The magistrate was clearly between the devil and the deep blue sea as he did not dare to refuse the student demands and all the more dared not offend the powerful Chamber of Commerce member. So with well feigned indignation he declared that the matter must be. sifted to the bottom and appointed his first secretary to try: the case at once. The joke is that the aforesaid First Secretary is og harmless as an ancient toothless tabby and when the accused protested that they were innocent, that the deed had been committed while they were sleeping the sleep of honest men, he released them, or at least tried to. But the students, assembled in force, gr: the discharged prisoners and made such a hubbub that the magistrate himself felt compelled to come into court to quiet things. He rapped fiercely on the table, demanded a. further questioning and on) receiving the same protestations of innocence ordered the two men to be beaten with a thousand strokes of the bamboo.
Anyone who has been an eye and ear witness of a Chinese trial knows' that there is an_ official counter of the strokes: furthermore that this counter when properly "seen" by friends of the victim can count at a most amazing speed, making a modern automobile motor seem slow by ocomparison and before the traditional Jack Robinson could be said the punishment had been duly and officially inflicted and recorded. Ordering a ful] and strict vestigation of every clue—the magistrate adjourned the case, leaving the students in dumb but helpless fury. They realized probably for the first time in their whole career of folly that they had been made a public laughing stock.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.