3rd December.
The Special Commissioner, Rich Liang, yesterday. inspected the remainder of the departments in: the Arsenal which ho had not seen on his previous visits, and then drove over to inspect the smokeless-powder works, near the Lunghua Pagoda. Yesterday afternoon his Excellency relaxed somewhat the policy of seclusiveness' kept by him and his suite since arrival from the North, by ing a few calls from prominent mandarins, and also opened. his. doors to receive their Excellencies Li Hai-huan, President of the Board of Works' and Treaty Commissioner, and Wu Chung-hsi, Vice Director-General of Government Telegraphs, but refused to give audience to such officials as General Yang, Proial Commander-in-Chief of Kiangsu, couple of other Generals, the Shanghai: and Several other expectant Taotais.
The General Interchange of posts among the high' provincial authorities of Kiangsu, Fukien and Shi tung, as may be soon by the Imper decrees published in this column this morning, is said to have been due to the constant denunciations made by metropol-Jitan censors against the officials concerned, for no other apparent reason than the old, old story of " asked you to help me (financially) but you wouldn't; and so there you are." To put a stop to those pinpricks, the powers that behave resorted to this method—an old one—of shuffling the official cards. The rumour given out in some papers that their Excellencies Teén Chun-hsien, Viceroy of Kuangtung and Kuangsi provinces, and Hsi Liang, Viceroy.of Szechuan, are to exchange posts'is not credited in local mandarin circles.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.