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I pointed out to the Managing Director that I could not travel over the railway without an interpreter, and I was authorized verbally to employ one. I employed a Chinese surveyor who had been over the route before, and I subsequently transferred him to the survey party. On my recommending that this man should be permanently employed he was summarily dismissed, and no explanation given to me.
I hold, as you do, that a railway accountant is a technical employé, and also a railway storekeeper, but the Managing Director holds that they are not, and that I have no say whatever as to these departments. These matters have not come to a head on account of the work of construction not being started. But I cannot control the work at all unless I am given a say in the running of these departments,
The Accounts Department might be, I think, a semi-independent department, but the Store Department should, during construction, be under the Engineering Department, I know of no precedent for its being run independently, although on a railway in operation, where there are many different departments to be supplied, the stores are customarily run as a separate department.
The present Chief Storekeeper was recommended by me for the post, and was appointed Chief Accountant. He has, however, now vacated the latter position and taken up that of storekeeper. He and all the other storekeepers along the railway are, according to the Managing Director's decision, to be under the Managing Director and absolutely independent of me. I cannot possibly control the consumption of materials under such a system. The organization has, however, taken no practical shape so far.
As regards the Accounts Department. I believe that an accountant was appointed just before we left for our trip over the line, but I was not consulted at all about him. I believe that he was No. 3 in the Accounts Department of the Shanghae- Nanking Railway. There have been various Chinese holders of this position, one of whom appeared to be a competent man. The latter, however, would not remain in the head office, and only held his appointment a few days. A Chinese storekeeper left in the same way, because he found the conditions impossible.
I have not been consulted about the auditing, but when I was in Peking last May I gave it as my opinion that it would be better to have the accounts audited at Pukou. My reason for giving that opinion was that the audit could follow the expenditure more quickly, and that discrepancies could be immediately investigated on the spot. An audit at any time within the last three months would have revealed the state of affairs. My own impression is that the accounts have never been made up at all, but I
be may
I gather that things have been lax from the fact that wrong. an engineer was paid twice over for the month of August last, and the fact never discovered until he called attention to it in December. There has been, however, some improvement lately. For a long time I had to pay all the expenses of my office out of my own pocket, and even to advance pay to the draughtsmen working in my office, because they could not find any one in the head office authorized to pay them.
Re the appointment of engineers other than British. There was great delay in sanctioning the appointment of any foreign engineers. When I returned to Peking fron Nanking in May last, I found that nineteen engineers had already been engaged for the northern section, whereas I had not been allowed to engage any up to that time. When, therefore, on the 9th June I at last got sanetion to employ some men, I wanted them as early as possible. Three men offered in China, who could take up their duties almost immediately. They were one American, one Swede, and one young British engineer. These men I recommended, and they have all proved useful members of the staff. I stated that as an absolute minimum I must have ten more men, who I proposed to get from England. The Managing Director gave me eight signed Agreements to fill as I thought best, and informed me that the Director- General objected to so many as ten engineers of one nationality being employed, and wished four engineers to be engaged from America. This gave me two more engineers than I expected at that date, and was a good bargain for me, but in forwarding the Agreements to the Managing Director I pointed out to him that, while I might be willing to accept any really competent men, he must not expect that the representa- tives of British interests would take the same view, and that I know that they "considered the appointment of engineers other than British to a railway financed by British capital not as a friendly action." I got no reply to this letter, but I under- stand from the Managing Director that he got a despatch from the Director-General authorizing him to get these engineers from America. This was a very different thing from the order to employ them which I understood had been given in the first
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instance, but months had elapsed before I got this information. These engineers only reached here in November, two months later than the men engaged in England. The delay caused cousiderable inconvenience, but I am very much pleased with the men selected, who appear to be thoroughly competent men, and quite equal to any that I might have procured in England.
You must remember that there has been one cause of delay for which the British and Chinese themselves are responsible, and that is the very defective original survey. Foord was apparently provided with a quite inadequate staff, and his Report stated that a better route could be obtained. I have had to make a fresh survey of the first 100 miles, which has only just been completed, and have still to re-survey some 50 miles more. The first 100 miles passes through some extremely difficult country; and where Foord had to work with a party of two, the senior man being quite inexperienced in railway location, I have had a party of seven, the engineer-in-charge being a man of considerable experience in this class of work, for which he had a very high reputation in South Africa. The result is that we have secured a first-class line, with easy grades and curves, whereas the original line had heavy grades and very sharp curves. We have also actually saved 7 miles of distance in the first 100 miles. I do not claim special merit for myself for this result. I bave had a first-class staff on the work, who have carried out my wishes excellently. You will understand, however, that when there was a possibility of getting a first-class line through the country I could not possibly adopt the line originally laid down, or make use of the original plans,
The survey of the No. 1 district was only completed on the 24th December, and the plans are not yet all completed, but in October last sufficient location had been done to enable work to be commenced on the first portion of the line, where the earthwork is specially heavy, and the country flooded nearly every summer.
Another primary cause of delay was the late date at which the Managing Director appeared on the scene. The Managing Director of the north section took up his appointment at once, before even the Chief Engineer was appointed. The Managing Director of the south section did not reach Shanghae until the 4th July. Even then he did not proceed at once to Nanking, but reached there, as a result of entreaties from me, on the 24th July. I believed that some progress would be possible then, and I immediately handed in indents for rails, &c. No rails have yet been ordered.
The Managing Director decided that the first thing to be done was for him to He sent his chair across the river in July preparatory to go over the line with me. starting, and fixed one date after another, thus delaying my inspection of the route. Finally I could wait no longer, and went over the difficult country without him in September, returning in October, when the Report which you have seen was sent in. Again I was kept waiting, owing to the Managing Director fixing various dates for starting, and again I had to start without him to investigate country in advance of the survey party. Finally the Director started on the trip on the 6th December, and we returned yesterday to find the Director-General already here. This is a fair sample of the way everything is done. The delays are interminable, but naturally it took some time to find out that there was no hope of amendment.
By the 4th September all the engineers except the Americans had arrived, and it was possible to start the survey in ernest, but even then there was great delay owing to the methods of the Director. The engineers were not able to control their coolies, because the men were paid independently, and were even in many cases appointed by the Director. Some of the interpreters were not paid for months. I kept my own office going by paying the current expenditure out of my own pocket, but I could not ask the engineers under me to do the same. The Managing Director was always away, visiting Nanking only at intervals, but it was always understood that he was trying to arrange for an adequate head office staff, and that when he got that matters would progress smoothly. He arranged for the engagement of Hall, of the Shanghae-Nanking Railway, as Chief Accountant, and then when Hall proposed to take up his appointment he quarrelled with him. I have not been able to ascertain the exact particulars of the case, but I believe the appointment would have been a very suitable one.
I have not got notes of the dates when the Managing Director was at Nanking until the 12th September, when I see from my diary that he loft for Shanghar, having returned from Sooch only a day or two before. I see that he returned to Nanking from this trip on the night of the 22nd September. On the 28th September he again left for Shanghae, and was stated to have returned on the 11th October,
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