CO129-224 - Foreign Office - 1885 — Page 443

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No. 116.

Mr. O'Conor to the Marquis of Salisbury.-(Received November 3.)

(No. 387.) My Lord,

Peking, September 8, 1885. SOME weeks ago I instructed Mr. Consul Gardner to report to me on the probable effect of the commercial stipulations of the Treaty recently concluded between France and China upon the trade via Canton with the inland markets of Kwangtung, Kwangsi, and Yunnan, and to inform me how far he considered that the opening of a Treaty port on the West River, as, for instance, Wuchow, would counterbalance the advantages secured to the French by the present Treaty.

In reply to the above questions, Mr. Gardner is distinctly of opinion that the stipula- tions alluded to will have no serious effect upon the trade via Canton with the inland markets, and is inclined to believe that the establishment of a Treaty port on the West River would counterbalance the advantages accruing to the French under the late Agree-

ment.

To support this opinion Mr. Gardner alleges that the inland trade between Kwang- tung and Tonquin is insignificant, being a very small interchange of commodities between the Lien-chow Prefecture in Kwantung and the Quangyen Province in Tonquin. Vr. Gardner considers that the few foreign goods required by the natives of Quangyen will continue, as heretofore, to reach them neither from Canton nor the French ports in Tonquin, but from Hong Kong, through Pakhoi.

Referring to the trade of Kwangsi, Mr. Gardner expects that the populous southern

Admiralty, September 25, 1885.

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