Peasants, NOCBN, SPRCIAL service Peking, Oct. 3.
Five thousand. farmers and! market-gardeners in the vicinity of Peking have combined. to protest against any further continuation of the ancient Chinese custom of the collection of! taxes. Spokesiiien of the farmers, who led a large group in a march, through Peking to the city hall, Agclared that the Nationalist Govment should no longer tolerate this snefent and evil custom.
'The municipal government, according to tite farmers' plea, recently sold to a group of speculators the Tight to collect taxes on farm produce. According to an _ancient precedent in China, the tax-eollection privilege was sold for a lump sum, Teaving the purchasers the privilege of collecting whatever they could in taxes. The demon-strafers aver that they do not object to paying taxes, but they wish to pay them directly to the municipal authorities, and not to a private group which has no interest in the people.
Mr. Chang Via-wa, the Mayor, proposed a compromise, stating that he would cancel the' sale of the tax-collection rights if the farmers would organize. a ce-operative society of their own, collect their own taxes, and remit the money to the municipal government. This Jarrangement, it is understood, was, accepted by the farmers—United Press.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.