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JAPAN'S HISTORY LIBRARY

 

 

 

 

THE RESTORATION OF THE MIKADO

AND

THE GREAT EMANCIPATION

1867-1912

 

EX-EMPRESS HARUKO&MUTSU-HITO, EMPEROR OF JAPAN

 

THE green shoot of New Japan was coming through the ground. One of the chief hindrances to its growth was to disappear in 1867, with the death, early in the year, of the Emperor Ko-mei, who had reigned twenty years. Ko-mei Ten-no is supposed to have been bitterly anti-foreign, but it should be borne in mind that, in his time, the Emperor's personal opinion was but the reflection of the views of the women by whom alone he was constantly attended, and of the Imperial princes and the very few nobles sufficiently exalted in rank to approach his sacred person. Towards the close of his reign, his entourage, taught by the stern logic of facts, had become more resigned to the unwelcome presence of foreigners in the "Holy Land" of Japan; but it was hardly to be expected that, as long as their august sovereign occupied the Imperial Palace at Kioto, they would openly recant their opinions. They toned down their anti-foreign diatribes considerably some time before the Emperor's death on February 13, 1867; the advent of his successor, his son Mutsu-hito—born on November 3, 1852, and enthroned, with ceremonies equivalent to an Occidental coronation, on October 13, 1868—gave them full opportunity for an avowed change of policy. The boy of fifteen, who now became the one hundred and twenty-third sovereign of Japan "of one unbroken line", by far the oldest dynasty in the world, was unhampered by any anti-foreign edicts. He could accept the advice of his councillors, speaking of great things that were impending, of an entire change of front towards the "haughty barbarians", of a complete alteration in the system of government, of innovations and reforms that would have staggered the late monarch, to whom they would have seemed impious and accursed.

Fortunately for Japan, this new Emperor was no weakling, but strong in health—he grew up a fine, deep-chested man, tall for a Japanese, five feet eight inches in height—and strong in character. Deeply imbued with the awful responsibility of his position, animated by a strict sense of duty, his Imperial Majesty gave throughout his long and epoch-making reign, many proofs of shrewd common-sense and of that supreme political sagacity which consists in the selection of the best advisers and in a wise abstention from interference, except in cases of great emergency. In such times of crisis, the Emperor Mutsu-hito always spoke the right word at the proper moment, and all Japan bowed in awe struck obedience. How much of this policy was his own, how much was due to the Elder Statesmen he consulted, will probably never be known; this much is certain, that the acceptance of good advice, and the use thereof at the right moment, constitute by themselves political wisdom of the soundest kind, and with such wisdom the stately, imperturbable, benign Emperor Mutsu-hito was amply endowed. The Japanese National Anthem, "Kimiga yo, etc.," expresses a pious wish for the long continuance of the monarch's reign; and even this was granted to new Japan, as the great Emperor had completed a reign of forty-five years at his lamented death, on July 20th, 1912.

Surely no reign in history can show such a record of progress, of reform, of peaceful achievement, of military glory by land and sea, as that of Mutsu-hito—a name meaning literally, "Benign Man"—one hundred and twenty-third sovereign of Old, first Emperor of New, Japan! With his accession a new wind began to blow in official circles; the Court of Kioto was no longer a hotbed of anti-foreign fanaticism. The Shogun's government, which had been only outwardly friendly to foreigners, now earnestly strove to cultivate amicable relations, especially with Britain, with the United States, and with France. Napoleon III lost no opportunity of showing how well he was disposed towards the Baku-fu. Misinformed as to the state of Japan—as in so many other matters—that schemer and dreamer "backed the wrong horse", at least with moral support, and might have given material aid, in the hope of reaping the Shogun's gratitude, had not the march of events been too rapid for Napoleon's vague plans to mature.

EUROPEAN ORGANISERS OF THE JAPANESE ARMY AND NAVY.

Japan, at the time of the Great Change, sought European counsel in military and naval matters. French military officers, under General Chanoine, undertook the reorganisation of the Army at the request of the Shogun (not yet deposed), but after the defeat of the French at Sedan the Shogun replaced the French instructors by Germans. Admiral Sir Richard Tracey, of the British Navy, began the organisation of the Japanese Navy at the invitation of the Shogun, and after the downfall of the Shogunate the wo A was resumed by Admiral Sir Archibald Douglas and Rear-Admiral Ingles.

ADMIRAL SIR RICHARD TRACEY

REAR-ADMIRAL INGLES

GENERAL CHANOINE, OF THE FRENCH ARMY

ADMIRAL SIR ARCHIBALD DOUGLAS

 

French influence was paramount at this time in the Baku-fu's military councils; at the Shogun's request the French Government selected a military mission, which set to work to train the Baku-fu's motley troops and to educate young Samurai in the art of war. The mission, consisting of five officers, under Captain Chanoine, of the Staff Corps, arrived in January, 1867. Its activity was, a year later, transferred by the course of events to a wider sphere, when the nucleus of a truly national army was formed. The French instructors remained at their posts until after the Franco-German war had opened the eyes of the Japanese to the fact that another great military Power had arisen, under whose scientifically calculated, overwhelming blows, the gallant but ill-organised and badly-directed Army of the Second Empire had crumbled into dust.

New organisers and instructors were procured from the victorious German General Staff, the late General Meckel at their head, and for years the German officers brought their consummate knowledge of military science and their native thoroughness to bear on shaping and moulding into its present marvellous approach to perfection the excellent material prepared by their French predecessors.

The year of the arrival of the French military mission saw the advent, in September, 1867, of a British naval mission, under Commander Tracey, R.N., invited by the Shogun to organise and train his Navy, which, consisting in 1865 of five vessels of European build—one paddle-steamship, two square-rigged sailing ships for training purposes, a steam-yacht presented to the Shogun by Britain, and a three-masted steamer—had grown to the total strength of eight ships. The downfall of the Shogunate interrupted the labours of this first naval mission only five months after its arrival. Its work was taken up in 1873 by the second British naval mission, under Commander Douglas, R.N., now Admiral Sir Archibald Douglas, which remained in active operation six years. After its departure, a few British naval officers, warrant officers, and petty officers, were still employed as instructors in special branches, with Commander Ingles, R.N. (now Rear-Admiral, retired), as naval adviser to the Japanese Admiralty: but their number became steadily less as the Japanese began to feel confidence in their own naval efficiency. The last Occidental officer to be employed by the Japanese Government was Engineer-Commander A. R. Pattison, R.N., who returned to his duty in the Royal Navy in 1901. The work of these men, sailors and soldiers, British, French, German, and Italian—for a couple of Italian artillery officers organised the great military arsenal and gun-foundry at Osaka—whether performed in the office, in the lecture-room, on the parade-ground, or at sea, was herculean, and the success proportionate. It is to them, in great measure, that Japan owes the efficiency that has made, as the native phrase has it, her glory to shine beyond the seas". In 1867, that glory was not yet apparent, the outlook was cloudy, and many shook their heads anxiously, anticipating a bitter and long-continued civil war between the Imperialists and the Shogun's party. Their forebodings were not justified by events; some fighting took place—the disruption and reconstruction of the whole system of government, the uprooting of hoary institutions, and the consequent unavoidable disturbance of every class interest, could not happen without some violence being used—but the armed struggle was short and confined to a few districts.

It was at no time a great regional conflict, like the American Civil War, nor did it split the whole nation into two belligerent parties, opposing each other in every part of the land, as in the English Civil War between King and Parliament. The conflicting parties were too unevenly matched for the struggle to become a severe one, and the leader of the losing side, the Shogun Kei-ki, was not made of the stem stuff that prolongs the game to the utmost, even with all the chances adverse. Meeting with bitter opposition from the great clans of the west and south, and beset by financial anxieties, an opportunity of ridding himself of his uneasy office and of its crushing responsibilities presented itself when, in October, 1867, Yama-no-uchi Yo-do, the retired Lord of Tosa, addressed a letter to him wherein he earnestly advised him to resign the governing power and to hand it over to the sovereign, thus restoring that unity of rule for lack of which the empire was distracted and weak, a prey to foreigners and "a butt for their insults". Kei-ki took the great noble's advice to heart, and, by a manifesto dated November 9th, 1867, resigned his office and returned to the Emperor the delegated powers he held as Shogun. The Emperor accepted, and summoned the feudal lords to Kioto to discuss matters and to consult as to the new order of things. The old order was gone, never to return.

The Shogunate, after an existence of nearly seven centuries as a ruling power, had succumbed to senile decay. In Tokugawa hands it had given Japan two centuries and a half of unbroken peace. Its very success in maintaining order in the land—an object it attained by the exercise of cunning diplomacy rather than by a display of force—made hosts of enemies who eventually compassed its downfall. Its worst legacy is the widely ramified system of spying it brought to the pitch of perfection, a system that has stood Japan in good stead in the preparations for her wars, but has severely damaged her national character. The Japanese are the best spies in the world; the Baku-fu system trained their ancestors to be eaves-droppers, but they have small cause to be thankful for it. They would have been victorious against China, even against Russia, had the Intelligence Departments of their Navy and their Army been less wonderfully efficient; but more than two generations must pass before they get the spy-taint out of their blood.

At present it poisons life in Japan in almost every phase; until its disappearance no real fellow-feeling is possible between Japanese and Occidentals. Spies had a busy time in 1868 and the next few years, for with the restoration of the ruling power into the hands of the Emperor the Samurai class were plunged into a whirlpool of intrigues, of plots and counter-plots, of schemes of reform (some admirably practical, others visionary), of accusations and suspicions, a feeling of bewilderment permeating all at the seemingly inexplicable conduct of the leaders of the Imperialist party. During the struggle against the Shogunate, "Out with the Foreigners!" had been the War-cry; now the Shogunate was no more, behold the victors sitting at meat with the hated "barbarians", worse still, inviting them to Kioto, to the sacred precincts of the Court and—it was hardly to be believed—allowing them to gaze on the divinely-descended Emperor's face in solemn audience! Such impious proceedings must be stopped, and the disgusted Samurai kept his long sword keen as a razor and used it, as opportunity offered, on the "ugly barbarian", the "hairy Chinaman", as the Occidental was scornfully called, and on the native traitor, for so seemed to the swordsman the Japanese who had become defiled by associating with foreigners.

This anomalous state of things continued until well into the seventies, the Court and the Government markedly friendly to Occidentals, the officials adopting the same attitude, sometimes painfully against their inclination, but the great body of the Samurai, on the other hand, inspired by fanatical anti-foreign feelings, leading to the commission of such outrages as the indiscriminate firing on the foreign settlement at Kobé by troops of the Bizen clan, on February 4th, 1868; the murder, by Tosa clansmen, of eleven French man-of-war's men at Sakai on March 8th of the same year (a crime for which an equal number of the assassins had to commit hara-kiri); and, most audacious of all, the fierce attack on the procession in the midst of which the British Minister, Sir Harry Parkes, was riding to the palace at Kioto, on March 23rd, 1868, to be received for the first time by the Emperor.

The assailants were only two, members of a newly-raised force of red-hot Imperialists, the Shim-pei, or "New Troops", a corps intended to act as an Imperial body-guard, formed principally of yeomen, landed gentry holding small estates and independent of any feudal lord, with a considerable admixture of Ronin and other adventurers, ex-Buddhist priests and the like. The two fanatics managed between them to wound, with their long swords, nine out of the eleven ex-constables of the Metropolitan Police who, tired of the monotony of their London beats and "point-duty", had volunteered to serve as the mounted escort attached to the British Legation in Japan. They also wounded one of the military escort of 48 men (furnished by the detachment of the 9th Foot, then guarding the foreign settlement at Yokohama), a Japanese groom in the British Minister's employ, and five horses.

