prevent my Government from giving their support to the scheme will not be misunderstood or misconstrued.

"The most serious objection to the proposal in question lies in the fact that it contemplates a very important departure from the terms of the Treaty of Portsmouth," he declares. This is interesting. For American critics. without exception, then and to this day, have denounced the refusal of the Russian and Japanese Governments to fall in with the Knox plan as a violation of the Treaty of Portsmouth and an affront to it. Count Komura was one of the authors of the Portsmouth Treaty, and was apt to know something as to the meaning of that historic document. He went on: "That treaty was designed to establish in Manchuria a permanent order of things, and the Imperial Government firmly believed that in a strict and loyal adhesion to its provisions are to be found the highest guarantees of enduring peace and repose in this part of the world and of the orderly advancement of Manchuria. Not the least difficult of the many and important problems that were definitely solved at Portsmouth was the question of railways. That adjustment subsequently received the deliberate confirmation of the Chinese Government in the Treaty of Peking (December 22, 1905), and the railway operations now carried on in Southern Manchuria are consistent with the original concessions which were with equal deliberation granted by the same Power.

"Nor can the Imperial Government see in the present condition of things in Manchuria anything so exceptional as to make it necessary or desirable to set up there an exceptional system not required in other parts of China. There is nothing in the actual situation in that region, so far as the Imperial Government are aware, which exceptionally interferes with the undisturbed enjoyment by China of her political rights. So far as the question of the open door is concerned the principle of equal op

portunity possesses in its application to Manchuria a more comprehensive signification than it has elsewhere in China, since, in virtue of Article VII of the Treaty of Portsmouth, the Japanese and Russian railways in those provinces are dedicated exclusively to commercial and industrial uses. Finally, in the matter of railway administration, it is impossible for the Imperial Government to believe that the substitution of the international in place of a national régime would prove advantageous or beneficial. On the contrary, it seems to them that in the presence of such a system economy and efficiency would, in the nature of things, be obliged to yield to political exigencies and that the divided responsibility of the system would invariably mean an absence of due responsibility, to the serious disadvantage of the public and the detriment of the service.

"These are the principal reasons why the project under examination does not commend itself to the favorable consideration of the Imperial Government. But there are other cogent reasons which cannot be ignored.

"In the regions affected by the Japanese railways in Manchuria there have grown numerous Japanese industrial and commercial undertakings which owed their inception, as they owe their continual existence, to the fact that the Imperial Government, possessing the railways in question, are able to extend to these enterprises and to the persons engaged in them due protection and defense against attack and pillage by lawless bands that still infest the country. In the development of these enterprises, which are contributing in such a marked degree to the prosperity and progress of Manchuria, a large number of Japanese subjects and large sums of Japanese money are enlisted, and the Imperial Government could not in good faith or with due sense of responsibility consent to surrender the means by which such protection and defense are made possible.

"The observations which I have now the honor to present to your Excellency, and which I venture to hope may prove as convincing to your Excellency's Government as they are convincing to my own, have reference to the plan in its widest sense, but they are, I should add, no less applicable to the scheme in its more restricted form, since the two plans in principle are the same and differ only in degree."

France supported Russia in her contention against the American proposal and in Russia's wish to be consulted by China before any railway-construction concession in North Manchuria should be granted.

British Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey, speaking in Parliament June 15th, 1910, is reported to have said: "If Japan had taken the line of stating that she wished to have a railway monopoly in Manchuria, that would have been a distinct breach of the open door. If she made use of her position there by giving preferential treatment to her own people as against others, that again would be a breach of the open door. But for Japan to say that after all that has passed she has an interest in Manchuria which justifies her in wishing for participation in railways which may to some extent compete with the railway which is already in existence-not, I say, in opposing them in principle, but in asking for participation in them-it would be going too far for us to declare that that is an unreasonable demand to make, and to take active diplomatic steps at Peking to press for the granting of this concession."

Thus passed Secretary Knox's scheme. The British Government did not even see the wisdom of supporting the Chinchou-Aigun railway project with any aggressive measures in the face of the Russian objections. But the American proposal and the activities of American bankers did not pass as a shadow on the water. They brought forth a decidedly important fruit. For one thing, they