To the Editor of the oxrm-DIMNA Dany News"
Sm—Your correspondents complaint against the disgusting cargoes brought in by public rickshaws from Hunfjio Road, is timely. However, the filthy state of rickshaws is but one indication of the pitiful decay into which the district west of Shanghai has been allowed to fall. Two months ago, when the Chinese were first permitted to return to the Hungjao area, one was led to believe that they, were going back to rebuild their ancestral homes and to culti-vote their barley and beans, cabbages and cotton for this years harvest. Now, you can see them walking empty-handed and unchallenged over the railway, and coming báck towards the Settlement with the most amazing assortment of legal and illegal merchandise, all of which is taxed as it passes the Japanese barrier. The most conspicuous commodity is rice, brought over, for some reason, on bicycles, a couple of sack-loads at a time. Vegetables arrive in smaller quantities: this produce is, presumably, also taxed—if so, this partly explains why market prices in Shanghai continue to be excessive. But what is so deplorable, is the amount of sheer loot that comes through—rags, furniture and,, especially, broken-up fences. It would appear that a large percentage of those who went out to rehabilitate the Hungjao area, were in reality nothing but scavengers, who are making the task of rehabilitation all the more dim-cult. Certainly, signs of honest agriculture are scarce, and great tracts of land have obviously not been farmed since last October.
Not the least objectionable aspect of this whole business, is the development of a new Thieves' Market at-the junction of three roads which the Municipal Council still, officially, controls—namely, Rockhill Avenue, "Hungjao Road and Keswick Road.—With the consequent spoliation of one of our very few Sunday promenades,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.