Yang Ch'ang-chun, degraded but retained in office xs Viceroy of the Shen-Kan provinces, reports in a posteript memorial that he has received petitions from the Provincial Treasurer of Kansu to the effect that owing to the Mahommedan rebellion in the sub-prefectures' and districts of Hoiinhua, Hochou, and Haicheng, asto the poppy crop for the extraction of opium in those districts and the adjoining ones, in fact, where-r the foot of the Mussulman rebel reached, the cultivators of the rug were one and all unable to gather in the results of their plantations owing to mas-sacros, flight, ete. The districts and subprefectures that suffered in this way number twenty-two in all; but as no harvest was gathered nor can' the majority of the Cultivators be at present found, it naturally follows that the tax collectors have not been able to collect a single cash for the "Treasury this year, The excise on poppy cultivation is one mace (thirteen dollar cents) per inw in the valleys and plains and six candareens (about eight cents and a-half) for ench mow of billiand. In view of the above state of affairs and the sent unsettled condition of the country, memorialist would therefor recommend that the prayer of both the Treasurer and Fudge of the province to absolve the people from paying their poppy taxes this year be granted as a special act of grace.—Reseript: Granted.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.