The disaster which Mr. Griffith of Changteh has already reported as having overtaken this district of Honan and the adjacent provinces is greatly understated in his very graphic letter. The area affected ig much wider than his first estimate, and the numbers already suffering the privations of famine in varying degrees from mere deprivation of the ordinary _necessaries to death by starvation or suicide are now put, at a fairly conservative estimate, at twenty millions.
If one were to consul a map of this district where the four _provinces of Shansi, Honan, Chibli and Shantung have their borders sending capes or peninsulas into each other he will find the famine area. This district, comprising perhaps not less than 40,000 square miles, begins north of Weihwei and goes east to the Yellow River: it follows the river to its mouth and along the coast north to the Tientsin area: from Tientsin a line drawn through Paotingfu and passing into Shansi for about 100 li would form the northern boundary: the western line would pass down through Shansi approximately taking in a strip of 50 to 10 li.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.