Murder of an Officer of Governor's Crack Troops From Our Own Correspondent, Kueiteh, Ho., Dec. 16.
Under the care of our new military lords and masters, this eastern part of Honan is rapidly following the rest of the province in coming under the control of bandits. Ucheng, 20 Ni north of the Lunghai Railway, was surrounded, but the rumours of its fall were not confirmed and troops have gone out from here to lend a hand. This morning we heard on good authority that a band of robbers, 500 to 6UO strong, are operating near Hsiaopa, the next station west on the railway.
The factory for manufacturing brigands—the good old Chinese army—is still working overtime on its job. On Thursday evening, a company stationed at the Kueiteh railway station mutinied and killed their officer. They looted a little, fired off a great many shots and then cleared off to join their robber friends. Bang goes another 100 good government rifles to add to this unfortunate province's scourge. These soldiers were of the 24th Division, Chang Fw-lai's own. It appears that the officer thought that he could discipline some of his men who had been a little more outrageous than usual, but found out that he was mistaken, Our magistrate, Mr. Hsu, is as energetic as ever and the brigands will have to get up very early in the morning to catch him napping, but having to be continually on guard against soldiers as well as robbers makes his position very difficult. He has fitted up a large temple outside the west gate to be used as an industrial works for the poor. It is now eminently suited for such work, with good glass doors and windows, but it is doubtful whether work will actually be: started or not, for this military plague is as a blight upon all works of this nature. One is tempted to write bitterly of the condition of things, but what is the use?
The anti-foot-binding campaign has ceased, of course, but the three missions here are still running their girls' schools, although some girls have preferred to stop attending rather than run the risk of insult on the streets from our protectors, the undersized youths in soldiers' clothes. One of these schools has an attendance of, over 50, but the others are smaller, having 20 to 30 pupils each. One often thinks, when looking at the bright and eager faces of some of these children, what a blunder China kas made in deliberately keeping her girls illiterate.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.