From Our Own Correspondent, Shaohsing, Che., Jan. 9
The water in the canals is now lower than it has boom for years and prices are rising, owing to communications becoming more and more difficult. The lack of water is only partly owing to the drought. and partly to the lack of proper control of the great sluices at Saenkong, which regulate the height of the water on our really fine system of canals. During the floods that occurred in the summer and autumn, a controversy arose between the fishermen whose interest it was to keep the waters high and the farmers whose interest it was just then to keep the waters low, lest their fields should be flooded and their crops. spoiled.
'A strong body of police wag posted at the sluices to guard them and these men were bribed by the fishermen to keep the sluices shut] and so prevent the fish that had been reared in the canals from escaping into the water of the Hangchow Bay. The farmers, hearing that the police had been bribed to keep the sluices shut and seeing the canals rise daily higher and higher after the heavy rains of September and eventually flood their fields, determined to take matters into their own hands and so, assembling in force, they made a raid upon the sluices, removed the planks and, carrying them off, hid them. The planks were retail until the water in the canals had sunk some two or three feet below its normal level.
Since September, scarcely any rain has fallen and the canals, largely owing to the actions of the corrupt police and tha incensed farmers, are now abnormally low. There is a great dearth of water in the city canals and to-morrow all the water gates are to be blocked and water is to be pumped into the city from the canals outside, as the merchants are afraid of fires breaking out and the whole city being placed in grave danger of being destroyed if there is no water in the canals to quench the fires.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.