t
1
COPY.
Confidential.
Hon. Colonial Secretary,
C.O.
80
5446
RECE R15 FEB 13
Lir. Kong Kung Yan, alias Kong Ha, is at present in the Colony, having come down from Peking on a mission from Yuan Shih Kai to Canton. He was born in Shanghai, the son of a wealthy Cantonese merch- -ant: a han lin, closely connected with Government Officials in Canton before the revolution, and was freely used as an intermediary between the two parties at the time of the revolution. After the revolution he was for a short time put in charge of all the gunboats and the soldiery for keeping order in the Province outside the City: but soon resigned as he could not see eye to eye with the new Government. He has been several times back and fore to Peking since, and is now down here after a conference with Yuan, in whose confidence he has long been. I saw him today and had a talk with him: he made a condition that it should be treated as confidential.
on
It appears that Yuan wishes him to become Governor- -General of Canton, and to form an entirely new Government: and that he himself is willing to undertake the work, provided only that he can see his way through the present financial difficulties before he takes over the charge of the Province: it is therefore the financial question in the main that he is now investigating in Canton. Liu Chung On, the Provincial Treasurer, in interviews. with Yuan at which Kong Ha was present, at first gave the total of the notes issued by the Canton
Government as $18,000,000:/being (it appears) threatened with execution
if this should turn out to be a false statement, he thought it over
and amended his figure next day to $22,000,000 and possibly something extra for forgeries. Making a reasonable allawance for these, and allow- -ing the total to be dealt with including forgeries was something
under $30,000,000, Yuan pressed Kong to take over the Governorship,
and promised if he would do so to grant him for the dedemption of the note issue one-third of the total amount required in coin, anf the balance in the new properly secured notes to be issued in Peking when the Foreign Loan goes through. The forgeries were marked down at a low figure as it was considered that in most cases they could be dealt