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The death is announced of Mr. Edwards, chief superintendent of the Peking Syndicate in Honan. Mr. Edwards is reported to have taken his own life on Sunday week by shooting himself. It is believed that the tragic deed was the result of his sufferings under the heat.
H. E. the Governor of Macao, Senhor Rocadas, who has been appointed to the Governorship of Angola (Africa), was expected to leave Macao about the middle of the month, but has now been instructed to await the arrival of his successor. It is not yet known who the next Governor will be.
Many of the European contractors who have come to China, with the view to securing naval contracts, are leaving Peking one after the other, says the Peking Daily News, The Imperial Government has not yet made any decision as regards the navy and will not until
financial matters are sottled.
A meeting of Ratepayers of the German Concession at Hankow authorized the Munici pal Council to raise a 7 per cent. loan of Tls. 75,00. Tis 30,000, in debentures of Tls. 100, will be issued shortly. Redemption does not com- mence before 30th Juue, 1914, and the loan is to be completely paid off by 30th June, 1934.
A Vladivostok telegram states that it is expected that about 1,500 persons will go there from Japan to attend the horse races to be held between September 6 and 19. About 82 horses from Japan have been entered for the meeting. The event is arousing much enthusiasm among the Vladivostok public.
The revised law for physicians in Japan, which was passed at the last session of the Diet, was issued in the Official Gazette for July 19. The chief point of the law is that physicians are not allowed to advertise in any way whatever their medical ability, methods of treating patients, or their past career. If they violate the law, they will be punished with fines ranging up to 100 yen. The law also applies to dentists.
Plans for the celebration of the 300tli anniversary of the introduction of the art of printing into the Philippine Islands are now under way.
At nine o'clock this morning, says the Cablenews of the 1st inst., at the committee rooms of the Philippine Assembly, a meeting of those interested in the event will be held to decide upon the manner in which the celebration shall be held.
A report states that Mr. J. H. Mackintosh, of the firm of Mackintosh & Co. of Shanghai, is endeavouring to secure capital in Eugland for a company in China, the China and Great Western Silk Manufacturing Company, Ltd. Half the capital of £1.000,0 has been already promised by Chinese. The Directors in China are:-His Excellency Sheng Tan-Ho, H.E. Chu Pao-san (chairman of directors), and Messrs. Yang Sing-tse, Chang Tse-ying and Ting-Chia-hou. Mr. Mackintosh will be the
managing director.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
Mr. J. Mears, Inspector of Police at Kiu- kiang, was arrested on Saturday at Kulinz, and brought last Monday before Mr. G. T. C. Werner. H. B. M. Consul at Kiukiang. Mr. Wm. S. Fleming, attorney and counsellor at law. Shang hai, prosecuted on behalf of the Chinese authori- ties. The accused was remanded till the 7th August. Mr. Francis Ellis. of Ellis and Hays,
solicitors, Shanghai, will defend Mr. Mears. The charge is connected with the death of a Chinese coolie several months ago. Mr. H. P. Wilkinson, the Crown Advocate, visited Kin. kiang in connection with the case some time ago, but apparently he did not think there was sufficient ground for prosecution.
Northern newspapers report many deaths from heat apoplexy. The heat in the shade at Tien- tsin has reached 107 degrees Fahrenheit, and in Peking 115 degrees has been registered. At Peking on July 24 three Europeans at the Hotel du Nord were completely prostrated and did not recover until the evening. A great shock was caused the foreign community of Tientsin ou Sunday week by the death of the Rev. Pere du Cray, SJ., from heat stroke, and on the same evening Sgt. J. Aldridge, of the Army Service Corps, died in the British Settlement, Tientsin. from the same cause. Altogether fifteen deaths occurred in Tientsin that day, all of which were due to the intense heat. The previous Friday snow fell on the summit of Mount Fuji in Japan.
Mr.
Cameron Forbes, Acting Governor- General of the Philippine Islands, has announc ed that the stockholders of the Manila Uailroad Company, at a recent meeting in London, agreed to accept the franchise for the extension of the Manila Railroad Company's system in the Island of Luzon, retiring their bonds and accepting a guarantee by the insular government of four per cent. per annum on the invested capital conditional on the extension of the line into Albay, into the summer capital, and along the new docks in the city of Manila.
ì
Reports from Chemulpo state that on July 26th Mr. Wada, Director of the Chemulpo Meteorological Observatory, collected a number of relies of the stone age in the grounds of his official house at Hakkeiyen after digging for two hours only. It appears that after the establishment of the observatory on the top of Eungponghyon hill in 1902 he came to the conclusion that the place was a shell-mound from the shells which had frequently been found at the top, notwithstanding that it was about 230 feet above the sea-level. He has since been making occasional observations, and, being convinced in his idea, has made the experimental excavation as above said. The relics discovered
consisted of axes, arrowheads and swords all made of stone, besides a number of fragments of
euthenware.
|
THE FRENCH
[August 16, 1909.
AVY.
