The Saint Paul globe., 1897-12-05
THE ADVANCE ON CHINA.

railway between them.
THE ADVANCE ON CHINA.
There could scarcely be a more strik-
ing contrast than that shown by the
position of China today and half
century ago. Up to that time the
| Celestial empire was, save where it
! touched the sea, the great highway of
| the nations, quite as unknown as
Central Africa and even more forbid
ding. The Chinese were as proud OF
their exclusiveness and regarded them
selves as much superior to the rest OF
the world as if they were really, as the
fowery title of their empire implies, a
race Of celestial beings. They had their
customs, their language, their religion
and their policy of absolute isolation
from the rest of the world. They main
tanned this as long as it was possible
by force, and it was only finally, at the
mouth of the cannon, that certain ports
We're opened by treaty to the commerce
of the rest of the world. Even then
the ideas and the policy Of the nation
were not changed. China continued to
exist for and by itself; the people of
all other countries were foreign
devils;' the invasion even of travellers
bent on peaceful purposes was dis
couraged and prevented, if possible,
and the exodus of Chinese to other
countries was no more obnoxious to
those whom they visited than it was
distasteful to the authorities at home.
The laws by which Chinese laborers
were excluded from the United States
were as welcome to China as to us. By
this means China maintained herself
stationary while ideas and methods of
the modern world were revolving mad
ly in a whirlpool around her; and she
remains today survival Of centuries
past and almost forgotten in the midst
of civilizations and systems with which
but which she is not able even to un-
derstand. 1t was a sort of proud neu-
trality and independence of the rest
of the world, which that world seemed
to respect.
After the treaty ports were opened,
Europe cared little, apparently, what
China might do or become. The shock
came with the recent war between
China and Japan. At the touch of that
contest the Chinese mummy crumbled
to dust at exposure to the atmosphere
of latter-day life. Her internal weak
ness was evidenced instantly to the
rest of the world, and most fatally of
all to herself. The nations had count
ed, up to that time, upon the number
of men that China could put into the
field. They remembered the desperate
valor of the natives who fought on both
sides in the Tai Ping rebellion; and,
although China was without modern
all, it was supposed that, at home and
on land, she was a formidable nation.
The japanese war dispelled the illu-
sion. China was found as helpless as
an infant, not before one of the great
European powers, with all it's modern
appliances of war, but before people
whose sole advantage over her was
it's acceptance, to very limited de-
gree, of modern ideas. Not power on
earth doubted, at the outbreak of this
contest, that China would certainly
overwhelm Japan by the mere force of
numbers before the end Of the year.
The triumphant advance of the Japan
ese, the spectacle of thousands of Chi
nese soldiers throwing down their rude
arms and fleeing at the first sight of
the enemy, laid bare the secret. China
stood in the face Of the world like a
mob of naked and unarmed savages be-
fore a little squadron of soldiery arm
ed with Gatling gun. 1t would have
been a perilous exposure at any time
of national weakness, and the assault
which 1T invited shows that neither
progress nor civilization has dulled the
edge of the appetite of mankind for
territory and conquest.
The assault upon China today is be-
ing made as if by concert. The nations
are closing around her, and division of
her territory either by common agree
ment or by sudden onset in which
each shall grab and hold all that he
can is fairly under way. Russia, with
her customary insidious diplomacy, un-
der guise of permission to secure a
short line for her great railway, is al
ready in practical possession of large
part of Northern China, and is in a
| position to dictate terms for her pro-
J lection. Germany has taken possession