Our Hangchow correspondents announcement that the allowance to the Church Missionary Society is being cut down 25 per cent. as from May 1 is a_ regrettable piece of news. First the war, then the high exchange hit the G. M.S. severely, and now, we suppose, the Society is feeling the effects of business depression and the crushing taxation at Hbme. Some time ago we urged that the Society should try to obtain a regular income in China, with a special eye to obviating losses due to exchange. Whether it has done so or not we do not know. But churchmen, particularly in Shanghai, owe a di to the Church Missionary Society which they ought to recognize and which is not unlikely to take' a more pressing shape in the not distant future. The bishop to whom the congregation of Holy Trinity Cathedral looks is the Bishop in Mid-China, who is appointed by Canterbury but supported by the O. M.S. And churchmen in Shanghai have had the advantage of his jurisdiction without paying for it. Now the view taken by the recent Lambeth Conference was that the time is drawing near when Canterbury will renounce its authority over English congregations in China and the Church here will become the Church of China and no more be the Church in China. What will then be the position of the English congregations no one can tell. But a little reflexion will show that it may not be altogether to their liking. Their claim to remain in touch with Canterbury would probably be a good deal stronger if they could show that they were active supporters of the C. M. S. There are obviously other grounds on which the Society is entitled to assistance in its present great need. These, however, may be left to our readers' imagination.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.