They ran "amok" down the line of the procession till one was stopped by a British bullet and a British bayonet (he was ultimately degraded from his rank as a Samurai and decapitated), and the other cut down by a Japanese official, Goto Shojiro, of the Foreign Departments, and beheaded by a Japanese officer, Nakai Kozo, who was cut on the head in a brief but fierce sword-fight with the miscreant. The British Government recognised the gallantry of Goto and Nakai by the presentation to each of them of a hand­some sword of honour. An Imperial Edict, dated March 28th, 1868, threatened the perpetrators of outrages on foreigners with a punishment the two-sworded gentry feared more than anything else: the striking of their names off the rolls of the Samurai. The edict clearly stated the Emperor's resolve to "live in amity" with the Treaty Powers—two great strides forward in the history of New Japan: the first earnest attempt to check outrages and the first proclamation of the new Emperor's abandonment of the old anti-foreign policy. From this time outrages on foreigners became fewer, until they practically ceased to occur, with the exception of the isolated acts of criminal lunatics; there is little doubt it was while in an insane condition that the policeman Tsuda Sanzo slashed at and wounded the Tsarevitch, now the Tsar Nicholas II, at Otsu, in 1891, and Koyama, who shot Li Hung Chang in the face, during the peace negotiations at Shimonoseki, in March, 1895, was half­witted. In the opening years of the twentieth century, the lives and property of foreigners are as safe as in any civilised country—safer, indeed, than in most of them, the statistics of Japan showing that crime is not very prevalent, and the police being perhaps the most efficient in the world.

If this general state of security be, as it undoubtedly is, greatly to the credit of the way in which Japan is governed and of the law-abiding character of her people, it must be admitted that in one respect life is, unfortunately, still less safe than in most Occidental countries.

 

THE SEAT OF EARLY BRITISH INFLUENCE IN JAPAN

It was here that on the earliest unpleasant manifestations of the anti-foreign feeling in Japan was experienced. In June 1862, a party of hot-headed patriots made a desperate night attack on the Legation, killing two of the guard. The attack induced the chargé d`affaires, Col. Neale, to move the British Legation temporarily to Yokohama.

 

 

Japanese statesmen still run greater risks than most others, and have to be carefully guarded, for political assassination, which has cut off in their prime some of the noblest patriots and most enlightened administrators among the makers of New Japan, is still an ever-present danger. It is, of course, punished with the extreme penalty of the law; but its disappearance cannot be expected until the popular feeling towards it changes completely. Purity of motive, and zeal, however misguided, for what the assassin considers to be the public good, still justify his murderous deed in the eyes of the Japanese people. On April 6th, 1868, the Emperor assembled the Court nobles and great feudal lords at the Palace of Ni-jo, in Kioto, and, in their presence, took a solemn oath, by which he promised that a Deliberative Assembly should be constituted, so that all measures for the public would be, in future, decided by public opinion; that old abuses should be removed, and that impartiality and justice should reign in the government of the nation "as they were to be seen in the workings of Nature". The Emperor promised, further, that intellect and knowledge should be sought for throughout the world, in order to assist in establishing the foundations of the empire.

Thus was the seed of constitutional government sown in Japan, establishing once for all the principle of government by the will of the majority. The plant has grown apace; it is now a healthy tree, doing quite as well, all things considered, as similar ones planted in countries in which they were as exotic as in Japan. Some of the fruit borne by its branches has been sour enough; but it should be remembered that even the Mother of Parliaments has not always given her numerous offspring throughout the world an example of supreme dignity. That there is a certain amount of corruption in Japanese parliamentary politics is undeniable; but its proportions are far smaller than they were a few years ago. Scenes in the House still occur occasionally, but they have, fortunately, hardly ever sunk to the level of absolute savagery that has so often disgraced the sittings of the Reichsrath in Vienna and of the Lower House of the Hungarian Diet at Budapest. In one respect, the Parliament of Japan has been a brilliant model for the legislative assemblies of the world: at the outset of both the great wars in which New Japan has engaged, the Leader of the Opposition, speaking on behalf of his adherents, solemnly announced that thenceforward, until Japan's victorious sword returned to its sheath, there would be no more parties in the council of the nation; in the presence of a national crisis all Japan would be as one man.

In 1868, however, Japan's constitutionai government was in its earliest embryonic stage; divided counsels, intrigues, plots and counterplots still confused the nation and obscured the great issues at stake. The ex-Shogun Kei-ki had retired to the monastery of Kwanyei-ji, at Uyeno, in Yedo, and showed signs of disinclination to play any further part in politics. The Imperial troops were advancing on Yedo, the forts in the bay there being handed over to them without a blow on April 4th, 1868. On the 25th of the same month the Imperial ultimatum was presented to Kei-ki, summoning him to hand over the castle of Yedo, his warships and armaments, and to retire into seclusion in the from province of Mito.

Kei-ki accepted these terms and retired to Mito. The other conditions of the ultimatum were speedily complied with, except that relating to the transfer of the Shogunate's fleet, which was to have taken place on May 3rd, the day of Kei-ki's departure from Yedo, but was postponed owing to a violent storm. The next morning it was found that the squadron had put to sea. It subsequently returned and several months were spent in negotiations as to its surrender, the Imperial Government being obliged to temporise, as it had no naval force wherewith to compel submission. In the night of October 4th, 1868, the fleet, consisting of eight steam vessels, under the command of Captain Enomoto Kamajiro, whose naval education had been received in Holland, from 1862 to 1867, sailed from Yedo Bay for Yezo, where, at Hakodate, its commander and the three or four thousand adherents of the Tokugawa who sailed with him, attempted to set up a republic.

It seems more than likely that the idea of such a very un-Japanese experiment did not germinate spontaneously in the hardy sailor's mind, but was, in some way, connected with the presence on his staff of Captain Brunet and another member of the French military mission, as well as of two midshipmen from a French Warship, all of these having joined the expedition secretly, apparently without the knowledge of the French Minister. The strange kind of "Republic," which was anything but democratic, for only Samurai had votes, was short­lived. As soon as the Imperial Government could improvise a squadron of its own, it began operations against Enomoto, troops also attacking him by land. Short but sharp fighting took place by sea and land, in May and June, 1869,resulting in the total discomfiture of the "rebels," as they had been declared by a decree of October 10th of the previous year. Their leaders surrendered, their forces were disarmed, and the adventurous Frenchmen went on board a warship of their own country and placed themselves in the hands of her captain. They were conveyed as prisoners to Saigon, together with one of the runaway French mid­shipmen who had been captured by the Japanese Imperial forces at the stranding of the rebel ship in which he was serving, and who had been given up to the French Legation.

Thus ended, in a miserable manner, the hare-brained adventure of Enomoto and his followers. A remarkable sign of the times, auguring well for the wisdom with which the new Government was imbued, may be found in the clemency extended to the rebel leaders. In Old Japan their lives would certainly have been forfeited to the victors. After serving a term of imprisonment, they were, under the new regime, pardoned by the Emperor. Many of them lived to serve him faithfully in high official posts. Enomoto himself became a Viscount, a Vice-Admiral, and a highly-respected statesman, who rendered good service in several Cabinets, holding in turn all the portfolios except those of War, Finance, and Justice.

Meanwhile, other adherents of the Tokugawa besides the navy of the late Shogunate offered armed resistance to the new order of things. The powerful Aidzu clan had retired into their mountain fastnesses, after presenting to the Government a petition indicating their intense dissatisfaction with the state of affairs. They were joined by large numbers of malcontents, and prepared for war. About twenty-five clans ultimately joined this northern coalition of rebels, their headquarters being established in the castle of Waka-matsu, which was besieged by the Imperial forces during the month of October, 1868.

After severe fighting, the besieged making a heroic defence, the castle capitulated, on November 6th, the Imperial Army owing their victory chiefly to the superiority of their armament, which was of the most modern kind. In Yedo, the Tokugawa retainers, naturally dissatisfied at the disestablishment of their clan from the position of power it had enjoyed for 265 years, had formed themselves into armed bands, under the name of Shogitai, meaning "the corps that makes duty clear." They seized the person of the Imperial Prince, who, under the title of Rinnoji-no Miya, was abbot of the great Buddhist temple at Uyeno, a post always held by a son of a Mikado—an artful piece of policy on the part of the Shogunate, which thus always had a candidate ready to its hand in the event of a break in the direct succession to the Imperial throne.

The Shogitai proposed to set up their more or less willing captive as a rival emperor, and proceeded to establish themselves in the groves round the temple, then known as Toyeizan, and now forming part of the beautiful Uyeno Park. They attracted a host of dissatisfied adventurers and unemployed Samurai, who swaggered about on high clogs, with long swords stuck in their girdles, scowling at the Kingire, as the Imperial troops were called from the " scraps of brocade" sewn to their clothes as a distinguishing mark. Conflicts between the two parties were frequent, especially when the Tokugawa adherents could fall upon an isolated Imperialist in some remote street.

The proceedings of these lawless bands of swashbucklers became at last so outrageous that a decree was issued proclaiming them outlaws, and, as they refused to disperse, the forces of the loyal clans, those of Satsuma at their head, attacked them on July 4th, 1868, and utterly defeated them, chiefly owing to the execution done by two Armstrong field-guns served by the men of Hizen. In the course of the fight, the Hondo, or great hall of the monastery, was destroyed by fire. The Imperialists were now in full possession of Yedo, the municipal government of which they now took into their own hands.

The spirit of the Tokugawa clan had been broken, and their importance was further diminished by a great reduction in the extent of their territorial possessions, fixed by an Imperial decree. In the same year (1868), the birthday of the Emperor Mutsu-hito, November 3rd, was constituted a national holiday, and the important step was taken of decreeing that thenceforward there should be only one nengo, or chronological epoch, for each reign, not, as hitherto, liable to be altered, at the Emperor's will, on the occurrence of any notable event. The epoch beginning with the late Emperor's reign was ordered to be known as ''Enlightened Rule" (Meiji), surely a well-justified choice of name. Thus the year of grace 1914 is the forty-seventh year of Meiji, or the year 2574, of the existence of the Japanese Empire as reckoned from the beginning of the reign of its alleged founder, Jimmu, in 660 B.C., a mode of computing time introduced in 1872. A momentous decision was now taken by the makers of New Japan. It was resolved that the Emperor should reside, at least for a time, at Yedo, the city founded by the "usurpers," as the Shogun were now commonly called by the triumphant Imperialists; and his Majesty, travelling by land, in a closed palanquin, arrived in the Toku­gawa capital on November 26th, 1868. He found it no longer Yedo, but Tokio, the ''Eastern Capital", his Government having changed the city's name as a sign, easily understood by all and sundry, that the old order of things that centred in Yedo had passed away never to return, while a new era was dawning for the empire of which Tokio was to be the capital.

This action of the Government, and its effect on the popular mind, may best be understood if we imagine the first Republican Government of France changing the name of Paris, to celebrate the great revolution of 1789-1793, as the present Municipal Council of the French capital delights in changing the names of streets to commemorate various celebrities it holds in high honour; or if we can conceive, in our wildest dreams, the British Cabinet of 1832 changing the name of London to mark the passing of the great Reform Bill. The making of Tokio into the sole seat of the Imperial Government took place only after a transitory stage, when there were virtually two capitals—Tokio, the Eastern one; and Kioto, which was renamed Saikio, or "Western Capital."

With the extinguishing of the pinchbeck "republic" in Yezo, in October, 1869, all armed resistance to the new order of things seemed to have ceased. The ex-Shogun Kei-ki was living quietly in retirement —a state in which he long continued to remain—obtaining, in latet years, permission to reside in Tokio, where he was simply an amiable old nobleman of no political importance. The new Government continued to show its wisdom by the clemency with which the leaders of the rebellions were treated. The Imperial Prince-Abbot, Rinnoji-no Miya, was pardoned, and, under the title of Kita-Shira-kawa-no Miya, proceeded to Germany, where he resided for many years, ultimately returning to hold high command in the Imperial Army, in whose service he died from illness contracted during the occupation of Formosa at the close of the war with China, 1895. In January, 1869, the Emperor for the first time went on board one of his warships. He returned shortly afterwards, by land, to Kioto, where he was married, on February 9th, to the Princess Haruko, "Child of Spring," of the house of Ichijo, his senior by about two years.

