The Waikato Times AND THAMES VALLEY GAZETTE. TUESDAY, NOV. 13, 1894.

Waikato Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 3493, 13 November 1894, Page 4

The Waikato Times AND THAMES VALLEY GAZETTE.

TUESDAY, NOV. 13, 1894.

Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatsoever state or persuasion, religious or political.

Papers to hand by the mail evidence that the most lively interest, coupled with some anxiety, is being taken in 'the war between China and Japan. It is generally recognised that Japan must prove victorious, and speculation is general as to the stage at which she will voluntarily consent to terms of peace, or at which she will be checked by the interference of European Powers, provided their jealousies will allow of their taking combined action. It is admitted that Japan has established for herself the right to rank as a civilised nation and be treated as such by the Powers of the world. England has made a treaty with her which gives full recognition of the claim. A correspondent draws the following comparison between the two belligerents: "Never was stronger antithesis than that between Japanese'and Chinese. It is the perfection of order and of precision against atnorphism ; the pitting of a trained athlete against a corpulent brewer who hates fighting. o O China has in her history had good soldiers, but her system docs not produce nor encourage them. Despised by the. literary society, which never did anything.but misrule, the soldier having little chance of fame, and feeling himself as almost belonging to a degraded class takes o on naturally to pillage and peculation. If he is to succeed to honours it is as likely to be by corrupt interest ns by meritorious service, for the Chinese have no appreciation of military excellence. Of course, an army, however numerous, composed of such unkindly material, is but a mob, and if the Chinese had the spirit of soldiers they lack the arms, for in a service built up on corruption the funds allotted for equipment are apt to find other destinations." It has been predicted more than once by writers entitled to some consideration that the Chinese would become a paramount power, the writers, of course, presuming that an immense advance would be made in the form ot government and in the enormous fighting power which her enormous population indicates. Will it fall to the lot of the Japanese to bring about this transformation 1 If we are to accept this hypothesis, we must suppose tiiat the reigning family of the country can be deposed and the Mikado assume the position as conqueror. The writer of an article in St. James' Gazette, in speculating on the probable results of the war, writes: " Supposing, for example, not content with punishing, weakening, and plundering China, the Japanese should determine to conquer it. After all the idea is not nearly so improbable' as many that have be-

come historic facts. That the Mikado should make himself Emperor of China is less extravagant that it looks. Conquering China consists simply in the overthrow of a dynasty, in the seizure of the members of a single family, in the capture of a palace. That done China would be practically a conquered country, its four hundred million inhabitants a subjugated people, its whole administration at the disposition of the authority who had got its hand upon the levers of Government in the " forbidden city." One or two powerful Mandarins might have to be " squared," one or two more conveniently executed; but take it all round and there is no reason to suppose that the provincial governors and the army of local officials would not obey the orders of a Japanese Emperor as readily as they do those of a Manchu. The same thing has happened before. The Tartars could no more have conquered the Chinese millions, if the latter had been able and willing to fight, than they could have conquered Scotland. But when the Ming dynasty fell the millions quietly accepted the invaders. What a Tartar tribe did, a Japanese Government backed by forty millions of people might be able to accomplish." The writer presuming the Mikado sits upon the throne indulges in speculations as to remote events which might possibly follow, asks the question, in view of these possibilities whether the European Powers will check the Japanese in their career at the risk of raising all sorts of jealousies among the interveners. The Japanese dynasty, he points out, would make no startling changes, China would still be China; but it would be "Japanned China." , An army and a navy, an organisation by land and sea would grow up under the hand of the Mikado. Tn ten or fifteen years a China-Japanese Government would have an army of two millions of men armed with European weapons, In twenty-five years the available force might be five times as great, and the first couple of millions could be mobilised as quickly, let us say, as the armies of Russia; nothing at at present in Asia, not even Russia could stand against it, and it might knock at the door of Europe. This is all speculation of a most visionary nature. If we are to accept the writer's idea as to the simplicity of conquering China, the question is a natural one. If possible for the Japanese, is it not still more so for Russia ? The completion of her railway to the Chinese frontier is within a measurable space of time and she has been long credited with the design which the writer in our contemporary depicts as being so easy of accomplishment by the Mikado. Accepting the position as depicted, the European Powers have to.choose the lesser of two evils—the probability of gentle pressure by the Jap or the certairity of a crushing hug bv the Russian bear. There can be no question but that if China were under a strong and able government, with an efficient army and navy at their disposal, the ambitions ot Russia as regards Asia would have to be abandoned as being impossible to be realised;