3-085-634 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Chinese Crisis: a Chinese gun-boat, 1898. 'The scramble for the ports of Northern China goes on apace, and the plot of the political situation in the Far East thickens day by day. Germany remains in possession of the valuable Yellow Sea port of Kiao-Chau, opposite Corea, and some adjacent territory in the province of Shantung, and two more German war-ships have sailed for Chinese waters under the command of Prince Henry of Prussia, who was sped on his voyage from Kiel by the German Emperor, in a high-flown speech entrusting him with "the transmarine mission" of the German Empire, whatever that may be. By what is now proved to have been a tacit understanding with Germany, Russia has followed suit and occupied Port Arthur, a strong naval position on the promontory of the Manchurian Peninsula, commanding the Gulf of Pechili, with the maritime approach to Tientsin and Peking'. From "Illustrated London News", 1898.