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support Chen Chiung-ming (not only unofficially but
officially too you will remember Sir R. Stubbs urging
that a loan should be made to him in 1922 and 1923). It
is clear that even now Chen shows signs of using Hongkong
as a base of intrigue, and I welcome the steps taken
to suppress his Secret Society, the Chi Kung T'ong. There
can be no doubt that Chen's party exaggerated the amount
of encouragement given him; and there can be no doubt
that the party opposed to him came to regard Hongkong
as Chen's ally and as their enemy, and that this fact
was one of the component parts in the situation that
faced us in 1925.
But this is all ancient history.
The new point
in Commander Faure's memorandum is his suggestion that
Chen Chiung-ming was in some way and to some degree connected
with the Bias Bay piracies. Some such idea has certainly
been present in the minds of the Canton authorities
when they have retorted to our representations that
the real organisers of the piracies were to be found
in Hongkong. There may be nothing in it; but it was this
aspect of Commander Faure's memorandum which seemed to
us/