of the Japanese police in dealing with an uprising which occurred after the book was in press and which was not anticipated even by the Japanese and missionaries in Korea. I am grateful to reviewers for an unexpectedly kind reception of the volume. I am not surprised that some propagandists think that I have been too sympathetic with the Japanese, and that others think that I have been too sympathetic with the Koreans. I can only say that my object is not to make out a case either for or against the Japanese. I have simply tried to set forth the facts, without conscious effort to manipulate them for any partisan end. 156 Fifth Avenue, New York, ArtHUR JuDSON BkOWN. September, 1921. CONTENTS PART I KOREA— THE STRATEGIC POINT IN THE FAR EAST CHAPTER PAGE I, The Land of Korea 3 II. The Vanished Days of Old Korea 20 III. The Korean People 44 IV. Korean Customs, Education, and Literature . . 64 V. Religious Beliefs of the Koreans 81 VI. A Ramble in the Interior ..,,.... 93 PART II THE STRUGGLE FOR THE POSSESSION OF KOREA VII. The Rival Claims of Chlna and Japan and the China-Japan War 109 \ VIII. Russia's Effort to Obtain Korea 127 \J IX. The Russia-Japan War 148 X, Causes and Effects of Russian Defeat . . . 166 XL The Portsmouth Treaty and the Anglo- Japanese Convention 178 XII. Japanese Annexation of Korea . . . . . 195 XIII. Manchurla. as a Factor in the Far Eastern Problem 208 vii viii CONTENTS PART III JAPAN— THE IMPERIAL POWER IN THE FAR EAST CHAPTEB PAGE XIV. Japan and the Japanese 225 XV. Fundamental National Distinctions . . . 244 XVI. Japan as a Military Power 254 XVII. Japan's Commercial Development .... 273 XVIII. The Struggle Between Autocracy and Democ RACY in Japan XIX. Social, and Economic Conditions . . XX. Education in Japan XXI. Buddhism and Shintoism in Japan . XXII. Character of Japanese Rule in Korea XXIII. Benefits of Japanese Rule in Korea . XXIV. The Social and Morphine Evils . . XXV. Japan and America 292 307 318 328 341 354 376 393 XXVI. Effect of the World War on the Position OF Japan 416 XXVII. Deepening Complications with China . . . 430 XXVIII. Japan and Siberia 447 PART IV CHRISTIAN MISSIONS IN THE PROBLEM OF THE FAR EAST XXIX. The Influence of Christian Missions . . 469 XXX. Roman Catholic Missions in Korea . . . 487 XXXI. Protestant Missions in Korea . . . . . 500 CONTENTS ix CHAFTEB PAGE XXXII. Korean Christians 524 XXXIII. Type and Problems of Korean Religious Thought 539 XXXIV. The Politico-Missionary Complication in Korea , . 559 XXXV. Japanese Nationalism and Mission Schools . 586 XXXVI. Roman Catholic and Russian Orthodox Mis- sions IN Japan 611 XXXVII. Protestant Missions in Japan 622 XXXVIII. Trend of Japanese Religious Thought . . 643 XXXIX. Japanese Testimony to Japan's Urgent Need 652 Index 663 ILLUSTRATIONS Factors in the Mastery of the Far East Frontispiece FACING PAGE East Gate, Seoul 16 A Korean Official 32 Korean Women Washing Clothes, Seoul 66 Korean Peddling Fuel 72 Fusan 118 Unveiling the Monument to the Russian Dead at Port Arthur . . . 160 Mt. Fuji 232 A Road Scene in the Hakone District 240 Nagoya Castle 260 Bronze Statue of Buddha, the Daibutsu, at Kamakura 330 Shinto Torii (Gateway) at Miyajima 336 Procession of Shinto Priests to the Shrines of Ise '. 338 New Offices of the Government-General, Seoul 366 Telephone Exchange in the Post-Office, Seoul 366 Post-Office, Seoul 366 Korean Students of the Mission Academy, Pyengyang 554 An Open-Air Christian Service in Fukui, Japan 632 MAP The Heart of the Far East At end of volume PART I KOREA— THE STRATEGIC POINT IN THE FAR EAST CHAPTER I THE LAND OF KOREA The tide of the world's travel has hardly more than touched Korea. Increasing numbers of travellers are visit- ing China and Japan, but most of them pass by their lesser neighbor. No famous temples, no beautiful palaces of the hving or historic tombs of the dead attract the globe- trotter. Squalid towns and villages and wretchedly poor people offer faint lure to the seeker for the artistic or the picturesque. And yet to the thoughtful student of human life, to one who would understand the deep undercurrents of international affairs, and to one who would observe that most wonderful thing in the world, the spiritual transforma- tion of a people, Korea is a deeply interesting land. It is a small country compared with mighty China, which it adjoins; and yet it is of no inconsiderable size, ^having a length of 660 miles, a width of 150 miles, and an area of 84,173 square miles, of nearly one and a half times that of New England. The coast-line is irregular and varies greatly in configura- tion. On the eastern side it is rather precipitous and with a small tide of only about two feet. The west coast slopes more gradually, and the surging tide sometimes attains a height of thirty-two feet. The whole extent of coast-line is about 1,940 miles. Harbors are not numerous, but there are several good ones. The best are Gensan on the north- east coast, Fusan and Masampo at the southern end of the peninsula, and Mokpo, Kunsan, Chemulpo, Chinnampo, and Yongampo on the west coast, though not all of these harbors are of equal excellence, some of them being un- protected when the wind is in certain directions. The west coast is dotted with islands. They vary in size from mere rocks to mountain-crowned islands of con- 3 4 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST siderable area. In some cases cliffs rise precipitously from the water's edge; in others, noble forests clothe the hill- sides, while now and then cultivated fields add their charm to the varied landscape. When the day is pleasant and the water is dotted by the sails of the quaint fishing-boats, the scene is very attractive. Through the transparent depths great beds of coral can be seen with their varying colors and exquisite filaments, the perennial flowers of the sea. Sailors, however, dread the dangers of this archipelago. It was first made known in Europe by Captain Basil Hall, of the Lyra, and Captain Maxwell, of the Alceste, in 1816. At that time its situation was not indicated on the Chinese charts, or on those made by the Jesuits of Peking. In- deed, at the time of my second visit, in 1909, these waters had never been adequately sounded and charted, and there was not a lighthouse or a buoy on the whole coast. Since then the Japanese have been preparing charts and placing lights and buoys to mark the channels. Navigation still remains more or less dangerous, for rocks and reefs are numerous, and tidal currents sweep in and out of these narrow passages with terrific force. When fogs descend upon them, as they often do, it is extremely difficult for the mariner to find his way. Many are the tragic shipwrecks that have resulted, and sorrowful is the toll of death which these treacherous seas have exacted. The most notable of the islands which border the south and west coast are Quelpart and Kang-wa. The former is the largest island of Korea. It lies about sixty miles south- west of the peninsula, and has been called "the Sicily of Korea." It has been well populated from an early period, and almost every arable square rod of ground is culti- vated, even the mountainsides having been laboriously terraced. The inhabitants have not borne a good reputa- tion, as the island was formerly used as a sort of "Botany Bay" for criminals and political adventurers from the main- land. When it first appears in history it was an inde- pendent kingdom called Tam-na. At the end of the first THE LAND OF KOREA 5 century of the Chiistian era, there is a record of tribute sent to one of the petty kingdoms on the mainland; but long ago the island became an integral part of Korea. Kang-wa lies off the mouth of the Han River, and is a place of considerable historical interest. It has frequently served as a fortress and special refuge in time of danger for the royal family, while at other times it has provided a convenient place of banishment for princes and nobles who had incurred the imperial wrath. One does not expect to find mighty streams in such a comparatively small country, but the rivers of Korea make up in interest for what they lack in size. They come rushing down from the mountains, crooked and often diffi- cult or impossible of navigation, but usually cool and sparlding, noisily tumbling through narrow gorges, rippling aroimd bends and islets, and when they reach the lower levels becoming more turbid, indeed, but flowing smoothly and quietly to the sea. The Yalu is the longest of Korean rivers, flowing from a source high among the Ever White Mountains. For a considerable part of its course it forms the boundary be- tween Korea and Manchuria, and it figures largely in the troubled history of the border. It is the Rubicon of this part of the world, whose crossing by armies has been the signal for many a war. The heavy rains of midsummer and the melting snows of spring often cause freshets and make the current so swift that the water becomes muddy; but at other seasons it is clear and attractive. The silt and gravel which it has carried down for ages have formed a delta through which the river makes its way by three chan- nels into the Yellow Sea. The river is navigable about sixty miles from the sea to the ancient town of Chan-son. The Tumen River rises on the eastern slope of the water- shed of the Ever White Mountains, and runs northeasterly for more than one hundred and fifty miles before it bends southward to enter the Japan Sea within eighty miles of Vladivostok. It forms the northeastern boundary be- tween Korea and Manchuria, as the Yalu forms the boundary 6 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST on the north and northwest. Like the latter, the current and depth vary greatly with the season. In dry weather the stream is shallow and peaceful, but in the spring and fall freshets it becomes a roaring torrent. In winter the passage is made easy by the ice, across which for centuries Koreans and Chinese have fled when they have had special reason for getting out of their respective countries with all haste. The Tatong River was, in olden days, a boundary stream for considerable periods. It is navigable for launches and small, flat-bottomed steamers to a point near Pyengyang, where it is four hundred yards wide, although the channel is crooked and there are many rapids and sand-bars. Boats can go some distance above Pyengyang when the water is high, but the river can hardly be called navigable above the city. As the mouth is only eighty miles from the Chinese ports of Chefoo and Teng-chou, Chinese invading expedi- tions often entered the country by the Tatong. When the two countries were not at war, Chinese pirates used the same convenient route. The Koreans kept sentries on this part of their coast for many centuries, and when Chinese vessels were seen approaching, signal-fires carried the mes- sages of danger to other watchers on more distant hiUs, who in turn built other fires, so that in an incredibly short time beacons from scores of hill and mountain tops aroused the whole countryside. A more important river is the Han. It, too, teems with historic associations since it is in the centre of the country, and, until the construction of the railway, furnished the most convenient route to Seoul, the capital. It rises in the Diamond Mountains of Kang-wen Province, only thirty miles from the Japan Sea. It is navigable for junks and light-draught steamers to Seoul, about fifty-six miles from its mouth, and smaller craft run up about one himdred and fourteen miles farther. Above that point rapids are nu- merous. The river is the great highway of travel and transportation for the populous provinces through which it flows, and hundreds of quaint boats dot its surface. It THE LAND OF KOREA 7 is a swift and crooked stream^ and loaded with silt. The high tides of the western coast surge up the channel and check the current, but at low tide the river reasserts itself and pours its volume more swiftly than ever into the sea. The result of this alternate stopping and flowing appears in frequent changes of the channel, and in sand-bars, which make navigation difficult and treacherous except at high water. In 1845 the French vainly tried to find the chan- nel, but in 1866 two of their warships managed to reach the capital. The Japanese, quick to see the advantages of river communication, have spent large sums in making a permanent channel, so that the river is likely to be even more important in the future than in the past. Other rivers are the Rin-chin, which, rising in the moun- tains of Kang-wen, not far from Gensan, flows into the Han; the Keum, which flows into Basil's Bay; the Mokpo, which empties into the Yellow Sea in the extreme south- west, and the Naktong, which flows into the Korean Strait, about seven miles from Fusan, and is navigable for junks and small steamers for one hmidred miles, while boats drawing less than three feet can ascend seventy miles farther. Lying between the thirty-fourth and forty-third paral- lels of latitude, the climate of Korea is that of the north temperate zone. The southern end of the peninsula is in the latitude of Maiyland, and the northern end in that of Massachusetts, and the climate in general is not unHke that of the corresponding portion of the United States. The summers are hot and wet, but the other seasons, as a rule, are exceedingly fine. The rainfall is about thirty-six inches a year, the heaviest rains being in July and August. The winters are usually diy, clear, and crisp. The country abounds in the vegetation of the temperate zone. The hillsides near the cities have been denuded of their forests, but farther back one finds forests of pine, oak, maple, birch, ash, and juniper. Flowers and flowering shrubs grow in delightful variety. Song-birds are few, and the traveller misses some of the melodious warblers of Eng- 8 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST land and America; but the sportsman finds several varieties of wild ducks and geese. The imperial crane stalks solemnly about the rice-fields, and the splendid Mongolian pheasant is abundant. During our journey through the interior it was easy to keep our table well supplied with this most dehcious of pheasants. Animals are found in smaller numbers and more limited variety than in many other lands. I did not see a sheep or a goat anywhere, and was told that the grass was too sour for them. Deer, antelopes, and leopards are found among the mountains, and the diligent hunter may get a shot at a tiger. One would not naturally look in Korea for this savage lord of the wilderness, but here he is, not only on the lower slopes of the hills but even amid the snow and ice of the northern mountains. The natives fear the tiger, and as their weapons are poor he is very bold, prowHng around the smaller villages and sometimes even crashing through the thatched roof of a hut to carry off a woman or child. There is a popular saying among the Chinese across the border, that "the Koreans hunt the tiger during half the year, and the tigers hunt the Koreans during the other half." In the regions infested by these dread beasts the terror of the people is so great that cooHes are unwill- ing to travel at night, and if they are forced to do so, they wave torches and beat gongs, and shout at the top of their voices to keep up their courage and to frighten away any savage prowler. The tiger naturally figures largely in the superstitions and folk-lore of the common people, and many proverbs relate to him. The modem rifles introduced by the Japanese and the high value of the skins are now rapidly diminishing the number of these wild rovers. Five hun- dred tiger-skins were exported in a single year from Gensan, a rate which points to the early extinction of this true king of beasts. Opinions differ as to the value of Korea's resources. One traveller declares that "there is absolutely nothing worth having in Korea, except perhaps a mineral wealth, only to be discovered by a vast expenditm-e of capital; THE LAND OF KOREA 9 and that five-sixths of the country is occupied by lonely mountains or scantily clad hills." This is a superficial judgment. Mountains are usually "lonely/' anywhere, and some of the richest hills in the world are "scantily clad." Mining can be carried on far more easily than in frozen Alaska, which has poured out golden streams. Geological explorations made since the Japanese occupation have dis- closed a wealth of minerals. Gold, silver, copper, graphite, iron, coal, and chalk have been foimd, some of them in extensive deposits. The graphite of Ham-gyongdo averages eighty per cent fine as compared with the seventy-five per cent graphite of Italy. The region about Pyengyang has long had the reputation of being rich in gold and silver, but the mines were never worked to advantage until for- eigners obtained the concessions. In 1909 there were 368 mines in Korea: 312 were owned and operated by Japa- nese and Koreans, jointly; 6 by Japanese and Americans, and 1 by Japanese and Germans. American concession- aires controlled 8, German 6, British 5, French 2, and Italian 2.^ The principal gold-mines are at Unsan, Chikusan, Suwan, and Kosung. Within a dozen years after the con- cession was granted in 1896, the Unsan mine had yielded 1,637,591 tons of ore, valued at $10,701,157. A government coal-mine near Pyengyang produces 60,000 tons of anthracite a year. Iron ore is f oimd in many parts of the country, and the mines at Changyang and Wuryul, in the Province of Whang-hai, are working profitable veins. There is a prom- ising copper-mine at Kapsan. The Japanese are now ac- tively developing the mineral resources of the country, and their thoroughness and modern scientific methods are meet- ing with an encouraging degree of success. Agriculturally, Korea has great possibilities. It is true that the numerous mountains exclude large areas from cultivation, and I found a difference of opinion among residents as to whether the coimtry could maintain a much larger population than it now has. I can only state that ^Iwaya Hosoi, engineer of the Japanese Bureau of Mines, in the Oriental Review, December 24, 1910. 10 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST my own observations in travelling about the country did not give me occasion to doubt. The bottoms of the more fertile valleys are well occupied by rice-fields; but I saw tens of thousands of acres of good-looking land which was either not cultivated at all or so slightly tilled that it was yielding only a small proportion of what it might be made to produce; while innumerable hill-slopes were wholly un- touched. Such intensive cultivation and terracing of hill- sides as one sees in Japan and Syria would enormously in- crease the agricultural output of Korea. Even under the crude and shiftless methods of the Koreans the land pro- duces generous harvests of rice, beans, peas, barley, millet, cotton, tobacco, ginseng, and the castor-bean. The first two, being the staple food of the people, are the chief crops. Large quantities of millet are also raised. Not only is the grain a valued article of food, but the tall and strong stalk is put to a variety of uses. It supplies material for matting, fencing, and the poorer class of houses. The ginseng is the best in the world. A single guild formerly had the monopoly of exporting it, and its exclusive rights were protected by a law which inflicted the death penalty on any one who dared to ship the root out of the country. Smugglers, how- ever, managed to do a thriving business in certain places, but so valuable is the root, and so unlimited is the demand for it in China, that the guild sometimes paid the King half a million dollars a year in royalties. The Japanese Government-General has taken over the monopoly and is doing everything in its power to foster the industry. Less than ten per cent of the area of the country, and less than half of its arable land were under cultivation when the Japanese annexed the peninsula. With the modern methods of agriculture which the Japanese are now effectively teaching, Korea could feed double the munber of people who now occupy it, to say nothing of the added means of wealth which the development of other resources and of manufacturing would bring. The fisheries alone might yield millions of dollars annually, for Korea has the sea upon three sides, and the waters teem with food- THE LAND OF KOREA 11 fish. Then it should be borne in mind that prior to the coming of the Japanese there was practically no factory- population. The development of trade and manufactures would give employment to hundreds of thousands of people. There appears no reason to doubt, therefore, that Korea could easily maintain a far larger population than it has to-day. Korean scenery does not at first impress one favorably. The hills look bare, and the traveller who sees them for the first time, especially in wintry weather, is apt to consider them gloomy and desolate as compared with the tree-clad hills of Japan. But a better knowledge of the country leads one to a juster appreciation. The landscape, save in a few places, is much diversified. Some of the valleys are wide and flat, but most of them gently rise to the border- ing hills. A range of mountains runs irregularly the entire length of the peninsula, with outflanking ridges of varying height. The range is not a lofty one, few peaks reaching an altitude of 5,000 feet, and only one, Mt. Paik-to-san (Ever White Head Peak), attains 8,000 feet. It is an ex- tinct volcano, and the water-filled crater forms a lake of great beauty and of unknown depth. It is greatly revered, and not only Korean but Chinese and Japanese writers have sung its praises. It is popularly believed to be the abode of a goddess, who is the presiding deity of this range of mountains. The northern regions abound in bold moun- tains, narrow valleys, and rushing streams. The Chang Syung and Syek Tong districts abound with villages of Alpine picturesqueness. Kwallondong, for example, nestles in a gorge that would make it famous if it were more accessi- ble, while Kwen Myen lies cosily in one of the most lovely valleys in the world. Famous also are the Diamond Mountains, in the Province of Kang-wen, which Mrs. Isabella Bird Bishop so charmingly described. Of the cliffs and canyons viewed from the monastery of Chyang-yang Sa she says: "Surely the beauty of that eleven miles is not much exceeded anywhere on earth." The Western traveller who is tired of crowded resorts with their artificial 12 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST social conventions may find in the mountains of Korea a charm which will well repay him for a journey half-way round the world. Unlike Japan and China, Korea has no city which can be listed among the great cities of the world. It is a land of villages, with here and there a large town, and only occa- sionally one of considerable size. Fusan, at the southern end of the peninsula, is the place first seen by the average traveller. Being the Korean port nearest to Japan, it was naturally the first to come under Japanese influence. It was long considered a part of the domain of the lord of Tsushima, and in 1443 the prefect of Tongnai, near Fusan, entered into an agreement with the feudal lord of Tsushima by which the Japanese were given the right of permanent settlement. The Korean nobles who brought tribute to Japan sailed from Fusan, and at Fusan landed the invading armies of Hideyoshi in 1592 and 1593. For centuries after this, and through all the vicissitudes of unhappy Korea's relations with the contending powers of China and Japan, Japan managed to keep her hold upon this valuable port and the Japanese settlers had the unique distinction of being "the only Japanese colony in the world." With the downfall of the Shogun and the feudal system in 1868, the suzerainty of Fusan was transferred from the feudal lord of Tsushima to the Mikado. The opening of the city as a treaty port in 1876 inaugurated a new era, and business and population began to increase. Growth became rapid after the Russia-Japan War and the completion of the rail- way to Seoul, three hundred miles northward. The con- trast between my first and second visits, eight years apart, was amazing. The squalid town had become a bustling city. Great docks were being constructed. Shipping filled the harbor. Freight and passenger trains noisily rushed in and out of the new railway station. Shops and hotels were crowded. Large warehouses and public buildings were under construction. Streets were being straightened and widened, and thousands of cooHes were toiling on these and other improvements. The Japanese THE LAND OF KOREA 13 population has rapidly increased in the last decade, and the Korean population also has grown on account of the em- ployment which the Japanese improvements have made available. Chemulpo, on the west coast, was opened to foreign trade by the treaty of 1882, at which time it was a wretched fishing hamlet of only fifteen huts. It soon came into im- portance as the gateway to the capital, twenty-six miles overland. The so-called harbor is hardly more than a road- stead, save as some small islands afford partial protection. A thirty-two foot tide on a sloping bottom means that at low water there is a wide mud flat. A few years ago, if the traveller arrived at that stage, as I did, his steamer had to anchor far out, and he had a sloppy and malodorous experience in getting ashore, first in a sampan, a clumsy, flat-bottomed boat sculled by a single oar, and then on the back of a cooHe. The harbor facilities are now much better. Realizing the importance of the port, the Imperial Diet, in the spring of 1911, authorized the expenditure of three and a half million yen in six years for harbor improve- ments at Chemulpo, and June 11 of that year Governor General Terauchi inaugurated the work amid imposing ceremonies. The improvements include a wall 500 yards long, and a locked dock 120,000 square yards in area and 26 feet in depth. Vessels of 4,500 tons can be moored alongside the wall, and three movable cranes, with a lift- ing power of from one and a half to three tons, make quick work of loading and unloading the many steamers that make the place a port of call. There are stores in which one can buy many kinds of suppHes, and for many years there was a hotel kept by a Chinese, where, if one were not fastidious, he could get something to eat and a place to sleep. Itai, the proprietor, was an alert and reliable man, who had so long responded to the call for a steward on a coasting steamer that the title clung to him after he opened a store and hotel on shore, and for years "Steward's" was famous. The engaging Celestial proved a friend in need to many a traveller, doing everything he could with a 14 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ready good nature which disarmed criticism. The hotel has now given way to Japanese inns, but "Steward" still conducts prosperous shops in Chemulpo and Seoul. Che- mulpo figures prominently in the troubled history of Korea. Here the Japanese in 1894 sunk a Chinese transport and landed for their victorious march to Seoul; and here a Japanese squadron overwhelmed the Russian cruisers, Variag and Korietz, at the beginning of the Russia-Japan War, in 1904. The population has increased rapidly since the Japanese occupation. The Japanese quarter is large. Business has developed considerable proportions, and the docks are piled with goods for the export and import trade of the interior cities. Pyengyang, on the Tatong River, thirty-five miles from the port of Chinnampo, is the leading city in northern Korea. Although the census gives it only 51,846 inhabi- tants, it is the metropolis of about 4,000,000 people, who live in the forty-four counties of the North and South Pyeng-An provinces. The city stands on rising ground, and the view from the city wall includes the winding stream, a fertile valley, and ranges of noble hills. Pyengyang has historic associations, for it claims to have been founded more than three thousand years ago. Kija, the traditional founder of the city, is said to have been the first to observe that the site was shaped like a boat, and therefore that wells must not be dug, as they would make holes in the bottom and sink the city. He wanted a well for his own use, but to guard against the danger of scuttling the craft, he caused a huge metal bowl to be made and placed at the bottom of the well. Ever since, the people have continued to be- lieve that the city lies in a boat. They placed heavy stone posts at the end of the valley to keep it from floating away, and they laboriously carried water from the river rather than run the risk of digging wells, which would have let the underlying water flood their habitations. Pyengyang was the scene of the decisive battle between the Chinese and Japanese in the China-Japan War of 1894. Most of the buildings were destroyed, and those that were left were THE LAND OF KOREA 15 looted by thieves, and the woodwork used for fuel by the victorious Japanese. The terror-stricken inhabitants, who had fled at the first sound of trouble, were slow to return, and the population of the city fell from 80,000 to 15,000. It has since increased, but it is only now regaining its former prosperity. Few visitors, however, would tarry long in Pyengyang if it were not for the world-famed missionary work, which will be referred to again in a later chapter. Gensan, one hundred and seventy miles northeast of Seoul, is the leading city on the eastern coast. It is situ- ated on Broughton Bay, which takes its name from the British captain W. R. Broughton, who surveyed it in 1797. Port Lazareff, at the upper end of the bay, about sixteen miles from Gensan, was named by the Russians, who sur- veyed its waters in 1854, and who have long coveted that deep and safe harbor for one of the termini of the Trans- Siberian Railway. The whole bay is well protected by islands and promontories, and forms one of the most mag- nificent harbors in the world. Its length is about twenty miles, and its width varies from two to six miles, with a depth ranging from six to twelve fathoms. The town was opened as a treaty port. May 1, 1880. Not only as the entrance to northeastern Korea, but as the nearest Korean port to the Russian base at Vladivostok, Gensan is a place of considerable political importance, while its relation to trade as the gateway from the Japan Sea to northern Korea has brought to it a considerable foreign colony. The Japanese far outnumber all other foreigners combined and have built an unusually attractive quarter. There are interesting shops, a bank, a custom-house, a schoolhouse, and several other good buildings. Steamers run regularly to Japan and China, and the new railway to Seoul opens up a rich tributary region and affords easy access to other parts of the coimtry. Wiju, on the Yalu River, not far from its mouth, was for centuries the gateway between Korea and China through which the tribute embassies passed on their way to Peking. It has gained in importance in recent years as the point 16 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST where the great bridge spans the Yalu and the stream of railway travel from Europe, China, and Manchuria enters Korea. Formerly a wretched fishing village, it is now a bustling city. As the first city in Korea that is reached by the trains from Mukden to Seoul and Fusan, Wiju takes itself quite seriously. The Japanese have developed a new city not far from the old Korean town, and modern improve- ments have rapidly developed. Seoul is the largest city in the country, and the only one which reports a population of more than a hundred thou- sand. The census for the urban prefecture gives 302,686 inhabitants, of whom 50,291 are Japanese. The word simply means "capital," so that if the seat of government were to be anywhere else that place would become "Seoul." The first ruler of the present dynasty wanted to signalize his reign by founding a new capital. He fixed upon the town which had long stood upon the bank of the Han River, and in 1395 it became "Seoul." The site is excep- tionally fine. It is not far from the geographical centre of the country, in a valley about five miles in length by three in width, and surrounded by mountains which, in the clear atmosphere, seem to be close at hand. Their serrated peaks outlined against the sky make a superb natural rampart. There are many attractive nooks of a quieter character along the banks of the river. The venerable wall, now falling into decay, was built by the founder of the dynasty, and is about 22 feet in height and 9 miles in circumference. It is said that 198,000 men toiled a month, and 80,000 men one more month, in building this wall, which is constructed of massive blocks of stone. Eight ponderous gates give access to the city, each surmounted by massive roofs. The low-tiled and thatched houses of the city appear "like a vast bed of mushrooms." Here and there larger buildings rise. Most prominent among these are the Roman Cathohc cathedral and the European and American consulates. The palace groimds occupy a large space, and the foliage appears green and beautiful in a city where shade-trees are few. Most of the streets are mere alleys, but those leading c3 03 THE LAND OF KOREA 17 from the gates are wide enough to allow two carriages to pass, and one is a really noble avenue, a hundred feet wide and three miles long. It is one of the most picturesque streets in the world: sedan chairs, jinrikishas, bicycles, carriages, and clanging trolley-cars; coolies with their clumsy jickies; women carrying bundles of clothing, and children playing or going to or from school; pack ponies led by frowsy countrymen, and bullocks so heavily loaded with fuel that they look like moving piles of wood; uni- formed policemen, Japanese soldiers, civilian Japanese in their wooden shoes and native dress, other Japanese and some Koreans in foreign attire; and everjrwhere, paying little heed to vehicles in spite of the frantic shouts of their drivers, the leisurely moving throng of Koreans of the old regime, their odd hats, flowing white robes and long pipes giving them a quaint appearance, like some moving figures from a bygone age. The objects of special interest in Seoul are not numerous. Notable buildings are few, and the great temples that one sees in Japan and China are conspicuous by their absence. Of course, the traveller visits the Royal Palace, the Corona- tion Altar, the Japanese quarter, the Independence Hall and arch beyond the west gate, a marble pagoda presented by a Mongol Emperor to his daughter, who was Queen of Korea in 1354, and the great bronze bell, called the third largest in the world. For five hxmdred years this bell sig- nalled the opening and closing of the city gates with a quaint ceremony that has now been abandoned. Many small brass bells are suspended from the eaves of several of the palace buildings. A fish of the same metal is fast- ened to the clapper by a chain, and when the wind blows these fishes back and forth the bells ring. At simrise or sunset, when a gentle breeze is blowing, the effect is singu- larly sweet. Under the old regime Seoul literally swarmed with offi- cials and their dependents. It was popularly called "the city of 3,000 officials," as that number of the 3,800 officials in the whole country were said to be in the capital. Their 18 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST pride of position, their political ambitions, and their usually dissolute lives naturally determined to a considerable de- gree the character of the city as a whole. Recent years have witnessed a remarkable transformation in this famous old capital. Many of the once haughty nobles were im- poverished by the wars, or lost their positions when the government passed into alien hands. A great Japanese colony has grown up. The railway stations outside the wall have become the busiest centres of the metropolis, and evidences of the new political and commercial era are to b6 seen on every hand. In the last twenty-five years Seoul has seen more changes than any other city in the Far East, but it has lost its charai for "the old timer," a correspondent laments in the Japan Mail: "Sorcerers, jugglers, disease charmers, and fortune-tellers have van- ished. We are to lose the tinted yangban and to have in its place a modem city with wide streets, large buildings, clean drains, refreshing water-works, tall horses, electric lights, and for the average Korean a commoner, student or working man — anything but showy — making altogether a wonderful contrast with the loathsome alleys, dreadfully smelling corners, one-story buildings, packs of grinning, mangy dogs, presided over by the swell gentleman in green and blue silk, quilted and padded trousers, huge spectacles and waving fan." There are other interesting places, not large, indeed, and seldom visited by the traveller who is hurrying on the railway from Japan to China, but well worth a visit. Songdo, fifty miles northeast of Seoul, was the capital of Korea for over four himdred years (960-1392). Its former glory has departed, but it is still a place of considerable note. It is on the railway-line from Seoul to Gensan, and is the central city of a rich and populous region. Taiku, about a hundred miles north of Fusan, is a provincial cap- ital which the Japanese have made the administrative centre of an extensive region in southern Korea. Andong, in southeastern Korea, is a fine old provincial capital, famous for the number of its Confucian scholars. Kangkai, THE LAND OF KOREA 19 in the far northeast, is situated amid some of the most beautiful scenery in Asia. Haiju I have described in an- other chapter. Mokpo, near the southwestern end of the peninsula, is a small place but important on account of its excellent harbor, and was opened as a treaty port October 1, 1897. Kimsan, picturesquely located near the mouth of the Changpo River, about one hundred and fifty miles south of Chemulpo, was designated as a treaty port May 1, 1898. Chimju, the family seat of the last reigning djmasty, and the capital of North ChuUa Province, is a walled city of 25,000 mhabitants. Chungju is the military capital of the North and South Chung Cheng provinces, and its market-place is thronged with 5,000 people every five days. Small cities and market towns, with populations ranging from 5,000 to 12,000 each, are numerous, and villages are innumerable. Several places which are of comparatively small pohtical or commercial importance are the centres of missionary work of large significance. I shall recur to this in a later chapter. CHAPTER II THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA KoEEA is among the latest of the nations to become known to the Western world. Asia, indeed, has been more or less famihar with it from a remote antiquity. The en- voys of Persia met those of Korea at the capital of China more than two thousand years ago, and the contact must have been closer and more frequent than a casual meeting, for "Korean art shows the undoubted influence of Persia."^ Enterprising Arab merchants, too, in their trips to China, early learned of the great peninsula, and some of them crossed the narrow sea between the Province of Shantung and Korea. As far back as the ninth century, Khordadbeh, an Arab geographer, referred to the "high mountains" which "rise up densely across from Kantu in the land of Sila," and says that "Mussulmans who visit this country often allow themselves, through the advantages of the same, to be induced to settle there." This is undoubtedly a reference to Korea, as the Chinese name for that kingdom was Sinlo, and Sila was an easy Arabic corruption. Of the aboriginal inhabitants of Korea nothing is known. They early became extinct, except in so far as they were assimilated by alien conquerors. Modern Koreans are descendants of peoples that came from the region now known as Manchuria. They have many quaint legends as to their origin, most of which go back to mythical gods or goddesses. The most interesting traditions centre about Kija, or Ki-tsze, in the twelfth century before the Christian era. He was said to be a Chinese mandarin of scholarly attainments and high character, who was a counsellor of the cruel and evil-minded Emperor, Chow Sin, the last ruler ^William Elliot Griffis, Korea the Hermit Nation, to whose careful collec- tion of early historical material the reader is referred for a detailed narrative of events that I have epitomized in this chapter. 20 THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 21 of the Shang d3niasty. The earnest efforts of Ki-tsze to induce him to rectify the gross abuses of his government only excited the wrath of the monarch, who brutally mur- dered the friends of Kija, and threw the sage himself into prison. A revolution ended the sway of Chow Sin, and the successful revolutionist, Wu Wang, released Kija and offered him the post of prime minister. But sorely as Ki-tsze had suffered from the caprice of Chow Sin, his in- flexible conscience recognized him as a lawful King, and would not permit him to ally himself with a usurper, how- ever friendly. So at the head of about 5,000 followers, he migrated 1122 B.C. to the northeast, where he foimded a kingdom. Originally this kingdom does not appear to have been in Korea at all, but in southern Manchuria. It gradually extended its boundaries until its southern line reached the Tatong River. The last King of the earher Tangun dynasty fled before the mighty Kija, and took refuge in Kuwul Kuwul Mountain, in Whang-hai Province, where he died in exile and humiliation. In the second century B. C, the Chinese emperors of the Han dynasty warred with the descendants of Ki-tsze, and after a long and tumultuous series of victories and defeats, the kingdom was finally extinguished, 107 B. C, and its territory was annexed to China. The throneless kings of the line of Ki-tsze dwindled till 9 A. D., when the last one died, and the line became extinct. None of the many monarchs of that dynasty of more than a thousand years left any reputation, except the illustrious founder. He has several alleged graves north of the Yalu, where at least the greater part of his reign was spent. The tomb at Pyeng- yang, on a hill a short distance beyond the north wall, is the one most highly reverenced, though there is no reHable evidence that it contains his body. A stone tablet on the road below bears an inscription to the effect that those who approach on horseback should dismoimt at so sacred a place. A beautiful grove shades the tomb. Ponderous images guard the spot, and a large flat stone serves for the sacrifices which are offered to the spirit of the mighty dead. 22 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The stoiy of Kija, however, is not above suspicion from the view-point of historical criticism. The period of Kija and his successors (1122 B. C.-9 A. D.) presents such a jumble of facts, myths, and legends that it is often im- possible to separate them. There is nothing improbable in the story that a great Chinese mandarin incurred the wrath of his Emperor, migrated to Korea, gained ascen- dancy over the primitive people that he found there, and introduced a more stable and civilized order among them. But definite dates and other important data are uncertain. Indeed it has been conjectured that the kingdom founded by Kija was the Fuyu, another now forgotten state. But history or legend, or both, one's imagination is kindled by the story of that ancient migration and its results, and one longs for details to fill in its meagre outlines. In the days of Samuel, prophet of Israel, and Tiglath-Pileser, King of Assyria, five hundred years before Nabopolassar founded the Chaldean dynasty, while Athens was an obscure village, Rome was yet unheard of, and Europe was a wilderness inhabited only by savage tribes, this cultivated Chinese noble is said to have laid the foundations of social order in northern Korea. His colossal figure dominates the early history of Korea much as Abraham dominates that of the Hebrews. He is credited with introducing a written lan- guage, establishing stable government, enacting wise laws, and developing a civilization that was high in comparison with the barbarism he found. To this day the inhabitants of Pyengyang point to a square field as the identical ground where Kija laid out a model farm in nine divisions, the people to till eight for themselves, and the ninth for the government. The remains of the massive wall that he is supposed to have built may still be seen, though successive repairs and rebuildings have left little of the original struc- ture. It follows the river bank for miles, and indicates a city of considerably larger size than the present one. It is not surprising that the Koreans boast of their an- tiquity as one of the oldest nations in the world. Novem- ber 25, 1801, the King wrote to the Emperor of China: THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 23 "His Imperial Majesty knows that since the time when the remnants of the army of the Yin dynasty migrated to the East (1122 B. C), the Httle kingdom has always been dis- tinguished by its exactness in fulfilling all that the rites prescribe, justice and loyalty, and in general by fidelity to her duties." January 25, 1802, an edict against Christianity declared that "the Kingdom granted to Ki-tsze has enjoyed great peace during four hundred years (since the establisliment of the ruling dynasty), in all the extent of its territory of two thousand ri and more"; and when the American ad- miral, John Rodgers, tried to make a treaty in 1871, the Korean Government proudly replied that "Korea was satisfied with her civilization of four thousand years, and wanted no other." While Ki-tsze was doubtless the civilizer and lawgiver of early Korea, it is not at all certain that the Koreans of to-day should regard him as the foxmder of their na- tion. Rather do we look to the people called Korai, who originally came from a region north of the Sungari River, in what is now known as Manchuria. Various mi- grations from this region, led by powerful chieftains, re- sulted in the development of the petty kingdoms of Korai, Shinra, and Hiaksai, and for centuries the history of the country largely centred in their courts, their wars with one another and with China, and their changing boundaries as the tides of victory and defeat ebbed and flowed. By the seventh century Korai had gained the mastery from the Sea of Japan to the Liao River, and of the peninsula down to the Han River. The five provinces of the kingdom con- tained millions of people, and there were no less than a hundred and seventy-six cities. The warfare between Korai and Shinra was chronic, but the doughty Koraians would have held their own if it had not been for the Chinese, whose succeeding invasions proved overwhelming, and after a history of more than seven hundred years the kingdom of Korai was annexed to China. To Hiaksai Korea is indebted for the introduction of the 24 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST writings of Mencius and Confucius, and the literaiy cul- ture that they fostered easily made Hiaksai the intellectual centre of the peninsula. In the fifth century the kingdom had become strong enough to defeat a Chinese army; but internecine strife and constant wars with border kingdoms and with the powerful and usually victorious Chinese grad- ually weakened the people, until, in the sixth century, the devastated land became a part of the Celestial Empire. Shinra was a proud kingdom whose people were for a time farther advanced in civilization than any other people of ancient Korea. They cultivated the arts, built walls around their cities, fortified strategic posts, used horses, oxen, and wagons, made silk, smelted ore, manufactured iron, and traded with other kingdoms, including Japan. In the days of its greatest power Shinra occupied all the eastern half of Korea, from the Ever White Mountains in the north to the southernmost point of the peninsula. Its Chinese origin and occasional alliances with the Chinese Empire brought to it the principles and benefits of Chinese civilization, while its nearness to Japan and, for a time, its subjugation by the Japanese opened to it whatever advan- tages the Japan of that day possessed; and they were not small. Shinra was the last of the three kingdoms to fall. For two centuries after Hiaksai and Korai had been conquered by China, Shinra continued to exist, though civil war sadly diminished its power. Altogether, the kingdom of Shinra lasted nearly a thousand years, and her three royal famihes boasted fifty-five kings. But in 934 the end came. The next great wave of population to reach and influ- ence Korea emanated from that mysterious fountainhead of nations, northern Manchuria and Mongolia. Forth from this region there poured in the latter part of the ninth and the early part of the tenth centuries the fierce hordes of the Kitan tribes, breaking up the kingdom of Puhai, which had been founded in 700 A. D., and whose capital was the still important city of Kirin. Multitudes of the defeated people of Puhai emigrated southward and repopulated the devastated valleys of northern Korea. The infusion of new THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 25 blood brought vigor to a race which was fast becoming decadent, and with comparative ease the ambitious soldier- king, Wang-ken, brought all Korea under his sway, and fixed his capital at Sunto (Kai-seng). Thus for the first time the whole peninsula was united under one government. Wang-ken died in 945, but the dynasty that he founded endured for four centuries, and Sunto became a centre of wealth and learning, enjojdng its dignity as the residence of the royal family till the fall of the dynasty, in 1392. For a time the kingdom included not only the whole of modern Korea, but a considerable region north of the Yalu. But wars with the Emperor of Kitan resulted, in the early part of the eleventh century, in the loss of the Man- churian territory. From that time, the Yalu remained the boundary of Korea, and to-day, after the lapse of nearly a thousand years, the boimds of Korea remain unchanged. In the thirteenth century Korea felt the bloody hand of one of the mightiest of world conquerors. Few names in history are identified with more thrilling and yet more tragic events than the dread name of Genghis Khan. He also came from that breeding place of invaders, Mongolia. A Japanese writer, K. Suyematz, claims that Genghis Khan was none other than the Japanese warrior and hero, Yo- shitsune, who was born in 1159, became the general who conquered the Taira family, and having incurred the jealousy of his brother Yoritomo, fled to Manchuria, where his commanding talents made him the chief of the fierce and predatory Mongol tribes. Be this as it may, in 1206 a great chief of the Mongols named Yezokai, who had uni- fied and led to repeated triumphs the hitherto disorganized bands of northern horsemen, proclaimed himseK King under the name of Genghis Klian and began a career of conquest. In half a decade he had subdued the warlike Kitans, and by 1213 the Great Wall of China was pierced and his hosts were masters of everything north of the Yalu. With the lust for power now fully roused, Genghis Khan conceived the bold idea of conquering the world. How his invincible and terrible horsemen swept over China and clear across 26 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Asia to Europe, carrying consternation and iiiin wherever they went, every student of history knows. But less has been written of the division of the Mongol host which sought to carry out the ambition of Genghis Khan in Korea and Japan. The former was an easy prey, and in 1218 the King of Korea became a vassal of Genghis Khan. The murder of a Mongol envoy, in 1231, led to an invasion in which Korea suffered heavily. The Mongol officials were so severe in their rule that even Korean patience was ex- hausted, and they were assassinated. Thereupon another Mongol army came in 1241, and inflicted such dire ven- geance that the prostrate nation made no further resistance. The repeated efforts to conquer Japan, made by Genghis Khan and his famous grandson Khu-blai KJian, were less successful, and the Mongol occupation of Korea was brief, as the empire of Genghis Khan, like that of the world- ambitious Alexander the Great, fell to pieces soon after the death of his successor. From the view-point of history', the subjugation of Korea by Genghis Khan was merely an episode, terrible at the time, but leaving no appreciable mark on Korean customs or institutions. The modern Korean dynasty dates from the fall of the Wang dynasty, in 1392. The last King of that line was so cruel and dissolute that his subjects became restless and sullen. When he incurred the anger of China by refusing to give pledges of vassalage, Ni Taijo, the ambitious and talented general of the army and the father-in-law of the King, took advantage of the opportunity to depose him. Prompt acknowledgment of the suzerainty of Chuia secured the friendship and support of the Emperor, and Ni Taijo was soon firmly established on the throne, to the joy of the Koreans, with whom he was very popular. The capital was transferred to Han Yang, which took the name Seoul. The King built the wall which still stands, improved the administration of government, and divided the country into the eight provinces, or do, whose boundaries have remained to this day. The name Korea, or "Morning Calm," which had been dropped during the troubled period which began THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 27 with the Christian era, was resumed, and Korea entered upon an era of peace and prosperity. The descendants of Ni Taijo ruled in uninterrupted succession until the annexa- tion of Korea by Japan, in 1910, and the last Emperor proudly traced his Hneage back to him, although he was not in the direct line of descent. Old Korea was feudal. There was no such caste system as in India, but society was rigidly divided into various grades: the royal family, nobles, officials and literary men, farmers, and artisans. The lowest class was subdivided into "the seven vile callings" of merchants, boatmen, jail- ers, postal-slaves, monks, butchers, and sorcerers. While the merchant was at the head of the latter list, he belonged to one of the "vile callings," on the lowest round of the social ladder, and the monk was even nearer the bottom, only the butcher and sorcerer being below him. The government was a despotism of the patriarchal type. The Emperor was believed to rule by divine right and to be above wrong-doing. All abuses were charged to the ministers and subordinate officials who failed to do the will of the sovereign. There was an official censor whose alleged duty it was to call the royal attention to evils, but he would have been badly overworked if he had faithfully performed his duties; and even then, such is the Asiatic fondness for hyperbole and self-depreciation, his writings would not have been seriously applied to the divinity on the throne, if indeed his Majesty ever saw them. The person of the Emperor was sacred, and by immemorial tradition, iron must never be permitted to touch it. It is said that King Cheng-jong died of an abscess in the year 1800 because it was not thought proper that steel should be used to lance it. No one was permitted to ride past the palace. No matter how high the dignitary, he must leave his chair or dismount from his pony and walk. When his Majesty left the royal precincts extraordinary efforts were made to guard his person. The old Emperor probably did not know how fflthy and wretched the streets of his capital were, for he saw them only at rare intervals after they had 28 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST been carefully cleaned for his passage. He would not have cared much if he had known, for his own grounds would have given a Dutch or Yankee housewife nei'vous prostra- tion. It was "lese-majesty" for any one to look down upon the Emperor, and in order to prevent this the windows of the houses upon the street through which the Emperor passed were carefully sealed so that no one could peer through them. Every door had to be closed, and the owner of each house was required to kneel in front of it with a broom and dust-pan as evidences that he recognized the august presence, and that he had made every effort to pre- pare for his coming. In order to lessen the risk of assas- sination, the procession included two sedan-chairs precisely alike, and no one except his confidential attendants was supposed to know in which one the Emperor rode. These royal processions were attended by all the pomp and para- phernalia so dear to the Oriental mind, and to the Occi- dental, too, for that matter. The old Emperor came to the throne on the death of his uncle. King Chul-chong, who died without issue, January 15, 1864. The new sovereign being a boy of twelve, a Council of Regency was headed by his father, Ni Kung, or, as he was commonly known, the Tai-wen-kun. The latter was a man of unusual strength of character for a Korean, and he speedily made himself master of the situa- tion, and was the virtual ruler till 1873. Koreans still shudder as they remember his sanguinaiy career, as a man "who had bowels of iron and a heart of stone." His regency was characterized not only by the usual corrup- tion but by ruthless slaughter. He even executed one of his own sons. He was fiercely anti-foreign and was re- sponsible for the murder of the French CathoHc mission- aries and Christians in 1866. When the King attained his majority, in 1873, the regency of course ended, but the belligerent Tai-wen-kun remained a power in the capital and was the source of aU sorts of nefarious conspiracies. He plotted several times to depose his son. He was at the bottom of the attack upon the Japanese legation in 1882. THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 29 When he wanted his enemies at court removed, he adopted the pleasant expedient of concealing bombs in boxes of bonbons. His enemies once retaliated by trying to blow him up, but the effort was a failure. If he had been as just and humane as he was able and energetic, he would have been a power for good. As it was, he was a disturbing ele- ment imtil the feebleness of age deprived him of the abihty to foment further mischief. The youthful King soon proved to be a weak and self- indulgent man, who was easily dominated by the minister, wife, or concubine who happened to be the favorite at a particular time. He was naturally a man of gentle spirit, well versed in the history and literature of his country, and kindly disposed toward foreigners. Like most weak des- pots, he was apt to be cruel when frightened. I was favored with an opportimity to see him in 1901, and also his son, then the Crown Prince, and afterward the Emperor. I owed the opportunity to the American Min- ister, the Honorable Horace Allen, whom the King held in high regard. Unfortunately, the time fixed was the evening of the day on which our steamer was to sail from Chemulpo. As I was near the beginning of a journey of over a year whose itinerary had been carefully planned, and as im- portant engagements in China were involved, I felt that I could not disarrange my whole schedule even to meet an Emperor. I was therefore indiscreet enough to say to Minister Allen that, while I should highly appreciate the privilege of entering the august presence of his Majesty, to my profound regret it would be impossible as I had made all my plans to leave on the forenoon of that day. The experienced diplomat replied in some consternation: "Look here, you are not in America, but in Asia, and when an Asiatic monarch intimates that he wiU deign to receive a certain person at a certain hour, that person is to be re- ceived at that precise hour, and a httle matter like losing a steamer and waiting an indefinite period for another one is not to be considered for a moment. An invitation of the Emperor is law." There was a hurried consultation, the 30 THE MASTERY OF THE EAR EAST result of which was that a friend went to Chemulpo to see whether anything could be done with the steamer. This friend; in the kindness of his heart and with his knowledge that time is not of much account to an Oriental, gave the captain such an idea of the importance of my humble self and the appaUing discourtesy to the Emperor that would be involved in leaving his guest in the lurch, that the cap- tain actually held his ship until the next day. When he saw me at that time he was very polite and made no com- plaint, but I fear that his thoughts were not pleasant. And so at the appointed hour we presented ourselves at the gate of the royal palace, accompanied by the Reverend Doctor and Mrs. H. G. Underwood, and Doctor and Mrs. 0. R. Avison, missionaries whom the King knew and respected. An officer escorted us through files of soldiers and a labyrinth of low, rambling buildings, some of native construction, others of foreign style, through courtyards bare of grass and tramped hard by many feet, until we were ushered into a one-stoiy brick structure of European archi- tecture, which we were informed was the reception-hall, where we were offered tea and cigarettes by the master of court ceremonies, and then were escorted to the building where the Emperor and the Crown Prince were to receive us. Not being accustomed to hobnobbing with royalty, I had sought advice in advance as to the proper method of approach to his Majesty. We were counselled to pause on the threshold and make a low bow, advance a step and make another low bow, take a further step and make still another bow, take a third step and bend low once more, and then stand still and see what his Majesty would be pleased to do. We carefully followed these instructions, and his Majesty was pleased to give the men of our party a sHght nod, and to shake hands most effusively with our wives — ^which showed that he was a man of suflScient dis- cernment to recognize instantly the more worthy members of our respective families. The audience-chamber was scantily furnished, the only articles in it being a carpet and a small table. Ordinary THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 31 paper covered the walls, and there was a total lack of that gorgeousness which is supposed to characterize the audience- chamber of an Oriental monarch. The Emperor was then fifty years of age, rather short, inclined to stoutness, wore a thin beard, and had a face which, when lighted by a smile, as it was several times during the interview, was not un- attractive. The Crown Prince spoke little, and appeared to be much inferior to his father in intelligenceo A life spent amid the intrigues and vices of a Korean palace was not conducive to the development of strong qualities. The Emperor politely asked each of us if we were well, and after an interview of about half an hour, during which he conversed freely and pleasantly, he said that he had prepared a little dinner and that he hoped we would re- main as his guests, the master of ceremonies representing him at the table. (The Emperor never eats with foreigners.) He again shook hands with the ladies of the party, and then we backed out of the royal presence with the prescribed bows imtil we had passed the door. The dinner was served in another plain room, with low ceiling and common-looking wall-paper, but the table was set with snowy Hnen, exquisite china, and costly gold and silver dishes. Each guest's plate was marked by a card in Chinese characters. The food was perfectly cooked, and the thirteen courses were admirably served. We were told that the Emperor had a French chef, and we could easily beheve it. Four Koreans dined with us and were very polite and cordial. The one beside whom I sat was of princely rank and had visited America and Europe. He spoke Enghsh fluently, and I found him a most agree- able conversationalist. I was interested in noting that while five kinds of wine were served, only two persons at the table drank it, all the others contenting themselves with Tansan, a Japanese mineral water. After dinner we were taken to the drawing-rooms of the palace where we were entertained by a special programme. First appeared dancing lions, each consisting of two men under huge lion skins. The heads had been made of dis- 32 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST proportionate size, with eyes as large as saucers and eyelids which were operated by a string worked from the inside. When the lions stood before us and bowed, and those great saucer-like lids slowly winked, the effect was decidedly grotesque. After the lions, forty dancing-girls of the palace entered and gave an exhibition of their art to the missionary secretary and his wife from the far West. Everything, how- ever, was decorous. Indeed it would hardly be called a dance by Americans, consisting of a series of slow, swaying motions more nearly resembling callisthenic exercises, the arms gracefully waved, and the steps slow and measured. The reputation of dancing-girls in Korea is not good, but these were modestly dressed and their conduct was imex- ceptionable. Their faces were thickly painted and their hair was done up in most elaborate fashion. One of their exercises was the throwing of balls through a hole in a frame, each girl as she took her turn slowly swaying her arms and her body to the sound of the orchestra, and then at the climax of the music attempting to throw the ball through the hole. If she succeeded, she retired with evi- dent pleasure; if she failed, an attendant darted forward and painted a black spot upon her cheek, a mark of dis- grace. The last of the dances was a sword-dance, and as it proceeded the music became more rapid until the dance ended in a dizzy whirl. By the time the entertainment was concluded it was ten o'clock, and we took our departure, having spent four hours in the palace. The easy-going King paid little attention to affairs of state, and the real government was in the hands of the Cabinet ministers and their subordinates. Some of these ojBicials were hereditaiy nobles whose power had grown great imder the feudal system. Others were men who had obtained their posts by bribery or special influence. Offices were supposed to be obtained, as in China, by competitive examinations, but in practice they were virtually sold to the highest bidder or given to favorites. Sometimes an official resigned a few days after his appointment, as he had sought the place only for the rank which even a brief ten- THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 33 ure enabled him to claim for the rest of his life, or to foist some of his poor relations upon the public pm'se. The number of officials and theii- retainers was almost incredible, the average district mandarin having four hundred subor- dinates, who did little but collect taxes, loaf, and eat so gluttonously and cheat so brazenly that, a British vice- consul told Mrs. Bishop, their food alone cost $392,000 a year in a single one of the forty-four districts. The nobles, or yangbans, as they were called, were ab- normally proud of characteristics of which a self-respecting American would be ashamed. The physical strength of the yangban was usually weak, as his life was one of self- indulgence and absence of healthful exercise, but he deemed it essential to his dignity to give beholders the impression that he was weaker than he really was, so that he would not be suspected of ever having done any work. Accord- ingly he staggered out of his house and sank into the arms of his attendants as if he had taxed his energies to the utmost in walking a few steps. The obsequious attendants tenderly placed him on the back of the pony, and then held each leg in order that the precious body of the dignitary might not be subjected to too much strain as he was borne through the streets. Canopies or great umbrellas were held over his devoted head. Servants ran before him knocking the vulgar crowd out of the way, ordering every other rider to dismount, and unmercifully belaboring any one who was slow about it, or any pedestrian who dared to pass in front of the procession. Another attendant osten- tatiously carried a cuspidor, while other attendants carried pipes, tobacco, cigarettes, and other conveniences to an- ticipate his slightest wish. The life of the individual Korean was spent mider con- stant official espionage. Unless he was a noble, he must have a tablet bearing his name and residence so that he could be identified at any time. If he was accused of crime, and he was so accused on the slightest pretext, he was brought before the magistrate who was both judge and jury, and usually lazy, corrupt, and cruel. If the cul- 34 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST prit did not confess that he had committed the alleged crime, he was subjected to torture. Every court had an appalling array of paraphernalia for this purpose — clubs, paddles, stocks, chains, ropes, and manacles. The un- happy prisoner was sometimes beaten imtil his back was torn to ribbons, or perhaps he was hung up by the arms, or was rolled about with his hands fastened to his knees. Breaking the shin-bones with clubs was a common mode of torture. Prior to 1785 more frightful modes of punish- ment were in common use, such as the tearing the body apart by oxen; but m that year a new criminal code was put in force that aboHshed some of the worst abuses. Those that still prevailed were so great as to shock a white man, though he need not go many generations back into the his- tory of his own ancestors to find equal cmelties. Under such a government the common people suffered grievously. They had no rights which their rulers felt bound to respect. The taxes would have been heavy enough if they had been honestly collected, but dishonesty more than doubled them. Corrupt and unscrupulous officials extorted as much as possible from the helpless masses. Fixed salaries were seldom paid, and adequate ones never, so that "squeezing" was expected as a matter of course. If an official turned the required amount into the imperial treasury no questions were asked regarding the additional sum which he kept for himself. As this system of graft ran down a long line of officials of varying ranks until it reached the taxpayer, the plight of that unfortunate individual may be imagined. He was lucky if he had enough left for his family to eat. An illustration of their methods was given in a village in a southern province where telegraph-poles were required. "The provincial governor made a requisi- tion of 100 cash on every house. The local magistrate in- creased it to 200, and his runners to 250, which was actually paid by the people; the runners getting 50 cash, the magis- trate 100, and the governor 100, a portion of which sum was expended on the object for which it was levied." ^ 1 Cited by Bishop in Korea and Her Neighbors, p. 329. THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 35 Any man suspected of having property was liable to be thrown into a filthy prison on some trumped-up charge, and held and perhaps tortured until he disgorged to the magistrate. The privilege of collecting taxes was sold to the highest bidder or given to dissipated favorites who divided the spoU. The courts gave no redress, for the plunderer himseK was usually both judge and jury. A man had no incentive to toil when he knew that the fruits of endeavor would be taken from him by lynx-eyed officials. So he cultivated only the rice and beans that he required for food, and devoted the remainder of his time to smoking and resting. Duiing our journey through the interior, we stopped one night with an inteUigent-looking Korean who lived in a modest house, kept one ox, and tilled a few acres of land. My missionary companion, knowing him well, said to him: "Why do you not build a better house, keep more oxen, and cultivate more land ? " "Hush," rephed the frightened Korean, "it is not safe even to whisper such things, for if they were to come to the ears of the magistrate, I should be persecuted until he extorted from me the last yen that I possess." Wherever we went we heard substantially the same story and saw substantially the same conditions — a rapacious and dissolute governing class, and a shabby im- provident people who lived from hand to mouth and hardly dared call their souls their own. The prevailing wretchedness was so great that one wondered how long human nature could endure it. Anglo-Saxons would not have tolerated it a month. But these stolid Oriental grown-up children ate their rice and took their hard lot apathetically, while the Emperor borrowed money or sold concessions, and the officials stole to keep up appearances. Few of the higher classes appeared to discern the coming storm, and those who did shrugged their shoulders in the spirit of "after us the deluge." Against foreign aggressions Korea was utterly helpless. The army of about 17,000 men was ostensibly modelled after European standards, but no European officer would 36 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST have been willing to assume responsibility for such an army. In 1896 a Russian colonel, assisted by thi'ee com- missioned officers and ten non-commissioned officers, un- dertook to bring some order out of the chaos. He organ- ized a royal body-guard of 1,000 men, and armed them with Berdan rifles. But he and his officers were displaced in April, 1898. The army as a whole was about the worst equipped and worst disciplined body imaginable. The sol- diers slouched about in most unmilitary fashion. Their valor was tested by Mr. J. McLeavy Brown, a British sub- ject who was formerly commissioner of maritime customs. In addition to the duties of this office he became financial adviser to the treasury in 1895, and a royal edict issued in July, 1896, gave him control of all disbursements. His post was a trying one, for the Korean officials with whom he dealt were prolific in schemes for robbing the treasiuy. But Mr. Brown was not only incorruptible but fearless, and under his honest and skilful management the financial condition of the government rapidly improved. The Rus- sians and French, finding him an obstacle to their plans, succeeded in persuading the Emperor to depose him. But Mr. Brown refused to be deposed. A detachment of Korean troops was therefore sent to eject him; whereupon the re- doubtable Scotch-Irishman, with a vigorous use of a fight cane and a heavy boot, put the whole detachment to ignominious fiight in spite of its loaded rifles and fixed bayonets. When the army was mustered out by the Japa- nese after they had taken control of the government, the military establishment consisted of thirty generals, ten colonels, and a few nondescript regiments of slouchy and unkempt soldiers. The navy — ^but it is hardly proper to apply the word navy to a variegated assortment of twenty-eight admirals, a few sailors, and no war-vessels at all. The diplomatic service was, on the whole, better than might have been expected in such circumstances; perhaps because most of the yangbans were too stupid to know anything about other countries, or too lazy to care about THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 37 going to them, so that the posts at foreign capitals went to the more ambitious men. They were rather helpless figures abroad. The government which they represented manifested only languid interest in them, and often left them for long periods without salaries or allowances. More than once the Korean Minister in Washington was unable to pay his grocer, and the correspondence of several dignitaries in Europe and America was burdened with pathetic appeals for money to meet unpaid bills of long standing and thus preserve the government's honor. The whole administration was corrupt and impotent. But it did not trouble the Koreans. It was the only kind of government that they had known for centuries, and they accepted it as a matter of course. As for the Emperor, it probably never occurred to him that the countiy and peo- ple existed for any other purpose than to minister to his indulgence, and he would have greeted with stupefaction a suggestion that he could or should give his subjects a more efficient government. He sometimes gave good-natured approval when a foreigner proposed an improvement; but he was too weak and indolent to care about better things either for himself or for his people. It is difficult to tell who were the first white men to see the shores of the Hermit Nation. Probably the earhest arrival was a Portuguese Jesuit priest, Gregorio de Ces- pedes, who came as a chaplain of the Japanese Roman Catholic Christian, Don Augustin Konishi Yukinaga, who commanded the second expedition against Korea by Hideyoshi. The next white men were some Dutch sailors who be- longed to a ship which was making a trading voyage in the Far East in 1627. Three sailors, one of whom was named Jan Weltervree, landed on the Korean coast to get fresh water, and were taken prisoners. They were kindly treated but compelled to remain in the country. The two others were killed in the Manchu invasion of 1635, but Weltervree lived a lonely life till 1653, when he was dehghted by the unexpected arrival of a considerable party of his coimtry- 38 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST men. They, too, liad come involuntarily. The Dutch ship Sparwehr had been wrecked off Quelpart Island. Of the sixty-four men on board all were drowned except thirty- six, who managed to reach land. One of these was a Scotch- man named John Bosket, and another was the famous Hen- drik Hamel, the supercargo of the vessel. He has left a quaint narrative of the experiences of the party. A local magistrate received them with some kindness, and October 29 they were brought to Weltervree in order that he might serve as interpreter. With his aid an escape to Japan was planned, but the barking of dogs betrayed them, and they were soundly bambooed and sent to Seoul under a guard. All along the way the people manifested the greatest curi- osity to see the strange white men. Arriving at Seoul, they were brought before King Hyo-jong, who told them that they must remain permanently in Korea. The captives had checkered experiences. Sometimes they were treated kindly, and sometimes harshly; but they were always closely watched. After a time they were sepa- rated, and the allowance of rice, which they had at first been given, was cut off. Their condition now became pitiable, and hunger and disease thinned their numbers. Septem- ber 5, 1666, after thirteen years of captivity, the few sur- vivors succeeded in escaping in a native sailboat to Japan, where they found a ship from Batavia that was about to sail on its return voyage. They arrived at Batavia No- vember 20, 1667, and July 20 of the following year they again set foot on the soil of Holland. Hamel's account of their adventures was published at Rotterdam in 1668, and passed through several editions in Dutch, French, German, Spanish, and English. He gives a good account of the vari- ous parts of Korea that he saw in his captivity, although his spelling of proper names makes it rather difficult to follow his narrative. Meantime, other sources of information had become available. A rude map of the peninsula, sent by the Jesuits in Peking, had been published in France. In 1649 an Amsterdam press issued a book entitled China Illustrata, THE V/VNISIIED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 39 written by the Jesuit Father Martini, in which another map of Korea figured. In 1707 a Chinese envoy obtained a map in Seoul, which the Jesuits carefully reproduced on a smaller scale and sent to France to be engraved. Rest- less Cossacks, who had pushed their way across Siberia to the Pacific, sent reports of Korea back to Russia, and so full were these accounts that Sir John Campbell was able to compile from them his book. Commercial History of Chorea and Japan, which was pubhshed in 1771. As time passed a few other scraps of information were added to the world's tiny stock of knowledge of this far-away land. A wandering trading vessel now and then touched at a Korean port, and at rare intervals a foreign warship anchored in a convenient harbor. Captain W. R. Broughton stopped at Yung-hing Bay, October 4, 1797. Basil's Bay takes its name from Captain Basil Hall who entered it in 1816. Here the famous missionary, Charles Gutzlaff, landed in 1832, showed the people how to raise potatoes, and when he departed left with them seeds and Christian books. June 25, 1845, the British ship Samarang, commanded by Captain Edwin Belcher, arrived off Quelpart and spent about a month in making a survey of this dangerous coast. Koreans, however, continued to jog along their imme- morial ways, ignorantly indifferent to the Western world. China and Japan they knew from the painful experience of war and tribute, but the occasional white men who sporadi- cally landed on their shores were transitory visitants from a realm of which Koreans knew little and cared less. Korea was still the Hermit Nation and the Land of the Morning Calm, and of several other kinds of calm. China was forced into treaty relations with European nations, and Japan was opened to the outside world, but Korea slum- bered on as it had slumbered for centuries. It was not till the latter half of the nineteenth century that the spell was broken. Men of three nations pressed for entrance in the year 1866. Russians demanded trading concessions. A French war- vessel arrived to inflict punish- ment for the murder of some French missionaries who had 40 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST entered the country in disguise, but the commander found the task more difficult than he had anticipated, and left without doing any serious damage. Americans also came, and in circumstances which their countrymen recall with disagreeable sensations. The first contact, indeed, was pleasant. The American schooner Surprise was wrecked off the Korean coast, June 24. Its destitute crew was treated with the utmost kindness by the Korean officials, who pro- vided for their wants and facilitated their journey to the Chinese border, whence they proceeded to New-chwang, in Manchuria, where there was an American consul. In August of the same year the American schooner General Sherman sailed up the Tatong River. It reached a point about a mile from the city of Pyengyang, where it went aground. Multitudes of Koreans flocked to the shore to see the strange vessel, and some went aboard. Trouble soon broke out, and in the melee the schooner was burned, most of its officers and crew were killed, the rest taken to the city and executed, and the cannon and anchor-chains were exposed to public view on the city gates. The following year, 1867, came the famous, or rather in- famous, "International Body-Snatching Expedition," un- der command of a German named Oppert, guided by a French priest, and accompanied by an American inter- preter. They had the crazy notion that the tombs of the Korean kings were rich repositories of gold and other treasure, and that these tombs could not only be easily pillaged, but the bodies of the defunct kings held for ransom. The buccaneers failed to achieve their nefarious purpose, but they succeeded in desecrating some graves, fighting a number of Koreans, and causing wholesale exas- peration. The American Consul in Shanghai, Mr. George F. Seward, arrested and tried the American for participating in the expedition; but legal evidence to justify a verdict of guilty was lacking, although the Consul had no doubt that it would have been richly deserved. When, therefore, an American naval sqiiadron went to Korea, in 1871, commanded by Admiral John Rodgers, to demand satisfaction for the murder of the crew of the Gen- THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 41 eral Sherman, Koreans were not in a mood to regard it as friendly. The King declined to recognize the squadron, sending back word that if the sailors were hungry they would be given food on condition that they would immedi- ately depart; but that if they had come to change the cus- toms of the people they would find it difficult to overthrow the prejudices of four thousand years; that a people calling themselves French had once undertaken this, and the Americans were respectfully referred to them for the de- tails of what happened then. Thereupon the admiral or- dered an attack upon the fort at the mouth of the river, which was quickly demoHshed, although not without sharp fighting. This was June 10, and two weeks later the squadron sailed away. Admiral Winfield Scott Schley, who participated as a yoimg officer in this expedition, gives a graphic account of it in his Ovm Story, published in 1912. He declared that "the General Sherman had been wantonly destroyed for no other reason than that she had visited the Korean waters," and that "the action taken by Korea against the General Sherman was so unprovoked and so unjustified that no nation could maintain its influence, or even its self-respect, unless it demanded an apology and indemnity, especially at a time when the hostile feeling of a large class in China was being outwardly manifested toward all foreigners." Whether this version of the case is correct or not, it is gratify- ing to know that the American naval officers felt so con- fident that their course was justified, and that "Admiral Rodgers exhausted every peaceful means to negotiate with the Koreans in order to ascertain whether they could jus- tify their destruction of the General Sherman and the mur- der of her crew." At any rate, the punishment was swift and dire. After killing many of the Koreans, routing the remainder, disabling their cannon, and blowing up their magazines, "we returned to our ships," continues the nar- rative, "the duty of our expedition having been fulfilled to the letter and the insult to the flag avenged." Koreans give a different account of the circumstances which brought about the massacre of the crew of the Gen- 42 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST eral Sherman. It is difficult to separate the truth from the error in the confused jumble of reports, rumors, charges, and countercharges. Not an American Kved to tell the tale, and Koreans are not famous for telling the unvarnished truth, especially when they are defending themselves from a charge of murder; neither are Americans. At any rate, candor compels record of the fact that the Koreans assert that the provocation was conomitted by the foreign sailors. Doctor S. Wells WiUiams, then secretary of the American legation in Peking, carefully inquired into the matter, and came to the conclusion that "the evidence goes to uphold the presumption that they (the crew) invoked their sad fate by some rash or violent act toward the natives." It should be borne in mind, too, that the Koreans at that time were apprehensive of an attack by the French; that they had seen very few white men and could not easily distinguish between Frenchmen and Americans; that the schooner was heavily armed; and that the natives, remem- bering the stories that were in circulation regarding the cruelty of foreigners would naturally suspect sinister mo- tives in such visitors. The Reverend Doctor William M. Baird, an American Presbyterian missionary in Pyengyang, says that he talked with many people who saw the General Sherman come up the river and some who were aboard the steamer at a point some distance from Pyengyang, and that one of them, who at the time of the interview had become a Christian and whom Doctor Baird regarded as trustworthy, told him that the schooner had violated the law in entering the river without permission, and that a magistrate, who had gone on board, was detained and not allowed to return to the shore. Admiral Rodgers said that his purpose was peaceful, and that he only desired justice; but the Koreans did not imder- stand why a peaceful mission should come in ships of war. They were not accustomed to seeing kindly disposed vis- itors approaching them armed to the teeth. They had learned that foreign ships had usually meant fighting, and they acted accordingly. THE VANISHED DAYS OF OLD KOREA 43 Wherever the tiiith may he, Americans should be fair enough to see that, reprehensible as the course of the Koreans may have been from om- view-point, the occasions for misunderstanding undoubtedly existed, and that in the whole series of events Americans were far from blame- less. As for the Koreans, they were more thoroughly con- vinced than ever that foreigners were barbarians and that the less that was seen of them the better. But the time had come when the isolation of the past could no longer be maintained. The new world movement had reached the Far East. Japan and China had already been forced out of their immemorial seclusion, and it was impossible for the intervening Korean peninsula to stand apart from a force which had overcome the conservatism of stronger nations. A few of the more mtelligent Koreans saw this; but the dull and stubborn conservatism of cen- turies was not to be overcome in a day. The party of re- action, led by the able and fanatical Tai-wen-kun, fiercely opposed the men of progressive spirit. However, other nations pressed for treaty relations, and the year 1882 saw their consummation. The first to be signed was with the United States. Several American ships had been wrecked off the Korean coast, and the sailors who had managed to reach the shore had been tied hand and foot, slung on poles like pigs for the market, borne to some interior city, and there put to death. The government at Washington had made several vain attempts to secure relations which would prevent the recurrence of such outrages, and finally, in 1882, Commodore R. W. Schufeldt of the American navy succeeded in effecting a treaty, which was drafted by the Honorable Chester Holcombe, then acting American Min- ister in Peking. Treaties with other nations soon fol- lowed — ^with Germany in 1883, Russia and Italy in 1884, France in 1886, and Austria-Hungary in 1892; the Korean Government signing one after the other with varying de- grees of reluctance. And so Korea ceased to be the "Her- mit Nation." CHAPTER III THE KOREAN PEOPLE The census of 1902 gave the population of the country as 5;782,806, a preposterously imreliable figure. The old Korean Government required each magistrate to state how many people were under his jurisdiction, and it assessed taxes on the basis of his report. In order to make the taxes as low as possible, the magistrates lied egregiously, having no American ambition to make their cities appear as large as possible. The latest Japanese census places the popu- lation at 17,406,645, of whom 18,972 were Chinese, 597 Americans, 223 British, 107 French, 57 Germans, and 303,659 Japanese. All of the difference of a dozen miUions between the Korean and Japanese counts should not be charged to the mendacity of the native officials, for the population has really increased rapidly during recent years. The Japanese census of 1910 reported 12,934,282 people, so that rehable data indicate moimting numbers. The influx of Japanese is about offset by the exodus of Koreans to Manchuria, so that the native birth-rate is apparently rising and the death-rate faUing under the better physical conditions of Japanese rule. Shaiply diverse views have been expressed regarding the character of the Koreans. No other people in Asia have been so contemptuously characterized. Captain Bostwick, of the United States warship Polos, which lay some months in the harbor of Chemulpo many years ago, expressed in a poetic effusion his disgust of the "... singular country far over the seas, Which is known to the world as Korea, Where there's nothing to charm and nothing to please. And of cleanliness not an idea." Some later travellers have not been more favorably im- pressed. Mr. Whigham, in his Manchuria and Korea, de- 44 THE KOREAN PEOPLE 45 clares that "the Korean resembles the pale ghost of what a Chinaman was a thousand years ago. . . . The China- man has so many good points that it is possible even to defend his civilization against our own. The Korean has absolutely nothing to recommend him save his good nature." Lord Cm'zon expressed an equally unfavorable opinion in his volume on Problems of the Far East: "The spectacle of a country boasting a separate, if not an independent national existence for centuries, and yet devoid of all external symp- toms of strength; inhabited by a people of physical vigor but moral inertness; well endowed with resources, yet crip- pled for want of fimds — such a spectacle is one to which I know no counterpart even in Asia, the continent of con- trasts." Archibald Little, in The Far East, says that "all ambition or desire for progress seems to have died out from among them," and that "a naturally capable race, holding an exaggerated reverence for their Chinese teach- ers, has lapsed into a condition of seK-satisfaction and con- sequently arrested progress without, at the same time, hav- ing acquired Chinese devotion to work." George Kennan is even more pessimistic, declaring in an article in The Outlook that " they are not only unattractive and unsympathetic to a Westerner who feels no spiritual interest in them, but they appear more and more to be lazy, dirty, unscrupulous, dishonest, incredibly ignorant, and wholly lacking in the self-respect that comes from a consciousness of individual power and worth. They are not undeveloped savages; they are the rotten product of a decayed Oriental civilization." Professor George T. Ladd, after his visit to Korea in 1907, wrote : " The Koreans are the most untrustworthy and lacking in manly virtues of any people I have ever come in contact with. The most that their devoted admirers can say of them is that they are of an amiable nature. But nothing is more beastly and insane in its cinielty than a Korean mob. . . . The native character is rather more despicable than that of any other people whom I have come to know." One is reminded of Mr. Russell's story in Collections and 46 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Recollections, that when Selina, Countess of Huntingdon, asked the Duchess of Buckingham to accompany her to a seiTOon by Whitefield, the Duchess repHed that the doctrmes of the Methodist preachers were most repulsive and strongly tinged with impertinence and disrespect toward their su- periors. "It is monstrous to be told," she wrote, "that you have a heart as simple as the common wretches that crawl on the earth; and I cannot but wonder that your Ladyship should rehsh any sentiments so much at variance with high rank and good breeding." It must be admitted that some of the Korean traits which impress the superficial observer are far from agree- able. The people appear, at first glance, to be the least attractive of the peoples of Asia. They lack the energy and ambition of the Japanese, the thrift, industry, and strength of the Chinese. The visitor usually comes from Japan, and the contrast is painful. The villages are squahd collections of mushroom hovels. The streets are crooked alleys, and their lounging denizens are apparently most unpromising material. Indolence is a national character- istic. The Korean is content to take life as easily as pos- sible. He is never so happy as when he is supported by some wealthier relation or has some government office which relieves him from the necessity of labor. Public sentiment does not regard dependence as in any way un- manly, and every Korean of substance or position is sm*- rounded by a swarm of parasites. Filthy is not a pleasant word, but one must use it in re- ferring to the personal habits of the Koreans. The higher classes and the mission converts are notably clean, but the common people are unspeakably dirty. They know noth- ing of sanitation and care less. When free to do as they please, they throw garbage and offal on the ground, and leave it to breed every kind of zymotic abomination , They cast all slops into an open trench beside their huts. The trench ends a few yards from the house, and the filth seeps into the soil, often near the wells from which the drinking- water is drawn. Open ditches along the sides of the streets THE KOREAN PEOPLE 47 become choked with refuse and form pools of filth, in which mangy, quarrelling dogs prowl for refuse, and the scavenger hog wallows in a way that enables one to understand why the Mosaic law forbade the eating of pork. In the hot, wet months of July and August, a Korean city becomes a steaming cesspool of malodorous slime. The Korean does not have a nice taste regarding his food, and the foreigner will do well to avoid meat unless he has personally seen the animal killed. Koreans, like Chi- nese, seldom feel that they can afford to kill a useful cow or bullock, and the meat that is exposed for sale is ordi- narily that of some animal which has died of disease or old age. One is reminded of the old woman who was frying pork when a neighbor dropped in for a chat. "Grand bacon, that," said the friend, sniffing affably. "Grand bacon ? Well, I guess it is grand bacon," said the old lady, turning the slices in the pan. "An' it's none o' yer mur- dered stuff, nuther; that pig died a natural death." After a residence of fifteen years in Korea Mrs. H. G. Underwood wrote: "Every imaginable practice which comes under the definition of unhygienic or unsanitary is common. Even young children in arms eat raw and green cucumbers, un- peeled, acrid berries, and heavy, soggy, hot bread. They bolt quantities of hot or cold rice, with a tough, indigestible cabbage washed in ditch-water, prepared with turnips and flavored with salt and red pepper. Green fruit of every kind is eaten with perfect recklessness of all the laws of nature, and with an impunity which makes a Westerner stand aghast. But even these, so to speak, galvanized-iron interiors are not always proof. Every five or six years a bacillus develops itself, so hardened, so well-armed, so deeply toxic, that even Koreans must succumb, and then there is an epidemic of cholera."^ The Japanese have energetically grappled with the problem of sanitation and have made marked improvements, particularly in the capi- tal; but it will be a long time before the peasant Korean will be decently clean except imder compulsion. ^ Fifteen Years Among the Top-Knots, pp. 133-134. 48 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST But there is another side to this picture. While it must be conceded that the Koreans lack the energy and ambi- tion of the Japanese, and the industry and persistence of the Chinese, one should remember that for centuries their position has been unfavorable to the development of strength of character, A comparatively small nation, heromed in between warlike Japan on one side and mighty China on the other, the Land of the Morning Calm was doomed from the outset to be a tributary state, and its people long ago helplessly acquiesced in the inevitable. They had become so accustomed to being pulled and hauled by contending masters and to being impoverished and maltreated by their own magistrates that they came to accept subjugation and poverty as the natural concomi- tants of life. With no prospect of independence as a nation, their ruling classes gave themselves up to self-indulgence and dissipation. It is not siuprising, therefore, that the superior power of neighboring nations taught the Koreans dependence; that the exactions of tax-gatherers fostered deceit; that the certainty that the results of toil could not be enjoyed begat indolence; and that the denial of rights that any one was boimd to recognize generated despair. The poverty of the people was bitter, and the introduc- tion of foreign goods made it worse for a time. Koreans formerly grew their own cotton and wove on hand-looms the cloth for the ubiquitous white flowing garment of the common people, while the silk worn by the better classes was also produced at home. Then English cotton and Japanese silk were poured into the country, and the indolent people found it easier to buy them than to make their own. In like manner they bought foreign lamps, pipes, tobacco, and many of the utensils which they once made for them- selves. They had little to export to balance these imports. Some rice and beans went to Japan, but not enough to be an important factor in the economic situation. Concessions for the mines and forests were granted by the old Emperor to foreign companies, and the price of the concession was squandered by corrupt officials, so that the people derived THE KOREAN PEOPLE 49 no benefit. Thus Korea was drained of her money. It was all outgo and no income. Debt not infrequently ended in slaveiy, as the debtor could find no way to meet his obUgation except to sell him- self to his creditor. Apart from such cases, slaveiy could hardly be said to exist. It is true that children were occa- sionally sold by their parents in time of famine, that the family of a decapitated criminal might become the slaves of the judge, and that a few were born in slavery. But the number of slaves was small. Serfdom, however, existed for centuries. It was at its height during the old feudal days; and imtil recently serfs were still to be found on the estates of the great nobles. The condition of multitudes of the common people, however, was so abject that their lot could hardly be worse if they had been serfs. The general poverty appears in the architecture. It fol- lows Chinese lines m the more pretentious buildings, like the royal palaces and the yamens of the governors and magis- trates. But, however wonderful they may be in the eyes of a Korean, to a foreigner they are humble enough. A coimtry merchant in America lives in a better house than the Emperor of Korea occupied, and thousands of stables in the United States are more attractive than the official residence of a provincial governor. The buildings are not only plain, but usually dilapidated. It seldom occurs to a Korean to make repairs, and even in palaces and temples one sees crumbling walls and dirty courtyards. The houses are of one story. The typical house of the common people is a rude but strong framework of crooked poles, woven together with miUet-stalks or brush, fastened with straw ropes, and plastered with mud. The roofs in cities are covered with ponderous tiles, but in the villages they are thatched with rice straw. The interiors are gloomy and unwholesome, the windows, if there are any, being small and covered with a tough oiled paper, which admits a dim Kght but no air. The doors are so low that the American bumps his head at every entrance unless he keeps his wits about him. The floor is usually of flat stones covered with 50 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST a rough cement, on which He a few mats which are often aUve with vermin. The fire is built outside of the house and the flues run under the earthen floor. In this way the fire for cooking also serves to heat the room. As it is usually kept going in the summer to cook the rice and beans for the family food, the interior becomes like an oven. An inn is simply a larger house, and as there are no beds in Korea, the unhappy traveller who has not brought a cot with him must sleep, as the natives do, upon the floor. Half-boiled by the heat, assailed by the swarming vermin, and disturbed by barking dogs and squealing ponies in the adjoining courtyard, he is apt to feel in troubled dreams that he is lying on a hot stove amid jeering, biting demons. However, this arrangement serves the important purpose of keeping Korean houses free from dampness. The poorer ones have only two rooms, but the houses of the middle classes contain from three to six, while all gentlemen who are able to afford it have in addition a sarang, a kind of reception-room, which is used by the men, and where guests are entertained. The part of the house which is occupied by the women is called the anpang, and no men, except members of the' family, are ever admitted. There are, of course, some houses that are roomier, but as a rule the well-to-do Korean does not build a higher house, but sim- ply adds other rooms and courtyards, and perhaps puts on a tile roof. Rich or poor, he shuts his house from public view, by a wall if he can afford one, otherwise by a screen of bamboo or millet stalks. Hunger does not go hand in hand with poverty as it does in China and India. The food is coarse, but such as it is there is enough, save in exceptional times and places. The Korean coolie is a voracious eater, consuming great quantities of rice and beans, and more meat than either the Chinese or the Japanese. Like the latter, he is fond of raw fish, intestines and all, and he does not disdain dogs, which are freely eaten by the common people. Every traveller bears witness to the disposition of the Koreans to gorge themselves. I mai'velled at the enormous dishes of THE KOREAN PEOPLE 51 rice and beans and vegetables that my chair-carriers ate at our noon-day stops. When fruit, radishes, or cucumbers were to be had, one Korean would devour as many as sev- eral foreigners. Even babies, at an age when an American mother would allow her child to have nothing but milk, are crammed with rice, and after a child will not eat any more, the mother stuffs additional rice into its mouth until it is impossible to cram in any more. The major vices, while common, are not so conspicuous as in many other countries. Gambling exists, but is not a distinctive vice as in Siam and China. There is a good deal of immorality, particularly among the yangbans, who usually keep as many concubines and dancing-girls as they can afford. But before the Japanese occupation, outward signs of impurity were not nearly so much in evidence as in other Asiatic countries. Saloons are not numerous, save in the capital and the treaty ports, where they are largely patronized by foreigners. I saw very few intoxicated Koreans anywhere. But it would be misleading to infer temperance from the comparative absence of drunken men in public places, for the Korean drinks in his own home, especially at night, where, if he gets drunk, other people are not apt to see him. He makes various kinds of liquors, both fermented and distilled, from his native grains, and he often drinks to excess. Rice-whiskey is consumed in large quantities and is an inseparable concomitant of feasts and social gatherings of all kinds. It is not pleasant to know that contact with the outside world is aggravating the vice of intemperance in Korea. Koreans are learning to like foreign liquors better than their own raw spirits. Increasing quantities of gin and whiskey are being im- ported from Europe, and Japanese sake and beer are pour- ing in floods into the country. There is a good deal more to the Koreans than the cur- sory visitor reahzes. Physically, the average Korean is a robust man. He is not as tall as the European or the Chinese of the northern provinces, but he is larger than the Japanese. I was impressed by the strength and endurance 52 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST of the Korean porters. They were equipped with a wooden framework called a "jickie." It roughly resembles a chair upside down, and is held on the back by straps or ropes which pass over the shoulders and under the arms. A porter stooped while over two himdred pounds of luggage was piled into his jickie, when he rose with comparatively little effort and jogged along from the station in Seoul to the house, more than a mile away, at which we were to be entertained. I walked briskly myself and had nothing to carry, but the trimks were at the house within five minutes after our arrival, the charge being fifteen sen each (about seven and a half cents). These men live on a diet of rice and beans, with a few other vegetables and an occasional fish. But the muscles of their legs and arms are mighty bulging knots as hard as whip-cords. A significant fact is that with the adoption of foreign dress it is very difficult to tell Koreans and Japanese apart, except by the language. The former dissimilarity in appear- ance now proves to have been in the topknot, the horse- hair hat, and the flowing white garment. Many Koreans in the rural districts still adhere to their traditional garb, but increasing numbers in the cities are cutting their hair Japa- nese fashion and wearing the same style of clothing as their conquerors. To test the matter, I repeatedly asked old resi- dents in Seoul to tell me whether men whom we met on the streets were Koreans or Japanese, and they could sel- dom do so without inquiring. The Korean's personal courage is good, as he repeatedly showed in his former wars with the Japanese, though his lack of organization and competent leadership and his ignorance of the weapons and methods of modern warfare make him helpless before the Japanese to-day. Nor are Koreans lacking mentally. Their poHtical help- lessness and their lack of initiative and ambition have given the world a wrong impression as to their real ability. They learn readily under favorable conditions and develop rapidly. Every delegate conceded that the best speech at the International Student Conference of 1907 in Tokyo THE KOREAN PEOPLE 53 was made by a Korean. He delivered it with splendid power in excellent English, and then, to the admiration of his audience, he delivered it again in Japanese. Korean children are remarkably bright scholars, as all missionary teachers testify. My long torn* of Asia enabled me to compare the average village Korean with the average vil- lage types of the Chinese, Japanese, Filipinos, Siamese, East Indians, and Syrians, and while the Koreans were more dirty and wretched than the other peoples, they impressed me as quite as capable of development as the typical Asiatic elsewhere, if conditions were equally favorable. Archibald Little, who saw many of the countries of Asia, not only wrote of the superior physique of the Koreans, but he de- clared that "in intelligence, where the opportunity of its development is afforded, they are not inferior to other races of Mongol type."^ Their ancient history is one of honorable achievement. Slothful and imambitious as they now appear to be, they formerly showed considerable inventive genius and the ability to produce many articles of utility and ornament. I have referred elsewhere to the testimony of Koradadbeh, the Arab geographer of the ninth centi^y, that in his time the Koreans made nails, rode on saddles, wore satin, and manufactured porcelain. Japanese records show that the Japanese themselves first learned from Koreans the culti- vation of the silkworm, the weaving of cloth, the principles of architecture, the printing of books, the painting of pic- tures, the beautifying of gardens, the making of leather harness, and the shaping of more effective weapons. Ko- reans learned some of these arts from the Chinese; but even so they showed their readiness to learn, while they themselves were the first makers of a number of important articles. Whereas the Chinese invented the art of printing from movable wooden blocks, the Koreans invented metal type in 1403. They used a phonetic alphabet in the early part of the fifteenth century. They saw the significance of the mariner's compass in 1525. They devised, in 1550, 1 The Far East, p. 247. 54 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST an astronomical instrument which they very properly called "a heavenly measm-er." Money was used as a medium of exchange in Korea long before it was employed in northern Em*ope. They used cannon and explosive shells in attack- ing the invading Japanese in 1592. The first iron-clad warship in the world was invented by a Korean, Admiral Yi Sun-siu, in the sixteenth century. He called it The Tortoise Boat, and he commanded it with such effectiveness against the Japanese that it was largely instrumental in defeating the fleet of Hideyoshi. Korean paper has long been prized in the Far East. It is made from various ma- terials — ^rags, hemp, cotton, rice-stalks, and the inner bark of the mulberry-tree. When soaked in oil of sesame, it becomes strong, tough, and water-proof. It is made of any desired thickness and can be washed without injury. It is used for a variety of piuposes — laid upon the floor, hung upon walls and ceilings, and pasted over the latticed win- dows in place of glass. Dozens of articles are made of it — kites, lanterns, fans, umbrellas, hats, shoes, clothes-chests, tobacco-pouches, toys, rain-coats, water-proof covering for provisions, etc. The Koreans of to-day have not improved upon the in- ventions of their ancestors, and appear to have deteriorated rather than advanced; but this deterioration has been largely due to conditions which can be remedied, and as a matter of fact are now being remedied. A people that showed such intelHgence once can probably, under more favorable conditions, show equal alertness again. While the Japanese proved themselves to be the stronger in war, they were deeply influenced by the Koreans in re- ligion and the arts of peace. Korea gave Buddhism to Japan in 552 A. D. Some years ago a Japanese editor called the attention of his readers to two cases of beautiful early Korean pottery which had just been placed on ex- hibition in the Japanese department of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and whose equal, he declared, had probably never been seen in America before. A few pieces of this kind had been shown before in the Morse, Macom- THE KOREAN PEOPLE 55 ber, and Ross collections of the museum, but nothing so complete or so representative as these choice examples had been on view. This pottery is highly valued by Japanese collectors, who eagerly buy the few specimens that can now be found by diligent searching. '^ The Koreans of to-day are adepts in making pottery which, though far less beautiful than that now made in Japan and China, is well adapted to household uses. Jars of immense size are made for stor- ing water and grain, and smaller ones are used for scores of practical pxuposes, and for ornamental objects. Many people praise the Japanese for their exquisite Satsuma ware without knowing that the Koreans long ago taught the Japanese the art of its manufacture. After a seventh-century war between China and Japan, fought as usual in Korea and in which the Chinese were victorious, 2,400 Koreans preferred to follow the defeated Japanese to Japan rather than remain in Korea as subjects of China. They settled permanently in Japan, established potteries and taught pottery-making to the Japanese. This was the beginning of that industry in Japan for which the Japanese are now so famous. Other colonies of Korean emigrants followed from time to time until tens of thousands had come, bringing with them a civilization considerably higher than Japan then had, intermarrying with the islanders and introducing important elements into Japanese life. In spite of the apathetic conservatism of Korea, the people have welcomed foreign foods with avidity. It is not surprising that tobacco, which was introduced by the Japanese in 1614 or 1615, soon became a universal habit, not only aU the men but most of the women and children using the weed. But the people were not slow to recognize the value of more useful things. Cotton cloth was appre- ciated centuries ago. The rich had worn silks and furs, and the poorer classes a coarse cloth rudely woven from hemp, sea-grass, or plaited straw. For a long time the Koreans were unable to secure the seeds of the cotton-plant. There is a tradition that the Chinese had jealously guarded ^ The Oriental Review, Dec,, 1911. 56 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST them in order that they might control the trade, but that a member of one of the Korean tribute embassies had man- aged to smuggle a few seeds out of the country hidden in the quill of a feather in his hat. Cultivation of cotton did not become common until the Japanese had made the use of the cloth familiar at the time of their invasions in the latter part of the sixteenth century. Then the growing of cotton and the manufacture of cloth rapidly increased. Kerosene-oil was also instantly appreciated, and large quan- tities are now imported. This illuminant has made a great change in Korean life, since it has made possible ways of spending the evening that were out of the question when the only illuminant was smoky fish-oil. With kerosene-oil has come the Japanese match, which can now be found in the remotest hamlets. The Korean has shown that when he is fairly paid and well treated he can work faithfully and intelligently. This is the testimony of men who have had fair opportunity to judge. A missionary wrote to several American gentlemen who were superintending large enterprises in the country, and asked them to state their experience with the Koreans in their employ. The repHes, which are in my possession, are unanimously and emphatically in accord with the opinion of Mr. Thomas W. Van Ess, auditor of the 0. C. Mining Company, who wrote: "I have had Koreans work- ing under me for thirteen years. I have always found them diligent, good workers and very quick to learn, and in my opinion, taking them as a whole, much easier to teach than the other Oriental races with which I have also had many years' experience. The company employs on the concession about 5,000 Koreans, and the heads of the different departments can all produce dozens of natives who are now experts at their various duties, which include work as miners, timbermen, hoist and stationary engineers, machinists, blacksmiths, carpenters, electricians, assayers, millmen, hospital assistants, etc. All that is necessary to bring out the splendid capabiHties of the Korean is a prac- tical education." THE KOREAN PEOPLE 57 One of the mining superintendents wrote that in an acci- dent which filled a shaft with gas, the foreman, a Norwegian, became unconscious on the third level, and that, after many of the Americans were overcome in the effort to save him, the Korean miners begged the others not to go in but to leave the rescue to them and they would get him out; and get him out they did, but too late to save his life. "These Korean miners risked their lives to save Noren, who lost his life trjong to save their people. It was a splendid ex- hibition of manhood by three nationahties — American, Norwegian, and Korean — and the Korean held his own with the others." It is significant that many of the Koreans who have emigrated to Manchm-ia have quickly become industrious and capable men. This emigration began many years ago, but for a long period it was confined to comparatively few people near the border, some of whom had special reasons for getting out of Korea. More substantial emigration began during the famine of 1863, which led larger numbers of hungry Koreans to seek the more fertile lands of Man- churia. The rule of the Russians, prior to their expulsion from Manchuria, was far from ideal, but there was a better enforcement of law than in Korea, and a greater security of life and property. Under these improved conditions these famine refugees became comparatively thrifty and prosperous. Since the Japanese occupation this emigra- tion has become considerable, until there are now said to be more than 300,000 Koreans in Manchuria. Many of them have become well-to-do farmers and small tradesmen and have shown energy and self-reliance in adapting them- selves to the new conditions. Mr. J. Bryner, the Dutch Consul at Vladivostok, declared some years ago that Vladivostok "owed much to the industry of the Chinese and Koreans," and that "many of them are now quite wealthy and have had a university education, while the ladies may be observed in ballrooms or in any pubUc assem- blage exquisitely attired in the latest Paris fashions, and wearing them as to the manner born."^ I suspect that the 1 Quoted in the Seoul Press, February 11, 1912. 58 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Paris gowns were on the Chinese women, but the fact that Mr. Bryner included the Korean in his tribute to the in- dustry and prosperity of the city's Asiatic population in- dicates that he deemed them also worthy of respect. Courtesy of manner and kindliness of disposition are at- tractive qualities which many Koreans possess to a high degree. It is true that punishments were brutal and that indifference to suffering was callous; but this is true of Asiatics generally. Indeed a sensitive regard for the pains of others is a recent development in the white man. Stocks, whipping-posts, foul dungeons, debtors' prisons, and tor- turing to extort confession survived in England and America till well into the last century, and the notorious "third degree," to which suspected men are still subjected by the police of New York, Chicago, and other cities, causes a mental torture which is almost as bad as the rack and thumb-screw of the Middle Ages. Koreans are far more considerate and helpful to one another than Chinese. The unfortunate man in China is often left to bear his adversity alone. " Men are cheap, a few more or less are of no con- sequence," a Chinese indifferently repHed to an indignant protest against leaving the occupants of a capsized boat to drown. But the Korean is sympathetic, promptly goes to the rescue of an imperilled man, helps a neighbor whose home has been burned, and, however poor he may be him- seK, freely offers hospitality even to passing strangers. There is none of the prejudice against white men which was long so marked in China and Japan. It is true that only a generation ago (1866) there was a furious anti- foreign outbreak in which 9 French priests and about 20,000 Roman Catholic Christians are said to have been killed; but overt dislike of foreigners is now confined to a few officials and old Confucian scholars. There was a temporary commotion when it was discovered that on November 20, 1900, a secret edict had been issued ordering an uprising against foreigners on the 6th of December. Even in the most peaceable of civilized lands there are law- less characters who are always ready for violence. Ameri- THE KOREAN PEOPLE 59 cans who recall the readiness with which a mob forms in their own cities will miderstand how easily trouble might have followed such an edict in Korea. But the alert Ameri- can Minister, the Honorable Horace N. Allen, took such prompt and decisive measures that the plot was a fiasco. For a time the situation was strained, especially in the south, where Japan was suspected of inciting sedition as an excuse for landing more troops to protect her interests, especially the telegraph-line and the projected railway to Seoul. But the alarm quickly subsided. Mr. W. H. Grifiin, a mining engineer, who was badly beaten and robbed of one thousand dollars and most of his personal effects by nine Koreans in March, 1909, may be pardoned for doubting the peace- ableness of Koreans; but robbers are not peculiar to Korea, and a man who is known to be carrying such a sum would not be safe in many parts of Europe and America. The normal experience of a foreign traveller is one of marked kindliness and consideration. The best that the people have is promptly and gladly placed at his disposal. A mis- sionary writes that when foreign ladies arrive at night at an inn, the guests who are occupying the one small private room will invariably vacate and go to the common room, crowded with fifteen or twenty bad-smelling horsemen and cooHes. They almost always do this for a foreign man, and they accept his proffered apologies with the reply: "Are you not the American guest?" We had some opportunity to test this disposition of the people, for in our journey through the interior we passed through scores of villages far from the beaten track of travel, ate in native huts and slept in native iims, with our luggage and suppHes piled in the open courtyards. The people manifested great curiosity, following us in crowds through the streets, forming a solid wall of humanity about us at every stop, and peering at us through every door, window, and crevice. But not once was the sHghtest insolence shown, and not a penny's worth was stolen. Ever5^here we were treated respectfully and with a kindly hospitality which quite won our hearts. The best that a village af- 60 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST forded was gladly placed at our disposal, and while prices were never excessive, in several places the people refused to receive any compensation. We usually sent word ahead, so that accommodations might be ready for us, and when- ever we did so, groups of people would walk out several mUes to meet us, sometimes in a heavy rain. The invariable salutation was a smiling inquiry: "Have you come in peace?" And when we left, the people would escort us some distance on our way, and then poHtely bid us good-by in the words: "May you go in the peace of God !" These were usually Christians, but we saw multitudes who were not, and while the non-Christians were noticeably more unkempt than the Christians, they, too, were invariably kind and respectful. He must be a hard-hearted man who could move among such a people without feeling himself drawn to them in kindly ways. That Koreans are patient may not be wholly to their credit, as there are limits to that virtue, especially when, as in Korea, it degenerates into apathy. But not all of the Koreans have been meekly acquiescent. A sense of in- justice will occasionally goad even apathetic people to deeds of unreasoning fury; and when they once begin to "run amuck," they are not apt to distinguish between friend and foe. Because the Roman CathoHc priests of Quelpart allowed some of their converts to serve as collectors of in- creased taxes about a couple of decades ago, the populace arose in a frenzy and murdered a large part of the Chris- tian community. Drought sometimes increases the general unrest, and the desire of foreign nations to find excuse for interference was long a fruitful source of trouble, as secret emissaries did not always hesitate to foment disturbances. The recklessness of despair found expression in the no- torious Tong-hak Society. Some of the members of this society were mere robbers; but many were men who had been goaded to desperation by wrong and oppression, and who had determined to struggle for better conditions at any cost to themselves. The movement made trouble in 1893. It began, like the Tai-ping Rebellion in China, as THE KOREAN PEOPLE 61 a religious reformation. Its founder, Choi Chei Ou, who had seen something of the Roman CathoHc missionaries and had vaguely discerned some of their teachings, alleged that he had a vision in 1859 at his home in Kyeng-chu, in southern Korea. He forthwith proclaimed a new faith which was to include the best elements of Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Romanism, and which he called Tong-hak, or Eastern Learning. Followers multipHed. Loyal at first to the dynasty, the hostility of the government and the sorrows of the people developed the Tong-haks, like the Tai-pings in China, into revolutionaries. Con- vinced that foreign influences were imdermining the ancient institutions of the country and arousing the anger of the gods, the Tong-haks were avowedly anti-foreign. They strenuously urged the preservation of the old ways, and presented appeals to the throne calling for the extermina- tion of foreign traders, the severing of all relations with other nations, and the prohibition of alien religions. The movement quickly became a menacing one, and for a time there was considerable alarm, not only at the court, but among foreigners. But after some bloody fights the ring- leaders were arrested and the danger passed. In 1894 the Tong-haks availed themselves of the strained relations between China and Japan to make a fresh outbreak. They murdered a French missionary, plundered Roman Catholic villages, burned their houses, and started a revolutionary propaganda which assumed formidable proportions and helped to precipitate the China-Japan War. The society was conquered, but not subdued. It continued to exist with secret members in various parts of the country. Ad- vantage was taken of every opportunity to stir up trouble, and from time to time inflanunatory proclamations were issued. These proclamations usually stated in plain lan- guage the grievances of the people, arraigned the magis- trates as cruel and corrupt, and called for reforms in every department of the government. The Boxer uprising of 1900 in China gave new hope to the Tong-haks, and they did their utmost to stir up a 62 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST similar uprising in Korea. The following year they again fomented discord, and might have succeeded in seriously endangering the foreigners in Korea if the American Min- ister, Doctor Allen, had not gained timely knowledge of the plot and taken energetic measures to thwart it. The year 1904 was anticipated with some apprehension because one of the ancient sages had prophesied that it would be a year of crisis in Korea. The hostilities between Russia and Japan were hailed as a fulfilment of this prophecy. The Tong-haks and the Russians were beHeved to be in secret alliance, and there were uncanny rumors of a general mas- sacre. The swift and decisive expulsion of the Russians by the Japanese prevented trouble; but the Tong-haks became the rallying-point of the Koreans who hated the Japanese and of the restless elements which war always multiplies, and they began a guerilla warfare which gave the Japanese no small annoyance before it was finally stamped out. One cannot sympathize with lawlessness, but there was much in the Tong-hak movement to stir the interest of thoughtful men. With all its errors, it represented the groping of patriotic men after better things. It is true that many were fanatics, blinded by prejudice and passion, and that they were joined by vicious men who sought only plunder and rapine. Desperate men are not apt to be wise and gentle, and revolutionary movements have always attracted the outlaws of society. If David's cave of Adul- 1am became a refuge for "every one that was in distress, and every one that was in debt, and every one that was dis- contented," it is small wonder that the Tong-haks were reinforced from the same classes. The history of this Korean struggle is stained with plots and conflagrations and pillagings, in which the innocent often suffered with the guilty; but some day a poet may arise who will have the largeness of heart and the clearness of vision to discern the pathos and the tragedy of obscure, ignorant, poverty- stricken men, fighting lonely battles against insurmountable odds, without the inspiration of the world's recognition, THE KOREAN PEOPLE 63 and leaving their bones to the dreaded Oriental calamity of unburied neglect, because in a crude way they believed that justice and patriotism demanded the sacrifice. It is easy to pick out the defects of any people and, by concentrating attention upon them, create an unfavorable impression of their worth. But Americans do not like to be judged by the worst elements of their society, or by the folHes of those who should know better. The annals of Korea contain no more savage atrocity than the burning of negroes at the stake, which occurred twice in the United States within the months that these pages were written. The sorrowful conditions in Korea have been largely due to injustice, oppression, and superstition. With good gov- ernment, a fair chance, and a Christian basis of morals, I believe that the Koreans would develop into a fine people. CHAPTER IV KOREAN CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE The manners and customs of a people are always an in- teresting study. They not only have the charm of novelty, and perhaps oddity, to a foreign observer, but they often afford a clew to historical relationships or to characteristics of temperament or environment. Take, for example, the dress of the Koreans. It is at once distinctive, no matter how many other nationalities may be represented about him. The fashion came from China many centuries ago. The Chinese long since modi- fied their garb to suit their own tastes and those of their Manchu rulers; but the Korean dresses to-day as the Chinese did a thousand years ago. The outer clothing of the man consists of loose trousers and a flowing tunic of ample length and fulness. Gradations of rank are indi- cated by the color and material. Only officials may wear blue. If they are of low grade the material must be cotton, but above the third rank it may be silk. With the excep- tion of officials, the entire nation wears white, which is the color for mourning, a decidedly more sensible and artistic one than the sombre black of Western peoples. Custom requires that this mourning color shall be worn for three years after the death of a relative, and that when a king dies the whole nation shall be arrayed in white for a year. As some member of a large family circle is quite apt to die in three years, particularly in times of pestilence, and as three kings died in a single decade, the people came to the conclusion that it was easier and cheaper to wear white all the time than to buy special mourning clothes so often. A city street filled with these leisurely moving, white-robed figures, and a Sunday congregation arrayed in spotless white are picturesque to a high degree. 64 CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 65 The washing of these garments is the bane of the Korean wife. She takes them to pieces every time, pounds or thrashes them on stones by the riverside, spreads them out in the sun to dry, and "irons" by beating them with sticks in her house. The monotonous rat-tat-tat of these sticks can be heard at all hours of the day and night. They are among the first things that the visitor hears when he enters a village and the last when he leaves it, so that he wonders whether the Korean woman ever sleeps. Such methods of launder- ing are rather hard on the clothes; but when they survive, they come forth with a soft gloss which makes the proud husband a strikingly attractive figure. Unfortunately white is attractive only when it is clean, and perhaps one reason why the average Korean impresses one as the most untidy man in Asia is because his white clothing makes conspicuous a dirt which the Chinese dark-blue cloth does not so readily show. The shoe is not so distinctive — a, coarse sandal of twisted rice straw for the poor, and Chinese footwear for those who are able to afford it. The hat is more unique. It has a broad brim, a small round crown considerably too small for the head, and it is tied under the chin. Some of the poorest people wear hats made of spHt bamboo, but every Korean covets a tile of silk thread or horsehair. A boy engaged to be married wears a white hat of a special shape, but the hats of men are black. From a foreign view-point the hat is absurdly unbecoming, but the Korean highly prizes it, and often pays for it a sum which he can ill afford. But while the foreigner smiles at this grotesque head cover- ing, I fear that even the Korean's habitual courtesy would be severely strained if he could see some of the monstrosi- ties with which the women of New York "adorn" their heads. The method of dressing the hair was, however, the most distinctive feature of a Korean of the old regime. He wore it parted in the middle and hanging in a long braid until he was betrothed, when he was invested with the far-famed topknot. This investiture was an important event in the 66 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST life of a Korean. There was an elaborate ceremony in the presence of a large gathering of friends, and the clothing and the hat provided for the candidate were as costly as the means of the family permitted. The youth was seated with his face toward the point of the compass which the geomancer had indicated as lucky. The master of cere- monies then solemnly unwound the boyish plait, shaved a spot about three inches in diameter on the top of the head, and pulled the hair tightly about it into a topknot about three inches in height, and an inch and a half in diameter. A cap was placed upon the head and closely tied, and above all was placed a new hat. The candidate was now supposed to have passed from youth to manhood, and "the man," although still at the age that we would call boyish, ceremoniously bowed to all his relations, be- ginning with the eldest, and offered solemn sacrifices to his deceased ancestors. A feast followed and formal calls were made upon friends of the family. The cost of this ceremony, with its feasting and supplies of new clothing and the attendant expenses, was often so great as to involve a family in debt for years. In old Korea, the topknot was as characteristic as the queue in China, and far more significant, for it originated, not as a badge of submission to a conqueror, but as an ex- pression of the people's ancient and venerated beliefs. The tenacity with which the Koreans cling to their ancient customs was illustrated when the Japanese, after their occupation of the country in the war with Russia, undertook to make certain reforms. In spite of the fact that they were Orientals themselves and therefore supposed to know something of the power of Asiatic customs, they were ap- parently of the opinion that they could reform Korea out of hand. The Koreans sullenly listened to orders to shorten and narrow their capacious sleeves, wear coats of a certain color, make hat-brims of prescribed width, and, in the case of women, to uncover their faces when on the streets. But the limit of self-control was passed when the subser- vient acting home Minister of the Korean Government CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 67 commanded the cutting of the topknot — the sign and seal of old Korea, the hall-mark of Korean nationality, and the embodiment of Korean traditions and pride of race. The excitement and consternation were miparalleled. The Koreans submitted with little or no protest to many other changes that would have aroused an Anglo-Saxon people, but when their sacred topknot was touched the anger of this peaceable race flamed up. "Tender associations of early manhood, honored family traditions, ghostly super- stition, the anger and disgust of ancestral spirits, the iron grip of long custom, the loathing of the effeminate, sensual, and despised Buddhist priests, all forbade this desecration. Their pride, self-respect, and dignity were all assailed and crushed under foot. Sullen, angry faces were seen every- where, sounds of wailing and woe were heard continually in every house, for the women took it even harder than the men. Farmers and carriers of food and fuel refused to bring their produce to market, for guards stood at the gates and cut off with their swords every topknot as it came through." ^ The capital began to suffer for want of suppHes. Business was paralyzed. The Japanese regime was brief, and the order was soon rescinded, but not before it had been demon- strated that it is a serious matter to tamper with a Korean topknot. When the Japanese regained control after the Russia- Japan War, they renewed their efforts to abolish the top- knot. They were too discreet this time to issue an order, but they succeeded in "persuading" the new Emperor, the Crown Prince, and several members of the court to cut off their topknots at the time of the coronation, August 27, 1907; and under royal example and the known wishes of their new rulers, the days of this notable native custom are passing with the bound feet of Chinese women. At the time of my first visit to Korea, in 1901, I did not see a single Korean without a topknot. During my second visit, in 1909, I saw hundreds of men and boys who had cut their hair in the pompadour fashion of the Japanese. 1 Mrs. Underwood, Fifteen Years Among the Top-Knots, 167-168. 68 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST To-day the Christians, the boys in the mission schools, and most of the people in the cities have adopted the modem style and the topknot is rapidly becoming excep- tional. The disappearance of this venerable symbol is significant, for it testifies, more eloquently perhaps than anjrthing else could do, to the passing of ancient Korea and the dawning of a new era. There is probably no other country in the world where niceties of etiquette are more rigidly followed, or where they signify so much. The foreign visitor who calls to pay his respects to the local magistrate may flatter himself that he is being received with every mark of distinction, while the Korean attendants are chuckling beneath their impassive exteriors over the indignities that are being heaped upon him. For example, if the magistrate has high regard for his visitor, he will meet him at the outer gate of the yamen; if he wishes to pay him only ordinary courtesy, he will meet him outside of the middle gate; if he cares little about him, he will meet him inside the middle gate; if he deems him an inferior, he will greet him on the piazza; and if he despises him, he will await him in his audience-chamber. The location of the chair which the caller is to occupy is also significant. If the Korean feels that his visitor is of equal rank, the chair is so placed that the caller will face the east; if he regards him as a subordinate, he wiU see that the caller faces the south; and if he has contempt for him, the caller will find his chair facing the north; the host all the time facing the west. In the conversation that ensues, the magistrate indicates his respect for his caller, or his lack of it, by the terminations of his words, which in- dicate varying degrees of esteem and the Korean's concep- tion of the standing of his guest. Etiquette dominates every occasion and period of life and reaches its climax in connection with death. The Korean Government issued an oflficial Guide to Mourners, which prescribed the necessary forms and ceremonies in minute detail. The body was to be carefully washed, and then laid out on a plank which had been painted with seven CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 69 stars. This was called "the star board/' and in popular speech was a symbol of death. Precise instructions were given regarding the size and thickness of the coffin, the way the body was to be placed in it, the decoration of the cham- ber in which the coffin was to lie, when and how the weeping must be done, and what clothing the mourner must wear as he entered the room for this purpose. The interval be- tween death and funeral was carefully determined in ac- cordance with the rank of the deceased. A common man might be interred in three days. The interval lengthened with the importance of the dead, until in the case of a mem- ber of the royal family it was nine months. The location of the grave must be determined with special care, and the site selected must, if possible, be on high ground command- ing a good view. For the funeral every act was minutely prescribed, and Dame Fashion in Europe and America is not half so particular in these matters as she is in Korea. The body is arrayed in red, blue, and yellow garments. The hour for the funeral is usually, though not always, at sunset, so that the colored lanterns used on such occasions can show off to better advantage. The bearers wear big yellow hats with garlands of flowers, which are blue and pink when they can be obtained. The chief mourner is clad in sackcloth, and is almost completely covered by a huge conical bamboo hat, which he is expected to wear for a considerable period after the funeral, three years for a father. The hat-brim droops so low that it completely conceals the head, because "heaven is angry with the mourner and does not wish to look upon his face." An- other mourner, from whose hat bits of colored ribbon are flying, walks backward ringing a bell and chanting a dirge. The coffin is borne on a platform under a cover supported by foiu- posts, and draped with curtains, which the Koreans fondly believe to be very handsome. The cover is usually surmounted by representations of birds, and streamers of brightly colored ribbons hang from the sides. Painted birds and dragons are apt to be in evidence, and a variety of musical instruments which can be heard afar. Thus 70 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the procession moves slowly on, the pall-bearers joining in a monotonous chant, and sometimes stopping or turning backward for a short distance to express their sorrowful reluctance that they must bear one whom they loved to the grave. Near the principal cities are extensive spaces devoted to graves. Koreans are more particular about their last resting-place than about the place where they spend their lives. They do not object to low, swampy ground for their hovels, and they huddle their houses together even when there is no apparent necessity for doing so. But when this poor man dies, he must have a well-kept grave on a hill- side commanding a fine view. Members of the royal family and other persons of high rank insist on generous spaces about their graves; and as kings and princes and nobles have been dying for centuries, vast areas about the capital are peopled by the dead. The grave of a noble is a high mound standing, if possible, in a horseshoe- shaped enclosure on a terraced hillside, and surrounded by a stone fence. A little altar and a lantern or two, also of stone, are in ^ont of the grave. The royal tombs are quite imposing. The mounds, altars, and lanterns are of larger size; a temple contains memorial tablets, stately pine-trees grow about them, and the avenues of approach are lined with grotesquely carved stone figures of warriors, priests, servants, and horses.^ The period of mourning is fixed by equally stringent rules. Even if a man is about to be married, when a death occurs in the family he must postpone his wedding for a period exactly commensiu-ate with the closeness of his re- lationship to the departed, that for a parent or a grand- parent being, as we have seen, three years. This is a griev- ous hardship in a countiy where a man, whatever his age, is treated as a boy and assigned to the lowest place until he has a wife, and where the postponement of his hopes, and especially if prolonged by other deaths, may seriously delay and perhaps altogether prevent the birth of sons who ^ Mrs. Isabella Bird Bishop, Korea and Her Neighbors, pp. 61-62. CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 71 can provide for his old age and reverence his departed spirit. In the Grammaire Coreenne a Korean is represented as be- wailing his hard lot as follows: "My parents, thinking of my marriage, had arranged my be- trothal; but some time before the preparations were concluded, my future grandfather died and it became necessary to wait three years. Hardly had I put off mourning, when I was called on to lament the death of my poor father. I was now compelled to wait still another three years. These three years finished, behold my mother-in-law, who was to be, died and three years passed away. Finally, I had the misfortune to lose my poor mother, which required me to wait again three years. And so, three times four — a dozen years — ^have elapsed, during which we have waited the one for the other. By this time, she who was to be my wife fell ill. As she was upon the point of death, I went to make her a visit. My intended brother-in-law, came to see me, found me, and said: 'Although the ceremonies of marriage have not been made, they may certainly consider you as married, therefore come and see her.' Upon his invitation, I entered her house, but we had hardly blown a puff of smoke one before the other than she died. Seeing this, I have no more wished even to dream at night. I am not yet married. You may understand, then, why I have neither wife, children nor home." ^ Koreans are inveterate gossipers. The rural population is not scattered on farms as in England and America, but is segregated in hamlets for protection and companionship. Privacy is impossible in the lightly constructed houses closely huddled together, and the lack of any form of public amusement or recreation leaves little to occupy the mind except the daily chat and doings of neighbors. The larger towns have market-days once or twice a week, when the villagers throng in from all the adjacent hamlets, their bul- locks and ponies heavily loaded with produce. Shops are few and small, and fruit, grain, vegetables, utensils, clothing, and all sorts of merchandise are exposed on mats laid in the streets. The people squat about them and news flies easily from lip to lip. The day is spent in incessant bar- gaining and gossiping, the people from the country ex- changing their produce for all sorts of domestic and im- 1 Quoted by GriflGis in Korea the Hermit Nation, pp. 281-282. 72 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ported articles such as cotton cloth, wooden combs, pipes, tobacco, straw shoes, dried fish, matches, sugar, matting, etc. At all times Koreans are fond of visiting one an- other's houses, and are never so happy as when they are gathered in groups smoking and retailing the stories of the community. But is this not a village characteristic the world over? Is there an American hamlet in which the sayings and doings of every one are not recounted with gusto around half the firesides of the place? Korean gossip usually has the merit of good nature, at least, which is more than can be said of some Western gossip. There are times, however, when a dispute waxes hot and results in a Korean "fight." Voices become loud and angry. Speech grows bitter and filled with invective and expressions of contempt. Faces are contorted with pas- sion, eyes glare, and gesticulation is frantic. When the frenzied participants begin to leap up and down, tear their hair and foam at the mouth, the spectator from the West feels sure that gory murder is about to be committed. But the war is ordinarily one of words rather than deeds, and the fighters continue to hurl maledictions and curses at each other until they are so overcome by passion that they fall to the ground in the exhaustion of hysterical collapse. Such personal quarrels between neighbors do not mean that Koreans cannot fight in right good earnest against a com- mon enemy. Korea has seen many bloody battles, as we have noted in other pages; but common disputes are not so apt to issue in broken heads as they are in some other lands. Woman has a lower place in Korea than in China or Japan. She has less freedom and less influence. Parents choose her husband, all details are managed by "a go- between," and the bride is not supposed to see her husband until the wedding-day. After that he deems it beneath his dignity to converse with her or to ask her opinion about anything. Her function is merely to bear him the coveted sons and otherwise to keep out of sight as much as possible. There is no family life, as we understand the term. Re- Ph M CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 73 spectable women of any social standing are expected to seclude themselves in a separate part of the house. Until recently it was deemed a reproach for a woman over ten or twelve years of age to be seen by any man except her father or husband. She must not go upon the streets without special permission, and then only when heavily veiled, borne in a closed chair, and accompanied by suitable attendants. Women of the lower classes live like beasts of burden, and get considerably less care. Their lives are an imending drudgery. They toil not only in the house but in the fields. They are not deemed worthy of education. A Korean woman is not supposed to have any individuality of her own. The name given her at birth is used only in her own family. Outside of that she is known simply as the daughter or the sister or the mother of some man. As a wife her identity is lost in that of her husband. Even her parents cease to use the name which they gave her in infancy, and describe her by the name of the place where she is living. A husband may have as many concubines and dancing-girls as he pleases, but a wife must preserve her virtue. He may remarry as often as he likes if his first wife or wives die; but a widow is not supposed to re- marry, and if she does, she makes herself infamous, and her children by any subsequent marriage are regarded as illegitimate. "What is woman in Korea!" bitterly ex- claimed a woman to a missionary, who was urging her to send her daughter to school. "After the dogs and pigs were made, there was nothing left to be done, so woman was created — ^lowest of the low!" The Korean woman has, indeed, certain privileges, in theory. She is referred to with terminations that indicate respect. Men make way for her chair on the street. The part of the house which she occupies is regarded as sacred to her, and no right-minded Korean would think of tres- passing upon it. Even a criminal may not be sought for in a woman's room, and if a disgraced official should take refuge there, he could not be arrested unless he could be lured outside. To break into a woman's apartment is a 74 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST crime that is severely punished. When the missionaries first went to Korea, they found a quaint method of per- mitting women to go abroad without scandal. Instead of having a curfew for children, there was one for men. They were to be in the house by nine o'clock so that their wives and daughters could promenade the streets without reproach. If a man had to be out after that hour and met a woman, he was expected to shield his face with a fan and hasten from her. To touch her or even speak to her in such circumstances was a punishable offense. These customs belonged to the Korea which is now rapidly passing away. The lady of to-day does not find the streets reserved for her use after nine o'clock, nor is she treated with special respect, except where Christian teach- ing has improved her status. She is still a pathetic figure, ignorant, superstitious, and old and withered at forty. One cannot leave this subject without some reference to the gesang, the singing and dancing girls who occupy about the same place in society as the geishas of Japan. Some were kept by the government and court ministers, and were supported out of the pubhc treasury. There were usually about seventy-five connected with the palace in Seoul, and most officials and wealthy men maintained a number, or employed them for special occasions. They are trained from childhood for their careers and are taught many ac- complishments which are denied to other girls. As they are not secluded like other women, they are more in evi- dence, and the greater freedom of movement which they are permitted has given them an ease of manner in sharp contrast with the timidity and even awkwardness of the average Korean woman. Their singing and dancing are features of most entertainments. The moral reputation of the gesang is bad. In spite of their popularity with officials, the prominence they are given at entertainments, and the presents and fine dresses which they receive, no Korean would think of marrying one. In Japan a geisha occasionally becomes the wife of a man of good position, but there is no such possibility in the life of a Korean CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 75 gesang. She is simply the plaything of men, a pitiful little figure to amuse him for a fleeting time and then to be cast out to die in neglect and abuse. The language of Korea differs from both the Chinese and the Japanese, although it is more closely related to the former than to the latter, for Korean learning originally came from China. The character used in the written lan- guage is the Chinese, and Chinese words are largely employed in the conversation and hterary essays of the higher classes. The pronunciation is quite different from that heard in China and the characters themselves have undergone some modifications. A different alphabet called the Un-mun is in use among the common people who can read and write. It consists of twenty-five characters, and is simplicity it- self compared with the Chinese hieroglyphics. It is be- lieved to have originated with a Buddhist priest named Syel Chong, in the year 1446. It was regarded with con- tempt until the missionaries, finding that it was better adapted to their use than the cumbersome Chinese char- acters, and more easily taught to the illiterate people, issued many of their books and tracts in it. They trans- lated the New Testament, prepared grammars and dic- tionaries, and were rapidly rehabilitating the Un-mun in some such way as Wyclif 's translation of the Bible inaugu- rated a new era for English. In 1895, the official Gazette^ which hitherto had been printed only in Chinese characters, adopted a combination of the Un-mun and the Chinese, and for some time before the Japanese occupation all public edicts were in the Un-mun as well as in the Chinese character. The Korean language is a very difficult one for a for- eigner to acquire, partly because of this division into a sort of Koreanized Chinese and a vernacular Un-mun, and partly because each tongue presents formidable obstacles to the ears and vocal organs of a foreigner. The meaning of a given word is largely determined by inflection and termination, with divisions and subdivisions that are dis- tracting to the learner. 76 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The literature of Korea is less voluminous and valuable than might be expected when one considers the venera- tion in which scholarship is held, and the official positions that were supposed, as in China, to be the rewards of literary merit. The compositions that were most admired seem almost absurd when judged by the canons of Western learning, abounding in quotations from the classics, pom- pous phrases, rhetorical flourishes, and endless redundan- cies. Books of this kind are numerous enough. The royal library in the palace at Seoul is a notable depository of such alleged literature, some of it in elaborate and costly bind- ings. Books in the Un-mun are more common, Seoul alone having a number of circulating libraries. Unfortunately, most of the volumes are not only valueless as literature, but injurious to morals, filled with coarse jests and obscene details. A majority of the common people can neither read nor write, but every hamlet has at least one or two men who serve as the readers and story-tellers of the com- munity, and recite the books to groups of eager listeners. The folk-lore songs and tales are often interesting and occasionally of real worth. Some indicate the view of life which finds expression in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The author of that Epicurean poem might have found a congenial spirit in the writer of the following Korean song: " Time, O Time, flee not away ! Fresh spring's ruddy face is growing old. If we don't play now, when shall we play ? When once we mortals are dead and cold. Like the mist on the mountains we fade away. Let us feast, let us play. If we don't play now, if we don't feast now. When shall we feast, and when shall we play?'* Another poem suggests a hterary vein worthy of further exploration. An ambitious youth who is journeying to the capital for the national examinations stops to rest on a mountainside, and as he muses about his predecessors who must have trodden the same path in their hope of fame, CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 77 he breaks forth into a poetic summons to the spirit of the mountain, which towers above him: ** O mountain blue, Deliver up thy lore. Tell me, this hour, the name Of him most worthy — be he child, or man, or sage — Who 'neath thy summit, hailed to-morrow, wrestling with To-day or reached out memory's hands toward yesterday. Deliver up thy lore." At this point the youth falls asleep, and the spirit of the mountain tells him in his dreams the long story of the worthy ones that had preceded him. As he awakes and resumes his journey he implores the mountain to add his name to the honored Hst: " O mountain blue. Be thou my cenotaph; and when, long ages hence. Some youth, presumptuous, shall again thy secret guess. Thy lips unseal, among the names of them who claim The guerdon of thy praise, I pray let mine appear. Be thou my cenotaph." The names which these simple-hearted people give to natural objects reveal an imagination and love of beauty in strange contrast with their squaUd villages, though oc- casionally a name indicates superstition as well as imagina- tion. Mountain-Facing-the-Sun, White Cloud, The Peak of a Thousand Buddhas, Heaven-Reaching, Cloud-Toucher, Sword Mountain, Lasting Peace, and Changing Cloud are names given to some of their mountams. Sheet of Re- splendent Water, Water-that-slides-as-straight-as-a-sword and Falling Snow Cataract, suggest an appreciation of the beauty of streams. An inn which has a fine outlook is called The House Fronting the Moon. Another, which affords a view of the simrise, is called The House of the Morning Sim. Mighty Fortress, Rock-loving Chamber, Cave Spirit, Morning Star, and The Chamber Between the Strong Fortress and the Tender Verdure are other charac- teristic names. Even the yamens of the officials are apt 78 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST to have names which suggest an attractiveness in marked contrast with their dilapidation, such as Little Flowery- House, Rising Cloud, Gate of Lapis Lazuli, and Man- sion Near the Whirlpool. These are but a few illustrations of names all over the country. Almost every town, river, valley, or natural object of any kind has a name which indi- cates the native conception of its beauty or of some other characteristic.^ When one turns to the intellectual training which Koreans receive, he finds the emptiest educational system imagina- ble. The typical Korean school-teacher was a solemn- looking old gentleman who wore inunense spectacles, which were designed not to aid the eyes but to give a scholarly and venerable aspect to the wearer. The pupils squatted upon the floor, swayed their bodies backward and forward, and monotonously and stridently chanted Chinese classics. Such schools afforded the only education that Korea could boast until 1884, when, largely influenced by the American Minister, Mr. Allen, the King asked the govern- ment of the United States to send to Korea three men for educational work. The American Secretary of State re- ferred the request to General John Eaton, then United States Commissioner of Education, who selected Mr. Homer B. Hulbert, Mr. George W. Gilmore, and Mr. Dalzell A. Bunker, all three being students in Union The- ological Seminary, New York City. They arrived in Korea July 4, 1886, when a thousand people a day were d3dng of cholera. Undismayed, the three young men immediately started an English school under the patronage and support of the government. The King took a personal interest in the institution, and for several years conducted the examina- tions in person, the students lying prone upon the floor before his Majesty. The coiu^se of the young American educators was not a smooth one. Western pedagogical methods did not harmonize with deeply rooted prejudices, official jealousies and corruptions, and the arbitrary will of a King who was often petulant and exacting. Mr. Gil- 1 C/. Griffis, p. 233. CUSTOMS, EDUCATION, AND LITERATURE 79 more returned to America in 1888. Mr. Bunker remained for seven years, when he entered the Methodist Mission, Mr. Hulbert resigned after a service of five years, but in 1897, at the urgent request of the King, he took charge of the Government Normal School, which had been recently organized and had been superintended by a Japanese un- til the murder of the Queen. This school became quite influential and trained a considerable number of young men who, after their graduation, became teachers in the government common schools in the capital and prov- inces. Influenced to some extent by the Japanese, the official literary examinations were abolished in 1894, and a Depart- ment of Education was constituted the following year. This gave a new impetus to the desire for Western learn- ing, and for a time the outlook was more promising. But the department was so languidly and ineffectively admin- istered that progress Avas slow and fitful. In 1899 the gov- ernment founded the Royal English School in Seoul, for the sons of families of the higher classes, erected an excel- lent building, and asked Professor Hulbert to transfer his services to it. He quickly made it influential, but the gov- ernment never adequately supported it, or for that matter any of the other schools under its care. When the Japa- nese came the government system included only fifty schools, most of them with a mere handful of pupils, and the national budget assigned only $162,792 to education, and $135,074 of this was expended in Seoul, leaving only $27,718 for all the rest of the country. A few French, Russian, and Japanese schools followed the establishment of the Royal English School, and were conducted with varjdng degrees of success, but they were not important enough to affect materially the prevailing intellectual stagnation. We are discussing now the educational methods of old Korea prior to the Japanese occupation, and we may, therefore, reserve for subsequent discussion the notable later increase in the number and quality of mission schools 80 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and the programme of the Japanese Bm^eau of Education. Siiffice it here that it was not imtil after the year 1900 that modern educational facilities began to be available for any appreciable number of Koreans, and even then they were on a very limited scale for the first decade of the century. This fact should be taken into account in forming a fair judgment regarding the intelligence and mental develop- ment of the Korean people. CHAPTER V RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE KOREANS The traveller in Korea is impressed by the absence of those outward manifestations of religion which are so numerous in other Asiatic lands. There is no temple in all Seoul, if we except a poor Confucian one. Outside of the city there is one to the God of War, but few Koreans ever visit it. Throughout the country the evidences of public worship are few and far between. One who is fa- miliar with the innumerable temples in Japan, China, and Siam, is at first disposed to regard Korea as a land without a reHgion. A closer study will show that, while there is no out- wardly established religion with its temples and prescribed observances, there are religious customs which have great power over the Hves of the people. Indeed Korea may be said to have three religions. Buddhism entered from China as far back as 371 A. D. It attained great influence, and its numerous priests included some of the ablest men in the kingdom. Great monasteries on some of the moun- tains still attest the wealth and power which Buddhism once enjoyed. The buildings are massive, and the Hbraries contain rare old books and manuscripts. The temples are ricHy adorned, and their treasure-boxes are filled with the gifts of kings and princes. Some of these monasteries were established as far back as the sixth century, and their ap- pearance still testifies to the power which Buddhism long wielded in the Hermit Nation. Few travellers see them, for they are in remote parts of the country, and are rather difficult of access. Mrs. Bishop says that at Keum Kang San in the Diamond Mountains, she found four of these great monasteries, whose shrines were the headquarters of 81 82 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST about foui- hundred and fifty nuns with a thousand paid semtors. Many Koreans annually visit the famous mountain mon- asteries. A charitable judgment may consider a few of them devout pilgrims, but a large majority of the alleged votaries are far from religious in spirit and purpose. AVhat Hamel wrote two hundred and fifty years ago has been true ever since: "The nobles frequent the monasteries very much to divert themselves there with common women or others they carry with them, because they are generally deliciously seated and very pleasant for prospect and fine gardens. So that they might better be called pleasm-e- houses than temples, which is to be understood of the common monasteries, where the religious men love to drink hard."i Like the Jesuits in some European countries, the fond- ness of Buddhist monks for political intrigue resulted in their overthrow. They made themselves so disliked and feared in connection with the preceding dynasty, and were so generally held responsible for its downfall, that they lost practically all their power, and for more than five hun- dred years Buddhist priests were forbidden to enter the capital. Korean Buddhism has decayed until it now re- tains hardly a vestige of its former power, and the monks are among the most despised of men. They well deserve the contempt in which they are held. They are ignorant and superstitious, unfamiHar even with their own rehgion, and understanding only a few of its simplest rites. Their moral reputation is exceedingly bad. I saw several of them outside the walls of Seoul, but they appeared to have but a small following, and they looked dejected and dirty. It was easy to identify them by their shaven heads, beehive- shaped hats, grass-cloth coats, rosaiy, and staff. In their days of power and prestige Korean Buddhists sent missionaries to Japan, and the Island Empire was con- verted to the faith. But modern Japanese Buddhism is ashamed of its parentage. In 1876 one of the more pro- ^ Quoted by Lord Curzon in Problems of the Far East, p. 105. RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE KOREANS 83 gressive Buddhist sects of Japan, the Shin, sent represen- tatives to Korea to see if they could not win the people to a purer type of Buddhism. They managed to convert a number of young Koreans, six of whom went to Japan to receive a special education in the Shin School at Kyoto; but the effort was short-lived. Buddhism in Korea ap- peared to be dead beyond possibility of resurrection. Since the country has been incoiporated into the Empire the Buddhists of Japan have been making more resolute efforts to revive Buddhism in Korea. A large majority of the Japanese who have permanently settled in the peninsula of course are Buddhists. They have brought priests from the mother country, and are building temples, establishing Buddhist Sunday-schools, and circulating Buddhist Htera- ture. A definite propaganda has been undertaken, and Buddhism may once more take its place as one of the re- ligions of Korea. Confucianism is generally considered one of the religions of Korea, coming of course from China, from which Korea received its literature and civiHzation. Confucius would probably be as much surprised as Gautama would be if the two sages could visit Korea and see what passes for their respective reHgions. The Koreans have departed more widely from true Confucianism than the Chinese, for their temperament is not so practical and materiahstic, and they craved a faith more emotional and mystical. But they have all the Chinese reverence for ancestors, and their customs in this respect are thoroughly Confucian. Filial piety is highly rewarded. A man who does not rever- ence his father, living or dead, is deemed the worst of repro- bates. Obedience does not always extend to the mother, but the father is regarded with a reverence bordering upon awe, a son sometimes kneehng in the street when his father approaches. To be disrespectful to a parent is to commit a serious offense; to strike him is to deserve capital punish- ment; to fail to mourn for him on his death the prescribed period of thirty-six months is a disgrace, and if the son is an oflficial he must retire from office for that purpose. 