There has been considerable discussion lately regarding the Chinese rickshaw puller who, at the bottom end of the social and economic scale, deserves more sympathy and assistance than he gets, although a few out of the tens of thousands abuse public patronage. These polemics occur from time to time through concentration on particular cases, and therefore the whole discussion is thrown out of proper perspective. But it is incorrect to say that the howling, sprawling, quarrelling experiences on the street are symptomatic of Chinese labour in Shanghai. An incident on the Bund yesterday should be an example to those who refuse to believe that assistance and common courtesy are absent in this city. A Chinese coolie had his hat blown off his head by one of the sudden gusts of wind stirring up the city's dust yesterday. He was pulling a foreigner and his hat fell accurately on the tram track in the path of the oncoming tram and destruction appeared inevitable. To a man of such low pay to whom the loss of a hat would be costly, the first step ought to have been to stop his rickshaw immediately, abandon his customer and run to retrieve his hat. Instead, with that smile charac-tensing most rickshaw pullers, he carefully drew up his rickshaw alongside the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank, and the tram conductor, noticing the incident and the probable loss, stopped his tram for a few brief seconds, which enabled the puller to rescue his hat. It would be interesting to consider if such ce-operation and common decency could have occurred elsewhere in the world, Need for Vigilance One of the most interesting features of the debate in the House of Commons, which ended on Wednesday, centres round the manner in which the developments following the landing of Allied forces in Norway were so enthusiastically reported, chiefly from Stockholm. That capital was obviously the place from which most of the early news would originate, and those respon ble for despatches emanating therefrom seem to have been entirely carried away. The result was that the whole of the world was completely misled as to the situation, and to some extent the Allied statesmen. That the British Ministers were able to rise in the House of Commons and make the admissions they did must doubtless' have come as a considerable surprise to many, but there is one aspect of the situation of which sight should not be lost. The original mistakes appear to have been made innocently enough, and while the enemy will seek to make as much as possible over the errors committed, that will be offset by the complete frankness with which the Government took the House of Commons into its confidence this week. There has been no attempt to, gloze over the setback. The explanations as to why there was a failure are wholly convince ing, and there is nothing whatever to justify belief that the Government has held anything back. Out of it all emerges the one important fact of which all small neutrals adjacent to Germany should take note. The initiative resting with the Reich as to what shall be the next development, they must at all times be on their guard, and prepared to defend themselves strenuously from the very outset, It may be impossible for the Allies to render them the assistance they are only too willing to do unless adequate time is given them to go to their aid. It is realized that it would be a departure from their neutrality to enter into military conversations providing for Allied intervention in the event of a German onslaught, but the success of any such intervention depends very largely upon the time given the Allies in which to come to their aid. The present German propaganda campaign is undoubted! designed to lull the neutrals into a false sen: of security. Sweden has been given soft assurances by Herr Hitler in which it would be the most criminal folly to place any reliance whatever. Assurances are frequently given that neither in the Lowlands, nor in the Balkans have the Germans nefarious ideas. Those countries do not appear to be very much deceived about the whole trend of affairs, but, unless they look to their own borders, and the strain ers within their gates, they may find this twe! teeth century version of the Trojan horse repeated to their own disadvantage.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.