Tae Ohina Mail publishes a piece of information from native sources which indicates the possibility of future serious trouble in Canton. The secret societies of China have not been heard of now for a considerable time. That they wore extinct nobody of course with any knowledge of Chinese history will have believed, but the general impression seems to have been that they were settling down into a condition of harmless inactivity, devoted to no more than the harmless mummery which asia fact the only element in their constitution that kept them alive at all. The Jargest and most formidable of them, however, appears to have recently started into fresh life. We are iuformed by our Hongkong contemporary that the members of the 'l'riad Association have been very active lately, and that for a considerable time past they have been meditating an attack upon the city of Kowloon. " About a month ago," says the Mail, "a bold and successful armed attack was made at night on a house of a wealthy Chinaman near Kwong-shing, nnd a great amount of booty decamped with. The affair was reported to the authorities, who at once despatched a body of troops to arrest (he ringleaders and bring them to justice. Instead of the marauders being cowed by this demonstration of authority, they summoned their fall strength and fought the sol-diary. Hight soldiers.and six members of the Society are said to have been killed in the encounter, and a great many wounded. This showa that the Society is becoming too powerfal, and will require a very effective check, a it has already assumed a very menacing attitude." "The premeditated attack upon Kowloon is attributed by the Hongkong paper to a desire for ven-glance, and we are further informed, though with reserve, that a considerable quantity of arms has been purchased by the agents of the Society in Hongkong. All this of course is serious enough as far as the condition of the provincial cities is concerned. It is however difficult to conceive what the policy enn be which actuated the Society in question, The Government is credited with much uneasiness on the score of these associations, and the gloomy forebodings consequent on the appearance of the comet are not likely to be allayed by the latest exhibition of restlessness on the part of a Society it has always dreaded. But the reigning dynasty has little to fear from nuy organisation which from sheer mischief or robber-instincts makes wanton war on private property. No national policy can nctuate the leaders of a predutury band, however complete may be its coustitutiou; nor could any such leaders exorcise an influence upon the populations of China menacing to the reigning dynasty. They represent no cause which the people have at heart, and are looked upon simply as purposeless marauders, in the suppression of whom the people have an equal interest with the Government, As long as they enjoy tolerably just and able admin. istration—one cannot reasonably expect more in China—an immunity from national disasters, and timely aid in case of floods or famine, the Chinese will never rise against their ralers. If any catastrophe were to occur, sufficient to shake the Throne, it would not come from the lawless bands which give such trouble to the authorities. It is far likelier that in such an improbable event as a change of dynasty the revolution would be effected a3 a matter of state policy, forced upon some high officer of Chinese Tineage, and that the great body of the Empire would remain tranquil and unmoved while it was going on.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.