This noble-hearted lady, as sweet and graceful as her own poetical name, exerted an incalculably great influence for good in the land over which her spouse reigned. Keeping carefully aloof from politics, she was the guiding spirit in Emperor every good work, bestowing her high patronage especially on institutions connected with female education, with the care of the sick and wounded, of orphans, and of all who are in distress. Her Imperial Majesty contributed generously from her privy purse to these charities and other good works, taking a personal, active part in their management. Japan has indeed been fortunate in having so long at the head of the nation a sovereign worthy of the veneration, amounting almost to worship, with which he was regarded, and, in his gracious consort, an Empress who may be described as the very embodiment of the noble spirit, the devotion, the quiet dignity, the gentleness and sweetness that are the characteristics of Japanese womanhood.

In March, 1869, the Official Gazette (Kampo) published a memorial to the throne by the feudal lords of the four leading clans—Satsuma, Cho-shu, Tosa, and Hizen—offering up lists of their entire possessions and of their retainers, and placing the whole at the disposal of his Imperial Majesty. In this remarkable document, the drafting of which has been attributed to a Samurai, Kido Junichiro, one of the foremost makers of New Japan, the princely memorialists state: "The place where we live is the Emperor's land, and the food we eat is grown by the Emperor's men," and they proceed, in burning words of devoted loyalty, to beg the Emperor to take possession of all they own, and to assume the direct rule over the empire. Their example was followed by all but 17 of the 276 Daimiyo. The offer was accepted, and the greatest revolution of modern times was thus completed with less strain and friction than had accompanied any great change in the world's history. It cannot be said that the restoration of the Imperial power was a bloodless revolution. As already related, the malcontents had made a short but stout resistance in arms, and blood was still to flow before the new state of things could be firmly established. Nevertheless, the loss of life and destruction of property were astonishingly small when it is considered what immense issues were at stake. Had the French nobility possessed the wisdom of the counsellors who advised the Daimiyo, and the good sense shown by the latter in adopting their advice, the great Revolution at the end of the eighteenth century would have been a peaceful one, and France would have been spared "the red fool-fury of the Seine."

The feudal lords were not immediately dispossessed of all their power, although their revenues were greatly diminished and their warships and armed retainers were taken over to form the nucleus of the Imperial Navy and Army respectively. With that prudence that has always been characteristic of the policy of the rulers of New Japan, they caused the Daimiyo to be appointed governors (Chihanji) to administer their old clans (Han) on behalf of the Emperor. This period of transition lasted till 1871, when the Han were converted into Ken, or prefectures, governed by prefects appointed by the Imperial Government, and the old feudal lords became simply members of the aristocracy, as they are today with no administrative functions and no political power beyond their votes in the House of Peers. If of a rank lower than that of a marquis, they must be elected by their peers, for a term of seven years, to the delegation representing their particular rank in the House.

Before feudalism could be looked upon as completely abolished, the division of the people into strictly separated classes, or castes, had to be effaced; the various elements that had for centuries been kept apart, with the very object of preventing combination between them, had now to be welded into a nation of men equal before the law, possessing equal rights and duties, and permeated by a feeling of brotherhood within the borders of the empire—in short, a nation had to be established on the only principles that can ensure national strength. Two short years saw the greater part of this stupendous work accomplished.

By the end of 1871 feudalism had been entirely abolished, leaving behind it only a very natural sentimental attachment on the part of those who had been retainers towards the great families to which they had owed allegiance as their forefathers had done for so many centuries. By the noblest stroke that ever moved an imperial pen two classes of human beings who had hitherto enjoyed no legal rights, the Eta, a despised class who had for centuries been occupied in trades considered degrading, such as the slaughtering of animals, the preparation of leather, digging of criminals graves, and the Hinin, or "Non-humans", a still lower class of outcasts, were admitted to citizenship. This grand act of emancipation raised nearly a million of human beings (287,111 Eta, and 695,689 Hinin) from a position little different from that of cattle to a state of manhood. The nation was now divided into three great social orders: the Kwazoku, or nobility; the Shikozu, or gentry, the old Samurai class; and the Heimin, embracing all the rest of the people. This division exists today, but it must be noted that there is, in practice, absolutely no dividing wall between one and the other of these classes. A capable member of the Heimin may rise, by his own exertions, to the highest post in the State, and intermarriage between one class and another, although still infrequent, is perfectly feasible. Socially, there is far less demarcation between the classes than in the monarchical countries of Europe, or than between the millionaires of the United States of North America and their less wealthy fellow-citizens.

Along with so much that is good, Japan has imported from the Occident more than one thing that would better have been left outside its borders; there is, however, one foul thing that degrades Occidental, and especially British, humanity that has not obtained any hold in Japan : the Japanese has not become a snob. It is, indeed, one of the greatest marvels in a land of wonders that the intense feeling of veneration for the sovereign, the respect for his Court, the sentimental attachment to the ex-feudal lord, and the awe inspired by official rank are co-existent in Japan with a truly democratic spirit probably unequalled in any country except Switzerland or Norway. The reason is probably to be found in the self-respect, and consequent self-esteem, of every Japanese. High and low, rich and poor, are carefully trained from early childhood, and have been trained for untold generations, to treat all and sundry with that courteous consideration that honours the giver as much as the receiver. They have for ages appreciated the truth that rudeness is no sign of manliness, that courtesy of speech and manner are perfectly compatible with self-respect.

 

THE HOME OF MEDIEVALISM, NOW THE HEADQUARTERS OF MODERN GOVERNMENT Sakurada Avenue in Tokio is here shown as it was when occupied by the Daimiyos. Then the most aristocratic thoroughfare in Yedo, it is now the "Downing Street" of Tokio, containing the Foreign Office and War Department

JAPAN UNDER A CONSTITUTION : PARLIAMENT IN SESSION

Interior of Japanese Parliament, showing Minister speaking at the tribune from which members address the House

THE EMPEROR'S THRONE IN THE JAPANESE HOUSE OF PEERS, AT TOKIO

THE FIRST JAPANESE HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT, IN TOKIO

The first home of constitutional government in Japan, since replaced by a new palatial structure.

PROCESSION OF OLD JAPAN FEUDAL LORDS WHO OFFERED THEIR ENTIRE POSSESSION TO THE MIKADO

One of the most dramatic events of modern times was the submission of the feudal lords of Old Japan on the restoration of the Mikado to power. The lords of the four leading clans—Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa, and Hizen—offered to give up their entire possessions, their estates and their retainers, to the service oF the Emperor, and all but seventeen of 276 Daimiyos followed their example. "The place where we live, "said the feudal lords in words of burning loyalty, "is the Emperor's land, and the food we eat is grown by the Emperor's men".

 

 

REORGANISING THE NATION

 

Imperial Palace Tokyo

 

WITH the early 'seventies began the great period of national reorganisation. The most intelligent men in the land scoured the world in search of everything that might, perchance, be usefully introduced into Japan, and the best technical advice was sought from all parts of Europe and America. Hundreds of Occidentals, eminent in their various callings, were engaged, at handsome salaries, to come to Japan and guide the footsteps of the infant Power. Japan will never be able fully to repay the debt she owes to these men. No pillar of stone, no brazen tablet, has been erected to their memory by the Japanese. They need none. The noblest monument in the world is that which the Occidental instructors and advisers have erected for themselves—the New Japan that would not for generations to come have reached its greatness had it not been for their devoted labours.

With rare insight, the rulers of Japan knew where to look for the best help; they placed their infant navy under the charge of British instructors; their army was organised and trained according to the advice of Germans of the school of Moltke, after the war of 1870-71 had shown their superiority over the French officers, at whose feet the Japanese had hitherto sat. The system of national education—it would perhaps be better to say national instruction—was modelled chiefly by Americans, while the codification of the laws and the reform of jurisprudence was the work of Frenchmen and of Germans. In medicine and surgery, too, the Japanese sought instruction from German men of science. They learnt their engineering, their chemistry and their electro-technical science at first from Britons and Americans, but latterly, to a great extent, from Germans.

In many cases the Japanese have improved upon the instruction imparted to them; in no case have they, so to say, swallowed an Occidental idea whole. It is a very prevalent, but entirely erroneous, idea that the Japanese have merely copied from the Occident. They have not adopted so much as adapted, showing, in most cases, sound judgment in their selection and great skill in modifying Occidental importations to suit Japanese conditions.

Besides placing the intelligent youth of the country—destined to carry on the work of governing the nation, of leading its forces, of building its means of communication, of increasing its wealth—under the tuition of the best obtainable foreign knowledge and skill, large numbers of young men were sent to study abroad. The selection of these students, sent out sometimes by the Imperial Government, sometimes by their ex-feudal lords, was in the early days somewhat of a haphazard nature. The results obtained were therefore scarcely commensurate with the great expense entailed, and the Government found itself obliged, in the early 'seventies, to recall the majority of the students who were maintained abroad from the public purse.

With the establishment of excellent facilities for secondary and higher education in Japan, and the engagement of the best procurable foreign professors and lecturers, it became possible for students to complete their studies in the country at a very moderate cost to the Government, and scarcely any expense to themselves. The disturbing influences of residence in foreign countries, away from disciplinary control, were thus obviated. Residence abroad, for the purpose of pursuing the higher branches of their studies, was thenceforward reserved as a prize, to be obtained only as the reward of extraordinary ability and application. The students who were sent abroad under these revised conditions were consequently the pick of the youth of the country. They achieved excellent results at the principal universities and technical schools of Europe and America. Their industry, their intelligence, and their excellent conduct won golden opinions for them and for their nation. With very few exceptions, they seemed to feel that Japan's reputation depended on their conduct, and they behaved accordingly. At first the students, and the numerous officials sent abroad to investigate matters connected with their particular departments, were much "lionised" by society in Europe and America. No public function, no evening party, was complete without the presence of one of "those delightful, interesting Japanese." But society soon tired of its new toy, and the Japanese abroad found, after a while, that their social life was restricted within rather narrow limits. In England they found themselves welcomed chiefly in intellectual circles of rather advanced opinions. The Philosophical Radicals—a class now practically extinct—took them under their wing and exerted a considerable influence on the minds of the students. Those were the days when the Japanese worshipped at the shrine of Herbert Spencer, and derived their economic principles from the works of John Stuart Mill. Had the rulers of Japan—for such those students eventually became—continued to be guided by the principles imbibed abroad in the 'seventies, the course of history might have been different indeed. The great watchwords that lingered on in Europe and America at that time—Free Trade, Universal Peace, the Rights of Man, the Brotherhood of Nations, and other high-sounding terms, as comforting to the minds of the period as "that blessed word Mesopotamia", were imported into Japan by returning students, whose influence was so great that the nation seemed likely to adopt their views, however advanced and subversive.

Impelled by such ideas, Japan might have been a sort of "proof-butt" for the firing of experimental shots by various Utopian doctrinaires; it would not have become, in our time, the grimly efficient power that now makes its stern influence felt even beyond the Far East. An idealistic Japan, animated by advanced liberal theories, might have suited the Occident far better; the West has only itself to blame if the Far East has entered upon a different, more practical, course. It was Germany's triumph over France that decided Japan's career at the parting of the ways. Bismarck's policy of "Blood and Iron" established, by its emphatic success, the principle that "Might is Right"; and the Far East, always ready to admire strength and power, was not slow in learning the lesson.

From that time dates the powerful German influence that swayed Japan until 1895, reaching its culminating point in the years 1886-7. The Constitution of Japan, which was originally intended to be constructed in accordance with the British pattern, was ultimately inspired by the Constitution of the Kingdom of Prussia, with its restricted popular liberties. There is some reason in the explanation of this fact offered by a Japanese statesman: "We went to London to study the British Constitution, with the intention of taking it as our model, but we could not find it anywhere; so we had to go to Berlin, where they showed us, with great readiness, something that we could easily understand, for it was clear, logical, and set forth plainly in black and white". So Japan participated in the wave of reaction that swept over Europe in the last thirty years of the nineteenth century. Protection, Militarism, Nationalism, Imperialism, Colonial Expansion, replaced the old watch-words: Free Trade, Universal Peace, and the Brotherhood of Nations, which were relegated to the lumber-room, where cobwebs were already accumulating over the Rights of Man.

