CO129-369 - Acting Governor May Governor Sir Lugard - 1910 [10-11] — Page 481

479

Government without reference to His Majesty's Legation or

to the Government of Hongkong. But apart from this issue

there remains the fact that the Consul-General has through-

-out adopted views which are apparently directly antagonist-

-ic to those of his predecessors, Messrs. Scott, Mansfield,

and Fox, and in opposition alike to the view taken by is

Majesty's Government, the British Minister and the Govern-

-ment of Hongkong. In brief the lattor have consistently

held the viow and impressed it upon tho Chinese Government

that under the additional article of the Chefoo Convention

no tax whatever in excess of Tacls 110 per chest could be

levied on Foreign Opium in a Treaty Port, and that Foreign

Opium if covered by a Transit Certificate, was free from

F

any additional tax while in transit beyond the Treaty

Forts into the interior of China, until the packages made

}

up in bond at the Treaty Port were opened at the place of

consumption in the interior (Sir Jolm Jordan's Despatches

14th. December, 1908, and 2nd. January, 1909). It follows

that the Canton Government has no right whatever to

interfere with Raw Opium destined for the interior until

it reaches its place of consumption provided it has paid

its dues (Tacls 110). They cannot take delivery and order

it to be boiled or assume that Canton is its place of

consumption