Today the blockade of Tientsin enters upon its third week without there having been any betterment of the situation, and at the present moment no prospects of an early improvement. The issue has developed from that merely involving the handing over of four Chinese accused of complicity in murder, and wanted by the Japanese, to a number of unspecified points concerning. which Tokyo has up to the present remained silent. On the absurd fiction that Britons may be smuggling arms and documents in and out of the blockaded concessions they are rigorously searched, and in a number of cases, including one German woman, British by marriage, Britons have been stripped before the gaze of Chinese standing round. It is described as an absurd fiction for not even the Japanese themselves have claimed to have discovered anything of the sort on the persons they have searched, and the only possible conclusion which can be drawn from the ascertained facts is that the Japanese hope by conduct of this sort to degrade the Britons in the eyes of the Chinese. The Britons involved have submitted to these indignities in a manner which has aroused nothing but the greatest admiration, and in this connection a kindly note in the local "Ostasiatischer Lloyd" on Sunday last is worth reproduction:—
"In view of the degrading treatment to which subjects of the British Empire had to submit in Tientsin, the cautious stand of the British Government is all the more remarkable. It is easily understandable if the fact is taken into consideration that today political differences one part of the world may react strong! other tension points. Without doubt Great Britain views the sit-nation from this point of view and,—this to their honour—also the Britons in Tientsin who fight through this battle with patience, discipline and toughness."
In this connection, despite Japanese denials that these searchings and strippings actually took place, or that if they did the descriptions were exaggerated, it is to be noted that the German journal accepts the stories which have been published as correct. Hence its comment. Point is made of this because of the recent attempts, as recent as Monday evening, of the Japanese spokesmen locally to throw doubts upon the reports which have been carried by reputable news agencies of all that has been going on in British and other news agencies and newspapers are being accused of disseminating malicious propaganda concerning the stripping incidents in the northern port. Point has been made of the fact that, with regard to the earlier cases, the names of the victims were not divulged, while it has been sought to make some obscure contention over the wrong description of one Canadian victim as an American. This latter has no particular significance; errors do creep in in reporting nowadays, owing to the high speed with which news has to be covered, and to seek to attribute some machiavellian inspiration behind this particular incident is but to show how even the slightest of straws are seized upon to cover up a particularly noisome business. With regard to the earlier suppress sion of the names of victims, and the Japanese contention that because of this no such cases occurred, it must be remembered that in 1927 certain foreigners including Japanese were subjected to indignities at Nanking by the Chinese soldiery. By arrangement the names of those women victims were never divulged in a desire that their personal shame should not be revealed and recorded for all time in the press of the world. Would the Japanese now deny the fact of those outrages because the names of the victims were not disclosed? Directly the Japanese sought to establish suppression of names as proof of untruth, names of victims were, and have since been published. The considerations which applied in 1927 no longer obtain, and' the Japanese and the world at large have been given names, chapter and verse of the incidents of which the last two weeks have been fruitful. Why? Because there is no shame in having to submit to indignities in the service of one's country, and those people who have suffered the obscene attentions of the Japanese soldiery have been as faithfully serving their country as if they were carrying arms and striving in its defence. Let there be no doubt about it, the shame rests on entirely other shoulders,—upon those of the men who have forgotten the high tradition of their military code and the chivalrous exhortation of their great Emperor Meiji.
In this connection an interesting telegram from Tokyo, carrying a report from Peking, stated that Italy's full ce-operation with the Japanese military authorities in North China was pledged by the Italian Commander-in-chief in the Far East. The Italians have a high moral code, and it is not to be believed that this full ce-operation embodies approval of what the Japanese are doing to white people. It is not to be believed for one moment that, no matter what may be the tensions amongst the white races of the world, any of them can regard with favour the disgraceful tactics which are being followed by the Japanese in Tientsin, for attempts to degrade the British are just as much attempts to degrade every other white race, and there is not a European in the Far East who does not completely realize it. Consequently these endeavours by the Japanese spokesmen to gloze over uncomfortable facts, facts which reflect upon the chivalry of their own race, will be accepted for precisely what they "are worth, and it has to be confessed that is not much. The very best that can be said for them is that they must be very grievously
happening. For the rest it may be said that misinformed as to what Bas actually been the discipline of the Britons of Tientsin in such trying circumstances reflects the highest honour upon them. Their restraint is evidence of voluntary discipline well within the traditions of the race, and in the rest of the Far East; indeed all over the world there can be nothing but admiration for the manner in which they have met the situation. Those other foreign communities involved in the blockade are to be praised for their forbearance and understanding. The inconveniences to which they have been subjected are not so grave as those under which the British suffer, but the knowledge that they sympathize with the British victims, and resent the insult which has been offered to the whole white race in their persons, is a comfort and a lasting encouragement to the Britons to carry on.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.