CO129-314 - Public Offices - 1902 — Page 148

for the present putly

15/2

CP.2.19

at once

MEMORANDUM

147

Art.XIV

Art.XVI

itel 6.199 $99.

June 26, 1858

9.161

qu. 1943)

The earlier history of the relations between the

Chinese Customs authorities and the free port of Hong

Kong begins with the supplementary Treaty of October 8th

1843, which provided that "an English officer will be

appointed at Hong Kong, one part of whose duty will be

to examine the registers and passes of all Chinese ves-

sels that may repair to that port to buy or sell goods;

and should such officer at any time find that any Chinese

merchant-vessel has not a pass or register, from one of

the five ports, she is to be considered as an unauthor-

ised or smuggling vessel, and is not to be allowed to

trade, whilst a report of the circumstance is to be made

to the Chinese authorities". The officer was also to

make a return to the Chinese authorities at Canton "shot

ing the names of Chinese vessels arrived at Hong Kong,

or departed from that port, with the nature of their

cargoes".

These provisions seem to have been disapproved lo-

cally and no British officer was ever appointed to discharge these duties. (The whole supplementary Treaty was formally abrogated in 1858). In his evidence before the House of Commons Committee in 1847 on Commercial Re-

lations with China, Mr.Matheson stated that the regula- tion forbidding junks to anchor at Hong Kong without a pass from a mandarin had been strictly observed for a year or two by Government, and "of late at the earnest entreaty of the British merchants, dispensed with".

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