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He said that deportation was a severe punishment, especially I said that ties and long for a man with long residence and ties. residence were always considered very carefully.

" referred to abuses by He said that illegal punishments police constables at police stations. I said that if any abuses were discovered we were only too anxious to suppress them.

He suggested that an arrangement should be made under which a Labour member or two Labour members should be nominated for appointment by the Government to the Legislative Council. I said that this was an internal matter, and an Imperial matter, but that the Governor would always consider carefully and sym pathetically any request from the inhabitants of the Colony for increased representation.

The strikers ask, he said, that Labour representatives should be present at, and take part in, the discussion of all Labour legis. lation. I said that we must conform to the constitution of the Legislative Council, but that we would try at some stage to ascertain the views of Labour on any future Labour legislation. Mr. C. C The next points were reinstatement and strike pay. Wu said: "Now we come to the terms which Mr. Fletcher un- I do not know what Mr. fortunately called the economic terms." C. C. Wu meant by this; he may have merely meant that the term was inappropriate.

He gave me the latest strike pay figures which he had received from the strikers the previous day. The Committee say they still have 70,109 strikers on hand from the first strike (i.e. June, 1925). this number including "a few thousand" Canton strikers, i.e. from Shameen, &c. The average monthly pay of these 70,109 persons was $29.22c. That works out at $2,048,584.98c. per month, or, roughly, $20,000,000 for the ten months from the 19th June, 1925.

From the second strike (Chinese New Year, 1926), they had 1,377 persons, with an average wage of $22.60c, making $31,120.20c. per month, or, roughly, $60,000 for the two months. I laughed at these figures. Mr. C. C. Wu said that they could be checked and the Strike Committee had books and photographs in support. I said that it did not matter because we are not going to pay a cent. The Government will neither pay nor countenance payment. He said that payment could be made to the individual strikers. He suggested that "Manchester" might pay. I re- peated our position. He said that settlement was going to be more difficult than he thought.

I then raised the question of a loan. He agreed that that would meet the reinstatement point, by providing labour for the unem- ployed, but that it did not meet the strike pay point. He said that no settlement was possible without a payment, and that the Canton Government, which was less wealthy than Hongkong,

could not pay.

We left Mr. C. C. Wu about 6 p.m., making an appointment for 10 a.m. the next day.

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We met again at Mr. C. C. Wu's office at 10 a.m. on Friday, the 9th April, and we resumed the discussion of the strikers terms. Again I mention only special points.

"

Mr. C. C. Wu suggested an amnesty of strike prisoners. I said that each case would have to be considered on its merits, that a bomb thrower, for instance, would not have the least chance of getting out, and that in any case this could not be made a term of the settlement, any more than the other strikers' terms.

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On the question of the Rents Ordinance he suggested a tem- porary restriction of rents, in the case of tenements below a cer- tain rental, or in certain working class districts, for a limited period after the settlement, to cope with the situation which would be created by the large influx of population which would result from the expected boom. I said that this was worth considering. I said that I did not understand the proposed "compensation to sufferers." Mr. C. C. Wu was not very clear on the point. He said that perhaps it referred to (1) families of strikers and (2) unions which had been evicted or distrained on. I said that as regards families it seemed to be strike pay in another form. We agreed that we could discuss the point at some future time.

My copy of the "strikers' terms

All contained an item, trading privileges in force before the strike to be continued." This was not in Mr. C. C. Wu's Chinese version, but we came to the conclusion that it referred to the question of licences and cer- tificates current at the time of the strike, which have since ex- pired by effluxion of time. The only instance which we discussed was that of hawkers. Mr. C. C. Wu asked if new licences could be issued to former stallholders, and if a reduction would be made in the fee. I said that a reduction in the fee would be putting a premium on striking, but that we might extend, if necessary, the maximum number of hawkers, so as to give licences to hawkers of long standing. I said that as this was the first time that this request had been disclosed we would consider it, but that I did not want to offer any encouragement on the reduction point.

I should say that at some stage Mr. C. C. Wu said that strike pay need not be paid by the Hongkong Government but could be paid by the employers. I said that that would be a practical im- possibility, even if allowed. It could not be made compulsory, employers may have disappeared, and some labour is casual. Persons such as hawkers, who have no employer, are another obvious difficulty.

I said that we most certainly would not dismiss non-strikers.

Mr. C. C. Wu then came to the students' terms. I rather de- murred discussing them at all. I said that we would take back, as new boys, with no allowance for past fees, any boys who left, except ringleaders, if there was room for them. He asked about freedom of meeting and association and speech for the students: I said that it was ridiculous, that they must be subject to school discipline, that far too much licence was given to students, that

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some of them ought to be chastised, and that we could not dis- cuss these terms at all at the official conference. Mr. C. C. Wu then raised the question of giving the Chinese national holi- days in the Hongkong schools, and he gave me a list of them. He said that there had been some fuss about holidays in the University. I think that he was here mainly trying to emphasise the idea of sympathy with Chinese modern sentiment.

