I wrote in my last about the serious looting of Liuhsien, 60 4 to the west of us, on the edge of Hionan. It is now reported that 33. persons were killed, 1% kidnapped and about 500,000 worth of loot taken. All the captives except 39 have been re-Jeased and returned. Redemption for a single' wealthy man was fixed at $100,000 and finally bargained down to $30,000, but the cruelty of it all is that nothing was left for him to sell except his land. I hear that the Asiatic Fetroleum Ca. alone lost 4,000 tins of. oil.
This large robber band has now been driven to its lonely lair, the Confucius' Fowl reserve—just as well spell it "foul" now—in Shantung, over which no province has any control, a land without law. Whatever else the new Government may do, among the first things should be to put that land where robbers are bred and raised under the strict authority of some province. There are small bands of robbers plying their trade almost daily in this and adjoining counties and in almost all cases persons are taken captives. Three nights ago, a grain dealer, living right by us, but who has a farm 15 li away, was taken from his country home and held for $10,000, perhaps fully double the worth of all his possessions. These demons are not fair in their dealings.
Much of the booty taken is opium that has been planted, grown and is being sold and in violation of law, so it is the lawless living off the. lawless! This opium business is just a little above the doings of the tufei. I have heard of one farmer who resisted to death and then his opium was lost. Many farmers, 1 hear, are not sleeping at their homes, but take their stuff to the fields and sleep with it there. There is a heavy trade in wheat just now, due in part to the excessive growing of opium in the southern part of the country, where little wheat was grown. Now they are buying wheat here in great quantities from farmers who bring it from north and east.
June was quite hot. For more than 20 days the thermometer rose to 96 degrees to 101 degrees and there was not much rain. Beans were not planted till near the end of June. So far, July has been quite cooler, the highest reading being about 94 degrees and there has been but little rain. Owing to this fact, the automobile service has done well in the past few weeks. General Tseng owns and runs two buses from here to the Kweiteh railway station. Both fre-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.