Swatow, July 7.
The Bus Companies in this province have all along fared very badly at the hands of the author fies, and now comes news from Canton that the companies there fare proposing to go out of business as a result of the unreasonable demands of the powers-that-be.
In Swatow, the bus company has gone into bankruptcy on account of the impositions of the government, fand the buses are now operated by the Municipality. The service is very poor, indeed, the buses running according to the whims of the chauffeurs and conductors. People have sometimes to wait for half an hour for a bus. Not infrequent ly the conductor and driver will decide to park the bus in a shady spot and rest for an hour or In Canton, the authorities have milked the bus companies very thoroughly, and now are demanding that the companies bay and operate newer and larger buses. The latter are unable to comply, as it would entail an outlay of more money than they can afford. "Either you Duy and operate the buses we want or you go out of business," say the authorities, The bus companies point out that it costs at least $4,000 to purchase a new bus. They therefore propose to go out of business on July 20, and are said to be making arrangements to ship the buses to Hongkong or Macao for disposal, rather than let them fall into the hands of the authorities, who seem to be anxious to get them: for nothing as was the case in Swatow.
Should this come about the public at Canton will suffer no end of inconvenience. There will be the rieshas to fall back upon, of course, Dut the pullers in these parts are a truculent lot and will make the most of the situation Just what tude the authorit will take in o:.. threat to suspend all services the bus companies carry out
remains to be seen, but they seem to think that no one has any right to go out of business.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.