The Koreas Between China And Japan PDF Download

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1884 edition. Excerpt: ... China's Claims Of Suzerainty. 9 neighbors, the Chinese, or to any other nations. This pressure and persistency on the part of the Japanese--no doubt magnified and made the most of by the Peking Government--' has caused no little offence to Korea. Rather than give Japan any partial advantages, and influenced by the threatening position of her very powerful northern neighbor, Russia, as well as by the friendly advice of China, Korea very properly concluded, in 1882, that the auspicious time had at last arrived when it was to her own advantage to emerge from her seclusion and open her gates to foreign intercourse, as Japan had already done but a few years before, and thus at last to enter into the comity of nations. I give these details that we may the better understand the motives which have impelled Korea forward in the path she has so recently elected to follow. China is generally supposed to have professed and maintained the claims of suzerainty, or control, over the kingdom of Korea for many centuries past, and this assumption is made manifest in the late negotiations carried on with Korea by Com. Schufeldt, under the good auspices of his former friend, Li-hung-chang. On the part of Japan, ever jealous of China's increasing influence in Korea, and annoyed at the preference given to Chinese instead of Japanese aid, this concession by Korea to China has never been acknowledged; still, to a degree it is undoubtedly accepted by Korea, and annually their Embassy, accompanied by a few privileged traders, repairs to the principal fairs held in Manchuria a portion continuing on to the Chinese capital, Peking, where audiences are held at the Chinese court. In the Imperial edict, dealing with the late Regent of Korea, the Dai-un-kun, when sent...