Whatever one's opinions may be, one must admit that Japan took a wise course in devoting her energies primarily to making herself immensely strong by sea and land, thus acquiring that sense of absolute security indispensable to national development. It is quite certain that no amount of progress in education, in arts, science, commerce, and industries, no increase, however wonderful, in the institutions for promoting the welfare of the population, would have earned for Japan the position among nations that she has made for herself by the use of her keen-edged sword. "Pity 'tis, 'tis true," but we need only carry our thoughts back to the Occidental opinion of Japan before her victory over China in 1893 to realise that it was her military prowess that opened the eyes of the purblind West to the fact that a new Great Power was arising in the Far East. When the makers of New Japan set about constituting the armed forces that were to make the reorganised empire safe and, later, to "carry its glory beyond the seas"—to use a Japanese phrase—they might easily have adopted the system of voluntary service that still obtains in the British Empire and in the United States of America, with this difference, that the question of pay would have been a minor consideration.

They had ready to their hands, in 1868, about half a million males of the military class—Samurai—hereditary warriors, the kind of material any Occidental Minister of War would have given a year's budget to have at his disposal. These born fighters would have flocked to the standards, considering, as they did, that the profession of arms, even in its lowest ranks, was the only one fit for a gentleman to follow.

But the makers of the new empire were wise men; they decided that the pick of Japan's manhood, irrespective of class or wealth, should man Japan's warships and fill the ranks of her Army. By so doing, they not only ensured that their forces would combine intelligence with physical vigour, skill with strength, but they also prepared for the nation a magnificent training-school where all the best elements of the population could be further improved by being taught the great lessons of devotion to the public weal, of self-sacrifice, of discipline, of order and cleanliness—the last a "gilding of fine gold" in the case of such a cleanly people.

So the law of universal naval or military service was instituted, in 1873, placing every able-bodied Japanese male at the disposal of his country from the age of seventeen to that of forty. In practice, only the physically and mentally fittest are selected, joining the colours at twenty years of age, for an active service of three years if in the Army, four in the Navy—the active service of the infantry of the line is about to be reduced to two years. This is followed by service in the Reserve, for four years in the Army, or seven years in the Navy, with periodical recalls to the colours for training and manoeuvres. On leaving the Reserve, a Japanese is still liable during ten years to be called upon for what is called "Depot Service" at home or abroad, in case of extreme urgency. Not only are these military obligations cheerfully borne by all classes—a premium is offered to young men of higher education by allowing them the privilege of a reduction of their active service to one year, during which they must qualify themselves for the duties of officers in the Reserve—but they are eagerly entered upon and considered a personal honour.

The formation of this truly national army aroused misgivings in the minds of many of the Samurai, who could not bring themselves to believe that the Heimin, the common people, who had hitherto been denied the privilege of bearing arms, could ever be made into soldiers. Their opposition to the enrolment of peasants, craftsmen, and traders had an element of personal interest, for military service, ashore or afloat, seemed the only occupation open to the two-sworded men now that feudalism was abolished; had the armed forces been recruited entirely from them, as in the past, their future would not have appeared so gloomy.

It must be borne in mind that these feudal retainers had, under the old system, little need of care for the morrow. They and their families were kept by their feudal lords. Some of them obtained their pay—for such it really was—from the rents of lands assigned to their ancestors by their feudal masters, in return for military service; the majority received their salary in rice. Some enjoyed pensions for life, as a reward for special services. With the disestablishment of the Han, or feudal clan governments, these pensions, and the whole system of feudal service, were bound to terminate, but the Imperial Government recognised that the Samurai had a vested right that could not be ignored, so they decreed, in 1873, that any Samurai who desired to commute his hereditary income could do so, receiving the commutation, equivalent to six years' income, half in cash and half in Government Bonds, bearing 8 per cent, interest; life- pensioners could commute for the equivalent of four years' income, in the same proportion of cash and bonds. In 1876 this commutation was made compulsory.

It will be of interest to Socialists to note that, soon after this distribution of capital amongst the Samurai, many of them were found to have fallen into great poverty. The energetic and clever ones made excellent use of the means at their disposal. Equipped with the capacity for ruling that was the result of their hereditary high position and privileges, they managed to remain in the upper strata of society, and they virtually rule Japan in our time. The less capable, the spendthrifts, the careless ones, sank from their high estate and became gradually merged in the ranks of the common people. Some of them are drawing jinrikisha in the streets of Tokio. A great number naturally entered the armed forces, but as they could not all be officers, many of them had to be content with warrant rank or non-commissioned ratings. The admirable police force is recruited entirely from Samurai, or, as they are called, since 1878, Shi-zoku. The misgivings of the knightly class as to the efficiency of the new Army, the majority of whose men were not Samurai, were soon to be dispelled by its prowess in war, although its early victories were gained over its fellow-countrymen, except in one case, and in that over Formosan savages.

The new military law had only been in operation one year when, in 1874, the troops had to be employed in quelling an insurrection in the province of Saga, where a number of the discontented attempted to oppose by force the great changes that were being introduced. In the same year, New Japan sent its first warlike expedition across the seas; the savage aborigines of Formosa were chastised for the massacre of some shipwrecked Japanese fishermen, China, at that time the owner of the island, being totally unable to control its unruly subjects in those parts. The expedition, the expense whereof was ultimately refunded by China, provided but an unsatisfactory test of the efficiency of the new army; the rugged, mountainous nature of the country presented great obstacles to the movement of troops, but the fighting was insignificant. Three years later, in 1877, the new Imperial forces were to come, with brilliant success, through a very severe ordeal. The ultra-conservative party in the powerful Satsuma clan, under the leadership of the famous General Saigo Takamori, the idol of the Samurai, the very incarnation of the Japanese knightly spirit, had determined to possess themselves of the Emperor's person, quite in the grand manner of Old Japan, and to save him, so they said, from the evil counsellors who were ruining the country with their absurd new-fangled notions. The truth is that the High Toryism of these men of Satsuma was not unmixed with personal interests. They considered that the Imperialists of other clans—and especially those of Cho-shu and of Tosa—had secured an undue share of the loaves and fishes. Saigo, who had retired to Kagoshima in the sulks, had organised a vast system of military schools, at which 20,000 young Samurai were being trained for war and imbued with deadly hatred of the Government.

After several ineffectual attempts on the part of emissaries of the Government to come to an amicable understanding with Saigo, he began a march, at the head of 14,000 men, up the west coast of Kiu-shu, with the intention of reaching Tokio. The great obstacle in his way was the ancient castle of Kumamoto, built by the famous General Kato Kiyomasa, after his Korean expedition at the end of the sixteenth century. This was garrisoned by a force of between two and three thousand Imperial troops under General Tani. Saigo made a furious onslaught on the fortress, which was most gallantly defended, and delayed his advance for several weeks. This gave the Government time to organise a large force, under the Imperial Prince Arisugawa. The preparation of the expedition was entrusted, strangely enough, to General Saigo Tsugumichi, a younger brother of the great rebel. By keeping him at headquarters at Tokio, busy with matters of equipment and organisation, he was given the opportunity of displaying his loyalty to the Emperor, without actually taking the field against his brother. The Imperial forces relieved Kumamoto in the nick of time, for the garrison was reduced to great straits. There was desperate fighting, the besiegers were driven off and retreated towards the east coast, and after a succession of desperate actions, in which they were outnumbered and outmanoeuvred, they made a last stand at Nobeoka, in the north-eastern corner of Hiuga.

GENERAL VISCOUNT KODAMA

who took a leading part, under General Tani, in the defence of Kumamoto Castle against the Satsuma rebels in 1877. He became Vice-chief of the Japanese Army.

 

Recognising the hopeless nature of their position, Saigo, with about two hundred of his adherents, broke through the Imperial lines and escaped to Kagoshima. The bulk of his army surrendered on August 19th, 1877; they had begun their northward march in the middle of February of the same year. Saigo and his devoted little band entrenched themselves on the hill Shiro-yama, above Kago­shima, where they were surrounded and subjected to bombardment day and night. The great rebel, wounded in the thigh, and seeing that all hope was gone, retired into a cave, and committed hara-kiri, after having requested one of his trusted lieutenants to behead him, which his friend promptly did, as the last service he could render to his revered leader. When the Imperial troops discovered the remains of the little band of heroes—the few who had not been killed, some of them mere boys, had committed hara-kiri—they gave them decent burial. Admiral Kawamura himself reverently washed the head of his dead friend and fellow-clansman Saigo, whose memory is venerated to this day as that of a brave knight and noble gentleman, who paid for his misguided zeal with his life. A monument has been erected in Tokio to his memory, to which even the Imperial Court paid homage, his honours having been posthumously restored in 1890.

The Satsuma rebellion of 1877 was the last struggle of moribund feudalism. It taught two great lessons: the powerlessness of the ancient weapons, even though wielded by the bravest of the brave, when opposed to modern armaments and Occidental tactics, drill, and organisation; and the splendid fighting capacity of the common people when led by Samurai. It could no longer be maintained by the Conservatives that the Heimin troops could never prevail against the hereditary warriors. The newly-introduced universal military service was thus fully justified by its works, and there could be no more question of restricting the army to the old warrior class. The Satsuma clan soon settled down to peaceful pursuits, but it continues to play a leading part in the affairs of the nation, supplying more officers to the Navy and the Army than any other of the old clans, thus forming the backbone of the strong Military Party.

 

THE LAST REBELS: DEFEATED OFFICERS OF THE GREAT SATSUMA REBELLION OF 1877

The rebellion of the conservative Samurai of the Satsuma Clan, under the leadership of General Saigo Takamori, in 1877, was the last struggle of the dying feudalism against the spirit of progress.

 

In the early 'seventies, whilst the foundations of the Imperial forces were being laid, Japan was, towards the outer world, much in the same condition as a shellfish deprived of its shell. Fully cognisant of the danger they ran whilst the country was in a state of transition, preparing its new armour, the wise states­men of Japan exercised remarkable prudence in dealing with such international questions as might have involved them in war. It was thus they came to an agreement, in 1875, with Russia, by which they exchanged such parts of the island of Saghalin as were considered within their sphere of influence for the long chain of the barren Kurile Islands (in Japanese, Chi-shima, or "Thousand Islands"). They were well aware of the bad bargain they were making, but considered it preferable to a breach with Russia at a time when they were not in a position to oppose a great Power with any chance of success. Patiently biding their time, as is the wont of Orientals, some of those statesmen have lived to see, thirty years later, the southern part of Saghalin restored to Japan, whilst the Kuriles remain in her possession.

They behaved with similar prudence when, in January, 1876, they found themselves compelled to despatch a small expedition, under General Kuroda, to Korea, to demand satisfaction from the "Hermit Kingdom" for an unprovoked attack upon a Japanese ship calling for coal and provisions at a Korean port. The High Tories, especially those of Satsuma, clamoured for immediate chastisement of the Koreans, who had already incurred their wrath by neglecting to send a congratulatory mission, as ancient usage demanded, on the accession of the Emperor in 1867. The rulers of Japan wisely preferred to settle the matter by diplomacy, and concluded a treaty with Korea, safeguarding the important Japanese interests in that country. In 1879, the Riu-kiu, or Loo-choo, Islands, the suzerainty over which had long been claimed both by China and by Japan, were incorporated in the latter empire, as the Prefecture of Okinawa, after diplomatic negotiations conducted with great skill. The period from the abolition of feudalism in 1871 to 1887 was one of tremendous activity and restless effort in the direction of reform. A great wave of foreign influence swept over the land, culminating in 1873 and in the years between 1885 and 1887, when the movement for "Europeanisation" became a perfect rage, affecting not only administrative methods and national institutions but social life. Many of the foreign features introduced into public and private life in that epoch took Arm root, being recognised as great improvements on the old order of things; but every one of them suffered a "sea-change" in crossing the ocean, being adapted, generally with great skill, to national requirements, and coated, so to say, with a layer of fine Japanese lacquer. Other importations, hailed at first with enthusiasm, proved, by the experience of practical use, unsuited to Japanese conditions, and were dropped as hastily as they had been taken up, leaving no trace behind.

