strangling in prison of such patriots as An Kyun-su and Kwan Yung-chin, on the night of May 27, 1900—than which, it has truly been said, “no more dastardly crime ever stained the annals of this or any other government”: sometimes it was the torturing and execution of such unspeakable rascals as the ex-court-favorites, Kim Yung-chun (1901), Yi Yong-ik, and Yi Keun-tak (1902). In a word, _the period of “independence,” to which the Emperor has been lately imploring his own subjects and the civilized world to restore him, was the period in which he took what, and gave away what, and did what he chose, under the basest influences; for the most worthless or mischievous ends, without law or pretence of justice or goodness of heart, to the lasting disgrace and essential ruin of the nation_. Such is a summary of the doings during the years preceding the Russo-Japanese war, on the part of the Korean Emperor and his Court. “Through all this period,” says Mr. Hulbert,[25] “Russian influence was quietly at work securing its hold upon the Korean Court and upon such members of the government as it could win over. The general populace was always suspicious of her, however, and always preferred the rougher hand of Japan to the soft but heavy hand of Russia.” The threatening nature of the situation created by these Russian encroachments was as well understood at Washington and London as at Tokyo. It was intimately connected with the Manchurian question to the untangling of which Mr. Hay had devoted so much thought. But Russia’s action in Manchuria, threatening as it was to the interests, not alone of Japan but also of other foreign powers, did not call upon the Japanese Government for armed interference.[26] As the behavior of Japan showed during the Boxer troubles in China, she had learned caution with respect to fighting the battles of civilized Europe and America, at her own expense and without show of gratitude from others.