1,750,000 Cigarettes Seized and Burnt by Chinese Shanghai, June 1, The New Life Movement is providing a mask behind which a group of anti-foreign boycotters are working. Sucty is the true state of affairs existing in Wenchow at the moment, it was learnt in Shanghai yesterday from reliable authority, Cigarettes made by Chinese firms have been allowed in to Wenchow without let or hindrance, It is only cigarettes of foreign manufacture with which interference has occurred, The Chinese organization actively concerned in the boycott is the Yungkia_ (Wenchow) Cigarette Money Exchange Shops Association, while another is the New Life Movement Promotion Society, though aparently, the principals of the latter are used as a cat's paw by the former, 1,750,000 Cigarettes Burnt On May 18 the former association seized 30 large cases and 25 small cusses of Ruby Queen cigarettes, amounting in all to 1,760,000 cigaccottes on arrival in Wenchow.—The seizure was made in the morning and, it is understood, these goods were burnt about 15 li from the city fat about noon on the same day.
The local tax officials, whose duty it was to see that the goods were Properly stamped, protested against the seizure and demanded to see ti goods but were not allowed to carry out their duty, 'A protest was immediately made to the Magistrate and the Public Safety Bureau by the local dealer of the Yee Tsoong Distributors Ltd. Gormerly the B.A.T.) but nothing wag done until 5 pin, when the Chief of the Police sent twelve policemen to the place of seizure but by then the perpetrators of the outrage could not be found.
Mr. E. W. Jeffrey, Beitish Vice-Consul, eaves' for Wenchow to-day to investigate the matter.
At the Japanese Consulate, little of the present deadlock was known, Japanese interests in Wenchow, it was stated, ceased two years ago, when, owing to a vigorous antic Japanese movement, all Japanese inhabitants were forced to evacuate. Quite recently, however, some Jaanese goods consigned to a Chinese merchant _were not allowed to be landed. The view was expressed that, in the near future, a Japanese consul would visit Wenchow in the hope of successfully closing negotiations to allow Japanese to return again.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.