The importance of the recent incident at Hankow has beet
exaggerated, but still it has a certain significance. Messrs, Jardine, Matheson, and Co. possessed some property within the new Russian concession in that city. The Russians denied Messrs. Jardine's right, and threatened to employ force for their ejection. Thereupon bluejackets were landed from a British warship, guns were trained to bear on the spot, and the Russians asked for orders from Pekin. M. de Giers, the Russian Minister, then proposed to submit the affair to arbitration, and Mr. Ironeide, the British Chargé d'Affaires, agreed. The quarrel has, therefore, blown over, but it marks the Russian and the English readiness in China to suspect each other, and resort to violence on the occasion of any dispute. The Russians suspect encroachment in the simplest English actions, while the English believe that Russians never do justice except under compulsion. A temper of that kind is more dangerous to peace than any amount of competition for concessions, and it can be removed only by a working agree- ment between the two Governments. Our countrymen in Asia do not, we think, " grab " what is not their own, but they do imagine that any order from foreigners delivered in an Asiatic seaport marks some scheme of oppression. They are the most peaceable of men in their own cities, but worse subjects for divided jurisdictions could not be imagined, They always prosper, but are always being betrayed, either by their own representatives, or the foreign authority.
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