84 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST A Korean Confucian tract states that the Emperor U Jai-sun (2255-2205 B. C.) gathered his disciples together and taught them the principles of fihal etiquette, which included the following instructions: "Sons must rise at cock-crow. . . . When property dressed, they must present themselves before their parents and inquire of them whether the room is warm and everything is to their comfort. . . . There are many ways in which a son is to serve his parents. If their bodies itch, he is to scratch them; when they wash, to hold the bowl so that the parents may bathe in comfort, and when ready for it to hand them the towel; to respectfully inquire what they will take to eat, and then with honor to serve the meal; to wait imtil a portion of the food is eaten so as to ascertain whether it is to their taste and then to retire. After the meal, both son and daughter-in-law should go to the parents to learn from them whether there is anything they wish done or errand to run. . . . When nothing has been given them to do, to remain where the parents are, so that they may receive their orders. When spoken to, always to reply in humility and never to answer back. . . . There are a number of things that must not be done in the presence of a parent — to yawn; to peep about; to blow the nose; if the body is cold not to don extra clothes before them; however one's body may itch, not to scratch it; and never to laugh at anything unless the parent laughs. . . . Etiquette requires that a son shall neither sit on a higher level nor in front of a parent; that he shall not stand or walk inunediately in front of them. . . . Reverence of parents is similar to the carrying of a bowl full of water: unless much care is exercised the water will be spilt. In like manner, unless much care is taken in doing all things respectfully and cor- rectly, an offense against the parent is committed. ... If told to do a thing that may seem impossible to perform, it is nevertheless necessary that the attempt should be made." A Korean who can afford it usually has a small separate building in the rear of his house where he keeps his ances- tral tablets, and where at stated periods he offers sacrifices to his deceased parents. A missionary writes that during an itinerating tour he saw three well-dressed Korean gentle- rnen and their servants around a grave on the crest of a hill, worshipping the spirits of their ancestors. Offerings of food were upon the ground in front of the tomb, before which each of the men kneeled in turn, prostrating himself RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE KOREANS 85 reverently several times, with forehead touching the ground. The food-offerings consisted of large plates of sliced dough- like bread, dishes filled with candies, generous platters of sHced pork, fried chicken, fish, fresh persimmons, peeled pears and vegetables, and good-sized jars of seul (a distilled liqueur). Enormous sums in the aggregate are spent in offerings to deceased ancestors; but as the food is often eaten by the living after it has been presented to the dead, the waste is not total. Koreans would interest English and American spiritual- ists. Professor Hulbert says that after the death of a relar tive or friend they frequently call up the spirit of the dead to ask it questions, or call up the ruler of Hades to bribe him with gifts to let the departed one off easy. The spirit of the dead frequently "promises" in turn to do what he can with the authorities of the nether world to bring good luck to the relatives and friends left behind. This is all done through a medium or sorceress, who goes into a trance and is supposed to become possessed by the spirit with which the people wish to communicate. Intelligent Confucian- ists in China are probably no more proud of their co- religionists in Korea than the Buddhists of Japan are of theirs, for Korean Confucianism is a sorry caricature of their faith. The dominant rehgion of Korea, or rather the dominant superstition, is Animism. Indeed Animism is the heavy substratum of faith in practically all non-Christian lands except those in which the monotheistic creed of Islam prevails, and even there traces of it may be found. It is the primitive religion outside of the pale of revelation. Aboriginal peoples are almost invariably animists. Vast populations in Africa are wholly animistic. All of the elaborate reHgious systems in other lands found Animism already existing and no one of them wholly succeeded in displacing it. It was universal in China when Confucius arose, and his ancestral worship is really a development of it. Modem China is pervaded by fear of evil spirits, and its Buddhism and Taoism are now half animistic. One of 86 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the chief reasons why caste was developed by the Brahmans of India was the prevalence of Animism from which they wished to protect their adherents. Before Buddhism was introduced into Burma, about 400 A. D., all the people were spirit-worshippers, as many of them still are. They pros- trate themselves before an image of Buddha in a temple, but outside of it they tremble at the thought of evil spirits in spite of the fact that Buddhism is not supposed to countenance belief in demons. Animism is the religion of fear, of ghosts and portents and witches and demons. Air, earth, and water teem with them. They lurk in dark ravines and whisper menace from tree-tops. They laugh derisively in rimning streams. They shriek in the tempest and roar in the thunder, and the lightning is the glaring of their angry eyes. They inhabit the soil so that its surface must not be broken by the hus- bandman or the miner unless incantations or propitiator}" offerings are first offered. They jeeringly sit on roofs and slyly creep into windows and down chimneys. These grin- ning, malignant demons haunt every waking and sleeping moment of human life. They swarm at man's birth, and death is their final victory over him. Terror of them weighs upon existence like a nightmare, and turns life into a hell of shuddering, sobbing fright. Our own ancestors knew this baleful fear. German forests were once the scenes of animistic incantations. The mysterious rites of ancient Druidism in England were largely prompted bj^ animistic ideas, and belief in witchcraft survived in proud New England until the last century. Even in this twen- tieth century some of their descendants are not free from superstition. Shall we wonder that the simple-minded and untutored Korean lives under the baleful spell of Animism? Beyond a ceremonial observance of the rites of ancestral worship, it is the only religion that really influences him. Investigators have classified Korean spirits under no less than thirty-five main divisions, including spirits of heaven, of stars, of earth, of mountains and hills, and of the district; spirits of the house site, of the house itself, of the IIELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE KOREANS 87 ridge-pole, of goods and furniture, and of the kitchen; spirits that dwell in trees, in caverns, in streams, and that roam through houses and about the coimtry, making trouble wherever they go; spirits that serve one's ancestors, that aid jugglers and exorcists, that take possession of young girls, and that bring death to women in childbirth; spirits that make men brave and that make them cowardly; spirits that convey smallpox, cholera, and a long list of other diseases; spirits that cause one to die young, to die away from home, to die as substitute for another, to die by strangulation, by drowning, by suicide, by a fall, and by being beaten. Each main subdivision is divided and subdivided and subdivided again, until count is lost among the legions and legions of spirits. Korean religious rites are pathetic efforts to propitiate or outwit these imiumerable demons. All sorts of expedi- ents are adopted by the terrified people. High posts, sur- mounted by grotesquely carved heads with painted lips, cheeks, and eyebrows, guard the approaches to a village. Near the house a stake is driven into the ground, the ex- posed part wrapped with straw and tipped with a bit of white paper, on which words of alleged mystical power have been inscribed. This stake propitiates the god of the site, and sacrifices and offerings are made to keep him in good humor. The ridge-poles of houses, public buildings, and city gates are adorned with odd, misshapen figures which are beHeved to be a protection to the occupants and the city. Hilltops have shrines, small and usually dilapi- dated buildings, containing images or paper pictures of mythical beings. Pain means that a demon has gotten into the body, and the method of treatment is an attempt to kill it. A eunuch swings a burning torch to insure abundant harvests. A cracked nut held in the mouth and then spat out is supposed to prevent boils and sores. When a child is bom, a candle is lighted; if it does not go out un- til it is consumed, the child will have a long life; but if the flame dies out or is blown out before the candle bums down to its socket, early death must be anticipated. The 88 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST traveller will sometimes find across the path a log with several holes in it, one of which has been carefully plugged. This means that a sorceress has succeeded in corking up a demon which had been causing sickness. The muleteers will step carefully over such a log. Many a time as we travelled through the interior our path wound aroimd a tree about whose trunk were piles of stones and from whose branches bits of colored rags fluttered. The superstitious people imagined that an evil spirit inhabited such a tree. The spirit was believed to be curious as well as malignant, and in order to divert his attention the wayfarer would toss a stone about the base of the tree or tear a strip from his garment and fasten it to a limb, and while the curious demon was examining the stone or rag, the frightened Korean would dodge past. At the Korean New Year superstition runs riot. Hair that has been cut off or combed out during the year is burned in an earthen vessel to prevent demons from enter- ing the house during the following year. Troubles are metaphorically placed in straw dolls and tossed into the street in the belief that whoever picks them up will take the troubles away from the original owner. It is not un- common to see a frightened mother vigorously spanking a child who has innocently picked up one of these dolls. Bits of colored paper are placed in spUt sticks on the tops of the houses, and the moon is besought to take them away, or a statement of some adversity and a painted image are put on paper and burned. Multitudes of both sexes and all ages cross a bridge shortly after dark once for each year of their lives in the conviction that this will prevent pains in the feet and legs throughout the new year. The formidable personages in all this rehgious life, if indeed it may be called a religious life, are not the priests but the shamans, or sorcerers. They are of two kinds, the mu-tang and the pan-su. The latter are blind, and popular imagination invests them with extraordinary gifts. Some sorcerers are men, but most of them are women. They are supposed to have a supernatural call to their pro- RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE KOREANS 89 fession, and to have magical power over demons. They are held in such mingled reverence and fear that no one thinks of associating familiarly with them, the people re- garding them with something of the terror with which they regard the demons whom the sorcerers are believed to ex- orcise. And yet the Koreans feel that they cannot get along without them. They consult them on all sorts of occasions, and before beginning any kind of an enterprise, in order to make sure that the demons will not interfere. On the advice of mu-tangs, demon festivals are arranged to keep the demons in good hmnor. The mu-tangs are summoned in illness that they may banish the demon that is causing the pain or fever. The medicine employed by the mu-tang or sorcerer cer- tainly ought to accomplish something. The remedy fre- quently employed for smallpox is a stew of meat cut from the body of a yellow dog, the eyebrows of a tiger, and dried beetles of several species, it being important that the beetles were caught on a dewy summer morning. Witches are exorcised by a broth made from snakes, Hzards, toads, and powdered tiger's teeth. This interesting decoction is also deemed a specific for fevers, and a large bowlful is ad- ministered at a single dose. A medical missionary writes: "The horns of a deer when only about six inches long and filled with blood are highly esteemed. Dried and pow- dered, they are prescribed to restore agility to the aged. I priced some of these horns at a Korean drug-store, and the dealer asked from fifty to a hundred dollars a pair. In desperate cases, a mixture of snakes, toads, and centi- pedes is carefully boiled together and warranted to kill or cure. Gall is another favorite remedy — ^beef's gall for digestion, bear's gall for the liver, crow's gall for debility. In the last case there are certain conditions attendant upon its use. Mr. Kim Tuck Yomgi, my language-teacher, ex- citedly aroused me one morning before daybreak while at a mountain monastery where we were studying. 'Please come quickly and Idll it,' he shouted. I grasped my shot- gun and rushed out to behold him pointing at an ordinary 90 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST black crow seated in a tree. ' What's the matter ? WTiat do you want me to kill?' 'That crow,' said he. 'Quick, before the sun gets up!' Astonishment deprived me of action and the crow flew away. Whereupon Mr. Kim sadly explained that a crow must be killed before daybreak or its gall would have no medical virtue." The spirit of smallpox requires special handling. The mu-tang solemnly advises that its arrival be observed by a cessation of labor on the part of the family and its neigh- bors, and the offering of a ceremonial feast. He then directs that the patient be respectfully worshipped several times a day as the abode of the dread spirit. If the disease abates, the departure of the spirit is celebrated by another feast, a prominent feature of which is a small wooden horse which is heavily loaded with supplies for the journey of the departing demon. Sometimes a mother will make a straw horse and place it by the door in order that a lag- gard demon may take the hint and have a convenient means of getting away. If death occurs, a swarm of evil spirits attend the fimeral, looking for a chance to whisk away the dead. If the family is able to afford the expense of two or more coffins, they are provided and buried in different places, the utmost care being observed to prevent the demons finding out which coffin contains the body. More deadly than "medicines" is the chim, the surgical instrument commonly used. There are two kinds, one a small knife and the other a large and rudely made iron needle. The former is seldom used, the latter is universal. The sorcerer thrusts it into the body to let out or kill the demon, which is beheved to cause the pain. As the chim is usually rusty, and is never properly cleaned after using, it makes an infected pimctured wound which not infre- quently develops into an ugly sore. I saw many pitiful illustrations of the disastrous consequences as I attended the clinics in mission hospitals, and eveiy medical mission- ary could tell a heart-rending story of the sufferings, not oidy of men and women, but of little children, whose bodies have been infected in this way. RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF THE KOREANS 91 The whole life of the Korean is grievously influenced by these superstitions, and by the cunning and often hysterical sorcerers. They are to be found in hovel and palace alike. Officers of exalted rank as well as poverty-stricken peasants call in blind sorcerers to perform magical ceremonies over a sick member of the family, or to select a lucky day for the marriage of a son or daughter. As our party entered one village, we heard the sound of native drums and the clangor of brass cymbals. On going to the house we saw a hideous old sorceress dancing in the midst of nervous relatives, alternately mumbling and shrieking incantations, while attendants made racket enough to make a weU person ill, to say nothing of the poor sufferers whose disease was being treated. The fees which these sorcerers receive are often large, and in the aggregate they reach enormous propor- tions. Within recent years the more intelligent officials in the cities have tried to hold the worst of these sorcerers in check, and the police have sometimes arrested them; but superstitions die hard. "This is a dreadful state of affairs," a Korean in Seoul was overheard saying to a friend. "My brother is very sick, and although I have tried to get a mu-tang, no one will come for fear of being arrested and punished; so I suppose there is nothing for it but to let the poor feUow die." No right-minded person will ridicule such superstition. Rather will he be deeply moved by its pathos, and often by its tragedy. After an epidemic of cholera in Seoul, Mrs. Underwood wrote: "Koreans call the cholera 'the rat disease,' believing that cramps are rats gnawing and crawling inside the legs, going up till the heart is reached; so that they offer prayers to the spirit of the cat, hang a paper cat on the house-door and rub their cramps with a cat's skin. They offered prayers and sacrifices in various high places to the heavens, and some of the streets in in- fected districts were almost impassable on account of ropes stretched across, about five feet high, at intervals of about every twenty-five feet, to which paper prayers were attached. As my coolies, trying to pass along with my chair, broke 92 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST one of these; I could not help admonishing the owner who came to its rescue: 'Better put them up a little higher/ Ay, put them up higher, poor Korean brother, they are far too near the earth ! One of the most pathetic sights in connection with this plague were these poor, wind-torn, bedraggled paper prayers, hanging helplessly everywhere, the offering of bHnd superstition to useless dumb gods who can neither pity nor hear.'" They " — stretch lame hands of faith, and grope. And gather dust and chaff." * Fifteen Years Among the Top-Knots, pp. 139-140. CHAPTER VI A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR Korea is changing rapidly under the new conditions of recent years, and railways now make travelling as easy as it is unromantic. I shall always be glad that I enjoyed a rambling Journey through some of the provinces in the quaint old style of former days. It was during my first visit in the beautiful spring weeks of 1901. My party con- sisted of my wife and two experienced missionaries, 0. R. Avison, M.D., and the Reverend C. E. Sharp, who proved to be not only indispensable guides and interpreters but delightfully congenial companions. Before starting from Seoul we obtained a travelling pass- port called the kwan-ja, which called on all magistrates to whom it might be presented to furnish whatever we re- quired in the way of food, lodging, money, animals, and carriers. We did not use it, however. Local magistrates do not take kindly to such passports. Some travellers had abused their privileges under them, and when magistrates had found it impracticable to comply with their peremp- tory demands, the travellers had become insolent and threat- ening. A magistrate, even though weak and corrupt, is a human being with some rights, and he cannot always place himself at the disposal of a wandering foreigner. In the rice-planting or harvesting season, when every able-bodied man is toiling in the fields, it is intolerable to have a white man come along and present a government order for car- riers. The magistrates had learned, too, that money ad- vanced to travellers on a kwan-ja was not always repaid. The traveller might honestly pay the amount on his return to Seoul, but the official who received it might pocket it. The unhappy magistrate did not dare to make remon- 93 94 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST strance, and he knew that if he did he would get no redress. The sensible, kindly traveller who makes reasonable re- quests, pays fair prices and deals through an honest inter- preter, will have little difficulty in procuring anything he really needs that the people can supply. Proceeding by rail to Chemulpo, we there took a tiny twenty-five ton steamer, which bore us over smooth waters among the many islands dotting this lovely coast to Hai Ju. We passed dozens of lazily moving junks crowded with Koreans who were contentedly chatting and smoking. A Korean junk is not a graceful object. It is climasily con- structed of heavy, irregularly sawed planks, and is so poorly put together that it appears like tempting Providence to trust oneself to such a craft. The sails are wretchedly made of coarse matting. A junk does fairly well working up a river when time is no object, as it seldom is to Koreans, and it will behave with tolerable decency on the open sea when it is running before the wind. But the foreigner who confides himself to a Korean junk when his route does not lie in the direction of the wind, and when the sea is heavy, should be well equipped with life preservers and accident insurance policies, although accidents are really less common than one would imagine from the dilapidated appearance of these crazy boats. I saw junks that ap- peared to be so old and rotten that they were about to fall to pieces, but which somehow managed to wabble along without sinking. The trip from Chemulpo was supposed to occupy twelve hours, but as we sat on the upper deck in the early evening, enjoying the soft glories of sunset on land and sea, and the still softer beauties of the full moonlight which ere long flooded the scene, we learned that we could not reach our destination till midnight. As Hai Ju, where we intended to spend the night, was three and a half miles from the landing-place, we decided to remain on board till morning. The tiny cabin was filled with Koreans eating rice and drinking sake; but they left after a while, and we stacked the table and chairs across the middle of the room, Doctor A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR 95 AvisoD and Mr. Sharp taking one of the improvised com- partments and Mrs. Brown and I the other, a sharp bump on the head emphasizing the fact that the ceiling was only- five feet from the floor. The cabin was only wide enough for three, and a Japanese policeman was already asleep on our side. But we rolled ourselves up in our rugs and lay down on the floor. Though the accommodations were somewhat inferior to those on an Atlantic liner, we slept soundly till half-past five the next morning, when we were roused by a boy standing beside our open window and bawling to some one on shore. As we were already dressed, we were soon on deck. What a glorious morning it was ! The air was deUciously cool and bracing. The water flashed in the bright sunlight and the shore view was superb — a green valley, a fine hill beyond it and in the farther background noble mountains. After a hurried breakfast from our stores, we went ashore in the inevitable sampan, and after the necessary dickering for bullocks to carry our luggage, started for Hai Ju. That three-and-a-half -mile walk I shall never forget. The scenery was beautiful beyond description. Up and down high hills we went, the views commanding wide sweeps of ocean and bay, of carefully tilled fields, blossoming fruit-trees, and thatched farmhouses, which, in such environment, looked far more attractive than they really were. Just before reaching the city, we topped a crest from which we looked upon the lovely valley in which lies the walled city of Hai Ju, a considerable place of about 10,000 inhabitants. The houses were the typical low, thatched-roofed huts of the Koreans, but the wall appeared massive and its gates rose impressively above it. There were at that time no resident white men in Hai Ju, and the arrival of our party was therefore quite an event. The people pressed about us in great crowds. They knew Doctor Avison as the wonderful foreign doctor from Seoul, and they came to him with all their sick and injured. Many of the cases were pathetic in the extreme. Doctor Avison handled each one with sympathy as well as 96 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST with skill, and he spoke to each one about the Good Physi- cian in whose name he had come. In the evening I was called upon to address the people through an interpreter. I sympathized with the late Doctor Maltbie D. Babcock, who said that an interpreter is an "interrupter," and that the result is "a compound dis- location of ideas with mortification immediately setting in." I had never realized before how much of the effect of public speech is dependent upon a continuous flow of language and gradually increasing momentum. If the Koreans did not understand, or if they deemed the address iminteresting, they were too uncivilized to be rude or restless, for they sat quietly and listened intently and with the utmost courtesy. It was a striking scene from the porch of the little building, with the people sitting and standing all about and the flickering flame of a chimneyless kerosene- lamp lighting the up-turned faces. The problem of conveyance was a serious one, for at that time the Japanese had not constructed the roads which may now be found, and we had to follow mere paths, often worn into deep ruts by the passage of many feet and hoofs. In wet weather these ruts were full of sticky mud, and in dry weather they were usually half filled with a powdery dust that was very trying. Bridges were few and were ordinarily of poles covered with dirt. The chances were about even that our pony's or bullock's foot would sink through the dirt, and that the supporting poles were half rotten. After I had crashed through one of these pre- carious bridges and had sprawled down in a heap amid a shower of earth, stones, broken timbers, and the heels of the pony I was riding, I made it a rule to avoid bridges, imless certain of their strength, and to ford the brooks and gullies. The chair is the most comfortable conveyance on a coxmtry trip in Korea, and we had brought two with us. Each chair is suspended between two long poles and is car- ried on such long tours by four men, although two are sometimes used for short rides on the level streets of cities. A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR 97 The chair coolies received three hundred and seventy-five cash (about six cents) for every ten li (three and a third miles), and bought their own food; unless our stay at any particular place was prolonged. We had two chairs, and our plan was to hire two ponies, using oxen to transport our luggage and supplies. On ar- riving at Hai Ju the negotiations were begun. The owners demanded seven hundred cash (about ten cents) for every ten li for each ox, six hundred cash for each pony, and in addition rice for two meals a day for the animals and their drivers, for in Korea a man goes with each animal. The price appeared very low to an American, but for Korea it was exorbitant and my companions did their utmost to secure a reduction. But the Oriental loves to dicker. He was not in a hurry and he knew that we were. Moreover, at that season he needed his oxen for work in the fields. Late at night a bargain was concluded for two ponies and four oxen at about the terms imposed. That settled, we went to sleep, and early the next morning we were astir for a seven-o'clock start. But we were again reminded that we were in Asia by the appearance of only one pony and two oxen. The men solemnly declared that there was not another animal in town, although the night before they had assured us that they had all we wanted. We could not spend another day haggling, so we extemporized another chair, hired men to carry it, piled the most neces- sary suppHes on the two oxen and started, leaving Doctor Avison's medicine-boy and Mr. Sharp's helper to find other oxen and follow when they could. They were successful and joined us later in the day. Although we were only four foreigners and travelled as lightly as possible, yet our cavalcade was considerable. We had four bullocks, one pony, and three chairs. As each bullock and the pony had a separate man and each chair had four bearers, and we had a Korean cook, the Christian helper for this field, and Doctor Avison's hospital assistant, we made up a party of twenty-four persons and five animals. The Korean pony is not an attractive beast either in size 98 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST or disposition. There were no foreign saddles, and it was customary to pile one's bedding on top of the little animal and then to climb on top and let the feet dangle about the pony's neck. It is not a comfortable position, and as it is impossible to hold on to anything, and as the typical pony is restless and vicious, the possibihties of disaster are numerous. The ponies that are available for this puipose are nearly all stallions, and, though they are not large, they are tough and have remarkable powers of endurance. Their savagery is a proverb. They are willing to fight everything and everybody at all times and places. No matter how heavily they may be loaded or how tired they are supposed to be after a day's journey, they will attack one another with the furious glee of an Irishman at a Donny- brook Fair. Even after the most toilsome journey, it is ordinarily necessary to chain them to their troughs while they are feeding, while at night they are fastened by ropes hung from the rafters of the inn and passing under them in such^a way that they are partially suspended. Whether this is simply a custom, or to keep them from fighting, or to prevent them from lying down it would be difficult to say, though probably all three reasons enter, for Koreans have an idea that a pony must never be allowed to He down. They also insist that he must not be permitted to drink water when it can possibly be avoided, his food con- sisting of chopped millet-stalks, rice-husks, bran, and beans, all boiled together and served hot as a thin gruel. While the Korean pony is not to be made a friend of, he may be implicitly trusted in the most uncertain places. He will work like a Trojan and keep his footing on the edge of precipices which make the foreigner shiver. Mine proved perfectly reliable in these respects, save, of course, when a bridge gave way under him, and then his rage soothed me, for he gave expression to our common feelings. The days of that interior trip were revelations that con- vinced us how much is missed by the traveller who visits only the cities. All the way the scenery was alternately beautiful and sublime. The vallevs were cultivated fields A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR 99 dotted with farmhouses, adorned with blossoming fruit- trees, and surromided by noble hills. From a crest over which oiu- path wound, we conmianded on one side a wide panorama of ocean and inlets, green islands, and bold prom- ontories, and on the other side hills and dales and meadows and majestic ranges piled high against the blue sky. We passed many quaint little villages nestling in the nooks of the hills. Here, as in China, it is customary for farmers to segregate themselves into hamlets, going to their fields each morning and returning in the evening. This is not so exclusively the rule as in China so that here and there we saw an isolated farmhouse, but such houses were not common. We stopped for tiffin at the village of Kerumajai, the whole population curiously watching us as we ate. Mrs. Brown, as usual, was the cynosure of all eyes. The people had occasionally seen a foreign man, but a white woman was rare and aroused as much excitement as a circus in a Western American town. The Korean women thronged about her, feeling of her shoes and dress, trying on her hat, asking her to undo her hair, endeavoring to take off her wedding-ring, and rubbing her cheek to see whether her white complexion would come off, all the while excitedly jabbering and laughing at so strange an object as an Ameri- can woman. But they were always good-natured, and Mrs. Brown took their attentions with like good nature, though there must have been times when such personal hberties were rather irksome. Privacy was impossible, and she was obliged not only to eat but to retire at night and dress in the morning with the inquisitive eyes of Ko- rean women at every chink. If there was none, the oiled paper on the windows was broken and the space quickly filled with the tousled heads of the curious. This, of course, was the experience of every woman missionary who went among the villages. After days and nights of such experi- ences, it was a relief to enter a missionary home or a village where the Christians were numerous enough to secure pri- vacy for the visitor. 100 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Evening found us at a typical inn in the village of Tanai. It was a low building of poles, with mud walls and thatched roof and enclosing a square courtyard crowded with dogs, people, and the effects of the native travellers who had already arrived. One side was occupied by feeding cattle. Another was devoted to large earthenware pots, in which rice was being cooked. The remaining sides were small rooms with paper-covered openings for windows, and earth floors, beneath which ran the flues from the kitchen-fires. There being no chairs, we squatted, Korean fashion, on some matting, which slowly became so warm that we felt as if we were sitting on a stove. We had travelled faster than our bullocks so that we had no suppHes, but we suc- ceeded in buying some food from the natives and we watched our cook prepare it over a few sticks of charcoal in a pot of ashes. A good supper it was, too, and we ate it before a wondering audience of natives, who were not in the least embarrassed because their faces and clothing did not ap- pear to have been washed for a decade. We enjoyed our meal as only himgry travellers can enjoy food, and then, spreading our blankets on our cots, we slept so soundly that the swarming vermin had an undisturbed repast. In Asia it is just as well to submit calmly to the inevitable. The next day we journeyed through another beautiful region to Kum Dong, where we were welcomed by Kim Yun 0, a notable man in the community, and surrounded by relatives and dependents like an Old Testament patriarch. He is a Christian, and so devoted that he had succeeded in leading to Christ no less than twenty of his family and neighbors. He quickly installed us in a literal prophet's chamber, built on the end of his house expressly for the comfort of visiting missionaries, and soon he had gathered a gi^eat company of his neighbors and friends to hear an address. Our pony man now refused to go farther, and as no other pony was to be had, Avison, Sharp, and I took turns in walk- ing. We dismissed our four men and piled our impedi- menta on a clumsy but strong two-wheeled cart, drawn by A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR 101 an ox. But rain turned what was supposed to be a road into ruts of mud, and so Saturday noon found us at Sung- kokai, miles ahead of our plodding oxen. There were only three families in this hamlet, and they evidently had fared badly at the hands of some former traveller, for in reply to our inquiries they solemnly asserted that they had no fowls, no eggs, no anything but rice. While this was being cooked, I strolled into ^Hhe suburbs" where I found chickens in abundance. Meanwhile Avison prowled around a back yard and found some clams (we were only a mile from the sea). More foraging by other members of the party de- veloped eight eggs and a bowl of wild honey. Sharp pro- duced a corruption fund whose hundreds of "cash" sounded big to the natives, although they only meant a few cents to us; and soon we were seated cross-legged on an earthen floor, feasting on a four-course dinner consisting of rice and clam- broth, rice and eggs, rice and chicken, and rice and honey. Eight miles farther we saw a group of white figures await- ing us on the top of a hill. It was a delegation from Sorai to bid us welcome to the village whose remarkable story is narrated in a later chapter. We were domiciled in two of the classrooms of the church. It is a notable building for Korea, and almost imposing in comparison with the hum- ble homes about it, standing on an eminence commanding a wide view, and on the edge of a grove which was once the centre of pagan worship. It was dedicated in June, 1896, and was the first church in Korea built wholly by Koreans. One of the elders, Suk (or Sau) Kyung Jo, had gone to Seoul on purpose to escort us to Sorai, but through a misimderstanding as to the time of our departure, he ar- rived there after we had started. Disappointed but not dismayed, he took the next train to Chemulpo, travelled a day and a night in a small sampan over the route we had come by steamer, and then, without stopping to rest, he had walked thirty-five miles till he overtook us, footsore and weary, but happy in finding us. When I recalled the roughness of the road and observed that he had passed middle life, I marvelled again. 102 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST An unmarked mound back of the church reminds one of the tragedy of Sorai. Years before, some devoted Canadian Christians had conceived the idea of an independent mission work in which a sohtary missionary should live "as the natives do." Three men thus lived in a small native house in Sorai at various times. The experiment proved to be a disastrous failure. Two of the men soon saw the futility of the method and left for other work. The third, Mr. W. J. Mackenzie, had a sorrowful experience. He was a consecrated, indefatigable missionary, and so persuasively commanding that he not only prevented a robber-band from attacking Sorai but actually converted the chieftain. In the delirium of a high fever he shot himself in June, 1895. The poor people mourned as for a brother and buried him among their own dead. The grave has no mark. Every Korean for miles around knows it and it no more needs a sign than the mountain which silently looks down upon it. After a Simday in Sorai with three services, each attended by the whole village, we journeyed Monday morning over an undulating grassy prairie to a narrow valley which led us deeply into the famous Pul Tai San or Great Mountains of Buddha. Soon we had to dismount and begin a steep climb over the Tai Kyung Kol Pass, which means "the Valley of Great Sights." It is a fitting name. Seldom have I seen nobler sceneiy. Mighty must have been the elemental forces which once convulsed this region, up- heaving those stupendous masses of rock to dizzy heights, the strata often standing perpendicularly in mute witness to the omnipotence of the power which had hurled them upward. And yet amid all this sublimity we found a flora so abundant that in a few hours Mrs. Brown collected speci- mens of no less than sixty varieties of flowers, many of them dehcately beautiful, though only two were fragrant. On the simimit of the pass we had a view which brought to mind the reverent lines of Wordsworth: " Were there below a spot of holy ground, Where from distress a refuge might be found. A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR 103 And solitude prepare the soul for heaven; Sure Nature's God to man that spot had given Where falls the purple morning far and wide In flakes of light upon the mountainside; Where with loud voice the power of water shakes The leafy wood, or sleeps in quiet lakes." Emerging from the mountains into a broad, cultivated valley, we stopped for a late tiffin at Wu Dong. We did not need to be told that there were Christians here, for as usual we had been met several miles out by smiling people, and as we drew near, we saw the tall pole with its fluttering flag — the happy custom of the Korean churches, so that every one knows where the "Jesus Church" is. Seated on the floor, native fashion, we enjoyed the rice, eggs, and chicken which the hospitable villagers provided, and for which they refused to accept any compensation. Then we held a short service, the audience filling the little church and every outside space within hearing. Evening found us at the walled town of Chang Yun. A Christian family kindly welcomed us, and soon our arrival was known among the 2,000 people of the place. Presently the curious crowd silently parted and a boy of about twelve years of age hobbled in on one foot and crouched at Doctor Avison's feet. The doctor was tired after a hard day's travel, but his kind heart could not resist that mute appeal. But, alas! the trouble was a dislocated hip of such long stand- ing that the limb had grown solidly in its unnatural posi- tion and could only be remedied by surgical treatment so heroic as to be quite out of the question with a pocket-case of instruments and in a few hours' stay. So he could only speak sympathetically to the boy and promise treatment if his father could bring him to the mission hospital in Seoul. "He has had sores there, hasn't he?" I asked as I pointed to the many scars on the deformed hip. "No," said the doctor, "those are places where the Korean doc- tors have thrust in needles to kill the devil that is supposed to cause the pain!" My heart was heavy for the poor little fellow as he limped away, for he had a good 104 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST face, pitiful now in its expression of disappointment and agony. No sooner had he gone than another boy of about the same age showed a stiff arm. Rolling up the sleeve, Doctor Avison found a dislocated elbow. The accident had hap- pened eight months before, and in this case also a new adhesion had formed. However the difficulty admitted of speedier treatment, and so then and there the boy was given an anaesthetic and the useless arm was pulled and bent into the proper shape. How bravely and trustfully the boy looked into the face of the physician who, he knew, was about to hurt him ! But the doctor is a true missionary physician. I have seen him take frightened, dirty, vermin- infested children in his arms, soothe and pet them into quietness, and then tenderly examine and treat some sore so hideous as to make one shudder. As we were about to eat our supper a middle-aged man staggered in. His once white raiment had evidently never been pounded by the clubs with which Korean women be- labor clothing in washing it, and his skin was caked with the accumulations of years of filthy habits. Untying a rag about his foot, he exhibited a frightful ulcer. Inquiry de- veloped the fact that a blister had once formed on his ankle and that by the advice of the native doctor he had smeared it with oil and set it on fire in order to burn out the imag- inary demon. Dirt, neglect, and flies had aggravated the resultant sore until the bones were literally rotting away. It was plainly a hospital case, and he was therefore advised to go to Seoul after the doctor's return. "How can I travel one hundred and seventy miles to Seoul with no money and such a foot?" plaintively queried the sufferer. True, but how could the necessary operation be performed amid the septic conditions of a Korean hut and with the few instruments the doctor had brought along ? Moreover, we had to attend a meeting that evening, and to start on our journey early the next morning. So the man went away sorrowful. But his pitiable state haunted us. Would it not be better to risk an operation here with what was at A RAMBLE IN THE INTERIOR 105 hand than to leave the man to rot ? At eleven o'clock that night it was so decided. The man was hunted up and told that if he would come at four o'clock the next morning, the doctor would do what he could for him. He gladly came. There are no tables in these native houses and so the pa- tient was laid on the floor. The scanty supply of ether would keep him unconscious only a few minutes, and in such primitive surroundings and with the dim light of a cloudy morning struggling through the open door, the doctor hastily washed and cut and scraped and cleaned the foulest foot I ever saw. Leaving careful directions for daily dressing with a young man who had formerly assisted him in the Seoul hospital, we wended our way onward, hoping that in spite of the rude conditions a man's life had been saved. These are among the common experiences of a medical missionary's Mfe. He has a hospital at his city station, but whenever he goes to the country villages the old pitiable conditions must be faced. That entire trip through the villages of Korea was a revelation to us. We journeyed by so circuitous a path, in order to see as many of the outstations as possible, that we covered about three hundred miles. Everywhere the Chris- tians were hospitable and affectionate, and in several places the evidences of the Gospel's transforming power were wonderful. Li Eul Yul, for example, a town of 4,000 in- habitants, there were no Christians three years before our visit. Then one of its prominent men went to Seoul to buy a pubhc office. He met Doctor Underwood, was con- verted, put his money into Bibles and tracts instead of a bribe for an office, returned and distributed them among his fellow townsmen. They responded at once, and we found more than a himdred baptized Christians in Eul Yul, and a considerable number of catechumens. They had built, unaided, a neat little church, donated half the cost of the native house set apart for the use of the visiting missionary, and were paying all their congregational ex- penses. 106 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST As this was the last outstation of the Seoul field; our travelling companions, Doctor Avison and Mr. Sharp, left us here and we were taken in charge by Mr. Hunt and Doctor Wells of Pyengyang, who with equal kindness and skill led us through many other villages, each with its own story of human interest. Over more hills and through more valleys we travelled, crossing an inlet of the sea with wide, steep mud banks through which coolies carried us on their backs, carefully picking our way across innumerable flooded rice-fields where the path wound along the narrow slippery tops of the dividing embankments, till we reached Whang Ju, where for the first time we struck the main road between Seoul and Pyengyang. Near the gate of this walled city of 5,000 souls, we passed a sorcerer with two assistants beating a drum, clanging cymbals, and shaking strings of bells — a hideous din, the object of which was to frighten away an evil spirit from a little child who was ill. Saturday was cold and windy and we travelled a hun- dred li to Pyengyang in a driving rain. The cooHes and ponies had a hard time in the sticky, slippery clay. But the stormy elements did not prevent four of the missionary women from meeting us at Chimg Wha, thirteen miles out, nor did they deter scores of Korean Christians from tramp- ing several miles through the mud and rain to give us hearty welcome. Both missionaries and natives brought bountiful refreshments with them, and we had a picnic lunch of the most delightful kind in spite of the dripping skies and the fighting, squealing ponies in the inn court- yard. And so after a journey of twelve days, one on train and steamer and eleven in chairs, on ponies and afoot, visiting many villages and speaking daily to crowds of Koreans, we arrived at the historic old city of Pyengyang. PART II THE STRUGGLE FOR THE POSSESSION OF KOREA CHAPTER VII THE RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN AND THE CHINA-JAPAN WAR Chinese ascendancy in Korea dates from an early period. We have already seen that the history of Korea begins with an immigration from China, and that Kija, who is supposed to have been the first ruler of the country, was a Chinese. Korea received from China two of her religions, Buddhism and Confucianism, her written language, her literature and philosophy, her dress, and many of her customs. Trade, too, was largely with China. Thrifty Chinese shopkeepers settled in various parts of the coun- try. They formed a considerable colony in Seoul and speedily gained control of the business of the capital. The Chinese Government asserted and the Korean Government conceded poHtical superiority. Embassies from Korea regularly visited Peking to pay tribute. The amount gradually diminished, but the forms were scmpulously observed. After the Manchu occupation of China each Korean King, on ascending the throne, paid humble re- spects to the Emperor of China and received his patent of royalty from him. This investiture and the annual visit to Peking of a Korean embassy bearing gifts and protestations of allegiance came to be established customs. Imperial Chinese commissioners on arriving at Seoul were received by the King outside of the capital with all the honors due to envoys suzerain. A stately arch long marked the spot where this ceremony took place. The Japanese treaty of 1876 stipulated that "Chosen, being an inde- pendent State, enjoys the same sovereign rights as does Japan." But as late as 1890 the King, in acknowledguig the thoughtfulness of the Emperor of China in lessening the expenses of an embassy of condolence after the death 109 110 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST of the Queen Dowager, wrote: "Our country is a small Kingdom and a vassal State of China, to which the Emperor has shown his graciousness from time immemorial. . . . The Emperor's consideration for his vassal State, as evinced by his thoughtfulness in matters pertaining to the Mission, is fathomless. How admirable and satisfactory ! And how glorious!" The question seesawed back and forth, China claiming suzerainty whenever she deemed it to her advantage to do so, and Korea conceding it whenever she was obliged to. While imperious in her demands in ordinary times, China was quick to disclaim responsibility when it was likely to mean trouble for herself. After the massacre of French missionaries, in 1866, China was not at all disposed to face the angry French Government or to pay a heavy indemnity, and when the French Charge d'Affaires pressed the matter at Peking, the Tsung-li Yamen virtuously pro- tested that Korea was an independent state for which China had no responsibility. When, m 1871, Admiral Rodgers, of the American navy, claimed satisfaction for the looting of the schooner General Sherman and the murder of its crew, in 1866, the Chinese Government took the same position. And in 1876, when the Japanese were about to send an expedition to Korea to insist upon their demands, the Chinese reiterated their waiver of responsibility. It was a costly mistake, for when China wished to re- assert her claims, it was easy for objectors to quote her own admissions that the country was independent. In 1882 China insisted that the words, "Korea has always been tributary to China, and this is admitted by the Presi- dent of the United States," should be inserted in the first part of the treaty between Korea and America. The American Government eliminated the clause, and China vainly tried to have the same provision inserted in the treaty with Great Britain in 1883. Chma did not readily yield, and even after the Korean envoj^ had reached Washington, the Chinese minister told him that he must not make any representations to the American Government RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAxN 111 without prior consultation with the Chinese legation. The President of the United States, however, took the posi- tion that the American Government was dealing with Korea as an independent state, and that the Korean Min- ister could be received only on that supposition. In spite of this loss of diplomatic ground, the Chinese Resident in Seoul was for a time the virtual ruler of the country, at least so far as foreign relations were concerned. From 1884 to 1893 the Resident was the famous Yuan Shih Kai, who afterward became President of the Chinese Re- pubhc, a man of extraordinary abihty and force of character, as all the world afterward learned. He was only twenty- six years of age when he arrived in Korea, and he had not then acquired, or he deemed it unnecessary to exercise, the tact in deaUng with men that he showed in later life, al- though he never was lacking in decision and ruthless energy when he beheved them to be required to gain his ends. At any rate, his policy in Seoul was that of "the big stick." He maintained an estabHshment of royal magnificence, de- manded precedence over all the diplomatic corps, insisted on his right to sit when received in audience by the King, and conducted himself with such general arrogance that, while he completely cowed the helpless Korean Govern- ment, he so strengthened suspicion and dislike among Ko- reans and Japanese that he materially hastened the out- break of war between China and Japan. For the Chinese claims to Korea were disputed at every point by the Japanese. They, too, could point to numer- ous historical precedents. As far back as 202 A. D., the Empress Regent Jingu of Japan had led an expedition to Korea and received the submission of the Korean court. For eleven hundred years after that, the Japanese claimed, and the Koreans with varying degrees of reluctance ad- mitted, allegiance to Japan. Korean embassies bearing tribute sailed regularly from Fusan to the court of the Shogun. After Ni Taijo gained the throne of Korea, in 1392, the tribute embassies to Japan became less numerous and the presents less costly until in 1460 they ceased alto- 112 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST gether. The Japanese resented the growing incHnation of the Koreans to acknowledge the overlordship of China rather than that of Japan. Internal troubles postponed active interference, but the day of reckoning came with the accession to power of the ambitious and martial-spirited Hideyoshi, one of the great figures in Japanese history, who was made regent of Japan July 31, 1585. Angered by the refusal of the Koreans to pay tribute and to give the Japa- nese certain trading privileges, and desirmg to strike at China through Korea, he sent an army of 130,000 men into the peninsula in April, 1592. This army was memora- ble not only for its size and elaborate equipment but for its firearms, which the Japanese used for the first time on a large scale against a foreign foe. One of its two generals, Konishi Yukinaga, was a Roman CathoHc Christian. His army swept northward in an unbroken series of victories to Pyengyang, while the other general, Kato, moved north- east to Gensan. From Pyengyang, Konishi, flushed with victory, sent for the Japanese fleet at Fusan to join him. But oddly as it sounds in our day, when the Japanese ves- sels set forth, they were met and decisively defeated by the Korean ships. Meantime, the repeated appeals of the Koreans to the Chinese court had begun to be heeded and a Chinese army marched to the rehef of the Koreans. The first detach- ment of 5,000 men was routed at Pyengyang by the Japa- nese; but a second force, consisting of 60,000 men, was more successful. The Japanese, far from their base of sup- plies, decimated by months of fighting and disease, suffer- ing from the cold of an inclement winter, and harassed by the now thoroughly aroused Koreans who kept up a guerilla warfare, were compelled to retreat. They were joined at Seoul by the division of Kato, dismayed by the bombs which a Korean named Richosen had invented, and which, fired from hooped wooden cannon^ exploded with destructive effect among the invaders. The poor Koreans suffered heavily between the eon- tending armies of China and Japan. The country was E.IVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 113 ravaged, the crops were destroyed, and many cities sacked. The Japanese, fearing treachery on the part of the Ko- reans, burned a large part of Seoul and drove out the inhabitants. Multitudes of the defenseless people were butchered with such ruthlessness that the memory of that fearful slaughter remains to this day. At a great battle fought soon afterward, near Seoul, the Chinese and Ko- reans were driven back with heavy loss, and after much suffering on both sides, peace was concluded May 22, 1593. The Japanese evacuated Seoul, which was im- mediately occupied by the Chinese. By the terms agreed upon, Japan held the three southern provinces, Hideyoshi was recognized as King of Korea, and tribute was to be sent to Japan. The peace was short-lived. Despite the treaty, the Japa- nese captured Chin-chiu, an important castle forty miles from Fusan. China protested and began to mobilize an- other army. A Chinese embassy to Japan in October, 1596, presented a letter so patronizing in its assumption of superiority that Hideyoshi dismissed it in a rage and January 7, 1597, despatched a second army of invasion, numberiag 163,000 men. The Koreans, encouraged by their former victory, formed a fleet of two hundred ships which were formidable for those days in size, weight, and equipment. This time, however, the Japanese were better prepared, and in an engagement of only two hours sunk or captured one hundred and seventy-four of the Korean vessels. They were equally successful on land. The Chi- nese had taken possession of the castle at Nan-on, and greatly strengthened its fortifications, but the Japanese furiously stormed it. The defenders fought desperately but unavailingly, and a gruesome heap of 3,726 severed heads marked the bloody victory of the assailants. September 30, the Japanese advanced into the interior. The panic-stricken Koreans abandoned the castle of Teru- shiu, and the invaders razed it and marched on toward Seoul. October 19 found them at Chin-zen, seventeen miles from the capital. Here they hesitated, for while 114 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST they had been winnmg brilliant victories, their ships had met the combined Chinese and Korean fleets and suffered disastrous defeat. It is curious, in the light of present-day conditions, to reflect that China and Korea were once more powerful on the water than the Japanese. Deprived of the supplies and naval support that they had confidently counted on at the port of Seoul, dismayed by the report that the Chinese general Keikai had been reinforced and was advancing at the head of 100,000 men, reahzing that winter was approaching, that the country was ravaged and desolate, that the whole population was against them, that provisions were running short, and that their ranks were thinned by wounds and disease, th^ Japa- nese reluctantly retreated. Sullenly determined to do all the damage possible, they looted the houses and castles of the Koreans and burned the fine old historic cities of Kion- chiu, the ancient capital of Shinra, and Keku-shiu, another famous city. November 18, they arrived at Uru-san on the seacoast, thirty-five miles from Fusan, where they fever- ishly toiled day and night to fortify themselves before the Chinese and Korean armies could arrive. January 30, 1598, the allies, 80,000 strong, furiously attacked the 23,000 Japanese. In the desperate battle that ensued, three-fourths of the Japanese are said to have been killed or wounded. The Chinese and Koreans of that day knew how to fight, and day after day the terrific struggle was renewed till the defenders were so worn and emaciated that, as one chronicle quaintly runs, "their legs were as lean as bamboo sticks." Thirst and starvation added to the terrors of cold and battle, for the assailants had cut off the water and food supply of the garrison. But the undaunted Japanese fought stubbornly on till, on February 9, a relieving column from Fusan decisively defeated the Chinese at the battle of Gisen. The besiegers retreated. Ships laden with provisions arrived, and the beleaguered and decimated Japa- nese found themselves snatched from the very jaws of de- struction. The crippled and famished survivors laid aside their bloody armor, ravenously devoured the fresh food, RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 115 and sent to Kyoto the ears and noses of 13,238 Chinese and Koreans as trophies of their victory. September 9 of the same year (1598) Hideyoshi died at the age of sixty-three, and in accordance with his dying orders the Japanese army in Korea sailed for home. This ended the war of the second Japanese invasion, a war as imnecessary as it was brutal, which cost the Japa- nese 50,000 men, and in which the bodies of 185,738 Koreans, and 29,014 Chinese, 214,752 in all, were said to have been left on the field. Two of the Korean leaders won midying fame: Admiral Yi, whose skill and valor were the chief factor in the defeat of the Japanese at sea, and General Kim Tuk-nyimg, who displayed such high military quali- ties that his distinguished enemy, General Konishi, ordered his portrait painted, and when he received it, ejaculated: "This man is indeed a general." Japan for a time turned her attention to her own affairs, and stricken Korea sorrowfully considered her ruined cities and weed-grown fields. The process of reconstruction was slow, for fire and sword, famine and pestilence had left httle. Roots and berries were all that the starving people could find to eat, and if it had not been for the ever-bounti- ful fisheries the remaining population could hardly have survived until the first harvests could be ripened. Korea never fully recovered from the disaster. The Hideyoshi in- vasions left her a ruined country. Many of the cities were rebuilt only in part, and they squalidly. Some were never rebuilt at all. Destroyed palaces, libraries, and treasures of art have not been replaced. Hovels succeeded houses, abject poverty followed wealth, and hopeless despair set- tled upon the people like a pall. The spirit of the Koreans was permanently broken. "The accursed nation" the Koreans long called the Japanese as they bitterly thought of the authors of their fallen estate. The failure of the Japanese to gain a permanent foothold gave temporary respite to the sorely beset Koreans; but in 1623 lyemitsu, under the title of Tycoon, renewed the demand for tribute. The Koreans were in no mood to 116 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST risk another invasion, and the following year an embassy loaded with presents proceeded to Japan, where it was re- ceived with gorgeous ceremony. For a considerable period thereafter a similar embassy journeyed to Japan each year, the size of the embassy increasing imtil it reached 400 persons. The Japanese enjoyed this annual and pompous homage for a while, but after the submission of Korea to the Manchu throne, in 1667, the value of the tribute dwindled until the embassies went almost empty-handed. The Japanese insisted upon their coming as a concession to their pride, even though they meant nothing more than an exchange of presents; but the expense involved in suita- bly entertaining the numerous tribute-bearers gradually became a burden, and in 1790 the embassies were ordered to stop at the island of Tsushima, where they were enter- tained by the local daimios, who received a grant from the Tycoon for this purpose. This arrangement was kept up as a mere form until 1832, when the embassies were dis- continued. While the harassed Koreans were thus being relieved from the worst of their troubles with Japan, new trouble had developed on their northern frontier. The restless and powerful Manchu tribes had taken advantage of the des- perate struggle between the Chinese and the Japanese to invade Chinese territory. Weakened by the war with Japan, the Chinese were ill prepared to resist the belligerent Man- chus. The Ming Emperor managed to have the leader of the Manchus beheaded; but this, so far from disheartening the Manchus, roused them to greater fury, and they ad- vanced in vast hordes upon Liao-tung. The frightened Chinese demanded an army of 20,000 men from the Ko- reans; but in spite of this reinforcement the Manchus de- cisively defeated the allied Chinese and Korean armies in 1619. The Manchu general was not disposed to retaliate on the Koreans, for he remembered their services in helping to stay the tide of Japanese conquest. But he significantly intimated to the Korean King that for the future it would be the part of wisdom not to take sides in the struggle be- RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 117 tween the Chinese and Manchus. The Korean King failed to heed the warning and so actively aided the Chinese that in 1627 the Manchus angrily turned upon the Koreans. Crossing the Yalu, they destroyed cities and ravaged fields all the way to Seoul. The King was forced to capitulate and to sign a treaty of allegiance to the Manchu overlords. As soon, however, as the Manchu army had returned to its struggle with the Chinese, the Koreans treacherously vio- lated the treaty. They paid dear. The Manchus marched back, captured Seoul, and, crossing to the island of Kang-wa, where the ladies of the court had taken refuge, they seized it also. The humbled King prostrated himself nine times before the wrathful Manchu, confessed his crimes, and signed a treaty (February, 1637), promising never to have anything more to do with the Chinese, and to pay tribute to the Manchu court. A memorial stand was erected, and the victorious Manchus marched back to China. The Ming Emperor, now threatened by a formidable re- beUion, made peace with the Manchus, who helped him to suppress the rebelHon, and then entered Peking, deposed him and placed Chien Chi, the son of their own late King, upon the throne of the Middle Kingdom. So great was the fear which the Manchurian invaders had inspired among the Koreans that a strip of territory on the Yalu River, sixty miles wide and three hundred miles long, was left uncultivated and depopulated. It failed to be a real bar- rier as it speedily became the refuge of outlaws from both sides of the line. In 1875, the King of Korea sent a com- plaint to the Emperor of China regarding the danger to which he was exposed from the lawless characters which infested this neutral strip, and whom he could not reach. Li Hung Chang thereupon marched into the region at the head of a military force. Impressed with the beauty of the scenery, the fertility of the soil, and the accessibility of the region by the river, he recommended to the Em- peror that the strip be added to Chinese territory, and that a wall and moat be built along the southern boundary for the protection of the Koreans. The King of Korea 118 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST thoughtlessly agreed to this arrangement, the result being that he lost his claim to an exceedingly valuable region without gaining the protection he desired, for the hastily constructed wall and moat proved to be of small defensive value. By mutual agreement, a Korean caught on the Chinese side of the line was to be summarily executed, and a Chinese caught on the Korean side was to suffer a like fate. Under the more stable conditions of later times, this neutral strip rapidly filled up with inhabitants and became relatively prosperous, but for a long period it was a menace to peace. Korea continued to pay tribute regularly to the new Em- peror of China. The amount was reduced to one-third in 1643, and in 1650 a Korean lady who became a favorite at the imperial court in Peking was able to secure a further modification so that the tribute became little more than a formal recognition of China's suzerainty. Still, the Chi- nese punctiliously insisted upon it, and in 1695 they made the King of Korea pay a penalty of ten thousand ounces of silver for ignoring a point which they deemed essential to their dignity. The accession of a Korean ruler was not considered complete until two Chinese functionaries had solemnly invested him with the crown. Korea profited in various ways by this close relationship, especially in the domain of learning, for many scholarly and patriotic Chi- nese who chafed under the Manchu rule came to Korea, bringing with them more advanced learning and civilization. Fusan, however, remained in the possession of the Japa- nese, who kept it as a convenient conamercial port and, in case of further need, a military base. The occupation of their southern port by an alien Power was a sore grievance to the proud Koreans. However, relations with Japan now remained comparatively quiescent for a long period. In 1866 the frightened King of Korea asked Japan for help in dealing with the French Government, which had been ex- asperated by the massacre of French Roman Cathohc mis- sionaries, referred to on a preceding page. Japan, however, had no idea of embroiling herself with France, and made no P=H RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 119 reply. More than two hundred years of comparative free- dom from Japanese domination had cast Japan's earher claims and conquests somewhat into the background when the islanders suddenly revived their claims. The overthrow of feudalism and the Shogunate, m 1868, and the unifying of the nation imder the Mikado ended the long internal strug- gles of the Japanese, and led them to look again beyond their own boundaries with a new sense of power and ambi- tion. An embassy was promptly despatched to Korea to suggest to the Koreans the expediency of renewing their recognition of Japanese suzerainty. The King was then a minor, and his father, the Tai-wen-kun, was regent. A haughty man at all times, he was just then exalted above measure by a victory over the French and his apparently successful effort to stamp out the Roman Catholic mis- sions. He refused the Japanese demand so curtly that the Japanese were furious. A hot-headed party wanted to declare war at once; but internal conditions in Japan were not yet sufficiently stable to make it prudent to risk a for- eign war. The Japanese Government therefore swallowed its wrath and waited for a more favorable opportunity to take revenge. The effort to induce Korea to resume its foiTQer relation as a tributary state was renewed in 1873, and again in 1875, but still in vain. The young King of Korea had become of age in the former year and begun to reign in his own name. He soon proved himself to be a better ruler than the brutal and reactionary Tai-wen-kun, but he was not disposed to become a vassal of the Mikado. Matters came to a crisis September 19, 1875. A Japa- nese vessel, the Unyo Kuan, landed a party of sailors for water near Kang-wa. The Koreans fired upon them, per- haps beheving them to be French or Americans, with whom there had recently been trouble. Whereupon the Japanese stormed the fort and made short work of its de- fenders. Japan promptly sent a commissioner to Peking to ascertain what responsibiHty the Chinese Government was disposed to assume, and January 6, 1876, sent an ex- pedition of 800 armed men to Korea, in command of Gen- 120 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST eral Kuroda. The Chinese Government disavowed all re- sponsibility; and advised the Korean King to make a treaty with the offended Japanese. The treaty, which was signed February 27 (1876), opened the ports of Fusan, Chemulpo, and Gensan to Japanese trade, provided for a Japanese Minister at Seoul, and asserted that "Chosen, being an in- dependent state, enjoys the same sovereign rights as Japan." This recognition of Korean independence, of course, was purely "diplomatic," but it was an advantage to Japan since it afforded her an excuse for ignoring the claims of China. The meaning of the treaty was significantly illus- trated three months later when a Korean embassy sailed from Fusan for the court of Japan, the first since the former century. It was received with elaborate ceremonies at the Mikado's com't, and ere long Japanese influence was again in the ascendant. In 1882 Japan strengthened her posi- tion by a further convention with Korea, one clause of which gave her the right to keep troops in the countiy for the pro- tection of resident Japanese. Japan thereafter continued to maintain a garrison in the Korean capital. As China also kept a garrison there after the revolution of 1882, the rival claimants were face to face in circumstances which might at any time develop trouble. The helpless King was between two masters, each jealous of the other, and each interpreting his independence to mean that his rival must keep hands off while he himself was free to push his claims to the utmost. The situation became more complicated and the relations between China and Japan more strained. A clash was temporarily averted when Viceroy Li Hung Chang and Marquis Ito signed a convention at Tien-tsin, in 1885, in which it was agreed that both nations should withdraw their troops from Korea, and that if any " grave disturbance " should occur "of great moment or concern to China or Japan, such as might of necessity call for troops from the outside for the suppression thereof," either nation sending such troops should give due notice in writing to the other. This helped matters for a while, but it proved to be a truce RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 121 rather than a peace. I shall have occasion to refer in a later chapter to some of the plots, counter-plots, and acts of violence which characterized the next decade. The blaze was finally started by the Tong-haks, whose miagling of patriotic and lawless elements I have described in a former chapter. In the early months of 1894, they became so troublesome and formidable that the frightened King asked China to help him in suppressing the rebellion, which was rapidly developing. China promptly responded, and June 7 trot)ps were despatched to Korea. The Chinese Government notified the Japanese legation in Peking, in a mernorandum which included the following words: "It is in harmony with our constant practice to protect our tribu- tary states by sending our troops to assist them, and Gen- eral Weh has been ordered to proceed to Zenra ... to restore the peace of our tributary state." This was too much for the Japanese Government. It sharply repHed that it did not recognize Korea as a tributary of China, and promptly availed itseK of its rights imder the treaty of Tien-tsin to send troops also. The result was that while 2,000 Chinese troops landed at Asan, 10,000 Japanese troops landed at Chemulpo in July, marched to Seoul and occupied it. China retaliated by sendmg more troops and a fleet. Negotiations followed. Japan proposed that the rival Powers co-operate in effecting certain reforms in Korea. China objected, insisted that the Koreans should be left to work out their- own reforms, and demanded that the Japanese troops withdraw. The Japanese refused to com- ply and July 14 notified the Chinese Government that the coming of any more Chinese troops would be regarded as an unfriendly act. July 20 the Japanese requested the Korean King to order the Chinese troops out of the country on pain of "decisive measures." The ministers of other Powers intervened and suggested that the Japanese and Chinese troops retire simultaneously. China professed to be willing to accede to this, but July 23 the Japanese, learn- ing that Chinese reinforcements were on the way by both 122 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST sea and land, took possession of the imperial palace, made the King a virtual prisoner, and placed the government under the control of the Tai-wen-kun, the King's father. The Japanese Government denied that it had received from China the notice that the convention of Tien-tsin called for before either government was to send additional troops to Korea. Li Hung Chang, by whose advice they were sent, afterward claimed that the government at Peking had as- sured him that due notice had been sent, and that he learned later that he had been deceived. However this may have been, July 25 two Japanese cruisers met three Chinese war- ships convoying a transport with 1,200 soldiers bound for Korea. The Chinese rashly opened fire; but in the en- gagement that followed the Japanese destroyed one of the Chinese ships, disabled the second, captured the third, and sent the transport and its soldiers to the bottom. Three days later, July 28, the Japanese general in Seoul requested the Chinese commander at Asan to withdraw his men from Korea; and, on receiving a defiant reply, attacked in such force that the Chinese were utterly routed and fled pell-mell toward Pyengyang. July 30, the Korean Government, un- der the complaisant Tai-wen-kun, abrogated the conven- tions with China, and on the first day of August, 1894, war was formally declared. The contestants appeared to be grotesquely unmatched. The Chinese were overwhelmingly superior in numbers. The Western world was amazed at the supposed temerity of small Japan in attacking mighty China. It seemed like a terrier attacking a mastiff, and they expected to see the big dog crush the Httle one with a single bite of his massive jaws. But the little fighter proved to be all bone and sinew, and pluck and skill, and the large one to be as flabby as a jelly-fish, and as helpless as a prize pig. The Chinese were pathetically ignorant of the methods of modern war, and unprepared for effective war of any kind. The Peking government was in the hands of selfish and corrupt officials who knew little and cared less about the outfitting of an army and the proper planning of a campaign. They de- RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 123 spised the Japanese as an insignificant and inferior bar- barian nation, underrated their strength, and were intent only upon enriching themselves. The regiments were largely made up of paupers, criminals, and other dregs of the population; for the Chinese regarded the profession of arms with contempt, and respectable and efficient men avoided military service. The officers, like their civil superiors, thought only of their own interests, swindled the government and their subordinates, and greedily accepted Japanese bribes for betraying information. The disgrace- ful situation was relieved only by the devotion of a hand- ful of army and naval officers, chief of whom was Admiral Ting, and he committed suicide after the disastrous battle before Wei-hai Wei. The equipment of the Chinese troops would have been amusing if its grim consequences had not been so pitiful. Many soldiers were armed only with spears or bayonets fastened to the ends of poles. Many who had guns carried old muzzle-loading muskets, or the still more antiquated gingals. A few had modem rifles, but they were of varying calibers. Cartridges of assorted sizes were thrown in piles on the ground, and each soldier had to find, if he could, the ones that fitted his particular gun. The officers bore umbrellas and fans, and in some instances singing birds. There was practically no discipline except in the command of General Tso, and the men drank and pillaged and quar- relled incessantly. What food the government supplied was largely stolen by dishonest officers, and the men were left to forage for themselves. The result was that the people of the land through which the army passed suffered almost as much as if they had been attacked by an enemy. For fighting purposes, the Chinese regiments were hardly more formidable than flocks of sheep, making a show of a few volleys, and then runnuig away as fast as their legs could carry them. China had men of splendid strength, but they saw no reason why they should leave their shops and farms in order to be killed in a war which did not in- terest them. The Manchu government officials had gotten 124 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST themselves into the war, and they should get out of it as best they could with the aid of such offscourings of Chinese towns as they could hire or compel to enhst. Japan, on the other hand, though small and poor in comparison with her huge opponent, was thoroughly pre- pared for war. Her ablest men were warlike in spirit, zealous students of modern military science, and experts in miHtary organization. The soldiers were hardy, brave, and highly disciplined. The equipment was the very best — trifles, artillery, and warships of the latest patterns. The Intelligence Department had maps showing every hill and valley, every creek and tree in the whole zone of opera- tions, and surveys and soundings of every square rod of rivers and coast-line. The General Staff knew exactly what it wanted to do, and where and how to do it; and the whole military machine moved with a smoothness, speed, and effectiveness which amazed European observers and boded ill for the Chinese. The war was short, bloody, and decisive. Seven months sufficed to carry out the Japanese plans. A series of swift successes culminated in the battle of Pyengyang, September 15. The Chinese met the advancing Japanese, beating gongs, waving banners, and firing their old blunderbusses after a fashion that did but little more damage than if they had been bunches of firecrackers. The Japanese replied with a hail of bullets and shells. The result was appaUing. The plain near Pyengyang quickly became a shambles. The Chinese general Tso was killed at the first onset, and his troops ignominiously fled. That night the Japanese captured the Chinese forts, and the Chinese army, to the number of about 12,000, made its way through the city and attempted to escape along the road to the north. Estimates of its casualties vary, but it is believed that nearly 5,000 men were killed, while the Japanese losses were only 250. It was a slaughter rather than a battle. The panic-stricken Chinese who succeeded in escaping were completely demoral- ized. The retreat became a rout, and the war was prac- tically ended. During the entire war the Japanese lost RIVAL CLAIMS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 125 only 3,284 men, of whom only 795 were kiUed or died from wotmds, all the rest dying from disease. The Chinese are said to have lost 27,917 in battle, besides uncounted num- bers who died of disease. Chinese commissioners, headed by Viceroy Li Hung Chang, and counselled by the American Honorable John W. Foster, met the Japanese Count Ito and Viscount Mutso in Shimonoseki and concluded a treaty of peace April 17, 1895. It was a trying experience for the proud old Viceroy, and all the more so because he had undertaken it with great reluctance, keenly feeling the humihatuig position in which he was placed. The treaty recognized the indepen- dence of Korea, ceded the Liao-tung peninsula, including Port Arthur, to the Japanese, bound the Chinese to pay a heavy indemnity, and made several other concessions to the victors. The independence of Korea was formally proclaimed by the King at the Altar of the Spirits of the Lamb, January 8, 1895. The Japanese Minister, Count Inouye, caused the occasion to be celebrated with considerable ceremony. The Korean ruler went through the elaborately prescribed . form with poor grace, and the Korean officials looked on in troubled silence. They were not so lacking in intelligence as to fail to understand that, while Korea by that act be- came independent of China, she did not obtain any more j^ freedom than she had before, but simply transferred her ' ^ allegiance to Japan; and they preferred China. The King was induced to form an assembly of twenty-one counsellors "for the discussion of all matters, grave and trivial, within the reahn." This body solemnly convened July 30, but after a few slimly attended and ineffective meetings was superseded by a privy council, December 17. Petitions were presented to the throne to "expel" the foreign con- queror, but they could avail nothing. For a few years the outward forms of independence were maintained after a fashion. For the edification of the outside world and to lend color to the appearance of reality, these forms cul- minated October 15, 1907, in a change of title. Prior to 126 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST that date the ruler's designation was "King." This word (Wang) may signify a tributary prince. ''Emperor/' how- ever (Hwang-ti) means in Asia the sovereign of an inde- pendent state. And so the world saw the hollowly pa- thetic spectacle of the timid, feeble King solemnly assum- ing the title of Emperor. Seldom have imperial honors been worn in poorer state or exercised with scantier dignity. The frail reed of Korean sovereignty could not stand amid the international storms of the Far East in the twentieth century. What followed will be discussed in a later chap- ter. Space Hmits have compelled me to give only in outline an account of the long and complicated struggle between China and Japan for the possession of Korea. But this much appeared to be necessary to show how deeply rooted in former centuries some of the present conditions and problems are. Readers who wish to delve more deeply into the history of the country will find ample materials in Homer B. Hulbert's The History of Korea, and WilHam Elliot Griffis's Corea the Hermit Nation, to whose stores of facts I have been much indebted. CHAPTER VIII RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA I HAVE discussed in another book^ Russia's ambition to reach an open port on the north Pacific Ocean, the Russian advance across northern Asia, the remarkable natural re- sources of Siberia, and the construction of the Trans- Siberian Railway, which was begun in 1891 and practically completed in 1902. It was a great and costly enterprise, splendid in conception and in achievement, flinging a high- way of steel across 5,426 miles of territory which the world had regarded as a wilderness of sand and snow. There was nothing to interfere with Russia's freedom to run the line of the Trans-Siberian Railway wherever she liked, except two obstacles, one natural and the other poHtical. The first was Lake Baikal, about two-thirds of the way across Siberia. It is the largest body of fresh water in the eastern hemisphere except the Victoria Nyanza, in Africa. It Hes 1,561 feet above sea-level, is 40 miles wide, 400 miles long, and 3,185 feet deep. The surface is frozen to a depth of about nine feet five months in the year, and the ice breaks into fissures and piles into hummocks and windrows that prevent easy and safe passage on sledges. The Rus- sians temporarily solved this problem by using heavy ferry- steamers which were kept running in winter as ice-breakers. But as soon as practicable, the railway-line was carried around the lake. This involved a detour of 200 miles through a mountainous region, which presented serious en- gineering difficulties. No less than thirty-three tunnels were required. But the Russians persevered and the detour v/as completed in 1904. The political obstacle was near the eastern end, where Chinese Manchuria projects northward so far as to necessi- ^ Biissia in Transformation, pp. 135-164. 127 128 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST tate another long detour and to interpose an extensive alien territory between the Trans-Baikal region and the ter- minus of the railway at Vladivostok. This difficulty was eliminated by an "agreement/' September 6, 1896, through the Russo-Chinese Bank in Peking, in which China was "persuaded" to permit the construction of the railway "under joint control," south of the Amur River. This con- cession made Russian influence paramount in an immense area to the southward and enabled the Russians in the fol- lowing year to begin the development of a squalid settle- ment on the Sungari River into the important city of Har- bin in the centre of one of the most productive wheat and grazing regions in the world. A concession obtained in \i March, 1898, enabled Russia to build a branch line from Harbin southward to Port Arthur. That this desirable ter- ritory was considered a Russian preserve soon appeared in a proposal which M. Plangon, Russian Charge d' Affaires at Peking, presented to the Chinese Government, one clause of which reads: "That the Chinese Government will not make any decision with regard to the opening to foreign trade of any new treaty ports in Manchuria and the estab- Hshment of foreign consuls there, without previous con- sultation with the Imperial Government." Vladivostok, while a position of great natural strength, and with a fine harbor in summer, is closed by ice sij^ ^ months in the year. Moreover, it is not upon the open ^ Pacific but upon the Japan Sea, from which there are only three outlets: La Perouse (or Soya) Strait, about five hun- dred miles northeast; Tsugaru Strait, four hundred and twenty-four miles east; and Korea Strait, nearly six hun- dred miles south. The first is a far-northern wintry passage between Saghalien and the Japanese Yezo; the second is a narrow channel between the two largest islands of Japan, Hondo and Yezo; and the latter, although one hmidred and twenty miles wide, is bordered on one side by Japan, and is cut in two by the Japanese island of Tsushima. In other words, the Japan Sea is literally Japan's sea. and it would be difficult for a fleet of any other nation to get in RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 129 or out of it without her consent, as a Russian admiral after- ward learned to his sorrow. The later annexation of Korea locked a door which already was shut. Naturally, therefore, Russia began to press her way southward through Manchuria, that great province of China whose southern end is washed by the Yellow Sea. China's resistance was no match for Russian diplomacy, and rapid progress was being made when the China-Japan War broke out, in 1894. I have discussed this war in an- other chapter. Suffice it here that the Japanese made short work of the Chinese, and in. November, after a brilliant campaign, they captured Port Arthur, which had been a squaHd fishing-village until Li Hung Chang, then Viceroy of Chih-H, had fortified it on the advice of German engineers, who discerned its strategic value. April 17, 1895, the treaty of peace was signed at Shimonoseki. This treaty stipulated among other things that Korea should be abso- lutely independent, but that the Liao-tung peninsula, as well as Fonnosa and the Pescadores, should be ceded to Japan, and an indemnity of two hundred million taels paid. Ostensibly in the interest of the integrity of China, but really in the interests of her own ambition, Russia per- suaded France and Germany to join her in notifying the Japanese Government, April 23, that "it would not be per- mitted to retain permanent possession of any portion of the mainland of Asia." The soHcitude of the Russians for the integrity of China was touching, but it did not prevent them from making one encroachment after another upon the coveted territory. The treaty of St. Petersburg, December 26, 1896, gave the Eastern Chinese Railroad Company, whose stock could be held only by Russians and Chinese, the right to construct a line through Manchuria, to develop mines, to promote all other commercial enterprises, and to station troops in Manchuria "to protect the railroad." This virtually made Manchuria a Russian province.^ March 8, 1898, Russia threw off all disguise and peremp- ^ Cf. Alfred Rambaud's The Case of Russia, pp. 1-135. 130 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST torily demanded from China a lease of the Liao-tung penin- sula, including Port Arthur and 800 square miles of adjoin- ing territory. The Chinese helplessly yielded, and March 27, the humiliating lease was signed. Grim significance was given to Russia's action by the prompt appearance at Port Arthur of 20,000 soldiers and 90,000 Chinese coolies, who were set to work developing a great modem fortification. The term of the lease was twenty-five years, but he must have been a very imsophisticated observer who imagined that such enormous expenditures with such interests at stake would be voluntarily abandoned at the expiration of so brief a period. The harbor of Port Arthur is hardly large enough for naval purposes, and quite inadequate for commercial use. The Russians did not wish, anyway, to make their fortress accessible to the rest of the world. The treaty of March 27, 1898, under which Russia acquired possession of Port Arthur and Talien-wan, stipulated that "all land held by Chinese within such limits, as well as the adjacent waters, shall be held by Russia alone on lease. . . . Port Arthur shall be a naval base for the sole use of Russian and Chinese men-of-war, and be considered as an unopened port so far as the naval and mercantile vessels of other na- tions are concerned." So the Russians decided to build a commercial city thii'ty-three miles northeast of Port Arthur and to call it Dahiy, which quite appropriately means " far away." Most cities grow, but the Russians could not afford to wait for so slow a method, and a metropolis was made to order as a result of an edict issued by the Czar, July 30, 1899. The harbor at Dalny is a fine one, with thirty feet of water at low tide, so that large vessels can lie along the docks and transfer their cargoes directly to trains for Europe. The boom cities of the American West j-ielded the pahn to this boom city of the Far East. In 1899 there was practically nothing at Dalny but a wretched Chinese village. By 1903 great piers had been constructed; enor- mous warehouses and elevators erected; gas, electric light, RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 13i water and street-car plants installed ; wide and well-sewered streets laid out; and a thoroughly modern and handsome city plamied in four sections, the first of which was admin- istrative, the second mercantile, the third residential, and the fourth Chinese. Neither labor nor expense was spared in the construction of this ambitious city, which within four years had a population of 50,000 and represented an ex- penditure of $150,000,000. The edict of the Czar promised that Dalny was to enjo)^ "the rights of free trade which belong to free ports" upon certain "conditions." But the histoiy of Russia's dealings with outsiders makes it not uncharitable to suspect that the port would have been really free only so far as the in- terests of the Trans-Siberian Railway might require and that the line of freedom would have been so closely drawn at the city limits that the vaunted liberty would not be worth much to any but Russian subjects. Russian policy in Asia was not philanthropic. It has been alleged that the Chinese benefited from Rus- sian occupation, but in 1903 M. Gerrare wrote: "It is true that some thousands of coolies from Chefoo have found occasional remunerative emplojnnent in constructing rail- ways, building forts, barracks, and houses; but these are not resident, are no more part of the population of Man- churia, and the purchasing power of the people has not been greatly increased by the money Russia has expended there. Manchuria has the railway, but enormous tracts of fertile land have been thrown out of cultivation; thriving towns and villages too numerous to count have disappeared en- tirely; the junks are off the rivers, trade is at a standstill, industry is dead, the robber bands have increased in num- ber and infest the countryside so that travel into the wilder parts is no safer than it was previous to the imposition of the Russian regime." The confusion caused by the Boxer uprising of 1900 af- forded Russia a pretext for further aggressions. Asserting, and with reason, that foreign interests in Manchuria were imperilled, Russia sent troops into New-chwang and vir- 132 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST tually assumed the government of all Manchuria. In a treaty with China, signed April 8, 1902, Russia solemnly agreed to evacuate Manchuria, except the leased Liao-tung peninsula, by October 8, 1903. The agreement was charm- ing in graciousness, the first of the four articles reading: "His Majesty the Emperor of all the Russias, desiring to give fresh proof of his love of peace and his sentiments of friendship for His Majesty the Emperor of China, not- withstanding the fact that the first attacks upon the peace- able Russian population were made from various points in Manchuria, which is situated on the frontier, consents to the re-establishment of the authority of the Chinese Govern- ment in the aforesaid province, and restores to the Chinese Government the right to exercise governmental and admin- istrative powers there as before its occupation by the Rus- sian troops." The other articles provided for the necessary- details, and everything appeared dehghtfuUy satisfactory. October 8, 1903, came and went, however, but Russia re- mained. Expostulations were met with evasive replies and specious excuses, and the world soon realized that Russia did not have the slightest intention of abandoning the vantage-ground that she had won. Russia had reached the open Pacific Ocean, and she proposed to stay there. The Russians were not satisfied with their gains in Man- churia, and for several reasons which they deemed con- vincing. The tiny basin at Port Arthur and the fair-sized harbor at Dalny were not deemed adequate to the needs of a great nation which had large ambitions in the north Pacific seas. Moreover, the Russians soon found that when the wind was from the southeast the harbor of Dalny did not afford safe anchorage. So at vast expense they constructed a breakwater. This gave needed protection, although the quieter water came so near freezing several times as to cause uneasiness. Additional port facilities were desirable, and the Russians began to seek them with greater deter- mination. Where else could they look ? Manifestly not on the China RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 133 side, for the next harbor in that direction is New-chwang, which is ice-bound in the winter. Beyond that is the im- perial province of Chih-li. China, of course, could not yield that, nor does it contain a harbor worthy of the name, Taku being only a shallow and dangerous roadstead. In- deed, there is no good harbor on that side until Chefoo is reached, and Germany had already pre-empted that. Plainly, no other harbors westward could be acquired with- out danger of international complications. Europe acqui- esced in Russia's possession of the Liao-tung peninsula, but any approach toward the capital of China would be another matter and would involve colhsion with the conflicting am- bitions of other Western Powers. There was but one place to which the Russians could turn, and that was southward, where lay the spacious and admirably located harbors of Korea^ admirably adapted to Russia's ambitions. Russia felt, too, that Korea was essential to her for other reasons. It borders the Manchurian frontier for about five hundred miles. Control of the Korean side of that frontier was therefore necessary to Russia's security in Manchuria, since a hostile Power in Korea could easily cross the border and break the north-and-south Hues of communi- cation. Moreover, the Korean peninsula lay between the two Russian fortifications of Vladivostok and Port Arthur, and dominated their connection by water. As Manchuria still nominally belonged to the Chinese Empire, and was only held by Russia under a lease about whose terms there was constant dispute, Russia naturally coveted possession of the intervening peninsula so that there would be imob- stmcted communication between her two naval bases. The Russians therefore deemed Korea indispensable to their naval and commercial purposes in the north Pacific and to the protection of their interests in Manchuria. The undertaking looked temptingly easy. It was clear to Rus- sia as to the rest of the world that Korea was too small and weak and too hopelessly degenerate to maintain its inde- pendence and that it was destined, sooner or later, to /•' 134 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST fall into the hands of some other Power. Russia felt that her need of it was paramount, and that it was desir- able to obtain possession before some rival secured the prize. For these reasons Russia began to make systematic "diplomatic" approaches toward Korea. In 1859 they had tried to obtain a foothold upon the important island of Tsushima, which commands the Korea Strait. They were making good progress, erecting barracks and laying out plantations, when a British fleet, commanded by Sir James Hope, put in an appearance, and the Russians were obliged to abandon their project. They now inaugurated system- atic plans for the control of the mainland. An agreement between the Russian and Japanese Minis- ters in Seoul, May 14, 1896, regarding the number and dis- position of Japanese troops in Korea, was followed by the Yamagata-Lobanoff protocol, signed at St. Petersburg June 9, of the same year, which provided that "if, as a re- sult of reforms which should be considered indispensable, it should become necessary to have recourse to foreign debts, the two governments should of a common accord render their support to Korea"; and that "the Japanese and Russian Governments should try to abandon to Korea, in so far as the financial and economic situation of that country should permit, the creation and maintenance of an armed force and of a police organized of native subjects, in proportion sufficient to maintain internal order, without foreign aid." This protocol proved to be no deterrent to the Slav, for the ink was hardly dry upon the signatures when the Rus- sian Minister in Seoul tried to have the Korean army placed under Russian officers, and a Httle later he sought to gain control of the revenues of the country by having the Rus- sian M. Kir Alexeieff substituted for the British Mr. J. McLeavy Brown as financial adviser and general director of customs. He succeeded in getting an order for Brown's dismissal, but the doughty Irishman refused to recognize it, RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 135 and was presently reinstated in his position, which, as a matter of fact, he had not rehnquished.^ April 25, 1898, as a salve to the wounded feelings of the Japanese and in order to leave herself free to consolidate her power in Manchuria, Russia entered into an agree- ment with Japan by which each Power promised to respect the integrity of Korea and not to maintain there more than 800 soldiers. This was followed, August 25, by the Nishi" Rosen protocol, which provided in Article I that "the Imperial Governments of Japan and Russia definitely recognize the sovereignty and entire independence of Korea, and mutually engage to abstain from all direct interference in the affairs of that country"; and in Article III that "in view of the great development of the commercial and in- dustrial enteiprise of Japan in Korea, as also the consider- able number of Japanese subjects residing in that country, the Russian Imperial Government shall not impede the development of commercial and industrial relations be- tween Japan and Korea." These agreements prevented Russia from adopting a policy of open aggression in Korea. However, a Httle matter like a solemn promise did not hinder the Russian Government where its interests were involved. At this point the friendship of France came in handy. France had no independent ambitions in Korea, but she was in close league with Russia, with substantial benefits in mind both in Europe and Asia. Russia now endeavored to obtain through her ally what she could not directly obtain without open rupture with Japan. Frenchmen were placed in all possible official positions in Korea, and as the Emperor was controlled by the Franco-Russian party, the Russians secured in this way a number of substantial advantages. This scheme proved to be helpful in furthering Russia's desire to secure an entrance to Korea by railway. July 4, 1896, a French company had obtained a concession to con- ^ C/. Hershey's International Law and Diplomacy of. the Russo-Chinese War, pp. 45 seq. 136 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST stnict a line from Wiju, on the Yalu River, to Seoul. The company failed to carry out its contract to begin work within the period specified, and in June, 1899, waived its rights on condition that the Korean Government should build the road and use only French engineers and materials. Everybody knew that the ruler of Korea had neither the inclination nor the money to build raUroads, that Russia was behind this plan, and that Russian funds would enable him to execute them unless it should finally become prac- ticable for the French to build the road. It was significant, at any rate, that the French Minister looked after the sur- veys. Wiju being on the border of Manchuria, Russia would have in this line direct entrance to Seoul from the north, and could get her troops easily and quickly into the capital. At one important point, however, an obstacle was en- countered. As inspector-general of maritime customs, Mr. McLeavy Brown, was the virtual manager of the revenues of Korea. Continued efforts were made to replace him with a man who would be friendly to Russian interests, and would not object to the proposal to relieve the monetary embarrassment of the Emperor by a French loan of five million yen, to be secured and repaid by the sympathetically managed customs. The Korean officials were more than willing to have a customs inspector who would be willing to give them an opportunity to peculate. But the British and American legations promptly and significantly advised the government that the dismissal of the incorruptible Brown would not iniu*e to the advantage of Korea, and they so vigorously protested against the virtual mortgaging of the empire to France and Russia that, although the pa- pers had actually been signed, the deal was quietly dropped. It was generally believed that the Franco-Russian schemes were materially aided by the Roman Catholic Church in Korea. It was then represented by a bishop, thirty-nine priests, and twenty-four unordained workers, all French, and under La Societe des Missions Etrangeres of Paris. The cathedral in Seoul is one of the most stately RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 137 buildings in the capital, and scattered over the country- were numerous churches and sixty-one schools of various grades. The relations between the French Mission and the French political plans were very close, as they usually were in Asia and Africa, and the legation and the missionaries worked together so openly that the priests were commonly regarded as quasi-political emissaries. A more direct effort was made through a Korean woman. By that combination of flattery and adroitness in which Russians were adepts, they cast the spell of their influence over the Queen, a woman of considerable abihty and the most aggressive factor in court circles. If it be thought strange that she should have allowed herseK to be made the tool of the Russians, it must be remembered that she could not see all the ulterior puiposes of Russian domina- tion, and that the Russians were so skilful in their manage- ment of Asiatic peoples that they usually succeeded in mak- ing themselves more popular than their rivals. At any rate, the ablest woman in Korea became the friend of Russia against the Japanese. Something of a diplomat herself, and aided by the astute counsel of the Russian Minister, matters began to go Russia's way. Meanwhile the Japanese were not inactive. They had waged a war for the integrity of Korea, and after their vic- tory they had solemnly proclaimed its independence. But they felt that their interests there were greater than those of other nations, and they were not disposed to acquiesce in Russia's schemes. The war had given them the upper hand and they proposed to keep it. They officered and drilled Korean troops, filled public posts with their own men, and vigorously pushed their own plans. Finding that the Queen was hindering their efforts, and furious over the ad- vantage which their foes were thus obtaining, the Japanese began to plot with her bitterest enemy, the Tai-wen-kun, father of the King; and October 8, 1895, they committed the blunder as well as the crime of assassinating the Queen. Not satisfied with the death of the Queen, the insatiable Tai-wen-kun caused a royal edict to be drafted defaming her 138 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST memory, stripping her of royal prerogatives, and degrad- ing her to the humblest rank of subjects — a punishment which Orientals deem the depth of infamy. This insult to the dead concluded as follows: "We have endeavored to discover her whereabouts, but as she does not come forth and appear. We are convinced that she is not only unfitted and unworthy of the Queen's rank but also that her guilt is excessive and brimful. Therefore with her We may not succeed to the glory of the Royal Ancestry. So we hereby depose her from the rank of Queen and reduce her to the level of the lowest class." Broken, humiliated, and terrified as the King was, this was too much. He flatly refused to sign the edict, exclaiming that he would rather have his hands cut off. But the Tai-wen-kun was not to be thwarted, and the edict was pubHshed over the signatures of the Prime Minister and eight other members of the Cabinet. There is a sharp controversy as to whether the Japanese y authorities were really responsible for the murder of the ,.,./ *»■ Queen. Professor George T. Ladd, who vigorously de- fends them, says: "The Japanese Home Government was i not responsible for the murder of the Korean Queen. It is - , true that General Miura and the Japanese Soshi were im- ^ plicated and co-operated in the murder of the Queen, but she was one of the most cruel and corrupt women that ever „, lived. During her time, according to the estimate — I do ^'^'not know how true — of one of the Korean bank officials, ''\ i she had 2,857 people put to death at her own personal '0' * caprice. If the Emperor looked on any girl or woman in r^* the palace, the Queen had her eyes torn out; and if the Emperor went further, she had her heart torn out. She festooned one of the gates once with the heads of some thirty friends of the Emperor's father, the Tai-wen-kun. . . . Nevertheless, the murder of the Queen was wrong, and Mr. Uchida, later consul-general in New York, who was consul in Chemulpo at the time, got word that the murder was to take place, and he wired to Tokyo to prevent it, but too late." ^ * With Marquis Ito in Korea, p. 7. ^^ RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 139 The cruelties perpetrated by the Queen are not to be condoned, but they are irrelevant because they were not the cause of the assassination. Such atrocities are unhap- pily common among Oriental despots, who think no more of decapitating a subject whom they fear or dislike than an American would think of drowning a cat. The Japanese did not care how many Koreans the Queen executed, and the Tai-wen-kun, whose career had been far more brutal and bloody than that of the Queen, was in no danger from them. The murder of the Queen caused such a storm of indignation, and the blow to Japanese prestige proved to be so serious, that a court of inquiry was convened at Hiro- shima. Whatever may be the technical accuracy of the statement that "the Japanese Home Government was not responsible for the murder of the Korean Queen," the official decision handed down by the Japanese court is significant reading, as the following extracts show: Wiir& " The accused Miura Gotv assumed his official duties . . . on September 1, 1895. According to his observation, things in Korea were tending in the wrong direction, the court was daily growing more and more arbitrary, and at- tempting wanton interference with the conduct of State affairs." Reference is then made to several conferences with the Tai-wen-kim and Japanese officials, one of which was held October 3. "The decision arrived at on that occasion was that assistance should be rendered to the Tai-wen-kun's entry into the palace. ... It was further resolved that this opportunity should be availed of for taking the life of the Queen, who exercised overwhelming influence in the Court. . . . Miura told them (the escort of the Tai-wen-kim) that on the success of the enterprise depended the eradication of the evils that had done so much mischief to the Kingdom for the past twenty years, and instigated them to despatch the Queen when they entered the palace. . . . About dawn, the whole party entered the palace through the Kwang-hwa gate, and at once proceeded to the inner chambers. Notwithstanding these facts, there is no sufficient evidence to prove that any 140 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST of the accused actually committed the crime originally meditated by them. . . . For these reasons, the accused, each and all, are hereby discharged." A more naive conclusion it would be difficult to imagiae. The fact of conspiracy to assassinate the Queen was estab- lished; the Queen was assassinated as the deHberately planned result of the conspiracy; but the conspirators, who "proceeded to the inner chambers" "to despatch the Queen" were "discharged"! A reign of terror followed. The panic-stricken King be- came abjectly helpless in the hands of the Japanese party, and they proceeded to run things with a high hand. A party of Koreans and Russian sympathizers matured a plot for the rescue of the King, who was a virtual prisoner in his own palace. Spies and traitors made it known, and the would-be rescuers were met by soldiers who shot them down without mercy. At the request of the American Minister, two missionaries, the Reverend Horace G. Under- wood, D.D., and 0. R. Avison, M.D., together with Mr. Homer B. Hulbert, had gone to the palace in the hope that their presence with the King would protect him from per- sonal violence in the melee that was expected to follow. His Majesty welcomed them with pathetic eagerness. The missionaries were the only men he could trust. He beheved, too, that his enemies would not dare to molest Americans, and he felt safer when they were beside him. He sat close to them during the weary, anxious hours, and after mid- night, when the sound of firing had died away, he leaned his head upon Doctor Underwood's shoulder, and the monarch of Korea slept the sleep of exhaustion in the arms of a missionaiy. For several weeks the timid King besought the mission- aries to spend every night with him, and after they ceased doing so the royal head lay down to fitful slmnber and un- pleasant dreams. He carefully secluded himself by day as well as by night in the women's apartments of the palace. Even there he was not free from espionage, for his enemies kept two sharp-eyed women, one of them the RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 141 wife of the Tai-wen-kun, to take turns in watching him with unceasing vigilance. After four months of this hu- miliating bondage the unhappy King managed to effect a coup d'etat which had startling results. In the small hours of the morning of February 11, 1896, when the King and the Crown Prince were supposed to be asleep after a birthday feast during which wine had freely flowed, and the watch- fulness of the duenna guards was dulled by their own pota- tions, the royal pair stole softly out, entered women's chairs which friends had secretly provided for them, passed the sentinels who had been pHed with liquor to lessen their sus- picions, and were swiftly borne to the Russian legation! The Russian Minister received the fugitives with open arms. That he had known of their coming was evidenced by the fact that he had brought up one himdred and sixty marines from a warship at Chemulpo, and had made other suitable arrangements for his expected guests. From the safe shelter of the Russian legation the royal fugitive issued two characteristically Oriental proclama- tions: " Alas alas ! on account of Our unworthiness and mal-administra- tion the wicked advanced and the wise retired. Of the last ten years, none has passed without troubles. Some were brought on by those We had trusted as the members of the body, while others by those of Our own bone and flesh. Our dynasty of five centuries has thereby been often endangered and millions of Our subjects have thereby been gradually impoverished. These facts make Us blush and sweat for shame. But these troubles have been brought about through Our partiality and self-will, giving rise to rascality and blunders leading to calamities. All have been Our own fault from the first to the last. . . . We shall endeavor to be merciful. No pardon, however, shall be extended to the principal traitors concerned in the affairs of July, 1894, and of October, 1895. But to all the rest, a general amnesty is granted, irrespective of the degree of their offenses. Reform your hearts; ease your minds; go about your business, public or private, as in times past." The King remained with the hospitable Slav for a year, and the seat of government was practically transferred to the Russian legation, which with the royal person in its 142 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST possession was not slow to avail itself of the opportunity thus afforded. There was, indeed, a great pretense of deUcacy and disinterestedness. Indeed it should be said that men of other nationaUties in Seoul gave the Russian Minister credit for modesty and forbearance, and even criticised him for not taking fuller advantage of his oppor- tunity. However, events soon showed that Russia was not losing much. The grateful monarch was easily per- suaded to agree to a convention, which was signed in Mos- cow, January 9, 1896, recognizing and organizing Russian interests in Korea. This was followed April 28, 1896, and therefore while the King was still at the Russian legation, * a by a concession giving a Russian company the monopoly /^^^^ for twenty years of the lumber region in the Musan district on the Tumen River, and on the island of Uinung in the Japan Sea. The concession provided that the King should receive a royalty of twenty-five per cent of the annual profit and that at any time within five years after the work had been begun the company might cut lumber in the valley of the Yalu. January 1, 1901, this time limit was extended to twenty years. After the Emperor returned to his palace, or rather to a new one, for a Korean ruler will not live in a palace where the death of his predecessor or consort has occurred, valu- able concessions followed rapidly. The Emperor was a chronic bankrupt, and no serious difficulty was encountered in inducing him to exchange privileges, which meant noth- ing to him, for Russian gold. A concession was obtained for mining coal in Ham-gyongdo, and April 20, 1900, for whale- fishing off the southern coast. With the utmost suavity the Russians represented the need of some place on shore where the oil could be tried out. The unsuspectmg Em- peror agreed. But since whales were made, no such build- ings had been erected for trying out oil, and it soon became apparent that, under the guise of that innocent-looking concession, the Russian bear had laid a massive paw on a strategic point on the southern end of the peninsula. The Russians were particularly desirous of obtaining RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 143 Masampo. The bay is on tKe southern end of the penin- sula, opposite the Island of Koji, which protects it from the outside. It is a good harbor, one of the best on the north Pacific coast, and spacious enough to accommodate a whole fleet. Such a port could be made a fortress of the first magnitude, and would give to its possessor the com- mand of aU southern Korea and a clear passage through the Korea Strait. In May, 1899, the Korean Government was induced to make Masampo a treaty port. As foreigners have the right to pm-chase land within a radius of three miles from a treaty port, the Russian Minister, M. Pavloff, promptly appeared on the ground, staked off a strategic line of gen- erous proportions, and informed the local magistrate that the Russians would take it for a dock and coaling sheds for a Russian steamship company. Imagining himself secure, he sailed for home on furlough, and it was not until July that M. Stein, of the legation staff, arrived to complete the purchase. To his consternation he found that the Japa- nese had already bought the tract direct from the Korean owners. A stormy time followed. The Russian lost his temper and made vehement demands upon the Korean Government to cancel the sale and let the Russians have the site. But the government, "advised" by the Japanese, was obhged to reply that it could not interfere, the land having been purchased from its owners in a regular way, and in accordance with law. Demands upon the Japanese Minister, Mr. Hayashi, to order or persuade the buyers to sell the whole or at least a part of the tract were equally unavaUing. Then bribery and threats were tried with the local magistrates at Masampo ; but this course accompHshed nothing more than a temporary withholding of the deeds. Furious at finding all other means futile, the Russian Charg^, September 14, notified the Korean Government that if the Japanese contract was not cancelled, the Russian Govern- ment might be obhged to take steps to protect its interests. October 4 he threatened to seize the desired land. The Korean Government, braced by the Japanese Minister, re- 144 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST maining firm, a Russian squadron appeared at Chemulpo, March 16, and was given a significantly ostentatious recep- tion by M. Pavloff, who by this time had returned to his post. On the 18th, the Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs signed a lease by which the Russians obtained several other tracts of land at Masampo. The Korean Minister also gave a pledge that the island of Kojedo, near Masampo, should not be aHenated to others. The Russians continued to buy every available spot within the three-mile limit, and once they were on the point of securing a large tract beyond it. The Japanese promptly and vigorously warned the Korean Government that this would not be tolerated, and the Russians withdrew. In May, 1900, the Russians tried to lease Tjapok on the inner shore of Masampo; but again finding that the Japa- nese had gotten ahead of them, they leased Pankumi on the outer shore, and began to improve it as a base for the Russian fleet. Meantime, the Japanese had retained the valuable site which they had originally secured in the sum- mer of 1901, and had added to it several other tracts, in- cluding one of forty acres. ^ Thus the Japanese and the Russians were face to face at this important port. If the Japanese Minister, Mr. Hayashi, had not been so alert and determined, Masampo would have fallen wholly into the hands of the Russians, and would have been made a forti- fication of such strength as to give Russia control of southern Korea and the command of Korea Strait. Thwarted in the south, the Russians again turned their attention to the north. April 3, 1901, the Emperor was induced to promise that he would not grant any further mining concessions to foreigners, but that if the right to operate the Korea household mines were given to any for- eigner, it should be to a Russian. It was also agreed that if any foreign capital were borrowed for the construction of the railroad from Seoul to Wiju, it should be from Russia. The timber concession in the Yalu River basin provoked ^ C/. Asakawa, The Russo-Japanese Conflict, pp. 274-277. RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 145 the sharpest controversy and did much to intensify the strain. This concession had been ahnost forgotten in the disputes over other matters. Only a few trees had been felled at Musan, and almost nothing had been done at Uinung. But it now became apparent that the innocent- looking clause conveying the optional right to monopolize lumber interests in the valley of the Yalu was a prize that the Russians were not overlooking. April 13, 1903, the Korean Government was informed that the company would now avail itself of its right to operate on the Yalu, and that Baron Gunzburg would represent the company in Seoul. What that meant soon became clear. The unsophisticated ruler thought that he had simply granted permission to cut trees in the lower part of the main valley; but the Rus- sians interpreted "valley" to mean all the vast region drained by the entire river and all its tributaries, a region whose immense forests were worth a thousand times what the wily Russians had paid for the concession, to say noth- ing of its strategic political value. The Emperor was to receive a share of the annual profits in addition to the initial payment, but it was only a paltry share. Japan protested as soon as this precious agreement became known; but the protest was unavailing. The Russians had been shrewd enough to slip into the concession a clause that, in the event of dispute as to the meaning of the concession, the Russian interpretation should prevail. This left the Koreans and Japanese absolutely helpless. The Russians began to construct military roads through- out the territory, thus bringing a large part of northern Korea into direct connection with their military base across the frontier. Under the pretext of protecting the property and the workmen who were employed, Russian soldiers were sent across the Yalu. The harbor of Yongampo, near the mouth of the river, was a long distance from Mt. Paikma, where the timber was to be cut, but it was capable of being made a good harbor. It controlled the valley of the Yalu, and it might be made a point of junction between the Trans- Siberian Railway and the Seoul-Wiju line. In May (1903), 146 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Russian soldiers in civilian dress quietly entered Yongampo, with a large number of Korean and Chinese coolies, and began to build what they blandly described as "timber warehouses." There were indeed warehouses, but they did not contain timber. An American who visited Yon- gampo in December wrote that the Russians had already erected substantial brick buildings, including large barracks and stables; that a breakwater had been constructed — a veiy creditable performance for one summer's work; that the one hundred Russians, with one or two exceptions, were aU military men; that they made no secret of the larger building operations which were contemplated the following spring; and that everything indicated a semipolitical and semimilitary permanent occupation. The local Koreans at first resented the coming of the Russians, but abundant work at high wages soon quieted their fears. Of course it would never do to leave such "timber" interests unpro- tected, and the original number of Russian soldiers was soon increased to two hundred, while at Antung and other places on the Chinese side of the Yalu considerable bodies of Russian troops were assembled. The meaning was unmistakable. Japan, seeing what was going on, urged the Korean Emperor to open Yongampo as a treaty port, and induced Great Britain and the United States to join in the request. But Russian influence with the weak and corrupt ruler was strong enough to defeat the effort. It will be seen from all this how persistently Russia pur- sued her poHcy to entrench herself upon an unfrozen sea, and why the Russians felt that they could not yield without sacrificing interests that were essential to their purpose. Russia moved to her goal as steadily as a glacier — ^huge, cold, silent, but persistent. British, German, French, and American poHcies come and go ; but Russian determination to reach the open ocean, Hke Tennyson's "Brook," goes "on forever." For a long period the rest of the world paid little attention to the Muscovite Empire, but all the time it was quietly encroaching on other countries, and adding one RUSSIA'S EFFORT TO OBTAIN KOREA 147 region after another to its already vast possessions. There was a facination almost terrible in this stealthy, never-rest- ing, all-embracing movement upon weaker nations. Against such a power poor Korea was utterly helpless. CHAPTER IX THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR The purposes of the Slav were not destined to develop further without challenge, and that challenge came from Japan. The Japanese were spurred on both by resentment and self-interest. The resentment had been created by the Port Arthur incident at the close of the China-Japan War. Li Hung Chang is alleged to have written in his Memoirs, shortly after the peace of Shimonoseki which concluded the China-Japan War, that Coimt Cassini had informed the Chinese Government that "Japan will not be permitted, either now or in the future, to seize upon any part of Manchuria or the mainland." The Memoirs include many things that the editor imagined that the Viceroy might or should have said; but this particular saying is quite in accord with the known attitude of the Russian Government at the time. At any rate Russia ordered Japan to leave the Liao-tung peninsula, and peremptorily demanded a favorable response within forty-eight hours. Mr. Chester Holcombe, formerly secretary of the American legation in Peking, was in Tokyo at the time, and had occa- sion to call upon a Cabinet Minister. "The Japanese, a friend of years' standing, gave free vent to his feelings, and shed tears like a child. Said he : 'If we only had three battle- ships we would declare war against Russia within twenty- four horn's. We have but one, recently captured from China, and it will not be fit for service within six months, while the Czar has six here in our harbors. What can we do but submit to this insolent threat?" ^ From that day Japan appHed her energies to creating a modem armament, expending tens of millions on cruisers, battleships, and torpedo-boats; sending her brightest men 1 Article "What of China?" in The Outlook, February 13, 1904. 148 THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 149 to study the naval system of England and the military sys- tem of Germany; buying and learning to manufacture for herself the most highly improved rifles and cannon; drilling almost Hterally day and night, and fiercely anticipating the day when she could wreak vengeance on the treacherous Slav. The Japanese had substantial as well as sentimental reasons for action. They wanted Korea themselves. The territory of Japan proper, as we have seen, is only 148,756 square miles in extent. For this limited territory there is a population of 317 to the square mile. Compare this with the United States, which has 28 to the square mile, and then consider that a large part of Japan is not adapted to agri- culture. If the population were distributed upon the till- able land there would be about 2,000 persons to each square mile. No other country in the world is in a worse predica- ment from the -sdew-point of food-supply. " Less than 13,- 000,000 acres are under cultivation, or about thirteen per cent of the extent of the country, while the arable area cannot possibly be increased by more than 10,500,000 acres, so that the per capita share of arable land is less than one-half of an acre, which is even below the corresponding rate in England and less than one-half of that in China." ^ The Japanese therefore needed room for colonization. What more natural than that they should look to Korea, which is almost within sight of their native land? A Japanese writer tersely summarized his country's position by saying that the people of Japan "must either die a saintly death in righteous starvation, or expand into the neighbor's back yard." He added: "Japan is not that much of a saint." ^ A steady emigration to Korea had been going on- for a considerable period, and after the abrogation, in 1902, of the Korean law requiring passports for Japanese, the emi- gration greatly increased. Japanese in the crowded south- western part of the islands can cross the Korea Strait easier and cheaper than they can journey to northern Japan or ^ K. Asakawa, The Russo-Japanese Conflict, pp. 5-7. ' Adachi Kinnosuke, in The World's Work, April, 1909. 150 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Formosa. Living is cheaper than in Japan, and the soil is more fertile. It is not surprising, therefore, that there were 40,000 Japanese in Korea prior to the outbreak of the war. By 1905, 65,000 had arrived, and others were coming at the rate of about 200 a day. This emigration created a Japanese interest in Korea which the islanders were not disposed to abandon to Rus- sians, who would be hostile to it. Unlike the Japanese emigrants to Manchuria and the Hawaiian Islands, most of whom are day-laborers, a large proportion of the Japanese in Korea were traders and shopkeepers. Many became permanent settlers and formed stable communities. There were Japanese settlements in all the treaty ports. Most of the larger towns in the interior also had Japanese quarters, some of them of considerable size, and with their own chambers of commerce, public schools, courts of justice, and police. When in 1906 the Korea Daily News, an anti- Japanese newspaper edited by an Englishman in Seoul, vehemently protested against the immigration of Japanese into Korea, the Japanese editor of the Yorodzu Ohoho, of Tokyo, caustically replied: "We humbly beg the Korea Daily News to teach us how to dispose of our surplus mil- lions. Our little country can hardly find room within its narrow boundary to accommodate half a million people who increase year after year. Of course we cannot kill them wholesale. We cannot fill up the Sea of Japan to create dry land and settle them thereon. We would like to go to Kansas or anywhere except the lower world where we could escape starvation. But however hospitable America may be, she refuses to receive so many incomers all at once. We would very much like to cross over to Australia; but it is white men's Australia, and although that continent is many times larger than Korea and is very thinly populated, no colored people are admitted there. We know Korea is densely populated, but there the least resistance is ofifered and so we go there, just as Englishmen went to America and Australia and elsewhere, forcing the natives to make room for them in daj^s of yore. But if the Korea Daily News wiU THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 151 kindly use its powerful influence in our favor and persuade the Americans and Australians to receive any number of us, why, we should leave Korea alone and emigrate to those lands of plenty with joy ia our hearts."^ Commercially, too, the Japanese felt that they needed Korea. As ia England, increasing population and inability to increase agriculture turned the national energies to manu- facturing. Raw materials and markets, therefore, became questions of the first magnitude. Korea had both. Japan wanted the open door in Korea; Russia would close it. This was vital, for Japan depended largely on Korea for the additional food-supplies that she needed. Before the war Japan drew from Korea more than half of the extra wheat that she required, nearly half of her importations of rice, and large quantities of beans and oil-cake. In return, Ja- pan sold Korea cotton yarn and textiles, tobacco, matches, coal and several other supplies. If we widen our field of observation to iuclude Manchuria and north China, "the conclusion would seem tenable that, should the markets of east Asia be closed, Japan's national Hfe would be para- lyzed, as her growing population would be largely deprived of its food and occupation. These markets, then, must be left as open as the circumstances permit, if Japan would exist as a growing nation. "^ At the outbreak of the Russia-Japan War the Japanese were controlling seventy-eight per cent of the tonnage en- gaged in shipping on the coast of Korea. Their 40,000 fishermen dominated the fisheries, and their business men owned many of the banks and commercial houses, the former issuing a paper currency that was widely used. In July, 1888, the Japanese completed a telegi'aph-line from Fusan to Seoul, and September 8, 1898, they obtained a conces- sion to build a railway between the two cities. With eager patriotism they quickly subscribed more than the 25,000,000 yen reqmi-ed for the railway. The first rail was laid with imposing ceremonies August 4, 1901, and construction was so vigorously pushed that the line was opened for traffic 1 Editorial, September 25, 1906. * Asakawa, pp. 8 seq. 152 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST December 1, 1904. This brought Seoul within fifty hours of Tokyo. The Russian Minister naively remarked that he did not think this railway would be a good thing for Korea. December 31, 1898, the Japanese had succeeded in obtaining another valuable concession, the railway from Seoul to its port, Chemulpo, twenty-six miles distant, and the line was opened for trafl&c July 8, 1900. August 23 of that year the Japanese secured a mining concession, Octo- ber 3 a fishing concession, December 8 a formal recognition of their rights in Fusan, and May 20, 1901, they began a settlement in Masampo to watch and checkmate the Rus- sians at that point. The Japanese closely watched for any revival of the lag- ging scheme of the French and Russians, refen-ed to on a preceding page, to construct a railway from Wiju on the Yalu River to Seoul the capital; and they formed a plan to build a railway of their own from Seoul to Gensan, the excellent harbor on the northeast coast, and another line from Fusan to Masampo. Besides the railway and tele- graph lines already noted, the Japanese had obtained be- fore the war concessions for a coal-mine, four gold-mines, whale-fisheries, a postal service, several banks and eighteen schools. Every little while Japanese owners were found to have acquired a foothold at some additional point. For example, during my first visit in 1901, it developed that a Japanese had bought a small island near Chemulpo. The Emperor of Korea wanted to add to his palace grounds some property occupied by the Presbyterian Mission, and, in exchange, offered to give any tract of land outside the walls that the missionaries might select. They chose a plot on the road between the West Gate and the river. His Majesty agreed, but when he tried to buy the site for the mission he found that parts of it belonged to Japa- nese, who refused to sell. Altogether, Japanese interests in Korea had become extensive and the Japanese were just as averse to having them throttled by Russians as Amer- ican business men would be in similar circumstances. Nat- urally, therefore, they prepared to defend their interests. THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 153 Another reason for Japanese opposition to Russia involved the far-reaching question of the resistance of Asia to the encroachments of Europe. The yellow race was beginning to view with alarm and irritation the aggressions of the white race, which controlled vast and populous regions in Asia, and had unmistakable designs upon others. Man- churia was already Russian. The great province of Shan- tung, China, was virtually German, and if Korea also were to fall into the hands of the Slav, the consequences to Japan would be dire. A formidable barrier would be erected be- tween the Japanese and Chinese, and Japan would be shut into the narrow confines of her islands with no possibility of expansion. Not only freedom to expand but self-preservation was beheved to be involved. Said an intelligent Japanese: "Korea is an arrow pointed at the heart of Japan." A strait only 120 miles wide separates southern Korea from Japan, and Japan, too, at the vulnerable point of en- trance to the Inland Sea, the heart of the Sunrise King- dom. The Japanese therefore felt that the possession of Korea by any other Power would be a grave mxenace to their own safety. This is the key to Japan's policy in Korea. Mr. Holcombe once described a conversation that he had at that time with an influential Japanese: "The Japanese Minister — ^he was a member of the Cabinet — ^was greatly disturbed at the prospect for the future. He insisted that the action taken by Korea, imder the guidance of China, would not save that little kingdom from attack and ab- sorption. Holding up one hand and separating the first and second fingers as widely as possible from the third and fourth, he said: 'Here is the situation. Those four fingers represent the four great European Powers, Great Britain, Germany, France, and Russia. In the open space between them He Japan, China, and Korea.' Then with really dra- matic force, he added: ^Like the jaws of a huge vise, those fingers are slowly closing, and unless some supreme effort is made, they will certainly crush the national life out of all three.'" 154 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST We can therefore understand why Japan watched the aggressions of Russia with growing uneasiness and alarm. The Japanese Minister in St. Petersburg made repeated rep- resentations to the Russian Government. He was received with the utmost courtesy and was given suave reassurances; but Russian aggressions continued. The fortifications at Port Arthur were made more impregnable. The mihtaiy force in Manchuria was constantly augmented. At last the Japanese felt that the time had come for more decisive pro- test; and July 28, 1903; Baron Komura, the Japanese Min- ister for Foreign Affairs, cabled to Mr. Kurino, the Japanese Minister in St. Petersburg: "The unconditioned and permanent occupation of Manchuria by Russia would create a state of things prejudicial to the security and interests of Japan. ... If Russia were established on the flank of Korea, it would be a constant menace to the separate existence of that Empire, or at least would make Russia the dominant Power in Korea. Korea is an important outpost in Japan's line of defense. . . . Moreover, the political as well as commercial and industrial interests and influence which Japan possesses in Korea are paramount over those of other Powers. These interests and influence, Japan, having regard to her own security, cannot consent to surrender to or share with another Power." This warning elicited only more evasive replies and un- kept promises. Whether the Russians beheved that the Japanese would not really fight; or whether they believed that if the Japanese did fight they could be easily defeated; it is difficult to tell. It is probable that with the character- istic arrogance of the SlaV; the strength of the Japanese w^as contemptuously undervalued. At any rate, the Russians went on their resolute way with absolute disregard of Japa- nese protests. Finally; it became apparent to the dullest observer that further negotiations would be imavailing. February 6; 1904, Japan broke off diplomatic relations and withdrew her legation from St. Petersburg. February 7, the Japanese seized Masampo as a base of operations in southern Korea, and began landing troops. February 8, a Japanese squadron appeared off Chemulpo and sent word THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 155 to the commander of the Russian ships in the roadstead that if he did not come outside on the open sea he would be attacked in the harbor. Although the Russians had only- two comparatively small vessels, the ciTiiser Variag and the gimboat Korietz, and were hopelessly outclassed by the size and weight of the Japanese squadron, they proved once more that Russians are not cowards, and the next day they boldly steamed out to meet their antagonists. The battle that ensued was brief and sharp, and of course resulted in the destruction of the Russian vessels without injury to the Japanese. That night the main Japanese fleet under Admiral Togo suddenly appeared off Port Arthur, torpedoed two Russian battleships and a cruiser, and the next day (the 9th) in a general engagement disabled another battleship and four more cruisers. The Russian fleet was so badly crippled that it had to seek refuge in the harbor of Port Arthur, where it was blockaded by the Japanese, who had lost only two torpedo-boats. These victories gave Japan absolute command of the sea, and troops were poured into Chemulpo and other Korean ports without danger of interruption. Thus far there had been no formal declaration of war, but February 10 the Czar issued one, which recited the facts from the Russian view-point, and the next day the Japanese declaration was made. The war now proceeded with tragic swiftness and decisive- ness. Seoul was occupied with practically no opposition. The Japanese army marched northward, and the first land engagement was fought at Pyengyang, Febmary 28. It was hardly more than a skirmish, for the Russians were not in heavy force, and were easily driven back. April 4 General Kuroki occupied Wiju on the Korean side of the Yalu River, and May 1 the battle of the Yalu was fought. The victory of the Japanese was followed by their rapid advance into Manchuria. As Admiral Togo reported. May 3, that he had "bottled" up the harbor at Port Arthur, a Japanese division mider General Oku landed at Pitsewo 156 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST May 5, and another under General Nodzu appeared at Taku-shan the 19th. By the 14th the Japanese had thrown themselves across the South Manchuria Railway and cut off Port Arthur from communication ^dth the Russian base in the north. May 23-26 the fierce battle of Nan-shan Hill gave General Oku possession of that formidable posi- tion, which commanded the approach to Port Arthur and enabled the Japanese to entrench themselves on the nar- row neck of the isthmus, so that the isolation of Port Arthur was complete. While the daring and skilful Kuroki, Oku, and Nodzu were doing their relentless wiU with the Rus- sian divisions which they encountered, the grim General Nogi began the formal investment of Port Arthur the mid- dle of June. The world, already startled by the dazzling succession of Japanese victories by land and sea, was appalled by the fierceness of the titanic struggle that followed. The Rus- sians had done everything that military science, prodigal expenditure, and an unlimited command of naked human strength could suggest to make the fortress impregnable. The natural position of Port Arthur is exceedingly strong, and more than a dozen hills, which were bare of trees, had steep sides, and commanded wide areas, had been crowned by no less than fifty-two forts and batteries. Whatever may be said of the incompetence of many of the Russian officers, no one can question the bravery of the Russian soldiers who were shut up in that fortress. Ignorant and rather stupid peasants they have been called, but they fought with obstinate courage in defense of their position. For nearly seven months they withstood the onset of their foes. It is true that their fortress was supposed to be impregnable, and that the garrison was large, weU provi- sioned, and amply equipped. But there was something uncanny about the fighting of the Japanese. They were not only indifferent to death, but they eagerly coveted the honor and privilege of djdng for their Emperor. They threw themselves against those frowning battlements with entire disregard of the hail of shot and shell which the THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 157 Russian infantry and artillery poured upon them. They made repeated assaults in which whole brigades were an- nihilated; but other brigades took their places undis- mayed, and renewed the fighting. Every possible resource of modem discovery and invention was called into requisi- tion, and the results of peaceful study and industry were employed to intensify the horrors of human slaughter. Electricity for the first time became an effective force in war. Search-lights, star-rockets, and parachute-torches swept the approaches with such brilliancy that darkness was no longer a cover for night assaults. Cannon were raised, aimed, fired, and lowered by electrical devices. Barbed-wire entanglements were charged v/ith electric currents which killed every foe who touched them. An electric railway ran inside the long arc of forts, so that reinforcements could be rushed to any point of attack. Headquarters were telephone central offices, with lines ra- diating to every part of the field. No furiously galloping staff-officers were required to transmit orders and receive information; the telephone did in a few seconds what the fastest horse would have required hours to do even if he were not shot. When the Japanese captured 203 Metre HUl, telephone messages from its summit directed the fire of heavy siege-guns in protected places, so that the gun- ners made untenable a city and harbor which they could not see. The Japanese fleet added to the pandemonium of ruin. Battleships cannot wisely take as many risks as land batteries, for it requires not only several million dol- lars but several years to build a battleship, while a few guns in a land battery are easily replaced. Admiral Togo solved this problem by having tiny torpedo-boats, which the Russians found it difficult to see and almost impossible to hit. He several miles off shore, and by wireless dispatches give the range and a report on each shot to gunners on the battleships lying safely out of reach of the Russian forts. Day and night for awful months the bombardment con- tinued. Day and night the inexorable brigades zigzagged 158 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST their trenches closer and closer to the forts, and charged against stone walls, heavy cannon, and machine-guns. Finally, flesh and blood could endure no more. The last dispatch of the Russian commander-in-chief, dated January 1, described the Japanese assault of December 31, and added: "We shall be obliged to capitulate, but everything is in the hands of God. We have suffered fearful losses. Great Sovereign, pardon us. We have done everything humanly possible. Judge us, but be merciful. Nearly eleven months of uninterrupted struggles have exhausted us. Only one-quarter of the garrison is alive, and of this number the majority are sick, and, being obliged to act on the defensive, without even short intervals for repose, are worn to shadows." January 2, 1905, the great fortress, which had been isolated from all support since May 14, sur- rendered. General Stoessel has been severely criticised for surren- dering even then. His own countrymen in Russia bitterly reproached him, and he went home to face a court martial. It was said that one of his subordinate generals. General Kondrachenko, was the real inspiration of the Russian troops, and that when he was killed at the battle of 203 Metre Hill, General Stoessel lost not only heart but abiKty to continue the fighting. His reply did not help either his military skill or his reputation for veracity. He declared on his return to Moscow that of his 680 officers 317 were killed and all the rest wounded; that his garrison had been reduced from 17,000 to 4,000, including wounded; that his "provisions were almost entirely exhausted"; that he "could hold out no longer for want of food"; and that he "could not reply to the enemy's fire for want of ammunition." These statements do not harmonize with General Nogi's official report that he captured 1,323 Russian officers who were neither sick nor wounded; 25,011 sound and uninjured soldiers, sailors, and marines; 690,000 rations of flour, 666,- 000 rations of hard bread, 80,000 rations of spHt barley, 175,000 rations of tinned beef, 11,200 rations of corn-meal, 1,125 rations of rice, 33,000 pounds of sugar, and 583,000 THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 159 pounds of salt — a sufficient supply to have maintained the entire garrison for at least two months longer; 528 cannon that were in good condition, an ample supply of small arms, 4,773 rounds for cannon of 6-inch caliber and upward, 62,640 rounds for guns of 3 to 6-inch caliber, and 138,821 rounds for quick-firers, small field-pieces, and Maxims, 5,436,240 rounds of small-arm ammunition, 33 tons of gunpowder, 1,588 mines, grenades, etc., and "an enormous amoimt of material and appliances intended for use in the further strengthening of the forts." One is forced to conclude either that General Stoessel did not know what he had, perhaps deceived by frightened or corrupt subordinates, or that he misrepresented the facts in order to justify his surrender. Doctor Morrison, the famous correspondent of the London Times, who inspected Port Arthur soon after its fall, wrote that "no more dis- creditable surrender has been recorded m history." Mr. George Kennan, an equally careful and judicious observer, while calling attention to the glaring discrepancies which have been noted between the statements of General Stoessel and the report of General Nogi, and while convinced that the fortress could have held out a month, and possibly two months longer, nevertheless does not agree with Doctor Morrison that the surrender was unnecessary and discredi- table, but that on the contrarj^ the "situation, when Gen- eral Stoessel surrendered, was hopeless; but he should not have allowed it to become hopeless." ^ It is always easy, in the quiet and leisure of later days, to find mistakes and blunders in military operations. No siege in history has ever been characterized by faultless judgment on both sides. The din and tumult and strain of battle day and night for half a year are apt to warp the mind and get on the nerves. I visited Port Arthm- in 1909 and stood upon the hills which had been crowned by the Russian forts. The destruction which was apparent even then, four years after the fall of the fortress, was ap- palling. The forts were a chaos of ruin. Summits and » Article in The Outlook, September 30, 1905. 160 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST slopes were thickly pitted with holes made by bursting shells. Those hilltops must have been belching volcanoes of death, and it is difficult to understand how the Russian soldiers could have stayed on them as long as they did. The fact that the fiercest, most daring, and most determined fighters the world has ever known, equipped with every conceivable weapon and appliance of scientific warfare, had to fight for about six months at a cost of 45,000 killed and wounded men before they could capture that fortress eloquently testifies to the bravery, fortitude, and resourcefulness of its defenders. Whether any other white soldiers would have held out longer, I doubt. The Japanese certainly did not despise their foes, for they have built a monument in memory of the 15,000 Russian dead, and General Nogi wrote to the Japanese Minister of War a few days after his victory : "The feeling I have at this moment is solely one of anguish and humiliation that I should have expended so many lives, so much ammunition, and such a long time in the accom- plishment of this task." Meantime, heavy fighting had been going on farther north. The Japanese army, now consolidated under Field- Marshal Oyama, met the Russian army under General Kuropatkin at Liao-yang, and a great battle was fought August 24 to September 4. In the number of men engaged, the extent of country fought over, the courage and stub- born determination manifested on both sides, and in the duration of the conflict, the battle of Liao-yang must be counted one of the great battles of history. But Russian courage and obstinacy had to yield at last before the de- termined onset of a foe which united equal courage and obstinacy with superior generalship and utter recklessness of death. The Russian army sullenly retreated northward, pressed and harassed at every step by the victorious Japanese, but skilfully handled by Kuropatkin. At the Shaho River he boldly took the aggressive in a desperate effort to check the Japanese advance. Ten days (October 11-21) the tide of Ph THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 161 battle surged back and forth, now favoring one side and then the other, till heavy rains stopped the weary comba- tants. Neither Russians nor Japanese could claim a de- cisive victory, but the Russians reahzed that they had not beaten back their oncoming foe. Both armies were well- nigh exhausted, and, intrenching themselves, they went into rude winter quarters, the men living in hastily made dugouts along the river. There were numerous small en- gagements, one of them, General Gripenberg's brave but fruitless attempt (January 25-29) to turn the wing of the Japanese army, calling 150,000 men into action, and en- tailing a Russian loss of 12,000 men, the Japanese loss being 5,000. After that a period of comparative quiet ensued. The Manchurian winter is bitterly cold, and the Japanese suffered much as they were not so accustomed as the Rus- sians to such low temperatures. WeU rested, and reinforced by General Nogi's army, which had been liberated by the fall of Port Arthur, the Japanese did not wait for the spring, which they knew would convert those loamy plains into unfathomable mud. Amid the cold storms of late February the memorable battle of Mukden was begun. General Kuropatkin had replaced Admiral Alexeieff as Russian commander-in-chief in Man- churia, October 20, and he had concentrated all his re- sources for this supreme struggle which he well knew must come. He was a brave and gallant officer, and after the war he wi'ote a book which discusses, with remarkable frank- ness for a Russian, the causes of his country's defeat. March 1, and therefore while the battle was still in progress, he was superseded by General Linevitch, who was beHeved to be a more aggressive commander. The rigors of winter intensified the usual horrors of warfare. "WTiat Httle rest and sleep the constant fighting permitted the troops had to snatch where adequate shelter could not be obtained, and wounded men, whose lives might have been saved in ordinary weather conditions, soon froze to death. Again, as in every preceding battle, the Japanese were victorious. 162 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST It is easy for the armchair critic at a cosey fireside to point out what the Russian generals might have done that they did not do. No one is perfect, not even a critic, and in the tumult of battle errors of judgment are hkely to occur even with the best of generals and the bravest of soldiers. But impartial history will undoubtedly record that an army that could withstand Japanese ferocity and skill for seven- teen days probably did all that any other army would or could have done. Mukden was not only the greatest battle of the war, but it was one of the greatest battles of history. Before the European War of 1914, what other battle had engaged a million men, on a fighting-line nearly a hundred miles long, and fought for seventeen successive days (February 24- March 12)? The Japanese victory ended the important land fighting of the war. Both armies had put forth their supreme effort. The Russians could do no more without time to recoup their losses and establish themselves at a new base. The Japanese, holding undisputed possession of all Korea and lower Manchuria, and exhausted by their terrific struggles, deemed it unwise to push the fighting farther northward into a region which was becoming in- conveniently distant from their base of suppHes and where the Russians could fight another battle to better advan- tage. Both armies, therefore, remained in comparative inaction while the last great drama of the war was being developed on the ocean. Russia had assembled all of her available ships that could be spared from home, and sent them to the Far East under command of Admiral Rojestvensky for a final effort to regain her lost ground. The fleet steamed out of the Baltic in the latter part of October, followed by high hopes that it would be able to turn the fortunes of war which had been running so heavily against them. The state of mind of the Russian officers and sailors themselves was pathetically illustrated by their firing upon some innocent fishing-boats one night before they had passed out of the safe waters of the North Sea. Officers who could mistake such boats at THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 163 such a place for Japanese torpedo-boats must have been drunk, or else in such pitiable terror as Kipling describes in The Destroyers : " Panic that shells the drifting spar, Loud waste with none to check; Mad fear that rakes a scornful star Or sweeps a consort's deck." After this untoward incident, which excited the mingled ridicule and indignation of the world, the Russian fleet pm^ued its voyage to the Far East. As it entered the North Pacific, the tension not only of the Russians but of the watching world was great. Not a syllable had been heard regarding the whereabouts of the Japanese fleet. Rumor had located it at a dozen different places, and the Russians had been for weeks in nightly e^qpectation of at- tack. The absolute secrecy which the Japanese preserved is a striking illustration of the loyalty of the Japanese people. Although tens of thousands of Japanese must have known that Admiral Togo's fleet was lying among the islands off the southern coast of Korea, near Masampo, although the sound of guns in target practice could be heard by hundreds of villages, and although scores of war correspondents and other curious Europeans and Americans were scattered among the treaty ports as near to the scene of expected operations as they could get, not a single Japanese disclosed the secret of his country, and the rigid censorship made it impossible for any one else to send a telltale letter or tele- gram out of the country. Japanese methods were further illustrated by the plans for locating the Russian fleet as it approached. There being three entrances to the Japan Sea by which Vladivostok might be approached, Korea, Tsugam, and La Perouse Straits, Rojestvensky assumed that Togo would divide his fleet into three squadrons so that the Russian fleet would find only one-third of the Japanese strength in whichever channel he might choose. As the Korea Strait is the one farthest from Vladivostok, the most easily and safely 164 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST navigated in the foggy month of May, the channel which affords the most direct route by avoiding the jom-ney around Japan, and as it is the natural approach in ordi- nary circumstances, Rojestvensky concluded that its very advantages would lead Togo to beheve that it would not be chosen, and that it might, therefore, be the safest. Togo, with almost uncanny prescience, foresaw this reason- ing, and kept his fleet together at this point. It was a bold decision, staking everything on a theory; but it proved to be sound. Elaborate precautions were taken for reporting the Rus- sian fleet as soon as possible. The coast of Japan was lined with signal stations on promontories, islands, and mountain-tops. A wide expanse of sea was divided into small numbered squares. Swift torpedo-boats and scout- ships equipped with wireless telegraph cruised far out at sea, watching night and day. When, at five o'clock Satur- day, May 27, the scoutship Shinano-maru sent a wireless message reading: "Enemy's fleet sighted in square 203" (near Quelpart Island), Togo was instantly ready to move. While the Russians, still ignorant of the whereabouts of the enemy, steamed at full speed into the strait, already exult- ing in the thought that its destination at Vladivostok was so near, and that most of the Japanese warships were guarding the two northern channels himdreds of miles away, Admiral Togo's warships suddenly appeared around the head of an island, and the battle was on. European ex- perts had credited the Russian fleet with faithful target practice and straight shooting; but either the Russians had been given credit which they did not merit, or official cor- ruption had sent them out with inferior guns and ammuni- tion. Both conjectures are probably correct. At any rate, the Japanese fire was far more effective than the Russian. "At a distance of four miles," a Russian lieutenant lamented to Mr. George Kennan, "the Japanese gunners seemed to hit us with almost every shot that they fired. Our men had not had practice enough to shoot accurately at such ranges. We hoped that we might be able to crowd Togo's ships up THE RUSSIA-JAPAN WAR 165 toward the land on the Japan side of the strait; and so get nearer to them; but they were too fast for us. They circled around ahead of us, and knocked us to pieces at such long ranges that we were barely able to see them through the mist." Never was naval victory more overwhelming than that which the Japanese achieved. The firing com- menced at 2:08 p. m., and within thirty-seven minutes six of the eight Russian battleships were so badly injured that Togo stated in his official report that "at 2:45 p. m. the re- sult of the battle had been decided." The remainder of the time was spent by the Japanese in hunting down and sink- ing or capturing the scattered and fleeing Russian vessels. Within thirty hours from the firing of the first shot Rojest- vensky was a wounded prisoner, and of a Russian fleet of eight battleships, three armored cruisers, three protected cruisers, three coast-defense armor-clads, and twenty-one auxiliary cruisers, destroyers, transports, and special-service ships — thirty-eight in all — all but four were sunk, beached, or captured, and even of the four that escaped only one, the auxiliary cruiser Almaz, succeeded in reaching Vladivos- tok, the others finding refuge in Manila Bay. This annihila- tion of the Russian fleet cost the Japanese only three tor- pedo-boats sunk, three cruisers temporarily disabled, 116 officers and men kiUed, and 538 wounded. CHAPTER X CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT The world was at first amazed by the sweeping victory of the Japanese. It had seemed ahnost foolhardy for a nation of about 50,000,000 of people, with small financial resources and a limited territory of 149,000 square miles, to attack a nation of 150,000,000 of people, supported by the enormous wealth of 8,650,000 square miles of territory. But it soon appeared that the contestants were not so un- equally matched as such comparisons might suggest. I have discussed in another chapter the military^ efficiency of the Japanese, the thoroughness with which they prepared for the war, and the zeal and determination with which the entire nation supported it. Remoteness from the zone of hostilities was a special dis- advantage to the Russians. The scene of fighting was so close to Japan that she could concentrate her whole military and naval force upon her enemy. Russia, on the other hand, was more than five thousand miles from the zone of hostilities, and after her naval force in the Far East was shut up in Port Arthur, she was dependent upon a single-track railway, poorly built, inadequately equipped, and with an awkward and time-destroying break at Lake Baikal. More- over, Russia did not dare send her entire army and navy to the Far East and thus leave her home territory unprotected from the warlike nations with whose jealousies she always had to reckon. Japan's available fleet for a war so near her doors was actually stronger than Russia's. She had, too, a great advantage in convenient ports to coal, clean, and repair her ships. Admiral Togo could not have fought the battle of Korea Strait with the gims which had seen such hard service before Port Arthur, for the life of a big gun is only about a hundred rounds, even if it is not hit 166 CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT 167 by the enemy. But it was easy to regun his ships from home navy-yards close at hand. The famous but some- what illiterate Confederate General Forrest, when asked for the secret of successful warfare, repHed: "Git thar fust with the mostest men." This was precisely what Japan was able to do, and what Russia was not able to do. The causes of Russia's defeat, however, lay not only in the superior military spirit and efficiency of her foe but in her own blunders and deficiencies. The serene self-con- fidence of the Russian, his contemptuous under-valuation of his enemy, and his "heaven-born" faith in Russia's divine mission, as well as official graft and corruption, combined to prevent a preparation which the character of the foe required. "The unpreparedness of Russia" is the burden of General Kuropatkin's Military and Political Memoirs, published after the war. He declared that the general staff estimated the total number of available Japanese troops at only a little more than 400,000, and that it ignored im- portant information that had been sent by Russian officers who had been in Japan. The leadership in the field was little if any above medi- ocrity. The war was a graveyard for the reputation of Russian generals and admirals; not one emerged as a com- mander of the first rank, and several proved to be grossly incompetent. I have referred elsewhere to General Stoes- sel's course at Port Arthur. General Kuropatkin showed great abiHty in extricating his defeated army from the clutches of the victorious Japanese, and perhaps he did as well as could have been expected, considering all that he had to contend with in his own army and government, as well as from the Japanese. But his abilities were those of a McClellan rather than of a Grant or Sheridan — strong in organizing and retreating, but lacking in genius for aggres- sive operations. General Linevitch was regarded by his friends as a general who might have retrieved the Russian fortunes; but he attained independent command only three months and a half before negotiations for peace stopped the fighting. Admiral Alexeieff was the com- 168 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST mander-in-chief by land and sea at the outbreak of the war, and is chiefly remembered for his colossal arrogance and his amazing lack of comprehension of the crisis which he was largely instrmnental in precipitating. Poor Rojestven- sky ! is all that one can say of the commander of the Baltic Fleet; and that is a pathetic thing to say of an admiral in a historic battle. General Kondrachenko and Admiral Ma- karoff were probably the most capable and brilliant of the Russian commanders, although their tragic end clothed their reputations with a glamour which the survivors of the war probably envied, General Kondrachenko having met his death in one of the mine explosions at Port Arthur and Admiral Makaroff having been blown up with his flag- ship, the Petropavlovsk, April 13, 1904, only five weeks after he assumed command of the fleet. The Japanese, on the other hand, developed a galaxy of military stars of the first magnitude. Field-Marshal Oyama, the commander-in-chief in the field, increased an already great reputation. His chief of staff. General Ko- dama, educated in Germany, minister of war in 1900-1902, vice-chief of the general staff at the outbreak of the war, and then chief of staff of the armies in Manchuria, was a strategist of phenomenal brilliancy, and his genius planned the battles which the aggressive Oyama carried out. An Englishman has called him "the Kitchener of Japan," which is a high compliment to Kitchener. Lieutenant General Fukushima, assistant chief of staff, was a worthy associate. Four separate armies executed the plans which were framed by these experts. Each army was led by a lieutenant general to v/hom the miUtary critics of Europe and America unhesitatingly accord the first rank: Kuroki, Nodzu, Oku, and Nogi. In the navy, Vice-Admirals Uriu, Kamimura, Dewa, and Kataoka bulk large in the world's respect, while Togo is universally regarded as one of the greatest naval strategists and fighters in all history. The Russian leadership lacked not only first-class ability but continuity. The commander-in-chief was changed three times during that short war. Admiral Alexeieff held su- CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT 169 preme command from the begmning mitil the middle of October, 1904; then General Kuropatkin was commander- in-chief till March 1, 1905, and after that and until the close of the war General Linevitch. Corps conmianders were constantly being changed, and General Km^opatkin has told the world in his Memoirs an unhappy story of the dissen- sions which existed among them, and between them and their commanders-in-chief. Against a united foe, the Russian conduct of the war was marked by constant squab- bles between the civil and mihtary authorities, between the oflBicers of the army and navj^, and between different ele- ments of the population at home. Innimierable stories were in circulation regarding not only the administrative dishonesty but the personal character of the Russian officers. One might ignore rumors, but one cannot ignore such direct testimony as that of Major Louis L. Seaman, of the American army, who was in Manchuria and who says that "arriving trains that should have been crowded with men and munitions of war brought each a full complement of the demi-monde and vodka. The thou- sands of these creatures and the tens of thousands of cases of vodka that passed over the Siberian Railway in place of food and equipments must have horrified even the gentle Verestchagin, familiar as he was with war in its most brutal and bestial aspects. Wine, women, and song were certainly the undoing of Russia. Sodom and Gomorrah — ^the cur- rent synonyms of Port Arthur and Vladivostok in the Orient — ^were temples of virtue in comparison to the de- bauchery, Kcentiousness, flagrant immorahties, and openly flaunted vice recently practised in those unhappy cities."