Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 265, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 November 1919 — SHANTUNG [ARTICLE]

SHANTUNG

Hat 30.000,000 People; Size of Small State

If you wish to realize the blessings of your native land, where there is plenty of room and plenty to eat, go and look at the province of Shantung, writes Niksah. Shantung has thirty million people, but it is no bigger than the state of Illinois. Not a scrap of anything is wasted in Shantung. The Chinese girls there weave the discarded queues of their brothers into the hair nets that American girls wear when they go motoring. The silk worm, which probably yields more wealth in proportion to what he eats , than any other ’Vntx-treox l ?, -.,.' ■ meStic asset. •> The great majority of the thirty million Chinese in Shantung Just barely exist. To add to the misery of this human mass, the ruthless Hwano-Ho river splits the province of Shantung with a yellow flood, which once a year rises over its banks, and kills „and destroys. It is held back by dikes that tower above the homes poor, keeping them always in the shadow of death. As everywhere else in the civilized world, an aristocracy, both oriental and, European, sits on the shoulders of this impoverished yellow mass. Tsing-Tau the chief port, is a sort of Chinese Atlantic City full of splendid hotels and homes, rich and beautiful.