[This Bocument is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
752
C.O.
Inclosure 5 in No. 1.
Prince Ching to Sir J. Jordan.
(Translation.) Sir,
Peking, January 14, 1909. I HAVE the honour to acknowledge receipt of your Excellency's note of the 4th instant complaining, on behalf of British importers of opium, of the Canton and Kiangnan Regulations which restricted their business, and requesting that foreign opium should be excepted from the scope of any rules for the control of the wholesale trade.
The Board at once telegraphed the purport of this communication to the two Viceroys, with a request for an expression of their views, and have now received a telegram in reply from the Viceroy at Nanking in which his Excellency says that the system for controlling the opium trade in Kiangnan is in compliance with the Regula- tions issued by this Board, and applies only to native opium, without affecting foreign opium at all. The Viceroy adds that this point has been clearly set forth in a letter to the British Consul by the Provincial Bureau of Foreign Affairs, in reply to inquiries which he had made; and his Excellency requests this Board to inform Excellency in this sense.
your
The Viceroy of Canton, in his reply, states that in the Knangtung Viceroyalty, foreign opium has never been subjected to any monopoly in the wholesale trade,
It will thus be seen that in Kiangnau, the system of wholesale houses is only intended to restrict the sale of native opium, and has nothing to do with foreign opium; while in Kwangtung no system of wholesale houses has been started.
I avail, &c.
(Card of Prince Ch'ing.)
CHINA TRADE.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[8517]
No. 1.
India Office to Foreign Office.--(Received March 4.)
[March 4.]
11308
SECTION
Rece Rece 1 APR 09,
Sir,
India Office, March 3, 1909. I AM directed by the Secretary of State for India in Council to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated the 11th February, 1909, on the subject of the action of the Provincial Government of Canton in placing restrictions upon the sale of opium.
In reply, I am to say that Viscount Morley gathers from the papers that the view held by Sir J. Jordan is that the Regulations of 1906, which were promulgated by the Imperial Government for enforcing the Opium Edict of the 20th September, 1906, throughout the Empire, should not be held to constitute au infringement of British Treaty rights, though he has been obliged on occasions to oppose subsidiary rules made by provincial authorities, especially such rules as would create monopolies within Treaty port areas. Viscount Morley has no hesitation in accepting this view, and concurs with Sir E. Grey that even if these Regulations might be considered to constitute a technical violation of Treaty rights no objection need be raised to their being carried out.
It is understood that the rules enforced by the Provincial Government in the interior of the Province of Canton are substantially the same as the Imperial *Regulations.
I am,
&c. (Signed)
A. GODLEY.
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