Part 7 (2/2)

VI

Those who apologize for j.a.panese aggressiveness in Manchuria, those who excuse or sympathize with her evident purpose to make Manchuria walk the way of Korea, have but one argument for their position--the pitiably abused and threadbare plea that the j.a.panese have won the country by the blood they shed in the war with Russia. The best answer to this is also a quotation from the distinguished and witty Chinaman just mentioned. ”The j.a.panese,” said he, ”claimed they were fighting Russia because she was preparing to rob China of Manchuria; now they themselves out-Russia Russia. It is much as if I should knock a man down, saying, 'That man was about to take your watch,' and then take the watch myself!”

The aptness of the simile is evident. My sympathy, and the sympathy of every other American acquaintance of mine as far as I can now recall, was with j.a.pan in her struggle because of our hot indignation over Russian aggressiveness. But if j.a.pan had said, ”I am fighting to put Russia out only that I may myself develop every identical policy of aggrandizement that she has inaugurated,” it is very easy to see with what different feelings we should have regarded the conflict.

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Moreover, j.a.pan's legitimate fruits of victory do not extend to the control or possession of Manchuria. As one of the ablest Englishmen met on my tour in the Far East pointed out, j.a.pan's purposes in inaugurating the war were four: (1) to get a preponderating influence in Korea; (2) to get the control of the Tsus.h.i.+ma Straits, which a preponderating influence in Korea would give her; (3) to drive Russia from her ever-menacing position at Port Arthur; and (4) to arrest (as she alleged) the increasing influence and power of Russia in Manchuria.

All these things she has gained. Furthermore, she now has actual possession of Korea. The menace of a great Russian navy has been swept away. Again, she has become (with the consent of England) the commanding naval power in the eastern Pacific; and she has gained an influence in South Manchuria at least equal to that which Russia had previous to the war.

And yet one hears the plea that unless she gets Manchuria her blood will have been spilt without result! Unless she can do more in the way of robbing China than she went to war with Russia for doing, she will not be justified!

Among representatives of five nations with whom I discussed the matter in Manchuria I found no dissent from the opinion that j.a.pan will never get out of Manchuria, unless forced to do so by a speedily awakened China or by the most emphatic and unmistakable att.i.tude on the part of the Powers. Chinese, English, Americans, Germans--all nationalities--in Manchuria agree that thus far the way of Manchuria has been the way of Korea and that only favoring circ.u.mstances--a rebellion fomented in China or whatever excuse may serve--is needed for the same end to be reached.

Then with j.a.panese customs duties to complete the shutting out of foreign goods, now made only partially possible by the discrimination of a railway monopoly, and with the entire Chinese Empire and foreign trade rights within it menaced by the added preeminence of j.a.pan, the people of Europe and America {92} may wake up too late to find out at last that the Open Door in Manchuria is a matter of somewhat more general importance than the disturbances in Turkey or the change of government in Portugal.

Be it said, in conclusion, however, that if the white nations take heed in time all this may be prevented. China's waking up may serve the same purpose, but it is doubtful whether she will develop sufficient military strength for this. In any case there need be and should be no war, and in describing conditions as I found them my purpose is to help the cause of peace and not that of bloodshed. For if the Powers realize the seriousness of the situation and give evidence of such feeling to j.a.pan that she will realize the bounds of safety, there will be no trouble. But a continued policy of ignorance, indifference, or inactivity means that j.a.pan will probably go so far that she cannot retreat without a struggle. Truth is in the interest of peace.

Mukden, Manchuria.

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X

LIGHT FROM CHINA ON PROBLEMS AT HOME

I am here in China's ancient capital at one of the most interesting periods in all the four thousand years that the Son of Heaven has ruled the Middle Kingdom. The old China is dying--fast dying; a new China is coming into being so rapidly as to amaze even those who were most expectant of rapid change. The dreams of twelve years ago, that have since seemed nothing but dreams, are coming into actual realization.

Great reforms were then proposed--twelve years ago--and the Emperor sanctioned edict after edict for their introduction. But their hour had not yet come.

