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it seemed to us to be unnecessary to include in our telegram the warning on the lines suggested in your letter. We understood, in fact, that your' paragraph 5 was a comment on our proposal in the last two sentences of paragraph 3 of my letter of 17th December. That proposal, however, was not followed up and was abandoned in favour of a suggestion by the Crown Agents that if they were appointed trustees of the sinking fund, they would be able, with the approval of the Secretary of State, to purchase the loan on the market if this seemed desirable, 1.e. if the price were below par.

As there will be no provision requiring the Crown Agents to do this in the Ordinance, the danger to which you refer would not appear to arise. In these circumstances, we assumed it was unnecessary to make the point to Hong Kong, or even to raise it further with you

I regret that the Colonial Office attitude on the above points was not made clear to you as soon as the telegram had been despatched. The file was, in fact, marked to be brought up for this purpose, but a minute appears thereon to the effect that the matter had been discussed with you and that, in these circumstances, a further letter did not appear to be necessary.

I

Yours sincerely,.

لم

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