^ Mr. F. A. McKenzie, who visited Port Arthur both before and after the siege, gives similar testimony: "Life seemed one endless round of champagne, of songs, of dances, of entertainments, and of gaiety. There was money for every man with influence; contracts with great profits attached were to be had; posts were to be filled and perquisites were 1 Address before the Association of Military and Naval Surgeons of the United States, St. Louis, October 12, 1904. 170 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST to be claimed. Why should the officer trouble about drill and discipline when there were ladies to entertain, wine to be drunk, and good fellowship to be emphasized? The army of parasites and hawks had gathered. There were the Jewish contractors, sleek, ingratiating, and hateful, making good fortunes, soon to be paid for by the blood of Russian peasants. There were the ladies of the half-world, sum- moned from three continents. . . . Then came the guns — no play salute this!"^ Contrast these bacchanalian revels with the rigid dis- cipline of the Japanese army. The Japanese are far from being a moral people, but in their camps there were no such orgies of drunkenness and lust as those which disgraced the camps of their foes. Perhaps it would be too much to assert that Japanese officers are more chaste than Russian; but they certainly are more abstemious when on duty in time of war. While the Russian camps were notorious for wine and women, and carloads of liquor and prostitutes took railway space that was urgently needed for troops and munitions, the Japanese generals enforced a Spartan severity of conduct. The Russian rank and file were almost wholly lacking in the enthusiasm which so conspicuously characterized the Japanese. The Russian peasant soldier is undoubtedly brave, his fighting showed that; but he is rather dull, heavy in mind as well as body, loyal indeed to his country and re- ligion, but often hating his government and officers. He felt little personal interest in the war, and fought because he was ordered to do so without half understanding what he was fighting for. General Kuropatkin wrote: "Out of compassion we permitted soldiers on the line to carry off their wounded comrades. Many companies literally melted away from this cause; there were many instances when perfectly sound men went to the rear under the pretext of carrying off the wounded, and when six, eight, and even ten men carried one wounded man. . . . The intellectual backwardness of our soldiers was a great disadvantage to 1 The Unveiled East, pp. 102-103. CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT 171 uSj because war now requires far more intelligence and initiative on the part of the individual soldier than ever before. Our men fought heroically in compact masses or in fairly close foimation, but few of our soldiers were capa- ble of fighting intelligently as individuals. In this respect the Japanese were much superior to us. Their non-com- missioned officers were far better developed intellectually than ourS; and among such officers, as well as among many of the conmion soldiers whom we took as prisoners, we found diaries which showed not only good education, but knowl- edge of what was happening and intelligent comprehension of the military problems to be solved." As these statements were made by the Russian conmiand- ing general, they cannot be attributed to anti-Russian prejudice. Even if we allow for the rankle of defeat in his mind, it is clear that, whatever may be said for the stubborn courage of the Russian troops as a whole, especially when defending a position, there was no such esprit de corps as there was in the Japanese army. The apathy of the army was equalled only by the apathy of the nation at home. General Kuropatkin quotes, with approval, an article by Mr. A. BUderling in the Russian Invalid, in 1906, in which the latter said: '^In a conflict between two peoples, the things of most importance are not material resources but moral strength, exaltation of spirit, and patriotism. . . . Every soldier (Japanese) knew that the whole nation stood behind him. With us, on the other hand, the war was un- popular from the very beginning. Soldiers were hastily put into railway trains, and when, after a journey that lasted a month, they alighted in Manchuria, they did not know in what country they were, nor whom they were to fight, nor what the war was about. Even our higher com- manders went to the front unwillingly and from a mere sense of duty . " General Kuropatkin adds : " Out of the tens of thousands of students who were then living in idleness, only a handful volunteered, while in Japan sons of the most distinguished citizens were striving for places in the ranks. . . . Leaders of the revolutionary party strove with ex- 172 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST traordinary energy to multiply our chances of failure. Per- sons who sincerely loved their country gave aid to Russia's enemies by expressing the opinion in the press that the war was irrational, and by criticising the mistakes of the government that had failed to prevent it. Soldiers of the reserves, when called into active service, were furnished by the anti-government party with proclamations intended to prejudice them against their officers, and similar procla- mations were sent to the army in Manchuria. Firm in spirit though Russians might be, the indifference of one class of the population and the seditious incitement of another could hardly fail to have upon many of them an influence that was not favorable to the successful prosecu- tion of war." The Russian commander-in-chief is surely a competent witness. The effects of the war were far-reaching. Russia's pres- tige suffered an eclipse; Japan's blazed forth with new splendor. For the first time in modern history an Asiatic nation had become a world-power of the first magnitude. Western nations, which had been accustomed to do their pleasure in the Far East, and to count on nothing more than a futile opposition, suddenly found that the day of their imchecked aggressions had passed. Everywhere Asia plucked up courage. It had regarded Russia as the most powerful of the white nations and Japan as a comparatively small island empire of no special impor- tance. When, therefore, Asia saw the most dreaded of Western nations so easily humbled by little Japan, people on the mainland began asking one another: "Why should we longer ' submit to this arrogant white man ? If the Japanese can defeat the Russians, why cannot Chinese and East Indians drive out the foreigners who are troubling them?" Excited Asia did not understand why not, and became vainglorious. The White Peril suddenly appeared less menacing. China awaked to a new sense of unity and power. Anti-British feeling in India was enormously in- tensified. Even Turkey and Persia felt the thrill of Asiatic triumph over Europe. Foreigners in the Far East testified CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT 173 to the general change in attitude. A French diplomat wrote in the Deutsche Revue: "All the Asiatic peoples now recognize that the axis of the Asiatic world has been shifted. They had resigned themselves to their fate. The Japanese successes struck this enei'vated world like a cannon stroke, and Siam, which is led by British sentiment; India, which is under England's dominion; the Malay Islands, Java, and Sumatra, the Anamites of Anam, Tonquin, and Cochin- China, pricked up their ears. Five hundred East Indians at once set out to attend the lectures at the Japanese uni- versities. Siam concluded a compact of amity, of whose provisions Europe has remained ignorant, with Japan. In Singapore, Batavia, Surabaya, Saigon, Hanoi, and Hai- phong the Chinese secret societies have redoubled their pre- cautionary measures and their activity. China has opened its doors to Japanese traders, Japanese officials, and Japa- nese military instructors. In French Indo-China it was found necessary to prohibit Chinese newspapers and to or- der the imprisonment of Chinese and Japanese spies." ^ The Hungarian traveller Arminius Vaminbeiy wrote ia the same periodical on the reaction of the Russian defeat upon the Moslem world and its menace to the AVest. He reminded Western readers that ever since the days of Ivan the Terrible, Mussulmans had regarded Russia as the arch- enemy of their faith, a scourge of Allah whom it was vain to resist. The reports of Japanese victories "were as startling as thunder in a clear sky to the Moslem nations of Asia. Shame is felt at the fear mspired by a country which has proved to be hollow and impotent, but still more at the defeats which the Moslem nations have sustained at the hands of the so greatly overrated giant, and different writers have come to the conclusion that owing to the ex- periences in Manchuria the Moslems may look forward to a more hopeful future." The attitude of Western nations toward Russia's progress in the Far East presented some interesting contrasts. Governments observed the laws of neutrality, but the press ^ Quoted in the American monthly Review of Reviews, August, 1905. 174 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST revealed the sympathies of the people. The prevailing sentiment in continental Europe was pro-Russian, fear of the international consequences of an Asiatic victory over- coming hereditary dislike of the Slav. British sentiment was more friendly to Japan. England discerned clearly enough that if the Slav gained his coveted mastery in the north Pacific he would have an access of power and pres- tige that would affect the balance in both European and Asiatic international relations and seriously intensify the menace of Russian aggression on her Indian frontier and her possessions in China. This was the chief consideration that led to the Anglo-Japanese Alliance of January 30, 1902. This alliance, as may be imagined, was not received with joy in Russia, but it encouraged the jubilant Japanese to prepare with new zest for the war which all saw was fast becoming inevitable. American feeling was decidedly pro-Japanese. Russia appeared to be surprised and hurt by the outspoken friendli- ness of Americans for Japan. They protested that white men should stand together against yellow men, and Chris- tians against "heathens," reminded us of Russian sympathy during the American Civil War, conjured up visions of sub- stantial benefits which would accrue from Russian victory, and persistently sought to arouse feeling against Japan by appealing to self-interest and race prejudice. Said Count Cassini, the Russian ambassador to the United States: "It is not a thoughtless statement that were Japan to obtain supreme control in Manchuria the dominant military spirit of the Japanese would lead them to organize the Chinese into a modem army of such proportions that Europe and America would stand aghast at this menace to their peace and well-being. With a population of more than 430,000,- 000 to draw from, an army could be raised that, co-operating with Japan, might with a reasonable show of confidence defy the civilized world. You in America should pause to contemplate the result of a union of the two great Mongol races — one progressive, aggressive, alert, overambitious, dreaming dreams of standing dominant not only in the CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT 175 Far East but in the councils of the Powers; the other imi- tative, easily influenced, ready if not anxious to have a stronger hand mould its flaccid character into whatever shape would be best suited to carry out a scheme of na- tional aggrandizement. You of America, as well as we of Europe, have this to confront. It is not Russia alone that the danger threatens, but the whole family of Caucasian nations." ^ Count Cassini proceeded to plead for American s3Tn- pathy with Russia on the ground that, if Russia should be victorious, she would discriminate in commercial matters "in favor of the United States" because "Manchuria would require many things that Russia could not supply," while "in this country [the United States] are made the very materials that would find a ready sale among the people of the province. " "On the one hand [ with Japan victorious] stands Manchuria open to the commerce of the world — Japan in competition with the United States, a manufac- tm^er of Japan capable of maldng the goods needed in Man- churia, and of making them cheaper than America can make them, and having the additional advantage of short all-water freight rates. On the other hand stands Man- churia under Russian control, with a friendly hand ex- tended to the United States, and Japan given no encour- agement. To my mind the conclusion is obvious." The conclusion was indeed "obvious," but it was not, as Count Cassini imagined, that the United States should sym- pathize with Russia for the ignoble purpose of securing a share of the spoil. Rather was it obvious that in principle Russia stood for a closed Manchuria, with only such con- sideration for other nations as might serve her own inter- ests, and that it would be safer for Americans to take their chances with Japan. They knew too much about auto- cratic Russia to have any confidence that it would accord any greater freedom of intercourse than it suited her pur- pose to give. In spite of their color, geographical location, and nominal faith, the Russian autocrats were at a farther * Article in the North American Review, May, 1904, pp. 686-687. 176 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST remove from the spirit of western Europe and the United States than were some of the peoples of eastern Asia. It is true that when the Russian rules an uncivilized people he sometimes benefits them. He is ruthless and bloody in conquering, and he introduces an order which is better than the one it displaces; but any praise given to Russia on this account should take into consideration the standards of comparison. The Asiatics in the regions ruled by Russia were under such hopelessly bad governments that any change at all was for the better. Making due allowance for the custom of all warring gov- ernments to call high heaven to witness to the rectitude of their intentions, Americans felt that Count Katsura, then Prime Minister of Japan, had the better of the argument when he repUed to the Russian plea as follows: "The ob- ject of the present war, on the part of Japan, is the security of the Empire and the permanent peace of the East. Russia is, and if allowed to be will continue to be, the great dis- turber of the peace of the East, and there can be no per- manent peace until she is put in bonds which she cannot break. The position of Japan is closely analogous to that of ancient Greece in her contest with Persia; a contest for the security of Greece and the permanent peace of Europe. Japan is Greece and Russia is Persia. The war is not a war for the supremacy of race over race, or of religion over rehgion. With differences of race or religion it has nothing to do; and it is carried on in the interests of justice, human- ity, and the commerce and civilization of the world."* The triumph of Japan marked the beginning of a new epoch not only for Japan, but for Korea, China, and proba- bly also for the world. It changed the whole complexion of Far Eastern poHtics. It gave Japan an acknowledged place among world-powers of the first rank. It seriously impaired Russian prestige everywhere. It meant the re- construction of Korea imder Japanese leadership; and it dissipated the fear that the vast populations of the Far ^ From an interview with the Reverend William Imbrie, D.D., of Tokyo, which he was authorized to publish in the United States. CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF RUSSIAN DEFEAT 177 East, numbering more than one-third of the human race, might fall under the baleful influence of Russian absolutism. I have no disposition to exalt Japan at the expense of Rus- sia. But since Japan happened to be the nation to resist the Russian advance in the Far East, one may call attention to the historical fact that Japan had made more real progress in five decades of contact with the Western world than Russia had made in five centuries. Japan was far from perfect, but it was better for the interests of mankind that Korea and lower Manchuria should develop under Japa- nese influence than under Russian. In a later chapter I must regretfully record a strengthen- ing of autocratic tendencies in Japan, and in another vol- ume I have described the remarkable revolution in Russia;^ but contrasting the two nations as they stood with their goveiTunents, methods, and ideals in the first decade of this century, it was painfully clear that the influence of Russia in the Far East was a menace not only to northern Asia but to the world, which is profoundly concerned by the forces which dominate these rising nations. It is hardly conceivable that a triumphant Russian autocracy would have permitted China to become a republic, and when that autocracy itself fell, in 1917, the sudden collapse of Russian rule in eastern Asia would have plunged China and Korea into chaos. Japan would then have been compelled to undertake the task of restoring order, but with the loss of at least a dozen years of time, during which many condi- tions would have become worse and the difficulties greatly multiplied. A free, orderly, and enlightened Russia would be a blessing not only to the Far East, but to the world. But there was no such Russia in 1905, and one grieves to say that while the Russia of to-day is nominally free, it is neither orderly nor enlightened, for Russia has dethroned the Czar only to enthrone fanatical Bolsheviki SociaHsts, who cannot even guide their own country aright, to say nothing of other countries. ^ Russia in Transformation. CHAPTER XI THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY AND THE ANGLO- JAPANESE CONVENTION The annihilation of the Russian fleet brought the war to its cuhnination. Each side was now ready to consider tenns of peace. Russia had lost all the ships that she could prudently send to the Far East. Her army had been dis- astrously defeated, and the single track Trans-Siberian Railway could not transport enough troops and munitions for adequate reinforcements. Russia, too, was feeling the pressure of financial necessity. Her natural resources were great, but they were unable to stand the strain of continuing the struggle. Her foreign loans on account of the war aggregated $335,000,000; her internal loans were $100,000,- 000; and her outstanding paper-money issue was $600,000,- 000. The war had cost Russia nearly if not quite $1,500,- 000,000. Moreover, the government was facing a revolu- tion of ominous portent, and needed freedom from foreign complications in order that it might be able to turn its attention to a home situation which was menacing the stability of the throne. The common people had never regarded the war with favor. They deemed it a war of the grand ducal psucty, but its sorrows had pressed heavily upon them. Every village had lost husbands and fathers and sons, and murmurs of discontent were becoming loud and insistent. Japan had even more cogent reasons for peace. The war map was altogether in her favor, but a continuance of the struggle would have involved grave risk. Russia had little more to lose. Her home territory was not involved. Her army in Manchuria included many Poles, Finns, and revolu- tionists whom the governing autocrats were quite willing to have killed off so that they could not return home to increase the popular discontent. While the Russians had 178 THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 179 no navy left worth mentioning, l^ey had 559,000 soldiers in Manchuria and the Primorsk or Pacific Province. Sixty- four thousand of these were in hospitals, but the remainder constituted a formidable army which was inured to war, and whose new and capable commander, General Linevitch, was eager to avenge the defeats of his predecessor. General Kuropatkin. Russia was undoubtedly in a bad way, but if she were forced to go on, her superior resources in men and money, her food-supplies in the flom'-mills and stock- yards at Harbin, "that great stomach of the war," and her imbroken control of the Trans-Siberian Railway from Si- beria and Russia would have enabled her in time to pull herself together and wage a long war more easily than the Japanese. The latter had defeated the Russians in every battle, but they had done so at fearful cost. Liao-yang and Mukden were fiercely contested battles, and the slopes of Port Arthur had been turned into Japanese shambles by the valor of their Russian defenders. Japan's victory had not been so easily won as to make the thought of- try- ing it again particularjy attractive. Mr. F. A. McKenzie, the well-known war correspondent, said that there was re- markable agreement among his colleagues with the differ- ent armies that the Japanese in striking their great blow at Mukden practically exhausted their strength,^ and George Kennan declared that when peace negotiations were begun Russia had 100,000 more troops in Manchuria than Japan, and that the Japanese General Staff did not believe that it could defeat General Linevitch and carry the war north- ward without a reinforcement, which it would be difficult for Japan to supply, and which the government had neither the arms nor the money to equip. In these circumstances it would not have been a light thing to face further battles with a still formidable and determined enemy which had learned much by experience, and which was willing to try the fortunes of another contest. There were, too, possible compHcations with other na- 1 The Unveiled East, pp. 105-106. * Article in The Outlo»k, December 30, 1911. - 180 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST tions which might diminish the results of the victory already obtained. The Japanese did not forget that they had cap- tured Port Arthur once before, in the war with China in 1895, and that they had been compelled to relinquish it by a combination of European Powers. It was not proba- ble that Europe would again iaterfere, as it had learned to respect the prowess of the Japanese, and had been led to fear the reflex effect of interference. But European diplomacy was believed to be prolific in unexpected schemes. It ap- peared prudent, therefore, to accept the substantial results that Russia was ready to acknowledge rather than to incur the risk of lessening them by contmuing the war under con- ditions that might be more favorable to Russia. Japan hesitated to bring upon herself the world odium that would have resulted from a continuance of the war which all men now thought should stop. Mankind had become sensitive to bloodshed and, knowing nothing of the greater horrors of the coming European War, was ap- palled by the carnage in Manchuria. Himianity virtually said to Japan: "After having obtained your avowed ob- jects in the war, you should be satisfied." The youngest of present-day Powers, Japan is not indifferent to the opinion of other nations, and this was deemed a good oppor- tunity to convince the world that Japan could be as wise in peace as she was efficient in war. Indemnity did not ap- peal to the Japanese as an adequate reason for rejecting terms of peace. While not unmindful of financial advan- tages, they can hardly be called a mercenaiy people. The Samurai, who form the bulk of the fighting class, are chival- rous in spirit and with a high sense of personal honor. They will fight to the death for their Emperor, but they would consider money an ignoble thing to die for. The cost of continuing the war would have been enor- mous. Japan had stood the financial strain unexpectedly well, but she could not have stood it much longer. The patriotism of the Japanese is equal to more exacting de- mands than that of most other peoples, and they were still willing to fight. But taxes had trebled since the outbreak THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 181 of hostilities, and had become a grievous burden for a poor people. The budget presented to the Diet of 1906 by the Minister of Finance showed that the war, including interest on the war debt, had cost Japan approximately yen 2,204,- 000,000, and the interest charges were nearly twice the revenues of the government a decade before. Bad weather had seriously lessened the rice-crop, and the price of food had reached alarming proportions. Distress would stare the nation in the face if the war continued. It is true that Koretiyo Takahashi, financial commissioner of Japan in London, is said to have told an enterprising newspaper re- porter that Japan had $175,000,000 untouched in England, Germany, and the United States, and that if peace had not been concluded his government could have raised an addi- tional internal loan of $100,000,000 to prosecute the war.^ But this pronouncement was regarded as purely "diplomatic." Whatever desperation might have prompted, Japan was plainly near the end of her resources. The financial as well as the political and humanitarian interests of the world were strongly for peace, and they had the advantage of being in a position to press their views. Each of the con- tending nations was compelled to borrow, and bankers did not care to lend more for the continuance of a conflict which might end in the bankruptcy of one or both of the debtors, and which had already disturbed the commercial and monetary interests of the w^orld. Other governments added their influence to the counsels for peace. France and Germany, who were more or less openly in sympathy with the Slav, saw that the time had come to stop, and so advised Russia. The German Em- peror and the Russian Czar had a mysterious meeting on the former's private yacht. Sovereigns do not confer in the presence of newspaper reporters; but no one, except those who were compelled for diplomatic reasons to do so, denied that the subject of the conference was the war, and that the German war lord gave some sound advice to his weaker friend; for every intelHgent man in Christendom ^ Interview in the New York Tribune, September 1, 1905. 182 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST probably had more accurate knowledge as to the actual progress of events than the unhappy Czar, who knew only what the court cabal permitted to reach him. Great Britain, meantime, was counselling Japan to make peace. The British had no interest in the prosecution of the conflict merely for a money or territorial consideration after the real ends of the war had been attained, and their special relations to Japan through the Anglo-Japanese Convention of 1902 might prove embarrassing if the strife increased in bitterness. This convention was designed to strengthen each of the contracting parties against Russia as their common danger. It provided that if either Japan or Eng- land, in defense of their respective Korean interests, should become involved in war with any other Power, the other party to the contract "will maintain a strict neutrality and use its efforts to prevent other Powers from joining in hos- tUities against its ally," but that if any other Power or Powers do so join in hostilities, then the other contracting party will join its ally." Thereupon France and Russia promptly made an agreement to stand together. If it had not been for these compacts the Russia-Japan War might have set half the world on fire. More than one nation might have helped Russia if it had not been for the knowledge that such help would have brought Great Britain and France into the mel6e. The cabinets of Chris- endom had been nervously apprehensive from the beginning that the interference of China on Japan's behalf might force France to keep her treaty promise to fight with Russia in the event of two nations uniting against her. Then Eng- land's treaty with Japan would have embroiled her, and Europe as well as Asia would have been in tumult. The Dogger Bank incident in the North Sea, in which Rojest- vensky's fleet fired on some British fishing-smacks, illus- trated the tension everywhere, and the imminence of war at that time between Great Britain and Russia made the rest of the world extremely nervous. The whole situation was full of dynamite, and everybody wanted the conflict to end before an}'- more of it exploded. THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 183 In these circumstances it was apparent to the whole world that the strategic moment to discuss terms of peace had arrived. The only question was: Who should take the initiative ?•' Pride kept each of the combatants from making overtures. The victorious Japanese felt that any advances on their part would be construed as a confession of inability to fight longer,--and the defeated Russians felt that to sue for peace would be to drink the dregs of the cup of humilia- tion. No European nation was in a position to act, as the leading governments were imderstood to be in sympathy with one or the other of the combatants. In these circum- stances all signs pointed to the United States, whose popular sentiment was known to be rather favorable to Japan, but whose government had carefully maintained neutraUty, and was credited with a larger measure of disinterestedness than any of the European governments. While everybody felt that somebody ought to move, and each was waiting for some one else, President Roosevelt broke through diplo- matic formalities and addressed an identical note to the Japanese and Russian Governments, June 7, 1905: "The President feels that the time has come, when, in the inter- est of all mankind, he must endeavor to see if it is not pos- sible to bring to an end the terrible and lamentable conflict now being waged. . . . The President accordingly urges the Russian and Japanese Governments, not only for their own sakes but in the interest of the whole civilized world, to open direct negotiations for peace with each other. ..." Japan promptly expressed its willingness to enter into negotiations for peace. Russia also answered affirmatively but in language whose sincerity was suspected by Japan. However the difficulties were overcome and plenipotenti- aries were appointed. Japan designated as her represen- tatives Baron Jutaro Komura, Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Mr. Kogoro Takahira, Minister to the United States. Russia was tardy, as usual, finally appointing M. NeUdov and M. Muraviev, who were soon replaced by Count Ser- gius Witte, former Privy Councillor and Minister of Finance, and Baron Romanovitch Rosen, who had just been ap- 184 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST pointed Ambassador to the United States. These selections were favorably regarded by the world. Baron Komura was educated in America, at Harvard University, and dur- ing his long diplomatic career had been Minister to Korea, China, and Russia. Count Witte, though cordially hated by the Grand Ducal party in Russia, was a man respected not only for ability but for honesty. Baron Rosen had served eight years as Secretary of the Russian Embassy in Washington, and also as Secretary of Legation and Minister in Tokyo. Physically, the Japanese and Russian plenipo- tentiaries presented a contrast not unlike that typified by their respective nations. The Russian Witte was of huge bulk, over six feet in height and over two hundred pounds in weight, while the Japanese Komura was but httle over five feet in height and weighing only about one hundred pounds. But events proved that in alertness and strength of intellect the small Japanese was no whit the inferior of the ponderous Russian. After some dickering America was accepted by both parties as the place of meeting, and the plenipotentiaries began their sessions August 8 at the government navy-yard near Portsmouth, New Hampshire. There was intense curiosity on the part of the Russians, as well as on the part of the world, to know what terms the Japanese would impose. Baron Komura submitted twelve in writing at an early session. The next day Coimt Witte submitted the Russian reply, protesting against certain of the terms. Baron Komura suavely proposed that the dis- cussion of the disputed terms be temporarily deferred, and that an effort be made to ascertain on how many of the others agreement could be reached. The articles were then taken up in this way, and it soon became apparent that the Russians would accept eight of the Japanese terms, but that the remaining four would be rejected. The Japa- nese insisted, but the Russians remained stubborn, and a deadlock resulted. It looked for a time as if the negotia- tions would end in failure. The cables between Ports- mouth and the governments concerned were kept hot with messages, but neither side would yield. THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 185 Then President Roosevelt intervened. From a diplo- matic view-point it was rather an extraordinary thing to do. But he seldom allowed convention to limit his course, and his independent position made it possible for him to do without suspicion of interested motives what no European monarch could have done. What cabled communications he had with St. Petersburg, Tokyo, and other capitals were carefully guarded from the public; but the remarks of the German Emperor after the peace conference had closed indicated that there was considerable consultation. At any rate, there were undoubted signs that the real centre of negotiations was transferred from Portsmouth to Presi- dent Roosevelt's summer home at Oyster Bay. Baron Rosen quietly sHpped away from Portsmouth and had a long conference with the President, returning as quietly to Portsmouth. The channel of communication with the Japanese was Baron Kaneko, a former member of the Japanese Cabinet, who was known to be high in the con- fidence of the Mikado and Elder Statesmen, and who had been for some time in the United States. There had been much speculation regarding his presence in America through- out the war. While he was affable with every one he had the proverbial reticence of the Japanese in important matters, and newspaper men never could learn anything from him. Although he was not one of the peace plenipo- tentiaries, he visited President Roosevelt no less than six times during the sessions of the Portsmouth conference. The Baron suavely told newspaper reporters that his visits to the President were purely personal, as he and Mr. Roose- velt had been friends since their association as fellow students at Harvard University, and that he had not sent a single cable message to the Mikado or to Prince Ito since the conference opened. Mr. Sato, the spokesman for the Japanese plenipotentiaries, added his disclaimer to that of Baron Kaneko, observing that if the President of the United States had any communications to make, he would naturally have made them through official channels. This sounded plausible, but the public was not convinced. The 186 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Japanese are past masters in the art of secrecy, and there were various ways by which the astute, self-effacing Baron could have transmitted his information to the right parties. At any rate it was apparent that the plenipotentiaries at Portsmouth were simply marking time while the main issue was being settled somewhere else. It looked for a time as if nothing could be accomplished. The Japanese insisted upon their terms, and the Russians declared that to concede the four in question would destroy their prestige in both Europe and Asia, and make serious trouble at home, and that it was their inflexible determina- tion to continue the war rather than yield to such humiliating conditions. August 29, to the surprise and rehef of the world. Baron Komura withdrew the three Japanese de- mands relating to indemnity, Russia's naval power in the Far East, and the interned ships, and proposed a division of the Island of Saghalien. The overjoyed Russians in- stantly assented, and the long suspense was over. As Count Witte returned to his hotel a throng of excited news- paper men pressed about him and called out : " Does Russia pay an indemnity?" "Pas un sou, et la moitie de Sa- khaline" (Not a sou and the half of SaghaHen) was the jubilant reply. The formal draft of the treaty was made by Mr. Heniy Willard Dennison, the American who was for many years the legal adviser of Japan, and Mr. Frederick de Martens, who sustained similar relation to the Russian Foreign Office. September 5, in the presence of all the envoys and their suites, and a few invited Americans, Count Witte and Baron Komura affixed their signatures. The profound silence during that supreme moment was then broken by a battery salute of nineteen gims, the ringing of the church-bells in Portsmouth, and the screaming of all the steam-whistles in the harbor. Mutual felicitations were exchanged by the plenipotentiaries while telegraph and cable sped the tidings to every part of the world. Copies of the treaty were transmitted to the governments in Tokyo and St. Petersburg, and were formally signed by both monarchs October 14. THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 1S7 The salient points of this treaty were as follows: Japan ratified Russia's lease of the trunk-Hne railway across Manchuria to Vladivostok. Russia recognized Japanese preponderating influence in Korea, agreed to respect the administrative entity of Manchuria and to limit her claim to police the Manchurian Railway, surrendered the Chinese Eastern Railway from Kwan-cheng-tze Pass to Port Arthur, and acknowledged Japan's title to Port Arthur and Dalny and to that portion of Saghalien south of the 50th parallel of latitude. Both nations agreed to evacuate Man- churia and to uphold the open-door policy in it, and each was to reimburse the other for the care of imprisoned sol- diers, sailors, and citizens. The first thought of the world was that the Japanese had yielded their ground, and surprise was general. Reflection, however, showed that Japan had taken the prudent course. She had obtained aU that she had fought for, and more. There would have been no war at all if Russia at the outset had conceded Japan's demands regarding Korea and Man- churia. By the terms of peace Japan not only eliminated Russia from Korea and southern Manchuria, but obtained for herself Dalny, Port Arthur, and the Chinese Eastern Railway. It is doubtful whether the Japanese really ex- pected to obtain more than they did. The surrender of the Russian ships that had taken refuge in neutral ports, and the limitation of Russia's naval power in the Far East were not reasonable demands. It was incredible that Russia should submit to dictation as to how many ships she should have in her own ports. The demand for Saghalien had a better basis, but the compromise agreed upon was compara- tively easy. Japan had ceded it to Russia in 1875 when its resources were little understood and its relation to future complications had not been foreseen. It is a more considerable island than is commonly supposed, being 670 miles long, and having an area of about 25,000 square miles, nearly that of Ireland. It has extensive forests, vast beds of coal and iron ore, rich deposits of oil, and its coasts and rivers teem with salmon, herrmg, and other 188 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST food-fish. Its location, twenty-five miles from the main- land, and thirty miles from Japan, gives it large strategic value. The Japanese were not thinking so much of com- mercial and military advantages in 1875 as they were in 1905, and they were determined that so strategic a base should no longer remain in the possession of a rival power. They had little zeal for the northern part, which is bleak, rocky, and ice-bound. It is of some use to Russia on ac- count of its relation to the mouth of the Amur River, and as a convict colony, but it is of little value for anything else. Japan secured the southern half whose climate is made more salubrious by the Japan Current, which includes the coal, iron, and oil deposits, which has the fisheries that Japan needs both for revenue and for food, and which has vital relations to the naval control of La Perouse Strait and the Japan Sea. With this half of the island and both sides of the Korea Strait, Russia cannot get in or out of Vladi- vostok without the consent of Japan. As for indemnity, Japan really got tne equivalent of an enormous one in Korea, Dalny, Port Arthur, the Chinese Eastern Railway, valuable fisheries, the control of southern Manchuria, and prestige in China. Her wildest dreams never compassed so much at the outbreak of the war. Of course she at first pressed for indemnity. It is the custom in all bargaining, particularly in the Orient, to ask more than one expects to get. Americans often do this, and Orientals always do. The method is dear to the Eastern mind as it leaves room for large apparent concessions without making any real sacrifice. The Japanese of the higher class are less disposed to haggle over a trade than most Asiatics, but they were far too shrewd to begin a diplomatic nego- tiation with their minimum terms. By stoutly insisting for a time on what they never really expected to get, they obtained the important things which they were actually after. Another reason, which probably had as much influence with Japan as any other, perhaps as much as all others combined, was the secret completion of another treaty with THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 189 Great Britain. The Anglo-Japanese Convention of Jan- uary 30; 1902, had greatly increased Japan's prestige, and had assured her of the powerful assistance of England in the event of any other Power coming to the assistance of Russia. This convention was for five years and therefore had two years more to run. Both Japan and England felt that the time had come for a closer and more effective aUi- ance, and without waiting for the expiration of the treaty, a new one was concluded for a further period of ten years, with the agreement, as in the former case, that even then it should continue in force until a year after one of the contracting parties should notify the other of its desire to end it. The object of this momentous convention, which was signed August 12, 1905, was stated in the pre- amble to be "(A) Consolidation and the maintenance of general peace in the regions of eastern Asia and India; (B) The preservation of the conmion interests of all the Powers in China by insuring the independence and integ- rity of the Chinese Empire and the principle of equal op- portunities for the commerce and industry of all nations in China; (C) The maintenance of the territorial rights of the high contracting parties in the regions of eastern Asia and of India, and the defense of their special interests in the said regions." Article II provided that "if by reason of an unprovoked attack or aggressive action, wherever arising, on the part of any other Power or Powers, either con- tractor be involved in war in defense of its territorial rights or special interests mentioned in the preamble, the other contractor shaU at once come to the assistance of its ally, and both parties wiU conduct war in common and make peace in mutual agreement with any Power or Powers in- volved in such war." Article III recognized Japan's "para- mount poHtical, military, and- economic interests in Korea/' and Article IV Great Britain's "special interests in aU that concerns the security of the Indian frontier," and Article VI declared that "in the matter of the present war between Japan and Russia, Great Britain will continue to maintain strict neutrality unless another Power or Powers join in 190 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST hostilities against Japan, in which case Great Britain will come to the assistance of Japan, will conduct war in com- mon, and will make peace in mutual agreement with Japan." This treaty was far-reaching in its significance. It meant peace in eastern Asia, relief of the British from anxiety regarding Russian aggressions upon their Indian frontier, and relief of the Japanese from anxiety regarding further Russian advance in Manchuria. It virtually guaranteed the integrity of China against further aggressions by Russia, Germany, and France, and kept open the door for the world's trade with that populous country. More than this, it was tantamount to an offensive and defensive aUiance between the greatest naval Power of Europe and the great- est military Power of Asia, thus securing to Japan the posi- tion that she had won, giving her a free hand in the develop- ment of Korea, and insuring that if other Powers should make war against either Great Britain or Japan they would be confronted by both Powers. As soon as the Emperor of Germany learned of this treaty, he saw its bearing upon some of his cherished plans, and he began making a hurried effort to form a league between Germany, France, and Russia. These governments shared his perturbation, but the Russians had their hands full with their own affairs, and France had recently entered into more amicable relations with England and was not disposed to run the risk of at- tack from such a near and powerful neighbor for the sake of pulling German chestnuts in China out of the fire. The ascendancy of Japan in Far Eastern affairs was thus firmly estabhshed for a decade, at least. Russia was to go no farther toward Korea, and to keep her hands off of China and India, while England and Japan were to be free to consoKdate their holdings and to extend their influence. This new treaty Japan was quietly negotiating with Great Britain while the peace conference was in progress, and as soon as it was consummated, the Japanese plenipotentiaries at Portsmouth, without referring to it of course, "mag- nanimously" withdrew the demands that Russia found so objectionable. The main things that Japan wanted were THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 191 Korea, a free field in lower Manchuria, and relief from the menace of Russian aggression. The first two were secured by her victory in the field, and the third by her treaty with England. The rest was a mere matter of bargaining in which Japan could afford to be generous. In these circumstances the alleged sadness of the Japa- nese envoys and the real exultation of the Russians w^hen Japan finally withdrew her non-essential demands appear rather amusing. The Russians were so reheved to save anything from the wreck that they were jubilantly talkative to the newspaper correspondents, while the Japanese main- tained their impenetrable reserve. As the Russians loudly declared that they had won their point, the reporters natu- rally reflected their view. But'-as time passed it became more and more evident that the real victory was with Japan. She had waged with unprecedented success a colossal war with the Power that had been deemed one of the mightiest in the world. With the minor exception of the almost un- inhabited and uninhabitable northern part of an island, she had kept all the fruits of victory, conciliated Russia by saving her pride, gained enormous prestige, and won the favor of mankind by appearing to be magnanimous to a defeated rival. That the Russians could be jubilant over the result only suggests the worse things that they had feared. The two nations accepted the peace quite differently. The Russians appeared greatly dehghted, and the Czar in an imperial rescript of October 10 extolled Count Witte's success in obtaining "rightful concessions" and "an all- advantageous peace." He telegraphed to General Line- vitch in Manchuria that "Japan yielded all our conditions, but asked for the return of Saghalien occupied by Japanese troops"; that "my glorious army is now greater in num- bers and stronger than before, not only prepared to ward off the enemy but also to inflict upon him an important defeat"; but that "my duty to my conscience and to the people intrusted to me by God commands me not again to put to the test the valor of Russian men so dear to my 192 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST heart and ... I have therefore accepted the preliminary peace conditions." This is an example of "saving face" which a Chinese mandarin might envy. The Japanese received the news in a different spirit. The MikadO; indeed, in an imperial rescript October 16 wrote of having secured "peace with glory," and that "after twenty months of war the position of the Empire has been strengthened, and the interests of the country have been advanced." But the people were not so well satisfied. Intoxicated by the success that had been achieved on the battle-field, they had set their hearts on the whole of Saghalien and on an indemnity which would reimburse them for the heavy cost of the war. They were not in a position to know, as their leaders were, of the difficulties which the continuance of the war would have involved. Their burning patriotism did not take account of risks. They did not know of the security which the renewed Anglo- Japanese Convention gave them. They feared that the terms of peace did not guarantee immunity from further Russian aggressions, and that as soon as Russia could double-track the Trans-Siberian Railway, mobiHze a larger army, and build a new fleet, the war would have to be fought over again against a strengthened foe. When, therefore, the extras announced to the waiting throngs that the Japanese plenipotentiaries had waived three of the terms of peace, and had compromised on a fourth, there was a storm of protest which found voice in great mass- meetings and in many of the leading newspapers, including all but one of the influential journals of Tokyo. The boast- ing of the Russians over the terms of peace intensified the popular wrath. The daily press reprinted a statement of Count Witte to a newspaper correspondent, in which he was quoted as saying: "I would not pay a sou of indem- nity. . . . The Japanese wanted the Chinese Eastern Railway as far north as Harbin. I gave it to them only to Chang-chun. . . . They asked an absurd price for the island of SaghaMen. They get half the island; they get no money." The Japanese also read the swaggering despatch THE PORTSMOUTH TREATY 193 which the excited Witte sent to the Czar : " I have the honor to report to your Majesty that Japan has agreed to your demands concerning the conditions of peace, and that con- sequently peace will be established, thanks to your wise and firm decision, and in strict conformity with the instruc- tions of your Majesty. Russia will remain in the Far East the great power which she hitherto has been, and will be forever." It was an exhibition of bluster which caused smiles in other countries, but it added fuel to the fire of Japanese protest. Prominent men shared the popular indignation . The newspapers headed their accounts with such captions as "Disgraceful Surrender," "Humiliating Peace." The Mikado was flooded with petitions to refuse to sign the treaty and to continue the war, and there were loud demands that the Ministry resign. If the government had pubHshed not only the actual terms of peace but the provisions of the Anglo-Japanese treaty the popular exasperation would have been aUayed, to some extent at least. Instead, the government tried to crush the discontent. The Japanese are the most loyal people in the world, but there are limits even to their acquiescence, and for a few days there were stormy times in the leading cities, especially in Tokyo. Riots broke out. The offices of newspapers that had sup- ported the government were wrecked, and considerable other property was destroyed. Prince Ito was threatened. The poHce were unable to quell the disorder and troops had to be called out. They ended the tumult in short order, but many rioters were killed or wounded. It would be wrong to infer too much from these distur- bances. Certainly neither Europe nor America can regard such outbreaks of popular violence as a sign of inferior civilization. The newspapers were filled for months with accounts of mobs in Russia. Mobs have repeatedly risen in England, and America probably sees as many as any civilized country in the world. It was quite natural that the settlement of a great war, in which popular feeling had been stirred to the utmost, should not be satisfactory to 194 ■ THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST everybody even in Japan. As time passed the Japanese gradually took the view that the sober second thought of the world has taken, namely, that the terms of peace were on the whole creditable to Japan, and quite favorable to her. CHAPTER XII JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA The Japanese found themselves in Korea in the course of the war with Russia in circumstances roughly analogous to those in which the Americans found themselves in the Philippine Islands in the war with Spain. Military neces- sity had brought them in, and once in, civil as well as mili- tary obligation confronted them. The country was in a chaotic condition, the people were sullen or openly hostile, and confusion and disorganization were on every hand. The Japanese lost no time in grappling with the situation. Their first thought was to take the direction of foreign affairs into their own hands, but to leave internal affairs in the hands of the Korean authorities, with Japanese resi- dent "advisers" to give needed counsel. The Japanese Minister to Korea frankly said: "Japan is confronted by a most difficult problem — ^to maintain the fiction of Korean independence while practically estabHshing a protectorate, and yet to avoid assuming the responsibihties of a govern- ing power." August 19 (1904), articles one and two, and August 22 article three of an "Agreement" between Japan and Korea were concluded at Seoul which stipulated that " the Korean Government shall engage a Japanese subject recommended by the Japanese Government as Financial Adviser to the Korean Government"; that "the Korean Government shall engage a foreigner recommended by the Japanese Government as Diplomatic Adviser to the Foreign Office"; and that "the Korean Government shall consult the Japa- nese Government before concluding treaties and conventions with foreign Powers, and also in dealing with other im- portant diplomatic affairs such as grants of concessions to or contracts with foreigners." This plan did not work 195 196 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST satisfactorily. The Japanese came to the conclusion that what their Minister had called "the problem" was too "difficult" to be solved by such half-way measures. They therefore began to take matters more decisively into their own hands. Prince Ito arrived with credentials as Resi- dent General, whose powers disconcerted the Korean Gov- ernment not a little, and its dismay was increased when the proposal was made that the Prince should occupy the imperial audience-chamber while receiving the return call of the Emperor. His Majesty resorted to the customary Oriental device of feigning illness, and five days passed be- fore the interview could be satisfactorily arranged. A draft of a treaty was soon presented which included the appointment of a Japanese administrator to govern Korea under the Emperor; the appointment of Japanese administrators at all treaty ports; the transfer of Korean diplomatic affairs to Tokyo; and an agreement to make no arrangements with other Powers without the consent of Ja- pan. The Emperor protested, and his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Pakchisun, implored him not to affront the spirits of his ancestors by yielding such prerogatives of his imperial house. But his other ministers, influenced either by fear or corruption, urged him to consent. Finally, the feeble and frightened monarch signed the treaty. This is officially known as the Convention of November 17, 1905, although it was actually signed at half past one o'clock of the morning of the 18th. January 29, 1906, the Emperor issued an appeal to the nations in which he declared that his signa- ture had been forged, and he besought them to estabhsh a Joint protectorate over Korea in order to save it from vassalage. He may not have told the literal truth in alleg- ing that his signature was forged, but he certainly did not sign the document voluntarily. Great was the excitement among the people when the treaty became known. A number of the more patriotic officials committed suicide, six of them of high rank, includ- ing the popular General Min Yung-whan, ending their lives by harakiri. Crowds gathered, screaming and tearing their JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA 197 hair. The Japanese wisely left the people to vent their grief and rage without interference; except when stones were thrown or fighting began. Order was gradually re- stored, but the fires of anger and chagrin long smouldered in secret. Prince Ito gave an interview to the representatives of the press in Seoul in which he said: "Now that the new treaty between Japan and Korea is concluded, it is beheved by many Japanese even that Korea has been given to Japan, and this rash belief has caused bad feeling and misunder- standings between the two races. The most important point that I wish to impress upon you is that, although the new relations between Japan and Korea have now been definitely established by the conclusion of the protectorate treaty, the sovereignty of Korea remains as it was, in the hands of the Korean Emperor, and the imperial house of Korea and government exists as it did before. The new relations do but add to the welfare and dignity of the Korean dynasty and the strengthening of the country. It is a great mistake to look upon the new treaty as a knell sounding the doom of Korea's existence as a kingdom." The Korean Emperor, however, refused to be comforted. He saw that he was really under the domination of the Japa- nese. A man of flabby will and of hopeless incompetence as a ruler, he was not destitute of royal pride, and he would not have been human if he had not felt aggrieved when he was despoiled of the power that he had wielded for forty- one years. He hated the Japanese, partly because he re- garded them as hereditary enemies, and partly because they were less disposed than the Russians had been to flatter him and to supply his financial necessities. Fail- ing to recognize the hopelessness of his situation, he made his palace a centre of intrigue against the Japanese. He was too helpless to do anything that could seriously affect their plans, but he could do quite enough to irritate them in a hundred ways which Oriental duplicity so well under- stands. Some time before the convention of November 17, as a 198 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST last desperate recourse he had asked Mr. Homer B. Hul- bert, the American in charge of the government school in Seoul, to make a personal appeal to President Roosevelt. Mr. Hulbert started at once, but the Japanese suspected the object of his journey, and shadowed him by spies all the way. They deemed it improbable that the American Government would interfere, but they took no chances and pressed matters as vigorously as possible with a view to having the whole question irrevocably decided before Mr. Hulbert could reach Washington. He managed to arrive in San Francisco before the final steps of the convention could be completed, but by the time he reached Washington he was too late. He vainly sought an interview with the President, but Mr. Roosevelt did not deem it expedient to see him, and he was obliged to content himseK with an interview with the Secretary of State, who frankly advised him that it was impracticable for the American Govern- ment to intervene. The Emperor cabled Mr. Hulbert December 8 that he regarded the convention of November 17 as "cancelled on account of force," and that "protest should be entered at once"; but Mr. Hulbert found that his path was blocked at every turn and that he could ac- complish nothing. The course of the American Government had been a bitter disappointment to the Koreans for some time prior to Hulbert's arrival in Washington. The government felt that it was in an awkward position by reason of the treaty with Korea which was proposed in 1882 and agreed to May 10, 1883, one of whose clauses provided that if other Powers dealt unjustly or oppressively with either govern- ment, "the other would exert their good offices, on being informed of the case, to bring about an amicable arrange- ment, thus showing their friendly feehng." On the strength of this treaty an American party was growing up in Korea composed of Koreans who looked to the United States for help in the emergency which all saw to be impending. The Washington State Department saw the trend of Korean feel- ing, and was not a little embarrassed as it was convinced JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA 199 that it could not wisely intervene in the conditions which had developed. The American Minister at Seoul, tne Honorable Horace N. Allen, was a careful diplomat, and he realized the deli- cacy of the situation. ^ But he could not tell the Koreans that his government would not observe its treaty obliga- tions, nor could he prevent the Koreans from regarding him as their special friend. He had lived among them for many years, and he had a kindly feeling for them, which they well knew. Some of the Japanese newspapers charged him with being pro-Russian, a charge which had no foundation whatever. At any rate, the Japanese regarded him as an obstacle to their plans, and June 10, 1905, the Honorable Edwin V. Morgan appeared in Seoul, with orders to super- sede Allen as American Minister, his commission being dated the preceding March. The statement that the Tokyo government asked for Allen's recall has been vigorously denied; but a hint was doubtless conveyed to Washington, by the indirect methods which diplomacy so well understands, that the Japanese would be gratified if a change were made in the American legation at Seoul. Doubtless, too, the American Govern- ment beHeved that it would be better at that particular juncture to have a minister in Korea who was not so well known for his friendship with the Koreans. So one of the most efficient representatives that the United States has ever had in the Far East, who in a residence of twenty-one years in Korea, fifteen of them in the diplomatic service, had acquired knowledge and experience of exceptional value and was dean of the diplomatic corps in Seoul, was summarily dropped for the offense of being Hked and trusted by the government and people to which he was accredited. Mr. Morgan's tenure was brief. The Western govern- ments did not fan to discern the significance of the conven- tion of November 17. With all diplomatic matters handled in Tokyo, the occupation of the legations in Seoul was gone, and the Ministers were therefore withdrawn. To the in- dignation of the Koreans and the chagrin of the Americans 200 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST in Korea, the government of the United States was the first to withdraw its Minister. It leaked out afterward that the Japanese Minister at Peking had hinted to the American Minister, the Honorable William W. Rockhill, that in view of the Korean hope of American intervention, it would be pleasing to Japan if the United States should be the first nation to close its legation in Seoul, as the moral effect upon the Koreans would be great, and the American party would realize that it would be useless to make further opposition. The Japanese Minister at Washington had dropped an intimation to the same effect. The American Government obligingly compHed. November 25, only a week after the convention between Korea and Japan was signed, Morgan was officially notified to leave, and as soon as he could pack up he left the city, December 8. Ameri- can prestige among the Koreans immediately slumped, and among the Japanese it as promptly rose. Three days later, December 11, Min Yeung-tchan, who was styled "special envoy without credentials," called on the American Secretary of State in Washington and stated that the treaty of November 17, under which the direction of the external relations of Korea was to be conducted through the Department of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo, was procured from the Emperor of Korea by duress, and should, therefore, be ignored. He asked the United States to act in behalf of Korea under the treaty of May 10, 1883, be- tween the United States and Korea. Secretary Root re- plied December 19, stating that he had given his communi- cation consideration, and since his call had received a note from Mr. Kim, Charge d'Affaires of Korea, in which he had informed the State Department that he had instructions from the Foreign Minister of Korea to turn the archives and other property in his charge over to the Japanese lega- tion. Secretary Root concluded: "In view of this official communication, it is difficult to see how the Government of the United States can proceed in any manner upon the entirely different view of the facts which you tell us per- sonally you have been led to take by the information which JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA 201 you have received. It is to be observed, moreover, that the oflBicial conunimications from the Japanese Govermnent agree with the official commimications from the Korean Government and are ouite inconsistent with your informa- tion."! This, of course, was diplomatic camouflage. We shall not do Mr. Root the injustice to assume that a Secretary of State of his ability and intelligence did not know that "the official communications" to which he referred were not representative of the real Korean opinion. The simple fact was that the American Government deemed interven- tion impracticable, and foimd it convenient to take advan- tage of technical reports in excusing itself. It well knew that protest would avail nothing, that it would not help Korea, and would only irritate Japan. Years afterward Mr. Roosevelt justified his course in the following statement, which at a later date must have been read in Berlin with full approval: "Korea is absolutely Japan's. To be sure, by treaty it was solemnly covenanted that Korea should re- main independent. But Korea was itself helpless to en- force the treaty, and it was out of the question to suppose that any other nation with no interest of its own at stake would attempt to do for the Koreans what they were utterly unable to do for themselves. Moreover, the treaty rested on the false assumption that Korea could govern herself well. It had already been shown that she could not in any real sense govern herself at aU. Japan could not af- ford to see Korea in the hands of a great foreign power. She regarded her duty to her children and her children's children as overriding her treaty obligations. Therefore, when Japan thought the right time had come, it calmly tore up the treaty and took Korea, with the polite and busi- nesslike efficiency it had already shown in dealing with Russia, and was afterward to show in dealing with Ger- many."^ The limit of Japanese patience was reached when, in the 1 Foreign Relations of the United States, 1905. 2 Article in The Outlook, New York, September 23, 1914. 202 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST spring of 1907, the Korean Emperor sent a delegation to the International Conference at The Hague to implore the interference of Western nations. There was something pa- thetic in the appearance of the forlorn but patriotic Koreans pleading for a lost cause; for, of course, the Hague commis- sioners could not receive them. The Japanese were furious. The Korean Emperor denied that he was responsible for the delegation, but no one believed him. July 18, the Korean Cabinet ministers waited upon his Majesty and humbly but firmly represented to him the serious dangers to which he was exposing the country by his continued opposition to the Japanese, and advised him to abdicate. He listened with mingled rage and consterna- tion; but after long and stormy conferences with them and his Elder Statesmen, the crushed and humihated ruler tremblingly affixed his signature to an imperial decree an- nouncing the transfer of the throne to the Crown Prince. The hapless man who ascended the throne in this inglorious manner was even weaker in mind and body than his father, so dull and stupid that he was suspected of being mentally deficient. He was crowned with due ceremonial August 27, and when the Koreans saw that he had cut off his topknot, they felt that their cup of humiliation was full. Mobs sur- rounded the palace and for a time it looked as if there would be serious trouble. But the Japanese troops were ready, and gradually the tumult subsided, although many of the people remained sullen. Of course, the Japanese diplomatically annoimced that they had nothing whatever to do with the Emperor's abdi- cation; that the step had been taken solely on the advice of wise and patriotic Koreans who had become firmly con- vinced that the retirement of the Emperor was necessary in the interests of the people themselves; that the Japanese would have preferred to have the old Emperor remain on the throne, etc. Of course, also, no one with intelhgence enough to be out of a kindergarten doubted for a mo- ment that the Japanese really deposed the troublesome old Emperor and put his putty son in his place. Denials were JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA 203 purely "diplomatic," "to save face." The Japanese were simply astute enough to cover up their tracks so that it would be difficult for an outsider to connect them directly with the affair. Even if the Korean Cabinet Ministers did act without explicit orders, the essential fact would be im- changed. Does any sane person imagine that those puppet Orientals would have proceeded to such extremes in a mat- ter affecting the throne without knowing what their Jap- anese masters wanted; or if they had, that the Japanese would not have stopped them in a hurry ? Much has been said about Japan's disregara of Korean rights in this matter. The Japanese defend themselves by sajdng that they did not violate any treaty, as they left the throne in the hands of the Korean royal family, simply anticipating by a few years the transfer from father to son. However this may be, the Japanese lost no time in putting themselves into such relations with the situation that the new Emperor would be even more helpless than his royal father. July 24, Yi Wan-yimg, an able and well-educated but notoriously corrupt official, acting by authority of the Emperor and Prince Ito, signed an agreement at the Japanese residency in the following terms: "Article I. The Government of Korea shall follow the directions of the Resident-General in connection with the reform of the ad- ministration. Article II. Korea shall not enact any law or ordinance or carry out any administrative measure un- less it has the previous approval of the Resident-General. Article III. The judicial affairs of Korea shall be kept distinct from ordinary administrative affairs. Article IV. No appointment or dismissal of Korean officials of high grade shall be made without the consent of the Resident- General. Article V. Korea shaU appoint to official posi- tions such Japanese as are recommended by the Resident- General. Article VI. Korea shall not engage any foreigner without the consent of the Resident-General. Article VII. The first clause of the agreement between Japan and Korea, dated August 22, 1904, is hereby abrogated. ' ' The Emperor was required to issue a proclamation disbanding his army, 204 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST although he was permitted to retain a few battalions of the imperial court guards to assist in maintaining the semblance of royalty. Some of the soldiers mutinied on receiving the order to give up their arms, and killed a few of the Japanese; but they were quickly overpowered and the Korean army ceased to exist. Thus died Korea as even a nominally independent nation. It is true that the formal announcement of annexation to Japan was not made till 1910; but the proclamation then simply gave official recognition to a fact which had long been known and recognized. Any one who had observed the tide of Japanese immigration into Korea, the business and property interests which were speedily developed, and who knew the national and international questions at stake, might have known that annexation was inevitable sooner or later. There were 60,000 Japanese in Korea before the war, and after the Japanese occupation the number increased by leaps and bounds. It was not reasonable to suppose that a large Japanese population would permanently re- main under the absurd Korean laws, or support by taxes the rotten Korean Government. The principle of extra- territoriaHty was not deemed sufficient to provide for such a situation. Nor was it probable that a region so vital to Japan's political and military position would be left in such an unsatisfactory condition. The critics of Japan have charged her with breaking her plighted word, given in the treaty of February 23, 1904, which included the following pledge: "The Imperial Gov- ernment of Japan definitively guarantees the independence and territorial integrity of the Korean Empire." The semi- oflScial Japan Times, whose editor, Mr. Zumoto, was for- merly private secretary of Prince Ito, and afterward a member of the Japanese Diet, had editorially declared in September, 1904: "We are solemnly pledged before the world to respect the independence^of the Peninsula Kingdom, and nothing in the past poHcy and action of the Imperial Government gives even the shadow of excuse for doubting its good faith in its international relations." It is not neces- JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA 205 sary, however, to assume that Japan acted m bad faith. Some Japanese call attention to the fact that the treaty of November 17, 1905, dropped the guarantee of independence and substituted an undertaking to "maintain the security and respect and dignity of the Korean Imperial House." But the facts may be interpreted consistently with the gen- uineness of Japan's original purpose to content herself with a protectorate. Prince Ito, in an authorized interview with a representative of the Associated Press, September 21, 1907, had said that "some people in Japan believe it is a mistake not to annex Korea, but I have been steadfastly opposed to annexation. Annexation is no part of the Em- peror's plan, unless it should prove quite unavoidable." We believe that Prince Ito was sincere in his purpose to give a fair trial to the plan of a protectorate. But experi- ence proved that the plan was a failure. The Foreign Office in Tokyo frankly admitted it when, in an official statement issued in connection with the promulgation of the treaty of annexation, it said: "An earnest and careful examination of the Korean problem has convinced the Japanese Govern- ment that the regime of a protectorate can not be made to adapt itself to the actual condition of affairs in Korea, and that the responsibilities devolving upon Japan for the due administration of that country can not be justly fulfilled without the complete annexation of Korea to this Empire. . . . Resident-General Viscount Terauchi, in proceeding to his post, was charged to arrange for such solution." Mr. Kotaro Michizuki, a prominent member of the Par- liamentary Commission, pointedly declared: "President Roosevelt took the Canal Zone because it was essential for the national defence of the United States. Japan annexed Korea for the same reason. Only Colombia was not men- acing the very existence of the United States, while Korea certainly was through her intrigues with Russia." So no one was surprised when the Foreign Office in Tokyo gave out the text of the "treaty" of annexation, August 29, 1910, which declared that "His Majesty the Emperor of Japan and His Majesty the Emperor of Korea, having in view the 206 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST special and close relations between their respective coun- tries, desiring to promote the common weal of the two na- tions and to assure permanent peace in the Extreme East, and being convinced that these objects can be best attained by the annexation of Korea to the Empire of Japan, have resolved to conclude a treaty of such annexation. . . . His Majesty the Emperor of Korea makes complete and per- manent cession to His Majesty the Emperor of Japan of all rights of sovereignty over the whole of Korea"; and "His Majesty the Emperor of Japan accepts the cession mentioned in the preceding Article, and consents to the complete annexation of Korea to the Empire of Japan. . . ." Much of the talk about the loss of Korean independence is irrelevant. It is indeed pathetic to the last degree to see an ancient people reduced to vassalage. The meeting of the Cabinet Ministers and the Emperor, August 24, at which annexation was agreed to, is said to have been a moving one. The Premier, Yi Wan-yung, spoke sorrowfully and at length of "the hard fate of the country in being obKged to surrender its independence in deference to the weKare of the people and the security of their lives and property." The Emperor listened and then said in a low voice and with evident emotion : " I have fully understood the representations made by the Prime Minister, and I leave it in your Excellencies' hands to deal with the situa- tion." But acquiescence was unavoidable. Korea's weak- ness and its position in the Far East rendered domination by some foreign Power inevitable. The only question was: "Under which King, Bezonian" — Russia's or Japan's? Thus the curtain fell on the final scene of the passing of old Korea — "this shuttlecock among the nations," as Lord Curzon characterized her, "who treated her from entirely different and wholly irreconcilable standpoints according to their own interests or prejudices, and at whose hands she was alternately — ^nay even simultaneously — ^patronized, ca- joled, bullied and caressed."^ The long and weary struggle was now ended, and Korea became in name as well as in 1 Problems of the Far East, p. 188. JAPANESE ANNEXATION OF KOREA 207 fact an integral part of the Japanese Empire. The old Emperor and his successor were more fortunate than most deposed sovereigns, for their heads remained on their shoulders. They were officially called Prince Father Yi and Prince Yi, and were given an annual civil list of yen 1,500,- 000 while they vegetated in retirement in their former capital. Stupidity and feebleness are conducive to longev- ity in such circumstances. Prince Father Yi indolently lingered till January 21, 1919, when he was gathered to his ancestors. Prince Yi was still living, at last accounts, a dolorously pathetic survival of a bygone era. CHAPTER XIII MANCHURIA AS A FACTOR IN THE FAR EASTERN PROBLEM Crossing the Yalu River at Wiju, Korea, one enters Manchuria, the great debatable ground of the Far East. It more nearly resembles Canada than any other region of my acquaintance. Its area of 363,610 square miles is more than double that of Japan, and four times that of Korea. The scenery is as diversified as one might expect in so vast a territory; but while certain parts are hilly, and even mountainous, an immense section is as level as an American prairie. It is one of the finest agricultural regions in the world. Although comparatively undeveloped, it already produces immense quantities of grain. Manchuria could be made the granary of eastern Asia as there is hardly any limit to the staple crops that it could yield. Minerals are abundant. Coal, iron, mica, lead, copper, gold, silver, asbestos and gypsum are found in various sections, and in varjdng degrees of richness, as well as lime- stone and other rocks, some of them well adapted to build- ing pmposes. The Chinese have long known of the de- posits that he near the surface or outcrop on hillsides or river-banks, but their mining methods were crude and in- fluenced by superstitious fear of fung-shui (spirits of earth and air), so that they yielded scanty results. Russians in the north and a few British companies in the south operated more successfully, the latter under concessions from the Chinese Government. Such concessions were not easily secured dm-mg the last decade, and it is doubtful whether more will be granted, partly because of the growing unwill- ingness of the Peking authorities, but chiefly because the Japanese want the mining privfleges themselves. They are already developing a number of mines on a comparatively large scale. The Fushun pits, northeast of Mukden, are 208 MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 209 turning out great quantities of coal. The quality is not high, but the mining methods are thoroughly modem, and the product is so abundant and cheap that it can be bought almost anywhere in Manchuria and Korea. The Penchi-hu mines work less extensive deposits, but the coal is superior for industrial purposes, while anthracite and natural coke, valuable for smelting, are mined in the neighborhood of Niusin-tai. Iron ore is found in generous quantities near enough to veins of coal to make foundries exceedingly profitable. Gold, silver, lead, and copper are mined on a smaller scale, but successfully in a number of places. A British mining engineer has characterized as "exceedingly rich" a region thirty-five square miles near Tung-hwa and Hwai-jen, and the report of a Japanese investigator men- tions ore whose gold reaches in some cases above 1/10,000 grade, and is ninety-nine per cent fine.^ The population of Manchuria, estimated to be about 20,000,000, looks large in comparison with Canada, which, with a habitable area equal to that of Manchuria, has a population of only 7,206,643; but compared with Japan, Korea, and the eighteen provinces of China, Manchuria is sparsely settled, and could easily support many times its present population. The characteristic type of course is Manchu; but there are great numbers of pure Chinese, and the numbers are rapidly increasing, for Manchuria offers cheaper land and better hope of remunerative employment than the more crowded sections of China. The distinction between the Manchu and the Chinese is not so apparent in Manchuria as in China proper. Indeed, I often found it impossible to tell whether men I met upon the streets were Manchus or Chinese. I frequently asked residents to tell me, and they were usually unable to do so except after inquiry. It is easier to distinguish Manchu women, as their manner of dressing the hair is different from that of Chinese women. Manchu women also do not bind their feet; but unbound feet are not always a clew in Manchuria, as the Chinese women in that region do not bind their feet 1 Cf. The Oriental Review, November 25, 1910. 210 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST SO generally as their sisters in central and southern China. The intermingling of the Chinese and the Manchus appears much more complete in Manchuria than in other parts of China, and the result is a virile tj^e, physically vigorous and mentally alert. The Manchu dynasty long ruled all China, but in recent years the people of Manchiu-ia have been overawed by the aggressive power first of the Russians, and later of the Japanese. Manchuria was helpless before the mihtary strength of the Russian occupation prior to the Russia- Japan War. The common people cared little who their rulers were, knowing that they would get scanty considera- tion in any event, while the mffled dignity of officials was smoothed by Russian gold. The Russians had greater tact in gettmg along with the Chinese than any other foreign people showed, and difficulties were seldom serious. When Japan drove Russia out of Port Arthur and southern Manchuria, the people simply exchanged one master for another. Many of their fields and villages were destroyed; but it was not the poHcy of either the Japanese or the Rus- sians to molest the Manchurians unnecessarily, and as the contending armies required enormous food-suppHes and tens of thousands of carts and laborers, the thrifty inhabi- tants took shrewd advantage of their opportunity and reaped rich profits from both sides with true Chinese impartiality. There are several important towns and cities besides in- numerable villages. Port Arthur and Dalny have been already mentioned. Antung on the Yalu River, not long ago a squalid village, has been developed as the point at which the railway from Fusan to Mukden crosses the river, and as the port of entry to Manchuria through which pours an immense volume of Japanese trade. Kirin has been given prosperity by its coal-mines and by the railway which connects it with Chang-chun and, through that city, with the great markets of the regions beyond. One of the most mteresting cities to the traveller is Mukden, the ancient capital of the Manchu emperors, and afterward the seat of a Chinese Viceroy. The fine old wall, MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 211 though crumbling m places, is still a notable monument of former power. We walked the entire circumference of it during our visit. A few breaks necessitated awkward scrambling, but the view was inspiring and every yard seemed to teem with historic associations, the vanished glories of a great imperial house. The palaces of the em- perors are kept in tolerable repair, and were freely showed to us on a card of introduction from the American Consul. A few miles from the city are the tombs of the emperors — massive mounds, small hills, indeed, rather than mounds, and fronted by the spacious parks and temples and gates which usually mark the last resting-places of Asiatic rulers, and which are profoundly impressive with their noble pro- portions and solenm surroundings. Here also are battle- fields of many wars, from the fierce fights of wild tribes far back in a shadowy antiquity to that titanic conflict between Russia and Japan, when, along a front of a hundred miles, huge modem armies grappled in one of the decisive battles of the world. Recent years have brought startling changes to the quaint old city. After gazing with stirred imagina- tion at the rehcs of ancient wealth and splendor, it seems odd to see a railway station, telegraph and telephone lines, macadamized streets, trolley-cars, and modem public build- ings lighted by electricity. The Scotch Presbyterian Mission on the east side of the city, the Irish Presbyterian on the west side, and the British and Foreign Bible Society's agency not far from the Scotch compound, represent churches, schools, hospitals, and a wide-reaching evangelistic work. The Scotch Presbyterian Hospital, so long superintended by the famous Doctor Dugald Christie, is one of the most notable mission hos- pitals in the world. Doctor Christie, whose missionary career began in 1882 and continued for a notable genera- tion, was a man of large vision, catholic sympathies, and conspicuous ability in dealing with men. He so impressed officials and wealthy Manchus and Chinese that they liber- ally contributed to his work. Personal danger did not deter him, and in the tragic days when violence raged about 212 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Mukden, he calmly continued his beneficent care of the sick and wounded. The mission property was destroyed in the Boxer Uprising, his associate, Mr. Wylie, was murdered by Chinese soldiers in the China-Japan War, and shells fell in the hospital compound and on the roof of the building during the battle between the Russians and Japanese; but with the heroism of a soldier he steadily performed opera- tions and ministered to the dying. The whole city honored this intrepid missionary. New-chwang has long been the commercial gateway of Manchuria. Situated on the river Lia-ho only a few miles from the Gulf of Liao-tung, its low, flat mucky ground be- comes unfathomable mud in the rainy season; but the soil of the outlying region is amazingly fertile, and the city as the shipping-port has long had a rich trade. The South Manchurian Railway, under Japanese management, has made vigorous efforts to divert this trade to Dalny (now Dairen). Discriminatory rates bore heavily against New- chwang, an official report showing that the freight tariff to Mukden, 115 miles distant, was higher than that from Dairen to Mukden, 246 miles away. Chang-chun, formerly a wretched place, rapidly rose in importance after the Russia-Japan War as the point of transition from Japanese to Russian spheres of influence. Here the South Manchurian Railway ended and the Russian State Railway began. Both Russians and Japanese there- fore kept their eyes on Chang-chun. The railways brought not only political and mihtary importance, but access to markets for the beans which peld prolifically on the broad, rich fields which stretch for scores of miles in every direc- tion. The resultant trade has reached huge proportions. Chang-chun is probably the pre-eminent bean city of the world. Enormous heaps lying on the dry ground at the shipping season are one of the sights of the Far East. The beans and their product in oil or cake are shipped to China, Korea, Japan, and even Europe, to which 350,000 tons have been sent in a single year. Harbin is another city which owes its present dignity to MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 213 foreigners. The Russians have made Harbin. It is on the main line of the Trans-Siberian Railway from Vladivostok, and at its junction with the line which runs southward through Manchuria. This means that the whole tide of railway travel and freight from Manchuria, China, and Korea passes through Harbin, and is transshipped there, Japan adding its quota during the six months of every year that the harbor of Vladivostok is closed by ice. What Chang-chun is for beans Harbin is for flour, horses, cattle, and sheep. The boundless prairies of northern Manchuria raise miUions of bushels of wheat, and the migratory Mon- goHans of the steppes find in Harbin a market for their vast flocks and herds. During the war with Japan the Russian Government built eight flour-mills at Harbin, with a ca- pacity of 1,700,000 pounds a day, and it largely depended upon them to provide bread for its armies. A period of de- pression followed the war, but when the government heard reports that American flour-manufacturers were trying to buy the mills with a view to controlling the trade, it promptly gave financial assistance in order to keep the miUs in Rus- sian hands. The wheat is of good quahty, but the millers do not make as good flour as Americans. They can make it more cheaply, however, and their customers are not so particular as we are, so that Harbin is likely to remain the centre of flour manufacture for the Far East. When we take into consideration not only these mills but the great stock-yards and horse-markets, the beet-sugar factories, and the general business for which it is the distributing-point, one can easily see that Harbin is a city of no smaU impor- tance. Since the Russia-Japan War an anomalous condition has prevailed. Theoretically, Manchuria remains a part of China. Its ofiicials are appointed by the government of China, and are supposed to be amenable to it. Practically, the Viceroy and his subordinates are in a very embarrassing position. They are expected by the Peking government to rule the country; but north of Chang-chun the Rus- sians, until the chaos which followed the revolution of 1917 214 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST weakened their hold, were in possession of the railwa}^ and all the leading cities en route. South of Chang-chun the Japanese hold the railway, the fortified city of Port Arthur, and the commercial city of Dairen. Both Russians and Japanese do as they please in their respective territories, with Httle regard for the wishes of the Chinese officials. It is true that their jurisdiction is technically limited to a narrow strip on each side of the railway, but as that rail- way is the one thoroughfare of the country along which all streams of trade and travel flow, and in which practically all the activities of Manchuria centre, the limitation is more nominal than real, and a Chinese magistrate who acted on any other assumption would quickly find himself in hot water. An incident will illustrate the difficulties of the situation. Shortly before my visit a representative of an electrical supply company in the United States obtained a contract for electric lighting from the Chinese Viceroy at Mukden, who employed an American electrical engineer to install the plant. After the poles were set up there was some de- lay waiting for the wires to arrive. In the interval the Japanese began erecting poles in the same streets. They had no legal right to do this outside of their concession around the railway station, about three miles from the city wall; but they proceeded to do so and without asking per- mission from the Chinese authorities. In some streets they actually strung their wires on the poles which had been set up by the American engineer. When their right was challenged, they replied that Prince Fushima, the Crown Prince, was expected to visit Mukden, and that they de- sired to illuminate the streets and the Japanese Consulate in his honor. Asked whether they would take down their wires and poles after his visit, they replied in the affirmative; so they were permitted to continue their work. The princely visit passed, but the wires were not taken down. Mean- time, the American wires had arrived. The Japanese ig- nored requests to take their poles and wires out of the way. The wrathful American engineer gave them three days' MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 215 notice, and then instructed his men to cut down the Japa- nese wii'es and to string his own. A terrific uproar ensued. The Japanese inished to the Viceroy and made such rep- resentations to him that he ordered the American engineer, whom he himself had employed, to take down the wires from his own poles and let the Japanese put theirs back. The American engineer refused compHance, and the fright- ened Viceroy was induced to give the Japanese permission to do it themselves. Then the Japanese offered to sell their wires to the Viceroy, fixing a price about three times above their value. This was the situation when I left. I heard many complaints that during and immediately after the Russia-Japan War hundreds of Japanese trades- men had taken possession of shops in Manchurian cities, in some cases forcibly ejecting the Chinese proprietors, and that they have kept these shops ever since, refusing to pay rent except where some particular shopkeeper was able to compel payment. Any one who wishes information about the methods which the Japanese employ in such circum- stances might secure heartfelt opinions from Colbran & Bostwick, the American company which had the street railway, electric lighting, and some other concessions in Seoul. In 1909 the Honorable Philander Knox, then American Secretary of State, conceived the notion of neutralizing the Manchurian railways under the joint agreement of Russia, Japan, France, Germany, and Great Britain, and he pro- posed this in a note to these Powers. It was a beautiful mirage, easily suggested by the anomalous condition which prevailed in Manchuria, the overlapping and ii'ritations in- cident to the relations of Chinese, Japanese, and Russians, and the commercial interests of American and European nations. It was so utterly impracticable that it is amazing that a responsible government official should have seriously m'ged it, and it is all the more amazing that he should have allowed it to become public before he had confidentially as- certained the attitude of the Powers concerned. While Russia and Japan highly valued the commercial advantages 216 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST of the railways which they respectively controlled in Man- churia; their chief interest in them was mihtary. The idea that the Russians would consent to having the railway which was their only thoroughfare of approach to Man- churia and the Far East taken out of their hands, and the idea that the Japanese would ever surrender exclusive con- trol of the railways which are indispensable to their exist- ence in Manchuria and to the safety of Korea, were utterly visionary. However desirable from an American view- point, the proposal was as chimerical as a trip to the moon. It is not surprising that the proposal was received with outward politeness and inward derision in Berlin, Paris, and London, and that in Tokyo and St. Petersburg it was re- ceived with emotions which would not come under the motto of the New York Times: "All the news that's fit to print." However, the amenities of diplomatic intercourse proved to be equal to the strain. France, Germany, and Great Britain suavely regretted that they were unable to comply with the request. Russia in January, 1910, solemnly reminded the government of the United States that the Chinese Eastern Railway represented such expenditures of Russian money, was so related to the development of Rus- sian enterprises, and so "served as the principal mediimi of Russia's connections" that "it is most important to re- tain the closest control over the line which of course could not be maintained if the railway were transferred to an in- ternational syndicate"; . . . that "the principles of the inviolabihty of China's sovereignty, the policy of the open door and equal commercial opportunities in Manchuria, are not at present threatened in any way; and therefore the questions raised by the government of the United States with regard to the most effective means of defending these principles are not justified by the condition of affairs in Manchuria." In Tokyo, Count Komura, Minister of Foreign Affairs, blandly explained Japan's refusal in an address in the Diet, January 27, which included the following significant sen- tences: "While the Imperial Government are determined MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 217 to adhere to their avowed policy scrupulously to uphold the principle of the open door and equal opportunity in Man- churia, it should be observed that realization of the pro- posed plan would bring about radical changes in the condi- tion of things in Manchuria which was established by the treaties of Portsmouth and Peking, and would thus be at- tended with serious consequences in the region affected by the South Manchurian Railway. There have grown up niunerous undertakings which have been promoted in the behef that the railway would remain in our possession and the Imperial Government could not, with a due sense of their responsibihty, agree to abandon the railway in ques- tion." The proposal not only failed, but it had the startling re- sult of bringing Russia and Japan together, as each govern- ment wished to retain what it had. For once they had a common interest against the rest of the world, and July 4, 1910, they signed an agreement which recognized their con- trol of their respective railway-lines, delimited their spheres of influence in Manchuria, formed a working agreement which gave each government freedom to consolidate its interests in the region assigned to it, and served as a broad hint to western secretaries of state that outsiders had better " keep off the grass." Marquis Katsura, then Premier of Japan, denied that the treaty was influenced by the pro- posal of Mr. Knox, and asserted that it had been under consideration for some time prior to that proposal, "solely with the purpose of affording a reassurance of the friendly relations between Japan and Russia and of insuring peace in the Far East; though at the same time with the prac- tical object of improving traffic connections and working arrangements between the railroads." Whether or not this statement was purely "diplomatic," it is undoubtedly true that the American proposal hastened the consumma- tion of any negotiations that may have been in progress between Japan and Russia and gave both parties added satisfaction when they were concluded. The only satisfac- tion that the rest of the world could get out of the treaty 218 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST lay in the reflection that, since Russia and Japan were in Manchuria anjnvay, and intended to stay there, it was better for them to come to some agreement than to keep the region in turmoil by conflicting activities. Mr. Knox, therefore, instead of opening Manchuria as he had contemplated, simply consolidated Japanese power in Korea and lower Manchuria and Russian power in upper Manchuria. China's interests were wholly ignored. It is true that Marquis Katsura declared that "it is Japan's determined policy to adhere closely to all agreements and treaties with China and other nations." But this signified nothing when a large section of Chinese territory was calmly divided between two foreign Powers. Yint Chang, then the Chinese Minister to Germany, truly said : " The Russo- Japanese agreement of course deals my countiy a vital blow. It amounts to nothing more or less than the partition of Manchuria between the contracting powers. They talk, it is true, about maintenance of the status quo and have written ^open door' in large beautiful characters across the face of the agreement; but everybody understands that the door is really being slammed shut." Did Russia abandon her purpose to reach the open sea in the Far East ? She did not. There were Russians who felt that the whole Manchurian policy of their government had been a mistake, that Manchiuia was a costly burden, and that Russia would be better off without it; but such Russians were comparatively few. No one who under- stood the character and aspirations of Russia beheved that her withdrawal was even a remote possibihty, or that she would fail to move farther south as soon as she could. For the time Russia appeared to be on good terms with Japan and the two countries sought certain common interests in an amicable way. A brief but significant convention of two articles was signed July 6, 1916, to safeguard the inter- ests of the two governments in the Far East. But all the reasons which led her to occupy Manchuria and to try to get Korea years ago existed in undiminished force. CH- mate and geography had not changed. Vladivostock, the MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 219 terminus of the Trans-Siberian Railway, was still blocked by ice nearly half of the year and was still upon the Japan Sea with no outlet upon the Pacific except through narrow straits which Japan controlled. The Russian imperiaUsts, blissfully unaware that they were to fall a few years later, had an irrefragable conviction that they were to inherit the earth. They believed that an outlet to the open sea through Manchuria was indispensable to their rightful position in the Far East, and their determination to secure it had not altered an iota. There might be delay; they would wait. A few decades more or less were a minor matter in reahzing an age-old ambition. Meantime, Rus- sia proceeded to tighten her hold upon northern Manchuria, developed its agriculture and flour-mills so that they could furnish abundant food-suppHes, spent enormous sums in re- grading and double-tracking the Trans-Siberian Railway, laying heavier rails, improving rolling-stock and terminal facihties, encouraging her peasants to settle along the line, aiding them in getting land and making a start, and strength- ening the fortifications of Vladivostok until it would be harder to capture than Port Arthur ever was. A significant illustration of Russia's intentions occurred early in the year X911, when Russia threatened to occupy the Chinese Province of Hi, on the MongoHan frontier, on the pretext that the privileges granted by China in the treaty of 1881 were being denied to Russian trade. The Chinese Government hastily replied that it would comply with all of Russia's demands. Russian troops, however, continued to advance until they were within a hundred miles of the Chinese border, when another ultimatum was issued. China yielded again, and the Slav slowly retired, having impressed China anew with his power and his readiness to use it when necessaiy to carry out his pur- poses. Japan, too, is under no less constraint than before to re- sist the advance of any European nation in Manchuria, and to maintain paramount influence in China. It is difficult to understand how any one who knows what they have 220 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST done and are now doing can imagine that they contemplate anything else than peimanent occupation. The Southern Manchurian Railway is one of the best railways in Asia. Its Pullman sleeping-cars, its fast locomotives, and its excel- lent road-bed are a delight to the traveller after the so- called acconmiodations which he finds in some other coun- tries. The Japanese have expended great sums at Dairen, They have constructed inamense docks for shipping, opened new streets and repaved old ones, erected handsome public and private buildings, and in general are making Dairen a model city of the Far East. Japanese expenditures at Port Arthur are not so much in evidence as at Dairen. Most of the forts where the heavy fighting of the siege was done remain in the state of ruin in which they were left when the Russians surrendered. This is interesting to the visitor, for it enables him to form a clearer idea of the terrific character of the struggle. It is awe-inspiring to stand upon one of those mounds and mark the ruined masonry, the heaps of debris, and the iimumera- ble shell-holes which dot the tops and sides of the hills. It is difficult to understand how flesh and blood could have endured such a bombardment. It is no wonder that the Russians, brave as they were, found it impossible to stay in forts which must have been belching volcanoes of ex- ploding shells. The fact that the Japanese have left most of these forts in their ruined condition does not prove that Port Arthur is an unguarded position. The most formidable fortifications which the Russians developed, those which protected the fortress from the sea, were not seriously in- jured by the Japanese. The heavy fightmg was done over the outer line of forts on the land side, and the other gar- risons surrendered when the city and harbor became un- tenable. The result was that the Japanese obtained the best of the forts in excellent condition. There is little ne- cessity for them to spend much money in further fortifica- tions, for Port Arthur is as impregnable from the sea as it ever was, and the Japanese are in such absolute control of the land approaches that they probably are not appre- MANCHURIA AND THE FAR EAST 221 hensive of the results of such an attack from that direction as they made upon the Russians. It is difficult to speak positively, however, for, while visitors are freely admitted to the ruined forts, they are not permitted to approach those that are occupied. Occa- sionally, too, a ruined fort, which had hitherto been open to inspection, is quietly withdrawn from pubHc gaze. No pubHc announcement is made and nothing appears in the newspapers, but the visitor who applies for a pass is politely told that that particular place "is not open to-day." There is nttle doubt not only that many of the forts are in excel- lent mihtary condition, with ample stores and munitions, but that from time to time the most important of the ruined forts are quietly refortified. That person is innocent in- deed who imagines that Japan is doing all that she is doing in southern Manchuria with the expectation of withdrawing in the near future. As a matter of fact, why should the Japanese withdraw? They knew perfectly well that if they did the Russians would move down and occupy their old positions, and that the conditions which preceded the Russia-Japan War, and which caused it, would recur. It is fundamental to sound thinking on this subject to remember that Japan cannot be e3q)ected to acquiesce in having any European Power form a wedge between Japan and China and He along the Korean frontier in such a way as to make Japanese occupation of Korea precarious. It has long been a settled principle of British policy in India not to permit Russia to come down to the Indian frontier, and every inteUigent person under- stands the reason. Why, then, should the Japanese be criti- cised for doing what the British are doing with their posses- sions, and what America would surely do if any other nation were to attempt to occupy Mexico? The United States does not fortify its Canadian line or have any un- easiness about it, because the Canadians are men of our own race and speech, and we regard them almost as we do our own countiymen. But suppose a nation radically dif- fering from us and known to have plans inimical to our in- J22 THE MASTERY OF TPIE FAR EAST terests should seize Canada, does any one imagine that the United States would be acquiescent? The Japanese had abundant reason to suspect the plans of Russia, and while it was to the temporary interest of the two nations to work in harmony, the Japanese did not propose to be caught napping if the poUtical whirhgig should make another turn. PART III JAPAN—THE IMPERIAL POWER IN THE FAR EAST CHAPTER XIV JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE The rise of Japan is one of the startling phenomena of the age. Within the memory of men now Hving Japan was an obscure and unimportant Asiatic nation, whose people knew little and cared less about the Western world, and were still under the sway of age-old feudalism and superstition. Only a few Europeans had been seen, beginning with some wandering Portuguese, who are said to have arrived at Kyushu in the year 1530, and the Portuguese Pinto, who came in 1542. The first white men were hospitably re- ceived. Shortly after Francis Xavier arrived, in 1549, he wrote: "The nation with which we have to deal here sur- passes in goodness any of the nations ever discovered. They are of a kindly disposition, wonderfully desirous of honor, which is placed above everything else. They listen with great avidity to discourses about God and divine things." During the last quarter of the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth, "the testimony of all writers is that the Japanese in then- intercourse with foreigners were distinguished for high-bred courtesy combined with refined liberaUty and generous hospitahty. On the other hand, the merchants and mariners with whom they came in con- tact were usually of bad manners and morals, overreaching, avaricious, and cruel ; the missionaries were often arrogant, ambitious, and without proper respect for native customs; and the naval and other officials of foreign governments were haughty, actuated by a spirit of aggression, and un- mindful of the comity of nations. The history of the time shows that the poHcy of exclusion adopted by Japan in the seventeenth century was not inherent in the constitution of the state or the character of the people, but that it was 225 226 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST adopted in consequence of the unfavorable character of the relations with Europeans."* Incensed by the overbearing conduct of the white men and alarmed by reports that the Roman CathoHc mission- aries were political emissaries of Western nations, the Japa- nese turned against the foreigners within their territory. Missionaries and traders were driven out, Japanese converts to Christianity were subjected to bloody persecution, severe laws were enacted forbidding foreigners to enter the coun- try or Japanese to leave it under pain of death, and fierce efforts were made to root out and exterminate every foreign influence, missionary and commercial. This period ex- tended down to 1853. During all those years Japan ap- peared to be hermetically sealed from the outside world. Americans are fond of saying that this isolation and stag- nation were broken up by Commodore Matthew C. Perry, who, March 31, 1854, concluded a treaty between Japan and the United States, the first of the links to bind Japan to Western nations. Many Japanese have given cordial testimony to the same effect; but Marquis Okuma has challenged this popular belief and ascribed the first impulse toward modern civilization to the Russian Admiral Nicholas "Lizanoff" (Nicolai Petrovitch de Rezanov, 1764-1807), who visited Japan nearly half a century before Perry. Certain it is, however, that Commodore Perry's visit to Japan and the visit of a Japanese commission to America in 1860 marked the transition from the old to the new Japan, and the start of the nation on that road of progress on which it has since made such amazing strides. A period of internal commotion ensued. While some Japanese welcomed the new era, others reacted in fierce opposition. It is always thus in every land. Some men eagerly reach forward to the new, others cling tenaciously to the old. In Japan the conflict between the progressive and conservative forces kept the country in a turmoil for a decade. The reactionary party rallied about the Shogun, the most powerful of the feudal lords and the commander- ^ John W. Foster, American Diplomacy in the Orient, p. 12. JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 227 in-chief of the army, who had virtually usurped the govern- ment and reduced the Emperor not only to a position of nominal authority but of real subordination. The pro- gressive party rallied about the Emperor. The struggle culminated in 1868 in the overthrow of the Shogun and the restoration of the Emperor to his rightful place as reigning sovereign. The reconstruction of Japan upon modem lines promptly followed. The mere enumeration of the changes that were inaugurated profoundly impresses one: 1869 saw the tele- graph and the Charter Oath, which was to Japan almost what Magna Charta was to England; 1870 saw charted waters and lighthouses; and 1871, post-offices, postage- stamps, railways, newspapers, the downfall of feudalism and the founding of the Imperial University. In 1872, an imperial commission visited Europe and America to study Western institutions and methods and ascertain what they contained that would be beneficial to Japan. In 1873 the Christian calendar was adopted and the anti-Christian edicts were repealed. In 1877 a postal treaty was con- cluded with foreign nations. In 1880 the penal code was reorganized and prefectural assemblies were established. The year 1881 marked the first steps toward constitutional government, and February 11, 1889, the Constitution was formally promulgated, the first constitution to be adopted by any country in Asia. In 1897 the gold standard cur- rency was adopted. By 1899 Japan had made such pro- gress and had so gained the confidence of the world that, with the consent of the European and American govern- ments, the extra-territorial laws were abolished and Japan was recognized as one of the enlightened nations which could be trusted to deal fairly with citizens of other nation- ahties within her borders. Foreigners do not complain of any loss of privilege as a result of the treaties, which July 17, 1899, abolished their long-cherished rights of extra-territoriality and brought them under the jurisdiction of Japanese courts. The new treaties went into effect without a jar. Both missionaries 228 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and business men assured me that they were as safe in their rights as ever, and that Japanese judges were rather in- clined to favor them in their solicitude that foreigners should have full justice in the courts. Indeed Americans in Japan have had less trouble than Japanese in the United States. Foreigners are free to travel or reside wherever they please, and they are perfectly safe in doing so if they behave them- selves. If they violate the law, a Japanese policeman will courteously but resolutely hale them before a Japanese magistrate, who with like courtesy and resolution will in- flict appropriate punishment. Aiid the offender almost invariably richly deserves what he gets. To-day, all the tides of modem life are sweeping through Japan. Evidences of the new spirit which is stirring the nation are apparent on every hand. Tokyo, the poHtical and intellectual centre of the nation, has become the largest city of Asia, and one of the influential cities of the world. Osaka is a great manufacturing city. The ports of Yoko- hama, Kobe, Nagasaki and Shimonoseki are crowded with the shipping of many lands. One would not expect to see much change in Kyoto, the artistic and Buddhistic heart of Japan, or in scenic and historic Nikko; but even in these places of venerable antiquity the traveller finds modem hotels and other indications of progress. The fine high- way, three miles in length connecting the two Shinto shrines in the sacred city of Yamada, is not surpassed by any road in Europe. The contrast with the Japan of 1850 is so great as to be well-nigh incredible. A nation that had never heard of steam as a motive power is now grid-ironed with six thousand miles of railways and is sending its merchant marine to the most distant lands. A nation that knew nothing of electricity uses telegraphs, telephones, trolley- cars, and motors of every kind. From small coasting junks to huge ocean steamers, from hand-looms to improved machinery, from sedan-chairs to railway-trains, from swords to magazine rifles and battleships, from a burning rag in a saucer of bean-ofl to the briUiancy of electric lights, from memorizing Confucian classics to the study of modem sci- JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 229 ence, from national insignificance to world-power — and all this within a haK dozen decades, leaping as it were at a bound over stages of development which other nations spent weary centuries in traversing — this is the amazing achieve- ment of Japan. Such a people is worthy of our careful study. Inquiry regarding the early history of Japan speedily brings the investigator to a point where facts are shrouded in myth and legend. Ethnologists have long speculated re- garding the origin of the curious white Ainus, of whom about 17,600 still remain in Yezo and the Kurile Isles. Doctor William Elliot Griffis believes the Ainus to be of Aryan stock. He gives an interesting account of their coming to prehistoric Japan, and shows how the Ainu and Yamato peoples struggled during two thousand years for supremacy until the fusion of races made the present Japanese nation. He places this prehistoric period prior to 552 A. D., and divides the subsequent history into four periods: military and civil conquest 552-1192; establishment of feudalism 1192-1604; Yedo period of the Shogunate 1604-1868; Mi- kado period of modern development 1868-1900; and the period of world relationships 1900 to the present time. He declares that the conclusion of nearly thirty years of scien- tific investigation by native Japanese men of science is, in Professor Koganei's verdict, that "the Mikado's realm was once an Ainu realm" ; and that his "own opinion is that the Ainu once occupied the whole archipelago of Japan. The oldest names of the mountains and rivers are not Japanese but Ainu. Made up of four of the strong races of mankind, Aryan, Semitic, Malay, and Tartar, there was no such thing as a Japanese nation until 1192 A. D.; and the fusion was not complete until much later. Increasing harmony among scholars, archaeologists, ethnologists, critical reading of the Kojiki, or ancient records, 712 A. D., all point to the fact that the basic stock of the Japanese of to-day is Ainu. That is, the Japanese are as much Aryan — ^whatever that may be — as an}^ other stock perhaps on earth. Leaving diplomacy to settle political questions, let us hold to science. 230 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST After forty-six yeare' study of the Japanese, I cannot but conceive of them as a non-Mongohan people." Doctor Kazutami Ukita, Professor of History in Waseda Univer- sity, Japan, holds substantially the same view, character- izing the Ainus as "of an ancient Caucasian origin in race, the descendants of those who did not assimilate with the Japanese in the main island . . . gentle, honest and kind though backward in civiHzation." He says that "they can be called the American Indians of the Far East," although his description of their temperament hardly fits that of the American aborigines. Professor Edward S. Morse, formerly professor in the Imperial University, Tokyo, vigorously challenges the theory of Aryan origin. He holds that the Ainus were the original inhabitants of Japan, or at any rate the only ones that are known, and that they are not Aryans at all; that the an- cestors of the modem Japanese were MongoKans who came from the mainland of Asia by way of Korea; that Japanese civilization is essentially Mongohan; that there has been some admixture of Ainu blood, possibly of Malay and per- haps of North American Indian, which was near in Alaska; but that these strains had no appreciable effect upon the national type.^ We may leave to experts this vexed question of ethnologi- cal and antiquarian research; and readers who wish to delve deeply into it may find ample material in their wiitings.^ Our present concern is with the Japan of more recent days. Suffice it here that the definitely known history of Japan is far less ancient than that of India, China, and even Europe, and that when the nation emerged from the mists of the prehistoric era, it was composed of several discordant ele- ments which were a long time in solidifying into the com- pact body with which the world is now familiar. Professor Basil H. Chamberlain declares that it is one of the certain * Address, November 24, 1911. ^History of the Japanese People, by Captain Frank Brinkley; Japan and Japanese- American Relations (Proceedings of Conference at Clark University, November, 1910); History of Japan, by Murdock; The Mikado's Empire, by W. E. GrifRs; The Ainu of Japan, by John Batchelor. JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 231 results of investigation that the first glimmer of genuine Japanese history dates from the fifth century after Christ; that the accounts of what happened in the sixth century must be received with caution ; and that back of that period, we enter the realm of national mythology and legends, char- acterized by miraculous impossibilities and chronology pal- pably fraudulent.^ Modern Japan has passed considerably beyond the hmits of ancient Japan in territory as well as population, as the following table shows: AREA IN SQUARE MILES POPUIiATION Japan proper 148,756 84,738 13,944 13,253 56,860,735 16,913,224 3,710,848 95,194 Korea Taiwan (Formosa) Karafuto (Japanese Saghalien) 260,691 77,580,001 Tokyo, the capital, with 2,033,320 inhabitants, is the metropolis of the Far East. Osaka is the second city of Japan, with 1,387,366, and Kyoto follows with 508,068. A half-dozen other cities are of good size and are rapidly growing. Twelve million six hundred and sixty-nine thou- sand six hundred and thirty-five people five in cities of more than 10,000 inhabitants, according to the last census. The average number of foreigners residing in Japan in recent years is about 18,000, of whom approximately three- fifths are Chinese, and the remainder British, German, American, French, and Russian in the order named, al- though the number of Germans was greatly lessened during the European War. The territory of Japan proper is smaller than that of CaHfomia, but its population is twenty-one times larger. If we imagine half the people of the United States packed into California, we shall have an idea of the density of population in Japan. Tlie situation is anal- 1 Article in The Japan Weekly Mail, December 23, 1911. 232 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ogous to that of the British Islands, which, with an area of 121,633 square miles, has 45,370,530 inhabitants. The combined area of Japan and all its dependencies is less than that of Texas, but the population is sixteen times greater. To the visitor Japan is one of the most attractive coun- tries in the world. One can never forget the charm of its hospitality, the neatness of the homes and villages, and the courageous energy with which the people are grappHng with their new and difficult problems. The first view lives long in one's memory — ^the serrated mountains shaiply outlined against the sky; the thatched houses of the villages nestling at their feet; the neatly divided plots of rice-fields on the lowlands; the gleaming water of the bay dotted by quaint sampans sculled by half-naked boatmen; the island made famous by the landing of Commodore Perry in 1853; the grim fortifications guarding the harbor entrance; and, as we steam slowly onward, the busy city of Yokohama, with its modern buildings and the countless funnels and masts of its world-wide commerce; while, towering above all, the snow-covered monarch of this matchless scene, is majestic Fujiama, the sacred mountain of Japan. Closer acquaintance deepens the favorable first impres- sion. Physical^, Japan is very beautiful — a land of hills and valleys, of rushing streams and rich bottom-lands. Kanazawa is one of the scenic cities of the world, while the view from the mountain above the Bay of Tsugaru amply repays a journey across Japan. "Do not use the word magnificent until you have seen Nikko" is a Japanese proverb which many a visitor has echoed. The trip from Tokyo to the mountain resort of Karuizawa will never be forgotten by one who has taken it, and the railway journey from Kyoto to Tsu is through a region of fascinating beauty. Foreign residents have grown weary of the praises of Fu- jiama; but Americans are forever telling of Niagara Falls and Europeans of Mt. Blanc, and why should not Japanese love and revere their royal mountain? We were so fortu- nate as to be in Japan in the famous cherrj^-blossom season. The trees are not cultivated for their fruit, but simply from JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 233 love of the beautiful the people have set out so many that their cities and villages are Hterally abloom with the deH- cate pink and white flowers. When to these are added the deeper tints of the peach and camellia, the purple of violets, the white and purple of stately magnolias, and the rich yellow of the fields of rape-seed, the traveller feels as if he, were in some vast conservatory. The high cultivation of the soil adds to the effect. Not a weed is permitted to grow. Not a foot of available land is wasted. Even the hillsides are terraced to the very sum- mits, sometimes by almost incredible labor. Rice is the staple product wherever the land can be flooded. But we saw many fields of wheat, sowed not broadcast as in America, but in rows which are carefully hoed. Considerable space is devoted to rape-seed, from which oil is extracted for both cooking and illuminating, while vegetable-gardens, tea- bushes, mulberry-trees, and a species of palm are often seen. The fields are pleasantest from a respectful distance, as dis- agreeable refuse is the favorite fertilizer. Even in Tokyo, at the time of our visit, there were no sewers except street- gutters, but every scrap of household waste was scrupu- lously preserved in earthen jars and collected every morning for use on the farms and gardens. Sanitary laws are strict and are enforced with varying degrees of energy. Epidemics are carefully guarded against. In Osaka, we saw municipal house-cleaning on a large scale. A suspicion that bubonic plague was present having injxu-ed the business of the city, the suspected quarter was visited by a swarm of inspectors who entered every house, removed furniture, took up matting, pulled down ceilings and swept out dirt, while the unhappy inhabitants looked on in help- less dismay. The streets were filled with the smoke of the burning debris. Factory conditions are not so well watched, as we shall have later occasion to note. Japanese conceptions of comfort differ from ours. Their houses are scantily furnished. There are no beds, the Japa- nese simply spreading their quilts on the matting which covers the floor. Chairs are unknown except in a few 234 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Europeanized homes. People sit on the floor with their legs under them in a way which a foreigner soon finds in- tolerably painful. The railway-cars in which we travelled had seats, but we were usually the only persons in them whose feet were on the floor. Our fellow passengers had slipped off their sandals and tucked their feet under them on the seats. The village Japanese are a cleanly people after their manner, but that is somewhat peculiar from a Western view- point. The hotels conducted for foreigners in the ports and the larger cities of the interior have all modern con- veniences; but in the smaller towns the inns are "native style." The bathtubs — wooden boxes with Httle stoves on one side — are filled with water in the morning, and when guests arrive the fire is started, soon making the water hot enough to stew one. When the first arrival has bathed, the thrifty proprietor has no idea of wasting all that hot water, nor does the next guest expect him to do so. So the new- comer willingly bathes in the same water. Later guests do likewise, and the last traveller, if he is a foreigner, discreetly decides to postpone his bath until the next morning. The Japanese do not regard it as good form to use soap in such a bathtub as it would discolor the water for subsequent users. Unhappily, I did not know this when I reached my first inn, and as I was covered with the dust of a hot jour- ney, I fear that I gave the next bather reason to use strong language. Neither houses, schools, nor pubHc buildings are ade- quately heated. Furnaces are almost unknown, and the scanty warmth of a few pieces of charcoal is poor protec- tion against the chill winds that easily find their way through the lightly built walls and loosely fitting doors and windows. The ordinary dress of both sexes is cut so low in the neck as to expose the upper part of the chest. How- ever abundant the body clothing may be, the legs are often bare below the knees, and sockless feet are thrust into the straps of straw or wooden sandals, not only in summer but in winter. As I wrote on the train with my overcoat JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 235 closely buttoned, the bare feet and ankles of a three-year- old child peeped from under the folds of an apparently ex- pensive dress. Of the 193 people whom I had the curiosity to count in a few minutes on the streets of Tokyo, 130 were either barefooted or wore only a sandal which protected the sole from pebbles; 59 had a thin white cotton cloth wrapped around the foot, the calf of the leg often being bare; and only 4 wore European shoes. It is a mistake to suppose that this habitual exposure so hardens the people that they suffer no ill effects. It may indeed dull their sensibilities to some extent, but it does not relieve them from the consequences. Half the chil- dren I saw had colds. Throat and lung diseases are alarm- ingly prevalent and tuberculosis is the scourge of Japan. In the Japanese code of good manners it is considered bad form to show emotion. One must not storm in anger or sob in grief. Stoical self-control when others are excited, an impassive countenance when under critical observation — ^these are Japanese virtues. The more mercurial Korean and most white men manifest their feelings in their faces. Not so the Japanese. They are, as a rule, outwardly calm, although they may be inwardly boiling. It is not always prudent, therefore, to infer their real sentiments from their public manner. This is not hypocrisy; it results from their conviction that a self-respecting man does not parade his private sentiments before strangers. And yet the people are the most charming of Orientals to meet, if we may judge from our experience. We travelled many hundreds of miles in Japan, mingled with the crowds in cities and villages, visited shops, offices, factories, homes, Buddhist, Shinto, and Christian places of worship, schools of all kinds and even military posts; and we were uniformly treated with the utmost courtesy. I did not see a fight in Japan, and a drunken man only once. Nobody was rude, but every one was smilingly polite and ready to show every kindness. The traveller is sometimes misled by this universal politeness^ for it occasionally leads the Japanese to smile 236 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST affably and bow assent to his questions whether they under- stand him or not. You ask whether the post-office ''is on this street," and when you receive what you regard as a pleasant affirmation in reply, you tramp contentedly on- ward, only to find later that the post-office is not on that street. The Japanese did not mean to deceive you, but he did not understand you. He was too poHte to tell you that you had not made your meaning clear, so he com*teously expressed assent. It is said that two American women awoke one night to find a burglar standing at the foot of their bed. He suavely asked for money. The frightened ladies said that all their money was locked up, that they were American ladies and could not get out of bed when a man was in the room, but that if he would step out while they dressed, they would get the money for him. The burglar actually compUed with the request, going out of the room and nearly closing the door, simply keeping one foot in the opening, "not necessarily for publication but merely as a guarantee of good faith," while the modest maidens arrayed themselves for such noctm'nal company. Then he again entered. By this time, however, the nerves of one of the young women gave way in a scream, whereupon the burglar snatched the pocketbook and ran, doubtless distressed that he was under the disagreeable necessity of acting so rudely. The national pohteness, while very delightful to the traveller, does not necessarily argue superior moral quahties. The characteristic vices of Japan are substantially the same as those of Europe and America, and some of them are far more general. If the excitable Anglo-Saxon goes wrong, he is apt to make himself a nuisance in public, where he attracts instant attention. The Japanese is more even-tempered and prides himself on concealing his emotions; but in his code of morals, certain vices are not reckoned so heinous as we reckon them. But this subject belongs in another chapter. The Japan of to-day is a curious mixture of the antique and the modern. I saw a man riding a new bicycle, wear- JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 237 ing a derby hat, cutaway coat, shirt, collar, cuffs and neck- tie; but his single loose lower garment streamed behind him exposing a pair of bare legs, and his feet were naked save for clumsy wooden sandals. He was a type that we saw in many other cities. European dress, however, has become common in the capital and port cities. I found a number of high ojfficials, including Prince Ito, in frock coats, and these garments and silk hats are numerous among the guests at the best social functions. Facihties for intercommunication are well developed. Eight daily newspapers in English and over three hundred in Japanese have growing circulations. The leading cities have street-cars, telegraphs and telephones, electric lights, government and commercial buildings of modem architec- ture, and streets so hard and smooth and clean as to excite wonder and admiration. The prevalence of EngKsh signs is a great convenience to the Western traveller. One rarely sees Russian, German or French signs, but English are numerous. Railway-tickets are printed in EngHsh on one side and Japanese on the other. At the stations the names of the towns are printed in Japanese and EngHsh. On the cars the designations of class and destination are given in both English and Japa- nese. EngHsh notices teU you not to put your head out of the window and not to stand on the platform. Some- times the wording is rather odd, as when one is warned: "No admission to enter," but the meaning is usually clear. The efforts of Japanese shopkeepers to attract EngHsh visitors result in some amusing struggles with our lan- guage. Every returning traveUer brings a sheaf of stories to chuckle over with his friends. You observe that in one place "Printiny is Done," and that in another "Drugs Apothecary Sell." A sign on a tailor's shop hospitably announces that "Respectable Ladies and Gentlemen are Invited to come in and have Fits." An express-office truly says that "Baggage is Sent in Every Direction"; a fur dealer's sign vouchsafes the disquieting information that 238 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST "Furs are Made from our Skin or Yours;" and an antique shop naively admits that '^Antique Curios are Bought, Sold and Made." A Japanese in applying to a London newspaper for a position as correspondent from Japan, after describing in detail his other qualifications, added: "As for my knowledge of English and capacity of journaHstic work, I cannot myself say much for them, but you may perhaps be able to roughly estimate them by these lines. With regard to my personal reMability and honest character I can, however, unscrupulously vouchsafe them." If we are disposed to smile at such mistakes, we may discreetly re- member that even the courtesy and impassivity of the Japanese countenance are often severely taxed to keep from uproarious laughter over the worse blunders of Americans in trying to use the Japanese language. Thousands of educated Japanese speak English with accuracy, and many thousands more are acquiring it. At all the leading hotels and railway-stations and on most of the trains, we found one or more Japanese who spoke Eng- lish, and an American or EngHshman who knows no lan- guage but his own seldom has any serious difficulty in travelling about the country. Indeed English is now being taught in the public schools and in the universities, and lecturers from the West can find audiences to which they can dehver their message without an interpreter. The railway service is excellent. Five thousand four hundred and seventy-two miles of track in a country so limited in area afford good transportation facilities. First, second, and third class cars are run on most trains; but there is not so much difference in the equipment of the cars as in the number of passengers. A fare of one sen (half a cent) a mile crowds the thii'd class cars with the lowest classes. A two-sen rate gives reasonable comfort in the second-class cars with their long upholstered side-seats and lavatories. We found this class quite satisfactory, with middle-class Japanese, line officers of the army, and missionaries as typi- cal fellow-passengers. The first-class cars attract only a very few persons who are willing to pay three sen a mile JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 239 for the probability of having a compartment largely to themselves. There is none of the fussy calling for tickets every hour or two that is such a nuisance on American rail- ways. The passenger shows his ticket tq the gateman be- fore entering the train, and to the guard that he may know the class, and that is the end of it till the ticket is surren- dered at the gate after leaving the train at the destination. There is no separate compartment for smoking, but both sexes smoke incessantly in the cars of all classes. The popular mode of local conveyance is the jinrikisha, a tiny, light, two-wheeled affair, seating one person, and whose invention the American Griffis attributes to a Japa- nese and the Japanese Nitobe to an American named Goble. I mentally doff my hat as I think of the men who draw it. Of the scores that I used at various times the typical one wore even in cold weather a single, close-fitting cotton upper garment, thin, tight, very short drawers, and straw sandals. He could not have weighed more than a himdred and fifteen pounds, while the jinrikisha and I together tipped the beam at over two himdred. But that little fellow drew me five miles at a fast trot, which slowed into a walk only a few minutes at a particularly steep place. I gasped when I learned that the fare was sixteen sen (eight cents). I felt ashamed to pay him such a sum; but my host ad- vised me not to give more, saying that the prices are now much higher than formerly, and that soft-hearted visitors make things harder for residents. In Kanazawa we rode up a long hill in a cold, heavy rain. When I asked the charge the men, with smiles and bows and profuse apologies, said that they would have to ask for more than the usual rate because of the storm. What was that extra charge ? Nine rin — ^less than half a cent of American money. We used scores of jinrikishas in various parts of the empire, and we invariably found the men patient, poHte, good-natured and with amazing powers of endurance. Colonel Davis, of Kyoto, laughed when I spoke of their runs with me, and said that they often made fifty miles a day. I have bumped my head often enough in entering their doors to give me 240 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST painful proof that the Japanese are a small race, but their bodies are all bone and sinew. It is about as difficult to get an unprejudiced and dispas- sionate opinion of the Japanese people as it is to get one of Theodore Roosevelt, William Jennings Bryan, or Lloyd George. Each observer is prone to look through the haze which has been created by his own imagination, and he glorifies or defames in accordance with his preconceived ideas. Some writers laud the Japanese with fulsome eulogy, magnifying their virtues and minimizing their vices — a nation of saints before whose perfection Europeans and Americans should veil their faces in shame. I have listened to adulatory speeches of this kind which, if I were a sensible Japanese, I would deprecate as flattery too gross to be pleas- ant or helpful. Other writers exhaust their vocabulary in denunciation and abuse, alleging that the real Japan is not what Americans innocently imagine it to be, but "the Japan of farms and factories and fishermen, ruled by a little group of ambitious statesmen, and dominated by the imperialistic aims which dominated Germany"; that "in Japan we see a power still partially under the influence of barbaric tra- ditions of warfare and conquest, and yet possessed of all the weapons and powers of the most enhghtened countries"; that "she maintains a double standard of conduct — one for use with strong nations, the other for use with weak ones"; that "her boasted progress has consisted in imitating the inventions and discoveries of Western nations" ; and that "we should beware of the reports of American visitors to Japan who have been dined and flattered, and in some cases decorated by the Emperor, until they have been hypno- tized and have returned to America to spread rosy impres- sions of a Japan whose virtues and good intentions exist only in their own imaginations." ^ It is undeniable that the world's sympathy with Japan has materially lessened since the war with Russia. This may be due in part to the fact that it is human nature to sympathize with the under man, and that the mingled ad- ^ Quotations are from Japan and America, by Carl Crow. JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 241 miration and pity which were evoked by the spectacle of a Httle nation attacking mighty Russia were no longer needed when the little nation emerged as proud victor. Western nations began to reaHze, too, that the war had made Japan a factor in world problems and a rival in the Far East which must hereafter be reckoned with, and there was some disquietude as to whether the new rival would introduce additional complications. Triumphant, imperial Japan, proposing to be mistress of the Pacific Ocean, and with an army and navy which enable her to make the claim good, is not so appealing an object to grow sentimental over as a small country fighting for its life against one three times its size. The wrath of numerous war correspondents has been another factor in the change of public sentiment. They eagerly flocked to the Far East at the outbreak of hostilities with Russia, only to find their high hopes for good copy destroyed by polite but inexorable Japanese officials, who kept them cooling their heels several hundred miles from the front. The sternly practical Orientals were not playing to the galleries of Europe and America. They were making grim war and they gave scant heed to ambitious joumaHsts. Indeed it was feared that with the Russia-Japan War the era of war correspondents passed. Governments would not permit inquisitive and ubiquitous reporters to herald their plans and movements to the world, and therefore to the enemy. The resultant emotions of the correspondents could not be expressed in anything short of the vocabulary of Billy Sunday's objurgations of the devil. As these war correspondents included influential writers who had free access to the columns of the greatest daily newspapers and magazines, the effect was soon apparent. We need not ascribe this criticism wholly to pique. Writers of such character cannot be lightly dismissed. Prior to the Russia-Japan War Americans and EngHshmen saw everything Japanese through a glamour of cherry- blossoms, cloisonne, Satsuma ware, quaint temples, ancient palaces, polite men, daintily smiling girls, romantic glens 242 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and snowy Fujiama. It was the land of poetry, beauty and art. Mr. Thomas F. Millard declares that the accounts of it which were so widely published in Europe and America were the output of the most skilful and systematic press bureau in the world, and that nearly all of the news that reached Enghsh-speaking readers came through that press bureau, whose dehberate intent was to extol everything Japanese and decry everything Russian. We are told that the closer and more independent knowledge that we have gained since the war has dispelled the glamour and revealed the Japanese in their true Hght. The reports given by Mr. MiUard and Mr. F. A. McKenzie of their personal observa- tions in Korea, after the Japanese were in full control, are grewsome reading,^ and Price CoUier felt moved to exclaim that "it is an open question whether England's hypocritical and short-sightedly selfish aUiance with these varnished savages has not done more to menace Saxon civilization, both in Europe and America, than any diplomatic step that has been taken for centuries." ^ For myself, while not blind to the faults of the Japanese, I deplore such indiscriminate condemnation of them. K they are not the lovely fairies that Lafcadio Hearn pictm-ed them, neither are they the "varnished savages" that Price Collier called them. From the huge mass of available data it is not difficult to make a selection that will apparently support almost any preconceived idea. But conclusions obtained in that way are one-sided. They leave some facts out of account, and state others in ways which make them appear more imfavorable than they really are. If one is to err at all, it is better to do so on the side of charity, to magnify good qualities rather than to minimize them. It is unreasonable to expect an Asiatic people to exemplify within sixty years standards of Christian character and con- duct which Europe and America but imperfectly exemplify after fifteen hundred years. The Japanese have many fine qualities. They also have some grave defects. So have ^ McKenzie, The Unveiled East ; Millard, The New Far East. * England and the English, p. 243. JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE 243 we. It is easy to pick out flaws in any people under heaven, including our own. After all, the Japanese are human beings Uke ourselves, and in thinking of them we may well remember the words of the poet Bailey: "Men might be better if we better deemed of them.'* CHAPTER XV FUNDAMENTAL NATIONAL DISTINCTIONS The superficial observer is apt to comment upon the essential similarity of the peoples of Japan, Korea, and China. It is true that there are points of resemblance. When dressed alike it is not always easy for a traveller to distinguish them. Certain manners and customs are similar, too, as well as some reHgious beliefs, and a general type of mind which may be called Oriental and Asiatic as distin- guished from Occidental and European or American. Nevertheless, there are fundamental distinctions that must be borne in mind if the characteristics and problems of these three peoples are to be rightly understood. I do not refer now to physical distinctions, but to psychological ones, the real things wherein Japanese, Chinese, and Koreans really differ. The keynote of Japan is solidarity. The individual is nothing; the nation is everything. The Japanese move as a unit in politics, in war, in commerce, and in the daily activities of life. How far back this characteristic runs is a disputed question. Baron Kikuchi, President of the Im- perial University in Kyoto, in an address in New York in 1910, emphasized the unity of the nation through a tradi- tional succession of twenty-five unbroken centuries of a single dynasty in relation to a people who regard it with profound veneration. The Japanese appear to be com- pletely under the spell of this fascinating conception. They insist upon the indissoluble relation of modern Japan to ancestral Japan, of the ancestors of the people to the an- cestors of the imperial house. It is not simply the rela- tion of present Japan to its ancestors, but of many centuries of Japanese to many centuries of imperial rulers, the soH- darity of a nation persisting through the ages. Professor Basil H. Chamberlain, however, scoffs at this 244 FUNDAMENTAL NATIONAL DISTINCTIONS 245 claim of the Japanese. He says: "The sober fact is that no nation probably has ever treated its sovereigns more cavalierly than the Japanese have done, from the beginning of authentic history down to within the memory of living men. Emperors have been deposed, emperors have been assassinated; for centuries every succession to the throne was the signal for intrigues and sanguinary broils. . . . An analysis of mediaeval Japanese history shows that the great feudal houses, so far from displaying an excessive idealism in the matter of fealty to one emperor, one lord, or one party, had evolved the eminently practical plan of letting their different members take different sides, so that the family as a whole might come out as winner in any event, and thus avoid the confiscation of its lands." He proceeds to argue that the whole superstructure of alleged Japanese unity and emperor-worship is of modern creation — a purely manufactured article devised by astute leaders who see that their ambitions to make this com- paratively smaU nation a first-class power in the world cannot be realized unless they can weld the people into a compact mass that will be absolutely amenable to their leadership, and can be handled as a solid body in all its relations with other nations. Whatever may be the antiquity of this national solidarity, its present existence and power cannot be doubted. An- cient or modern, natural or manufactured, no one can im- derstand the Japanese who fails to take it into account — a solemn, mystical, and yet tremendously real and vital fact. The submergence of the individual in the mass, the knitting of the entire body of the people into one com- mimahstic system, has no parallel in history, imless it be among the ancient Peruvians. Lafcadio Hearn knew and loved old Japan, but he wrote: "Personahty has been wholly suppressed by coercion, the life of every individual being so ordered by the will of the rest as to render free action, free speaking, free thinking out of the question. . . . With implacable minuteness, with ferocity of detail, every- thing was ordained for him, even to the quaUty of his foot- 246 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST gear, the cost of his wife's hair-pin, and the price of his child's doll. . . . The result was to suppress all mental and moral differentiation, to numb personaHty, to establish one uniform and unchanging type of character. To this day every Japanese mind reveals the lines of that antique mould by which the ancestral mind was compressed and limited." The degree to which this characteristic influences modern Japan may be partly due to the fact that feudaHsm con- tinued in Japan until a later period than in any other na- tion, having been aboKshed only a few decades ago. But while feudaHsm has disappeared as a poHtical system, its spirit has been merged into the larger and more absolute feudaHsm of the State, one vast system having taken the place of several smaUer ones. Among themselves, indeed, the Japanese have differed, and they now differ. There are clans and political parties which sometimes fiercely dispute. In recent years these parties have become more outspoken in the press and in the Imperial Diet. But Western gov- ernments wiU be grievously mistaken if they proceed on the assumption that in all international affairs the Japa- nese will not act as a compact and well-disciplined unit. The Western world marvelled when Admiral Togo, in his famous telegram after the defeat of the Russian fleet, modestly ascribed his victory "to the virtue of the Emperor" and "the protection of his ancestors," and "not to the ac- tion of any human being." Western men said: Is it pos- sible that an intelligent Japanese, who had had a modern education and who is said to be in sympathy with Chris- tianity, could make a statement of that kind? But Ad- miral Togo was as intelligible to the Japanese as Moses was to the victorious Hebrews when he exclaimed : "I will sing unto Jehovah for He hath triumphed gloriously." The Emperor is conceived, not as an individual temporarily at the head of the country, but as the supreme incarnation of the communal Hfe, the spirit and tradition and power of the nation, the "Son of Heaven," whose government is an integral part of "a line of Emperors unbroken from ages PUNDx\MENTAL NATIONAL DISTINCTIONS 247 eternal," as the first article of the Constitution declares. Speaking of the Mikado as the centre of the nation, I-Ichiro Tokutomi says: "Considered as a body politic it has him as its sovereign, considered as a distinct race it has him as its leader, considered as a social commmiity it has him as its nucleus." In a very real sense, therefore, says Doctor William Elliot Griffis, "the victories of Oyama and Togo were not theirs but the nation's. They were literally the result of all the past life and training of the whole people. Admiral or field- marshal, like every individual sailor and soldier, considers himself as but a cog in the mighty wheel that grinds out results. As hfe has value only in the line of duty and is worthless outside of loyalty and right doing, so also the issue of victory is that in which personality is sunk utterly. The 'brilliant virtue' of the Mikado is not a stock phrase, a figment of imagination; it is a soul-nerving reality; it is Japan's grandest asset. Neither the Mikado nor his people would be what they are except for 'the spirits of the an- cestors.' Togo's statement is in harmony with all Japanese history, with literal fact as determined by critical analysis, as well as with sentiment, art, poetry, mythology, tradition, Bushido (the knightly code), and all that goes to make up the world of thought and subconscious motive in the minds of men that fought the battle of the Sea of Japan. Togo could make no other answer. No true son of Nippon is likely for generations to come to express his thoughts other- wise. Be he Confucian, Shintoist, Buddhist, or Christian in religion, be he of this or that philosophy in vogue among us Occidentals, he will ascribe no glory of Japanese victory to 'any human being' but to the virtue of the Mikado and to the spirits of his imperial ancestors." The early literature of ancient Japan abounds in senti- ments of veneration for the Emperor, such as: "Never die unless for the sake of the Emperor"; and when the late Emperor lay dying, weeping and praying multitudes pros- trated themselves before the palace gates for whole days and nights, unmoved alike by heat of sun and fall of rain. 248 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The keynote of China is the direct opposite of this : it is individuahsm. The Chinese as, a man is industrious and capable, often masterful, and able to compete with any- other man in the world. But he does not take naturally to co-operative enterprises. He is not good in team-work. The Chinese are individually strong but collectively weak. They are deficient in organization. Everywhere in China you see evidences of this characteristic. Commercially, although the Chinese are the best business men in Asia, it is difficult to form a large Chinese corporation which can hold together and do efficient work. Politically, there is a conspicuous absence of centraHzation. The Emperor was traditionally venerated as the Son of Heaven; but the peo- ple regarded him as an aHen Manchu and they chafed under his rule. The nation was honeycombed with anti-dynastic societies which were continually plotting the overthrow of the Emperor and his whole line. When the revolution was accomplished a repubhc was declared under a presidency which had five incumbents in half a dozen years. Indi- viduahsm characterizes the nation. Village fife is largely communal under local elders; but, taking China as a whole, it is evety man for himself. Thus there is none of that sense of national unity which is so evident in Japan. The people of the south know little and care less about the people of the north. The inhabi- tants of Szechuan are almost as far removed in sympathy from those of Fuh-kien as if they belonged to different na- tions. If a war breaks out, large sections of the country are indifferent. It is a matter for the Pekiag officials and the governors of the provinces attacked; let them attend to^ it. Probably many of the Chinese people never knew that there was a war between China and Japan in 1894, and those who did know cared little more than if the war had been between Germany and Japan. If a foreign Power were to obtain possession of a Japanese port, it would not be able to hire a coolie in all Japan to fortify it; but when the Germans seized Kiao-chou Bay in 1897, although the province of Shantung was thrown into great alarm, the FUNDAMENTAL NATIONAL DISTINCTIONS 249 German admiral had no difficulty in employing thousands of Chinese to make the German position impregnable against the -Chinese. In like manner the Russians, when they took Port Arthur under an agreement which they extorted from the Chinese Government, found it easy to employ 60,000 coolies to construct their defenses, while the foreign legations in Peking fortified themselves by the aid of Chinese laborers within rifle-shot of the imperial palace. China is a loose aggregation of units rather than a sohd- ified nation. Governors and viceroys are virtually inde- pendent rulers who have their own mints, their own military force, and who do about as they please as long as they send tribute to Peking. The Japanese Government directs its individual subjects and supports them in their enterprises; but the government of China leaves its subjects to shift for themselves. Perhaps this is due in part to the density of population, which makes the struggle for existence fiercer than anywhere else, and develops a callous selfishness as well as a spirit of self-reliance. This individuaHsm is one of the reasons why the present transformation in China is so significant. The new influ- ences which are at work are affecting the essential genius of Chinese life. They are revolutionizing fundamental thoughts and relationships. Railways and telegraphs are making possible intercommunication and a knowledge of other parts of the country and are tending to develop a consciousness of unity which have never existed before. And herein is large ground for hope. The reform move- ments in China are essentially movements of the people. The government did not lead them; it was indeed far be- hind. A popular movement on so vast a scale will proba- bly prove as irresistible as the similar movement was in Europe, for it wiU mean that the new order, when once estabhshed, will be firmly based on the consent of the nation. In Japan, on the other hand, the government is leading the reconstructive movements and the people are far in the rear. The whole modem development is directed by a 250 THE MASTERY OP THE FAR EAST comparatively small group of leaders who are more or less blindly followed by the masses of the population. These leaders are men of splendid ability, and their ideas are gradually making their way down among the common people; but it will be a long time yet before the majority of the people of Japan will assert themselves as a real governing force. History shows that such a situation is not altogether reassuring. It is a great thing for advance movements to have the prestige of official leadership; but unless there is wide popular support based on intelligent public sentiment, changes in personnel may at any time result in an alteration of policy. The increasing number of men in the upper classes who have caught the spirit of the modern world encourage the hope that no reaction will set in; but if it ever should come, the solidarity of the nation will make it a serious matter. I shall refer in a later chapter to the fact that underneath the autocratic party that is now in control, a progressive party is already developing and that its growth promises much for the future. The keynote of Korea is not so easily stated in one word. We might call it subjectivity. The people are less virile, less ambitious, less independent in spirit. They revered their Emperor in a general way, but with none of that passionate devotion which characterizes the Japanese. Any Japanese will gladly give his life for his Emperor, and this is one reason why Japan is such a formidable military power. The entire nation fights, and fights to the death for the Emperor who incarnates the national ideals. Such a sentiment is utterly foreign to the Chinese mind. The Korean occupies a middle position in this respect. Some devoted officials committed suicide when their Emperor was humihated; but this spirit did not characterize the people as a whole. Even in the most patriotic Korean the normal feeling was one of wounded national pride, because a foreigner ruled, rather than of special attachment to the Emperor. The Korean has so long been oppressed, he feels so helpless between the mighty nations about him, FUNDMIENTAL NATIONAL DISTINCTIONS 251 that he has settled into almost apathetic despair. Indi- viduals have made heroic struggles, but the people as a whole have so long acquiesced in the inevitable that a cer- tain state of mind has resulted. The decisive methods of the Japanese are doing much to stir the Koreans out of this apathy, but it still prevails to a marked degree. They accept, often grudgingly, the modem improvements that the Japanese have introduced; but they show little dis- position to make them their own or to bring in others. They merely acquiesce in what the Japanese do and let it go at that. An inherent difficulty which runs deep and affects many problems in both church and state is the fact that Korea has no middle class, no manufacturing or pro- fessional class, few trained leaders of any kind. There are only two classes, the ''noble" and the peasant, although it would be difficult to find men who are less noble than the former, the yangbans. The Korean temperament, too, is more emotional than that of the Japanese or Chinese. It is comparatively easy to reach his heart and to arouse his sympathies. This is one reason why Christianity has made more rapid progress in Korea than in either China or Japan. There are, of course, other reasons for evangehstic success in Korea, which I shall describe elsewhere, but this temperamental condition is a differentiating factor. National ambitions also differ. The ambition of the Japanese is that his comitry shall be recognized as a world- power. The ambition of the Chinese is to advance his personal interests. The ambition of the Korean is to be let alone. It was pathetic to see the people flock to the Salvation Army officers. They felt in a half-childish way that the drums and fifes and mifitary imagery meant some- thing which would help them to get rid of the outsiders who were disturbing their life. I am aware of the limitations of the distinctions which have been indicated. It would be easy to specify excep- tions in each country; but I am now considering the peo- ples as a whole, and these fundamental distinctions run 252 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST deep and affect many political, commercial, and missionary problems. The Japanese sensibly make no secret of their ambition. The well-known Japanese author. Professor Kawakami, writes: "Japan must have a place in the sun."