Map of the Battle of Mukden 469 Russian Retreat in Manchuria 475 Russian Suffering after the Battle of Mukden 486 On Board a Japanese Battle ship during the Battle of the Japan Sea 496 The Russian Fleet in the Battle of the Japan Sea 505 The Retreat from Mukden 519 Peace Envoys in Session at Portsmouth 556 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Japan-Russia War CHAPTER I. Two Irreconcilable Destinies--Progress v. Stagnation--Europe's Danger--Insatiable Russia--A Warm Water Port--Japan's Warlike Progress--The Chino-Japanese War--Russia's "Honor"--M. Pavloff--Russia in China--The Russo-Chinese Bank--The Mailed Fist--Russian "Leases"--Benevolent Professions--Wei-Hai-Wei--Niuchwang Railway--Pavloff in Korea--Russia and Manchuria--Russo-Chinese Treaty--Anglo-Japanese Alliance--Russians in Korea--Japanese Protests--Russia's Discourtesy. Never since the great Napoleonic wars which convulsed Europe a century ago has the world witnessed an appeal to arms so momentous in its issues and so tremendous in its possibilities as that which has just been tried between Russia and Japan in the Far East. The great internecine struggle in the United States in the middle of the last century, the disastrous duel between France and Germany which followed, and England's recently-concluded campaign in South Africa, have each, indeed, left a deep mark upon history. But while their import was at most Continental, if not local, the conflict between Japan and Russia is fraught with consequences which must inevitably be world-wide in scope. There is no civilized Power in either hemisphere whose interests are not more or less directly concerned in the question--Who shall be the dominant Power in the China Seas? For the whole course of the world's development in that quarter must depend on whether the mastery remains to the obstructive and oppressive Colossus of the North or to the progressive and enlightened island-Empire which, like Pallas in Pagan myth, has sprung fully armed from an ancient civilization into the very van of modern progress. It was no mere dynastic jealousy or racial animosity that brought about this fateful collision. It was the inevitable antagonism of two irreconcilable destinies. "Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere"; and the ambitions of Russia and the aspirations of Japan cannot find room for fulfilment together. One or the other must be crushed. [Sidenote: Two Irreconcilable Destinies]