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JO. 29760
payments due this year (and if need be next year) could be
made on the application of the Viceroy based on a plea that
it was inconvenient to meet the obligation at present, with
a private understanding that the money which is entirely
Chinese money raised by local taxation would be applied to
pushing on construction. It may be that if the French
Group find that the Chinese are obdurate and that they are
themselves finding money for the work they may recede from
the position which has caused this impasse. In this con-
-nection I would invite Your Lordship's attention to Mr.
Justs letter of August 24th., 1907, to the Foreign
Office, and to the previous correspondence to which it
referred.
5.
Sir John Jordan, I think, con-
-curred that this would be a means and the only visible
means of getting out of the difficulty unless either
the French or Chang-chi-tung should give way, but he
appeared to think that it would be necessary to inform the
French of the fact that I had allowed postponement of the
Viceroy's payments. I can hardly see the necessity for this
myself, it being purely a matter between this Colony and
the Viceroy how and when the Loan he has contracted shall
be repaid, but Sir John Jordan is in a better position to
judge
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