^ "It is Japan's mission to harmonize Eastern and Western civiliza- tions in order to bring about the imification of the world," said Marquis Okuma;^ and in a public address he declared: "Forty years ago but an insignificant nation in the eye of the world, Japan is now regarded as one of its strongest Powers, in a sense holding the destiny of Asia in her hand. Henceforth, in the solution of the Eastern questions, even where she does not play a conspicuous part, her will cannot be altogether ignored. She has raised herseK to this high position and has determined to maintain it none too soon, for the object of European anxiety is no longer the con- tinent of Africa alone but that of Asia as well, with which Japan is so closely connected; for, unless she is strong enough to make her voice heard in the deliberation as to measures for reheving that anxiety, her own safety might be threatened." There may be individuals here and there who can con- sistently criticise Japan for cherishing such an ambition,- but they are not representative citizens of the United States, Great Britain, France, Germany, or Russia. Charles Dick- ens found Americans so loudly asseverating that their coimtiy was destined to be the biggest, grandest, most glorious country on earth that he good-naturedly satirized us in the pages of Martin Chuzzlewit. For generations. Fourth of July orations, congressional speeches, and innu- merable newspaper and magazine articles have proclaimed the same tidings to a sceptical world. Some Americans talk as if they had a right to the control of the Pacific. If they were familiar with the history of their own country, they would know that the United States did not possess a clear title to any territory bordering on the Pacific Ocean ^ Article in the New York Times, April 9, 1915. ^ Japan to America, p. 2. FUNDAMENTAL NATIONAL DISTINCTIONS 253 till 1846. Why should we regard our claim to the supremacy of the Pacific as superior to that of nations which have occupied territory on that ocean for more than two thou- sand years? It may be that the Japanese are overambi- tious and offensively self-assertive. I suspect that they are and that we ourselves belong in the same category. If we are disposed to persuade nations to adopt a more modest and Christian attitude toward one another, we should in- clude our own people as well as the Japanese in our well- meant efforts. CHAPTER XVI JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER Is Japan physically able to maintaiii the place in world affairs which she has attained? It is not to the credit of modern civihzation that such a question must be con- sidered either by others or by the Japanese themselves. Unhappily, we have been slow in emerging from the period in which there is no international court to which a wronged nation may appeal for justice, and in which national selfish- ness, greed, and arrogance are often glorified as "patriotism." Each government has felt that it must be able to protect itself or go to the wall, and that in the scramble for trade and territory and "a place in the sun" it is every nation for itseK and "the devil take the hindmost." "A nation must maintain its sea and land forces at such a point as shall correspond with its national strength," said the Ger- man Chancellor in an address before the Reichstag; other- wise "it would run the risk of forfeiting its present place among the Powers to some stronger nation that is willing to take it." Japan is as apt a pupil in war as in peace, and Western nations have done much to convince her that it was neces- sary to be. They long acted on the assumption that might makes right. Asia has always acted on that assumption, and recent experiences have not weakened the savage neces- sity. While Europeans and Americans have been talking about "The Yellow Peril," Asiatics have been talking about "The White Peril." The impressions of the Japa- nese are voiced by Doctor Toyokichi lyenaga, who grimly writes: "Since modem nations have erected their poHtical structures upon the ruins of Rome, the dominant note of their existence has been and still is miHtarism. To join their ranks the best passport is martial prowess. This as- 254 JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 255 sertion is strikingly proved by the manner in which Japan was at last admitted into the Kst of modern Powers. For half a century Japan assiduously applied herself to the re- construction of the arts of peace. She remodelled her edu- cational system, codified her laws, brought the adminis- tration of justice to the modern standard, consecrated her energy to the cultivation of Western science and literature, created the commercial and industrial middle class, opened a ParHament, and proclaimed the freedom of speech, press, and faith — ^in short, she completely reorganized her political and social fabric upon the model of the West. Did this progress of Japan in the way of peace succeed in placing her on an equal footing with the Western nations, however ? No! Unpleasant as it may sound to you, the position which Japan coveted in the family of nations was gained only after she had unwittingly demonstrated her skill in the game of war. When in defense of her national honor and interests she fought her great neighbor and won the battles of Pyengyang and the Yalu, Japan discovered to her surprise that her prestige in the eyes of the West had be- come suddenly enhanced. And it was only after another terrible war, waged with fear and trembling for her national seciu-ity, that the frank recognition of the insular kingdom as a great Power was given by the world. This is forsooth a sad commentary on the miUtarism of the West. ... Is there any wonder that the conviction of dire necessity for guarding herself by efficient armament has sunk deep into the heart of Japan ? " ^ The aggressions of European Powers in Asia and Africa afforded painful evidence that Japan's apprehensions were not without cause, and Italy's attack upon TripoH gave a fresh illustration. The wrongs of which the ItaHans in Tripoli complained could have been remedied by peaceful means. But Italy wanted territory, a place where her overcrowded population could colonize imder her own flag and remain a material asset, instead of going off to the United States and to South America to strengthen other ^Article in The Oriental Review, June 10, 1911. 256 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST nations. Therefore Italy plunged into a war in order to obtain a region which she coveted, and which she knew that Turkey had no navy to defend. ItaUan rule is undoubtedly better than Moslem rule. But this defense of Italy, which is so often urged, wUl not pass muster at the bar of morality. The fact that one might use another man's property more wisely than he is using it does not justify one in seizing it by violence and murder. The Japanese were not slow in taking the lesson to heart. They realized that the necessity for military and naval strength in their case was intensified by their small home territory, its inadequate agricultural productiveness, their island position, their dependence upon foreign com- merce, and the disposition of powerful Western nations to seize the countries on the adjacent mainland, whose enor- mous markets and resources, if in xmfriendly hands, would isolate Japan and reduce her to a position of weakness and insignificance. They understood perfectly that the Rus- sians would not permanently acquiesce in exclusion from an ice-free port in the North Pacific. They know that the Ko- reans and Chinese fear and dislike them. They know that many foreigners throughout the Far East are not friendly to them. They believe too that the position which they have won in the world in general and in the Far East in particular is one which can be held only by military force. Lamentable it surely is that Japan's entrance into the family of nations should entail a demonstration of her ability to fight on equal terms with the alleged Christian Powers of the West! Convinced that this must be done, the Japa- nese are maintaining their army and navy at a high stage of efl&ciency. One hears many stories about a large army and enormous stores of munitions of war. It is difficult to tell how far they are true, for government secrets are more closely guarded than in America. The reports are probably exaggerated, but no one doubts that the Japanese are keeping themselves in a state of effective military pre- paredness. As for the navy, in 1894 it had a tonnage of 61,000; in 1904 of 283,743; in 1916 of 699,916, and large JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 257 additions have been made since then. Japan is able to make her own ships and cannon, and her gun-factory at Km'e is one of the largest and best-equipped plants of the kind in the world. Modest in size as Japan is, it possesses some special ad- vantages which make it more formidable as a fighting na- tion than its numerical strength and financial resources might suggest, and as they are important factors in the consideration of Japan as a world-power, it may be well to mention them. First: A poKtical organization able to act quickly and decisively. Highly centraHzed monarchical governments can prepare for and wage war more readily and effectively than democratic governments. This is one of the grave in- dictments against war — ^it gives the advantage to those forms of government which allow the least Hberty to the indi- vidual and concentrate the most power in a few men. Such governments can adopt war measures secretly without the necessity of consulting congresses and parliaments, whose members demand unHmited freedom of debate, and who are sensitive to a pubHc opinion represented by myriads of inquisitive and outspoken newspapers. A democracy acts slowly and cumbersomely in comparison. Second: A martial spirit pervading the entire popula- tion. The typical Japanese is a bom soldier and he takes naturally and with avidity to the profession of arms. The annual calling of young men to the colors is made an occa- sion of festivities. Their houses are decorated with flags, and processions of friends and neighbors accompany the recruits to the station with every demonstration of honor. Military ardor and love of the beautiful are seldom united, but they are in the Japanese. It is true that they do not fight except under provocation; but, given the provocation, they are ready to meet it with a swiftness that is apt to be disconcerting to their enemies. Their temperament is the opposite of the temperament of the Chinese. The latter are peaceful in disposition, despising the profession of arms, and, until the aggressions of Western nations compelled 258 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST them to adopt a different policy, filled their regiments and warships with the oft'scourings of their population. The Japanese are militant in disposition. They have a genius for war. Feudahsm dominated Japan longer than any other nation, and while the system has been overthrown, the feudal spirit survives and becomes a formidable asset for war. For many centuries and until within the memory of men now living, the ideal type of the Japanese was the Knight. "Among flowers the cherry, among men the war- rior" was a popular sentiment. "Bushido, the Soul of Japan," is "the Way of the Warrior" — ^literally, "Figjiting — Knightways" or "Teachings of Knightly Behavior." It is not surprising that such a people quickly assimilated modern weapons of precision and in an incredibly brief time learned to use them efficiently. Third: An extraordinary national unity, inspired by the most intense and self-sacrificing loyalty. I have referred in another chapter to the solidarity of the Japanese people. The whole nation becomes a fighting machine in time of danger. The war with Russia illustrated this on a startling scale. The civil, mihtary, and naval departments of the government acted in absolute accord. The spirit of patri- otic determination actuated not only every soldier and sailor, but the entire population. Wives proudly saw their husbands march away, and mothers committed suicide in grief and shame when their sons were pronounced physically disqualified. Fourth: Thorough preparation. This preparation be- gins with the boys in the pubhc schools. There is a parade- ground in connection with each one that I saw, and a spa- cious hall for drill in bad weather. Light rifles are provided and a dark-blue uniform with brass buttons. The training is far from superficial. Drills are a regular feature of the curriculum. In several cities that we visited our hosts hap- pened to live near public-school buildings, and every day I heard the bugle-calls and saw the platoons of boys march- ing and going through the manual of arms in businesslike fashion; The Japanese believe in universal military ser- JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 259 vice, and every physically qualified man between the ages of seventeen and forty is potentially a soldier. Provision is made for a few exemptions and for alternative service for university students; but the general rule calls for two years of active service with the colors, four years and four months in the reserve service, and ten years in the depot service. Japan therefore does not need as large a standing army as some other nations, for practically every man receives mili- tary training and, after his return to civil life, is amenable to his country's summons. The number of men actually under arms at any given time is, therefore, not important. The entire able-bodied population of the coimtry is avail- able on instant call. Some of the military posts are the old feudal castles, which were appropriated by the government when feudal- ism was abolished in 1871. I do not wonder that the Em- peror deemed it inexpedient to leave the great nobles in possession of those massive fortifications. That at Nagoya, for example, stands in grounds of vast extent, and is pro- tected by deep outer and inner moats, whose solid stone walls are of a height and thickness which would make them impregnable against anything but modern artillery. The labor of construction must have been prodigious. The castle was founded in 1607 by Yoshinao, who received the overlordship of the province of Owari from his father, the celebrated Tokugawa leyasu. It towers impressively above the northern part of the city, its famous golden dol- phins, although forty-eight feet long, appearing to be of modest size in comparison with the huge building which, as masters of water, they were supposed to defend from the god of fire. Ten thousand soldiers were stationed at the castle at the time of my visit, and the hard, level parade- ground is so vast that I was told that 37,000 men had drilled on it at once. The castle at Osaka is another no- table example. I saw single stones which, as nearly as I could estimate, were forty feet long, twenty high, and eight feet thick, and there were others almost as large. Only "an unlimited command of naked human strength" could 260 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST have made possible those stupendous fortifications in an age when our modem hoisting-machinery was unknown. Of course, they were built by forced labor and maintained by tribute exacted from the wretched farmers and common people over a wide area. When feudalism received its death-blow, the people were emancipated from such con- tributions of work and rice. The haughty lords were com- pelled to reside in Tokyo, where the Emperor could keep his eye on them, and their formidable castles were filled with imperial troops. Seven thousand were quartered in the barracks that had been erected on the Osaka Castle grounds, and the number appeared small in comparison with the extent of the preserve. Regiments are drilled until they are perfect fighting imits. I visited a number of military posts, and although I have seen soldiers of many nations, I have never seen such drHling as I saw in Japan. The officers devoted Kttle time to those showy parades and fancy exercises which so de- light spectators at an American mihtary post, and which are about as helpful as dancing-lessons when fighting-days come. They made their men trudge up-hill and down in heavy marching order, dig trenches, charge batteries, fight sham battles, and do everything just as it must be done in real warfare. The house in which I was entertained at Kanazawa was not far from a garrison, and the troops were drilling night after night when I went to sleep. I formed the impression then that when Japan did fight somebody would get hurt. The navy was working equally hard. "When matters were growing serious in the winter of 1903-4," an observer wrote, "the Japanese navy imderwent a special battle- training — constant firing at long range with heavy gmis under war conditions, torpedo work at night in bad weather, using live torpedoes, manoeuvring at night without fights, night-firing, and the rehearsal of operations that were actually to form part of the war when it began." The individual Japanese soldier, while short of stature as all his countrymen are, is solid, sturdy, patient, temperate, c3 o o biD JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 261 inured to hardship, accustomed to an outdoor life, dis- cipHned to the highest point of a military efficiency, armed with the most highlj^ improved weapons, and unquestioning in obedience to his officers, who are often hereditary chiefs of his clan. He was a familiar figure on the streets of all the cities I visited. He invariably wore his belt and side- arms and often his gloves, was neat in appearance, erect in bearing and well behaved in manner. After the outbreak of the European War in 1914, a mis- sionary in the Marshall Islands wrote: "On the morning of September 29, several Japanese men-of-war appeared, and an aimed force was landed and the Japanese flag hoisted. Although martial law necessarily prevails, it is in its mild- est form, and all nationahties are treated with the utmost courtesy and consideration. Last month 800 men from the fleet had leave on shore for a day, but there were no cases whatever of drunkenness, disorder, or immorality. The men, iastead of drinkiag freely of beer and other intoxicants, which they could have obtained at the saloon that was open to all, preferred to spend their leave money on sugar, and appeared to enjoy themselves immensely. From the time of the first landing until the present, the conduct of the men has been exemplary, and I do not think could be sur- passed by the troops of any other civihzed nation." The Japanese soldier needs no such elaborate commis- sariat as the British and American soldier. He can five contentedly on a daily ration of a few cents' worth of rice mixed with whole wheat or barley, occasionally supple- mented by a httle meat or fish. And yet his endurance is as remarkable as his loyalty and bravery. In north China, during the Boxer Uprising in 1900, he came into competi- tion with the soldiers of the great nations of the West, and it was the well-nigh universal testimony not only of mis- sionaries and newspaper correspondents, but of European and American army officers, that "the little Japs were the best soldiers of them all," excelling in discipline, in celerity of movement, in orderly behavior, in the perfection of their commissary and quartermaster departments, and in general 262 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST efficiency for hard campaigning. When the Pope sent a handsome diamond to Bishop Favier with instructions to give it to the man who had performed the best service dur- ing the siege of Peking, the bishop gave it to Colonel Shiba, military attache of the Japanese legation. Japan's navy, too, is one of the best in the world. Her ships are thoroughly modern in construction and equipment, and her officers and men know how to use their formidable fighting machines. The world has not forgotten that in the war with China the Japanese captured and sunk Chi- nese battleships with unarmored cruisers. When the thermometer is twenty-six degrees below the freezing-point, and the decks are sheeted with ice and the wind is blowing a gale and the air is thick with whirling snow, most sailors would discreetly suspend operations. But though these were the conditions before Wei-hai-wei, the Japanese tumbled down the Chinese fortifications as smilingly as if on a summer's holiday. Admiral Belknap said : " I do not hesitate to express the opinion that, were English and Japa- nese fleets of about equal strength to meet in battle, the chances would be as favorable to the Japanese as to the EngHsh. The Japanese will fight; let there be no mistake about that. The sun does not shine on a more determined or more intrepid race than that of Japan." The Japanese soldier never counts the cost to himself of any order that he may receive, and rather hopes that he may have the honor of being killed for the Emperor, whom he loves and worships. Japanese soldiers and sailors are characterized by a self-sacrificing dash and determination which make them well-nigh invincible. At the outbreak of the war with Russia, some Japanese in their eagerness to go to the front divorced their wives or sent them back to their parents. The Reverend Doctor Heniy Loomis, of Yokohama, says that one man, finding himself unable to make arrangements for the care of his two little children, killed them in order to free himself for militaiy service. Another sold his two daughters to a brothel-keeper. Ad- miral Togo told his officers to sail with the expectation that J.\PAN AS A MILITARY POWER 263 they would not see their wives and children again, and not even to think about them or write to them. It is said that he himself once struck his wife and ordered her to be silent when she entreated him not to rise from a sick-bed to go to his ship. "I shall count it an honor to die for Japan/' was the unanimous reply of a regiment to the question: "What do you plan to do in the war with Russia?" When Admiral Togo called for Kesshi-tai (a body of men resolved to fight till death) to sink blocking steamships in the en- trance to Port Arthur, 2,000 men eagerly responded, and among the applications was the following from a second- class warrant officer: February 18, 1904. Commander Hikojiro Ijichi, H. /. M. S. Mikasa. Sir: — I, being desirous of participating in the volunteer corps now being raised, entreat you to select me, hereby sending in application written with my own blood. Monpei Hatashi. When Captain Yashiro, of the Japanese battleship Asama, bade good-by to the volunteers, he gave them to drink from a large silver loving-cup filled with cold water, as if he were giving them the wine of the sacrament (when near relatives in Japan part without any expectation of ever meeting again, they drink by turns from a cup of cold water as they bid each other a last good-by), and said to them: "I send you to the place of death, and I have no doiibt that you are ready to die; but I do not mean to advise you to despise your life nor to run needless risks in trying to make a great name. What I ask of you all is to do your duty regardless of your life. The cup of water that I now offer you is not meant to give you courage — ^it would be shameful if our men needed Dutch courage to go to the place of death — it is only to make you representatives of the honor of the Asama. Submit your life to the will of Heaven and calmly perform your duty."^ In April, 1910, Lieutenant Tsutomu Sakuma, of the ill- fated submarine No. 6, found that, as the result of an 1 Quoted by George Kennan, article in The Outlook, June 18, 1904. 264 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST unavoidable accident, his submarine was sinking and that death by suffocation was inevitable. He calmly wrote in his log-book: "I have no words to beg pardon for losing His Majesty's boat and for killing my men, owing to my carelessness. But all the crew have well discharged their duties till their death, and have worked with fortitude. . . . Our only regret is that this accident may, we fear, cause a hindrance to the development of the submarine. ... I am greatly satisfied. I have always been prepared for death on leaving home. I humbly ask Your Majesty, the Emperor, to be so gracious as not to let the bereaved families of my men be subjected to desti- tution. This is the only anxiety which occupies my mind at present." Human Bullets, A Soldier^s Story of Port Arthur, is the title of a httle book by Lieutenant Tadayoshi Sakurai, in which a typical Japanese vividly describes the fierce joy of battle against the foes of his coimtry. He calls it a "de- lightful business to pursue a flying enemy when they are shot from behind and fall like leaves in the autumnal wind." It is not a hght thing for the world when modern weapons of precision are put into the hands of men of such warlike passion. Like devotion characterized the people at home. Sev- eral fathers and mothers committed suicide to enable their sons, upon whom they were dependent, to go to the war. When neighbors called to express sympathy with a man whose boy had been killed, he replied: "I am not an ob- ject of sympathy. All must die, and my son might have died like the son of my neighbor, in a cabin, of fever. But he died on the field of battle in the service of his Emperor and in the performance of his duty. I should be con- gratulated." " The war with Russia brought into high reHef some phases of Japan's methods of preparation. The intelli- gence department had collected complete and detailed in- formation regarding the topography of the country to be fought over. Every path and creek, every hill and valley in all Korea and Manchuria were indicated upon maps conveniently arranged for officers in the field. Plans of campaign had been worked out so that every important JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 265 battle was fought on the prescribed lines, and the command- ing general could report afterward that he had engaged the enemy "as prearranged," a phrase which occurs with sig- nificant frequency in official reports. Enormous accumula- tions of suppHes and munitions of war had been bought or manufactured. Arms, ammunition, food, clothing, equip- ment, transportation — everything indeed that the army and navy required — ^were provided and stored where they could be readily used. This perfect preparedness enabled the Japanese to be prompt in taking the offensive. They forced the fighting from start to finish. Knowing precisely what they wanted to do, they went at their task with relentless energy. Gen- eral Grant's motto, "When in doubt, go forward," was bet- tered by the Japanese for they were never in doubt. The result was that the campaign was fought on their lines, and that the Russians were kept so busy defending themselves that they had no chance to develop strategy of their own. The moral power of such bold initiative was tremendous. The Japanese troops were always eager and confident, while the Russians were kept in constant apprehension of attack, an apprehension which was saved from frequent panic only by the dogged obstinacy of the Slavic tempera- ment. Fifth: Maximum strength at the front was another ele- ment in Japanese success. The Russian general Kuropat- kin lamented that "at the end of March, 1905, when we had carried out a very energetic preparation of the theatre of warlike action as far as the River Sungari, the fighting element in the Manchurian army consisted only of 58 per cent in some sections of the troops. ... In April, the per- centage of bayonets in the First Manchurian Army consti- tuted 51.9 per cent." But the Japanese succeeded in keep- ing their sick and special-detail lists so small and the health of their troops so good that they usually had more than 90 per cent of their men in action. Sixth: Sanitation and prophylaxis must not be over- looked in studying the causes of Japanese success. Disease is often a greater danger to an army than the living enemy. 266 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The history of former wars shows that an average of four men have died from disease for every one killed in action. In six months of the Crimean campaign, the losses of the allied forces from this cause were 50,000 as against 20,000 from battle casualties. In the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-8, the deaths from disease (80,000) were four times as many as those which occurred in battle or from wounds. In our own war with Mexico, the proportion of deaths from disease to those from battle casualties was three to one. In the American Civil War the Northern armies lost 110,000 men by shells and bullets and 199,720 by disease, or 8.6 per cent of the number of men in the army. During the French campaign of 1894 in Madagascar, about 14,000 sol- diers were sent to the front. Only 29 were killed in action, but over 7,000 perished from preventable disease. In the Boer War in South Africa, the British losses from disease, compared with those from wounds, were ten to one. In our own war with Spain 14 lives were sacrificed to ignorance and carelessness for every soldier who died on the firing- line or from wounds. The actual figures were 293 deaths from battle casualties and 3,681 from disease.^ President Taft declared that there were 20,000 cases of typhoid fever among 120,000 troops, and that 90 per cent of the volunteer regiments were infected within eight weeks from- the date of mobilization. Among 10,759 men encamped at Jackson- ville, Florida, for four months in 1898, there were 2,693 cases of fever, and 529 deaths; an annual death-rate of 147.5 per 1,000 for soldiers at whom not a shot was fired.' Colonel Theodore Roosevelt declared that the whole Ameri- can force at Santiago was an army of invalids. Shakespeare caused Henry V to voice the experience of many military commanders when, after a short campaign in France, the King lamented : "My people are with sickness much enfeebled; My army but a weak and sickly guard." ^ Cf. Doctor L. L. Seaman, The Real Triumph of Japan. 2 Major Robert E. Noble, quoted in the New York Times, May 27, 1917. JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 267 Until recent years, many officers of European and Ameri- can armies were almost contemptuously indifferent to the health of their men. Army surgeons were free to advise, but had little or no authority to enforce sanitaiy measures. Their duty was beHeved to be to take care of men after they became ill, not to prevent them from becoming ill. There were regulations regarding camp locations, latrines, sick- calls and field-hospitals; but the average commander ap- parently deemed the prevention of disease unworthy of the soldier spirit. When I was in Manila in 1901, I saw a regi- ment encamped in a veritable lake of mud, and many of the men sick in consequence. I was credibly informed that a request for permission to remove the camp to an available drier site was sharply refused on the ground that soldiers must get used to such things ! An artillery officer who was prominent in the Santiago campaign boasted that he did not drink boiled water in Cuba, or carry out any other ' ' ridiculous sanitary recommendations. ' ' He died of typhoid in the Philippines six months later. A heutenant of in- fantry refused to be vaccinated, and smallpox caused his funeral a month after reaching the Philippines. Both of these officers were regarded by their countrymen as heroes who h^d died for the flag.^ Japan was the first nation to remedy these abuses and to deal intelligently with questions of military health and sanitation. It is only fair to bear in mind that the real causes of many maladies and of the methods of propaga- tion were not known until a short time ago. The germ theory of disease, the relation of mosquitoes to malaria, ffies and water to typhoid, body-lice to typhus, dirt to sup- puration, and the use of anti-septics, anti-toxins, and other preventives are comparatively recent discoveries. The average civilian slept in an unventilated room under the blissful impression that "night air is injurious," and ate and drank. what he pleased in calm neglect of every health pre- caution. Even the medical profession prescribed drugs for 1 Article by Major Charles E. Woodruff, of the Medical Corps, U. S. A., in the New York Times, October 18, 1908. 268 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST diphtheria while di'ain-pipes were out of order, and ordered a milk diet for a fever patient without reference to the character of the milk-supply. The last two decades have seen a remarkable increase in knowledge regarding these subjects. Japan and Russia were the first nations to wage a great war after the civilized world had begun to realize the significance of these things. But Russia certainly did not show, and it is doubtful whether any other white nation would have shown, the intelligent and resolute determina- tion with which the Japanese handled this problem. This care is not to be attributed to a greater regard for the welfare of the individual soldier as a man than has been manifested by other governments. No other generals in the world more freely sacrificed their men in battle. They were wise enough, however, to realize that sick men cannot fight effectively, that an invahd soldier is a double loss, for he needs a well man to take care of him, and that men in prime condition make a more formidable army than men weakened by disease. The Japanese went about this work in the thorough and methodical manner which characterized all their prepara- tion and conduct of the war. Surgeons were not regarded as mere civilians in uniform who were accorded rank by courtesy; they were authoritative officers who not only cared for the sick and wounded, but who had power and discretion in sanitary matters. A commanding officer who ignored a recommendation of an army surgeon which dealt with the preservation of the health of his troops would have found himself in trouble in short order. The aphorism of Napoleon, that "an army fights on its stomach" was fully understood by the Japanese. Careful attention was given to camp hygiene, and the troops were told how to prepare and serve their food, what kinds must be avoided, how food should be chewed, and how the bowels should be kept in proper order. Drinking-water received special attention. The medical department of the army sent experts in advance of march- ing troops to test the water in wells and streams. If one JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 269 was found impure, a notice was posted forbidding the use of the water without boiling. Every company had an ap- paratus for boiling water, and a soldier was not permitted to take a drink of any water which had not been pronounced fit for use either by testing or boiling. Before going into battle, every soldier was given a first- aid-to-the-injured packet, and taught how to use it. He was required to take a bath, put on clean underclothing, and pare and clean his finger-nails, so that if a bullet entered his body it would not carry in shreds of dirty cloth- ing or impurities from the skin or hands. One can imagine the laughter with which American troops would have greeted such orders, and the difficulty of enforcing them. But the feudal spirit, the unquestioning obedience, and the iron discipHne of the Japanese were equal to every demand. The results of this poHcy amazed the world. The Japa- nese generals commanded men in "the pink of condition." As the steel-jacketed bullets usually bored clean holes which were not infected by dirty bodies or soiled clothing, and as the soldier promptly clapped an antiseptic bandage over the wound, a very large percentage of the injuries re- ceived in battle quickly healed by first intention, many of them requiring no other treatment. Sickness was so effec- tually held in check that, while 58,887 men were killed in battle or died from wounds, there were only 27,158 deaths from disease among the 1,200,000 men who went to the front. Equal care was exercised in the navy. Food and sanita- tion are more easily watched on warships than on land, so that iUness is less common among sailors than among sol- diers. Wounded men, too, can be more quickly cared for on shipboard than when they are scattered over miles of ground, where they may have to He for hours, and perhaps days, before they can be reached. Naval commanders or- der men to plug their ears with cotton before a battle so that the concussion of heavy cannon will not rupture ear- drums. The Japanese surgeons took this precaution, carefully examined the eyes of gunners to make sure that 270 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST there was no impairment of vision which might affect their aim, and during engagements suppHed the battery crews with a weak solution of boracic acid to wash out the eyes when they became affected by smoke and dust. Food and clothing for both soldiers and sailors were adapted to the climate and season, so that Japanese troops were not com- pelled in midsummer to swelter in the heavy flannel shirts and to eat the heating foods of Wisconsin lumber- jacks in winter, as American soldiers were in the war with Spain. Some critics assert that the Japanese have been over- praised for their health record. It is alleged that they were as secretive about their sick returns as they were about everything else, and that there were more sick soldiers than they cared to have the world know. The Asiatic scourge of beri-beri was often prevalent.^ We must re- member, too, in connection with the fact that the number of deaths from disease was less than that from bullets, that the Japanese sacrificed their lives in battle as white soldiers seldom do. An American general who ordered repeated charges which resulted in the annihilation of the columns making them would be universally execrated. General Grant was denoimced as "a butcher" because he directed single assaults which caused the death of less than half of the attacking force. But when Japanese regiments were completely annihilated at Port Arthur, fresh regiments were ordered up, to be wiped out in turn, and then still other regi- ments, until the hill slopes were turned into shambles. This kind of warfare of course swelled the proportion of killed and wounded as compared with the sick. But making all due allowance for these considerations, the general fact remains that, in comparison with all previous wars, the Japanese were successful to an unprecedented degree in lessening disease and in treating woimds. Western governments were not slow in learning the les- son. Their war departments now pay far closer attention to the health of soldiers, and the medical arm of the service 1 C/. F. A. McKenzie, The Unveiled East, p. 106, and B. L. Putnam Weale, The Coming Struggle in Eastern Asia, p. 204. JAPAN AS A MILITARY POWER 271 has a higher relative standing than it had before the Russia- Japan War. The European War, a decade later, bore striking witness to this improvement. It is true that tj^hus raged among the Serbian troops, that the Russians were characteristically heedless in matters of sanitation, and that the British and French expedition to GalHpoU lost nearly a hundred thousand men on account of disease. But the health record on the western front was remarkably good. Soldiers on both sides were well fed and well clothed. Epidemics were stopped. Wounds were so skilfully treated that more than 80 per cent of the wounded men recovered sufficiently to enable them to return to the battle-line within three or four weeks. Of the first half-miUion men that Canada sent to Europe, "the deaths from sickness were less than 5.3 per cent of all the deaths, and less than l}^, per cent of all the casualties. . . . Only one out of every 411 soldiers succumbed to sickness in the course of nearly three years of camp and trench life combined." The English and Australian showing would probably be about equally satisfactory. The French record was sadly lowered by tuberculosis. Doctor Herman M. Biggs, of New York, said that 150,000 French soldiers had to be withdrawn from the army on this account alone. This lamentable fact should not be attributed to French dis- regard of reasonable precautions but to the fact that the frightful and long-continued fighting compelled France in her desperation to send to the front many men who were not physically able to withstand the strain of life in the trenches. Taking the European War as a whole, careful sanitation, preventive medicine and antiseptic treatment of wounds so lowered the mortality rate that the proportion of men killed or permanently disabled by wounds or disease was probably not as high as in some former wars. One third of all the men who went into the battle of Gettysburg were left on the field. General Grant began a campaign in Virginia with 150,000 men, and from these and the re- inforcements which joined them he lost 200,000 in three months from sickness and fighting. Major-General Wilham 272 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST C. Gorgas, Surgeon-General of the United States Army, who cites these facts, says that there has been no such pro- portionate loss as that in any of the big battles of the recent war. The actual number is, of course, far greater than in previous wars; but this is due to the unprecedented number of combatants engaged and not to higher proportion. The death-rate from disease in the American army in France was declared by General Peyton C. March, to have been less than three-fourths of one per cent, which is believed to be the lowest that any army has ever reported. I am digressing from the Japanese; but perhaps I have said enough in this chapter to show that Japan is now a military Power of the first class, and that she is quite able to maintain her position. Marquis Okuma voiced the united opinion of the Japanese people when he concluded an address in March, 1915, by sa3dng: "Japan is becoming a great country. We must have an army adequate to de- fend our country. The European War proved that a regu- larly trained army is necessary in defending a country. The one-year service system advocated may do for small coun- tries, Hke Switzerland for instance, but it will not do for Japan. We should consider our position in the world." The Japan Advertiser said that the hanzais of the five thou- sand people who heard him "nearly lifted the Kabukiza Theatre." CHAPTER XVII JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT My two visits to Japan, eight years apart, gave me an opportunity to note the altering conditions. Visibly indeed there was comparatively Httle change. The charm of Japa- nese scenery was still mmiarred, save in a few places, by the crass materiahsm which in America lines our railways with huge signs vouchsafing the opinion that we ought to use bile beans, that soothing syrup is good for babies, and that pink pills will redden pale faces. Japanese architec- ture was the same, save that here and there a new public building was of foreign style. Native garments still pre- dominated on the streets. The jinrikisha stiU awaited the traveller at every station, and there were the same long rows of narrow shops with their picturesque signs. The visitor could easily find external signs of change if he looked for them, and in some instances they obtruded themselves. Nevertheless, Japan to the eye was the familiar historic Japan. But as I moved among the people I became conscious of subtler changes. In 1901 I found the militant spirit domi- nant. The people had not recovered from their rage and chagrin over Russia's seizure of Port Arthur and Man- churia, thus depriving them of the hard-won fruits of the China-Japan War. The nation was thinking of revenge. It realized, too, that Russian aggressions must result in war. It was therefore drilling soldiers, building warships, and accumulating military stores. Present-day Japan, while not less miHtary, is more com- mercial. It understands that war is expensive business. The China-Japan War ran up the national budget from $41,500,000 annually to $84,000,000, and the Russia-Japan 273 274 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST War swelled it to $252,500,000. The latter war cost Japan $585,000,000, and at its close the nation was staggering under a debt of $1,125,153,411. This does not look large in comparison with the enormous debts mcurred by Western nations in the European War a decade later, but it was $23 per capita, which was ten times the per-capita debt of 1893. Almost everything is taxed. Official reports list among other sources of revenue taxes on land, incomes, business, succession, travelling, mining, bank-notes, liquors, soy, sugar, textile fabrics, kerosene-oil, bourses, imports, ton- nage, stamps, and "other taxes," while postal, telegraph, telephone, and railway services, forests, salt, camphor, and tobacco are classed as "public undertakings and state prop- erty," whose profits accrue to the state treasury. In addi- tion to an import duty of 15 per cent on manufactured articles, native manufacturers are heavily assessed, and ev- ery citizen with an annual income of more than $150 pays income tax. The Japanese have to pay from 20 to 30 per cent of their incomes for taxes. A Tokyo paper (the Kokumin Shimbun) declares that " the heavy debts of Japan are more than the nation can endure"; and Baron Shibu- sawa, one of the ablest financiers in Japan, admitted re- cently that "the present rate of taxation in Japan is indeed extremely high and more than the people at large can bear." Japan realizes that its material resources are greatly inferior to those of other first-class Powers, and that the position and ambitions of the nation require wealth as well as an army and navy. The Japanese cannot get this wealth by agriculture; for not only is Japan a comparatively small country territorially, but only 13 per cent of its area is easily susceptible of cultivation, and 15 per cent is about the practicable limit. The valleys are rich, but they are not extensive, and there are no vast stretches of rich prairie soil like those in Manchuria and the western part of the United States. The pressure of population in Japan has JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 275 already been noted. The Empire had 37,017;362 inhabi- tants in 1883; 39,607,254 in 1888; 41,388,313 in 1893; 43,763,855 in 1898; 46,732,807 in 1903; 48,649,583 in 1906; and it now has 56,860,735 exclusive of Korea, For- mosa, and Saghalien. The cost of living is rising. The limit of soil productiveness has been practically reached and Japan has to import food for her people. Every year she purchases abroad millions of piculs of rice and beans, the former chiefly from China, Siam, and Burma and the latter largely from Manchuria. Her imports of flour in a recent year were $1,819,166. There are already 350 people to the square mile and the birth-rate is rising. The Japanese have therefore entered upon a period of commercial and industrial development. They have studied to good effect the example of England and they are foster- ing trade and manufactures on a large scale. They were already proficient in making artistic goods. Their lacquer- work, cloisonne, and porcelain are justly famous, while their silks and embroideries call forth ejaculations of delight from every visitor. The finest pieces of decorated ware and embroidery are not made in factories, but in the homes of the people or in obscure little shops. Nothing could be more unostentatious than the process of porcelain manufacture that we saw in Nagoya. A half-dozen common-looking Japanese, some of them mere boys and girls, sat in a rude shed, shaping dishes and vases out of the moist clay and pressing and cutting them into form with the simplest tools and yet with rare skill. The decorating was done in hundreds of lowly homes, and the firing in rough kilns tended by men who looked like day-laborers. But the results were so deli- cately beautiful that one felt like spending days in admir- ing them. People in other lands prize so highly what Nagoya produces that they annually buy nearly a million yen' worth of her pottery, cloisonne, lacquer, and other art objects. The curio-shops and silk-stores in all the principal cities 276 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST are well worth visiting, though the prudent man will limit the sum of money that he takes with him. In Kyoto, for example, where the silk industry centres, one is taken to a modest building only one and a half stories in height and with no pretensions to elegance — a place as far removed as possible from the gorgeous department stores of America. The politest imaginable salesman meets you at the door with low bows, and escorts you through a littered outer room and passageway into a back room, where he unfolds before you silks and embroideries that fairly take your breath away. The prices, too, are seductively low, if you forget the heavy duty which Uncle Sam will remorselessly exact on your return to America. It is not surprising that the art products of Japan have made their way aU over the civilized world. The demand for the export trade is large and increasing, and stores for Japanese articles are now to be found in most of the lead- ing cities of Europe and America. Unfortunately, the cruder taste of many people in other lands calls for a larger and gaudier kind of ware than the Japanese would make for themselves, and they are yielding, to some extent, to the demand, while the growth of the trade is begetting a haste to meet it which often shortens the time spent on the decorated ware. In some articles, therefore, particularly in lacquer, "the ol.d is better." Japan exports annually about a million dollars' worth of lacquered ware, and two million dollars' worth of porcelain and earthenware, with every prospect of an unlimited increase. The imitative temperament of the Japanese was a valu- able asset in getting a start in manufacturing staple goods and articles. As soon as they realized the necessity for developing manufactures, they sensibly decided to avail themselves of the inventions and processes which Western peoples had gradually acquired through many years of re- search and experiment. Accordingly European and Ameri- can experts were invited to Japan to take charge of the new establishments. A Board of Public Works was con- stituted to secure the needed assistance in men and appa- JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 277 ratus. An amusing but characteristic story is told of the following order that was sent to the board's agent in London: " Urgent. Send to Tokyo at once as follows : 1 Professor of Electrical Science. 1 Do. Mining. 2 Blast Furnaces." Attracted by the high salaries offered, many experts gladly accepted the invitations. The Japanese carefully watched their work so as to understand how it was done, let them educate the people to use the new appliances and then, when the market had been created and the foreigners fondly imagined that they were about to reap the harvest of their toil and expenditure, the Japanese politely dismissed them, did the work themselves with their cheap labor, and so un- dersold the alien companies that they were driven out of the business. Hence there was woe among the foreign merchants of Yokohama, Kobe, and Nagasaki. In the oil trade, however, the Japanese ran against a force that was not so easily overcome. Petroleiun was early introduced and it quickly became popular. The duty down to 1898 was only five sen (2^ cents) on a ten-gallon case. But Japan found that she had oil-fields of her own in several parts of the Empire, and especially in the province of Echigo. In order to promote their development and protect the producers from the competition of the Standard Oil Company, which had a manager in Yokohama and agents in several other cities, the government in that year in- creased the duty to sixteen sen per case. As the Standard Oil Company continued to bring in large quantities of oil, the government announced that on October 1, 1901, the duty would be doubled, making it thirty-two sen. This of course seriously affected the import trade. But those who get ahead of the Standard Oil Company m.ust rise early. Undismayed, it proceeded to organize a local company un- der the laws of Japan, with a capital of $10,000,000. This company, nominally Japanese but really Standard Oil, ac- quired large holdings in the province of Echigo, sunk wells, 278 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST erected a refinery-; laid pipe-lines, and proposed to handle the oil output of Japan. The outcome was a compromise to such mutual advantage as the circumstances permitted. It did not follow, however, that this plan could be suc- cessfully adopted by other foreign corporations. The Standard Oil Company had such unlimited capital that it could afford to lose a few millions if necessarj^ in a fight for a market. Moreover, oil is a natural product, and the right to sink wells for it can be bought or leased without purchasing the land, for which indeed the company usually cares nothing. The average foreign investor had no money that he was willing to lose, and, besides, before he invested he usually insisted upon control. But foreign control was precisely what the Japanese would not grant. Their pride of independence is a national passion. They want the foreigner's ideas and inventions, but they will not brook his leadership. Foreigners can own land only in a very few places and under such restrictions as to make purchase almost prohibitive. Nearly all foreign properties are held under lease or in the name of Japanese. Missionary work- ers feel under a constraint of conscience to give Christian teaching to Japan at any sacrifice; but business men do not deem it a duty to invest their money apart from the expectation of returns in hard cash. Japan therefore found great difficulty in securing the capital that she needed to develop her resources and finance her enterprises. One cannot but admke the courage with which the Japa- nese spent money on plants and equipment. They per- ceived that if they were to succeed against foreign competi- tion they must not begin on a small scale and wait for busi- ness to grow. Their competitors had the benefit of long experimenting and accumulated capital, and the Japanese must risk everything on a bold plunge. This required nerve, for they had Kttle money and their resources were largely undeveloped. But they dared to go ahead. By using what they had, by heavily taxing themselves, and by borrowing what they could, they proceeded to invest huge sums in mills, factories, railways, steamships, telegraph- JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 279 lines, post-offices, docking and terminal facilities. Deter- mined to make equal advance in other lines, enormous amounts were also expended on streets, roads, sanitation, the army, navy, and pubUc buildings. For years, this meant hard times in Japan. Everything was outgo, and of course income was not immediate. The gold in some of her banks went to a perilously low level. Convertible notes multiphed. The demand for foreign goods increased, for Japan wanted many things in machin- eiy, apparatus, and suppHes that Europe and America had to sell. As there was at first little to sell in exchange, im- ports were heavily in excess of exports and gold was drained out of the coimtry to meet the unfavorable balance of trade. But the plucky people persistently continued their policy, and gradually the tide began to turn. To-day, Japan has great machine-shops, mills, foundries, shipyards, and manu- facturing establishments of all kinds, equipped with the best modem machinery. More than 200 shipbuilding yards turn out hundreds of vessels yearly, three of them — ^the Mitsu-Bishi Dockyard and Engine Works of Nagasaki ; the Kawasaki Docking Company, Ltd., of Kobe; and the Uraga Dock Company of Tokyo Bay — bemg among the largest and best-equipped in the world. The latest Japan Year- Book shows that since 1914 private yards for the construc- tion of steamships of more than 1,000 gross tons have in- creased their capacity two and one-half times. In a recent year 200,453 gross tons of merchant shipping were launched. The number of factories increased from 125 in 1883 to 20,000 in 1917. The Japanese not only supply their own needs, but they have entered into vigorous competition with England, Germany, and the United States for the conamerce of the world. They are making bicycles, guaranteed to be equal to ours, for twelve dollars. They are turning out matches at a price that is closing the Asiatic market to Western fac- tories. They can deliver sashes, doors, blinds, and wooden- ware in North and South America at so low a rate that 280 THE MASTERY OF THE EAR EAST American manufacturers would be driven out of business if they were not protected by a tariff. Special attention has been given to the manufacture of cotton yam and cloth. In the old days, the yam was spun by hand and the cloth made on hand-looms in the homes of the people. But in 1865, the progressive Prince Shi- madzu imported machinery from England and started at Kagoshima the first factory m Japan to spin and weave cotton by steam-power. His 6,000 spindles attracted wide attention and within a few years other factories were erected. By 1880, the business of cotton-manufacture had assumed considerable proportions. In 1897 American manufacturers besought a committee of Congress to protect them against the competition of the Japanese, and a little later Edward xAtkinson predicted that in the course of a few years thei Japanese would be able to supply the increasing wants of the modem world. Over 500,000 weavers were employed in 1895, and the growth since then has been so rapid that, in addition to supplying the home market, Japan in a single year exported nearly a hundred million dollars' worth of manufactured cotton goods. The Asiatic market for cotton cloth is almost unlimited. The millions of people in Korea and Manchuria wear cotton garments the year around. Only the rich wear silk, and their number is relatively small. The staple garment is made of heavy, cheap, cotton sheeting, which is bought unbleached and uncolored. It is then bleached if used in Korea, and if used in Manchuria is colored by the native dyers and made up into the various garments which the people wear. With the exception of the wealthy and official classes, every man, woman, and child wears these cotton garments. Not a yard of that cloth is manufactured in Korea or Manchuria, nor did a pound of cotton grow there. What business men call "the piece-goodc trade" is therefore very great. The American Government sent Special Agent W. A. Graham Clark to Manchuria in 1906 to inquire into trade conditions, and in his report he said: " Manchuria is a very important market for American flour, JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 281 oil, tobacco, etc., and especially for American piece goods. It is the only section of China in which American piece goods practically monopolize the market. . . . The trade of Manchuria is of more importance to the United States than to any other nation, with the possible exception of Japan." Desire to retain and enlarge this trade was one of the chief reasons which led Secretary of State John Hay to urge the poHcy of "The Open Door." Of course the Japanese want that trade themselves, and they are getting it. While they do not grow very much cotton, they are encouraging its cultivation. Meantime, their subsidized steamers and government railways brmg cotton to their factories and take the manufactured product to the foreign market. The goods are sold locally through Japanese tradesmen, who swarm in Korea and Manchuria, and who can live more cheaply and are content with smaller profits than white men. In these circumstances, it is not surprising that the Japanese control these great markets. Nor are Korea and Manchuria their only objectives. The garment of blue cotton sheeting is the well-nigh uni- versal dress throughout the whole of China. While southern China is adapted to the cultivation of cotton and produces considerable quantities, northern China does not grow enough to be a serious factor in the situation, nor have the Chinese yet applied themselves to modern methods of cot- ton-manufacture on any considerable scale. The Chinese market is therefore one of enormous possibiHties for the piece-goods trade. Japanese are after it, and the German, Englishman, and American find them a competitor not to be despised. Substantially the same statements may be made regarding Siam, the Philippines, India, and Burma, and the Dutch islands. The hundreds of millions of people in these countries are also wearers of cotton which they buy in the piece. Their soil and climate are better adapted to the raising of cotton than the colder regions of Japan, Korea, and Manchuria. A good deal of it is raised, but compara- tively Httle is manufactured. Japan proposes to do this for them, and she is to-day shipping her cotton cloth and yarn 282 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST not only to Korea, Manchuria, and China, but to Siberia, India, the Phihppines, the Dutch East Indies, the Straits Settlements, Australia, and the Hawaiian Islands. The United States formerly had a generous share of the North China trade, but the Japanese developed their trade with such vigor and success that the National City Bank of New York announced in Februaiy, 1917, that in the short space of three years Japan had practicall}^ eliminated the United States as an exporter of cotton cloths to China, exports in 1916 having fallen to less than $200,000. In the same year Japan poured in cotton products to the value of nearly $60,000,000. Within thirty years following 1880, the foreign trade of Japan increased 1,419 per cent, and it has been mounting steadily since then. Japan buys most heavily abroad raw cotton and wool, iron and steel ingots, bars, rods and plates, pipes and fittings, machinerj?^, tin plates, leather, kerosene, paraffine, lead, rubber, paper and paper-pulp, and food-sup- plies of various kinds. She sells in largest quantities raw and manufactured silk, wool and cotton goods, straw and hemp braids, porcelain, earthenware, and bean-oil. The difficulty of securing money, although very serious for a time, has now passed. The Japan of to-day has become so prosperous that her national credit is good in the banking circles of the world. Her currency, which a generation ago was as chaotic as China's, is now on a gold basis. There are 1,442 ordinary banks and 654 savings-banks. The leading institutions, Hke the Bank of Japan, the Yokohama Specie Bank, the Japanese Industrial Bank, and others that might be mentioned, have a recognized standing not only in Asia but in Europe and America. Modem industrial Japan can be best studied in Osaka, although scores of other places have also become important. The growth of Osaka has been prodigious. Its population in 1898 was 506,000, but to-day it is 1,387,366. Long be- fore our train reached it, we saw the paU-like smoke of its factories, and as we drew nearer tall chimneys were in evi- JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 283 dence on every side. Articles of wide variety are manu- factured here. One finds wool and cotton factories^ seed- oil mills, brick-yards, cement-works, match-factories, and dozens of plants of other kinds. Special permits were necessary to visit the establishments I wanted to see, but they were obtained without difficulty, and, taking jinrikishas (which by the way were more ex- pensive there than in any other city in Japan), we rode through the busy streets, crowded with shops full of ma- chinery, hardware, and staple goods of aU kinds, to a great woollen-factory. One vast room contained 1,600 weaving- machines, managed by 800 women and girls, each attending to two machines. The racket of countless shuttles was in the air and innumerable whirling belts confused the eye. Other hundreds of men and women were employed in the winding, dyeing, and printing departments. The machinery was of EngHsh and French make, and the wool came from Australia by way of France, where it was cleaned and carded, the factory paying 2.15 yen for a kilogram of wool. The whole plant was thoroughly modern in its appointments — spacious brick buildings, improved machinery, everything apparently that science could suggest and money procure. The Japanese owner had travelled widely in Europe and America, and was reputed to be an intelligent, progressive, and well-informed man. But in a comer of the factory yard I found a shrine con- taining a stone fox on a pedestal. My courteous Japanese guide from the firm's office informed me, in answer to a question, that the fox was the guardian of the factory, that the owner worshipped it, and that once a year a festival of the employees and their families was held in honor of the fox ! Nor was this factory an exception. Most of the great factories in Osaka had similar shrines to Reynard. This significant fact is respectfully commended to those well- meaning gentlemen in America who are fond of telling us that civihzation should precede Christianity and prepare the way for it. All that Japanese manufacturer's knowledge 284 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and appropriation of the most highly civihzed appliances of the modern world did not prevent him from superstitiously bowing down to a stone fox. Several other cities illustrate the new commercial era in Japan, to a lesser degree mdeed, but in a no less interesting way. Nagoya, for example, not only produces the exqui- site artistic articles of old Japan, to which I have referred on a preceding page, but also such modern staples as rail- way-cars, textile fabrics, and other useful articles. The population of the city has leaped from 160,000 in 1889 to nearly half a million, and its ambitious inhabitants hustle for it as energetically as if they were Yankees. When one considers the neglect of trade by feudal Japan until a few decades ago, he is amazed by the skill and per- sistence with which the new Japan is striving for mastery in the markets of the world. It is not easy for the white races to compete with them. They dominate the trade of Manchuria and a large part of the trade of central China and of the Pacific Ocean. They are competing with foreign and Chinese steamship-lines far up the Yang-tze River, , planting their colonies in every port city of the Far East, and running their steamships to Europe, the United States, India, South Africa, Australia, and South America. The Japanese are skilful in gettmg trade, and American merchants might well learn a lesson from them. They send their agents to the leading towns of a coimtry to make careful inquiry about the kind of goods that the people want, including quality, color, price, and size of package. For example, the Korean, in order to make his pecuHar garment to advantage, demands white cotton cloth eighteen inches wide. The Western exporter is apt to ignore this, and the consequence is that the Korean does not buy his cloth as there would be waste in cutting it. Japanese firms do not attempt to change the Korean sentiment but make the cloth of the desired width. Then they pack the goods in packages convenient in size and weight for handling by porters and for transportation on the backs of ponies and bullocks; while the more ignorant or careless foreign mer- JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 285 chant ships in cases or bales so large and heavy that they must be repacked before the goods can be carried into the interior. The Korean, too, wants his cotton very strong in order to stand the pounding of Korean laundiy methods. The flimsy stuff that the foreigner sells quickly goes to pieces in washing. The shrewd Japanese, by careful attention to these details, gets the trade as he deserves to, while the white merchant curses the alleged stupidity of the Korean and "the trickery" of the Japanese. The advantages of Japan in commercial rivalry with other nations are numerous. Control of transportation lines by land and sea, government subsidies, and, in the trade with Asia, short haul are very important factors. The Japanese are so near to the great markets of the mainland that they can fill an order from almost any of the principal cities in Korea, lower Manchuria, and eastern China within a week or ten days. Labor is so cheap in Japan that the cost of production is much less than in Europe and the United States, and prices can be kept low consistently with good profits. The strain of longer hours and the lower scale of living sag efiiciency below the standard of the American working men; but the supply is abundant and the toilers are driven hard. The Japanese people, moreover, move as a unit in fm-ther- ing their commercial ambitions. Several of the great enter- prises of modem Japan are controlled either directly or in- directly by the government. In some instances, the govern- ment owns them outright; in other instances, high officials and members of the imperial family are heavy stockholders. By the railway-nationalization law and railway-purchase law of March, 1906, the government acquired all the lines in the country with the exception of a few of relatively small importance. Payment was made by pubHc loan bonds aggregating nearly $250,000,000. The street-car lines in Tokyo are owned by the city, and government ownership of pubHc utihties is far more conmion than in America. The nation as a whole rules in commercial as well as in government affairs. The business man does not have to 286 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST fight alone for foreign trade, as the American tradesman must. He has the backing of the countiy. AUied indus- tries support him. Shipping companies give him eveiy possible advantage. He is, to use an American term, a part of an immense "trust," only the trust is a government instead of a corporation. Take, for example, the periodical excitement in the United States regarding the alleged purpose of Japan to secure a foothold on Magdalena Bay, Mexico. A Japa- nese writer declares that any effort of this kind, if made, would have no political significance but would be merely an instance of a business corporation obtaining an ordinary lease for purely commercial puiposes such as an American corporation might seek in some Asiatic country. This is an excellent technical reply, but it is only technical. Ameri- cans have no such national solidarity as the Japanese and their government has no such relation to their business ventures. Every one knows that when an American firm secures a lease in Asia, the arrangement has no political significance whatever either present or prospective, that the government of the United States does not work through the commercial ventures of its citizens, and that beyond giving half-hearted and perhaps inefficient protection in case of attack upon life or property the government will not con- cern itself with the interests of its citizens abroad. When, however, a great Japanese company leases harbor and shore rights in a foreign country, the lease is virtually tantamount to a government one, and it may be controlled as such at any time the government chooses. While, therefore, it may be literally correct to state that the Japanese Govern- ment is not tryuig to secure a base at Magdalena Bay, and that only a conmiercial company's lease is contemplated, the American people are quite right in giving the reported effort a political meaning which would not attach to the effort of an American corporation to lease a harbor in Japan, which, by the way, the Japanese Government would never permit. The principal steamship-lines are so liberally subsidized JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 287 by the goveniment and hire their seamen at such low wages that they can carry freight at rates that are impos- sible for American-owned steamships which have no sub- sidies and are obliged by law to employ a considerable por- tion of white men who demand reasonable wages. The result is that the carrying trade of the Pacific is in Japanese hands. The Merchant Marine League of San Francisco, in March, 1917, sponsored a statement by Mr. Louis Getz to the effect that the Nipponese steamship companies are permitted to charge foreigners whatever they please for moving freight, but are rigidly held down to a small margin of profit in dealing with Japanese shippers; that the freight on a cargo of beans from San Francisco to Manila is twenty dollars a ton in a subsidized Japanese ship ; but that if the same cargo is consigned to Kobe or Yokohama the freight charges are ten dollars a ton. A comparison of the rates charged for fifteen kinds of staple goods revealed that the citizens of Japan pay no higher freight rate for their neces- sities now than before the war, while the citizens of China and the Philippine Islands pay rates a hundred per cent higher. I heard much criticism of Japanese commercial methods. European and American business men spoke with great bitterness of their imfairness. They alleged that Japanese firms obtain railway rebates; that transportation-lines are so managed that Japanese firms have their freight promptly forwarded, while foreign firms are subject to ruinous delays; that foreign labels and trade-marks are placed upon in- ferior goods so that it is difficult to sell a genuine brand to an Asiatic as the latter believes that he can get the same brand from a Japanese at a lower price. They also alleged that foreign traders in Manchuria are compelled to pay fuU duties upon all goods, but that the Japanese, through their absolute control of the only railway, are able to evade the customs. It was said that of $12,000,000 worth of Japa- nese goods which went into Dairen in the year preceding my visit only $3,000,000 worth paid duty. For a long time Japanese goods were poured into Manchuria at Antimg, on 288 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the Yalu River. Then foreign Powers advised the Chinese to place an inspector of the imperial Chinese customs at Antung. The Japanese could not oppose this, but they tried to have a Japanese inspector chosen. An American in the customs service, however, was appointed. His ex- perience in endeavoring to enforce the laws against the Japanese, if it is ever published, will make what Horace Greeley would have called "mighty interesting reading." The rage and chagrin of European and American business men in the Far East can be imagined. A disgusted foreigner declared to me that there is not a white man in the Far East, except those who are in the employ of the Japanese, who are friendly to them, and that their dominant charac- teristics are "conceit and deceit." He denied not only the honesty but even the courage of the Japanese, insisting that the capture of Port Arthur was not due to the bravery of the assailants but to the incompetence of the defenders. He said that the Russian soldiers were as heroic as any in the world but that their officers were drunkards and de- bauchees; that the War Department, which should have sustained them, was rotten with corruption; that at the battle of Liao-yang both Russian and Japanese generals gave the order for retreat at about the same time, each feel- ing that the battle was lost; but that the Russian regiments received their order first, and that as the Japanese saw them retreat they moved forward. He held that the anti- Japa- nese agitation in the public schools of San Francisco was secretly fomented and made an international incident by the Japanese themselves, in order to divert attention from what they were doing in Manchuria; and more to the same effect. I have cited these opinions as they are illustrative of many that I heard in the Far East. I need hardly say that I regard them as unjust. Their very bitterness indicates the prejudice which gave birth to some of them and added exaggeration to others. Even if they were true, the Japa- nese would simply be doing what it is notorious that some American corporations have often done. Rebates, adul- JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 289 teration, evasion of customs, short weight, unfair crushing of competitors, and kindred methods are not so unfamiliar to Americans that they can consistently lift hands of pious horror when they hear of them in Asia. The fact is that white traders until recently had pretty much their own way in the Far East. While some of them were men of high character and fair dealing, others cajoled and bullied and threatened and bribed the Asiatic to their hearts' content and their pockets' enrichment. They domi- nated the markets, charged what prices they pleased, and reaped enormous profits. When they got into trouble with local authorities they called upon their home governments to help them out of their scrapes. Now the white man finds himself face to face with an Asiatic who can play the same game and with all the odds in his favor. The Japanese want those rich markets for themselves. They are going after them and getting them. It is rather late in the day for white men to go into paroxysms of grief and indignation over commercial methods which they themselves have long practised. I do not mean that such methods should be condoned in the Japanese or any one else, and I gladly add that the American and British firms now engaged in the Asiatic trade include many men of the best business t^npe and of high personal character. I am simply calling attention to the fact that the Japanese are a strong, alert, aggressive people who have precisely those ambitions for supremacy which characterize white men. It is unfortunately true that the general tone of commercial morality in Japan has been distinctly lower than in Western nations. This was proba- bly due to the fact that, until comparatively recent years, business was largely in the hands of a low class of Japanese. Trading was long regarded as beneath the dignity of a gentleman. In the old feudal days, the knightly classes de- voted themselves to arms and despised traders as heartily as the ancient Jews despised the publicans. Besides, the priests of the old rehgions of Japan ignored the relation of religion to conduct and did not educate the popular mind 290 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST to that regard for truth which Christianity inculcates. As a consequence, the mercantile classes were chiefly recruited from men whose unscrupulous greed was proof against the contempt of their fellows — ^men who had no standing to be sacrificed, and whose trickery and dishonesty justified the ill repute in which they were popularly held. The notorious Doshisha scandal illustrated the resultant trouble to the foreigner. The title to the fine plant of this college of the American Board of Commissioners for For- eign Missions was vested in Japanese directors who held the property in trust for the American Board. But to the consternation of the friends of missions, the directors re- fused to acknowledge the rights of the real owners, and in February, 1898, actually repealed an "irrevocable" con- stitutional provision that Christianity should always be the basis of instruction, banished religious teaching, and not only made the institution completely secular, but allowed anti-Christian addresses in the chapel. Protests were unavailing. Appeals to honor were received with in- creduhty. For a long time the Japanese could not be made to understand that they had committed an unrighteous breach of faith, and it was only after the most persistent efforts that the college was restored to a Christian basis. The Japanese long paid the penalty of the distrust which the Doshisha affair engendered, especially as many Japa- nese merchants guilelessly acted on the same principle. During my first visit a merchant refused to accept a large consignment of goods because the price had fallen since he had placed the order, and I was told that a foreigner could not always depend upon the delivery of goods which he had bought of the Japanese, if the price had risen. When feudalism was abohshed and the daimios and samurai were obHged to adapt themselves to the changed conditions of a society in which men had to earn their own living or starve, they naturally found military, naval, and civil offices more congenial than business, and their training fitted them for an eflSciency in war and government which quicldy brought Japan to the front in international affairs. JAPAN'S COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT 291 as the Russians learned to their cost. After a time capable men realized that captains of industiy rank as high in the modem world as generals and admu-als, and render as valu- able service to their country, and that if Japan expected to take a place among strong and progressive nations, a due proportion of her best men must become bankers, manufac- turers, and railwaj^ and steamship managers. To-day many of Japan's firms are managed by men of unquestioned probity and reliability, and the old gibe about Chinese tellers in Japanese banks has lost its point. Modem Japan is sensitive to considerations of business honor, and is out- spoken in condemning fraud. The Jiji Shimpo, an influen- tial joimial in Tokyo, had a strong editorial on this subject in July, 1916, and the Japanese Consul-General at Bombay, India, frankly declared in a report : "Although I am confident that the credit of Japanese merchants in general is not so low as is represented by a small section of the foreign merchants, yet it is to be deplored as an indisputable fact that there is one sort of short-sighted dishonest Japanese merchants who are always eager to obtain a temporary profit just before their eyes, who resort to extremely detestable and crafty expedients. They will send samples of goods far superior in quality in comparison with the price quoted, and when they receive orders according to these samples, they never manufacture goods equal to the samples in quality, but manufacture and ship inferior goods suitable to the price." ^ Evidently intelligent Japanese are learning well the les- son that Western business men have learned frcm lara ex- perience — ^that a reputation for trustworthiness is the most valuable asset that a commercial house can have, and that the merchant who deals fairly with his customers prospers best in the long run. Japan has great commercial houses that are as honestly and capably managed as houses of corresponding rank in Europe and America, and their representatives in the metropolitan cities of other lands are men of unchallenged character and ability. 1 Quoted in the Japan Weekly Chronicle, July 3, 1916. CHAPTER XVIII THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN The mighty democratic movement of the modern world has not failed to affect Japan. No nation in this era can wholly escape its influence. Whether it comes slowly or rapidly, peacefully or violently, come it does. John Vis- count Morley in his Recollections weU says that "alike with those who adore and those who detest it, the domi- nating force in the living mind of Europe for a long gen- eration after the overthrow of the French monarchy in 1830 has been that marked way of looking at things, feeling them, handling them, judging main actors in them, for which, with a hundred kaleidoscopic turns, the accepted name is Lib- eralism. . . . Respect for the dignity and worth of the individual is its root. It stands for pursuit of social good against class interest or dynastic interest. It stands for the subjection to human judgment of all claims of external authority, whether in an organized church, or in more loosely gathered societies of believers, or in books held sacred. In lawmaking it does not neglect the higher characteristics of human nature, it attends to them first." This force has banished kings from North and South America, France, and Portugal; wrested power from throne and aristocracy in Great Britain; convinced sovereigns in Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Italy, and Greece that they must walk carefully as constitutional rulers; overturned autocratic government in Russia, and, aided by the invincible armies and navies of the free nations of the West, it has wrought the downfall of the haughty German HohenzoUerns and Austrian Hapsburgs. The race is emerging once for all from the stage of develop- 292 AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 293 ment in which, irrespective of personal qualifications, a few persons can be permitted to arrogate to themselves the right to rule as they please millions of their fellow men because they imagine themselves to be divinely appointed rulers by virtue of descent from ancestors, some of whom were dissolute idlers and most of whom, if compelled to earn their own living, would never have become anything more than clerks behind the ribbon counters of department stores. The few really great kings, like Albert of Belgium, do not need the trappings of inherited royalty, for they would have risen to eminence if they had been bom in cabins. A decade ago one might have supposed that Asia would be the last to reconstruct governments on the basis of the rights of the people. But to the amazement of mankind, the openmg decades of the twentieth century saw the ground- swell of humanity beginning to manifest itself even in that age-old citadel of despotism. Persia and Turkey have seen the begiimings of constitutional government, poor and weak beginnings, travesties of freedom indeed, but nevertheless marking the inauguration of a new era. India is seething with the spirit of unrest. It was strenuously demanding a larger measure of self-government before the outbreak of the European War, and the assistance that the Indian princes gave to Great Britain in that titanic struggle was undoubtedly influenced in some degree by the expectation that they would be repaid by liberal concessions after the war. China has amazed the world by overthrowing her dynasty and estabhshing a repubhc, cariying through that stupendous revolution in an incredibly brief period and with less loss of hfe than attended a single battle of the European War. It is true that Yuan Shih Kai became a dictator under the title of President, but it was profoundly significant that the republican idea had gained such a hold upon the imagination of the Chinese people that when, December 12, 1915, Yuan Shih Kai announced that he would become Emperor, rebellion immediately broke out and became so formidable that even that man of blood and iron found it 294 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST prudent to bow before the storm. January 23, 1916, he deemed it the part of wisdom to say that he would post- pone his coronation indefinitely; and March 23 he declared that he had decided to decline the "proffered" crown. But he had lost the confidence of the coimtry and stirred up a protest which made his position so impossible that his death, June 6 of that year, was generally regarded as most opportime. China has a weary road to travel before the discordant elements of her vast population settle them- selves into a compact and well-governed repubMc; but the monarchy has gone beyond possibility of recovery. It was inevitable that Japan should feel the impulse of this rising tide of popular will. When one considers the history and social and political organization of the Japa- nese people he is not surprised to find that the modern movement has made rather slow headway thus far. Feudal- ism was not abolished till 1871, and it was not till 1889 that the Constitution was formally promulgated. It was a great day for Japan when the fii'st Imperial Diet convened, November 29, 1890. It consists of a House of Peers and a House of Representatives. The former comprises 379 members as follows: 12 princes of the blood royal, 13 other princes and 33 marquises, all of whom have seats by virtue of their rank; 17 counts, 68 viscounts and 66 barons, chosen by the noblemen of these orders; 122 men of distinguished position appointed by the Emperor, and 48 of the largest taxpayers in the Empire. The House of Representatives is a popular body consisting of 381 members who are elected by male Japanese subjects not less than tw^enty-five years of age and paying a direct tax of ten yen or more. The House did not immediately find itself. Gradually, however, its members began to give voice to their opinions and even to criticise the a,cts or policies of the Cabinet. But the mental attitude developed by centuries of implicit obedience to feudal chieftains is not readily changed. The surprising thing is that the popular will has foimd any ex- pression at all within so short a period. To-day, debates in the Diet are often animated and sometimes sharply critical AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 295 of the government, and the daily and weekly press is out- spoken. But ruling classes everywhere do not Hghtly yield their prerogatives. They beHeve with the German philosopher Hegel that "the people is that portion of the state which does not know what it wills/' and with the Prussian Minister von Rochow, who spoke of "the limited intelHgence of sub- jects." In Japan, the ruling class has the power in its own hands. The aristocratic House of Peers is at a far remove from the people and wholly beyond their reach. The ad- ministration of the government is vested in a Cabinet of ten Ministers of State, including the Premier, appointed by the Emperor. A Privy Council with a President, Vice- President and twenty-four Councillors advises with the Em- peror in matters of importance. This organization of the state is a great advance upon the feudahsm which it supplanted, and it gives Japan a re- markably capable and efficient government. But modem Japan can hardly be called democratic. A nation which regards its sovereign as a ruler by divine right and a demi- god to be worshipped, and whose real government is not in the hands of any constitutional body or person but of a small group of "Elder Statesmen "—such a nation is not yet under the sway of those conceptions of popular govern- ment which are current in the most advanced Western nations. These Elder Statesmen, or Genro, constitute a body which should not be overlooked by any one who wishes to under- stand Japanese political affairs. They have no legal status. "They are not recognized in the Japanese Constitution nor in the laws of Japan." ^ They are merely a Httle group of old men of high rank who have become trusted advisers of the Emperor. The prerogatives of the crown are great, and they are exercised as the Elder Statesmen "advise." Theoretically the Cabinet represents the throne; prac- tically the Elder Statesmen represent it. The Japanese Cabinet does not wield the power of the British Cabinet. 1 The Tokyo Ashai. 296 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Changes in ministerial personnel seldom effect changes in national policy, for the Emperor remains and he does what the Genro tell him to do. The latter, therefore, are really the supreme governing body. Ministers rise and fall, but the Elder Statesmen abide, independent of Cabinet and Diet ahke and beyond the reach of either. If the official bodies do not agree with the Genro, so much the worse for the official bodies. Seldom mindful of the opinion of the people, usually in- deed defiant of it, there was a time in the early months of 1914 when the Genro deemed it prudent to do what astute poHtical managers in America occasionally do — give out- ward recognition to a wave of popular feeling by acquiescing in the choice of a popular idol for high oflSce, in the hope that if they cannot manage him directly they may be able to do so by their control of the agencies thi'ough which he will be obliged to work. Scandals in governmental depart- ments under Prime Minister Yamamoto stung the nation to the quick, and in the turmoil the Cabinet went to pieces. The Elder Statesmen chose o'ne "trusted" man after an- other to form a new Cabinet, but no one of them could succeed. The situation was becoming serious when the great popularity of Marquis Shigenobu Okuma and the belief that his advanced age would prevent him from being active, at any rate for any considerable period, led the Genro to offer him the post. They did this with many misgivings, for Okuma was not a member of "The Old Guard " but was the acknowledged head of the constitutional party. He stood as strongly as any one for the throne and for Im- perial Japan, but with due recognition of the voice of the nation as expressed through the Imperial Diet. But the people regarded him as the "Grand Old Man" of Japan, and popular demand for him became too loud to be pru- dently resisted at a time when "The Old Guard" had been thrown on the defensive by disclosures of corruption which could not be excused. Okuma intensified both the misgivings of the Elder Statesmen and the hopes of the constitutionaHsts by the AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 297 vigor with which he undertook reforms. He beheved that a programme of peaceful development of internal social and economic conditions was more important than an aggres- sive foreign and militaristic policy. Unfortunately, the outbreak of the European War and the resultant changes in the Far Eastern situation worked a corresponding change in Okuma's policy. Foreign affairs quickl}'- took precedence of internal ones. Questions of home admuiistration fell into the background before Great Britain's request to drive the Germans out of the province of Shantung on the main- land, the opportunit}^ to seize the German islands in the Pacific and thus eliminate a powerful rival to Japan's policy of supremacy in the Far East, and, most attractive of all, the chance to strengthen Japan's influence in China while the European Powers were so preoccupied at home that they could interpose no effective objection. These developments necessarily brought the imperiaHstic militaiy party to the front again and compelled Okuma to work with it. And so the world saw the interesting spec- tacle of the venerable advocate of popular rights and the precedence of internal affairs working hand in hand with the party which deemed the time propitious for estabhshing Japan's supremacy as the overlord of eastern Asia. This situation was not altogether agreeable to him and, together with the burden of great age, criticisms of his handhng of relations with China, and an election scandal which in- volved his Minister of Home Affairs and weakened the in- fluence of the Cabinet, led him to the decision to resign his post as Prime Minister. It was significant of the power which the Elder Statesmen held that, before the public announcement of his retirement, October 4, 1916, he re- spectfully asked permission of the Elder Statesmen, and that when he recommended Viscount Takaaki Kato as his successor, in accordance with the known wishes of the Diet, the Elder Statesmen calmly disregarded the recom- mendation and the popular will and chose Viscount Seiki Terauchi, then Governor-General of Korea. This selection illustrated not only the ascendancy of the 298 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Elder Statesmen, but a trend in the government of Japan which is distinctively the reverse of democratic. The Elder Statesmen at this time were Prince Yamagata, Prince Oyama, and Marquis Matsukata, Prince Yamagata being the dominant figure. These men, of great ability and force of character, were strongly of the opinion that the Cabinet should be responsible to the throne rather than to the Diet, which really meant that it be responsible to them. Marquis Okuma, however, was the head of the party which held that the Cabinet should be accountable to the Diet, and through that body to the people. The issue, therefore, was really between autocracy and democracy. And autocracy won. Great was the satisfaction in army circles and equally great the dissatisfaction in other quarters. The popular press, not only in America and Great Britain but in Japan, was outspoken in opposition. The objection was not so much to Terauchi personally as to the autocratic and mili- taristic party that he represented. The Tokyo Ashai sharply said: "The Genro should have respected the opin- ion of the Premier and should have paid attention to his recommendation of the leader of the majority as his suc- cessor." The Tokyo Nichi-nichi boldly declared: "There is no doubt that a Terauchi ministry will be opposed by the nation. The question is whether or not the government of Japan is to be conducted to forward the wishes of the people and whether the spirit of the Constitution is to be fulfilled." The Japan Advertiser added : " The Elder States- men have once more conferred on Japan a Cabinet devoid of an}^ pretense of connection with representative institu- tions. Once more it is demonstrated that all the appur- tenances of popular government with which we are familiar — ^the voters, registers, the elections, the legislators, and the parties — are a Western fagade run up to modernize an old- style personal-government edifice of which the interior arrangements are uniquely Japanese." A^Tiile the autocracy of Japan is almost as absolute as was the autocracy of Russia prior to the revolution, it is a AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 299 more enlightened and efficient autocracy, and it put foward a good representative in Viscount Terauchi. He was an able, efficient, and masterful man, one of the outstanding personalities of Asia. He was, moreover, honest, patriotic and well-meaning. But he was an autocrat in every fibre of his being. A field-marshal in the army, he was a soldier by training, profession, and temperament — a great soldier and a good autocrat — ^but pre-eminently a soldier and an auto- crat as distinguished from a civilian and a man of the people. He wanted to do what he deemed to be for the best interests of his country. When he made mistakes they were not those of intention or corruption. He sincerely beheved that Japan can best fulffi its high destiny as a Power of the first class, and as the leader and guardian of eastern Asia against further aggressions of Western nations, by having a strong centralized government that is free to act without being obliged to obey a popular assembly, whose members might not act with adequate knowledge or under a due sense of responsibility. A Samurai of the Choshu Clan, to which Prince Yamagata and Prince Ito also belonged, born on February 5, 1852, he was a soldier from his youth. After his graduation from the Military Academy at Osaka, he was commissioned a subHeutenant in 1871. He re- ceived his baptism of fire in the civil war of Kyushu, in 1878, in which he received a wound which permanently disabled his right arm. The post of military attache to the Japanese legation in Paris, from 1882 to 1885, gave him a knowledge of European military and diplomatic methods. After his return to Japan he became professor in the Military Academy. He was a Major-General in the China-Japan War. Then he was appointed Inspector- General of Military Education and Vice-Chief of the Gen- eral Staff. He was Minister of War in the Cabinet formed by Count Katsura, in 1902. He foresaw the coming strug- gle with Russia, and it was due in no small part to his re- markable ability and energy that the Japanese army was so well prepared for its victorious progress through Korea and Manchuria. The grateful government made him a 300 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Viscount. When, in 1911, the strongest available man was sought to succeed Prince Ito as Governor-General of Korea, Terauchi, still Minister of War, was chosen for that high office, which is to the Japanese what the Vice-Royalty of India is to the British, and which, in Terauchi' s case, carried with it membership in the Supreme Military Coun- cil of the Empire. His five years' administration of that great dependency is discussed in other chapters. From this post he was summoned by the Elder Statesmen to become the Prime Minister of Japan. He died November 3, 1919. The new Premier early took occasion to assure pubhc opinion in other countries of his pacific intentions by say- ing in a published statement: "Since there seems to have been apprehension in some American circles as to the course I shall follow, I am willing and anxious to say that I have no desire to govern with the sword. One who expects that of me does not xmderstand the tasks I have performed, nor the spirit in which I performed them." It is only fair for his critics to credit him with sincerity. He is a straight- forward man and he speaks frankly. Like some other great soldiers, he prefers peace to war. But his point of view is that of the army and the court rather than that of democ- racy in the British and American sense. Viscount, now Count, Terauchi was a strong Premier, but he was guided by the opinion of the Genro and not by that of the Diet as the representative of the nation. He befieved that power should come from above and not from below, that the court and nobility should rule and that the people should obey. He was not a Gladstone but a Bismarck; with this differ- ence, that back of him were the all-powerful Elder States- men to whom even he had to bow. Japan diu-ing his prem- iership was efficiently governed, but the government was in the hands of the party which stood for absolutism and an imperialistic poHcy in the Far East. If Western nations imagined that they could henceforth decide Asiatic matters to suit themselves, as they had been doing in the past, they were reckoning without prudent regard for a Japan led by the masterful Yamagata and the resolute Terauchi. AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 301 A well-known Japanese in America, in defending his native land before an audience which was cheering the world's growing demand for popular government; rightly argued that "democracy is no synonym for republic." But the situation in Japan hardly bears out his further statement that; if the former is rightly defined, "present- day Japan is as much a democracy as the United States, England, France, Italy and the newly formed democracy of Russia." It is true that Marquis Okuma himseK said to a newspaper reporter after his retirement from office: "Japan is not ruled by a small group of politicians, or by a minis- try, but by pubKc opinion. It has been so for many years." ^ Perhaps he felt that patriotism made it desirable to speak in this way to the representative of a foreign newspaper. But he had said to his own people on a former occasion: "Certainly it does not appear to be the pohcy of Japanese diplomacy to voice the views of the people and their rep- resentatives in the Imperial Diet. Our Foreign Office has as a rule overlooked or disregarded pubHc opinion. In most countries the co-operation of pubUc opinion and diplo- matic pohcy is thought to be most conducive to the best interests of the state; but in Japan diplomats are a class apart." ^ The Japan Society Bulletin of New York char- acterized the general election in the spring of 1917 as "a fight for control between the Military Bureaucrats and the Constitutionahsts."^ And "the Military Bureaucrats" prevailed. The attitude of the dominant party was significantly illustrated within a few weeks after the Terauchi Cabinet took office. The Honorable Daikichiro Tagawa, a Chris- tian gentleman of high standing, formerly a member of the Imperial Diet, and for five years one of the two vice- mayors of Tokyo, published three articles in January, 1917, in which he criticised the government in language that would be considered commonplace in America, where the ^ Interview reported in the Christian Herald, Dec. 13, 1916. 2 Reported in the Japan Magazine, Tokyo, June, 1913. » Bulletin of April 30, 1917. 302 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST opponents of the party in power are accustomed to pour out vituperative tirades upon the President and his ad- visers. He compared the method of choosing a premier in Great Britain with the method in Japan; King George selecting the man whom the people desired, and the Emperor the man designated by the Elder Statesmen without regard to the popular will. "The whole Empire," added Mr. Tagawa, "recognizes that the Terauchi Cabinet was formed by the Elder Statesmen rather than by the imperial com- mands. By such means it is futile to think that the people can be made to respect the imperial house. In fact it must be said with regret that the dignity of the imperial house has been not a httle impaired by such procedure." This was held to be lese-majesty, as reflecting upon the Emperor and implying that he, who is of divine origin, is in the same class as King George and the men on thrones in other lands. At the instigation of the Cabinet Mr. Tagawa was arrested and sentenced to be imprisoned for five months and to pay a fine of one hundred dollars. Not only this, but Mr. Kashiwai, editor of the Bummei Hyoron, in which this article appeared, was also arrested and sen- tenced to two months' imprisonment and a fine of sixty dollars. Article XXIX of the Constitution guarantees that "Japanese subjects shall, within the limits of law, enjoy the liberty of speech, writing, pubHcation, pubUc meeting, and association," but these writings were held to be not "within the limits of law." This stem decisiveness was displayed not only toward the press but toward the Imperial Diet itself. In January, 1917, members of the House of Representatives ventured to raise the issue of parliamentary responsibility and a sharp debate ensued, vigorously led by Mr. Yukio Ozaki, leader of the Constitutional party, and Mr. Takashi Inukai, leader of the Kokuminto or National party. BeUevers in democratic institutions in other lands are glad to know that the party of the people is already strong enough in Japan to find bold advocates in the Diet. In this debate, .the tide of opposition to the course of the government rose AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 303 high, and Terauchi found himself confronted with the probabiHty of an adverse vote on a question of confidence in the ministry. He did not flinch an iota. Rising, he de- clared that the situation involved the prosperity of the Empire, and that while he maintained the confidence of the Emperor he could not accept the verdict of the House. Angry members rose to protest, but he stood his ground and demonstrated his power and his willingness to use it by having the Emperor dissolve the Diet January 25. The discomfited members had no alternative but to go home. This occurrence has been construed as supporting the opinion that Carl Crow expressed in his book entitled Japan and America — A Contrast: that Japan is absolutely ruled by a small group of resolute men who dominate the Emperor and the people afike so that the former is a mere puppet in their hands and the latter an ignorant and acquiescent proletariat which is not consulted in any important matter. But this is going too far. The Emperor of Japan is not "a mere puppet." It is true that the organization of the government and the course of affairs make it clear that, however great his constitutional powers may be, these powers are exercised through the Genro and the Premier whom the Genro virtually selects. But high rank among sovereigns must be accorded to the late Emperor, his Im- perial Majesty Mutsuhito, in whose long reign of forty-five years Japan passed from a backward to a progressive na- tion. The present Emperor, his Imperial Majesty Yoshi- hito, the one hundred and twenty-second Emperor of Japan, was bom August 31, 1879, and ascended the throne on the death of his honored father, July 30, 1912. While he is more frequently seen by his subjects than his prede- cessor was, his actual influence in affairs of state cannot yet be definitely appraised as his reign has not been long, and all governmental actions of course reach the pubhc through the Premier or other oflficials. General comment refers to him as a man of excellent character and inten- tions, intelMgent, patriotic, and worthy of the respect of his people. 304 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Nor am I willing to concede that the people of Japan are adequately described as "an ignorant and acquiescent proletariat." It would be unreasonable to expect that the democratic spirit could pervade the people of Japan in sixt}^ years to the extent that it has pervaded Western nations after hundreds of years. It is highly creditable to the Japa- nese that alread}^ they have developed a small group of ex- ceptionally strong and capable leaders to guide the nation through the period of transition. Some of these men, as for example Prince Ito, Marquis Okuma, and Viscount Kato, have high place among the progressive statesmen of the modern era. It is not surprising that long and deeply- rooted absolutism is still incarnated in other equally power- ful men and that the latter have succeeded in retaining the ascendancy for a time. The Japanese will work out the problem of relative pre- eminence in their own way. The issue of democracy versus autocracy is joined there as it has been everywhere else in the modern world. Men in the Island Empire are asking: Do the people exist for the state or the state for the people ? Should the cabinet be responsible to a monarch or to a parHament? Should final supremacy be lodged in an em- peror or in a body chosen by the people ? The parhamentary leader, Mr. Ozaki, said, shortly after an attempt had been made to assassinate him: "To make the situation as clear as possible to the American people, let me say simply that our aim is that the ministers of state who direct the affairs of this Empire shall be chosen with some regard for the make-up of the House of Representatives, which is elected by the people. That is, after all, the essential meaning of our Constitution." This element in the nation is certain to prevail sooner or later, for "the stars in their courses" fight for it. It had become strong enough by the summer of 1918 to make the tenure of Count Terauchi rather precarious, and on Sep- tember 21 he found it expedient to resign. He was suc- ceeded by the Honorable Kei Hara, leader of the Constitu- tional party known as Rikken Seiyukai, originally formed AUTOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY IN JAPAN 305 by Prince Ito, and which had opposed the administration of Terauchi. Prime Muiister Kei Hara was sixty-four years of age, a trained lawyer, an eminent journaHst (editor-in- chief of the Mainichi Shimbun of Osaka), and a man of considerable experience in diplomatic hfe, having served as Consul in Tien-tsin, China, Secretary and Charge d'Af- faires of the embassy in Paris in 1886, Director of the Com- mercial Bureau and Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo in 1895, Minister to Korea, 1896-1897, Minister of Communications, 1900-1901, and Minister of Home Affairs, 1906-1907. He visited Europe and America in 1908-1909, and retm-ned to the Ministry of Home Affairs in 1911, and again in 1913-1914. He was one of Prince Ito's principal supporters in founding the Seiyukai party in 1900, and in 1914 he succeeded Marquis Saionji in its leadership. We may add that the English terms appHed to political parties in Japan: Seiyukai (Liberal), Kenseikai (Con- servative, the result of a fusion in 1913 which supported the Cabinet of Marquis Okmna), and Kokuminto (Nation- alist-Progressive) should not be interpreted too Hterally, as these parties are often Httle more than groups around particular leaders. No one party has a majority, their present strength in the House of Representatives being: Seiyukai 162, Kenseikai 122, Kokuminto 36, Independents 61, total 381. The important point now is that the party of which Mr. Hara is the„ head represents the strongest democratic tendencies. It is a long step from the plat- form of Count Terauchi to that of Mr. Hara. Both men have fine qualities; but the friends of Japan in other lands, while gladly recognizing the great abilities of the former Premier, naturally anticipate with satisfaction the develop- ment of democratic tendencies under the leadership of the latter, if the poHtical kaleidoscope does not soon take a turn that will displace him. He has surrounded himself with men of kindred spirit. The Foreign Minister is Vis- count Y. Uchida, a progressive man who is well and favor- ably known in America, He has had a conspicuous diplo- matic career for a man who is not yet fifty years of age, as 306 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST he has not only had service as Minister of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo, but as Secretary of Legation in Peking and Lon- don, and Ambassador in Vienna and Washington. He knows the modem world. His wife, by the way, is a graduate of Vassar College, New York. The Minister of Home Affairs is Mr. Tokonami, who has visited Europe and America, and who, in 1912, when Vice-Minister of Home Affairs, was so impressed by the necessity of rehgion in a nation's life that he arranged the conference of representa- tives of religions which we have described in another chapter. The outside world should not expect any sudden or de- cisive change in the national policy of Japan. The Seiyu- kai party is absolutely loyal to the traditions of historic Japan and is patriotic to the core. But it is far more democratic in its tendencies than the party that was rep- resented by Viscoimt Terauchi, and it favored co-operation with the United States in the Siberian intervention, which will be discussed in a later chapter. Of the three powerful Elder Statesmen, two are over eighty years of age, and the other has passed seventy. Jn the course of nature, they must soon pass from the stage of human affairs, and it is doubtful whether they wiU have successors of the same type. Democratic sentiment among the Japanese has made striking growth within the last year, and it will surely prevail in time. That influential Japanese, Doctor Dan jo Ebina, has said that "the German system suited the spirit of militarism and imperiaUsm that still obtained in certain quarters, and gave to Japan a philosophy of absolutism which had a fascination for some minds," but that "the defeat of German militarism and imperialism on the battle- fields of Europe means the defeat of these doctrines all the world over." He declares that "the greatest crisis in Japanese history is impending," and that "when this shell of Japanese nationaHsm breaks, the people of this country will become an international people, the universalism of Christ will take the place of Buddhism, and Christianity wiU become the religion of international Japan. "^ 1 Quoted in Millaxd's Review, Shanghai, August 17, 1918. CHAPTER XIX SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS Despite the growing wealth of the nation, the poverty that still prevails among the masses of the common people is illustrated by the statement of the Honorable Yukio Ozaki, a member of the Imperial Diet, that there are only 1,500,000 voters in aU the Empire, although there are 56,000,000 people in Japan proper, and the suffrage is given to all male citizens of twenty-five and over who own prop- erty enough to pay a direct tax of ten yen a year. The tax rate is so high that one does not have to own much property to be required to pay a tax of ten yen. The proportion of the population that is engaged in man- ual labor is large, and its condition is far from satisfactory. Three million seven hundred and seven thousand and eighty- eight families are wholly dependent upon farming for a livelihood, and 1,736,631 other families, although they have some other work, depend in large part upon what they raise from the soil. As Japanese families are prolific, this makes about 40,000,000 people who depend for subsistence either wholly or chiefly upon farming. High fertihzation and in- tensive cultivation make the land very productive and the farmers usually have enough to eat; but as the average farm is only about two and a half acres and the average family is large, the daily fare is not abundant. Meat is seldom eaten, the staple fare consisting of rice, vegetables, and an occasional fish. Few animals can be kept on these tiny plots. Only one farmer in three is said to own a horse or an ox, and men, women, and children toil early and late in doing by hand what an American farmer does by machin- ery. "The day-laborers on the farm receive wages ranging between nine and fifteen cents, though the latter have risen more than 100 per cent during the last fifteen years. With 307 308 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST this meagre income some of the laborers have to support their aged parents, wives, and children. The tenants, whose number bears the ratio of about two to one to that of the proprietors, hve hterally from hand to mouth and cannot always afford even the necessary manure, and the proprietor's profit hardly rises above 5 per cent, while the capital he employs pays an interest of 15 to 30 per cent and his local and central taxes further reduce his income." ^ The laboring classes in the larger towns are considerably worse off than in Western lands. The rapid development of manufacturing has brought great numbers of people into the cities for employment in the mills and factories. These working people are herded in overcrowded sections and their wages are so small that many of them cannot secure suitable food and healthful surroundings. Employees in most of the factories toil twelve hours a day and sometimes sixteen. Many of the factories are poorly ventilated and without safety or sanitary conveniences. Of the 853,864 operatives, 535,297 are females. Multitudes are children, 60 per cent being under twenty years of age, and 8 per cent being httle girls. Many factories hold their girls and young women in virtual slavery, compelling them to live within stockades on such hght food and in such unsanitary condi- tions that tuberculosis rages among them. Official reports show that "while the general death-rate from tubercular diseases is about 10 per cent, the death-rate from the same cause in printing-works and type-foundries is 49 per cent, and in cotton-spinning and weaving factories 35 per cent. The agents who seek operatives for the factories pay httle attention to health and, in competition with one another, do not hesitate to employ even those who are positively ill. When the diseased operatives return to their native villages they spread germs broadcast among healthy people." Of the 200,000 girls who enter the factories each year, 120,000, according to A. M. Pooley, in Japan at the Cross Roads, never return to their homes, but diift from one factory to another till they are broken down or become open or clan- ^ K. Asakawa, The Russo-Japanese Conflict, pp. 5-7. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 309 destine prostitutes; while of the 80,000 who do go back to their families 13,000 are ill.. Strenuous efforts have been made by enlightened Japa- nese in recent years to bring about better industrial condi- tions, and with partial success. Some manufacturers are providing for the welfare of their employees in the most approved modern way. Some good laws are now upon the statute-books. The employment of children under the age of twelve in any heavy and laborious work is forbidden, and also the compelling of boys under fifteen and women of any age to work more than twelve hours a day. But the struggle for existence in overcrowded cities, the pres- sure of competition, the eager desire for profits, the ab- normal demands for increased production caused by the European War, have thus far prevented adequate enforce- ment of legal requirements. Western lands are still far from perfect in this respect; but the condition of working people in Japan is undoubtedly low as compared with that of the corresponding classes in America. Men and women, and especially boys and girls, cannot work twelve hours a day, seven days a week, on poor food, in overcrowded quar- ters, and amid unsanitary surroundings without serious physical, intellectual and moral deterioration.^ Human life has long been held cheap among the Japa- nese. Some peoples who Hghtly value the lives of others are scrupulously careful of their own. But the Japanese do not hesitate to sacrifice their lives on various pretexts. I have discussed in another chapter the mihtary significance of this fact, but we may note it here among the social phe- nomena of the nation. Suicides are common even among the young. According to official statistics, in a recent year 241 youths mider the age of sixteen committed suicide, 801 between sixteen and twenty years of age, and 3,086 between twenty and thirty. An American student who fails to pass his examinations never thinks of killing himself, 1 Cf. Report on Industrial Conditions of Modem Japan, prepared by the Social Welfare Committee of the Conference of Federated Missions, 1916, and Doctor Sydney L. Gulick's Working Women of Japan. 310 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST but every year Japanese students end their lives for this reason. One young man of nineteen years left the follow- ing lines: "Alas I having missed the road to success, I go a sheep into the night. The days of a man's life are but fifty sad years — the end, dust." A favorite place for suicides is the beautiful Kegon Waterfall near Nikko. Doctor Sydney L. Gulick writes that "a brilliant and widely known university graduate flung himself into the river just above the waterfall. His battered body was found a few days later among the rocks six hundred feet below. He left behind a letter, which was published throughout the land and was in substance as follows : ' I have studied all that science and philosophy have to teach about the problem of existence. I have examined all the reHgions for their answers to the problem of human life. Nowhere have I found anjiihing satisfactoiy. I now go into the other world to search for the solution myseK.' Presently another youth did the same thing, and then another, and still another. Police were stationed at the head of the waterfall to stop the tragedy, but without com- plete success. A barricade of stout posts fastened together by iron failed to stop the human cataract over those falls that for a thousand years had been connected with the pessimistic religious traditions of the land. In 1912 no fewer than 248 men and women ended their hves in that tragic way at that single spot. How many had ended their lives in the crater of Asama no records can show." Even maternal love sometimes fails to make a mother cling to her child when she beheves that his honor is in- volved, although the point may concern only a school prize. In his Life of Japan, Mr. Masuji Miyakawa tells us that a Japanese mother would want her son to commit cuicide because he had failed to get a prize at school and another boy had received it. He says that when he was a school- boy in Tokyo, only six years old, "his most faithful school- mate received a medal and he got none; his dear mother t SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 311 then told him he had better commit hari-kari, which even at that yomig age he thought strongly of doing." The social unrest which is creating such a ferment in Western countries has reached Japan, and although its manifestations have not yet appeared on a large scale, they have been prominent enough to indicate that a sig- nificant movement has begun. The government does not permit the kind of labor-unions with which America is famihar, but the principle of collective bargaining is rapidly gaining advocates. The Japanese laborer is not always as docile and submissive as his fathers were. The Japan Ad- vertiser reports that in a recent year there were strikes in- volving 9,000 workmen, but that in the following year there were 180 strikes in which 30,000 men participated. "In olden times," said Mr. Nakashoji, Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, "we very seldom had a labor question. Because of the relations between lords and subjects, sub- jects had to obey their lords. Lately, with the coming in of new ideas, disorder has arisen here and there." ^ During the European War the cost of living rose 80 per cent and, as in other lands, the profits of the enormous in- crease in manufactures and commerce were very unequally distributed. While some men accumulated huge fortunes, the wage-earning classes found that the prices of all neces- saries of fife went up out of all proportion to the gain in their incomes. Wide-spread discontent resulted. In the summer of 1918, the large stores of food which the War Department felt obHged to accumulate for the Siberian ex- pedition, and the hoarding of the remaining rice by greedy speculators who charged exorbitant prices, caused a shortage of this staple which the Japanese deem so essential. The victimized people were not so submissive as they would have been in like circumstances a generation ago. Riots broke out in various parts of the country, and the situation became so serious that the government was forced to buy up all the rice in storage and sell it to the people at reason- able prices. 1 Address, June 12, 1917. 312 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The Yuai Kai, a friendly association of workers, as near a labcff-union as the laws permit, was founded in 1912 and already claims more than 30,000 members. Its President, Mr. Suzukui, visited the United States in 1916 and attended the meetings of the California State Federation of Labor, the International Seamen's Union of America, and the American Federation of Labor, where he was received as a fraternal delegate from Japan and brought into touch with the spirit of that powerful organization. It may not be long before the working men of Japan will secure some of the reforms which their brethren in Western lands have enforced. It is interesting to find that Sociahsm has also made its appearance in Japan. Several teachers in educational in- stitutions, and even in the imperial universities, are known to entertain socialistic views. Those who hold moderate opinions are not disturbed, but some alarm was felt when, in 1910, a band of men, who professed to be SociaHsts but who were more nearly anarchists, were discovered to be plotting against the government. Their leader, Kotoku, and twenty-five of his confederates were promptly arrested and given short shrift. Libraries were searched and every Socialist book and pamphlet was destroyed. Unfortunately, three or four of the plotters claimed to be Christians, and for a time the pubHc was disposed to regard Christianity as the source of Socialism, and therefore to be opposed as the foe of the government, in spite of the fact that nearly all of the criminals were not Christians and that Kotokii was a violent hater of Christianity and the author of a book entitled An Argument for the Efacement of Christ, in which he bitterly arraigned the religion of Jesus as a superstitious fable and the enemy of all freedom. The excitement stirred up by this group of fanatics soon died down, but the au- thorities are keeping their eye on the sociaHstic propaganda, of which Japan, like Europe and Ameiica, has not seen the end. It is gratifying to note the rapid growth of himiane move- ments in Japan. A Red Cross Society, organized in a SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 313 small way in 1877, now enrolls over 2;000,000 members, including the Emperor, the Empress, and many of their most distinguished subjects. Its hospitals, physicians, nurses, and financial resources are prepared to meet almost any emergency. The Japan Society for the Humane Pro- tection of Animals finds congenial soil in a land where Buddhism, at least in theory, opposes the taking of life. The Prison Association of Japan, an influential society started a generation ago at the instigation of Doctor John C. Berry, an American missionary, has given much study to the subject of prison reform, has sent intelligent dele- gates to the meetings of the International Prison Congresses, and has been instrumental in abating some forms of cruel and inhuman punishments. Societies for the protection of children were later in starting, but in recent years large- hearted Japanese have been making earnest efforts to ameliorate the condition of orphans and other neglected waifs. Efforts for the blind have a needy field in a coxm- try where their number is 141 for every 100,000 of the popu- lation, a proportion nearly double that in America and western Europe. Wide is the opportunity in many direc- tions, but the himaane movement in Japan is well imder way and is gaining strength and momentum eveiy year. Intemperance is a more prevalent vice m Japan than the casual visitor realizes, as drinking is usually done in the home at night where the effects are quietly slept off before the next day. Drunkenness is therefore less con- spicuous than in Western lands, where a greater proportion of the drinking is done in public saloons and other places outside of the home and an intoxicated man reels out on the street. Buddhism is a prohibition religion in theory, but its adherents seldom practise it in Japan. While beer has become popular, sake (rice Hquor) is the national bever- age. One hundred and sixty million gallons are -made in an average year, and the revenue tax is a prolific source of income to the government. Protest against this evil is not wanting. A temperance society was started as early as 1875. There are now over two hundred such societies, and 314 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST their membership is rapidly growing. This cause has a powerful advocate in the Honorable Sho Nemoto, a member of the Imperial Diet. The position of woman is undergoing change hke almost everything else in Japan. Happy homes, love between husbands and wives, respect for mothers, and tender care of children have long existed in Japan. "Most entertain- ing things are written by foreigners about marriage forced upon imwilling brides, and even of marriages by purchase," keenly observes Professor Inazo Nitobe. "I may just as truly amuse and instruct my own people with stories about ambitious American parents practically selling their daugh- ters to European nobles, or of the sorrows of 'mariage de convenance' in Europe. There are certainly more oppor- tunities for American girls to marry the men whom they most love, and, vice versa, for men to take to wife girls whom they like best ; , but I doubt whether the proportion of happy unions is very different in the two countries."^ The general fact remains, however, that the status of Japanese women as a class has always been and still is be- low that of men. They were not considered by men, and they did not consider themselves, as equals of the other sex. In a widely circulated volume entitled Great Learning for Women, it is said that "the five worst maladies that affect the female mind are indocility, discontent, slander, jealousy, and silliness. Without doubt these five maladies affect seven or eight out of every ten women." As late as 1871 the Emperor said: "Japanese women are without un- derstanding." The popular notion was that of the Con- fucian maxim : " It is no undesirable thing for a wife to be stupid, whereas a wise woman is more likely to be a curse in a family than a blessing." Daughters were seldom de- sired and, especially among the lower classes, were given scant consideration and often sold to brothel-keepers, or encouraged to go there of themselves. In a striking article in the Shin Nikon for August, 1917, Marquis Okuma wrote: "In early days, the intercourse of 1 The Japanese Nation, p. 163. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 315 men aiid women was little above the animals. . . . Then came Christianity to show the higher path and to give clear, strict teaching about one husband and one wife, which has gradually influenced the world. ... In feudal times women were hardly regarded as human beings of the same kind as men and were too severely restricted. Women ought to be well educated, but it was thought bad for them to know much, so they were instructed in Httle except the duty of submission. They were supposed to exist only for the pleasure and use of men, who laid down the rules which suited themselves. The time has come when those old ways will no longer serve us. . . . Women are demanding social and political equality with men. Now, if this demand arises naturally from circumstances or necessity, well and good; but if it only comes from jealousy of men, or the ambition to be like them, or such shallow motives, it has no value at all. If women obtain powers with only these uncentred ideas, and enter freely into many activities, it is impossible to say how much harm may be done. If women imitate the reckless behavior of men, the world, dark enough al- ready, will become darker still. . . . This women's ques- tion is not one which can be neglected with impunity. It is chattered about carelessly by young people; but it is plain that sooner or later it will become a problem of burn- ing importance in mtimate connection with our practical life." Missionaries from the West taught the Christian ideas of the equality of the sexes, and gave an object-lesson in the treatment of their own wives and daughters which Japanese women did not fail to observe. Mission schools for girls were opened. Their attendance was small at first, but in time they became popular. A pioneer in this work for the Christian education of women was Miss Juha N. Crosby of the Woman's Union Missionary Society of America, who, with Mrs. Louise H. Pierson and Mrs. Samuel Pruyn, founded a boarding-school for girls in Yokohama in 1870. The Emperor fittingly recognized her inestimable services to Japan by conferring upon her in 1917 the decoration of the blue ribbon. 316 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST To-day, many thousands of girls are being educated in both government and private schools, and highly educated women are to be found in all the leading cities and in many of the smaller towns. The wives of Japanese diplomatic and consular officials and of prominent business men in Europe and America are famous for their cultivated grace of manner. A social function imder the auspices of the Japan Society of New York brings together as charming and inteUigent a company of Japanese women as one could meet anywhere, and they do not suffer in comparison with their American sisters. The marriage tie is more frequently broken in Japan than in any country of Europe or America. This is saying a good deal, for the breaking up of homes in the United States is disgracefully common. Statistics of divorce, compiled by Professor W. B. Bailey of Yale University for the eleven leading nations, show that the proportion of divorces is three times higher in Japan than in the next highest coun- try, the United States, the ratio being 215 per 100,000 of the population in Japan, to 73 in the United States. Pro- fessor Inazo Nitobe, while frankly admitting that "the number of divorces is appalling and a disgrace to our family system," adds: "I have purposely said that this is a dis- grace to our family system, avoiding the term marriage system; for in a large proportion of our divorces the cause is to be found not in the rupture of conjugal relations, but in the custom of a married son living under the same roof with his parents; in short, in the universally notorious rela- tionship between a wife and a mother-in-law ! It argues a marvellous amount of fortitude and sweetness in the women of Japan that they bear the burden of wifehood and motherhood under conditions so exacting."^ Certain it is that the women of Japan are bestirring them- selves. Like their sisters in Western lands, some of them are entering business, journaHsm, medicine, nursing, and philanthropy. Stenography, typewriting, and telephoning are largely in their hands. Prominent women are active in ^ The Japanese Nation, p. 164. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 317 social and temperance reform. Madame Yajima is known all over Japan for her able leadership in these reforms. Whether the enhghtened and enfranchised women of the new era, in both the East and the West, will acquiesce in the kind of treatment to which their mothers and grand- mothers more or less meekly jdelded remains to be seen. I suspect that the male "lords of creation" will hereafter be obHged to recognize the fact that the days of their un- challenged domination are about over. CHAPTER XX EDUCATION IN JAPAN Japan has had schools and books from a remote antiquity. The first impetus to intellectual culture came from China, whose literature and civilization antedated those of Japan by many centuries. The earhest Chinese books to reach Japan are supposed to have arrived 284 A. D. The earhest extant Japanese book appeared in Chinese characters in the second decade of the eighth century. It is probable that many books preceded it that long since disappeared. This particular book, the Kojiki, is a "Record of Ancient Happenings" and gives an alleged history of Japan from "the beginning," but one which mingles fact, tradition, myth, and legend in hopeless confusion. The art of printing by movable wooden-block types, which also was introduced from China in the eighth century, enabled the Japanese to multiply their own books, and the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries were prolific in literature. The period of internecine strife between rival clans made the following centuries intellectually barren; but with the "Great Peace" which began in the seventeenth century, the minds of thoughtful men again turned to learning and books and pamphlets became numerous. Most of them bore the unmistakable stamp of Chinese influence, being either Chinese classics or Japanese books that derived their thought and style in large measure from them. With the exception of a few sporadic books, the literature of Europe and America did not appear in Japan until the modern era which opened with the arrival of Conmiodore Perry in 1853. Since then, there has been a remarkable quickening and broadening of intellectual Hfe. To-day, Japan has printing- presses of the latest type, and libraries well stocked with the world's best volumes on histoiy and art, science and political 318 EDUCATION IN JAPAN 319 economy, philosophy and rehgion. Books in Japanese and English are published and imported in great quantities. Newspapers and magazines are numerous and widely read, and there are scholars and authors of international fame. The first school in Japan of which there is any record was founded 664 A. D. The educational system which fol- lowed, if it could be called educational, was of the famihar tjqpe in eastern Asia prior to the coming of missionaries from the West — a mere memorizing of ancient classics and the composition of rhetorical essays about them. Educa- tion in the modern sense was begun by the missionaries who arrived in 1859. They founded the first schools which in- troduced Western learning into Japan. Imperfect though they were from the view-point of present-day pedagogical standards, they were a vast improvement upon anything that Japan had hitherto known. The awakening of the Japanese mind in the new era resulted not only in poHtical and industrial changes but in a new intellectual life which soon demanded a national system of education. The fifth of the five articles of the oath promulgated by the Emperor, April 6, 1868, declared : "Knowledge shall be sought for throughout the world, so that the welfare of the Empire may be promulgated." The deputation which sailed from Japan in 1871 to study the institutions and methods of Western nations included two men, Mr. Kido and Mr. Okubo, who gave special at- tention to education. They were deeply impressed by the general diffusion of intelligence among the people of America, and they speedily came to the conclusion expressed by Mr. Okubo in the words: "We must first educate leaders and the rest will foUow." Mr. Kido added : "We must educate the masses, for unless the people are trained they cannot follow their leaders, or, if they follow, it will never do for them to follow blindly." A Department of Education was established and the first educational regulations were issued in September, 1872. The preamble of this historic document declared that "the cultivation of morals, the improvement of intellect, 320 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and proficiency in arts cannot be attained except through learning. This is the reason why schools are estabhshed." The Japanese cordially acknowledge their indebtedness to the United States for guidance in educational matters. Doctor K. Ibuka, President of the Meiji Gakuin, Tokyo, says that "when Japan reached out after Western ideas, she copied her navy from Great Britain, her army from France, her medical science from Germany, and her educational sys- tem from America." The constructive genius whose name will always have an honored place in the history of Japan's educational development was the American, David Murray, Ph.D., LL.D., who was the adviser of the government Department of Education from 1873 to 1879. He was the real master builder of Japan's modem system of education. An extensive programme was mapped out, beginning with primary schools and culminating in the Imperial University in the capital. Several trained educators from Western lands were invited to fill important professorships until the new institutions were able to turn out highly qualified men of their own. The Emperor declared : "It is intended that henceforth education shall be so devised that there may not be a village with an ignorant family or a family with an ignorant member." Education in Japan is not left so largely to local control as in America. It is administered by the national govern- ment through a Department of Education, which is sub- divided into three bureaus: General Education, Special Education, and Religions. A few institutions, like the Peers' School, the Nautical School, the Post and Telegraph School, and the military and naval colleges, are related to other departments of the government, but they are none the less imder the supervision of the authorities. The basis of instruction in morals is the following imperial rescript of October 30, 1890, which is posted in every school and is certainly admirable as far as it goes: "Know Ye, Our Subjects: Our Imperial Ancestors have founded our Empire on a basis broad and everlasting, and have deeply and EDUCATION IN JAPAN 321 firmly implanted virtue. Our subjects, ever united in loyalty and filial piety, have from generation to generation illustrated the beauty thereof. This is the glory and fundamental character of our Empire, and herein also lies the source of our education. Ye, our subjects, be filial to your parents, affectionate to your brothers and sisters; as husbands and wives, be harmonious; as friends, true; bear yourselves in modesty and moderation; extend your benevolence to all; pursue learning and cultivate the arts and thereby develop intellectual faculties and perfect moral powers; furthermore, advance public good and promote common interests; always respect the Constitution and observe the laws; should emergency arise, offer yourselves cou- rageously to the State and thus guard and maintain the prosperity of our Imperial Throne coeval with heaven and earth. So shall ye not only be our good and faithful subjects but render illustrious the best traditions of your forefathers. The way here set forth is indeed the teaching bequeathed by our Imperial Ancestors to be observed alike by their descendants and the subjects, infallible for all ages and true in all places. It is our wish to take it to heart in all reverence, in common with you our subjects, that we may all thus attain to the same virtue." All public schools are forbidden to teach rehgion, the governmental educational policy being one of neutrahty be- tween the various religious faiths of the empire. This neu- trality, however, is often in theorj^ rather than in fact, since the government does not consider Shinto ceremonies religious, as nearly everybody else does, and since the large preponderance of Buddhist and anti-Christian teachers naturally creates an atmosphere unfavorable to Christi- anity and colors the instruction in many departments, particularly those in ethics, science, and philosophy. More- over, some of the required ceremonies, which the govern- ment considers patriotic rather than rehgious, are deemed reUgious in fact not only by foreigners but by many Chris- tian Japanese; as, for example, the worship of the picture of the Emperor, and the acts of veneration to the spirits of the imperial ancestors. Painful experience has taught the Christians of Japan that they must maintain their own schools and colleges if they are to secure educated leaders for their churches. Private schools are permitted to exist and may teach religion; but their curricula must be ap- 322 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST proved by the Department of Education, which demands satisfactory courses, text-books, methods, and qualified teachers under penalty of exclusion of their graduates from the government universities and technical schools. As the diplomas of these universities and technical schools are virtually essential to civil, military, or naval preferment, the consequences of failure to meet the government require- ments are not hght. The latest official reports of the pubhc schools list 25,673 elementary schools, with 158,601 teachers and 7,037,430 pupils; 317 middle schools with 6,220 teachers and 128,- 973 pupils; 299 high schools with 3,818 teachers and 71,280 pupils; 4 imperial universities with 792 professors and in- structors and 8,946 students; and 792 technical schools with 7,505 teachers and 428,732 students. Including some mis- cellaneous schools not classified under these headings, the total number of schools is 36,776 with 188,967 teachers, and 7,893,719 pupils. One million three hundred and twenty- two thousand nine hundred and ninety-one were graduated in a recent year. Ninety-eight per cent of the boys of school age are enrolled, and 96 per cent of the girls. The average daily attendance is 92 per cent — ^the highest record of any country in the world. Russia has only 25 per cent of her children of school age enrolled in schools. With less than one-third of Russia's population, Japan has a larger actual as well as relative school attendance and spends four times as much money on public education. The leading institu- tion, the Imperial University in Tokyo, is one of the best equipped universities in the world, with every facility in buildings, laboratories, and libraries, and with a faculty which includes some men of international reputation. The largest of the private institutions is the famous Waseda University, also in Tokyo, founded by Marquis Okuma, but of course conducted in full conformity with the stand- ards of the government, of which he was long such an in- fluential member. I visited a number of the public schools and was very favorably impressed. Discipline is about perfect, as might EDUCATION IN JAPAN 323 be expected; for teachers are regarded as virtually officials of the government, and the Japanese by temperament and hereditary training are obedient to authority. This may account; in some degree at least, for the high records in at- tendance, punctuality, and deportment. But Japanese schools are also notable for the quickness with which the pupils learn their lessons. Wherever I went I found hand- some, commodious, well-equipped school-buildings. In one school I visited in Kyoto, 1,600 pupils were enrolled, the ages being from eleven to fifteen. The grounds and build- ings were so extensive that there was no undue crowding. The order was excellent, and the apparatus as complete as in any public school I have seen in America. My visit to the public schools in Kanazawa occurred on a raw day in early spring, when I was glad to wear my heavy clothing; but most of the children were bare-footed, and the teachers told me that the boys and girls often came to school through the winter snow without footwear. This is not to be wholly attributed to a desire for learning, as the teacher also said that the children were eager to play in the snow. Japanese children are not accustomed to protecting themselves against the cold as we do; but the striking thing was that with insufficient clothing and in poorly heated rooms they sat so quietly at their lessons during the long hours of study. Japanese school children have a harder time in getting an education than the children in other lands. Japanese youths are so ambitious to obtain the education that opens the way for preferment in life that the government has not yet been able to provide sufficient buildings, equipment, and teachers to acconomodate the throngs of applicants. Partly because this fact compels selection and partly be- cause the government insists upon a high standard, the examinations are made very severe. Doctor Nitobe says that the number of candidates for admission to the freshman class of the college in Tokyo is usually seven or eight times the number that can be received. He adds: "It is a very touching sight to watch some 2,000 boys, the pick of our 324 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST youth from all parts of the empire, flocking to the college for examination — to watch them at their heavy task, all the time knowing that seven out of every eight will be dis- appointed. Those who fail one year can try again; a great many do try three or four times, and in exceptional cases seven or eight times, one instance of perseverance being on record where success crowned the fourteenth at- tempt." The task of the Japanese school children is seriously in- tensified by the nature of the written language. When Japan received her civilization, reHgion, and learning from China, she received with them the Chinese character. The Japanese gave their own pronunciation to the Chinese ideographs, so that the spoken language became quite dis- tinct from the Chinese, but the written language is a curious mixture of Chinese and Japanese elements. Professor Tanakadate, of the Imperial University of Tokyo, says: "The Japanese student must learn the language and the method of its representation in a system which is foreign to the nature of the language. The nmnber of these Chi- nese characters amounts to over 50,000, of which about 3,000 are used in daily life. Each of these characters has two or three, sometimes five or six, different meanings, so that the learning of 3,000 amounts really to that of more than 10,000." The result, as frankly stated in Marquis Okuma's Fifty Years of New Japan, is that "Japanese students to-day are attempting what is only possible to the strongest and clever- est of them, that is to say, two or three in every hundred. They are trying to learn their own language, which is in reality two languages, blended or confused the one with the other, according to the point of view, while attempting to learn Enghsh and German, and in addition studying tech- nical subjects like law, medicine, engineering or science." As far back as the year 809, a priest, Kobo Daishi, devised a syllabary of forty-seven symbols. Many attempts at simpli- fication have been made since. Modern authorities tried some years ago to lessen the confusion by limiting the num- EDUCATION IN JAPAN 325 ber of Chinese characters to be taught in the lower schools to twelve hundred. As this was considered almost revo- lutionary, a virtual discarding of Chinese classics in favor of more modem literature, a foreigner can but dimly imagine the labors of the Japanese boy under the old system. It is more difficult to limit the use of Chinese in the higher in- stitutions, for many of the modern scientific and philosophi- cal terms, while not easy to translate at all, can now be better expressed in Chinese characters than in vernacular Japa- nese. The demand for the adoption of the Roman alphabet is steadily gaining ground in Japan as it is in China, and has the powerful backing of many of Japan's leading edu- cators, including, besides those already mentioned. Baron Kikuchi, formerly president of the Peers' School and the Imperial University and Minister of Education in the Im- perial Cabinet. He says that the change to Roman letters must come, although it will come very slowly since long established usage is to be overcome. Under present conditions the strain upon students is heavy and prolonged. The combination of severe examina- tions and a cumbersome language constitute formidable handicaps. University professors declare that many stu- dents break down during their course; that those who do get through "require six or eight years longer to acquire a university education than in other countries," and that "the number of students who reach the age of thirty by the time they have finished their university course is very large." An imperial rescript, issued September 20, 1917, an- nounced that "We, in view of the situation at home and abroad, and in consideration of the future of the Empire, have thought it advisable to organize an educational com- mittee in the Cabinet, empowering it to deliberate on edu- cational affairs in Japan, so that progress of education may be attained. We hereby approve the organic regulations of the Extraordinary Educational Conference and order them to be published." This committee went vigorously to work under the chairmanship of Viscount T. Hirata, 326 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST formerly Minister of Home Affairs, and Baron Y. Kubota, formerly Minister of Education, as vice-chairman, and the whole educational system of the country was carefully studied with a view to ascertaining what improvements could be made. It will be noted, therefore, that the Japa- nese are thoroughly modern and progressive in their edu- cational ambitions. They want the best methods and they are sparing no effort to develop them. Speaking broadly, the Asiatic mind is more imitative and less constructive than the mind of the Anglo-Saxon. It commits a lesson to memory in school more easily, but it is less resourceful and energetic in the practical duties of Hfe. Observers have long noted that the East Indian youth, who easily outstrips his duller English schoolmate in the class- room, is likely to be the latter's clerk ten years after gradua- tion, not merely because of his race but because of his com- parative lack of constructive abilitj^ and aggressiveness. He is better fitted to copy than to create, to do something that has been marked out for him than to mark out some- thing for himself. There are, of course, many exceptions to this. Some Asiatics are born leaders, as both ancient and modern history clearly shows; and man}^ Anglo-Saxons are content to be followers. Making all due allowance, how- ever, for exceptions, the generalization holds, although the proportion of exceptions is larger in Japan than in China and Korea. Imitation is natural in such circumstances, since the first task of an awakened people is to catch up with the peoples who have gone further. It is not surprising, therefore, that Japan as a whole is utilizing the inventions and discoveries of Western nations rather than making its own. The Japanese, however, are catching up with extraordi- nary rapidity. Indeed in some directions they are now fully abreast of Western nations. They have already made some additions to the stock of the world's knowledge and appliances, and they will undoubtedly make more as a larger number of their capable men take their positions in the front rank of the progressive movements of modern EDUCATION IN JAPAN 327 civilization. Some of the ablest statesmen, generals, ad- mirals and professional and business men of the modern world are Japanese, and almost every year sees new figures of commanding proportions. Modern Japan has educators, authors and lecturers who are widely and favorably known outside of their own land, and she can point with just pride to specialists of recognized standing in the field of scientific research and discovery. CHAPTER XXI BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN Buddhism entered Japan from Korea 552 A. D. The new faith encountered opposition and spread slowly, but the Korean missionaries were persistent. By 684 a cabinet minister gave Buddhism distinction by building a chapel, appointing two Korean priests to minister in it, and encour- agiQg his daughter to become a nun. After that Buddhism rapidly gained headway until it became the dominant re- Hgion of the country. As in China, it did not prevail in a pure form, but was mingled with Confucian ancestor-wor- ship and with a variety of behefs and practices, many of them animistic, which made it a queer jumble of miscellane- ous odds and ends of reUgious behefs and customs. In reply to a question from a contributor, the editor of the Rinri Koenshu said: "Present-day Buddhism in Japan is very complex, and it is difficult to say in a word what its characteristics are." ^ To the eye of a visitor Buddhism in Japan appears strong. Temples are conspicuously in evidence. There are said to be 71,730 of them, and some are noble in proportions and elaborate in ceremonies. Fifty-three thousand two hundred and sixty-eight priests are connected with these temples. Many others are engaged in teaching, preaching, and other duties. Nuns are also numerous. The total number of priests and nuns is placed at 180,129 — a great estabhshment indeed. Statues of Buddha are innumerable — statues sit- ting and reclining, statues of wood and iron and stone and marble and bronze and alabaster, and of every conceivable size from tiny images that can be put in a vest pocket to 1 July, 1916. 328 BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN 329 the colossal figure at Kamakura^ made in the year 1252, fifty feet in height, body of bronze and eyes of gold — " A statue solid-set And moulded in colossal calm." In the "dim religious Hght" of the larger temples these huge figures (one I saw was 145 feet long and overlaid with thin sheets of pure gold), look down upon the worshipper with a solemn, majestic impassiveness, a timeless, unmoved calm which impresses even a Western traveller, and help him to understand in some measure the awe which these vast statues excite in the minds of the people. Nara, with its spacious park and venerable trees and pic- turesque temple and huge Buddha, so impressed Phillips Brooks that he wrote: "No one of all the world's sacred places has so stirred my soul as has Nara." But a reHgion is supposed to be a moral force. Is Budd- hism one? Whatever influence in purif5dng conduct it may ever have had finally ceased almost wholly. While it retained its temples and priests and external pomp, it became virtually dead from the view-point of vital faith and regenerative power. How widely modern Buddhism sepa- rates rehgion and conduct painfully appears in the attitude of its priests toward immorahty. There are imdoubtedly pure priests, and it would be grossly unjust to make an in- discriminate charge of impurity against the whole class; but there are some stubborn facts that cannot be success- fully challenged. When, in 1916, Buddhist and Shinto leaders in Osaka were asked to co-operate in the effort to prevent the rebuilding of the vice district, which had been burned, they declined to do so, although some individual Japanese of these faiths gave hearty assistance. Indeed the head priest of a great Shinto shrine actually performed a ceremony of propitiation over the grounds of the proposed new prostitute quarters. I was credibly informed that it is not imcommon to open a new resort of vice with religious ceremonies conducted by Buddhist priests, and that priests often visit brothels to collect alms from the inmates. 330 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The neighborhood of many of the large temples reeks with brothels, which are so numerous and whose inmates are so openly aggressive in soliciting men who are on their way to and from the temples that it is impossible to doubt that such juxtaposition to places of worship implies, if not direct connivance, at least absence of protest from the temple authorities, and a conception of religion which sees no incongruity between Buddhist observances and houses of prostitution. "When the patriotic youth of new Japan, wishing to pay homage at the most fashionable shrines of Ise, are compelled to reach the spot by passing along a road lined on both sides with legalized brothels, it looks as if official encouragement to impurity was offered, or at least temptation was presented, to the rising generation." ^ One of the* incidental but nevertheless interesting results of Christian missionary work in Japan is an attempt on the part of leading Buddhists to revive and purify their religion. This is partly due to the diffusion of the teachings of Chris- tianity, in whose light the Buddhist leaders see more clearly the decay and moral weakness of their own faith, and are led to go back to its original teachings and to bring into new prominence some of the ethical precepts of its founders. A stronger motive is self-defense, for Christianity's doctrines and the standards of conduct which it inculcates compel Buddhism to undertake radical reforms or to give up al- together. The Japanese mind has begun to be less indiffer- ent to rehgious questions, and signs of awakening and un- rest are multiplying. Would-be reformers have sprung up and are advocating all sorts of religious vagaries. Doctor Anezaki, professor in the Imperial University, commented in 1917 upon the significant fact that eight or ten new fanatical, superstitious movements were just budding out which had not been noticed by the public press. Buddhist leaders became alarmed. They began to use the printing press, to distribute leaflets, and issue periodicals. They did not mince words in attempting to shame their people into activity. The first number of Jiyu Bukkyo, a 1 Ernest W. Clement in A Handbook of Modem Japan, p. 167. 3 o3 S .S -^ s dj -c) « BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN 331 Buddhist magazine which appeared in Kobe in October, 1916, frankly said in a leading editorial: ''Buddhism is like a hotel near the railway but between stations. Once it was a famous hostelry, but the advent of the railway has left it stranded and the whole neighborhood suffers from neglect. Even should a wayfarer drop in he will find no comfort, for the place is not able to renew its furnishings and it has become worn out and obsolete. Just so is Japanese Bud- dhism — ^passed by and ignored by modern progress and un- able to afford spiritual refreshment. True, there are still some intellectuals, people hke university professors, who profess Buddhism, but they are very few, the great majority of Buddhists being but blind followers of tradition. They do as their fathers did, being too ignorant to know what changes science has T^TOught in the world, while their tra- dition is so dead that it has no influence on their hves." Buddhism in many lands has incorporated the ideas of other faiths as a sponge absorbs water, and Japanese Bud- dhism is no exception. The methods of Christianity have been freely borrowed. Recognizing the advantage of Sunday-schools, a fund of a million yen ($500,000) was raised a few years ago to estabhsh them, and within a recent period of six months over 800 were started, with an enrolment of 120,000 children. The regulations for Sunday-schools, promulgated in 1914, include the following: " Art. II. The aim of the Sunday-Schools is to cultivate the char- acter of the pupils according to the doctrine of our sect (Shinshiu) , " Art. III. To attain the aim above mentioned, the Sunday-Schools should make some connection with the primary schools and the pupils' homes, and on Sunday give lessons on religion and morality. If local conditions allow, hand work and manners are to be taught besides. " Art. IV. There shall be a superintendent in each Sunday School, and the superior of a temple or a teacher only can take charge of it. " Art. VII. Every school should make an educational report twice a year. "Art. VIII. The expenses of the School shall be defrayed out of the contributions of the supporters and subscriptions to the local temple." 332 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The extent of the copying of Christian material is curiously illustrated in the songs that are provided for these Buddhist Sunday-schools. Some of them are taken almost bodily from the Christian hymn-book — words, tune, meter, and chorus, the only change being the substitution of the name Buddha for Jesus and the omission of an occasional stanza whose Christian meaning cannot be twisted to fit Buddhist teachings. It is odd to enter a Buddhist school and find, as one visitor did, a hundred and fifty children lustily sing- ing: " Buddha loves me, this I know"; and to note that the organist is playing the tune from a Christian hymnal. If it be true that imitation is the sin- cerest form of flattery, missionaries have abundant reason to feel flattered. The Young Men's Christian Association has been made the model of the Yoimg Men's Buddhist Association, which has grown rapidly in membership and influence. Professor Kaneka Umaji, of Waseda University, wrote: "I am very glad to see that the long wished-for Y. M. B. A. has come into being among the students of this imiversity. The times needed it, and I am glad that you have taken up the task of finding a new Buddhism which shall march hand in hand with the progress of civilization. Ancient, divided, and often corrupt, the Buddhism we have known awaits your reforms to regain its influence. To me. Buddhism with its profound philosophy and its spiritual power over men and women is the best of all religions. Yet with sorrow I confess that it fails to serve the youth of to-day. It is a sun obscured in clouds. It has been left behind by a pro- gressive world. Not a few young men, having sought in vain, have desperately flung their fives away in a deep cataract pool or before a running train. Buddhism must therefore be reformed." ^ Buddhist Women's Associations have also been organ- ized. There are eight such associations in Tokyo, the old- ^ Article in the Seinem Yuben, December, 1916. BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN 333 est having been formed in 1886. A Buddhist Union rep- resents and co-ordinates some of the modern movements, and at the third general meeting of its central committee in May, 1917, one of the main subjects of discussion was "how to perfect the establishment of the Buddhist Pro- tective Association." The candor of the leaders of the new movement has gone further and compared Christian and Buddhist missionary- work to the latter 's disadvantage. Mokushoko Shonin plainly wrote as follows: " Christian missionaries go into the remotest parts of the earth to increase their converts, braving all dangers and discomforts. But what do the Buddhist priests of Japan ? Are men really alive who are content to exist upon the remuneration they receive for reading pray- ers they do not understand at funerals ? So mechanical is their per- formance that they make prayers at piece-work rates. They drink and dissipate, to pay for which they resort to ways of getting money from which even laymen shrink. There are black sheep doubtless in the Christian ministry, but in the bulk there is no comparison. Chris- tian workers constantly strike for the amelioration of social condi- tions — to rescue women, to educate the poor, to succor orphans, and the Buddhist priests loiter far in their rear. . . . Buddhist preachers appeal only to the old and uneducated whom they tell of the delights of paradise, but they have no message for this life. Their preaching places often remain closed for months at a time. While the Christians strive to save souls, the Buddhists flatter milUonaires and magnates. There are 72,000 first-class Buddhist temples, 52,000 chief priests, 148,000 preachers, 52,000 probationary priests, and 12,000 students in Buddhist schools — an astonishing number of men to be doing nothing." ^ How far the reformers can succeed in galvanizing the moribund body of Buddhism into some kind of life remains to be seen. They are certainly trying hard. Realizing that only educated men can influence modern Japan and compete with the highly trained Christian leaders, they have founded colleges to whose graduates they can look for future leadership, and they are actively at work in many fields of effort. Special occasions are magnified in every 1 Article in the Shin Nippon, October, 1916. 334 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST possible way. The Shinshiu sect of Buddhists celebrated the six hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the death of its founder at Kyoto, in 1911, with elaborate ceremonies. Vast multitudes attended; but observers noted that they were almost wholly from the country towns and villages, and that there were very few young people. Among the activities of modern Japanese Buddhists is an effort to rehabihtate Buddhism in Korea, where, as we noted in a former chapter, it long since disappeared as a national faith, its only vestiges to-day being a few remote mountain monasteries, and here and there a ruined temple or a dirty priest slinking like an outcast in the outskirts of some town. A number of Japanese Buddhist propagan- dists were sent to Korea some years ago. Others followed, and the effort has been earnestly pressed. A Western Chris- tian's estimate of the true character and the poor promise of the enterprise might not be deemed impartial. For- tunately, it is not necessary for me to appraise it, as this has been done by two Japanese newspapers whose freedom from bias is not likely to be challenged. The Japan Times says: "It is extremely doubtful that the Buddhist religion, or at least the grossly unphilosophical and superstitious part of it .which alone can be taught by average priests, will do any good to Koreans. Koreans as a whole are born to all sorts and forms of superstition of their own, and it really seems a sin to burden them with more. But that is only by the way. We notice an opinion expressed now and then that Buddhistic propagation should be a part of the plan to assimilate Koreans. Call it a social plan, if you will, but its end is unmistakably political, and we strenuously object to such a scheme. . . . The case would be different if Buddhism, however degraded in its form now, had in any way been helpful in bringing about the modern civilization of Japan. But whatever preten- sions it may set forth in other directions, it certainly and absolutely has no claim to make in this particular respect, that is, in the work of the moral, intellectual and social elevation of new Japan. In Korea we are now to do the BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN 335 same work over again, and it is most preposterous for Buddhist bonzes to come foi-ward with their uncalled-for service and with the claim that they can and will do in Korea what they have not done, and never have even tried to do, in Japan. It is still more intolerable that any well meaning friends of Koreans should ask for the assistance of those worldly and narrow-viewed latter-day disciples of Buddha. There will be enough to worry about in Korea for some time to come, and the sending out there these bonzes can only make the situation worse." The Seoul Press has this to say : '^ Having some knowledge of the present condition of Buddhism in Japan, we find it rather hard to entertain any great hope as to the future of the religion in this coimtry. We believe few will contra- dict us when we say that Buddhism is on the wane. . . , The only time educated people repair to a Buddhist temple is when they attend the funeral or other religious service for some one dear to them. . . . Buddhism is dying in Japan, and scarcely holds its place as a religion in the minds of the Japanese younger men. It is not a power having great influence in the shaping of their moral character and spurring them to a higher, nobler and purer life. Inasmuch as Buddhism is in such a condition in Japan, it is reason- able, we think, to entertain some doubt as to the success of the proposed propaganda of the religion in this country." Many Japanese are openly sceptical regarding the ability of Buddhism to adapt itself to modern conditions in either Korea or Japan. An editorial in the Kirisuto Kycho says that there is a general expectation that religion will be changed as a result of the war, and it asks: "Will Bud- dhism, the religion of Japan from ancient times, be able to undergo a change sufficient to enable it to lead the new Japan?" The writer declares ''that such a revival is scarcely within the range of possibility. Buddhism is abso- lutely opposed, as a religion, to the present life. Whatever efforts the Buddhists may put forth to meet the needs of the new times, their most important scriptural teachings contradict such efforts by their antagonism to the present 336 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST life. On the other hand, if some sHght changes be made in the poUty of the churches (Christian), and if we cast off the teachings that smack of Europe and America, and give ex- pression to a purer teaching concerning Christ and God, then Christianity will be in position to exert a living leader- ship capable of satisfying the needs of the nation."