Life — August 2, 1900 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

| While there is VOL. XXXVI. AUGUST 2, 1900. 19 Was Taixry-Prnst § 8500 year in ad~ jantries in the Pustal ingle current coptes, three months from Mack f publicatt n, wcents. No contribution will be returned unless accompanied by stamped and addressed envelope. The illustrations in Live are copyrighted, and are not to be reproduced without speciat arrangement with the publishers, Prompt notification should be sent by sud- soribers of any change of address. Te outbreak in China is ix weeks old, and still the world looks, and rubs its eyes, and wonders what to think and what to do. What does ‘¢China’’ mean? None of us is quite sure he knows. An enormous territory “~ maintaining an enormous population, split up into principalities governed by Viceroys, many of whom are almost independent of the Im- perial authority. A loosely joincd empire in which distances are im- mense, and space is still unannihilated, and even unabridged, by railroads. Shoals and shoals of people, most of them ignorant, superstitious, suspicious and impulsive, profoundly ignorant of all the world except China, and con- siderably ignorant of China, When we talk just now of what China has got, or wants, or intends, we do well to stop and try to think whom or what we mean by China, We know her as the geography class knows her, and that is almost all. China, then—the China of the geog- raphies—is said to have bought during the last four years in England and Germany nearly a million modern rifles ; German officers have taught soldiering to her soldiers, and mission- aries from all countries have offered to her people the religious advantages which Christendom enjoys. Mean- while the Powers have talked openly of cutting her up and using her in their business. Not much has been omitted that would stir a Chinese patriot to resentment, and all the time there has been a constant furnishing of means for that resentment to ex- press itself with vigor. It is a funny world, and we who live in it put up a wonderful inixture of behavior. There would be entertainment in watching the progres of the upset in China if it were not for the prodifious tragedy that seems to have accom- panied it, the scope and éxtent of which are still unascertained. 3 Bed jt is our turn to smile at our friends who have maintained all along that they did not care for the Philippines in themselves, but valued them as a van- tage point from which to deal with With vital need of a large fo go to Pekin on an errand of rescue, and with sixty-five thousand soldiers nearby in the Philippines, we are sending troops to China from home because only three or four thonsand soldierscan be spared from Luzon, even ina life and death emergency, In a speech at St. Paul the other day, Colonel Roosevelt maintained that tho Boxer revolt showed the wisdom of our in the Philippines, becauso Agninaldo’s levies were no better than Boxers, and would have raised just as much hob as the Boxers have done if they had got a chance, The Colonel did not find it worth while to point out that our policy for China, so far as it has been outlined, is precisely the opposite of our policy in the Philippines. In China, our de- clared intention is to oppose any sover- eignty that is not Chinese; to oppose dismemberment of the empire ; and to support the worthiest native govern- ment that can be found, in the task of bringing order out of the Chinese chaos. We seem to be starting right in China, and with such men as Mr. Hay, Mr. Long, and Mr. Root in the Cabinet we will doubtless continue right. There is a good deal about the Chinese outbreak that would tend to make the country more loath than ever to see the Administration change hands, but it is not of much value as an argu- ment to make our policy in the Philip- pines any more popular. HE sudden diversion of attention from Pretoria to Pekin is almost tragic in its completeness, Mr. Kip- ling’s new Boer-War stories will be stale before they get into type, albeit they are good stories and will keep. ‘There ought to be a rule against bring- ing out any great, new milito-literary attraction until the preceding one has finished its course on the boards. The English and Americans, and doubtless the French too, like when they fight to be respectfully observed and fully reported. The Germans seem some- what less solicitous of mention, and the Russians, when they take action, are apt to find it advantageous that no one should bo looking. WE have very hot spells this sum- mer, One of the respecied astronomers has announced that there are big spots on the Sun ; much hgger ones than usual; and that they be- token excessive heat on Earth. Pres- ently when Colonel Bryan and Colonel Roosevelt get started on the road and are endeavoring in competition to tell every citizen of the United States how he shall vote, our auditory nerves will be subjected to an appalling strain. We hope they won’t begin until the sun spots are burnt out and the weather is cooler, and until we see some light in China, Moreover, it will be politic to wait, for no one can say with assurance that when all the Powers join in medicating China an issue may not result that may put both platforms in need of tinkering, and turn the tide of talk in a new direction. The man whose turn to discourse it just now is the Prophet Totten. Totten has been forecasting for some time past that general hob would be raised this yea, and things have gone far enough his way to give him encouragement. Any forecasts he makes for the immediate future will receive respectful attention from newspaper readers.