The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1910-12-07

IL is Sald Win authority IN TOXIC
that the warrior spirit among young
Japanese is vanishing and that the /
generation just coming OF conscript
age promises to be force Tor peace.
The male youth is looking on himself
as citizen and not as a unit of war |
The change in his point of view is
seen in ways which may even reflect
upon his personal courage. If he
can avoid CONSUMPTION he will do so;
if not, he tries to Join the engineering
or transportation services of the army
so as to lessen his bodily risk. Life
and future usefulness are preferred to
a remembered military name. Time
was, so late as ten years ago, that il
the young japanese capable of bearing
arms was overlooked in the conscrip-
ton he was Inundated and distressed;
if rejected he did not hesitate to take
his own life. But now, if left off the
muster roll he thinks himself in parti-
cular luck. He has no ambition, as
his forefathers had, to die for his coun-
try or his emperor; he prefers to live
for them and for himself and contri-
butte as best he may to the phases of
national industry and share in their
material rewards.
Toxic correspondent, quoting mi
litary opinion, says this unlocked for
development of the Japanese character
has appeared since the Russian war,
though not altogether the result of it.
That conflict was inspiring, but cost
ly. 1t was glorious, but disquieting.
Japan had a clear record of victory,
but the roll of her dead and wounded
was long and red. Financially, moth
ing could have been worse for Japan
except defeat and indemnity. All that
saved the land from bankruptcy was
the timely mediation which led to the
peace of Portsmouth. Not a rouble
of blood money was had from Russia,
and the land recompense, a piece of
the island of Saghalien and a free
hand in Korea, provided no interest on
the new debt. These circumstances
have made the rising generation pru-
dent beyond it's years; and in place
of the quarrel-picking Samurai spirit
of the recent past is shown the cal
culating designs of a new race of scho-
lars and shopkeepers.
Military observers of other countries
including our own, have also noted
this transformation. A year or two
ago, in Honolulu, Colonel Walter S.
Schuyler, U. S. A., in a paper read
before the Social Science Club of that
city, which covered his personal ex.
periences as an American attache in
the Russian war, ventured to say that
the Samurai ethics of battle had gone
from the army with the Samurai them
selves. These choice and master
spirits of Japanese manhood had sa-
crified themselves in the deadly crap,
pie with the bear. They had gone to
death as the bridegroom to the feast.
Japanese armies, said this competent
observer, would never be the same
again. In every desperate venture of
the Russian war the numbers of the
Samurai had been cut down more than
those Of any other portion of the
army. These fierce warriors, having
sought humiliation, had found it, in
dividually and for their guild. Other
standards than theirs must sway the
conscript of the future; and now we
have the confession, which even so
great an authority as Major General
Sato attests, that the Japanese soldier,
while as amenable to discipline as ever
is no longer the bloodthirsty and UNI
conquerable fighting man whose on
ward and devastating march not all
the might of Russia could check.
But there are other causes of the
change. socialism among the rest, civil
lization in it's broader aspects more
especially. The young Japanese is
falling in line with the age he lives in.