We sojourners in the East are inclined to pity ourselves on account of the troubles and difficulties with which life is beset in a land abounding in so many incongruities as those that face us in China, The perplexed merchant who sees the business he has built up with much patient toil and cate wiped out by a sudden outbreak of petty war which, so far as he respondent in Szechuan has shown recently how it is possible there to travel. from place to place! with a shoe of silver and lose the whole value of the money in exchanging it by the way. Either' the weight is not correct for the particular place in which you are' doing business, or the sycee is rot up to standard in colour or! fineness; in short, any reason is good enough to show why the! seller must' always lose on the exchange transaction, The same takes place, in a lesser degree} here, as well as everywhere else. 'One has to be continually on the' watch against short change or! bad coins and while the loss is! trifling it is annoying to di can see, is about nothing at all,|cover cover that you have been "done. must be pardoned for carrying It is another cas that you have been "done." a worried countenance.
The rouble being borne harried housewife whose house-|Plainingly while the meaner hold arrangements tumble into] worry frets like the - continual! chaos through some upheaval in dropping that wears away a stone. the kitchen, because a new coolie A few days ago a lady of has been engaged who does not our acquaintance was alarmed! hail from the same part of the by hearing strident sounds country as the previous denizens of strife proceeding from her of that important household do-kitchen, Knowing, from long main, is also a person to be experience, that the approach of sympathized with, But while!
China New Year is a time when there may be worlds in which servants must be placated, _she worries are unknown in this hurried to the downstairs regions particular world of ours, as has intent on an errand of peace. She been pointed out by an ancient found a boy, who had just d writer, man is born to trouble livered a parcel, C. 0. D,, suras the sparks fly upward. We rounded by the three lords of the must fortify our minds with the back door. 'These were evidently' conviction that life is a threatening the messenger and strenuous undertaking and has was weeping bitterly. On her to be taken seriously if we are! inquiring the cause of the dié- to get through it creditably. turbance the boy said that the There are those who say that. servants were demanding the people in the East live easier usual percentage on bills paid. lives, on the whole, than folk of That he had received a cheque their own class at home. Also, and had no money to give them that we are thereby enervated except a few coppers which he and our nerves easily frazzled had been given for tram fare and so that molehills of annoyance that if he gave these up he become mountains of irritation. would have to walk more than The retired Indian Colonel with three miles back to his shop and his liver complaint and irascible would be rated for loitering by' comic papers at Elon "There angry. She scolded the servants temper is a stock joke in. the|the way. The lady was justly
may be some truth in the for their cruelty to one who criticism but we think the called unself their "little abnormal conditions we are brother," gave the messenger a living in at present would provide excuse for a good deal of real and excusable anxiety. And though we are not yet out of the wood, we think it may be said that the population of the Settlement have faced the dangers: to which they have been twice] exposed within the last few! weeks with more sang fraid than would have been exhibited in city of equal size in the West. This leads to the reflexion that, we usually face our greatest, trials with fortitude and worry' cumshaw to comfort his heart, dismissed him out of the back door and so ended the fracas. A little later the table boy sought an interview with "Missee" and expostulated:—"Suppose Chinese man no can ask Chinese man for money this no proper.". He felt that this was another unwary ranted infringement by the foreigner on China's sovereign rights; the universal right to] squeeze—and the hi found ourselves over pin-pricks of annoyances which are of no real importance.
An example will illustrate thi column
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.