Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-04-25
Treated of the Care of Russian
Prisoners in Japan.
HER FIRST ESSAY AT FICTION
An Interesting Talk With the
Writer, Who Studied War Con-
ditions in Japan in 19O4-5.

not been there have bseR char&ed%wHn
it's authorship. The mystery has been
we'll maintained for the year since the
anonymous tale was published. and the
critics have never been able to guess the
name of the author. despite their wide
and wild guesses. The publishers. in an
nouncing a new edition of the book. now
disclose as its author Eliza r. Scidmore,
author of "Jinrikisha Days in Japan
Java, the Garden of the East" China.
the Long-Lived Empire. and Winter
India LAS The Hague Ordains'' is the
first essay at romance by this we'll known
writer of books of travel.
Miss Scidmore talked Interestingly
about her book to Star reporter in her
Washington home the other day. When
asked II she had partner or cola borator
in the work. any Russian journal to work
from, or whether 10 was in any part
translation, she answered the questions in
the negative. adding:
Il wrote it here in Washington in Au-
gust and September 1903. while waiting
for some freight to arrive from Seattle
and for Washington real estate agent to
find me house into which to put the
freight. 1 had had the half-fOrmed idea
in Japan, as the only way to adequately
describe the extraordinary status of
prisoner of war in the twentieth century.
i had been cabled to write an article on
that subject by d magazine. but found it
pot1ts OF view, too many historical prece
dents to be quoted to make the situation
clear. Besides, all sorts of people would
not read nor be trapped into reading
serious article about prisoners of war; as
they might be induced to read if it were
put in lighter form
Were you in Japan during the war;?
Saw Some War Signs. {.
Not at the beginning, but there was
more war than 1 wanted to be narrowed
by between April. 1904, and June. 1905. I
saw the wonderful spirit with which the
soldiers went to fight those terrible bat
ties, the fortitude of the sufferers in hos
pitals and of families bereaved and, most
wonderful of ali, tne:r generous and kind
~ attitude toward the 10000 Russian pris-
oners detained by the government at
twenty-eight castle towns and provincial
capitals. Many foreign residents loudly
condemned the way in which the Japan
csc were OVERRIDING the command to Love
your enemies. their hypersentimentalit
and extra-altruism. l repeated to one
cabinet minister the comment of an
American missionary who supposed 1T
was only fair to give them three meals
day. but drew the line at giving them
afternoon tea, with sugar. and at all the
pampering attentions, of tea. sweets and
cigarettes at the railway stations by the
Red Cross ladies'
Give them to me and I will land
them all on one of the Kurile Islands.
with tents. black bread. candle ends and
fishing tackle. Let them rustic for the
rest advised another American.
THE minister held up both hands with
horror. Why should we be unkind to the
prisoners in our hands? No. no. 1t is
suffering enough for brave men to be
prisoners at all. 1 wish you would go
and see how We treat them. Perhaps you
will think we are not kind enough. 1t
cannot be pleasant to be a prisoner any
where
Scenes at the War Prisons.
They gave me passes to all the places
of detention, and / visited four of them.
and had such revelation of an uncom-
pretended phase of war that l made no
more visits. 1t was saddening and very
depressing to see tle sorrow and chagrin
of good and loyal Russians. the humi,ia-
ton Of honest patriotic. men who loved
their country and their sovereign. and
who could do no more for the cause;
who had not committed crimes. yet were
deprived of their liberty, rather
strained like boys in : boarding school.
And it was exasperating to see, as at
Hamadera, below Osaka, 10000 soldiers
from Port Arthur. idling the days away,
feeding and feasting and playing games,
even dancing TO pass the time. while the
poor Japanese toiled in the fields beyond
and Japanese women and boys earned a
slender wage pushing bread carts down
from Osaka to help feed this army of
loafefs. There was certainly something
wrong about that Then there were all
those Russian officers and men whom
their companions scorned for deliberately
going over to the enemy in each engage
ment. glad to surrender and accept the
ease land idleness of prison life, rather
thanItace any more of the hardships and
dangers of campaigning.
Some of the officers were intelligent
cultivated. brOad-minded men. capable of
accepting and approaching the situation
Others whimpered. lamented, reviled and
openly insulted the japanese at every op-
portunity. Some officers occupied them
selves in studous pursuits and lived as
gentlemen; others laid aside all
of civilization, and lived and dressed as
untidily as Digger Indians. and when the
restrictions were lightened. descended to
that made every Anglo-S Saxon ashamed of
his color and race. l met the wives of
two officers who were residents with
their prisoner husbands at one garrison
town. These officers were engineers who
had been for some years constructing
forts, docks and public works at Port
Arthur. Dalny and Vladivostok, and had
come over to live in Japan when work
was suspended during the winters Theirs
was a very queer and unique sort of
prison life to me.
An Illogical Situation.
1T is wholly Illogical Something ought
to be done about it. There should not
be prisoners of war at all in this century
1t is all survival of primitive war. when
they were knocked on the head Or sold as
slaves-their heads brought home to be
counted. or the captfves dragged through
the streets in the conquerors triumphal
procession. The loss of these 20 600 men
did not seriously cripple the Russian
forces. 1t bore more heavily I'm way on
the japanese. who had to provide for
these foreign visitors more deliberately
than for their own troops. who had all
the bother and expense of providing for
eign food for them, of detailing their own
best and most trusted troops to guard
them. The minister of war was really
the head of a great chain of foreign ho-
tels-twenty-eigh hotels in all-and IL was
two years after the departure of the last
boarder before the board bill was paid"
Did not The Hague conference last
summer do anything relative to prisoners
of war;"
No Only the Koreans and myself took
The Hague conference seriously. l had
supposed that The Hague conference was
called by President Roosevelt purposely
to discuss the questions that had been
raised during the war. / was astonished
to find Europe sneering at the peace con-
gress before 1t met. ignoring it while 1t