The decisive victory which Japan obtained over China five years ago revealed to the civilized world the existence in the East of Asia of another Sick Man, an even greater invalid and infinitely richer than the better known patient at Constantinople. Four times the size, and twelve or fifteen times more densely peopled than the Ottoman Empire, China contains a much smaller proportion of deserts, her resources are greater and far more varied, and her inhabitants are not only more industrious, but more peaceful and apparently much easier to govern. Therefore, at the end of the nineteenth century—when the material wealth of a country is of far greater importance than its historical memories, and men are more eager to discover fresh openings for enterprise, new lands to cultivate, or mines to exploit than relics to preserve or peoples to liberate—Europe abandons the bedside of the Grand Turk to occupy herself with her chances of inheriting far greater riches from the Son of Heaven. The Sick Man on the shores of the Bosphorus may be afflicted with some dreadful convulsion or crisis in his illness, but the nations pretend not to perceive his contortions, and joyfully welcome any evidence of even a feeble return to health; in a word, they only seek to prolong his existence. If the preservation of peace in Europe has its share in this attitude, the wish not to be disturbed in the work which she pursues in China has also its share in the position which Russia and more than one other Power have assumed with regard to the Chinese Empire. The fact is, the nations have promised themselves a booty in the Middle Kingdom as precious as it is easy to obtain. China from this point of view is worth a great deal more than Turkey, or even Africa, which Europe has so eagerly sought to divide. Although less extensive than the Dark Continent, China is much more thickly peopled, and the climate is less unhealthy, access easier, the rivers more navigable, and the soil far more fertile. The patient and laborious Chinese will eventually facilitate the exploitation of the wealth of their vast territory, which is more than can ever be expected from the barbarous, ignorant and indolent peoples of Africa.