Tsao Kun's invitation to his friends, rivals and enemies, to come into his fold and be at peace with him would scarcely be worthy of comment if the circumstances under which the call was issued were not amusing enough to warrant repetition. Very few English Janguage papers have reprinted the text of the appeal and Chinese press comment has been perfunctory. It has been so generally assumed that it was one of those "'come-into-my-parlour" invitations from the spider to the fly and that_no one would interpret it as anything else, that it has attracted little attention. The real significance of the proclamation does not seem to have been generally grasped. For weeks past Tsao Kun's more intelligent advisers have. been very _much afraid that the new ''president" might any day be in receipt of an appeal from Sir Robert Ho Tung to endorse his Round Table Conference scheme and to pledge himself to attend. Such an appeal, had it been public, would have been very difficult to answer. To acknowledge the need of a conference and to endorse it would have been evidence on Tsao's_ part of lack of confidence in the security and "legi macy" of his own position. Any thing but an endorsement, on the other hand, would have come convenient to his enemies and would have deen advertised by them as an uncompromising.challenge to the nation. The only way to meet this difficulty was to anticipate it. Tsao Kun's advisers, therefore, drafted a peace message for him to send out upon his assumption of office. long before he came to Peking and, as soon as he was installed, presented it to him for his signature. To their great chagrin, the Big Man refused flatly to have anything to do with it.. What was the sense of inviting a lot of rebels to Peking who would not come? Why pretend to make concessions to a lot of petty enemies whom he could crush and! to whom he had no intention of offering terms of any sort? It was not until all the king's horses and all the king's men had been brought into the field that the war lord grumblingly affixed his seal. The effect pon Tsao's open enemies. and upon a_ generally hostile public has been nil. as the advisers undoubtedly anticipated; but from Wu Peifu it has elected an enigmatic endorsement which was wholly unexpected and which is very disturbing. Tsao's benevo-Tent message was scarcely on the wires before Wu Pei-fu raised his voice in cheers and_ cried: Splendid! We'll have the conference and we'll have it at Loyang."" This is the last thing that the Tientsin clique could possibly endorse and it is already felt in political circles that it is the first gesture iv a kind of left-handed support from Loyang, which will lead to the disintegration of the Chihli party,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.