This childho
Februíry 25, 1897.
told them of Your Excellency's I just actions, and they one and all our Excellency, the highest con-
There & matter to which I would like to call Your Excellency's attention. Your Excellency will doubtless remember that in May, 1893, Inspector-General Hart sent Mr. Ludlow to see Your Excellency in Penang, saying that since so much opium had been smuggled from Singapore it was desired that new regulations for signing duty certificates might be enforced, and for this he asked Your Excellency's assistance, to which Your Excel- lenoy replied that it could be tried; but, if the English Government objected or should the Singapore merchants be inconvenienced by such regulations, it should be withdrawn imme- diately. On the 3rd of June I called on Your Excellency, and on that occasion Your
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
afterwards he, the Protector of Chinese, mis- represented to the Governor, who reported to the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Minis ter for the Colonies, that this money was a compulsory tax from the merchants.
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That this money was collected from the mer chants with their own full consent, and on their own petition and that I gave answer that I could not on my own authority receive it, but would ask for the instructions of my govern ment, and as to whether or not the payment thereof was compulsory the record itself shows. Whether in Singapore, a duty free colony, the Government ought to or ought not to try to enforce such regulations it was not for me to decide. Moreover, at that time I, with the same opinion as Your Excellency, said that it would be difficult to enforce such regulations. With the instructions from the Teungli Yamen and petitions from the merchants my duty as From the beginning to the end the money was never in my charge, and as to the slanderous charge that it was a compulsory fee to be ap. propriated by me, this, I think, Your Excellency could never have imagined.
derations
leave port, and apore who per chest fi what regul effect next y to the Tsungli Y
placed our respective stam
151
(Stamps of 19 Chinese Firm)
TRANSLATION OF CONSUL-GENERAL HUANGH BEPLY TO MERCHANTS PETITION (19TH YEAR, OTH MOON, 23RD DAY).
I have the honour to acknowledge ther ceipt of your patition. Since your actions in accord with new regulations, it becomes my duty to issue certificates with perm port, As to the payment of $40 per oh made to free them from furthe
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Excellency was good enough to tell me that Cóusul was simply to transmit their views.datter.
proper investigations had been made and that It was found that, while the junkmen are the purchasers of the opium, it is the merchants who give bonds for payment of the necessary duty, therefore it was impossible to enforce the proposed regulations, and that the Inspector- General had been duly advised with a request that the proposed action should not be taken. Three days afterwards I again met your Ex cellency, when Your Excellency said that the Inspector-General still wired begging that a trial should be made, and that since it would be awkward to refuse, said that the new regula tions might be tried experimentally.
The new regulations having been issued a month, there was not a single person who came to the Consulate to sign the certificates as re- quired. When the Chinese heard that new regulations would soon be enforced, a great demand was made for opium, and eight to nine hundred chests were contracted for. Shipment of this opium was prevented and 50 to 60 junks with over a thousand junkmen were not allowed to leave the port, for which reasons they peti- tioned that the Consul and the Protector of Chinese should withdraw the new regulations, which was not granted. Hence it was proposed to the Chinese that, as these new regulations were not issued from the Colonial Office, nor were they regulations enacted by the Straits Government, as soon as they resorted to legal proceedings the said regulations would be im. mediately ended. For this a fund was raised among the junkmen. I heard this news with much anxiety, and it was with much exertion on my part that such action was suppressed.
Boon afterwards the merchants presented a united petition stating that the junkmen would pay $40 per chest as a guarantee for the duty, and that when the opium reached China whether or not the specified duty could be collected, the Singapore merchants who signed the certificates should be held to no further obligations. I answered that the money should be put in the charge of Tsai Mun-pow, to wait for further instructions from the Tsungli Yamen. In the meantime I allowed the opium to leave the port as desired.
On the 10th of July, in company with my interpreter Mr. La-shan, I again called on Your Excellency, when Your Excellency's attention was drawn to the above mentioned petition from the Chinese merchants, and Your Excel loney remarked that since the merchants asked this to be done with their Own free will there was nothing in it that does not conform with English law. As there was no despatch sent me on these subjects I could not notify the Colonial Secre- tary of the same, and I am not aware whether or not Your Excellency has noted our con- versation in your register. Nevertheless, I doubt not in the least that all these occurrences are still fresh in your memory. Herewith I have the honour to submit for Your Excellency's perusal a copy of the merchants' petition, a facsimile of the one now on file in the Teungli
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Since Your Excellency's departure from Singapore, very unfortunately, on account of lio questions, the Protector of Chinese and ayself were not on
ot on very good terms. The Protector of Chinese, finding no weaknesses in me that he could utilise, finally took away the
that was in Tsai Mun pow's charge and || deposited it, with the Colonial Treasury An
mon
The German Government hearing these unfound reports have now refused to accept my appointment as Minister to that Court. I have done nothing that would cause Germany | to raise such objections nor have my astions been disagreeable to England. It was only the Protector of Chinese with whom I was not on perfectly good terms. As to the instructions from Inspector-General Hart to enforce the new opium regulations they were all verbal, no written documents existing to which re- ference can be made. But as to the claim that a compulsory fee was exacted, there remains on record the merchants' petition in which they asked for such a tax themselves. Four years of my duty in Singapore were passed under your administration; my actions are all known to Your Excellency and do not require any explanation from me. Fearing that your Foreign Office might not know the real facts of the case, I take the liberty to address you in the premises.
