province, that the Japanese should have the right to construct certain specified railways, and that certain ports (unspecified) should be opened to trade; also that no privileges in Shantung should be granted to any Power other than Japan.  The second group concerns South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mongolia, and demands what is in effect a protectorate, with control of railways, complete economic freedom for Japanese enterprise, and exclusion of all other foreign industrial enterprise.  The third group gives Japan a monopoly of the mines and iron and steel works in a certain region of the Yangtze,[63] where we claim a sphere of influence.  The fourth group consists of a single demand, that China shall not cede any harbour, bay or island to any Power except Japan.  The fifth group, which was the most serious, demanded that Japanese political, financial, and military advisers should be employed by the Chinese Government; that the police in important places should be administered by Chinese and Japanese jointly, and should be largely Japanese in personnel; that China should purchase from Japan at least 50 per cent. of her munitions, or obtain them from a Sino-Japanese arsenal to be established in China, controlled by Japanese experts and employing Japanese material; that Japan should have the right to construct certain railways in and near the Yangtze valley; that Japan should have industrial priority in Fukien (opposite Formosa); and finally that the Japanese should have the right of missionary propaganda in China, to spread the knowledge of their admirable ethics.

These demands involved, as is obvious, a complete loss of Chinese independence, the closing of important areas to the commerce and industry of Europe and America, and a special attack upon the British position in the Yangtze.  We, however, were so busy with the war that we had no time to think of keeping ourselves alive.  Although the demands constituted a grave menace to our trade, although the Far East was in an uproar about them, although America took drastic diplomatic action against them, Mr. Lloyd George never heard of them until they were explained to him by the Chinese Delegation at Versailles.[64] He had no time to find out what Japan wanted, but had time to conclude a secret agreement with Japan in February 1917, promising that whatever Japan wanted in Shantung we would support at the Peace Conference.[65] By the terms of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, Japan was bound to communicate the Twenty-one Demands to the British Government.  In fact, Japan communicated the first four groups, but not the fifth and worst, thus definitely breaking the treaty;[66] but this also, one must suppose, Mr. Lloyd George only discovered by chance when he got to Versailles.