158.
Telegraphs, called on me. They explained that it would be easy to delete the words in the despatch, they suggested, indeed, that I might omit them in the copy sent to Your Excellency, but practically impossible to do so in the Share Receipts, since Miso tao-t'ai will probably have already disposed of several of these last.
I must not, however, attach too much weight to them. "...The T'engyueh Railway Company" would, of course, eventually take the form which might be agreed upon between the Governments of China and Great Britain. In any case some expenditure would have to be incurred by Yunnan. For example, even should the Railway be altogether a British concern, just as the Laokai-Yunnanfu Railway is French, Yunnan would, if the regulations were similar, be called on to provide the land, for some of which she would have to pay; and for such payment the words "Yunnan and T'engyueh" might be taken to provide.
I answered that if it is understood that these words do not commit me, or Your Excellency's Government, to an acknowledgment that shares in a T'engyueh railway