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Enclosure No.4 in Mr. Brenan's despatch No.51 of April 16th, 1928.
No.64.
Government House,
Hongkong.
26th March, 1928.
sir,
I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of
your letter of the 22nd March regarding the Chinese
Telegraph Office in Hong Kong, and to request you to bring
to Mr. Chu's attention the fact that no Chinese equivalent
for the title "Commercial Agent in Charge of the Chinese
Telegraph Office in Kong Kong" was agreed upon at the
conference in Canton on the 10th March. A pencilled
note by Mr, Chu as a suggested translation was included
in the notes of the meeting, but there was no discussion of
it and the point was merely reserved for later consideration.
2 The result of the conference was that I engaged
to raise no objection to the nomination by the Canton
Government of a Commercial Agent to be in charge of the
Hong Kong Office: but it was made perfectly clear that
this agent must be persona grata to the Hong Kong
Government and must not be an official and that his
appointment would require the previous approval of the
Hong Kong Government. Further emphasis was laid on the
point that the selection of the agent must rest entirely on
commercial grounds, and that the appointment could be in
no sense a political one
Accordingly, on my return to Hong Kong, after
careful consideration I settled upon the following
translation of the title, the English version of which
I note from your letter is accepted by Mr.Chu namely:
Mr. Chu's version, namely
contravenes