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matter may be proceeded with at once.
As soon as the consulting engineer appointed by the Board of Communications has given his opinion with reference to the Tung Chiang bridge the construction will at once be undertaken by the Peking-Mukden Railway's Bridge Building Works at Shan-haikuan, an agreement being signed guaranteeing the completion of the bridge in a fixed time. As, in a contract of this nature the Bridge works must purchase the best steelwork and other materials and must engage an engineer to inspect these when taking them over it would appear unnecessary for the Canton-Kowloon Railway to engage another engineer for the same purpose. As regards the inspection of other machinery and materials the foreign engineer should wait until these materials have been ordered and then engage a competent man on the spot to inspect them.
The question of the connection of the British and Chinese sections of the line should be settled in a friendly spirit between the engineers-in-chief of the two sections, the Engineer of the Chinese section reporting to me for instructions from time to time. In the case of the connection of the Peking-Mukden and Peking-Hankow Railways there was no question of engaging a consulting engineer specially for the work, which was nevertheless carried out in a perfectly satisfactory manner, and I can see little force in Mr. Grove's argument that because Sir John Barry was engaged as Consulting Engineer for the British section of the line he should also be engaged for the Chinese section.
I remain &c.
(P) Liang