The rice and other food stuts provided by now Been all brought up so far, The pres-the government to meet the distress, have
sure on the steamers is accordingly at an end. It is not expected that any extra steamers will be up again, while the usual ones will get back to their ordinary runs and be free to carry cargo. Nothing but rice has been brought up for a month and more—one hundred and twenty thousand _piculs have been sent in all. But a considerable quantity of it is still here, as there is difficulty in getting it up the river. A great number of beals are lying in the river loaded, but trackers can scarcely be got. The Governmentis chartering all who can be got for rice transport, but the supply is insufficient. Outside people like the cargo hongs and passenger boats simply cannot move. Several boats that managed to get away had their trackers sent back again from Pingshanpa or above it by official orders. A missionary friend who is here just now with a party going West is having great difficulty in the same way. "His boatman has had men and the "w-pan" or small oat, engaged two or three times over, but the men have left him or been taken away again. The price demanded too, by trackers is almost twice what it was three months ago. "tine more one hears of the state of things above here during the last three months, the more one realises how severe has been the distress. A friend who came down the other day from Eastern Szechuan, after a journey both by road and river, tells me that before getting to Wanhsien, he saw a great number of dead bodies, At one town he passed, he was told that about half the population had died—at another (Kaihsien) that thirty or forty burials were taking place daily of people who had died of star vation or disease occasioned by famine. Evidently the relief provided has come none too soon.
The latest news is that the Viceroy has changed the Asien official here. The present one seems to have been too slack over matters in connection with sending up this relief or at least has not shown zeal enough to please the folks below. He only came last summer, to take the place of another man also superseded for some offence.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.