Mar. 16.
Up to the present we in China have scarcely had a chance to come into close contact with that singular and utterly pernicious body of opinion going under the title of the I.W.W., but this week, through a case in the United States Court, we make its none too. pleasant personal acquaintance. After consideration of the general attitude of these half dozen misguided seamen who have been sent to gaol for refusal of duty we confess that the average vocabulary is totally inadequate to describe them. Grousers,. slackers, scrimshankers—these are all admirable What, then, of the future?} words in their way but they fail Assuredly the women who have to meet the case even in their laid such good foundations are in no need of advice as to what they shall set upon them. But it may be imagined that the B.W.A.,-if it so wish, is destined to exercise a great influence on the life of the community, in which connexion we certainly must not \forget the same power that the American Woman's Club possesses. We are not thinking of material things, of the sort mentioned above, but of the unwritten law,"" of which, perhaps, Shanghai stands somewhat in need. It is a generous, hospitable, warm-hearted place. But the spirit of easy tolerance which, somehow, the Far East readily begets, is apt to degenerate into laxity; and this the more so as the community grows bigger and the doings of each one of us are less and less exposed to the criticism of everybody else. It is; here undoubtedly that the ability of women to get what they want, which implies an aqua! ability to exclude what they do not like, might be exerted. More than this we had hetter not try to say. This article, which began with a} laborious attempt at humour, is; ending in-an even more unaccept-cumulative effect. Something far more obnoxious and iniquitous is piled up behind their general attitude, their outlook on life, on work, on everything else. Put their case at its very best, admit that they did have a certain amount of grievance against their officers, there is still absolutely no ground for condoning any of their actions. Common sense, the natural instinct towards self-preservation, it might have been thought, would have impelled them to turn to at the times when their ship needed delicate handling, but even at such moments their own precious theories were ever uppermost in their minds and everything else might gladly go to perdition. Fortunately for their ship, but frerhaps less for themselves, these theories of theirs were never put to the acid test which only dire crisis produces. _Had it so happened, it is only too much ito be feared that not until too late would realization of their supreme folly have been brought home to them.
As we have mentioned, this is probably the first real - taste which Shanghai thas had of the
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.