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ment to entertain high hopes and to make free sacrifices for the war. Instead of letting the people know the truth, the government created an impression among them through its publicity channels that the meddling of the United States was robbing Japan of substantial fruits of victory, and that the people should not hesitate to make further sacrifices for the creating and maintaining of a bigger army and navy which alone could vindicate Japan's rights in the future -especially against the United States. "If publicity is wanted in the Far East, some publication in China frequently is used. For instance, soon after Japan declared war against Germany a report was published in the Fengtien Daily News on August 9, 1914, that an American fleet had been dispatched to the Far East to protect China against Japan. Japan's vernacular organs in China spread this report, and caused some excitement among the Chinese. The report was telegraphed to Tokyo, and for a while it served as a topic for bitter editorial criticism of the United States. When denial was made by the United States, the Japanese press had to drop the matter; and it then side-stepped responsibility by charging the origin of the report to Germany. The facts seem to be that the report originated in Japan, with the purpose of using it for all it was worth to stir up popular feeling there against America, then accuse Germany of

inciting it; thus making it serve the various purposes of further stimulating Japanese resentment against America, rousing American resentment against Germany, and warning Chinese against alleged German and American intrigues."

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The government interception of private mail is not less thorough than the control of dispatches. It is not a war measure or military necessity, but a part of the established system of national administration. A short account given by Samuel G. Blythe, concerning the indiscriminate opening of private mail, is interesting and to the point. It follows:

"An official in the Department of Communication, whom I happen to know, told me with great pride, when I was in Japan, that they had just secured from Russia a machine which made the work of opening and reading letters much easier. The former method was to steam the letters open, read them, copy them if desired, and seal them again. This Russian machine, as I understand it, has a blade of great thinness and keenness. It slits the envelope in such a manner that the cut is barely perceptible along the edge of the envelope. Then the writing is taken out, read, copied and replaced or destroyed; and the edges are rubbed and stuck together by the machine in such a way that the fact that they have been cut is not discernible. Millard, "Our Eastern Question," pp. 213-214.

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I asked this man why they went to such great trouble:

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Everybody who knows anything about the inside workings of the Japanese Government knows that all letters they want to read are opened and read anyhow. Why take such elaborate precautions to hide that fact?' I said.

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'My dear sir,' he replied, 'it is contrary to the practice of our government to disclose these things.'

"Japan always has opened letters. . . . No one can object if a government opens letters that may contain information of use to an enemy; but why should letters be opened indiscriminately?

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It goes without saying that such a system is highly annoying to foreigners in Japan and Korea. Even missionaries, the most subservient and non-complaining of all Westerners in the Far East, have complained of the Japanese interception of their mail."

But the heaviest blow of the system falls on the Koreans. In Korea, under the Japanese military administration, the system is not covered up, but openly practiced. Both the writer and receiver of letters objectionable to the government are punished. I know of more than

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Saturday Evening Post, May 22, 1915.

See W. T. Ellis, Christianity's Fiery Trial in Korea," The Continent, June 27, 1912, pp. 896–899.

one case in which confiscation of property took place on the charge of this "treasonable crime."

This overt punishment for writing objectionable letters may be said to be another point of Japanese cleverness in the abolition of the Korean nationality. For it creates an atmosphere of fear, which suppresses almost unconsciously everything that pertains to Korean independence or nationality, or anything that intimates criticism of the Japanese administration in the peninsula. No Korean in America or in any other foreign country dare write anything in the least questionable in his letters to his friends at home, not because of himself but for the sake of those receiving them.”

"See Missionary Review of the World, June, 1913, vol. 36: pp. 450-453

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III 1

PUBLICITY PROPAGANDA

OFFICIAL PUBLICATIONS

HERE is a remarkable similarity between the German publicity propa

ganda, as it was disclosed at the beginning of the European War, and the Japanese publicity propaganda; only the Japanese method is far subtler than the German. Fatherland, formerly published in New York, once characterized Dr. Eliot, the president emeritus of Harvard, as "Foxy Eliot," for the stand he took with regard to the belligerents. A Japanese organ would never have done this, for the Japanese have enough knowledge of American psychology to know that such an attack on one of the most venerable educators in the country would produce an effect contrary to that intended. This instance is cited to illustrate the difference between the Japanese and the German methods.

The government publishes or authorizes private concerns to publish year books, annual

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