3
of the projected tour of American missionaries in Chenpien, Ch'en-nieht'ai brought up the question of the Tali reconnaissance and the Tengyueh Railway.
to
I
In regard to the former, he hoped that instructions would be given to Mr. Lilley not to cross the frontier. I said that I have no authority to stop Mr. Lilley, who as a British subject has a Treaty right to travel in Yunnan; that I have repeated by telegram you the gist of Government-General Ting's letter on this subject, but was still without an answer; and that it was very possible that the Indian Government would not consider it expedient to put off Mr. Lilley's tour. Ch'en Ta-jen said that if Mr. Lilley did come he hoped there would be no trouble, but more than hinted that there might be. replied that Mr. Lilley had twice surveyed in Tengyuch Sub-Prefecture, and there had been no sort of trouble; the Yunnanese, as the Commissioner well knew, were a very peaceable folk. Ch'en answered that this is true as a rule, but that if they once get out of bounds they are very dangerous. I then observed that was quite sure that Mr. Lilley would not be attacked, but if he were, I added with some emphasis, it could only be because his assailants had been instigated by others. (I may here say that Chien Ta-jen two days later suggested verbally to my Writer that the expedition might be postponed, and that either Mr. Lilley should not accompany it, or that he should not appear as "Lei Li." The object of this manœuvre was to save his (Ch'en's) face vis-à-vis of the Directors.)
The conversation then turned to the Tengyueh Railway. The Commissioner said that the gentry and people of all Yünnan were bent on building it themselves. I smiled, and said that, on the contrary, the people-the tradesmen and farmers would be delighted if it were built by engineers from Burmah. He replied that telegrams had been received from the gentry of Yungchang and Tali, from the Yünnan students in Japan, and from the various sawbwas begging that foreigners should not have a part in it, I retorted that Mr. Ottewill informed me that Tengyuch merchants were coming to his Consulate eager to contract for the supply of labour; that it was easy to make up telegrams, whether here or at Yungch'ang; that the Yunnan Government should not pay attention to schoolboys; and that, as regards the sawbwas, these had to do what the Sub-Prefect of Tengyueh told them. I repeated, finally, that his Central Government at Peking had admitted our right to equal treatment with the French, and I produced again the Chinese text of the communications of the 12th and 16th March, 1902.
Ch'en-nicht'ai read them slowly through out loud; then observed that the despatch from the Wai-wa Pu did not amount to assent, but merely noted (or placed on record) Sir E. Satow's views. He locked round on his subordinates, who, of course, nodded approbation. I replied that this was certainly not the opinion of Sir E. Satow, when he sent officially to my locum tenens, Mr. Litton, copies of the correspondence; it was not the opinion of Mr. Carnegie, his immediate successor, who a few months ago had directed my attention to the communication of the 10th March; nor is it that of the Indian Government, who telegraphed to me last month that they considered the correspondence gives us equal advantages with the French. Ch'en Ta-jen observed that a Railway Concession might have been obtainable by us some time ago, but that conditions had of late greatly changed; the gentry now desired to undertake the work themselves. I answered that it rested with my Government to decide whether they would avail themselves of their right to equality with the French in Yünnan; a handful of young schoolmasters could not be suffered to overrule international obligations.
You will observe that the contention of Ch'en Ta-jen and his colleagues on the 26th instant does not agree with the view taken by the "Directors" a fortnight earlier, if I understand the poster aright. It is possible that instructions have come meanwhile from the Wai-wu Pu to deny that their communication of 1902 amounted to a promise of equal treatment, although I cannot learn, directly or indirectly, that a further telegram has been received by the local Government. In any case I have thought it as well to inform you by telegraph both of the appearance of the poster and of the denial by the Department of Foreign Affairs that the correspondence of 1902 bas the force and meaning which Sir E. Satow designed, and the Government of India believes it to possess,
I have, &c.
(Signed)
W. H. WILKINSON.
Inclosure 2 in No. 1.
Poster issued by the Yunnan--Szechuan und Tengyuch Railways Company about
(Translation.)
November 15, 1906.
Head Office of the Yunnan-Szechuan and Tengyueh Railways Company.
NOTIFICATION.
In the matter of starting the construction of a Tengyueh Railway, and of fixing its
trace, so as to preserve our hold on the profits and to secure our frontiers.
THE instituting of railways means profits exceedingly wide, but also a task that is most formidable. All the provinces of late have planned how to build them themselves, which is good, in so far as economies are concerned, and cannot be otherwise than timely and excellent. In the case of those that have been conceded to foreigners, money to buy them back has been raised with alacrity, as, for example, the Lu-han (Peking to Hankow), the Ching-han (sic, ? Tien-tsin to Chinkiang), and the Yuch-han (Canton to Hankow) Railways, which have all been redeemed, through the collection of large sums, for construction by ourselves. In the case of those that were about to be conceded to but have not been commenced by foreigners, as, for instance, the Yunnan-Tengyueh Railway, his Excellency the Governor-General Ting has recently anthorized us to bring reason to bear on and to contravert the British Consul, and to insist on its being built by ourselves, combining it with the Yunnan-Szechuan Railway, for which sanction has been asked by Memorial, and collecting capital for its construction.
Moreover, Yunnan is on the far frontier, limitrophe with England and France. If commerce is to flourish, and we do not build railways, we shall be unable to open up sources of profit; if for the course of the line we do not fix a trace, we shall be unable to give check to their covetous desires.
Our Governor-General, with anxious thought for the difficulties of the time, and with a keen view of the situation, has been good enough to memorialize for the construc- tion by ourselves of the Yunnan-Szechuan Railway. The Yunnan-Touquin Railway is being pushed forward by the French, and in no long time will be completed; the days can be counted when an advance in trade can certainly be expected. But, considering that the commerce of the province is equally important in the west as in the south, and that the movement of merchandize is far greater at Tengyueh than at Mengtzu, once the southern road (to Tonquin) is opened, French goods will increase on the market, and the British will quote the principle of "equality of treatment in the matter of privileges" to set to and build the Tengyueh-Burah Railway. This would certainly be reasonable; but as great gain is involved, we cannot but take thought beforehand, and rather than concede the construction to others and let the profits go entirely to them, it would be better to make our own plans for building and let the profits come to ourselves.
Moreover, from the Burmah frontier to Tengyueh is only 300 odd li (100 miles or so), and would not cost more than one-fifth of the amount needed for the Yunnan- Szechuan line. All that would be required would be to set aside the proceeds for one or two years of the charge on the salt and grain contributions, already arranged for. This would form the base; for the balance, the wealthy merchants of the western circuit would be urged to show energy in taking up shares. Many a mickle would make a muckle, and we believe that this road, its length being short, would speedily become a
success.
Fellow countrymen! Fathers! We think that you will assuredly struggle who shall be first, each fearing to be last, and that you will exhort one another to effort, emptying your purses in contributions. Do not disappoint our earnest hopes!
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