Sir H.S. Parkes to Earl Granville.―(Received March 28)

(No. 26 Confidential)
Tôkiô, February 17, 1883

My Lord,

WITH reference to my despatch No. 4 of the 12th ultimo, reporting my conversation with the Corean Confidential Agent, Kim Ok Kiun, consequent on your Lordship’s telegram of the 30th December, I have now to add that on the 13th instant he informed me that he had heard nothing from Corea in reply to his report of that conversation. He observed spontaneously that he was unable to say whether his government would go on following blindly the dictation of China, or whether they would be bold enough to take a course of their own in regard to their foreign relations. He had heard that the United States had ratified their Treaty, and this act, he thought, would serve to test Corea’s position and bring to an issue the question of her dependency on China.
He wished that that test could be made more forcible by the ratification of the British Treaty.
I replied that I thought my Government might think it necessary to understand the position of Corea before ratifying a Treaty with her, and that the disadvantageous conditions of the Treaty negotiated by Admiral Willes were a further impediment in the way of its ratification. I had, therefore, pointed out to him, in our conversation of the 1st ultimo, that if Corea wanted a Treaty with Great Britain, she should lose no time in offering to negotiate one that would be acceptable.
He then inquired whether Her Majesty’s Government would be disposed to ask Li Hung Chang whether Corea should make with Great Britain a Treaty including similar arrangements to those recently concluded between Corea and China, to which I replied that my Government would not lose sight of their own dignity in any course they might see fit to take.
In a conversation which I had yesterday with the Japanese foreign Minister, His Excellency stated that he had received no reply from the Corean Government to his proposal (which I reported in my despatch No. 3 of the 12th ultimo), that a Corean Plenipotentiary should be sent to Tôkiô to negotiate a new Commercial Treaty with Japan. This was the only overture, his Excellency added, which his Government could make, and Corea could show, by accepting or declining it, how far she was now acting under the domination of China. Japan had hitherto treated with Corea as an independent State, and if any change had taken place in the relations of Corea to China, the Governments of those two countries should inform Japan of it, and this they had not done. Japan’s relations with Corea continued, therefore, to be based on the Treaties of 1876, and if China had assumed the control of Corea she must also fulfill the obligations of those Treaties. Japan could not allow her people in Corea to be placed in a worse position than Chinese subjects.
His Excellency also observed that Japan was said to be arming against China, but that there was no foundation for such a report. A certain increase of naval and military force had been authorized, but not more than was necessary for efficient defensive strength. He strongly deprecated collision with China, for which indeed there was no cause, and he invariably endeavoured to suppress such an idea whenever it found expression either among Japanese officials or the people. Military men were inclined at all times towards military enterprise, but he had shown how effectually he had discouraged this feeling when it naturally evinced itself at the outset of the recent Corean difficulty. He had heard with regret that the French Minister, when conversing lately at his, the Foreign Minister’s house, with three members of the Cabinet, General Oyama, the Minister of War, Admiral Kawamura, the Minister of Marine, and General Saigo, the Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, had asked them why they did not send 20,000 men to China, as with such a force they could easily take Peking, and if Japan were to undertake an operation of this nature she would be supported by French action in Tongking.
He believed that this was only said in jest, but he thought it was a bad jest, as it might excite the minds of those who heard it.
I observed that he might feel assured that such a postprandial remark could not have been seriously intended, and that the Ministers who heard it could of course not regard it in any other light. I was very glad to hear his Excellency express himself so decidedly against hostility to China, as he was aware that my opinion had always been that Japan should do all in her power to cultivate friendly relations with that Power, as she could only contend with her on very unequal terms, and that nothing but manifest wrong or insult would ever justify Japan in perilling her own interests by engaging in any military undertaking except such as might be required for self-defence.

I have, &c.
(Signed) HARRY S. PARKES