The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1905-07-20
RAPID GROWTH Of JAPAN
A Comparison of the Little"
Country and Russia.
TIE WEAKNESS OF RUSSIA
The Surprising Progress Made by Jap
an is due to the Intense Loyalty OF
Her Subjects to Their Ruler, the
Mikado. Would Give All Their Mon
ey IL Needed.

ey IL Needed.
While Russia's essential weakness,
in the utter discredit with which her
promises are regarded by the nations,
in the internal troubles which are as
sailing her and in her financial depend
ence upon those who distrust her, is
becoming patent to ALL dispelling the
dread with which her mere size has
heretofore dominated the Imagination
of the world, the growth in strength
and resource of what we still perverse-
ly call little" Japan, is by no means
the least Of the surprises which that
empire has Of late years been spring
ing upon the people of the west, says
the Boston Transcript She is to-day
rich in everything which Russia lacks.
Her honor unstained, no promise she
has made has ever been broken. No
internal troubles can veX a govern
ment like that of the emperor whose
throne rests upon the well.nigh idola-
trous affection of his people; and az for
wealth. no other nation can compare
with ii In the readiness with which
that people would lay every dollar of
their savings ut his feet should war
he declared against their giant antag-
cnist.
Nor is Iapan's wealth by any means
solely of this sentimental sort. She is
rich not merely in the honor and pa
triotism of her people. Relatively she
may be said to be one of the richest
countries in the world, surprising
every other except perhaps France in
the rigid economics of life and in the
proportion of the savings to the earn
ings of her people. II is only In the
aggregate of her wealth that she is
diStanced by the nations of the west.
1t is. however. when we come to con-
slider the marvellous development of
her resources since her emergence into
the world that her growing, If not her
present agility to cope with her giant
antagonist becomes at once manifest
An estimate of this growth Is now
made possible bp the recent publica-
ton of the "Fianancial and Economi-
cal Annual of Japan issued by the de-
partment of finance and printed in
English. To the eye it is but Il colum-
mar array of figures, yet to the stu
dent of modern history ii is an array
eloquent with its surprising record of
progress. Beginning with the year
1868. the date of the restoration of
the emperor to power. there is no field
of industrial or commercial enterprise
which does not bear witness to the
rejuvenated energy and ambition of
the nations.
Leaving out OF account the islets
having less than one ri two and one
half niles of coast line the empire of
Japan comprises 4S7 islands, with an
area of 100000 square miles. Upon
this area, about equal to that of our
Atlantic coast states from Maine as
far south as North Carolina, despite
the fact that only one-twelfth of the
land is arabic, there is subsisted a
population of $1,000 900, increasing to-
day at the average rate of nearly L.
O00,000 per annum. 1t was not so long
ago that the United States thought it.
self the greatest of nations when its
population reached that figure and the
nation would have been greatly wroth
should any one have applied to it then
the diminutive with which Japan is so
often designated. Nor. with our waste
fulness and extravaganza, would it be
in any way possible to support here so
vast a number on so limited an area.
AS to the aggregate of the nations
wealth, while no such claim as the
above can be made, yet If the com
parative tables of the revenue and ex.
penditures of the government for the
thirty-fve years of Japan's new era
may be taken as an index of the
growth of the nations wealth, the
exhibit is a surprising one. In 1868
the total revenues of the empire
amounted to only 33.0S9,313 yen tS15,-
544 500, while those of the current tis.
cal year have reached the sum Of 251,-
6S1,9G1 yen; the annual expeditures
during the same period increasing
from 30,5O5,0S yen to 244, ,152 ,3i6 yen.
Even more signally illustrative of the
growth of the nations wealth is the
relative expenditure in certain depart
ments. The civil list, for example,
while calling Tor only 100000 yen
(S125 900 in 1868, now involves an eX-
penditure of 100000 yen. Japan's
coming OUT has cost a penny also,
the appropriation for the department
of foreign affairs mounting from ILL.,
81 yen in 1865 to 2,125, 900 for the
current year. In the meantime, the
cost of the maintenance of the army
and navy has grown from 100000 to
upward G000O,000, the latter sum be-
ing the appropriation of the current
year for these departments. AS proof
however, that the nation has not given
her exclusive devotion to these eXpen-
sive modern playthings, the depart
ments Of public instruction and Of
communications bear ample witness,
the cost of the former having leaped
from 57,709 yen in 1868 to 1904 ,2S3
yen in 1908, while the latter, opened in
1871, and then administered at an ex