arrangement to which Great Britain is expected to be a consenting party, 19. And here I may observe that I was anxious to transmit to Your Grace the views of parties more practically acquainted with details of the trade than I can be; especially as questions relative to Customs duties, &c. can best be handled by those whose daily experience makes them acquainted with the exact amount of inconvenience suffered from injudicious regulations. 10. Therefore in the usual course I would probably have submitted the enclosures in Your Grace's despatch to the local Chamber of Commerce and have requested their opinion on the point at issue. I confess, however, that I felt very reluctant to expose to public comment the language used by H.M.'s Minister at Peking towards this Colony in the concluding part of his despatch No. 131 of the 29th May last.
1. It is true that, as the correspondence forwarded by Your Grace is printed, it may be assumed that the documents in question are intended to become, if they have not already become, Parliamentary Papers accessible to everyone, but nevertheless I felt it impolitic to give any very general or premature publicity here to observations calculated to excite much public indignation and angry comment, which could serve no good purpose.