Oct. 17, THE ceremonious visit paid to President Tsao Kun by the Dipplomatic Body on Monday morning effectually ''puts the lid'' on whatever: lingering hopes may have existed that the Powers might withhold recognition of his remarkable election' We dislike being slangy in the portentous columns of a leading article. But, really, in regarding recent events in China, one has only the alternatives of laughter or tears. Nobody doubts for an instant that the M.P.'s who voted for President Tsao were bought at so much the bushel. It might be said of them that "their sound is gone out into all lands and their words (together with the price paid for them) into the ends of the world."' In Canton Dr. Sun fulminates anathemas, promises to bring the siege of Waichow to an end in a fortnight, notwithstanding that-he has been a3 it already for some.months with no sign of success, announces new punitive expedition and solemnly notifies the Powers. Other worthy men, from gentry to journalists, from tuchuns to tipao, also fulminate, but show no great inclination for action. "The above-named gentlemen F'aying upon the aforesaid musical instruments."' It is all very familiar. The occasion is rather more conspicuous than others in the past which have evoked similar threatenings and vows of slaughter, yet it promises to end in precisely the same way. Meanwhile. the Diplomatic Body, spurred on by fear that the Japanese Minister will steal a march on them by presenting his credentials if they do not bestir themselves, make virtue of @ necessity and present their visiting cards en masse, with the customary congratulations and promises of collaboration. To which President Tsao replies with all suitable fervour and his tongue in his cheek like everybody else.
The situation transcends comment. Chinese newspapers, safe in the shelter of foreign concessions, can hardly find words to express their fury at the President's inaugural address, But for the foreign onlooker,. also safe in a foreign settlement and not personally, inconvenienced by the welter of brigandage and rapine which has made the very name of Government in China a by -word among the nations, President Tsao's beautiful periods merely confirm the conviction that the Chinese are the finest humourist in the world. The President' trembles', reflecting on the weight of responsibility he is "'obliged to assume"', but is partly consoled. the thought that he is more fortunate than his predecessors in having the support of a brand-new, really and truly completed Constitution, which the M. P.'¢ have thrown in, og it were, to make up weight for their cheques, Education, finance, the development of industry and_reduction of military expenditure are then passed' muder review, with the soundest of moral conclusions. But the President is "'deeply grieved to observe' that "the difference of political viewpoints and the conflict of old and new ideas have driven men of talent to dissipate their 2nergies in internal strife from which the nation has suffered grievously."' This truly muse be
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.