!
COPY.
(Sub-enclosure 1 to Enclosure 3.)
170
H. B. M. Office of Works,
Shanghai, 19th. January, 1905.
(Received 3rd. February, 1905.)
Sir,
in reply to your Despatch of the 23rd.
ultimo, as to the proposed lease to the Hongkong Postal Agency
of the land, known as the old gaol site, in the rear of the
British Post Office at Shanghai, I have the honour to enclose
herewith copies of the following correspondence:-
a.
27th. March, 1902: First Commissioner of Works to
His Majesty's Treasury.
19th. June, 1902: His Majesty's Treasury to First
Commissioner of forks.
6.
24th.
do.
: Private Letter: Mr. Barstow to
Mr. Downer;
from which you will observe that it lies with the Agency to
prove that it cannot afford to pay the rent asked.
I believe it may be seen from the Agency
returns, as published in the Hongkong Gazette, that the profits of the Agency are sufficiently large to pay the proposed rental of Taels One Hundred (Taels 100) per month for the valuable land in question. As you are aware, the British Consular Offices throughout China already afford free accommodation for the business of the Agency, and it would in my opinion be no more than fair to the Imperial Government that the Agency should pay the proposed rental, provided of course it can afford to do so.
In asking the Agency to pay a reasonable
rent for the ground I am only carrying out the instructions of
His Majesty's Minister,
PEKING.
my