s reversed, for the Japanese
in line ahead took the initiative, used their superior speed to
conduct the battle on their own terms, and won the day.

Trouble arose in the Far East over the dissolution of the decrepit
monarchy of Korea, upon which both Japan and China cast covetous
eyes. As nominal suzerain, China in the spring of 1894 sent 2000
troops to Korea to suppress an insurrection, without observing
certain treaty stipulations which required her to notify Japan. The
latter nation despatched 5000 men to Chemulpo in June. Hostilities
broke out on July 25, when four fast Japanese cruisers, including the
_Naniwa Kan_ under the future Admiral Togo, fell upon the Chinese
cruiser _Tsi-yuen_ and two smaller vessels, captured the latter
and battered the cruiser badly before she got away, and then to
complete the day's work sank a Chinese troop transport, saving
only the European officers on board.

After this affair the Chinese Admiral Ting, a former cavalry officer
but with some naval experience, favored taking the offensive, since
control of the sea by China would at once decide the war. But the
Chinese Foreign Council gave him orders not to cruise east of a
line from Shantung to the mouth of the Yalu. Reverses on land soon
forced him to give all his time to troop transportation, and this
occupied both navies throughout the summer.

On September 16, the day before the Battle of the Yalu, the Chinese
battleships escorted transports with 5000 troops to the mouth of
the Yalu, and on the following morning they were anchored quietly
outside the river. "For weeks," writes an American naval officer
who was in command of one of the Chinese battleships, "we had
anticipated an engagement, and had had daily exercise at general
quarters, etc., and little remained to be done.... The fleet went
into action as well prepared as it was humanly possible for it
to be with the same officers and men, handicapped as they were
by official corruption and treachery ashore."[1] As the midday
meal was in preparation, columns of black smoke appeared to
southwestward. The squadron at once weighed anchor, cleared for
action, and put on forced draft, while "dark-skinned men, with
queues tightly coiled around their heads, and with arms bare to the
elbow, clustered along the decks in groups at the guns, waiting to
kill or be killed." Out of the smoke soon emerged 12 enemy cruisers
which, with information of the Chinese movements, had entered the
G