to settle, owing to the hostility everywhere against the French, that in many parts of the province there were English and American and they, the officials, had no trouble with them, but that wherever there was a Roman Catholic station they had constant, worry and trouble. From Yunnan comes a report that a priest insulted a high official, the Zitai (Provincial Commander in Chief), that the soldiers resented the affront, and that Yunnan is on the point of rebellion. True, many of these stories afloat are manufactured to stir up hatred against foreigners in general and the French in particular, yet where there is so much smoke there must be a fire somewhere.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.