CANNIBALS IN TONQUIN.

Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1813, 19 February 1884, Page 3

CANNIBALS IN TONQU IN.

The following despatch has been received at the London office of the New York Herald :- - Hongkong, October 20. — To-day I met Major General Mesny, of the Imperial Chinese Army, who has just arrived from Yunnan, where he has had an opportunity of observing much that is of interest concerning the recent operations in Tonquin. He is well informed concerning Chinese affairs, having spent fifteon years out of twenty five in travelling tlnough the interior, chiefly in an official capacity. He was ordered Irom the Mongolian province to Yunnan to assist the Viceroy in consequenceof his perfect knowledge of the French language. He is a native of the island of Jersey. He is now en route to Foo Chow to take charge of the naval arsenal. He weais a Chinese costume with a queue, and speaks the Chinese language fluently. While the Yunnan two of his men spent a month in the Black Flag camp, and he also met the chief, who holds a commission in the Chinese army. The Black Flags received exaggerated lepoits of the French losses at Hanoi, but conect reports concerning the Chinese loss, as stated in my despatches. He says that if the prisoners fall into the hands of the Black Flags they will be reserved for fortune, but the bodies of the dead will not be found, as the Chinese believe that eating the flesh of ferocious men makes them bra\o, especially the heait and liver; therefore they are accustomed to eat their enemies. The Black Flags are strongly addicted to this habit : they even eat their own people who die by accident on the march. This may account for tiie success which attended the search for the bodies of Riviere and his followers, w hose heads alone weie found on the last sortie made by Geneial Bouet. He regards fighting the Black Flags as fighting the Chinese army on a small scale. The Chinese undoubtedly furnish arms, munition, and nipn to peipetuatc a haiassing war upon the Fieneh in Tonquin. The French originally made such a bugbear of the Black Flags that the Chinese considered it was woith while to keep up the organisation by subsidy as long as they were continuing the war with France. At that time they nuiiibeied only i3OO fighting muu, now they can put 3000 in the field and still ganison the stiongholds. My informant consideis the Black Flags the best and bravest of all the Chinese soldiers. He has no doubt that Fiance would conquer China if she made war as with a European power, but in the same way as in Tonquin she must suffer defeat and disgrace for a time. The city of Canton is appalently quiet, but theie is constant dread of further tiouble unless the Hankow affair ''s satisfactorily settled. Six war ships help to pieserve order. The Palos has gone to Formosa. The Viceroy has about 10,000 tioops in the city to curb any attempt at rebellion fomented by the secret societies.

A peasant named James Zygelof lias jusb died aged 147 yeais. His son is still alive at the age of 115 ; he has a grandson of 85, and a gieat grandson of 40 yeais. Thk Timaru Herald quarrels with Dr Hector's recently-published "Handbook of the Colony " for treating all subjects scientifically. It s.ijs: — " Under the head ot " Agricultuie " he classes the farm lands ot the North and .South Islands respectively in this lucid and familiar fashion, vu,: 'Fluviatile drifts, marine teitiary, uppei secondary, palaeozoic, schiotose, gtanite, and volcanic ' Any rustic immigrant will be able to judge in a minute horn this the locality best svntcd to his notions of fanning. Curious to know uhatUr Hector Ins to say about this distiict as a field for agi icultural enteipiise, we were rather flabbergasted to find him disposing of it in these Avoids : 'The iillmial soils of tho lower pait of the Canterbuiy Plains are the most remat liable for their fertility ; but scarcely less important are the low rolling downs ioimed by the calcaicous locks of the teitiary formation, which skiit the higher mountain masses, and frequently have their quality impro\ed by the disintegration of interspetsed basaltic locks.' This is a \eiy fine description of South Canterbury, truly, and eminently calculated to attiact settlement hitherwaids !" Tut: Melbourne correspondent of the Southern News wiitts, with regaid to the recent journalistic expeditions to New Guinea in a way that is not very eomplimentaiy to Captain Armit and tho " Vagibond." He says :— Mr George Ernest Morrison, whose plucky conduct in connection with his unsuccessful attempt to tia\erse New Guinea from south to noi th is worthy ot all praise, is now reci uitmg his shattered health at Geelong. In the sallow-faced invalid, worn to a skeleton by puvations, intermittent fev-er, and tho loss of blood consequent on a spear wo.md which cut a blood vessel near the biidge of the nose, few peisons would lecognise the athletic young footballer, the piide of the champion team of Australia. Under the parental root, he is slowely recovering, and before long the story of his tiavels may be looked for. His achievements as explorer far suipasq those of tho two gentlemen who may fairly be assumed to have been his rivals in the same field. One of them never went beyond the bounds of missionary civilisation, travelling a distance which anyone can now traverse in a tin cc days' tiip ; and the other closely imitated the famous Kin^ of France, who " marched up the hill and then marched down again " by simply going to New Guinea and coming home without attempting anything. And it must be remembered that Mr Morrison is baiely 21 years of age.