The Canadian Mission complain that their losses for the past two years have amounted to $30,000 according to a report of a Harlan Government Committee of Assessment. This was done under Marshal Feng's people in the autumn of 1927, and the buildings were not! vacated till the summer of the present year. In the meantime most of the school furniture has been reduced to a heap of wreckage. Not one single cent has been offer-way of com the local Government Assessment Committee's report is in the Government Gazette, Now the representatives, of the Government that has been apparent. ly honestly trying to regain its! lost prestige in the minds of foreigners guests, and vis-i-vis of Foreign Governments, come along, and in spite of the most emphatic protests again occupy these buildings. They are at. present using the Orphanage building, the East or Dormitory building of St. Androw's School, and the basement of the new Recitation and Adi tration building.
There may be some comfort for the Canadians in the assurance of the Hospital staff that they are to occupy but fur a short time toast a month, "If this can be bes lieved, then they are in for the "duration" of the present campaign. Of the progress of the fighting there is absolutely no news. We might as well be in America, s0 far as gleaning of reliable news is concerned. 'The positive gein from this dearth of news, either good or bad, is in the fact that Kaifeng' goes about ite ordinary avocations as though there were no war. neighbouring islands and even the mainland around Kowloon were sadly devastated. The climate of a small area is strongly influenced by the surrounding country. If all the surrounding hills were not reafforested, Hongkong, said the speaker, would soon be like Aden. That town had already practically no more water of its own, and its water supply was by tank ships, from the Perim Islands.
It would be an experiment of the greatest importance, said the speaker in conclusion, not only for the Colony itself, but' for humanity as a whole, if extensive afforestation could be carried out around Hongkong.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.