The daily morning journal and courier., 1904-01-30

a g0cd-sized lot in San Francisco, ana the cultivation is intense. The waters are farmed as well as the land, and but for the fish the people could not get along at all. As it is. their hours are long. their food scanty and their com forts few. They deny themselves eve rything but the barest necessaries of life. and when a crop fails thousands of them live on grass
 It will be impossible for fifty million people. or anything like that number. to live on those islands when they awaken to their true condition and demand food, clothing and the comforts of life common to the poorest people in Amer ica and Europe. The great mass of them live in the most abject poverty. There is no prosperous middle class, no community of thrifty land owners, as with us. When the feudal system was broken up, about forty years ago, the lands went to the crown. They are farmed out to-day in tiny lots, and the crops are divided with a liberal hand in favor of the tax-gatferer. There is an astonishing scarcity of general wealth. The large investments in livestock which enrich the American farmer are unknown. They do not know what a COW was made for, and have no use for the gentle bos. They know nothing of milk, butter or beef. The Shinto reli- zion forhids meat eating. and Budd- hism opposes taking life in any form. The absence Of work animals reduces the farm to the bare land, with shan ty for shelter, and perhaps go-down to store the crop in No fences, stables, wagons or machinery are required. Sheep cannot live in Japan, as the coarse ribbon grass lacerates their ten der entrails, and they soon die.
 Even in the cities there is no furni- ture in the dwellings, no stoves or ranges for heating or cooking, no chinl- |neys or fireplaces built in the walls, na bed room sets, no carpets, only straw mats upon the floor, and they take the place not only of carpets and tables, but of beds. In shops and factories all classes work from dawn till dark for one-tenth of the wages paid in America. Many thorough artists in metals in DOT |celain, or in fabrics, earn from thirty to
 
 zine drivers get about fifty cents day, while the men who drag the drays, stevedores and laborers get third as much. The scale of living is in propor- ton; in fact, no traveller has dared to describe the destitution which is we'll |nigh universal. Formerly the laborer went naked to his work, but laws have been passed compelling certain amount of clothing to be worn. Fruit and eggs can be had by those who wish to pay for them. but the proportion that eats them is smaller than the one that |eats terrapin in the United States. The Japanese do not eat their own rice; it is too costly. They sell it, and buy third class rice from the continent-yelloW, lfishy and cheap.
 But discontent has set in and great changes are apparent. A general and growing demand for better living is un- iversal. When the western nations broke through the crust and compelled the Orientals to open their territory to outside traffic, China sulked and India wept, but Japan responded readily, and entered into the game of world politics heartily The result has been felt all along the line, particularly in wages, which have advanced and are still ad- vancing.
 Corea and Manchur ia are fertilere- gions, with scaflty population, and if open to Japanese enterprise would re- lieve the situation for some time to come, but when they see Manchuria closed and Corea threatened. the grip which has so long been tightening around them strikes panic in the Japa nese and they are a unit for war The government is more conservative than the people, for the hardship and danger are more apparent to the man who must borrow money, buy ships and pro- vision armies than to the soldier and the citizen. No doubt Japan would make a great fight. She has an advan- tage on the start, for her navy is on the spot and is much larger than the por- tion of the Russian navy stationed in the Pacific. She has a gallant army, we'll officered and splendidly drilled, with a rank and file made up of as brave men as ever lived, men whose re- ligion is loyalty to their country and devotion to their emperor. But in the clements that win in the long run there is no comparison.-R. l.. Fulton in the San Francisco Argonaut.