Receipt of a proposal for the "isolation" of Hangchow from the scene of Sino-Japanese hostilities was announced by a Japanese Em-spokesman yesterday.
The plan, he said, had been communicated to the "authorities concerned" for consideration, According to the spokesman, the scheme asked that Hangchow be spared from aerial bombing or shelling; that the city be spared from becoming a centre of hostilities and from being set on fire, It had been sent to the Japanese authorities through the American Consulate General, A Japanese naval spokesman, speaking privately, expressed the hope that Hangchow would be spared from the ravages of war "because of its natural beauties,"
All Chinese Government offices, he added, had been painted black last year as an anti-air raid measure, The result, however, had been the opposite, for the black paint now identified all governmental organs, his makes it easy to single out Chinese Government establishments from the air," he remarked,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.