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To maintain the line as at present laid down, will be to include within the European Quarter a very large number of what practically are Chinese tenements with European or semi-European frontage, and much trouble and litigation must necessarily attend any subsequent endeavour to force builders, or repairers of old buildings, back to the European style of structure.
The alteration of the line as proposed by us will have the effect of leaving Sassoon & Co's houses on the Chinese side of the frontier, and will remove the latter from debatable ground to those streets where the actual division between European and native occupancy is clearly and distinctly marked.
We are aware that the Secretary of State expressed a wish to be consulted before any concessions beyond the line determined on in 1877 were made, but looking to the fact that nearly 10 years have passed since that rule was laid down, and that the circumstances and surroundings of the Colony have greatly changed due to the large increase in the population, and that only this year an application from the London Mission for a deviation of the line in their favour was readily sanctioned from home, notwithstanding that there did not exist anything like the same degree of powerful reasons for the present amendment, which we adduce, there can be no doubt in our minds that, taking into consideration the respective positions and surroundings of the London Mission property and that of Messrs D. Sassoon & Co., the Secretary Stanhope will approve the action of this Government in slightly altering the position of the frontier in order to accord with the dictates of common sense and to avoid a litigation which, to say the least, must be problematic.