ce. Ther mometer!
North East rr blue sky: ©. clouds; f fog; THE news that we published in this morning's issue of the " North-China Daily News," that the home Govyernments have decided to patch up the trouble in the North, not to enter into any serious conflict with the present Government of China, but merely to use force enough to protect foreigners in China and repress disturbances, seems to indicate such extraordinary weakness that it has been received, and naturally so, with general incredulity. No more soldiers are to be landed in China, the protection and repression being left in the hands of the naval officers now marching on Peking and the bluejackets and marines under their command; and the reparation to be made by China for the destruction of foreign lives and property is to be settled diplomatically at home.
It is not possible that Sir Claude Macdonald had any idea that this was the turn affairs would take when he telegraphed his manifesto for publication the other day. His statements, which we all know to be true, that the Boxer movement is anti-foreign, and is encouraged by the Throne which does not show any intention to summarily suppress the Boxers was equivalent to a declaration of hostilities. Now comes, on authority which we cannot but' regard as credible, the news that all this is to be smoothed over.
Apologies will be made and an indemnity promised, the dead missionaries, engineers, and ladies will be buried, and neat crosses crected over their remains, the railways will be restored and the stations rebuilt, the survivors of that terrible march from Paotingfu to Tientsin will be sent home with a small solatium, their whole future lives affected by the sufferings they have undergone, and everything will go on
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.