^ Nevertheless, Mr. Nakashoji, Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, said in an address at a meeting of Buddhists: "I feel regret on account of the evils that lead the nation to devote itself to the almighty dollar. With the coming in of new ideas disorder has arisen here and there. ... At this time, the Buddhist rehgious leaders are going to do their utmost in order to destroy such evil tendencies." ^ Every open-minded Christian will applaud such a pur- pose. If Buddhism is to exist at all, and it undoubtedly is for some time yet, it is better to have it clean than un- clean, a friend rather than a foe of morality. Nothing could be worse than to have some of the rehgious guides of a deeply-rooted national faith reeking with impurity, as many Buddhist priests notoriously are, and others, although not personally vile, yet apparently seeing no wrong in immorahty and making no protest against it. In so far as the reform movement leads earnest souls to remain in the faith of their fathers rather than to follow Christ, it will indeed do harm. Some Japanese are now being influenced to do this who otherwise would have renounced Buddhism. This is not a Hght danger, since it encourages men to imagine that they can appropriate the social results of Christianity without the deeper truths and obligations from which the results flow. A Christless morahty may again illustrate the apho- rism that the good is the enemy of the best. On the other hand, reformed Buddhism is so manifestly a half-way house, so evidently an imitation of Christianity, and the road beyond it is so clear and straight, that thought- ful Japanese who really desire a virile rehgion of trans- forming power are not hkely to be content with such a ^ Quoted in Ttie Japan Evangelist, July, 1917. * Tr. The Japan Evangelist, June, 1917. BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN 337 weak compromise as "revived" Buddhism offers. It has no roots, if I may change the figure, and is merely attempt- ing to tie the fruits of Christianity to the withered branches of a dead tree. Marquis Okuma may be assumed to know, and he has frankly said: "To be sure, Japan had her re- ligions and Buddhism prospered greatly; but this pros- perity was largely through political means. Now this creed has been practically rejected by the better classes, who, being spiritually thirsty, have nothing to drink." ^ The other great national faith of Japan is Shintoism. Is it a religion? No one ever thought of arguing that it is not until the Christians in Japan objected to the obser- vances of Shinto rites on the ground that they are incompati- ble with Christianity. Then the argument became general, Shinto advocates declaring that its ceremonies are to be re- garded as patriotic and social rather than religious, and that every loyal Japanese could observe them without disloyalty to his religious convictions. Finally, the government took a hand in the discussion by officially distinguishing between state Shintoism and religious Shintoism, and it divided the Bureau of Shrines and Temples into the Bureau of Shrines and the Bureau of ReHgions, thus taking Shintoism out of the category of reHgion and putting it into the category of state institutions. Thereafter, ceremonies at the shrines were under the supervision of government officials. This, however, did not end the discussion. Historically, the Japanese have for centuries regarded Shinto "as the way of the gods." The general Christian view has been admirably stated by the Right Reverend J. G. Combaz, Bishop of the Roman Catholic Church at Nagasaki, in an article in which he gives full and sympathetic recognition to the intentions of the government in regard to Shinto as simply a form of patriotic and social observance; but he declares that "nevertheless, however generous our frame of mind may be with regard to this view of the shrines, we cannot give our support to it." And he assigns the follow- ing reasons: "For several thousand years the officials and 1 Address, October 9, 1909. 338 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the people alike have looked upon them as sanctuaries and places of worship and as institutions founded upon the supernatural. This being so, how can the nature of shrines be changed by a single government edict? One may change the label on a bottle, but the contents will not be changed thereby. In the official edict it is said that shrines are dedicated to the worship of the gods of the Empire for the pubhc observance of festivals and for public worship. The use of the term 'worship' is sufficient evidence of the rehgious nature of the performance. It is also officially said that the object of the shrines is to pay respect to gods who have rendered meritorious service to the State, to the Im- perial House and to ancestors. Is not such reverence of a religious nature? . . . The rites observed at shrines are in accordance with the rules of the book of ceremonies. . . . From their very nature they must be deemed a form of rehgious observance. The fact that government officials, and not Shinto priests, conduct the ceremonies does not deprive them of their rehgious nature. In the ancient Roman Empire also, officials took charge of such shrines. But this was done in order to render the rites more im- pressive to the popular mind and to give dignity to their observance. When the officials performed the rites, they did precisely what the priests were accustomed to do and were, in fact, assisted by the priests. The shrines, therefore, could not be devoid of religious character."^ This view finds ample support in the opinions of men who cannot be charged with religious bias. That keen analyst of Japanese life and character, Laf cadio Hearn, wrote: "Stated in the simplest possible form, the pecuhar element of truth in Shinto is the belief that the world of the living is directly governed by the world of the dead. That every impulse or act of man is the work of a god, and that all the dead become gods are the basic ideas of the cult."^ That high Japanese authority, Professor T. Inouye, * Article in the Kirisutokyoho, March 28, 1918; translated in The Japan Evangelist, May, 1918. 2 Kokoro, pp. 21 and 200. o d m BUDDHISM AND SHINTOISM IN JAPAN 339 says: "Shi'ines are the vehicles which give expression to the Shinto spirit and our rehgious institutions. The rehgious rites practised in connection with them are the hairi, saikei, and kito — ^worship, ceremonies and prayer. These all alike are religious ceremonials. It is clearly a mistake to put the shrines outside the category of reUgion." Professor K. Kakehi expresses a like opinion. "Reverence for shrines," he says, "is religious in nature, and the view that reverence paid to them is not rehgious is meaningless. It is a high form of rehgion even from the scientific point of view." Significance, too, must be given to the fact that when, in 1912, the Vice-Minister of Home Affairs called a con- ference of the religious leaders of the Empire, to be de- scribed in a later chapter, he invited representatives of Shintoism as well as of Buddhism and Christianity; and that in his public statement regarding the conference he used these words: "Shintoism, Buddhism and Christianity are all religions. . . . Shintoism and Buddhism have long had a recognized place as rehgions of the Japanese people." We cordially concur, and we beHeve with all Protestant missionaries and Japanese Christians, in the statement of Bishop Combaz that "as long as the Japanese stand firm on their historic past, no one can find fault with them, much less can any one expect them to be disloyal to their own country. But we deeply regret that the Japanese still retain a mythology long ago given up by other countries as being unreasonable and untrustworthy; and not only so, but with a certain coercion this mythology is required to be recognized." Meantime, Shintoism is a waxing power rather than, hke Buddhism, a waning one. In 1912 the nimiber of Shinto shrines was 127,076, but the latest available figures place the number at 137,184. Fourteen thousand five hundred and twenty-seven Shinto priests are connected with them, and the total number of preachers and teachers of religious Shinto is given as 74,619. It is interesting to note that the increase of national prosperity and power resulting from the world war is redoimding to the benefit of Shintoism as 340 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST well as to that of commercial and political influence. A prominent Japanese has recently said: "The present war has led some of us to agnosticism or national Shintoism. Shintoism has made great progress at the expense of Chris- tianity by the support of our Imperial Court and the government, and the Ise Shrine and influential professors in the Imperial University. National spirit combined with the faith of old Shintoism has risen in power, and is attract- ing the attention of intelligent Japanese young men. This phenomenon can not be ignored by those who care about the spiritual welfare of our people." From all of which it appears that Shintoism is likely to remain a force to be reckoned with for some time to come. CHAPTER XXII CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA From the view-point of international law and diplomatic intercourse this question primarily relates to Japan's treat- ment of her own subjects; but it may be said of nations, as of individuals, that "none of us liveth to himseK." The world has passed the stage in which any government is re- garded as morally free to do as it pleases with a subject people without regard to the pubHc opinion of mankind. America's treatment of the Indians, Negroes, Chinese, and Japanese in the United States and of the Hawaiians and Filipinos in their Pacific archipelagos, and British, French, Belgian, and German treatment of their subject populations in Asia and Africa, are universally recognized as fair sub- jects of discussion. While Korea is a national possession of the Japanese, their policy in dealing with it is of inter- national concern. That they themselves recognize this is proved by the Government-General's annual pubhcation in English of a thick pamphlet entitled Reforms and Progress in Korea, which gives a detailed account of what is being done. We should frankly recognize at the outset that the Japa- nese were handicapped in Korea, not only by the chaotic conditions that prevailed, but by the fact that if domination by some foreign power was inevitable, the Koreans would have been better pleased if that power had been some other than Japan. The two nations had been hereditary enemies for a thousand years. Japanese invasions had been numer- ous, and the one in 1592 had wrought such devastation that Korea has been a wretched and dilapidated country ever since. After his observant journey through the Far East, Lord Curzon wrote: "The national race hatred be- tween the Koreans and Japanese was, and is, one of the most 341 342 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST striking phenomena in contemporary Korea." ^ The suf- ferings of the people were severe during the China-Japan War of 1894, and the Russia-Japan War of 1905; and as the Japanese were the victors in both wars, they were natu- rally held responsible for the resultant distress. During these wars, and for years after them, the Japanese were not conciliatory in their dealings with the Koreans. They had long regarded them as inferiors, and had never taken the pains that the Russians took to cajole them, to keep their Emperor supphed with money, and to cultivate popular good- will. They managed the Koreans with the brusque- ness of the Anglo-Saxon rather than with the suavity of the Oriental, ignored ''face," which every Korean sensi- tively cherishes, and in general dealt with the Koreans about as Americans dealt with the North American In- dians, and the British with their subject populations in India and Africa, always preserving the attitude of superiors even when acting justly. Unfortunately, too, the first Japanese who came to Korea after the Russia-Japan War were soldiers and camp-follow- ers. The army necessarily occupied the country during the war, and for some time after its close. Military rule is strict everywhere. It must be in the more or less lawless conditions which follow a war; but it is none the less galling to civilians. We know how Filipinos and Americans alike chafed under the rule of the United States army in the Philippines, notwithstanding the fact that the American commanders were men of the highest rectitude of intention. The Japanese soldiers in Korea were those who had fought in the campaigns against Russia. They regarded Korea as the prize of the war, and in spite of Japanese discipline they had something of that spirit of exhilaration and law- lessness which usually characterizes soldiers after a victori- ous campaign. White men who remember the conduct of the foreign troops in Peking after the raising of the siege of the legations in 1900 will not be surprised at the attitude of Japanese troops in Korea. During the period of military * Problems of the Far East, pp. 194r-195. CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 343 occupation there were undoubtedly many cases of brutality, and the enterprises which were necessary to strengthen Japanese occupation were carried out with scant regard for the feelings of the people. The civihan immigrants who poured into Korea after the war were not the best type of Japanese. Americans know the breed — ^the lawless characters in the frontier mining- camps of a generation ago, who did their ruthless pleasure in Alaska and became the carpet-baggers of the Southern States after the Civil War. Our usually good-natured Mr. Taft characterized the dissolute and brutal Americans whom he fomid in the Philippines, when he became Governor- General, with a sharpness of invective which made them his bitter enemies. He declared that they were the worst obstacle to America's purpose to deal justly with the Fili- pinos. The same class of Japanese hurried to Korea, and they rode rough-shod over the helpless natives, appropriating food, seizing farm-animals, taking possession of land, mal- treating women, and, in some instances when opposed, burning houses and even villages. The Nagamori land scheme aroused wide-spread alarm. Nagamori was a speculator who, backed by the Secretary of the Japanese Legation (the Minister, Mr. Hayashi, was then absent in Japan), induced the weak Korean Emperor to grant him an exclusive concession for a period of fifty years to reclaim, improve, and cultivate forests, fields and waste lands, exclusive of the grounds of imperial mausolea, temple-grounds, preserved forests, government and private lands already reclaimed. This practically turned over the larger part of the country to this daring speculator. As soon as the meaning of the concession became clear, a storm of protest broke forth. We cannot believe that a man hke Mr. Hayashi would have countenanced such a bare-faced land-grab. The Tokyo authorities, with whom he was at the time, disavowed the whole scheme and compelled the ingenious promoter to relinquish it. But the memory rankled in the minds of the Koreans, who beHeved that it was a sample of what they might expect from the rapacity 344 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST of their conquerors whenever too much pubHcity was not involved. The course of the Japanese was usually more exemplaiy in regions where officers of high rank were resident; and where foreigners had opportunity to notice what was being done. Officials of lower grade in places remote from the capital were not always so considerate. Inferior men^ far from the observation of their superiors; were able to indulge their temper or prejudices with little fear of consequences. Doubtless some of the stories of injustice are susceptible of explanation; but the reports are too numerous and ex- plicit to be dismissed as altogether baseless. We know what white men have sometimes done when placed in abso- lute control of a helpless people, and it is not surppising that some Japanese have showed the same traits in like cir- cumstances. Some of the documents of this period, in my possession, are not pleasant reading. Shortly after Vis- count Terauchi became Resident-General, in 1910, he frankly admitted that there was some foundation for com- plaints, and he as frankly deplored them, for in that year the Japan Times gave the following account of an interview by the Seoul representative of a Tokyo news agency: '"The Resident-General says he greatly regrets to find that the Japanese residents in Korea are sometimes inclined to despise and oppress the Korean people. Koreans have, therefore, a tendency to bear a grudge against the Japanese. . . . The Resident-General is afraid that such acts may not be isolated, and thus contribute to the injury of the re- lations between Japanese and Koreans in general." Conditions improved, but the revelations in connection with the "Korean Conspiracy Case" showed that in 1911 and 1912 Korea was swarming with suspicious secret police and ruthless gendarmes, and that the lower courts were imder police control. It is not easy for the outside world to get an accurate idea of the real situation, for the censor- ship limits the publication of unfavorable opinions in Korea, and foreigners sometimes find it prudent to be careful about what they intrust to the mails. The officially influ- CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 345 enced press gives the most glowing accounts of contentment and prosperity. Japanese in Japan have frankly admitted that Korea is not an Arcadia of dehghts, and they have criticised with a freedom that would hardly have been per- mitted in Korea. Witness the following from the Shin Nippon: "The Governor-General's desire is to make the peninsula one big fortress, and he seems to regard all those engaged in industrial or conmiercial work in Korea as mere camp followers within the walls of a barracks." ^ The Reverend George Shigetsugu Murata wrote an article in The Oriental Review for October, 1912, in which, after making some criticisms upon the missionaries and Korean Christians, he frankly said: "It is not only Koreans who make mistakes. When I was in Korea, a company of Japanese soldiers burnt down a Christian church from a mere fit of passion. On another occasion, a party of sol- diers entered a church during a prayer-meeting and de- manded lodging. When asked to wait till the end of the service, they drove out the congregation at the end of bayonets, and occupied the church for the night. A drunken soldier forced his way into the house of Doctor W. A. Noble, a missionary friend of mine, without the slightest reason for so doing. These acts caused just criticism against the Japanese officials." The Chu Koron pubHshed an article by Doctor Yoshino, who was referred to as a university professor, giving his impressions of a visit to Korea in 1916. After enumerating the great material improvements that had been made, he wrote: "The above, however, is merely the surface condi- tion of things. It is impossible for mere casual visitors to know whether or not there are dead men's bones under the whited sepulchres. The Japanese authorities declare that peace is enjoyed aU over the country. There is no doubt whatever about that, but it is nothing but the dull peace of serfdom. . . . Without consideration and mercilessly they [the authorities] have resorted to laws for the expropriation of lands, the Koreans concerned being compelled to part ^ Translation in the China Press, June 21, 1912. 346 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST with their family property ahnost for nothing. On many occasions they have been also forced to work on the con- struction of the roads without receiving any wages. . . . As far as the law is concerned, Koreans and Japanese are on precisely the same footing. This is the theory, but the fact is not exactly the same. . . . They [Koreans] are discriminated against both officially and privately. . . . Business men in Korea are fully acquainted with the ex- istence of this evil, but can say nothing against it, the free- dom of speech being severely restricted. It must be re- membered that papers and magazines published iu Japan are not allowed to enter Korea if they contain articles criticising Japanese official methods in the peninsula." ^ This is plain speaking, and it cannot be charged to for- eign prejudice since it comes from a Japanese. It is quite safe to assume that the article was not permitted to enter Korea. Since then a foreign resident of Korea has written : " We are now living in the age of permits. We have to have permits for everything from killing a wild goose or estab- lishing a new church, hiring or dismissing a teacher or preacher, to forty other things. If a guest comes and stays more than a few days, we have to report him to the police and repeat the operation when he leaves. It takes a good deal of time running to the police office for permits and to make reports. The German system of espionage is quite well established here now. It is pretty galling on the nerves of one who has been brought up in a country where poHce- men mind their own business, and one does not know of the existence of a government till one becomes a male- factor or has to pay taxes." Whatever may be said in defense of stem measures as a political and military necessity in dealing with the pecuHar conditions in Korea, there remains a wide difference of opinion regarding the general course of the Japanese. The justice of their methods in dealing with the Koreans is a hotly disputed question. The pro-Japanese view is vigor- ously presented by Professor George T. Ladd in a volume * Translation in the Japan Weekly Chronicle, July 13, 1916. CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 347 entitled With Marquis Ito in Korea, and the anti-Japanese view is presented with equal vigor in Professor Homer B. Hulbert's The Passing of Korea. Professor Ladd, who went to Korea on the cordial invitation of Prince Ito, and whose visit was "personally conducted" by the Japanese, exhausts his vocabulary in pouring out his contempt upon the Ko- reans, who manifested only languid interest in his efforts to convince them in a series of lectures what great and good people their Japanese rulers were. Professor Hulbert's point of view is that of deep sympathy with the Koreans, among whom he lived for many years and whom he regards as a grossly wronged people, while his opinion of the Japa- nese, sharpened by some personal experiences, he makes "as emphatic as the rules of the House will permit," if I may borrow a phrase of Gladstone's in the British Parlia- ment. Both writers, in my humble opinion, are right in some things and wrong in others, for both are partisans. Un- doubtedly the conduct of the Japanese has been character- ized by both good and evil, and it is not well to concentrate attention upon either to the exclusion of the other. The judicious man will seek a balanced judgment between the two extremes.^ To this end I hope that the reader who has gone with me thus far will not fail to read my following account of other and better phases of Japanese rule in Korea, which are quite as essential to a fair judgment. And first, we should bear in mind considerations that have been mentioned before, and that wiU bear repetition as fundamental factors in the situation, namely: that the Japanese justification for taking Korea lay in the inescapa- ble facts that, if Japan had not occupied the peninsula, Russia would have done so; that Japan's national safety would have been imperilled by Russian occupation; that Japanese ascendancy was far better for the Koreans than ^ Cf. for additional facts, George Kennan, article in The Outlook, November 11, 1905; William T. EUis, article in The North American Review, October, 1907; F. A. McKenzie, The Tragedy of Korea, pp. 108 seg., and The Unveiled East, pp. 33-95; Thomas F. Millard, The New Far East, pp. 80-123; B. L. Putjiam Weale, The Truce in the Far East and Its Aftermath, pp. 40-108. 348 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Russian ascendancy would have been; that the Korean Government was so hopelessly rotten and the condition of the country so pitiable that there was no possibihty of poHtical regeneration from within; and that the interests both of Koreans and of the other peoples concerned made it imperative that Japan should undertake the work of reconstruction. It was an extraordinarily difficult task. Gross abuses existed — a veritable sink of misgovemment, corruption, filth, and misery. As the Japanese are not angels but fallible human beings, it is not surprising"^ that the best of them have made mistakes, and that the worst have committed ciimes. It was equally inevitable that some of the best of the Koreans should feel their national pride wounded by the domination of an aHen government; that corrupt officials and indolent peasants should resent the reforms that had to be forced upon them; that some misguided men should resort to violent methods against their new rulers; and that subordinate officials should not always be considerate and humane in carrying out their task. Some Koreans manifested their resentment against the Japanese in ways that made the government feel that stern measures were required. While the so-called "Korean Conspiracy Case" was largely a product of excited police imagination and officiousness, there were other cases of a more substantial character. Patriotic groups were formed in various parts of the country. Their slogans were: "Korea for the Koreans;" "It is better to die than to be slaves." One of the most formidable of these groups was the II Chin Hoi, which was formed in Seoul in 1904. Chris- tians were prominent among its founders and the first meetings were opened with prayer. No unlawful acts were contemplated and no secrecy was attempted. Members were exhorted not to use force but to rely upon moral sua- sion, and a well-known Christian evangelist was appointed to inform the government of the organization of the society, and of its peaceful patriotic purpose along four lines: 1. More firmly to estabfish and strengthen the present CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 349 dynasty; 2. restrain the nobility in their office-bearing, assist all good movements and resist all evil ones; 3. pro- tect the common people's property and persons from nobles and every one else; and, 4. regulate the Korean soldiers of whom there were 20,000 at that time, some of them quite unruly, especially in the countiy districts. The member- ship of the society rapidly increased until there was a verita- ble scramble to join. The good objects and peaceful methods of the society were soon obscured. Meetings be- came turbulent, and violent measures were advocated. Non-Christians gained control and the Christian members dropped out till all semblance of the original character of the society was lost, and it became a menace to the country. Another patriotic society was called Chung Yun Hoi. Unfortunately this was the name by which the Young Men's Christian Association is known in China and Japan, and it was also the name of the young people's societies in some of the Methodist and Presbyterian churches. The astute leaders of the political Chung Yun Hoi quickly took advantage of this identity of names. New members flocked into the Y. M. C. A. and the local church societies, and branches were formed in hundreds of outlying towns. Be- fore the significance of the movement was fully realized, the society had made such progress that it had nearly cap- tured the Y. M. C. A. and many of the Epworth Leagues of the Methodist chm'ches. The Wipyung Society (Righteous Army) was started in 1907 and spread like wild-fire. Its leaders, too, saw the gain that would accrue to them if they could utilize the Chris- tian churches, as these churches were the largest and strongest organizations among the Koreans. These societies gained such headway among Christians that it looked for a time as if the whole Christian enter- prise in Korea would be irreparably damaged by becoming the tool of a pohtical party whose object was not spiritual religion, but a revolutionary propaganda against the gov- ernment. When the missionaries saw what was being done imder cover of Christianity, they took decisive measures. 350 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The Presbyterians warned their churches against the soci- eties, dismissed evangehsts and teachers who were active in them, and sharply discipHned members whose activities were more poHtical than rehgious. "Our Mission," wrote a missionary, "set ourselves rigidly against it [the Wipyung Society], and we have held our church and almost to a man our members from going into it. When the movement struck Pyengyang it was in full swing, and would have swept the entire population in if it had not been for the Christians of our Mission. Pastor Kil called all the people together and pleaded with them not to go out, and he held them firm, and then the Christians went out two by two throughout the city urging their friends as individuals to be quiet. They stopped the movement in Pyengyang, and it was stopped all over those two provinces in the same way." The Y. M. C. A. secretaries and Board of Directors also took energetic steps to restore their organization to its proper character and to cut off poHtical affihations, and the Methodists put the pseudo-reHgious society out of their churches and forbade the Korean Christian leaders to have anything to do with it under pain of expulsion. These drastic measures prevented the Christian move- ment from degenerating into a more anti-Japanese propa- ganda; but the revolutionists continued their activities under other forms and a variety of names. All pretense of reHgion was thrown off. Bands of desperate men began to roam about the country, and their mountain retreats became caves of Adullam, to which lawless and vicious characters resorted. Disbanded Korean soldiers joined them and a guerrilla warfare ensued. Attacks were made not only upon Japanese but upon Koreans who were sus- pected of sympathy with them. These suspicions were easily made the excuse for paying off old scores against personal enemies, and for pillaging houses that were be- Heved to contain money. Robberies and murders were frequent occurrences. The "Righteous Army" now in- cluded in its vindictive hatred the members of the II Chin Hoi in Seoul, who were charged with being too friendly CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 351 with the Japanese. "They wear their hair short/' wrote the Reverend Doctor James S. Gale, of Seoul, "but so do the disbanded soldiers, and so do the Christians; so when the Righteous Army men capture a short-haired passer, they do not know whether he is a soldier or a Christian or an II Chin Hoi man. If he says he is a soldier they press him into service. If he says he is a Christian they ask him to repeat the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments. If he does this successfully: they say: 'Yes, you are a Chris- tian, go in peace.' But if he fails they say: 'He is an II Chin Hoi man, take him out and shoot him.' " The blindly furious agitators made no distinction be- tween friendly and unfriendly Japanese. If there was any man who deserved the good-will of the Koreans it was the humane and enlightened Prince Hirobumi Ito, who had become the first civil Resident-General of Korea in 1906, and whose administration was distinguished by many of the reforms to which I shall presently refer in some detail. But October 26, 1909, a Korean fanatic named Inchan Angan assassiaated him during a visit to Harbin, whither he had gone to confer with representatives of the Russian Government regarding Manchurian matters. "I am a Korean," proudly said the assassin when questioned, "and am very happy to have fulfilled my duty for my coimtry and to have avenged my people and also the pubHc dis- honor of unfortunate Korea." This outrage was followed by repeated efforts to kill other officials, including four attacks in 1907 upon Korean Cabinet Ministers who had accepted appointment by the Japanese. In March of the following year the Honorable Durham White Stevens, an American who was diplomatic adviser to the Department of Foreign Affairs in Prince Ito's administration in Seoul, was fatally shot by a Korean shortly after his arrival in San Francisco, his offense having been the assistance that he had given to the Japanese, and an interview published in the San Francisco papers defending their course in Korea. A recent author, in his eagerness to defend everything that the Japanese have done, refers to the Koreans as "sea- 352 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST thieves" and "semi-pirates/' whose conversion into peace- ful citizens "requires as much skill and firmness as to domesticate savages." He declares that "gentle methods, kindness and diplomacy have been tried in both instances, [Korea and Formosa] only to be requited by assassination, violence and brutality. Then what the Japanese ingeniously call a 'stronger pressure' has been brought to bear, and it would be folly to deny that hard blows have been dealt ahke to those who would despoil and assassinate. But when all milder measures fail, there remains but one method of dealing with armed insurgents and bloodthirsty savages, and that is to shoot them." Fair-minded Japanese will hardly reHsh that kind of a defense. A writer who does not have a juster compre- hension of the situation than such words indicate should be followed with caution. There are thieving and brutal Koreans just as there are thieving and brutal Japanese, Americans, and Englishmen; but men of that type are no more common in Korea than in other lands. I have trav- elled through many parts of Korea without losing a penny's worth of goods or witnessing a single act of violence. I have seen more savagery in Glasgow and Chicago in a single day than I saw in Korea in two months. Every right-minded person must sympathize with the grief and despair of the better class of Koreans. Wretched as Korea was, it was nevertheless their native land. They had apparently cared little for it as long as they had it to themselves; but when an alien conqueror appeared, the patriotic spirit which had burned low suddenly flamed up. They might have adapted the words of Daniel Webster in his famous address to the jury in the case of Dartmouth College a centuiy ago: "It is a poor little coimtry, but there are those who love it." But love is not always wise, and a misguided patriot may be his country's worst enemy. Hot-headed youths added to the clamor. Shortly after the arrival of Coimt Terauchi, a foreigner in Korea wrote me about "a marked evidence of severity in the government's handling of the CHARACTER OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 353 situation now that did not exist with Prince Ito," but he added: "Since you were here, I realize more and more that the young men in schools are the most radically anti- government natives that one sees. They are ungoverna- ble to a very large degree; want to dictate to directors, principals, superiors, King, cabinet and everybody. The same story seems true of China, India, Syria, and Egypt. Sometimes when the obstmacy and pride of these young fellows rise up to block church and school and everything else that one holds dear, I begin to think that the time may come when the government will have to hammer these boys into law-abiding shape." This was probably the way the officials felt. They could not tolerate disorders and revolutionary acts, however patriotically intended. In adopting stem measures they may not have. chosen the wisest course, but they did what all governments are quite apt to do in such circumstances. CHAPTER XXIII BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA The establishment of civil rule by Prince Ito in 1906 in- augurated a better era than the unhappy one that followed the Russia-Japan War. He was in many respects a re- markable man. As a youth he was eager to learn of the outside world. It was not easy at that time to get per- mission to leave the country, but at the age of seventeen (1858) he and a friend, who afterward became the famous Coimt K. Inouye, secretly escaped to a British vessel that was about to sail for England. They persuaded the cap- tain to permit them to work their passage, and they arrived in London friendless and, save for four shillings, penniless. Their presence became known to Mr. Hugh Matheson, a Christian merchant who was deeply interested in foreign missions, and who afterward became convener of the For- eign Missionary Society of the English Presbyterian Church. He generously took the two young men into his own home, where they remained for two years. When they returned to their native land conditions had begun to change, and, although they were at first regarded with suspicion, their intelligence and knowledge of European methods ere long made them useful to the government. When the aUied fleet captured Shimonoseki in 1864, the Japanese authorities called upon Ito and Inouye to confer with the victors re- garding terms. They discharged this delicate duty with such skill and discretion that they won high favor. After that their rise was rapid. The list of positions that Ito was called upon to fiU at various times during his subsequent career is a striking one: Governor of Hyogo, member of special embassy to Europe to revise treaties, organizer of Japanese banking regulations. Minister of Works in the Imperial Cabinet, framer of the new Constitution, first 354 BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 355 President of the House of Peers, negotiator of the treaties of Tien-tsin and Shimonoseki with China, President of the Privy Council, representative of Japan at the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria, and five times Prime Minister. No other Japanese bulks so large in the period of transition from feudal to modern Japan, and no other had so influential a part in shaping the national pohcy in that era of recon- struction. It was this man, the foremost statesman of the empire, that at the height of his fame came to Korea in 1906 as the first Resident-General. I do not agree with those who reviled him as the arch-enemy of Korea. Granting that some of his methods were of dubious character, and that his private morals were criticised even in his own country, where laxity is common, the fact remains that he was one of the very wisest and most progressive of the pubhc men of Japan, and that he had large and considerate views of the Koreans and of the duty of his country to them. If Korea was to be ruled by Japan at all, its friends could not have suggested a better Japanese as Resident-General than Prince Ito. I found a general opinion, not only among Japanese but among missionaries and other foreigners with whom I talked, that he was a firm and just administrator who earnestly tried to better conditions. He had the statesmanship to see that, from the view-point of Japan herself, it was expedient to deal justly with a subject peo- ple. During his incumbency of three years he placed a higher class of men in public office, enacted wholesome laws, made roads, built railways, encouraged education, reor- ganized the courts, systematized the revenues, promoted agriculture and fisheries, took vigorous measures to sup- press the bands of brigands who infested the country dis- tricts, and promoted other salutary reforms. Prominent among these was the placing of the currency of the countr}^ on a gold basis. I have described in another chapter the financial chaos that had existed. Prince Ito called in the numerous coins of varying weight and purity, issued new coins of uniform value, imposed severe penalties for counter- 356 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST feiting, and inaugurated plans for a Bank of Korea, which was formally established July 27, 1909. One of his first acts was to deal sternly with the bmtal Japanese who had been guilty of the kind of maltreatment of the Koreans to which I have referred in a preceding chap- ter. Shortly after his assumption of office, in 1906, he caused a law to be enacted giving the Resident-General authority to take cognizance of any Japanese subjects having no fixed abode or means of hvelihood, or guilty of using intemperate language, or resorting to extortion, usury, or cognate offenses. Many were fined and impris- oned, and one hundred and seven were deported during his term of office. I had a long conference with Prince Ito in Tokyo. I shall not attempt to give a full account of that conversa- tion. While it was private, he knew that I was seeking information for pubHc use, and gave me full liberty to quote him. He spoke excellent Enghsh and discussed the whole question of Japanese plans in Korea with every appearance of candor. He freely admitted that mistakes had been made, and he lamented that many of the Japanese who at first went to Korea did some regrettable things; but he earnestly expressed his desire to make his country's rule a real benefit to a people who, he deeply felt, had never had a fair chance. The fanatic who assassinated him did the worst possible thing for Korea, for he murdered the most powerful friend that his coimtr3niien had among the ruling Japanese. It is significant that the opponents of Prince Ito in Japan were of the party which favored a more drastic poHcy. This party felt that Korea was the absolute prop- erty of Japan, that its prompt "Japanization" was a miH- tary necessity, and that its people were so hopelessly and contemptibly inferior and incorrigible that as little atten- tion should be paid to their alleged rights as the United States of half a century ago paid to the rights of the American Indians. Prince Ito, on the contrary, held that the Ko- reans were capable of development, and that it would not BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 357 only be humane but to the advantage of Japan to treat them fairly. The revolutionary cabal in Manchuria and California which planned and executed the foul murder of this enlightened statesman weakened their own case and strengthened the hands of their enemieS; who now ex- claimed: "What encouragement has any Japanese official to attempt to deal justly by the Koreans if he is in danger of being assassinated for his pains?" Fortunately, intelli- gent Japanese know that the crime was that of a compara- tively small number of reactionaries. The majority of the people of Korea do not love their ahen rulers, but they are not disposed to shoot those who try to deal fairly by them. Viscomit Sone, who succeeded Prince Ito in 1909, con- tinued the work along the lines laid down by his distin- guished predecessor until he was compelled by ill health to return to Japan, in the spring of 1910. Lieutenant-General Terauchi was then appointed to this responsible post. His pohcy is discussed in other chapters. But criticism of his stem mihtaristic rule and of the harsh police methods that he permitted, or at least acquiesced in, should not fail to do justice to his integrity, his patriotic purpose to do what he sincerely beheved to be for the best, his large ad- ministrative abihtj^, and his vigor in carrying out and en- larging the plans for public improvements inaugurated by Prince Ito. Sanitary ordinances were promulgated and enforced. Water and sewerage systems were installed. Free hospitals and dispensaries were opened in the prin- cipal cities. Railways, telegraphs, and highways were ex- tended mitil the traveller can reach many parts of the country without floundering through the alternately muddy and dusty ruts that were euphemistically called paths. Railway construction began under the old Korean Gov- ernment, which was persuaded to grant a concession to an American company to build a line from Seoul to Chemulpo, 19.4 miles. Work was begmi in 1899, but the road was sold to a Japanese company before it was opened for traffic. This company began, in 1901, to build a railroad from Seoul 358 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST to the southern port of Fusan, a distance of 274.9 miles, which was completed in 1904 and formally opened January 1, 1905. The year 1902 saw the beginning of the line from Seoul northward to Wiju, on the Yalu River, 309,7 miles. The work was started as an xmdertaking of the Korean Government through French engineers; but soon after the outbreak of the Russia-Japan War it was taken over by the Japanese, who made it a part of their trunk line nmning the entire length of the country from Fusan to Wiju, a distance of 584.6 miles. The lightly constructed narrow- gauge line from the Yalu River to Mukden was changed to a solidly ballasted broad-gauge, and the Yalu was spanned by a noble bridge, which was opened with elaborate cere- monies November 3, 1911, and through service established. One may now travel from Tokyo, Japan, to Fusan, Korea, in thirty-six hours, including the eight-hour ferry across Korea Strait; from Fusan to Seoul in eleven hours; from Seoul to Wiju in fourteen hours; and from Wiju to Mukden in nine hours; in other words, from Tokyo to Mukden in seventy hours. Of several branch lines that have since been built, the most important is the one from Seoul, one hundred and fifty miles northeastward to the port of Gensan. It did not offer such early commercial business as the main north- and-south lines, for while it traverses some fertile valleys it also crosses a mountainous and sparsely populated region. But its administrative and military importance is very great, and the Japanese were jubilant when the road was officially proclaimed open for traffic September 16, 1914. Over a thousand miles of railway are now in operation in Korea. All are owned by the government and have the standard gauge of four feet eight and a half inches. About 10,000 men are employed, of whom approximately three- fifths are Japanese and two-fifths Koreans. The equip- ment is modern, and the service reasonably good. It will be noted that, with the exception of the short line from Seoul to Chemulpo, all the railroad building in Korea has been done by the Japanese. Nor is this all, for they have BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 359 made over fifteen hundred miles of graded highways, and are adding new ones every year. They are therefore en- titled to the full measure of credit for the inestimable ad- vantages which these improved facilities for travel and transportation have brought to Korea. Diligent efforts were also made to bring order out of chaos in land titles and boundaries. Surveys were made and submitted to local committees of investigation. If a Ko- rean who claimed ownership of a piece of property felt aggrieved by the decision of a committee, he could appeal to a higher committee composed of the Administrative Superintendent as chairman, three judges, and six officials of the Government-General and Land Investigation Bureau. It is true that the poor peasant was seldom able to invoke his legal rights effectively; but it is hard in any land for the best of laws to afford adequate protection to ignorant and penniless men who have neither the knowledge nor the money to make a contest in the courts. Afforestation is another great boon which the Japanese have brought to Korea. Millions of young trees were set out on the bare hillsides, and April 3 was officially desig- nated as Arbor Day, on which the Koreans, and especially school children, were urged to set out trees, which the gov- ernment furnished. This was a most wise and enlightened measure to restore the fertiHty of the soil, check the ravages of floods, and provide the next generation with the fuel and lumber which the country now so sorely lacks. The far-sighted policy of the administration was also manifested in its intelligent recognition of the fact that the Koreans are chiefly an agricultural people, that their farm- ing operations were crude in the extreme, and that their prosperity and the resultant prosperity of the countr}^ would be enormously increased by teaching a better system. "In order to accomplish this purpose," wTote Governor-General Terauchi, "I planned the extension and creation of organs for encouraging agricultm-e and introducing unproved agri- cultural methods. Besides the Model Agricultural Station at Suwon, the central organ, I caused the establishment of 360 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST two branches, one at Taiku and the other at Pyengyang. For sericulture; another branch was established at Yongsan near Seoul; for cotton cultivation, one at Mokpo; and for horticulture, one at Tukto near Seoul, and another at Gensan. Besides these, I caused the establishment of nurseries in all the provinces, charged with the investiga- tion of all matters relating to agriculture, examinations and tests of agricultural products, fertilizers and so forth, giving instruction in improved agricultural methods and distribution of seeds and seedlings. I also caused sericul- tural schools and agricultural schools to be established, the former in many places, and the latter in important local centres. Further, I appointed a large number of experts to the central and provincial offices to teach and guide Ko- reans in general agricultural industry, sericulture, stock- breeding, irrigation and so forth. I also occasionally issued special instructions with regard to the cultivation of rice and upland cotton, sericultural industry and stock-breeding, and showed methods to be pursued in effectmg improve- ment and obtaining increased crops. Finally, in order to encourage the general agricultural industry, I abolished, in 1912, export duties on rice, cotton, silk-cocoons, and many other agricultural products." ^ Large credit is due Viscount Terauchi for this beneficent work. Continued improvement, too, was made in the character of the Japanese population in Korea. Most of the soldiers who fought in the Russia-Japan War were en- couraged to return to Japan when their terms of enhstment expired. The adventurers who had flocked in at the close of the war found the changed conditions less favorable to them and began to go back to their native land, and the Japanese who came in their place were of a distinctly better class. When Viscount Terauchi became Prime Minister of the Empire, in 1916, he was succeeded in the Governor-General- ship of Korea by Field-Marshal Viscount Hasegawa, an- other able soldier and administrator, and he carried on the 1 Report to the Throne, 1914. BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 361 great task of reconstruction along the lines inaugurated by his capable predecessor. The Japanese officials whom I personally met in Seoul, Taiku, and Fyengyang, impressed me as men of high grade who did not suffer in comparison with many white colonial administrators in similar positions in Asia. Judge Noboru Watanabe, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, is a Presby- terian elder, a Christian gentleman of as fine a type as one could find anywhere. He makes no secret of his faith, and shortly after his arrival in Seoul he accepted a missionary's invitation to speak to the large Korean congregation in the Yun Mot Kol Church in Seoul. He took as his text Eph. 4 : 4-6, and preached Christ with earnestness and power. His wife is a woman of like culture and faith, and was President of the Woman's Christian Temperance Society when their home was in Yokohama. My interview with the Japanese Resident at Taiku de- veloped some interesting facts. I found the Resident, Mr. Saburo Hisamidsu, an intelligent man of about fifty years of age, who was formerly for six years Consul-General at Seattle, Washington, and who spoke Enghsh fluently. He received me cordially and described with enthusiasm a plan of having the Korean magistrates of the forty-one counties under his jurisdiction come to Taiku once a year for special instruction. He said that little could be accom- plished by the mere promulgation of laws and ordinances; for while many of the Korean officials were well-meaping men, they were without the knowledge and experience that would enable them to carry out the reforms which the Japanese had inaugurated. He stated that the second an- nual conference of this kind was then in session and that he would be glad to have me visit it. I repHed that it would be very gratifying for me to do so, and he thereupon took me to the conference. It was held in a long, low room, but well-lighted and ventilated. The Korean magistrates were seated at two parallel tables extending the full length of the room. The name and residence of each magistrate were posted on a strip of paper about six inches wide and fifteen 362 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST inches long hanging from the edge of the table in front of him. The Japanese Resident, the Korean Governor, a Japanese secretary, an interpreter and six Japanese clerks occupied seats at the head of the room. The Korean Governor was president of the conference, though it was evident that the real leadership was with the Japanese Secretary. At the first conference the year before, twenty- nine of the forty-one coimty magistrates were present, and all but three wore the traditional topknot. This year forty of the forty-one magistrates attended, and not one wore a topknot, all having their hair cut in Japanese style. The magistrates manifested keen interest in the proceed- ings and discussed the various topics with animation. They were apparently learning some useful things. Mr. Hisamidsu gave me a copy of the printed programme and the rules and the regulations which were being taught. It was an octavo pamphlet of twenty-two pages, and dealt with such subjects as the making and repairing of roads, the erection and care of public buildings, the clerical staff required in offices of various grades, sanitary rules and their enforcement, police regulations, etc. Sample reports and vouchers were given, and methods of keeping accounts were explained. The conference was in session eight days and I could readily see how such instruction would increase the intelligence and efficiency of the magistrates who at- tended it. Koreans who accept office under the Japanese are not always popular with their countrymen, but these Koreans certainly became wiser magistrates than their predecessors. Some of the acts which have given offense to the Koreans were inevitable. It is not possible for a conquering army in time of war to sweep through a country and not incur the fear and hatred of the native population; and Japan had to do this twice within a decade. Moreover, when the Japanese took control of Korea, they found one of the worst and most inefficient governments imaginable. It would not be easy to exaggerate the extremity of the situation. Save for a few local improvements which had been made by foreigners. BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 363 there were no roads, no railways, no telegraphs, no schools worthy of the name (except mission schools), no justice in the courts, no uniform currency — ^practically nothing of any kind that a people need. The Japanese had to create all the external conditions of stable government and civil- ized life, and to create them against the opposition of a corrupt and degenerate ruKng class and the inherited inertia and squalor of a people who had so long acquiesced in mis- government and injustice that they had ceased to care. When the energetic reforms of the Japanese spurred them out of their indolence and apathy and made them go to work and to clean up their filthy alleys, they were as cross and peevish as the slum-dwellers of New York and Chicago when sanitary laws order them to cease sweat-shop work in living rooms, to stop throwing garbage into the streets, and to submit to vaccination and tenement inspection. The profligate official class more or less secretly hated the Japa- nese and hoped for the triumph of the Russians because the Russians were not disposed to interfere so seriously with the old order and were willing to let vicious magistrates and court ministers neglect and rob and abuse the people pro- vided they recognized Russian supremacy. Russia in Korea would have meant abundance of foreign gold, the continu- ance of profligacy, misgovernment, and filth, and in general the poHcy of laissez-faire. The magistrates, finding their corrupt practices interfered with and their extortionate gains cut off, raised a loud outcry, and the swarm of para- sites who loimged about their yamens swelled the clamor. I have referred in a former chapter to the charges of forced labor and the seizure of property without due com- pensation. But even these questions have two sides. There undoubtedly were instances of great hardship to Ko- reans who were compelled to leave their fields and to toil on pubHc works, often at a distance from their homes. Some Koreans, too, received little or nothing for land which they were forced to surrender. I would not minimize this gross injustice. The following letter from one important city describes a typical experience: "With the advent of 364 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST many Japanese, the coming of the railroad, the confiscation of land and houses by Japanese merchants and others, the injustice of the Korean magistrate, his apparent alliance with the Japanese to force Koreans to sell at great loss, the indefiniteness of Korean deeds, the lack of a system for re- cording deeds, the high-handed measures of Japanese and French and the Korean officials, many comphcations over property questions arise. The Japanese have staked off their purchases, marking the stakes as defining Japanese property. The railroad men have run the line through growing crops and houses, and on either side of it have marked off a large concession of hundreds of acres contain- ing the best land and best houses in the province. The land and four hundred houses have been condemned, and the people are ordered out by the Japanese and Korean officials and told to look to the Korean Government for pay. They are paid for their houses through the Korean magistrate, and although not treated impartially are, on the whole, paid a pretty fair compensation. I have not heard of any one having been paid for land or crops, but on the contrary, apparently reHable reports say that within this concession the magistrate himself is buying up land at a cheap price and selling it to the Japanese. The people are highly enraged and see no hope of redress. They do not understand what is being done, cannot trust their own officials, are being driven out of house and land, and lose their crops. Ignorant and helpless, they are the victims of all kinds of sharpers. Outside of this 'concession' also, the Japanese have bought hundreds of fields and the French have bought some. The latter with liigh-handed measures forced the people who had houses on their property to tear them down under threats of exacting a high rent for them. This produced intense indignation." A letter from another city said that the Japanese were buying all available land sites; that they had laid out a regular settlement with broad, straight streets, having razed a whole Korean vil- lage that stood in the way, and that they were tearing down the city wall to put a street through. BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 365 On the other hand, it should be borne in mind that it would have been difficult if not impossible for the Japanese authorities to carry out some of the improvements that are of large value to the whole country, such as roads, railways, sanitation, etc., if they had been obliged to depend upon the voluntary labor of Korean peasants, who are admitted by their warmest admirers to be lazy and shiftless, and who, even when diligent and ambitious, do not like Japanese taskmasters. The Japanese claim that they had no in- tention of forcing Koreans to labor, but that their contrac- tors were given written and officially stamped requests for so many hundred laborers to be presented to Korean offi- cials. The Korean magistrates, however, understood these "requests" as equivalent to demands. Complaints be- came numerous, and were so well substantiated that an order was issued January 6, 1906, forbidding railway con- tractors to apply to the Korean authorities for laborers. As for land, every government has the unquestionable and absolutely necessary right to take private property imder the right of eminent domain. It ought to pay a fair price for it. The Japanese affirm that they tried to do this, but that the Korean magistrates, through whom the ar- rangements were made, pocketed the money. Japanese officials, not knowing the Korean language, were obliged to deal through native inteipreters and "go-betweens," who were not always honest. If a piece of property was to be bought, the "go-between" might take it for a quarter of its value under threat of Japanese vengeance, collect full price from the Japanese purchaser, and steal the difference. Land titles, too, were in hopeless confusion, as missionaries and mission boards knew to their cost, and it was not always easy to discriminate between state property, which the government had a right to use, and private property, for which owners were entitled to compensation. These con- siderations do not wholly excuse the Japanese, for they did not always pay fair prices, and they knew the bad character of the native magistrates and "go-betweens"; but it is only just to recognize the difficulties of the situation. 366 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The annual reports of the Government-General, entitled Reforms and Progress in Korea, are very interesting reading. They describe what has been done and what is projected under such headings as "Administration/' "Judiciary," "Peace and Order," "Fuiance," "Currency," "Banking," "Government Undertakings," "Civil Engineering Works," "Communications," "Commerce," "Agriculture," "Trade and Industry," "Mining," "Forestiy," "Fishery," "Sani- tation," and "Education." Appendices, tables of statistics, maps, and illustrations make these reports a valuable com- pendium of Japanese efforts in Korea. The Japanese, like Americans, naturally put their best foot forward in reports that are issued for the outside world. The most favorable construction is placed upon their acts. Highly virtuous language is employed in setting forth their intentions. Unpleasant things are as skilfully minimized as malaria and mosquitoes are in the glowing accounts of summer-resort proprietors in the United States. But after making due allowances for this common characteristic of all such writ- ings, the general fact remains that the Japanese have done wonders in Korea. Grant that many of the reforms may be found in a well-regulated penal colony, and that a cita- tion of them does not meet all the questions that may be fairly raised. The reforms are none the less valuable and praiseworthy. The Japanese have changed the names of places in a way that appears odd to a foreigner. The renaming has some justification, for a number of the names that have become famihar to English readers are crude attempts at phonetic spellings of what foreigners understood to be Ko- rean pronunciation. "Coria" was the name that the early Portuguese sailors gave to the country, a corruption of "Korai," the name of one of the native states into which the peninsula was long divided. Europe took this name from the Portuguese, the French rendering it La Coree, and the English Corea or Korea. The people themselves for many centuries have called their country Chosen (The Morning Calm). As this is the real name of the country, New Offices of the Government-General, Seoul. To be completed in 1924 at a cost of yen 3,000,000. Telephone Exchange in the Post-Office, Seoul. Post-Office, Seoul. Completed in 1915. BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 367 the Japanese, properly enough, have adopted it. They are not to be blamed either for rejecting imported European names and foreign spellings of native sounds that are aUen to Asia, and substituting a Japanese spelling or restoring a native name which foreigners had arbitrarily changed. The new spellings are said to represent the Japanese pro- nunciation of the Chinese characters which the cities have long borne. The Japanese did not, therefore change the names but merely their English form. When, however, they attempt to give an English phonetic version of their pronunciation of a Chinese character applied to a Korean locality, the result is sometimes startling and confusing to a traveller. I do not profess to be an authority on the lan- guages of China, Japan, and Korea, and consequently can only express my ignorant and humble admiration for the combination of Asiatic loyalty and linguistic agihty which have transformed Pyengyang into Heijo, Seoul into Keijo, Songdo into Kaijo, and Chemulpo into Jinsen. The new nomenclature is gradually becoming famihar, although there will be some confusion until corrected maps become availa- ble to Western readers. The fact is that the Japanese have made Korea an integral part of their empire, and that they are reorganizing every phase of it in accordance with their national characteristics and methods. In pursuance of this policy of assimilation, the imperial government in 1916 gave open sanction to in- termarriages by betrothing Princess Nashimoto, a daughter of a Prince of the Japanese imperial family, to Prince Yi, Jr., who was Crown Prince when his elder brother was Em- peror. The betrothal evoked no enthusiasm, but with the encouragement of such an example, marriages of Japan- ese and Koreans are becoming more frequent than formerly. It is doubtful whether such unions will become general, at least for a considerable period, for the rather matter-of-fact reason that Japanese men deem their own countrywomen far more attractive and congenial than Korean women, whose physical charms, it must be confessed, average con- siderably lower than those of Japanese women. 368 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The Japanese are making efforts, too, to win the support of prominent Koreans. Men who show a disposition to be loyal to the government are given such positions as they are deemed fitted to occupy. Quite a number of the provin- cial governors and local officials of various grades are native Koreans. There is usually a Japanese "resident" close by to "advise" them, but the Korean enjoys the title and show of office, at any rate. October 9, 1910, Governor-General Terauchi, in the name of the Emperor of Japan, formally created a Korean peerage of the Empire, and conferred the rank of marquis upon six Koreans, count upon three, viscount upon twenty-two, and baron upon forty-five. The function was made an impos- ing one with all the ceremony that was calculated to make a deep impression upon the new peers and upon their coun- trymen. While Korean children are urged to attend the free public schools, to which we have referred in another chapter, promising young men are encouraged to go to Japan for collegiate and technical courses, and Korean students may now be found in the Imperial University and in a variety of medical, industrial, normal, and other schools. These young men naturally imbibe a good deal of Japanese sentiment, and return to their own land to become capable instruments of the Government-General. Many of the Japanese in Korea shrink from the full ap- plication of the poHcy of equality and assimilation. "Birds of a feather flock together" there as eveiywhere else, and the Japanese naturally live in sections which are distinct from the Korean town, and have their own clubs, schools, churches, and social fife. The average Japanese considers himself superior to the Korean and with reason. Making all due allowance for exceptions and for the rapid levelling-up process that is now going on as the result of improved gov- ernmental, economic, educational, and religious conditions, the present fact is indubitable that the Japanese do represent a higher civilization and culture in Korea, and they are prone to act accordingly in their relations with "the natives." BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 369 The latter are sensitively quick to see this and to feel hurt by it. It is not surprising, therefore, that in most places the social cleavage is marked. That cleavage is notoriously wide between Americans and Fihpinos in the Philippine Islands, in spite of the earnest efforts of the Governor- General in Manila and the beneficent desires of the ad- ministration in Washington. How long was it before the English, Scotch, Welsh and Irish peoples were welded into a single nationality in common feeling and purpose? Are the Irish welded in yet? So in Korea, considerable time must pass before the Japanese and Koreans are really one people. Meantime, we have the impression that the Government- General is honestly trying to develop the poHcy of assimila- tion as fast as it deems practicable. To his "Instructions to the Japanese Residents in Korea," shortly after his arrival in 1910, Viscount Terauchi added these wise words: "The aim and purpose of the annexation is to consoHdate the bonds of two countries, removing aU causes for the territorial and national discriminations neces- sarily existing as separate powers, so as perfectly to promote the mutual welfare and happiness of the two peoples in gen- eral. Consequently, should the Japanese people regard it as a result of the conquest of a weak country by a stronger one, and speak and act under such illusion in an overbearing and undignified manner, they would go contrary to the spirit in which the present step has been taken. Japanese settlers in Korea seem to have considered themselves to be living in a foreign land and have often fallen into the mistake of hold- ing themselves as superiors at the expense of the people of the country. It is opportune that things have now as- sumed a new aspect. Let them take this opportunity to change their ideas and attitude toward the people of Korea. Let them always bear m mind that they are our brothers and treat them with sympathy and friendship ; and in pur- suing individual avocations by mutual help and co-opera- tion, both peoples should contribute their shares to the progress and growth of the whole Empire." 370 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Intelligent opinion in Japan is supporting this policy, as witness the following extract from an article in a leading Tokyo newspaper, entitled "Assimilation Through Love and S)anpathy." "Koreans," said the writer, "are often spoken of as being a people who deserve no sympathy. But what is it that has made them so crooked in thought, perfidious, deceitful, and treacherous? Ages of maladmin- istration, and in that respect they indeed deserve all sym- pathy. True, there are incorrigible Koreans who would spurn sympathy ; on them force may properly be used. It is indeed imfortunate that unscrupulous adventurers have gone to Korea and by their evil conduct given a bad and wrong impression of the Japanese people as a whole; but such men are being dealt with as they deserve, and justice is being administered as never before." The foreigner who indiscriminately denoimces the Japa- nese may discreetly remember that the alleged Christian nations have not set Japan a very good example in dealing with subject races. To say nothing of French harshness in Madagascar, and Spanish oppression in Cuba and the Phihppines, is any American proud of his country's treat- ment of the Indians for two hundred years after the white man came ? If there is such an American, his spirit will be chastened by reading some of the voluminous literature on the subject, including Helen Hunt Jackson's A Century of Dishonor. And what about the flagrant injustice of our treatment of the Chinese and Japanese on the Pacific coast? As for the Philippines, while the executive de- partment of the American Government has done admirably and we "point with pride" to what has been accompHshed, it was a painfully long time before Congress could be in- duced to pass some laws which meant simple justice to the FiHpinos, and Mr. Taft, when Governor-General, pubHcly lamented the brutalities committed by some dissolute Americans in the archipelago. Can we reasonably expect Japan to do better by the Koreans than many Western nations have done by their conquered peoples? I am not excusing the Japanese. Faults should not be BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 371 condoned because other people commit them. I am simply reminding the reader of the magnitude and difficulty of their task, and that any disposition to be unduly censorious in judging them should be tempered by a frank recognition of the difficulties of the situation. Grant that they have not always acted in accordance with the standards of Christian altruism ; that they have made political and mih- tary necessity the first consideration; that some of their methods have been ruthless and that they have sometimes made the process of readjustment needlessly trying to the helpless natives. But let us remember that there never was a dirtier Augean stable to be cleansed than that which they found in the land of The Morning Cahn, and that the mess required decisive measures. The historian of the next generation will be in better position to take an impartial view than men of to-day, who are in danger of having their judgment warped by the personal feelings that have been aroused. Trjdng to look at the matter as fairly as possible now, I believe that the balance inclines heavily in favor of the Japanese. I do not defend some of the things that they have done. I sympathize with the Koreans. They would be unworthy of respect if they did not prefer their national freedom. One can understand why the injustice of their own magistrates seemed less irksome than the stem justice of alien conquerors. Nevertheless I confess to sympathy also with the Japanese. They were forced to occupy Korea to prevent a Russian occupation, which would have men- aced their own independence as a nation. They are now struggling with their burden against heavy odds, with lim- ited financial resources, and against the dislike and opposi- tion of Koreans, Russians, Chinese, and most of the foreign- ers in the Far East. While we should as frankly discuss their methods as we would those of our own country in similar circmnstances, as I have done in other chapters of this book, we should avoid the error of assuming that we can help the Koreans by unjust abuse of their rulers. It would be narrow and unscientific to estimate the his- 372 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST toric value of the Japanese occupation of Korea solely by incidental defects of method or spirit, just as it would be to protest that a transcontinental line of railway should not have been built because the right-of-way injured some man's property, or a brutal foreman committed acts of violence against his person or family. We should view a movement in historic perspective, deprecating indeed the wrongs of the people concerned, and visiting full blame upon those who unnecessarily caused them, but recognizing nevertheless that results, even when achieved by imper- fect human instruments, are to be measured rather by their worth to the country and the world than by the f oUies and crimes of some of the men who had a part in the effort. Looking at the question of Japanese administration as a whole, we must bear in mind that there are a large way and a small way of viewing it. The large way is to note that in the evolution of the race and the development of international conditions when it was clearly inevitable, and, for the time at least, for the welfare of the Koreans themselves that Korea should come under the tutelage of Japan. All great movements in this world, however beneficent in general character and ulti- mate purpose, involve human agents with their full share of human infirmities. Some of these agents are apt to be selfish, some greedy, some cruel, some lustful. The de- velopment of a movement, therefore, is certain to be at- tended by many individual acts that are wrong. Historic illustrations will at once occur to every student. The Protestant Reformation in Europe was not free from bigotry and passion on the side of the Reformers. The abolition of slavery in the United States was accomplished in a war whose moral majesty was tarnished by many acts of cruelty and passion; and it is an unpleasant chapter in American history that records the nefarious acts of Northern " carpet- baggers" in the South after the war. It was clearly for the best interests of Africa and the world that Great Britain should overthrow the corrupt and reactionary oligarchy that was masquerading under the name of a republic in the BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 373 Transvaal; but England did many things in that war and in the months following which her best people do not hke to remember. The small way of considering a historical question is to fix our attention on such acts of individuals or even on the poHcies of men temporarily in official position. We should not hastily conclude that, because a period of transition is turbulent and many of its agents are blundering or un- scrupulous, the movement itself is bad. It is right that we should plainly and firmly protest against Japanese acts of injustice to the helpless Koreans, right to do everything in our power to remedy injustice; but it would be grievously wrong to act on the supposition that Japan is not Kkely to remain in Korea and to antagonize the general poHcy of re- construction. We sjonpathize with the natural aspirations of any people for an independent nationality: but the Ko- reans could not be independent anyway under present con- ditions in the Far East, and they are far better off imder the Japanese than they were under their own rulers or than they would have been under the Russians. Nothing could be worse for Korea than plunging her back into the abyss of corruption, weakness, and oppression of the old regime. A new order is being established. The Koreans are being given better opportunities for advancement. The Japanese are the poKtical and economic agents through whom this uplifting movement is being developed. They have made some mistakes and they will doubtless make more; but on the whole their work in Korea has been beneficent in many ways. Of course it is hard for the Ko- reans, and for their foreign friends who came to the coun- try in the old days, to adapt themselves to the changed conditions; but there is no alternative, and it is the part of wisdom ungrudgingty to recognize the inescapable situation. As time passes some Koreans are gradually accepting the new conditions, or at least submitting to them. There are indeed many who are restive under Japanese rule, and who intrigue against it. It would be expecting too much of human nature to assume that milHons of people would 374 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST unanimously agree to the extinction of national independ- ence. In the spring of 1919, they led an uprising to which special circumstances gave surprising magnitude. President Wilson's declaration of the right of self-determination had fired the imagination of many dependent peoples. Egyp- tians and East Indians demanded freedom from Great Britain, and Filipinos from America. Korean fervor also flamed up. A revolutionary movement was inaugurated so secretly that missionaries and Japanese were caught un- awares. The funeral of the old Emperor was the chosen time, and March 1, 1919, independence was proclaimed. Pathos and childlikeness strangely mingled as the unarmed crowds (the Koreans are not permitted to have weapons) radiantly shouted and sang, as if, their mere proclamation had made them free. The result proved anew that Japan will not voluntarily grant Korean independence; that the Koreans cannot seciu-e it by force; and that other govern- ments, having long ago recognized Japanese annexation of the peninsula, will not interfere. The Japanese gendarmes were infiuiated, and wreaked merciless vengeance upon guilty and innocent ahke — ^burning villages, firing into crowds, arresting and torturing thousands, and displaying special mahgnity against Christians in the belief that the churches and schools were centres of sedition, in spite of the fact that the agitation also included Buddhists, members of the Chun Do Kyo (a patriotic society of non-Chris- tians), and students in government schools.^ Costly, too, was the movement to the Japanese, for it re- enforced their critics, disheartened their friends, alienated the sympathy of alhed nations, and brought upon the ruth- less militarists the opprobrious name of ^Hhe Huns of the Orient." A tidal wave of indignant protest swept over America and Great Britain. There was little sympathy with the uprising as a political movement, for well-iriformed observers knew its futility. The protest was against the brutality of the methods employed in suppressing it. Prime Minister Hara, in response to urgent representations, ^ cf . pamphlet — " The Korean Situation," by the Commission on Relations with the Orient of the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America. BENEFITS OF JAPANESE RULE IN KOREA 375 promised reforms; but that such atrocities should have been committed at all, and should have gone on unchecked until outside pressure was brought to bear, seriously impaired Japanese prestige. In August, Field Marshal Viscount Hasegawa was replaced as Governor-General by Admiral Baron Minoru Saito, and Mr. Rentaro Midzuno was ap- pointed Director-General of Administration. The former pubhcly declared that he would "govern Korea in the in- terest of the Koreans" and "abolish all forms of discrim- ination"; ^that "the gendarmerie, the unpopular gold braids and swords worn by officials will be discontinued"; and that "all the people will be given impartial justice." Admiral Saito has sincerely tried to carry out this program. Unfortunately, many of the subordinate officials through whom he has had to work, particularly in the local districts, have not been in sympathy with his reforms, so that while there has been improvement in some respects, abusive treat- ment of suspected Koreans has continued. If the Japanese really desire to amalgamate Korea in the Empire, they will do well to make the transition as easy as possible for Koreans who are sore of heart as they brood over their countiy's subjugation. There are indeed limits to prudent indifference; but the policy of sternly punishing every suspected person fans the revolutionary spirit into flame, as the history of Russia proves. He is a wise ruler, as he is a wise parent, who knows when it is better good- naturedly to ignore certain manifestations than it is to make a fuss about them. Criticism of a government, like steam, is seldom dangerous when it is allowed free vent in the open air. It is when repressed that it develops ex- plosive power. The Koreans are rapidly acquiring the qualities that fit a people for intelligent self-determination. If Japan, as many Japanese desire, is to be regarded as the Great Britain of the Far East, is Korea to be to her an integrally related Scotland, a self-governing and loyal Canada, or a turbulent and revolutionary Ireland? An altruistic and conciliatory policy will weld the peninsula and the island empire into a compact nation which will again illustrate the saying that in umon there is strength. CHAPTER XXIV THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS The moral conditions in Japan have long been of an un- pleasant character. Although improvement has been made in recent years, licentiousness is still regarded as a com- paratively venial offense, and it involves less reproach both to men and women than in any other country in the world which lays claim to civihzed standing. Ten and three- tenths per cent of the births are illegitimate. The state- ment of a recent writer that he has "no hesitation in de- scribing the morals of Japanese people to be on the whole greatly superior to those of Western nations," is simply pathetic. A man who can visit Japan and carry away such an impression is beyond argxmient. Murphy's The Social Evil in Japan describes the true situation with startling clearness. It is not an agreeable book to read, but its re- liability is indisputable. The author wrote out of the per- sonal knowledge that he had painfuUy acquired in a strug- gle of many years to save multitudes of Japanese girls from the virtual slavery of a prostitute's life. The alleged easier lot of the Japanese courtesan, as com- pared with that of her American and European sisters, is largely imaginary. It is true that she does not suffer the same sense of shame and guilt, and that she is not so com- pletely ostracized. But she is the victim of the same kind of maltreatment from brutal keepers; she is involved in the same debts from which she can seldom extricate herself; she contracts the same foul diseases ; and, until missionaries took up the struggle in her behalf, she had little better chance of escaping from her keepers and returning to a normal life before she was irretrievably wrecked in health. Young and ignorant girls were persuaded or forced to register as pros- 376 THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 377 titutes at the police stations, and were then assigned to the segregated districts. They were required to fulfil the con- tract which they thoughtlessly signed, and, if they man- aged to escape, the police often helped to capture them and send them back. Many Japanese do not appear to have a conscience on the subject of impurity. They are unmoral rather than immoral, and they frequently stare with ill-concealed sur- prise when they are told that the common licentiousness is wrong. Mr. Galen W. Fisher, Secretary of the Y. M. C. A. in Tokyo, vouches for the statement that the principal of a large normal school said that he not only patronized houses of ill fame himself, but that he advised his teachers to do so, and that he even gave them tickets so that at the end of each month the bills would be sent to him for payment and deducted from their salaries.^ Captain Bechel, who travelled about Japan for seventeen years, investigated one hundred and seven districts and foimd ninety-six of them pestilentially immoral. He reports that phalHc wor- ship is still practised in many Buddhist shrines, and that in some districts almost all the adults are tainted with im- morality. He speaks of a principal of a school who had several paramours with the knowledge of parents and chil- dren alike; of a member of parliament who publicly had two concubines; of a member of a provisional assembly who had two wives and two homes, and children in each, and travelled with geisha; and of leading men, including priests, soncho (chief of village), doctor, principal of the school, and leading business men who sold a girl of twelve years for ten yen because her parents could not support her, and she might become a charge to the village .^ The reliability of Ernest W. Clement's Handbook of Mod- em Japan is not likely to be questioned by any prudent man. The author has lived too long in Japan to be igno- 1 Pamphlet, Japanese Young Men in War and Peace, published by the International Committee of the Y. M. C. A., New York. * Article, "Japan's Need and Response," in the Missionary Review of the World, January, 1917, pp. 5-6. 378 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST rant of the facts, and he writes : "As is well known, the social evil is licensed, and therefore legalized, in Japan; it is not merely not condemned but actually condoned. In Old Ja- pan, the young girl willing to sell herseK to a life of shame to relieve the poverty and distress of her parents would be con- sidered virtuous, because filial piety was regarded as a higher virtue than personal chastity. Nor would the parents who accepted such relief be severely condemned, because the welfare of the family was more important than the condi- tion of the individual. And even in modem Japan, in the eyes of the law, it is no crime to visit a Hcensed house of ill fame; and visitors to such places hand in their cards and have their names registered just as if they were attend- ing an ordinary pubhc function. Nay, more, an ex-president of the Imperial University and one of the leading philos- ophers and educators of the day has come out in pubHc print and affirmed that, from the standpoint of science and philosophy, he can see no evil in prostitution per se." ^ Ideas of modesty in all countries are influenced to some extent by convention, and American women who would sharply resent the charge of indehcacy will sometimes ap- pear at social functions and even on the street in costumes which the Chinese would deem highly immoral. The visitor in Japan should, therefore, not infer too much from the exposure of the nude which is often observed in public places, and in bathing by both men and women. But mak- ing all due allowance for custom in such matters, the gen- eral fact is indubitable that the pubhc sentiment of Japan is pervaded by the idea that lust is a natural appetite which may be almost as properly gratified as one would gratify appetite for food and thirst for drink. I am not immindful that there is shameful immorahty in the cities of Europe and America, and that most of the foreign settlements in the ports of Asia include sinks of iniquity of which Sodom and Gomorrah might have been ashamed. Hundreds of Asiatic women are kept by dissolute Americans and Euro- peans, and the arrival of a steamer load of tourists usually ^ A Handbook of Modern Japan, pp. 166-167. THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 379 means a harvest for the brothels of the port. No Asiatic can be viler than a degenerate white man. Nor is Japan alone in hcensing prostitutes. Some men in Western lands deem governmental regulation under a license system a better way of dealing with the social evil than to permit it to run at large under prohibitory laws, which are usually a dead letter, except as police use them as a means for self-enrichment. Japan has followed the lead of some European nations in licensing a vice which no government has ever eradicated. But whatever may be the theory, the practical effect of Hcensure is to advertise vice, make it easy and attractive, and clothe it with official sanction. Very iFew governments are in such open alliance with vice as the Japanese municipal governments appear to be, and no brothel in all the world displays Christian sym- bols as Japanese brothels display Buddhist symbols, or is indorsed by Christian ministers or educators as Buddhists more or less openly indorse them in Japan. I am aware that some remedial laws have now been en- acted, and that restrictive decisions have been handed down by the courts. The "Free Cassation Regulation," issued by the Home Department October 2, 1900, gave Hcensed women the right to leave resorts without the con- sent of their keepers, and thousands of girls have availed themselves of this right, so that an inmate of a brothel is no longer a legal captive for the period of her contract. Girls under sixteen years of age may not be lawfully hcensed at all. Test cases have been fought through the courts which form gratifying precedents for future suits. Rescue homes have been opened, and the number of licensed pros- titutes has been greatly reduced. But these improvements were obtained chiefly as the result of agitation aroused by missionaries led by Mr. Murphy and the Salvation Army against a vehemence and bitterness of opposition which Mr. Murphy has vividly described. When, in 1916, the authorities of Osaka gave a permit to replace a burned vice district by the erection of brothels on a tract of seventeen acres near Tennoji Park, the Zoological Garden, and Luna 380 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Park, the most popular recreation grounds in the city, the Christians organized the " Tobita Licensed Quarter Opposi- tion Society," and under the leadership of Mr. George Gleason of the Y. M. C. A., and Colonel Yamamuro of the Salvation Army, began a campaign which enlisted the hearty co-operation of many of the best Japanese. Letters were sent to 2,000 leading citizens asking them to make a pubHc declaration of their attitude. Six hmidred sent favorable replies, and only 3 wrote in opposition to the movement. But nearly 1,400 made no reply. A procession of Japanese women headed by the venerable Christian, Madame Yajima, eighty-two years of age, went through the streets to present a petition to the Governor to abandon the scheme. He was "too busy" to see them, but they succeeded in getting ac- cess to the chief of poHce. The Far East, a Tokyo pubHca- tion, reported that though "the matter has now been before the public for months past," it is "remarkable that those in authority have not seen the advisability of determining such an unsavory business by a concession to pubHc opinion, which has been expressed with unusual force." A Supreme Court ruling that the debts of inmates to their brothel proprietors are binding leaves a powerful weapon in the hands of keepers, who are as notorious in Japan as else- where for cheating and overcharging their girls so as to keep them continually in debt. The following extract from a report that was published for the Standing Committee of Co-operating Christian Missions in Japan shows how the laws are evaded: "Strict guard is kept so that inmates cannot get out of the quarters easily without being detected. If detected, they are forced back, the section of the Regulations which provides for the punishment of those interfering with those who wish to secure their freedom being practically overlooked. After their arrival at the police station, the keepers or some of their hirehngs follow and threaten, cajole, and plead in turn, in the endeavor to get them to go back. After the report has been accepted and the women are no longer inmates, the keepers often take from them their clothes and THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 381 leave only thin, dirty dresses and obi. Immediately after one gets free, the keeper almost invariably distrains the property of those who have put their stamps to the con- tract. This has been the most effectual method used so far. About 20 per cent return to a Ufe of shame, and almost without exception the distraint on the household goods of parents and relatives furnishes the reason. A distraint is likely to take nearly everything so that the hardships en- dured by those who are so unfortunate as to have their property distrained upon are great, and from the point of view of those who are so low down in the moral and human scale as to sell their children for vile purposes it is too great a hardship to be endiu-ed for the sake of one's offspring." It is not surprising that the Japanese have carried their customs with them to the mainland of Asia. In China, in- cluding Manchuria, Japanese prostitutes abound in most of the larger cities, especially the ports; and they are also found in many of the smaller towns in the northern and eastern parts of the coimtry, and in the Philippines, For- mosa, and the Straits Settlements. The late John B. Devins, then editor of the New York Observer, wrote: "When passing through a government hospital in Manila, more than seventy Japanese women in one ward were pointed out as women of the street with the remark : ' Nearly every Japanese woman in the Philippines is an evil woman.' " It is said that 26,360 Japanese women are living as prosti- tutes outside of their own land. A particularly embarrassing situation has developed at Tsing-tau, the Chinese port which the Japanese took from the Germans after the outbreak of the European War, in 1914. One of their early acts was to select a spacious tract for a "red-light" section, and to erect several blocks of buildings upon it. The site chosen was close to the Presby- terian Mission compound, with its residences and schools. Respectful protests from the missionaries were politely re- ceived but were unavailing, the Japanese officials not con- cealing their surprise that such objections should be made. The buildings are commodious in size, attractive in appear- 382 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ance, and substantial enough to indicate intentions of per- manence. When they were ready for occupancy, they were filled with girls, and there was a formal opening with elab- orate festivities. Invitations to this opening were sent to all the officials, prominent men, and foreigners in the city, except the American missionaries. Every night the sounds of revelry come from the open-windowed and brightly lighted houses and the tastefully laid out gardens and park- ways connected with them. Sleep is often impossible in the front bedrooms of the , missionary residences, and the orgy seldom dies down till the early morning hours. Like conditions prevail in Korea. The tendency of men of all races to be more unrestrained abroad than at home is not lacking in the Japanese, and the result is a carnival of vice such as Korea never knew before. The remedial ordinances that have been enacted in recent years in Japan are nominally operative in Korea; but they are not enforced in any effective way except in sporadic cases. The Koreans are not a moral people, but they at least regarded sensu- ality as a private vice, and brothels as places to be kept in side alleys. But the Japanese have built houses of prosti- tution in Korea as they have built court-houses and railway- stations. When they locate a colony they usually set apart a section for brothels. Handsome buildings are erected, provided with music and electric lights, and made as attrac- tive as any places in the city. Nor are retired locations selected. In November, 1910, the Seoul authorities ordered the 130 brothels and immoral restaurants that were scat- tered over the Japanese quarter to remove to a segregated section. This order was carried out by police raids, and was an undoubted benefit to the business and residential districts in that part of the city. Unfortunately, the desig- nated site was on a prominent hillside within plain view of a far larger proportion of the capital than the resorts had been before. When brilliantly illuminated, as it is every evening, it is the most conspicuous object in the city. Every boy and girl in the missionary schools on the opposite hill cannot help knowing that it is there, and that it is THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 383 thronged nightly by men who consider themselves re- spectable. Conditions substantially similar, although of course on a smaller scale, exist in practically every Japanese colony in Korea. Even where the number of Japanese is very small, it includes prostitutes. The evil is not confined to the "red-light" districts. Geisha (dancing-girls) are scattered about every considerable town, and waitresses in many of the inns, restaurants and drinking-shops are well mider- stood to be prostitutes, although of course not all of them are. That the authorities know the facts is apparent from statistics which I obtained from official sources during my second visit, and which listed immoral women in Seoul and Pyengyang as "prostitutes," "geisha," and "waitresses in inns, saloons, and restaurants." The official records also showed that there was a monthly government tax collected from prostitutes and geisha. The number of Korean pros- titutes reported by the authorities in Seoul was also given me, and a comparison of the figures showed that one per- son in thirty-one of the Japanese population of the capital was then classified as immoral, and that only one in 730 of the Korean population was so classified. It is only fair to say, however, that the very publicity which the Japa- nese give to the traffic makes it easier to tabulate their statistics than those of the Koreans, who are more secretive in this respect. Racial distinctions are obliterated by this social evil. Koreans are not only openly sohcited to vice, but I was re- liably informed that it is not uncommon for Japanese pan- derers to conduct small traveUing parties of prostitutes from village to village in the country districts. The crown- ing outrage I could not bring myself to believe if the editor of the Korea Review had not declared that "it is so fully proved both by foreign and native witnesses that it is be- yond dispute. In a certain town in Korea, the military quartered soldiers in some Korean houses, and in others Japanese prostitutes. In a number of instances, Korean Christians were compelled to give up part of their houses 384 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST to these prostitutes who carried on their nefarious business on the premises. We made careful inquiries about this unspeakable outrage on decency, and the fact was verified in the most positive manner." I am sorry to write so plainly on this unpleasant subject regarding a people whom I respect and admire in many ways. I am glad to know that increasing numbers of Japa- nese lament the virtual partnership of their authorities with the social evil, and would gladly see it dissolved and vice banished, at least to the underworld to which enhghtened communities relegate it. One of the ways in which the friendly foreigner can help these high-minded Japanese to bring about better conditions is to make it clear that the public opinion of civilized mankind condemns vice, and that those who indulge in it lose both their own character and the respect of the world. Judgment of social and economic conditions in Japan should be tempered by the reflection that the nation has but recently emerged from an era of ignorance regarding these subjects, that Western nations which have known these things much longer still have much to be ashamed of, and that increasing numbers of Japanese are earnestly trying to bring about a better state of affairs. Bishop Charles H. Brent sadly writes of his observations in the Philippines: "How to deal wisely and effectively with this age-long problem has been the puzzle of the Christian mis- sionary ever since Christian missions were first founded. We ourselves have not yet found the way. If we have erred, as I think we have, it has been on the side of a lack of discipline. If we have seemed to be losing sight of the gravity of sexual immorality, it is because we have come to know that you cannot rate the offense there at the same estimate as in the Western world. I have often thought with contempt and scorn of the veneer that glosses over the imcleanness of our own country, and wondered what would happen to the self-righteous Westerner were he suddenly pressed into the social conditions of the Igorots."^ While 1 Article, "Sixteen Years in the Philippines," in the Spirit of M/issiom, March, 1918. THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 385 there is much to regret in the social and industrial condi- tions of modem Japan, there is also much to encourage the hope that a better day is dawning. The forces of humanity and moral upHft have begun to operate, and they are yearly gaining in vigor and power. A word may be added in passing regarding the policy of segregating social vice, since the Japanese method has been recommended by many European and some American stu- dents of this problem who, despairing of eradicating the evil, argue that it is better to restrict it to a limited area where it can be isolated and watched, where only deUber- ately immoral men will seek it, and where women can be medically examined, than it is to have it scattered through a city to tempt young men and contaminate the neighbor- hoods of respectable families. The fact is, however, that "segregation" fails to segregate. A typical woman of the class under consideration likes free- dom as well as other people and will operate at large as long as she can. When the police interfere, she will at- tempt to bribe them; and the experience of a thousand cities proves that she can usually succeed in doing so. Only the most hardened and reckless cases, or the most pitifully ignorant ones, will voluntarily become virtual prisoners in a segregated district. Proof of this appears in the great number of immoral women outside of these dis- tricts in Japan and in Western cities which have adopted the poHcy of segregation, no smaU part of their vice being "out of bounds." Segregation, too, places the stamp of legal approval upon licentiousness as a recognized business, and fosters police corruption, for not only will women pay the police to keep out but brothel-keepers will pay to have them kept in. The American Social Hygiene Association, after an exhaus- tive investigation of the subject in Europe and America, declares that segregation increases the demand for prosti- tutes, enlarges the supply, is a continuous advertisement of vice, creates an illegally privileged class, provides a meeting- place for the idle and vicious, increases illegal traffic in Hquor, and is the most prolific cause of public contamination. 386 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST The policy of licensing and regulating vice is an equally flat failure. Immoral women are as averse to public regis- tration and its accompanying exactions as they are to segregation, and most of them succeed in avoiding it. Doctor Abraham Flexner, of New York, a recognized au- thority, says that "nowhere is more than an unimportant fraction registered. . . . Time was when regulation pre- vailed throughout almost the whole of Europe. It has now died out in Great Britain, Holland, Denmark, Norway, and Switzerland, excepting only the city of Geneva. The sys- tem is on its last legs in France, Belgium, Germany, Austria- Hungary, Sweden, and Italy. In only two towns, Ham- burg and Budapest, do the municipal authorities as a whole any longer tenaciously cling to it. When we are told that regulation is practised in Europe, we may confidently reply that the system has died out in many countries, and is moribund almost everywhere else."^ As for the much- vaunted medical inspection. Doctor Flex- ner declares that "it is a farce, and that there is not the least doubt that it spreads more disease than it discovers." The whole method of dealing with the social evil by government licensure and regulation is inherently and thoroughly unsound in theory and a total failure in practice. There is no half-way ground in this matter. The only right way to handle it is to regard it as a sin and crime, to be treated as burglary and murder are treated — something always and everywhere and in all circumstances radically wrong, and to be fought as such wherever and whenever it is found. Compromise of any kind is not only futile as a remedial measure but it actually makes a bad matter worse. And how, one may wonderingly ask, and in the name of all justice, fairness, and common sense, is vice to be effec- tively segregated or regulated when only one party to it, the woman, is dealt with, and the other party, the man, is left to roam at will? Society is in far greater danger from licentious men, the majority of whom are also diseased, ^ Article in Social Hygiene, December, 1914. THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 387 than it is from fallen women, who are usually the victims of men. Let those who imagine that the social evil can be extirpated, or reduced to a minimum, by forcing a com- parative handful of pitifully forlorn girls to live in a segre- gated quarter, or to go to a police station and publicly register and take out licenses — ^let them, I say, demand that the far greater number of men who exploit or patronize them be compelled to submit to the same treatment or go to jail. We shall never get anywhere in dealing with the social evil until we realize that it is not so much a woman problem as it is a man problem. The morphine evil presents another serious question. The world followed with admiration the splendid effort which the Chinese made in recent years to extirpate the opium vice — the curse of China. Under the agreement with the British Government in 1907, the exportation of East Indian opium to China was to be reduced at the rate of 5,100 chests a year, provided the Chinese made propor- tionate reduction in the production of native opium, the traffic to cease altogether in ten years. The Anglo-Chinese treaty of 1911 supplemented this by forbidding the ship- ment of opium into any province which could show that it was not raising any domestic opium. The ten-year period for the country as a whole expired March 31, 1917, after which the legal prohibition became absolute. The law, like laws against vicious habits in other countries, was en- forced with varying degrees of strictness. For a time opium-smoking appeared to be eliminated. Violations were probably no more common than violations of prohibitory liquor laws in the ''dry" States of America, and for a time were quite as sternly pimished, except in the foreign con- cessions in the treaty ports, where the Chinese magistrates had no jurisdiction. Tang Shao Yi said in 1914 that Chinese officials had closed all the opium- joints in the Chinese city, but that in the foreign settlements joints were wide open and selling $600,000 worth of opium a week. Then the evil began to reassert itself. The poppy was 388 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST again cultivated, at first in secluded places in the mountain districts, and then more openly in some of the interior prov- inces like Shensi and Kwei-chou; the military governor of the former province openly declaring that opium-growing was necessary for revenue. The government had agreed to take over the 1,700 chests of East Indian opium held by the Opium Combine in Shanghai and Hongkong, paying $15,000,000 in government ten-year bonds. The govern- ment was then to sell the opium at an advanced price to a syndicate, which was to dispose of it for medicinal purposes at a stiU higher rate — considerably higher. Officials were well represented in the syndicate, and a rather loose inter- pretation was placed upon the word "medicinal." The dis- organized condition of the country encouraged laxity and diminished the danger of prosecution. However, men of character and intelHgence, both Chinese and foreign, were alert to the peril, and made resolute efforts to avert it. If the evil could have been narrowed down to the smoking of opium, it probably could have been abated, in large part, at least, for the law had the backing of a strong pubhc sentiment, and of the whole Christian element in the Chinese churches and the missionary body. Great satisfaction was expressed when, in November, 1918, the Chinese legation in Washington announced that President Hsu Shih-chang had ordered the burning of the opium which the Chinese Government had purchased from the foreign merchants in Shanghai. Unhappily, when evil appetite is repressed at one point it is apt to break out at another, and as the use of opium de- creased, the use of its alkaloid, morphine, increased. The Chinese Government discerned the danger, and in 1903 imposed a tax that was intended to be prohibitive, and was so as far as legitimate trade was concerned. Nevertheless, morphine was sold in constantly enlarging quantities. The Chinese authorities are not ignorant of this evasion of the law, but their difficulties are great. If smugglers only had to be dealt with, the injury would be comparatively small, for the drug would not be common enough to be accessible THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 389 except to the most confirmed and determined moi-phine fiends. Chinese dealers, too, can be and are severely pun- ished. The mischief is done by foreigners, chiefly Japanese. In the year 1914 Japan imported morphine at the rate of over a ton a month, buying most of it from one firm in London, and two firms in Edinburgh, and the drug con- tinues to pour in at a startling rate. What are the Japa- nese doing with all this morphine? They use very little of it themselves, only a comparatively small quantity for medicinal purposes, other uses of the drug being prohibited by Japanese law. Let any one go into the villages of northern China and Manchuria and he will quickly learn what the Japanese are doing with such vast quantities of morphine. He will find hundreds of Japanese peddlers selling it to the natives under various labels: ''white powder," "soothing stuff," "dreamland elixir," and in some instances the real name — ^morphine. Most of it comes in through the post. Several foreign governments, including Japan, maintain their own post-offices in China. The Chinese authorities have no control over them or their mail and m.erchandise unless a letter or package is remailed at a native office. A Japanese trader can therefore send morphine through any of the numerous Japanese post-offices. The Chinese Gov- ernment is not permitted to examine the packages, and the local Japanese obtain them direct. The Chinese magis- trates are helpless, as they dare not interfere with the Japanese. The London Lancet and The Medical Record have given currency to a paper read before a conference of the National Medical Association of China in January, 1917, by G. L. Tuck, M.D., whose Chinese name is Wu Lien-teh, in which he says: "Almost every Japanese drug dealer or peddler in Manchuria sells it in one form or another, and does so with impunity, because no Japanese can be arrested with- out complaint being first lodged at the consulate. From these Japanese agents and subagents, the drug may be passed on to disreputable Chinese who frequent the coolie depots, and inject a solution, usually very dirty, with a 390 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST hypodermic syringe which may be made of glass, metal, or even bamboo. Rigorous imprisonment for two years is a common sentence for Chinese found with morphine in their possession, but the principal culprits often escape punishment." Doctor Wu Lien-teh further stated that during his five years' residence in Manchuria he saw ter- rible havoc wrought upon the population by this drug; that thousands of poor people die in the large cities during the winter months, partly from cold but principally from in- ability to work on account of their morphine habits; that the evil appears to be spreading; and that enormous profits are made by the dealers in this ilHcit trade, the profits made on six and a quarter tons by the dealers in China in 1913 amounting to about $4,200,000. The situation is serious also in Korea. Most of the Ko- reans are not sensitive about it, but the more enHghtened are, and every real friend of the people is distressed by it. The traffic is contrary to Japanese law, but it is conducted more or less openly by Japanese, particularly in the coun- try districts, where peddlers spread the morphine and opium habit among multitudes of Koreans. The Japanese strictly enforce their law in Japan, and magistrates in Korea will usually punish a trafficker if the case is brought so directly to their notice that they cannot escape responsibihty; but they will seldom press matters unless compelled to do so, and the effort to make them is apt to be unpleasant. Thou- sands of Koreans are learning the use of the morphine syringe from these Japanese itinerant venders, and as they are like children in the indulgence of their appetites, as un- sophisticated as Africans and American Indians are with liquor, the evil has grown to serious proportions. Every hospital in Korea now has to treat opium and morphine fiends. Opium-smoking was brought to Korea by the Chi- nese long ago, but the evil has never been so great as it is now. Protests of missionaries are beginning to make some impression, but the demoralization of Koreans continues. It would be a great boon to the numerous but politically weak peoples of the mainland if the governments of Great THE SOCIAL AND MORPHINE EVILS 391 Britain and Japan would adopt joint measures to put an end to this demoralizing traffic. Official reports show that firms in Great Britain exported seven and a half tons of moi-phiue in 1912, eleven and a half tons in 1913, fourteen tons in 1914, and that by 1916 the annual export had reached sixteen tons. Germany exported one and three-eighths tons in 1913, but this small supply was cut off by the out- break of the war in the following year. ResponsibiHty un- der present conditions Kes heavily upon Japan and Great Britain. Exports from Great Britain have fallen off con- siderably in recent years, but the Edinburgh Anti-Opium Committee, of which Lord Polwarth is president, reported in April, 1917, that "allowing half a grain per injection, enough has been provided to drug daily 500,000 persons," and that "it is safe to say that the amount supplied from Britain amiually is sufficient to demoralize a million of Chinese." Steady pressure from the Anti-Opium Com- mittee finally resulted in the following announcement in the House of Commons, October 23, 1917, in answer to a question by Sir William J. Collins, M. P.: "Licenses to ex- port morphia or cocaine from this country to Japan are not granted unless they are accompanied by certificates ob- tained from the Japanese Home Office or from the Japanese authorities of the Kwantung Leased Territoiy, to the effect that the morphia or cocaine is for actual consumption in Japan or in Danen and its vicinity, and is for medical pur- poses only. A notice to this effect was pubhshed in the Board of Trade Journal on 11th October, after communica- tion with the Japanese Government." It was also stated that the Japanese Government had undertaken to prevent the smuggling of the drugs. It was not easy for the British Government to press the matter against an ally in a great war. But the war is now over. Moreover, something could be done at home. Manufac- ture as well as sale should be regulated. As long as three British firms are allowed to produce so much more of the di-ug than is required for legitimate medicinal purposes, the evil is likely to contmue. Moiphine, being a white, 392 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST light, odorless, and highly concentrated powder, can be smuggled out of a country with comparative ease. At any rate, it is fair to ask what becomes of the surplus British product. Presumably the manufacturers do not make more than they can sell, and it is quite safe to say that the surplus finds its way via Japan to Korea and China. CHAPTER XXV JAPAN AND AMERICA Relations between Japan and the United States began most auspiciously. I need not repeat the famihar story of the famous expedition which President Millard Fillmore sent to Japan in 1852 and 1853 under that sailor-diplomat, Commodore Matthew C. Perry. While it consisted of naval vessels whose saluting guns at first aroused the wildest ex- citement and alarm among the then untutored Japanese, the object of the expedition was distinctively peaceful in pur- pose, and it issued in peaceful conclusions. Americans are justly proud that Japan's first treaty with a Western nation was the treaty of March 31, 1854, with the United States. Happy was it also for relations of good-will that the first American Minister to Japan was Townsend Harris — ^mer- chant, educator, and philanthropist as well as diplomat, who was appointed Consul-General in 1855, and commis- sioned as Minister upon the ratification of the treaty of 1858, and who brought to his diflficult and delicate task a real genius for dealing with Asiatic peoples. His courage in remaining at his post in a time of danger when other foreigners fled, his genuine faith in the Japanese, and his tactful determination to win their confidence gave him a prestige in Japan which still abides. It enabled him, in 1858, to secure a connnercial treaty, and January 1, 1859, the opening of three treaty ports in which foreigners could reside. The Honorable John W. Foster said, in his history of American Diplomacy in the Orient, that while the genius of Perry had unbarred the gate of the Island Empire and left it ajar, it was the skill of Harris which threw it open to the commercial enterprise of the world; that he reflected great honor upon his country and justly deserves to rank among the first diplomats of the world, if such rank is measured by accomplishment. 393 394 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST This good beginning was followed by what William H. Seward called "the tutorship of the United States in Japan," "based on deeper and broader principles of philanthropy than have hitherto been practised in the intercourse of nations." Noble was the group of men and women from America who laid broad and deep the foundations of progress and friendship — Hepburn, Brown, Verbeck, Murray, and others of like character and devotion, whose special work will be discussed in a later chapter. All went smoothly in the relations of the two coimtries until comparatively recent years, when the Japanese began to emigrate. In this era of easy mternational travel most nations have overflowed their boundaries and subjects of the more alert and ambitious ones have gone to many differ- ent lands. The Japanese lived a secluded life until a few decades ago; but when their isolation ceased, enterprising Japanese began to roam afar. The pressure of expanding population in a limited territory added strong incentive. A generation ago there were not more than 20,000 Japa- nese outside of Japan, and most of them were in Korea. In 1918 the Department of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo re- ported that the number of Japanese in other lands was 640,421, distributed as follows: Manchuria, 310,158; China proper, 33,668; Southern Asia and Oceanica, 29,627; Europe, 1,464; Russia in Asia, 9,717; Canada, 13,823; Hawaiian Islands, 101,645; United States, 112,293; Mexico, 1,169; South America, 26,857. Nearly haK the pop- ulation of the Hawaiian Islands is Japanese — 101,645 out of 219,940. These emigrants met with varying degrees of welcome in the countries in which they settled. Industrious and self-reHant, they had no difficulty in gaining a foothold; but while their strong qualities were everywhere recognized, ,they were seldom popular. For that matter, are European and American colonies in Asia popular? Differences in race, language, religion, and social customs are not con- ducive to sympathetic personal relations anywhere. In the United States the strain became acute. Some JAPAN AND AMERICA 395 Americans who had regarded a Japanese in Japan as a picturesquely attractive figure changed their minds when he settled next door with his different scale of living and standards of conduct. Japanese students, merchants, and professional men have aroused no particular antagonism in America, and they freely reside where they please. In some cities, notably New York, Japanese of these types are held in high esteem. But 95 per cent of the Japanese in California are peasant farmers, fruit-raisers, truck-garden- ers, and laborers, only 5 per cent being classed as officials, students, and professional men.^ Willing to work longer hours than white men, and to accept lower wages, their successful competition speedily excites the wi-ath and race prejudice of their American neighbors. Social ostracism intensifies the natural disposition of men to associate with their own kind, and so the Japanese perforce segregate themselves in groups which are distinct from the rest of the population. These groups are of varying sizes. Of the 60,000 Japanese now in CaHfomia, 20,000 are in Los Angeles and its vicinity, 8,000 in and around San Francisco, 3,000 in Oakland and Alameda County, and the remaining 29,000 are in the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys, in and around Stockton, in Fresno County, and other places adjacent to agricultural regions.^ The story of the agitation on the Pacific coast is not pleasant reading. Angry recriminations, mob violence, inimical legislation, and indignant protests have marked the course of events. A detailed account would he beyond the scope of this volume. Abundant material is available for the reader in numerous books and magazine articles.' Suffice it here to indicate certain facts and conclusions that impress me as essential to an understanding of the problem : 1 Special State Investigation, cited by Gulick and Scherer. 2 Acting Consul-General Yamazaki, San Francisco, 1916. ^ The following are worthy of special mention: The Japanese Crisis, by James A. B. Scherer; The Japanese Problem in the United States, by H. A. Willis; Japanese Expansion and American Policies, by J. F. Abbott; Asia at the Door, by K. K. Kawakami; and The American- Japanese Problem and America arid the Orient, both by Sidney L. Gulick. 396 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST First. Unrestricted immigration and landownership by Asiatics who enter into industrial competition with Ameri- cans, who represent lower standards of living, and who cannot or will not assimilate with them, is clearly imprac- ticable. It is not a question of equahty or brotherhood, but of economic and social adjustments which are insoluble under present conditions. Second. The Japanese Government does not ask for such unrestricted immigration and landownership. It would rather have its surplus laboring population go to Korea, Formosa, and China, where eveiy additional Japanese helps to strengthen Japanese interests. The emigrants to America are not only lost to the nation, except for the money that they send back to their relatives, but the majority of them are of a grade which high-class Japanese do not care to have considered as representative of their people. The business and professional men in such cities as New York and Washington are a fine type of intelligent and cultured Japanese; but of the mass of laborers Marquis Okuma frankly said: "We are not proud of the Japanese emigrants who go to America. They are coohes. They do not un- derstand what trouble they have been giving to the Japa- nese nation by their presence in America. Somebody in Japan set the bad example of conducting an emigration business. . . . The emigration question, at all events, should be treated merely as an emigration question, and not as one either political or diplomatic."^ The Osaka Mainichi is equally outspoken. Commenting on the treaty of February 11, 1911, the editor wrote: "It is desirable to eliminate emigration not only from the treaty but to prevent emigration to America. Emigration is not a thing to be looked upon with favor. It means nothing but the exportation of coolies. It parades the lowest mass of the Japanese people in foreign countries, and furnishes the ground for various international em- broglios. . . . Because emigration has been conducted as a business, horrible crimes have been disclosed here and ^ Quoted in The Oriental Review, April 10, 1911. JAPAN AND AMERICA 397 there, impairing Japan's fair name. The exportation of coolies is a disgrace to the nation." Third. What, then, does the Japanese Government want ? Just this and nothing more : that American laws shall not discriminate against Japanese as compared with immigrants of other nationalities. No self-respecting government can acquiesce in having its subjects singled out for exclusion from privileges that are freely granted to subjects of other governments. "The real question at issue therefore is be- tween a discriminatory and a non-discriminatory alien land law." Japan is perfectly willing to have her people in the United States treated in the same way as other aliens are treated. It is the differential treatment that is objectiona- ble. Marquis Okuma said this in so many words in reply to a question by a representative of the New York Times : "If you ask me what we want, then I must say frankly that we want equal treatment with the European nations. We want you to cease to exercise racial discrimination."^ "Racial discrimination" is precisely what America is exer- cising now. Laws bear against the Japanese and Chinese which do not bear against peoples of many other nation- alities. Courts naturalize as American citizens all comers from Europe and South America, and also Turks, Hindus, Persians, Mexicans and Hottentots — ^but not Japanese or Chinese. Can we wonder that these high-spirited people are deeply wounded when we exclude them from those privileges that we readily grant to immigrants of inferior type? Only a very few of the Japanese would apply for naturalization if the laws permitted them to do so; for most of them do not want to change their allegiance. But their inclusion in the permissive law which opens the door to other races would alter what Doctor Sidney L. Gulick has well called "the entire psychological attitude" of the Japanese toward us. Immigration could be and should be handled as a separate problem. The Japanese, as already intimated, ask nothing more here than America freely ac- cords to Tartars and Zulus. ^ Interview in the New York Times, June 18, 1916. 398 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Fourth. Popular feeling lays all the blanie upon labor- unions; but Doctor James A. B. Scherer, after seven years' study of this question in Californiaj said, what will be news to most people in the eastern section of the United States, that the labor-unions in California as well as the Japanese Government would be entirely satisfied with a law excluding all aliens from landownership, but that the effort to pass such a law has been blocked by banks, trust companies, chambers of commerce, and other large business interests which fear that it would prevent the investment of foreign capital in the State. He deplores the fact that a grave international issue is thus subordinated to commercial in- terests which in his opinion would not be so seriously in- jured as they imagine.^ Fifth. There is now no danger whatever of a deluge of Japanese immigration. By the "Gentlemen's Agreement" of November, 1907, Japan consented to refuse passports to coolies who desire to go to the United States. The Japa- nese Ambassador in Washington made the following decla- ration in signing the treaty of Februaiy 21, 1911: "In proceeding this day to the signature of the treaty of com- merce and navigation, . . . the undersigned has the honor to declare that the Imperial Japanese Government are fully prepared to maintain with equal effectiveness the Hmitation and control which they have for the past three years exer- cised in regulation of the laborers to the United States." Japan has scrupulously kept this agreement. There has been no emigration of laboring men to the United States for years, and the total Japanese population in this coun- try is steadily decreasing. In a recent period of seven years 15,139 more Japanese men left America than ar- rived. When some overzealous members of Congress tried to have a clause inserted in the Burnett Bill, in 1916, which would give legal recognition to the "Gentlemen's Agree- ment," Japan vigorously protested. It would keep its coolies out of its own volition, but it would not submit to an order to do so. The Premier "of Japan, then Marquis ^ The Japanese Crisis, pp. 97-102, and 110. JAPAN AND AMERICA 399 Okuma, characterized "the indirect reference to Japan in the Burnett Bill as insulting/' and declared: "It is time for the people of the United States to wake up to a sense of justice and throw over racial prejudice."^ The objection- able clause in the bill was finally dropped, but the discus- sion left an unpleasant memory. Sixth. When a State fails to give proper protection to aliens residing within its borders or passes a law which contravenes rights that are guaranteed to them by treaty, it will not do for the federal government to answer just protests by pleading that it cannot coerce a sovereign State in such matters. Either the United States form a nation or they do not. If they do, the national government may be justly held responsible when its citizens violate treaties which it has made with other nations. If we are not a nation, then the offended government has the right to deal directly with the particular State which committed or con- doned the offense. America itself has acted on this prin- ciple with Japan. In 1863, the Daimyo of Choshu fired on some American, French, and Dutch merchant vessels which were passing the Strait of Shimonoseki. When their governments demanded his punishment, the Japanese Gov- ernment repMed that it had no control over the local au- thorities in such matters. The foreign governments then declared that if the government of Japan could not deal with the Daimyo, they could and would. The result was that a squadron of American, French, Dutch, and British warships bombarded the Daimyo's forts, completely de- molished them, and compelled the payment of an indemnity of $3,000,000. The United States ultimately returned its share; but the humiliating fact of punishment remained. Japanese memory is not short, and when Japan is told by the government of the United States that it cannot inter- fere with the State of California, the Japanese feel that they have a historical precedent, to which we ourselves have been a party, for saying that if the federal government cannot control its constituent parts, the Japanese Govem- 1 The New York Times, June 18, 1916. 400 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ment may proceed to do so. If our laws do not permit our federal government to prevent one or more of its consti- tuent States from embroiling the whole country with other countries, a law authorizing it to do so should be enacted without further delay. The American Bar Association has endorsed a bill to empower the federal government to deal directly in all criminal cases iii which ahens are involved. It ought to be passed. Seventh. This controversy has brought severer strain upon our relations with Japan than the American people reaHze. The Japanese do not conceal their irritation and resentment. "Any attempt to force the issue at the present time may lead to very undesirable results/' significantly remarked "one of America's best friends in Japan, Marquis Okuma, in the interview already referred to. In 1914 Naoichi Masaoka published, under the title Japan to America a symposium by thirty-five political leaders and representative citizens of Japan on the relations between Japan and the United States. The volume abounds in warmly appreciative references to the historical friendship of the Japanese toward America, and the sincere desire of the writers that it should continue unbroken; but through- out there is a distinct intimation that Japan is rankling under a sense of deep injustice, and that, if relief is not af- forded, it wiU not be the fault of Japan if trouble shall ensue. A characteristic utterance is that of Professor Shigeo Suyehiro, professor in the law school of the Kyoto Imperial University: "In recent years, America has been treating us in a way rather impleasant to us. In more than one instance it was only with a lingering sense of gratitude for her past friendship that we endured what we could not otherwise have endured. ... If she rejects it [our claim for justice] I am afraid that the day will come when our friendship toward her shall cease." ^ Even the kindly Baron Ei-ichi Shibusawa writes: "These things [anti- Japanese legislation] cause us anxiety. . . . There will not be any change in our friendship toward America; but * Japan to America, pp. 57 and 61. JAPAN AND AMERICA 401 the masses of the people may become enraged if the stramed relations continue long."^ And after his return to Japan from his visit to the United States in 1916, he sadly said: "Owing to a lack of thorough understanding on both sides of the Pacific, the two nations are dangerously drifting apart." ^ Baron Shibusawa's fear that "the masses of the people may become enraged" has come perilously near fulfilment. Many of the newspapers in Japan have been violent in their expressions of popular indignation, and have demanded summary measures with a vehemence that the heads of the government may not always be able to restrain. It cannot be denied that a feeling exists in Japan which might at any moment be fanned into a flame of national passion if certain legislative bills were to be passed, or if some irresponsible individual Japanese on the Pacific coast were to commit a crime, which would be deplored by every high-minded Japa- nese, but which might excite an American mob to lynch- law methods against not only the criminal but other Japa- nese in the community concerned. "There is," observes Mr. T. P. O'Connor, "in individual as well as in national character, one type which is always liable to give us some unpleasant surprises. You meet a man or a woman who is apparently soft, yielding, and self-controlled. You may try them with a certain want of consideration for their feelings; and, finding that you are met with nothing but the same agreeable smile and unquestioning docility, you rush to the conclusion that they are incapable of a moment of fierce anger or volcanic passion. But you find yourself suddenly and unexpectedly awakened. What you have not reahzed is that what you have said or done has been pro- foundly resented, and that, though the resentment has not been expressed, it has deepened in consequence; and that some fine day it bursts forth with all the rage and devasta- tion of a volcano. . . . And when a broad-minded Japa- nese discusses with you, in the confidence of private conver- sation, the character of his people, this is also the view he 1 Ibid., pp. 32 and 33. « The New York Times, April 23, 1916. 402 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST takes. Marquis Okuma, for instance; discussing this very question with the author, summed up the character of his people in these words: 'The Japanese are not cruel but they are turbulent, vindictive and irascible'; a portrait which, though terse, is sufficient to reveal to Europeans how Httle they have grasped the depths in Japanese life." Doctor Scherer, who quotes this opinion, adds: "This fact of the Japanese temperament is the focal point of impor- tance in this whole discussion. All Europeans or Americans that have lived among Japanese and had even a modicum of sympathetic discernment will agree with Mr. O'Connor."^ It is not cowardice but justice and common sense for patri- otic Americans to do everything in their power to prevent mobs and demagogues from exasperating beyond endur- ance a proud and sensitive people who ought to be our friends. For years there was a belief in Europe and the Far East that war between the United States and Japan was proba- ble, and it still persists in some quarters. Some of the prophecies belong to the category of thoughts that are fathered by a wish. German diplomacy in 1914 confidently counted upon such a war. Those who fear and dislike the Japanese are eager to see some nation fight her, and have selected America as the one which they would like to have undertake the task. Men who have a financial interest in promoting war scares and politicians who are looking for opportunities to attract attention to themselves ''patrioti- cally" declaim about "the Japanese peril." Strongly as every sane man must deplore agitation of this sort, it would be foolish to shut our eyes to its possibilities of mischief. Wars are not always caused by rational motives. The ques- tions in dispute between Japan and America are susceptible of solution by peaceful methods, but disputes between na- tions easily become complicated by jealousies and suspicions until that vaguely intangible but tremendously potent force called "national honor" becomes involved on one or both sides, and then reason disappears in the flaming fires of 1 The Japanese Crisis, pp. 54-56. JAPAN AND AMERICA 403 passion. Perhaps we should not attach conclusive weight to the pubUc utterances of government officials in either country. This is not because cabinet ministers and diplo- matic representatives do not know the factS; but because their position compels them to put forth reassuring senti- ments whether they accord with the facts or not. He must be a credulous student of international relations who inno- cently imagines that an ambassador or a minister of state would prematurely precipitate hostilities by publicly saying that war was in prospect. The history of diplomatic rela- tions shows that down to the firing of the first gun, official declarations abound in high-sounding sentences about "the friendly intentions of my Government and the distinguished consideration which the courteous proposal of Your Excel- lency's note will promptly receive/' etc. We must there- fore look for the broad underlying facts of the situation which make for war or peace. Beginning with our own country, even the critics of the United States usually credit us with peaceful intentions toward Japan. Americans are eager to extend their in- fluence in the Pacific seas, but they are after dollars, not territory. The Phihppines came into their possession as an unforeseen incident in a war with Spain, and were in no sense either the object or the occasion of the war. In spite of a certain swagger and high temper, the American people are not disposed to rush into actual hostilities with any nation, as the long-drawn out negotiations with Mexico and Germany proved. Congressman Richmond Pearson Hob- son talked himself hoarse in warning his countrymen of the dire consequences to which they were exposed from Japa- nese designs/ but the country listened with languid amuse- ment, because it did not intend to make war on Japan, and beheved that Japan did not intend to make war on us. The average American is firmly convinced that such a con- ffict could bring absolutely nothing that we want, but only things that we do not want. I venture the assertion that 1 Cf. his article in The Cosmopolitan for May, 1908, and similar articles in other magazines. 404 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST no other nation in the world is less likely to make war upon Japan. American ambitions in the Far East are not mili- tary. A suggestion that any considerable portion of re- spectable Americans cherish hostile sentiments against the Japanese would be greeted with derision anywhere in the United States; except possibly in a few local communities on the Pacific coast. The feeling of the American people as a whole is one of real friendliness toward Japan. Nor does Japan want war with the United States. She wishes to pay off her heavy debts, strengthen her general financial position, and develop her internal manufactures and foreign trade. Friendly America is valuable to her as a source of supplies for raw material and a profitable market for manufactured goods. Nearly all of Japan's exported tea is sold iu America, 70 per cent of her raw and manufac- tured silk and an important part of other products. Alto- gether more than one-third of Japan's exports go to the United States. She buys from us, too, many supplies that she requires. I have written in another chapter of the large development of her cotton-manufactures, and she depends upon the United States for the best grade of raw cotton. Her soldiers in the Russia-Japan War ate Chicago beef and bread made from American flour. Hostilities with America would destroy this trade, for a time at least, and might result in conditions which would prevent a resumption of it on the scale that it is now attaining. Therefore Japan, like Eng- land, desires a peace that will leave her mercantile marine an undisturbed ocean pathway. Nor does Japan overlook the fact that the United States is now the greatest reservoir of capital in the world. Japan needs money. Europe, impoverished and exhausted by war, cannot supply it; America can. Japan values, too, her alliance with Great Britain. It is her largest asset to-day in international affairs. Would Great Britain support her in a war with America? Japan knows quite well that she would not, and that it would be highly imprudent to run the risk of alienating such an in- valuable ally. JAPAN AND AMERICA 405 Moreover, Japan needs time and freedom for matters that engage her attention nearer home. Korea, Formosa, and China present problems and anxieties that the Japa- nese cannot ignore, and that are formidable enough to absorb all their energies. They know that they have for- midable competitors in several European Powers, that it will be no easy task to bring the millions of Koreans into a state of mind that will keep them quiet in the event of an- other war, and that the Chinese are increasingly jealous of them. The Japanese well understand that in their struggle with Russia they were victorious by a very narrow margin; that President Roosevelt's intervention brought peace just when they had reached their maximum of suc- cess; and that they had a powerful support in the sym- pathy of most of the Western nations which they probably would not have again, for Japan is less popular than she was in 1905. Having attained her present poHtical ambi- tion, Japan is not inclined to jeopardize it unnecessarily by the uncertainties of another war. Military difficulties, too, should not be left out of account. Grant that Japan, which can keep her movements secret as America can not, could land an army on our Pacific coast before our government could mobilize either a fleet or a mihtary force to prevent it. How could Japan feed and maintain that army at fight- ing size after it got there? The best army in the world, separated from its base of supphes by 4,500 miles of ocean, would be in a pHght to which such wise generals as the Japanese, daring as they are, would be slow to subject them- selves. Americans finally came to the conclusion that they ought to have the Hawaiian Islands, and it would not be surprising if in time the Japanese come to feel that, for similar reasons, they ought to have the Philippines. But the conditions are hardly parallel, for the Hawaiian Islands did not belong to another friendly nation, and the ruling class was composed of men of American blood and speech who had been seeking annexation for many years. Whatever deeper causes might have led to annexation, the immediate cause was pressure 406 thp: mastery of the far east from the islands themselves, to which our government, after much hesitation, finally yielded. The Philippine Islands are alien to Japan in both government and people, and could only be taken by force in a great war. Japan has no notion of taking them in that way. It is true that the Philippines are so close to Japan that the Japanese might plead almost as vital an interest in them as Ameri- cans plead in the West Indies. It is also true that Japan could take them with ease at any time, for the American military and naval force in the archipelago is pathetically small for such a contingency. Thanks to repubhcan insti- tutions, our government could not make the preparations which would be required to hold the archipelago against attack, without a publicity and duration of congressional debates which would advertise its purpose to the world months before adequate action could be taken. Meantime, Japan has the troops, the merchant ships available for transports, the naval vessels to escort them, and the abihty to act with promptness and secrecy which would enable her to have 400,000 soldiers begin disembarkation in the Phil- ippines before the United States could even know anything about the expedition. If war should break out from other causes, doubtless the first act of Japan would be the occu- pation of the Philippines, just as her first act in the war with Russia was the occupation of Korea. Nor would the oc- cupation of the Hawaiian Islands be a very difficult task, since 44 per cent of the population of the islands is now Japanese, including a large proportion of men and many veterans of the Russia-Japan War. But we are confident that Japan has no such intentions and that there will be no war if Americans keep their senses. The Japanese, in spite of their martial spirit, are not as eager to fight other nations as their critics are wont to allege. Japan has had comparatively few foreign wars. Indeed she had none at all between her invasion of Korea in the sixteenth century and her war with China at the end of the nineteenth. For the last three hundred years, during which Europe and America were repeatedly convulsed by JAPAN AND AMERICA 407 bloody strife, Japan had no internal revolution of any im- portance, except the necessary conflict which resulted in the overthrow of the Shogun, the fall of feudalism, and the rise of modern Japan. Japan did not begin hostilities against Russia until she had been humiliated and endangered and goaded for years in ways that no Western nation would have tolerated. Then Japan fought as a last resort after every other means had been exhausted. It would be ab- surd to represent the Japanese as a meek and gentle people. They have clearly shown their ability to take care of them- selves against all comers. When they did begin to fight Russia, they continued in a fashion which should make other nations think twice before pushing them into war again. We must remember, too, that their comparative isolation imtil recent years exempted them from most of the occasions for international comphcations to which the more closely related European peoples are constantly ex- posed. But making all due allowance for these considera- tions, the historic fact remains that the Japanese, with all their undoubted genius for war, have not shown a disposi- tion to go into it for light reasons. Fair-minded Americans can help to ward off difiiculties by refusing to coimtenance some of the reports that are current. It is true that there are ominous facts that cannot be denied. But something depends upon the way that facts are manipulated; as in the alphabet, the same letters may spell either lived or devil. Many of the common allegations regarding Japan are not facts at all. It is pain- ful to note the credulity with which the wildest statements are received. For example, in April, 1916, a metropoHtan daily newspaper in the United States pubhshed an article whose truthfulness was said to be vouched for by ''a rank- ing officer of the United States Army and a ranldng officer of the United States Navy." This article, and the transla- tion of a Japanese book on which it was said to be based, declared that "there are 55,000 trained Japanese troops in the PhiHppines." As a matter of fact, the War Depart- ment of the United States Govemnient reported the total 408 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Japanese population in the Philippines as less than S^OOO. Another statement was : " There are in the Hawaiian Islands 80;000 Japanese, all of whom have received army instruc- tion and they know their duty." The census then gave the total Japanese population in the Hawaiian Islands as 89,715, of whom 24,881 were women, and 33,288 were chil- dren, " There are already 61,000 trained Japanese troops in California," said the article. There were not as many Japa- nese as that in California, including men, women and chil- dren. Emphasizing the danger that the Japanese would seize the Hawaiian Islands, the writer said: "The Hawaiian Islands are only distant from San Francisco a few hours." Every schoolboy knows that they are distant six days. And yet such preposterous allegations as these were solemnly printed and widely quoted as illustrative of our alleged peril from a Japanese invasion. Carl Crow, in his book entitled Japan and America — A Contrast, asserts -that "Japan and the United States have nothing in common," and that the two coimtries are champions of such "opposing aims and in- terests" that "one of the two countries must recede from its present position." His closing chapter is entitled "Is Japan a Menace?" and he does not conceal his opinion that it is. He says that "the situation is now and has been for years very much the same as that which existed between England and Germany before the outbreak of the European War"; that "for every just cause of quarrel Germany had against England, Japan has half a dozen against us"; that in the Japanese vernacular there is "a steady outpouring of vilification and abuse of the United States"; and that "Japanese friendship for the United States exists only in the meaningless conventional phrases of diplomatic usage, in the propaganda of Japanese statesmen and American peace-at-any-price advocates, and in the wine-warmed sentiments of Japanese- American banquets."^ From such statements one turns with relief to the opin- ions of the American missionaries resident in Japan. They are in a position to know the attitude of the people. In 1 Pp. 1, 4, 204, 301-302. JAPAN AND AMERICA 409 1907, when sensational newspapers in America were fran- tically predicting a Japanese attack upon the United States, one hundred and ten missionaries in Japan, representing more than twenty American Christian organizations, and residing in all sections of the Empire, published the follow- ing statement: "As Americans residing in Japan, we feel bound to do all that is in our power to remove misunder- standings and suspicions which are intended to interrupt the long standing friendship between this nation and our own. Hence, we wish to bear testimony to the sobriety, sense of international justice, and freedom from aggressive designs exhibited by the great majority of the Japanese peo- ple, and to their faith in the traditional justice and equity of the United States. Moreover, we desire to place on record our profound appreciation of the kind treatment which we experience at the hands of both government and people; our belief that the alleged ^belligerent attitude' of the Japanese does not represent the real sentiments of the nation; and our ardent hope that local and spasmodic mis- understandings may not be allowed to affect in the shght- est degree the natural and historic friendship of the two neighbors on opposite sides of the Pacific." At the semicentemiial celebration of Protestant missions in Japan, October, 1909, a resolution was unanimously adopted which included the foUowmg sentences: "While the Government and people of Japan have maintained a general attitude of cordial friendship for the United States, there has sprung up in some quarters of the latter country a spirit of distrust of Japan. ... In this day of extensive and increasing commingling of races and civilizations, one of the prime problems is the maintenance of amicable inter- national relations. Essential to this are not only just and honest dealings between governments, but also, as far as practicable, the prevention as weU as the removal of race jealousy and misunderstanding between the peoples them- selves. False or even exaggerated reports of the customs, beHefs or actions of other nations are fruitful causes of con- tempt, ill-will, animosity, and even war. If libel on an in- 410 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST dividual is a grave offense, how much more grave is libel on a nation?" With this irenic and sensible utterance of fair-minded and well-informed men, we may leave the matter for the present. I earnestly hope and pray that our country will have no trouble with Japan over the immigration question. If we do, America will not be free from blame. Our rela- tions with Japan have undoubtedly been in a sensitive state, but I believe with Doctor Scherer that "our Japanese prob- lem will vanish into thin air if we substitute in dealing with it the spirit of the gentleman and statesman" for that of the sensational "journalist." ^ The Honorable Elihu Root gives this significant testimony: "For many years I was very- familiar with our own Department of Foreign Affairs. During that time there were many difficult, perplexing and doubtful questions to be discussed and settled between the United States and Japan. During all that period there never was a moment when the Government of Japan was not frank, sincere, friendly, and most solicitous not to en- large but to minimize and do away with all causes of con- troversy."^ American relations with Japan were placed on an easier footing during the visit of a Japanese commission headed by Viscount Kikujiro Ishii in 1917. He was hospitably welcomed everywhere, and he won golden opinions by his affable manners and tactful speeches. His brief address at the tomb of Washington, August 26, will live in literature. Of all the memorable words that have been spoken at that historic spot, none have been more truly eloquent in thought and expression. Americans will long cherish that address. Grant that it ideahzes the attitude of Japan, and that at the very time that Viscount Ishii was in America some things were being done in the Far East that were not exactly in accord with his noble sentiments. Nevertheless, he spoke out of his own heart, and he gave voice to an element in Japan which ought to be better known and more fully trusted. 1 The Japanese Crisis, p. 63. * Address, October 21, 1917. JAPAN AND AMERICA 411 The conferences in Washington resulted in an agreement which was set forth in the Honorable Robert Lansing's note of November 2, as Secretary of State, to Viscount Ishii, which included the following paragraph: "In order to silence mischievous reports that have from time to time been circulated, it is believed by us that a public announcement once more of the desires and intentions shared by our two Govern- ments with regard to China is advisable. The Governments of the United States and Japan recognize that territorial propinquity cre- ates special relations between countries, and, consequently, the Government of the United States recognizes that Japan has special interests in China, particularly in the part to which her possessions are contiguous. The Governments of United States and Japan deny that they have any purpose to infringe in any way the independence or territorial integrity of China and they declare, furthermore, that they always adhere to the principle of the so called 'Open Door' or equal opportunity for commerce and industry in China." Viscount Ishii confirmed this statement in a note to Mr. Lansing of the same date. The agreement was made public a few d&js later, and was hailed with immense satis- faction by the American and Japanese peoples. Mutual feHcitations and congratulations were enthusiastically ex- changed. Secretary of State Lansing said in a public statement accompanying his announcement of the corre- spondence: "There had unquestionably been growing up between the peoples of the two countries a feeling of suspicion as to the motives inducing the activities of the other in the Far East, a feeling which, if unchecked, promised to develop a serious situation. Fortunately this distrust was not so general in either the United States or Japan as to affect the friendly relations of the two Governments, but there is no doubt that the feeling of suspicion was increasing, and the untrue reports were receiving more and more credence in spite of the earnest efforts which were made on both sides of the Pacific to counteract a move- ment which would jeopardize the ancient friendship of the two nations. The visit of Viscount Ishii and his colleagues has accom- plished a great change of opinion in this country. In a few days the propaganda of years has been undone, and both nations are now able to see how near they came to being led into the trap which had 412 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST been skilfully set for them. The principal result of the negotiations was the mutual understanding which was reached in relation to China. The statements in the notes require no explanation. They not only contain a reaffirmation of the 'open door' policy, but intro- duce a principle of non-interference with the sovereignty and terri- torial integrity of China." The Japanese view was expressed by Mr. Kenkichi Mori; who said: "The United States has established a notable precedent by recog- nizing Japan's special position in China with a view to the general weal of the Chinese people. . . . The main idea of the agreement runs, roughly speaking, parallel to that which is embodied in the American declaration of paramountcy on this side of the Atlantic. Just as the United States has acquiesced in the retaining of the col- onies by European countries on this hemisphere but objects to the acquisition of new ones, so Japan is willing to maintain the Hay Doctrine, recognizing the interests of the Powers previously acquired in Chinese territory, but she is loath to permit hereafter any third Power to secure territory or special privilege, which may run counter to the principle already enunciated." ^ China, however, heard of the agreement with very dif- ferent emotions; nor was her agitation lessened by the fact that the Chinese Foreign Office in Peking received its first intimation of the agreement from Japanese sources before either the American Minister in Peking or the Chinese Min- ister in Washington knew about it, a circumstance which considerably impaired the "face" of these two diplomats. November 12, the Chinese Minister in Washington, the Honorable V. K. Wellington Koo, lodged formal protest at the American Department of State, concluding with the statement that "it is again declared that the Chinese Gov- ernment will not allow herself to be bound by any agree- ment entered into by other nations." The essential point of protest was that the United States and Japan had showed a disregard for the rights of China by making her most sacred interests the subject of consideration and formal agreement without consultation with her government. * Article in The World Court, December, 1917. JAPAN AND AMERICA 413 The plain implication of course was that China wias so helpless, or incompetent, that her wishes need not be taken into account, and that stronger and wiser parties must decide matters for her. It is not surprising that this im- plication was gaUing to Chinese sensibiHties. Mr. Stewart E. S. Yin, editor of The Chinese Students' Mo7ithly, New York, undoubtedly expressed the Chinese opinion when he wrote: "The agreement was made between the United States and Japan, but the subject of the agreement is China. It vitally concerns the political as well as the commercial and industrial future of the Chinese Republic. Justice, therefore, demanded that China should have had a voice in the negotiations of an agreement affecting herself. As a matter of fact, neither our Government at Peking nor our Minister at Washington was advised of the agreement until several days after it had already been concluded and signed, although 'conversations' between Secretary Lansing and Viscount Ishii began very early in September. ... It is highly questionable whether it will enable the American and Japanese Governments to ' maintain a perfectly appre- ciative attitude toward each other,' and whether it will result in * per- petual international peace.' The only way to bring about interna- tional peace is to have the nations come together and make agree- ments, not to take advantage of the weak and unprepared, but to insure international justice." * As the negotiations were conducted in Washington, and as the government of China was represented in that city by an able Minister, who could have been easily called into conference, one does not wonder that the Chinese ask why the agreement was consmnmated without consulting him. All conjectures, however, should take into account the fact that President Wilson and Secretary of State Lansing were real friends of China, who would not be disposed to adopt any course which they felt would be unjust to China, or jeopardize the good relations which they earnestly desired to exist between the two coimtries. Moreover, some of China's best friends regarded the agreement with favor. That devoted advocate of China's interests, Doctor Jeremiah W. Jenks, said: "America has 1 Article in The World Court, December, 1917. 414 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST certainly now a basis for protest against any aggressive abuse that did not exist before. A careful study of the situation seems to show that no concessions whatever were made, that generally accepted facts were recognized, and that no harm has been done to Chinese interests." ^ Bishop James W. Bashford, of Peking, also strongly pro-Chinese, expressed the opinion that the note will in the end result in good. He frankly admitted that "it would have been better could Secretary Lansing have removed the real source of difficulty between the two nations [that both the United States and individual States discriminate against the yellow races]." But he held that "it was utterly impossible in the present state of American sentiment toward Japan, and with the Constitution as it is, for Mr. Lansing or Mr. Wilson to make any agreement with Japan removing these two grievances. Doubtless the problems of Japanese aggression in China and our exclusion law and discrimination legislation in the United States were discussed with more or less frankness by Mr. Lansing and Viscount Ishii; but one can see the utter impossibility of Japan and the United States alone settling these world problems in advance of a world con- ference. Under these conditions this note, which sends the Japanese mission home with good-will toward our govern- ment, and increases the friendship of the two peoples, may go farther in helping Japan make the inevitable transition from the German to the AUied ideal, both in China and at home, than any affirmation on our part of ' Thou shalt ' or 'Thou Shalt not.'" It is true that the agreement is not a treaty, and that a future administration in either country may or not con- sider itself bound by an interchange of notes which were not formally ratified in the method prescribed by law, and which simply represented "the desires and intentions" of ofiicials who were in office at the time. But such a "gen- tlemen's agreement" is weighty nevertheless, not only be- cause it constitutes a public declaration of attitude and policy, but because it rests upon mutual confidence in the ^ Article in The World Court, December, 1917. JAPAN AND AMERICA 415 good faith of both parties and involves the honor of the two governments. It is rather unfortunate that varying interpretations have been placed upon it by the interested parties. The Japa- nese emphasize the clause: "The Government of the United States recognizes that Japan has special interests in China/' and regard it as equivalent to conceding their paramountcy ; while Americans emphasize the clauses which "adhere to the principle of the 'Open Door' for commerce and indus- try/' and "deny any purpose to infringe in any way the independence or territorial integrity of China." It is easy to foresee that disputes may arise if either government shall overlook the fact that each of these clauses is to be inter- preted consistently with the other. The holding power of the agreement will be tested as soon as necessity arises for applying it to some concrete case. Meantime, the agreement has undoubtedly greatly im- proved the relations of the United States and Japan. In so far as those relations needed improvement; and Secre- tary Lansing's words indicated that they needed it badly, all concerned have reason to be relieved and gratified, al- though the fundamental causes of disagreement still re- main. If the American-Japanese sore has been salved by making an American-Chinese sore, the relief will be only temporary. But in a time of world war it was urgentty important to remove any suspicion between two such governments as the Japanese and American. We can only hope that the party among the Chinese, headed by Tang Shao Yi, who indignantly declare that the Washington government has "sold China out," will find as time passes that their fears have not been realized. CHAPTER XXVI EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON THE POSITION OF JAPAN All the consequences of the World War of 1914-1918 cannot now be forecast, but one that is already apparent is the establishment of Japanese hegemony in the Far East. Japan's former efforts to secure it were hampered by the conflicting interests of several European Powers, and by their ability to protect them. The war diverted their attention and energy, while it sunmioned Japan to a great enlargement of her activity just where it could not but accrue to her benefit. Great Britain early gave Japan a fine opportunity in con- nection with the German fortified post at Tsing-tau in the province of Shantung, China, which had been made one of the most formidable fortifications in the world. Of course the British could not afford to leave the Germans in pos- session of a naval base from which the immense commerce of the Allies in the Far East could be successfully raided; and as the British had their hands full in Europe, it was natural that they should expect their more conveniently situated ally, Japan, to attend to this matter for them. The Japanese promptly despatched an ultimatum to the Germans, and followed it by a declaration of war August 23, 1914. German artillery would have made an attack from the sea or a landing within the German concession a hazardous proceeding; so upon the time-honored plea of "mihtar}^ necessity," which Western nations have so often used, Japan, in spite of China's protests, landed an expedi- tionary force on Chinese territory a hundred miles north of Tsing-tau, and marched overland. The Germans made a sharp resistance, but they did not have enough men to hold such extensive works against a greatly superior force, and November 7 the Japanese captured the place. 