Dairen, July 27.
Interesting comparisons between the Manchuria of 30 or 40 years ago and the Manchoukuo of the present day have been made lately by two or three of the old residents and the difference is almost incredible. For instance it seems impossible: now that three or four decades ago there was no South Manchuria Railway, no Dairen Kisen Kaisha and no Osaka Shosen Kaisha and that foreigners going on a visit from Manchuria to Japan travelled on a military train as far as Dairen and from there by a military transport.
It is hard to believe that, with the vast quantities of goods being exported from and arriving at Dairen these times that in old Manchuria the chief exports were animal products and hemp while the main imports were piece-goods and small metal goods, The animal products consisted of bristles, horse and camel hair, hides, furs and skins and while these are still being shipped to other countries they form but a fraction of the export of to-day.
Earlier. Mukden was the great distributing centre for exports bound for Europe and goods were sent down the Liaoho River, either by junks in the warm weather or by sleds over the ice-bound waterway in the wintertime, These picturesque though slow methods of transportation were ended when railways started to make their way through South Manchuria.
The decline of Newchwang began with the development of Dairen as a port. Dairen had the advantage of starting from scratch and all that was put into it was modern, whereas Newchwang was handicapped by being an old port with facilities which were not by any means of the latest. The elimination of Newchwang as an entrepot began before the World War which sped up the process and the harbour to-day is but a ghost of its former self, Groundnuts, however, are exported from Yingkow, though 30 years ago they were unknown in Manchuria. No longer are British textiles imported to this port as it has been found impossible to compete with Japanese goods of the same kind and of infinitely less price. What has come into being as an import qf some note is material for bridge building and rolling, stock.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.