The camps are full of soldiers, and the drill, at any rate as far_as a civ can judge, is very good. But in some of the camps outside the city discipline is relaxed, officers and men spend their nights on the streets, and opium smokers common. But in the engineers' camp and in some others in the city the rules are still very strict and there is not single opium smoker in the ranks. this seems to show that under prop foreign direction an efficient Chine army could easily be maintained, b under ordinary Chinese control the tree soon degenerate, a state of things few people in China will wonder at. There are, of course, a few honest, patriotic and capable Chinese officers, but there are only a few.
20th March.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.