a letter to Port Arthur asking for troops, and that, while unofficial in form, it came from the very officials who had promulgated the declaration of neutrality, it became abundantly clear that the spirit of neutrality was non-existent. It must be left to the future historian to declare whether the Japanese were justified in impairing a declared neutrality that existed only in name, and under cover of which the Korean officials were proved to be acting in a manner distinctly hostile to the interests of Japan.
All through January the Japanese were busy making military stations every fifteen miles between Fusan and Seoul. All along the line small buildings were erected, sufficiently large to house twenty or thirty men. On the 22nd of January General Ijichi arrived in Seoul as Military Attache of the Japanese Legation. The appointment of a man of such rank as this was most significant and should have aroused the Russians to a realising sense of their danger; but it did not do so. Four days later this general made a final appeal to the Korean government, asking for some definite statement as to its attitude toward Russia and Japan. The foreign office answered that the government was entirely neutral. Two days later the Japanese landed a large amount of barley at the port of Kunsan, a few hours' run south of Chemulpo, and a light railway of the Decauville type was also landed at the same place. On the 20th all Korean students were recalled from Japan.
On the 1st of February the Russians appeared to be the only ones who did not realise that trouble was brewing, otherwise why should they have stored fifteen hundred tons of coal and a quantity of barley in their godowns on Roze Island in Chemulpo harbour on the 2nd of that month? On the 7th the government received a despatch from Wiju saying that several thousand Russian troops were approaching the border, and that the Japanese merchants and others were preparing to retire from that place. The same day the foreign office sent to all the open ports ordering that news should be immediately telegraphed of any important movements.