416 EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON JAPAN 417 The Japanese not only took Tsing-tau and its hinterland but all the German property and concessions in the prov- ince, including the railway from Tsing-tau to Tsinan-fu, on the groimd that they could not leave their enemies in possession of valuable privileges in the interior, and that it was their duty to take over everything that the Germans had in Shantung, pending the close of the war. While the Germans had employed less than a hundred of their own nationals on the railway, including the officials of the com- pany, and had used Chinese for all the other places, the Japanese staffed and operated the railway exclusively with their own people. They posted detachments of Japanese troops along the line and placed a garrison in Tsinan-fu, the capital of the province, two hundred and fifty miles in the interior. Substantial stone and concrete barracks have been erected at convenient intervals. Courts, post-offices, banks, and numerous commercial enterprises have been estabHshed. Fifty thousand Japanese were reported to be in or near Tsing-tau by the end of 1917. Colonies of vary- ing size were to be found in other important cities, and traders, engineers, and other Japanese on various quests were in evidence in almost every part of the province. They assert that Shantung belongs to them "as the prize of war," and that "under no circumstances must this pro- vince ever be alienated from Japanese control." Tokyo officials declare their intention to return Tsing-tau to China in due time. The Chinese do not conceal their anxiety, failing to understand how Japanese procedure in Shantung can be reconciled with temporary purposes. Foreign observers wait to see how soon "circumstances" will render it "practicable" for the Japanese to relax their hold. Some surprise was expressed in America because the Japanese Government did not send an army to Europe to the help of her sorely beset allies in the great war. Whether Great Britain and France really wanted a Japanese army in France, and whether the Japanese Government really wanted to send one and thus leave itself unable to deal 418 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST with any emergency that might arise nearer home, are questions on which opinions differ. It should be said, in justice to Japan, that it is a long distance from the Sunrise Kingdom to France; that by the ocean route it would have been difficult to spare enough ships to transport an army that would be large enough to form an appreciable factor in military operations in which millions of men were engaged on each side, and to keep such an army adequately supplied with mimitions, equipment, and the special kind of food to which the Japanese are accustomed. Military men esti- mated that five tons of shipping were required to transport and maintain one foreign soldier in France, so that 2,500,000 tons would have been needed for 500,000 men; and even that force would have been almost insignificant in com- parison with the huge armies of the other Allies. America had to commandeer every possible vessel, borrow every one that England could spare, and inaugurate a stupendous ship-building programme in order to get her army less than half the distance; and America's resources were far greater than Japan's. As for the land route by the Trans-Siberian Railway, troops sent by that line would have been for Russia, which had ample men of her own. Russia needed rifles, cannon, ammunition, and supplies for an army in the field, and these Japan did sell to her in such quantities that the Trans-Siberian Railway was choked with the traffic. Doctor lyenaga said in an address in New York that among Japan's reasons for not sending armies to Europe were that it would impair the hard-won military prestige of Japan to put comparatively small forces into the European battle-fields, and that Japan was anxious not to re-awaken another "Yellow Peril" propaganda with the old one almost dead. "Japan is keeping safe the channel of communica- tion from Aden to Shanghai, and her troops are kept ready in case of need for sustaining the status quo in India," He significantly added: "Japan would not send her troops as mercenaries. We are, to be sure, all united in a common cause. But I feel confident that even the United States will want a quid pro quo. It has been said that through the EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON JAPAN 419 war Japan has already gained a commanding position in the Orient, but this position has never been recognized. At present we are holding our troops to safeguard allied interests in the East." ^ As a matter of fact Japan did give considerable assistance to the AUies, probably all that they expected or desired. In addition to furnishing indispensable supplies to Russia during the period of the latter's participation in the war, Japan drove Germany out of China, seized the German colonies in the Far East, swept her naval and mercantile shipping from the Pacific Ocean, kept that important part of the world open for the commerce of the Allied nations and the transport of AustraHan and New Zealand troops, maintained at heavy cost her own army and navy on a war basis, ready for instant action in case her allies should desire it, and, according to official figures given out in August, 1918, advanced credits to her allies amounting to yen 1,186,000,000 ($593,000,000), of which Great Britain re- ceived $371,149,000, Russia, $127,084,000, and France about $78,000,000. If it is objected that all these things were to Japan's advantage, I reply that this was Japan's good fortune, and none the less to the advantage of her allies, especially as they enabled Great Britain, France, and Italy to concentrate their naval strength in European waters, where they most needed it. Another phase of the greatly enhanced position which Japan has attained as a result of the European War is the control of the trade of the Far East. She was zealously seeking it before the war broke out, and had already secured a substantial share. Nevertheless, the British were still the chief factors in the commerce of eastern Asia, althougli they were meeting increasingly vigorous competition froi'^ the Germans as well as the Japanese. At the beginning of the war there were 244 German companies in China, 3,740 German residents, and a capital investment of $256,760,000. The enforced withdrawal of the German ships and the ab- sorption of the British in the European conflict naturally 1 Address, May 30, 1917. 420 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST resulted in eliminating German companies and ships al- together, and in transferring a large part of British ener- gies and shipping to places nearer home. This left the Japanese a free field, and they have taken over the bulk of the trade that was formerly conducted by British as well as by German firms. In doing so, they did what white men, Americans included, have repeatedly done wherever they have had a chance. Like the United States, Japan at once found an unlimited demand at high prices for muni- tions and every staple article that she could produce, and her export trade quickly rose to huge proportions. India was flooded with Japanese matches, toys, cigarettes, glass- ware, silk, cotton, and leather goods. Shipments to South America were more than doubled. I have referred in an- other chapter to the remarkable increase in the trade with China. I may add that an interesting illustration of Japanese shrewdness, which a Connecticut Yankee might envy, was given in a deal in copper. The war caused an extraordinary demand for this metal, and sent the price soaring. The coin in common circulation in China is the copper ''cash," about the size of an English penny, and so small in value that a gold dollar will buy anj^here from fifteen hundred to two thousand of them, according to the rate of exchange. In my travels in the interior of China I had to have an extra donkey to carry the cash needed for my party, and its load had to be replenished several times at the money-changers' in the cities through which I passed, bullion silver being carried along for this piupose. It was said that the copper cash in the Province of Shantmig alone would weigh nearly fifty thousand tons. To buy these cash of the Chinese and sell them to the Europeans, who needed the copper for shells, would yield a handsome profit. The Japanese proceeded to do it. The Manchuria Daily News reported that in a single year the purchases amounted to 25,600 tons, and that the transaction was completed at a profit of yen 2,167,000 ($1,083,500). This is only an incident in many and varied operations which ramified widely throughout China. Mr. C. E. Ben- EFFECT OF THE ^^^OItLD WAR ON JAPAN 421 jamin, general passenger agent of the trans-Pacific busi- ness of the Canadian Pacific Ocean Service, stated in March, 1917, after his return from a visit to the Far East : "The Japanese small traders and travelling merchants are swarming over China, especially throughout the Yang-tze River district, which really includes the most important part of China commercially. They move where they like, far beyond the trading limits established by treaty. They come and go as they will, with small regard for the restric- tions of Chinese regulations or written conventions, under the protection of the vigilant and courageous government at Tokyo. The Japanese have acquired extensive hold- ings along the Yang-tze and now have sufficient troops garrisoned at Hankow to enforce any demand they may make." Prior to the war, 40 per cent of China's coasting trade of taels 1,200,000,000 was carried in British ships, and only 10 per cent in Japanese; while of China's importations of cotton goods, 70 per cent was from Europe and America and 20 per cent from Japan. Mr. Yoshida, of the Japanese Department of Commerce and Agriculture, who reports these facts, adds with pardonable gratification: "Things have been developing in favor of Japan since the outbreak of hostihties." ^ Many people in Great Britain were so preoccupied by the war that they were slow to concern themselves very much with this situation; but British residents in the Far East knew all about it, and they looked upon Japanese absorp- tion of British trade with emotions which can better be imagined than described. Russia, too, soon became a profitable customer of Japan. Before the war, she had been bujdng Japanese goods at the rate of yen 120,000,000 a year, and now this trade received a great impetus, as Russia needed vast quantities of war munitions, besides various kinds of manufactured goods. The usual channels of trade with western Europe and the United States were cut off by Germany, but the Trans- 1 Report published July 18, 1918. 422 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Siberian Railway remained an open line from Japan. The result was that Russia began to buy in Japan, and presently long freight-trains were loaded with Japanese rifles, ammu- nition, chemicals, hospital suppHes, clothing, copper and leather goods, and a variety of other manufactured products. By the end of 1917 Japan had furnished Russia munitions and other supplies to the value of $300,000,000. As Russia had comparatively little to sell to Japan in retimi, Japan's favorable balance was a comfortable sum for a nation that had been in financial straits. Nor did Japan suffer in competition with her greatest free rival, the United States. American trade with Japan in 1916 was valued at $290,845,813, against $154,047,067 in 1915, and $147,477,231 in 1914. Imports from Japan in 1916 were $182,090,737, an increase of 73 per cent over the preceding year, while our exports to Japan were $108,755,- 000, a gain of 136 per cent. In spite, therefore, of our ad- vance in exports, the balance of trade was against the United States to the tune of $73,335,737. In these circumstances, Japan began to heap up the wealth that she so greatly needed. One steamship company declared dividends of 360 per cent, and another paid divi- dends at the rate of 720 per cent. A metal-refining com- pany declared 200 per cent, besides writing off for the largest part of its plant. Manufacturing concerns increased their plants, employed more operatives, and ran at high pressure. Japan's ocean shipping, which aggregated 1,030,- 000 tons in 1905, had reached 1,690,000 in 1915, and is now 2,000,000 tons, and her 224 shipyards are working night and day. One hundred and eighty-two steamships were under construction in 1917, and 72 with an aggregate tonnage of 333,841 were launched during the year ending March 31, 1918. Bank clearings in a single year showed a gain of 78 per cent. Postal savings in 1918 were yen 299,860,776 greater than in 1914, and had passed the half-billion mark. The number of depositors had become 18,464,431, an in- crease of 5,493,524; and their average deposit had risen nearly a hundred per cent. Japan, like the United States. EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON JAPAN 423 suddenly passed from a borrowing to a creditor nation. Foreign indebtedness was considerably reduced, and large purchases were made of the bonds and treasury notes issued by her European Allies. By the beginning of 1918 the gold holdings of the government and the Bank of Japan were over $400,000,000. Viscount Yataro Mishima, governor of the Bank of Japan, stated in his Annual Report in 1918 that Japan took $230,000,000 of the war loans of Great Britain, France, and Russia in 1917, while in addition $340,000,000 was furnished as capital for new business enterprises. The amount of Japan's national loans floated during the year was about $120,000,000, and issues of debentures by various com- panies and of municipal bonds aggregated about $70,000,- 000. He truly said that "this clearly indicates that the augmentation in our resources is really remarkable." Turn- ing to the record of the year's foreign trade, he estimated that, including the trade in Korea and Taiwan, exports aggregated $831,450,000, and imports $543,660,000, the total being about $1,375,110,000. Compared with the re- sults of the previous year, these figiu-es show an increase of $244,970,000 on the side of exports, and $146,730,000 on that of imports. Imports of gold and silver aggregated $196,110,000, and exports $76,865,000. Of course, the war trade was abnormal, but Japan's added wealth, her increased industrial equipment and eflB^- ciency, and her pre-eminence in Asiatic markets remain as national assets of immense value. Every year increases her ability to manufacture what the world needs, to ship it where it is needed, and to sell it in competition with business men of Western nations. Most significant of all in its effect not only upon the Far East but upon the world at large is the ascendancy of the Japanese in Chinese governmental affairs. Possession of the strategic base which Germany held in the pro^dnce of Shantung is a political and military advantage of high value; but this is not all. Early in the year 1915, the world was startled to learn that on January 18 Japan had made 424 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST twenty-one demands upon the government of China. They were arranged in five groups. The first group re- lated to the interests which Japan had won from Germany in Shantung; the second to "the special position enjoyed by Japan in South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mon- golia"; the third to the Hanyeh-ping Iron and Steel Com- pany; the fourth required China "not to cede or lease to a third Power any harbor or bay or island along the coast of China"; and the fifth asked China to "employ influential Japanese as advisers in political, financial and mihtary affairs" ; to agree that "the police departments of important places in China shall be jointly administered by Japanese and Chinese"; to "purchase from Japan 50 per cent or more of munitions of war needed by the Chinese Govern- ment," "Japanese experts to be employed and Japanese material to be purchased"; to grant Japan the right to construct certain railways; to give Japanese hospitals, churches, and schools the right to own land in the interior of China; to consult Japan before borrowing foreign cap- ital for mines, railways, and harbor work; and to permit Japanese to propagate Buddhism in China. These demands threw the Chinese into the utmost con- sternation, as they were understood to mean the impairment of Chinese sovereignty and the virtual overlordship of Japan. President Yuan Shih Kai protested against several of them and flatly refused to sign those in Group V. Rep- resentatives of the American and British Governments used their friendly offices with the Japanese, and April 26 the Japanese presented a revised list, in which some of the most objectionable of the original demands were modified, and a few were dropped. May 1 the Chinese Government ac- cepted some of the demands, but dealt with others in a way that was not satisfactory to the Japanese, who May 7 presented an ultimatum closing with the peremptory state- ment: "The Imperial Government hereby again offer their advice and hope that the Chinese Government, upon this advice, will give a satisfactory reply by six o'clock p. m. on the 9th day of May. It is hereby declared that if no satis- EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON JAPAN 425 factory reply is received before or at the specified time, the Imperial Govermnent will take steps they may deem necessary." The Chinese felt that they were in a grievous case. They did not want to yield; but they knew that they were help- less, with no military or naval strength to withstand the disciplined and efficient forces of the Japanese. They knew, too, that they could get no assistance from Western nations. The British made no secret of their concern; but Japan was their ally in the European War, and they did not deem it prudent to offend her. The American Gov- ernment intimated its anxiety and the American press was outspoken in protest; but nobody was in a position to in- terpose effective objection. Reams of explanations have been written from the Japa- nese view-point, and other reams of criticism from the Chi- nese view-point. Doctor Sidney L. Gulick says: "I have it on pretty high authority that Group V was put up for pur- poses of trading. Japan arranged that Yuan Shih Kai could say to China that he had forced Japan to back down on the most important demands and thus 'save his face' for having yielded the rest." Unfortunately, China was not in a position to "trade" with a fair chance, and Yuan Shih Kai's "face" was beyond saving. The position of the Japanese as explained to me by sev- eral prominent Japanese may be epitomized as follows: China is huge in population and resources, but lacking in national unity and efficiency. In this age, when interna- tional relations are founded upon force and each govern- ment is seeking its own interests with scant regard for the rights of others, China cannot take care of herself. Euro- pean nations have made repeated aggressions upon her, and to-day they occupy her most valuable harbors. In the capital itself, the foreign legations are virtually fortified posts, armed, provisioned and guarded by mihtary forces in a way that would not be permitted in the capital of any government able to defend itself from such an insult. Further foreign aggressions are probable and China cannot 426 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST resist them. It is equally clear that the government is not strong enough to develop the resources of the country and to organize its industries and life as they ought to be de- veloped and organized both for the sake of China and for that of other nations which need her products. In these circumstances, China must have guidance and protection from the outside, or else continue in a state of disorganiza- tion equally injurious to herself and dangerous to the peace of the world. The Japanese are the proper ones to give this assistance. They are close at hand, a sister Asiatic people, with large interests in China, and with their own safety involved in Chinese affairs. It is therefore the duty of Japan to do in China what imperatively needs to be done. It is to be regretted that the Chinese do not appre- ciate the necessity for Japan's assistance and organizing ability; but Japan cannot permit herself to be diverted from her plain national and international obHgations by the jealousy or obtuseness of Chinese officials. The United States Government has its Monroe Doctrine and has re- peatedly given notice that it will not permit any other nation to obtain further territories in Mexico, Central or South America, or to secure concessions or make loans which would give a right to impinge upon the territory or sovereignty of any nation in the Western hemisphere. China is Japan's Monroe Doctrine. It is even more vital to Japan than South America is to the United States. Just as the United States will not permit any other Power to interfere in South America, so Japan will not permit any other Power to interfere in China. I have not attempted to quote the exact words of my Japanese friends. I have simply given my impression of the substance of the position that they took, and I believe it to be approximately correct. What they said certainly justified such an interpretation. I am confirmed in this opinion by the following statement of Mr. K. Yoshizawa, Counselor of the Japanese Legation in Peking: "There are only two world powers now which can give attention to China in any appreciable degree. They are Japan and the EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON JAPAN 427 United States. . . . But Japan, for geographical i-easons and because of her political and other relations in the past, is in a more convenient position than America to assist China. The responsibility of Japan, therefore, is very great. Japan should treat China as if she were Japan's own rela- tive. This task requires a great deal of patience on the part of Japan. Japan must care for China as a mother cares for her child. It is my idea that we should be patient with China. If she listens to our friendly suggestions, she should be encouraged; if she does not, she should be chas- tised as a father punishes his wayward son, I expect to assist Baron Hayashi, my chief, in Peking with that policy in mind." ^ During Viscount Kikujiro Ishii's visit in America, he dis- claimed a press report that in one of his addresses he had announced a Japanese Monroe Doctrine for Asia. He de- clared that "there is this fundamental difference between the Monroe Doctrine of the United States as to Central and South America and the enunciation of Japan's attitude toward China. In the first, there is on the part of the United States no engagement or promise, while in the other Japan voluntarily announces that Japan will herself engage not to violate the political or territorial integrity of her neighbor and to observe the principle of the open door and equal opportunity, asking at the same time other nations to respect these principles. Therefore, gentlemen, you will mark the wide difference and agree with me, I am sure, that the use of the term is somewhat loose and mis- leading." 2 I am glad to quote Viscount Ishii's disclaimer. How- ever, the use of the Monroe Doctrine, as an illustration of Japan's relations to China, was first suggested by the Japa- nese themselves, and it has been repeatedly pressed by them. Viscount Ishii's intimation that Japan has made more liberal promises to China than the United States has made to South America may be verbally correct, but we 1 Quoted in The Japan Society Bulletin, New York, April 30, 1917. * Address in New York, October 1, 1917. 428 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST are puzzled to understand how the declaration can be squared with the facts. At any rate, Americans will doubt- less say at once that if Japan means for China only what the United States means by its Monroe Doctrine, they have no objection whatever, but, on the contrary, hearty sym- pathy. As a matter of fact, our country does not interfere with the internal affairs of any other nation in this hemi- sphere. It demands no concessions from them, appoints no advisers, and stations no soldiers within their territories. Even when Mexico was convulsed for years by a revolution which ruined valuable American property and destroyed many American hves, the Washington government declined to intervene, although strongly urged to do so. The Ameri- can policy is that each nation should be left absolutely free to work out its own destiny. The United States simply says to other Powers: "Hands off." The demands which Japan has made upon China go much farther than this. It is im- possible to read them and conclude that Japan contemplates nothing more in China than the United States contemplates in the Western hemisphere. The Cheng-chiatun affair in 1916 is a case in point. Fighting occurred between Japanese troops and the Chi- nese, and men were killed on both sides. Opinions differ as to whether the Japanese or the Chinese were to blame. It was natural that the government of Japan should ac- cept the interpretation of its own officers, especially as Chinese officials are notorious for "saving face" without regard to truthfulness. But an outsider naturally inquires: Why were Japanese troops there at all? Cheng-chiatun is not in any part of China in which the Chinese have recog- nized the right of Japan to station soldiers. Clashes are to be expected in such circumstances. One can imagine what would happen to a foreign armed force in Japan. But in Cheng-chiatun Japanese troops were stationed, and for what followed, whether it was attack or resistance on the part of the Chinese, China was forced to pay ignomini- ous penalties. The first demands of Japan included the rights to establish Japanese police stations " at certain fixed EFFECT OF THE WORLD WAR ON JAPAN 429 localities in Manchuria and Inner Mongolia," and, "in case of necessity, at other special locahties in the above-men- tioned region." "Japan is entitled to ask permission from China to establish police stations." Another point was that "besides the engagement of Lieutenant-General Aoki as military adviser, China is asked to engage several more mihtary advisers from Japan." After considerable nego- tiation Japan agreed to withdraw these clauses, and the final agreement was as follows: (1) " The commander of the Twenty-Eighth Division shall be repri- manded. (2) Chinese miUtary officers responsible for the trouble shall be duly punished. (3) China agrees to issue orders to the mili- tary and civil classes in districts wherein Japanese subjects enjoy the privilege of residence, stating that Japanese subjects, civil and mili- tary, shall all be accorded such courtesy as is due them. (4) The military governor of Mukden will send a delegate to express his re- grets to the Japanese military governor of Kwang-tung and the Japanese consul-general at Mukden at a time when both of them are at Port Arthur. The form of expressing such regrets will be deter- mined by the Chinese governor himself. (5) The family of the Japanese Yoshimoto will be given five hundred dollars silver as in- demnity. On the execution of the foregoing provisions, Japan will withdraw the additionally stationed troops from Shipinchie and Cheng-chiatun." The Chinese Government submitted to these terms; and so this particular crisis, which at first appeared omi- nous, was safely passed. But what next ? Doctor Jeremiah W. Jenks says that "information from authoritative sources is to the effect that at the very time that Viscount Ishii was making his most eloquent addresses in this country, Japanese agents in Peking were crowding Chinese Govern- ment officials by every device known to those skillful negotiators."^ 1 The New York Times, December 28, 1917. CHAPTER XXVII DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA The Far Eastern situation assumed a new phase in March, 1917, when China severed diplomatic relations with Ger- many, handed the German Minister in Peking his passports, and ordered the seizure of German ships in Chinese harbors. This was followed by a formal declaration of war August 17. The ostensible reason was the submarine policy of Germany, which had largely broken up China's trade with Europe, and caused the death of several hundred Chinese who were on torpedoed ships. Large numbers of cooHes were being sent to France to take the places of French laborers, who were needed in the trenches. More than 100,000 were in France by the first of March, and the ships that were sunk were carrying additional men. No one who knows China and the Chinese will take these reasons at their face value. China had submitted in the past to far more grievous provocations without making war, and she would not have dreamed of war in 1917 if Germany had not been shut up in Europe beyond possibiHty of getting out. The spirit of republican China is far differ- ent from that of the Manchu autocrats of the old regime, and the sympathy of the new leaders would naturally be with the democratic peoples of the West. But the govern- ment knew quite well that the repubMc had too many in- ternal problems on its hands, and was too utterly helpless as a military factor to imdertake war against a first-class Power like Germany. Besides, the sentiment of the people of northern China was largely pro-German. This was not because the Chinese were antagonistic to England and and France, but because they feared the Japanese and in- stinctively sympathized with Germany as Japan's enemy. Ai'thur H. Smith, who probably knows China better than 430 DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 431 any other living man, said: "This [the declaration of war] is largely a legal fiction. No man [soldier] has gone nor \vdll go, so far as we know; no money has been spent or will be spent, so far as we can see. It is only the external im- pression that goes abroad that China is hostile to Ger- many. It is very uncertain whether China is really hos- tile to Germany. The Germans have adapted themselves in their commerce to China as no other nations have ever done; they also have known better how to advertise and to make themselves and their productions known. Now that China has declared war on Germany, most official Germans, from the Minister down, have been deported, but private citizens remain and their internment is only nominal." Why, then, did the government break with Germany and identify itself with the Alhes? Devious are the ways of diplomacy, and its real reasons are seldom megaphoned from housetops. It may be some time yet before the world will know the actual motives in this case; but certain con- siderations He upon the surface, and while we cannot now appraise their exact relative influence, we shall not be going far afield in mentioning them. For one thing, China had a strong financial reason for breaking with Germany. The government was in desperate financial straits, and it owed Germany a large sum on which the interest charges were $20,000,000 a year. China rightly regarded this debt as an unjust one since it was the indem- nity imposed after the Boxer Uprising, an indemnity which on the part of all the European Powers concerned, includ- ing Germany, was deliberately intended not merely to be a reimbursement for actual losses but a severe pimishment. The United States refused to accept more than the amount of its estimated loss and then refunded the excess; but the Eiu"opean governments demanded their full pound of flesh. Germany's share was 90,070,515 taels, and Austria- Hxmgary's was 4,003,920 taels more, which, Hke the shares of other nations, was to be paid in thirty-nine annual in- stalments, with interest at 4 per cent on deferred pay- 432 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ments. Many of the payments had been deferred since the protocol was signed in 1901, and interest had piled up until the burden had become ponderous. The declaration of war was held to cancel this obligation as well as all treaties, and it thus afforded substantial relief to a govern- ment which was in sore need of money. China also owed the Allies large sums for their indemnities. The portion assigned to France was 70,878,240 taels, to Great Britain 50,712,795, to Italy 26,617,005, and to Russia 130,371,120. The annual interest on the remaining part of the principal and on deferred payments amounted to a huge sum. Would the Allies remit a part or the whole of these obligations if China would join them against Germany? The answer appeared in September, 1917, when the ministers of the Entente Powers at Peking informed the Foreign Office of the Chinese Government that their governments would postpone further payments of the indemnities for a period of five years, a concession which, it was estimated, would give China the use of about $200,000,000. Whether the payments will ever be resumed remains to be seen. Moreover, under the treaties which Western governments imposed upon China at the close of the nineteenth century, import duties are limited to 5 per cent ad valorem based on the average prices of goods in the years 1897-1899. This is a heavy handicap, especially as the great increase in prices, and the change from an ad valorem duty to specific duties for purposes of collection, reduced the actual tariff on the basis of present values to a considerably lower rate. Meantime, Chinese goods entering Western coun- tries were taxed from 33 to 100 per cent. This was an in- justice which no foreign government would have tolerated. China had long been petitioning Western governments to consent to a change in the tariff. The United States had complied, but several of the European governments had refused to do so. Professor Jeremiah W. Jenks weU says that "the foreign-controlled Chinese tariff cripples Chinese industry because it discriminates against Chinese industry and in favor of foreign products at all points. It weakens DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 433 the Chinese central and provincial governments because it encourages contempt for native authority, while depriving these authorities of the money-means of securing efficiency and respect." China therefore urgently desired relief, and everybody believed that the Allies were disposed to give it if China would range herself on their side in the war. China, too, wished to secure foreign loans, and her credit was bad. She could not obtain money from Great Britain or France unless she could supplement her secm-ity by other considerations that the British and the French deemed valuable. Help in the war was a consideration of this kind. China had another reason of still greater moment. Her leaders knew quite well that when the representatives of all the belligerent nations should meet around a council-table to consider terms of peace, there would probably be a re- distribution of large parts of Asia, Africa, and the Pacific Islands, in all of which the belligerent nations on both sides had great colonial territories. Among these valuable possessions were the priceless concessions which Germany had held in the province of Shantung, and which the Japa- nese took over when they drove the Germans out of Tsing- tau. China feared that the Japanese intended to keep them; and many observers believed that there was groimd for the fear. As the disposition of all the German colonies would come before the peace conference the Chinese Gov- ernment naturally desired representation in order that it might have a voice in deciding what was to be done with Tsing-tau and its hinterland. Indeed the whole question of foreign aggressions upon China might come up. The Premier, Tuan Chi-jui, told the Parliament that not only these questions but questions of the tariff, extraterritorial laws, and revision of treaties would probably be considered and settled at the peace conference, and that in the final adjustments and compromises, China would almost cer- tainly be involved. The Chinese did not like the idea of having such matters decided without them, and they were well aware that their only chance to be heard was to iden- 434 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST tify themselves with the AlHes. The event proved the correctness of their behef, for their status as a belligerent secured them two representatives at the Peace Conference. It had been known for some time that the European Allies were urging China to join them, and it is easy to see why they were anxious to have her do so. Every co- operating nation, however small, meant additional moral support. But China is not small. It is true that it is not formidable as a military power, but it was not a light thing for the AlHes to be able to feel that, if they had China's co-operation, they would have nearly the whole of Asia, since they already had, either voluntarily or involimtarily, India, Persia, Japan, and Korea, with Siam well under way. China could bring some material advantages that were not to be despised. She had an army of 458,600 men. This was a comparatively small force, and not an effective one from a modern view-point. But there was an unlimited number of men to enlarge it; and if the war should be pro- longed, they could be drilled into efficiency, for the Chinese make good soldiers when properly organized and led. Laboring men were quite as important to the AlHes as soldiers. So many of their own workmen were needed in the fighting ranks that they were having great difficulty in maintaining their farms and factories and other industrial operations. In a war in which food and munitions played so large a part, and in which enemy submarines jeopardized supplies from other lands, it was an enormous advantage to have such a boundless reservoir of men as China to draw upon. Nor was China without means of giving some assistance in munitions. She then had several arsenals — ^the Hanyang arsenal, the Hupeh Steel and Power Factory, the Teh-chou arsenal, the Shanghai arsenal, and the Nanking arsenal, and two more were planned for in the provinces of Chih-li and Kwang-tung, respectively. Some of these arsenals were large, and all could be easily made larger. Raw ma- terials, too, China possesses in unlimited abundance, the very ones that the European armies most needed. DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 435 The British had an urgent additional reason for seeking the co-operation of China in their conviction, for which there were abundant grounds, that the German legation in Peking, the German consulates in a number of impor- tant cities, and the 3,740 Germans scattered throughout China were conducting a propaganda against the Allies, obstructing their plans, and making China a base for plot- ting against India in a way which was causing no small anxiety to the authorities in that country, where condi- tions were not as satisfactory as a censored press sought to make the world believe. No one who was familiar with German methods deemed this a light thing, and the most effective way for Great Britain to stop this dangerous ac- tivity was to induce China to break with Germany, and to intern German subjects within her bounds. As soon as it became evident that the AlHes were trjdng to persuade China to join them against Germany, and that the Chinese Government was disposed to do so, Japan protested. Without professing to know why the Japanese did this, we may, as in the case of China, note some reasons that He upon the surface. The objects that China hoped to secure by breaking with Germany were the very ones that it was not to the interest of Japan that China should obtain. Japan preferred to deal with China herself, un- embarrassed by complications with European governments. Japan did not care to have China's financial position strengthened by European loans, secured by valuable con- siderations of a kind that the United States would object to if a South American republic were to give them to a European nation. Nor did Japan care to have China given a voice around the council-table of nations where the dis- position of the province of Shantung and perhaps Man- churia might be considered. Japan's opposition was so definite and so potent that the plan to have China break with Germany was checked. In March, 1917, Japan suddenly withdrew objection. How are we to account for such a reversal of attitude? Again I must remark that the ways of diplomacy are devious 436 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and seldom megaphoned from housetops, and that he ia unsophisticated indeed in international affairs who imagines that Japan changed her mind without valuable considera- tions. The European Allies undoubtedly gave Japan as- surances that the Japanese thought were worth while, among them perhaps the promise that Japan would not be seriously interfered with in carrjdng out her programme in China. This suspicion was strengthened when the Russian Revolutionary Government pubhshed some of the documents that it found in the Foreign Office at Petrograd. Among the revelations was evidence that the Alhed Minis- ters in Peking had urged the Chinese Government to go into the war, and had presented as an inducement the con- sideration that China would then have a seat at the peace conference, and thus have a chance to get back Tsing-tau. At the same time, the Russian Minister in Tokyo was urging the Japanese Government to withdraw its objec- tion to China's going to the war, and saying that, if it would do so, the AlHes would support Japan's claim to keep Tsing-tau.^ Verily, dubious are the ways of secret diplomacy. Certain it is that Japan, which had at first vetoed the break with Germany, afterward advised it. Doctor Frank J. Good- now. President of Johns Hopkins University and formerly confidential Foreign Adviser of the Chinese Government, said at the time: "China would never have broken off re- lations but for the urgings of Japan, which has sinister de- signs against the integrity of China. And mif ortunately she will be able to carry out her scheme. One obvious motive is the opportunity it will afford Japan to gain control of China's army and navy, a step that will put her abso- lutely at the Mikado's mercy." ^ Time alone will show whether China embroiled herself in the world war to her benefit or to her hurt. We suspect ^ Despatch from M. Krupensky, former Russian Ambassador at Tokyo, to the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Petrograd, February 8, 1917, cited in The Secret Treaties and Understandings, pubhshed by the Russian Revolu- tionary Government. At the Peace Conference Japan claimed like agree- ments by France, England, and Italy. ^ press interview, March 14, 1917. DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 437 that, in spite of the virtuous and weU-meant declarations of the various Powers regarding "the rights of weaker nations/' poor, helpless China will get only what the re- presentatives of stronger governments deem expedient, and that Japan will have a good deal to say as to what that shall be. Meantime, the number of Japanese in China is rapidly increasing. Not only is Tsing-tau wholly under Japanese control, but such cities as Peking, Tien-tsin, Shanghai, and others far in the interior have Japanese quarters. Tsinan-fu, which had only 1,400 Japanese in March, 1916, had 22,000 a year later. Hankow, six hundred miles up the Yang-tze River, also has a numerous Japanese colony. Indeed almost all the important centres in the country have groups of Japanese, ranging from a few individuals to populous set- tlements. These Japanese are seldom of the coolie class; they are as a rule enterprising and capable men of a higher type, able to represent their country's interests to advan- tage, and on the alert to do so. Premier Terauchi and his Foreign Minister publicly de- clared early in 1917 that their poHcy in China was to be one of "non-interference" with Chinese affairs. But Chi- nese officials find able and courteous Japanese "advisers" at their elbows, and foreign diplomats and consuls discover that in various and more or less mysterious ways Japanese influence makes itself felt. Documents in my possession from men of undoubted reliability give a rather startling account of the imperious methods of the Japanese in a part of China in which they are particularly numerous, and of the resultant uneasiness and even actual terror of the Chi- nese population. However reassiuing the public language of diplomacy may be, any one who acts on the assimiption that the Japanese do not possess an ascendancy in Chinese matters which they intend to maintain is likely to have a rude awakening. One can understand the resentment of the Chinese against the constant interference of other nations in their internal affairs, and their quite natural demand to be let 438 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST alone. On the other hand, it is painfully evident that China will not be let alone. She has no adequate leader- ship, and she is too big a hulk to be allowed to drift help- lessly about the world's thoroughfares for a generation or more before she can right herseK and cease to be a tempta- tion to any predatory Power that may covet her. More- over, several nations besides Japan are already there, and show no disposition to leave. With Russia in Manchuria, Great Britain in Hong Kong, and France in Saigon, I can understand the feeling of the Japanese that their interests may be fairly considered paramount to those of European nations, and that since there is bound to be interference with China anyway, Japan has a better right than any of her competitors. Japan's interests in China are more vital than America's interests in South America. The United States could get along without that continent far better than Japan could get along without China. While we desire South American trade and raw materials, we are not dependent upon them. But Japan is dependent, in part at least, upon the Chinese market and Chinese products. I have referred in another chapter to her large trade relations with China, and many other instances might be cited. For example, as a great manufacturing and steel-producing country, Japan must have ample supplies of iron ore. She has practically none of her own and must import her supply. The nearest place where it can be found in sufficient quantity is in China, which has vast deposits. Japan also needs China's coal. She has some of her own, but not nearly enough. A great manufacturing nation in this industrial era must have un- limited supplies of iron and coal. China has both. Hence Japan wants prior rights in China. An interesting illustration of Japan's attitude occurred after the American Minister in Peking, the Honorable Paul S. Reinsch, presented to the government of China, June 7, 1917, a note to the effect that the government of the United States viewed with deep and friendly concern the disturbed situation in China; that China's entrance into the world DEEPENING COMPUCATIONS WITH CHINA 439 war or the continuance of the status quo in her relation with Germany was of "secondary importance"; that her "principal necessity" was to "resume and continue her poKtical entity and proceed along the road to national de- velopment"; that it was the hope of America that "fac- tional and political disputes" would be "set aside," and that "all parties and persons would work to re-establish and co-ordinate the government and secure China's posi- tion among the nations, which is impossible while there is internal discord"; and that the United States was a friend who desired to be "of service to China." Japan resented this advice to China without prior consultation with the Tokyo government. The pubHcation of a garbled revision of the American note made matters worse. The correct copy, pubHshed June 13, somewhat modified the anger of the Japanese, but failed to dispel it. The comments of the Japanese press were vitriolic, and the Tokyo government courteously but firmly intimated its surprise and regret. "Woe betide China," exclaimed Mr. Kyoshi Kawakami, "if she thinks that America can be relied upon to save her when the day really comes that China must be saved." "Let me say to you quite frankly," remarked Doctor Toyo- kishi lyenaga in an article in the New York Evening Post, "that Japan will resent an attempt at extending the politi- cal influence of the United States in China; but it must be clearly understood that this does not involve any curtail- ment of the privileges of commercial and industrial ex- pansion which the United States may seek in China. Our poHtical interests in China are greater than yours. China is closer to us. But there is no disposition on the part of Japan to close the open door or to create inequalities in the terms on which the United States may engage in Far East- ern trade." That America was not discriminated against as compared with Great Britain appeared in the spring of 1918, when the Japanese Minister in Peking protested to the Chinese Government against giving a British syndicate a conces- sion to construct a railway from Posiet Bay, near Vladivos- 440 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST tok, by way of Hun-chun on the Korean border to Kirin, the tenninus of the Japanese branch line. It is clear that Japan's claim to pre-eminence in the Far East is not an empty expression, and that other nations are expected to take due notice and govern themselves accordingly. There is a vital aspect of the international question in- volved that should not be overlooked. We are hearing much in these days of the right of each nation to manage its own affairs and to determine for itself whether it shall be independent or under the tutelage of some stronger Power. The speakers and writers who dress up this prin- ciple in such attractive language for public consumption apparently do not realize, or if they do, they deem it inex- pedient to indicate, the limitations that are imposed by inexorable necessity. A nation, like an individual, has a right to do as it pleases as long as it pleases to do right. But suppose it pleases to do wrong ? Or suppose, with good intentions, it is too ignorant or undisciplined to use freedom in proper ways? "Ay, there's the rub!" Must we not qualify acceptance of the principle by saying that when the consequences of a nation's ill-doing affect only its own people, other nations should not interfere but leave it to work out its own salvation, and to learn by painful ex- perience that the way of the transgressor is hard; but that if the consequences of a nation's Hi-doing impinge upon other nations, they are justified in interfering to the extent that their rights are impaired ? Otherwise, the very essence of the principle of national rights is vitiated since other nations are denied theii' rights. This is precisely the situation that confronts the world to-day. During the great war we said in the same breath that a nation has a right to determine its own form of government and to manage its own affairs, but that when a powerful nation like Germany comes into world relation- ships armed to the teeth, and under the leadership of a monarch who asserts that he derives his power directly from God, and is responsible only to God and not to his fellow men for the use that he makes of it, no other nation DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 441 on the planet is safe until that government is deprived of its power to do evil. The principle of self-determination must also be quali- fied in the ease of peoples who are so unfitted for the exer- cise of freedom that their internal affairs become a source of international trouble. Turkey, Mexico, and the Balkan States belong in this class. Was it the duty of other na- tions to acquiesce in Turkey's treatment of the Armenians, in the endless succession of bloody revolutions in Mexico, and in the liberty of unscrupulous adventurers to make the Balkan States a Pandora's box of world evils? Clearty, the orderly and capable nations of the world must adopt some method of dealing with the disorderly and incapable ones, and with the same justification that every state pos- sesses in dealing with its immature, defective, and criminal classes. The individual man has the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; but the most democratic government on earth will promptly punish him if he breaks the laws which are essential to the preserva- tion of the rights of the community. If it be objected that Americans did not recognize the riglit of self-determination in their acquisition of Florida, Louisiana, California, Alaska, Porto Rico, and the Phil- ippines, and that Great Britain did not recognize it in establishing her rule over several hundred millions of other peoples, I reply that in every one of these cases the new government has been far better for the people themselves than the government which it superseded; that no one of these territories is held by America or Great Britain against the will of its inhabitants, except where they are plainly unfitted to exercise the functions of self-government; and that even in these cases, the ruling Power has declared its readiness to offer self-government as soon as the people concerned can establish and maintain it. The Cubans already have it. The Filipinos are getting it as rapidly as they can use it. Great Britain's colonies highly prize their inclusion in the Empire and would never dream of separating themselves from it. In Ireland, for which Great Britain 442 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST has been so sharply assailed, the real trouble does not lie in the attitude of the British Govenunent but in the divi- sions among the Irish themselves, no one faction being able to set up a government which the other faction will accept. The British Government has, in effect, told the people of Ireland that it will approve any practicable plan which they themselves will agree upon. Until they do that, the attempt to give self-government to Ireland would simply result in civil war. As for the subject peoples of Great Britain and the United States, Sir Michael F. O'Dwyer, Lieutenant-Governor of the Pimjab, after speaking of the evils from which the peo- ple of India chiefly suffer — ^ignorance, disease, crime, abuse of office, corruption by those in authority, excessive Htiga- tion, and the law's delay, said: "Some people teU us that the panacea for these and all other evils is self-government. I readily admit that self-government within the Empire, in a form suitable to the traditions and aptitudes of the various component parts, is a legitimate ideal. But the ideal can only be reahzed when the three indispensable conditions, laid down by so great a champion of popular rights as Mill, are fulfilled. Those are: (1) That the great majority of the people shall desire it; (2) that they shall be capable of exercising it; (3) that they shall be able and willing to im- dertake the responsibilities, among them external and in- ternal defence, which it entails. Speaking of my own Province, while I would welcome speedy progress, I may say that those conditions are not likely to be fulfilled for many a long day. Meantime, while the people with the aid of government are fitting themselves for self-govern- ment, the meaning and responsibilities of which at present but few understand, it is our duty to do what we can to insure to them good government which all desire and which all have a right to expect."^ There is room for wide difference of opinion, and even for oppression and injustice, when any given nation claims the right to decide for itself when its interference with some ^ Address, September 13, 1917. DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 443 other nation is justified. Even the best of governments is not free from the more or less subconscious influence of national self-interest, and the wisest of statesmen are falli- ble men. The remedy here is for an international court and a league of nations to sustain it, so that when a nation transgresses the rights of another nation, or manages its own affairs in such a way as to menace the peace of the world, appeal can be taken to an impartial and broadly repre- sentative body which can decide what measures are required. The controversy between China and Japan illustrates the desirabihty of having some such method of international procedure. China is not small and ought not to be weak; but the huge masses of her people are not yet sufficiently coherent and efficient in national administration to enable them to conduct their government effectively, or to protect themselves against the aggressions of stronger nations which have selfish motives for exploiting the country. The revo- lution of 1911-12 was carried through with remarkable speed and effectiveness, but governmental chaos followed. There were five presidents within six years. Parliaments spent their time in bickerings, and were short-lived. A provisional constitution was formed, but a permanent one was not completed. The cleavage between the North and the South found expression in parties which warred for supremacy. The northern party was in possession of the Peking government, and when President Li arbitrarily dissolved Parliament, June 12, 1917, a majority of that body refused to obey the order, went to Canton, and there resumed the sessions. Two governments resulted, one in Peking and the other in Canton. The former claims legality and, as the de facto successor of former governments, is recognized by other nations as the government of China in international matters. The latter claims to represent the true republican and independent spirit of the Chinese peo- ple, and asks recognition on that basis. Peking assails Canton as a rebellion, and Canton assails Peking as a militarism dominated by Japan. "Japan is virtually ruling China through the mihtary party in Peking," charges the 444 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST editor of the Peking Gazette (now removed to Shanghai). "Japan is our enemy," adds a prominent member of the Canton government. The strife between the two sections has waxed bitter, and there has been considerable bloodshed. Meantime, other pressing needs are being neglected. An American who has spent many years in China writes: "The period on the whole is discom-aging from the point of view of China as a nation. I beheve in the Chinese people; they have great latent potentiaUties. Chinese brains, ability and capacity for great and deep thought are the equal of any. But the official class is the curse of China and her greatest obstacle to progress. All the advancement that China has made the past two decades has been made in spite of the drawbacks due to the ruling class. The land shows the effects of ages of wilful neglect. The hills are denuded, and rainfall and wind work havoc, whereas in normal conditions they should facilitate productivity. There are no roads, and transportation is largely restricted to neighboring villages and cities. Markets are poor and famines prevail. In short, China, by years of sheer neglect, has made itself a country to be exploited. In this age of the world's development, such a large part of the earth's surface cannot be left to he idle or go to waste. China doesn't begin to reahze it. We may be sorry for China for losing her national sovereignty, but the seeds of death that have been sown by the officials in the past must bear their fruit in due season." The resultant problem is international. The era of isola- tion has passed forever. The nations of the world have come into such close relations that it is no longer possible for one-quarter of the human race to be in a disorganized condition, the prey to every governmental buccaneei on ths high seas of the world, without creating conditions which other nations are obliged to take into account. I am among those who have immense confidence in the ability of the individual Chinese to take care of himself in all cir- cumstances, and to do so in a peaceable way and with due regard to the rights of other individuals. I also have large DEEPENING COMPLICATIONS WITH CHINA 445 confidence in the ultimate ability of China as a whole to become a well-governed modern country, both able and willing to take a high place among the great nations of the earth. Critics in Western lands, who pessimistically shake their heads about the confusion in China as an evidence of the incapacity of the Chinese to manage their own affairs, might discreetly remember that even the wise and capable men of the American colonies did not succeed in establish- ing a constitution until thirteen years after their declara- tion of independence, and that it is not yet thirteen years since the Chinese overthrew the Manchu Djmasty and be- gan to lay the foundations of a repubhc. China is an enormous and backward country, which cannot begin a new era in a new region as the American colonists did, but must laboriously and against imprecedented obstacles change from antiquated to modern methods where she is, and with no Washington to guide her. She is like a ship without a captain or pilot, helplessly drifting on the high seas, apparently unable to right herself, and, in her present water-logged condition, a menace to other ships. In these circumstances, the Japanese quite naturally say that, as China's next-door neighbor, they are more vitally concerned than any other people, and that as long as there is no world court or league of nations to give the required assistance under international auspices, they must do it themselves. I sympathize, therefore, with the feeling of the Japanese that they cannot ignore this incontestable situation. And yet, I sympathize also with the Chinese, who resent dictation from a single Power whose methods wound their national pride, and whose motives are believed to be in- fluenced by self-interest. I have often said, and I expect to continue to say, that the Chinese could work out their own problem if other nations would give them a reasona- ble chance to do so, but that with several other governments constantly interfering and bullying for selfish ends, China is seriously handicapped and Japan afforded an excuse for claiming priority of interest. Ardently do I hope that a 446 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST world court and a league of nations will be so constituted that conditions of this kind can be wisely handled with due regard both to the rights of the nation concerned and to the rights of other nations that are involved. Meantime, we can only urge Japan to be just and fair to a sister people in a trying period of transition and readjust- ment, and to refrain from taking improper advantage of proximity and superior power. It is disquieting to find that some careful students of Chinese affairs beheve that the Japanese are not free from responsibility for the dis- turbed conditions in China. After noting a credible report that there were in 1918 more than 30,000 organized brigands in the province of Shantung, and that they were suspiciously well supplied with rifles and cartridges, Doctor Arthur H. Smith writes: "The natives who have been subjected to this grilling for two years or more are well aware that many of these weapons and most of the ammunition have been specially imported for them (the bandits) from 'a certain country,'" and that "but for the help of the natives of 'a, certain country,' the Shantimg people are sure that things could never have come to such a pass."^ The Japanese re- ferred to may have been acting as individuals or as agents of private companies which have munitions to sell; but their alleged relationship to the distiu-bances, the fact that Japan is in virtual control of Shantung, and the further fact that these disturbances are assigned as one of the reasons for her maintenance there of a considerable mihtary force make it difficult to contemplate the situation without un- easiness. It would be well also if other nations would be careful to refrain from acts and policies which might intensify an already tense and somewhat inflammable state of mind in this part of the world, and which might strengthen the feeling of the Japanese that they must aggressively push their interests in seK-protection. It was a Western Power that forced Japan to take Korea and Southern Manchuria. Will Western Powers now force Japan to take China? ^ Quoted in Millard's Review, Shanghai, September 7, 1918. CHAPTER XXVIII JAPAN AND SIBERIA The Russian Revolution of 1917 wrought a change of startling magnitude in the Far-Eastern situation. This change formed no part of the plan of the revolutionists; it was a result of the course that they pursued. Their withdrawal from the great war, their internal dissensions, their inability to prevent the break-up of the country into several independent imits, and their helpless submission to the demands of Germany combined to create a new and extraordinarily difficult problem for the Entente govern- ments. The European aspects of this problem do not He within the range of our present discussion. We are now concerned with its Asiatic aspects, and these were of enor- mous advantage to Japan, since they called for an occu- pation of eastern Siberia, which was certain to redound to her advantage. Over 600,000 tons of provisions, ma- chinery, and mihtary supphes were said to be piled up at Vladivostok, most of it in the open air, and other huge quantities had been accumulated at Harbin and at various stations as far west as Irkutsk. Most of these had been sold to Russia by the Japanese, but they could not be sent on with any certainty that they would get to their destina- tion; or, if they did, that there would be any responsible government to pay for them, or that they would not fall into the hands of the Germans, to whom they would be equivalent to a substantial reinforcement. Nor was it ex- pedient to leave miUions of dollars' worth of provisions and equipment to spoil on the docks and the ground, for ware- house facilities were far from adequate. It appeared reasonable that Japan should protect these supplies, some of which fairly belonged to her in the circumstances. 447 448 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Japan, too, had a considerable number of her nationals in Siberia. The Japanese Foreign Office reported that July 1, 1917, there were 9,717 Japanese in Russian territory, in- cluding 3,979 Koreans, distributed as follows: in Vladivos- tok, 3,283; at other places under the jurisdiction of the Japanese Consulate-General at Vladivostok, 1,762; under the jurisdiction of the Consulate-General at Moscow, 129; under the jurisdiction of the Consulate at Nikolaievsk, 4,543. Many of these Japanese had acquired business in- terests in which they naturally expected the protection of their home government. Another consideration was more serious. Russia had sent many of her German and Austrian prisoners of war into Siberia. Most of them were west of Lake Baikal, but others were scattered along the line east of it. Their exact number was unknown. Rumors ranged from 80,000 to 1,000,000. The latter estimate was certainly a great ex- aggeration, but the smaller one was large enough to cause concern. Whatever the number of Germans and Austrians was, the disorganization of the government had given them virtual liberty. It is true that they were still prisoners in theory, but they were not confined in jails or camps, and enjoyed considerable freedom as residents of villages and towns, where their superior intelligence and industrial effi- ciency had given them some prominence and where, in many cases, they lived with the wives of Russian men who were absent in the army. The Russian population between Lake Baikal and Vladivostok was only about 3,500,000, including women and children. AVhat was to hinder the capable Germans from organizing under their own officers, taking possession of a large part of Siberia, and possibly moving along the Trans-Siberian Railway to Vladivostok, where there were not only immense accumulations of every- thing that an army needed but a fortress regarded as one of the most impregnable in the world ? An Associated Press despatch from Harbin, February 20, 1918, said that 2,000 Germans had been armed and were drilling at Irkutsk, and according to an official report received from a foreign con- JAPAN AND SIBERIA 449 sul, the Germans were making preparations to bring much larger forces there. A report that 150 Japanese had been killed in a clash with German-aided Russian Maximalists at Blagovieschensk in March, 1918, added to the excite- ment, although it was afterward ascertained that only one Japanese was kiUed, and two wounded. Perhaps the danger from this source was magnified. It would not have been easy for scattered Germans to conduct effective military operations against a powerful military nation like Japan, many thousands of miles from their home base, and with a single line of communication liable to be broken at a dozen places; for many of the Russian revolutionists did not love the Kaiser's brand of autocracy any better than the Tsar's. Germany could send little help to her nationals in Siberia, for she had her hands full in Europe. Indeed many foreigners in the Far East felt that the German scare was so exaggerated and exploited so persistently and on such a wide-spread scale as to suggest the suspicion of propaganda. The plea that intervention was necessary to restore order was met by the retort that this was Germany's excuse for marching into Russia after peace had been agreed to, and that the Allies scoffed at it. A man long resident in eastern Asia wrote in the spring of 1918: "The reason for that German scare is out now. Japan worked it up so as to present the famous 'Group Five ' demands in a new form under the guise of protecting China against the Germans." It is hardly fair, however, to attribute wholly to Japan a demand for intervention in Siberia, which was certainly caused, in considerable part at least, by the fear of the French, British, and American as well as Japanese peoples that Germany might gain an alarming ascendancy in northern Asia unless decisive measures were adopted to check her advance. Whatever the exact number of Germans and Austrians in Siberia, there were enough of them to make a good deal of trouble. Where the suggestion of intervention originated is a disputed question. Diplomats well understand how to make soundings of opinion and bring about desired situa- 450 THE MASTERY OF THE FAK EAST tions before committing themselves to official acts or written statements that might fall under unfriendly eyes. No authorized person, however, has challenged the state- ment of Viscoimt Motono, the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs, in the Imperial Diet, March 26, 1918, that "the general beHef that intervention was proposed in Japan is unfounded. . . . The Imperial Government neither sug- gested nor proposed military action in Siberia. . . . Never- theless, it regards with gravest apprehension the eastward movement of Germany. Hitherto, Japan has received no joint allied proposal, but if such a proposal is received it wiU be considered most carefully. This will be especially the case if the Siberian situation becomes worse, requiring decisive steps on behalf of the interests of the Allies, in which event the Imperial Government will not hesitate to take prompt and adequate measures in a whole-hearted manner." The wanton murder of Mr. Ishido, a Japanese merchant of Vladivostok, April 4, by five Russians, one of whom was in the uniform of a Bolshevik soldier, hastened the crisis, and Admiral Saito, commanding the Japanese naval vessels in the port, promptly landed an armed force to prevent further depredations. British marines also went ashore as Great Britain, too, had a consulate to guard. When the formal question of intervention came out into the open arena, varying opinions were expressed. All the correspondence that passed between the governments con- cerned and the conversations between their representatives have not been made public, and are not likely to be; but the general positions taken are known and the newspaper discussions were along the same lines. , The American Government caused its opinion to be given that such an occupation of Russian territory would be inconsistent with the motives and aims of the United States in the prosecution of the war, that it was not fight- ing for the protection of property or for territorial advan- tage, and that the Allies would be placed in an awkward position if they favored Japanese occupation of Russian JAPAN AND SIBERIA 451 territory in the East while denouncing German invasion of Russian territory in the West; the alleged reasons in both cases being substantially the same. This view found large support in the public press, although a contrary view was vigorously urged. European opinion showed the same cleavage; but closer contact with the war and clearer reahzation of its perils gave greater prominence to the consideration of immediate military necessity. German power must be prevented at all hazards from securing a foothold in eastern Siberia, and Japan was the only nation which could prevent it. This was the prevailing view in France, and it had influential advocacy in Great Britain, which was Japan's ally, not only in the war but under the Anglo-Japanese Alliance which long preceded it. Objections there doubtless were, but war emergencies must be deemed paramount. Lord Robert Cecil, British Minister of Blockade, declared: "The Japanese alone can act effectively in the present crisis. If they are intrusted by the Allies with the duty of going to the assistance of Russia against Germany, I am sure they will carry out the task with perfect loyalty and great effi- ciency. It would be in the highest degree foolish, if not criminal, if the Entente failed to take every step possible to frustrate this German scheme." And yet there had been for some time a growing uneasi- ness among British merchants and public men about the overshadowing ascendancy which war conditions were giv- ing to Japan in the Far East — an ill-concealed fear that by the time the war ceased British interests in that part of the world would be gone beyond recovery. They now sug- gested that Vladivostok be occupied by a joint expedition of Japanese, British, and American troops, so that it would be clear that the move would be by the Allies as a whole, and that the benefit would not accrue to any one of them alone. Of course, Japan would supply the bulk of the oc- cupjdng force, but it was urged that even a small force of British and American troops would give an international character to the expedition. 452 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST China liked this suggestion and wanted to be represented. She had not only become an ally by her declaration of war against Germany, but she had special interests at stake, since Manchuria was supposed to belong to her and to be under her civil and military jurisdiction, except for certain places and railroad rights of way which had been extorted from her. If the government that held some of these leases was unable to protect foreign interests, and intervention became necessary, who was so vitally concerned as China? If she herself was too disorganized by internal troubles to act alone, she certainly had a right to act in conjunction with any other Power. Japan acquiesced in this, and March 25, 1918, the Japa- nese and Chinese Governments entered into a joint agree- ment, which was withheld from publication for a time. When knowledge of it leaked out and became the object of suspicion, the Chinese Government authorized the fol- lowing statement. May 19: "In view of the circulation of false reports, it is necessary to inform the Chinese people of the facts of the negotiations. Since the conclusion of peace between the Russian Maximalists and the enemy, the fear has existed in Japan and China of an eastward intru- sion of German influence. On account of the propinquity of their territory, the governments recognized the necessity of a definite arrangement for joint defense. This joint de- fense concerns military movements in Siberia and Man- churia, and has no reference to other matters. The scheme will become null and void with the termination of the war. On the other hand, the convention will not be forced un- less the influence of the enemy actually penetrates Siberia. It is not a treaty but an entente, which will become a scrap of paper if there is no enemy menace. The sole reason for the non-publication of the contents is the preservation of the secret from the enemy. The convention does not in- volve the loss of sovereign territorial rights and Japan gains no privileges." The Japanese Government supplemented this by an official statement, June 8, to the same general effect. JAPAN AND SIBERIA 453 Japan looked askance at the proposal for Eiu'opean rep- resentation in the expedition, on the ground that it implied distrust of her intentions. And it did. It had no other basis whatever. Japan was fully able to do the job her- self, and she quite naturally resented the apparent insinua- tion that a handful of European and American troops should go along to watch her and to see that she did not take mifair advantage of the opportunity. The Tokyo Hochi editorially quoted, August 5, Prime Minister Lloyd George's statement that "there is only one country having access to Russia on a grand scale. That is Japan, and the difficul- ties with regard to that nation are well known." "What are these difficulties?" the editor sharply inquired. "Why should Count Terauchi and President Wilson permit them- selves to be regarded as the creators of these difficulties?" Japan had cogent reasons, however, for not pressing into Siberia alone against the judgment of her alHes. She did not want to jeopardize her amicable relations with Great Britain and the United States. Her statesmen clearly saw that intervention in Siberia was inevitable sooner or later, and that when it came, Japan's proximity to the theatre of operations, her ability to use whatever force might be necessary, and the fact that the British and Americans were obliged to concentrate their efforts in France would necessarily give Japan whatever measure of leadership she needed. She could afford to wait, therefore, until the London and Washington governments realized that further delay was dangerous. The outcome proved the wisdom of Japan's prudence. By the latter part of July conditions in Siberia imperatively required Allied action. A considerable number of Czecho- slovak soldiers refused to accept the humiliating terms of the Brest-Litovsk peace treaty which Germany forced upon the helpless and subservient Russian Revolutionary Govern- ment. When the Bolshevik government in Petrograd tried to coerce them into obedience, hostilities broke out between the opposing factions. Some of the Czecho-Slovaks kept up the struggle in Russia, and others managed to make 454 THE MASTERY OF THE EAR ]':AST their way across Siberia in the hope of joining the AUied armies in France. Some day a story of epic interest may be written regarding that comparative handful of brave and determined men, cut off from all communication with the outside world, trying to keep on good terms with the friendly or neutral peoples through whose territories they had to pass and from whom they had to secure some sup- phes, and opposed all the way not only by German and Austrian influence but by the Bolshevik Red Guards, who fiercely fought them at every opportunity. It was im- thinkable that these heroic men should be left to struggle and die unaided — ^martyrs to their devotion to the cause of the Allies. Meantime, the situation in Siberia was becoming more tumultuous. The Siberians had declared their indepen- dence of Russia and set up a provisional government. But the discordant elements in the population could not coalesce. A medley of military forces were in the field — Bolshevik and anti-Bolshevik, pro-German and pro-Ally. July 18, Gen- eral Horvath, one of the anti-Bolshevik leaders, proclaimed himself dictator of Siberia. This angered the provisional Siberian government and brought protests from the French, British and Japanese Ministers in Peking. Fifteen thousand Czecho-Slovaks, finding on their ar- rival at Vladivostok that the Bolsheviki were in control of the city, marched into it June 30, captured the headquarters of the Soviet, and seized the municipal offices, the bank, and a quantity of ammunition. There was some fighting in which the Czecho-Slovaks had 3 men killed and 155 wounded; while the Soviet forces had 51 kiUed and 159 wounded. British, American, Japanese and Chinese war- ships in the harbor landed small forces to protect their consulates. The victorious Czecho-Slovaks postponed their plans for proceeding to France and began to move westward in order to co-operate with the other Czecho-Slovak forces which were struggling at several points along the Trans- Siberian Railway. The various factions among the Si- berians grew more angry and clamorous; the Germans and JAPAN AND SIBERIA 455 Austrians redoubled their activity, and the whole country was in tumult. All this time negotiations between the Allied governments were in progress. President Wilson was the one waited for. August 3 the State Department in Washington an- nounced the conclusions that he had reached, to which the Japanese Government had assented, and which the other Allied governments had accepted in principle. The text of the statement issued by the Acting Secretary of State was as follows: "In the judgment of the Government of the United States . . . military intervention in Russia would be more likely to add to the present sad confusion there than to cure it, and would be more likely to turn out to be merely a method of making use of Russia than to be a method of serving her. . . . Military action is admissible in Russia now only to render such protection and help as is possible to the Czecho-Slovaks against the armed Austrian and German pris- oners who are attacking them, and to steady any efforts at self- government or self-defense in which the Russians themselves may be willing to accept assistance. Whether from Vladivostok or from Murmansk and Archangel, the only present object for which Ameri- can troops will be employed will be to guard military stores which may subsequently be needed by Russian forces, and to render such aid as may be acceptable to the Russians in the organization of their own self-defense. . . . The United States and Japan are the only powers which are just now in a position to act in Siberia in sufficient force to accomplish even such modest objects as those that have been outlined. The Government of the United States has, therefore, pro- posed to the Government of Japan that each of the two Governments send a force of a few thousand men to Vladivostok, with the purpose of co-operating as a single force in the occupation of Vladivostok and in safeguarding, so far as it may, the country to the rear of the west- ward-moviag Czecho-Slovaks, and the Japanese Government has consented. In taking this action the Government of the United States wishes to announce to the people of Russia in the most public and solemn manner that it contemplates no interference with the political sovereignty of Russia, not even in the local affairs of the limited areas which her military force may be obliged to occupy — and no impairment of her territorial integrity, either now or here- after, but that what we are about to do has as its single and only object the rendering of such aid as shall be acceptable to the Rus- sian people themselves in their endeavors to regain control of their 456 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST own aflPairs, their own territory, and their own destiny. The Japa- nese Government, it is understood, will issue a similar assurance." The preceding evening, the Official Gazette at Tokyo pub- lished a declaration emphasizing the Japanese Govern- ment's "sincere friendship toward the Russian people"; the danger "that the Central European Empires, taking advantage of the defenseless and chaotic condition in which Russia has momentarily been placed, are consolidating their hold on that country, and are steadily extending their ac- tivities to Russia's eastern possessions"; the necessity of aiding the Czecho-Slovak troops, who "justly command every sympathy and consideration from the co-belligerents, to whom their destiny is a matter of deep and abiding con- cern;" and closing with the statement: " The Japanese Government, being anxious to fall in with the de- sire of the American Government, have decided to proceed at once to make disposition of suitable forces for the proposed mission, and a certain number of these troops will be sent forthwith to Vladivostok. "In adopting this course, the Japanese Government remain con- stant in their desire to promote relations of enduring friendship, and they reaffirm their avowed policy of respecting the territorial integrity of Russia, and of abstaining from all interference in her internal politics. They further declare that upon the realization of the objects above indicated, they will immediately withdraw all Japanese troops from Russian territory, and will leave whoUy unim- paired the sovereignty of Russia in all its phases, whether political or military." The assurances of friendly sentiments toward Russia were of course diplomatic, but they were undoubtedly sin- cere on the part of both governments. The good-will of America had been long known. In the case of Japan, friendly relations with the government of the Czar had been cultivated for several years, as it was to the interests of both Powers to work together for the time in Far Eastern affairs. In the agreement of July 3, 1916, Russia had delegated to Japan the right of military protection of her Eastern possessions, thus enabling Russia to withdraw her JAPAN AND SIBERIA 457 military forces from the East for employment on the West- ern front in Europe. The unpublished parts of the agree- ment recognized Japan's equality of right in the navigation of the three great rivers of northern Manchuria; the Amur, the Nonni, and the Sungari, an important recognition. In view, however, of the fact that, after the revolution, large sections of Russia, including Siberia, had seceded and set up independent governments, a question may arise as to the precise meaning in August, 1918, of the phrase, "the territorial integrity of Russia." To what extent is Siberia to remain a part of Russia ? Protestations that the occupation was to be "merely temporary as a war measure" are not to be taken too seri- ously, however sincerely made. Governments always make such declarations when they enter territories of weaker peoples, but conditions usually arise to postpone perform- ance. Of the many seizures by various nations in China, Manchuria, Korea, Siam, the Phihppines, and the Pacific Islands, which one has ever been relinquished except under compulsion? Grant that in some cases the reasons for staying are sound; the fact is none the less indisputable. The original declaration may have been honestly made as an expression of intention at the time; but a later adminis- tration is apt to decide for itself whether the time has come to act under it. There were ample reasons for President Wilson's cautious refusal to favor the grandiose plan of a large military ex- pedition. Even if so many troops and supplies could have been spared from the Western front in Europe and trans- ported the long voyage to Vladivostok, it would not have been as delightfully simple a task as armchair civilians imagined to get them across the interminable expanse of Siberia on a single railroad, whose hundreds of bridges and tunnels could be easily destroyed by the Germans. Gen- eral Peyton C. March, Chief of Staff of the American Army, plainly said that "the idea of trying to estabhsh an eastern front in Russia with a handful of Americans is simply ridiculous." 458 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST A more ominous aspect of the question received less public attention, but it did not escape the notice of the British and American Governments. I refer to the probable effect of such action upon the Russian people. The reasons for intervention were gratifyingly apparent to the Allies. But would they be to the Russians? If the people of Russia had been in a position to know all the facts and to weigh them intelligently, it is conceivable that they might have concurred in intervention and perhaps even wel- comed it. But about 80 per cent of them are illiterate, and the information that reaches them is usually distorted to suit the ideas of the persons who disseminate it. Ger- man propagandists literally swarmed throughout Russia and Siberia and labored to prejudice the popular mind against the Allies and in favor of Germany. They did not fail to see the use that they could make of the proposed oc- cupation of Russian territory, and they promptly proceeded to inflame public sentiment against "the unwarranted in- vasion of Russian soil by professed Allies which had now become enemies." As for the educated men who were in power, they were believed to be more pro-German than pro-Ally. They certainly had no special love for the Entente Allies, and they repeatedly declared their behef that on both sides "this is a war of the capitalistic and im- perialistic classes, which are sacrificing the common people to their selfish interests." The danger was, therefore, that any move on the part of the Allies which could be rep- resented or misrepresented as inimical to Russia might play directly into the hands of Germany by leading the Siberians and large sections of the population of European Russia to make common cause with her in "resisting ag- gression." Almost incredible as this may appear to Americans, it was by no means improbable. It is significant that Rus- sians in America strongly protested against any campaign in eastern Siberia, whether conducted by the Japanese alone or by a joint expedition. One could imagine how much more resentful the people of Russia might be, since the JAPAN AND SIBERIA 469 Germans could get their special version of the case before them, and the Allies could not get theirs; for Germany controlled all avenues of approach, and could tell the Slavs whatever she pleased. The ambitions attributed to Japan have long been deemed ominous by the peoples on the mainland of eastern Asia. A Western newspaper corre- spondent, who visited Siberia early in 1918, wrote: "It is astonishing how deep-rooted the anti-Japanese sentiment in Siberia has become. The Japanese menace was very real to the people of Pri-Amur. A Russian from Irkutsk told me that his wife used the threat of a Japanese invasion to quiet the children. In Harbin, wild action on the part of the Coromittee of Soldiers' and Workmen's Delegates was held in check more than once by a reminder that any serious breaches of the peace would result in the coming of Japanese troops from Manchuria. I talked with a num- ber of Russians of several classes about the possibility that Japan might have to guard the accumulated stores in Vladivostok. Nowhere in Siberia did I find a Russian in favor of this." ^ The Bolshevik leaders, both in Siberia and Russia, promptly denounced the proposed intervention. When the Japanese and British warships landed smaU forces at Vladivostok to protect their own nationals, after the mur- der of Mr. Ishido, April 4, the local Council of Soldiers' and Workmen's Delegates protested to the consular corps, and the Council of People's Conamissaries in Moscow, claiming to represent "the All-Siberian Soviets," declared its indignation and ordered "all the Soviets in Siberia to offer armed resistance to an enemy incursion into Russian territory." July 29 the Bolshevik Premier, Lenine, said to the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets that a state of war existed between the Russian Republic and the Allied Powers. He added: "The fatal plans of Anglo- French imperialism can only be frustrated if we succeed in crushing the Czecho-Slovaks and their counter-revolu- tionary partisans on the Volga, in the Urals, and in Siberia. 1 Article in the New York Times, March 17, 1918. 460 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST This is the urgent task and all others must be relegated to the background. All our forces must be devoted to the war." ' This utterance was enthusiastically cheered. The con- suls-general of France, Great Britain; and the United States asked Foreign Minister Tchitcherin for an explanation, and August 2 he sent a long reply in which he bitterly charged that the course of the British and French at Arch- angel and Vladivostok was "a completely unjustifiable act"; that "without a declaration of war hostihties are opened against us"; that "despite the existing state of peace, Anglo-French armed forces have invaded our terri- tory, taken our towns and villages by force, dissolved our workers' organizations, imprisoned their members, and driven them from their homes without any reason possibly warranting these predatory acts"; and that "these people, who did not declare war against us, act like barbarians toward us." The attack on the British Embassy in Petrograd, August 31, with the murder of Captain Francis Cromie, the attache, and the attack on the British Consulate in Moscow, Sep- tember 4, both apparently at the instigation of the govern- ment, showed that the Bolshevik authorities were fiercely anti-British. As for America, the Russian leaders regarded the United States with suspicion and dislike, in spite of President Wilson's expression of friendship. Trotzky and several others had formerly been in America. They had lived in the squalid tenements of its poorest and most con- gested quarters. The America of their experience was a land of the sweat-shops of New York, the mines of Penn- sylvania, and the stock-yards of Chicago — of toihng masses in bitter poverty, a "capitahstic imperiahsm," where the "rich oppressed the poor and controlled the government in the interest of privilege. ' ' From their radical sociahstic view- point, America, while politically democratic, is industrially autocratic, and they were against its social organization ^ Cable of De Witt C. Poole, Jr., American Consul at Moscow, to the Wash- ington Department of State, July 31, 1918. JAPAN AND SIBERIA 461 as well as against that of imperial Russia and militaristic Germany. They hated an economic system which they regarded as vesting absolute ownership and control of a business or factory in the one or more individuals who own it and counting all the workmen as mere employees who have no voice in the management, no share in the profits except such wages or bonus as the owners may choose to give, and who may be discharged at any time at the will of the employer. This, to the Russian socialists, is the type of autocracy which they are determined to overthrow, and this they believe to exist in the United States as well as in other countries. When the All-Russian Congress of Soviets assembled in Moscow, March 11, 1918, President Wilson cabled a message of greeting. The Soviets received it with hearty applause but rephed, in the name of "the Russian Sociahst Soviet Republic," "first of all to the laboring and exploited classes in the United States." They spoke of "all peoples" as "suffermg from this imperialistic war," and called upon "the laboring classes in all bourgeois coimtries," apparently including the United States, to "throw off the capitahstic yoke and estabhsh a socialistic state of society" as "the only one capable of assuring a permanent and just peace." "Why have the Bolshevik failed so utterly to understand President Wilson ? " a New York editor asked a distinguished newspaper correspondent who had recently returned from Petrograd. "Among the Bolsheviki the United States has the reputation of being a nation of money-grabbers," he replied. "You see, the only part of the United States which the Bolshevists know is Hester Street in New York. That was where they lived in the United States. That is where their relatives live to-day. They judge the United States by Hester Street." "Sociahst Russia," declared Trotzky, March 19, "can never place itself under obliga- tions to capitahstic America." It was comforting to our minds to hear it said that the Bolshevik government did not truly represent the people of Russia, and that it was a contemptible tyranny of so- 462 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST cialistic radicals anyhow. Unfortunately, wretched trav- esty of government as it was, it happened to be the only government that Russia had at the time, and it was in possession of the capital, the seals of state, and whatever authority existed. Any dealings with Russia had, per- force, to be with it, for the simple reason that there was no other government to deal with. It was disconcerting, too, to reflect that it might please Germany to have the AUies make a mihtary demonstration in Russian territory, which the Russians would regard as a hostile act, and thus widen the breach between them and the Allies. Nor were the Bolsheviki to be despised as a mere handful of men in power. Their local councils were scattered all over the country. It is significant that in the spring of 1918, while the events referred to in this chapter were transpiring, an election took place in Vladivostok, and was carried by the Bolsheviki by a decided majority. Parties and leaders may change; Constitutional Democrats, Maximalists, Bolsheviki, Soviets, and Councils of Work- men's and Soldiers' Delegates may come and go; Milyu- koffs, Kerenskys, Lenines, and Trotzkys may rise and fall, but radical socialism remains the underlying principle of the men now at the top of the social heap in Russia. The peasant at the bottom of the heap wants land, and any government that lets him have it can do pretty much as it pleases in international relations. A further disquieting fact was not overlooked, and that was that the treaties which the German Government forced upon the Ukraine, Russia, and Rumania in February and March, 1918, ceded enough territory to Germany's Allies to open a new route from Berlin via the Black Sea ports to Samsun, Trebizond, Batum, and thence to Meso- potamia, Persia, Afghanistan, India, and indeed almost any part of Asia that the Teutons might care to reach. They already possessed practically all of the coveted Berlin-Baghdad route, except Baghdad itself, and they now obtained another independent and more easily protected route to Asia, from which it would be exceedingly diflicult to dislodge them. JAPAN AND SIBERIA 463 Japan could not be reasonably blamed for regarding this prospect with profound anxiety. From the view-point of the political and miHtary necessities which her geographi- cal position imposes, she has ample ground for believing that Vladivostok and its hinterland are related to her na- tional safety and development. She has more than once frankly declared that, as compared with Western nations, she has a paramount interest in the Far East. One has studied Far Eastern affairs during recent decades to poor advantage if he does not know that occupation of any part of Manchuria, and of a strongly intrenched position at Vladivostok, by a European Power has long been a source of weU-founded anxiety to the Japanese. To imagine that they were averse to having an opportunity to end it would be to attribute to them a saintUness of self-abnegation which few, if any, Western nations would show in similar circimistances. Kenkichi Mori wrote: "No statement of the President [Wilsonl prevents Japan from taking precau- tionary measures in Siberia. It must be remembered that Japan is immediately affected by the German invasion of Russia. . . . Accordingly, Japan reserves the right of ac- tion and can act whenever she thinks it necessary for her self-preservation. . . . Japan is not going to invade Russia, but is going to intervene if the disturbance created in that coimtry by Japan's enemies menaces her security, together with the interests of her allies. ... It would be a great mistake to think that the issues of the war are going to be decided in Europe alone. The war is being fought not only on the Western front, but also in the East, and disintegrated Russia gives to the Central Powers some important strategic points from which to strike at the pos- sessions of the Allies in the Orient, so that the enemies will be at Hberty to eventually, but in short time, threaten the Pacific." Intervention having been decided upon by the govern- ments concerned, there was no delay in acting. The Japa- nese, of course, could act easily and quickly, as they had their whole army near by, and the British and French Governments contented themselves with comparatively 464 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST small detachments, chiefly from their availaljle forces in the Far East. The Japanese force was naturally the largest and its general was commander-in-chief of the Allied expedi- tion. Vladivostok was occupied as a base, and regiments pushed out from it to several strategic points, the Japanese occupying Blagovieschensk, the capital of Amur Province, September 18. There were no aggressive operations on a large scale, as the opposition was not sufficiently imited, organized, and equipped to offer effective resistance. The expedition, therefore, simply took such steps as appeared necessary for the protection of the Allied interests and the maintenance of order, while the conflicting parties in Si- beria and the anxious governments in Europe were trying to see whether any sort of coherency could be brought out of the chaos and a civil administration estabhshed under auspices that would not make it a menace to the peace of the Far East. Time, and perhaps a good deal of it, wiU be required for the working out of the various and complicated problems that are involved. The close of the World War in Novem- ber, 1918, and the downfall of the Prussian military autoc- racy ehminated the German menace from the Far Eastern problem. But Siberia is still Siberia — a vast, fertile, sparsely populated, poHtically weak and disorganized region, lying just where its relation to Far Eastern problems renders it of crucial importance. In so far as eastern Siberia is con- cerned, Japan is quite right in insisting upon having a dis- tinct voice in the settlement, just as the United States proposes to have a distinct voice in settling those which affect the Western hemisphere. Japan hopes that the reasonableness of her claim will be recognized and respected. She would sincerely regret the necessity of sustaining it by any action which would be deprecated by her allies; but she feels that she cannot be indifferent to the possi- ble bearing of the situation upon her vital national inter- ests. Her hmited territory, her overcrowded and rapidly increasing population, and her virtual exclusion from the very large part of the world that is controlled by the Eu- JAPAN AND SIBERIA 465 ropean and American nations; compel her to look to the adjoining parts of northern Asia as her most practicable sphere of development. China has rights there which should not be ignored, but if I were a Japanese I should feel that my countiy's claim to eastern Siberia and northern Manchuria was stronger than the claim of any Western nation. Russia has no title to these regions except that she took them under extorted treaties because she felt that she needed them in the inter- ests of national expansion. Such treaties have a certain legal and diplomatic vahdity, and undoubtedly must have some recognition in international procedure, especially after they have received the sanction of time and general ac- quiescence. China, however, never gave anything more than an enforced acquiescence to Russia's occupation. The people of Manchuria and of eastern Siberia, such as they were, were never consulted at all; and what recogni- tion Japan gave was dictated by temporary military condi- tions. Of moral right to the region in question, Russia never had more than a shadow. The United States has enough territory of its own; and yet an American can un- derstand how he would feel if a European or Asiatic Power were to occupy Mexico. He would want that Power to get out, and would quite readily salve his conscience in case any local conditions were to give his government an opportunity to facilitate the ousting. However strong one's sympathies may be with China, and mine are very strong, one must concede that, as between Japan and other world-powers, the equities of the case are overwhelmingly with Japan. PART IV CHRISTIAN MISSIONS IN THE PROBLEM OF THE FAR EAST CHAPTER XXIX THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS We have considered the chief political forces in the Far East whose pohcies and methods have sometimes operated independently, at other times conflictingly, and at still others jointly. But another force is operating, with less noise but -with more depth, a force more far-reaching in character and results — ^the force of Christian missions. It is the most pervasive and reconstructive of all forces. Others effect more or less extensive changes in externals; but this effects an internal transformation. Others may make man outwardly a more decent animal, and give him greater efficiency in the struggle for supremacy. But, as St. Paul said, "if any man be in Christ Jesus he is a new creature." This transformation involves not only the man himself but all his relationships and environments. The "great voice" that St. John heard declared: "Behold, I make aU things new." The missionary objective was finely expressed by St. Peter when he wrote: "We look . . . for a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness." The men of Thessalonica uttered a profounder truth than they knew when they complained that Paul and Silas had "turned the world upside down." The world of that day needed to be turned upside down because it was wrong side up. The influence of Christian missions has already attained magnitude as one of the recognized forces operating in eastern Asia. The strength of Christianity in Japan and China is discussed in separate chapters. We may note here that in 1917 the Ministry of the Interior of the Chinese Government reported there were 2,717 Christian churches in China, 4,288 chapels, 8 Bible societies, 161 missionary hospitals and medical schools, 9 missionary colleges, 1,171 469 470 THE ]\IASTERY OF THE FAR EAST middle schools, and 2,557 jDrimary schools, l^esides many branches of the Y. M. C. A. The report further showed that there were 1,836 men and 2,716 women missionaries, 902 native preachers, 8,381 native assistant preachers, 1,108 native Bible women, 2,799 teachers and 186,130 stu- dents in the missionary schools, and 388 physicians working in the missionary hospitals. The total number of converts to Christianity was placed at 35,287,809, this number in- cluding, of course, both Protestants and Roman Catholics. The last figure is very much too high an estimate, if the term "converts" is used in a proper sense. But it is sig- nificant that to government officials, Christian churches look so large, and that so many Chinese are willing to be called Christians, even though their connection with the church is merely nominal. The China Continuation Com- mittee reported, in 1917, a Protestant Christian constituency in China of 595,684, and Les Missions de Chine et du Japon in the same year gave the Roman Catholic consti- tuency as 1,789,297. In the three countries that are commonly grouped as the Far East, Protestant missions are represented by 7,356 for- eign missionaries, 21,024 native workers, 13,678 congrega- tions with 698,566 communicants and definitely known adherents, 6,214 schools and colleges with 215,819 students, 729 hospitals and dispensaries, which treated in a recent typical year 1,255,827 patients, and 37 printing-presses, whose annual output of Bibles, books, tracts, and periodicals aggregates 107,700,000 pages. The Roman Catholic Mis- sions report 1,944,281 baptized members, including children. This is really wonderful when we consider the compara- tively brief period in which missionary work has been con- ducted, the difficulty of inducing peoples of other races to change their hereditary beliefs, the limited resources of the mission boards, and the fact that they have had the support of only a part of the churches in Europe and America. There are more Christians in each one of the countries un- der consideration than there were in the Roman Empire a century after Pentecost. Now that Christianity has be- THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 471 come well rooted in all these Far Eastern lands, and with increasingly competent native as well as foreign leadership, rapidly increasing influence may be reasonably expected. Everywhere Christian missions have gone, they have been a reconstructive force. This has been particularly true of missionary work in the Far East. Missions are a reconstructive economic force. Others be- sides missionaries have had a large part in this phase of the reconstructive process, but the missionaries have been potent influences. The lamps, kerosene oil, watches, clocks, furnaces, glass windows, sewing-machines, and other conve- niences in their houses; the agricultural implements in their gardens and machinists' tools in their industrial schools; the improved machinery and methods in their printing- presses; their explanations of the steam-engine, the electric motor, the railway, and the telegraph — ^these attracted at- tention and developed desire. The missionaries sought no profit from these opening markets; but traders quickly turned them to commercial advantage and built up business interests which were of large value to Eastern and Western nations alike. Said Ex-President William H. Taft, at a missionary meeting of the Methodist Episcopal Church: "You are pioneers in pushing Christian civilization into the Orient, and it has been one of the great pleasures of my life that I have had to do with these leaders of yours who represent your interest in China, India, the Philippines, and in Africa. These men are not only bishops and ministers, they are statesmen. They have to be. They make their missions centres of influence such as to attract the attention of native rulers. The statistics of conversions do not at all represent the enormous good they are doing in pushing Christian standards and advancing high civilization in all these far-distant lands." Missions are a reconstructive social force. They have effected striking changes in the popular attitude toward woman, in the status of the wife, in the education of girls, in the care of the sick, and in creating a sentiment against harmful drugs. William Elliot Griffis, who lived in Japan in 472 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the old feudal days, says that conditions at that time were unspeakably bad — ^ignorance, squalor, disease, and im- morality. He declares that old Japan had no principle of regeneration; and he quotes approvingly a statement of Doctor Verbeck's that new Japan came from across the sea with missionaries. The defective and dependent classes were almost wholly neglected until the missionaries came with their humani- tarian teaching and Christlike ministries. It was the mis- sionary who first showed interest in the blind, the deaf and dumb, the orphaned, the leprous, the sick, and the insane. Institutions for their care are scattered all over Asia, and all of them were founded either directly by missionaries or indirectly as the result of their teachings. The Honorable V. K. Wellington Koo, Chinese Minister to Washington, has emphasized "the influence of the missionaries as a fac- tor in the social regeneration of China. Many of the epoch-making reforms, such as the suppression of opium and the abolition of foot-binding, have been brought about with no little encouragement and help from them. In the field of medicine in China, American missionaries have rendered important service. Their hospitals and dispen- saries, nearly four hundred in all, not only give shelter, comfort, and peace to hundreds of thousands of the sick and suffering, but also serve as centres from which radiates with increasing luminosity the hght of modern medical science."^ This testimony is as applicable to other lands as to China. Professor Nitobe, of the Imperial University in Tokyo, after recounting the indebtedness of Japan to Christianity for schools, hospitals, and churches, added: "The leaders of the campaign to promote sanitation and hygiene, of the anti-prostitution movement, and of the temperance societies are recruited from among the Chris- tians." Missions are a reconstructive intellectual force. The mis- sionary has planted the church and the school side by side. He is a teacher as well as a preacher. The first modem 1 Address in Chicago, December 19, 1916. THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 473 schools in the Far East were founded by missionaries, and their present schools are among the best to-day. It is sometimes said that modern science has been the chief factor in the intellectual awakening of the Far East; but it was the missionary who first took modern science to those lands; who translated the text-books, taught the sci- ences, and explained the uses of steam and electricity. The Honorable C. T. Wang, Vice-President of the Chinese Senate, writes: "The mission schools throughout the coun- try have led the way and in many cases have been the cradle of the modern Chinese educationalists. In all the political upheavals people have a good opportunity of watching the students that come into power. They find that those students who, through their touch with the mis- sion schools have embraced the real spirit of love and sac- rifice of Jesus Christ, are the ones that can best be trusted."^ The Honorable V. K. Wellington Koo, in the address already referred to, gave emphatic testimony on this point : "For the introduction of modem education China owes a great deal to American missionaries. It is a general con- viction on the part of the Chinese people that through their translation into Chinese of books on religious and scien- tific subjects, through their untiring efforts in estabhshing schools and colleges in China, and through their work as teachers and professors, American missionaries, in co-opera- tion with those from other countries, have awakened the interest of the Chinese masses in the value and importance of the new learning. To a great extent the present wide- spread educational movement in China is traceable in its origin to the humble efforts begun a few decades ago by the Christian evangelists from the West." Substantially the same words might have been written of Japan. Mis- sionaries were its first educators, founded its first schools, translated its first text-books, and compiled its first gram- mars. In Korea, practically the entire educational move- ment of the country was organized, directed, and maintained by missionaries until recent years. The governments in ^ Article in the Missionary Review of the World, August, 1916. 474 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the Far East have now undertaken large educational pro- grammes of their own, but their officials unhesitatingly tes- tify that they were indebted to missionaries for the sugges- tion and impetus, for the best text-books, and for the most highly qualified teachers. Missions are a reconstructive moral force. They make plainer the distinction between right and wrong, clarify conscience, and quicken desire to do right. The light of Christianity makes virtue appear more attractive and vice more vile. There is evil in every land where Christianity exists; but it is there in spite of Christianity, not because of it. The most prejudiced critic knows that Christ should not be judged by the conduct of those who reject Him, or by those who, while professing to accept Him, show by their actions that they have only partially or nominally done so. The consistent Christian is a clean man, advocating good, hating wrong, fighting intemperance, gambling, dishonesty, and the social evil, purifying the moral atmosphere of the community, and furnishing the type of reliability that is indispensable to the stability of the State. The Honorable S. Shimada, M. P., of Tokyo, said in a public address in Yokohama that during the China-Japan War, the victories achieved were attended by disgraceful reports of fraud and embezzlement on the part of the officials to whom was in- trusted the holding and disbursement of the funds; that to obviate such conduct in the last war (Russia- Japan), Chris- tian men were selected to fill such places; and that from the beginning to the end the administration was efficient and satisfactory.^ Bishop Awdry, the Enghsh bishop of South Tokyo, says that in the Russia-Japan War the Japanese Government ruled that all native interpreters who accompanied foreign correspondents must be Christians, and that this action was taken on the ground that for this important post men of absolute reh ability were desired, who would fairly represent the interests of Japan. ^ It is not surprising that Sir Ernest * Reported by the Reverend H. Loomis, D.D., of Yokohama, in The Chinese Recorder, March, 1907. * Reported in The Spirit of Missions, July, 1904. THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 475 Satow, for many years the British Ambassador to Tokyo, and a recognized authority on Japanese matters, said: "In Japan, Christianity is now recognized as a very great moral motive in the national hfe." Missions are a reconstructive poUtical force. With poHtics as such, missionaries have nothing to do. They carefully avoid political affiliations. Mission boards do not encour- age appeals to officials nor do they seek the aid of their own consular and diplomatic representatives except in cases of urgent need which involve necessary treaty rights. The missionaries strongly believe that all due respect should be paid to the lawfully constituted civil authorities, that care should be observed not to embarrass them needlessly, that the laws of the land should be obeyed, and that it is better for the followers of Christ patiently to endure some in- justice than to array the churches m antagonism to the governments under which they labor. On the other hand, Christianity is always and everywhere a reorganizing force. It may not produce this result as quickly among a conservative as among a progressive people; but sooner or later, the consequences are inevitable. Modem Japan is swiftly in some respects, and slowly but surely in others, reorganizing her institutions in accordance with the new spirit, so that the revolution in that country is a comparatively peaceful and normal one, as it was in England. The ruhng classes in China and Russia, like those in France prior to the Revolution, shut their eyes to the facts only to be violently hurled from power. What is happening to Korea is described in other chapters. The ideas of God, of man, and of duty which Christianity in- culcates invariably effect profound changes in the body poHtic. They did this in Europe and America, and they are doing it in Asia. Christianity alters a man's outlook, upon life, gives him new conceptions of responsibihty, strengthens moral fibre, and nerves him to oppose tyranny and wrong. What Draper said of Europe may be said with equal truth of modern Asia: "The civil law exerted an exterior power in human relations; Christianity pro- 476 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST duced an interior and moral change." The Honorable Winston Churchill of the British Government, formerly Under-Secretary for the Colonies, said: ''Every penny presented to the cause of missions is a contribution to good government; every penny spent on missions saves the spending of pounds in administration; for missions bring peace, law, and order." Similar opinions of British ad- ministrators in India have been widely quoted. If Asiatic testimony is desired, it may be found in abun- dance. Of the scores of utterances that might be cited, three may suffice here: General Li Yuan Hung, the commander- in-chief of the Republican Army during the revolution, and afterward successor of Yuan Shih Kai in the presidency: "Missionaries are our friends. I am strongly in favor of more missionaries coming to China to teach Christianity. We shall do all we can to assist them, and the more mission- aries we get to come to China the greater will the Republi- can Government be pleased. China would not be aroused to-day as it is were it not for the missionaries, who have pen- etrated even the most out-of-the-way parts of the Empire, and opened up the country." The Honorable S. Shimada, M. P. : "Japan's progress and development are largely due to the influence of missionaries exerted in the right direc- tion when Japan was first studying the outer world." Mar- quis Okuma, former Prime Minister: "The coming of missionaries to Japan was the means of linking this country to the Anglo-Saxon spirit to which the heart of Japan has always responded. The success of Christian work in Japan can be measured by the extent to which it has been able to infuse the Anglo-Saxon and the Christian spirit into the nation. It has been the means of putting into these fifty years an advance equivalent to that of one himdred years. Japan has a history of two thousand five hundred years, and one thousand five hundred years ago had advanced in civilization and domestic arts, but never took wide views nor entered upon wide work. Only by the coming of the West in its missionary representatives and by the spread of the gospel, did the nation enter upon world-wide thoughts and THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 477 world-wide work. This is a great result of the Christian spirit." 1 Missions are a reconstructive spiritual force. I do not mean to separate this phase of missionary influence from other phases. The spiritual motive pervades all forms of the work and furnishes the mainspring of activity; but missionaries are preachers and evangelists above aU else. They believe that man's supreme need is the quickening of conscience, the discernment between right and wrong, the clarification of moral vision, the power that is conveyed in the gospel of Christ. They have opened the Bible not merely as a text-book on morals but as the revelation of the character and wiU of God. They have presented Christ not only as the best man that ever lived but as the incarnation of God. They have proclaimed the gospel not simply as a code of ethics but as what St. Paul declared it to be: "the power of God unto salvation." They have gone to all classes of people — ^the rich and the poor, the noble and the peasant, the sick and the sorrowing. The history of their labors is a record of adventurous expeditions, of pa- tient toil, of unflinching courage, of uncomplaining self- denial, of endurance of persecution, and finally of large achievement. As I have visited the missionaries, travelled with them, and watched their work during two visits to Asia, I have thought more than once that if the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews were to be brought down to date, it would surely include the names of many of these men and women of whom, like the Christians of the first century, "the world is not worthy." Missions are a reconstructive international force. "For- eign missions are influences toward better world relation- ships," says ex-President William H. Taft. If I may again quote from the remarkable address of the Chinese Minis- ter to Washington: "Even more significant than the trade relations between our two countries has been the work of American missionaries in China, than whom no class of foreigners are more friendly, sympathetic, and unselfish in 1 Japan Daily Mail, October 9, 1909. 478 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST their attitude toward the Chinese people. The spirit which has underlain and still underlies the relations between China and the United States is nowhere better illustrated than in the devotion of this comparatively small group of Americans to their useful services in China and in their readiness to uphold the cause of justice and fairness. . . . The American missionaries' record of service properly de- serves the gratitude of China and the admiration of the world." The reason for this influence inheres in the nature of the faith which the missionary preaches. Christianity is a world religion. In this respect it differs from other re- ligions which are popularly called ethnic or racial. True, some of them have spread beyond the bounds of the nations in which they originated; but none of them have gone over the world, and none of them possess the elements that would adapt them to the world. Christianity alone has the stamp of universality upon it. Amid a multitude of tribal and national deities, the Old Testament prophets proclaimed Jehovah as the supernational God, "the Lord of all the earth." The New Testament writers brought this world idea into special prominence. While the life of our Lord was confined to Palestine, He made it clear that the scope of His purpose was world-wide. He said: "Other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring"; "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." In an age when men regarded men of other races as foes. He said: "Love your enemies." He told the Jews that the disliked Samaritan was their " neigh- bor." He gave Paul his commission to the Gentiles. With a vision of the world He said: "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, wiU draw all men unto Me." The fundamental ideas of New Testament teaching are universals — ^the world-wide reign of God, the essential imity of the human race, Christ as "the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world," salvation for "whosoever will," a law of THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 479 righteousness which knows no exemptions, and a love which recognizes no racial or sectarian limits. Universality is of the very essence of the gospel. Christianity stands or falls as a world faith. It alone has gone to every part of the world and has proved its adaptation to peoples of every race and clime. Christianity is, therefore, pre-eminently a supernational rehgion. We do not say international, because that sug- gests the plane of agreements between governments; but supernational in that Christianity transcends nations. There is, indeed, a proper nationalism, and it has many noble elements. Patriotic love for one's own country and a zeal to advance its legitimate interests are great virtues. Missionary societies are in warm sympathy with all true nationahsm. They thoroughly respect the reasonable de- sire of any people to manage their own affairs imhindered by unjust interference from outsiders. But it is sometimes difficult to draw the line between nationalism and inter- nationalism — ^the due claims of a people to control their own interests, and the moral obligation to take into account the interests of humanity at large. It is as true of nations as of individuals that "none of us liveth to himself." Na- tionahsm properly resents dictation in political matters, but it should welcome unselfish efforts to disseminate those truths of medicine, sanitation, education, social justice, and religion which are universal in character, and which no na- tion can exclude without consequences that are not only injurious to others but fatal to itself. The type of nationalism which caused the great war is thoroughly pagan. It makes each member of the family of nations a law imto itself irrespective of the rights of others. It baptizes national selfishness and greed as patriotism, and justifies cruelty and murder as "military necessity." Said Lord Hugh Cecil, of the British Parhament: "Nationahsm, in a degree, is a very desirable thing; but it differs from any other form of esprit de corps in that it implies or permits a suspension of the moral law. We must get people to feel that there is something higher than the loyalty to their 480 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST own country — there is an obligation to the interests of all mankind. This doctrine is one of the most elementary tenets of Christianity. We want to get behind the idea that the higher loyalty is to our own country, to the idea that all men are brethren and that we owe to them a duty of inexhaustible, immeasurable love." True nationahsm is related to supernationalism as the family is related to the community and the community to the state. The local duty is imperative, but it is consistent with the duty to the larger relationship. President Wilson declared in a memor- able address: "The principle of pubhc right must hence- forth take precedence over the individual interests of par- ticular nations. . . . Always think first of humanity." This is precisely what Foreign Missions are doing. They inculcate that highest type of loyalty to coxmtry, which makes it minister to the supreme good of the race. Christi- anity is the antithesis of a self -centered nationahsm. It sub- stitutes the law of brotherhood for the law of the jungle. Some have alleged that Christianity is impracticable as a working principle in social and national affairs. This is what Confucianists assert — that the Sermon on the Mount is a beautiful theory, but that it cannot be put into practice as Confucianism can be. It is odd to hear some professed Christians revert to this non-Christian argument. Did Christ preach an impracticable gospel? Did He teU His followers to do something that He knew they could not do? Surely we must believe that Christianity is a religion that can be put into practical operation in himian affairs; that the whole gospel applies to the whole Hfe; and that nothing that man touches is beyond the scope of the law of God. Now, Foreign Missions are the organized effort of the Church of God to carry out the supernational programme of Christianity; that is, the dissemination of the gospel throughout the world and the apphcation of it to the problems of humanity. It is the recognition of the world mission of Christianity, the international mind upon its highest level, the emancipation of the Church from the parochial and provincial into the wide spaces of the kingdom THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 481 of God. It teaches that the world is one; that each nation is an integral part of a common race; that no people can live an isolated life; that we are kin to oiu- brethren in other lands; that the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man include all mankmd; and that righteousness and truth should be supreme eveiywhere. This evangel is indispensable to the peace of the world. President Wilson voiced the common sentiment when he disclaimed selfish intentions in the war. He declared that what we demanded in that struggle was "nothing peculiar to ourselves. It is that the world be made fit and safe to live in; and particularly that it be made safe for every peace- loving nation which, like our own, wishes to live its own life, determine its own institutions, and be assured of justice and fair deaHng by the peoples of the world as against force and selfish aggression." This object rendered imperative the overthrow of a Prussian military autocracy, whose character and purposes were absolutely incompatible with these ideals. But was nothing more needed than the over- throw of that autocracy? Will nations ever live in peace if the spirit which has heretofore animated them continues to prevail ? Do suspicion plus jealousy equal international good-will? We say with President Wilson that we wish to "make the world safe for democracy." But what kind of democracy? Will a lawless, godless democracy make the world safe? On the contrary, selfish and cruel men will fight under any kind of government. The alternative of autocracy is not necessarily democracy. It may be mob- ocracy. Look at Russia. Look at Mexico. If people are too ignorant or too imdisciplined for freedom, the world is not bettered unless the conditions which make freedom a blessing are promptly created. Many people appeared to imagine that the millennium would come when the house of HohenzoUern was forced to abdicate. It is true that the power of that house was the greatest hindrance to the coming of the better day for which the world waits. It has gone, but has the millennimn come? Did the exile of the Czar suflSce to make Russia 482 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST an ideal State? Did the downfall of the dictator Diaz usher in a perfect day for Mexico? After all external ob- stacles have been removed, the task of fitting men for the right exercise of liberty remains. It was Christ Himself who said: "The Kingdom of God is within you." We fondly beheve that America, Great Britain, and France have learned to use democracy aright, although probably few of us are free from anxiety on this subject. But assuming that they can do so, we must remember that in this era of race solidarity it is not only a question whether they are safe, but whether Asia, Africa, and Latin America are safe. Does any one beheve that Colombia and Venezuela are ready to help in creating a desirable new world order? Are China, India, Persia, and Turkey? No matter how perfectly we apply Christian principles to our own institu- tions, if we leave the rest of the world out of account, it is vain to imagine that we shall escape the inevitable day of reckoning. If democracy is to rule the world in righteous- ness, it must be safe not only here but elsewhere. "There is no political alchemy," said Herbert Spencer, "by which you can get golden conduct out of leaden motives." Of what avail for our sons to die on the battle-field if the world whose freedom they secure is unable to utiHze it worthily ? We are hearing much these days about armies and navies and governments and territorial adjustments. But what about the soul of the world — ^its ideals, its aspirations, its moral principles, that which differentiates the spiritual from the physical, which makes men sons of God instead of animals, and transmutes hatred into love? "What shall it profit" if we gain the whole world of civil freedom and physical might, and lose the soul of the world? In Foreign Missions Christian men are trying to save the soul of the world, and they are justified in magnifying the task as one of the indispensable efforts of the age. Since Foreign Missions deals with supemational ideas, it is in a sense a supemational movement. Of course, the individual missionaiy is a citizen of some country, and cannot claim supernationalism for himself unless he accepts THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 483 the necessary implications of supernationalism. The coun- try whose rights of citizenship he enjoys has rights regard- ing him and must hold him to responsibility for his acts and words. But his missionary objectives and work are supemational and they distinctly help international rela- tions. The true missionary does not stamp his own na- tional characteristics upon his work, but conveys super- national ideas of God and man and duty, and leaves the peoples who receive them freedom to organize their exter- nal forms in accordance with their own genius. Represen- tative Asiatics have repeatedly spoken in terms of warmest appreciation of the value of missionary work from this view-point. The late Mr. Fukuzawa, of Japan, said: "In the early days of Japanese intercourse with foreigners, there can be no doubt that many serious troubles would have occurred had not the Christian missionary not only showed to the Japanese the altruistic side of the Occidental character, but also by his teaching and his preaching im- parted a new and attractive aspect to the intercourse which otherwise would have been masterful and repellent. The Japanese cannot thank the missionary too much for the admirable leaven that he introduced into their relation with foreigners."^ It would be easy to fiU pages with quo- tations to the same effect. Foreign missionary work is more and more clearly coming to be understood as dis- tinctively altruistic in its character and aims. Christians in Western lands maintain it with no thought whatever of any return to themselves other than that of realizing the truth that "it is more blessed to give than to receive." The correlation of such a supemational enterprise to a justifiable national spirit involves many difficulties. These difficulties become acute when international relations are ruptured. But it is manifestly unjust that an altruistic supemational work should be destroyed by nationalistic wars. When missionary work is broken up, the real sufferer is not the missionary, who usually is simply returned to his own country, but the natives — ^the sick and injured 1 Japan Weekly Mail, May 21, 1898. 484 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST turned out of hospitals, children dismissed from schools, and struggling native churches left without guidance. The Japanese Government set a good example to all other na- tions in the Russia-Japan War. It was fraught with dire issues to Japan. Defeat would have meant subjection to a corrupt and ruthless Russian autocracy. But although the Russian Church was a state church, the Japanese Government permitted the Russian missionaries in Japan to continue their work immolested throughout the war, because it realized that their mission was conducted from motives quite distinct from the objectives of the war, and was for the direct benefit of the Japanese people. Indeed, Count Katsura, then Prime Minister, sent an official com- munication to the representatives of the Christian Church in the Empire, in which he said that, anticipating that the feelings aroused by the war might cause differences be- tween peoples of different nationahties and religious behefs, instruction had been issued to local officials regarding the protection of Russian residents and the members of the Russian Church. He declared that the need for this cau- tion was emphasized by the fact that the war was against a professedly Christian nation, and he hoped that no one "will be betrayed into the error of supposing that such things as differences in race or religion have anything what- ever to do with the present complication. . . . Regarding religion as an essential element of civihzation," he con- tinued, "I have uniformly tried to treat all rehgions with becoming respect; and I believe it to be an important duty of statesmen, under all circumstances, to do their utmost to prevent racial animosities." Of course, a government has the undoubted right to satisfy itself regarding the neutral character of a missionar}^, to watch him closely, and to insist that he shall accept the limitations which his supernational work involves. If he violates them, his punishment should be as stern and swift as the punishment of any one who in n time of war misuses the privileges accorded him as a non-combatant. Some missionaries could not meet this test, as experience in sev- THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS 485 eral lands has showed. But if the supernational principle is recognized, it is comparatively easy to test indi\iduals by it and to eliminate those who cannot meet the required conditions. The only hope for the future of the world lies in the uni- versal recognition and application of those ideas of interna- tional order, justice, and brotherhood which Christ pro- claimed, and of which the foreign missionary enterprise is the organized expression. All other ties snapped in the war^ Science, philosophy, education, commerce — each and all tailed to hold the world together. Labor and social- ism came nearer than any of them to maintaining a kind of imity; but they too were soon rent apart. The home churches were as widely sundered as other interests. For- eign Missions alone preserved the international idea. Not that missionaries and their boards were neutral; they were not. But they steadily pressed the constructive and uni- fjdng principles on which the new world order must be built. In a shattered world, Missions represented the truths that must ultimately tie the nations together, if they are ever to be brought together at aU. We asserted with earnestness that we wanted an enduring peace and that it would be better to fight on imtil the in- dispensable factors of such a peace could be secured. But peace is not an end in itseK ; it is a by-product of righteous- ness. So Isaiah declares : " The work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and con- fidence forever." No poHtical adjustments between gov- ernments can create enduring peace unless they rest upon a foimdation of righteousness and good-will; and these are precisely the foundations which the missionary enterprise is laying. Treaties are no stronger than the moral character of the peoples that make them, and missionary work makes moral character. It is inspiring to think of the prophetic day when nations shall "beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning-hooks " ; when '^nation shall not Hft up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." The prophet intimated that this day will 486 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST dawn when, and only when "&]}. nations shall walk in His paths." This is exactly what Foreign Missions are attempt- ing to do — lead all nations to "walk in His paths." Unless this task shall be achieved, our sons will have died on the battle-field in vain. President Wilson evidently feels that Foreign Missions are related to the conditions of permanent world-peace, for at a time when he was heavily burdened with the cares of the war and was summoning the people of the United States to redouble their energies in its prosecution, he said to a deputation of ministers: "I think it would be a real mis- fortune, a misfortune of lasting consequence, if the mission- ary programme for the world should be interrupted. . . . That the work imdertaken should be continued, and con- tinued, as far as possible, at its full force, seems to me of capital necessity, and I for one hope that there may be no slackening or recession of any sort." The special service that Foreign Missions can render in rightly influencing the pressing world problems in eastern Asia was well expressed by Viscount James Bryce, when he said that the jarring contact of many nations in the Far East to-day impera- tively calls for the strengthening of foreign missionary work, which, he declared, must be the chief influence in smoothing that contact, in allaying irritation, and in creating those conditions of international good-will which are essential to the preservation of world peace; and he added: "The one sure hope of a permanent foundation for world peace lies in the extension throughout the world of the principles of the Christian gospel." CHAPTER XXX ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA The story of Roman Catholic missions in Korea illus- trates both the merits and the defects of the missionary zeal of the Roman Catholic Church. It abomids in in- stances of unselfish devotion and splendid courage, of sore hardship and thrilHng adventure; and it also abounds in the poHtical scheming and peculiarities of method which have characterized so much of Roman Catholic propaganda in Asia. So far as we can learn, the first missionary to enter Korea was a Portuguese Jesuit, Gregorio de Cespedes, who at the request of General Konishi came from Japan to the army at Fusan in the spring of 1594. He and a Japanese convert named Foucan Eion labored zealously among the Japanese soldiers; but they made little effort to reach the Koreans, although some of the Korean prisoners who were sent to Japan came under the influence of the Jesuits there and were converted. The decisive movement that led to the founding of the mission originated in China, where some of the Roman Catholic missionaries became interested in the Koreans who periodically visited Peking with tribute for the Emperor. A few tracts in Chinese, prepared by the Jesuit missionaries in Peking, were brought to Korea by a returning embassy, in 1777, and fell into the hands of some Korean students, chief among whom was a young man whose name has been paraphrased as "Stonewall." He and his companions were deeply impressed by the doc- trines that were presented in these tracts, and they dili- gently studied them. Efforts to obtain further informa- tion from Peking were fruitless for a time; but in 1782 Stonewall went to Seoul, and the next year he found an opportunity to send a letter to the Roman Catholic bishop 487 488 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST at Peking, Alexander de Gorla, by his friend, Senghuni, the son of one of the members of an embassy to Peking. This friend managed to deUver the message, and was him- self baptized. Returning to Korea, he brought with him a generous supply of religious books, tracts, images, ci-uci- fixes, and pictures, although, so far as is known, he was not given the Bible. Stonewall read the books and tracts with avidity. The number of those interested increased. The zealous con- verts adopted the names of famous saints, one calling him- self Ambrose, and others Augustine, Thomas, Paul, Francis Xavier, etc. Stonewall took the name of John the Baptist, and his friend Senghuni wished to be known as Peter. The new faith soon began to attract attention, and with attention began suspicion and enmity. The foreign names gave special offense, and the Christians were called for- eigner-Koreans. Some of the Korean scholars tried to argue the new converts out of their faith, but the Chris- tians had studied their books and tracts to good effect, and they easily held their ground. One of the literati was ap- parently impressed by the teaching, for he exclaimed: "This doctrine is magnificent, it is true, but it will bring sorrow to those who profess it. What are you going to do about it?" A Christian, who had come from the province of Chung-chong, carried the new faith to his home, where it soon took such firm root that in the annals of Roman Catholic missions this province figures "as the nursery of the faith," although in several of its towns, particularly in the Naipo region, numbers of Christians suffered death. Another convert went to Chul-la, where he preached with equal zeal. Meantime one of the more learned of the Christians in Seoul made copies of the religious books, which thus became accessible to a larger number of be- Hevers. The authorities now determined to take sternly repres- sive measures. Thomas Kim was accused of destroying his ancestral tablets, was arrested, put to torture, and sent into exile. In April, 1784, the government issued a ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA 489 proclamation against Christianity written by a preceptor of the King. It warned people everywhere to have nothing to do with the new faith, and exhorted famihes to disown relatives who had adopted it. Under this heavy pressure the faith of several converts, including Stonewall himself, collapsed; but many of the converts remained faithful. They chose one of their number, Francis Xavier, as bishop. They consecrated others as priests, and preached and baptized with indefatigable zeal. In 1789 they became convinced from the books in their possession that their ordination was not valid, and the bishop and priests laid aside their ecclesiastical functions; but they went on with their work as la3niien with no cessa- tion of zeal. The next year they sent Paul to Peking, where the astonished and gratified priests baptized him and explained to him the teachings of the church regarding or- dination. When he returned to Korea he took with him the right to baptize, but not to administer the other sacra- ment. He brought such glowing accounts of the beauty and majesty of the worship in the cathedral in Peking that the httle band of converts sent a letter to the bishop of Peking, prajdng that an ordained priest might be sent to them. Paul bore this letter also, accompanying the Ko- rean embassy to Peking in September, 1790. The bishop promised to send a priest, loaded Paul and one of his com- panions, -who had been baptized in Peking, with presents and sacred vessels, but charged them that the worship of ancestors must be given up. This message brought con- sternation to the 'little company of Korean Christians who had continued to burn incense before their ancestral tablets and shrines. Meantime enemies multiphed. Persecution increased. The Christians were charged with fihal disrespect, a heinous crime in the eyes of a Korean. A considerable number of converts and adherents renounced their faith, but others stood as firmly as ever. Paul and Jacques Kim burned their ancestral tablets. They were promptly arrested and ordered to recant. They might have saved their lives by 490 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST doing so, but they steadfast!}^ refused, and December 8, 1791, they were beheaded, calHng upon Jesus and the Virgin Mary. However widely one may differ with the Roman CathoKcs in doctrinal and ecclesiastical matters, he cannot but admire the fidelity of these early Korean converts, who at the ages of thirty-three and forty-one, re- spectively, testified by their blood to the genuineness of their faith — ^the first martyrs of Korean Christianity. Grievous days followed for the other Christians. They were relentlessly hunted down. The legs of some were broken with clubs, and the backs of others were scourged to a bloody pulp. Many were put to death, and others thrown into foul prisons to die of himger or of their un- tended injuries. Francis Xavier was cruelly beaten and then banished, only to die a broken man before he reached the final place to which he was transferred. "Peter, sixty-one years old, after wearying his torturers with his endurance, was tied round with a cord, laid on the icy ground at night, while pails of water were poured over him, which, freezing as it fell, covered his body with a shroud of ice. In this Dantean tomb, the old martyr, caUing on the name of Jesus, was left to welcome death, which came to him at the second cock-crow on the morn- ing of January 29, 1793."^ Even this bloody persecution could not exterminate the new faith. By 1794 the Roman Catholics claimed 4,000 converts. The spread of Chris- tianity in such circumstances by the Koreans themselves, without assistance from foreigners, is an effective testimony both to the vitality of the Christian faith and to the stamina of the Korean converts. The bishop of Peking had not forgotten his promise to send a foreign priest as soon as an available one could be found, and now Joao dos Remedios, a Portuguese, volun- teered to go to Korea. After a hard and perilous mid- winter journey of twenty daj'-s, he was unable to cross the border, and returned to Peking, where he soon after died. Two years later another effort was made, this time by ^ GriflSs, Korea, the Hermit Nation, p. 352. ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA 491 Jacques Tsiu, a Chinese priest, twenty-four years of age. Arriving at the frontier, a few Christians there advised him not to try to cross at once as the sentinels were so vigilant that he would surely be caught and killed. He waited, therefore, at Shing-king until December 23, 1794, when he crossed the Yalu River in the night, and after many hard- ships, succeeded in reaching Seoul. He ministered secretly to the Christians until June, when the enemies of Chris- tianity learned of his presence. He was sheltered by a noble Korean lady who had accepted Christianity. Three Christians were arrested and commanded to disclose his whereabouts. When they courageously refused, their arms and legs were broken, and they were again commanded to reveal the priest's hiding-place. Still their fortitude was unshaken, and June 18 they were beheaded, and their bodies thrown into the Han River. The Chinese priest, protected by the law which made the house of a noble secure from search, managed to remain with his benefactress for three years, ministering as best he could to the Christians who secretly came to him. In September, 1796, he sent a letter to the bishop of Peking by two Korean Christians, who had obtained for this pur- pose places as servants in connection with an embassy. In order to make sure that the letter should reach its desti- nation, they copied it on silk and sewed it into their gar- ments. The letter was safely delivered to the bishop, January 28, 1797. It urged that the King of Portugal be asked, through English friends, to intercede with the King of Korea in behalf of the Christians, and to make a treaty which would give greater freedom to the faith, and permit the coming of foreign priests and teachers. Nothing came of the letter; but the King, Cheng-chong, who had never been zealous in persecuting the Christians, refused to countenance some of the more drastic measures proposed by the reactionary nobles, and there was little more per- secution imtil his death, in the year 1800. His son and suc- cessor, Suncho, being a minor, his grandmother became regent. She promptly placed in power some of the most 492 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST strenuous haters of Christianity, and persecution broke out afresh. The next year, 1801, was a dark one for the Chris- tians. They were imprisoned, scourged, and in some in- stances, beheaded. The Chinese priest, Jacques Tsiu, proved himself a hero. Learning that he had been pro- scribed by the government, he declared that he would no longer imperil his noble friend by his presence. Volun- tarily giving himself up, he was beheaded May 31. He did not succeed, however, in saving the lady who had so long befriended him, for she too was seized and beheaded, leav- ing an account of the life of the priest written on one of the skirts of her dress. Four other Korean women of high rank also were beheaded. In his distress and fear a Christian named Alexander Wang wrote a letter to the bishop of Peking, imploring him to " appeal to the Christian nations of Eiu-ope to send sixty or seventy thousand to conquer Korea." The letter was discovered, the bearer smnmarily executed, and Alex- ander, in spite of the fact that he wore on his wrist the crimson silk cord which testified that he had touched the sacred person of the King, was put to death. The King, reaHzing that he might get into trouble with China on account of the execution of the Chinese priest, wrote a letter to the Emperor at Peking, humbly explaining that he had executed the priest not because he was a Chi- nese, but because he was a teacher of "the monstrous, bar- barous, and infamous sect of brigands who live like brutes and birds of the vilest sort," and who were traitorously con- spiring to bring into Korea a foreign army to subjugate it. The Emperor contented himself with extorting a fine, and the persecution continued. January 25, 1802, another royal edict against the Christians was issued, and the poor behevers were hunted mercilessly throughout the whole kingdom. In 1811 some of the sorely beset leaders des- patched two letters to the Pope, dated respectively De- cember 9 and 18, imploring him to send them help. As on an earlier occasion, the messengers copied the letters on silk, sewed them in their clothing, and succeeded in ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA 493 reaching Peking, from which the letters were forwarded to Rome. But the Pope had troubles of his own at that time, being a virtual prisoner at Fontainebleau, and help did not come. Gradually, however, the fierceness of the persecution relaxed, and an era of comparative quiet fol- lowed. In 1815 persecution again broke out in Kang-wen and Kiung-sang, and in 1826 there was a short outbreak of enmity in Chul-la; but for the most part the Christians were not seriously molested for a considerable period. Doubtless the enmity of the Korean Government was in- fluenced to a considerable extent not only by general op- position to foreign ideas and by wrath at the desecration of ancestral tablets, but by the fear that the new faith was poKtically revolutionary. The converts gave some ground for this charge. The Peking priests had told them of the supreme sovereignty of the Pope. They beHeved and acted in accordance with their belief. "Seeing the Pope's politi- cal power upheld by the powerful European nations then under Bourbon rule, the Korean Christians, following the ethics of their teachers, played the part of traitors to their country; they not only deceived the magistrates and vio- lated their country's laws but, as the letter of Alexander Wang shows, actually invited armed invasion. Hence, from the first Christianity was associated in patriotic minds with treason and robbery. The French missionary as the fore- runner of the French soldier and invader, the priest as the pilot of the gunboat, were not mere imaginings but, as the subsequent narrative shows, strict logic and actual fact. It is the narrative of friends, not foes, that later shows us a bishop acting as spy and pilot on a French man- of-war, a priest as guide to a buccaneering raid, and, after the story of papal Christianity, the inevitable French ex- pedition!"^ Though several representations had been sent to the Pope regarding the struggling church in Korea, the troubled conditions in Europe delayed action. When the skies finally cleared, Korea was remembered and given separate >Griffis, p. 360. 494 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST status as a mission, under the care of the Paris Society, and in 1832 Barthelemy Brugiere, at that time a missionary in Bangkok, Siam, was appointed Apostohc Vicar of Korea. He started with the zeal of a volunteer, but he never reached his field, d5dng at Shing-king, October 20, 1835. His place was taken by Pierre Philibert Maubant, who, accompanied by five Korean Christians, crossed the Yalu River on the ice in the following winter (1836), and, finding sentinels guarding every gate of Wiju, they crawled on their hands and knees through a sewer-drain into the city. After having been secretly warmed and fed by a few Christians there, they crawled out by the malodorous channel and made their way through the country to Seoul, suffering great hardships from exposure in the bitter cold. In the winter of 1837 Maubant was joined by Jacques Honore Chastan, who, on January 17, had succeeded in passing Wiju in the disguise of a Korean mourner. December 19, 1838, Bishop Laurent Marie-Joseph Imbert arrived. Under the vigorous leadership of these three priests the mission work took on new life. The most pronounced opponent of Rome cannot justly withhold the meed of praise from those pioneer priests. They suffered almost everyi-hing that mortal man could endure in order to reach their fields. They braved innumer- able perils, tramped weary days through the snows of the mountains, buffeted the icy floods of the rivers, slept in wretched vermin-infested huts, ate the coarsest food, and had no one to care for them in illness or accident. They were hunted by their enemies as mercilessly as wild beasts, living face to face with death and knowing that at any mo- ment they were liable to discovery, to cruel torture, and to frightful mutilation. Yet their zeal never flagged. The mission work now prospered, and by 1838 there were 9,000 Korean Christians. By January 16, 1839, the fac- tion that was most bitterly opposed to Christianity gained the ascendancy at court, and a furious persecution began. The regent who, during the minority of the King, was gov- erning the country, had not been disposed to persecute the ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA 495 Christians, but he was growing old and feeble, and the persecutors began to have their way. July 7, 1839, the King's uncle, one of the most relentless enemies of the Christians, had a decree issued ordering the severest pun- ishment of all persons who adhered to the Christian faith. Three of the most influential Korean Christians and a number of women and children were immediately executed. Then Bishop Imbert showed a sublime devotion. Believing that the persecution was primarily directed against himself as the head of the Christians, and hoping that if he gave himself up his poor followers might be spared, he volun- tarily surrendered himself August 10, and directed his priests, Maubant and Chastan, to follow his example. They promptly and gladly obeyed. But the hard hearts of their foes were not touched by this instance of noble seK-sacrifice. The three devoted priests were beaten with the paddle until their flesh was terribly mangled, and September 21, 1839, they were executed. Seventy of the Korean Chris- tians were beheaded at the same time, and sixty others were strangled or died from tortures. Deprived of their leaders by this tragedy, hated and pur- sued of all men, the Christians suffered much. It is ir- refragable evidence of the genuineness of their faith that all did not recant. Some did, as might be expected, but the majority remained faithful. Nor were there wanting priests to take the places of the fallen. December 31, 1843, Jean-Joseph Ferreol was made Bishop of Korea. Having heard so much of the difficulty of entering the country at Wiju, he sent a trusty Korean, Andrew Kim, to see if an entrance could not be effected at Him-chun. After a painful journey of a month through the deep snow of the mountains, Kim reached Hun-chim February 25, 1844. Crossing the Tumen on the ice, he conferred with a little party of Christians who, by previous arrangement, had assembled at Kion-wen, a town not far from Hun-chim, on a tributary of the Tumen. All agreed that the difficulty and danger of entering Korea by that route were greater than at Wiju. Kim therefore rejoined 496 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the bishop; who sought to come in at the Border Gate. Finding that the vigilant guards examined every traveller, and that it would be well-nigh impossible for a white man to pass them without discovery, the bishop ordered Kim to go on alone, while he gave up the attempt and went to Macao. Andrew Kim showed himself to be a remarkable man. As soon as possible after reaching Seoul, January 8, 1845, he "collected a crew of eleven fellow-believers, only four of whom had ever seen the sea and none of whom knew their destination, and, equipped with but a single compass, put to sea in a rude fishing-boat, April 24, 1845. Despite the storms and baffling winds, this uncouth mass of fire- wood, which the Chinese sailors jeeringly dubbed The Shoe, reached Shanghai in June. Andrew Kim, never before at sea except as a passenger, had brought this uncaulked, deckless, and unseaworthy scow across the entire breadth of the Yellow Sea."^ He certainly deserves a prominent place in the history of adventurous daring in missionaiy annals. At Shanghai Kim was joined by Bishop Ferreol, and August 17 he received the formal ordination to the priesthood, which was soon to be followed by his martyr- dom. September 1 the bishop sailed with another French priest, Marie Antoine Nicholas Daveluy, and on the night of October 12 succeeded in making a landing unobserved on the coast of Korea. Fourteen years later, in 1859, the Roman CathoHc con- verts were said to number 17,000. The roll continued to lengthen until the brutal, fanatical Tai-wen-kun began what he designed to be a war of extermination. Multi- tudes of Christians laid down their lives during those awful days. The French Government tried to send relief in the expedition of 1866; but the effort failed, and the persecu- tion continued with such fury that by the year 1870, it was believed that 8,000 Korean Christians had been slaughtered. Fierce were the fires of persecution that raged about the devoted men and women who accepted the Christian faith 1 Griffis, pp. 365-366. ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA 497 in the years that preceded the opening of Korea to the influences of the modern world. ^ With the end of the regency and the accession of the King better days dawned. Christians were still perse- cuted, but the King lacked both the vigor and the fanati- cism of the Tai-wen-kun. Since then, progress has been fairly steady, and in some years rapid. In 1909, the bishop told me that the Roman Catholic population in Korea was then 42,441. The Roman CathoKc constituency is now given as 87,270, a gain of more than 100 per cent in a decade. The Roman Catholic cathedral in Seoul occupies a com- manding site on high ground, and is the most conspicuous building in the city. It was an eyesore to the Korean Em- peror and to his loyal subjects, for it was deemed discourte- ous, a kind of lese-majeste, for any one to erect a building that could look down on the imperial palace. The Koreans made strenuous objection to this site for the cathedral, as the eminence on which it stands commands not only the palace, but practically the whole city. But the Roman Catholics, with the powerful backing of the French legation, refused to yield. The bishop at the time of my visit impressed me as a very intelligent man. He had a fine, expressive face, and a cultivated manner. The Protestant missionaries said that he had an unsurpassed knowledge of the Korean language and literature, and they deeply regretted his death some years later. The priests that I saw were, with some nota- ble exceptions, evidently from the peasant class — faithful, industrious, and intensely devoted to their church, but not mea of special education or refinement. They are, of course, celibates, and a prominent priest told me that candidates for the foreign priesthood are not accepted if they have dependent relatives. Accustomed from their earliest years to a very simple scale of living, they can reside in communi- ties and on a much smaller sum than Protestant mission- * C/. Griff is, pp. 347-S76, and the sources in the account of Dallet, the Roman CathoUc annalist. 498 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST aries, who as a rule represent the best type of British and American college and university trained men. With wife and children, the Protestant missionary requires a separate house, and the wives and single women of the mission are also, as a rule, college graduates. While the Roman Catholic missionary does not receive a salary like the Protestant missionary, the order to which he belongs provides his room, food, and clothing, and makes modest allowances for other needs. With no one dependent upon him, no chil- dren to care for and educate, he is about as comfortably off as other missionaries, all things considered. His life, however, is a narrower one, as his, ability to buy books and periodicals is small, and as he is seldom permitted to return on a furlough to his native land. When he goes to his field, he goes to stay; and unless he is so fortunate as to be sent home on some rare mission, he spends his life in Korea; perhaps in a city like Seoul, with its social and in- tellectual advantages, but more probably in some lonely station where he has few or no companionships of his own race. There is much in the Roman Catholic doctrinal teaching and missionary method with which I do not sympathize; but the discussion of such matters would lie outside the scope of this book. I am heartily glad to pay my humble tribute of praise to the courage and self-sacrifice that have so signally marked the history of Roman Catholic missions in Korea. Readers who wish to go more fuUy into the story will find ample material in pubHcations of the Church, and in William Elliot Griflfis's Korea, the Hermit Nation, to which I have frequently referred. I am glad also to be able to record that I have never heard of the moral delin- quencies of priests in Korea of which I felt obliged to write so plainly in my book on the Philippines, and which have long been notorious among the clergy in many parts of Mexico, Central and South America. The typical Roman Cathohc priest in Korea, like his brother in France, differs widely in many respects from an AngUcan, Congregational, or Presbyterian clergyman, but he is a man whose mis- ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN KOREA 499 sionaiy ardor and devotion are undoubted. As for the Korean converts, their standards are very different from ours; but members and priests ahke can point to a history which leads one to say with Lord Curzon that ''the infant Korean church has shown a heroism, has endured suffer- ings, and has produced a martyr-roll that will compare favorably with the missionary annals of less obscure coun- tries and more forward peoples."