Copy.
Enclosure No. 2.
November 15th, 1927.
136
Dear Mr. Chiang Tsun-wei,
In confirmation of our conversation to-day, I write to say that Mr. Chen Ch' ing-wen will be accept-
able to the Hong Kong Government as officer in charge
of the Chinese Telegraph Office, provided that he is
equally acceptable to the Canton Authorities, If,
however, his appointment proved to be unacceptable to
the Canton Authorities, the Hong Kong Government would
have no course open to it but to close down the Chinese
Telegraph Office in Hong Kong. Such closure would
not be a breach by the Hong Kong Government of the 1884
Agreement. The 1844 Agreement has already been broken,
not by the Hong Kong Government but by the breach between
the Peking and the Canton Authorities. The closure would
merely mark the determination of the Hong Kong Government
not to be drawn into the civil conflict now unhappily
raging between various contending Chinese authorities.
I see little hope under existing circumstances
that the appointment of Mr. Ch'en or of any other
nominee of the Peking Government would prove acceptable
to the Canton Authorities, and I therefore suggest with
great respect that the course most consonant with the
dignity of your Department would be to send Mr. Ch'en
to Hong Kong with instructions to close down the Chinese
Telegraph Office there. In that case I would hand
over the seals of the Office to him and he could take
it back to Peking. This seal has been in my personal
custody