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Europe seem to think, but through the agency of thousands of petty local leaders whose ambitions and needs he knows and looks after. Bolshevik propaganda he finds useful as a political weapon and as a means of stirring up trouble in industrial districts. But there is no question of trying to make China go Bolshevik, as the Bolshevik ideal is totally opposed to the Chinese conception of life. The one aim of Karakhan and his satellites is to clear Europe out of the Pacific.

'Meanwhile there is no central authority in China to check their activities. The fabric of the state has collapsed into a confused mass of toy republics that constitute and reconstitute themselves with bewildering rapidity, and own allegiance to nobody and command none. Every ambitious mandarin who forms a political "clan" sets up a republic. There is no chance of things permanently improving, as it serves innumerable interests both personal and political that the anarchy should continue. When the muddle assumes such gigantic and alarming proportions that some sort of systematisation becomes an urgent necessity, the Powers, in spite of their caution, will be compelled to intervene on a large scale. This will be the beginning of the end. Their competing political claims and the clashing of their big economic interests will precipitate a world-war for the control of the Pacific and the distribution of China's immense resources. On the one side will be China, Russia, and Japan, supported more or less effectively by all nationalist Asia; on the other will be the United States, Great Britain, France, and Italy. It will be the conflagration of the Pacific. The catastrophe is already signed in the book of Fate. And the recent outbreaks in Canton and Shanghai are the portents of its coming.'

From the above abstract of his views it will be seen that Do-Huu-Chan is as convinced of the approaching 'conflagration of the Pacific' as is Signor Appelius, the only difference being that whereas the former sees it as the inevitable last stage in the process of China's disintegration, the latter rather conceives it as occurring somewhere, and no less inevitably, in the process of her regeneration-a point of view to which we ourselves incline. That the former, however, should be more pessimistic in his forecast of China's future, and see only darkness ahead, is understandable, in view of the feeling of hopelessness that would naturally be aroused in the

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soul of a patriotic Chinaman at sight of her present chaotic condition.

We have given so much space to the worthy Mandarin, as his train of thought seems to us strikingly suggestive, and his argument, in the main, sound. This does not mean that we agree with all his conclusions. For instance, we think, with Signor Appelius, that IndoChina is far more likely to fall to China than to Japan ; unless, of course, Japan gets possession of it before China settles down-in which case she will be faced with a colossal 'Chinese minority' problem. Again, Russian strategy is hardly developing on the majestic lines of our Mandarin's interesting prognostication; and we certainly do not agree with him that Russia will collaborate for any length of time with Japan; rather do we foresee a mortal struggle between them for the control of the Pacific. On the whole, however, his analysis of the general situation in the Far East is the most illuminating that has yet come our way, and we can well understand the profound impression it made on Signor Appelius.

In confining ourselves, of set purpose, to one side only of 'Asia Gialla '-that, namely, which deals with the political and psychological ferment in the Far East, and with what is likely to be the outcome of it all-we have been compelled to omit all reference to its abundant merits as a book of travel pure and simple. As such it is superlatively good. The author has a veritable genius for observation, and his receptiveness to impressions is almost uncanny. Nothing escapes him. His descriptions are admirable in their graphic intensity, whether they deal with places or persons, bustling cities or dead civilisations, freaks of climate or scenes of natural beauty, objective happenings or personal experiences. Such matters, however, interesting as they are, fall outside the scope of the present article, the object of which has been to sum up for English readers those factors in the vast and complex problem of the Far East that chiefly impressed an intelligent and much-travelled Italian who went East on a voyage of discovery and found there- the Yellow Peril.

CONRAD M. R. BONACINA.

Art. 13.-COAL, POWER, AND INDUSTRY.

The British Coal Dilemma. By Isador Lubin and Helen
Everett. Macmillan, 1928.

