CO129-357 - Governor Sir Lugard - 1909 [7-9] — Page 103

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prejudice the issue since they would not require another

batch for 3 years. Such action on my part might I consider-

-ed be regarded by China as a very discourteous act.

9.

Moreover even if the Chinese

Government did not resent my action, I had every reason

to suppose that it would be bitterly resented by the

guilds who had prohibited the emigration from Swatow, and

the Self-Government Society of Canton, who had shown them-

-selves able to institute a Boycott in the Fatshan and

other cases in opposition to the Chinese Government. I

could not consent to undertake this risk which I regarded

as a very serious one, in spite of my genuine desire to

oblige the Germans.

10.

Dr. Voretzsch in repeated inter-

-views amounting in the aggregate to many hours of argu-

-ment

at which the Attorney-General was present urged

me by every means at his command to relax my decision,

finally appealing to me as an act of personal friendship

to himself. He admitted the risk I had described but

considered that I over-estimated it; he urged the promise

already given in the name of this Government to Messrs. ~

Wendt and Company and the parallel case of the Pellew

Islands. I replied that in the latter case there had not

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