One of the most astonishing sights was that of a River Police sampan which somehow or other got adrift and was seen floating on the Bund outside the Customs examination building and appeared to be trying to get inside the building to find its way back to its proper environment.
The flood caught many buildings unprepared for the invasion for nobody conceived the possibility of its occurrence. Many basements were flooded in the Central district but engineers were able to get to work and pump out the water. At the Shanghai Club, a sort of landing stage was quickly improvised to enable members to go to their homes and offices without having to wade through the brown ravages of the river.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.