chief traitors and bring them to him. This gave final edge to the temper of
the mob. Two Ministers were dragged into the street and slaughtered.
Another Minister was murdered at his home. In one respect the upheaval
brought peace. The people in the country districts had been on the point of
rising against the Japanese, who were reported to be universally hated as
oppressors. With their King in power again, they settled down peaceably.




IV

THE INDEPENDENCE CLUB


It was a double blow to Japan that the check to her plans should have been
inflicted by Russia, for she now regarded Russia as the next enemy to be
overthrown, and was already secretly preparing against her. Russia had
succeeded in humiliating Japan by inducing France and Germany to cooperate
in a demand that she should evacuate the Liaotung Peninsula, ceded to her,
under the Treaty of Shimonoseki, by China. Forced to obey, Japan entered on
another nine years of preparation, to enable her to cross swords with the
Colossus of the North.

At the close of the nineteenth century Russia was regarded as the supreme
menace to world peace. Her expansion to the south of Siberia threatened
British power in India; her railway developments to the Pacific threatened
Japan. She struggled for a dominating place in the councils of China and
was believed to have cast an ambitious eye on Korea. Germany looked with
dread on the prospect of France and Russia striking her on either side and