Los Angeles herald., 1908-04-24

n TIlOKIO-In any open port of the
lXzAX east one will find Occidental
lW k4fSl society divided like ancient
ilM NE&l Gaul--into three parts. There
! ~ GI are the commercial, the Of
flcial, the missionary circles
and the dealings between
them are at arms length. The mis-
sionary is more distinctly apart, but
at the same time the other sections OF
occidental society in the east recognize
| him as a potent factor in the develop
ment of the orient. The late Charles
DENLY, long the American minister at
| Peking, declared that every dollar spent
by American church people in support
of ,oriental missions was worth ter
dollars in actual returns to the COM
merce of the United States. While the
missionary is not a drummer" and
while extension of trade is the last
thing ,he thinks of, the history of the
orient shows that trade always follows
the cross.
The direct relation between the ad-
vance work of the missionaries and the
concrete commercial profit which fol-
lows is not always easy to trace. In
some instances, however, the benefit is
direct. The government of Japan In
furtherance of it's south Manchurian
railway scheme went into the English
When the British found out that this
money. borrowed In London had been
spent in the United States for railroad
supplies they kicked up a pretty row
in the house of commons. But there
was nothing to be done about 1t, so the
question was dropped. The reason why
the Japanese government spent Eng
lish money In the United States was
due solely to the fact that the Japanese
engineers in charge of the work had
been educated in the United States at
the expense of the American mission
aries and had there imbibed Yankee
notions which made 1t impossible for
them to build "A railroad along any
other than American lines. Therefore at
one fell swoop American commerce
reaped direct return of $50,000,000 from
missionary effort.
The missionary outposts are the
skirmish lines of the advancing army
of civilization. That their mere
presence means opening new territory
to foreign influence, and hence new
market for foreign goods, no one can
deny. 1t is interesting to study the
methods by which these results are
accomplished. For instance, one mis-
sionary came to Japan twenty-five
years ago and went to live in remote
town in the interior. This man and his
family could not buy the simplest
articles for household use, as no
European had ever lived in that Sec
ton. The people came in to see the
foreign house and its furniture just as
they might crowd into museum.
They examined the queer foreign
clothes with their curious buttons.
They were filled with admiration when
they gazed upon the metal wash basin
in which the foreign barbarians washed
their faces and hands. The first knowl-
edge that came to the missionary that
he was a drummer" In disguise was
when a delegation of prominent citi-
zens waited upon him and requested
him to send to one of the open ports
and buy them some metal wash basins.
Then followed the demand for under
clothing with buttons-which is one
feature of occidental dress quite gener-
ally adopted now even in rural Japan.
The hardness of pocketknife finaily
struck the Japanese, so that the mis-
sionary imported a supply of them.
Within two years there was such a
demand for foreign goods that he per-
suaded a Japanese merchant to open
a foreign store. A stock was pur-
chased at one of the ports and the
store was opened. From that little be-
ginning grew up one of the great trad
ing companies of inland Japan, hand
ing many lIlOuSdIiuS VI dOiie1Ao w. -
of goods annually. Not all of this
trade now goes abroad, for the COM
pany has two factories, one of which
makes metal wash basins and such
utensils, and the other spins and knits
cotton underwear
The conservatism of the Chinese Is
proyerbial. but even they sometimes
take kindly to an innovation. A mis-
sionary family in the interior managed
to keep provided with stock of con-
densed milk. brought in large quanti-
ties once or twice a year from the dis
tant open port. Although the use OF
milk was unknown to the Chinese the
servants soon spread tales of its Won
derful qualities. From time to time the
missionary gave away some OF the cans
to his Chinese neighbors The result
was that a local merchant put in
stock of condensed milk, the first time
in the history of the place that any
foreign goods had been offered for sale.
The business was good from the start,
and in the course of time a big trad
ing concern sent man up to inVesti-
gate the strange orders for CONDENSED
milk which came from town hitherto
unknown on commercial maps. Inc