In 1871, the defunct feudal system was replaced by a centralised bureaucratic administration. The Daimiyo, being thus deprived of the last remnant of authority that remained to them whilst they had been placed in charge of their former clans, were "compensated" by the receipt of fixed incomes, amounting to one-tenth of their former revenues. This arrangement, apparently unfavourable to the ex-feudal nobility, was in reality much to the advantage of most of them, who were now relieved of the heavy charges they had formerly borne for the expenses of the government of their fiefs and the support of the Samurai families. The large sum that had to be raised by the Government for the commutation, already described, of the pensions, or salaries, of the Samurai class, was obtained by means of public loans.

The first foreign loan was negotiated in London, in 1870, bearing interest at 9 per cent., the proceeds being employed chiefly for the construction of the first railway, between Tokio and Yokohama (eighteen miles), opened for traffic in 1872, and of that between Osaka and Kobé. At the end of 1913, the total mileage open to traffic was 5,606. The nationalisation of all the railways was decided upon in 1906 and has been gradually effected. The State began purchasing the private lines, starting with seventeen companies, whose property was to be bought within ten years from March, 1906, and paid for with bonds bearing interest at 5 per cent., the purchase-price being calculated thus: the average rate of profit, over cost of construction, during six half-yearly terms (the first half of 1902, first and second halves of 1903 and 1904, and the first half of 1905), is multiplied by twenty; the figure thus obtained is then added to the cost of construction up to the date of purchase and to the cost price of rolling stock and stores in hand at that time. At the beginning of the fiscal year 1913—that is, in April of that year—the National Debt of Japan amounted to $1,250,000,000 of which total $713,841,450 was owing to foreign creditors. The war with Russia increased the National Debt of Japan from $267,729,500 by $765,141,500 to nearly $1,000,000,000.

These figures, those for railway mileage, and those for the national indebtedness, bear eloquent testimony to the enormous increase in facilities for internal communications and in the extension of the national credit. In every direction the same astonishing development may be traced since the Great Change in 1868. The system of lighting the coasts of Japan, now a pattern for the maritime nations, dates its inception from 1870, the year which also saw the birth of the network of telegraph lines that now covers the whole empire. In 1871, the ancient method of conveying letters by post­runners, a wonderfully speedy one considering its primitive nature, was supplanted by the beginnings of a Postal Administration that has reached a high degree of efficiency, handling, at the end of the fiscal year 1912, at 7166 post and telegraph offices, 1,677,000,000 articles of ordinary mail matter. The total length of telegraph lines amounted to 295,000 miles in 1913. The Imperial Mint at Osaka was established, with British technical assistance, in 1871.

The first railway was opened, as already mentioned, in 1872, the year that also saw the birth of the newspaper press, with the appearance of the first number of the Nisshin Shinjishi, a periodical started by an Englishman named Black. There had been attempts at the publication of newspapers, of a sort, in 1871, and as far back as 1864-5; but Mr. Black's venture was the first serious step taken to provide the nation permanently with something better than the news-sheets hawked about the streets by newsvendors called yomi-uri, who bawled out their wares, usually lurid accounts of some horrible murder, a fire or an earthquake, very much in the style of the London newsboy's "'Orful slaughter!" of bygone days. These roughly-printed broadsheets were issued spasmodically, whenever some important event, or some crime sure to excite the popular imagination, seemed likely to render their sale profitable.

The publication of Mr. Black's little journal was followed by the establishment of purely Japanese journalistic undertakings—the Nichi Nichi Simbun (Daily News) in 1872, which still flourishes under the same title. The number of periodicals has continued to increase steadily, especially since the amendment of the Press Laws, in 1890, substituting the regular process of law for the arbitrary jurisdiction of the censorship. Every periodical must have a responsible editor or publisher, and any daily paper or other periodical dealing with current politics must deposit with the authorities a sum, ranging from $500 downwards, as security for good behaviour, to cover eventual fines. The price of one of the Tokio dailies is as high as one cent and a quarter (2'5 sen) ; all the others cost half a cent (one sen). They are all issued in the morning, except the only Tokio newspaper written, edited, and published in English by Japanese, which appears in the evening. The charge for advertisements in the Japanese Press is from 18c. to 30c. per line of about twenty words. In 1903 there were 1,499 news­papers and other periodicals published in Japan, whereof seven were English news­papers written, edited, and owned by foreigners, British or American, and published in the foreign settlements at the late Treaty Ports, the most important and oldest established being the Japan Mail, which circulates throughout the country, and is widely read by Europeans interested in Japanese affairs. This excellent periodical was established in 1865. Of the nearly fifteen hundred vernacular periodicals, some are of high standing and deserving of all praise. Many of the others, unfortunately, take the "Yellow Press" of America and England as their model, and are correspondingly mischievous and degrading.

Nearly every Japanese adult, and practically all the young people of both sexes, are able to read, and make great use of this ability. Even the sturdy men who do the work of horses, drawing the jinrikisha, the cabs of Japan, seem to occupy the greater portion of their unemployed hours in the daytime in reading newspapers or cheap, popular books. The craftsmen and peasants are kept well informed of current events, and take an intelligent interest in the affairs of the nation, the farmers especially often displaying sound common-sense when they discuss, as they often do when the day's work is over, the topics of the day. The greatest need in connection with the Press in Japan is undoubtedly a more drastic law of libel, to check the slanderous scandal that at present disfigures the "Personal" columns of all but the very best journals, pandering to the national love of ill-natured gossip about those in high official positions or otherwise prominently before the public.

The year 1872 was also memorable for the establishment of the first Protestant church, and for the foundation of the Imperial University of Tokio. In the same year a special embassy, with the former Court Noble, Iwakura, a former Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs, at its head, was sent out, first to the United States, thence to England and the Continent of Europe, nominally "to communicate to the Governments of the Treaty Powers details of the internal history of Japan during the years preceding the revolution of 1868, and the restoration of the Imperial power, to explain fully the actual state of affairs and the future policy of the Japanese Government, and to study the institutions of other countries, their laws, commerce and educational methods, as well as their naval and military systems". The real object of this embassy was to endeavour to obtain a revision of the treaties, whereby the "Extra-territoriality Clause," withdrawing foreigners from Japanese jurisdiction and placing them under that of the representatives of their own nations, would be abrogated, thus removing a sharp thorn from the Japanese national body. To such a proud, sensitive people, the idea of foreign jurisdiction established on their territory was unbearably galling. The embassy failed to secure the abrogation of the obnoxious clause, and Japan had to wait twenty-seven years, till 1899, for the nations, Britain leading, to treat her, for the first time, on terms of equality by consenting to abandon the privileged position of their subjects and placing them under the jurisdiction of the Japanese courts. The next year, 1873, was memorable for two acts of progress—the adoption of the Gregorian calendar, and, more important, the repeal of the edicts against Christianity that were still in vigour, in spite of repeated unofficial assurances that no Japanese should suffer for his adherence to that faith. One of the first edicts of the Imperial Government, after its establishment in 1868, ran as follows : "The evil sect called Christian is strictly prohibited. Suspected persons should be reported to the proper officials, and reward will be given for detection." The immediate cause of this intolerant order was the discovery, at Urakami, a village in the mountains near Nagasaki, of a small community who had retained, in secret, some faint reminiscences of the Iberian Catholicism openly practised by their forefathers in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It is said that about 4,000 people in the district still carefully cherished the shreds of doctrine and of ritual that had been thus wonderfully preserved, at the risk of torture and death. In June, 1868, the Government ordered that all native Christians who would not recant should be deported to different provinces as dangerous persons, and put in charge of various feudal lords. The foreign diplomatic representatives protested vigorously and successfully; the Government, after striving to excuse its conduct by alleging the intense feeling of the nation against Christianity, ultimately restored these faithful ones to their homes. As already stated, in 1873 Christianity was no longer a misdemeanour, and there began the reign of toleration which culminated in the right, assured to all Japanese subjects by the Constitution of 1889, of freedom of religious belief "within limits not prejudicial to peace and order, and not antagonistic to their duties as subjects."

PRINCE IWAKURA, JAPAN'S ENVOY TO EUROPE IN 1872

He headed the Mission to Europe and America in 1872, to obtain treaty revision and to study methods of government and education.

This religious tolerance is, indeed, in accordance with the real feeling of the Japanese in such matters. Having, as a rule, no deep religious sentiment, as Occidentals know it, they pass easily from one creed to another, many of them belonging to more than one religious denomination, at all events as far as the outward observances are concerned, and the majority of those educated in the higher schools being practically Agnostics. The fact is that the Japanese of our time have been, and still are, so busy acquiring the Occidental knowledge necessary for the transformation of their country into the great naval, military, commercial, and industrial power of the Far East, that, as they themselves have frequently stated, "they have had no time to devote to religious questions." Nevertheless, whether they be willing to admit it or not, the men of New Japan have been greatly under the influence of Christian ideas, propagated by the numerous missionaries within their borders or imbibed by Japanese students residence abroad, especially in the early years of the present era. Although the number of natives professing Christianity is not very great, amounting only to about 150,000 of all denominations out of a population of nearly 53,000,000, they exercise a considerable influence, several of them occupying some of the highest posts.

The rights assured to the Japanese by their Constitution are borrowed from the liberties enjoyed by the citizens of Occidental nations, whose laws are inspired by the spirit of Christianity, if their policy be often sadly at variance therewith. In one respect Christianity has, fortunately, succeeded in effecting a marked change in the Japanese: the spirit of mercy so brilliantly in evidence in the treatment of defeated enemies, and of the sick and wounded in war and the weak and suffering in peace, especially in the humane work of that most admirable Japanese institution, the Red Cross Society of Japan, with its membership of over a million — all this is undoubtedly the outcome of Christian influence prevailing over the old savage ruthlessness of the Japanese character. A generation or two will have to pass before Christianity can totally eradicate the cruelty, the deceit, and the spirit of revenge from Japanese natures—it has not yet, after many centuries, succeeded in eliminating them from the bosom of some Occidental nations; but there are good grounds for hoping that the Japanese of a not very distant future will let Christianity accomplish, in that respect, what nearly fourteen centuries of Buddhism have failed to do. Whatever form of Christianity may ultimately claim the adherence of a large proportion of the Japanese people—and they are, at present, bewildered by the multiplicity of "one and only" direct routes to heaven offered to them— it will not be the Christianity of Rome, nor of Canterbury, nor of Moscow, nor of the Salvation Army; it will surely be a Japanese Christianity, and, perchance, nearer than any of the others to the Christianity of Christ.

Meanwhile, the State religion of Japan is the ancient, truly national, faith known as Shinto, meaning "The Way of the Gods", a mixture of primitive Nature-worship and of the cult of the Kami, the spirits of the Powers of Nature and the spirits of deified heroes, from whom the Japanese claim descent—the noble families directly, the others in a more or less vague way. It can hardly be termed a religion, as it has neither dogma, creed, nor commandments. Its principal idea, which forms its sole ethical teaching, is, roughly expressed, that, the nature of mankind being originally good, every man may safely be left to his own devices, provided he always bear in mind the duty of so regulating his conduct as to "make the faces of his ancestors to shine with glory" and never to do aught that would cause them to blush.

The makers of New Japan sought to re-establish this ancient cult in its original purity, cleansing it of the Buddhist overgrowth that had accumulated since the cunning Buddhist priests of the Middle Ages had virtually "annexed" Shinto, providentially discovering that the Kami of the aboriginal faith were "avatars," or incarnations (in Japanese, gon-gen, or temporary manifestations) of the myriad Buddhas who lived in this world and are now in Nirvana. The reformers, who had succeeded in abolishing the "usurpation" that had so long flourished as the Shogunate, were keen in scenting out usurpations. Surely, the mixture of the original national cult with Buddhism, the creed favoured by the Shogunate, producing the strange composite religion known as Riyobu Shinto, or Shin-Butsu Gattai—"amalgamation of Shinto and Buddhism"—was a usurpation not further to be tolerated.

