Milo Hastings

“ Indeed, America called Japan the yellow peril; and with her own prejudices to maintain, her institutions of graft and exploitation to fatten her luxury-loving lords and her laborers to appease, she was in mortal terror of the simple efficiency of the Japanese people who had taken the laws of Nature into their own hands and shaped human evolution by human reason. ”

“ The harbors of the world were filled with huge, floating, flat-topped battleships, within the capacious interiors of which were packed the parts of aeroplanes as were the soldiers of the Grecian army in their wooden horse at Troy, for assembling and launching them. But the engines of warfare which men had repeatedly claimed would make war so terrible as to end war, had failed to fulfill anticipations. ”

“ Indeed it is doubtful if the invasion of the Japanese should be called war at all. They were not blood-thirsty. In fact, the Japanese invaders had sent word to the American Government asserting their peaceful intentions if they were unmolested, though threatening dire vengeance by firing cities and poisoning water supplies if they were attacked.
Madame Oshima shook her head. "Such talk is only pretense," she said, "the Japanese intend to live in America and would never so embitter the people—and it will not be necessary." ”

“ For a time both soldiers eyed the distant fighting.
"When I get out of this," continued the first speaker; "when I get out, I'm going to join the Regenerationists."
"What's that; peace cranks?"
"Yep; but it's more than that, it's health cranks and temperance cranks, and moral cranks, and socialist cranks, and every other kind of crank that believes in people being decent and living happy—health, quiet lives, instead of fighting and robbing and—boozing and abusing themselves and each other to death."
"Oh, Hell! don't preach just because you're scared," said the other, getting up. ”

“ The scientists and officials had from time to time considered the advisability of increasing the restrictions—and yet why should they? The Japanese people had submitted to the prohibition of the marriage of the unfit, but they loved children; and, with their virile outdoor life, the instinct of procreation was strong within them. True, the assignable lands in Japan continued to grow smaller, but what reason was there for stifling the reproductive instincts of a vigorous people in a great unused world half populated by a degenerate humanity? ”

“ Neither the men nor Madame Oshima seemed the least bit excited over the prospects; but Ethel, striving to keep up external appearances, was inwardly torn with warring emotions.
Making an excuse of wishing to look for something among her luggage, the girl finally escaped and walked quickly toward the other plane. But instead of stopping, she passed by and continued down between the rows of cotton, avoiding as much as possible the lights that dotted the field about her. ”

“ There had been some fighting in the streets and a few buildings were burning. Walking along to the main street of the town, they came upon a crowd of Japanese who were collected in front of a building from which the contents were being dragged hastily.
"What is it?" asked Komoru of one of the men.
"Hardware store," replied the other; "we've rifled all of them for the weapons and explosives."
"Where are all the people?" asked Ethel. "The Americans—are they killed or captured?"
"They are at home in their houses," answered the man, who seemed well posted. ”

“ As Commodore Perry had forced the open door of commerce upon Japan a century before, so Japan decided to force upon America the acknowledgment of any human being's right to live in any land on earth. She had tried first by peaceful means to secure these ends, but failing here and driven on by the lash of her own necessity, Japan had come to feel that force alone could break the clannish resistance of the Anglo-Saxon, who having gone into the four corners of the earth and forced upon the world his language, commerce and customs, now refused to receive ideas or citizens in return. ”

“ Tilting the plane upward, Komoru circled for altitude. Presently he called back over his shoulder, saying that he saw the signal fire at Beaumont at the same time heading the plane in that direction.
As the dawn began to break in the East, the occasional passing lights of flying planes became less bright and soon the planes themselves stood out against the sky like shadows. And then the whole majestic train of aerial invaders became visible as they poured over the southern horizon—-a never ending stream. ”

“ The Americans had too much territory to protect to take the offensive and their Pacific fleet lay close to Manila, where, with the help of land aviation forces, they hoped to hold the possession of the islands, which according to the popular American view was supposed to be the prize for which the Japanese had gone to war.
The test of the actual warfare proved several things upon which mankind had long been in doubt. One of these was that, with all the expert mechanism that science and invention had supplied, the personal equation of the man could not be eliminated. ”

“ The old spirit of Japanese patriotism had grown into a semi-religious worship of racial fitness and a moral pride developed which eulogized the sacrifice of the liberties of the individual to the larger needs of the people. Legal restrictions of the follies of fashion in dress and food, the prohibition of alcohol and narcotics, the restriction of unwise marriages, and the punishments of immorality were stoically accepted, not as the blue laws of religious fanaticism, but as requisites of racial progress and a mark of patriotism. ”

“ After this most of the lazy circling planes rose and made off to the left, while a few assigned to guard duty circled above the retreating cavalry, as they moved off slowly in the opposite direction.
Two belated members of the troop, who had lost their horses, flung themselves down to rest for a moment in the lengthening shadow of the oak tree.
"Oh Gawd!" said one, as he panted and mopped his forehead. "Oh Gawd! I was scared! That damned shrapnel bursting right over us and no chance to fight back or get away. It ain't no fair fighting like that—you can't get at 'em." ”

“ Intensive culture would do wonders and the just administration of wealth and the physical efficiency of her people had eliminated the waste of supporting the non-productive, but an acre is but a small piece of land at most, and Japan had long since passed the point where the number of her people exceeded the number of her acres. A quarter of an acre would produce enough grain and coarse vegetables to keep a man alive, but the Japanese wanted eggs and fruit and milk for their children ”

“ In the year of 1958, Ethel Calvert, a daughter of an American grain-merchant, residing in Japan, because of her father's death in an anti-foreign riot, is forced to take refuge, with Madame Oshima, the French wife of a Japanese scientist. She becomes accustomed to the land and mode of living followed by the Japanese, and is finally persuaded to adopt the costume of the land of her exile. ”

