The soldiery have not been the only plague. So severe has banditry become in the western borders of North Honan that over large areas it has not been possible to reap the} Jautumn harvests even to this date. Two of the large market towns, Shaoyang and Wangwu, on the trade routes to Shansi and' Shensi, lo deserted on account of the hordes of bandits lurking in the hills, and another place, Kuangyang, in, the same district, has been occupied bby these gentlemen of the road for! some time, If the robbers are not} very soon cleared out, making it possible for the crops to be harvest ed, it will not, of course, be possible to plant the wheat and barley} for the spring harvest. In this case, the land will become a waste, as jit is in many other bandit-ridden parts of the country. So bold were these marauders that, had it not] been for the arrival of troops, it! in said that Huaiking city itself would have been threatened. In the Tsiyuan district, the villagers have been goaded to a position which has' caused them to take up their own defence, and many: of them are now armed with locally-made revolvers and even rifles, constructed to take the ammunition' used by the army.
Buyers from outside have come in and bought up considerable [quantities of last spring's wheat, which was a poor crop, resulting] in a big advance in the -price of this*mecessity. © This: has made it Jeompulsory for: most people. to. live on "something less- expensive.: " We OFFICIAL EVIDENCE OF,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.