We do not believe that the Japanese will yield, or
that anything will happen for the present. The Mikado's Govern- ment have the greatest difficulty in resisting the Jingoism of their people, and declare, in answer to the three Powers, that if they yielded they would have insurrection to fear. On the other hand, Russia cannot fight alone just now. Her journalists are talking big, but as a matter of fact she has not thirty thousand drilled men available in the Far East. and could not, single-handed, resist a Japanese attack. Nor is Russia prepared to risk her Fleet ten thousand miles from its supports, against the Japanese Fleet, now strengthened by the Chinese captures. We exaggerate the strength of Russia in these regions. When the Siberian Railway is complete, she will have great potential strength by land ; but before then the Japanese will have fortified themselves in Corea, doubled their Fleet, and made Port Arthur an impregnable "place of arms." We are not satis- fied either, nor is Russia, that the alliance with China does not exist. As to help from France or Germany in such a struggle, both Powers have to explain themselves to their people, and to form depots, of coal at least, which they have not got now. Japan and England have all the coal.
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