Reuter's telegram of an attack on the German marines put an interrogation into everyone's mouth, for we had no knowledge of such an affair, Gradually the facts have come to light. On the night of the " feast of lanterns" some of these marines went sightseeing in jinricsha into the densely crowded streets, Had they gone on foot and accompanied by some one who spoke Chinese, possibly they would have met only the ordinary jostling of such a crowd: even the Chinese sometimes get hurt' in these jams. In the ricshas, blocking the street and intensifying the jam, they were special targets for the natural ill-feeling produced by the new and unnatural conditions. Hed the same or similar conditions occurred in any large Western city, the probabilities are that the same or similar results would have followed. The fact is the marines were where they had no business to be; they unwisely placed themselves in circumstances to invite what befell them, and have no one to blame but themselves. For the German Government to seek redress, and demand that the culprits in such a crowd be sought out and punished will be like "hunting a needle in a haystack it will be most unwise and only tend to increase the anti-foreign feeling which already exists in so many places, and which we should do all in our power to allay.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.