t the bottom
anywhere, and there is strong hostility against them on the part of the
officials.

As a sample of the way business is done here, we have just had an
express letter from Shanghai which took four days to arrive. It should
arrive in twelve hours. People use express letters rather than the
telegraph because they are quicker. You may spend as much time as you
like or don't like, wondering why your express letter did not reach you
on time; you do it at your own risk and expense. The Chinese do not
juggle with foreigners as the Japanese do, in the conscious sense, they
simply drift, they juggle with themselves and with each other all the
time.

This house is four miles from the railroad station. There is no street
car here; there are many 'rickshas, a few carriages, still fewer autos.
There are no sedan chairs, at least I don't remember seeing any, but at
Chienkiang, where we went the other day, the streets are so narrow that
chairs are the main means of conveyance. The 'ricksha men here pay forty
cents a day to the city for their vehicles, which are all alike and very
poor ones. They make a little more than that sum for themselves. In
Shanghai they pay ninety cents a day for their right to work, and earn
from one dollar to a possible dollar and a half for themselves.

I said to a young professor, the other day, that China was still
supporting three idle classes of people. He looked surprised, though a
student and critic of social conditions, and asked me who they were.
When I asked him if that couldn't be said of the officials, the priests,
and the army, he said yes, it could. Thus far and no further, seems to
be their motto, both in thinking and acting, especially in acting.

NANKING, May 23.

I don't believe anybody knows what the political prospects are; this
students' movement has introduced a new and uncalculable factor--and all
in the three weeks we have been here. You heard nothing but gloom about
political China at first, corrupt and traitorous officials, soldiers
only paid banditti, the officers getting the money from Japan to pay
them with, no organizing power or cohesion among the Chinese; and then
the students take things into their hands, and there is animation and a
sudden buzz. There are a hundred students being coached here to go out
and make speeches, they will have a hundred different stations scattered
through the city. It is also said the soldiers are responding to the
patriotic