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2. French Railway.
In April there were three French survey camps along the proposed new railway, tracing from Mengtse viâ A-Mi and I Liang to Yunnan-fu. I learn that nothing really definite has been decided as to what route the railway is to take from Mengtse to Yunnan-fu, and I should not be surprised if in a few months the plans are all changed again. It seems, however, to be decided that the line to be adopted from Laokai up to the Yunnan plateau is to be the Nan Hsi route, and not the Hsin Hsien route selected by M. Doumer. The Viceroy Ting is obstructing; he wants to see a plan of the Nan Hsi route before he will consent to a service road being made there. The French reply that the country is under dense jungle, and that no plan can be made unless they are allowed first to cut a path; "but the path may disturb the graves," replies the Viceroy, and so on.
Meanwhile the money of the "Compagnie des Constructions des Chemins de Fer" flows like water.
Complaints are rife in Tonquin that an excessive number of Italians have been imported into this concern. "We are ruined by Italian cheap labour" is the cry. It was the same in Algeria, Turkey, and Asia Minor; nothing could be done without the Lombards. These people are skilled workmen of a special character. They are temperate, thrifty, and avoid rows about native women; they can handle either a theodolite or a shovel, and can teach unskilled native labourers how to use a pick or a spade. If they are discarded the railway scheme becomes more nebulous than ever, and the labour difficulty already serious will become acute.
There have been some unimportant collisions between the French and the people at A-Mi Chou,
3. Frontier.
The frontier districts on the Chinese side are in a state of confusion. Serious raids over the frontier into Burmah have, I am happy to say, wholly ceased, and the indemnity of 26,000 rupees for damages sustained by British villages up to January 1902, has been fully paid by the Teng-yueh officials. Cattle-lifting, pony-stealing, and a few broken heads, continue to be reported from time to time, but from the international point of view the state of the frontier is much better than it was two years ago. The Bhamo-Teng-yueh-Ta Li trade route has remained open and quiet but the internal condition of the Chinese Shan and Kachin districts is one of anarchy. In the Shan Chinese States of Meng Wan and Meng Mao which border on Bhamo district, the native Chiefs are at war with their hill Kachins; many villages have been burnt and Chinese troops have gone to the spot nominally to attempt to restore order, but more probably to join in and increase the general confusion. These Kachins, I have good authority for believing, are anxious to make their submission to the British, but as they are on the Chinese side of the frontier, such an idea is not to be encouraged.
Keng Ma, a Chinese Shan State, near the Kun Long Ferry, was in April raided by a number of Wild Wa head-hunters from the hills on the east of the Salwen. These warriors consider the head of an old woman shot sitting in a padi-field to be as valuable as the head of an enemy killed in fair fight, and my information is that Keng Ma has been much cut up by this raid and by a sort of civil war with its neighbour State of Meng Ting. Chinese troops have been sent from Mien Ning.
Further south, the Chen Pien Sub-Prefecture, west of Pu Erh city in south-west Yunnan, is the scene of a general revolt against the extortions of local Mandarins by the La, Lobei, and Shan tribes. The Assistant Sub-Prefect was murdered in March, and the other officials took to their heels. The Pu Erh Taotai died early in March, and Hu, the new Taotai, has declined to leave Yünnan-fu for his post on the ground that "there is money in it, and considerable personal risk."
The Upper Red River, north of Laokay, or rather north of Lung Po, after which place both banks are in Chinese territory has been the scene of numerous piracies which for about three weeks in April blocked the trade route to Manhao and Mengtse, to the benefit of Teng-yueh merchants who took up caravans of foreign goods to Yunnan-fu by the Bhamo Ta Li route at a heavy profit.
It is clear that a bale of yarn is not an object that a Chinaman can carry off without being noticed, and it is notorious that these piracies on the Upper Red River are worked in collusion with the petty local Mandarins who are supposed to protect the trade. It is only the "dead-beats" of Yunnan officialdom who will go to the unhealthy Red River ports of Manhao, Ho ko'u, &c., and they expect, if they do go, to make money by opening gambling dens, smuggling, and if occasion serve, pirating on their own account.
The result is that the scum of the earth has settled down at those places and constant disturbances occur. The present Viceroy takes no action in such cases and the remonstrances of the French Consul have not been of a very energetic character. The fact is that he uses these frontier Mandarins to give him secret information regarding the proceedings of the French Colonial authorities, and he therefore winks at their mal-practices, all the more so as the trade which suffers is really Hong Kong trade.
In other matters the French Consular authorities seem lately to have adopted a policy of shutting their eyes to the "squeezes" and abuses practised by the Chinese officials, hoping thereby to gain the goodwill of the Mandarins and disarm opposition to the railway. I understand that the French Consul-General supported the Chinese in the resistance which they have offered to the removal of the exactions against which I have been protesting.
Taotai Wei was absent on duty at Kwang Nan in the south-east of the province when the Red River trade route became blocked. I suggested that he should proceed to Mengtse, which he did, and as he is a man of energy, he soon succeeded in putting things straight.
For the present Yünnan continues to be free from Kwang-si rebels, but part of the Kwang Nan district has been depopulated, and trade with Canton by the West River continues to be at a standstill.
A sketch map is attached.
Sketch of part of Burmah-Yünnan Frontier, to illustrate Memorandum on Yünnan Affairs. [Not printed.]
