The Rotary Club entertained Mx.
M. Green, editor of the "Norta-China Daily News," og lunch on June 12, in view of his approach-retirement from China. There was a large attendance of members and the funds of the club must have benefited handsomely from the sentences passed upon members convicted of offending against rules, Mr. S. M1, Peck introduced the guest of the day with many Kindly allusions to" his_misspent career, and Mr. George Fire Jater, paying a tribute to Inv. Gre work and declaring that "he was always ready to read the "North-China," however much he might disagree with thanking hie Kind. hosts for their enter Mr. Green said:
When I received from Mr. Peck your very complimentary invitation to lunch' with you to-day, in view of my approaching departure feo: China, it was suggested to me that T might tell you something of my Teminiscences since first T came Shanghai. Thinking over this suggestion T very soon came to the conclusion that Thad remarkably Bittle to say that could be of interest to anybody. I cannot go hack into the past like some of the older generation of Shanghai. The Battle of Muddy Flats was actually fought before Twas born. That ether battle, over the inviolability of the Recreation Ground and Sir Edmond Hornby's famous judgment securing it in perpetuity for foreign, use, took place when the chief figure' on my mental horizon was still my nurse, I never shot snipe on the Race Course, though T have frequently seen pheasants when out riding on the Settlement Worder without a gan to. shoot at them, though T may perhaps adi that, had T been on foot and possessced of fifty guns, the pheasants would have been just as safe, In fuct I almost ashamed to be rati from China atter so compara' short a time here, 1 remember 9 friend of mine who hud been in fand numbers' of others from eon, should be very kad to enjoy myself, should b jad
tinaing to live ina luxury and splendour which Solomon and the Hilies of the field combined might! well have envied. "Indeed, only a week ago 1 hail the pleasure of if Present at a garden party Adniiving, from. a. diserest corner, frocks which would not have London or New York garden party in the height of the season, Perhaps the first big land mark in my recollections was the Revol tion of 1911, So. far as. thi istrict was concerned it was real in the nature of comic opera. A small party of Nationalists landed from the river close to the arsenal, rapped on the gates, fired a volley! or two in the air," and then the defenders. promptly' legged it out of the backdoor. 'The same afternoon many foreign residents, my'wife ard myself included, pienieked out to the arsenal to' watch the mobs looting the godowns of rifles a ammunition. The Chinese of those days knew very" much Tess about such weapons than they have since learnd and it is a miracle tox that nobody was shot. But, as professional brethren some ti say, no untoward incident occurred" and by next morning the: five-barred flag, which is now as: much out of fashion as the el dragon, was flying in profusion and down Nanking 'Road. Very different was the second Revol 1913, when Admival Tseng Ya-cheng, holding the arsenal for Yuan' Shih-kai, was attacked by the Nationalists under General Hsing and General Chen Chi-mei, Night after night for a whole week the bombardment we on, shells fell in numbers in. Settlement and everybody had time, By. good luck, how-little damage wa: and with' reinforcements, from the- north the—Nationalicts were obliged to retire.
One rather hume Shanghai for over 3 years telling of a dinner party he had been the night before, when the rest of those present were highly indignant Wecause he redueed the average length of life in China of all the guests to a mere testy-one years. hat is the sort of man who oughs tion of those days may be told. Shortly after the fight for Kiangnan Arsenal Chang Hyun, the old Manchu general, recaptured Nanking for the North. Some of rialists, retreating to Shi fed' off with' them ext to be talkinys to you now.
SUIIL in twenty-three yenrs, which, aby an odd coincidence, happens te to the very day the length life in Shanghai, things are bound to happen, Looking back lo those earlier days one ix chiefly impressed Awith the spuciousneas of lite. The were no trams, there were ally no motor Tt was sidéved almost_an extravagant maint 2 priv ing happy vend after A o'eloeie for an ceeasional dance, pet yestauvant. in Stevenson. might hay "an obscure wished to start running thole trains again, only to find. that Chang Hisun had gov mandeered, most of the rolling' stock, When they approached hi to hand it over he offered to ma bargain with them. He so "Being batch my wife from Shanghai and. you shall have your rolling:
ok" The detective force of the Settlement was work and the lady was hanghai-Nanking Teeling that they.
el, ought her together Road, culled think' we did not mea tien in polite Dinner always began at B o'clock., There were no encktatle, vp to Nanking to ker lord at: master, wha duly handed over ths]
In facy yo had hardly heard of them. "Nobody smoked cigarettes the drawing Yoom er indeed in th yrestnee of the ladies, and punctual! ly at 11 o'clock the principal lady would rise to her feet and mumbling.
The tate Dr.
Yat-sen 1 sav and conversed with many times, and like every one was deeply impressed by his magnetic person "The most interesting meetin: r Canton in December 192 something aloat "so many Tate nights" would head the p ion thankfully for home.
Yet in some ways life was ye: similar to what it is now. then Shanghai was called Paris of the East" and other places such as Hongkong, Kobe or Yok. ama seem to have passed much of their time in waging their heads over the dissipated life we led the shores of the Whangpoo. Then, too, as nov, the staple subject of conversation was the rottenness of the government, the anarchical sta" of China, and the deplorable condition of trade. Tam not a business man and I cannot pretend to under. stand the (technique of business, but it is a carious fact that never since when he had announced tion of seizing the Customs money, and the foreign Powers jointly sent a large number gunboats to protect the Customs' in Shameen. It happened that T was the first foreigner to see D: Sun after the gunboats arrived, and it was through me that he made known his intention to turn to the Russians since Europe and America, as he thought, persisted misunderstanding his intentions. Since those days civil war has beer almost unceasing. Tu the autumn of 1924 Logan the encounter between, the late Chang Tso-lin and the vast ion formed by Wu Pei-fu fall and A eqme to China can I remembs any, business man describing trad"
jing but rotten and exe pressing continual wonder as to whether next year he would still be solvent. Which does not seem to have. prevented numbers of people within my recollection retiring to Europe on competencies which I
Chang Tso-un.
This would not Lo the place, even if there were time, to recall in detail the story of all these waste struggles. Bot there is a distin:
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.