4
"A correspondent, referring to this subject, writes as follows:-
"At present a Chinese in the Customs Service is debarred, simply because of his Chinese nationality, from promotion above the rank of mere clerkship, whatever his ability or standing in the service, while subjects of other nationalities can aspire to gradual promotions up to a Commissionership. This is a manifestly unjust and intoler- able discrimination, uncalled for by the Treaties with the foreign Powers and urgently demanding reform. The result of this system has been the exclusion of well-educated Chinese from the service, which offers no attraction to them.
"In view of the growing number of Chinese educated on Western lines, for whose service the field must be widened, the time seems to be ripe for representation to be made to the proper quarter for the removal of this disability imposed upon the Chinese, the injustice of which is now rendered the more pronounced by the fact that capable Chinese are not now lacking-if they were before--in filling responsible posts in the Customs.
"All we ask is a fair field and no favour, and it seems certain that our reason- able request in behalf of the educated young men cannot be denied or at least ignored.'
"Candidate clerks are employed at 25 Haikwan taels a-month. If they are so fortunate as to be engaged on the 2nd January-the 1st being a holiday-they will get an increase of 5 taels a-month from next January. But it very rarely happens that they are engaged on the 2nd January. If they are engaged on any day subsequent to the 2nd Jaunary, then they will not get the increase till the beginning of the third year. For example, a man is engaged on the 3rd January, 1905. In 1906 he gets no increase. In January 1907 his pay is increased monthly by 5 taels, and in January 1908 another increase of 5 taels. A clerk getting 35 taels a-month is termed 'Candidate Clerk A, but it is impossible to tell when he will be promoted to be * Fourth Clerk B,' at 40 taels a-month. If he is lucky, he may get his promotion a year after he was made Candidate Clerk A, but, if not, he may have to wait for two or three years.
"It would be quite impossible for a clerk nowadays to receive the high rate of pay --250 taels--though be may live seventy or eighty years. Of course there are some exceptions, but these are very rare at present. We are informed that promotions are very slow for the Chinese staff, and none of the 140 clerks engaged in the Shanghae Office, for instance, was promoted last year, while one-half of the thirty-five of thirty- seven assistants in the Office received promotions, and one of them even was promoted twice. The Deputy Inspector-General is reported to have said while he was Commis- sioner of the Shangbae Customs that if he had the power he would, instead of increasing the pay of Chinese in general, employ more men to do more work.
"Chinese clerks may be transferred to any port without any increase of pay. They may be ordered to go to Tengyueh, Mengtsz, and Chungking, and if they should refuse to proceed to their destination for good and justifiable reasons, they will be asked to resign from the service.
"Chinese clerks are powerless, and have to do what the assistants tell them to do, If they make any blunders in their work, they are blamed, warned, and so on. The assistants are, in fact, the masters, and the Chinese their slaves.
"Chinese writers and Shupan are even worse off than the clerks, and their lot is by no means to be envied, in view of the great inequality of treatment between them and their foreign confrères in the Customs Service."
[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
530
C. O.
11983
[B]
AFFAIRS OF CHINA.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[7684]
(No. 47.)
No. 1.
[March 9.
REGE 5 APR 07,
SECTION 11.
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received March 9.)
Sir,
Peking, January 23, 1907. SINCE writing my despatches Nos. 497 and 523 of the 29th November and the 12th December last on the subject of the establishment of custom-houses in Manchuria, I have repeatedly pressed the Wai-wu Pu in interviews to accelerate their arrangements with the Japanese and Russian Representatives, and on receipt of your telegram No. 8 of the 18th January, inquiring whether any settlement of the question had been reached, I addressed a note to Prince Ching, copy of which I have the honour to inclose, calling attention to the necessity of taking immediate steps in this matter.
At my last interview with the Wai-wu Pu on the 18th instant, I informed the Ministers present of the result of Mr. Coales' investigation at Antung, and was assured that instructions had already been issued to the Inspector-General of Customs to send a staff to that port for the establishment of a custom-house. The only cause of delay there was the difficulty in finding a suitable location, owing to the acquisition by Japan of all the water frontage. Their Excellencies promised that every effort would be made to arrive at a settlement of the whole question before navigation opens; but, as I stated in my telegram No. 13 of the 19th instant, I am doubtful whether this can be done, unless representations are made at Tôkið and St. Petersburgh.
Mr. Coales' Report, copy of which I also have the honour to inclose, shows clearly that Japanese goods imported into Antung escape entirely the levy of dues which are enforced on British goods, and that this condition of things arises from the want of a maritime custom-house at that Treaty port.
Mr. Coales' Report touches further on the question of the levy of inland dues in these new Manchurian ports, which formed the subject of my despatch No. 20 of the 8th January. Respecting this question Mr. Fulford reports from Mukden that the Tartar General has now replied to the identic notes of the Consuls, maintaining that under the Japanese and American Commercial Trentics of 1903 the entire towns of Mukden, Antung, and Tatungkou were not opened to international trade and residence, but only a limited area in each place to be settled by negotiation,
your
The Consular Body at Mukden have replied severally to this communication, refusing to admit the contention, and I have furnished Mr. Fulford with a copy of despatch No. 418 of the 29th November, describing the view of His Majesty's Govern- ment as to the term "Treaty Port."
I have, &c. (Signed) J. N. JORDAN.
Inclosure 1 in No. 1.
0
Your Highness,
Sir J. Jordan to Prince Ching.
Peking, January 21, 1907. IN a note of the 15th August, 1906. Mr. Carnegie, under instructions from His Majesty's Government, reminded your Highness that the Chinese Government had taken no steps to levy tariff duties on goods passing the north or south frontiers of Man- churia by the Chinese Eastern Railway, and that the result was an unfair discrimination against goods passing through Newchwang, on all of which duties were levied, and a large proportion of which were of British origin. The simultaneous establishment of custom-houses by the Imperial Chinese Government in the north, as well as in the south of Manchuria, in order that the tariff duties might be levied alike on all goods exported or imported, either by railway or by sea, was urgently recommended, in view of the proximate opening of Talienwan (Dalny) as a free port.
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