marched
northward from Seoul, won the battle of Pyong-yang, advanced to the
Yalu, forced its way into Manchuria, and moved towards Mukden by
Feng-hwang, fighting several minor engagements, and conducting the
greater part of its operations amid deep snow in midwinter. The
second column diverged westward from the Yalu, and, marching through
southern Manchuria, reached Haicheng, whence it advanced to the
capture of Niuchwang. The third landed on the Liaotung peninsula,
and, turning southward, carried Talien and Port Arthur by assault.
The fourth moved up the Liaotung peninsula, and, having seized
Kaiping, advanced against Niuchwang, where it joined hands with the
second column. The fifth crossed from Port Arthur to Weihaiwei, which
it captured." In all these operations the Japanese casualties
totalled 1005 killed and 4922 wounded; the deaths from disease
aggregated 16,866, and the monetary expenditure amounted to twenty
millions sterling, about $100,000,000. It had been almost universally
believed that, although Japan might have some success at the outset,
she would ultimately be shattered by impact with the enormous mass
and the overwhelming resources of China. Never was forecast more
signally contradicted by events.

CONCLUSION OF PEACE

Li Hung-chang, viceroy of Pehchili, whose troops had been chiefly
engaged during the war, and who had been mainly responsible for the
diplomacy that had led up to it, was sent by China as plenipotentiary
to discuss terms of peace. The conference took place at Shimonoseki,
Japan being represented by Marquis (afterwards Prince) Ito, and on
the 17th of April, 1895, the treaty was signed. It recognized the
independence of Korea; ceded to Japan the littoral of Manchuria lying
south of a line drawn from the mouth of the river Anping to the
estuary of the Liao, together with the islands of Formosa and the
Pescadores; pledged China to pay an indemnity of two hundred million
taels; provided for the occupation of Weihaiwei by Japan pending
payment of that sum; secured the opening of four new places to
foreign trade and the right of foreigners to engage in manufacturing
enterprises in China, and provided for a treaty of commerce and amity
between the two empires, based on the lines of China's treaty with
Occidental powers.

FOREIGN INTERFERENCE

Scarcely was the ink dry upon this agreement when Russia, Germany,
and France presented a joint note to the Tokyo Government, urging
that the perma