The reports from Honan are very instructive. It is a number of years since the political school now represented by the Anfu Club took into its mind the pi: ig of a certain game of chess in which Tuchuns and other officials would be pieces and pawns and the provinces would be the chequerboard. Checkmate would be to them possession of the Yangtze provinces, so it was a game demanding deep cogitation, so much so that they have hesitated much over the opening move. But at length, if the panic in Honan is justified—and it seems to be—the scheme of play has been resolved
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.