So the reformers proceeded to disestablish Buddhism with a thoroughness approaching that of Henry VIII in his suppression of monastic institutions. The gorgeous paraphernalia of Buddhism, inspired by the ornate art of ancient India, was cleared out of the annexed Shinto temples (Jin-ja), which were restored to their original austere simplicity, resembling that of a bicycle-shed or a motor garage, and many Buddhist monasteries were shorn of their fat revenues. The imported faith had never succeeded in gaining a footing in Izumo, the "Land of the Gods" (Kami-no Kuni), where the influence of ancient tradition, making that district the scene of so many purely Japanese mythological events, was too strong to be overcome, nor in Satsuma, whose warlike people naturally looked upon meek and mild Buddhism as a creed unfit for warriors; in the rest of Japan the disestablishment of the Indian religion, and the Buddhism return to pure Shinto, was a serious matter.

That it was so easily accomplished indicates the strength of the national movement, striving to reestablish the supreme influence of the sacred Imperial power.

Like other creeds, Buddhism derived benefit from persecution; a notable revival has taken place in that religion of late years. Strangely enough, in its efforts to regain its lost predominance in Japan, it has taken a lesson from the activity of the Christian missionaries. Every feature that distinguishes missionary enterprise in the Far East has been faithfully copied by the more enlightened sects of Japanese Buddhists, especially by the wealthy and powerful Mon-to, or Shin-shu, who have been called the Bhuddist Protestants (their priests are allowed to marry; in fact, the priesthood is hereditary with them). Buddhist chaplains march with the troops in the field, minister to the sick and wounded, and preach to convicts in the gaols; Bhuddist priests and lay-helpers visit the poor, a popular religious literature is widely circulated, Buddhist periodicals flourish, seminaries are attached to the more important temples, the one belonging to the great Nishi Hongwan-ji Temple of the Mon-to, at Kioto, being virtually a Buddhist university.

The same sect has formed a splendid library of theological literature, embracing, with a praiseworthy broadness of view, works in foreign languages dealing with all creeds. Mothers' meetings prison gate missions, rescue work amongst fallen women, in short, all phases of Christian activity have now their counterpart amongst the progressive Buddhists. Even foreign missions have been undertaken, Buddhist priests working amongst the tens of thousands of Japanese emigrants in the Hawaiian Islands and in California, nothing loth to expound their ancient faith to non-Japanese inquirers.

All this manifold activity is supported entirely by voluntary contributions, the offerings of the faithful, mostly peasants and craftsmen, pouring in, both in money and in kind. Thousands of poor women, who have nothing else to give, cut off their long hair to be made into a huge cable wherewith the main beam of the roof of a new temple is hoisted into position.

In 1877 the new state of things was, for the first time, made manifest to one and all by the opening, in Tokio, of the First National Exhibition of Arts and Industries, commencing a regular series of such exhibitions, held periodically, alternately in the capital, at Kioto, and at Osaka, the first commercial and industrial city of the empire. These admirably managed shows of Japanese natural and industrial products led up to a great International Exhibition, held in Tokio in 1912.

In 1880 a great step forward was taken by the promulgation of a new penal code and a coode of criminal procedure, both inspired by a close study of the best foreign models.

In the same year, prefectural assemblies were instituted, as training schools not only for provincial self-government but to familiarise the people with parliamentary forms as a preparation for the introduction of the long-promised era of constitutional government, the advent of which, in 1890, was officially announced, nine years beforehand, in 1881.

The following year, 1882, was one of feverish political activity, parties being busily formed in readiness for parliamentary government.

Whilst Japan was preparing, from 1882, for the new era that was to dawn with the promulgation of the Constitution, on February 11th, 1889, tremendous intellectual activity prevailed throughout the land. From 1868 to 1888, Occidental ideas permeated the minds of the rising generation. No man did more to explain them to his fellow-countrymen than the great educationalist Fukuzawa Yukichi, the "Sage of Mita" (a district of Tokio), whom the Japanese are fond of comparing to Arnold of Rugby. This remarkable man, who was born in 1835 and died, regretted by the whole nation, in 1901, probably exercised a greater influence on the minds of those who now rule Japan than any other of their fellow-countrymen. Many of the most prominent public men were educated at the great school, the Keio-gi-jiku, founded, and directed for many years, by him. He was a prolific author and his works have had, and still have, an enormous circulation.

 

"THE SAGE OF MITA," FUKUZAWA YUKICHI

The celebrated Japanese educationalist (1835-1901), whom his countrymen are fond of comparing to Arnold of Rugby, exercised a greater influence on the intellect of Japan than any of his countrymen.

 

The widespread Occidental influences affected every phase of the life of the higher and middle classes, who strove, during the decade prior to 1888, to alter their way of living after the fashion of the West. The national costume was discarded by many, even by ladies, who underwent much voluntary torture in the tight boots, with high heels, and the corsets, of Paris for the sake of being "in the movement." In 1873, Government officials were ordered to wear European dress, uniforms of European pattern were designed for all the Services, and an edict was issued abolishing the little, stiff queue, the magé, that Japanese men used to bring forward over the shaven forepart of the head, and ordering the hair to be worn in the Occidental fashion. Many crazes turned the heads of Tokio society in that period, from rabbit-fancying (in 1873 as much as one thousand dollars being paid for a single "bunny," the little animal having been, till then, unknown in Japan) to waltzing. The rabbit craze did not last long; the Government saw its chance, and imposed a poll-tax on the long-eared pets, whose price dropped suddenly, ruining many gambler in rabbits. The craze for waltzing vanished as rapidly as it had appeared, and the most that Japanese now attempt in the way of Occidental dancing is the solemn, and perfectly correct, walking through a quadrille at an official ball.

The succession of fashionable crazes, all more or less derived from the Occident, lasted, in full swing, until 1889, when a severe anti-foreign reaction set in. The cause of this set-back was political; it was due to the nation's disgust at what it considered the rank injustice of foreign Powers in refusing to abrogate the Extraterritoriality Clause in the Treaties. The Japanese, conscious of the giant strides with which they were marching on the road of progress, felt deeply humiliated by the continued refusal of foreign nations to submit to the jurisdiction of Japanese courts of law. From the Iwakura Embassy of 1872, the chief, almost the sole, aim of Japanese diplomacy had been to obtain the removal of the obnoxious clause.

Several times success had been within sight, but some hitch had always occurred to frustrate the hopes of the nation. Its irritation broke out in 1889 in the above­mentioned wave of anti-foreign feeling, causing most of the foreign innovations in the home and social life of the upper and middle classes to be abandoned, which happened the more easily as they had never taken firm root, being generally the result of the craze of the moment. The life of the masses remained, and still remains, almost untouched by foreign influences. Needless to say, the backward swing of the pendulum did not affect essentials, such as the brand-new Constitution, nor the material importations, such as railways, telegraphs, steamships, gas, petroleum, matches, which had already become necessities to the people. Their introduction had caused new wants to arise, and the cost of living was steadily augmenting; it still continues to rise. In 1899, a family of the lower middle class, consisting of five members and one servant, living in Tokio, and practising the strict economy usual with the Japanese, required a monthly income of at least 35 yen, whereas in 1889 they could have lived decently for 19 yen less than that sum. In 1901, the general average index number of the price of commodities classed as necessaries was 97; it had risen in 1904 to 108.

Since the war with Russia, prices have taken a great leap upward, and the cost of living has much increased, whilst salaries and wages, although they have risen steadily since the beginning of the new era, have not kept pace with the rise in necessary expenditure. The increasing demands on everyone's means, consequent on the Great Change, rendered the acquisition of more capital absolutely necessary.

Japan's funds were at that time not large—the resources of the country were not yet developed—and her rulers had to strain every nerve to meet the enormous constantly growing, expenditure necessitated bv what may be termed the national outfit.

Japan was, in those years, and, to a certain extent, still is, in the position of a new firm starting in manufacturing business. She has to provide herself with plant, tools, and the thousand-and-one things necessary for beginning operations. All these have had, and in great measure still have, to be procured from abroad; hence the great excess of imports over exports in nearly every year since 1871.

In the period from that year to 1905, only two years showed an excess of exports over imports—1904—the first year of the war with Russia, being the one in which the imports most largely exceeded exports, the excess amounting to 167,004,000 yen. It will probably be some years before the exports steadily exceed the imports. The extraordinary balance of trade in favour of Japan in 1906 was exceptional, and is not likely to become a settled feature for some years to come. The progress of the foreign trade of Japan under the new regime has been phenomenal; in 1871, the total figure, exports and imports together, was $19,483,000; in 1912 it had risen to $587,076,840.

The marvellous development of commerce, and especially of industries, has been due to the fostering care of the Government, which may be said also of the mercantile marine, whose development, almost entirely due to a system of subsidies and bounties, has been as wonderful as the industrial expansion that has raised a forest of tall factory chimneys, belching forth a pall of smoke over the great cotton spinning city of Osaka.

At the end of the year 1892, Japan possessed a mercantile fleet of 214,000 tons; in 1902 the tonnage had risen to 934,000. In 1912 the steamers of the mercantile marine above 20 tons numbered 1981, and of these 388 were over 1000 tons, while the sailing vessels over 100 tons, numbered 1317.

Shipbuilding, which seems likely to become one of Japan's greatest industries, is much encouraged by a law which awards valuable bounties for the construction of steel-framed steamships of not less than 700 tons burthen. To the English-speaking races, hitherto staunch believers in individualism, it may seem but an artificial, unhealthy prosperity that is bolstered up in this way by support drawn from the national taxation. The rulers of Japan, however, evidently think otherwise, and they have shown such wisdom in many other directions that there is some ground for belief in their being right also in respect of State-aided and State-controlled industries, commerce, and navigation.

They have taken a keen survey of the world in our time; the lesson it has taught them is that ours is the day of combined, methodically organised effort, before which the activity of even the most capable single individual must give way. They have watched the growth of huge "trusts" in America, of "combines" of various kinds in Germany and in Britain; they have noted the tendency towards cooperation, which seems the only practical panacea for the constant warfare between Capital and Labour, that threatens the very existence of the social system of the Occident; and they have resolved that Japan's economic activities shall be organised, drilled, and directed with the same thoroughness, knowledge,and skill that have made Japan's armed forces the wonder of our time. The national predisposition to cooperation in guilds, the people's capacity for organisation, subdivision of labour, and attention to minute details, their amenability to directions from above, all seem to point to the ultimate success of the tremendous task undertaken by Japan's rulers. As in trade, in manufactures and in navigation, so in banking, the Government exercises firm control, not only over the great Bank of Japan, founded in 1882, the prosperous Yokohama Specie Bank, Limited, established in 1880, and over the very important Industrial Bank of Japan, established in 1902—these institutions may be looked upon as being, in reality, Government concerns—every financial transaction of any magnitude comes under the cognisance of State officials, and is subject to their control.

It may be a purely private business, exempt from the control by law established; it will, nevertheless, be dependent for its success on the sympathy and goodwill of the powers that be, who constitute themselves judges as to what is good, financially, for Japan.

All this naturally takes place sub rosa, and is usually emphatically denied by Japanese, both official and unofficial. The fact, nevertheless, remains, and is responsible for the tired feeling that overcomes most of the Occidental capitalists desirous of utilising their funds in Japan, a lassitude that causes their early abandonment of the held and the turning of their attention to countries where there is more scope for individual action. In 1887, the dissatisfaction of the more ardent reformers at the prudent slowness of the preparations for constitutional government caused them to become so restless and aggressive that an edict, commonly called the "Peace Preservation Act," was issued, enabling the Government to keep them in order with a high hand, expelling many, for a time, from Tokio, and imprisoning the recalcitrant.

 

THE IMPERIAL UNIVERSITY OF TOKIO, FOUNDED IN 1872

The year 1872 was memorable because of Japan's advance in educational methods. In that year the Imperial University of Tokio was founded, and a special embassy, under Prince Iwakura, a former Prime Minister, was sent to America and Europe to study the laws, commerce, institutions, and educational methods of other countries.

