128
even effected captures within them. This, I hold, must be withstood without com- promise. The jurisdiction of the Colony must not be invaded. It is complained that their cruizers lie in the port of the Colony to watch the junk trade. I do not see that this is a sufficient ground for the exclusion of the cruizers in question. It is argued that these cruizers are cruizers not of the Chinese Government, but of the Provincial Government, or even of the Superintendent of Customs, and that their establishment of officers, &c., is not duly commissioned. The form of written authority under which these cruizers act may not be that with which we provide officers and vessels similarly employed, but I consider them to be employed bona fide for the execution of a duty which the Chinese Government has as good a right to require of them as, on shore, to require a like duty of the foreign establishment that assists it in the collection of its revenue on foreign trade. In any case an intimation to the Chinese Government that, in order to secure the e cruizers the consideration, formal or substantial, that is con- ceded to similar vessels elsewhere, it will be necessary that their status be regularised, would, I cannot doubt, immediately insure the introduction of such changes as would leave us no ground for objection under this head.
The real matter of complaint is that the junk trade is "worried" by both cruizers and custom-houses. The latter being exclusively Chinese, the dues or duties demanded of the junks are certain to be in excess of what is just; at least, of my measure of what is just.
By the Treaties between England and China, I think China entitled to argue that, if British imports are to have the benefit of the Tariff, they must be brought to one of the ports open by Treaty, and, if carried thence to other parts of China, must pay the half-duty composition for transit dues, or, if unaccompanied by the certificate attesting payment of this half-duty, must face whatever charges may be demanded upon them.
say
I have been asked, "How if a Chinese, having purchased manufactures in England, were to carry them direct to some point of the coast to which British shipping have not by Treaty right of access ?" I that in such a case the Chinese Government would be free, in my opinion, as the Treaty now stands, to make what law it pleased. It might suit it to enable its own subjects (by Treaty it could not enable the subjects of any other Power) to pay less dutics than a British subject has to pay at the open ports, or more duties, or the same. The latter would be the more probable course, because it would prefer, I suspect, to keep the foreign import trade on the sea-board under the foreign Inspectorate. And it could not be held culpable or unfair if it placed our imports, brought as above by a Chinese from England, on the same footing as if they had come in a British bottom to a Treaty port. But if this were not unfair when they came from England, neither could it be so regarded, I think, if they came from a British Colony-Hong Kong, Singapore, or any other.
The arrangement I desire is this: that the Chinese Government should consent to extinguish the three custom-houses that now keep watch round Hong Kong, and to substitute for these a branch of the Canton Inspectorate, to be located at some spot conveniently near the Colony; to agree that at this branch office there should be levied the Tariff duty on imports proceeding in Chinese bottoms to a Treaty port, and the Tariff duty and half Tariff duty on imports proceeding to any point on the coast or up rivers not open by Treaty.
On opium, which article cannot by Treaty be franked and certificated like other imports, the same office should be authorized, when levying the import duty, to levy the likin that would be levied were it sold at Canton. Every junk arriving at Hong Kong or leaving the harbour should be obliged to call at the office of the branch Inspectorate to receive a clearance, and the Colony should engage so to assist in giving effect to this part of the arrangement, that disputes about limits of jurisdiction might be avoided.
If it be urged that, when the duties have been collected by the branch Inspectorate, the imports are not secured against an ad libitum levy of fees, &c., in addition, when they reach their destination, I reply that I cannot, indeed, guarantee that the Chinese will not do whatever seems good to them where the foreigner has no agent to watch them. But we must remember that, before the junk trade of Hong Kong was subjected to the surveillance now so obnoxious to the Colony, we did not hear of excessive levies of duty along the coast, and the contingency that excessive duties will be levied is certainly not increased by a measure that will largely add to the receipts of the provin cial Treasury.
