The Washington Conference has not held a session during the
past week, but the delegates have been actively negotiating in private. Japan and China have accepted the gcod offices of the British and American Governments in an attempt to settle the dispute over Shantung. The Powers have agreed to abolish their separate post-offices in China. Japan has not yet definitely agreed to the 5-5-3 formula for capital ships, and is still anxious to modify it to 10-10---7, so that she may have capital ships to a tonnage of 350,000 as com- pared with the 500,000 tons allotted to Great Britain and America. She is unwilling to destroy her latest capital ship, which is just completed, and she desires to complete the negotiations about China before coming to a decision on the naval question. The American journalists, who do not know much about Japan, profess to discover differences of opinion among the Japanese delegates, but the truth is that Japan is hesitating. France has agreed to be satisfied with as many capital ships as Italy is to possess—with a tonnage, perhaps, of 200,000 in all. The submarine question has not yet been faced.
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