sugar cane and maize, raised pigs, geese and ducks, and caught turtle. They appeared to live in decency and order, and to be comfortable, but they had no thought of religion, and with the exception of one person, could not read or write. Life had often been insecure among them, eleven men having met violent deaths within twenty-five years. The settlers had a repugnance to settled government. Though the American flag was displayed from one of the huts, the American Government apparently had no idea of taking possession. By the opening of Japan to the world the Bonins became less important. They were left to the southward of the steamer line routes between the United States and the Orient, Yokohama being a more convenient and more desirable station. Mr. Robertson, the British consul at Yokohama, who visited Port Lloyd in 1875, proposed that Great Britain should take the Bonins beneath her sheltering wings, initiate some simple inexpensive form of government there, and attempt to guide the young settlement through its early perils." Japan then seemed unable to colonize Yesso, right at her doors, but in 1878 she took undisputed possession of the whole Bonin group.

The United States, especially after the ratification of the treaty with Japan, probably had no desire to enter into discussion regarding questions of title to an island so far distant." In 1835, Edmund Roberts, who had succeeded in negotiating a treaty with Siam, was instructed to endeavor studiously to inculcate upon all (including Japan) the idea that the United States, though strong and resourceful, had a history indicating no ambition for conquest and no desire for colonial possessions, and a policy whose essential part was to avoid political connection with any other government.

16

Wilkes, during his explorations in 1841, had surveyed

"Chambers' Journal, July 5, 1879.

15 See p. 52; also Senate Doc. 77, 20-2, February 16, 1829.

16

I Sp. M. 131.

Wake Island (19 N. lat., 166 E. long.) and asserted title, but the United States Navy never took possession." Webster, in June, 1852, agreed to send a naval vessel to protect American guano interests on the Lobos Islands which were not occupied by any of the South American States, and had been visited by American fishermen for half a century, but he decided to yield to the protests of Peru, who declared her ownership had never been questioned before." Under an act of Congress of August 18, 1856, conferring discretionary power on the President to assume the ownership of guano islands discovered by United States citizens," Commander Davis, of the St. Mary's, sailed from the coasts of Central America in 1858 and took formal possession of Jarvis and Nantucket islands in the name of the United States, and deposited in the earth a declaration to that effect. Lieutenant Brooke, in the next year, took possession of Bird and Necker islands, near the Hawaiian group." In October, 1858, Cakobau, the principal chief of Bau, and also king of the whole Fiji group, in a document offering the sovereignty to Queen Victoria," declared that his action was

"The United States took possession of Wake Island, in January, 1899, with a view to using it as a station on a cable-telegraph line between Hawaii and the Philippines.

18

Sen. Exec. Rp. 109, 32-1, Aug. 21, 1852.

1 Under this act the United States, in 1898, owned 57 islands and groups of islands in the Pacific, and 13 in the Caribbean sea. Report Secy. of Navy, Dec. 2, 1859.

"This deed of cession was ratified, and signed by 21 chiefs on December 14, 1859, and by others in August and September. The legislative assembly of New South Wales recommended the acceptance of the proffered sovereignty, and captains in the British navy recommended occupation, but after sending Dr. B. Seemann to secure further information, the British Government decided to decline the offer. Seemann reported that the islands would become a flourishing colony. American whaleships which had been getting supplies at Samoa or Tonga were now beginning to go to Fiji on account of the exorbitant prices recently asked by the natives of the former islands. [Berthold Seemann: Viti, Cambridge, Eng., 1862.] In 1864, an attempt was made to establish a regular government based on English models, but was not a success. Meanwhile the rumor went that the United States intended to

for the purpose of preventing severe measures threatened by the United States against the king and the sovereignty and the territory of the islands in case of the non-payment of a debt of $45,000" which, under the existing state of affairs in the islands," he would not be able to collect within the brief time stated in the contract.

In 1867, by the acquisition of Alaska, the United States became the owner of the Aleutian Islands, extending almost to the Asiatic coasts. On August 28 of the same year, Captain Reynolds, by order of the United States Navy, occupied the Midway Islands [28° 12′ north lat., 177° 22′ west long.] which had been discovered by Captain N. C. Brooks on July 5, 1859, and first occupied by the Pacific Mail Steamship Company in July, 1867." The Senate Committee, in January, 1869, for both political and commercial reasons, favored making a naval station there, stating that the United States should have at least one harbor of refuge on the route to China, and should prevent the possibility of European occupation of any island which, under their control, might become another Nassau. The Secretary of the Navy, in his report of the previous December, had

assume the protectorate. In 1869, Lord Granville considered that there would be "more disadvantage in Great Britain taking the responsibility of the government of Fiji than in the risk of the United States assuming the Protectorate." [Parl. Papers, 1875.] But the Australian colonies at the Conference of 1870 called for British annexation, and Lord Kimberly decided to send a commission to report. The report of Commander Goodenough and Mr. Layard was strongly in favor of annexation. The cession was accepted in October, 1874, and the islands were organized as a crown colony with Sir Arthur Gordon as Governor.

[Egerton: History of English Colonial Policy, p. 396.]

22

23

Quarterly Review, July, 1859, p. 203.

The Fijis, which had become the resort of the European trader, "threatened to become an anarchic Hell." [Egerton: History of English Colonial Policy, p. 396.]

The natives, however, were not such ferocious cannibals as they had formerly been. [Quarterly Review, July, 1859, p. 203.]

24

Senate Rp. 194, 40-3, Jan. 28, 1869. Sen. Exec. Doc. 79, 40-2. Report of Secy. of the Navy, 1870, p. 8, and 1871, pp. 6, 7 and 8.

said the rapid increase of Pacific commerce and of American interests springing up in connection with our recent extensive acquisitions, our rising States on the Pacific, everincreasing intimacy with the islands of the ocean, made the United States interested beyond any other power in giving security to mariners in the Pacific. On March 1, 1869, the sum of $50,000 was appropriated for opening a harbor at Midway; but, after spending that amount, it was seen that $400,000 would be required, and the plan was abandoned. The United States, however, still owns the island.

CHAPTER VII.

UNLOCKING THE GATES OF THE ORIENT.

Until a comparatively recent date, the Orient remained a sealed mystery to the nations of Western civilization and progress. It was only by the persistent and increasingly determined efforts of foreigners that Japan was finally induced to open her doors and windows. China, assuming an arrogant supremacy, though she had permitted a limited trade, endeavored to erect barriers of exclusiveness, but was finally forced to be more liberal in commercial relations, and slowly extended her intercourse with the younger and more progressive nations of the West.

2

Japan. The Japanese policy from 1637 to 1854 was one of exclusion and inclusion-to keep the world out and the Japanese at home-and the Dutch factory at Deshema of Nagasaki was the only window or loophole of observation during that time. All attempts by foreigners to secure trading advantages were successfully resisted. The strict isolation of Japan, closing her eyes to keep out the light of the universe, and refusing to open her arms to the West,

'Humboldt once said that the narrow neck of land forming the isthmus of Panama had been the "bulwark of the independence of China and Japan."

2 Between 1542 and 1600 Christian missionaries exerted considerable influence in Japan. By 1581 there were 200 churches and 150,000 converts. A few years later the rivalry of the opposing orders, the Spanish Jesuits and the Portuguese Franciscans, created animosities, and resulted in persecution by the Japanese. At the battle of Sekigahara, in 1600, in which 10,000 lives were lost, the Christian army (of Southern Japan) was defeated. A reactionary policy of the conservatives followed, and an edict of 1606 prohibited Christianity. The last Christian uprising was defeated in