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agents in Hong Kong, and the letter of the 15th May 1893
in reply to the letter of the 12th May appears to accept
this position as nothing is said to the contrary in such
letter. Unfortunately, having stated that the water
abstracted was to be for private use only, the Government
seem to have done nothing further in the subsequent
negotiations and the documents entered into to provide
for this.
In accordance with the mode of disposition
of property by the Crown which obtains in Hong Kong the
property was put up for sale by public auction under
Conditions which were prepared and published in the
Government Gazette of the 24th June 1893. At the auction,
which was held on the 11th July 1895, the Company purchased
and on the 2nd September the sale was carried into effect
under the Conditions by the grant of the Lease of that
date. In neither the Conditions of Sale nor the lease
was any reference made to the fact that the water to be
used by the Company, if they constructed a reservoir on
the property purchased and abstracted water, was to be
used for private purposes only, nor did the Conditions or
the lease contain any restriction whatsoever as to the user
of the water, in fact the lease did not refer to the water
at all. Subsequently the directors of the Company in
London seem to have become apprehensive that the lease did
not give them rignts and privileges as to water which they
had bargained for, and on the 15th May 1896 the Hong Kong
managers of the Company wrote to the Colonial Secretary
stating that there had been an omission in the lease of any
reference to water privileges accorded to them in connection
with it and requesting to have the lease amended. This
letter contains a suggested form of amendment. The suggested
form gave the Company power to collect and impound water
in any reservoir constructed on the demised land and divert
streams, but it did not contain any suggestion that the
2.