^ 1 ProbUms of the Far East, p. 183. CHAPTER XXXI PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA A GENERATION ago few students of the non-Christian world would have selected Korea as a missionary field of strategic importance. What was there except human misery to attract men of the West to this small and weak country, with its slovenly, indolent, and apathetic people? Did the first missionaries and their supporters see the gold in the dirt of Korean character when they began the work in this distant and then little-known land? It may have been, for they were far-seeing men. More probably they were prompted by that spirit which impels the true dis- ciple of the Master to stretch out the uplifting hand to those who are farthest out and lowest down. Korea was a land which needed spiritual help and there were mission- aries ready to go; this was enough. The first Protestant missionary visitor was the Reverend Charles Gutzlaff, a Prussian, representing the Netherlands Missionary Society, who arrived in Korea July 17, 1832, on an East India Company's ship commanded by Lord Am- herst. He spent a month in Chul-la, distributing books and medicines, and teaching the people how to cultivate potatoes. Presents, including the Bible, were sent to the royal palace, but the King refused to receive them. Gutz- laff's knowledge of Chinese enabled him to make many inquiries and to gather considerable information; but his stay was too brief to produce permanent effect. The next missionary visitor was a Scotchman, the Reverend John Ross, of Manchuria, who in 1873 made a tour across the border and studied the language to such effect that he was subsequently able to translate the New Testament into Korean. Permanent mission work did not begin till the treaty of May 22, 1883, had brought Korea to the attention of the 500 PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 501 outside world. Horace N. Allen, M.D., a Presbyterian medical missionary in China, learned during a temporary stay in Shanghai that a physician was needed by the for- eign community in Seoul. In consultation with the Rev- erend William S. Holt, a missionary in whose house he and Mrs. Allen were staying, it was agreed that Doctor Allen should make a preliminar}^ trip of inquiry to Seoul, and that Mr. Holt should write to the Presbyterian Board in New York, suggesting that the time had come to open missionary work in Korea, and that Allen be assigned for this purpose. Meantime, Mr. Daniel W. McWilHams, of BrookljTi, New York, read an article in a newspaper advis- ing against the sending of missionaries to the newly opened comitry lest thej^ cause a reaction. Mr. McWilHams had a better appreciation of the influence of missionaries, and in February, 1884, he offered $5,000 to the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions for this purpose, out of the sum received by him from the estate of Mr. Frederick Mar- quand. The gift was accepted, and a cable sped to Shanghai bearing the words: "Allen, Korea." Except for the tem- porary visit of Doctor Ross eleven years earlier, "this cable- gram was the first voice from Protestant Christendom to molest the age-old heathenism of Korea. It was destined to wake the echoes from end to end of the kingdom." Mr. Holt forwarded the message to Doctor Allen, who promptly returned to Shanghai for his family and went back to Seoul, arriving September 20, 1884. The memory of some experiences with Roman Catholic missionaries in former years and reports of what had oc- curred in China did not incline the Korean officials to wel- come any more missionaries. However, the government did not oppose Doctor Allen, although some of the foreign- ers in Seoul, and particularly a German who was then ad- vising the government, strengthened suspicion and prejudice. Fortimately, the need of a physician in the foreign com- munity was great. The American Legation also needed a physician, and the American Minister, General Lucius H. Foote, appointed Doctor Allen surgeon to the Legation. 502 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST This appointment gave him a standing, and he soon made his way to favor. December 4, a banquet was given at the royal palace to celebrate the opening of the first Korean post-office. An enemy of the party in power, Kim Ok Kiun, took advan- tage of the opportunity to attempt a revolution. In the tumult several high officers were assassinated, and Prince Min Yong Ik, a nephew of the King, who had headed the embassy to the United States the preceding year, was badly wounded. Frightened people scurried to cover, but the missionary bravely made his way to the palace and of- fered to help the wounded. He found thirteen native physicians excitedly crowding about the Prince, and about to pour boiling wax into his gaping wounds. He tactfully persuaded them to allow him to dress the injuries, and for the first time the court saw a modern surgeon at his skilful work. Days of violence followed in the city. The Japanese Legation, the post-office, and the residences of foreigners were looted, and on the 10th the American Minister, the British and German Consuls-General, and all the other for- eigners in Seoul, except Doctor and Mrs. Allen, fled to Chemulpo. The heroic missionary and his wife refused to abandon their posts. Doctor Allen wrote: "We couldn't if we would, and we wouldn't if we could. I came to do just such work. I can't leave these wounded people. . . . We shall live in the Legation with the old flag fljdng, and trust the kind Father to care for us." Ere long, to the surprise of every one, the Prince recov- ered, and Doctor Allen became the most famous man in the capital. The grateful King became his friend, and February 25, 1885, a government hospital was opened un- der royal patronage, with the missionary in full charge. The King himself named it Hoy Min So, the House of Civil- ized Virtue. The forty beds were quickly filled, and within the first year 10,000 patients were treated in the hospital and its dispensary. In this beneficent way. Christian work obtained a foothold. April 5, 1885, the first resident or- PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 503 dained missionary arrived, the Reverend Horace G. Under- wood, also a Presbyterian, and he speedily became a tower of strength to the infant mission. Jime 21, J. W. Heron, M.D., was added to the little company. Meantime, the attention of the Board of Missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church had been directed to the coim- try by the Reverend John F. Goucher, D.D., of Baltimore. During a trip across the continent in 1883 he had met the first Korean Embassy on its way to Washington, formed a personal acquaintance with its leader. Prince Min Yong Ik, and invited him and several of his official associates to visit his home in Baltimore. He was so much interested that he wrote to the Reverend Robert S. Maclay, D.D., superin- tendent of the Methodist missions in Japan, suggesting that he visit Korea and report upon its possibilities as a mission field. Doctor and Mrs. Maclay made the desired visit in Jime, 1884. They met with small encouragement, but they sent back such an account of the need that Doctor Goucher was confirmed in his first impressions as to the importance of the field. He had already offered $2,000 for the opening of this work. To this sum the Board added $2,000, and in the latter part of the year 1884, the Reverend H. G. Appenzeller, WiUiam B. Scranton, M.D., and his mother, Mrs. M. F. Scranton, were appointed the first Methodist missionaries to Korea. They were delayed by the December revolution, but Mr. Appenzeller arrived at Chemulpo, Easter Sunday, April 5, 1885, and Doctor Scranton the third of the following May. Both men de- veloped qualities of leadership and soon became influential, while Mrs. Scranton became a power for good in connec- tion with the Ewha School for Gii'ls, in Seoul. July 5, 1886, a trained nurse and medical student. Miss Annie EUers, a Presbyterian, arrived. She became physi- cian to the Queen, and swung the door of royal favor more widely open. The first graduate physician to arrive was Miss Meta Howard, M.D., who joined the Methodist mission in 1887, and opened the first hospital for women in the spring of the following year. After Miss Eller's 504 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST marriage to Mr. Dalzel A. Bunker, who entered the Metho- dist mission, she was succeeded as physician to the Queen by Miss LiUias Horton, M.D., later Mrs. Underwood, an- other Presbyterian, who arrived in 1888, and by her skill and tact gained great influence at the palace. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, of the Church of England, as early as 1880 had received a sug- gestion from the Reverend A. C. Shaw, one of its mission- aries in Japan, regarding the founding of a mission in Korea. This suggestion was reinforced in 1887 by Bishops Scott of North China and Bickerstaph of Japan, who visited Korea in that year. The society did not find it practicable to open work at once, but on All Saints' Day, 1889, the Right Reverend Charles John Corfe, D.D., was consecrated the first missionary bishop of Korea in Westminster Abbey, and he reached the field September 29, 1890, with six or- dained men and two physicians. Property was acquired at Seoul and Chemulpo and work begun. September 30, 1891, the first Anglican church in Korea was dedicated at Chemulpo, and on the following Simday the first confirma- tion was held, "the first candidate being a little serving- maid of a pious German family." Later, the island of Kang-wa off the west coast attracted the missionaries, and they founded work there as well as on the mainland. The resignation of Bishop Corfe was followed by the election of Bishop H. B. Turner, in 1905. After his lamented death in 1911, Bishop M. N. TroUope took charge of the diocese. In September, 1906, the Reverend S. H. Cartwright, of the Japan mission, began a special work among the Japanese in Korea, making Seoul his headquarters. The society is now represented in Korea by twenty-seven missionaries. The mission of the Southern Presbyterian Church (Amer- ican) was established in 1892, when six missionaries arrived. They began their work in Seoul, but later removed to the two Chul-la provinces in the southwestern part of Korea, where they began an effective work from the three central cities of Kwanju, Chungju, and Kunsan. The Presbyterians of Australia opened a station at I usan, in 1889, their pioneer PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 505 missionaries being the Reverend John H. Da\des and his sister. Canadian Presbyterians were first interested in Korea by the devoted W. J. McKenzie, who went to Korea in 1893 under the support of his university, and whose sad death two years later touched all hearts. It was not until 1897 that the General Assembly felt that the way was clear to foxmd a mission. September 8 of the following year three missionaries reached Seoul, and after consultation with the Council of Missions, the province of Hamgyondo, on the northeast coast, was agreed upon as the field of the Canadian Presbyterians. The work of the Methodist Episcopal Church South originated in 1895, when Bishop E. R. Hendrix and the Reverend C. F. Reed visited Korea, the mission being formally opened the following year. Stations were estab- lished at such strategic centres as Seoul, Gensan, and Songdo. The beginnings of the work of the Yoxmg Men's Chris- tian Association were made in 1901, when Mr. Phillip L. Gillett arrived in Seoul. He started with Bible classes for English-speaking Koreans and Japanese, and October 27, 1903, he was able to organize a City Association, with an influential board of directors, and on the same day a Student Association in the Methodist Boys' School. The British and Foreign Bible Society, the American Bible Society, and the National Bible Society of Scotland also arrived early on the field and effectively co-operated with all the missions in printing and distributing the Bible. Thus the foundations were laid by brave and tireless pioneer missionaries, who had painful reason to know the difficulties of the field. The diary of Doctor Allen includes the following entry for October 11, 1885: "To-day we cele- brated the first Protestant commimion service in Korea. . . . The service was impressive and productive of good. We used an old silver teapot given me by my mother, and one of our glass goblets. Mr. Loomis (of Japan) preached." No Korean name appears in the list of twelve persons pres- ent, including three American naval officers. 506 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Progress was slow for several years. Missionaries were endeavoring to commiinicate totally new ideas to a people who had been made sodden and apathetic by an inheritance of centuries of rank heathenism. It is difficult for Ameri- cans, who have been famiHar with the gospel from infancy, to realize how hard it is for the people of the Far East to understand the new conceptions which Christianity incul- cates. We need to remember that our own ancestors were slow in imderstanding them, and that centuries passed before Christianity was apprehended even by Anglo-Saxons. It is not surprising, therefore, that the superstition-clouded Korean listened dully and thought the missionary "a, setter forth of strange gods." If the intellectual Athenians mocked St. Paul when he preached to them Christ and the resurrection, what could be expected of the darkened Koreans ? Gradually, however, the truth made its way. Mr. Un- derwood baptized the first convert in 1886, and the Metho- dist mission received its first convert a little later in the same year. The first Protestant church was organized in Seoul, in September, 1887, and the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was administered to the new believers for the fii^st time Christmas Day of that year in Mr. Underwood's house. Only seven persons, including the missionaries, were pres- ent at that small but historic service. After ten years of patient labor by the missionaries of several conmiunions, there were still only 141 baptized Christians in all Korea. The work early found a foothold in Pyengyang through a few Koreans, who had wandered northward into Man- churia and had there come under the influence of Mr. Ross, and had been converted. Returning to Korea, they were more fully instructed by the missionaries in Seoul, and then they undertook to communicate their new faith to their countrymen. By 1887 there were several inquirers, and a native helper was stationed there to preach to them. Soon after the Reverend Samuel A. Moffett arrived, in 1889, he went to Pyengyang. He found bad moral conditions, for the city PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 507 was notorious for wickedness. A handful of friendly Ko- reans gathered around him, but the difficulties were numer- ous and formidable. However, Mr. Moffett took a little Korean house, lived among the people, and by patience and tact made his way into their confidence. In 1892 he was joined by the Reverend Graham Lee, also a Presbyterian, and by M. J. Hall, M.D., of the Methodist mission. One of the notable Korean Christians of this early period was a man named Kim Chang Sik. Brought by a Korean friend to the home of a missionary in Seoul, his curiosity was excited by some copies of the New Testament in Chi- nese. He bought one, read it, and beHeved. He quickly became a useful worker, and in 1894 was sent to his home in Pyengyang to aid Doctor Hall. By this time opposition had become violent. Persecution broke out, and Kim was one of the first to be arrested. He and other Christians were cruelly beaten, placed in stocks, and warned that if they did not give up "the foreigner's rehgion" they would be punished still more severely, but that if they would re- cant they would be set at liberty. The others in their pain and terror yielded, but Kim remained steadfast. He was taken to the death-cell, and, although beheving that he would be decapitated if he did not recant, he exclaimed in a spirit worthy of the ancient martyrs: "God loves me and has forgiven my sins. How can I curse Him !" For- tunately, orders came from Seoul to release the prisoners, and the mangled and haK-dead Kim went out with the others. His fidelity made a profound impression upon the city, and people began to say that there must be something real in the new religion when a man was willing to suffer so much for it. The war of 1894 between China and Japan powerfully influenced the work. Korea became the battle-ground of the contending forces. Soon it became evident that the decisive battle of the war would be fought in the vicinity of Pyengyang. The wildest excitement prevailed. In the crash much Korean property was destroyed, fields were ravaged, and many of the imhappy people, caught between 508 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the upper and nether millstones, suffered from wounds as well as fear. The habitually unsanitary condition of Pyeng- yang was made worse by the superstitious behef of the people that the city rested on a boat, and that to dig wells would make holes in its bottom so that it would sink. The only available water-supply therefore was the river, and as that was polluted by the numerous bodies of men and animals, typhus-fever and dysentery developed and swept among the poor Koreans with frightful virulence. Although the situation was known to be full of danger, the missionaries heroically remained at their posts. They went about among the panic-stricken people at the risk of their lives, binding up the wounds of the injured, caring for the sick, burjdng the dead, and doing everything in their power to allay terror and to urge trust in God. To the in- expressible regret of all who knew him, the beloved Doctor Hall, of the Methodist mission, was among those who were fatally stricken by typhus-fever. The Koreans then real- ized for the first time that the American missionaries were the best friends they had. Public sentiment began to change. An epidemic of cholera in Seoul brought out like devo- tion on the part of the missionaries in the capital. They toiled indefatigably for the sick and dying, performing offices from which the bravest Koreans shrank, exposing themselves without stint, and saving hundreds of lives. "All these recoveries made no little stir in the city. Proc- lamations were posted on the walls telling people there was no need for them to die when they might go to the Chris- tian hospital and live. People who watched missionaries working over the sick night after night said to each other: 'How these foreigners love us ! Would we do as much for one of our own kin as they do for strangers?' Some men who saw Mr. Underwood hurrying along the road in the gray twilight of a summer morning, remarked : ' There goes the Jesus man; he works all night and all day with the sick without resting.' 'Why does he do it?' said another. 'Because he loves us,' was the reply." ^ * Mrs. H. G. Underwood, Fifteen Years Among the Top-Knots, p. 144. PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 509 From that time the work made rapid progress. The story- forms one of the most stirring chapters in the history of modern missions. The people who had been Hving in dark- ness and superstition, who had seen ghosts and demons in every rock and tree, in the murmur of the waves, and in the roar of the thimder, heard the missionaries teach in their villages that the Supreme Power was not an evil spirit trying to injure them but a loving Father whose heart went out to them as His wandering children; and who, if they turned to Him in repentance and faith, would bestow upon them the joy and dignity of a new life. Eagerly the people listened, this time with clearer understanding. The good news began to spread in all directions, and the first decade of the twentieth century saw an amazing de- velopment. The average net increase of the Northern Presbyterian Mission for thirteen years was 38 per cent. The Reverend D. A. Bunker, of the Methodist Church, wrote: "Work along all lines goes forward so fast that we are all on the run to keep pace with it. The church of which I have charge in the city is carrying on home-mission work in over 140 villages. At eveiy chapel there are candidates for baptism or probationship awaiting us. In the past ten days 611 new names have been added to the list of be- lievers." In Pyengyang, the Reverend W. L. Swallen re- ported that 2,000 persons confessed Christ in the re^dval of 1907. The churches were filled to overflowing, and in order to relieve the congestion the men and women were compelled to meet at separate hours. The meetings were characterized by deep feeling and fervent prayer, sometimes lasting till midnight. The awakening manifested itself in varying degrees in many parts of the country. Seoul as the capital and me- tropolis is a peculiarly difficult city to influence, but the preacher at the Yun Mot Kol Church often faced 1,500 persons. The ordinary experience of all the city churches was a crowded house, and a union meeting would bring out from 3,000 to 5,000 people. Taiku Station, which had been opened in 1897 by the Reverend and Mrs. James E. 510 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Adams, reported that by the end of the first five years, 177 adults had been baptized; by the end of a decade, 6,145; and that the twentieth anniversary witnessed 17,448 Chris- tians in the city and outlying villages. Syenchyun, one hundred miles north of Pyengyang, although only an ordi- nary town in size, sprung into prominence for its remarka- ble missionary work. The station was not organized imtil 1901, but within sixteen years it reported 187 outstations, 11,681 communicants, 5,416 catechumens, and 28,350 ad- herents. At Kangkai, an isolated northern city of 10,000 inhabitants, there was no resident missionary until 1908, and only an itinerating visitor at rare intervals. When he made his annual visit, the people came long distances to meet him, crowded the rooms in which he spoke, and often stood outside in the snow for hours to hear the one message of the year. From this scanty seed-sowing, a vigorous con- gregation grew up, and over 1,200 men and women threw away their fetiches, stopped sacrificing to evil spirits, kept Sunday as a day of rest and Christian worship, and, in spite of persecution by angry neighbors, followed the light that they had dimly seen. Sorai became a transfigured community. Think of a village of fifty-eight houses, in fifty of which all persons over fifteen years of age are Christians; a community in which there is no liquor, no brawling, no vice of any kind; where Simday is scrupulously observed, and the entire population attends chiu-ch, Simday-school, and prayer-meeting ! The church is the principal building in the place, almost impos- ing in comparison with the humble homes of the people. Two brothers were instnmiental in creating this model Christian village. The elder was converted through the Reverend John Ross during a visit in Manchuria. Soon after his return he met Doctor Underwood, who gladly gave him the instruction he was so eager to obtain. Filled with joy and zeal, Hke Andrew of old, "he first findeth his own brother and said unto him: 'We have found the Messiah,' and he brought him to Jesus." Removing to Sorai, these brothers preached the gospel with such power and exem- PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 511 plified it with such beauty of character that the whole village was transformed. Long shall we cherish the memory of our visit. We arrived late Saturday afternoon after a hard journey. As we gazed upon the Christian homes clustering at the foot of the hill, the wide expanse of meadow beyond, and farther away, but in plain view, the quiet sea, the clouds which had heavily lowered during the day sud- denly broke, the setting sun burst forth in radiant beauty, and at evening-time there was light. A trumpet sounded from the church steps. Softly and yet clearly it echoed among the trees and through the village, and soon answering groups of white-robed figures were wending their way up the hillside to the house of God, where we communed long with them as the shadows fell and the stars came out. Vividly interesting instances might be cited from the history of several other stations. Many parts of the coim- try were powerfully moved. The Reverend WiUiam A. Noble, of the Methodist Church, wrote: "The total in- crease in followers during the year has not been paralleled during the history of our work in northern Korea. The district now records a total following of more than all our our work in Korea three years ago. . . . The immediate effect of the revival has been to revolutionize the character of the church. It has given the people at large a different idea of what it means to become a Christian. Now they are discriminating in judgment. A man will take a stand in relation to moral questions with intelhgence and commit himself only when ready to make a change in his life." In 1911 the Methodist Board of Missions reported that, within the short period of twenty-five years, the church in Korea had grown to over 60,000 members and probation- ers. Stations had been opened at six centres. An Annual Conference had been organized with 34 ministerial mem- bers and 21 probationers, native and foreign, 7 districts, over 400 organized congregations, and more than a thou- sand preaching-places. The quarter-centennial year was signaHzed by the first appointment to the district superin- tendency of a Korean minister, and the sending of a Korean 512 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST missionary, supported by the Korean churcheS; to work in China. In educational work, there were 172 schools with 6,083 pupils, besides 183 theological students. The Woman's Foreign Missionary Society had schools for the training of Bible-women and nurses, and for the education of the blind and of deaf-mutes. During the preceding year 30,000 patients were cared for by the Methodist physicians, and since the opening of the mission over 500,000 patients had been treated in the hospitals. All the missions reported large gains. The Southern Methodist mission made a net increase of 62 per cent in a single year. "The people are turning to Christ as I have never seen in any field," wrote Bishop Candler. The Young Men's Christian Association shared in the general advance. Within two years the membership of the City Association had risen to 600, and Secretary Gillett could write: "In- stead of the interest and enthusiasm of the membership subsiding, as some of our friends feared, it is growing con- stantly. We are turning men away now for lack of room. Our rooms are so jammed at the lectures we hold every Tuesday and Thursday evening that men are unable to get within earshot of the speaker. I have frequently seen as many as a hundred gathered outside at the -^^dndows." The association now has a fine plant in an excellent location, the building erected with a generous gift by Mr. John Wana- maker of Philadelphia, but the valuable site and the nmning expenses paid for by the Koreans. The visitor finds a day-school, a gymnasium, industrial classes and shops for practical training, and numerous meetings of various kinds. The missionaries found results multipljdng with such rapidity that they were overworked in the effort to organize and superintend them. Every missionary assigned to evangelistic work is virtually a bishop of an extensive di- ocese, and is obhged to toil and travel almost incessantly in order to keep any kind of oversight of his numerous and scattered outstations. A typical missionary, whose re- port is before me, super^dses forty-seven churches and thirty other outstations. He visits each of these churches PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 513 and outstations twice a year, and some of them oftener. This obliges him to ride 1,500 miles on horseback, besides the time he spends in trains and on foot. Thirty miles a day is a common experience, with one or more sermons preached in the evening. This itineration keeps him from home two himdred days of the year. Few old-time Metho- dist circuit-riders could offer a better record. These itiner- ating tours are busy times for the missionary. He must labor early and late, for he is expected to assign native workers to their circuits, give the leaders instruction re- garding their work, lay out a course of Bible study for those who are prepared to take it, invite selected men and women to attend the training-classes at the nearest central station, examine candidates for admission to the church, settle dis- putes often prolonged and loquacious, administer discipline, baptize, marry, and perhaps bury. When the weather is pleasant in the spring and fall, travelling in the interior is a deUghtful experience, as I can testify; but in the storms of winter, and in the rainy season of summer, itineration is quite another matter. The hard- ships of travel prior to the completion of the railway, and to-day in the large parts of the country that are not reached by rail, are illustrated by the journey of two missionaries, one of them accompanied by his wife and child, on their way from an interior station to Pyengyang: "It rained steadily for a week before starting. The rivers were up to our chins, and we not only had to ford them ourselves but induce frightened natives to do so. The horse that car- ried the food-boxes and cots fell behind, and we were obliged to eat anything we could get, and to sleep on the floor, Ko- rean fashion, in wet clothes and devoured by insects. The pouring rain and flooded streams made fast travelling, or any travelling at all, nearly impossible. In one place, we waded through water and mud to our waists for five H (a mile and two-thirds). This was especially hard on the chair coolies, who had to keep the poles on their shoulders the whole dis- tance, and could not put down the chair to rest. In spite of all obstacles we made the hundred miles in five days." 514 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST It is hazardous to give exact statistics of the mission work, as the figures that are correct as one writes are sure to be below the mark by the time this book is read. The annual volume of The Christian Movement in Japan includes re- ports for Korea, and may be consulted for the latest returns. Suffice it here that the last report gave 219,220 Protestant Christians, including definitely known adherents, in httle Korea. Adding the Roman and Greek CathoHc reports swells the total to 318,708, or about three times as many as there were in all the world at the end of the first century of the Christian era. Seldom has it been given to the first generation of missionaries in any land to witness such rich fmitage while yet in their prime. Every year, it seemed that the movement must have reached its climax, and that there would certainly be a reaction; but every year saw it broadening and deepening until it looked as if Korea would be the first of the non-Christian nations to become evan- gelized. Almost every night we had a picture in chiaroscuro of the spiritual condition of Asia. A himable church, whose flickering oil-lamps made the room bright in contrast with the surrounding darkness, was filled with believers who were rejoicing within the pale of "His marvellous fight." Be- yond them crowding the doors were many others, not yet wholly in the fight, but partially illuminated by it, their eager faces turned toward the place from which it was shin- ing, and where a man was speaking of the Light of the World. Behind these were still others, whom I could not count, standing in deeper shadows. Now and then a flare of the lamp shot a ray of fight into the gloom and showed scores of spectators, some indifferent, some curious, some gravely wondering; and then the darkness silently enfolded them again so that only indistinct masses of heavier blackness showed where an unnumbered multitude was gathered. As I looked upon this scene night after night, I was encour- aged by the number of those who had come into the light; but my heart was moved for those who were standing in the dark. PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 515 Why did Christianity make such rapid growth in Korea, far outstripping, in the number of converts, the results of missionary effort in Japan and, in proportion to population, in China? Many Christian workers in Korea and some in other fields attribute this success to superiority of poHcies and methods. The opinion has even been expressed that if a like course had been adopted in China, that country would now be largely evangehzed. It may be well, therefore, to note the main outlines of the Korea missionary programme as given by one of the influential factors in shaping it, the Reverend James E. Adams, D.D., of Taiku: "(1) The Chiu-ch's first and chief task is to preach the gospel to every soul it can reach. (2) As far as possible, all who ac- cept the gospel should be trained in knowledge, in faith, in self-control, in Christian activity, and from among these should be chosen the most Christ-like and capable to whom should be given an education that wiU fit them to become leaders in their church and nation. (3) During such train- ing it is essential to self-respecting character and inde- pendence on the part of the Church, as on the part of indi- viduals, that it should finance its own way just as far as possible, with help only in the diflSlcult places; for in any land a Gospel not worth pajdng for is not worth having, and the simple facts are that the Gospel costs less than heathen- ism even in lands where it costs most, and subsidizing the Church is fatal to Christian character. In accordance with this principle, all ordinary church buildings and equip- ment should be within the financial means of the people. (4) All buildings, equipment, and machinery as far as pos- sible should be in harmony with national ideals of archi- tecture and arrangement. (5) Self-government is the legitimate right of any Church that even approximately pays its own way, and should be given according as the young Church is able to assume its responsibihties, and, in practically every case, before it is demanded. (6) The in- dividual missionary and the Mission, as far as able, ought to live ahead of the Church; that is, ought to reach out 516 THE MASTERY OF THE EAR EAST and pre-empt for the future those fields and every field of Christian activity and of opportunity which the young Church is unable, not unwilling, to lay hold of for itself, or which it has not as yet the vision to see. (7) The Mis- sion as a Mission has no call to give secular education to non-Christians, but it should, to the extent of its abihty, give a broad education to the greatest possible number of its sons and daughters. (8) The Mission exists only for the Church; it should not even consider permanency, and should make aU its work tend to its own withdrawal as soon as the ends which it seeks are accomplished." These are excellent principles, but it is clear that they are not peculiar to Korea. With the possible exception of number seven, they are among the axioms of sound mission- ary policy everywhere; and the only change that could be suggested in number seven would be to make the last clause read: "give a broad Christian education to its sons and daughters, and to such others as it can bring imder direct religious influence for the forming of Christian character." These principles account verj^ satisfactorily for results any- where, but they do not explain why results in Korea have been more quickly achieved than in some other mission fields where substantially the same principles have gov- erned the work. Evidently we must look for something in Korea that is more distinctive. Among a number of such^factors that might be enumerated, the following may be mentioned : First: Koreans are temperamentally more docile and emo- tional than Chinese and Japanese, so that it is easier to make an impression upon them. Second: For centuries Korea was a vassal of its power- ful neighbors and was subject to foreign domination. Politically small and weak in comparison with the strong adjoining nations, the Koreans had become accustomed to being led from the outside. When, therefore, the mis- sionary gained entrance, he found less national indepen- dence and self-sufficiency to be overcome than in China and Japan, which from time im^memorial had regarded foreign- PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 517 ers as inferiors and suppliants. To the Korean, on the contrary, the missionary appeared as a superior being. Third: AVhile ancestral and demon worship were for- midable obstacles, there was no powerful state rehgion as in most other Asiatic countries, so that there was no in- fluential and strongly intrenched priestly class to oppose the missionaries. Buddhist monks were regarded with contempt, and their loyalty was so distrusted that they were not permitted to enter the capital. The real religion of Korea was Animism, and animistic peoples are usually the readiest to respond to the gospel message. Their lives are spent in constant fear of demons. Christianity comes to them as a blessed deliverance. Uganda, the Kameruns, and the South Sea Islands are illustrations of this. The marvellous success of the Baptists in Burma has been chiefly among those elements of the population in which animistic ideas were strongest. In Korea, also, the notable success of missionary work has been influenced in no small degree by the fact that the real religion of the people is Animism. It would be difficult to exaggerate the terror in which the people lived. When the missionary went among them with his message of emancipation from fear, the tidings seemed almost too good to be true. Fourth: Poverty, oppression and distress, resulting from excessive taxation and the corrupt administration of jus- tice, had begotten in many minds a longing for relief, and a hope that the missionary could secure it for them. A Methodist missionary told me that most of those who came to the missionary for the first time were iufluenced by this motive. Beyond any other people that I saw in Asia, the Koreans impressed me as pathetically stretching out their hands for help and guidance out of bitter bondage. In acceptmg Christianity, they had less to lose in a worldly way than the Chinese and Japanese. In countries where another rehgion is an estabhshed state institution of which the Emperor is the head, or as in India where it is forti- fied by walls of caste, or as in Turkey and Persia where Islam is an implacable foe, the resisting power of the na- 518 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ^ tional system is enormous. A confession of Christ often cuts a man off from the associations that he most values. He is usually disowned by his family, ostracized by society, and ruined in business. The Korean did not always find the transition to Christianity easy, but, except at the be- ginning of missionary effort, he encountered nothing hke the obstacles that the convert had to surmoimt in some other lands. Fifth: It is comparatively easy to induce converts to become personal workers for Christ among their own peo- ple in a comitry like Korea. The typical Korean had fewer interests to occupy his attention. He commanded a larger proportion of his own time, and he was more amenable to missionary direction than converts in such coimtries as China, Japan, and India, where society is more highly de- veloped, where relations are more compHcated, where social and business status is more rigidly fixed, where the struggle for livelihood makes severer demands upon time and strength, and where that pride and reserve which all civil- ized men feel, in some measure at least, make them more conservative in proclaiming a new faith, with perhaps the consequent loss of social and business advantages. Sixth: The experience of the helpless people during the China-Japan War of 1894 disarmed suspicion and turned the tide of popular sentiment. As they saw the hostile armies fighting in their cities, devastating their fields and destroying their homes, they turned in a frenzy of fear and dismay to the friendly missionary, beseeching him to save them; and their hearts were won by the sympathy and devotion of the missionary's response. Seventh: The favor of the court was a factor that should not be left out of account. The Emperor openly befriended the missionaries. I have referred in a former chapter to the facts that at the beginning of missionary work Doctor Allen saved the life of the King's nephew, that the grateful monarch gave him a hospital, and that after the murder of the Queen, when the terrified ruler expected his own assas- sination, he found counsel and courage in the missionaries. PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 519 The Emperor personally expressed to me his remembrance of their fidelity in his hour of peril. His favor meant no spiritual help, but the Imperial smile counted for much in an Oriental country, and few Koreans were disposed to antagonize those whom the Emperor favored. One should not fall into the error of Gibbon, who, in his History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ignored a primary cause of the rapid growth of the Christian Church in the first centuries of the Christian era, and emphasized only the secondary causes, which he defined as the inflexi- ble zeaJ of the Christians; the doctrine of a future fife; the miraculous powers ascribed to the primitive Church; the pure and austere morals of the Christians; the union and discipline of the Christian republic. These were, indeed, powerful contributory influences; but of themselves they would hardly have carried Christianity so far and sustained it so long. In Korea, as in the Roman Empire, the causes that have been mentioned need to be supplemented by the fact that no one of them, nor all of them combined, fully account for such triumphs of the gospel as Korea has wit- nessed. They undoubtedly prepared the way for the mis- sionaries; but the best soil in the world will produce noth- ing of value unless the right seed is sowed and properly cultivated. We must, therefore, include in our survey the inherent character of the gospel, its satisfaction of the hunger of the soul, and its mighty expansive power under the divine influence. But I am discussing now, not what regenerates human hearts in all lands, but the special circumstances which made man's work less difficult in Korea than in some other fields where the same kind of seed, planted with equal faithfulness, was longer in germinating, and where like methods and care in cultivation resulted in less bountiful harvests. The conditions that have been described created a state of receptivity in the Korean mind, a remarkable pre- paration of the soil for the gospel seed. Korea was like a Western prairie, ready for the plough of the husbandman and able to yield a harvest the first season; while the vaster, haughtier, more stubborn, phlegmatic, and self-satisfied 520 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST population of China was like the rocky and densely wooded region of the New England coast, where weary years of toil had to be spent in hewing down the forest, uprooting gigan- tic stumps, and gathering out stones. Comparisons are, therefore, unfair. Conditions independent of the mission- ary made the task of evangelization less difficult in one field than in the other. It was to be expected that a given amount of effort would produce an earlier harvest in Korea than in fields where such conditions did not exist. And yet it would be wrong to give the impression that there were no obstacles to be encountered in Korea. It is not easy to induce any non-Christian people to change its ancestral faith. Superstitious fears, the inertia of indolence, the apathy of despair, the jealousy of the literary class, the demoralizing example of officials — all these heavily re- inforce the ever-present influences of the world, the flesh, and the devil. The human heart does not readily relin- quish its idols in Korea or anywhere else. The special credit of the missionaries is that they were wise and faith- ful in taking advantage of the peculiar conditions of the land. Coming in "the fulness of the time," they discerned the providential significance of the hour. It was not neces- sary to begin with schools, as in Moslem lands. Korea was ready for the direct preaching of the gospel, and to that preaching the missionaries gave themselves with unceasing zeal. Some methods of mission work that have been adopted in other fields have been developed with such conspicuous success in Korea that they merit special mention. One of these is the training-class for Christian workers. The classes usually last from ten to fourteen days. The larger ones are held at the central stations, and smaller ones led by Korean Christians are conducted at some of the outstations. Be- ginning with one class of seven men in 1891, the classes have increased in numbers until now a single mission holds over 800 classes every year, with an aggregate attendance ex- ceeding 50,000 persons. Pyengyang has become famous for its large classes, the number of persons attending often ex- PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 521 ceeding IjOOO. About 500 Korean workers co-operated with the missionaries in holding classes in a recent year at 250 different places in northern Korea, the attendance being over 12,000. It is not uncommon for Koreans to walk more than a hundred miles to attend these classes, bringing their own food with them, and some have journeyed as far as three hundred miles. Then these eager Christians go back to do personal evangehstic work in their villages. There is something inspiring in the contemplation of such devotion, and it accounts in no small measure for the splen- did success of the missionary movement in Korea. Self-support, too, has been pressed with striking results. From the beginning, Korean Christians have not been al- lowed to expect paid employment from the missionaries, nor have they received it, save in comparatively few and exceptional cases. Foreign money has been used to some extent in building churches in the large central stations where the missionaries reside, but in the villages the be- lievers meet in one another's houses until they are strong enough to build a church for themselves. The edifice is usually a very humble one, but it is as good as the houses in which the members live, and sometimes, as in Sorai, it is the most notable building in the community. The peo- ple prize it because it has cost them something, and because it belongs to them. The most competent man among them is selected, in consultation with the missionary, as their leader; and he is responsible, under the missionary, for the conduct of the work, without compensation, like a Sunday- school superintendent in America. The missionary visits these outstations once or twice a year to give such counsel and supervision as may be needed; but at all other times the Christians manage their own affairs. After a while, when the whole time of the leader is required, he receives a small salary, about what the average member of the group lives upon; but the people pay it. Their poverty is startling to an American; but they support him as best they can. A limited number of qualified Christians are employed by the missionaries for evangelistic work among 522 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST non-Christians; although some of these, also, are main- tained by the larger groups of Christians. The mission- aries do not go to unreasonable extremes in their refusal to employ native workers, and they use them wherever the interests of the work appear to justify them. But the pres- sure is strong for self-support and self-propagation. No Christian is permitted to feel that he has any financial claim on the missionaiy, or that, if he is employed, the employ- ment is anything more than temporary. The Koreans now support a large majority of their workers, churches, and primary schools. They rightly regard them as their own, and they are devotedly loyal to them. The missionaries have been particularly wise in pressing the principle of the self-propagation of the church. Con- verts are urged to carry the Christian message to their neighbors and friends at once. Koreans are fluent talkers, and they preach as readily as they give. Many Koreans have a natural gift for public speaking, and they find inter- esting scope for it in proclaiming the gospel. Indeed, the chief work of direct evangehzation is now ardently done by the Koreans themselves. Willingness to lead others to Christ is deemed a test of fitness for church membership. Thus the Korean churches are to a remarkable degree work- ing evangehstic bodies. "With great power" give "they witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace" is "upon them all." If any one feature of the Ko- rean method needs to be heralded as an example to Chris- tians both at home and abroad it is this — ^the duty and privilege of the individual disciple to witness for Christ without depending upon his minister to do it for him, and without expectation of financial reward, but living and teaching the gospel in the sphere of life in which he was before. I asked the leaders of the Korean Christians in several conferences: "What is it in Christianity that particularly appeals to the Korean mind?" The answers naturally varied, but the ones most frequently recurring were "sal- vation," "joy." The poor Koreans were living in wretch- PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN KOREA 523 edness and despair, oppressed, poverty-stricken, literally "having no hope and without God in the world," knowing nothing of anything better, but knowing well their own bitterness and sorrow. Suddenly, they heard the clear, sweet invitation of the gospel, telling them of pardon, de- liverance, and peace. Eagerly and tmstfully as children they came and found rest for their souls. Nowhere else in the world is there a more significant illustration of the gos- pel's response to human need and the value of personal work. Making all due allowance for other causes and the excep- tional conditions that undoubtedly existed, the fact remains that the Divine Power has moved in a remarkable way upon the Land of the Morning Calm. One does not wonder that Mrs. Isabella Bird Bishop said that the mission work there was the most impressive she saw in any part of the world. CHAPTER XXXII KOREAN CHRISTIANS The Korean Christians deeply interest the student of rehgious hfe and activity. The criticism has been made that their profession is of doubtful stability because it is alleged to be simply a mass movement of peasants, em.o- tional in character, and with no sufficient basis in knowledge. WiU their faith be as virile and permanent as that of the more tenacious Chinese and the mjore philosophical East Indian ? The Koreans are turning to God from the depths of utter worldly despair, accepting the gospel as their only hope and help in this world. WiU they give it the same supremacy in their lives when their material conditions improve and life has in it more of the opportunities and ambitions which characterize other peoples? It is true that there is a large emotional element in Korean Christi- anity; but why should we distrust the work on that ac- count? The heart is quite as likely to be right as the head. Repentance, faith, and devotion which enlist the profoundest emotions of the soul are surely not to be sHghted. Love is one of the strongest of human passions; and when it is centred in Christ, it flowers into rare beauty. It must be admitted, however, that the factor of tempera- ment exposes the Korean churches to special peril. Emo- tions that are quickly aroused sometimes subside with equal quickness. A comparison of the number of accessions with the net gain in membership through a series of years shows that there have been serious losses in the Korean churches. Of course there are leakages in every organization of human beings. Not all men and women who join any society in any land remain in it all their lives. But the percentage of those who lapse in Korea is higher than in some other lands. This does not necessarily argue instability of the church, 524 KOREAN CHRISTIANS 525 for one should remember that there is less family, social, and financial loss in confessing Christ in Korea than in China, India, and Mohammedan lands. Where little opposition or sacrifice is involved, it is easier to identify oneself with Christianity than in a comitry where one knows that if he announces that he has become a Christian he will probably be disowned by his family, ostracized by the community, and bitterly persecuted by powerful priests. I am aware that there have been times when these obstacles have been encountered in Korea, and that they are occasionally en- countered now. I have described in another chapter the fear of some of the Koreans that a confession of Christianity wUl expose them to closer espionage by the Japanese police. Whether this fear is ill or well grounded, it undoubtedly has existed at various times. Nevertheless, the generaliza- tion holds that the barriers to church membership are less formidable in Korea than in many other mission fields. This consideration, taken in connection with the Korean temperament, helps one to understand why some Koreans profess conversion only to drop out of sight a few years later. The missionaries do everything in their power to guard against this evil. It is true that the Koreans are coming to the church in large numbers; but it is not true that they are received in a mass. Missionaries deal with each in- dividual separately, carefully examining him and testing him as a catechumen for an average period of a year. He is not enrolled as a communicant until he shows reasonable familiarity with the Bible, maintains family prayers, con- tributes in proportion to his means, and lives a fairly con- sistent Christian life. If membership in American churches were confined to Christians of that type, would the enrol- ment be as large as it is now? It is misleading to assert that Korean converts are not grounded in the faith and that they are not receiving an education. I have referred else- where to the congregational Bible schools every Sunday, and to the Bible training-classes which are held at all the principal stations. These special means of instruction are 526 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST supplemented by preaching services and by daily study in the homes. If there are any other Christians in the world who are more f amiHar with the Bible than the Korean Chris- tians, I have not had the privilege either of meeting them or of hearing about them. Another criticism frequently urged is that the Christian movement in Korea is largely political and influenced by expectation of financial gain. PoHtical conditions imdoubt- edly made the progress of the gospel more easy than in some other lands. The Christian movement, however, attained large proportions before the Japanese occupation and while the Koreans were under their own government. I have already referred to the efforts of the revolutionary party, some years ago, to utilize the churches and the Young Men's Christian Association. But the missionaries and the Ko- rean Christian leaders promptly and decisively put a stop to this. The Koreans now clearly understand that the Christian Church and the Y. M. C. A. have no relation whatever to politics, and that those who wish to foment revolutionary ideas must do so outside of the churches. The flimsiness of the charge that Korean Christians are influenced by the expectation of financial gain is shown by the well-known facts that, though they are among the most poverty-stricken people in the world, they support a large majority of their churches, chapels, and the primary schools, which, as a rule, are associated with the congregations; that an insignificant fraction of them are employed by the missionaries; and that self-support has been pressed to as great an extent as in any mission field in the world. The wage of a Korean laborer is about twenty cents a day, as compared with $2 to $3 in the United States. Imagine, then, the significance of gifts and fees in a single year aggre- gating yen 356,995. In one mission the contributions in- creased from yen 6,583 in 1903 to yen 77,335 in 1908, and yen 193,304 in 191§. The original buflding of the First Presbyterian Church of Pyengyang cost 4,000 yen. The Mission Board agreed to provide half of this sum if the people would furnish the other half. But on a memorable KOREAN CHRISTIANS 527 February Sunday, the Christians surprised and dehghted the missionaries by subscribing 3,000 yen, and a few years later they actually raised and refunded to the Mission Board the remaining 1,000. A visitor interested in Sunday-school work was troubled because he found what seemed to be a smaU proportion of children in the Sunday-schools. The fact was that prac- tically the whole congregation of each group of believers was in Sunday-school studying the Bible. AH the boys and girls were there; but, scattered through the great assem- blages with their parents, they were not so readily noticed by an American traveller to whom a Sunday-school meant a gathering of children with only a handful of adults. Korea has the best kind of Sunday-schools for they are congrega- tional Bible schools. Official reports show that the Sunday- school membership is about three and a half times the conmaunicant membership of the church, and is 90 per cent of the total number of communicants and adherents combined. Sunday is the great day of the week to these Korean Christians. Their best clothes have been carefully laun- dered for the occasion, and they flock to the chmrch, their clean white figures lending a picturesquely attractive touch to the squaHd aspect of a Korean village. The edifice is soon crowded. All Korean congregations sit on the floor, the men with their hats on and the sexes divided by a par- tition; the preacher standing so that he can see both sexes. When the attendance is so large as to require more room, the minister asks the congregation to rise, to move forward, and to sit down again. Few churches in Europe and Amer- ica have an average attendance at pubhc worship as large as their reported membership. But a tj^ical mission in Korea reports the average attendance at church services as two and nine-tenths times its communicant membership. . As for prayer, the family altar is the rule rather than the exception, and few Christians would think of eating a meal without asking the blessing of God. The report of the Korean clerk of a Presbytery for a recent year included the 528 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST following: "Individual Christians have grown in their per- sonal prayer life. The Morning Watch has grown the past few years until many churches have the daybreak prayer- meetings in the church buildings. Some have never missed the Morning Watch a single day in eight years, and this early tryst with the Lord has brought a hundredfold bless- ing to individuals and to churches. The mid-week prayer meetings, of course [mark the words: "of course"], are at- tended by all Christians. There have been special prayer- meetings. Also the universal Week of Prayer was well observed. Besides these, there have been prayer-meetings on the roadside, in the inns, in prisons, and on the moun- tains where God has given the children of the North great comfort and inspiration." The mid-week prayer-meetings are notable characteristics of Korean religious life. The meeting in Pyengyang is probably the largest in the world, the attendance rarely falling below a thousand, and often rising to 1,400. I attended a prayer-meeting in the Yun Mot Kol Church in Seoul. It was a dark, rainy night. A Korean was to lead, and the people did not know that a traveller from the West would be present; but I found about 1,000 Christians assembled. It would be extraordinary if 1,200 American church members came out on prayer-meeting night in any city in the United States, but 1,200 people filled the Syen- chyun Church the evening we spent there. It is worth going far to hear Korean Christians pray. They bow with their faces to the floor and pour out praise, confession, and supplication as those who know what it is to have daily audience with God. This spirit of prayer and Bible study pervades their daily lives. The Reverend F. S. Miller writes from Chungju: "'We are in a mountain village in a rocky gully at the foot of YeUow Crane Mountain. These people appreciate the hght and joy that the gospel brings into their dark homes. They have time to think and pray and study during the winter. The little bands of Christians scattered through the moun- tains have a common bond of union with each other and KOREAN CHRISTIANS 529 with the great church out in the world; a bond that gives them a new vision, a new life. We are levelling off the south end of our hill for a hospital. As I walked over the site the other day, I noticed a niche in the bank, and that it contained four Testaments and hymn-books. Where in America do you find a band of workers taking Testaments and hymn-books to work with them ? As I stood thinking these things over, the men came around the bank, laid down their shovels and picks and asked me to lead their ^rest-time prayer-meeting.' Perhaps only half of them were Christians, but all sat in respectful silence and bowed their heads in prayer." There is something deeply moving about the zeal of these Korean Christians. A deacon, who had attended the Syen- chyun men's Bible study conference, on his way back came toward evening to a mountain pass. As it was the evening for the regular mid-week service, he wanted to cross and worship in a Httle gathering on the other side. He started over, but night came on, he lost his way, and fell into a snow bank, where he perished. When his body was found, it was in the attitude of prayer. Investigation revealed the fact that he had left the inn that morning without breakfast as he had used up all his money, so that hunger and weari- ness had lessened his power of resistance to the bitter cold. The following extracts from letters from three different parts of Korea are samples of scores that I might cite from my correspondence: "The men's class which has just closed was attended by 500 men. They came from all parts of the Province. The spirit was fine. Two hundred and fifty men pledged enough days of preaching to equal the work of one man for nine years, and a large body of men pledged themselves to begin each day with the petition: 'What wilt Thou have me do to-day?'" Another letter says: "The Church is waking up to a strenuous effort to take the gospel to every house and every man and woman this year. At a circuit class which I held for a week, 250 were present, all sta3dng till the close of the last session. One evening was given to the subject of per- 530 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST sonal work, and an opportunity for pledging a number of days' work during the year resulted in an aggregate of 2,700 days of preaching pledged. The helpers who had no time of their own to give pledged each half a month's salarJ^ An ox-load of 4,000 copies of St. Mark's Gospel was sent to me during the class, and in less than half an hour they were all gone. I had not sufficient to supply the de- mand." Another missionaiy writes: "I have just returned from a class where there were 1,400 present. Three thousand three hundred copies of St. Mark's Gospel were purchased by the Christians to give away in their preaching to unbe- lievers. After an address on the subject of tithing, several hundred decided hereafter to give a tenth. At the close of a sermon over 400 stood up and solemnly dedicated them- selves wholly to the Lord. A colporteur, while coming into the city from ten miles out, counted 400 men who had re- ceived a Gospel. Men coming in from churches where they were having a week of Bible study say that the churches are crowded with new believers. In some instances the congregations are doubled, and people are standing outside the doors Hstening to the Gospel." One more letter may be cited: "The Methodist Confer- ence was a most enthusiastic one. The 159 men who were present pledged some 3,000 days during the next three months. At Chairyung the training class pledged during the next three months over 5,000 days. We have secured from the British and Foreign Bible Society a special copy of St. Mark's Gospel that is bemg printed in large quan- tities. These will be sold to Christians who will take them, and with a word of prayer and advice give them to their friends. The Society first ordered 100,000, and then cabled to make it 200,000. Finding the orders were nearly 300,000, the edition was made 400,000. We expect considerably over a million of these Gospels will be distributed during the year, and a determmed effort will be made to see that every household in Korea during this year hears the story of Christ in an intelligent manner. The whole countiy will be dis- KOREAN CHRISTIANS 531 tricted, and in some way or other every house will be reached." At the close of a conference for the training of lay work- ers, when the men were asked to consider the claims of Christian service, 178 of the finest men in the north dedi- cated their Hves to the ministry. One does not wonder that, when a certain critic asserted that "the Korean Christians are on a low level, and that perhaps four-fifths of those who are enrolled will have to be sifted out," Doctor John R. Mott, who has probably seen as much of Christians in various lands as any Hving man, replied: "I cannot agree with him in his estimate of the Korean Christians. I regard them to be in advance of the first generation of Christians of most of the non-Chris- tian countries which I have visited. Moreover, they put to shame a multitude of the Christians of the West in more than one respect." Nor is the thought of the Korean Christians confined to their immediate neighborhoods. One of the seven men ordained September 17, 1907, Yi Ki Poung, was set aside as a missionary to Quelpart, the large island about fifty miles off the southern coast, whose population of approx- imately a hundred thousand has long had a bad name. It is interesting to note that this first Korean missionary was a man who stoned the Reverend Samuel A. Moffett during the latter' s first visit to Pyengyang, in 1889. The Korean churches had been conducting Christian work for some years among the Chinese in Korea, and when a Korean Board of Foreign Missions was organized in 1907 it at once began to plan for missionary work in China. The church leaders were stirred as they learned of its vast unevangelized population, and they felt that their prox- imity, their knowledge of the Chinese ideographs, the his- toric relations of the two countries, and Korea's indebted- ness to China for its civiHzation and literature, combined to reinforce the missionary obhgation which they held to be binding upon them as well as upon Western Christians. They realized that the Chinese had long regarded Koreans 532 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST as a small and inferior people, but their consecration was illustrated by a prayer that a missionary happened to overhear in a church service: "0 Lord, we are a despised people, the weakest nation on the earth. But thou art a God who choosest the despised things. Wilt thou use this nation to show forth Thy glory in Asia ! " In 1912, negotia- tions were opened with the Chinese Presbytery in the province of Shantung regarding the advisability of sending Korean missionaries to China. The Presbytery welcomed the offer of co-operation, and the outcome was the com- missioning of three Korean missionaries to open a station at Lai-yang, a walled city about eighty miles southwest of Chefoo. The station had a checkered history for several years. The health of the senior member broke down, and the two other workers became discontented and went back to Korea. It looked for a time as if the effort would prove a failure. The Korean General Assembly, however, de- cided to go on. Other missionaries were appointed and funds raised for their support. Difficulties have been numerous, and the work has not been as successful as its projectors had hoped; but a fairly prosperous church at Lai-yang has been developed, and the Korean churches are warmly interested in it and eager to develop it. Meantime the attention of the Korean Christians, par- ticularly in the northern stations, had been turned to the adjacent region in Manchuria, where the number of Korean immigrants was rapidly becoming large. Korean evangel- ists were sent to work among their brethren there, and to take advantage of any opportunities that might arise to preach to the Chinese. A visitor writes that he happened to be in Syenchyun one Sunday evening when a Korean evangelist, who had just returned from Siberia, presented his report. He had been very successful in organizing groups of believers, but he had been obHged to return at the end of six months because the 500 yen that had been given him by the church had been exhausted, although he had used it prudently; a statement which was confirmed by an American missionary who had audited his accounts. KOREAN CHRISTIANS 533 After the meeting had closed and many of the members had gone home, the Korean pastor exclaimed: "Oh, must we drop this work for lack of money?" and he broke down in tears. A voice in the rear of the chm"ch called out: "To comfort the heart of the pastor, I'll give five yen to start a subscription to continue the Siberian work six months." Other pledges of varying amounts quicldy fol- lowed, until another 500 yen had been secured. Then those poor Koreans, not one of whom had an income of 500 yen a year, shouted for joy, sung "Praise God from whom all blessings flow," and went out into the darkness and rain to their hmnble homes with a great happiness in their hearts. The next day, the congregation voted to send an ordained minister to Siberia as its own representative, pay- ing his salary and providing him a house; and in order that no one might imagine that this action would interfere with its pledges toward the support of the missionary work of the Presbytery on Quelpart and in Vladivostok, the con- gregation also voted to increase its contributions to these objects by 10 per cent. There is something striking about the transformation that Christianity effects in these Koreans. George Kennan regarded the vain, lazy, bigoted Korean yangban "as ap- parently an absolutely impossible person to do anything with or make anything out of," but he declared that mis- sionary schools. Christian education, and foreign travel have transformed some of them into intelHgent, trustworthy, and patriotic men, and he thought that if they could be recon- structed, there was hope for others and for the next genera- tion. Mr. F. A. Mackenzie, the English war correspondent, writes: "Some travellers are accustomed to sneer at mis- sionar}^ converts. Usually these are people who have never travelled further than treaty ports, and who consider that a few days' stay at a semi-Europeanized town like Shanghai or Yokohama enables them to speak as authorities on heathen lands forever after. Those of us who have pene- trated into the interior of the great dark continents know 534 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST better. I was with one of the Japanese armies in 1904 in its advance into Manchuria. Among my servants were several native Korean converts. Early in the spring, it was neces- sary for me to conomunicate with some associates at Chef oo, in China. I called one of my 'boys' and told him to set out from Antung and reach the other side. He had to cross the Yellow Sea by himself, escape the mines aroimd Port Arthur, land in China, obtain money for me, and return. The 'boy' had never been outside his native country before. He disappeared, and for weeks nothing was heard of him. Then, one day, when our army had advanced far up into Manchuria, I was riding along, when a bronzed, ragged, weary figure ran up to my horse, with one cry on his lips: 'Master, Master !' My 'boy' had come back. He took me on one side and showed me a heavy package of money in his inner dress. He had been de- layed. His own fimds were exhausted. He had starved and suffered desperately. Yet it had never crossed his mind to give up his work or to help himself to my money. That was a missionary boy. I know too much of what the missionaries actually do to have anything but a profound respect for their work." The Christians are fearless in their devotion. We have seen to what extent the history of early Christianity in Korea aboimds in accounts of martyrdoms which the be- lievers could have escaped by recanting their faith. Such dangers have now passed; but ever and anon some incident shows that the spirit of the modem Korean Christian is as devoted as that of his predecessors. The teachers and students at. Syenchyun, who were arrested by the Japanese pohce at the time of the "Korean Conspiracy Case," were not told what they had been arrested for, and supposed it was because they were Christians. But on their arrival in Seoul, as they were driven in chains and handcuffs through the streets to the prison, they lustily sung the hynm, "Glory to His Name." Not without humor are some of the manifestations of fidehty. When the Christians believed that the Japanese KOREAN CHRISTIANS 535 were imprisoning church members on account of their re- hgion, a Korean evangelist connected with the Methodist Mission, anxiously said to a missionary: "Moksa, there must be something wrong in our Methodist Church. I fear we are lacking in faith. There are thirty-seven Presby- terians in jail and only one Methodist. I fear the Lord does not count us worthy to suffer persecution." Our first meeting with the Korean Christians will not soon be forgotten. The trip across the narrow strait between Japan and Korea was decidedly rough. We had crossed the Pacific with such comfort that we had fondly imagined ourselves to be good sailors. But that comparatively short passage of a single night brought us to grief. The winds and tides that alternately sweep back and forth between the Japan and Eastern seas usually keep the Korea Strait rather tumultuous, and this time a recent storm had stirred up a furious sea. All night our little Japanese steamer pitched and rolled through the assaulting waves, while we Well, I told the "boy" to call us an hour before reaching Fusan. He smiled assent and called us ten minutes before instead of sixty. Hastily tumbling out of our berths and donning our clothes, we jumped into a waiting sampan with the hospitable missionaries who had already boarded the steamer. It was nearly half past ten o'clock and there was no time for breakfast, nor had we appetite for it. So we proceeded at once to the building where the Korean Christians had been for some time awaiting us, troops of them having met us at the foot of the hill and escorted us up the road. The seasickness from which we had just risen was not the best preparation for speaking; but after a felicitous address of welcome by one of the Koreans, a hun- dred voices rose in a song of praise. Such congregational singing ! It was so hearty and yet so truly worshipful that it was a physical and spiritual tonic. Not a fine could we understand, till suddenly from out of the uninteUigible words there fairly leaped two that we recognized: "Jesus, Hallelujah ! " There being no Korean equivalents for them. 636 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the missionaries had taught the people to use the terms so familiar to us. We forgot our seasickness as those wondrous words sounded in our ears. One could have had no more inspiring theme, and so I spoke on the meaning of "Jesus, HaUelujah!" Wherever we went in Korea nothing stirred us more deeply than the singing of the Korean Christians. A stranger in a strange land enters a room filled with strange people, who greet him in a strange tongue and then begin to sing a strange tune. The voices are not melodious and they do not always keep the key. But the singing plainly voices the aspirations of a fervent and genuine experience. Those Koreans sing as they pray — ^with all their hearts. Unfamiliar as the language is, the visitor is thrilled by the exultant ring of a living, joyous faith. And the mud walls and the dark faces and all the strange surroundings fade from view, and one feels that he is no longer among strangers but in the household of faith and love. I have since journeyed far and have seen many places and peoples. But there still lives to my vision the humble chapels on those Korean hills, with worshipping Koreans sitting Oriental fashion on the floor. I can see their faces light up as I spoke to them of Jesus as our revelation of the love of God, Jesus as our Saviour from sin, Jesus as our Friend and King, Jesus as the Giver of such peace and joy that there is no word so appropriate for true disciples as "Hallelujah." Even as I write, I seem to hear the unison ofj^those eager voices as, in glad response to my closing re- quest, they joined me in repeating the words: "Jesus, Halle- lujah," and then with the reverent petition of their leader as he prayed for us all, while the white-robed worshippers bowed with their faces to the floor. A visit to Korea is a tonic to faith. As one travels through the coimtry, facing crowds of Christians from Fusan to Syenchyun, it is difficult to realize that Protestant mis- sions in Korea date only from 1884, and that the great host of communicants and adherents in the Pyengyang field alone began with the baptism of a handful of men in KOREAN CHRISTIANS 537 January, 1894. "Will it be permanent?" some are ask- ing. Well, a willingness to support their-own work without dependence upon the foreigner's money, an eagerness to extend the gospel to their countrjmien, a persistence in Christian fidelity when left without missionary supervi- sion, and a patient endurance of persecution — ^these are surely encouraging indications of genuineness of purpose. Many a time as I studied the movement in the villages of Korea, it seemed to me that the Son of Man was again walking upon earth and calling to lowly men: "Follow me," and that again men were "straightway" leaving aU and fol- lowing Him. As I sat in their lowly chapels and com- muned with them, I could see how the gospel had enlight- ened their hearts and how their once joyless Uves now centred in the Church of God which gave them their only light and peace. Taking Korean Christians as a whole, the facts that have been stated regarding their giving, their study of the Bible, their zeal for the conversion of others, and the consistency of their daily fives, should protect them from the charge of being unintefiigent and merely emotional Christians. Their confession of heinous sins during the intensity of re- vivals has been cited as evidence that their Christianity is shallow. It is odd that any one should draw such a conclusion. Penitence of heart led those poor Koreans to confess to the very sins which notoriously exist among those who are called "Christians" in Europe and America. It ill becomes traveUers from countries where such sins are not confessed until investigations expose them to criticise Christians in Korea who have the grace to confess them voluntarily. For myself, I cannot withhold the tribute of my confi- dence and love for the Korean Christians. I met them in various parts of the coimtry, in villages and cities, churches and homes; and everywhere I was profoundly impressed by their sincerity and devotion. We arrived at Chairyung about dark one Saturday evening, after a journey of five hours in chairs from the railway-station. Tii'ed and dusty, 538 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST I did not expect to meet the Christians that evening. Learning, however, that many of them had assembled in the church, I went over, and during the meeting asked them to tell me in their own way what they found in Christ that led them to love and serve him. One after another the men rose and answered my question. I jotted down their replies, and find the following in my note-book : " De- liverance from sin," "forgiveness," "peace," "eternal life," "guidance," "strength," "power to do," "joy," "com- fort." Surely those earnest Koreans had found something of value in Christ. As we bowed together in a closing prayer, my heart went out to them as to those who, with fewer advantages than I had enjoyed, had nevertheless learned more than I of the deep things of God. Childlike? Yes, they are; but it was the Master himself who said to his disciples, and through them to us all : " Except ye turn and become as little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven." CHAPTER XXXIII TYPE AND PROBLEMS OF KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT Although bordering China and only a few hours from Japan, with tides of Chinese and Japanese Hfe and thought alternately sweeping back and forth throughout the length of the country, we nevertheless find ourselves in a different religious atmosphere when we enter the Christian churches of Korea. Korean temperament is quite distinct from that of China and Japan. Less stolid and materiahstic than the Chinese, less alert and martial than the Japanese, the Korean is more susceptible and tiTistful than either. He responds more readily to suggestion from the outside. His heart is more easily touched by the rehgious message; his faith is more childlike, and his spiritual vision more im- troubled by doubt. He came to Christianity out of deeper sorrows than the self-confident Chinese and the masterful Japanese. The missionaries in each country have felt that the character and trend of the native mind with which they had to deal called for special emphasis upon certain theologi- cal doctrines, which, while not fundamentally at variance with the equally evangehcal doctrines that the other body of missionaries were emphasizing, were nevertheless differ- ent. The range of New Testament teaching is wide, and each national group of Christians, like each individual be- liever, instinctively appropriates the truths which impress them as best adapted to their needs. The oppressed, de- spairing, impoverished, emotional Korean approaches Christ from a different angle than the proud, ambitious, and all- conquering Japanese. Korean and Japanese types of Chris- tianity are, therefore, as different as the Moravian and Presbyterian types in the West. The Japanese Christian subjects the teachings of the missionaries to his own independent scrutiny. The Ko- 539 540 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST rean Christian takes them without question. The former is a theological progressive; the latter a theological con- servative. No questions regarding miracles or inspiration trouble the Korean Christian. He implicitly beheves every- thing that he has been taught by his missionary teachers. The typical missionary of the first quarter century after the opening of the country was a man of the Puritan type. He kept the Sabbath as our New England forefathers did a century ago. He looked upon dancing, smoking, and card- playing as sins in which no true follower of Christ should indulge. In theology and biblical criticism he was strongly conservative, and he held as a vital truth the premille- narian view of the second coming of Christ. The higher criticism and liberal theology were deemed dangerous heresies. In most of the evangelical churches of America and Great Britain, conservatives and evangelical hberals have learned to live together in peace; but in Korea the evangelical liberal, whose interpretation of the Bible differs from the commonly accepted one, sometimes has a rough road to travel. The Korean converts naturally reproduced the prevaiHng type. The result was a Christian experience like that of Bunyan's Pilgrim. Salvation was an escape from the City of Destruction. Satan was not a rhetorical expression, but a real and malignant personage — "your adversary" who, "as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour." The accounts of the Garden of Eden, the ex- perience of Jonah, the virgin birth of our Lord, the resur- rection of Lazarus, and of the gates of pearls and streets of pure gold in the Heavenly City were taken as historical de- scriptions of actual facts. Nowhere else in the world is there a higher percentage of church members who pray, study the Bible, attend devotional services, give proportionately of their money, and manifest evangelistic zeal in spreading the gospel; and nowhere else are there greater strictness of Sabbath observance, rigidity of doctrinal con\dction, and inflexibility of opposition to anything that does not accord with the accepted type. The deficiencies in the Korean religious type are a cer- KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 541 tain lack of largeness of view and of recognition of the fact that behevers of equal piety and loyalty to Christ differ in their interpretation of the Bible and in the degree of liberty that should be permitted in matters that do not involve questions of right or wrong but merely of Christian judg- ment and expediency. The Korean line is sharply drawn. The area of duty in both doctrine and practice is strictly defined, and every professing Christian who does not keep within it is counted a heretic. Intensity rather than breadth characterizes the typical Korean Christian. In- tense in advocacy of the truth, some say; intense in advo- cacy of only a part of the truth, others reply. Another characteristic of Korean Christianity is compara- tive indifference to the social application of the gospel. The thought of the Korean churches is fixed on the next world. The present world is regarded as so utterly lost that it cannot be saved in this dispensation; nor is it be- lieved that the Divine plan contemplates such an end. The duty of the church now is to preach the gospel "for a witness," to gather out the elect, and to leave the world till Christ shall return. The church must be composed of men and women of clean lives; but efforts to clean up the community and to briQg about better social conditions are regarded as a use of time and strength that could be more usefully employed in other ways. "What are you doing in the way of social reform?" a Korea missionary was once asked. "Nothing," was the reply, "we are too busy preachiQg the gospel." Some Korea missionaries would emphatically disavow such a sweepiag statement, and with justice, for Christianity in Korea has done many things to alleviate suffering and to secure proper treatment for the sick and defective classes. The mission hospitals scattered over the country, the Home for Destitute Children in Seoul, and the work for lepers on an island near Fusan, all testify to the fact that the missionaries have not been indifferent to physical suffering. If they have done httle to remedy bad community conditions outside of the membership of the churches, it should be borne in mind that, under the 542 IHE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST old political regime, the Korean officials were so luzj, cor- rupt, and reactionary that the missionaries coiild do nothing with them. But speaking broadly, and making due allow- ance for exceptional missionaries and institutions, the gen- eral type of Korean Christianity is individualistic rather than social. The world is a sinking ship, and the best that the church can do is to rescue as many as possible of the passengers. The once popular revival hymn expresses the thought : "Pull for the shore, sailor; Pull for the shore; Leave the poor old stranded wreck. And pull for the shore." This rescue work has been pressed with splendid devo- tion, in the eager hope that our Lord will return in the flesh in the immediate future and set up his earthly kingdom. Education, sanitation, social and economic conditions were deemed relatively unimportant in such an emergency. The mission schools were to be Hmited to the children of the church, and attempts to extend their benefits to the children of non-Christians were frowned upon as tending to carry the work of the missions beyond their proper sphere. Even the hospitals, which are deemed so essential a part of missionary work in many other fields, were long regarded in Korea as useful merely for opening doors of opportmiity for preaching; and when they were no longer needed for that purpose, some missionaries favored their continuance only on a small and limited scale. Many of the mission- aries have now passed beyond this stage. They regard the medical work with justifiable pride as a legitimate and powerful missionary agency, and they welcome to their schools the children of non-Christian parents who are will- ing to have their sons and daughters receive a Christian education. But in some of the missions this freedom was gained at great cost. Let those who are disposed to criti- cise the missionaries for their conservatism remember that even in America and Great Britain the idea of the social KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 543 application of the gospel and the consequent duty of the church to Christianize the social order is comparatively- new, and that there are still devout Christians in the West who deem such effort a semi-heresy, or at best a diversion of precious time and energy from the more pressing task of '' preaching the gospel." ' The revival in Pyengyang which culminated in January, 1907, illustrated the characteristics of Korean temperament. It was attended by extraordinary physical and mental manifestations — shouts, groans, violent weeping, falling upon the ground, frothing at the mouth, and paroxysms of varying intensity, culminating in complete insensibilit}^ These manifestations were attributed by many persons to the conflict between Christ and the evil spirits sent by Satan to resist the gracious work of God; for demon posses- sion is accepted as a fact in Korea as it was in the first cen- tury, and the absence of such signs at other times and places is lamented as an evidence of spiritual decadence. It is hazardous to dogmatize on a subject of which we know so httle. It is historically true, however, that such scenes have been usually witnessed when a simple-minded emo- tional people have suddenly been brought face to face with the tremendous eternal issues of sin and salvation, heaven and hell. The Reverend Doctor John F. Goucher, of Bal- timore, says that in his early ministry he was perplexed because his preaching was received so quietly by his people; nobody shouted or fainted or became hysterical even when his themes were of the most searching and soiil-stirring kind. He resolved to make an experiment. Going to some ignorant mountaineers at a distance, people who had been wholly beyond the reach of church work, he persuaded them to attend a service. Before it was concluded, men and women were uncontrollably excited; groans and wailings filled the room; strong men writhed in anguish, and some, jumping into the air, fell insensible to the floor, foaming at the mouth. Doctor Goucher became convinced that the ^ I have discussed this subject more fully in another book — Rising Churches in Non-Christian Lands, pp. 155 aeq. 544 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST difference was not in him or in his message but in his con- gregations, and that given the same conditions anywhere — an ignorant; excitable people and a vivid portrayal of the consequences of sin and the pardon offered in Christ — the same results would follow. If this theory is correct, the presence or absence of such signs indicates Httle regarding the genuineness of a revival but much regarding the state of the people. Those who receive the gospel with like sin- cerity may differ widely in their external manifestations of feeling. The processes and results may be genuine in both cases, but the human signs may be quite different. The Korea missionaries made earnest efforts to hold this abnormal excitement in check. They saw its perils, and yet they felt obliged to be cautious about rebuking it, for they knew that they were deahng with the very real religious experience of sincere men and women, however extravagant it might appear to educated and self-controlled foreigners. Those in whom the gospel message stirs no such emotions may well hesitate to plume themselves upon their superi- ority. More learning and reserve they undoubtedly have, but perhaps a shallower experience also. It is not alto- gether a reason for self-satisfaction if we have become so blase under oft-repeated preaching of the truth that it no longer arouses anything more than a languid interest in us. The facts of spiritual life and death do not become less tremendous or significant when people advance in so- called civilization and culture. Recent years have brought severe tests upon the churches of Korea. The period of isolation and seclusion has passed. The once "Hermit Nation" is now wide open. Through the open doors a variety of good, bad, and indifferent influences have poured in. Steamships, railways, and telegraphs have brought the world to Korea. New condi- tions have caused economic disturbances and readjustments. Opportunities to make and to spend money delight and bewilder the simple-hearted Koreans. A tide of material- ism is sweeping over the country. The life of the average Korean is no longer an empty one apart from the church, KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 545 and he is almost intoxicated by the inrush of new ideas and methods. Will the early evangelical fervor be main- tained in such circumstances? A Korean elder expressed to me anxiety on this point. He said that at first practically every Christian was an evangelist, but that now there are some who are content with Sunday worship and prayer- meeting attendance. A missionary writes: "One result of the Japanese occupation is that pressure of business is very much greater upon the Koreans than it used to be. The Christians are so occupied with worldly affairs that they do not attend our Bible classes as they used to do. I do not think that it is wholly a decrease of interest or dropping away from faith. They observe and gather on Sunday as before and seem to be leading consistent Christian lives; but they do not have the week-day leisure that they once had. It will take some years for the church to adjust it- self to the new conditions." Perhaps the leakage in church membership, to which I have referred on a preceding page, may be due, in part at least, to these considerations as well as to the emotional temperament of the Koreans. Some losses are inevitable in such circumstances. Churches in many lands have had to pass through such a period of transi- tion. Wherever isolated communities have been suddenly brought out of stagnant seclusion into the whirling currents of the world, readjustments and realignments have neces- sarily followed. The old appeals have lost some of their force and other interests have imperatively demanded attention. The changing spirit was manifested as early as 1910 in the so-called "Million Campaign for Christ." Never was an evangelistic movement more carefully planned; never were plans more systematically carried out. City dis- tricting, house-to-house canvassing, newspaper advertising, handbill and tract distributing, earnest preaching, personal work with individuals — all these were energetically and skilfully used "along the most approved lines of western- world revival meetings." Every theatre and public hall in Seoul was engaged for the month, so that no other public meetings or entertainments could be given to distract at- 546 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST tention. A column a day was secured in each of the six daily papers. Every family in the city was visited every day for six days. But the ex-pected response was not forth- coming. There were, it is true, largely attended meetmgs, and many Koreans expressed a desire to become Christians; but the net results were not what had been expected. From the reports of several stations I cull such statements as the following: "We did all that men could do. Many Chris- tians received an inspiration for personal work; but the congregations show no increase beyond what is to be ex- pected each year." "The church was filled nightly and between 400 and 500 professed conversion; but almost none of them can be found now." The missionaries were dis- appointed, but far from discouraged, concluding that the most effective way to reach and hold Koreans was "the man-to-man method" of constant individual effort supple- menting the regular services of the churches. Difficulties of various kinds are beginning to perplex the Korean Christian. He had innocently imagined that in these later days all white men were Christians like the mis- sionaries, and he has learned to his sorrow that many, who proudly refer to their own country as "Christian," and to Korea as "heathen," are really irrehgious and, in some cases, dissolute — ^brutal in their treatment of Asiatics, lustful in their relations with women, and blasphemous in their references to the God whom the Korean beHever reveres. His conception of Christianity, too, is being disturbed. The happy, radiant, unsophisticated believers, trustful as little children, and accepting the Bible in the most literal sense from Genesis to Revelation, are receiving the dis- quieting knowledge that not all of the devoted servants of God in other lands interpret the Bible as they have been taught to interpret it; that reverent opinions differ as to whether the accounts of the Garden of Eden, the experi- ences of Job and Jonah, and the descriptions of hell and the heavenly city should be interpreted Hterally or figura- tively; and that men who differ regarding these and other matters are equally earnest and active in loving and serving KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 547 Chi'ist as their Lord and Saviour. At first the Korean is stmined. Then he is apt to become intolerant in attitude toward the Christians who differ with him and to imagine that he is more righteous than they; or else he goes to the other extreme and loses confidence in his missionary teachers. The present tendency is toward the former course, but the result is disastrous in either case. How to guide the Ko- rean churches in this period of inevitable transition and readjustment is a difficult and delicate problem. The problem of missionary relationship to the native church does not exist in Korea in the advanced form in which one finds it in Japan, The reasons for this have been discussed in other chapters. It is true that the Ko- rean Christian of to-day is not as docile under missionary leadership as he was a dozen years ago; but the generaliza- tion still holds that in Japan the chm-ches dominate the missionaries, and in Korea the missionaries dominate the churches. The troubles of this kind that the Korea mis- sionaries now have are with a certain wilfulness of disposi- tion, a child's tendency to sudden alternations of feeling — gusts of temper and excitabihty. The missionaries are rightly devolving larger responsibilities upon the Korean church leaders, and they are meeting with some success in doing so; but as one missionary rather anxiously put it: "The Koreans, by thousands of years of misrule, are like children. Spiritually, they are in advance of many Chris- tian nations; but they lack balance, foresight, the essence of self-government; and it will require years of discipline to form it in them." Presbyterians, with what some regarded as an excess of caution, deemed it prudent to defer organization of churches imtil there was suitable material for officers. When quah- fied men were developed and the lai^ger groups were formed into churches, these churches were carried with no other external bond of union than the Presbyterian Council, which was formed in 1889 of representatives of the four Presbji^erian missions. This body acted as a governing body until September 17, 1907, when the independent Union 548 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Presbyterian Church of Korea was constituted, with thirty- three missionaries and elders, representing thirty-eight churches, under authority given by the general assemblies of the four Presbyterian Churches, whose missions were united in the General Council of Missions in Korea — Ameri- can Presbyterian North, Presbyterian South, Canadian Presbyterian, and Australian Presbyterian. The Presby- tery at once ordained seven Koreans to the ministry, and adopted the Confession of Faith and Form of Government which were adopted by the Presbyterian Church in India at its organization in 1904, taking the former entire, and the latter with only a few modifications. With the growth of the church, the original Presbytery was subdivided, imtil six presb3d:eries united in forming a General Assembly, which held its first, meeting in September, 1912. The missionaries of the Methodist Episcopal Church were also conservative in ecclesiastical procedure, carrying most of their Korean converts as probationers m connection with the mission for a considerable period. They began the formal organization of churches in 1888. A Mission Con- ference was constituted in 1904, but it was not set apart as a fully empowered Annual Conference until 1908. The creed and discipline are those of the parent church in America. It is now a strong and vigorous body, imder the leadership of an able American bishop, the Reverend Doctor Herbert Welch, and it is energetically developing its work and institutions among the three millions of Koreans who occupy the territory which, by agreements with other com- munions, is regarded as the special field of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Korea. At the meeting of the Con- ference in 1918, Bishop Welch ordained twenty-eight Ko- reans to the ministr}^, which is believed to be the largest number of ministers admitted at one time to any annual conference of that communion anywhere in the world. The Southern Methodists organized a District Confer- ence in 1897, which was for a time attached to their confer- ence in China, but which is now a full Conference with seven districts under its supervision. KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 549 It will be noted that, with the exception of the com- paratively small mission of the Church of England, the mis- sionaries and churches in Korea are divided into two main denominational groups, Methodist and Presbyterian; the former representing a union of two Methodist bodies, and the latter of four Presbyterian bodies. The union in each group is complete, and in some cases finds outward expres- sion in institutions, such as the college and theological seminary in Pyengyang supported by the Presbyterian missions, and the theological seminary in Seoul supported by the Methodist missions. Federated relations between the two denominational groups have existed since 1904, when the General Council of Evangelical Missions in Korea was formed, whose aim was announced to be "co-operation in mission efforts and eventually the organization in Korea of but one native evangelical church." "Negotiations look- ing toward such a union have been carried on in a tentative way, but their consummation has been delayed not only by the difficulties which beset organic union elsewhere, but by differences in mission policies and methods, par- ticularly in educational work and in attitude toward the government's desire that mission schools should take out permits under the educational regulations of the Govern- ment-General. There have been, however, several co-operative efforts of the two denominational groups. Territory has been re- distributed so that each mission now has a separate field without overlapping the fields of other missions. Mission- aries and money are thus used to the best advantage and local competition between denominations is avoided. This has involved the transfer of hundreds and, in some cases, of thousands of Korean Christians from Methodist to Pres- byterian affiliations and from Presbyterian to Methodist; but the transfers have been effected with perfect good feel- ing. (If Methodists and Presbyterians can do this in Korea, why can they not do it in America?) Another successful co-operative effort is in the preparation and distribution of Christian literature. Bible translations have been made 550 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST by imion committees of missionaries. The year 1911 was signalized by the completion of the whole Bible in Korean, a notable achievement. The Korean Religious Tract So- ciety, composed of representatives of various communions, has produced books, tracts, and periodicals for the Korean churches and their evangelistic and educational workers. In institutional work notable success has attended the group of union institutions in Seoul. One of these, the Chosen Christian College, will stand as an enduring monu- ment to the memory of one of the great missionaries of the modern church — ^the Reverend Horace Grant Underwood, D.D., LL.D. His missionary career from his arrival in Korea in 1884 to his lamented death, October 12, 1916, was rich in incident and achievement. He was the first or- dained missionary to Korea. He baptized the first convert in 1886, opened the first school, also in 1886, organized the first church and administered the first sacrament of the Lord's Supper to Koreans in 1887. In the same year, he made the first of those long itinerating tours into the in- terior which, continued by him and his successors, spread the knowledge of the Gospel far and wide in Korea and resulted in groups of believers in hundreds of towns and villages. He began the literary work of Christian mis- sions in Korea, and in 1889 published the first of the long list of volumes with which he and other missionaries have enriched the literature of missions; and his translation of the Gospel of St. Mark in 1887 first made any part of the Bible accessible to the people in written form. A district of diocesan proportions was imder his care, and he did in it the work of an apostle — ^holding meetings, baptizing converts, conducting Bible conferences, organizing groups and churches, ordaining elders, settling disputes, and coun- selling leaders. He often walked upon these tours, slept in the wretched Korean huts or inns, and exposed himself freely to physical hardships from which many a man would have shrunk. He had extraordinary influence with high officials and members of the Korean royal family, including the Em- KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 551 peror himself who often consulted him and sent him a valuable pearl ring as a wedding present. How the Em- peror clung to him at the time of the assassination of the Queen in 1895, and finally slept wdth his head upon the missionaty's shoulder, has been described in an earher chap- ter. After the amiexation of Korea bj^ the Japanese, they were for a time somew^hat suspicious of him in view of his known iatimacy with the royal family and his sympathies with the frightened people. But they soon came to learn and to value the high quality and absolute tmstworthiness of the man; and when he left Korea for the last time, the authorities showed him marked honor. On the twentj^- fifth anniversary of his wedding, March 13, 1914, nearly all the notable men and women of Korea's capital called to tender their congratulations — Japanese officials, Korean nobles, members of the consular corps, missionaries and Korean Christians of all communions, and faculties and student deputations of schools, while the tables were loaded with presents. He was a man of conspicuous ability and force of character. His convictions were intense and his temperament enthusiastic, but his spirit was catholic and his vision broad. He was once offered the vice-presidency of a great corporation in America at a salaiy of $25,000 a year, but he felt that his life was consecrated to the mis- sionary enterprise in Korea, and he unhesitatingly declined the offer. It was in the mind of this man that the Chosen Christian College in Seoul was conceived, and it was he who won the good-will of the Japanese Government-General for it, became its first president, and personally secm-ed the first gifts of $77,000 in America for the erection of buildings. Another imion institution in Seoul is the Pierson Memo- rial Bible School, founded by friends of the late Reverend Doctor Arthur T. Pierson, whose flaming zeal did so much to arouse the missionary interest of his generation. While the Chosen Christian College and the Pierson Memorial are jointly supported by Methodists and Presb5^erians, they do not have the united constituency of all the mis- sionary bodies in Korea that is enjoyed by the remarkable 552 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST group of medical institutions known as the Severance Union Medical College and its affiliated Severance Union Hos- pital and Nurses Training School. The hospital is the suc- cessor of the Royal Korean Hospital, which was founded by Horace N. Allen, M.D., in 1884. In the year 1900 0. R. Avison, M.D., who had become its superintendent several years before, enlisted the interest of that Christian phi- lanthropist, Mr. Lewis H. Severance of Cleveland, Ohio, whose generous gifts, followed by those of his son, Mr. John L. Severance, and his daughter, Mrs. Francis F. Prentiss, have made possible one of the most complete medical plants in Asia. The work of its medical and sur- gical staff, headed by Doctor Avison, has won the high commendation of such competent judges as Doctor William H. Welch of Johns Hopkins Medical College in Baltimore and Doctor Simon Flexner of the Rockefeller Bureau of Medical Research in New York, both of whom personally inspected the institution during their trip to the Far East a few years ago. Major-General Arthur MacArthur, of the United States Army, wrote: "In a very extended tour of the entire East, I found no institution doing more beneficent work than the Severance Hospital in Seoul." The gradua- tion in 1908 of the first class to take the fuU course in medi- cine and surgery in the Medical College was recognized by the Japanese as well as by Koreans and foreigners as an occasion of great interest, the seven Koreans receiving their diplomas from no less a personage than Prince Ito, who made a warmly congratulatory address. The Government- General has fixed a high standard for the practice of medi- cine, but the graduates of the Severance Union Medical College meet it, and the first certificates that were issued by the government were given to these young men on the day following their graduation. The semiofficial Seoul Press, edited by a Japanese, devoted six columns of its issue, June 5, to a highly commendatory account of the graduating exercises, and editorially declared that they "marked the opening of a new chapter in the history of medical science in Korea." KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 553 The perplexing problems which mission schools are facing, in connection with the educational regulations of the gov- ernment, have been discussed in a separate chapter, but some other phases of the mission educational problem may- be noted here. The Korea missions were late in beginning educational work. This was partly because the missions themselves were comparatively new. The first Protestant missionary did not enter Korea until a quarter of a century after the beginning of work in Japan and three-quarters of a century after the beginning of work in China. Schools were not necessary to secure a foothold, as in some other lands, and the missionaries were so engrossed by their evangelistic opportunities that everything else fell into the background. There was, too, a period when many of the missionaries feared that large schools would foster the spirit of institutionalism and divert energy from preaching the gospel. While the Presbyterians had some small day- schools of primary grade almost from the beginning of their work, they did not have a permanently established academy for boys until 1900, and only one for girls. The Methodist missionaries opened a boarding-school for boys in Seoul in 1886, and the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society a board- ing-school for girls in the same year, but the former did not reach the status of a high school until 1894, and the latter until some time later. Finally, the missionaries awaked to the fact that an illiterate church among an emotional peo- ple would be built on sand; that congregations could not be maintained on a stable basis by memorizing hymns and texts, learning Bible stories, and listening to the extem- poraneous talks of unschooled local leaders, however de- voted they might be; and that there must be a settled ministry of men competent to preach statedly and intelli- gently. Now, the average mission station has a boarding- school for boys and another for girls, and each of the two largest stations, Seoul and Pyengyang, has the higher in- stitutions already described. Industrial training is wisely provided in several schools. The occasion for this form of educational work lies in the 554 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST desirability of providing some means of self-help for stu- dents who have no money and who ought not to be given a support which would beget an expectation of support through Hfe, and thus pauperize them at the outset. More- over, it is unwise to educate boys away from their former manner of life and not to any other in which they can support themselves. Such industrial training is often es- sential to the accomplishment of the missionary object. A self-supporting, indigenous church cannot be built up unless there are Christians who are able to maintain it. Education in countries whose economic conditions are so radically wrong as they are in many parts of Asia should not ignore practical needs. The Korea missionaries realize the importance of these considerations, and they are train- ing the students in their schools to a wholesome, practical life. The studies that are essential to mental discipline and intellectual culture are carefully taught, but instruc- tion is also provided in farming, gardening, fruit-raising, blacksmithing, carpentering, furniture-making, shoemaking, printing, and other practical trades. In the Hugh O'Neill Jr. Industrial Academy in Syenchyim, for example, there are a model farm, garden and orchard, and shops of various kinds. The boys do all the work of the institution, devoting to it a part of every week-day. The work includes working out by contract, road-making, teaching in the lower schools, bookbinding, hat-making, making straw rope and straw shoes, and preparing materials for additional school-build- ings. The minimum of practicable expenditure has been maintained, and the spirit of seK-dependence is diligently fostered. When these j^oung men are graduated, they are worth something to the state as well as to the church. Training of this kind is given at a number of other mission stations. The schools for girls are equally practical, the courses including sewing, embroidery, cooking, and other household duties and economics. A Korean who marries a girl who has been educated at a mission school gets a wife who knows how to transform a dirty hovel into a decent and well-ordered home. bC Pi CD Ph <^ ^ M KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 555 The educational regulations of the Government-General have caused some anxieties that are quite apart from the mooted question about the teaching of religion. The gov- ernment is not to be blamed for these anxieties since they relate to the question whether the mission institutions can meet the proper requirements of the authorities regarding buildings, grade of work, and qualifications of teachers. The colleges and boarding-schools are loyally endeavoring to do so. The policy of the boards and missions is not to develop a great system of general education which would duplicate the educational system of the government, but to maintain a limited number of institutions of high grade to serve the specific purposes for which Christian work is conducted in a non-Christian land. This much is clear; but the question of elementary schools is far from being so. They are maintained by the Korean Christians in connec- tion with their village churches. Very few of them come up to the standard which the government deems it neces- sary to impose. Their teachers do not know the Japanese language, which the government desires to have taught, and Japanese teachers command higher wages than the schools can pay. To enable these schools to meet the re- quirements would involve expenditures for enlargements and teachers which are far beyond the ability of the poor Korean Christians, and which the mission boards could hardly imdertake in addition to their other obligations. And yet Korea needs all its present schools, and many more. The census does not give the number of children of elemen- tary school age, but Mr. Sekiya, director of the Bureau of Education, estimates it at one-tenth of the population, or nearly 1,700,000. He also says that approximately 75,000 children are in the government elementary schools, and 55,000 in the private schools, a total of only 130,000. It has been said that 98 per cent of the children of school age in Japan are enrolled in schools, and that 98 per cent in Korea are not. This reminds one of Macaulay's Hterary vice — "exaggeration in the interest of vividness"; but it suggests the wide difference between Japan and Korea in 556 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST educational facilities and the urgent need of more adequate school facilities in the latter country. The medical work of the missions is also meeting diffi- culties of a similar kind. The policy of the boards and missions has been to have a hospital at each central station. The typical hospital is a modest building, with accommoda- tions for only a small number of in-patients, and with but one foreign physician, a few instruments, and one or two native assistants and nurses who usually have had no train- ing except what he could give them. As I visited these hospitals, I marvelled at the amount and value of the medical and surgical work that the overworked and scantily equipped doctor was doing — ^treating all sorts of diseases and performing alone major operations which no surgeon in America would undertake without assisting surgeons and several trained nurses. However unsatisfactory such a hospital might be from the view-point of advanced modern equipment, it was in- finitely better than an3^hing that the Koreans had ever known. Their neglect of all sanitary precautions, their filthy houses, their carelessness in food, their drinking from infected wells and streams, and their utter ignorance of the causes of disease combine to give every kind of malady a free course, and the sufferings of the afflicted are often grievous. To people who know nothing of sanitation, who believe disease to be caused by demons who must be propi- tiated, who were accustomed to plaster wax over suppurat- ing sores to keep the discharges from escaping, to feed sickly babies with cucumbers and chunks of half-cooked rice, and to treat pain by sticking a dirty iron needle into the affected part — ^to such people the least that a medical missionary could do with unaided hands was an unspeakable blessing. When a Mr. On, living about twenty-five miles from Taiku, had a bad case of dyspepsia, a sympathetic neighbor tied a cloth swab on the end of a reed, two and a half feet long, and pushed it down his throat as far as it would go, "in order to ram the food past the sticking place." Unfortunately, the reed broke off and left ten and a half KOREAN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 557 inches and the swab in the stomach. After five days of agony, the sufferer was brought to the mission hospital at Taiku, arriving in a pitiable condition. The hospital that one now finds in Taiku had not then been built. There were only two small, straw-thatched, mud-walled buildings, a home-made wooden operating-table, and a small instrument case. This was the equipment of the medical missionary when Mr. On was carried into the compound, nor was there any one who knew how to help in a major operation. Would a surgeon in the United States consent to operate in such circumstances ? But the alternative was death, and Doctor W. 0. Johnson administered an anaesthetic, opened the abdomen and stomach by median incisions, found the piece of reed with the swab attached to it Ijang in the stomach, extracted it, and nursed Mr. On to such a fine recoverv that on the day of his discharge, he ate a big bowl of rice and said he wanted to walk home. But the day for the small, one-man hospital in Korea has passed. The Japanese Government-General rightly holds that a hospital should have a more adequate staff, plant and equipment. Not only this, but the government has opened free public hospitals in many of the cities where the mis- sion hospitals are located, and has provided them with spa- cious buildings, modern operating-rooms and apparatus, and a large corps of physicians, surgeons, and nurses. At Chungju, for example, where the little mission hospital has one physician and no trained nurse, the government hospital has seven doctors, a dentist, an eye, ear, nose, and throat specialist, a druggist, a business superintendent, an ample supply of nurses and helpers, and enough money to make their budget as elastic as their needs. In a large metropolitan centre like Seoul, where half a dozen missions can join in a union institution, and where a great philanthropist can be found to equip it, the problem can be successfully solved, as it has been in the Severance Union Hospital, with its numerous staff and modem facili- ties. But what can the isolated hospitals in the provincial cities do? The medical missionaries have long keenly felt 558 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the limitations to which they have been subjected. They are well-educated men, graduates of American and British medical colleges of recognized standing, thoroughly com- petent professionally. But they cannot do the impossible. Two foreign physicians, at least one foreign trained nurse, and several native physicians and nurses should be deemed a minimum staff for a hospital under present conditions, together with a considerable increase in financial support. The Severance Union Medical College and Nurses Training School are turning out the native physicians and nurses, but the foreign staff and the increased budget must come from America and Great Britain. This is delightfully easy to say; but any one who innocently imagines that it is easy to accomplish little knows how difficult it is to secure enough highly trained physicians and nurses who are will- ing to spend their hves in a squalid Korean city, on a mis- sionary's salary, and with an equipment which, however improved, would still be small compared with the elabor- ately equipped hospitals in the United States. There are no more self-sacrificing men in the world than the medical missionaries in Asia and Africa. They are doing a wonderful work for humanity with the scantiest material resources. To the poor and suffering people the sympathetic and devoted missionary physician is like an angel of mercy. His power in alleviating pain and in heal- ing disease is miraculous in their eyes. They almost wor- ship him, and with reason. Like his divine Master, the Great Physician, he goes "about doing good" and "healing all manner of disease," "for God 'is' with him." CHAPTER XXXIV THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION IN KOREA I HAVE described in another chapter the attitude of the Japanese Government toward missionaries and churches in Japan, the freedom that all religious work enjoys, and the recognition that is given to Christianity and some of its representatives. In Korea, the attitude of the Government- General and its various officials is somewhat different. The reason does not lie in opposition to Christianity as a religion, but in the peculiarity of the political conditions and in the problems which grow out of the influence of the foreign missionary body over the Korean Christians. The Japanese attitude cannot be properly characterized as one of hostihty. Indeed, it frequently has been one of cor- diality and helpfulness, particularly toward the mission- aries in Seoul. This has been especially noticeable in recent years. But for some time after the Japanese occu- pation, there was considerable irritation because of the alleged anti-Japanese attitude of missionaries. The Japa- nese regarded them as inimical to their interests and as more or less consciously giving such encouragement to the Koreans as to embarrass the Government-General. Civil and military officials did not hesitate to express their concern in personal conversations, and the vernacular press in Japan teemed with bitter attacks upon the mis- sionaries, especially those from America. The more care- ful Japan Times undoubtedly reflected the common view when it editorially said: "If there was a time when we en- tertained some misgivings about Christian missionaries in Korea, these suspicions have long since vanished with us. They will find us among the last, therefore, to accuse them of meddling with political affairs in Korea. But the fact 559 560 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST remains that they are very influential among the Koreans, especially amongst the younger and rising generation. It is also a fact that dissatisfied and aggressive Koreans, who are constantly conspiring against the protectorate regime, are largely those who at one time or another have come imder missionary influence. Hence arises the circumstance that missionaries, their churches and schools in Korea, are made the rallying-points for these malcontents, though such a thing may be wholly against the intentions and wishes of these missionaries, as we know they are. However against the aims and endeavors of the missionaries these acts of their fostering may be then, it is nevertheless true that the latter are causing considerable mischief in the friendly re- lations with Japan and Korea. Here then is a very trouble- some problem which we are facing."^ The situation is a complicated one, and we should do the Japanese the justice of attempting to understand their point of view. The Japanese are intensely nationalistic. Indeed they represent the most highly developed type of nationalism in the world. It led them into the war with Russia, since nationalism was endangered by Russian ag- gression in the Far East. And nationalism is the regulative principle of Japanese rule in Korea. Realizing the island isolation and the limited area and productivity of their own land, the Japanese look upon the adjacent peninsula as necessary to afford an outlet for Japan's overcrowded population and to produce the additional food supplies that the nation needs. Moreover, from a military and politi- cal view-point, it is the most exposed portion of the Em- pire and the one regarding which the Japanese are most sensitive. Close to Vladivostok, bordering Manchuria, and only a few hours by steamer from Chefoo, it would be the danger-zone in case of international complications, since Japan there comes in contact with China and some of the powerful nations of Europe — a serious matter in this un- happy era of racial jealousies and strife. Japan has learned this to her bitter cost, as her most serious trouble at home 1 Editorial, Aprils, 1910. THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 561 (the Satsuma Rebellion) and two foreign wars (the China- Japan War and the Russia-Japan War) were caused by the Korean situation. It is clear that if Japan should again become embroiled with China, or with any Western Power, Korea would be the battle-groxmd, as it has been in every war that Japan has ever waged. The attitude of the Koreans, therefore, is of vital importance to the Japanese. While they are not strong from a military point of view, 17,000,000 of sullen, embittered people between a Japanese army and its foreign foe, or at the rear of a Japanese army at the front, would be a serious menace. For these reasons the Japanese feel that they cannot be content with ruling Korea as an outlying dependency, as America rules the Philippines and Great Britain rules India, but that they must amalgamate it with the Empire and as- similate its people, teaching them the Japanese language, infusing them with Japanese ideals, and developing in them patriotic feeling for Japan as their mother country. The Honorable M. Komatsu, then director of the Bureau of Foreign Affairs of the Government-General, wrote Novem- ber 4, 1915: "It is the purpose of Japan to make them (the Koreans) not only good and intelligent but also loyal subjects of the Empire in name and reality." It is inevitable in such circumstances that the Japanese should be sensitive about any influences which they regard as in the slightest degree divisive or as coming between them and the people that they are trying to assimilate, and that they should feel that the carrying out of their policy, in the pecuHar conditions that prevail, justifies close gov- ernmental control. There are two opinions among the Japanese as to the best method of attaining the desired end. The civil party believes that a humane and enhghtened policy is not only the best for the Koreans but the best for the Japanese, conciliating a people who have for centuries feared and distrusted the Japanese, and tending to bind them to their new rulers. The military party believes that the Koreans should be ruled with an iron hand, and so thoroughly cowed 562 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST that they will never dare to assert themselves against the Japanese. The words "civil" and "military" are not en- tirely accurate as descriptive terms. Some civilians ad- vocate the stern policy and some army officers the humane. But, broadly speaking, they serve to indicate the line of cleavage between the two parties. The military party governed Korea immediately after the Russia-Japan War, and its inexorable methods, together with the brutality and greed of a swarm of Japanese adven- turers who came over to exploit the helpless country, were fast reducing the people to the desperation of despair. Civil government was then established by Piince Ito. Under his wise and statesmanlike administration, many needed reforms were inaugurated. Some of the indolent and slovenly Koreans resented the effort to arouse them from their lethargy, compel them to obey sanitary regula- tions, and to work as they had never worked before; but the Japanese were right, and the substantial benefits of their policy soon became so apparent that the better class of Koreans began to recognize them, and the country ap- peared to be entering upon an era of peaceful prosperity. Prince Ito's successor. Viscount Sone, continued this wise poHcy. After an administration which was shortened by illness, he was succeeded in July, 1910, by Count Terauchi. I have had occasion to write more fully of him in another chapter. Suffice it here that he was a soldier by tempera- ment as well as by profession, an able executive, and was believed to hold just and moderate views and to be disposed to continue the enlightened policy of his predecessors. His personal attitude toward Christianity was not sympathetic, partly because his reUgious beliefs were in accord with the dominant systems in Japan, and partly because his ideas of Christianity had been formed during his stay in Paris. He supposed that France was a Christian nation, and when he saw the irreUgion in poHtical circles and the frivohty and dissipation in the social life of the capital, which were more conspicuous in the Paris of that day than they are now, and which did not represent the real character of the THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 563 French people, he concluded that if these were consistent with Christianity, it was not to be admired as a reHgious faith. Nevertheless, he desired to be administratively just in his attitude toward all religions in Korea, Christianity in- cluded. Shortly after his arrival he issued a proclamation in which he said: "The freedom of religious belief is recog- nized in all civilized countries. . . . But those who en- gage in strife on account of sectarian differences, or take part in politics, or pursue political intrigues under the name of religious propaganda, will injure good customs and manners and disturb pubHc peace and order, and as such shall be dealt with by law. There is no doubt, however, that a good religion, be it Buddhism or Confucianism or Christianity, has as its aim the improvement, spiritual as well as material, of mankind at large; and in this not only does it not conflict with administration but really helps it in attaining the purpose it has in view." When a news- paper interviewer asked him his opinion of missionaries, he replied: "Freedom of religion will always be respected, and I am ready to extend due protection and faciUties to the propagation of all religious doctrines, provided they do not interfere with politics. I am one of those who fully appreciate the good work of foreign missionaries, and as we have the same object in view as they, the improving of the general conditions of the people, their work will by no means be subject to any inconvenience. I need scarcely say that all vested rights of foreign residents will be fully respected." Two events, however, induced him to listen to the more extreme party, which was headed by General Akashi, the conmiander of the gendarmerie in Korea. The first was the assassination, in October, 1909, of Prince Ito, by a Korean fanatic who had once been connected with the Roman Cathohc Church. This tragedy, following the shooting in San Francisco in March, 1908, of Mr. D. W. Stevens, the American diplomatic adviser of the Japanese in Seoul, by a Korean who claimed to be a Protestant, 564 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST doubtless brought Count Terauchi to Korea with the feel- ing that he would have to deal with desperate men and with the suspicion that such men might be seeking to shelter themselves in the Christian Church. This suspicion was intensified by various minor acts and reports of Korean revolutionaries, which were less tragic but apparently no less significant. The second event was the growth of revo- lutionary sentiment in various parts of Asia, and particu- larly in China. Every throne felt its effects and the minds of some Koreans were stirred with new hope that they, too, might inaugurate a successful revolt, pathetic as such a hope seems to us. The Japanese party which favored stern treatment of the Koreans made the most of these events. They vehemently argued that the fate of Prince Ito showed the futility of a concihatory policy and that if Japan did not want to have a revolution on its hands, it must adopt such sternly re- pressive measures that the Koreans would learn once for all that Japan would not brook opposition. Like men of the same type in other lands, these Japanese "Jingoes" luridly described the perils to which the nation was exposed and the necessity of giving the mihtary secret service and the gendarmerie ample powers to meet them. When the Governor General made a journey, they surrounded him with poHce and gave him the impression that nothing but their vigilance saved his life. For example, when he was to pass through Syenchyun, December 28, 1910, the police ordered the students of the mission school, the Hugh O'Neill Jr. Industrial Academy, to be at the railway station in honor of his passage. Before the boys were permitted to enter the station enclosure, they were searched by the pohce and deprived of their pocket-knives. Two six-year- old tots, whose little legs had been unable to keep up with the procession and who arrived breathlessly a few minutes afterward, were also searched in the same manner and their pencil-knives taken away. The Data for Prosecution, issued by the Japanese in the spring of 1912, as a "statement of the facts connected with the indictment of the accused THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 565 Koreans" in the "Korean Conspiracy Case/' included the following: "At Syenchyun, the conspirators proceeded on the 28th [Dec. 1910] to the station again and ranged themselves on the platform with the Japanese and Koreans who came there to welcome the Gov- ernor General. The train arrived about noon, and every one of the would-be assassins watched intently for the opportunity, having ready his revolver or short sword under his long cloak. The Governor General descended from the train and saluting the welcomers passed within three or four steps of the conspirators. Owing, however, to the strict vigilance of the police oflBcers and others, they could not accomplish their nefarious object." The Data for Prosecution described several other alleged attempts to assassinate the Governor-General at railway stations, the accounts closing with substantially the same formula: "The Governor-General passed closely by the would-be assassins, but the vigilance of the gendarmerie gave them no chance." It would occur to the average man that as railway-station premises in Korea are carefully en- closed and as no one was permitted to pass the gates, when the Governor-General came, without being searched, "the would-be assassins" could hardly have brought into the sta- tion "ready revolvers or short swords," except with the con- nivance of the police, and that if they did get inside with such arms and with the intention of killing the Governor- General, they had ample opportunity to do so at some one of the several times described by the police when "he passed closely by them." It is difficult to read this official docu- ment without getting the impression that the police who furnished the material were very desirous of having the Governor-General imderstand that nothing but their "vigi- lance" had kept him from being assassinated. It required either malice, or such a panic-stricken imagination as the Russian naval officers had when they fired on fishing-boats in the North Sea, to see dangerous assassins in trembling little boys whose very penknives had been taken away from them. 566 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Evidences multiplied that this military party was in the saddle. Unifonned gendarmes swanned throughout the country, particularly in the north. Secret poHce were ubiquitous. Spies attended every meeting of Koreans. All organizations were suspected of revolutionary designs. Perhaps some organizations had such designs. We do not know that they had; but every country in Asia is honey- combed with guilds and societies of various kinds, many of them more or less political. The Koreans would be lacking in the commonest elements of human nature if some of them might not have done what every subject people has done since the world began — ^take secret counsel as to how the yoke of the alien conqueror might be thrown off. From all political movements, however, the missionaries and the leading Korean Christians resolutely sought to keep the churches aloof. Obedience to "the powers that be" was preached from every pulpit. The church must have nothing to do with pohtics, the Christians were told. Some Christians who were suspected of activity in poHtical movements were not permitted to hold office in the church, and in some cases were excommimicated. So strong was this determination of the missionaries and Korean church leaders that it was not uncommon for Koreans outside of the churches to taunt Christians with being on the side of the enemies of their country, and for the missionaries to be told that if it were not for them, a revolution would have been started long ago. During my last visit I was at pains to question the missionaries and leading Korean Christians regarding their attitude toward the Japanese. The con- ferences were in private homes, and those who were present had no motive for not talking frankly. Without exception they rephed that loyal recognition was the duty of every Christian and in line with the teaching of Christ, who said : "Render unto Caesar the things which be Caesar's," and of Paul, who said: "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers." One of the missionaries made the point that when a missionary opposes wrong he should not be understood as opposing the government. It is the duty of THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 567 missionaries to oppose evil wherever it exists and under whatever auspices. When they protest against the opium traffic, they are simply doing what the Japanese Govern- ment is enforcing by law in Japan. When they denounce the estabhshment of brothels, they are combating vice, not the government. After going back and forth through Korea and getting the opinions of missionaries and Korean Christians from one end of the country to the other, I be- came satisfied that the missionaries were disposed to sup- port the government in every proper way. In spite of this policy, however, the churches did not escape hostile espionage and they soon began to feel the unpleasant effects. For more than two years reports from various parts of the country described growing suspicion and harshness by Japanese local gendarmes toward the "helpless Korean Christians. The correspondence indicated that something more was involved in the course of the gen- darmerie than could be accounted for by the assumption that, wholly unknown to the missionaries, there was a plot against the government of which certain Korean Chris- tians were cognizant and in which some may have par- ticipated. When the Japanese were charged with persecuting Chris- tianity, they replied that the liberty which Christianity enjoyed in Japan proved that they were not persecuting it in Korea. We believe this to be true. A distinction, how- ever, must be observed between the Japanese conception of Christianity and the Japanese conception of the church as an organization. In Japan, there is no hostility to the church because it is composed of Japanese, some of them of high rank, and it is controlled by them. The missionaries co-operate with the church, but they have little or no voice in its management. In Korea the church is more than twice as large as the church in Japan and, in proportion to the population, many times larger, and it is of course com- posed of Koreans. The Japanese desire to control every- thing within their dominions, as foreign business men have learned to their cost. This is particularly true in Korea, 568 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST where they deem it necessaiy to their plans to be absolutei masters. Now the Japanese saw in the Korean churches numerous and powerful organizations of their subjects which they did not control. They observed the devotion of the people to the church, a devotion almost unparalleled elsewhere. The life of the Korean was singularly empty and forlorn be- fore Christianity came to him. When he heard the gospel preached, he eagerly accepted it and found in its services inspirations and companionships that he had never before known. He could say with Paul : ' ' For me to hve is Christ. ' ' When he had a dispute with his brother Christian, he re- membered the New Testament question: "Dare any of you having a matter against his neighbor go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints?" So he takes his case, not to the Japanese policeman or magistrate, but to his pastor or the missionary. This leaves the Japanese official with little to do and forces him to see the life of the people, whom he is supposed to govern, go on without him. A Japanese town of 8,000 inhabitants probably has 100 or 200 Christians. The church edifice is a comparatively small building and the congregations are largely outnum- bered by Buddhist or secular gatherings. But of the 8,000 inhabitants of the Korean town of Syenchyun, where the trouble first became acute, about half are Christians, while the adjacent villages are also largely Christian. The church and the mission school are the largest and most conspicuous buildings in the place. There are no Buddhist temples and no secular attractions which can draw more than a few score persons. Congregations of Christians, however, throng the church with 1,200 or 1,500 Koreans several times on Sundays, and the mid-week prayer meetings are attended by from 700 to 1,000. Similar conditions prevail in many other towns and villages. Presbyterians alone reported at that time 60,736 Christians, including enrolled adherents, in Syenchyun and Pj^engyang (Japanese Heijo) and their tributary villages. As the Japanese police noted the multi- tudes of Christians flocking to the churches, they irritably THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 569 wondered why these Christians met so often and what they were doing. Spies were sent to find out. Imperious as Russian police in hunting poKtical agitators among students, eager to obtain the rewards which were beheved to be be- stowed upon the pohce who were most successful in ferreting out treason, and imfamiliar with Christian terminolog}'-, their suspicions were aroused as they heard the great con- gregations sing with fervor such hymns as: "Onward, Christian Soldiers, Marching as to warl" "Stand up, stand up for Jesus, Ye soldiers of the Cross!" and then listen to a stirring sermon which perhaps personi- fied the forces of evil in the heart, as Paul did, and summoned the believer to cast them out. One of the missionaries, Mr. George S. McCune, of Syenchyun, in one of his daily Bible talks to his students in the Hugh O'Neill Jr. Academy, expounded the narrative of David and Goliath, emphasizing the conventional lesson that the weak man whose cause is just and whose heart is pure can overcome the strongest. This was promptly reported to the authorities as treasona- ble, since Mr. McCune must have intended to teach that David symbolized the weak Korean and Goliath the strong Japanese. One pastor was arrested because he preached about the Kingdom of Heaven; he was told that there was "only one kingdom out here and that is the kingdom of Japan." The Christian Church opposes immorality, the morphine habit, and cigarette smoking, especially by the women and children, and this aroused the anger of certain Japanese who have done not a little to encourage these vices in Korea. Pastor Kil of Pyengyang advised the par- ents of his congregation not to allow their children to smoke cigarettes or to work in the recently estabhshed cigarette factory. Shortly afterward, he was warned by the police that, as the manufacture of tobacco was a government monopoly, his advice was treasonable and must not be re- 570 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST peated. Thus the poUce placed wrong constructions upon what they saw and heard, and imagined in a vague but bitter way that it was inimical to the interests of Japan to have such a large organization of Koreans that was not amenable to their control. The suspicions of the Japanese were probably strengthened by the widely published statements regarding the promi- nence of Christians in the revolutionary movement in China. Every American and European knows that while Christi- anity awakens the minds of men, makes them impatient of injustice and arouses them to demand an honest and en- lightened government, there is absolutely nothing in the teaching of Christ to lead Christians to conspire against a government, unless it is an evil and oppressive one. Japa- nese Christians are famous for their loyalty to their Em- peror, and British Christians are more devoted to their Ejng than American Christians are to their President. If a government is just, Christianity is absolutely indifferent as to whether it is monarchical or republican. Indeed, the majority of Christians throughout the world live content- edly under monarchies. Christians in China opposed the Manchu Dynasty, not because it had an Emperor, but be- cause it was hopelessly reactionary and corrupt. As a matter of fact, the revolutionary spirit was strongest among the Chinese who were educated in Japan. But the Japa- nese police in Korea got it into their heads that the great organization of the Korean church was a hotbed of revo- lutionary opportunity, and they jealously watched it. The so-called "Million EvangeHstic Campaign" in 1910 and 1911 intensified these suspicions. It was a concerted effort of the churches to seek the conversion of a milHon souls. But the Japanese misunderstood it, or feared that such an enormous reinforcement would make the leaders of the church overshadow the civil authorities still more. The police accordingly redoubled their activities. Gen- darmes in uniform and spies in citizens' dress attended the special services. Pastors were required to report the names of converts at pohce headquarters. A gendarme THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 571 ei^teied a private house, drew his sword and threateningly asked why the owner had joined "the Jesus Church/' the night before. Shopkeepers who became Christians were visited by the poHce and remonstrated with for closing their places of business on Sunday. In one large country church, a Japanese official walked into the pulpit at a Sunday ser- vice and denounced Christianity to the congregation. Probably one reason for the activity of the police was the desire to find out whether the Christians of Korea were in- clined to imitate the example of their brethren in China and whether Baron Yun Chi Ho was ambitious of becoming a Korean Sun Yat Sen. The strain was intensified by the educational situation, which I have described in a separate chapter. The Japa- nese attach great importance to their public school system and to the necessity of managing it as a department of the government. When a poHceman called on a Korean par- ent and sharply asked him why he did not send his children to the pubHc school instead of to the church school, the timid Korean was apt to conclude that he was in danger of punishment if he did not heed what he regarded as a man- date; and when so many of the teachers and pupils of the mission schools were among those who were arrested, the conclusion appeared to be justified. The whole extensive system of church primary schools in Korea was in jeop- ardy under the combined exactions of Japanese regula- tions and the course of the local police in intimidating parents. In the fall of 1911, police suspicion culminated in the so-called "Korean Conspiracy Case." Christians in vari- ous places were arrested until hundreds were in jail. So many teachers and students of the Presbyterian Academy at Syenchyun were taken that it had to be closed. Pastors, elders, deacons, and other leading church members were also seized and sent handcuffed to the capital. The police refused to make any explanations either to the arrested men or to their frightened fanfiilies. Many of the men and boys were kept in jail for months without proper food or 572 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST clothing for the cold weather, without knowing the charges against them, and without being permitted to confer with counsel. Finally some were released, and the remainder were brought to trial, June 28, 1912, in the District Court in Seoul, on a charge of conspiracy to murder Governor General Terauchi, to which it was said they had confessed. The testimony was not fairly interpreted to the judges, who did not understand the Korean language; counsel for the defense were not permitted to produce witnesses who could have testified to alibis, and the "confessions" turned out to have been obtained in secret examinations under police torture, and were repudiated in open court by the men who were alleged to have made them. The trial was a travesty of justice. But the powerful gendarmerie had committed themselves too deeply to accept the humiliation of defeat, and on their insistence the complaisant judges, September 28, sentenced 105 of the accused men to terms of imprisonment ranging from five to ten years. All of the condemned men were of high character, one of them being Baron Yun Chi Ho, a former member of the Korean Cab- inet, president of the Southern Methodist College at Songdo, vice-president of the Korea Y. M. C. A., and widely known for integrity as well as ability. The case was car- ried to the Court of Appeals, which gave a new trial begin- ning November 26, 1912, and which resulted, March 21, 1913, in the acquittal of all the defendants except six. The latter were sentenced to six years' imprisonment. Baron Yun Chi Ho among them. After further appeals, the Supreme Court at Seoul, October 9, 1913, ruled that the proceedings in the Court of Appeals had been "regular," and, without passing on the merits of the case, sustained the verdict. By this time many Japanese, as well as prac- tically all foreign observers, realized that the "conspiracy" had been manufactured out of the imaginations of hostile and overzealous police, and believed that the government would take advantage of the first convenient opportunity for liberating the men whom everybody now believed to be innocent. This opportunity came in connection with the THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 573 coronation of the Emperor in February, 1915, at which time all the accused men were released as a mark of "imperial clemency." The collapse of the "Conspiracy Case" cleared the air considerably. It taught the Japanese that the mission- aries were not hostile to Japanese iTile, and it emphasized to the missionaries the necessity for special care in their dealings with officials and people in matters which affect the government. The resultant improvement in relation- ships has been marked. Nevertheless, a certain uneasiness continues to exist. The Japanese see that in this country, for whose people they feel that they should be the special guides and counsellors, there are over 400 foreign mission- aries, many of them resident in Korea before the Japanese annexed it, compactly organized into missions, strong in the principal cities of the country, and having great influ- ence with hundreds of thousands of Koreans. Whatever may be the attitude of the lower police officials and the venders of morphine and panders of vice, intelligent Japa- nese thoroughly respect the missionaries. They know them to be Christian gentlemen who are devoting their lives to unselfish labor for the Korean people. Many Japanese would agree with the traveller who wrote from Korea: "Here has been wrought one of the greatest Christian ac- complishments in the world's history. The lives of the Americans who have accomplished this great work are an open book. I hold no brief for the missionary. But I have seen much of the work being done here and I know the men who are doing it. Picture to yourself the saintliest man of your acquaintance — the man whose character is so far above reproach that no man has ever questioned it even in his own mind; the man who, filled with the spirit of Christianity, lives his religion every day of his Hfe; the man who asks nothing else but opportunity to devote all his talents and all his energies to unselfish labor in his Master's service. Think of that man, and you have the American missionary in Korea as I know him to be." The Japan Advertiser editorially referred to this opinion and added: 574 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST "We do not believe these statements will be gainsaid by- unprejudiced critics." Just because of this character, the Korean Christians look up to the missionaries with an affection and respect bordering upon veneration. When they were ignorant, depressed, and superstitious, the missionaries brought them knowledge and hope, liberated them from the fear of demons, ministered to their sick in hospitals, taught their children in schools, visited the poor, comforted the dying, and preached to all the people ''good tidings of great joy." The simple-hearted Koreans, temperamentally affectionate and responsive to a high degree, gladly responded to the message and gave to the men and women who brought it an imstinted measure of devotion. The missionaries are the great men in Korea. Their influence is moral rather than authoritative, for the Korean churches are not sub- ject to the missions, and the latter are doing all they can to induce the churches to assume the management of their own religious activities. But to Japanese observers the ascendancy of the missionary body appears large. Every government in the world is insistent upon the recognition of its authority in its own domain, especially in annexed or colonial territory. We know how particular the British are about this in India, the French in Madagascar, and the Americans in the Phihppines. The Japanese are a high- spirited people, legitimately sensitive about their national prerogatives and resentful of anything that looks like an infringement upon them. As a matter of fact, the missionaries, in so far as they have touched pohtical matters at all, have used their great influence to induce the Koreans to acquiesce in Japanese rule. Indeed it has often been said that if it had not been for the missionaries, a revolution would have broken out when Korea was annexed to Japan. The Japanese fuUy appreciate this; but they are restive imder a situation in which foreigners apparently have power to make or im- make a revolution among their own subjects. Japanese national pride demands Japanese supremacy within Japa- THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 575 nese territory. A Japanese official who sees himself over- shadowed by an American missionary is more or less un- consciously jealous and is apt to feel that such pre-eminence is prejudicial to the interests of Japan, and that in some way it must be broken. It is clear that the missionaries are not to be blamed for this situation. On the contrary, it is a high tribute to their worth. Surely they should not be censured for being men of such piuity of character, kind- ness of heart, and unselfishness of conduct that the people trust them. We cannot tell them to act so badly that they will forfeit the respect of the Korean Christians. But it is equally clear that the missionaries and their boards must consider the view-point of the Japanese and do what they can to meet it. We do not insist that all of the several hundred American missionaries have been wholly without fault. In the midst of a frightened and helpless people, seeing what they be- lieved to be injustice and cruelty, anxious for the churches and schools which represent the toils of many years, they could not be reasonably expected to act as if they were deaf and dumb. Let it be conceded that some of them have contributed heat as well as light to the question imder con- sideration. Their position was one of exceeding difficulty. They strongly sympathized with Japan during the war v/ith Russia. When, however, Japan at the close of the war began the actual work of reorganizing the country, the missionaries could not be blind to the numerous acts of injustice that were committed. They saw that many of the Japanese in Korea were not the best representatives of the spirit and purpose that Japan had shown in the war and that she professed to be desirous of maintaining before the world. They saw the property of the Koreans taken without due compensation, and that it did not help the poor people in the least to be told that the compensation had been paid to corrupt officials, who had pocketed it. The missionaries, living in various parts of the country, intimately acquainted with the Koreans and in close con- tact with them, regarded by them as their best friends and 576 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST natural protectors, were in a position to see better than any one else in the world the wrongs and hardships of the people under their care. And yet the missionaries were friends not only of the Koreans but of the Japanese. In these circumstances, it was and it is now exceedingly difficult for the missionaries to hold a mediate position. When the Korean Christians appealed to them for help, it was natural that they should speak in their behalf to the Japanese; and when the Japanese, as was sometimes the case, declined under various pretexts to give the desired relief, or failed to do so, the missionaries were as naturally troubled. Their situation is still one of great delicacy. A close observer remarked only a few months ago that multi- tudes of the Koreans are not reconciled to Japanese rule; that they simply acquiesce in it as they know that they are helpless; and that they are hoping and waiting for some other nation to come in and release them. If the mission- aries show sympathy with the Koreans, they arouse the resentment of the Japanese; and if they show sympathy with the Japanese, they arouse the resentment of the Ko- reans and lose their influence with them. It is a case of walking a tight rope between the devil and the deep sea. The armchair critic ten thousand miles away may well consider whether he would or could have walked as straight as the missionaries did. They have borne themselves with remarkable moderation, dignity, and self-restraint. They may need to be cautioned and advised by men to whom distance can give greater calmness of judgment; but such caution and advice they have not only shown themselves willing to receive, but they have earnestly sought them. It is not true, as some Japanese newspapers have alleged, that the missionaries are anti-Japanese. Prince Ito was well satisfied with their attitude during his administration. He personally told me so when we discussed the question together during my second visit. When a Korean official. Sung Pyong-chun, Minister for Home Affairs in the Korean Government, was reported by a Tokyo paper as having charged that Korean Christians "are united in the common object of opposing the present administration and that they are backed by a group of American missionaries," the missionaries in Seoul communicated with Mr. Sung, who denied that he had made the statement attributed to him; and the Honorable Thomas J. O'Brien, then American Am- bassador to Japan, addressed a communication to Prince Ito, asking him to state whether he had any reason to be- lieve that the statements attributed to Mr. Sung were correct. The following is an extract from Prince Ito's reply: "I met a number of missionaries at Pyengyang, where many of them reside, and had an opportunity to as- certain that they not only take no steps whatever in oppo- sition to the administration of the Korean Government, but that they are in sympathy with the new regime in- augurated after the estabhshment of the Residency-General and are endeavoring to interpret to the Korean people the true purpose of that regime. I am personally acquainted with many American missionaries stationed at Seoul, with whose conduct and views I am fully famihar. The fact that they are in sympathy with the new regime in Korea, and that, in co-operation with the Residency-General, they are endeavoring to enlighten the Korean people, does not, I trust, require any special confirmation." If the critics of missionaries believe that this situation was altered for the worse under subsequent administrations, they might discreetly ask themselves why American, Eng- lish, Canadian, and Australian missionaries, who had re- ceived such high indorsement from Prince Ito, were led to change their attitude. The Japanese editor of the Fukuin Shimpo, of Tokyo, while suggesting that "the foreign mis- sionaries in. Korea seem to be moved by various baseless imaginations resulting from a misunderstanding of the facts," candidly added: "Nevertheless, there is probably material for reflection and improvement in the causes and conditions which have stirred their minds to such a degree, and a prompt investigation would benefit the nation." However just may have been the intentions of the Japanese Government, the administration in Korea was 578 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST plainly interpreting its problem in terms of the supposed military necessities of the Empire in occupying an exposed frontier. Whatever defense may be made of this as a political measure, it opened a nervous prospect to the helpless people who were thus subordinated to a war policy, and to the missionaries whose influence was considered an obstruction to the military purposes for which the country was held. A large number of Japanese keenly felt the un- fortunate position into which the peremptory course of the gendarmerie had brought their country. They advocated a more humane policy and the wisdom as well as the human- ity of fair and conciliatory treatment of the Koreans. They did not resent the friendly interest of Western peoples in their problems and in the effect of a militaristic policy upon miUions of people in whose welfare British and American Christians have been deeply interested for more than a quarter of a century, for whom they have undertaken ex- tensive educational, evangelistic, and medical missionary work which the Japanese themselves have long welcomed and warmly commended in their own country, and which many Japanese have expressly approved and encouraged in Korea. The question of Sunday observance has also caused em- barrassment. Nowhere else in the world is the day more scrupulously kept by Christian people. With such strict ideas regarding its sanctity, one can imagine the dismay when Koreans, Christians included, are called upon by the government to work on Sunday, not on account of any extraordinary emergency of war or fire or epidemic, but in ordinary public tasks. The Japanese attitude is indicated by the following extracts from the reply of a prominent government official to complaints on this subject: "I have recently been told that not a few Korean Christians are dis- satisfied with the authorities, because they are often re- quired to contribute labor on Sundays, and schools also not infrequently make excursions on Sundays. I have also been told that certain teachers of private schools re- fused to attend the examination for private school teachers THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 579 because it was held on a Sunday, with the result that they lost the opportunity to take the examination. I am very sorry that those persons fall so short of a right understand- ing of conditions in Japan. Japan does not make Chris- tianity her national rehgion. It is no v/onder then that things in Japan, whether political, educational, or social, are not necessarily in conformity with the customs of West- ern Christian coimtries. It is true, Sunday is observed as a holiday by government offices and schools, but the ob- servance has no religious basis in it, the day being fixed simply as the day on which offices or schools are to be closed. In the same sense, banks and companies also observe Sunday as a day of rest. Under the circumstances, the government, as well as schools, is quite at Hberty to make any use of Sunday, if the authorities consider it necessary to do so." ^ This explanation will doubtless be considered quite satis- factory by those who hold the Prussian idea of the state — that the state is above moral obHgation; that whatever it does is right; that the individual subject must render it implicit obedience irrespective of the moral quality of its acts; that one can be a Christian as a private person and at the same time a pagan as a citizen; and that rehgion has nothing to do with poHtics or business. The missionaries, of course, reahze that^ they cannot expect the Japanese Government to enforce their ideas of Sabbath observance; but they are unable to show the Korean Christians how a man can divide his life into such separate water-tight com- partments that he can be both Christian and non-Christian at the same time, and consistently conform to each of two confficting standards of duty. Of course difficulties of this sort are to be expected in a land where the prevailing religious beliefs differ from ours, and missionaries and native Christians must meet them as best they can. For- tunately, there is now a growing disposition on the part of many officials to be as considerate as possible in dealing * Published by the Seoul Press, June 22, 1916. 