Sketches from Formosa.

BRITISH ALLIANCE WITH JAPAN 289
school about which we heard so much last year. About
a hundred Japanese students are now domiciled there
studying Chinese and English with a view, no doubt,
to finding positions of usefulness in China before long.
At the opening of the institution a few weeks ago, a
company of Government functionaries was present, and
letters of congratulation from Viceroys Liu and Chang
were read ; all of which seems to indicate unmistakably
that Chinese officials are highly pleased with the prospect
of securing the assistance of Japan as a guide along the
paths that China is forced to follow ; and, it may be, as
an important aid in resisting the domination of the White
Race in Eastern Asia. Again, the Tung-wen Hu-pao of
Shanghai, and the Jih-jih Sin-pao of Tientsin are two
leading Chinese newspapers which have a wide circulation,
but both of them are owned and ably conducted by
editors from Japan. Another noticeable item is that
Translation Societies and Improvement Associations
are now springing up everywhere in China, in order to
popularize the educational methods and scientific achieve-
ments of the West ; the significant feature being that
almost everything issued by these societies has been
taken from books which were first published in Japan.
all that
Thus, Japanese scholars begin by appropriating
is best in the literature of Europe and America, and then
Chinese reformers pursue the less expensive and much
safer plan of utilising this experience by making their
translations from the Japanese ; a comparatively easy
process, owing to the simplicity of the Japanese alphabetic
system, and the enormous extent to which Chinese writing
is made use of in Japan."
As regards commerce and trade, the Japanese are also
showing much activity on the mainland of China ;
methods comparing most favourably
their
with those of
Europeans in several particulars, such as (i) the greater
19