The bombshell which General Li Shun has cast into our midst by ordering the arrest of General Wang I-tang sets one guessing as Without implying any intentional inaccuracy on the Tuchun's part, the charges that he brings against General Wang of leaguing himself with bandits to foment. trouble, may mean everything or nothing. It seems hardly possible that General Wang, from the quiet retreat of a British subjects house in Shanghai, should have "played it so low down" on his host as to organize such a plot. Yet the precise enumeration of persons and places involved in the Tuchun's order is a little staggering. It is noticeable that lo mentions Chekiang: and Anhui as provinces on which, with Kiangsu, General Wang is supposed to have fell designs; thereby, in anticipation, disarming any indignation Which ight be telt by tne Anfu chieftains of the two provinces named at this onslaught on a pillar of Antu., Wnat one"cannot but feel is this. 1f the Tuchun of Nanking has conclusive evidence that General Wang L-tang is havching a criminal piot—for that and no less it would assuredly be—it should not be impossible for him to secure the Anfu General's arrest by the ordinary means, or at least to have him put under. strict surveillance, without this thunderous proclamation of his crimes, One. irresistibly reminded of the oid-fashioned Chinese watchman who goes round banging " gong to warn the robbers of his arrival.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.