May 20.
Shanghai is shivering; and this is May. Experts say, that "anti-cyclonic rains," and "high pressures" are contributing to this" depressing result. This time last year the thermometer was cheering Shanghai-landers with a vision of summer and registering a minimum shade temperature of 70, which is two points higher than the maximum on Monday. Can misery be better illustrated? Why the temperature should suddenly deve-Top an affinity with: 3 which,-again, is displaying most "evil characteristics, it is dificult to understand. The resourcefulness of the oldest inhabitant is sorely strained such malignance. He is always ready to argue with newcomers who deplore the absence of sun and suggest that should be the abode of amp! pians and not ingenuous hu seeking for dry ground on which to play polo, hold inspections and generally disport themselves in the open air. His line is simple: the weather is most unusual for Shanghai. "It has never been so rainy before. The newcomer tries to: be soothed; postpones, thankfully, (his purchase of ' rubber boots which the low state of change, nullifying the depression in.the rubber trade, makes too burdensome for his purse.
But this chilly world of May piles Pelion upon Olympus. Housekeepers, exercising what! re pleased to call their dis jon, have shut off the central heating and knocked the a electric fans, oketers have announced that their season has begun, with the resident of the Cricket Club and the vice-president} successfully breaking his duck. Baseball clubs have started to erect their sun-shelters. One daring policeman has been seen in white uniform. In Nanking Road last Saturday a member of Council was smiling under a panting, "And now fires are ing hastily restored to their place as homeside comforts, overcoats are being withdrawn from store or other less respectable, more remunerative places. No-one talks of mixed bathing and intending visitors to "The Middle Watch" and "Make Believe" next week are warned to get out their Lyceum snowshoes, tant to say to that? He cannot blame Extraterritoriality for the apse in his calculations. It is ficult. to believe that Shanghai's climate has been affected by the abolition of likin or by ithe plunge of the Municipal Orchestra into the Broadcasting business. The oldest inhabitant} must ponder over these things. "perhaps Mrs. Aimee Macphergon is right after all" and Shanghai is a place past praying for, although it does not seem to be qualifying for the torments to which she would expose it. The only frank and honourable course is to admit that Shanghai the moment under the Weather and, thoroughly depressing weather at that, The summer may be coming but, it seems, as slowly as that promised' trade revival or the conding tael, There is one possible remedy: let the matter be referred to the newly-created Shanghai branch of the Institution of Civil Engineers or to the International Conference Women's Clubs. The engineers are prepared to put everything right: traffic problems, depreciated dollars, and infected golf clubs.. The women will 1 with what is left—culture, be That' something must, be done plays and empty cinema about it is generally agreed,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.