I talked yesterday with one of the men whose voice was most potent at that time: a man whose heart was then aflame with the idea of remaking China. They dared much, did these men, and Tantsetung, a Chinaman of high rank and a Christian, consecrated himself on his knees to the great task, with all the devotion of a Hannibal swearing allegiance to Carthage. But reaction came. The Emperor was deposed and the Empress Dowager subst.i.tuted, and Tantsetung and five other leaders were beheaded.

Now, however, dying Tantsetung's brave words have already been fulfilled: ”You may put me to death, but a thousand others will rise up to preach the same doctrine.” A new reign has come; the Empress Dowager, dying, has been succeeded by a mere boy, whose father, the Prince Regent, holds the imperial sceptre. But the sceptre is no longer all-powerful. {94} For the first time in all the cycles of Cathay the voice of the people is stronger than the voice of the Throne. Men do not hesitate any day to say things for which, ten years ago, they would have paid the penalty with their heads.

There are many things that give one faith in the future of China, but nothing else which begets such confidence as the success of the crusade against the opium habit. Four years ago, when the news went out that China had resolved to put an end to the opium habit within ten years--had started on a ten years' war against opium--there were many who scoffed at the whole project as too ridiculous and quixotic even for praise; there were more who regarded it as praiseworthy but as being as unpromising as a drunkard's swearing off at New Year's, while those who expected success to come even in twice ten years hardly dared express their confidence among well-informed people.

”If there is anything which all our contact with the Chinese has taught more unquestionably than anything else, it is that the Chinaman will always be a slave to the opium habit.” So said a professedly authoritative American book on China, published only five years ago, and to hold any other opinion was usually regarded as contradictory to common sense. ”We white Americans can't get rid of whiskey intemperance with all our moral courage and all our civilization and all our Christianity. How then can you expect the poor, ignorant Chinaman to shake off the clutches of opium?” So it was said, but to-day the most tremendous moral achievement of recent history--China's victory over opium-intemperance already a.s.sured and in great measure completed, not in ten years, but in four--stands out as a stinging rebuke to the slow progress our own people have made in their warfare against drink-intemperance.

To shake off the opium habit when once it has gripped a man is no easy task. Officials right here in Peking, for example, died as a result of stopping too suddenly after the {95} edict came out announcing that no opium victim could remain in the public service. But a member of the Emperor's cabinet, or Grand Council, tells me that 95 per cent, of the public officials who were formerly opium-smokers have given up the habit, or have been dismissed from office. Five per cent, may smoke in secret, but with the constant menace of dismissal hanging like a Damocles sword over their heads, it may be a.s.sumed that even these few are breaking themselves from the use of the drug.

Formerly it was the custom for the host to offer opium to his guests, but the Chinese have now quite a changed public sentiment. Because they recognize that opium is ruining the lives of many of their people, and lessening the efficiency of many others, because they regard it as a source of weakness to their country and danger to their sons, it has become a matter of shame for a man to be known as an opium-smoker, even ”in moderation.” To be free from such an enervating dissipation is regarded as the duty not only to one's self and one's family, but to the country as well: it is a patriotic duty. I saw a cartoon in a native Chinese paper the other day in which there were held up to especial scorn and humiliation the weakling officials who had lost their offices by reason of failure to shake off opium. In short, the opium-smoker, instead of being a sort of ”good fellow with human weaknessess”--and with possibilities, of course, of going utterly to wreck--has become an object of contempt, a bad citizen.

The earnestness of the people has been strikingly ill.u.s.trated in the great financial sacrifices made by farmers and landowners in sections where the opium poppy was formerly grown. The culture of the poppy in some sections was far more profitable than that of any other crop; it was, in fact, the ”money crop” of the people. In fact, to stop growing the opium poppy has meant in some cases a decrease of 75 per cent, in the profit and value of the land. Farms mortgaged on the basis of old land values, therefore, had to be sold; peasants who had {96} been home-owners became homeless. And yet China has thought no price too great to pay in the effort to free herself from this form of intemperance. Well may her leading men proudly declare, as one did to me to-day: ”While America dares not undertake the task of stopping the whiskey curse among less than a hundred million people, we are stopping the opium curse among over four hundred millions.” It should also be observed that there is little drunkenness over here. At a dinner party Friday evening my hostess thought it worth while to mention as a matter of general interest to her guests (so rare is the occurrence) that she had seen a drunken Chinaman that day. I have not yet seen one.

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