Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 5.djvu/87

 very Powers that had expelled her. Solicitude for the preservation of China's integrity, which had formed their pretext for expelling Japan, was now shown to have been anxiety lest by leaving her in possession their own opportunities for aggrandisement might be curtailed.

But to have been openly flouted caused comparatively little concern to the Japanese. What chiefly troubled them was that by Russia's occupation of the Liao-tung peninsula a danger hitherto remote had become imminent. To a Power holding Vladivostock and Liao-tung the possession of Korea, or at any rate of a portion of its southern coast, is essential. For between Korea and Japan not only does the sea of Japan narrow to a breadth of one hundred and twenty miles, but also the Japanese island of Tsushima lies in the middle, and immediately opposite to Tsushima on the Korean coast is the Japanese settlement of Fusan. Japan, therefore, is competent to sever at any moment the maritime communications between Vladivostock and Liao-tung, unless Russia can secure in Korea such a position as will give her at least equal command of the narrows. But Russia in Korea is an intolerable prospect to the Japanese nation. They cannot consent to see planted, almost within sight of their shores, the outposts of an empire enormously powerful and governed by an irresistible impulse of expansion. They know well that Russia's growth is not controlled from St. Petersburg, but is perpetu-