To tha Editor of the "Nowra-Cuisa Dany News,"
61n,—In your correspondence column of the 93rd instant the terms "astute" (shrewd, subtle, cunning) and the diametically opposite term "guileless" were both used in one breath of the Viceroy of the Hukuang provinces, by a highly respected missionary who has had opportunities for studying the anomalies of the Chinese character for, I am informed, over forty vats. And whether the terms were used advisedly or not, they do seem to sum up the impressions produced, perhaps in the majority of foreign minds, by the attitude of the dignitary in question. It is bitter-sweet. Some imagine that these elements may coexist all the time others that they alternate like the hot and cold stages of an ague, or like the con-tresting characters Jekyll and Hyde.
On the alternation theory, Hyde must have been predominant during the anti-Foreign outrages of 91, and Jekyll seems to have come to the front this July, saying "Man man tsou" (Don't hurry away, we're just beginning to like you) to most of the Foreigners in his jurisdiction. Then Hyde appeared in the anti-Christian proclamation of August the 7th, and outrages on the property, if not the persons, of foreigners resulted. Then Jekyll tore them down and issued a guileless disclaimer on August the Lith.
Then, on the very day, apparently, when the above letter was printed in Shanghai, "some thirty of the Reform party were arrested in Wuchimg and two beheaded." Will the next more be an invitation to the wives of the Consuls to be kissed in Wuchang, by His Excellency's wife? It might be good policy to issue such an invitation, and perfectly so considering that the ladies have lori nce been withdrawn from central China, owing to the insecurity of lifo and limb there. Besides it is customary, after beheading Reformers, to be specially polite to the wives of foreign officials, lest they should imagine that the sword reeking to-day with the blood of enlightened Chinese is being sharpened behind the scene for the necks of foreigners themselves when opportunity presents itself!
Jekyll is guileless; Hyde is astute; may not the Viceroy himself be astutely guileless? And should not foreigners, 60 deficient in astuteness, mingle a little robust caution with the guilelessness that Hung-chang, on leaving England, pointed out as a' predominant characteris-tie of at least the British T am, ete., Mth August.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.