Aug. 11.
It was only to be expected that there would be some sort of disorder with regard to the rickshaw trade reforms, no matter which side was to concede most in the nature of a compromise, and the incidents of yesterday and the day before to show that such an anticipation was particularly well founded. Up to the present the demonstration seems fairly moderate, the agita~ tors confining their activities to letting air out of the pneumatic tyres, and thereby forcing the pullers, whom they victimize, off the streets, at any rate for a short time while their tyres are being again blown up. Whether the middle-men who Jaze reported to be incensed over the losses they sustain by the changed hiring rate, or the new would-be rickshaw owners whose Jambitions have been thwarted by the arrival at a settlement, are to blame, really does not matter, for the real point of the whole disturbance is that it is the puller who is made to suffer. The unfortunate fellow pays his usual sum for hiring the vehicle, and naturally expects to get it back by plying the streets, when the agitators prevent him getting his original outlay. back and earning the wherewithal to live. It is a particularly mean. sort of business and it is to be hoped that sooner or later the police will be able to reach those who are engineering the whole business behind the scenes. It is they who deserve punishment even more than the ill-advised men who busy themselves stopping their fellows from earning a living.
The police are to be congratulat-the manner in which they ure handling the whole matter. "It Is naturally somewhat difficult to deal with for the instances of molestation of the rickshaw puller are sporadic and not necessarily confined to any one locality, though the centre of the whole trouble appears to be in the ise trict. Dealing with the naturally keeps the police very much on the move, and it cannot be expected that they should capture every one of the guilty parties. Nevertheless the number of arrests made indicate that they are doing their work extremely well, while the District Court appears to be in-fioting punishments adequate for the offences with which the prisoners are charged. It is to be hoped that the trouble will not spread or pass out of the present control which seems to be admirably ex-excised by the authorities, who deserve every credit for the patience with they are handling ich the affair.
At the same time these minor disorders serve to indicate the manner in which the rickshaw puler in his ignorance may be made
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.