Peiyang Arsenal outside Tientsin, on June 27th, 1900, by the British, Americans, and Russians, the Chinese defenders, before evacuating it when hard pressed, laid strings of crackers along the walls. As our marines and bluejackets, with the Americans, advanced to the final assault these were set fire to. The explosions sounded like a very heavy fusillade and the assailants took cover. The Chinese meanwhile bolted out of the arsenal and got safely away before the attackers discovered the trick and stormed the place. A week or two after this false alarm, I obtained permission to cross into Chinese territory and visit Samchun. The town looked very interesting at a distance, with its high walls and two square stone towers, which were in reality pawn‐shops. For these establishments in China are looked upon as safe deposit offices. A rich man about to leave home for any length of time removes his valuables to the nearest pawn‐shop and there stores them. They are the first places attacked when a band of robbers seizes some small town, as frequently happens. So they are built in the form of strong towers with the entrance generally several feet from the ground, in order that the proprietor and his friends may retire within and defend them. Accompanied by Captain Woolley, I.M.S., I set out to visit the town, having received many injunctions to be careful not to embroil ourselves with the inhabitants or the soldiery, who were not likely to prove over friendly. We were provided with interpreters in the persons of a Chinese policeman in British employ and a Sikh constable who had learned to converse very well in the language of the country. As we intended to make a formal call on the mandarin in command of Samchun and had heard that in China a man’s importance is gauged by the size of his visiting‐card, we wrote our names on sheets of foolscap—the largest pieces of paper we could find. Red, however, is the proper colour. In mufti and taking no weapons, we left the camp and crossed the river in a small, flat‐bottomed ferry‐boat. Landed on the far side, we set off along the tops of the mud banks between the paddy‐fields, the only roads available. Those which are used as general paths are laid with flat stones, which, not being fastened in any way, occasionally tilt up and slide about in a disconcerting manner. As we neared the town we were observed with interest by a number of Chinese soldiers lounging about in front of the principal gateway. We felt a little nervous as to our reception but putting a bold face on the matter directed our way towards them. We were stopped, however, by our Chinese policeman, who told us that we should not approach this entrance as it faced the mandarin’s Yamen and was reserved for important individuals. We being _merely_ foreigners—this although he was in British employment!—must seek admittance through the back gate into the town. Irritated at his insolent tone, the Sikh constable