Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1901-04-09
A REMARKABLE PREDICTION,
An Insurance Man FOreshadowed the
Boxer Uprising in China.

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Boxer Uprising in China.
cit is a curious fact, remarked an
insurance man Of this city the other
day, to New Orleans Times-Demo-
crat reporter, chat a quiet gentle
man seated in a certain Office in New
York, foreshadowing the terrible up
rising in China months before it took
place, and did so by process Of pure
ly inductive reasoning. He was sep
arated by thousands Of leagues from
the scene of action, he knew nothing
of oriental complications, aid his pro-
fession was that Of plain, every
day accountant; yet he not only pre-
dicted what was going to happen, but
named the locality of the outbreak
and the native class that would be
chiefly involved--this, too, at time
when the foreign colonists, from the
ambassadors down, were in blissful ig.
norance Of the gathering storm. The
basis of his remarkable forecast.
which was made in letter written
at the beginning of the year, was a
brief report in a London fnancial-pa.
per Of life insurance policies lately
written in the northern Chinese prov
inces. The number was something
astonishing, and he noted with in
terest that the new policy holders
were nearly all native army and naval
officers Of high rank, among them be-
ing several commanding generals wht
were presumably very near the i'm
perial throne. That set the quiet in.
surance man to thinking, and he pro-
ceeded to examine the statistics lit
tie more closely. Only0 few lasmarce
companies have entered tha nor,h
China field for business, ANA il was
a significant Circumstance that ihe
great majority Of the recent policies
were written in concern tina, agrees
among other things, not to contest
losses incurred through military OPP
erations'-in plain English 90 pay
the insurance carried by men VINO are
killed in battle. The other companies
do not include that proviso in their
terms, and, being a bit of a Sherlock
Holmes in his way, the quiet insu-
rance man came to the conclusion that
trouble was brewing. What kind OF
trouble was naturally the first ques-
ton, and, as China had at that time
no quarrel afoot with any particu-
lar power, the inference was quite nat
ural that she was preparing to assume
the aggressive against outsiders in
general. If a purpose of that kind
was being entertained it would Ger.
tainly be known to the military chiefs
who would be called upon to put it
into execution, and they, as it seemed,
were the very people who were do
ing the heaviest insuring. The fact
that the phenomenal business was
chiefly confined to Picking and Tien.
tsin led Mr.. Holmes, Jr., to conclude
that the conspiracy was a close cor.
poration affair, limited to Manchuria.
lie figured all out for his own amuse-
ment purely, but he had SO strong
prescience of the correctness of his
deductions that he wrote me let
ter, in which he remarked, apropos
Of nothing, that there was likely, in
his opinion, to be a general outbreak
against the white devils in north
China before the end of the year. He
added that conspiracy was evident
ly in train, centering about the throne
itself and including the chief mill
tary officers Of the empire. i have
not heard from him since the trouble
began, but | fancy he is patting him
self on the back. Maybe, though, he
has forgotten all about it,"
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