In the uttermost East - Russia observed Author:Charles Henry Hawes Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II AT VLADIVOSTOK Russia, Japan, and Korea—Vladivostok—Siberian hotels—Search for an ice-free port—Tariff imposition and its results—Difficulties of ... more »travel. FROM Gensan north to Vladivostok is a twenty-four hours' steam, the boundary between Korea and the Russian Empire (Primorsk) being passed at the mouth of the river Tume'n, about ninety miles before reaching the latter town. The Russian maritime province of the Primorsk and Korea are conterminous, save for the river, for a few miles inland, thus squeezing Manchuria into a wedge-shaped piece which fails to reach the coast. Hereabouts the great rugged scarred mountains give place to sloping hills, which fall gently to the sea. This contiguity of Russia has had a great influence on the attitude of Japan towards Korea. After the negotiations, in which Japan, at the close of the Chino-Japanese war, was prevented by Russia, Germany and France from acquiring any territory on the Chinese mainland, feeling ran high in the Island Empire, and there remained the impression in Europe that Japan might soon come to blows with Russia over Korea. The rapid and abnormal increase of Japan's navy, and the supposed need for the latter to attack Russia before her trans-continental railway was finished, made a rupture, to European eyes, imminent . As time went by, and Japan joined with the Powers in the Peking expedition, these fears were somewhat allayed,but not dispelled, as was evidenced by the refusal to lend Japan money to prevent the financial crisis of 1901. And yet, all the while, politicians in the West were labouring under a misapprehension. Notwithstanding all our boasted rapidity of communication, the telegraph and the press, distance counts for very much as a factor of ignorance. Youthful Japan was fired with patriotic ...« less