THE Coal problem has become so obscured by politics
and overlaid by sentiment that its real prospective in
relation to Industry generally is now hopelessly dis-
torted. Before attempting to find any solution of
existing economic difficulties it is essential that pre-
judice be eliminated. On the one hand, colliery owners
are accused of gross incompetence in the conduct of their
business, and on the other of such unconscionable pro-
fiteering that those they employ have been driven into
starvation. The State, we are freely told, must forcibly
step in, take over the pits, pay labour a minimum wage,
and, at the same time, protect the consumer. Even
those who have some doubts about the aptitude of civil
servants to conduct profitably and well an industry
freely in competition with the rest of the world talk
vaguely about a national trust under government con-
trol, and clamour, according to their political predilec-
tions, either for expropriation or rationalisation. Every
theorist presses his own special nostrum and every
politician seeks his party opportunity. Small wonder
that the man in the street is perplexed and a little
upset; perplexed because his coal is undeniably cheap,
and upset since he hears of the frequent closing of pits
and consequent increase of unemployment. It is pro-
posed in this article to restore coal to its proper per-
spective in relation to the other items of industry by
examining shortly the conditions which have governed
output in the past, the market that then existed, the
market that now exists, and what hope generally there
is for the future. When the lesson from history has
been read the national problem of meeting changed con-
ditions can be considered.

Our great good fortune in the possession of practically unlimited coal has, in the end, proved the bane of the mining industry. The iron, steel, shipbuilding, engineering, and textile trades have thriven practically on pit-head supplies, while the food and raw materials

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imported have come back cheaply to us because exported coal paid for half the freight. When the steam revolution began we were in an exceptional position to take advantage of our luck. Other nations have been a century in drawing level. We have passed gradually from practical monopoly to intensive competition. Throughout the length of our golden century as trade expanded the demand for coal grew, and with the inevitable rise in price output responded and passed the demand, then fell and grew again, and so on, since the raw material never failed, with periods of alternating adversity and prosperity for the industry. At the end of the last century our general export trade monopoly was already being seriously challenged by the United States and by Germany. The former, secure in a gigantic home market, and the latter driven to production and export by pressure of population, were using all the resources of education, scientific research, and long credit to supplant us in world markets. The trade expansion of both countries was sufficient at least to make many minds doubt the ark of free trade and seek for re-insurance in some form of safeguarding and Empire trade federation.

During the opening years of the present century the true signs of the times for coal were cloaked by a period of unexampled prosperity in the industry. Whatever the state of trade in the United Kingdom, foreign nations had increasingly demanded British coal, and from the years 1900 to 1913 exports increased by an amount equal to all the growth of the half-century preceding. In the year 1913 coal was 10 per cent. in value of the nation's total exports. Throughout these years, although the miners naturally fought for a better share of the profits the industry was earning, coal owners were never accused of incompetence. At length more than 1,118,000 men were finding good employment in the pits. Then came the war. Within twelve months a quarter of the men employed were in the ranks, and the work of production fell mainly on the older men, those dug out from retirement and recruits. In February 1917 the industry passed under Government control. Output, distribution, and price were regulated, exports licensed, and profits limited. Output, by reason of war recruitment, contracted steadily as our own and Allied needs grew, and only the Armistice saved us from a serious crisis. The advent of peace found the industry in a state of chaos. The needs of war production had compelled concentration on the easier-got seams, with the consequence that, in many pits, any settled plans of far-sighted development had long dissolved. War conditions had prevented necessary re-equipment and new installations were perforce postponed. The men back from the front and the newcomers of the war did not get on well together. There was general malaise, disinclination to face facts, and much leeway to make up. Early in 1919 the men demanded an increase in wages commensurate with the heightened cost of living. The Government concessions were refused and a strike ordered for March 15. The strike was averted by the appointment of the Sankey Commission, whose findings were accepted by the Government. An increase of wages was given and a sevenhour day fixed by law. The Commission had consisted of representatives of owners and miners and industrialists appointed by the Government. There was no unanimous general finding. While the Chairman and the miners' representatives recommended nationalisation, the owners and two Government nominees saw no reason to make any appreciable change in organisation. But in one item all did agree, and that was the acquirement by the State of the royalties. From this period the political side of the Miners' Federation took complete charge of their policy, and as a sole remedy emitted on all occasions the parrot-cry of 'nationalisation.' It was the fear that the Government might bow in whole or part to this demand which caused the owners to limit strictly to immediate needs all expenditure on reconstruction and development. Why should they spend? Since profits were guaranteed and limited there was no incentive to expand output, and since prices were rising they could afford to wait. During 1920 the insatiable demand for export coal nearly trebled prices, and there accrued to the credit of the coal fund a huge surplus, which more than paid for the deficit caused by restricted home prices. The Government speculated on the future, and guaranteed the industry an export price of 72s. a ton,

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