The Brandon news. (Brandon, Miss.) 1892-1961, 1905-08-10

g y Vuotuo eApounusu ~ tue do-
n = 3 sembled Greeks his cele-
Sso1 brated theory that the car
dinal fact IN history was the interac-
ton Of Asia and Europe, the pendulum
of asceudency swing now to the East
and now to the West. From the fall
Of Troy to the memorable land and
sea fight at Mykale he depicted many
a vicissitude, but of course he could
not foresee that the grandsons of the
men who heard him would witness the
destruction OF the Persian Empire by
Alexander and the penetration of In
Ola by the Macedonian phalanx. AS
little could the Western peoples, which
in the nineteenth century despoiled
and insulted China and wrenched open
the gates Of Japan, have expected that
in the course OF few decades a Far
Eastern nation would exhibit degree
OF military and naval efficiency unsur-
passed, If eQualed, in the annals of
mankind
Had our memories been more tena~
Cous, none Of us would have taken for
granted, as most of us have, that Asia
was beyond the hope of resurrection,
doomed to permanent prostration under
the EuropeanNheel Such, undoubtedly,
was. the delusion In which the Eastern
subjects of the Roman Empire long
abided, although such defeats as those
of Crassus and Valerian ought to have
excited deep misgivings. Everybody
imagined that the Oriental wave had
spent Itself when Hannibal was rout-
ed at Zama, and nobody could have
anticipated that, from the second half
of the seventh to near the close of the
seventeenth century, Europe would be
haunted with the dread of Asiatic in
yasion and conquest. Yet more than
thousand years were to eIapse from
the seizure Of Roman Syria by sue
cesSOr of MOhammed to Sobieski's re-
pulse Of the Turks from before the
walls of Vienna. OF all Aryan coun-
tries Russia had least reason to AFRO
gate an innate superiority over the
Turanian stock. The Grand Dukes Of
Muskovy had been paying tribute two
centuries to the Mongol rulers of the
Golden Horde when the Turks took
Constantinople, and some three and a
half centuries more. were to elapse
before the Russians regained control Of
the Crimea. Even China in the sew
enteenth century, when the Manchu
dynasty was young, drove Muscovite
pioneers and merchants out of Man.
chur1a and forced them by treaty to
retire behind the Amur River. His
tory, therefore, will but repeat itself
when Russia submits to similar bound
aries at the command of the Japanese.
1t is incOntestable, if we consider
the size and equipment of the armies
despatched by Russia to the scene Of
war in the Far East, that we have wit
messed the most stupendous effort ever
yet made by Europe in it's age-long
struggle for the mastery of Asia. Com
pared with the multitude of disciplined
soldiers massed under Kuropatkin or
Linievitch, the hoplites of Alexander,
the legions of Trajan, the mail-clad
hosts of the Crusaders, seem insignif-
can't and impOtent. At one time or an
other during the past sixteen months
Russia has launched across Lake Bal
Kali more than half million discip-
lined soldiers, supplied with the ripest
products Of military science-only to
see them succumb to the smashing
blows of Oyama like the SHOWS of ST.
IBERIA beneath q summers sun. In the
camp, the hospital and the battlefield
the Japanese have excelled their Euro
pean antagonists. They have, eXhib-
tied the virtues of ancient, medieval
and modern soldiers combined. show
ing themselves at once more dauntless,
more chivalrous and more. scientific
than the Russians.
Here, then, at the outset of the TWEEN
tieth century, Asiatics have proved
themselves capable of beating Euro
peans in the game of war, alike upon
the land and on the ocean. We are
fresh confirmation of the
theory of Herodotus that the earth's
surface is forever fated to be the thea
tire of racial interaction. The vertigin-
Gus rapidity with which the Japanese
have assimllated and applied the eco
nomical, the mechanical, the military,
the naval and the medical science of
the West, and the amazing facility
with which they have shamed their
pretended masters, throw a 1urid light
upon the arrogance which has f1ippant-
~ asserted: Better fifty years of Eu-
rope than cycle of Cathayr' A peo-
pie like the Japanese, which has
learned more in thirty years than the
Russians have learned in three hun
dred, may well deem itself qualified
to teach. OF this, at all events, we
may be certain, that about Japan's
qualifications to play the schoolmaster
and the paternal autocrat there is not
a trace Of doubt I'm Asia.
Nowhere upon the globe does sue
cess command homage so profound
and obedience so unquestioning as il
does among the Asiatics. There is
not a bazaar in. India, not felt tent i'm
Turkestan, In which the name of the
Mikado is not whispered with mysteri-
Gus reverence. All differences of creed
are sunk under the electrffying inffu-
ence OF racial gratitude and pride.
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