Hawke's Bay Herald. TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 1900. FAX EASTERN OMSNS.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 11559, 12 June 1900, Page 2

Hawke's Bay Herald. TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 1900. FAX EASTERN OMSNS.

Thb spectacle of China, armed with '"spears and agricultural imple--0 inents " bearding the modern world with all its perfected instruments of destruction is a fit theme for comic opera. How the dim far past is mirrored in the perennial China. By studying the methods of the Boxers ! our historians could gain an admirable * idea of the manner in which the ancient Britons organised troops to oppose the Roman legions. At the _ time of the China-Japanese war [j many funny illustrations appeared of Chinese recruits "hurrying" to * the front. One of the bland Celestials carried the commissariat in advance on an antique wheelbarrow, 1 and the recruits followed armed - with the implements which they were accustomed to use in their > peaceful avocations, ranging from _ the humble but necessary hoe to the more formidable hatchet and billyhook. It can be imagined what consternation would .be created in an army thus constituted were a few quick-firers — say pom-poms or " Weary Willies " — opened upon them at a distance of five miles or so. They would wonder what it was that had struct them, and ascribe it to the anger of their Joss. That would be the most effective method of dispersing the Boxers, for if they once thought the powers of their superstition were against them, they would speedily relinquish all hope of resistance There is a grim humor in the thought of the implements of industry and peace being ranged on one side, and the finished weapons of modern warfare ranged against them on the other. Fancy can depict a battalion with reapers and binders, spades and shovels, pick-axes, sickles and hay rakes going into action, and the trouble an agricultural implement factory would have in executing repairs after the melee was over in order that the next harvest might not be delayed. The Boxer rebellion is a huge national farce on an immense scale. It can only result in so many dead Chinamen, and some of them can be so easily spired out of the 600,000,000 of them, as there is but a remote possibility of the race becoming extinct. It will be remembered that in the battle in which the Duke of Monmouth, the pretender to the English throne, was finally crushed the rebels were armed with their agricultural implements, and did great havoc in the ditches with their saythes and sickles, but in those days a battle was fought at close quarters; and it didn't matter much whether a man were hit with an adze or a gunstock, he was just as effectively put out of action, and that after all was the object aimed at There are remarkable differences between the trouble in South Africa and that in China. The people, both of the Boer Bepublics and the Chinese Empire, are hopelessly contending against the advance of civilisation. But the former, although not strong numerically, are armed with the most modern weapons. For years they have practised the arts of modern warfare, and secretly prepared for the struggle by obtaining the best armamentß procurable. In China, on the other hand, the numbers of the inhabitants present the only serious problem. They fight to-day as our ancestors did before the Christian era ; indeed, it is questionable whether they are so well equipped as the barbarians against which > Rome waged her ceaseless warß,

lad the conditions been altered, lupposing the Chinese to be of the lame rugged implacable fibre as the Boers, and to have equipped themlelves similarly, they would have jeen a menace to modern civilisation. The suppression of the Chinese is not a serious problem. It is the settlement in which the real danger lies. Tho interests of the differenb Powers may conflict to such an exteDt that hostilities among them may follow. Were China in ' some measure able to hold her own, and with the assistance of a friendly Power, capable of stemming invasion by a rapacious Power, the danger would be averted. But the great Celestial Empire is so pulseless, so utterly rotten to the core, that it is an easy prey to any Power which could, unhampered by any other modern force, attack it. Herein lies the real danger which threatens as a result of the bursting of the Chinese bubble. The statement in The Timescabled yesterday that the interests of civilisation demand that the Powers of the world shall no longer tolerate the Empress of China's sinister rule, and advising Britain and Eusfia to co-operate, may be inspired. It is possible the two Great Powers may have arrived at some agreement on the point. But such action would be an entire reversal of the British policy in regard to the Chinese question, Up to the present, in fact, it is Britain who has guaranteed Chinese integrity. Had Britain not displayed a strong hand in the Far East, and insisted on the static quo, China would long since have been divided among the various interested Powers. Then, again, such action on the part of Britain would appear to be in direct opposition to the interests of Japan and America, nations which it has always been concluded were acting in concert with Britain on this matter. Were the question so disposed between Britain and Russia that £he latter secured the central province of Chi-lee, it would undoubtedly lead to complications with America and Japan. We hear little of the part Germany and France are playing, but in any scheme of division it may be assured they would claim the right to participate substantially, and that Italy would make her voice heard. The Times' statement indicates that the partition of the Chinese Empire cannot be delayed ; that it is inevitable it may be that the whole of the Powers have arrived at an agreement, but their interests are so diverse that such a possibility is very remote. Never was there a question in which all the great forces of the world were so interested, and the claims of each bo great. The absorption it creates may be the Jneans of inducing an era of peace that the Powers may develop the separate spheres of interest undisturbed, or it may culminate in a terrific struggle for supremacy over the disputed areas. There is something sinister in the news by late files to the effect that liussia has secured the right to run a branch line to Peking from her trans-Siberian railway. It is true that the present Chinese Government granted the concession, and that ere it may be fulfilled the said Government is extremely likely to have been supplanted. But all the same .Russia would not relinquish her concession, whatever Government granted it, Russia declares her resolve to suppress the Boxers at all costs, but her intentions cannot be regarded as wholly uninterested. She is tightening her grip upon Corea, and it would seem impossible that a conflict between her and Japan can be avoided. In such an event can Eussia oppose the Japanese and still pursue her present policy in China ? If hostilities should ensue it will be interesting to find whether the otlfer Powers will remain neutral or take sides. America and Japan are evidently on an understanding, and it would be extraordinary if we were to find Britain ranged on the side of Kussia in opposition to them. There are all the elements of an Armageddon in the Ear Eastern complication, and so intricate are the varying interests that until there are further developments between two at least of the Powers it is impossible to define the two political sections or the combination of partisans.