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bridge. Three-quarters of the procession, consisting of labour, agricultural and other unions, passed by in an orderly manner, and His Majesty's Consul-General was about to return to the Consulate to telegraph to the Legation that all had passed off peacefully, when it was suggested to him that he should wait until the students had passed by. In the course of a few minutes bodies of students came in sight, and following behind them was a body of armed military cadets, who halted at a point some fifty yards east of the bridge-head. In the meantime, the Consul-General had noticed a man mount on to a box at a street corner and at the same time a person waving a flag shouted derision at the Consul- General and his party. Some members of the procession fell out, in order, as it appeared, to listen to what was being said, when suddenly a rifle shot was heard, and the procession broke up in disorder, rushing for shelter. Half a minute afterwards a volley was fired on to Shameen, and one of the guard posts on the island, seeing the Consul- General and the Senior Naval Officer under fire, returned the fire, but the Senior Naval Officer at once proceeded to the spot and stopped the firing. As, however, firing at Shameen still continued. The other guard posts also opened fire, and continued intermittently for about ten minutes until orders to cease firing had reached all posts. After this occa- sional shots were necessary to deal with snipers, who were very persistent on the mainland side. Even this was soon stopped by orders not to reply unless the snipers became too dangerous. About 4.30 all firing on both sides had stopped.
I have the honour to observe that the above deplorable incident has been exploited for the purposes of an unrestrained Press campaign of calumny and malice against my country, the promoters of which, without waiting or caring to learn the facts, have utilized these tragic events as the basis of unscrupulous propaganda.
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The acutal facts are as above stated, and show that the foreigners on Shameen were not the aggressors, and that the foreign authorities concerned limited their action to what was necessary for the defence of the lives of those on the island.
In bringing the above to Your Excellency's notice I have the honour to express the hope that, in the interests of the truth, your Ministry will give directions for this Note to be published in the Press.
SECOND
(Signed) MICHAEL PALAIRET.
BRITISH NOTE.
A second Note from the British Charge d'Affaires to the Chinese Foreign Minister, with regard to the Shameen incident, was handed in on July 15th. It was as follows:-
Sir, With reference to my Note of 13th July, relative to the incident at Canton on June 23rd, I have the honour to communicate to Your Excellency herewith copy and translation of a statement* signed by four foreigners who personally witnessed the attack on Shameen. One of the signatories to this document is a military officer of non-British nationality, and two of the remaining three signatories are also of non-British nationality. Although the statement was drawn up on 23rd June, the day of the incident, it was not handed to His Majesty's Consul-General until 30th June, and the latter had no knowledge of its contents when drawing up his own report, the substance of which was communicated to Your Excellency in my Note under reference.
*The enclosure to this Note was the report of the four eye-witnesses from U.S.S. "Asheville" reprinted separately as Appendix C.
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