Page:The Truth about China and Japan - Weale - 1919.djvu/152

 the period of the war she had frankly warned Japan off all China treaty ports, declaring that she would not tolerate interference with her trade. Nevertheless England was so friendly that it was largely due to her initiative that tariff and judicial subjection were so rapidly abolished, even America not caring to deal with the matter until Britain had spoken.

By 1895, therefore, Japan had certain very clear-cut ideas on international politics. She had been given practical proofs of hostility and of qualified friendship; and American silence during this critical period had told her that the United States as a world-Power was still more of a theory than a fact. Japan was still so weak that she did not dare to challenge what almost immediately took place in Korea because the buffer-territory idea had been destroyed; and the fearful assassination of the old Korean queen by Soshi and secret agents of the Japanese Legation showed how desperate the collapse of her plans had made her. Russian influence now not only took the place of Chinese influence in Korea, but by the railway plans the great Northern Power showed that her goal was the ice-free waters of the Yellow Sea, which she desired to dominate. The curious and perverse after-war diplomacy of Li Hung Chang,