ut in 1876,
in violation of the treaty and without a declaration of war, she annexed
the Ryukyu Islands. In 1876 began the Japanese penetration into Korea;
by 1885 she had reached the stage of a declaration that Korea was a
joint sphere of interest of China and Japan; until then China's
protectorate over Korea had been unchallenged. At the same time (1876)
Great Britain had secured further Capitulations in the Chefoo
Convention; in 1862 France had acquired Cochin China, in 1864 Cambodia,
in 1874 Tongking, and in 1883 Annam. This led in 1884 to war between
France and China, in which the French did not by any means gain an
indubitable victory; but the Treaty of Tientsin left them with their
acquisitions.

Meanwhile, at the beginning of 1875, the young Chinese emperor died of
smallpox, without issue. Under the influence of the two empresses, who
still remained regents, a cousin of the dead emperor, the three-year-old
prince Tsai T'ien was chosen as emperor Te Tsung (reign name Kuang-hsue:
1875-1909). He came of age in 1889 and took over the government of the
country. The empress Tzu Hsi retired, but did not really relinquish the
reins.

In 1894 the Sino-Japanese War broke out over Korea, as an outcome of the
undefined position that had existed since 1885 owing to the
imperialistic policy of the Japanese. China had created a North China
squadron, but this was all that can be regarded as Chinese preparation
for the long-expected war. The Governor General of Chihli (now
Hopei--the province in which Peking is situated), Li Hung-chang, was a
general who had done good service, but he lost the war, and at
Shimonoseki (1895) he had to sign a treaty on very harsh terms, in which
China relinquished her protectorate over Korea and lost Formosa. The
intervention of France, Germany, and Russia compelled Japan to content
herself with these acquisitions, abandoning her demand for South
Manchuria.

10 _Russia in Manchuria_

After the Crimean War, Russia had turned her attention once more to the
East. There had been hostilities with China over eastern Siberia, which
were brought to an end in 1858 by the Treaty of Aigun, under which China
ceded certain territories in northern Manchuria. This made possible the
founding of Vladivostok in 1860. Russia received Sakhalin from Japan in
1875 in exchange for the Kurile Islands. She received from China the
important Port Arthur as a leased territory, and then tried to secure
the whole of Sou