Taking up his journey again in the Vale of Gold Scekers, the traveller pursuing his way round the territorial boundary passes through two exceptionally clean villages called Changkiajwong and Yukia~ wong, the latter being divided by the curve of the river or gully into Biyukiawong and Banyukiajwong. It was from these villages-that the natives, a fairly prosperous lot, set forth to remove the boundary stones as fast as the boundary commissioners moved on. And it is not surprising that they did so when one considers an ancient custom which prevails amongst the native Shantungese; namely their method of acquiring a building site when about to contemplate matrimony of the Celestial type. This consists in placing stones in a pile at each corner of the ground they. wish to appropriate, in preference that belonging to some near relative being selected. If these stones are left standing for a certain time without remonstrance, a right is established to such building plot free of cost at merely nominal rent. There fore, seeing the foreigner adopting their own custom, they gave expression to their remonstrance by removing the stones, and thereby doing away with any theory of freehold right on the part of the foreign officials. This slight occurrence is one of many instances of bad judgment on the part of the administrative apprentices doing duty at Weihaiwei.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.