Chinese suspicion of any invitation coming by way of Tokio has been, therefore, in every way justified, if it is a reasonable and legitimate thing for a nation of four hundred millions of people to be acutely concerned about their independence; for events have already proved up to the hilt that so far from the expulsion of Germany from Shantung having resulted in the handing-back of interests which were forcibly acquired from China in 1898, that expulsion has merely resulted in Japan succeeding to such interests and thereby obliterating all trace of her original promise to the world in 1914 that she would restore to China what was originally taken from her.  Here it is necessary to remark that not only did Japan in her negotiations over the Twenty-one Demands force China to hand over the twelve million pounds of German improvements in Shantung province, but that Baron Hayashi, the present Japanese Minister to China, has recently declared that Japan would demand from China a vast settlement or concession at Tsingtao, thus making even the alleged handing-back of the leased territory—­which Japan is pledged to force from Germany at the Peace Conference—­wholly illusory, the formula of a Settlement being adopted because twelve years’ experience of Port Arthur has shown that territorial “leases,” with their military garrisons and administrative offices, are expensive and antiquated things, and that it is easier to push infiltration by means of a multitude of Settlements in which police-boxes and policemen form an important element, than to cut off slices of territory under a nomenclature which is a clamant advertisement of disruptive aims.

Now although these matters appear to be taking us far from the particular theme we are discussing, it is not really so.  Like a dark thunder-cloud on the horizon the menace of Japanese action has rendered frank Chinese co-operation, even in such a simple matter as war-measures against Germany, a thing of supreme difficulty.  The mere rumour that China might dispatch an Expeditionary Force to Mesopotamia was sufficient to send the host of unofficial Japanese agents in Peking scurrying in every direction and insisting that if the Chinese did anything at all they should limit themselves to sending troops to Russia, where they would be “lost”—­a suggestion made because that was what Japan herself offered to do when she declined in 1915 the Allies’ proposal to dispatch troops to Europe.  Nor must the fact be lost sight of that as in other countries so in China, foreign affairs provide an excellent opportunity for influencing the march of internal events.  Thus, as we have clearly shown, the Military Party, although originally averse to any action at all, saw that a strong foreign policy would greatly enhance its reputation and allow it to influence the important elections for the Parliament of 1918 which, sitting as a National Convention, will elect the next President.  Thus, in the extraordinary way which happens throughout the world, the whole of February was consumed in the rival political parties manoeuvring for position, the Vice-President, General Feng Kuo-chang, himself coming hastily to Peking from Nanking to take part in this elaborate game in which many were now participating merely for what they could get out of it.