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3
181
2. French Railway.
In April there were three French survey camps along the proposed new railway, tracing from Mengtse viâ A-Mi and I Liang to Yunnan-fu. I learn that nothingreally definite has been decided as to what route the railway is to take from Mengtse to Yunnan-fu, and I should not be surprised if in a few months the plans are all changed again. It seems, however, to be decided that the line to be adopted from Laokai up to the Yunnan plateau is to be the Nan Hsi route, and not the Hsin Hsien route selected by M. Doumer. The Viceroy Ting is obstructing; he wants to see a plan of the Nan Hsi route before he will consent to a service road being made there. The French reply that the country is under dense jungle, and that no plan can be made unless they are allowed first to cut a path; "but the path may disturb the graves," replies the Viceroy, and so on.
Meanwhile the money of the "Compagnie des Constructions des Chemins de Fer" flows like water.
Complaints are rife in Tonquin that an excessive number of Italians have been imported into this concern. "We are ruined by Italian cheap labour" is the cry. It was the same in Algeria, Turkey, and Asia Minor; nothing could be done without the Lombards. These people are skilled workmen of a special character. They are temperate, thrifty, and avoid rows about native women; they can handle either a theodolite or a shovel, and can teach unskilled native labourers how to use a pick or a spade. If they are discarded the railway scheme becomes more nebulous than ever, and the labour difficulty already serious will become acute.
There have been some unimportant collisions between the French and the people at A-Mi Chou,
3. Frontier.
The frontier districts on the Chinese side are in a state of confusion. Serious raids over the frontier into Burmah have, I am happy to say, wholly ceased, and the indemnity of 26,000 rupees for damages sustained by British villages up to January 1902, has been fully paid by the Teng-yuch officials. Cattle-lifting, pony-stealing, and a few broken heads, continue to be reported from time to time, but from the international point of view the state of the frontier is much better than it was two years ago. The Bhamo- Teng-yuch-Ta Li trade route has remained open and quiet but the internal condition of the Chinese Shan and Kachin districts is one of anarchy. In the Shan Chinese States of Meng Wan and Meng Mao which border on Bhamo district, the native Chiefs are at war with their bill Kachins; many villages have been burnt and Chinese troops have gone to the spot nominally to attempt to restore order, but more probably to join in and increase the general confusion. These Kachins, I have good authority for believing, are anxious to make their submission to the British, but as they are on the Chinese side of the frontier, such an idea is not to be encouraged.
Keng Ma, a Chinese Shan State, near the Kun Long Ferry, was in April raided by a number of Wild Wa head-hunters from the hills on the cast of the Salwen. These warriors consider the head of an old woman shot sitting in a padi-field to be as valuable as the head of an enemy killed in fair fight, and my information is that Keng Ma has been much cut up by this raid and by a sort of civil war with its neighbour State of Meng Ting. Chinese troops have been sent from Mien Ning.
Further south, the Chen Pien Sub-Prefecture, west of Pu Erh city in south-west Yunnan, is the scene of a general revolt against the extortions of local Mandarins by the La, Lobei, and Shan tribes. The Assistant Sub-Prefect was murdered in March, and the other officials took to their heels. The Pu Erh Taotai died early in March, and Hu, the new Taotai, has declined to leave Yünnan-fu for his post on the ground that "there is money in it, and considerable personal risk.”
The Upper Red River, north of Laokay, or rather north of Lung Po, after which place both banks are in Chinese territory has been the scene of numerous piracies which for about three weeks in April blocked the trade route to Manhao and Mengtse, to the benefit of Teng-yueh merchants who took up caravans of foreign goods to Yunnan-fu by the Bhamo Ta Li route at a heavy profit.
It is clear that a bale of yarn is not an object that a Chinaman can carry off with- out being noticed, and it is notorious that these piracies on the Upper Red River are worked in collusion with the petty local Mandarins who are supposed to protect the trade. It is only the "dead-beats" of Yunnan officialdom who will go to the unhealthy
account.
Red River ports of Manhao, Ho ko'u, &c., and they expect, if they do go, to make money" by opening gambling dens, smuggling, and if occasion serve, pirating on their own The result is that the scum of the earth has settled down at those places and constant disturbances occur. The present Viceroy takes no action in such cases and the remonstrances of the French Consul have not been of a very energetic character. The fact is that he uses these frontier Mandarins to give him secret information regarding the proceedings of the French Colonial anthorities, and he therefore winks at their mal-practices, all the more so as the trade which suffers is really Hong Kong trade.
In other matters the French Consular authorities seem lately to have adopted a policy of shutting their eyes to the "squeezes" and abuses practised by the Chinese officials, hoping thereby to gain the goodwill of the Mandarins and disarm opposition to the railway. I understand that the French Consul-General supported the Chinese in the resistance which they have offered to the removal of the exactions against which I have been protesting.
Taotai Wei was absent on duty at Kwang Nan in the south-east of the province when the Red River trade route became blocked. I suggested that he should proceed to Mengtse, which he did, and as he is a man of energy, he soon succeeded in putting things straight.
For the present Yünnan continues to be free from Kwang-si rebels, but part of the Kwang Nan district has been depopulated, and trade with Canton by the West River continues to be at a standstill.
A sketch map is attached.
Sketch of part of Burmah-Yünnan Frontier, to illustrate Memorandum on Yünnan Affairs. [Not printed.]
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