THE recent great battle in Manchuria between the Japanese and Russians, which will probably go into history as the battle of Liao Yang, is noteworthy in several respects. While the precise number of combatants on either side is not definitely known, it is believed the combined number is greater than ever before met on the battle-field with modern military weapons. It also raged for a longer time than any other known military combat. But far more noteworthy than this is the fact that for the first time in military annals the white race has given way before the yellow race in a great pitched battle. It gives a new and, until recently, undreamed-of aspect to the question of the conquest and partition of Asiatic territory, which the powers of Europe had regarded as fairly well settled. It calls a decisive halt on the program for the dividing up of China. The yellow race must be reckoned with; and if China, under Japan's leadership, can be awakened and brought in touch with the spirit of modern progress and military science, the yellow race can bid defiance to all the Caucasian nations combined. In this battle the Japanese were numerically somewhat superior to the Russians, but the latter occupied strongly fortified positions, which had been made impregnable to assault by all the devices of modern military science, and the Russian commander fought on ground of his own choosing. Nor were the Russian troops at all lacking in bravery. But with all these advantages in his favor, the Russian commander, though accounted a man of much experience and ability, was squarely beaten, and with difficulty saved his army from disintegration and ruin. By some this battle is regarded as entitled to rank as one of the decisive battles of the world,—decisive in its effects upon Europe and Asia far more than in its immediate results to the defeated army. According to the historian Creasy, there had been fifteen “decisive battles of the world” since Marathon, B. C. 490, down to his own time, which was half a century ago. Since that time there have been Gettysburg and Sedan, and to these should perhaps be added the battle of Manila Bay, which brought the United States into the arena of old-world politics. This would make eighteen decisive battles of the world, with that at Liao Yang, if it may be classed with the others, the nineteenth. Certainly it will be a long time, if ever, before Russia recovers from this blow to her military prestige.