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may easily be done, and the additional area ascertained for purpose of taxation.
"The question of ownership which you raise has been brought up on several occasions by one or more of your honour- able predecessors, and several precedents are on record in this office and in your yamen, and I was hopeful that the principle was clearly established thereby. I will cite one or more. In 1871 the point came up in respect of title deeds Nos. 268 and 270, and in 1873 in the case of title deed No. 246. The Taotai at that time proposed in his view of the case to fix a price per mow for the accretions, but so antenable a position was upon examination abandoned by him, he finding that under the law his authority was to ascertain the area of such accretion for purpose of taxation. In one case, having the report of his deputy, he not only added the area of accretion to the measurement on the old deed, but went so far as to embrace it in the consideration expressed for the last pur- chase. If you will consult the records of about April, 1873, you will find the report of the de- puties in the instance referred to, as communi- cated to this office by the Tantai. In this con- nection I desire to remark that I consider the title deeds for land held by foreigners are simply leases or grants from the Imperial Government, and I know of no clause in them whereby any rights are reserved or abridged, which would be enjoyed by a Chinese holder, who I understand enjoys the right to the alluvial deposit of the river. This deposit is esteemed both in your honourable country and in mine to be natural result, consequent проц the peculiar situation of the land so fronting the stream. The principle seems to obtain near the junk anchorage at Tunkah-dco, where I am informed taxes are actually paid by the owners of the front lots upon land for several tens of feet under water. They do this as willingly as the foreign renter, who asks that an accretion be surveyed and added to his title deed.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
[August 13, 1896.
the municipality bound to pay government | cases entirely dissimilar, and they preclude any land tax thereon is an open and a complicated possibility of interference with the existing one which has before now been referred (use | status quo in Shanghai. lessly) to Peking. It is, however, unimportant. The procedure at present in force precludes the municipality from paying such taxes on any land for which it does not hold title deeds, and the foreshore title deeds are in the hands of the Band lotholders. If, however, it should be decided by good authority that the tax is pro- perly payable, there is nothing to prevent either the Council or the Bund lot-renters from paying such amounts as may be in arrear. This was the course taken when the Council for 1885-6 was instructed by the ratepayers to pay the Chinese Government tax on municipal | roads; and arrears due for 14 years were then paid. But there is no mention in the Land Regulations of any penalty attaching to non- payment of this tax, beyond the recovery of the actual amount (under article VIII.) in a sum.
mary manner.
We now come to the question of accretions- the most important point. The history of the Bund foreshore tends to show that unfor tunately litigation on this point has not been confined-as it should have been-to the laws governing ownership of land in China; and in such cases as Regina v. Reynolds and the Har bour Master v. Hall & Holtz, decisións based on the laws of foreign countries have only served to complicate the situation and to provide oc- casion for that pettifogging policy which the Chinese love. In the former case, it was laid down by the Court that "if a certain piece of land were given in the title deeds as being of so many mow between certain limits, of which low water were one, and if low water subsequently receded, it was of no advantage to the renter;" a principle entirely contrary to Chinese law, which gives the reuter ก claim on all accretions, on payment of a nominal sum (varying between 12 and 32 taels) for regis- tering the same. The expression of this unfor- Moreover, in a despatch from the Taotai tunate opinion has done a great deal of harm; about the 12th September, 1873, he returned, for the Chinese and their hungry advisers have after examination, to the Consular body, a triumphantly brought it up against successive plan of the proposed bund line and bunding, Consuls and Councils ever since, quite oblivious prepared for the mouth of the Soochow creek.
of the fact that, though it may be sound Eng- He made one or two suggestions as to the lish law, it has nothing whatsoever to do with width of the channel. The plan so modified land rented under Chinese title deeds, from the was submitted to the Municipal Council, and in Emperor of China. Mr. Bradford, in the de- October, 1873, Mr. Seward informed the Taotaispatch already quoted, refused rightly enough that the Council had accepted his amended plan. to admit the case of Mr. Reynolds as an argu- The matter has therefore been fixed long since, and the records seem complete. The filling in of which you speak is clearly within the lines defined and accepted by the Tuotai, the Consuls, and the Municipal Council. Why should it then become necessary or expedient to pronounce against a settled scheme made for the public good, or to agitate a subject in the discussion of which, from your premises, no good result is likely to be obtained When such matters are brought to your notice by those who are not fully informed, if you will ask information it will always be gladly given you from reliable quarters, and thus much time would be saved and useless speculative theories avoided, and the public interest will not be harmed.
"I trust that in view of these and other premises which might be cited; the established precedents, and your knowledge of the law, you will agree with me that to insist upon the right to control the foreshore of, the lot in question would be against precedent, which is supported by accepted plans, and would be contrary to law and custom."
Consul Bradford's argument that the foreign landrenter's rights vis-à-vis the Chinese Govern- ment are the same as these enjoyed by a Chinese holder is an extremely strong and valid one; and it must be borne in mind that the eastern boundary as given on the Bund lot title deed is put'an, the river-beach, or mud flat." As was pointed out by Dr. Yates (who agreed with Mr. Bradford) at a meeting of ratepayers in May, 1869, the meaning of such a boundary in Chinese title-deeds is "to low water mark," and he rays, "so that if the river filled up to Pootung. the land would still belong to the Bund lotholders All the owner of the Bund let has to do to secure his title is to register the increase and pay the land! tax. Now the foreshore having been surrende:ed for public use, the question whether
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ment.
