¡This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's overment
25167 430 [June 17.]
CHINA RAILWAYS,
CONFIDENTIAL.
(19879]
No. 1.
SEBAGON67, JUL 07
(No. 195.) Sir,
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received June 17.)
Peking, April 29, 1907. WITH reference to my despatch No. 183 of the 16th instant, I have the honour to state that I was informed by the Grand Secretary Na Tung at the Wai-wu Pu on the 23rd instant that Prince Ch'ing, who had been consulted, held that it was too early yet to consider the question of a final Agreement relating to the Soochow-Hangchow- Ningpo Railway, and that a reply in that sense would be sent to my note of the 12th
instant.
I made it quite clear to his Excellency that such an answer would be highly unsatisfactory, and that in fact no answer would be preferable. It was useless for me to transmit such a communication to His Majesty's Government, when it was a patent fact that the Chekiang authorities and people were actually attempting to construct the line themselves, regardless of the rights of the British and Chinese Corporation under their preliminary Agreement. By asking for delay, did his Highness mean that the Corporation were to wait until the railway was built by others? The matter was too serious to be treated in that way, and the existing situation could not continue without danger of grave injury to China's credit. I was ready to consider any reasonable proposals for co-operation by the Chekiangese, but this being the most immediately important of the outstanding railway questions in which we were interested, His Majesty's Government had instructed me to take it in hand as soon as the Canton- Kowloon Railway Agreement was concluded, and they would be strongly dissatisfied if I was met with further requests for delay.
The Grand Secretary said that the question of compensation had been mooted, and that the Prince's reason for counselling delay was that nothing had come of it.
I still pressed my objection to the proposed reply to my note, and his Excellency promised to see Prince Ch'ing again on the subject.
The latest information which I have received in regard to the Chinese enterprise is contained in an Intelligence Report for the March quarter from His Majesty's Acting Consul at Hangchow. Mr. Smith states that by the end of February a fairly good embankment for the railway was completed from Chiang Kan around the south and east walls of the city to a point some 2 miles from the proposed site of the station near the Settlement. Rails are now being laid down, and the work of constructing the remaining 2 miles of embankment has been commenced. It is hoped to have trains running in June.
Rails and some heavy machinery, including two engines, were imported during January and February, the former are said to have come from Hankow, most of the latter appear to have come from England, as the packages bear the name of Hudswell, Clarke, and Co., Engineers, Leeds.
The purchase of land involved the Railway Company in some unpopularity during the early part of the year. The Company has the right of enforcing the sale of land required for railway purposes, which is bought at fixed rates, much under market value. The sale of a good deal more land than could be required for actual railway purposes in the neighbourhood of prospective stations was enforced, probably by private persons, whose employment in the Company enabled them to make use of its name as a cloak for their own ends. The Company, however, got the blame, and anonymous placards attacking it were issued, but the feeling aroused seems to have died down.
The survey of the line to Kashing, on which it is intended to begin work in the middle of April, was completed during January. The route to be followed is viâ Lin P'ing and Ch'ang An.
Arrangements are, it is believed, being made for connecting this line with those projected in Anhui by constructing a branch from Kashing to Kuang Te Chou, a border town in the east of that province.
I have, &c. (Signed) J. N. JORDAN,
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