 

 

 
NEW JAPAN OVERCOMES OLD CHINA

 

NOTABLE FIGURES IN THE HISTORY OF THE JAPANESE ARMY

Lieutenant General Terauchi & Field-Marshal Prince Yamagata

General Count Oku & Field-Marshal Prince Oyama

Field-Marshal Marquis Nodzu & General Count Nogi

THE JAPANESE BATTLESHIP KASHIMA

 

 

IN 1888, on July 15th, on a fine, clear morning, the great volcano Bandai-san —6,000 feet high—broke out in a terrible eruption, that completely buried four hamlets, destroying 461 lives. The year 1889 was remarkable, as already stated, for the promulgation of the Constitution and the establishment of local self­government, more under Government control than the type prevalent in English­speaking countries. In the same year the Imperial Prince Haru was proclaimed Crown Prince. The next year, 1890, saw the first parliamentary election, on July 4th, and the opening of the first session of the Imperial Diet on November 29th. The new civil and commercial codes were promulgated in the same year. In 1891, the tremendous earthquake in the Gifu district killed about ten thousand people. Within the next three years ominous portents of great events began to be apparent to those who had eyes to see and ears to hear. The Shadow determination of Russia to construct, with French capital, a gigantic railway across Siberia foreshadowed her intention of becoming the paramount Power in the Far East. In the year 1893 Major-General Fukushima, at the close of his period of service as Military Attaché to the Japanese Legation at Berlin, rode on horseback from the German capital to the Pacific Ocean, arousing by his sports­manlike feat incredible enthusiasm in Japan. The real cause for the popular exultation was the fact that every Japanese knew that the gallant horseman kept his eyes wide open and his keen brain alert during his ride along the track of the proposed Russian railway. What he reported as to the rate of its construction, and other portents he noted, confirmed the suspicions of the Japanese Government as to the Muscovite designs. The Japanese spies, who swarmed all over China, especially in the northern parts, also sent home disquieting reports. It became evident to the clear-sighted statesmen in Tokio that the huge, flabby, weak and corrupt Chinese Empire would, within a few years, pass entirely under the mastery of Russia. Li Hung Chang, at that time the man who ruled the destinies of China, was a tool in the hands of Russian agents. It had become known to the JapaneseGovernment that he was meditating an attack on Japan, with his fleet of excellent warships, built in England and in Germany, and his army—drilled by German officers—at the first favourable opportunity. The ill-will with which China regarded New Japan—a nation it affected to despise as "impudent dwarfs"—manifested itself in many directions, but more especially in that truly distressful country, Korea. That kingdom, as it then was, must always be within the sphere of Japan's vital interests. Japan could no more allow a foreign Power to become predominant there than England could permit an alien state to hold Ireland. Moreover, gifted by nature with rich resources, waiting to be developed in a manner impossible with its small population of people who, if physically fine, and mentally capable, are reduced morally to a level so low as to deprive them of nearly all the qualities a nation should possess, Korea is the natural receptacle for the oversow of Japan's teeming, rapidly-increasing population. It is destined to be the granary of Japan, and is already the scene of great commercial activity on the part of the Japanese, who possess flourishing settlements there, some of them, like Fusan, from ancient times.

By diplomatic agreement, neither Japan nor China was to preponderate in Korea, and, whenever the frequent disorder in that disturbed country rendered it necessary for one of the two Far Eastern empires to land troops for the protection of its subjects, due notice was to be given to the other Power. Such was the compact entered into by the Convention negotiated at Tientsin on April 18th, 1885, by Ito and Li Hung Chang. In 1894, a fanatical sect (the Tong-hak) started a serious revolt in Korea. The distracted Government of that country applied to their ancient suzerain, China, for help. Japan immediately replied to this move by announcing her intention of sending an expedition of equal strength to any China might despatch. The first Chinese expedition landed in Korea on June 8th, the first Japanese four days later. The revolt was soon suppressed, but on China informing Japan that it considered the trouble at an end, and that the troops of both should be recalled, Japan stated that she thought the time had come to confer with China as to the future of Korea, so as to avoid a repetition of similar incidents. China refused to discuss the matter, prepared for war, in her own spasmodic, reckless way, and continued to despatch troops to Korea. Over a thousand of these soldiers were being conveyed in the British steam­ship Kowshing, chartered by China. On the refusal of that vessel to submit to the orders of Captain Togo—since known to fame as Japan's great admiral, "the Nelson of the Far East"—that gallant sailor acted with quick decision. His ship, the cruiser Naniwa, had met the Kowshing off Shopeiul Island, in the Korean Archipelago, on July 25th, 1894, and on that very day he sank the recalcitrant transport, whose British captain and European officers were willing enough to surrender, but were prevented from so doing by the Chinese officers and troops, who, panic-stricken, had lost their heads and had filled the ship with a mutinous, excited crowd, firing at random. The Japanese picked up the European officers who had jumped overboard, and ultimately released them, after treating them with great kindness. To save the drowning Chinese was not feasible, as they kept up a frantic rifle-fire from the ports and the deck, not only at the Naniwa's boats, but at the Europeans and at their own comrades, who had jumped over the side, as they struggled in the water. This incident, virtually the first hostile act in a war thus begun without a regular declaration, which was issued, by both belligerents, only on August 1st, nearly embroiled Japan with Britain, but the very able Minister of Foreign Affairs, the late Count M. Mutsu, one of the ablest and most honest statesmen of New Japan, conducted the delicate negotiations that ensued with such tact that Britain was satisfied with an indemnity to the owners of the ship, paid by China.

On July 28th, 1894, the Japanese attacked and routed the Chinese near Asan, in Korea. This success, gained by about 2,500 Japanese, under General Oshima, over 3,000 Chinese, under General Yeh, resulting in the capture of eight guns and large quantities of stores and ammunition, made a great impression on the Koreans. A pro-Japanese Cabinet was formed in Seoul, which concluded an alliance with Japan, inviting its new friends to expel the Chinese from Korea. On September 15th, the Japanese took Ping Yang, an important strategical point, on the Tai-dong River, in the north-west of Korea, after a pitched battle, in which about 14.000 Japanese utterly defeated about 13.000 Chinese, capturing thirty-five guns and an immense quantity of rifles, ammunition, and stores, with a loss to themselves of 162 killed and 438 wounded, the Chinese losing about 1,500 men on the night of the 15th alone, during their disorderly flight.

By this victory the Japanese virtually became masters of Korea. Two days later, their Navy was to win an action that gave them full control of the seas between Korea, China, and Japan. On September 17th, 1894, the Japanese Fleet, consisting chiefly of unarmoured, partially protected, cruisers, under Vice­Admiral Ito (now a Count), gained a victory over the Chinese squadron, under brave old Vice-Admiral Ting, whose five armoured ships (two of them powerful battleships) and well-armed cruisers should have been much more than a match for their opponents. It was the superior handling of the Japanese ships, their greater speed, and better gunnery that won for them this action, known as the Battle of the Yalu, owing to its having been fought in Korea Bay, between the Island of Hai-yang and the mouth of the Yalu River.

The Chinese sailors fought bravely where their captains gave them a chance of fighting—some of them, thinking discretion the better part of valour, steamed out of action at the first shots—but the absence of a knowledge of steam tactics on the part of most of their commanders, and the diversity of speed of the various units of their fleet, rendering it impossible for many of the ships to keep station in the line of battle, placed them at the mercy of Ito's well-trained squadron, acting like a perfectly-regulated machine.

 

 

ADMIRAL TING
Chinese leader at the Battle of Yalu, in 1894, when the Japanese gained control of the Eastern Seas. A fe months later, after the fall of Weihai-wei, Admiral Ting took his own life rather than surrender, and the Japanese bugles rang out a salute in honour of Japan's brave foe.

The significance of this naval victory, by its consequences the most important, at the time, since Trafalgar, cannot be over-estimated. It heralded the birth of a new Great Power and the advent of an entire change in the balance of power in the Far East. The present writer has attempted to set forth, in his book, "The New Far East", the causes that led to the war between Japan and China, the lessons that campaign taught the world, and the consequences of Japan's victory over her huge adversary. Exigencies of space forbid a detailed description in these pages of the moving incidents of the conflict. Suffice it to record that on October 25th the Japanese crossed the Yalu River and again scored a victory. Bearing all before them, they advanced into Manchuria, until brought to a halt by the approach of winter. In the meantime, a second Japanese army corps landed on October 24th on the east coast of the peninsula of Liao-tung, took possession of Ta-lien-wan on November 7th, and stormed Port Arthur on the 21st. The capture of this "Gibraltar of the Far East" cost the Japanese only 270 casualties, the extraordinarily small number of eighteen losing their lives in the action, whereas the Chinese had more than a thousand killed. The fact is, the Chinese had by this time become thoroughly demoralised, and, besides, never had sufficient drilled troops to man the vast system of forts and connecting defences that the Viceroy Li Hung Chang had spent such vast sums in erecting—French and, later, German military engineers supplying the admirable plans.

With the capture of this stronghold Japan had apparently achieved her main object. It needed only the taking of the fortified aval harbour at Wei-hai-wei, the opposite gate-post of the "Door of Peking," to place the Chinese capital entirely at her mercy. It must be borne in mind that this was the main purpose of the war—to obtain that control over China that would otherwise inevitably have passed into Russian hands. Thoroughly alarmed, the Government of China opened negotiations for peace, but the pompous embassy that arrived in Japan, at Hiroshima, on January 31st, 1895, reinforced by the presence of an American diplomatist, Mr. Foster, as "unofficial adviser," was made ridiculous in the eyes of the whole world by the refusal of the Japanese plenipotentiaries to negotiate with it, the credentials of the envoys being found to be vague and insufficient. Thus did this mission fail owing to the attempt of its Government to practise a childish trick. A prior, informal, peace mission, entrusted to Mr. Detring, the Commissioner of Imperial Chinese Maritime Customs at Tientsin, and the trusted adviser of the Viceroy Li, had been politely bowed out of Japan when he attempted, soon after the fall of Port Arthur, to open negotiations with the Japanese Government, who, of course, refused to have any relations with an envoy of such very inadequate rank, who was not even a Chinese.

Towards the end of January, 1895, a fleet of fifty transports, protected by twenty warships, landed a Japanese division on the coast of Shan-tung, near the town of Yung-cheng, whence it marched to attack Wei-hai-wei, whilst a separate brigade proceeded all the way by sea. On January 26th, the Japanese troops began the attack, and, after some hard fighting on land and some daring raids into the fortified harbour by the Japanese torpedo-boats, Wei-hai-wei was taken on the afternoon of February 2nd. The Chinese fleet, at anchor in the harbour, still had to be dealt with. By February 16th it was in the hands of the Japanese. Vice-Admiral Ting, one of the few heroic figures in the modern history of China, after a correspondence with Vice-Admiral Ito that reads like an extract from Plutarch, committed suicide so as to avoid the humiliation of conducting the surrender of his fleet. What followed fills a bright page in the history of the war, illustrating that fine sense of chivalry that still animates the warriors of Japan. Admiral Ito returned to the Chinese their gun-vessel Kwang-tsi, one of the captured fleet, with her officers and crew, in order that the remains of China's greatest sailor might be conveyed to their last resting-place in one of his own ships, under the Dragon Flag of the empire he had served so faithfully. The Japanese even allowed the Kwang-tsi to retain her four guns, so that she might fire a salute when her admiral's body was brought on board. Before she left her anchorage, the officers of the Japanese fleet, and many from the troops on shore, filed slowly past the coffin, solemnly and reverently saluting the remains of the enemy who had fought so stoutly against them. As the Kwang-tsi passed between the long lines of the Japanese squadron, flying at half-mast the dead Admiral's flag, every Japanese ship dipped her victorious ensign, minute guns were fired, the ships' bands played funeral marches, and the "Admiral's salute" rang out from Japanese bugles in honour of the gallant enemy who would fight no more.

