While owners of gardens in Shanghai are prepared for many things being purloined from them—an it be in reason—they ought to be warned of a special danger now abroad—to cabbage lettuce plants. Usually immune from theftuous designs, these plants are at present so highly prized that they are in jeopardy of disappearing from the gardens where they are wont to flourish.
The particular reason for "this peculiar outburst of crime is an almost total absence this year of cab-page lettuce seed. For one reason or another Shanghai has failed to obtain its wonted supply from Home, and probably only those who happened to have seed left over from last year are in a position to grow the lettuces.
In one such case almost the total crop has been cleaned out by a night raid, The seed had been duly sown, and when the plants came up they were carefully thinned out and transplanted, and an excellent harvest was in prospect. On Thursday morning when the happy owner paid his daily visit to the garden, he was horrified to find that all but the poorest specimens had vanished. That a thief should have taken the risk and spent the time necessary to make this collection of young plants seemed at first sight preposterous, but when on consideration the shortage of seed came to mind the motive of the depredation duly appeared.
This should provide an exceptionally interesting study in local criminology. Who may the thief have been? Perhaps some disappointed gardener who having no cabbage lettuce of his own had set about finding some so that in due season he might gratify tai panic tables with a luxury noted for its rarity. The crime, however, may have even a darker hue than this. A horticultural show looms on the horizon where honour and glory are to be gained through the display of luxuriant cabbage lettuces. When this is borne in mind the possibility 3 that some amateur, seeing himself foiled of the aforesaid honour and glory, has descended to the depths of infamy out of a love of self-gratification. But whatever be the case, fortunate owners of oabpage lettuces should take the most elaborate precautions to safeguard their treasure.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.