Peking, Jane 6.
Anybody who was in Peking at the time of the spring war of 1922, when Wu Pei-fa and Chang Tso-lin were battling within ten miles of the capital, will sympathize with the demand of the police here for their pay, arrears and all. It is not usual to notice the police until danger is in the air, just as Tommy Atkins, according' to Radyard Kiping, is appreciated only when we have something very urgent for him to do; and in Peking we are little different from the general run of people in this respect. Even old hands were amazed at the excellent moral of the Peking police during those disturbing times in 1922, when we whose lot it was to stay in the capital were in no little danger from the scattered army of Manchurian soldiery who were routed almost within sight of the city wall. When it was all over we played the band for the local policeman, and the strains should still be in our ears fas we listen to the tale of his impoverishment.
The House Tax.
Like the teachers and the civil servants in the capital, the policeman has been without pay for several months, and the problem has become so' acute that the authorities, in view of the necessity of keeping him in good humour, have proposed the levying of a tax on the Peking people with which to dis charge their obligations to him. was at first called a police tax and under that name received the approval of the Cabinet. But a hue and ery had been brewing the Pekingese, and the nai hastily changed to "house tax" when it seemed evident that there was to bbe some opposition to the impost. Even the new name did not prevent the storm from breaking. It was a dog all the same. indignation meetings were called, and all sorts of organizations, the most vociferous, of which was Parliament, protested Against any farther levy on the people.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.