No. 413.
Mr. Hubbard to Mr. Bayard.
[Extract.]
Legation of
the United States,
Tokio, March 8, 1887.
(Received March 31.)
No. 302.]
Sir: I have the honor to inclose herewith two
clippings from the Japan Daily Mail, a British newspaper, being comments of
said newspaper on two editorials from leading native (Japan) daily
journals.
1 have forwarded this clipping from the Anglo-Japanese press as an index of
what Englishmen regard here as a, turning point in trade relations which
have hitherto been largely monopolized by their countrymen. In the same
connection, as bearing on the question of cultivating more speedy
transportation between Japan and the United States, I call your attention
also respectfully to what an influential native commercial daily says in
relation thereto. The Nippon Yusen Kaisha, to which allusion is made, is the
great steamship company of Japan, whose bonds are all guaranteed by the
Japanese Government, and which owns more than a hundred ships.
I have, etc.,
[Inclosure 1 in No. 302.—Clipping from
Japan Daily Mail.]
The Mainichi Shimbun recommends the promoters of Japanese railways to
intrust the work of construction to American engineers. Public attention
has been strongly directed of late to railway enterprise. Lines from
Kobe to Shimonoseki, from the north to the south of Kiushiu from Tokio
to Hachioji, and between places in other localities are projected. The
idea that this industry must of necessity be left to officialdom, an
idea long maintained, has been abandoned, and capitalists everywhere
throughout the
[Page 660]
Empire are
hastening to invest their money in iron roads. But the question of
construction is still a difficulty. Most people think that the only
feasible course is to enlist the services of the railway department. The
Mainichi Shimbun, however, strongly condemns this plan. On the score of
delay alone, if for no other reason, such a burden should not be placed
on official shoulders. Better employ American engineers, says our
contemporary, plenty of whom would be quite willing to undertake the
work. Certainly Japan can not do better than procure scientific
assistance from America, but we hope that for work of this sort
Englishmen may have a fair show. Japan owes almost everything she knows
about railways to England. She has paid for the knowledge, it is true,
but except on the principle that variety is charming, a principle which
she seems not unlikely to get the discredit of obeying too implicity, we
do not see why she should go back on her old love.
[Inclosure 2 in No. 302.—Clipping from
Japan Daily Mail.]
The Keizai Zasshi publishes a note in which it points out that, while
Japan and the United States of America are such near neighbors,
geographically, the actual commercial routes are unnecessarily long, the
commodities passing between the two countries being mostly carried by
way of the Suez Canal. Our contemporary recommends the Nippon Yusen
Kaisha to open communication on the Pacific between this Country and
America.