“ War is declared between Japan and the United States, and Professor Oshima, and Komoru, his Secretary, together with Madame Oshima and Ethel Calvert, sail for the United States in a Japanese war vessel. When near the Pacific Coast, the many men and women who have been passengers on the vessel, leave the ship by means of aeroplanes, and sail eastwardly toward Texas, where they establish plantations and conduct a desultory warfare by aeroplanes with United States troops. While working in the fields Ethel discovers a young American in concealment. ”

“ Well, the Regenerationists, along with many other sincere men and women in this country tried to prevent this war and are trying to get it peaceably settled now. The Japs don't want to die. They want a chance to live. We've got a lot of vainglorious, debauched, professional soldiery that wanted to fight something, and now they're getting their fill. In the first place, there is no need of war and in the second place, when there is war, the same stamina that will make efficient humans for the ordinary walks of life will make good soldiers. ”

“ Throughout the summer, in the rice lands in the South, and the wheat lands of the North, the Japanese lived, harmless gardeners of their newly acquired possessions. But their gasoline tanks were full and they carried sufficient conflagration bombs to have fired every city from New Orleans to St. Paul, had the truce been broken by American treachery. ”

“ Aviation increased the human element in warfare. To shoot straight requires calm nerves, but to fly straight requires also agility and endurance.
The American aeroplanes were made of steel and aluminum, and when they hit the water they sank like lead, but the Japanese planes were made of silk and bamboo, and their engines were built with multiple compartment air tanks and after a battle the Japanese picked up the floating engines and placed them, ready to use, in inexpensive new planes. ”

“ Among opponents of Japanese racial expansion, the United States was the greatest offender. Japanese immigration had long since been forbidden by the United States, and American diplomats had more recently been instrumental in bringing about an agreement among the powers of Europe by which all outlets were locked against the overflowing stream of Asiatic population. ”

“ But Japan refused the American proposals of peace, which conceded them the Philippines, unless the United States be also opened to universal immigration. And so it was that when Japan, in addition to accepting the Philippines, demanded the right to settle her cheap labor in the United States, the American authorities cut short the peace negotiation and began concentrating troops and battleships along the Pacific Coast in fear of an invasion of California. ”

“ Save for the few thousand white laborers who were supported by the oil industry, the whole resident population were negroes who were worked under imported white foremen in the rice and truck lands of the region.
The negroes were panic stricken by the Japanese invasion and made practically no resistance. In two or three days, the country for a forty-mile radius around Beaumont was cleared of Americans and practically the entire oil region of Texas with its vast storage tanks at Port Arthur on the Sabine River, were in the hands of the invaders. ”

“ Corn-fed hogs and the rotund carcasses of stall-fed cattle were produced on mammoth ranches for the edification of mankind, and fowl were hatched by the billions in huge incubators, and the chicks reared and slaughtered with scarcely a touch of a human hand. ”

“ Late that night, their possessions made ready for flight, Komoru and Ethel sat with Professor and Madame Oshima beneath the latter's plane.
"Our scouts have come to the conclusion," said Oshima, "that a cavalry attack is to be expected in the early morning. So our plan is for a signal plane to rise at two o'clock directly over the center of our territory. It will carry a bright yellow light. Beginning with the outlying groups our forces are to fly toward the light, rising as they go. Attaining an altitude of two miles they are thence to fly due north as our maps show. ”

“ Now if the low birth rate that had resulted when the examinations for parenthood were first enforced had continued, Japan would not have been so crowded, but after the first generation of marriage restriction the percentage of those who reached the legal standard of fitness was naturally increased. ”

“ Thus equipped, the two strapped their captive's hands and one foot together behind him.
"There now," said Winslow, as he relieved the officer of his weapon. "Hop back to the bridge and look after your comrade. He fell on the turnpike a while ago and I'm afraid he hurt his head. We'll have to be going."
"Shall we take the horse?" asked Ethel.
"No," replied her companion, beginning to throw clods at the animal, "we'll simply run him away. As for us, we are safer on foot, and will in the long run make better time." ”

“ Taking his seat he threw down a lever and what had appeared to be two small superimposed planes above the main plane assumed the form of flat screws. Letting the engine gain full headway, Komoru threw the clutch on this shafting, and the vertical screws started revolving in opposite directions with a great downward rush of air. The whole apparatus tilted a bit, and then slowly but steadily arose.
When they had reached altitude of a hundred feet or so, the driver shifted the power to the quieter horizontal propeller and the plane sidled off like an eagle dropping from a crag. ”

“ The outside work of the professor and his secretary threw Ethel altogether in the company of Madame Oshima. For this fact she was very grateful, as her aversion to Komoru, to whom she was nominally bound, grew more and more a source of worry and fear. So the two women of Aryan blood worked together in the cotton field side by side with the Orientals—worked and waited and wondered what was awing in the surrounding world.
The gasoline wagons came around and refilled the fuel tanks of the planes. Mechanics inspected the engines carefully and replaced defective parts. ”

“ The more she considered the man before her, the more she marvelled at his powers. She confessed he interested her; she wondered why she disliked him. The only answer that seemed acceptable was that he was "not her kind."
Towards dusk, they hove in sight of the derricks of the Beaumont oil region. The leader with the red plane descended in a large meadow. Komoru was well to the front and brought his plane to earth a few meters from the red wings. The man in the flag plane who had that day led them over a thousand miles and a score of cities got out and stretched himself. ”

“ The old, sturdy, wasteful farmer class had gone out of existence.
Only the rich who owned aeroplanes could afford to live in the country. The poor had been forced to the cities where they could be sheltered en masse, and fed, as it were, by machinery. ”