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Mr. C. P. Waite, mechanical engineer, who was riding in the car, at the time of the occur. rence, averred that defendant used very bad language to Mr. Marican and himself.
By the Court-The only assault committed by the defendant was in seizing Mr. Marican,
Mr. Grist- And in using threatening language. He is not charged with assault and battery.
Defendant-Is it an offence to prevent a man from running away before the police come ?
His Worship-Sometimes it is. Defendant-Then I am guilty. I wanted to keep him there until the police arrived.
Witness said that he wished to move the car into a safer position and the crowd thought he was going away,
Mr. Kapteyn, of the Holland China Trading Company, declared that Mr. Swart said if no- body was going to take the matter in hand he would. Marican wanted to go away but Mr. Swart would not let him. Witness did not hear defendant call Marioan a blackguard; he might have called him a --- fool.
His Worship said the circumstances justified a reasonable amount of indignation. He would not impose any penalty but he would record a conviction against Mr. Swart for bad language.
The parties then left the court.
ANOTHER SNATCHING CASE.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
THE BRITISH POST OFFICES IN NORTH CHINA.
FROM OUR PEKING CORRESPONDENT,]
August 6th.
The Hongkong Postmaster has caused to be published in Tientsin an announcement that the British Postal agency in this post will be closed on October 10 next. A similar announce. ment was made last year, but the Tientsin office was not closed then owing to the British Municipal Councils and the Chamber of Com. merce coming forward with a guarantee for the amount of the deficit involved in the running of the establishment. Negotiations are pow but it is by no means certain that it will be afoot with a view to renewing this arrangement renewed.
Daring the past twelve months the general body of British and other residents in the British Concessions of Tientein have been taxed to the tune of $7,500 per annum in order that the British Postal Agency here might be main tained and they contend that the chief benefits resulting from the existence of the agency are This is to say, the community at large pays derived by heads of the commercial hongs.
for the couveniences of a small section of itself. Hongkong naturally declined to bear the burden of the deficit, though last year there were some in Tientsin who would not have objected to this and did not seem to see anything
unnatural in a plan that would have bee¤ BO economical to Tientsin. Hongkong, however, has from the first stood to its guns; it will not conduct the Tientsin agency at a loss and if Tientsin wishes the agency continued, so long as the loss in working lasts, Tientsin must make it good. The matter is left, therefore, for local adjustment. There is every hope of the mercantile part of the community will bear a agency being preserved if the shipping and larger proportion of the financial burden than they have hitherto been willing to do. But the general body of ratepayers will probably kick if it is selfishly proposed to viațimise them on behalf of a specially interested section.
There was some hard swearing before Mr. J. B. Wood at the Magistracy on Ang. 22nd when Bhum Chung was charged by Inspector Robert- son with snatching a gold ear pick from a Chinese woman. Complainant was proceeding along Des Voux Road West in a ricksha when defendant ran behind the vehicle, lifted up the hood, removed the ear pick from the woman's head and ran away. His action, however, was observed by four persons, and two of them, students, pursued him. When the thief found his pursuers gaining on him he climbed under a wharf. hoping to escape detection. But the students discovered him, and assisted by a ricksha coolie, succeeded in landing him on the top of the wharf and handing him over to the police. When Inspector Robertson took the charge against him the defendant said he was awei, too, and there have come to my knowledge diver, but he denied having made this statement in Court. He also swore that the evidence of the four who bore witness against him was untrue, and asked permission to call a witness on his behalf. This was granted and in police custody defendant was escorted to Queen's Road. There, he pointed out the man he wanted to call, and the latter was taken up to the Court. De fendant then told His Worship that the police had brought the wrong man, and asked permis sion to call someone else. When a second witness was called the police were again accused of supplying the wrong man, and Inspector Robertson informed the Court that defendant
was only wasting his Worship's time. His Worship sentenced the defendant to six months' imprisonment with hard labour and two whip pings of twelve strokes each.
THE CANTON-HANKOW RAILWAY.
It is satisfactory to learn that, in contradis- tinction to the fends which have delayed work
on the southern end of the Canton-Hankow Railway, peace and harmony reign over the construction preliminaries on the northern section. The work for 148 miles from Wachang is in charge of Mr. G. Moore, Engineer-in Chief of the Hankow Waterworks, and the ceremony of turning the first sod will be performed by Viceroy Chên Kuei-lung in October. The railway property at Wuchang is on the river and will afford excellent wharfages The problem of communication between the two sections of China's grand trunk line from Peking to Canton has not yet been solved. By no means the most unlikely solution is a tunnel under the Yangtze, which is about a mile wide at this point, but lends itself to a workable gradient-N.-C. Daily News,
Viceroy Chu Shi-obong has applied to the Throne for permission to increase the strength of the new army of Manchuria by another 50,000 men,
WEI HAI-WEI BRITISH POST OFFICE, There is a British Postal Agency at Wei-hai-
(August 81, 1908.
