''Snatch"

It seemed last week as if British Ambassador to China Sir Hughe Montgomery Knatchbull-Hugessen, a wispy-looking sahib whose friends call him "Snatch," would have completely recovered from the machine-gunning he received last month before the British Government could manage to pry a reply as to this outrage from the Japanese Government.

"Snatch" last week was sitting up in bed at Shanghai, surrounded by flowers, cablegrams and congratulatory letters. His doctors permitted him to walk about his room and receive visitors. A warship waited to take Sir Hughe to a swank resort in The Netherlands East Indies for final convalescence--and still the Japanese Government, far from having made the "fullest redress" demanded by the British Government, had not yet officially replied to London's charge that it was a Japanese war plane which suddenly swooped down on the Ambassador's car and shot "Snatch."

Tokyo papers loudly complained last week that British bankers, responsive to their Government, were putting on pressure to force a Japanese reply by suddenly refusing to discount the sterling bills of Japanese exporters. Whether or not this was being done, Japanese Premier Prince Konoye meanwhile scared the British Admiralty to issue instructions to unescorted British merchantmen, bidding them submit to search by Japanese warships if challenged in Chinese waters. The Admiralty saved as much face as possible by adding that after such a search the Japanese warship concerned "must" report its findings to the Admiralty, as must also the searched British merchantman.

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