Early in June I had occasion to visit Tientsin, and on the afternoon of my arrival I met Mr. Archibald, of _Collier’s Weekly_, who told me that he had just seen in the telegraph office a notice directing copies of all cables to be sent to a resident in Tientsin. Whatever may be the law and usage in China, I had always regarded the contents of a telegram once in the office for transmission as secret. It seemed to me that the case was equivalent to the conveyance of animals or goods; the owner was responsible for their safe keeping until delivery had been made to the carriers, when his liability ceased, and that of the carriers commenced. This Chinese method of dealing with messages was new to me; Dr. Morrison had never mentioned its existence. Subsequently we two correspondents were joined in Tientsin by Mr. Richard Little, representing the _Chicago Daily News_, and together we went to the head office of the Imperial Chinese Railway Telegraphs, where we saw in the instrument-room the notice directing that a copy of telegrams from Yingkow and other places, intended for the Eastern Telegraph Company was to be sent to Mr. Fenton, of the _Tientsin Press_. The notice was signed by Mr. N. F. Huang, who is the director of telegraphs, and it is a striking instance of the laxity of Chinese Railway Telegraph administration. [Illustration: FACSIMILE OF AN ORDER IN THE CHINESE TELEGRAPH OFFICE AT TIENTSIN.] At the date the notice was signed there were in Yingkow L. L. Etzel, of the _Daily Telegraph_; W. O. Greener, the _Times_; F. MacCullagh, _New York Herald_; Dr. G. E. Morrison, the _Times_; Lieut.-Col. C. Norris-Newman, the _Daily Mail_, besides Reuter’s representative and three correspondents of Continental newspapers. During the three months and upwards it had been posted over the receiving clerk’s desk representatives of all the great newspapers in England and America had visited Yingkow, and the number of cables dispatched from there and “other places” must have amounted to hundreds, for the transmission of which thousands of dollars had been accepted. We acquired that notice before we left the offices, and after it had been photographed I took it to the British consulate, and showed it to Mr. H. E. Fulford, H.B.M.’s Acting Consul-General at Tientsin. I explained to him where I had seen the notice, and reminded him that when he was at Newchwang there were upwards of a dozen special correspondents dispatching messages from Yingkow. He asked me what I wished him to do.