I then referred to the question of a loan. I said that we should like to assist them in the development of the province in some

We discussed the Loo way that would be of mutual advantage.

Line. Mr. C. C. Wu said that it would cost only about $500,000, and asked what amount of loan we had in mind. I mentioned $10,000,000. The Bias Bay light railway, even with an extension to Waichau, did not seem to appeal to him. He realised the difficulties of a Yuet Hon loan, and the railway would cost $60,000,000 to complete. He was greatly attracted by the pro- ject of a railway from Shek Lung to Wai Chau. He carried it on in mind to Swatow, or rather to meet the Swatow-Chiu-Chau line at Chiu Chau, and he consulted a map and measured out the He said that the 80 miles of distance and discussed the route.

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the Canton-Sham-Chun line cost about $40,000,000, or $500,000 a a mile, but he said that the average cost of railways in China “in- cluding rolling stock,' was about $50,000 a mile. He was not sure if this included land resumptions. I said that the average cost in England now, without land, was, I believed, about £13,000 a mile, but he kept to his $50,000 figure, which was afterwards confirmed by Mr. Sun Fo. Mr. Sun Fo also seemed a little vague about land. Mr. C. C. Wu estimated the cost of a Shek Lung Chiu Chau line at between $15,000,000 and $20,000,000. He asked me if we would lend money to develop Whampoa. I said that we would, subject to expert advice on a definite scheme. He said that Whampoa would take $20,000,000. They apparently

kind of scheme already. some

have

Mr. C. C. Wu seemed greatly attracted by these loan ideas. I did not think that the time was opportune to introduce the ques- tions of safeguards and control and payment for results. I should have had to do this if he had shown any indication that he looked upon the loan proposal as a camouflage of the payment demand. I do not think that he did, though it would be strange if the idea did not cross his mind that something could be made out of the loan, i.e. that some portion of the loan might be diverted, tem- porarily or permanently, to some purpose other than the purpose for which the loan had been granted. At all events he maintained up to the end the attitude that settlement is impossible without payment. This may, of course, have been tactics, and he may think that the loan will solve the problem, but I am inclined to think that his present view is that they cannot get rid of the boycott organisation without some payment, which must come from Hongkong.

Mr. C. C. Wu had asked Mr. Fitzmaurice and me to tiffin, and we now adjourned, at about 1 p.m., to a long and elaborate meal. Those present were Mr. C. C. Wu, Mr. Luk King-fo, Mr. Sun Fo,

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Mr. Fu Ping-sheung, Mr. Lo (a judge, whose admission at Hong- kong I had moved), Mr. Fitzmaurice and I. Mr. Sung Tsz-man had declined on account of a party of his own. Mr. Chan Kung- pok was detained at a meeting.

After tiffin we went back to Mr. C. C. Wu's office at about 2 p.m. Messrs. Sun Fo and Lo soon left. We did not resume our set conversation, but Mr. C. C. Wu and I had quite a long talk apart from the others. He did nearly all the talking. He had been courteous and reasonable all through our conversations, but it seemed to me that he was specially anxious to please during this final talk, though part of it was in criticism of Hongkong. It may, of course, have been due merely to extra politeness in the final stage,

He spoke about the necessity for friendship between Canton and Hongkong. He said that he quite realised that Whampoa could never rival Hongkong and that Hongkong must remain, at least for many years, the deep sea harbour for South China.

He said that whatever happened to the present government-- they might be out next year, or next week—a liberal form of government had come to stay in Canton, and they felt very much that support, or at all events sympathy, was in Hongkong always with the Conservative and reactionary elements. I made suitable replies.

We got back to the question of money. He said that the Government would use its influence with the strikers to get them to reduce their figures. I said that it was useless.

I had asked him more than once if he would come down to Hongkong, either with me, or after considering what we had said to each other, but he said he could not get away. He also said that there seemed to be nothing further to talk about at present. I secretly agreed with him on both points. It is unreasonable to expect any prominent member of the Government to leave Canton in the present uncertain state of affairs there, and until the idea of no payment sinks into the minds of the members of the Govern- ment and of the boycott organisation, no further progress is pos- sible. It will take some time for them to adapt their policy to this new point of view, and until they do so I think that we can do nothing but stand firm. We agreed to adjourn the informal conversations sine die. Mr. C. C. Wu said that he hoped that they would soon hear from us about the resumption of the con- versations. I said that I hoped that we would hear from them. I added that if they heard from us it would not be to give any other answer on the payment point, as our answer on that point was final. I was unable to arrange that the next meeting should take place in Hongkong, and it did not seem worth while, in the circumstances, to begin an argument on that point.

I decided to say nothing about our claim for damages. The occasion did not seem ripe. It might have caused irritation as its only effect, especially as the moment seems too far ahead of any possible action to back up the claim.

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