Such chivalry befitted the knightly heroes of Japan, for heroes they were, every one of them, those sturdy little brown men who planted the flag of the Rising Sun on the citadel of Port Arthur, Asia's strongest fortress, who marched through Korea and through the Liao-tung Peninsula, wheresoever they listed, crumpling up the armies of China like so much paper. They were heroes, every man, those dauntless bluejackets of Japan, who smashed China's modern fleet at the Yalu Mouth, who "picked up the pieces" of the defeated squadron, months later, at Wei-hai-wei. Their daring raids, with their torpedo-boats, into the harbour of Wei-hai-wei, under the guns of the forts, the swift "terrors of the sea" crashing through the ice-floes in the bitter nights—more than one gallant officer or man was found dead, frozen stiff, at the post of duty—would have caused Nelson's heart to rejoice and made Cochrane's blood tingle. And the folk at home, men and women too, were as heroic as the warriors at the front.

Since classic times the world had not been treated to the spectacle of such heroism, such patriotic devotion, such a noble spirit animating a whole nation. The statesmen of the Occident rubbed their eyes at the vision, to them a revelation of a new, unsuspected force; the naval and military experts found themselves, to their surprise, learning great lessons in the art of war from those who were but yesterday their pupils. They saw a great army, numbering about eighty thousand men, conveyed across the sea and landed, with its enormous supply of stores, on an enemy's coast without a hitch in any part of the operation. They saw that army kept healthy and strong, apparently unaffected by its herculean struggle against a difficult, roadless, broken country and—in the latter part of the campaign—against a terrible arctic winter. They knew this success was due to the best system of commissariat, supply and transport, ever seen in the field, working with automatic, mechanical regularity; and to an Army Medical Corps that was pronounced by a high British military-medical authority—Surgeon-General Taylor, R.A.M.C.— who witnessed its work in the war, to be "the nearest approach to absolute perfection."

From the actual fighting on land but little could be learnt, as the medley of well-trained, German-drilled troops, armed with the latest weapons, and of an undisciplined rabble of matchlock-men, bowmen and spearmen, that constituted the "army" of China, had so little notion of "playing the game" that its futile, though sometimes gallant, efforts were fore­doomed to failure. From the naval actions, however, much useful instruction was to be derived; they revealed the great danger arising from the presence of woodwork, catching fire at the long flames caused by the bursting of shells charged with high explosives; they demonstrated the value of speed and of handiness in steering. The whole course of the war bore testimony to the absolute necessity, in a campaign over­seas, for harmonious, carefully rehearsed cooperation of the naval and military forces. Above all, this conflict inculcated once more the great lesson Captain Mahan had so clearly expounded—the supreme importance of sea-power.

 

THE SINKING OF THE CHINESE TROOPSHIP KOWSHING IN JAPANS WAR WITH CHINA IN 1891. At the outset of the Chino-Japanese War In 1894, the British steamship Kowshing, chartered by the Chinese, was despatched to Korea with a thousand troops. The vessel was met by Captain, later Admiral, Togo, in his cruiser, the Naniwa, in the Korean Archipelago, on July 25th, 1894, and on that day the Kowshing was sunk. The British captain and the European officers on board, who vainly advised the Chinese to surrender, were picked up by the Japanese.

 

 

Japan's success had been followed with sympathetic attention by the chief nations of the Occident, by the people if not by their Governments. The Germans, especially, watched with delight the prowess of their apt pupils. The British nation, insufficiently informed, as it often is in questions affecting its vital interests abroad, had, at the outset of the conflict, "backed the wrong horse," feeling convinced that its "old friend"— it is difficult to see where the "friendship" ever manifested itself—and good customer, China, was bound to prevail in the end over the daring little islanders, owing to her huge population, her "unlimited resources," her "tremendous latent power." Those were catchwords of the day that appealed to the mind of the Briton, accustomed to hear them used in connection with his own vast, loosely-connected, ever-unready empire. When events proved that China's resources and population availed her so little that she was cowering under Japan's blows, that her "tremendous power" was so "latent" it could not be found when wanted, there was a revulsion of British public sympathy, which was transferred, as if by magic, to the winning side. The few who, like the present writer, had all along predicted, as a foregone conclusion, the victory of Japan, were no longer looked upon as "visionary enthusiasts," and popular attention was riveted on Japan for a quite considerable time, considering the fickleness of "public interest."

With the fall of Wei-hai-wei and the surrender of the remnant of the once so renowned "Northern Fleet," China's rulers understood that they must sue for peace, without the prevarication and delays so dear to them, if they wished to keep the victorious Japanese forces from marching on Peking. They reluctantly decided to send the Viceroy Li Hung Chang, their foremost statesman, to Japan. He arrived on March 19th, 1895, at Shimonoseki, the place appointed by the Government of Japan, whose plenipotentiaries were Count Ito (now Prince) and the late Count Mutsu. It looked as if the victors were about to impose harsh terms, when an incident occurred that greatly modified their attitude and turned out much to China's advantage. On March 24th, as the Viceroy Li was returning, borne in his palanquin, from a conference with the Japanese plenipotentiaries, a half-crazy fanatic named Koyama fired a pistol at him, almost point­blank, the bullet entering the cheek near the nose. The wound was, fortunately, slight and soon healed; but the feelings of sympathy for the aged statesman, who had so far overcome his proud nature as to sue for peace, it aroused amongst the Japanese, from the Emperor downwards, and the nation's sense of shame at the outrage, caused every consideration to be shown to the envoy, on whom kindness attentions were showered, and resulted in the granting of an armistice and the facilitation of the negotiations.

The treaty of peace was signed at Shimonoseki on April 17th, 1893. By its terms, China and Japan "recognised the independence of Korea"—a solemn farce that has been repeatedly performed, leaving that country on each occasion less "independent" than before. China agreed to pay, and did pay, an indemnity of 150,000,000 dollars, and ceded to Japan the rich island of Formosa, or Taiwan, the strategically important Pescadores (or Hokoto) Group, lying between China and Formosa, and—most important of all—the Liao-tung Peninsula, in which Port Arthur is situated.

This last cession caused grave misgivings to several Powers, more especially to Russia, who had long ago marked down Port Arthur to be hers at no distant date. France naturally shared the feelings of her "dear friend and ally"—at that time the most touching affection united the French to their Russian allies and debtors. They cherished the alliance, and well they might; it had cost them 1,500,000,000 dollars, the amount of French capital lent to Russia, or invested in Russian undertakings, at the time in question. The great Trans-Siberian Railway was being constructed with part of that moneys and the French were naturally much concerned as to the fate of Port Arthur, and of Manchuria in general.

The Powers consulted one another as to what should be done; Russia and France soon decided that Japan must not be allowed to remain in possession of Port Arthur, nor of any territory on the mainland. Germany, with startling suddenness, threw away the exceptional influence she enjoyed in Japan, with the commercial advantage it gave her, and earned the undying ill-will of the Japanese people by joining Russia and France in a sort of unholy alliance to coerce Japan, an alliance indirectly active against British prestige and interests in the Far East, as events proved. Britain had been invited to join Russia, France and Germany in their action, but the three Powers "advised" relinquish her claim to any Chinese territory on the mainland, "in the interests of the permanent peace of the Far East"! Their rank hypocrisy seems almost incredible when one thinks of subsequent events—the German seizure of Kiao-chau, the barefaced Russian "leasing" from China of Port Arthur, the so-called Boxer outbreak provoked by the German "grab," the terrible war of 1904-5, due entirely to the Russian one. Japan had to yield. She could not think, at that time, of facing, alone, a coalition of the three greatest military powers of the world—for so they then appeared to be; Russia was not yet found out—and no help could be expected from Britain, to whom Russia, even without partners, was, in those days, a paralysing "bogey."

The cause of the German Emperor's unexpected action in joining Russia and France was, probably, fourfold. Firstly, his anxiety to oblige his huge neighbour, Russia; next, his ardent desire to secure the goodwill of France; thirdly, the wish to inaugurate a strong German policy in the Far East, and lastly, perhaps principally, his idée fixe, "the Yellow Peril," then germinating in his active brain. The origin of the germ has been attributed, by some who claimed to be behind the scenes, to the audience to which the Kaiser summoned, immediately the Japanese terms of peace became known, his Excellency Dr. Max von Brandt, for many years Germany's diplomatic representative at Far Eastern courts. The Japanese courteously thanked their "dear friends" for their "kind and disinterested" advice, and—at a word from their Emperor—accepted the situation, relinquishing their claim to the Liaotung Peninsula and receiving, as compensation, fifteen million dollars more, added to the indemnity already agreed upon. They bowed to the inevitable with a deep sigh, and then clenched their teeth and grimly began those silent preparations that lasted nine years and led the Sunrise Flag once more to the topmost fort of Port Arthur, where it now flies, this time defying any coalition to haul it down.

The two great tasks to which Japan applied her energies directly after the conclusion of the treaty of peace with China were—apart from the strengthening to an enormous degree of her Navy and her Army—the pacification and civilising of her splendid, but turbulent, new dependency, the island of Formosa, and the settlement affairs of Korea.

In the first task she has succeeded admirably, after some initial mistakes, soon rectified. In 1905, the item "subsidy from the Imperial Government" disappeared, for the first time, from the Estimates of the island's financial position; the same cheering omission took place in 1906—the colony had become self-supporting within ten years. In Korea the Japanese were less successful. The Anti-Japanese Party in that country had gained strength after the war and influenced the Court and official circles, deriving its chief support from Queen Min, a woman of great determination and cunning. A plot was formed by certain Japanese adventurers and their Korean accomplices to "remove" the obnoxious Queen, who had acquired complete mastery over the weak, vacillating King.

MEMORIAL TO THE QUEEN OF KOREA
An Imperial Summer-house erected to mark the place where the body of the murdered Queen was burned by the Japanese in 1895.

It has been alleged that the Japanese Minister at Seoul instigated the conspiracy, but an official investigation failed to discover proofs of his complicity. Whether officially encouraged or not, the conspirators, on October 8th, 1895, broke into the royal apartments and murdered the queen with a barbarity that is recalled by a more recent foul tragedy at Belgrade. The miscreants hoped that, freed from the influence of his consort, the King would become more amenable to Japanese advice. On the contrary, fearing he might be the next victim, his agitated Majesty sought sanctuary at the Russian Legation, where he held his fugitive Court from February, 1896, to February, 1897.

 

This, naturally, gave Russia preponderating influence in his kingdom, and she made full use of her advantage, to the detriment of Japan, who found herself worse off in Korea than before the war. The strained situation, a conflict of intrigues between the Russian and Japanese Legations, could not last, and, after much diplomatic parleying, the two Powers entered into agreements, in May, 1896, at Seoul, and in July of the same year at St. Petersburg, by which they undertook to respect the independence" of Korea, that has so often been object of similar declarations, and fixed the number of troops each of them might maintain in Korea, for the protection of its subjects there, at 1,000 men. Japan must have signed this compact with a wry face, for it still left her with Russia for a competitor in Korea instead of China—as before the war—and she could hardly hope to profit by the change.

 

A JAPANESE COUNCIL OF WAR, AS DEPICTED BY A JAPANESE ARTIST

THE INFANCY OF THE JAPANESE ARMY: FRENCH-DRILLED TROOPS MARCHING IN 1870

END OF THE CHINA-JAPAN WAR: SURRENDER OF CHINESE GENERAL AND STAFF AFTER THE FALL OF WEI-HAI-WEI. The dauntless soldiers of Japan had "crumpled up the armies of China like paper." Her sailors, who crushed the Chinese fleet at Yalu River, "picked up the pieces of the defeated squadron" at Wei-hat-wei on February 2, 1895. With the fall of Wei-hai-wei and the surrender of the Northern Fleet, China's rulers understood that they must sue for peace.

GENERAL KUROKI, COMMANDER OF JAPANESE FIRST ARMY IN THE WAR WITH RUSSIA It was Count Kuroki's First Army which gained the first great land victory at Kiu-lien-cheng and played an important part in the last great defeat of the Russian Army at Mukden after a week of fighting, day and night.

4.- WAR WITH RUSSIA. THE TRIUMPH OF NEW JAPAN

 

 

 

 

 

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