CO129-303 - Public Offices & Others - 1900 — Page 427

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Commission or otherwise, and guard against any

preferential rights of Trade being granted to any nation.

4th. One policy must be laid down for our Consuls in China to follow, and each of them must no longer be allowed to be a law unto himself as in the past.

5th. Piracy must be put down with a strong hand, and at

once (I have, during the last 15 months, addressed to you some half dozen letters on this subject, pointing out the damage which is being done to British trade by these robberies on the waters of our adjacent waterways, and only a few days since yet another similar piratical occurrence took place on board the steam launch "Perseverance" in the mouth of the Canton River).

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6th. The Government should be required to pledge itself to promptly put this Port and Island in a satis- factory state of defence. I have addressed you already upon this subject in my letters of 4th. May 1899 and 31st. March 1900.

Surely the protection of the only serious British base and Coaling-station in the Far east (for Wei- hai-wei is apparently only being tinkered at) is a matter of national importance, and we hope that our members of Parliament who are interested in China will not rest until

(1) Every one of the muzzle-loading guns in our forts, which we mentioned in our letter to

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