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requirements of the present day. At the outset the Committee declare that they do not consider it their duty to design a new and symmetrical Senate; and go on to say that their suggestions are founded on utility only, and they ask that they may be accepted on that ground alone. This is, no doubt, a thoroughly British way of dealing with the subject; and it may be hoped that the difficult problem which has to be solved will be satisfactorily disposed of in this practical manner. The English instinct has always been to use and improve existing institutions rather than to make radical changes, and if this plan often leads to results that are illogical, it has the great advantage of obtaining the end in view as far as it is possible under the circumstances existing at the given time to do so.
[February 20, 1909.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
pire, namely that there should be means for European rivals from the similarity of cus- the better representation of the Colonies in toms of the two nations and from his Parliament. Possibly, however, a modifica- acquaintance with the written characters, tion might be made in the provision sug- that great barrier to freedom of intercourse gested, in favour of those who have served with the rest of the world. The similarity a certain number of years as Governors of habits, however, is more superficial than General or Governors, to the effect, either, real, the paychical differences being too that they should have the right to sit in the great to allow of real similarity in anything, House of Lords, whether they were created except the important circumstance that Peers at the end of their career or not, both greatly surpass Europeans in economy or that such elevation to the peerage of living. Other conditions being equal, it after a certain time of service should be a is a law of Nature that the cheapes, matter of course, as it is with the Speaker will survive; it is fortunate, thereforet of the House of Commons. But it is at that, up to the present, most of the other least satisfactory to observe that the Com-conditions are not equal. The Japanese, mittee is alive to the necessity for better however, are rapidly raising their standard representation of Greater Britain at home, of living and the economic difference between and the change that is about to be effected Japan and the Western world is becoming in the House of Lords might be made the less marked every year, and by so much are opportunity, as the Committee evidently the Japanese becoming less formidable as think desirable, of attaining this end to at competitors from the point of view of cheap- least the extent of securing he advantage ness. They are even now inclined, in fact, of ex-Governors and Governor-Generals to despise Chinese labouers or to fear their from the Colonies, in the counsels of the competition, whichever it may be, Empire.
account of their lower standard of living, in much the same way as Americans despise or fear Japanese.
The general scope of the scheme recom- mended is to do away with the principle that hereditary rank shall be the sole quali- fication for the exercise of Parliamentary powers in the Upper House. A certain number of Peers will be elected as Parlia- mentary Lords, and to the number thus. chosen, will be added persons specially qualified to sit in an Upper House; the effective result under the scheme proposed being that the House of Lords would consist of three peers of the blood royal, 200 representatives elected by hereditary peers, 130 hereditary peers, qualified by having held some high office, such as Cabinet Minister, Governor-General or Governor of Colony, an Ambassador, and the like; five Lords of Appeal in Ordinary, with a possible addition of Peers for Life to the number of 40; thus making a House consisting in all
of about 400 members.
Regarded generally, the plan suggested is satisfactory as securing the representation of the most solid and permanent interests in the United Kingdom, and of obtaining the best talent and statesmanship in the Upper House. This is the end that bas to be attained; and it is to be hoped that the wise action of the Committee in making this throughout their chief consideration will be followed when the subject comes to be finally dealt with. That a second Chamber is an essential for the satisfactory conduct of representative government is an axion almost universally accepted. The idea of doing away with the body who have hitherto supplied this want on account of that body not being adapted to modern times which has been proposed by some extremists, would be giving what it is not as all likely public opinion in Great Britain would countenance, especially as the House has always been popular. If, therefore, the existing House of Lords can be preserved, but reformed in such a manner that it can perform the func tions for which it is designed effectively, the end that is desired will be attained in the most effectual manner, and that too without going counter to the feelings which the more conservatively inclined naturally entertain towards an old and venerated institution.
In the direction in which those in the Colonies and Dependencies of Great Britain are more immediately concerned, namely the proper representation of Colonial stateman- ship; talent and experience at home, the scheme which has been proposed gives every ground for congratulation. It is proposed
that
JAPAN AND CHINA,
(Daily Press, 19th February.)
