20th April. Dwexzers in China outside the charmed circle of the Capital often wonder what the great men at Peking and the smaller men in their trains do with themselves in the winter months. Those who lead the active life of the ports where business goes on all the year round, with only the little interruptions made by China New Year, Christmas, and the Races, can hardly understand an existence that sinks into inactivity for three months in every year. We know that our foreign fellow-creatures, for though above us they are still our fellow-creatures, at Peking, though they may metaphorically hybernate, do not actually shut themselves up in their rooms and sleep through the cold quarter of the year; they receive mails and despatch them, and then, as far as. we generally know, devote the rest of the time to theatricals and dancing, The reverse of the proverbial butterfly's existence is theirs; she perished miserably in the winter because she had danced in the sun all the summer, The Peking people work more or less in the summer and devote the winter to reading news papers and amusing each other.
jat there are two people in Peking to whom the winter brings no such relaxation, but rather a time of serious consideration and planning, whose results burst over China when the first steamers come shivering back from the Taku Bar, The British Minister and the Inspector-General of Customs have fall employment for the winter in composing the far-reaching annual explosive known as the "Spring Removes." In every port of China a kind fate has placed at least two gentlemen who, like the parson and the squire in English parishes, are supposed to form nuclei of culture and refinement to which the society of the port looks up, these being the British Consul and the Commissioner of Customs, There is a healthy rivalry between them because while one has the prestige of representing his sovereign, the other is as a rule better paid; the-one meets the Taotai as an equal and occasionally bullies him, the other is supposed to regard the Taotai as his superior officer and advises him how best to disregard the Consul's bullying. Both of them are autocrats. in their own sphere, and both as a rule do their best to make their fellow-residents comfortable, and are comfortable enough themselves, except towards the close of winter, when thoughts unbidden rise of the Spring Removes. In them the British Minister has much less to do than the Inspector-General, and he has only two principles to bear in mind; one. is never to leave a Consul
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.