Page:The Truth about China and Japan - Weale - 1919.djvu/56

 Thus Japan assumes successfully that the people of a principality tributary to both China and Japan are Japanese subjects. This principle, once asserted, henceforth guided all her policy in her contest with her great neighbor.

In 1875 some Japanese sailors were fired upon from the Korean forts which the Americans had destroyed four years previously. Once again the forts were levelled and Japan informed China of her intentions. It was not only Chinese claims which were irritating to her but the menace of Russian arms was keenly felt. Not only had Russia, by the use of chicanery, annexed in 1860 the whole Pacific province of Manchuria and founded the great city of Vladivostok, but she had attempted in 1861 to do what the Mongols under Kublai Khan had done—to occupy the strategic island of Tsushuma, which commands the Korean Straits. China gave Korea friendly advice regarding the establishment of amicable relations, but although Japan sent a dispatch to the Seoul Court proposing a treaty it was rejected. In February, 1876, an ambassador and a divisional general, with the necessary troops, anchored