Greymouth Evening Star, AND BRUNNERTON ADVOCATE. THURSDAY, APRIL 25, 1901. COMING STRUGGLE IN CHINA.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 25 April 1901, Page 2

Greymouth Evening Star, AND BRUNNERTON ADVOCATE. THURSDAY, APRIL 25, 1901. COMING STRUGGLE IN CHINA.

The present century will see it ; a 1 few years, nay ft tew months, may seethe struggle in China commenced. Not a continuation of the present conflict, when a number of European Powers in “complete discord’’ endeavour to carve the country into convenient parts. But a struggle by Russia on the one hand to extend her already immense empire and a deter- | mined effort by China, led by Japan to drive the Muscovite from Manchuria. That these two powers are bent upon a policy—me of annexing Manchuria ; the other of guiding and controlling China and preventing further Prussian advancement, is generally admitted by reliable authorities. I The war party is Russia —ever the i dominant party—is urging the extension of the empire to the great wall of ■ China near Pekin, taking in the Korean peninsular, and full control of | the Yellow Boa. Of this fact Japan is fully aware, and firmly determined to oppose. Pier statesmen boldly challenge the issue, her poets fired with patriotism send forth their song i of fatherland and detestation of the Muscovite. Pier painters sti 1 further call upon the Japanese to resist the invasion, and to- , day a picture by one of Japan’s best artists is being more canvassed than the stolen Gainsborough picture. It is.- termed “ Tears,” and represents Japanese troops in occupation of a Chinese village dispensing food to the women and children, tending the sick, and generally engaged in works of mercy towards their helpless foes. In the other picture, sarcastically entitled ‘ Humanity,” we see the Russian troops in occupation of a Chinese town, hut very differently employed. The whole scene represents an orgy of lust, rapine, and bloodshed. In the background a number of Russian soldiers are busy plundering a .largo Chinese house, while others are hunting down panic-stricken women, one of whom is committing suicide in order to escape the clutches of the drunken soldiery. In the foreground a cavalry officer runs his sword through a poor little baby that one of his men has evidently just snatched away from its prostrate mother. As an appeal to popular sentiment, these picures are unquestionably telling. For, fierce and sanguinary as the temper of the Japanese may at times show itself to bo, violence to women and cruelty to children are things against which their nature revolts. Towards children especially they display a tenderness which is surpassed in no other country. Indeed Japan has been aptly described as “ the paradise of children.” Nor can it be denied that the contrast thus forcibly depicted rests on a broad basis of truth. The excesses perpetrated by foreign troops upon the defenceless Chinese population have not only entirely overshadowed the original outrages committed by the Chinese themselves, and intensified the national hatred of Russia ; they have cast discredit upon our Western civilization generally. And the i astern mind is being carcfu ly educated and taught to realise that it must ere long grapple with an aggressor, who threatens if left unmolested, to terrorise over the civilised world.