July 14.
Is it indeed to be the débdcle of Anfu? Truly it would seem so. Foreign correspondents in Peking agree that the Anfu troops refuse to fight against him, that Chinese bankers refuse the money to bribe them and that Big Tuan and Little Hsu are in very desperate plight. There is a disposition among some to think that the foreign correspondents in Peking) are too strongly ''anti-Anfu'', that they see things only from the narrow. angle of the capital and are insensible to broad considerations. But that, even if true, does not detract from the impor: tance of their messages. It adds to it. 1t means that the prevailing tone of the capital is anti-Anfu, as indeed there seems good reason to believe it is. To the Chinese public of Peking the Anfa Club means savage repression, the imprisonment, untried for long weeks, of students, the! squandering of n"tional resources, Above all it means Japanese military domination, Japanese penetration. It is hardly possible that the soldiers should be unaffected by these currents of feeling. What love are they likely to have' for a Government whose treasurer is always in arrears with their pay? And now that those _arrears have suddenly been made good, may not the soldiers ask themselves the reason for this) deathbed repentance, and whether it is not merely a bribe to induce them to fight against men with whom they have no quarrel for officials who, once assured of, power, would cheat them of their} pay as gaily, as ever?
A conspicuous feature of this crisis is the absence of any popular or provincial divisions. It was specially noted by foreign visitors to Wongdu and Quinsan on Monday, that the soldiers were apathetie, devoid of all animus one way or the other. No doubt if one side had tired, the other would have fired back: that is merely human, particularly soldier, nature. But the people as a whole and even the troops appear to have no part in the quarrel as against any other section of the people or army. This is a great' asset and a great opportunity. If Anfu troops refuse to fight Chibli troops, it ought not to be difficult to prevent them from looting Peking, evidently the great fear of the moment. Further, it means that the nation is making a united call to the opponents of Anfu te
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.