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PROTESTANT MISSIONARIES IN JAPAN--FORMOSA
SOCIETY OF FRIENDS
Токто
Joseph Cosand and wife, 30, Kounnachi, |
Mita Shiba
Miss M. A. Gundry
Miss Edith Dillon,
MITO
do. do.
Gurney Binford and wife, Mito, Ibar-
akiken
SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION U.S.A. KOKURA
Rev. N. Maynard and wife, 62, Sakaimachi FUKUOKA
Rev. J. W. McCollum and wife, 37 Hama- Rev. W. H. Clark
NAGASAKI
Rev. E. M. Walne and wife
UNITARIAN MISSION
TOKYO
[nomachi
Rev. Clay MacCauley, Tuiitsukwan, Shiba
UNION PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF SCOTLAND MISSION
TOKYO
Rev. Robert Davidson, 14-A, Tsukiji Rev. H. Waddell, B.A., 25 Nakano-cho, Azabu
UNIVERSALIST MISSION
TOKYO
Rev. E. Leavitt & wife, 32, Tsukiji
Koishikawa
Rev. G. J. Keirn and wife, Ushigame Miss C. M. Osborn, 4, Itchome Daimachi Miss M. M. Winslow,
do.
WOMAN'S UNION MISSIONARY SOCIETY OF AMERICA
212, Bluff, Yokohama
Miss R. A. Pratt
Miss J. N. Crosby, Omata
FORMOSA
This island, one of the largest in Asia, is situated between latitude 22 and 26 degrees N., and longitude 120 and 122 degrees E., and is separated from the coast of Fukien, China, by a channel about one hundred miles in width. It is a prolongation of the Japanese and Loochoo Archipelagoes and in 1895 was incorporated in the Jap anese empire. Its name Formosa, signifying “beautiful island, was conferred by the Portuguese, the first Europeans to visit it, but it was called Taiwan (Great Bay) by the Chinese, to whom it belonged from 1661 to 1894. It is said that the Japanese endeavoured to form a colony in the island in 1620, but large numbers of Chinese were settled there prior to that date, The Dutch arrived in 1634, and founded several settlements, and traces of their occupation are still to be found in the island, but they were compelled in 1661 to retire by the Chinese pirate chief Koxinga, who then assumed the sovereignty of western Formosa. His grandson and successor, however, was induced, twenty-two years later, to resign the crown to the Emperor of China. By the treaty of Shimonoseki the island was ceded to Japan as one of the terms of peace, and on the 1st June, 1895, the formal surrender was made, the ceremony taking place on board ship outside Kelung. The resident Chinese officials, however, declared a republic, and offered resistance, and it was not until the end of October that the opposing forces were completely overcome, the last stand being made in the south by Liu Yung-fu, the Black Flag General, of Tonkin notoriety. Takow was bom- barded and captured on 15th October, and Anping was peacefully occupied on the 21st of the same month, Liu Yung-fu having taken refuge in flight.
Formosa is about 260 miles in length, and from 60 to 70 miles broad in the widest part. It is intersected from north to south by a range of mountains, which forms a kind of backbone to the island, the loftiest peak of which, Mount Sylvia, is 11,300 feet high. On the western side of this range the slope is more gradual than on the eastern side, and broken by fertile valleys which lose themselves in the large undulating plain on which the Chinese are settled. The whole of the territory east of the dividing chain is peopled by an aboriginal race who acknowledged no allegiance to the Chinese Government and made frequent raids on the outlying Chinese settlements, but they have proved themselves friendly to the Japanese. They are a savage and warlike people, allied to the Malays and Polynesians, and live principally by the chase. The Chinese population of Formosa is estimated at about 2,500,000; the number of the aborigines it is, of course, quite impossible to estimate. The productions of Formosa are numerous, vegetation being everywhere most luxuriant, testifying to