Whatever it may be eventually determined to substitute for the system which the Colony finds so harassing, it is not to be expected that the junk trade of the Colony
123
Chinese The imports,
can quite regain the position it held before that system was introduced. produce carried to the Colony will undoubtedly have to pay some duty. formerly run duty-free by the junks to the coast, will have to pay duty; notably opium, Part of the opium an article of which the local monopoly is of no small importance. affected by the monopoly is of course consumed in Hong Kong, but part, certainly the the largest part, is carried away by junks. In either case I take it for granted that our imports, whether opium or other commodity, will undoubtedly fare better in the hands of the foreign Customs Inspectorate than if left to the mercy of the native régime. The native custom-houses, if they have a Tariff, are under no such supervision as will protect native junks against the exactions in excess of the Tariff. It is our interest to keep their hands off the trade, and especially off the trade in opium, collection of the duties on which was the first suggesting cause of their establishment.
I commenced this long excursus in explanation of Articles II and III. I must still add a few words which could not have been brought in opportunely elsewhere. Although my agreement contains no stipulations on the subject, I beg to recommend that if a decision be ultimately arrived at to require a larger area of exemption from li-kin than that proposed by me, such exemption be claimed by us only for commodities that are beyond dispute constituents of foreign, as distinguished from native, trade.
We are bound to seek every advantage for our manufactures, but we import some things that China produces, sugar, grain, and other raw material, which we shall suffer little by leaving to be treated as the Chinese treat their own produce of similar denomi- nations.
I come now to Article IV of this section, the object of which was, on the one part, to secure a plain admission of the extent of our right to use the transit-duty certificate, whether to cover imports or produce destined for exportation; while, on the other part, it records an engagement to protect the Chinese Government against evasion of the revenue due to it upon produce in transitu not so destined, such evasion having been matter of complaint.
Hu Poi, the province our imports traverse to reach Ssú Ch'uan has been in the babit of using a transit-duty certificate containing on the face of it certain restrictions. By the terms of this Article the Chinese Government agrees that the certificate shall be framed under one rule at all ports, and that, so far as imports are concerned, the nationality of the person possessing and carrying them is immaterial.
We have long maintained that our imports, Tariff paid and covered by a transit- duty certificate, are free of all charge in transit, no matter who the holder. But the Tsung-li Yamên, although, as I have mentioned before, its Circular to the Provincial Governments of 1868 admitted the Treaty right, did not communicate that Circular to the Legations, and withdrew from the admission made in it as soon as the Convention of 1869 was rejected. It is something, indeed much, to have obtained a formal recognition of this right.
I had similarly upheld our title to carry imports from a Treaty port to any point of the coast, if certificated, in a Chinese bottom; but the claim had always been contested. So, too, our title similarly to carry produce to a port. This is now formally conceded. Any available point of the coast is made as accessible for the above purposes as any point inland; the Chinese Government having, of course, reserved to it the right to make arrangements for the prevention of abuses.
These are such abuses as might be looked for equally at any inland centre. The abuse against which it is further agreed that rules shall be made to protect the revenue, where produce is carried under a transit-duty certificate, can only be controlled at the open ports.
For the transport of produce purchased inland, if it be bond fide intended for ship- ment to a foreign country, a British subject can, of course, claim a transit-duty certificate, and the half Tariff duty payment attested by this will clear the produce so certificated of all charges between the inland market and its stated port of destination. These charges, in some instances, amount to more than the half duty. Even where this is not the case, it is possible that a Chinese, carrying produce on his own account, will be called on to pay irregular fees that will swell the amount of these charges; his goods However little the transit-duty clauses are being detained pending settlement. respected in some regions, and in some they are beyond doubt ignored, the certificate has been found, in some instances, of sufficient power to shield the goods certificated from overcharge or detention. The result has been that foreigners have been invited, for a consideration, to lend their names to the Chinese carrier of produce, and he has been enabled, under the certificate taken out for him, to bring down produce, whether intended for exportation or not, free of all charges but the half duty paid by the foreigner
285