With best wishes for your good health and happiness.-I have the honour to be, sir, your most obedient servant,
Sir
HUANG-CHUN-HSIEN,
Late Chinese Consul-General, Singapore, Cecil Smith, Ex-Governor Singapore. London.
TRANSLATION OF PETITION FROM 16 SINGA- PORE FIRMS TO CONSUL-GENERAL HUANG (19TH YEAR, 5TH MOON, 23RD DAY). Sir-In regard to the new regulations for opium tariff that it would be impossible to comply with and as to our way of settling the matter by a tax of $80 on each chest to go into effect after the 6th moon, we have had the honour already to petition you, and of which you were good enough to report to the Tsungli Yamên. It is not necessary to state here that we are very grateful. But the distance between Singapore and Peking is rather far, requiring nearly two months for an answer, while the junkmen, during the middle of the 4th moon, before the new regulations were issued, had already purchased opium to several hundred chests; now they are not permitted to leave. The junks now at anchor number 50, with 30 persons to each junk; there are 1,500 men who for this socount are much inconvenienced. After great deliberation we consent to accept the new regulations temporarily so that the goods may leave the port. But according to the new regu- lations it is necessary to state in China in what district and store the duty is to be paid. From what the junkmen report, whether or not there is such store and whether or not they are reliable and competent to pay the required duty we have no means of finding out. In order to protect ourselves from damages thus suffered in the future, we cannot but think of some way at present to collect a certain sum from the junkmen as a guarantee. But they all say that their money having been used in the purchase of goods they have no other fund. To their very best they only can raise $40 per chest to
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leave
which I the Consul Genera But knowing your difficulties report accordingly and ask for the conse the Government. Mr. Tsai Mun-pow, a 1 of Chungchow, being an honourable and right subject, respected by all, shall for the time have charge of said money to wait for further instructions to beissued * from the Tsungli Yamen.
THE RUSSIAN SQUADRON IN THE FAR EAST.
According to the Russian "Admiralty Pro- gramme for 1897," the Russian Pacific Squadron this year will consist of the following vessels:
The first-class battleship Imperator Nicolas II. (flagship), the first-class cruisers Rossia, Rurik, Pamyat Azova, Admiral Nakhimoff, Ad- miral Korniloff, and Dmitri Donskoi; the second- class cruisers Sabiaka und Kreisser; the high- sea gunboats Gremyaschtchi, Otvaschni, Kore- yets, Mantchur, and Sivutch; the torpedo-orui- sers Vsadnik and Gaidamak, and two torpedo- In the early summer the first-class boats. cruiser Vladimir Monomach and the gunboat Gilyak will also be attached to the Far Eastern Squadron, which, it will be seen from the fore- going enumeration, now forms a strong fight- ing fotilla. The Sibirski Vyestnik the other day pointed out that it was undoubtedly neces sary for Russia to maintain a powerful fleet in the Far East as a check upon Japan, The same journal also complains that the great mass of Russian immigrants in Eastern Siberia, who come chiefly, from the agricultural and black- earth region of European Russia, are totally averse to being recruited for maritime ocenpa- tions, and consequently there is a complete dearth of Russian coastwise craft in those waters. It is owing to this necessity that the Imperial Government has just issued an order abrogating, for the present, the cabotage strictions which ordinarily prevent foreigners. from engaging in the Russian coasting trade This rescript applies, of course, only to the Pacific and Siberian seaboards.
SAIGON.
[FROM A CORRESPONDENT.]
14th February.
The mail steamer Melbourne, which had our new Governor-General, M. Doumer, on" board has arrived quite a day later than she was pected, owing to extremely bad weather ha been experienced between Singapore and C St. James N
The poll tax on Chinese coolies has raised, by a resolution of the Colonial and is now $13. This has caused grumbling and the head men various Chinese societies are petit Government for the me
maintenance rate, $10. The Treasury, howeve of funds and the Chinese are numbers, for notwithstanding said and written about the tion of Cochin China, it field of emigration for the therefore considered that the venient form of increasing th
There has been a Customs receipts,
ebe deposited with the Chung Chow Club House, having been
As the junks from Hainan always come from the_Srd till the 8th moon, it is fair to believe they left China un provided... For, these consi-
The French trade
in the Custom