California, U.S.A. It bore the address of the sender, a foreigner in Weihsien, Shantung. How it ever came to be delivered in Tientsin I do not know. One would suppose that from Weihaien it would have been sent to one of the soast ports and thence to Shanghai to be con- veyed to a merios. But Tientsin is clearly off the route between Shantong and Californis, This letter had been posted at the Chinesa Post Office, so that the bungling is not conflued to the British Post Office.
certain curiona facts regarding the working of the correspondence of that port. A Tientsin resident went there for a boliday with his wife, who was an invalid. While there they had letters, papers, etc., forwarded from Tientsin. In one base B letter
took no
August 10.
THE TIENTSIN BRITISH POST OFFICE,
I have just obtained the latest intelligence with regard to the proposed closing of the British Postal Agency in Tientsin. It had been antiai. would be made for making good the deficit pated that fresh and satisfactory arrangements
as required by the Hongkong Postsmaster. General. I now learn that, though prolonged negotiations have taken place with this in view, the attempt to obtain a fresh subsidy locally has been unsuccessful. As I have previously mentioned, last year's decision of the two British Municipal Councila to contribute a sum of $7,500 out of the rates evoked much unfavour- able comment, and the Municipal fathers, much as they like cut-and-dried schemes, and little as they consult the general body of ratepayars and electors, have this year hesitated to repeat their When financial undertaking of last year. therefore, their guarantee of the deficit expires, on Oct. 10 next, the British Post Office in Tientsin will be finally closed, and Tientsin will lose the advantages of the British penny post and will bave to revert to the old 2jd. rate. This will result in the advantage of the Imperial Post Office,
fewer than 23 days in reaching ita destination, though ordinarily the time occupied should not exceed 48 hours. The postmarks on the envelope showed that the fetter had been on a oironlar tour via Hongkon The same gentleman left his wife at Weihaiwei and returned to Tientsin. Before he left he wrote a letter to Tientsin. This was posted two days before his own departure, but was not delivered to the addressee till two days after he had arrived in Tientsin, so that it would have been far quicker had he kept his letter in his pooket till he got to Tientsin and then sent it by chit.
Again, while be was still at Weihaiwei, some letters from England arrived by Siberian mail at his Tientsin
residence, and were forwarded to him at the Wei-
It is to be noted that the French and German Communities in Tientsin manage to maintain their own national post offices without the slightest hint being made of any proposal for their discontinuance, At the moment I
cannot say whether either of them is ran at a loss, though I should think it probable in both cases, sincs both the French and German Communities in Tientsin are smaller than the British. But whether this be actually the case or not, for patriotic reasons they are kept up without marmar or protest of any kind.
Τι may interest Hongkong readers and others residing on the old mail rute to know that it is the heavy losses by the transit of letters over the Siberian Railway and by other routes that have caused the Tientsin Office to be closed.
NOTES FROM: THE NORTH.
[FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT.]
PAKING, August 6.
HE, YUAN SHId KAL. When last year H.E. Yuan Shih Kai was transferred from the Viceroyalty of Chihli to Peking, there to become a Grand Councillor and President of the Waiwupu, he did not disguise his personal unwillingness to leave Tientsin for the capital. It was promotion in dignity only; in other respects it was an Irishman's rise. "An enemy bath-done this thing,” he might well have said: except that the singular number would not have been correct—' mine enemies have done it" would bave hit the mark,
For months H.E. Yuan tried to get sent
haiwei Hotel. When they arrived he had back to Tientsin, but in vain. He himself left for Tientsin, so his wife placed them (five (and all his many friends in Tientsin) back to Tientsin. So far they have not reached to in number) in one envelope, and posted them hoped that ultimately he woull be permitted retura, But it was not to be. the addressee, who has in the meantime received Last week an Imperial Ediot
was issued several other letters from his wife in which appointing H.E. Yang (formerly Governor reference is made to these home letters duly of Suantung)-who subceeded H.E. Yuan as despatched but not yet delivered. Possibly the Acting Viceroy of Chihli-to be substantive Hongkong, Singapore, and other ports where for granted that Tientsin will not get back its five letters may yet turn up after visiting or permanent Viceroy, so that it may be taken
It is obvious, however, that, whether the fault in the political intrigues of the capital. there are British postal agencies and offices. old Viceroy, who is now permanently involved
be at Weibsiwei or elsewhere, arrangements which permit of such delayed delivery as that I have indicated-a d there are also instances of absolute non-delivery-are deplorable, and should be remedied in the interest of Britain's good name if not in the interest of those using the British post office in the Far East.
Another curious case came within my personal knowledge. A letter was delivered in Tientsin addressed to a correspondent at Oakland,
A DIFFICULT TASK,
admirers among the foreign residents in the H.E. Yuan has naturally many ardent
North and now that he seems to be intended to spend the rest of his offlci l'career in Peking, they all hope to see him fulfill the expectations formed of him since he came to the front as China's strongest statesman. It must be confessed, how. ever, that some of his strongest friends regard his position with some misgiving. His tank as
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