April 2, 1900.]
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
A NEW SHANGHAI COMPANY.
918
The now sawmill was put up during the year, Tla: 29,252.02 being the cost of new machinery purchased, consisting of a 220 h.p. marine engine, boiler, shafting, a large planing machine and be incurred during the coming year of about commodity the demand for which in China is | said, when he was a little above. Woosing creek sundry samller machines. A further outlay will
Thx 10,000 for new machines to make and to maintain our plant thoroughly np to date and to enable us to handle orders promptly. I am
glad to say that, thanks to the energetic measures adopted by the General Managers and the staff, the loss sustained by the Company through the flood of September last proved less serions than might have been anticipated. So far as we are able to form an opinion, the pros- pects for the coming year are quite favourable. The stocks of lumber on hand, as well as some further supplies contracted for, s onld yield very fair profit.
The report said :-
The Profit and Loss Account, including the
balance of Tls. 3,469.95 carried forward from last year, shows a credit balance of T18. 44,2 3.77, which amount the directors recom- mend to appropriate as follows:--- Allow for Agents' participation in
profits of...
Less - balance carried forward
from last year of
Tls. 44,203.77
3,469.95
Tis. 40,783.82
at 10 per cent. Tls 4,073.38
Pay & Dividend of : — 10% on-2,780 shares
fully paid up on
1st March, 1905.Tls, 27,800,00
10% in form of
interest, on issue
of 720`shares in 1905, from date of payment of Instalments until 28th Feb. 1906 ...
4,378.15
absorbing.. And carry forward to New Ac-
count the balance of
The possibilities of using the by-products of cotton seed and bea", in the making of oil, a out of all proportion to the supply, offers Prospects to a company which purposes to com- bine the businesses of mannfacturers of
and dealers in oil with that of manufac cake, producing all kinds of feeding stuff grains, and acting as warehousemen and store. keepers in all those several branches. Such s company is the Shanghai Oil Company. Ld. an abridged prospectus of which has appeared, says the N.-C. Daily News The capital of the proposed company is to be Tla. 175 000 in 7,000 shares of Tis. 25 each. Three thousand shares have been applied for in advance and the remaining 4.000 are offered to subscription. Mr. E. de Bavier is chairman of a strong board
turers and dealers in cotton seed cike, besa
of Chiness directors, which has secured the services as managing director of Mr. Moritz
Koppel, an expert who has arrived in Shanghai, and from whom particulars as to the prospects of the company can be obtained.
THE CHINA MARKET.
GERMANS COMPETE SUCCESSFULLY WITH
JAPANESE.
A Japanese contemporary observes that Japanese manufactures, inferior in quality, are able to compete with European and Americin goods. This advantage is due to the cheapness of labour in production. Lately, however. German goods are noderselling Japanese in China, and the reason is assigned by our con. temporary to the fact that Japanese mauu- factures, being made in small factories, the cost of production is correspondingly higher.
The amount paid in Tokyo for instance, for glycerine for soap-making is Y6 0,00 per annum, but if the existing small factories were incorporated, wi h the consegnent purchase of 32.178.15 | glycerine in large bulk, the sum of Y200,000 would be sufficient to supply the requirement. 7.952.24 | The responsibility for this assertion--whereby a saring of 66 per cent. is effeo ed-rests with T 8. 44 203.77 oar contemporary.
THE CHINA FLOUR MILL CO., LTD.
At the eleventh annual meeting of this company held at Shanghai on March 16th, the Chairman said :-The report and accounts liave been in your hands for some time and no doubt you will agree to take them as real. You will see from the accounts that we have an amount of Tls. 93,797.83 to the credit of Profit and Loss account for the year's, working, or equal to a little over 31 per cent, upon capital, a result which I think you must all agree is very satis factory. This amount we propose to appropriate is shown in the report, and if you approve of game the result will be:
Tl8.
A dividend for the year ending the
31st of December of 20 per cent. 61,000 To Reserve Fund, making this fund
up to Tls. 50, 00
...20,000 4,000
8,907,97 889,86
Write off from machinery Pay the agents for their participation
-in net profits Carry forward to new account
YANGTSZE WHARF AND GODOWN COMPANY, LIMITED.
The report of the Directors for the year ended December 31st, 1905, to be submitted to the forthcoming annual meeting, states :-
Out of the balance at credit of Profit and Loss, viz.: Taels 75,998 63, it is proposed to pay & Dividend of 18 per cent, absorbing Taels 45,000, to write off the whole of Preli- minary Charges, viz: Taels 12,830.23. and to place to credit of Reserve Account the sum of Tael's 12,500, thus increasing the Reserve to Taals 30,000, carrying forward Taals 5,668.41
to next year.
As usual, the Mitsui Bussan Kaisha beads the list of coal exports from Japan: Out of total of 6,382,923 tons in 1905, that company shied 3,017,069 tons,
Japanese merchants are generally indifferent to the freightage charged when shipping goods to China, continues the journal. They pay the freight demanded by shipowners, and this fact in many cases makes the price of Japanese goods in the Chinese market higher than German goods.
