d at it
that it was better to pay a man than to lose the lesson. The mud in the
roads here is much like the old days on Long Island before the gravel
was put there, only it is softer and more slippery here, and the water
stands.

PEKING, July 17.

We are pleased to learn that the Japanese censor hasn't detained all our
letters, though since you call them incoherent there must be some gaps.
I'm sure we never write anything incoherent if you get it all. The
course of events has been a trifle incoherent if you don't sit up and
hold its hands all the time. Since China didn't sign the peace treaty
things have quite settled down here, however, and the lack of excitement
after living on aerated news for a couple of months is quite a letdown.
However, we live in hopes of revolution or a coup d'etat or some other
little incident to liven up the dog days.

You will be pleased to know that the University Chancellor--see letters
of early May--has finally announced that he will return to the
University. It is supposed that the Government has assented to his
conditions, among which is that the police won't interfere with the
students, but will leave discipline to the University authorities. To
resign and run away in order to be coaxed back is an art. It's too bad
Wilson never studied it. The Chinese peace delegates reported back here
that Lloyd George inquired what the twenty-one Demands were, as he had
never heard of them. However, the Chinese hold Balfour as most
responsible. In order to avoid any incoherence I will add that a Chinese
servant informed a small boy in the household of one of our friends here
that the Chinese are much more cleanly than the foreigners, for they
have people come to them to clean their ears and said cleaners go way
down in. This is an unanswerable argument.

I hear your mother downstairs engaged on the fascinating task of trying
to make Chinese tones. I may tell you that there are only four hundred
spoken words in Chinese, all monosyllables. But each one of these is
spoken in a different tone, there being four tones in this part of the
country and increasing as you go south till in Canton there are twelve
or more. In writing there are only 214 radicals, which are then combined
and mixed up in all sorts of ways. My last name here is Du, my given
name is Wei. The Du is made up of two characters, one of which means
tree and the other earth. They are written separately. Then Wei is made
up of so