649
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WK UNIDS
oil in casks of the Standard Oil Company. The penalty inflicted was slight and soon afterwards the Chinaman again started this lucrative swindle with the result that he was again arrested and convicted. This time the Taotai before passing sentence wrote to Mr Jernigan asking whether he wished for the prisoner's head.
In drawing these remarks to a conclusion I wish to convey to you the impression created on my mind by my stay in Shanghai that while the British Government had been supine, foreign Governments and foreign officials had been most active not merely in supporting but in pushing their commercial interests.
Staying as I did at the Astor House Hotel I met and became casually acquainted with a weekly increasing number of new arrivals from Germany, France, Belgium and America, all coming to sell arms, railway material, machinery, electrical apparatus for tramcars, telegraphs or telephones, agricultural implements and almost every ordinary article of commerce. I always noticed that they were immediately in communication with their respective consuls from whom they received every possible encouragement and assistance. It almost seemed as if Englishmen were if possible too self-reliant, or British Consuls too far above or too little in touch with their mercantile compatriots.
It should also be noted that foreign steamship Companies are making strenuous efforts to wrest the carrying trade from the British flag. The total carrying trade by steamer with Shanghai in 1893 was divided among the different flags as follows:-
Steamers Tonnage
British 2,982 3,586,594
German 569 467,683