No. 73 P.
Sir J. Jordan to Sir E. Grey.
12440
RECO
REGP 12 APR D
Peking,
April 2, 1909.
71
Canton-Hankow railway loan.
Your telegram No. 60 of the 31st ultimo.
I warned Liang-tuh-yen, whom I saw last evening, that if the
Chinese Govt allowed Chang Chih-tung to violate the undertaking
of 1903 they would be held responsible for it. I added that
it would be unwise to accentuate the very bad impression which
had been produced by Chang's strange disregard of his obligat- ions towards us in connexionnwithk the Canten-Hankow line.
Lisng said he looked upon the whole business as "most unfor-
tunate" & promised to put himself in communication with Chang
at once. He asked me whether I knew of any British firms
who were prepared to tender on Tientsin-Pukow terms for the
loan for the construction of the Hupei section of the Hankow-
Ichang line.
I said that all we had asked from Chang was a guarantee for the honest expenditure of the loan funds & the duty of obtaining such a guarantee was imposed on us by our experience in the Shanghai-Ningpo case.
The Chinese are, I fancy, feeling very uneasy es to our atti- tude & I believe this is one of the reasons for their hesitation
in closing with the German offer.
(Confidential)
Liang admitted that the Government has had no directing head
since Yuan-shi-kai's dismissal & it is therefore diificult to deal
with Chang.