SHIPPING CASE AT SHANGHAI.
We make the following extracts from the judgment delivered on March 22nd in the case of the China Merchants' Steam Navigation Company. Owners of the str. Yushun, v. the Own rs of the str. A¡ palachee.
This is soother case of collision at that extremely dangerous part of the river Huangpu, namely, the inner Woosung Bar. The ships in collision on this occasion are the Yushun, which belongs to the China Merchants' Company and is under the Chinese flag, and the Ap alachre, which is a British ship. The Yushun is one of the ordinary vessels which navigate these parts these narrow waters, territorial waters and she is of a draft usual with vessels of that kind --of between 12 and 13 feet. She is a compara. tively small ship. The Appalachee is a large ship drawing 2lft. of water; at the time of the collision she was heavily laden, and the flood. The she was inward bound ou Yushun was coming out against the flood, but at the time she was above the lower Bar marks there was practically no current, and there was in fact an eddy or an ebb setting downwards up to a distance of about 300 feet from the northern bank of the river. The speed of the ships
was
The
same. substantially the Appalachee was coming in at between eight and nine knots with a two-knot flood under her, making it between ten and eleven knots over the ground, whereas the Yushun was coming out and her captain gave it that she was going attenknots over the ground. The Appalachee was coming in in charge of a pilot, and the Yushun was going out without a pilot. There is no com- pulsory pilotage on the river Huangpu, but from the evidence in this case and the
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experience which the master of the Yuhun had, I feel little doubt that he was quite as “áble, to navigate his ship up and down this river 89 any pilot. Now these vessels sighted one another, as the pilot on board the Appalachee
and the other ressol was just above the high' Bar mark. The Appalache came on, and in- consequence of an error in judgment, of the Fiksang being in his way, possibly to a certain extent both, he passed to the south of the line.... of Bar marks. In consequence of his being to
the Bonth he would have to being his head? It must be borne in mind that he had a pilot considerably to port to get on to the line, on board who knew the state of the currents. This pilot saw the Yuskun coming out well
over to the north side of the river, and at a
place where he knew that the tide would probably be ebbing, and where the Yushun, in consequence of the state of the tide and narrow- ness of the channel, could not anchor. He knew that as he came in and brought his head especially after his nose had got into the slack to port he would have on his port quarter, water, a two-knot' current which would tend to turn him right across the channel. Now the Yushun was already on the Bar. He could see her and he knew the condition of the tide. I asked the nautical assessor his opinion under these circumstances and he advises me that under these circumstances it was an imprudent course for him to take to try to cross the Bar. Although the pilot knew this when he found the vessel's head still swinging to port, when he began to part, in order to straighten his course, and continuing to swing to port, although under a hard aport helm, which she was by this time, the pilot of the Appalachee when he elected to come in got his head to the lower end of Gough Island, and when he got there he put his helm over becaUSI he knew there was a tendency to carry his nose across the river. When the vessel was parallel with the line of Bar marks his helm was hard aport and yet the ship continued to swing over. Although he found this and the head was still swinging to port, he did not realis, that the vessel was out of control until she had continued to swing considerably further, and he did not give the order" fall speed stern" until the collision was imminent. He only gave the order "full speed astern
" in order to minimise the effect of the collision. I am advised that he ought to have gone astern auder the circumstances, at least when he was parallel to the line of Bir marks. Had he done so and given three short blasts the Yushun would have been able to pass ahead of him. Further the pilot 14 to blame in not having realised sooner than he did that the Appalachee was out of control. Had he then given several short blasts, which in these waters appear to be a recognised form. of indicating that a vessel is ont of control and which the master of the Yushun would have understood, when the vessel first refused to answer her hard aport helm, I am advised that. the Yushun would have been able to get over the Bar and this accident would not have happened. Therefore, I hold the Appalache e
is to blame.
I am advised that, in reducing speed and keep. ing well out of the fairway for such a ship- as the Appalachce the Yushun adopted the most prudent course under the circumstances. I. therefore, find the Appalachee alone to blame, and I must give judgment for the plaintiffs in? this cass with costs, and order the damage to be referred to the Registrar and merchants to ascertain.
Reference is made in the annual report of the Hongkong Chamber of Commerce to pro- posed bi-monthly criminal sessions. A sugges- tion having been made to the Government that: it would be a couvenience to the business com- unity to hold the Session ones in two months, instead of monthly on the ground that jurors. would be called on less frequently, the opinion of the Chamber was sought, but the Committee, were unable to recommend the proposal on the ground that prisoners would suffer an injustice in being kept on remand longer than was absolutely necessary. With over 1,000 persons on the Jury List it seemed unnecessary for any ono person to be called more than onse in two- years and the time occupied in attendance at the Sessions wou'd also be shorter under the present system.
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