580 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST with the conscientious convictions of the Korean Christians when the latter exercise tact in presenting their case. Ordinance No. 83 "prescribing rules for the conduct of religious propagation," promulgated August 19, 1915, and which went into effect the 1st of October following, does not in itself hamper Christian workers, but it exposes them to the misunderstanding or caprice of any official who is inclined to be exacting or suspicious. The missionaries at first were greatly concerned, and the Federal Council of the missions in Korea, at its annual meeting in October, 1915, appointed a committee to confer with Mr. Usami, Director of the Bureau of Internal Affairs and of Religion. He re- ceived the committee very cordially, and the Coimcil, on hearing its report, voted to "record our pleasure that our apprehensions have been allayed." An amendment to substitute the word "removed" for "aUayed" was voted down. The rules are numerous, and a good deal of time is required to carry them into effect and to make all the detailed reports that they call for. No special harm has resulted, but Christian workers, both native and foreign, understand that the path of governmental favor, like the path of eternal life, is straight and narrow. A comparatively minor question, and yet one involving many perplexities, arises from the fact that the missionary boards operating in Korea own many pieces of church prop- erty, the titles to which, in most cases, were secured years ago when Korea was in a chaotic condition. The titles were obtained under Korean customs and laws, and do not ac- cord with the requirements of Japanese laws. Deeds issued prior to the annexation are not recognized as valid by the Government-General but must be presented to a Japanese official with proofs of ownership, when a new deed will be given. These proofs are not always easy to produce, as a given tract may have been made up of half a dozen or more small pieces that were bought from as many different Koreans, as some of the original owners may not be living, and as the papers that they gave may have been of a kind that a careful Japanese official does not find satisfactory THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY C0:MPLICATI0N 581 from the view-point of i^resent-day legal procedure. In the case of the campus of a large school, more than six years of effort on the part of the missionaries did not succeed in securing a new deed from the Japanese Government. In- terested parties might make no small trouble if these prop- erty rights were to be challenged under the strict provisions of Japanese statutes. The properties were acquired in good faith, were obtained from the original owners by fair purchase, and whatever defects there are in the titles were not the fault of the missionaries but were due to existing conditions at the time. The missionaries have worked hard to tiy to get these titles into satisfactory shape, and have measurably succeeded m some stations, but in others many properties are still in an unsatisfactory condition. It is an awkward and embarrassing fact that negotiations wdth the authorities regarding Korean religious matters have to be conducted by foreigners. Whenever a question affecting Christian work develops in Japan, there are able Japanese Christians who can handle it directly with their own government. The time will come when this course can be taken in Korea; but, unfortunately, it cannot be taken yet. Korea and Japan differ as widely in religious conditions as Mr. Komatsu states that they differ in educa- tional conditions; and just as he has said that "the opinion that the same educational policy as pursued in Japan should be applied to Korea emanates from an erroneous concep- tion of conditions existing in the two different parts of the country," so we may say in respect of the present question that a method of procedure which can be adopted in Japan cannot now be adopted in Korea. The missionary represen- tatives have no alternative, therefore, but to confer with the authorities themselves in spite of the delicacies that inhere in the fact that they are citizens of other countries. Americans are at a special disadvantage, since the Japanese Imperial Government can point to objectionable discrimina- tion against its subjects in California. These considera- tions render it all the more vital that we should show the most scrupulous regard for the dignity of the Government- 582 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST General, and make perfectly evident that we have no desire whatever to intervene between it and its own subjects. On the other hand, high Japanese officials, by conferring with missionaries and representatives of mission boards, frankly recognize that, in the peculiar circumstances that prevail, the missions and boards have a legitimate status as one of the factors in the pending problem. Not to dwell further on these phases of the question, let us ask: What can be done to promote satisfactory rela- tions between the missionaries and the Japanese in Korea? The boards frankly recognize that there are some things which they and the missionaries can do, or rather con- tinue to do: cultivate friendly relations with Japanese officials who are willing to be on such terms with them; scrupulously respect and obey, and teach the Korean Christians to respect and obey, the lawfully con- stituted authorities; limit their activities to missionary duties and keep themselves and, as far as possible, the Korean churches wholly apart from all political matters; take any necessary complaints directly to the Japanese and not to the consular or diplomatic representatives of their respective governments — save when their treaty rights as American or British citizens have been violated, and even then not unless the violation was very serious ; refuse to shield any Koreans who, although calling themselves Christians, are justly accused of crime; recognize the Japanese nation as the absolute legal master of Korea, which, on the whole, means well and which should be helped and not hindered in all its legitimate policies and methods; and, finally, en- courage such relations between Korean and Japanese Christians as will tend to unite the two peoples in bonds of amity. Japan's purpose to assimilate Korea in population and sentiment as well as in territory lies beyond missionary control. It is a settled national policy, and mission workers should accommodate themselves to it and scrupulously avoid acts and utterances that are incompatible with it. In short, they should bear in mind that the Japanese are THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 583 trying to amalgamate Korea and Japan and that they will resent any foreign influence which separates religiously and educationally peoples whom they are determined to unify politically. Korea is the broad highway from Japan to Manchuria, to China, to Russian territory, to the inter- national opportunities that Japan covets and the interna- tional dangers that she fears. Influence with the new Chinese Republic is the ambition of all the world-powers. With most of them active in China, the Japanese naturally feel that an imobstructed Korea is an absolute necessity of their national'life and that they cannot permit any anti- Japanese element in it, or look with unconcern upon any organization, however neutral, which is not amenable to their control. Whether we like this or not, the fact must be squarely faced. We are not dealing with peoples who, like Englishmen and Americans, are good-naturedly willing to allow their subjects to do almost anything they please short of open revolt; but we are dealing with Asiatics to whom freedom of speech, the rights of man, the privilege of peaceable assemblage, and the separation of church and state are comparatively new conceptions, and who will not condone in Korea what Americans indifferently over- look in the Philippines. Acts that look to us Hke dehberate hostility to Christianity may not be so intended. We must recur again and again to the interpretative fact that Japan is not a democracy but a paternal autocracy, which regulates the Hves of its subjects, which wants to know what they do and say, and which brings every activity under careful scrutiny and precise regulations. Missions and churches are watched and regulated just as everythiag else is. We should not, therefore, infer enmity from acts which appear arbitrary from the view-point of a Western democ- racy which gives itself no concern whatever about the activi- ties of religious and educational organizations so long as they keep within the broadest general limits of law and order. We frankly admit that there are deeply rooted difiicul- ties in the whole situation. Conquerors and conquered 584 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST have seldom mingled as equals anywhere in the world, and then only after the lapse of many generations. In the Phihppine Islands, a wide social chasm has opened between Americans and Filipinos, and missionaries are fast becom- ing the only class which associates with the people on terms of equality. Japanese and Koreans are separated by deep racial, linguistic, hereditaiy, and temperamental differences, and by social prejudices as stubborn as those which divided Jews and Samaritans of old. Now that the Koreans are beginning to adopt Japanese dress, the physical difference between the two peoples is becoming less marked, and of late years intermarriages have become more common. An eminent Japanese has expressed the opinion that inter- marriage will eventually solve this problem. But at pres- ent, while many Japanese are kind to the Koreans, as the best Japanese are, it is apt to be with the type of kindness which characterizes a Georgia gentleman toward a negro. The Georgian may be a friend and benefactor of the negro, but he does not consider himself on the latter's level. The Korean resents this attitude even more than the negro does, for his ancestry is not one of slavery and African barbarism but of the traditions of a proud and ancient nation. He feels that Korea is the land of his fathers and that the Japanese are aliens who have no right there except on the low plane of physical force. Is unity of feeling to be reason- ably expected in such circumstances? It is notorious that the white man the world over deems himself superior to men of other races, and that even missionaries have not always succeeded in preventing the development of social cleavage between their own famihes and native Christians. We should therefore be slow to criticise the Japanese for an attitude which we also have to struggle to overcome. There is also something that the Japanese can do: seek a better knowledge of what the missionaries and churches really are and are doing; study the beneficial changes that Christianity has wrought in the lives of the people; realize that good men who try to conform their lives to the teach- ings of Christ are never a hindrance to the state but are an THE POLITICO-MISSIONARY COMPLICATION 585 asset of enormous value; consider that a missionaiy's criti- cism of injustice on the part of some Japanese is not to be construed as antagonism to Japan as a nation or a reflec- tion upon its honor; and cease to deal with the Korean Christians through the kind of gendarmes and judges who brought about "The Korean Conspiracy Case" and per- verted the wise policy of Prince Ito and the good inten- tions of the Japanese people into a policy of espionage and intimidation. The situation in Korea imdoubtedly requires a firm government; but the firmness should be that of modern statesmanship and not that of a feudalism which would reproduce in Korea conditions which the Japanese abolished in Japan more than a generation ago. Ameri- cans, who remember with shame how their own local officials once treated the Indians and the conquered Southern people after the Civil War in the United States, may humbly hope that the Japanese will learn from our bitter experience that the soldier's rifle and the policeman's club do not make loyal citizens of a defeated people. CHAPTER XXXV JAPANESE NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS The considerations described in the chapter on "The Politico-Missionary CompHcation in Korea" have found another and more serious illustration in the restrictions which the Japanese Government has imposed upon mission schools. The resultant situation has aroused such wide- spread interest in the educational as well as the missionary world, and it throws so much light on poHtical conditions that it merits careful study. In carrying out their policy of assimilating Korea with Japan, the Japanese did not fail to perceive the difficulty of changing the attitude of mature men who have been moulded by the traditions of their own race, and who have personal memories of the tumults and sorrows that attended the subjugation of their native land. But if the children could be trained to the altered conditions, a single genera- tion would see the desired change in sentiment. The Japa- nese therefore turned their attention to the schools. Doctor Tan Shidehara, who had been educational adviser to the Korean Government, was instructed to study the educa- tional systems of America and Europe and to report upon their adaptation to dependent peoples. The Imperial Edu- cation Society of Japan announced that the purpose of the government was to extend to the people of Korea the prin- ciples of national education, as set forth in the Imperial Rescript of 1890, in such a manner as to make the Koreans understand that the union of the two countries came about inevitably as a consequence both of their historic associa- tion and of their geographical position; to inspire in them the hope of playing a noble part as Japanese subjects on the present and future stage of world-civilization; to bring 586 NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 587 them to an intelligent comprehension of the need, under existing conditions, of the general use of the Japanese lan- guage; and to create a new bureau under the direct control of the Governor-General to undertake the important work of compiling special text-books for Korean schools. This programme was energetically undertaken. Free public schools were opened under Japanese teachers and Korean parents were urged to send their children to them. The Japanese soon discovered, however, that their schools were not popular with the Koreans. This was partly be- cause parents hesitated to put their children imder alien conquerors whose purpose was to wean them away from their national ideas, customs, and language, and turn them into Japanese; partly because most parents who coveted a modern education for their sons and daughters were already sending them to the mission schools, where they were edu- cated in their own language as Koreans; and partly because many parents were Christians who wanted their children trained under strong religious influence. Indeed, nearly all the elementary village schools were church schools, directly connected with and supported by the local congregations. The school usually occupies a church building and is an integral part of church activities. Pupils who complete the course of these elementary schools go to the mission acad- emies and boarding-schools at the central stations, from which in due time they can go to a mission college, so that their entire training is under religious auspices. Most serious of all, from the view-point of the Japanese, is the fact that this whole educational system is either directly controlled, as in the case of the academies and boarding- schools, or indirectly influenced, as in the case of the ele- mentary church schools, by foreigners — American mission- aries. At this point another factor must be taken into account. The Japanese regard education as a function of the state; not in the sense of Great Britain and the United States, which deem it their duty to provide free education for those who need or desire it, but in the sense that the state must 588 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST absolutely control the education of its people in order to train them for the ends of the state. Schools are regarded as agencies of the state like the courts and the army. It is intolerable from the Japanese view-point that subjects of the Empire should be educated in private institutions over which the government has no control and in which they may be taught anything that the teachers please, especially when, as in Korea, these teachers are foreigners who owe allegiance to another government and who are suspected of lack of sympathy with the authorities of the coimtry. The government position appears to be: It is the duty of the church to preach and the duty of the state to teach. Missionaries may have unlimited freedom in evangeUza- tion, but they should leave education to the government. If they insist upon having schools, they must make them conform to the government schools in curriculum, in quaH- fications of teachers, and in the exclusion of religion; for the schools of the state must be secular with no rehgious exercises, whether Buddhist or Christian. Mission schools in Japan proper had some trouble for a time over the outworking of this fundamental principle. Graduates of the government schools have certain highly prized privileges, such as exemption from conscription in the army, admission to the Imperial University and the government technical and professional schools, and eligi- bility to many civil, military, and naval positions that are coveted by patriotic Japanese. These privileges had been extended to mission and other private schools which con- formed to the government regulations and submitted to inspection. These schools were free to teach religion. But August 3, 1899, Count Kabayama, the Minister of State for Education in Japan, issued the following order: "It being essential from the point of view of educational adminis- tration that general education should be independent of religion, re- ligious instruction must not be given or religious ceremonies performed at government schools, public schools or schools whose curricula are regulated by provisions of law, even outside the regular course of instruction." NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 589 This confronted mission schools with the alternative of abandoning religious instruction or relinquishing their gov- ernment registration, with the resultant forfeiture of the privileges which registration carried. It was feared that young men would not attend schools whose diplomas would debar them from so much that they valued. But the majority of missionaries and boards held that compli- ance would secularize their schools; that they should not use missionary funds for secular education; and that mis- sion educational work was distinctively for Christ and the church. A committee consisting of seven eminent Japanese Christians and seven representative missionaries of various communions presented a protest to Count Kabayama, the Vice-Minister, Mr. Okuda, and the Counsellor of the De- partment, Mr. Okada. The pubHshed report of the com- mittee indicated the frankness and earnestness with which the protest was urged, the protestants declaring: "It is a conviction of conscience with the friends of the schools which we represent that instruction in rehgion is essential to education, both as a matter of knowledge and also as the most effective incentive to right living. The Instruc- tion of the Department of Education compels us either to surrender this conviction or to subject the students attend- ing our schools to serious disadvantages. . . . That such an instruction infringes upon the principle of religious lib- erty is clear to every thoughtful mind." The committee was most courteously received, but the officials were inflexible in the conviction that the regula- tion must be enforced. The result was that many mission schools saw their attendance dwindle to a handful, and it looked for a time as if the end of mission educational work in Japan had come. But the protest of missionaries and Japanese Christians was vigorously taken up by the mis- sionary societies and their supporters in Great Britain and America. The Japanese authorities were finally convinced that a mistake had been made and the regulation was grad- ually allowed to drop out of sight. In the words of a dis- tinguished Japanese Christian educator: "In order to main- 590 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST taiii the principle of religious liberty, we gave up important privileges. But by patiently laying the matter before the authorities, we have succeeded in regaining one by one the lost privileges; so that finally the difference between the government middle school and our middle school de- partment is less than nominal. Even the names are al- most identical. The one is Chugakko, and the other is Chugaku-bu." Since then, mission schools in Japan have had comparatively little trouble. Schools that make re- ligious instruction and chapel services compulsory cannot obtain government registration, but schools that make them voluntary can register and teach the Bible and conduct religious services as freely as they please. Most of the mission schools have adopted this course, with the gratify- ing result that about four-fifths of the students elect to take religious teaching. This happy result was doubtless due, in some degree at least, to the fact that the schools in Japan are for the Japa- nese themselves, that they are few in number as compared with the thousands of public schools, and that, as a rule, they are not elementary schools or colleges. The government has the lower and higher educational fields almost wholly to itself, and the limited number of mission institutions of in- termediate grade, while excellent in character, are, in the estimation of the government, not relatively numerous enough to form a serious factor in the educational system of the country. In Korea, however, different conditions prevail. Here is an outlying dependency, occupied by a conquered people of different race and resentful attitude, which the government is trying to assimilate; numerous and flourishing schools which had grown up under Korean rule and are believed to require considerable modification to make them pro-Japa- nese instead of pro-Korean; and, most disturbing of all, the greater part of the educational system in the hands of foreigners. It is tnie that of 2,080 private schools at the time of annexation, only 778 were officially listed as mission schools. But save for a few notable exceptions, the others NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 591 were of small consequence, a negligible factor from the view-point of modern educational character. What more natural therefore than that the Japanese should concern themselves with this situation, try to get education into their own hands, and open public schools ? Hence the edu- cational Ordinances promulgated March 24, 1915. With a courteous desire to make these regulations availa- ble for English readers and to explain their character and purpose, the Honorable M. Komatsu wrote to me about them on April 8 and November 4, 1915, enclosing with the former letter a detailed explanation that he had published in the Seoul Press of April 2 and 3 of that year under the caption: "Separation of Education and Religion." The Honorable Teisaburo Sekiya, Director of the Bureau of Education, also published articles in the Nagasaki Press of March 30, 1915, and the Japan Advertiser of August 7; and the Honorable K. Usami, Minister of Home Affairs, made further public statements in the Seoul Press of March 17, 18, 19, and 21, 1915. These "Ordinances," "Instruc- tions," and "Regulations" and the official explanations of them will be memorable in the history of missions and of education. We need not write of them in detail, as most of them relate to questions of inspection, curriculum, grade of work, qualifications of teachers, and other matters about which missionaries raise no question. Many of the rules are excellent, indicating careful study of modem educational methods and intelligence in applying them. Others, how- ever, have caused deep concern to missionaries and mission boards, as they appear to forbid all religious teaching and services in mission as well as government schools. We are trying to be fair to the Japanese point of view, and that we are not misrepresenting it will appear from the following extracts from the government regulations and from official interpretations and applications of them: "In such schools (private), no religious teaching is permitted to be included in their curricula nor can religious ceremonies be allowed to be performed." (Instructions concerning the revision and enforce- 592 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ment of the private school regulations, issued by the Govemment- General, March 24, 1915.) "The principle of the separation of education and religion is abso- lutely necessary in Korea. . . . The enforcement of the principle . . . does not admit of any objections or criticism by anybody, native or foreign. . . . The recent amendment made in the regulations for private schools is nothing more or less than a step taken for attaining the aim of assimilation by directing and unifying the trend of the popular mind. Accordingly it has been provided in the regulations that all schools engaged in national (general) education, no matter whether they be government, public, or private establishments, should conform to the educational policy fixed by the government." (The Honorable M. Komatsu, in the Seoul Press, April 2 and 3, and No- vember 25, 1915.) "The authorities are very appreciative of the valuable contributions made by religious schools in Korea to the development of civilization and education, but they cannot allow the present state of education in Korea to continue for long. . . , Private schools are required to fix their curricula in accordance with regulations controlling public common schools, higher common schools, or government special schools, it being also prohibited to them to include any course of study other than those authorized by these regulations. In consequence, in all these schools it is prohibited to give religious education or to observe religious rites." (The Honorable Teisaburo Sekiya, in the Nagasaki Press, March 30, 1915.) "The Government-General, in carrying into effect the Educational Ordinance for Korea, announces that not only government and public schools but also private schools, whose curricula are fixed by pro- visions of law, shall not be permitted to give religious mstruction or conduct religious ceremonies." (The Official Gazette, Tokyo, March 29, 1915.) Mission schools which had a government permit when the regulations were announced were given ten years in which to adapt themselves to the new requirements. Other schools were required to conform or close. The Presby- terian Academy for girls at Syenchyun, and the Southern Presbyterian Academy for girls at Soonchun, although established before the law went into effect, had not received their permits on account of technical delays. The mission- aries felt that they could not conduct mission schools with- out Bible teaching and chapel services, and the Japanese magistrates closed both institutions, the Soonchun official NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 593 order reading: "Your having no intention of removing re- ligion from the curriculum and making application to estab- lish becomes clearly disobedience to the established law. Therefore from this time on I am ordered to forbid instruc- tions therein. I also have these instructions from high authorities, which I transmit to you." Three poHcemen went to the school the same day to see that this order was enforced. / An order to the same effect was issued by the magistrate at Syenchyun to the Girls' Academy in that city. The missionaries in both stations felt that they ought not to conduct mission schools without Bible teaching and chapel services, and so the academies were closed. The following statements apparently indicated a disposi- tion to carry to its logical conclusion the principle that education should be deemed exclusively a function of the state and that mission schools should be eliminated : "The undertaking of general educational work by the missions in Korea is a temporary work of expedience, and along with the comple- tion of the general educational system by the government, mission schools will gradually decrease in number or lose their raison d'etre. ... It is not quite unlikely that in six or seven years to come there will be no mission schools in Korea undertaking common education." (Letter of the Honorable M. Komatsu, November 4, 1915.) "Our object of education is not only to develop the intellect and morality of our people but also to foster in their minds such national spirit as will contribute to the existence and welfare of our Empire. Accordingly we are resolved to maintain an absolute independence in regard to our policy and system concerning national education, which we formulate and put into effect by ourselves without foreign interference or assistance. It follows then that educational work inaugurated by Foreign Missions in the days of the former Korean Government must be modified to-day so as to keep pace with the prog- ress of our plan to carry out modern administrative measures. I sin- cerely hope that you Avill appreciate thi^ change of the time and under- stand that missions should leave all affairs relating to education entirely in the hands of the government by transferring the money and labor they have hitherto been expending on education to their proper sphere of religious propagation. . . . Whatever the curriculum of a school may be, it is natural that the students of that school should be influ- enced by the ideas and personal character of its principal and teach- ers. Education must be decidedly nationaUstic and must not be 594 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST - mixed up with religion that is universal. . . . While the propagation of religion must belong solely to the control of the church, educational work must entirely come under that of the government. . . . Pre- cisely as the government should not interfere with religion, so the church should not interfere with political administration in general and education, which is part of the administrative work, in particular." (The Honorable M. Komatsu in the Seoul Press, April 3, 1915.) The dismay of the missionaries can be easily imagined. They felt that to forbid reHgious teaching in mission schools was equivalent to a denial of that educational and re- ligious freedom which they had supposed that it was the pride of Japan to accord. A mission school that is not permitted to have Bible study does not possess educational freedom, and religion that is not permitted to teach the Bible in its own schools is not free. The Federated Council of Missions in Korea, in September, 1915, adopted with only one dissenting vote a resolution which declared that "The Federal Council feels itself called upon, in view of the interests of its home constituency, the purpose for which alone its members reside in this land and the object for which the funds used to maintain schools are contributed, to affirm that in our judgment the conditions would cripple if not completely close our Christian schools." Those who were inclined to place the most favorable construction upon a governmental policy, sought to reas- sm'e themselves in three ways. The first was the belief that mission schools could count upon the same measure of freedom in Korea that they haVe long enjoyed in Japan, and that the new regulations should be interpreted by our experience there. This belief was soon seen to be illusory. "In Japan proper," wrote a missionary, "if the mission school conforms to the govern- ment system, it has certain privileges which other schools do not have. It may, however, continue to operate if it does not conform, in which case it has the utmost freedom of religious instruction in its curriculum. The option given is: 'Conform or stay out.' In Korea the option is: 'Con- form or close up.' One is an option of permission, the other NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 595 an option of suppression. No liberty of choice is given. It is secularize or go out of business." Mr. Komatsu frankly recognized and defended this fundamental distinc- tion in the following declaration: "I often hear that some missionaries in Korea entertain the opinion that the same educational pohcy as pursued in Japan should be ap- plied to Korea and the same privilege as extended to mission schools in the mother country be extended to similar institutions in the peninsula. This opinion, I do not hesitate to say, emanates from an erroneous conception of conditions existing in the two different parts of the country. . . . Should Korea attain the same stage of progress as in Japan, there can be no room for disputing about the matter; but inasmuch as the educational conditions in the two parts are widely different, it is altogether unreasonable to ask for the enforcement of one and the same practice in the two different parts." (Article: "Separation of Education and Religion," in the Seoul Press, Novem- ber 25, 1915.) The second hope lay in the reassuring personal words of prominent Japanese; but in reply to an inquiry which re- ferred to such utterances, Mr. Komatsu wrote, May 5, 1916 : "All official affairs are to be dealt with according to written laws concerned." The third hope was that Bible teaching might be given and chapel services held in the school either before or after the hours devoted to the curriculum prescribed by the gov- ernment regulations. Visitors and missionaries received encouraging impressions in personal interviews. But Sep- tember 17, 1915, the follo\\dng general instruction (Educa- tion Order No. 1371) was sent to the provincial officials throughout the country: "It is not permitted to add the teaching of religion to the regular courses of study taught in such schools. Nor is it permitted to give instruction in religion under the name of optional studies added to the regular courses of study; or to hold religious services as a part of the school work. This is to be clearly understood. On the other hand, there will be no objection to using the school buildings for religious purposes, provided it is done outside of the school work. In such cases, however, care should be taken not to confuse this with the work of the school, and also not to constrain scholars to accept re- 596 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ligious beliefs against their will. This communication is sent by order of the authorities, and it is hoped that due attention will be given to the matter." This was supplemented October 29, 1915, by an "Instruc- tion from the Director of Home Affairs Department to the Chief of Police Department," which included the following sentence: "If those hearing the (religious) lectures are cer- tainly the students of the school, I judge it a thing to be forbidden, in that it would be difficult to distinguish this from the work of the school." It is unjust to the Japanese to charge that their educa- tional regulations were framed for the purpose of hamper- ing Christianity as such. Mr. Komatsu truly said in the Seoul Press of November 25, 1915: "I regret to hear that there are some people who are apt to consider this measure as one aimed at creating a restriction on religious activity. Nothing could be further from the truth than such pre- sumption. . . . Freedom of religion is assured to each and all." And Governor-General Terauchi is reported to have said: "There is perfect freedom of religious belief, and not only tolerance but friendship for Christianity. The doing away with Bible study in Korean mission schools is a na- tional and educational measure and not a discrimination against Christianity." This is undoubtedly true; but it needs to be interpreted by the conviction to which we have referred, namely that education belongs in the sphere of the state as distinguished from that of the church, so that religion has no proper place in it. The church is first defined in a way which deprives it of an important part of its functions, and then it is told that its liberty is unimpaired within the limits of the defini- tion. Unfortunately, this does not help in solving the present problem, for while the missionaries gladly recog- nize their freedom in evangelistic work, they cannot concur in a theory of rehgious effort which excludes education. In excluding religion from all schools, private as well as public, the Japanese were under the impression that they NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 597 were simply following the example of the most enlightened Western nations. An official statement in the Seoul Press of April 2, 1915; included the following: "With the excep- tion of theological schools aiming at the study of religion, no school in the United States gives religious teaching." American readers are well aware that this is a misappre- hension. In the United States the responsibility of the state extends only to the provision and regulation of insti- tutions that are supported in whole or in part by taxation. The thousands of private institutions have no relation to or supervision by the government. The schools maintained by the state exclude religious teaching, although some of them permit the reading of the Bible and an opening prayer. Private schools, however, are entirely free to teach what they please, and how they please, religion included, and the government freely grants them charters of incorporation. These statements are substantially true of British edu- cational policy. The best institutions in Great Britain, including Oxford, Cambridge, the Scotch universities, and such secondary schools as Eton, Rugby, Harrow, and scores of others, though some of them are called "public schools," are not government schools at all but are privately con- trolled and are subject to no government regulations what- ever, although the royal family and the highest officers of the government have educated their sons in these schools for generations. Many of their teachers are ordained clergy- men, and nearly all of the others are communicant members of churches. Religion is freely taught in them, and many of the best Bible commentaries, devotional volumes, and other religious publications of the whole Christian world have been prepared bj^ the members of their faculties. In India, the Despatch of 1854 based the educational system for that great dependency on two principles: (1) re- liance on private schools supervised and aided by the gov- ernment, and (2) " an entire absence from interference with the religious instruction conveyed in the schools assisted." Unsuccessful effort has been made for several years to in- duce the Indian Government to insert a "conscience clause" 598 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST which would exchide compulsory religious exercises from missionary as well as non-missionary schools. The Na- tional Missionary Coimcil of India adopted the following resolutions in 1917: "That this Council expresses its conviction of the soundness of the principle on which the educational policy of the government in India is based, viz., of giving impartial aid to all institutions which con- tribute efficiently to general education, without reference to the re- ligious instruction given, and deprecates any departure from that principle in the widest interest of the public. "That all education given by missions or missionaries must be radi- cally Christian, . . . and including instruction in the Bible as the greatest of books for the teaching of truth and the building of character. "That Christian educational institutions exist to provide such edu- cation for all who are willing to receive it, and claim a definite sphere in which to exercise this function, and it is unreasonable to require Christian missionaries to participate in giving any education which is not fundamentally Christian. "That wherever there is a sufficient demand for other than Christian education, the Council holds it is the duty of private or public bodies to provide it." The justice of this position has been generally recognized. Turkey and Mexico prohibit religious teaching in church schools; but no friend of Japan wishes to see her in their class. Moreover, the governments of those countries have reasons, such as they are, which do not exist in Korea. Japanese officials urged that if the Government-General of Korea should permit Christianity to be taught in the private schools that the mission boards mahitain, it m.ust also permit Buddhism to be taught in any schools that Buddhists may desire to maintain. Missionaries have not the slightest objection to this. They ask no special favors whatever, but only religious liberty. Since the Imperial Government of Japan has recognized both Christianity and Buddhism as religions of the Empire, we are at a loss to imderstand why the adherents of either faith should not be permitted educational freedom as well as political freedom. History and the experience of other countries conclusively prove that the true interests of the state are injured rather NAT10Nx\LISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 599 than benefited by any restriction of the freedom of educa- tion and rehgion. Mission schools seek to train a child to a high type of Christian character and manhood; and such character and manhood form the securest possible founda- tion for the state as well as for the church. If, as Prince Ito declared, "civilization depends upon morality, and the highest morality upon religion," then religion has a proper place in education; and if the state cannot put it into the government schools, there is all the more reason for allow- ing private schools to do so. President Woodrow Wilson knows both education and government as well as any living man, and he has said that "the argument for efficiency in education can have no permanent validity if the efficiency sought be not moral as well as intellectual. The ages of strong and definite moral impulse have been the ages of achievement; and the moral impulses which have lifted highest have come from Christian peoples." The question has been asked whether the missionaries mean that a Christian should not teach in a public school in America because religious instruction is forbidden. The question is not to the point. We are not considering public schools maintained by taxation for children of all religious preferences or none at all. We are deahng in Korea with private schools maintained by Christian people, with no help from the state, for such pupils as may be sent to them by parents who desire Christian instruction for them. The Japanese Government is developing a public school system in Korea which will give a good secular education, and we do not ask that it include religion, nor do we object to any Korean boys and girls attending the government schools. The only reason why the mission boards should conduct schools lies in the desire to train boys and girls under such strong Christian influence that they will become men and women not only of good education but of high character and personal worth, so that the church may obtain from their ranks its ministers, evangelists, teachers, and laymen to sustain and lead its large and beneficent religious, phil- anthropic, and uplifting efforts. 600 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST It should be borne in mind, as an important factor in the problem, that no schools in Korea are neutral toward re- ligion, whatever the legal theory may be. In countries like America and Great Britain, where the Christian sentiment in communities is strong and there are ample educational facihties under Christian auspices for those who prefer them, the religious neutrality of public schools is more easily preserved; but in a country like Korea neutrality is impossible. Every institution there is either definitely Christian or definitely non-Christian or anti-Christian in influence. The Government-General of Korea itself effec- tively proves this. While it prohibits Christian religious exercises as a part of the curriculum and procedure of schools, it puts other religious teaching into its text-books and requu^ed ceremonies. A text-book on ethics, issued by the government for use in all schools, includes among its illustrations three Koreans prostrating themselves before the grave of their ancestors, on which there are sacrificial offerings. The accompanying text reads: "Lesson 17 — Ancestors "These persons have swept the grave clean, and prepared and set out in order the various kinds of sacrifices. "It will not do at all for anyone to neglect the sacrifices to his ancestors." Mission as weU as public schools are required to use this book and no substitute is permitted. The Japanese au- thorities do not appear to see the inconsistency between forbidding the teaching of the Christian religion in a school and commanding the teaching of ancestor-worship. They claim that the latter is "not religion but merely a good so- cial custom teaching respect for parents." But the "sac- rifices" are distinctly religious, and the people universally regard them as such. A related difiiculty grows out of the observance of na- tional holidays. The mission schools gladly celebrate those which commemorate events of historical importance, like the anniversary of the founding of the Empire, which corre- NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 601 spoiids in general to the American Fourth of July. But in Korea, most of these holidays are simply the days on which the Emperor offers the Imperial Sacrifices, and their significance is understood to be religious. Since April 1, 1915, when the new school laws went into effect, the mis- sion schools have been ordered to hold "ceremonies" on these days, and the missionaries do not find it easy to devise an observance of a "sacrificial day" that is satisfactoiy to the watchful officials. A special complication develops when cerem^onial days fall on Sunday. For example, in connection with the anni- versary of the death of the Empress Dowager, a mission school received an order to assemble its teachers and pupils at the hour of Sunday morning service and hold a "wor- shipping-at-a-distance ceremony." The word used for worship was the word used where the one worshipped is regarded as divine; and the missionaries were directed to report afterward exactly what they had done. They de- cided that they could not comply with this order; but they held a memorial service at three o'clock the preceding after- noon, and on Monday so reported. They expected trouble, but none resulted, although the officials were plainly dis- pleased. Ceremonial worship in schools before the picture of the Emperor on his birthday, and daily bowing before it by teachers in schools recognized by the government, are other observances that are not so simple as they sound, since they are interpreted to be not merely tokens of respect to the sovereign but acts of worship to a divine person. De- mocracy and Christianity do not relish such ceremonies. Some Japanese assert that they are really nothing more than the salute to the flag in American schools in the United States. If this were all, it would be captious to object. Unfortunately, not only missionaries but Korean Christians generally as well as many Japanese regard them as a rever- ential recognition of the divinity of the Emperor and a religious function. This was illustrated by the following incident, which I give in the exact form in which it was 602 "TPIE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST reported by a British missionary: "The celebration of the Emperor's birthday fell upon a Sunday, and our school re- ceived orders to assemble on the day and to sing the na- tional anthem and listen to a speech by the principal of the school. It has been customary in the past to hold such ceremonies, if they fell on Sunday, in a Christian manner, opening with prayer and a Bible reading, and perhaps sing- ing a hymn. This time we received very definite instruc- tions. There must be no religious ceremony of any kind; the church work must be conducted quite distinct from the school work; the celebration must be held strictly in accordance with the programme submitted, and the school must assemble as a school and do reverence to the name of the Emperor. I interviewed the Prefect and asked him if we could not meet on Saturday, or, if that were not possible, to hold the meeting on Sunday but to include some recog- nition in the meeting of our Christian position. He refused the request and said that we must carry out the request of the authorities. I replied that it was not a question of custom but of conscience, and that as a Christian I would have to refuse to conduct such a meeting on a Sunday, a day set apart for the worship of God. His reply was re- markable: 'We put the Emperor first and all Gods second, and you must hold the celebration even though it is on Sunday.' This, of course, settled the matter, and I had no more to say; but I wrote to him next day and again explained my position. In direct antagonism to his orders, we held our celebration on the Saturday. No doubt the school again is marked down as wanting in loyalty and patriotism." Some of the missionaries and their boards in America, while of course preferring to have the Bible in the cur- riculum and to have chapel services compulsory, did not deem it wise to force the issue on these points alone. If a definite part of the day were set apart for the curriculum prescribed by the government, they were willing to have their Bible teaching and chapel service either before or after the hours devoted to it, provided there were freedom for NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS G03 religious instruction and services on the school premises and as a recognized part of the school Ufe. Mr. Komatsu's statement in the Seoul Press of November 25, 1915, was held to justify this, for he said: "It is per- fectly free for students of all schools, whether governmental or private, to study the Bible outside of the school and fixed school-hours under private teachers, or at special institutes such as Sunday schools, seminaries or churches." Bishop Merriman C. Harris, then resident bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, decided that it would be wise to show good-will by conforming to the regulations on this basis, even in the case of schools that were entitled to the ten-year pe- riod of grace. Accordingly, he applied for a permit for the Methodist Pai Chai Academy for Boys in Seoul. The Jap- anese promptly issued it, and the event was made the oc- casion of a celebration at which mutual felicitations were ex- changed. The favor of the government caused a flood of applications for enrollment. Bishop Harris was convinced that he took the best course in view of all the circum- stances, and a number of missionaries supported him in this position. Others strongly dissented, declaring that they were unable to see how a law which explicitly commands the separation of education and religion in mission schools is compatible with that union of education and religion which mission schools are primarily maintained to secure. At this writing, the ten-year period of grace, given to mission schools that were in authorized operation when the law went into effect, has not expired, and many of the schools are continuing their rehgious teaching under its sanction; although several have deemed it wiser to follow the example of the Pai Chai Academy. Meantime, large significance has been attached to the charter which the Government-General issued April 7, 1917, to the newly organized Chosen Christian College in Seoul, represent- ing a union of mission boards. Article II of this charter, styled the "Hojin," stated that the "object of this Hojin shall be to establish and maintain this College in accordance with Christian principles"; Article IV that "the managers, 604 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST officers, members of the faculty and all the instructors must be believers in and followers of the doctrines contained in the Christian Bible"; Articles VI and VII that two- thirds of the members of the Hojin are to be chosen by the missions of the co-operating boards, and the remaining one-third of such "Christian Japanese subjects as these missionaries shall elect"; and Articles XVIII and XIX provide for the possible dissolution of the Hojin and the re- version of the property to the original donors or their suc- cessors, so that the co-operating boards, after due notice, can withdraw their missionaries and their financial support if at any time they should become convinced that the col- lege is not sufficiently Christian in character and influence to justify support as a part of the missionary work in Korea. The Honorable K. Usami, Director of Home Affairs of the Government-General, in connection with a letter dated September 22 to Doctor 0. R. Avison, president of the college, said: "There will be no restriction for students as to the free study of religion if they do it quite apart from the regular curriculum." While the Hojin does not afford all the liberty that mis- sion schools have long enjoyed in Korea, as well as in other fields, it was viewed as proof of the readiness of the officials to recognize the Christian character and purpose of an edu- cational institution conducted by mission boards as an integral part of their Christian effort, and to give it as large a measure of religious freedom as they could under the law. The fact that the college was to be located in Seoul, that it planned to do the kind of educational work that the Gov- ernment-General desired to have done, that Japanese were to be represented on the faculty and Field Board of Managers, and that the missionaries in charge were men whom the government officials best knew and most trusted, doubtless smoothed the way for this institution. Substantially the same arrangement was made in the Hojin of the Severance Union Medical College in Seoul. Japanese of high rank, including Mr. Sekiya, Director of the Bureau of Education, joined in what the Seoul Press described as a "congratula- NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 605 tory meeting" June 15, at which hearty good wishes for both colleges were freely expressed. A considerable num- ber of missionaries, although not a majority, and all of the five boards in North America voted to accept the Hojin, not because it conceded all they wanted, but because they felt that it was offered in a friendly spirit as the most prac- ticable present adjustment of an admittedly difficult prob- lem, and an advance step which would make other advances easier at a later time. Here the matter stands as these pages go to press. What will happen at the expiration of the ten-year period of grace in 1925 remains to be seen. Meantime, the Chosen Chris- tian College and the other conforming institutions are pros- pering greatly, while the other mission schools are having far from easy going. An illustration of their predicament appeared in connection with the graduating exercises of the Pyengyang Junior College last year. Four students made addresses. The foreigners present deemed them void of offense, but the police declared that all the speakers had said things subversive of the public good. The students were arrested, interrogated, and then released, as their pre- vious records had been good. The provincial chief of the gendarmes, however, summoned the students before him and again investigated the case. The president of the col- lege was called to the office and strictly charged to exercise greater care in the future. The matter was then reported to the Governor of the Province, and then to the Governor- General. The latter wrote to the president of the college that the indiscretion of the students was so serious that the government was contemplating closing the school. A similar communication was sent by the Governor-General to the provincial Governor, who thereupon called the president to his office and said that unless he was prepared to make certain changes the college would have to close. These changes were enumerated as follows: (1) Appointment of a Japanese head master; (2) dismissal of three of the boys who had spoken, relief of the fourth from certain as- signments of teaching which he was doing in the academy, 006 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST arid promise not to repeat the oratorical programme in the future; (3) secure more Japanese teachers, especially those who could understand Korean; (4) do all teaching, except the Chinese classics, Korean language, and English, through the medium of the Japanese language; (5) prepare syllabi of the subjects of instruction so as to limit it to specified points, teachers not to deviate from them or to speak on forbidden subjects; (6) conform under the new regulations. When the president repHed that he would do all that he could to make the first five changes desired, but that as to the sixth change, the mission preferred to continue for the present under the old permit which entitled the college to the ten- year period of grace, the official was plainly disappointed and he intimated that nmnber six was the most important of all. I think that we should consider the whole subject from the view-point of real friendship for the Japanese, of respect for their general policy in Korea, and of frank recognition of their point of view. We are not challenging their proper authority when we seek that reasonable religious freedom in mission schools which all civilized nations afford and which has been hitherto enjoyed in Korea. That the attitude of the missionaries was not influenced by prejudice is shown by the fact that the protest of the Council of Federated Missions, already quoted, was accompanied by the declaration that we "record our thankfulness to God for the freedom of conscience and the religious liberty we enjoy under the Imperial Government of Japan, and that as residents of the Empire of Japan and as Christian mis- sionaries we recognize the constituted civil authorities as ordained by God and to be duly honored and obeyed in accordance with the Word of God." We should also bear in mind the fundamental considera- tion already referred to, namely, that what the Japanese object to in Korea is not Christianity but the influence over their subjects and over hundreds of schools of a large body of Americans who are aliens in race and in social and politi- cal ideas, and who are regarded by many Japanese as an NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 607 obstacle to their national policy. The position so axiomatic to the mission boards — that religion is an essential part of the missionary programme — has become somewhat over- shadowed in the minds of the Japanese authorities by the political question of the general relationship of a body of foreigners to the governmental supremacy of the Japanese. I am inclined to think that the Government-General is more deeply interested in the recognition of its rightful authority in Korea than it is in the question of religion in schools, that it cares comparatively little whether the Bible is in or out of the curriculum of a private school, but that it cares a great deal whether the atmosphere of a school begets re- spect and loyalty for the government. Governor-General Terauchi is understood to have said that he could not afford to have little American citizens made out of Korean boys and girls. This suspicion lies at the bottom of present problems, and it must be dispelled before they can be solved. A happy adjustment may be practicable on the basis of complete mutual confidence that would be impossible with- out it. Fortunately, this does not involve a change in missionary policy, as the missionaries do not want to make Korean boys and girls into "little American citizens." The general educational regulations of the Japanese Governor-General are being scrupulously obeyed to the utmost limit of financial ability. The government has an unquestioned right to demand a reasonable standard in the schools which educate its subjects, and to object to any text-books or observances that are not compatible with the effort to develop that loyalty to Japan which is essential to its policy of unification. Observance of the American Fourth of July is out of place in Korea, and it is not the busi- ness of missionaries to teach the history of the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution in such a way as to permit Korean youths to get the impression that they should emulate American example. As for equip- ment and grade of work, if the mission boards cannot main- tain schools with sanitary buildings and qualified teachers, they have no right to complain if the government objects. 608 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST We should thoroughly respect and sympathize with the de- sire of the government to systematize, co-ordinate, and improve the educational institutions of the country. The mission boards have long realized that they needed improve- ment, and they cordially desire to co-operate with the Bu- reau of Education in its laudable efforts to this end. The ordinance regarding the separation of education from religion stands in a different category inasmuch as it affects the vital character of mission schools and the essential purpose for which they are maintained, and as it also affects the other important principles which have been discussed in this chapter. We are loyal to the American Government in the Philippine Islands; but if the American Governor there were to forbid religious teaching in privately maintained mission schools, they would yield only to for- cible closing by police; and their supporters would not ad- mit that the government's general benevolence of intention could be properly pleaded in justification of its course. It should be distinctly understood, therefore, that any protest in Korea is not caused in the slightest degree by anti-Japanese sentiment, but that it is only what Ameri- cans would unhesitatingly make if their own government in the Philippines were to adopt a similar measure. It has been said that if we expect to have the regula- tions modified, we should keep still, as protest will simply harden the government in its position and make it feel that it cannot change without sacrifice of its dignity — ^losing "face." This has not been our experience in dealings with the Japanese. They are courageously loyal to their own convictions, and they respect courage and loyalty in others. They are, withal, sensible men who have more than once showed themselves open to candid approach. I have described elsewhere the courteous consideration that was given to the respectful remonstrances that were made by the missionaries and their supporters in America and Great Britain in connection with the order of the Minister of State for Education in Japan in 1899 and the Korean Conspiracy Case, in 1912-13. In the case of the Doshisha College in NATIONALISM AND MISSION SCHOOLS 609 Kyoto, then under the care of the American Board of Com- missioners for Foreign Missions, the discussion was long and animated, but it ended satisfactorily. It is extraordinary that any one should feel that no pro- test should be made against an official act on the ground that protest would make the officials more determined to persist in it. What would be the condition of the world if such a course were to be everywhere followed ? Is it reason- able to expect that any government, having promulgated a law, would abstain from enforcing it because nobody pro- tested? If no protest is made against a given ordinance, why should not a government carry it into effect? Those who warn missionaries to jdeld without effort in this matter can hardly be conscious of the severe criticism of the Gov- ernment-General which they are really making, for their warning can only mean that they deem responsible Japanese officials to be so stubborn and reactionary that they will not listen to the opinions of their fellow men. Being myself a friend of the Japanese, I do them the justice to believe that they are rational and fair-minded men, and amenable to reasonable suggestion. I therefore have no hesitation whatever in approaching them with the same frankness with which I would approach our own government in Washing- ton, or broad-minded men anywhere, and I invariably find that my confidence is not misplaced. I renew the expression of my belief that what the govern- ment chiefly desires is fair recognition of its rightful juris- diction in Korea, its national policy of assimilation with Japan, and its just purpose to see that Korean youths are well educated and that they are trained in loyalty of feel- ing to the constituted authorities. As for the mission boards, all they ask is that liberty that they have hitherto had, to teach Chi'ist and the Bible in the private schools that they and the Korean Christians maintain. It should seem as if on this basis some amicable adjustment ought to be possible that would conserve the objects that each party deems essential. The boards and missions have no selfish interest in maintaining schools in Korea. They are expending 610 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST much labor and money for the sole purpose of doing good to the people and with no thought of advantage to them- selves. It is their earnest desire to co-operate with the Government-General in every possible way and with no reservation whatever except freedom to keep God in the forefront of all their institutions and activities. If they fail to do this, they fail in the chief reason for their exist- ence and should withdraw from Korea altogether. CHAPTER XXXVI ROMAN CATHOLIC AND RUSSIAN ORTHODOX MISSIONS IN JAPAN A SEPARATE volume, and a bulky one at that, would be required to tell in any adequate way the story of Christian missions in Japan. Indeed, Otis Cary devoted two closely printed volumes to his admirable History of Christianity in Japan, and the separate books that have been published by other writers upon particular phases of the work and the lives of notable missionaries would fill a fair-sized library. It is a stirring record, abounding in incident, full of human interest, and far-reaching in reconstructive influence. To the Roman Catholics belongs the credit of making the first effort to carry the Gospel to Japan, and it was a Jesuit who bore it. One of the five devoted souls whom Ignatius Loyola associated with himself in founding the Society of Jesus in the dark and stormy years of the sixteenth century was the immortal Francis Xavier. A gifted youth, educated at the Universitj^ of Paris, he with the others turned away from the allurements of secular life and took the rigid vows of chastity, poverty, obedience, and readiness to go wherever in the world they might be sent. When the King of Por- tugal asked the Jesuits to send missionaries to his newly won possessions in India, Loyola ordered Xavier to respond. He started for Lisbon on a day's notice, and reached Goa, May 6, 1542. His seven years in India were characterized by indefatigable labors, and by such apparent success that he wrote: "The multitude of those who become converts to the faith of Jesus Christ is so great that my arms often grow weary with baptizing and I am unable to speak any longer; ... I have baptized a whole village in a day." But the kind of Christians that were made in this whole- sale fashion is indicated in his dejected report to Loyola 611 612 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST in 1549: "The experience that I have of these countries shows me clearly that there is no possible hope of perpetu- ating the Society here by means of the native Indians. Christianity itself wiU survive only so long as we remain and live here — ^we who have already come or those whom you shall send." In this despairing mood he met, during a visit to Malacca, a wandering Japanese whose name he gave as Anjiro, but whom later writers have called Yajiro, who, after killing a man in Japan, had fled in a Portuguese ship to Malacca, where he was baptized. From him Xavier learned much of Japan. "If I went to Japan, would the people become Christians?" he asked. And Anjiro replied: "My people would not inamediately become Christians; but they would first ask you a multitude of questions, weighing carefully your answers and your claims. Above all, they would observe whether your conduct agreed with your words. If you should satisfy them on these points by suitable re- plies to their inquiries and by a life above reproach — then, as soon as the matter was known and fully examined, the King (Daimyo), the nobles, and the educated people would become Christians. Six months would suffice; for the nation is one that always follows the guidance of reason." Flaming with zeal stimulated by this opinion, Xavier quickly sailed for Japan accompanied by two other Jesuits, Father Cosmo Torres and Brother Juan Fernandez, and by three Japanese, including Anjiro. After a voyage so stormy that the little sailing vessel was more than once in imminent danger of foundering, they arrived at Kagoshima in the province of Satsuma, August 15, 1549. It was a memora- ble day in the history of Japan and of Christianity when these heroic men landed, the first messengers of the gospel of Christ to a people who were destifted to become one of the great nations of the earth. After twenty-seven months of incessant labor, Xavier sailed November 20, 1551, for India. After selecting more missionaries for Japan he de- parted for China, but died on the way at Chang-chuang on an island near INlacao, November 27, 1552. Fernandez ROMAN CATHOLIC AND RUSSIAN MISSIONS 613 and Torres remained in Japan till their deaths in 1567 and 1570 respectively. The mission work thus begmi was steadily pressed and the little band of pioneers was gradually enlarged by later ar- rivals. The Japanese appear to have welcomed the mis- sionaries with surprising cordiality. Xavier had written: "We have been received by the Governor (Capitan) of the city and by the Commandant (Alcayde) with much kind- ness and friendship, as we have also been by all the people." The novelty of the strangers' appearance attracted crowds. Converts were soon enrolled. The experiences of the mis- sionaries were varied, and for a score of years fair progress was made, although discouragements and occasional perils were not wanting. The decade beginning with the year 1571 was one of more rapid growth. Converts became numerous. The Jesuits made special effort to reach the higher classes and with no small degree of success. Among the Christians were such dignitaries as Takayama Yusho and his son and successor, Takayama Ukon, the feudal lords of Takatsuki, Konishi Yukinaga and Kuroda Yoshitaka, celebrated generals in the army, and a number of civil officials of rank and influence. But in the reign of Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the later years of the sixteenth centmy, the tide turned. Various reasons for this change, of attitude have been assigned. Defenders of the mis- sionaries dwell upon the resentment aroused by dissolute European traders, the wrath of Hideyoshi because Christian Japanese girls refused to pander to his Mcentious desires, and the growing suspicion that the priests represented the political ambitions of their governments; a suspicion to which their com-se lent some color, for they were active in court circles. It must be added that the zeal of the mis- sionaries was not always tempered by tactful consideration for the customs and sacred institutions of the people. They were relentless in their attacks upon Buddhist priests and worship, while their wholesale methods of baptism on merely superficial acquiescence in Christian formulas brought into the church multitudes of Japanese whose standards of con- 614 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST duct were little, and in many instances not at all, better than those of the non-Christians about them. The Japa- nese Department of Education, in a History of the Empire of Japan issued in 1893, assigned the following reason for the reversal of popular attitude toward Christianity: "When Hideyoshi in the course of his campaign against Shimazu reached Hakata, the Christian priests showed such an arro- gant demeanor that Hideyoshi, enraged by their conduct, ordered that they should leave Japan by a certain day and prohibited the people from embracing Christianity." At any rate, the following edict was promulgated July 25, 1587: " Having learned from our faithful counsellors that foreign religious teachers have come into our estates where they preach a law contrary to that of Japan, and that they have even had the audacity to destroy temples dedicated to our Kami and Hotoke, although this outrage merits the most extreme punishment, wishing nevertheless to show them mercy we order that under pain of death they quit Japan within twenty days. During that space of time no harm nor hurt will be done them; but at the expiration of that term, we order that if any of them be found in our states they shall be seized and punished as the greatest criminals. As for the Portuguese merchants, we per- mit them to enter our ports, there to continue their accustomed trade and to remain in our estates provided our affairs need this; but we forbid them to bring any foreign religious teachers into the country under the penalty of the confiscation of their ships and goods." The period of persecution which then began continued with varying degrees of intensity and vindictiveness through- out the reign of Hidej^oshi and his successors, leyasu and Hidetada till, by the year 1715, Christianity in Japan ap- peared to be almost exterminated. Many of the mission- aries were deported. Those who sought to remain were hunted down like wild beasts. Many of the Japanese Christians recanted, some because their profession of faith had been merely nominal, and others because their courage was not great enough to enable them to face the frightful ordeal with which a remorseless government confronted them. But multitudes were faithful to the end. They liOMAN CATHOLIC AND RUSSIAN MISSIONS 015 were persecuted without mercy — stripped of their posses- sions, burned, beheaded, crucified, thrown from cliffs, and subjected to every other form of torture and death that fanatical ingenuity could devise. The history of Christian martyrdoms contains no more tragically sublime manifes- tations of constancy than those which Japan affords. When, December 9, 1603, an executioner went to the house of Simon Takeda after midnight with an order to execute him because he had refused an offer of life if he would re- cant, we read that he thanked the executioner, knelt and prayed before a picture of Christ, awakened his mother and his wife, arrayed himself m ceremonial robes, begged his family and servants to forgive him for any wrong that he had done them, and said to his wife: "The hour for separa- tion has come. I go before you and thus show the road by which you also should reach Paradise. I will pray to God for you. I hope that ere long you will follow in my foot- steps." He then calmly bared his neck for the executioner's sword. As his head fell on the mat, his mother laid her hand on it and exclaimed: "Oh, my fortunate son, you have been deemed worthy to give your life for God's ser- vice. How blessed am I, sinful woman though I am, that I should be the mother of a martyr and that I can offer as a sacrifice this my only son, for whom during these many yeai-s I have so lovingly cared." Both mother and wife were crucified before another night fell.^ It is difficult to ascertain Just how many Christians there were in Japan during the various stages of Roman Catholic missionary effort, or how many suffered martyrdom. Eccle- siastical statistics were -not kept with such care as they now are. Doubtless, too, many records were lost or de- stroyed in the persecutions, while the Roman Catholic cus- tom of counting all persons who have been baptized in in- fancy as well as in later years does not always make the reported numbers indicative of actual strength. Certain ^For a detailed account of these persecutions, see Otis Gary's History of Christianity in Japan, Yo\. I, pp. 98-257. 616 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST it is, however, that the missionaries had a large following in Japan in the seventeenth century, and that several thousand Christians were executed for their faith or died as the result of the hardships which the persecutions involved. For more than a century Christianity in Japan almost disap- peared. A few believers remained, worshipping in out-of- the-way places or hiding from hostile eyes. Occasionally, little groups gathered and sometimes friendly neighbors let them live in peace. Now and then a daring priest went more or less furtively among them, giving counsel and en- couragement. But enmity of Christianity was deeply rooted among officials and common people. Suspected Japanese were compelled to trample upon the cross or the image of the Virgin Mary. Edicts and sign-boards forbade Christian profession or teaching under dire penalties. One tablet bore the oft-quoted inscription: "So long as the sun warms the earth, let no Christian be so bold as to come to Japan; and let all know that if the King of Spain, or the Christians' God, or the great God of all violate this com- mand, he shall pay for it with his head." The Roman Catholic Church in Europe, however, never abandoned its purpose to reopen mission work in Japan, and shortly after the promulgation of the treaty of 1854 between Japan and the United States, active preparations were made. In 1856, M. Furet and M. Mounicou, after several fruitless efforts, managed to get to Hakodate on a French war-vessel, and after a stay of four days went to the Loochoo Islands, where a struggling mission had been maintained for some years as a base from which Japan might again be entered. In 1859 the long-hoped-for day dawned. M. Girard landed at Yedo September 6, and two months later M. Mermet arrived in Hakodate. M. Mou- nicou came to Yokohama from Loochoo in 1861. Mission work was vigorously resimied. One by one new mission- aries arrived. Caution was still necessary, and in 1867 persecution again broke out. There were more deporta- tions, imprisonments, sufferings, and deaths. But in March, 1872, Monsignor Petitjean wrote to a priest in Hong Kong ROMAN CATHOLIC AND RUSSIAN MISSIONS 617 to cable the following message to the Paris headquarters of the Society: "Edicts against Christians removed. Prisoners freed. Inform Rome, Propagation of Faith, Holy Infancy. Need immediately fifteen missionaries." At that time the missionaries defuiitely Imew of 15,000 Christians; and they believed that there were many others who secretly held to the Christian faith but had not dared to identify themselves with it. Since then progress has been steady. By 1887 the Japan Weekly Mail could speak of the mission as "a large and powerful mission, numbering nearly sixty fathers, and over forty sisters of charity." Thirty years later the number of foreigners on the staff had risen to 352, with 179 Japanese workers, 270 churches, and 76,134 members. Seminaries, convents, monasteries, schools, creches, orphanages, hos- pitals, and leper asylums testify to the breadth and power of the movement. The Japanese have been more distrustful of the Roman Catholic missionaries than of the Protestants. This is partly because the close affiKation of the priests with their home governments and their diplomatic representatives in Japan has aroused suspicion of political aims, and partly because the Roman Catholic poKty places the seat of au- thority in Rome, and, as the Report of the Societe des Mis- sions Etrangeres for 1906 frankly says: "The Japanese na- tional pride opposes itself to permitting that a foreigner should, apart from the Emperor, have control over them." Nevertheless, the Roman Catholic Church in Japan is a real force in the country, and it can point to a long line of devoted workers and an impressive roll of martyrs. Some of its teachings and methods are at a far remove from those which represent my own views. Many of its priests have been narrow, intolerant, and arrogant. They have made serious blunders, and they cannot be freed from blame for a course of conduct which had something to do with turning an initial welcome into bitter resentment, and which, while not of itself causing persecution, at least broadened its scope and intensified its bitterness. 618 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST But while candor compels this stricture, candor also compels hearty recognition of courage, persistence, and personal character. Most of the foreign bishops and priests have been, and still are, French, and of a distinctly higher type than the Spanish priests in the Philippine and South American missions. The fair-minded Protestant who writes of them may, if I may borrow an illustration, treat their defects as an artist should treat the wart on Cromwell's face. He must paint it in, but he need not make it un- necessarily large, nor write underneath his picture: "Please note especially the wart." The story of the Greek Orthodox Mission of the Russian Church is a shorter one, for it deals with a more limited work and for a briefer period, since it dates only from 1861. But it forms a part of the Christian movement in Japan which is of no small importance. The mission centred about and was indeed incarnated in an extraordinary per- sonality — the great Archbishop Nicolai, one of the modem apostles of God whom all communions gladly recognize. When a yoimg man of twenty-four in Petrograd, he was chosen by the Holy Synod as chaplain of the Russian con- sulate at Hakodate, Japan. He eagerly accepted the ap- pointment, and on his ordination took the name Nicolai instead of Ivan Kasatkin, by which he had been hitherto known. Arriving at Hakodate in June, 1861, he was de- lighted to find his official duties so light that he had time to study the Japanese language, with a view to preaching to the people of the city. He studied with Joseph Neesima for a month, and after that with various teachers until he could speak in the native tongue. Opposition to Christi- anity was strong, and progress was beset with difficulties and at times danger. But in April, 1868, he conducted with tender solemnity a service in his own rooms, in which he administered the rite of baptism to three Japanese — Sawabe, Sakai, and Urano. The services had to be held in secret, and the converts had to leave town immediately to escape punishment. Sawabe soon afterward brought two other Japanese, Kannari and Arai, to Pere Nicolai, as he ROMAN CATHOLIC AND RUSSIAN MISSIONS 619 was now called. The good priest now became convinced that the time had come to give his whole time to work among the Japanese. He applied for a furlough and re- turned to Russia in 1870 to interest the Holy Synod, and to secure financial support for a mission. He was offered the bishopric of Peking, but attractive as the offer was he declined it, saying that he had consecrated his life to Japan. Thereupon his plans were approved; he was made an archi- mandrite; money was raised for his work, and he started back to Japan, arriving at Hakodate in February, 1871. The work broadened. Converts carried the gospel to other places, Sendai among others. In January, 1872, Nicolai removed to Tokyo, and there began the mission which afterward became so famous. Some of the con- verts were imprisoned and harshly treated, but they sturdily clung to their faith. The missionary himself was sus- pected of being a spy, and was hampered in many ways; but nothing could daunt him. By 1883 he could report 5 foreign priests and teachers, 120 Japanese evangehsts, of whom 11 were ordained priests, 148 organized churches, and a Christian constituency, including children, of 8,863. The political difficulties which developed between Japan and Russia in the closing years of the century and the opening years of the twentieth affected, to some extent, the position of the mission in the pubhc mind as compared with the popular attitude toward the Protestant missions. Christianity in all its forms was still unpopular, although active opposition was lessening. But the Greek Orthodox Church, being the State Church of Russia, and as such closely identified with its government, could not escape the distrust with which all Russian activities were regarded. One of the priests issued a statement in 1903, in which he said: "From the present political situation of Japan and Russia, since the Japanese Orthodox Church is aided by the Russian Missionary Society, some are led to beheve that the church is necessarily Russianized and given to Russian forms." He proceeded to explain that this was a misapprehen- 620 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST sion, but the Japanese were not easily convinced. It is immensely to the credit of both missionaries and Japanese that, during all the months of growing suspicion and irri- tation between the two countries, and the outburst of the storm of war in 1904, the work of the mission was main- tained, with some difficulty, indeed, but without disaster. The Russian missionaries were neither deported nor in- terned, but were allowed to go on with their duties. This happy result was due, in part, to the remarkable tact and wisdom of Pere Nicolai, now a bishop, in scrupulously ob- serving the proprieties of a very delicate situation, avoiding unneutral words and acts, and strictly confining himself and his priests to the regular duties of a Chi'istian mission. And it was also due to the equally remarkable fairness and good sense of the Japanese in recognizing the fact that mis- sionary work was conducted from motives quite distinct from the objectives of the war, and that it was not for the benefit of Russia but for the direct benefit of Japan. As the war grew in magnitude and intensity, and the fate of Japan trembled in the balance, the bishop wrote: "From our hearts we give thanks and praise God that through His mercy the Church remams in peace unmolested, and that its members still maintam their good faith, each worker doing his duty faithfully. We also give thanks to the Japa- nese Government for its kind protection. From the be- ginning of this war, the government declared that religion and politics or war should not be confounded, that no one should be hindered in religious rites or faith. As you know, this declaration has been kept." A wide field of effort developed in the camps, in which 73,000 Russian prisoners were confined. The bishop as- signed all he could spare of his Japanese priests and evangel- ists, 23 of whom could speak the Russian language, to do Christian work among these men, and to distribute copies of the four Gospels and religious tracts and books. The bishop himself devoted much of his time to literary work, writing articles and pamphlets, editing periodicals, and re- vising his translation of the New Testament. He was made ROMAN CATHOLIC AND RUSSIAN MISSIONS 621 an archbishop in 1906, and February 16, 1912, he died at the age of seventy-six, honored and loved not only by his own communion, but by foreigners and Japanese of all faiths. He was succeeded by Bishop Sergie. The last report of the mission gives 267 churches with 36,265 mem- bers, only one foreign missionary, 159 Japanese workers, yen 4,656 received from the Society in Russia, and yen 13,036 from Japanese sources — an interesting and sug- gestive commentary upon the success of the mission in developing and domesticating the work with a compara- tively small proportion of foreigners to superintend it. The Greek Catholic Church can hardly be said to have a present mission work in Korea, since it does Httle outside of the Russian Consulate in Seoul, where the services are held. The report in 1918 gives a total baptized member- ship of only 630. CHAPTER XXXVII PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN The first Protestant service of which we have any record was conducted by that fine Christian layman and American diplomat, Townsend Harris. The following entry appears in his diary: "Sunday, December 6, 1857. This is the second Sunday in Advent; assisted by Mr. Heusken, I read the fuU service in an audible voice, and with the paper doors of the houses here our voices could be heard in every part of the building. This was, beyond doubt, the first time that the English version of the Bible or the American Protestant Episcopal service was ever repeated in this city. Two himdred and thirty years ago a law was pro- mulgated in Japan inflicting death on any one who should use any of the rites of the Christian religion. That law is still unrepealed." This service, of course, was for his own household and official staff. The foundations of Protestant missionary work for the Japanese were laid soon afterward by a re- markable group of men. The Reverend John Liggins, of the American Protestant Episcopal Church, who arrived May 2, 1859; the Reverend Channing N. WilHams, of the same church, who joined him two months later; James C. Hep- bum, M.D., of the American Presbyterian Church, who arrived October 18 of that year; the Reverend Guido S. Verbeck, the Reverend Samuel R. Brown, and D. B. Sim- mons, M.D., of the Dutch Reformed Church, who landed in November — ^these were men of high tjrpe, characterized by breadth of view, intellectual ability, and force of char- acter. Four of them, Williams, Hepburn, Verbeck, and Brown, acquired large influence over the Japanese and an international reputation as Christian statesmen. Williams attained fame as a bishop of large administrative qualities. 622 PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 623 Hepburn was a physician, scholar, author, and translator, of whom The Japan Mail editorially said that he was "a man whose name will be remembered with respect and affection as long as Yokohama has annals — a man of beauty of character, untiring charity, absolute self -negation, steady zeal in the cause of everything good, constituting a picture which could not fail to appeal to the Japanese people." On his ninetieth birthday, in 1905, the Emperor of Japan, although burdened with the anxieties incident to a decisive battle in the war with Russia, remembered that devoted missionary and conferred upon him the Imperial Order of the Rising Sun in recognition of his distinguished services to Japan. Brown's great work as an educator led Wilham Elliot Griffis to write his biography under the title: A Maker of the New Orient. Verbeck was teacher, writer, statesman, and confidential adviser of the Japanese Govern- ment, which counselled with him and trusted him as it has trusted no other man from the West. The beginnings of mission work were so humble and be- set by such difficulties that less dauntless men would have been discouraged. The missionaries were regarded with suspicion and dislike, their motives were misunderstood, and their purpose was misrepresented. Not until March, 1860, ten months after the first arrivals, could any Japanese be persuaded to teach them the language; and then the only one who could be seciu-ed was a government spy, and the only pupils were a few little boys whose parents wanted them to learn Enghsh. Nearly five years passed before a convert was baptized, in November, 1864. But those early years were spent in quiet, patient study, winning the good-will of the people by kindly. Christlike fives, and lay- ing broad and deep foundations for coming years in Ian- guage helps and in translations of portions of the Bible and of Christian books and tracts. Gradually the Japanese began to understand these faithful workers, and to give their confidence to them. Gradually, too, the truths which they taught found lodgment in the hearts of earnest people. The lot of the first Christians was hard. It is easy to 624 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAbT confess Christ in a land where Christianity is the popular religion, where parents pray for one's conversion, and where church membership not only involves no real sacrifice but often gives increased prestige in the community. The first converts in Japan had to break with their relatives and lose their friends. They were ostracized by society, and per- secuted by the religious leaders of the dominant faiths. The shopkeeper found that his customers forsook him. The son was disowned by his family. The ambitious young man was debarred from office. A high type of courage was required to face a hostile world, to stand before the whole business, social, and reHgious order and, like Martin Luther, fling out the sublime challenge : "Here I stand. God help me; I can do no other." In a literal sense that we in America wot not of, these Asiatic Christians took up the Cross to follow Him. There have been martyrs in these Eastern lands, men and women who counted not their lives dear unto themselves for conscience sake. The missionaries suffered less than the native converts, but their position was far from comfortable during this period. An illustration of the attitude of many Japanese appeared in a letter sent from Kyoto in 1884, addressed "To the four American Barbarians — Davis, Gordon, Learned and Greene," and including these sentences: "You have come from a far country with the evil religion of Christ and as slaves of the robber Neesima. . . . Those who brought Buddhism to Japan in ancient times were killed; but we do not wish to defile the soil of Japan with your abominable blood. Hence take your famihes and go quickly." This was rather a belated manifestation of hostility, for the tide of national favor suddenly turned. The Japanese became eager to learn Western methods, and missionaries became popular almost over night, not because of their religious character, but because they were the most available foreigners who could tell the Japanese about European and American history, education, government, machinery, bank- ing, navigation, manufacturing, and military organization. PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 625 Mission schools were crowded. Churches doubled and trebled their membership. The advice of missionaries was sought by prominent Japanese, and they and other resident foreigners were treated with distinguished consideration. Christianity gained 6,000 communicants in 1889, and so promising were the signs of continued growth that it began to look as if Christianity might become the religion of Japan within a generation. The Japanese had no notion of allowing aliens to gain control of their country's industrial life. As soon as West- em methods were understood, suspicion and jealousy re- vived, and after 1889 the tide of national favor ebbed as sud- denly and violently as it had risen. Life in Japan was not pleasant for foreigners during these years. They were seldom subjected to violence, but they were snubbed and elbowed aside on every hand. Mission schools dwindled. Chapel congregations fell off, and new converts became so scarce that they hardly more than filled the vacancies caused by death and dismissal. ' ' The night of the nineties,' ' the missionaries called this gloomy period. Some came to the conclusion that the opportunity for mission work in Japan had passed, and a few resigned and went home. The change in pubHc sentiment, hke the one that pre- ceded it, was not primarily due to the fact that they were missionaries, but to the fact that they were foreigners. They shared the foreign and anti-foreign reactions of this period that we have mentioned in a former chapter, and that affected European and American business men in Japan quite as seriously as they affected missionary work. Many foreigners who had been employed by the Japanese were dismissed. Others who were engaged in trade saw their business go to pieces, and their curses were both loud and deep. A contributory cause, however, lay in the reports of Japa- nese who had gone to Europe and America to study the institutions and methods of Western lands, and to learn the secret of their ascendanc}^ They had supposed that Christianity was the religion of all the modern progressive 626 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST nations and that, if Japan were to take her place as an equal among them, she must adopt their religion as well as their miHtary, naval, industrial, and educational systems. They were impressed by a remark which Bismarck was re- ported to have made, that, if Japan expected to be regarded as a world-power of the first rank, she must become Chris- tian. There was actually some talk for a time of making Christianity the national religion, and Mr. William T. Ellis says that when he was in Tokyo he was told by a govern- ment official, whose "utterance upon any governmental question would not go unheeded in the world's capitals, that it had been the intention to make the Crown Prince a Christian, so that the next Emperor would be counted among the Christian rulers of the earth." Then the Japanese heard with surprise that Western nations were only partially Christian; that the people of the United States carefully separated church and state; that the French and Italian Governments were hostile to the church; that, while Great Britain and Germany had established churches, a large part of the population in both countries was outside of them; and that the great cities in dl of these lands reeked with immoraUty, intemperance, Sunday desecration, and other forms of irrefigion. The inquiring Japanese went back to tell their countrymen that Western nations were not really Christian; that their power was due to their science, inventions, discoveries, and manu- factures instead of to their refigion; that the Japanese could now handle the former themselves; that Christianity could be left out of account as a factor in the material pro- gramme; and that Japan's position in the world would be determined by her military and industrial efficiency rather than by her refigion. This anti-foreign reaction culminated in 1896, and by the opening of the twentieth century its force had been spent. By that time the Japanese had begun to feel more sure of themselves, and their jealousy and disfike of foreign- ers considerably abated. Since then, the attitude of the Japanese toward foreigners in both business and mission- PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 627 ary life has been one of personal kindness and good-natured recognition, as long as the foreigners have kept their proper place and recognized the fact that they are not superior beings, but residents or visitors among a people who pro- pose to manage their own affairs, and who gladly welcome co-operation but sternly resent dictation or patronage. The Japanese now accept most cordially the assistance which the missionaries can give. They have begun to un- derstand that the best elements in the life of the enHghtened and progressive nations of the world are Christian; that the teachings of the Founder of Christianity are pure and ennobling; that missionaries have come to communicate these teachings; and that they should not be judged by those of their countrymen who openly disregard them. The attitude of the government toward Christianity is friendly. Numerous evidences of this are cited in other chapters. It is true that the Emperor, the Elder States- men, and a large majority of officials of all grades are not Christians, and that so far as they are indifferent to Bud- dhism their indifference tends toward agnosticism rather than toward Christianity. Nevertheless, the governmental policy is one of fairness to all faiths. Article XXVIII of the Constitution provides that "Japanese subjects shall, within limits not prejudicial to peace and order, and not antagonistic to their duties as subjects, enjoy freedom of religious belief." Count Katsura, then Prime Minister, said in 1904: "Japan stands for religious freedom. This is a principle embodied in her Constitution, and her practice is in accord- ance with that principle. A man may be a Buddhist, a Christian, or even a Jew, without suffering for it. . , . There are Christian churches in every large city and in almost every town in Japan; and they all have complete freedom to teach and worship in accordance with their own convictions. These churches send out men to extend the influence of Christianity from one end of the country to the other as freely as such a thing might be done in the United States, and without attracting much if any more 628 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST attention. There are numerous Christian newspapers and magazines which obtain their Hcenses precisely as other newspapers and magazines and as a matter of course. Christian schools, some of them conducted by foreigners and some by Japanese, are found everywhere, and recently an ordinance has been issued by the Department of Educa- tion under which Christian schools of a certain grade are able to obtain all the privileges granted to government schools of the same grade. There are few things which are a better proof of the recognition of rights than the right to hold property. In many cases, associations composed of foreign missionaries permanently residing in Japan have been incorporated by the Department of Home Affairs. These associations are allowed to 'own and manage land, buildings and other property for the extension of Christi- anity, the carrying on of Christian education, and the per- formance of works of charity and benevolence.' It should be added also that they are incorporated under the article in the Civil Code which pro^ddes for the incorporation of associations founded for 'purposes beneficial to the public'; and as 'their object is not to make a profit out of the con- duct of their business,' no taxes are levied on their incomes. . . . Christian hterature has entrance into the mihtary and naval hospitals, and a relatively large number of the trained nurses employed in them are Christian women." ^ Indeed, the government has virtually recognized Chris- tianity as one of the rehgions of the Empire. In the war with Russia the War Department authorized the appoint- ment of chaplains for the armies in Manchuria. The mis- sionaries respectfully asked that Christian ministers as well as Buddhist and Shinto priests be appointed. The officers who had the power of selection were not disposed to accede to the request; but when it was presented to the Imperial Cabinet through the good offices of Sir Claude Macdonald, the British Ambassador, and Count Inouye, the influential Japanese statesman, that body promptl}^ sanctioned the appointment of six British and American ^ Interview with the Reverend William Imbrie, D.D. PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 629 missionaries and six Japanese Christians as chaplains with the transport and commissariat privileges accorded to other chaplains. The agents of the Bible Societies received special permission to distribute copies of the Bible among the men of the army and navy, and a Vice-Admiral promised to send to every ship in the navy the Bibles and other religious reading that the agents might wish to send. When, early in 1912, the Vice-Minister of Home Affairs for Japan, Mr. Tokonami, called a conference of the re- ligious leaders of the Empire "for the upholding of morality and the betterment of social conditions," he invited Chris- tians, Buddhists, and Shintoists alike to send representatives. Som.e of the missionaries were rather doubtful of the wisdom of accepting the invitation, fearing that acceptance might be construed as placing Christianity on a level with Bud- dhism and Shintoism, as if all three were simply different sects of a common rehgion. They knew, too, that govern- mental recognition in Japan involves a certain degree of relationship to and supervision by the government, and they beHeved that Christianity could best maintain its true character if it stood quite free from all political affilia- tions. Other missionaries and the Japanese Christians took a more favorable view, and the conference was attended bj^ thirteen Shintoists, fifty Buddhists, and seven Japanese Christians — one each of the Baptist, Methodist, Presbj^- terian, Congregational, Episcopal, Roman CathoHc, and Greek CathoHc communions. The omission of Confuci- anism was significant as showing that it is not regarded as one of the separate religions of Japan, its ethics and ancestor- worship finding expression in other ways. The government was represented by four members of the Cabinet and sev- eral vice-ministers and bureau chiefs. The conference continued in session four days. Its sessions were private, but one can imagine the decorum with which the Japanese would conduct the proceedings, in spite of the fact that the convictions of the delegates were as varied as their robes — the Shintoists white and gray; the Buddhists red, yellow, 630 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST and purple; and the Christians black. Mr. Tokonami sanctioned a public statement which included the following: "1. The primary intention in holding the conference is to direct attention to religion as a necessary means to the highest spiritual and moral welfare of both the individual and the nation. For a number of years this matter has not been given the importance that properly belongs to it, and the primary purpose of the conference is to reassert that importance. "2. No attempt is intended to unite the adherents of the several religions in one body, still less to establish a new religion. Shintoism, Buddhism and Christianity are all religions; but in certain important particulars each differs from the others and the religious convictions of the adherents of each should be respected without interference. It may, however, be confidently presumed that Shintoists, Buddhists and Christians alike will cordially recognize a responsibility to act as fellow-laborers for the advancement of the spiritual and moral interests of the nation to the utmost of their ability. "3. Shintoism and Buddhism have long had a recognized place as religions of the Japanese people. Christianity should also be ac- corded a similar place." Opinions as to the value of the conference differed after as well as before it. Some missionaries deplored it. Others went so far as to declare that "the conference is the most important event for Christianity since the edict boards against Christianity were removed over a generation ago." Perhaps the prevailing opinion was expressed by Professor A. K. Reischauer of the Meiji Gakuin (College); Tokyo, when he wrote: "We have in the statement of the Vice- Minister a recognition of the great importance of religion as a means to the highest spiritual and moral welfare of both the individual and the nation. This recognition is in sharp contrast with the views held by the great majority of Japanese statesmen during the past two or three decades. How widely this view of the Vice-Minister is held in the official world it is hard to say ; but it is certainly gratifying that a man as influential as Mr. Tokonami should give ex- pression to such opinions. Now, the main feature of Mr. Tokonami's scheme is that it recognizes two things about Christianity. One of these is that, though the Constitution PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 631 of Japan recognizes the principle of religious liberty, Chris- tianity has not had a fair chance in this land; the other point is that Chiistianity is worthy to be recognized as a religion which can contribute something to Japan's welfare." It would be easy to cite other evidences of friendly feel- ing toward Christianity. Governors and mayors often accept invitations to address annual meetings of religious bodies. At the coronation of the present Emperor, several Christians were included in the list of Japanese who re- ceived honors; some of them, like the Reverend Doctor Motoda, Headmaster of St. Paul's College, Tokyo, and Miss Ume Tsuda, Principal of a school for girls, being so prominent as Christian workers that their selection implied an approval of their work. Never before had Christians been so honored by the throne. Christian workers who are known to be favorabty dis- posed toward the government receive many courtesies. An American missionary, the Reverend Doctor George P. Pierson, writes: "I have to report the placing of forty-one railway stations at our disposal for addresses, the official assembling of audiences, and a free pass on the line when engaged in this particular work. The Railway Depart- ment of the Govermnent has for a long time felt the need of moral instmction for its employees. Buddhist and Shinto priests have had the privilege of holding meetings at the stations, and latterly Christian speakers have not only been allowed but even invited. When I wish to speak at a station or two, I ask our local station-master the day before to make arrangements. He telephones down the line, fixes the hour, and next day stands ready to furnish me with a pass. When I reach the station, I find the main waiting-room arranged like a chapel, with table, glass of water, and sometimes a vase of flowers. The seats are oc- cupied by the station-master, his assistant, the ticket man, the telegraph men, the baggage men, and in almost every case by some of the women and children from families of the men, as well as by people from the stores near by. The station-master asks me into his office, gives tea, and 632 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST sometimes offers Imich. I can leave a package of books in the men's room, and send them papers regularly thereafter." For a score of years, Christian work has steadily pro- gressed, and the Japanese chm-ches have made solid gains. At the Semi-Centennial of Protestant Missions in Tokyo, the Reverend Doctor William Imbrie was able to say: "Fifty years ago, notice boards were standing on the high- ways declaring Christianity a forbidden rehgion; to-day these same notice boards are seen standing in the Musemn in Tokyo as things of historical interest. Less than fifty years ago, the Christian Scriptures could be printed only in secret; to-day Bible Societies scatter them far and wide without let or hindrance. Even forty years ago, there was not an organized church in all Japan; to-day there are Synods and Conferences and Associations, with congrega- tions dotting the Empire from the Hokkaido to Formosa. To-day, Christians from the north and south and east and west gather together in the capital to celebrate the Semi- Centennial of the planting of Protestant Christianity in Japan, and men of high position in the nation cordially recognize the fact that Christianity in Japan has won for itself a place worthy of recognition." Christianity has made great strides in Japan since these words were spoken. A three-year national evangehstic campaign, inaugurated by a joint committee of Protestant churches and missions in 1913, resulted in 4,788 meetings, attended by 777,119 persons, of whom 27,350 professed conversion. Of the meetings in Kobe, the Reverend H. P. Jones wrote that the "first night the church, which seats 900, was filled and many were turned away. The next night a theatre seating 2,000 was crowded to the doors, and again many were turned away. Mr. Ando, the lay leader of the temperance movement in Japan, spoke for an hour. Then for another hour that packed house quietly listened to Doctor Ebina of Tokyo. The next day the capacious Y. M. C. A. building was filled to the hmit morning, afternoon and evening. In a club house near by a meeting for children was attended by 3,500. Monday night, the people Hterally PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 633 jammed the largest theatre, and a sign requested Chris- tians not to come into the building so that non-Christians could have the seats. The police ordered the doors closed, pronouncing the house full, but people kept coming for more than an hour demanding entrance."^ Protestant Christianity in Japan is now represented by 1,079 organized churches, 90,172 adult commimicants, a constituency (including children and enrolled catechumens) of 123,222; 2,861 Japanese workers, 174 kindergartens, 62 elementary schools, 56 middle schools, 6 normal schools, 14 colleges, 28 theological and Bible schools, 16 industrial training-schools, 9 hospitals, 9 orphanages, an ex-prisoners' home and school, and 2 day-nurseries. Japanese Chiistians contributed for the support of this work during the year in question 577,560 yen, in addition to the sums sent by the mission boards in Great Britain and North America. Roman Catholics report 270 churches, with 76,134 members, and Russian Greek Catholics 267 churches, with 36,265, swelhng Christianity's total in Japan to 235,621. These figures, which will be exceeded by the next report, do not include Korea, whose figures I give in another chapter. Japanese churches are not only alert and aggressive in their plans and work at home, but they have organized missionary societies to follow their countr3rmen who have emigrated to Korea, China, and Formosa. The Kumiai churches in particular have undertaken an active work in Korea, sending over a considerable number of ministers and evangehsts, and developing churches in several cities. Their efforts are encouraged by the government because they are deemed helpful in strengthening Japanese influ- ence in Korea, and in promoting the national policy of assimilation. The influence of Christianity is far greater than official reports can indicate. In most countries Christianity made its first converts among the lower strata of society; but in Japan it has won its greatest successes among the Samurai, or knightly class, which has furnished the majority of the ^ Article in The Missionary Review of the World, January, 1917. G34 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST arm)' and navj officers, journalists, legislators, educators, and leading men generally of the new Japan. \Vhile ap- proximately one person in every thousand of the popula- tion is a Christian, one in every hundred of the educated classes is a Christian. The personnel of the churches in Japan probably averages higher in intelHgence and social position than in any other land; though of course many exceptions could be made to such a generalization. The proportion of Christians is noticeably high among editors and school-teachers. At the time of my second visit to Japan, there were said to be scores of Christian editors in Tokyo alone, and fourteen members of the Imperial Diet were of the same faith. Christians are also to be foimd among the officers of the army and navy, and the ranks of business and professional men of high standing. Joseph Hardy Neesima, founder of the Doshisha College in Kyoto; Yoitsu Honda, first Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Japan; Kenkichi Kataoka, formerly President of the Lower House of the Imperial Diet; Tasuku Harada, President of the Doshisha; Kajinosuke Ibuka, President of the Meiji Gakuin in Tokyo; Masahisa Uemura, theologian, editor, and preacher of Tokyo — these are names of which the church in any land might well be proud, men of the first order of character and abiHty. "One would indeed be very courageous," says Tyler Dennett, "as well as something else, to suggest in Japan to Professor Nitobe of the Imperial University, Senator Suroku Ebara of the House of Peers, Doctor Ukita, editor of the Taiyo; Taku- taro Sakai of the Mitsui Bank, Mr. Kobaj^ashi, the tooth- powder man; Mr. Ohara, the milHonaire silk manufacturer of Kurashiki; Mr. Hatano of the Ayabe Silk Filatures; Madame Yajima and Miss Tsuda, both of whom were re- cently decorated by the Emperor; Madame Hirooka, daughter of the Mitsui family, and one of the richest women in Japan, that they were 'rice Christians.'"^ When the Reverend Doctor Henry Sloane Coffin of New York at- tended a Sunday service in Doctor Uemura's church in ^ Article in Asia, January, 1918. PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN Go 5 Tokyo, he found that the office-bearers of the congi'egation included the Vice-Mayor of the city, a professor iii the Imperial University, an editor of one of the principal daily newspapers, the head of the Government Bureau of Agri- culture, a general in the army, a prominent broker and banker, and a judge of the Court of Appeals. Very earnest many of the Japanese Christians are. An army officer, who was sent to open a new post at Kyodo on the Antung-Mukden Railway in Manchuria, where he had 3,000 Japanese laborers under his command for construc- tion work, made a neat Httle church the first building to be erected, he and his equally devoted Christian wife and a few other Japanese Christians paying for it themselves. One may now find quite a number of Japanese churches in Korea and Manchmia which have been developed without foreign assistance, and whose members evidence the gen- uineness of their faith by their works. We shall long remember the first Japanese Christian whom we met after our arrival in Japan — Kawai Suye Kichi, of the household of the Reverend and Mrs. Theodore MacNair, in Tokyo. Reared among the mountains of Shinshui, he had earned a hving by transporting loads over the pass by which multitudes of pilgrims journeyed to the sacred places beyond. The railroad destroyed his business, but one day it brought to his mountain home the tired missionary family, seeking rest. Ever intent upon their Father's business, they failed not to speak of Him. Kawai Suye Kichi heard and beheved. When the missionaries returned to Tokyo, he begged to be allowed to go with them that he might be more fully instructed. In due time he was bap- tized. A plain man past middle age, he gi'ew mighty in prayer and in the Scriptures, and expounded the way of fife to many in his former village, which he regularly visited. We learned that the day before we landed this brother at morning prayers had made special intercession for us, sim- ply but earnestly asking God to be with us during all our visit, and to make us a "witness for Jesus Christ" wherever we went. As we were beginning our tour of Asia, and were 636 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST then without experience in speaking through an inter- preter to strangers of a different race and modes of thought, the knowledge of such a prayer and the affectionate welcome of that humble child of God warmed our hearts, and made our speaking to Japanese congregations seem much easier. A fine t3^e of Christian faith was illustrated shortly after an explosion on a Japanese battleship some years ago. The son of a Vice-Admiral was involved in the wreckage. While search was being made for the bodies, many promi- nent Japanese called upon the mother to offer their con- dolence. She told them that she felt the need of the con- solations of the Christian religion in that time of anxiety, and she called upon her Japanese pastor to read the Scrip- tures and to offer prayer. He was a young man who had been recently graduated from the Theological Seminary. It was a difficult position for him; but with tact and fidelity he opened the New Testament, read suitable passages, and then earnestly prayed, while Japanese in high official posi- tion, some of whom had never heard such words before, bowed with the anxious mother. Later, the body of the son was found. The stricken parents announced that the public funeral would be followed by a Christian service, and that any of their friends who wished to come would be welcome. A distinguished company assembled. The young Japanese again spoke, impressively dwelling upon the Chris- tian meaning of death, and the comfort which God gives to His children in the time of need. Such an evidence of Christian faith, wholly independent of the presence or sug- gestion of any foreign missionary, is a significant illustra- tion of the hold that Christianity has taken upon the Japanese. It would be easy to multiply instances of a kind that cannot be tabulated in statistical tables. For example, a few years ago, the pupils of the government schools in a certain city were not allowed to attend the Sunday-school of the local church. Now they are not only free to attend, but six of the teachers are Christians, and four of them teach in that Sunday-school. Three successive principals PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 637 of the Government Normal School in the same city, and several of the teachers from the Normal and other public schools, although not Christians, have been members of the Bible class. In another city I obtained equally suggestive facts. There are five classes in the government school. In the first-year class there were forty-seven believers in Shinto- ism; in the second-year class thirty-one; in the third-year class eleven; in the fourth-year class eight, and in the fifth class, the graduating class, only three. These statistics were published by the Japanese principal of the school. They show how education is affecting Shintoism even in the government schools, which are supposed to be most favorable to it. The same report of the principal showed that there were seven students who were Christians, aU of whom were in the two highest classes. Of the five who stood at the head of the graduating class, four were Chris- tians. The principal reported that fourteen other students gave "no rehgion" in response to his inquiries, but stated that they were "inquirers." A missionary asked the prin- cipal what they were inquirers of, and he rephed : " Chris- tianity." A professor in the Imperial University at Tokyo has de- clared that "at least a million Japanese outside the Chris- tian church have so come to understand Christianity that, though as yet unbaptized, they are framing their fives ac- cording to the teachings of Christ"; and Marquis Okuma remarked: "Although Christianity has enrolled less than 200,000 behevers (this was in 1912), yet the indirect influ- ence of Christianity has poured into every realm of Japa- nese Kfe." This thought is emphasized by Mr. Kanzo Uchimura, a prominent Japanese, who avows himself a Christian though not connected with any church, and who declared in a pubHshed article: "There are hundreds and thousands of Christians in Japan who have had nothing to do with mis- sionaries, and who, without belonging to any church, and knjowing nothing about dogmas and sacraments and eccle- 638 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST siastical orders, are yet devout believers iii God and Christ. There is such a thing as 'Christianity outside of churches/ and it is taking hold of the Japanese people far more strongly than the missionaries imagine. The Western idea, that a rehgion must show itself in an organized form before it can be recognized as a rehgion at all, is alien to the Japa- nese mind. With us, rehgion is more a family affair than national or social, as is shown by the strong hold that Con- fucianism has had upon us without showing itself in any organized societies and movements. And I am confident that Christianity is now slowly but steadily taking the place of Confucianism as the family religion of the Japanese. Christianity is making progress in this country far ahead of missionaries. This new form of Christianity adopted by my countiymen is neither Orthodox nor Unitarian. We go to Jesus of Nazareth directly and aim to live and be made like Him." The Bible societies, which have done remarkably efficient work in Japan, report that 8,000,000 copies of the Bible have been circulated among the Japanese during the last forty years, and that the demand is still so great that the Bible is the best-selling book in Japan to-day. The transla- tions, begun by Doctor Gutzlaff and brought to a successful conclusion in 1885 by Doctors Hepburn, Verbeck, Brown, Bettelheim, and McCartee, have been characterized by com- petent linguists as "scholarly, idiomatic, readable and rhythmic," and have taken a recognized place in the Hterary as well as the rehgious life of Japan. The Young Men's Christian Association flourishes in the large cities and in the army and n&vy. The association won golden opinions from the governmental and military au- thorities during the Russia-Japan War, and has been in high favor ever since. The attendance of soldiers at the eleven Y. M. C. A. branches in Korea and Manchuria aggregated a million and a half in eighteen months. The branch at Dairen, equipped under the guidance of that capable Chris- tian officer, Colonel (now Major-General) Hibiki, held the record for attendance until the European War, in 1914, the ' PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 639 daily number of visiting soldiers ranging from 2,000 to 6,000. Prince Ito attended the dedication of the Y. M. C. A. building in Seoul, December 4, 1908, and said in an address: " It gives me great pleasure to be with you to-daj'' on this auspicious occasion. ... I am sincerely gratified to see the association installed in an abode so well ap- pointed for its purposes, because I recognize in it a most potent instrument for the advancement of the social and moral well-being of this people. I recognize in the associa- tion a friend and fellow-worker in the great cause of national regeneration, which it is my duty and pleasure to further to the best of my ability. I hardly need assure you, ladies and gentlemen, that the association may always count upon my sympathy and friendship. The Young Men's Christian Association of Seoul has the sincerest wishes of all true friends of Korea for its success and pros- perity." The secular press does not fail to note the trend. An editorial in The Japanese Advertiser, on Christmas Day, says: "There can be no gainsaying that the Christmas season, quite apart from its religious significance, is making great headway in this countiy. A walk through the streets of Tokyo to-day gives abundant evidence of the influence of the season, for all the shops are stocked with goods that are associated with the foreign Christmas quite as much as with the Japanese New Year. Dotted throughout the city are the Christian churches, each one of which is now en- gaged in celebrating the holy season with religious services, as well as sacred concerts and other entertainments suitable to the occasion. It must be conceded that Christianity is making great progress in a country where its principal fes- tivals are coming to be accepted by the mass of the people, even if that acceptation is only concerned with the purely secular manifestations of the faith. It is a great stride forward compared with what it was only a few years ago, when the people were still antagonistic toward the religion which, together with all its associations, they regarded with contempt." 640 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST Striking is the contrast between jeering crowds trampling on crosses lying in the dust a generation ago, and the great Red Cross Government Hospital in Tokyo, and the Japa- nese Red Cross Society enrolling thousands of the most in- fluential men and women of the new Japan imder the direct patronage of the Empress. It is true that the name "Red Cross" was adopted without reference to the rehgious sig- nificance of the word Cross; but it is significant that the Japanese see no objection to-day to a symbol which a former generation despised. I would not make too much of these facts. Japan is still far from being a Christian nation. The obstacles yet to be surmounted are numerous and some of them are formidable. The impression has gone abroad that the whole Japanese nation, having adopted many Western methods, has also undergone a vital religious transformation. That such a transformation has begun is undoubtedly true. Evidences of it are nimierous. But the statement of a committee of missionaries years ago still holds that, while the country has in many ways adopted the fruits of Christian civiHza- tion, it has done so with no large acceptance of Christian truth as its basis, and that approximately 80 per cent of the population is still destitute of a knowledge of the char- acter of Christianity which would make intelligent accep- tance possible. The bulk of the peasant class knows little or nothing of Christianity, except in the vaguest way; and many of the educated classes value its enlightening, social, and humanitarian influence without a real understanding of its vital spiritual power. Buddhism and Shintoism hav- ing long been the national rehgions, it is not surprising that there are thirty times as many Buddhist and Shinto tem- ples as Christian chapels, and two hundred times as many priests as Christian preachers; but the proportions indi- cated testify to the fact that the old faiths are far from moribund. Nevertheless, surveying the whole Christian movement in Japan, and making all due allowance for the many diffi- culties still existing and the great work yet to be done, the PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN JAPAN 641 broad fact remains that Christianity has made notable headway in a country to which it came as a faith ahen to the beHefs and customs of the people, a faith brought by foreigners whose motives were suspected and whose ideas and practices were widely at variance with those of the Japanese. A vigorous church has been developed, with capable leadership and a deepening sense of responsibiHty for the evangeUzation of the people of Japan. Christian ideas have begun to permeate the Hterature and the think- ing of the nation to a greater extent than is commonly realized. The Reverend Doctor D. C. Greene, of Tokyo, declared, shortly before his lamented deaths that "hardly ever before in any land has Christianity borne riper or more varied fruit at so early a stage in its history." The tree is comparatively small, but it is no longer an exotic of uncer- tain life. It has struck its roots firmly into Japanese soil and has showed that it can and that it will flourish there as an indigenous growth. It is regrettable that many of the Americans and Euro- peans who visit the Far East do not make more effort to see missionary work. Most of them spend their time in the shops, hotels, and clubs of the ports and capitals, the Buddhist and Shinto temples and shrines, and a few places of scenic or historic interest. The professional guides whom they employ know that they have nothing to gain by ad- vising a traveller to visit a mission; and if he asks about one, they are apt to profess ignorance, or to tell him that there is nothing worth seeing there. It is to their financial gain to pilot him to the shops, which pay them a commis- sion on articles that he can be induced to buy. The busi- ness and professional residents in the foreign settlements include men and women of high Chiistian character; but they themselves frankly lament that irrehgion in these set- tlements is more common than in corresponding circles in American and British cities. Between mendacious guides and irreligious foreigners, the hurried traveller is apt to get a poor opinion of missionaries unless he insists on seeing them for himself , which, unfortunatety, he does not always do. 642 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST During Colonel Alfred E. Buck's incumbency as American Minister to Japan, a traveller asked his opinion of mission- aries, stating that he had been a contributor to mission work, but that he had heard so many criticisms on the steamer and in the hotels that he was inclined to discon- tinue his support. Colonel Buck repHed that he should not make such reports the basis of judgment; that he him- self had once doubted the value and advisability of mission- ary effort, but that fuller knowledge had led him to revise his opinion, and that he had come to the conclusion that the influence of missionaries had been worth more to Japan than all other influences combined. Another American Am- bassador to Japan, the Honorable Luke E. Wright said: ''When I came to the Orient I was disappointed in the mis- sionaries — agreeably disappointed. I expected to find them, as in every other calHng, all sorts of men, with a proportion of no-account ones who had come out here because they could not make a living at home. But I must confess that I have not met a single missionary who could not pass anywhere. Both in the Philippines and in Japan I have met many missionaries, and a finer lot of men I have never seen anywhere." ^ These are the disinterested opinions of men who know the facts; and they are corroborated by the opinions of the eminent Japanese that have been cited on preceding pages. 1 C/. also the tribute of F. A. McKenzie, correspondent of the London Daily Mail, in his books, The Unveiled East and From Tokyo to Tiflis. CHAPTER XXXVIII TREND OF JAPANESE RELIGIOUS THOUGHT The Japanese type of religious thought is definitely evangelical of a moderate or liberal trend. At first, indeed, the accepted creeds were conservative. When the Presby- terian and Reformed missions formed the Church of Christ in Japan, they did so on the doctrinal basis of the home churches which they represented, and the infant organiza- tion solemnly adopted the Canons of the Synod of Dort, the Heidelberg Cathechism, the Westminster Confession of Faith, and the Shorter Catechism. The Reverend K. Ibuka, of Tokyo, vainly protested, urging not only un- suitabiHty but that two of these symbols had never been translated into the Japanese language, and were wholly unknown to the Japanese ministers and membership. But it was easier to use the historical creeds of the churches which maintained the co-operating missions than it was to frame a satisfactory new creed, and Mr. Ibuka's motion was defeated. Time soon showed the inexpediency of at- tempting to force these elaborate symbols of the West upon the youthful chiu-ch in the East. About ten years after- ward, Mr. Ibuka's motion was revived and carried, and short and simple articles, based on the Apostles' Creed, were adopted, with a preamble adapting it to Japanese needs. In 1912 the Christian Literatiu"e Society of Japan issued a "Statement of the Christian Faith and Life, A Message to the Japanese Churches," which had been pre- viously submitted to seven hundred missionaries of the various communions represented in Japan. It was issued, not as a complete presentation of the Christian faith and life, but "to acquaint the Japanese with the salient features of Christian teaching." One who wishes to know the sub- stance of the missionary teaching in Japan on the vital 643 644 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST points of theology and life will be deeply interested in this remarkable document. It might be supposed that the martial spirit of the Japa- nese and their strict ideas of organization and discipline would incline them to a rigid type of religious thinking and procedure; but their national tendency in this direction is modified by the equally strong Japanese disposition to scrutinize everything of foreign origin^ and to adopt only so much as they deem adapted to their use. Their selec- tion in doctrinal matters is influenced by the further fact, to which I have referred elsewhere, that they had not been accustomed to conceive of a Supreme Being in terms of personahty. Some of the tenets of Christianity, there- fore, appeared to them to be irrational. The fatherhood and love of God, so precious to us of the West, required a great deal of explanation before they became inteUigible to the Japanese. The parable of the Prodigal Son did not suggest to them what it instantly does to an American audi- ence, because they had never thought of God as a father, or of man as his child. Nor is it altogether easy to explain some other Christian truths and biblical accounts. The Twenty-third Psalm and the parable of the Good Shepherd conveyed very little of their rich meaning to people who had never seen a sheep. Only recently a scholarly missionary, who has midertaken to prepare a series of articles on Chris- tianity for the vernacular press, wrote: "One has to write in a very elementary fashion when one seeks to interest those who have alsolutely no knowledge of Christian teach- ing. Many things most simple to us must then be ex- plained, and it is often most difficult to find an explanation which makes the matter clear, and avoids making it gro- tesque. For example, to tell the story of the Annunciation and of the shepherds, one must explain what angels are; and to do that so as to seem reasonable and not silly is harder than you would think. In the case of the Tempta- tion, I found these difficulties so great that I left it out altogether — as Mark did ! To be sure, he mentions it, but he does not relate it." TREND OF JAPANESE RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 645 The Japanese churches now include a considerable num- ber of Christians who have passed beyond the stage re- ferred to in the preceding paragraph, but the difficulties described are still encountered by evangelists who address the comparatively untouched masses. Even among the Christians themselves, especially those of the first genera- tion of believers, the heritage of centuries of non-Christian beliefs often creates certain rather definite presuppositions that are apt to affect the interpretation of the Bible. The persistence of pre-Christian ideas in Christian chm-ches, and their effect upon faith and practice is a subject to which I have adverted in another volume,^ and which has received remarkably suggestive treatment by Professor Joh. War- neck. ^ The Japanese Christians propose to think through the problems of theology for themselves. Western creeds are not blindly accepted. One of their ablest men, the Reverend Doctor M. Uemura, of Tokyo, has plainly written: "In the realm of religious thought, is it not shameful to accept opinions ready-made, relying on the experiences of others instead of one's own? ... Is it not a great duty that we owe to God and to mankind to develop the religious talent of our people, and to contribute our share to the reHgious ideas of the world?" This is a healthy intellectual and spiritual sentiment, and it may result in time in a re- statement of theology in terms of Japanese thought. We should welcome this rather than deprecate it. We have done the same thing for ourselves and, we beHeve, to the enlargement and enrichment of common Christianity. Per- haps the Japanese will make quite as valuable an addition to the world's faith. The probability that some changes will be made (whether good, bad, or indifferent, time will show) is heightened by the fact that many of the leaders of the Japanese churches have been largely influenced by the inquiring spirit of modern scientific and philosophical ^Rising Churches in Non-Christian Lands, pp. 53 seq. 'Article, "Vestiges of Heathenism Within the Church in the Mission Field/' International Review of Mitssiond, October, 1914. 646 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST methods, either in European or American colleges and um*- versities or in Japanese institutions which have accepted those methods. Some years ago the tendency appeared to be toward Unitarianism. Since then, the current has swimg back to definitely evangeHcal channels. A well- known missionary of the conservative school expresses the opinion that the Japanese Christian leaders "are doctri- nally sound. This does not mean that they all stand for the old-line orthodoxy, especially with respect to the inspiration of the Scriptures. To a very considerable extent they ex- press themselves in terms of the 'assured results of Higher Criticism,' of what one may call the modem type. In spite of some things here and there that men Hke myself deplore, however, we find ourselves obliged in fairness to admit that the trend of the past decade has been toward a positive stand and a sound stand on the great funda- mentals of the faith." Another missionary writes: "We sometimes say hard things about the ministry of the Japa- nese Church, but it is not about their doctrines or prin- ciples. They are nearly as well grounded in the doctrines and principles of Christianity as the ministry of the Protes- tant Churches of America and England. The difficulty is that these doctrines and principles have not yet had time to work themselves out into consistent and steady prac- tice, and there are constant outcroppings in practice of pagan pride and injustice. There is much Judaism and heathenism left in us Western Christians. Why should there not be still more of Buddhist and Confucian thorn- life left in the first generation of Christians of Japan?" The problem of the relation of the foreign mission to the native church, which in most lands is still in its early or middle stages, has in Japan become acute. It is not a purely reUgious problem; it is fundamentally a part of the question which affects many poHtical and commercial relationships. When foreigners develop any enterprise in Japan, shall they or the Japanese control it? Japan has vigorous churches. Their governing bodies are composed in some cases wholly, and in others very largely, of Japanese. TREND OF JAPANESE RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 647 Independence of missionary control has reached its most complete stage in the Kumiai (Congregational) Churches. Congregational ministers in America are members of local churches, but not in Japan; nor are they eligible to member- ship in the National Coimcil. The Methodist Episcopal Church is organized into conferences presided over by a Japanese bishop, and The Church of Christ, formed in 1877 by the six Presbyterian and Reformed Missions, has seven Presbyteries which are united in a Japanese Synod. All of the seven bishops of the AngHcan communion, represent- ing a union of the Church of England and the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States, are still foreigners; but the Japanese clergy preponderate in the diocesan con- ventions, and the demand for Japanese bishops is becoming more insistent. A large proportion of the churches are self-supporting. The Church of Christ will not organize a congregation as a church unless it is wholly self-sustaining, including the pastor's salary; and if a church after being organized ceases to be self-supporting, it loses its status and its right to have a voting representative in Presbytery. The pas- tors of the self-supporting churches have greater prestige than their brethren who serve other congregations, and they alone have the power to vote in the presbyteries and to represent them in the joint committees of Japanese and missionaries in the supervision of evangelistic work. Doctor M. Uemura declares that "apart from Christ and the Spirit, Japanese Christianity has no need to rely on any one what- ever. Sufficient unto itself, resolved to stand alone, it must advance along the whole line toward the realization of this ideal. ... To depend upon the pockets of foreigners for money to pay the bills is not a situation which ought to satisfy the moral sense of Japanese Christians." The policy of the Roman and Greek Catholic Churches lodges final power in the authorities at Rome and Petro- grad, respectively, and all bishops are appointed by and are amenable to them. Practically, however, the local bishops exercise 'wdde discretion in the management of their 648 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST own work. That the national spirit of independence ex- ists among their Japanese clergy and laity may be inferred from the fact that July 13, 1909, forty delegates of the Rus- sian Greek Church, assembled in Tokyo, passed a resolution to the effect that the maintenance of the Japan Orthodox Church should be placed in the hands of the Japanese be- lievers as soon as possible; that, since the whole expenses of the church are met with money obtained from the Holy Synod, or supphed by the Russian Government, the pastors of the church are in the position of being salaried officials of the Russian Government, a position unbecoming for Japanese. Japanese ecclesiastical bodies of all types insist upon a decisive voice in the control of their religious work. This is partly because of the temperament of the Japanese, who are the most self-reHant, ambitious, and aggressive of all non-Christian peoples; and partly because of the fact that the converts in Japan have not come so generally from the lower classes as in most other countries, but from the middle and higher middle class, which has produced the leaders of modern Japan in education, commerce, politics, and the army and navy. This predominance of exception- ally strong men, together with the national spirit of pride and self-reliance, naturally resulted in the development of a spirit of independence in the church earUer than in other lands. The Japanese are not incHned to follow the leader- ship of foreigners in religion any more than in poHtics and business. The missionaries therefore found themselves confronted by the alternatives of organizing separate churches, or of withdrawing from the country, or of accepting co-operation with the Japanese churches on such terms as the latter might prescribe. The first alternative was manifestly im- practicable, except as a temporary makeshift. A Japanese church controlled by foreigners and accepting their leader- ship and money, side by side with an independent Japanese church struggling to make its own way, would command no respect, and could have no future. TREND OF JAPANESE RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 649 The second alternative might appear to be a natural corollary from the aim of the missionary enterprise. Since that aim is to found the church, it might be considered achieved when the church is started. The objections to withdrawal from Japan, however, are decisive. After making the most generous allowance for that part of the population that is being influenced by Christian ideas, there remain vast sections that are almost wholly un- touched. It is a great thing that within a little more than half a century after the establishment of Protestant mis- sions there are nearly a hundred thousand communicants in Japan; that Roman and Greek Catholics enlarge the total to a quarter of a million; and that the progressive Hfe of the nation is feeling the influence of Christianity in the varied ways that have been described in a former chapter. But there are 57,000,000 people in Japan. The churches, with all their intelligence and activity, are still too small and weak -to handle unaided the tremendous problems of evangelization and Christian education. They will un- doubtedly do so in time. I have such faith in the future of Christianity in Japan that, if missionaries were to be withdrawn entirely, I beheve that Christianity would sur- vive and ultimately spread throughout the Empire. But we should not acquiesce in a policy which might defer the evangelization of Japan for centuries, when we are able to assist in having it accomplished within a shorter period. The opinion of the Japanese Christian leaders on this subject is conclusive. They do not want the missions to withdraw. When the late Bishop Honda, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, was asked by the Canadian Methodist Mission for his judgment as to the advisability of an ex- tensive evangelistic work by the mission or, on the other hand, the gradual withdrawal of the mission force, he re- plied : "From the depth of my heart I request you to go on. . . . The united new church is struggling for self-support and has not power to advance; so it is absolutely necessar}'' to have the missionaries work for the imevangehzed places." The leaders of The Church of Christ told me that the pres- 650 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST ent foreign force is too small, and that more men and money are urgently needed, particularly for the educa- tional and literary work which the Japanese Christians are not yet able to do on an adequate scale. Of the Kumiai churches, their secretary, the Reverend T. Makino, wrote in the Japan Christian World: "For years we raised our voices for the independence of our churches. Now, inde- pendence being an accomplished fact, we are up against another problem. It is the need of that hand-in-hand effort that goes with the expansion of evangelistic effort. . . . The day has passed for us to regard them (mission- aries) as strangers. It is now the time for us to work in full fellowship with them in spiritual warfare. We earnestly hope that the American Board will appreciate the oppor- tunity and will greatly increase their forces." The third alternative, co-operation, appears to be an easy solution of the problem of relationship with a self- governing church. But what is meant by co-operation? Some explain it one way, some another. The Synod of The Church of Christ, in 1906, declared what it meant by the following action: "A co-operating mission is one which recognizes the right of The Church of Christ in Japan to the general control of all evangelistic work done by the mission as a mission within the chiu-ch, or in connection with it, and which carries on such work imder an arrange- ment based upon the foregoing principle, and concurred in by the Synod, acting through the Board of Missions." The following year, the Synod emphasized its position by voting that "all local churches receiving aid from missions which by September 30, 1908, should fail to co-operate by defini- tion, should be totally disconnected from The Church of Christ in Japan." Missionaries of some other communions, like the Protes- tant Episcopal and Methodist Episcopal, have not experi- enced the precise form of difficulty that for a time confronted the missions of the Presbyterian and Reformed churches, as their methods of organization are somewhat different. But the fundamental fact affects them all, namely, that TREND OF JAPANESE RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 651 missionaries in Japan cannot successfully separate their work from the Japanese churches, or wisely withdraw from the country, but must remain and work in some form of direct and sympathetic co-operation with them. This is what they are veiy cordialty doing. They respect their Japanese brethren, and are working happily with them. They do not believe that a missionary anywhere in the world makes a mistake when he trusts his native associates and co-operates ungrudgingly with them. If they wish to do some things that he does not approve, it may not fol- low that they are wrong. At any rate, they are in their own coimtry, and are deahng with affairs that are more vital to them than to any one else. The missionary is not in Japan for himself, but for the Japanese. His aim is to establish the church; and that church when established does not exist in the interest of the missions, but the mis- sions exist in the interest of the church, which is expected in due time to assume responsibility for the work that is developed. I look upon the growing power and independence of the churches in Japan, not indeed without some anxiety, and yet, on the whole, with large gratification. They have made mistakes, and doubtless they will make more. The churches in New Testament times made them, and so have the modern churches in Europe and America. The Asiatic churches may promulgate some doctrines and interpreta- tions of the Bible that we regard as unsound; but are Western churches so uniformly free from error that we are willing to make them patterns for the churches in the mis- sion field ? When we think of all the vagaries and heresies that thrive like weeds in the Western mind, we may feel that perhaps it is just as well that the churches in the Far East should be autonomous, so that they will be free to accept the good and to reject the bad.^ * For a further discussion of the relation of Western theological and eccle- siastical forms to the churches in Asia, and the pressing question of church union, see the author's volumes on The Foreign Missionary, Unity and Mis- sions, and Rising Churches in Non-Christian Lands. CHAPTER XXXIX JAPANESE TESTIMONY TO JAPAN'S URGENT NEED No one can study Japan and the Japanese with an open mind without becoming conscious of deepened interest and friendliness of feeling. Irritating as some of their methods are, trying as it is for the race-proud Anglo-Saxon to feel that at last he has met a competitor that he cannot easily overcome, these things increase rather than diminish one's interest. It is to the credit of the Japanese that they are able, luiited, ambitious, and aggressive. I do not extenuate their faults any more than I extenuate those of my own countrymen; but I am eager to see the Japanese united with the best people of Europe and America in the effort to promote righteousness throughout the earth. Forces and temptations in America, which numerous and powerful Christian churches help us to fight, are surging into a coun- try where the opposing forces of righteousness are still comparatively new and small. An influential Japanese journal editorially warns its readers of the resultant danger: "Japan is now joyfully riding on the wave of prosperity," it declares. "Gold is flowing in and many a man has amassed a fortune which he never dreamt of before. It is a question, however, whether this abnormal growth in wealth is an unalloyed blessing. A nation on which wealth has been unexpectedly thrust will degenerate unless it is morally strong enough to bear it. Japan now stands at the crossways of rise and decHne. If, on account of the great wealth she has been given, she becomes swell-headed, extravagant, and effeminate, she is doomed. Morally this is really a critical time for her, and it is a time when her statesmen, educationists, and reHgion- ists must exert themselves to the utmost to warn the people against the danger looming ahead, restrain them from giving 652 TESTIMONY TO JAPAN'S URGENT NEED 653 themselves up to a life of careless luxury, and show them the right way to pursue." The peril of the situation is intensified by the fact that the old rehgions of Japan are losing their hold, particularly upon the educated classes. Mr. Galen W. Fisher, Secretary of the Y. M. C. A. in Tokyo, says that a census of 409 stu- dents in three schools showed that only 21 acknowledged any faith; and that of these, 15 were Buddhists, 1 was a Confucian, 1 a Shintoist, and 4 were Christians. The flower of Japan's youth are the students of the government universities. The young men in the Imperial University in Tokyo were asked to indicate their religions. The re- sponses were as follows: Buddhists, 50; Christians, 60; atheists, 1,500; agnostics, 3,000. In other words, out of 4,610 young men who will be among the most influential men of the future, 4,500 had discarded the national religious faiths and become atheists or agnostics. What will it mean to the world if these proportions are to continue, and the Far East is to develop under the leadership of a nation that has no reHgious faith? No wonder that Baron Makino, Minister of Education, a few years ago said : "We are greatly distressed about the moral condition of the students, and the low character of the ordinary lodging-houses where young men live." Mr. Masujiro Honda says of the conference of represen- tatives of Buddhist, Shinto and Christian religions in 1912: ''It was, on the one hand, a frank admission on the part of government officials and Elder Statesmen of their power- lessness to cope with the alarming situation that the trend of events presented before their anxious eyes, and on the other hand it was a rebuke administered to the spiritual powers that be for their lack of zeal. . . . The leading in- tellects and financiers who organized it have been com- pelled to recognize the m-gent and imperative need of a reHgion as the true basis of a moral and material regenera- tion of their countrymen." A society for the study of rehgions has been formed among the professors of the Imperial University in Tokyo. 654 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST This does not imply that the members are disposed to be- come Christians, but it does signify that some of the ablest men in that faculty of able and scholarly men are not satis- fied with an agnostic or atheistic interpretation of Hfe, and that they regard rehgion as a force that should have care- ful and intelligent study. It is significant, too, that in 1916 the university accepted a gift of 200,000 yen from Baron Morimura, a well-known Christian, to establish a chair of Christianity in the university. In my conversations with prominent Japanese during my two visits to Japan, I was accustomed to bring in the query: "What do you regard as the chief need of modern Japan?" After collating the answers at the end of my tours, I found that the consensus of opinion was that Japan's most m-gent need is a new basis of morals; that the nation has broken loose from its old religious moorings and has not yet made new ones. The lesson should be taken to heart in Occidental as well as Oriental lands. We of the West know that Christ is a cleansing and stabiHzing force in national life, and we ought to be profoundly concerned that the Japanese should have Christ to help them. We want to see Christian mis- sions in Japan strengthened, not because we regard the Japanese as inferiors, not because we deserve any credit for the knowledge of God which was brought to us as to them from the outside, but because we coimt the Japanese as brethren who need the same Christ that we need. Lord Balfour, of the British Parliament, has well said that "the great lesson impressed upon us by our representatives from whatever race they come, and in whatever field they work, is that it is perilous to give the benefits of civilization with its accompanying temptations, without making an earnest effort to strengthen moral and spiritual forces. ... It is the duty of Christian nations to make as the first aim of their policy the good of the races with whom they are brought in contact. The desire for their own advantage is no excuse for departure on their part from this sound principle." TESTIMONY TO JAPAN'S URGENT NEED 655 We of the West have given the Japanese our weapons to increase their military efficiency, our inventions and dis- coveries to increase their manufacturing and commercial efficiency, our educational and scientific methods to increase their intellectual efficiency, our medical and surgical equip- ment to increase their ability to treat disease; are we not under equal obhgation, to say the least, to give them the gospel that will increase their spiritual efficiency and enable them to make right use of all their other powers? The Japanese already have a poHtical vision. They covet the leadership of Asia, and they are preparing for it with a skill and energy which elicit the wonder of man- kind. They already have a commercial vision, and they are strenuously trying to reafize it. They already have an intellectual vision, and they have built up one of the best educational systems in the world. What Japan now needs is a spiritual vision which will purify and glorify these other visions. This vision of Christ is vital to the future of Japan and of the Far East. Few foreigners have been so deeply in sympathy with the Japanese as the late Lafcadio Heam; but in his chapter on "The Genius of Japanese Civihza- tion" he wrote: "The psychologist knows that the so- called adoption of Western civilization within a time of thirty years cannot mean the addition to the Japanese brain of any organs or power previously absent from it. He knows that it cannot mean any sudden change in the mental or moral character of the race. Such changes are not made in a generation. Transmitted civilization works much more slowly, requiring even hundreds of years to produce certain permanent psychological results. ... It is quite evident that the mental readjustments, effected at a cost which remains to be told, have given good results only along directions in which the race has shown capaci- ties of special kinds. . . . Nothing remarkable has been done, however, in directions foreign to the national genius. ... To imagine that the emotional character of an Oriental race could be transformed in the short space of 656 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST thirty years by the contact of Occidental ideas is absurd. ... All that Japan has been able to do so miraculously well has been done without any self-transformation, and those who imagine her emotionaUy closer to us to-day than she may have been thirty years ago, ignore the facts of science which admit of no argument." ^ The Japanese mind has long been adapted to war, to politics, and to cer- tain kinds of industrial and scientific efficiency. Knowledge of Western methods and discoveries has simply enabled the Japanese to do more effectively and on a larger scale what they had been doing after a fashion before. The spiritual realm, however, is a comparatively new world to them. Shintoism and Buddhism have not known, and therefore could not make known, a personal God. In his instructive book. The Future of Japan, W. Petrie Watson declares that religion, conceived as God and as a final and sufficient explanation of all phenomena, is not a Japanese notion, and that of religion as it is conceived in Europe there is fittle or none in Japan. The Japanese re- gard religion as subordinate in life, and the temper of their mind is such that it is usually difficult for them to acquire a just view of its authority and indispensableness in indi- vidual and national existence. His conclusion is that Japan is addressing herself to the great responsibilities of the modern world without any religion at all, in the proper sense of the term; and that the effort is pathetic and dis- appointing rather than heroic and inspiring, since there is no fresh beginning of history which has not been born from a new reHgion or from the new interpretation of an existing rehgion. He admires the administrative efficiency with which Japan is doing her work at present, and the splendid enthusiasm which she is bringing to her present tasks; but even savages are often recklessly brave and eagerly willing to die for their leader. There is therefore reason for pro- found anxiety as we study the relations which Japan has formed with the modem world, and the power that she is exerting. Only as the Japanese grasp Christ's ideals of » Kokaro, pp. 16-18. TESTIMONY TO JAPAN'S URGENT NEED 657 life and build upon the solid foundation of Christ's teachings will they be able to maintain themselves as a great Power. The Japanese must be brought within view of the necessity of a reUgious interpretation of life, ampler, clearer, and more categorical than that which they have found or can find either in a rehgion of loyalty, or in Bushido, or in esoteric Buddhism, or in superstitious Shintoism. Japan can not hope to reap the results of the religion of Europe without an ultimate reckoning with their cause.^ Thoughtful Japanese have begun to see this, and to see also that Christianity offers the regenerative principle that Japan needs. Let their own authoritative testimony be cited rather than that of a foreigner: Marquis OkumaJ former Prime Minister: "The Japa- nese have made great progress along material lines. It is only sixty years since we were a feudal nation. We have done in that time what some nations have taken five cen- turies to accomplish. But our real development has been chiefly along the material side. We still have the moral and spiritual faults of a feudal civilization, even, in some cases, augmented by contact with the faidts of the most modem capitals. . . . Our mental and moral development has not kept pace with our material progress. . . . There is not a single moral standard to which the people can ad- here. Japan is athirst for moral and religious guidance. . . . The origin of modem civilization is to be found in the teach- ing of the Sage of Judea, by whom alone the necessary moral dynamic is supplied. ... No practical solution of many pressing problems is in sight apart from Christi- anity." Baron Mayejima, former member of the Imperial Cab- inet: "I firmly beHeve we must have rehgion as the basis of our national and personal welfare. No matter how large an army and navy we may have, unless we have righteous- ness as the foundation of our national existence, we shall fall short of success. And when I look about me to see what religion we may best rely upon, I am convinced that 1 The Future of Japan, cf. especially chape. XIV, XXVIII, and XXX. 658 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST the religion of Christ is the one most full of strength and promise for the nation." Baron Kanda, Head of the Higher Commercial School in Tokyo: "Let me pay a humble tribute to that noble band of American missionaries and teachers who have con- secrated their lives to the cause of moral and intellectual elevation of our people, . . . the lasting influence of whose labors it is impossible to overestimate. And I am glad to say that this noble band is constantly recruited and is ever swelling, whose influence is deeply stamped upon the rismg generation, and will be felt indirectly through genera- tions to come." Baron Shibusawa, chairman of the commission of rep- resentative business men of Japan which visited the United States a few years ago: "Japan in the future must base her morality on reHgion. It must be a religion that does not rest on an empty or superstitious faith, like that of some of the Buddhist sects in our land, but must be like the one that prevails in your own country, which manifests its power over men by filling them with good works." Prince Ito, former Prime Minister, early in his public career had said: "I regard rehgion as quite unnecessary to a nation's life. Science is far above superstition, and what is any religion. Buddhism or Christianity, but superstition and a possible source of weakness to a nation?" He Uved to change this opinion and in 1907, in an address at the laying of the corner-stone of the Y. M. C. A. building in Seoul, he pressed the following propositions: That no nar tion can prosper without material improvement; that material prosperity cannot last long without a moral back- bone; that the strongest backbone is that which has a religious sanction behind it. The following year he took part in the dedication of the completed building, where he made the address referred to in another chapter; and that evening (December 4, 1908), he gave a banquet at his offi- cial residence in honor of the Y. M. C. A., at which he said: "In the early years of Japan's reformation, the senior statesmen were opposed to religious toleration, especially TESTIMONY TO JAPAN'S URGENT NEED 659 because of distrust of Christianity. But I fought vehe- mently for freedom of belief and propagation, and finally tri- umphed. My reasoning was this: Civilization depends upon morality, and the highest moraHty upon religion. Therefore, religion must be tolerated and encouraged." Major-General Hibiki, of the Imperial Army: "It is important to send missionaries to other parts of Asia, but it is far more important to send them to Japan. This is the strategic land, and now is the strategic time. For Japan is the inevitable leader of the Orient. It will make a vast difference with the whole East, and indeed with the whole world, whether Japan becomes Christian or remains per- manently an un-Christian nation." The Kokumin, of Tokyo, regarded as an organ of the government: "The development of Japan to a first class power within the past fifty years is to a great extent at- tributable to the trouble taken by the missionaries who, either by establishing schools or by preaching the gospel of Christ in the churches, have cultivated the minds of the Japanese and enhanced the standard of their morals. It is to be hoped that the missionaries will redouble their energies and zeal in promoting the welfare and happiness of the Japanese." If any one in America or Great Britain doubts whether Christian missions are needed or desired by the Japanese, let him ponder these emphatic statements by representative Japanese. They believe that the duty of the hour is of the most urgent description. President Harada, of Kyoto, writes: "The situation in the Orient constitutes one of the most splendid opportunities, and at the same time one of the greatest crises in the whole history of the Church. . . . The Christianization of Japan is no holiday task; indeed, it is certain to be a long and a severe campaign. Japan, with all her progress in the arts and crafts of civiHzation, and all her friendliness toward Christian ethical standards, is far from being a Christian nation. Yet Japan is a prize worth capturing. Gigantic as are the internal forces ar- rayed against Christianity, the Christian cohorts are daily 660 THE MASTERY OF THE FAR EAST growing in numbers and efficiency. The disquieting con- sideration is that the tides of the new social and reUgious life are waiting for no man." No more significant event has occurred in modern times, few more significant events in all history, than the emer- gence of Japan from the isolation and ignorance of hoary centuries into the noonday blaze of world prominence. With remarkable energy and skill the Japanese are adapt- ing themselves to the wider demands of the new era. They have amply demonstrated that they are not an inferior people. They have been justly recognized at the Peace Conference in Paris as one of the five major Powers, on a plane of equahty with Great Britain, France, Italy and the United States. They should have, not a grudging toler- ance, but a cordial welcome as an equal member of the family of nations. They have done some splendid things already and they will imdoubtedly do more. They have achieved the mastery of the Far East. They are "leading the Orient — ^but whither?" Their best men are striving, imder a solemn sense of responsibility, to have their coun- try lead with "clean hands and a pure heart" toward high levels of national character and influence. A spiritually regenerated Japan would mean much for the Far East and for the whole world. The very solidarity of the Japanese nation would powerfully reinforce its im- pact for righteousness. The energy and courage which so eminently characterize the Japanese, their readiness to adapt themselves to new conditions, their sacrificial willingness to dare and to die for the cause they espouse — these qualities, if pervaded and inspired by the spirit of Christ, would make Japan one of the greatest powers for good that the world has known. Regenerative forces have already begun to operate most promisingly. Many intelligent Japanese are earnestly trying to strengthen them. The character of these Japanese justifies large hopes for the future. To aid them in seeking the best things for Japan and the Far East is our high privilege as well as our imperative duty. The Japanese tell us that they need our co-operation, and we TESTIMONY TO JAPAN'S URGENT NEED 661 should give it to them in ample measure. In the words of Mrs. Browning: "It is the hour for souls, That bodies, leavened by the will and love. Be lightened to redemption. The world's old; But the old world waits the time to be renewed. Toward which new hearts in individual growth Must quicken, and increase to multitude In new dynasties of the race of men, Developed whence shall grow spontaneously New churches, new economies, new laws Admitting freedom, new societies Excluding falsehood; He shall make all new." \**Heart of the Far East. 110 / " N ll'> LUPO.TES 115 N VJf M ^ (*?■> l:o c / 1 IVS^ Jfl "'wy^^ i^ pJ '%*'<■.,„ B»»»%'Os"'- ''\ ^