The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-08-07
THE CRISIS IN JAPAN.
Struggle Between the Ancient
and Modern Ideas.
OLD AND NEW QuEERLY MIXED
now the Politest People on Earth P,.x
=" Civilized Governmental Pic.
turesque Situation.

nnehI oi improper Interference
tlls Is japanese for plenty stick and
some bank note"-at the recent elections.
Inc men did what was equivalent to
passing vote of censure on the ministry
ana refusing to vote government measures.
% lar the widest advocate of representa-
i've government could have desired moth
ing better. Afterward things took a dis
.ihctiy oriental turn. The minister re-
FUSED to resign and the mikado proropued
the diet for week to think things over
Inc japanese papers are now at issue over
the event. Some say that representative
government implies party government,
ana Others swear at large. The Overseas
CLUB says for the most part, "Skittles."
IL Is a picturesque situation-one that
suggests rOmances and extrayaganzas.
mus, Imagine dreaming court IN
trenched behind triple line of moats
where the lotus blooms in summer
court whose outer fringe is aggressiyelv
European, but whose heart is Japan of
long ago. where a dreaming king sits
among some wives or other things, amused
from time TO time with magic lantern
SHOWS and performing fieas--a holy king
whose sanctity is used to conjure with,
ana VINO twice year gives garden parties,
Where every one must come in top hat and
frock coat. Round this court, wavering be-
tween the splendors of the sleeping and the
variety shows of the Crystal Palace, place
In furious but carefully yelled antagonism
the fragments of newly shattered castles,
their natural Oriental eccentriclties
oyerlaid with borrowed Western notions.
Imagine, now, large and hungry bureau
cracy, French in its fretful insistance on
detail where detail is Of no earthly mo-
ment, Oriental in its stress on etiquette
and punctilo, recruited from a military
caste accustomed for ages past to despise
alike farmer and trader. This caste, we
will suppose, is more or less imperfectly
controlled by syndicate of three clans,
which supply their own nominees to the
ministry. These are adroit, versatile and
INSCRIPTIONS men, hampered by no West
ern prejudice in favor of carrying any plan
to its completion. Through and at the
bidding of these men the holy monarch
acts, and the acts are wonderful. To
critlclse these acts exists wildcat press,
liable to suppression at any moment, as
morbidly sensitive to outside criticism as
an American, and almost as childishiv
untruthful, fungoid in the swiftness of its
growth, and pitiable in its unseasoned
wilder moments. lawIess, ignorant, sensi-
tive and vain, are the student class, edu-
Gated In the main at government expense,
and thorn In the side of the state,
Judges without training handle laws with
out precedents, and new measures are
passed and abandoned with almost incon-
celvable leyity. Out of the welter of
classes and interests that are not those of
the common folk is evolved the thing
called japanese policy; that has the pro-
portion and perspective of japanese
picture.
Finality and stability are absent from
its councils. Today. tor reasons none can
explain, it is pro-fOreign TO the verge of
servility. Tomorrow, for reasons equally
obscure, the pendulum swings back. and
the students are heaving mud at the for
eigners in the streets. Vexatious, ire
sponsible, incoherent, and, above all,
cheaply mysterious. IS the rule of the land
--stultified by intrigue and counter in
trigue, checkered with futile reforms be-
gun on European lines and light-heartedly
thrown aside; studded, as a bower birds
run is studded, with shells and shining
pebbles, with plagiarisms from half the
worid-an operetta of administration,
wherein the shadow of the king among
his wives, Samurai policemen, doctors
who have studied under Pasteur, kid
gloved cavalry officers from St. Cyr. Judges
tiddles, newspaper correspondents, mas
tiers of the ancient ceremonies of the land,
paid members of the Diet, secret societies
that borrow the knife and the dynamite
of the Irish, sons of dispossessed Daimios
returned from Europe and waiting for
what may turn up, with ministers of the
syndicate who have wrenched Japan from
her repose of twenty years ago, circle.
flicker, shift and reform in beWlldering
rings round the foreign resident. Is the
extravaganza complete!
Somewhere in the background of the
stage are the people of the iand-of whom
n very limited proportion enjoy the priv
ileges of the representative government.
Whether in the past few years they have
learned hat the thing means, or, learn
ing, have the least intention to make any
use OF 1t, is not clear. Mean
time the game of government goes for
ward as merriIy as game of puss in the
corner. with the additional JOY that not
more than half dozen men know who is
controlling IL or what in the world IT in
tends to do. In Tokyo live the steadily
diminishing staff of Europeans employed
by the emperor as engineers, railway ex-
merits professors in the colleges, and so
forth. Before many years they Will all be
dispensed with, and the country will set
forth among the nations alone and on its
own responsibility.
the intrusive American first broke her
peace, Japan will experience her new birth,
and, reorganiZed from sandal 10 top-knot,
play the Sdmfsea IN the march OF modern
progress. This Is the great advantage of
being born into the New Era when indi-
vidual and community alike can get some
thing for nothing-pay without work,
education without effort, religion without
thought, and free government without
slow and bitter toll.
The Overseas Club, as has been said. is
behind the spirit Of the age. 1t has To
work for what 1T gets. and II does not
always get what IL works for. Nor can It's
members take ship and go home when
they please. Imagine for a little the con-
tented frame OF mind that Is bred In q
man by the perpetual contemplation Of
haTbor as full OF steamers as a PlccadIliy
cab rank OF hansoms. The weather Is hot,
we Will suppose; something has gone
wrong with his work that day, or his chill
dren are not looking go well As might be.
Pretty tiled bungalows, powered IN roses
and wisterIa, do not console HIM, and the
voices OF the pOiitest people on earth Jar
soreiy. He knows every soul ia the club,
has thoroughly talked out every subject OF
interest. and would give halt year > Oh I!
I'VE years'-pay for one lung-filiing breath
of air that has life in IL. one sniff of The hay
ing grass, or half mile of muddy London
street where the muffin bell tinkles in the
1 O'Clock tog. Then the big liner moves
out across the staring blue OF the bay. SO
and-so and Such-an-one. both his friends,
are going home in her, and some one else
goes next week by the French mail. lie,
and lac alone, 1t seems TO him. must stay
on: and il is so madieningly easy TO GO
Tor every one save himself. The boats
smoke dies out along the horizon, and he
: .tf oil he. =rfl1x