All such criticism of the new form of government was based on comparison with that of European powers whose period of development included centuries, while Japan’s period of advancement covered barely half a century. Against the “disappointment” of students who had been educated out of Japan, and of “enlightened Japanese” who had traveled abroad, stood the satisfaction of the great body of people, whose source of satisfaction was the comparison of conditions in their country at the beginning of the twentieth century with conditions at the opening of the nineteenth century. Conditions in Japan in the first years of the nineteenth century are given in detail in previous chapters of this work. In comparison with those conditions, it is now in order to give the most important details of conditions one hundred years later. It must be remarked, first, that all Japan’s real advance took place during the last third of the nineteenth century, and that conditions in 1904 were the result, therefore, of the achievements of a single generation. It is not recorded in history that any other nation advanced so far in so short a time. In 1904, foreigners, instead of being feared, hated, and excluded from the country, as in 1804, were invited to come to Japan by the Government itself--to teach in Japanese universities, to drill the Japanese army and navy, to advise in matters of administration, and to engage in trade. Thousands of foreigners, then, of many different nationalities, not only traveled in Japan, but resided there. On the other hand, thousands of Japanese subjects were now seen in all parts of the world; many were enrolled as students in European and American universities; and many were residing in foreign countries as merchants and traders. In all the harbors of Japan were seen vessels flying the flags of many different nationalities; while vessels carrying the Japanese flag plied regularly between home ports and Asia, America, Europe, and Australia, conducting freight and passenger service. In 1904, too, the classes below the nobility had been minimized to two--namely, the gentry and the commons. Even in these two classes the distinction was nominal. Only in official records, in the exercise of the elective franchise and on certain other occasions, were the people required to register their grade in the social or political scale. Aside from the nobility, caste had disappeared. Merit, not rank, was rewarded in public life; while in private life claim to respect lay in achievement and education rather than in one’s standing as to class.