Ogden Standard-Examiner | 1921-03-06 | Page 25 | 'Silent Panic' Spreads in Famine Area

'SILENT PANIC SPREADS IN FAMINE AREA Graphic Description of the Stricken Chinese Given by American Engineer NEW YORK. Mar. 5 A graphic description of famine scenes In China, an explanation of their rause and outline out-line of methods of relief Is given by Charles Davis Jameson, who has been civil engineer In China since lS'Jll and for the last ten years has beSn i I nectcd with the department of famine relief and flood control of the Chlnest ; government. Ml i IM. BUJ m . A "alleiu panic" sprtads rapldl) ' over the famine-stricken area where the people realize their danger of starvation, says Mr Jameson. "All the people, when hunger sets in and the food Is all gone are wandering not to any definite point, but to any place I which changes the scene of their misery." mis-ery." he adds- "business Is at once paralyzed. When 1 last pass, d through a famine district, there was not a cart of any kind in the roads or streets. Not a mule nor a horse nor s wheelbarrow wheelbar-row was seen In motion. Not a coolie ! was encountered going to or from the ', market. It was as If a great fear were over the whole countrv and iiie people were holding their breath and listening and waiting for a horror. I None but the starving or sick are seen ' in the streets at such a time. Fam-' Fam-' lne. fever and typhus soon break out in very town and city. "Xiutsldo the walls of these towns i and on the highways are emaciated, half demented men. women and children chil-dren going anywhere: Bometlnies with a few belongings which they cannot ; sell. Some may carry bowls or baskets bas-kets containing leaves, twigs, straw oi ; bark from the trees. Nearly every tree is strlppe.l of its bark and dying, i Tho people walk until they can walk ' no more and ihen sit down and die. dim. KILLED; EATEN "Not a day goes by but one p.m.,-s bodies in the highways or at the roadsides road-sides -.nd the fields men, women, children chil-dren and baldes over the fields and along the ro;s prowl starving dogs that once more are fierce wolves gaunt, hungry, savage devouring wtiat lies In their way. In somo Instances In-stances m-n and women, insane, fight t with the dogs for food, whin on. of these dogs Is killed, he Is at once eaten eat-en by man or dog." The natural causes of famine in China ar droughts and floods, Mr. Jameson says- South of tho Yang-tze famines are rare as the rainfall is fairly regular, but north of the river in- country is classed as seml-arld and the rainfall la subject to great variations. Sometimes the rain Is so heavy that the grain H beaten flat on the ground, and large areas left under water. The harvest is lost, land becomes sodden and no crops are possible until th next year. What Is not actually under water becomes one vast swamp. I Kl Ml I l I IMI'I I Ml Ms More than fcur-flftha of the transportation trans-portation of ChUa is accomplished by hundreds of thousands of two-wheeled carta, pack camels, mules, horses, donkeys, don-keys, men. wheelbarrows and boats along the great rivers and canals. Mr. Jameson asserts that the calamity calam-ity that has now fallen upon millions of Chinese Is iluc to no lack of industry, indus-try, for they are the "most remarkable farmers In tho world.'" although their methods and tools arc much the. same as those used In Egypt in the time of Moses. The people live a hand-to-mouth existence and a failure of crops ono year means underfeeding. underfeed-ing. Two years of bad crops bring starvation and worse.