CO129-331 - Public Offices - 1905 — Page 427

[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]

CHINA TRADE.

CONFIDENTIAL,

C. O.

420

37375

RECE [Reot 20 00 05

[October 9.]

SECTION 2.

No. 1.

Sir E. Satow to the Marquess of Lansdowne.--(Received October 9.)

(No. 286.) My Lord,

Peking, August 24, 1905. WITH reference to my telegram No. 151 of the 16th instant, reporting that the Chairman of the Shanghae branch of the China Association had telegraphed to me, through His Majesty's Consul-General, to the effect that British commercial interests were suffering from the boycott of American-imported goods, I have the honour to forward copy of a despatch from Sir Pelham Warren, covering a letter to him from the Chairman of the Association on the same subject.

In the despatch from His Majesty's Consul-General an account is given of the origin of the movement. It seems now to have passed beyond the control of the native merchants, and to be maintained and developed by the efforts of the student class.

Mr. R. W. Little furnishes a statement of the quantities and values of American goods for which Chinese merchants have contracted with those of American, British, and other nationalities, but gives no indication of the proportion of the whole, which may be regarded as an exclusive interest of British merchants. It may also be observed that a distinction is to be drawn between the interest of a British merchant established in China who imports goods from America and of one who deals in goods of British origin.

I should mention that Mr. Little, the Chairman of the Association and writer of the letter to Sir Pelham Warren, is the editor of the "North China Daily News," a paper which at the outset of the movement published articles in favour of the boycott.

From my United States' colleague I learn that the negotiations for the renewal of the Exclusion Treaty have been laid on one side for the present, and the Chinese Government has been informed that these will not be renewed until the boycott is removed. While the Viceroy Yuan Shih-k'ai has acted with great energy in repressing all attempts to introduce it into the province administered by him, and has stopped the publication of a newspaper that had published articles of an inflammatory character, the provincial authorities in other parts of the country have displayed great slackness or have covertly supported the agitation. Nor has he hitherto been successful in inducing the Peking Government to take a serious view of their responsibilities in the face of what may lead to a serious commercial crisis and possibly even to a disturbance of the public peace.

I have, &c. (Signed)

ERNEST SATOW.

(No. 65.) Sir,

Inclosure 1 in No. 1.

Consul-General Sir P. Warren to Sir E. Satow.

Shanghae, August 12, 1905. REFERRING to my telegram No. 38 of the 8th August, I have now the honour to forward a copy of a letter dated the 11th instant, which I have received from the Chairman of the Shanghae branch of the China Association, setting forth the danger to British and general trade which will be incurred by a prolongation of the existing boycott of American goods.

The idea of the boycott was started by an article in one of the native papers, the "Eastern Times," written a day or two after the receipt of a telegram from Peking saying that Liang Cheng was vigorously resisting the new draft Exclusion Treaty. Other native papers followed on the same lines, and the question was taken up by students returned from Japan and America and those educated in foreign schools in China. The movement was headed by Tseng Shao-ch'ing, a native of the Fukien Province, and head of the Foochow Guild in Shanghae. He is a nan much respected.

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