39
-on
One striking proof of the lack of sympathy between Chinese and Japanese is the fact It is not long since the principal ingredient that Chinese is so little studied in Japan. in the Yellow Peril panic was the fear that Considering the proximity of the nations, Japan might attain such influence in China their immemorial historical relations, the as to be able to lead the rapidly-growing importauce of the Chinese trade to Japan energies of that country into the channels and, above all, the almost identity of their of her own ambitions, to the detriment of scripts, it cannot fail to surprise a foreign the Western world. The rush of Chinese observer in Japan that a Japanese who can students to Tokyo during and for a short speak Chinese is almost as great a rarity in time after the close of the war with Russia Japan as an Englishman having the same tended to strengthen this idea. Since then, accomplishment is in England. The Chinese however, events have occurred in rapid language is not taught anywhere in the succession which tend to show how little Empire except in one or two schools ground there is for any fear of a Sino- specially for that purpose, in the Universities Japanese coalition. The affair of the Tatsu and in three or four Higher Commercial Maru awoke an amount of indignation in Schools. In every Middle School, there are China which to most people seemed dispro- portionate to the trifling nature and doubt-
one or two individuals who are officially "Teachers of Chinese Classics etyled ful merits of the case.
or of But those who had been following events more closely knew these persons-who are generally elderly, Chinese and Japanese Literature"; but that the incident was only the last of 'a series of unpleasantnesses, small and great,
men of pronounced anti-foreign feelings ranging from pinpricks of annoyance up to China as is the babe unborn, and hardly one are as innocent of the spoken language of great questions still unsettled, such as the of them could, to save his life, pass the time respective limits of authority in Manchuria of day with a citizen of the Middle Kingdom. and the Chien-tao dispute. People who Perhaps there has never been another case know both nations assert that they will in which the literature and the language of never act together to any great extent. Their characters seem to be, not merely The quasi-identity of the character does a nation have been so totally dissociated. different but almost opposite; the good nothing whatever to assist towards orál qualities of each are the qualities in which intercourse. In becoming Japanized, the the other is deficient, so that in the opinion Chinese words have undergone an amount of many close observers closer intercourse is likely to lead chiefly to increased irritation equalled elsewhere except in the break-up of of phonetic degradation perhaps never and estrangement.
classical Latin which produced the Romance languages. Feng-tien becomes Ho-ten; Liao-tung becomes Ro-jun; Kuenlun, Kon- ron; the venerable holy teachers KUNG- FOO-TZE and MEN-TZE, who could readily MENCIUS would never suspect who was in- CONFUCIUS and recognize themselves as tended by such words as KOSHI and MOSHI, LI-HUNG-CHANG masquerades as RI-KO-SHO. and so on without end. The Japanized form of Chinese has, in fact, been wittily and accurately described as "trying to talk Chinese with one's mouth shut."
The Japanese possession of Formosa and open practical monopolization of Southern Manchuria and Korea are factors that will make for future dissension. The Chinese have hitherto been notorious for a lack of
that national spirit with which the Japanese are so overplentifully supplied the spirit which makes most Frenchmen feel the los, of Alsace-Lorraine as a personal loss, the spirit which moved Japan when Russia stripped her of the fruits of victory after her war with China and which nerved her during ten years of strenuous, but stealthy, preparation for the late great struggle. All any Peer who has been Governor, Gen- this, however, is changing so rapidly in eral of Canada, or the Australian Commou. China that every year makes a perceptible wealth and other important places, and difference, and no one can calculate what those who are or bave been Governors efforts China may be capable of, if, or when, of New Zealand, the Cape, Ceylon, Hong she shall be moved, for the first time in her kong or the Straits Settlement shall history, as one united nation. This is the be entitled to receive a writ to sit in great unknown quantity of the problem the House of Lords. This goes largely in for ambitious Japanese expansionists, the direction of the reform so often indicat- The Japanese merchant in China is sup- sed as necessary to the interests of the Em-posed to have great advantages over his
&
It is unfortunate that the rising genera- tion of Japanese are being confirmed in the habit of ignorant contempt of their great neighbour by teachers who ought to know better. Japanese schools are hotbeds of jingoistic Imperialism, to which there is no counterpoise, as the Government has almost a monopoly of education.
All these things serve to explain how it has come to pass that the prophesies of the quiduancs have not been fulfilled and are not likely to be.
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