7.
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Council. Even if the total grant from this Government (apart from the special subsidy to the School of Chinese) is thus increased to $250,000, which is the most that can be done
for the present, the University could do no more than balance its Budget and increase the salaries of its Teaching and Administrative Staffs to a small and inadequate extent. It must give up all hope of enlarging its sphere of
activities; and the project of founding a Chinese Faculty
must be abandoned.
12.
Furthermore, although contributions have
already been paid in for the erection of additional
buildings for specific purposes, they must be refunded
because the University would not be able to support the
recurrent expenditure involved in carrying any such purposes.
into effect.
13.
In other words the University cannot afford
to make use of the many opportunities which surround it,
because it lacks the necessary working capital. This
refusal of opportunities must react on its character and I greatly fear that discouragement will arise, and a state of stagnation be reached, which may largely nullify the work already done in the creation and working of the University
during the 17 years of its existence.
14.
I should deplore any such result as bad for the University, bad for the Colony and bad for the good relations which we all desire between China and the British
Empire. For it would be difficult to explain why an Institution such as the University, with opportunities for good such as are within its reach, should be allowed to decay, except on the supposition that its professed objects are considered of no importance by His Majesty's Government.
Hitherto His Majesty's Government has done
15.
very