Shanghai, like a woman, has her pretty days and her plain ones, seasons when her dwellers enjoy her and when they endure her. This winter, with ite clear, brace ing weather, blue skies, red sunsets and twinkling stars has been one of unusual delight and the warm sunshine of its mellow noons hag been! such as to tempt to leisurely saunterings along the Bund, surveying with satisfaction the outlines of the town and the variegated river life.
The uneven sky-line of the Bund, broken here and there by towers and spires and touched to life with fluttering flags is really most engaging. The dome of the new Hong-keng Bank building swims in mid-air like an onyx crown to some Maxfield Parrish castle, alluringly unreal. It will be something ote disappointment to dreamers when it is finally set upon more stable foundations.
Another companion of noon-tide strollings is that "true friend of the Chinese people," Sir Hart, as he stands there with bowed Jhead, "modest, patient, sagacious, and resolute." Of what can he be pondering one wonders aa he stands there, forever meditate ing, his back to the Custom House for which he did so much, his face turned to the ships coming up from the sea.?
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.