Similarly the Supreme Court's utterance in the case of Harbour Master r. Hall & Holtz was
untimely and unnecessary, for though it only stated the self evident fact that "land between high and low water belongs to the Emperor of China," it stated it in such a way as to let the native authorities believe they could with im- punity deal as they liked with such land. Now, all foreign-rented land in the settlements of Shanghai belongs to, and is leased from, the Emperor-in token of which fact the Govern. ment tax is paid-but the conditions of tenure are clearly fixed by usage, by title deeds, and, last but not least, by the Land Regulations. Art. VI of those Regulations (the "study of which should be made compulsory on all Taotais) distinctly states that land heretofore surrendered by the various foreign renters to public use, such as roads and the beach grounds of rivers within the aforesaid limits, shall remain henceforth dedi ated to the same uses." This surely is plain enough, and allows no room for quibbling. It is the beach of the river that is reserved for public use, and not any other spot-if the river recedes the beach goes with it-and the Land Regulations, though often questioned, have always proved to have sufficient force behind them to ensure their general observance.
11
Even were the question one of private ownership by a land-renter, the fact of non- registration of any accretion could not lead to eventual forfeiture of the right to register such accretion, unless the greatest indiffer ence were displayed by the Consul concerned. Such forfeiture would be against the prin- ciples of Chinese land-law, though that law is elastic enough to work in all sorts of ways. We know that of late years certain-na- tive officials, taking advantage of Consular apathy in such matters, have been refusing to shenko (or register) foreshore accretions at Woo sung and other places. Such action cannot be sustained either by law or custom; and the sooner such methods of filling official coffers are restrained, the better. But the Band foreshore does not stand on the same footing as land rented by a private individual. It has; ander clear title deeds, a right of way along the river. bank, a right which has been surrendered for the public use for ever, and which, under the Land Regulations, can never be diverted from that use. That any native official should dream, even in his most impecunious moments, of tampering with the Settlement's clearly established rights in this matter is only. another proof of the lengths to which they will go when actuated by greed, ignorance, and the probable absence of reprisals. But we believe the whole scheme to be due tó the over-zealous promptings of some energetic but ignorant "adviser," and we can only re-echo the sound advice of Con- sal Bradford to Liu Taotai concerning the futility of taking advice from those who are not fully informed," and the avoidance of "speculative theories" in general.
In conclusion, there can be no question of the Council paying the Taotai, or anyone else, for any accretions to the public foreshore. The Land Tax, if not paid, may be payable on applica tion received from the proper quarters; but the necessity for registering (shenko) foreshore accretions is not, and cannot, be the same in the case of public lands as in the case of private individuals. No Taotai can go beyond^ Art. VI. of the Land Regulations.-N. C. Daily News.
NEWCHWANG FLOODED.
Newchwang, 25th July. After several days of hot, dry weather, the rainy season set in rather prematurely, how- ever In rather less than 24 hours, nearly 3 inches of rainfall were registered. Yesterday, as a consequence, we had no perceptible ebb- tide, and when the strong spring-tide came up in the afternoon it was at once apparent that something phenomenal. would happen. How- ever, little preparation was made to meet con- sequent occurrences. At about 3 p.m. the tide was at its normal height. The water had still three hours to rise, and it did, with a vengeance. The tide had not risen to such an extent for thirty years, and the floods in 1888 were small in comparison. The water broke over the only piece of promenading ground the foreigners can utilize the Bund. It was a the site of the Rattler's winter dock that- the mischief commenced in the Settlement. In less than an hour the whole Settlement was flooded: Most foot traffic was immediately replaced by sampans and foreign boats. Crafts of all de scriptions and dimensions were requisitioned, and it was a novel sight to see sampans senlling; through the streets of our Settlement. How ever, there was work for these. Foreign ladies, and children had to be rescued from flooded houses and brought to places of comparative safety. In some foreign houses the water rose to eighteen inches above the flooring and in Chinese to over three feet. It was piteous to see whole. families of Chinese coming down the streets in sampans, having lost their all. Hundreds of houses are reported to have collapsed and The recent Chefoo case, to which the present thousands of people are rendered homeless. scheme has been compared, would have a certain This is in our vicinity. As one bearing upon it if (1) Shanghai had no Land up river the desolation increases Regulations, and (2) if the Shanghai Bund fore- portion. Miles and miles of crops shore had not long ago been surrendered water, and altogether the damage is by the original renters for public use in by hundreds of thousands of taels. The desola perpetuity. These two conditions render the l tion and destruction were more apparent when
In this connection it may be well to note the strong opinion of Mr. Seward regarding their validity as expressed in 1875 (vide Council v. Fogg), and to remember that Sir E. Hornby (in Council v. Wills) held them to be of equal authority with the charter of Hongkong.
T