3
4.
doctors had advised immediate departure for a cooler climate.
50
She
left by aeroplane for Kuling, accompanied by Col. Huang and Mr. Donald at 9 a.m. the next morning and is unlikely therefore to have been present at the meeting between the Generalissimo and Marshal
Li Tsung-jen to which I have already alluded.
4.
!
My second talk with the Generalissimo took place, at his
suggestion, after the Consulate dinner and the interpreter was Mr. T.L. Soong (Madane's brother) who is now in charge of the Provincial (Kwantung) Department of Finance. Mr. Phillips was busy entertaining his other guests, and we were thus left in a little conclave of three. Conversation began with the usual interchange of compliments and I invited Mr. T.L. Soong to stay with me at Goverment House whenever he might be passing through, telling him that I had received a telegram from Mr. Donald asking me to see that he met "the right people" in Hong Kong. The Generalissimo then proceeded to express the hope that, now that the South-West had been stabilised by him, British capital might be available for a programme of road and rail development which would benefit Hong Kong and British shareholders equally with his own Chinese people. He felt that a broad avenue now lay open for Anglo- Chinese enterprise. He recognised however that the financing of
such projects was a matter for London rather than Hong Kong, and
so turned to the subject of local co-operation. He would like
co-operation to cover the widest possible field, for instance he would like to keep in touch with the Hong Kong Defence Authorities. For the period of his stay at Whampoa he had, as I knew, sent Dr. Wang Chang-Hui (formerly a member of the International Court at the Hague) to Hong Kong as a sort of liaison officer but without
any official status. Did I think that he could send a military officer to reside in Hong Kong and keep in touch with our Defence
Authorities? He would have no official status and would never
wear uniform, but he would be in a position to give and receive information of mutual interest. I replied that our China