(Daily Press, August 7th.) Since the selection of the new French Ministry the telegrams have been silent on the political situation in France. The resig- nation of M. CLEMENCEAU can hardly fail to strike home to every Englishman who has at heart the interests of his country, and is strangely associated with our recent neglect of the defences of the country. It IR not for us to pass judgment on M. CLEMENCEAU, who lid so much towards building up the Alliance between France and England, but it is not be forgotten that the main instrument in his fall was DELCASSE; and it was mainly through the exertions of the latter that the Franco- English Alliance, which to the older genera- tion of statesmen in both countries had seemed a pure contradiction in terms, had been shown to be both advisable and natural or both. Without, then, iu any way inter- (fering in French home politics, we cau according to our immediate point of view, qually sympathise with either side in the d scussion which led to M. CLEMENCEAU'S enforced resiguation. It is no source of Mr. Werner, the British Consul at Kiukiang.
satisfaction to us to note how on many writes in his annual report the following occasions lately France has had to submit, interest note with regard to the import of matches in the district: -- At first sight it seems
without the power of retaliation, to snubs strange that the natives should pay 10.000 per pat upon her by her continental neigh- annum instead of making for themselves anbours, and it is now only too evident article of so apparently simple a character. | that rumours of the unpreparedness of The sine qui non of successful match-France, especially with regard to the condi- manufacture is a good wood, neither sappy.
tion of her Navy, were really at the bottom kuotty nor cross-grained. Nothing but the
of these ungenerous allusions. It is not choice portions of choice trees go to the match machine. Scraps are never used in making easy to account for the course of events that has resulted in France-once second in the world as a Naval Power, and in respect to the scientific attainments of her officers, and the general preparedness of her ships in many respects the first-sinking, now she hardly counts as a bad fourth, and, in respect to her immediate prepared. ness, is almost at the bottom of the scale. In the old halcyon days of the French Navy it was practically an appaaage of the pri vileged classes, and even through all the levelling tendencies of the Revolution, they still contrived to preserv› its aristocratic
natches. Matches are manufactured in many ways and with various kinds of machines, the processes also varying in different factories, and often being secret to prevent their adoption by rivals. Some matches are shaved with the grain from sawed blocks, others cut both ways by saws. In some factories the blocks are boiled to make them cut easily, or a boiled or seamed log is revolved on its own axis, and a shaving the thickness of a match ent round and round. This shaving is at the same tinë eut into lengths and split into match-sticks. The Chinese have not as yet possessed themselves of the necessary machinery, and suitable timber is not found in many districts, so that this industry has not become established.
A very large crowd assembled at the Kin Lee Yuen Wharf, Shanghai, to welcome Viceroy Chang Jen Chun on his arrival last Tuesday A handsome awning had been erected and an escort of cavalry and a brass band were in attendance. As the ship passed the Clio and the French man-of-war it was greeted by the
tone.
till
Even up to the time of the Second Empire the Navy had retained i's old aris. tocratic traditions, and it was only with the Third Republic that the bourgeoisie ele- ment commenced to affect the old conditions. Smehow these new-fangled ideas did not coalesce with the uld; the new officers had not the same feeling of esprit, the discipline playing of several lively airs, followed by the of the ships fell off; mercenary motives Chinese national anthem and the national stood in the way of efficiency, the higher anthems of Great Britain and France. The officers, finding their requisitions unattended ship came alongside promptly, and there was at t, gradually grew careless; and the younger first a great rush of waiting officials to god scovering that zeal did not conduce to aboard, but the Viceroy sent word that he would promotion, left the work of the ship to the receive all guests at the Bureau of Foreign Affairs, seeing only the three or four foreigners petty officers, so that the ol l-time sympathy who were on the wharf to receive him. He between officers and crew gradually gave quickly lauded and was taken away in a carriageway; and men and officers formed in Preceded by a Chinese cavalry escort and several mounted French police as far as the Yang-king pang bridge, from which point Municipal Sikh troopers under Sergeants Spottiswoode and MacSweeney, led the long procession to the Bureau of Foreign Affairs on Bubbling Well Road. His Excellency expected to remain in Shanghai two or three days and proceed to Nanking by rail, his wife and family on the Heinming proceeding to Nanking. large number of Chinese officials and mer.
A very
chants called од the Viceroy in the afternoon and the street in front of the Hureau of Foreign Affairs was crowded wi carriages. H. E. Yuan Shu Hsun, the new Viceroy of Canton, was expected to arrive at Shanghai from Tsingtao on Sunday and proceed direct to Nanking, where His Excellency will meet Viceroy Chang Jen Chan, after which H E. will return to Shanghai to embark for his new post.
the ship two separate orders, each with its independent instincts and in- terests; and with no common esprit de corps. Another thing that has worked badly in the French Navy is the want of any tangible system of compulsory retirement, so that ufter any long period of inaction the various offices are found to be occupied by men already grown old, and often incapable of performing the more active part of their duties. Iucapacity or indifference is the natural result, and a condition arises which, combited with the other, has certainly iuterfered with the mo'i iy of the Fleet.
But what in a comparatively small way has acted detrimentally on the actual execu tive of the Flee', has also been assisted in the higher branches of control by somewhat similar disabilities. If the Fleet have
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