To the Editor of the "Norrs-Cuina Datty News."
Sir,—How can one express his sympathy for the residents. of Shanghai who find it difficult. to live on Tls. 450 a month. Especially that poor tried one who signs himself a H. C. L. sufferer in your issue of June 19. It must be very hard indeed for him and his wife and two children only spending Tls. 150 a month on food and drink and Scott's Emulsion. Could you by any means find room in your columns for "John Kendall's poem on "The Simple Life?" It seems to express better than anything else one can think of, the. sentiments of those who desire to live "the simple life" in Shanghai I ask not wealth or high estate, The burden of too large a board, The constant strain of being great Would only make ing bored.
Moro houses than a man can use Were almost more than none at all; And quite the last that I should choose Would bg a Gilded Hall.
(A few nice rooms—just here a book, And there a picture—decent wine, Good carpets, and a cultured cook, And I should not repine.)
My tiny coach-house might contain For night a brougham, for day a cart; I should not mind their being plain As long as they were smart.
Of horses, both to ride and drive, Three at the utmost ought to do; And, at a pinch, one might contrive To get along with two, (The hovel on a "rising plat" Bosomed in trees, but not too dark, I like a bracing air. The flat Should overlook the Park.)
L have no love of crude excess To ona that only lives for show, The income I would fain possess Would sound absurdly low.
The theatre I find a source Of pleasure; music serves to fill The yawning soul; and then, of course, thas a tailor's bill.
Not that I care for fine array: Five suits are just as good as ten To me; but one would hike to pay The creature now and then.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.