Good Neighbors

A draft on the Riggs National Bank in Washington, D. C. for $2,214,007.36 payable to Cordell Hull was handed in Tokyo last week to a subordinate official of the U. S. Embassy by a subordinate official of the Japanese Foreign Office. Thus the Imperial Japanese Government paid in full as quietly as possible the following itemized bill, presented by Uncle Sam after Japanese bombers sank the U. S. river gunboat Panay and Standard Vacuum Oil Co.'s tankers Met Ping, Mei Hsia and Mei An (TIME, Dec. 20) : Property losses -- Navy Dept.

-- Loss of Panay $ 455,727.87 Loss of ship's equipment and supplies 97,766.48 Effects of personnel 40,263.00 Total 593,757.35

Post Office Department--Dept. drafts, funds, supplies 74.27 Dept. of State -- effects of embassy personnel 6,400.80

Standard-Vacuum Oil Com pany 1,287,942.00

Personal property of 13 American nationals not mem bers of Navy, Embassy or Standard-Vacuum personnel. 57,495.59 Total of all property losses above mentioned $1,945,670.01

Death and personal injury indemnification -- for the death of two members of the crew of the Panay and the captain of the Mei Ping, and injury of 74 other persons on board the Panay and other vessels 268,337.35

Grand total $2,214,007.36

Although the Japanese Government officially apologized and paid this bill with the greatest speed possible to officialdom, penitent Japanese civilians were even quicker, have been going around to able U. S. Ambassador Joseph Clark Grew with all sorts of small & large contributions, many brought by Japanese school children shepherded by their teachers. In Joe Crew's nondescript kitty there was $10,800 last week when the Ambassador was authorized by Good Neighbor Roosevelt to establish this as a trust fund in perpetuity, income to be spent entirely in Japan "for purposes testifying to good will between Japan and the United States." Part of the money will be spent upkeeping graves of U. S. sailors buried in Japan, part repairing sites associated in one way or another with U. S. citizens notable in Japanese eyes, such as Commodore Perry.

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