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November 17, 1902.]
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
BLAKE PIER AND THE CLOCK from Europe must be struck rather forcibly
TOWER.
with the contrast in this respect between Hongkong and the other ports at which they have landed en route. At Colombo, Penang, and Singapore, the landing piers are all protected from the sun and rain, but here in Hongkong passengers have to wait in the scorching heat or the soaking rain for their boat, nominally because the Colony is too poverty-stricken to provide shelter, but really because the Public Works Depart ment is incapable of carrying out more thau a given number of jobs at one time. As we have suggested before, if this Depart ment is undermanned, it is the simplest thing in life to procure assistance: there are hundreds of engineers and architects in England only too ready to accept work; and as there is the money to pay for it no ex- cuse for delay can be accepted. If, however, the responsibility of engaging a man from England be too great and crushing for our backboneless Administration, why then we have no doubt that any one of the private firms of architects in the Colony will be ready to take the work in band and guarantee its completion in a couple of years. We trust therefore that His Excel- lency the Governor will assert his authority and have this work carried out. It is true the Colonial Secretary has laid it down with dogmatic fervour that the Clock Tower will have to wait, and the Director of Public Works seems to have regarded the work as impossible of accomplishment, but if the Head of the Executive becomes peremptory, difficulties quickly vanish.
(Daily Press, 12th November.) In the course of his remarks in the Legislative Council on the 23rd ult. during the discussion of the Estimates, His Excellency the Governor said:"With reference to this matter of a shelter for "Blake Pier, I may tell hou: members of this Council that I am as anxious as any man in the Council to see this shelter put up at Blake Pier, and I fully recognise the importance of it; but unfortunately, "without increasing taxation, I do not see my way to leaving that on the Estimates "for this year.
At the same time, if we "found that the result of the year's revenue appeared to justify it, I have it in my mind that in those circumstances I should ask the permission of the Secretary of State to put a vote for that amount before "the Council with a view to carrying out that work" After the work has once been placed on the Estimates, and the money voted, as was the case last year, we fail to see why the permission of the Secretary of State is requisite for proceeding with it. There is far too much referance; of paltry details to Downing Street, and the officials at the Colonial Office must think we are a very helpless lot, unable to decide on any matter, however small. No petty municipality would be so leg-tied as the Government here appears to be. A good deal arises from dread of responsibility. If a Governor chooses to exercise his discretion in matters municipal it is hardly likely that be would be brought to book, unless in the course of carrying out a large constructive programme he achieved heavy deficit. We cannot for a moment imagine that Mr. CHAMBERLAIN wishes that bis consent should be specially obtained in order that a work for which the money has already been voted should be proceeded with. However that may be, the con- tingency that Sir HENRY BLAKE hoped for has since occurred, and the money is not only in sight, but hus actually been received. On the 3rd inst. a sale of crown land at Kowloon was effected, Marine Lots Nos. 74 and 75 and Inland Lots Nos. 1,140 and 1,141 situated at Tsimtsatsui Point, being put up to auction. The upset price was $232,800, and only a nominal bid of $20 above that price was expected, but opposition turned up at the sale, and the land was ultimately knocked down for $451,000. This menus that the Government are now in possession of a sum of nearly $220,000 which they never expected to realise, and on which they had never reckoned. It would have been a piece of good fortune merely to effect the sale at the upset price, for besides bringing in a very handsome sum of nearly a quarter of a million dollars it also adds an appre- ciable amount to reveaue from the Crown rent payable yearly on the land, to say nothing of the taxes to be collected from the buildings with which it will presently be covered. But the Treasury is now in possession of a further sum of more than two lakhs of dollars which may, in a sense, be regarded as a gift, and the Governor is at once put in a position to redeem his promise and place the Blake Clock Tower on the Estimates. There is, indeed, now not the very ghost of a reason for further delay. The work is a necessary one-it has been officially recognised as such; and it would, in the hands of a municipality, have long ago been commenced. If only as a matter of decency and justifiable regard for ap- pearances, the principal landing place in the Colony ought to be provided with a shelter from the elements. Travellers out
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THE ILLEGAL OPIUM FARM.
