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has been received from him on the subject.
(f.)
Meanwhile the question raised in my Despatch of September 3rd was referred to Sir John Jordan who consulted Mr. Dresing (Foreign Adviser to the Chinese Telegraph Administration) who not unnaturally "strongly deprecated disturbing the arrangement under which the Chinese Telegraph Company has always had an office in Hongkong", but conceded that the objection formulated by the Hongkong Government to the unauthorised ownership of the section of telegraphs between the old and the new frontier was well founded. The Waimupu, however, would not admit even this contention. Sir John Jordan recommends that the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company should acquire and work this section (as proposed by me) and that "the terminal office of the Chinese Telegraph Administration should be removed to the new frontier". He, however, goes on to urge that the Chinese Telegraph Administration should still be allowed to function in the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company's building in Hongkong itself, which means that in point of fact their terminal station would be in Hongkong and not at the frontier. He gives as his reason for this proposal the benefits enjoyed by the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company at Shanghai and Peking,