As a variation in nicknames, occasionally we have been honoured by being called the "Thunderer," after a greater and older sheet and if the tone of No. 1. of Volume 1, issued at "Shanghae" on August 3, 1850, had been maintained, the name would have been appropriate enough. It was a little four-page 20-column sheet, price 50 cents to non-subscribers and 25 cents to sub-Scribers, $4 for three months, $8 for six months, or $15 per annum if paid in advance. There was very little on the front and back pages beyond advertisements, a list of foreign residents, and trade and Shipping statistics. One of the inside pages was entirely filled with minutes of various bodies, official documents and cuttings from other papers. On the remaining page "we" claimed every line, putting our back to the wall, so to speak, and telling the world in general how it should arid must manage its affairs, firstly in "An Address to the Public" and then in "A Consideration of Our Present, and Future Relations with China." It seems that there were uncountable things in those days that the Chinese should have done and had not done, and just now there are several hundred more to add on. Our respected editorial ancestor was at his best when he declared:—"We, in common with the foreign community in China, feel how difficult it is to arouse public opinion in England, and to direct it in aid of our peculiar relations with the Chinese Empire" However, it was added that the paper would patiently persevere, and neither its patience or perseverance are exhausted yet.
Beyond the leading articles, there was not a great deal of interest in the first edition except an account of the collapse of the roof of Trinity Church, which happened on June 24. · The paper was published on August 3, and Shanghai must indeed have been deadly dull. if there had been nothing else in the meanwhile worth chronicling.
The list of foreign residents published on the front page, gives 157 names, apart from families, and amongst. these one notices many whose memory is kept green by present street names, though but few of the monuments are worthy of the old pioneers.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.