Foreign Correspondence

Tai-ku Shansr, December 21, 1885. Kditok (i;riek:- Your interesting etter of August I8tli carne to hand only a few days a go via Paris. It tuakes very llttle dinerence, in point of time, as to which way our mail comes frorn America. When it goes by way of Euope tliey send it by rail trom Paris to irindisi thereby rain ing nni'li time.! We looked lor winter before tliis but we are enjoying the saine eunny, mild weatlier we liad in TienUin last winter, Dust storm are not to frequent nor severe as ia Tlenimn. A good deal of the wheat sowed last all has failed to come up on account of dry wheather. So If we shouldn't have lentifiil rains in the spring Sbanze will e likely to have anotlier familie. In the famine f '77-'8, it is said that six million of people died of starvntion in the soutli of tli is provinca alone. Wliole villages till renmin in ruitis hik) rtesolation speafctig too pluinly of those terrible days. I )elieve at that time they liad no crops for bree years. Bread stuffs are slowlv adv:ineing in price, but this often oeeurs, so t is not so significant. The soil of this Uin is exceeding fertile when it 8 properly irrigated. The whole surface S covered for linndreds of feet in some places with tliat peculiar genlogical forHiation cnown as "löess" from the similar depost in the valley of the Rhine. 'Tis a irown porous eartli every little partiële of which is perforated wlth minute canal Ined with carbonate ol lime. It readlly breaks down into un loialpable powder md is so rlch that 'tls not nccesaary to ise other fertilizera ia the raising of rops. One of t lic most interestinifeatii es of lliis forin.il ion iH$ cleavageirtiicli salways perpendicular. Ii the nunmtains vliere we sptMit a part of tue suninier one ould see vast iierpendkular walla from wenty to one liuudred feet high, composd wholly of this brown earth and, at a ittle distance, lookiUir exaclly like dark andstone. In tliis Immediate locality the outcropping rock8 are all limestone filled vith gllica iiiidules. There are some peculiar features about he coal formation in this province. I lave scen a few of the fossils and had my urioHity aroused so tliat, if possilile. I inend to go and do some collectina of spemens next sumraer, with which sooiegei ologist may be able to determine somehing of interest. If you see any of my medicnl friends frowing despondent for lack of practico, 11 thora there is one country n the woild where there is no competition and where nedical and curglcal cases are as plentiful s thesandsof the sea. Here is a little artile I copy from the " North China Herald" of Shanghai. "Dr. D. E. Osborne of the A. BC. F. M. mission receiyed a gralifying expressiou if appreciation from the Chinese lately. The doctor had succeislully treated a cleik n one of the leading banks of Tai-ku isien who liad attempted to commit suiide with opium. A few days after the eading meuilier of the banking firm, accompaiiteit by a do7-en or mure frieuds, ame to the Doctor' residence and precnted him with gifts imounting to 18 or 20 tnels, (20 to'25 dollars) and also a r"rt'iius tablet of red and gold, un which hls virtues were extolled witli no stinted