(Daily Press, 13th November.)
from a Chinese source, some documents A little more than a month ago we gave, dealing with the subject of the illegal opium-farm at Canton, comprising a letter from the British Consul to the Viceroy, a telegrant from the Wai Wu-pu to the Governor of Canton, and a proclamation of the Governor in accordance with that telegram. The Canton Governor in his notice to his subordinates stated that the Provincial Treasurer, in conjunction with the Board of Taxation, would abolish the new tax on prepared opium at once. Com- "The benefit menting on this we said:
accruing from the display of a little "firmness on the part of the British Govern- "ment may be seen. The obnoxious tax, a flagrant violation of the Chefoo Conven- tion, has been ordered to cease." We expected, and indeed it might generally have been expected, that the tax would stop immediately. We have, however, received information from an absolutely trustworthy source that so far from the illegal farin having ceased its operations, in the hinter and adjoining the New Territory, just across the British border, in fact, there is a chain of stations under the control of the farming company at which the tax is being levied at the present moment. This being so, it is time that the Hongkong Govern- ment took steps in the matter. The order of the Wai Wu-pu, or Chinese Foreign Office, as embodied in the proclamation of the Governor of Canton, is being entirely disregarded and that on the very borders of the British territory of Kowloon. No assurances of the Chinese officials should be allowed to weigh against the actual facts of the situation.
the Red Cross to Lady MacDonald, wife of The German Emperor has sent the medal of
H.M. Minister at Tokyo, in recognition of the brave and untiring helpfulness shown by her throughout the siege at Peking.
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TENGYUEH AS A TRADE CENTRE,
(Daily Press, 14th November.) Customs trade reports for the year 1901 is Among the lately issued Imperial Maritime
an interesting note on a proposed trade MONTGOMERY, Commissioner of Customs, mart at Tengyueh (Momein) by Mr. G. F. dated the 25th February last. To Hong. kong residents Tengyueh, a walled town in South-western Yuunan, may seem rather It is, however, the only Chinese town of any remote and of little importance commercially. standing in the Irawadi River basin, and its position creates for it a distinct bearing on the question of the Burma-Yunnan frontier. trade. As the scheme of a British railway into Yunnan seems now indefinitely shelved, commerce in that part of the world, without a little consideration of the prospects of the aid of railways, umy not be altogether house at Teagyueh under I. M. C. control useless. The question of opening a custom was discussex some time ago and it was originally intended to open such a station in 1900. It was decided, however, to wait until the Northern troubles subsided. In the autumn of last year, when Mr. LITTON was appointed British Consul at Tengyueh, a Customs staff was sent from Shanghai to the same place. Customs parties met
The Consular and travelled together to their destination, at Bhamo and
arrival the status of Tengyueh was naturally which they reached in November. By their altered, and Mr. MONTGOMERY's notes, which are illustrated by two sketch-maps, may be taken as an indication of intention on the part of the Imperial Maritime Customs to foster the development of com- merce with Burma. The Commissioner
trade is already in a flourishing condition. quotes figures to show that the transfrontier
To increase it in the future," he says, "some encouragement should be given to the export trade; but unfortunately Westeru Yunnan's most valuable product, opium, is prohibited from entering Burma, and there is little likelihood of this pro- hibition being removed.” exports which bulk most largely in the At present the
export list are leather, hides and skins, raw silk, living animals (chiefly horses, ponies, and mules), orpiment, tea, cordage and ropes, fruit and vegetables. The principal imports through Bbamo to Tengyueb are cotton, leather, and to a less extent woollen piece goods. The obstacles to the increase of trade are difficulty of some of the routes, the turbulence of the Kachins on another, and on the chief road, the Manwyna, the heavy exactions made from traders using it. Mr. MONTGOMERY instances the payment made on a load of 130 catties of cotton yarn imported via Manwyne, Nan-tien, and Tengyueh to Yung-chang, on the way to
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Tali-fu. Altogether Tis. 4.95 or about 15 per cent. on the value of the load are said to be exacted. "In future," he says, however, the same weight of the yaru will have to pay only Tls. 1.71 if the Transit Pass system is made use of." From Mr. MONTGOMERY'S notes it
may gathered that if the vexatious taxes which merchants are at present forced to pay ba got rid of in favour of the Transit Pass system, and if the Kachins be pacified so as to allow the reopening of a trade route which was used twenty years ago but is now abandoned, there is a prospect of a considerable advance in this transfrontier commerce; but at present the latter is only in its infancy.
Marquis Ito celebrated his 61st birthday on the 25th ult., and was presented by his admirers with a bronze statue of himself.
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