ally independent of other
countries for basic supplies. But success in this direction is
problematical, to say the least.

For two thousand years Japan has mined copper in a limited way, but the
production of the metal is carried on at present without much profit.
When the Chinese government requires a vast quantity of copper the
order is sent to the United States. Japan cannot be considered as a
producer of minerals of sufficient importance to aspire to a profitable
career through them, for the yearly aggregate value of all minerals,
including gold from the Formosa mines, is not more than $20,000,000.

The inevitable query in the reader's mind is, How is the Jap, knowing it
is now or never with him--and cognizant that he is poor in all save
ambition and enterprise--going to create for his beloved Nippon a
position of prominence and security in the fast-rushing, selfish world?
Every intelligent Japanese is aware of the slenderness of his country's
resources, and yet every son of the Chrysanthemum Realm throbs with
desire to see Japan a first-class and self-supporting power, honored and
respected throughout the universe.

The Japanese possess some quality of golden value, otherwise cautious
capitalists in America and Europe would never have lent them
$360,000,000. What is it?

Japan's asset of importance is the awakened energy of her people--this
was the soundest security back of the bond issues. It won the war over
Russia, and persons familiar with the Japanese character believe it is
now going to win commercially and industrially. Better proof of this is
not wanted than the fact that Japanese bonds stood as firm as the rock
of Gibraltar on the world's exchanges when it became known that Russia
was to pay no indemnity. The information provoked street riots in Tokyo,
but Japanese securities moved only fractionally in New York and London.

Two countries have long been keenly observed by enlightened Japanese.
They study America as a model industrial land, and get manufacturing
ideas from us; but they look to Great Britain for everything having to
do with empire, with aggrandizement, and with diplomacy. To them England
is a glittering object lesson of a nation existing in overcrowded
islands extending its rule to other lands and other continents,
producing endless articles needed by mankind, and carrying these to the
ends of the earth in their own ships. These Japanese have perceived that
the interchange of commodities