CO129-372 - Public Offices - 1910 — Page 183

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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]

AFFAIRS OF CHINA.

CONFIDENTIAL.

119171]

No. 1.

[May 30.CO SECTION 28595

Mr. Max Müller to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received May 30.)

RECR Rro 18 JUN 10

(No. 144.) Sir,

Peking, May 6, 1910, YOU will have seen from my despatches and telegrams on the subject of the recent riots in Changsha that the immediate cause is reported to have been a scarcity of rice, and you will also have seen from my despatch No. 119 of the 21st April that there are very good grounds for asserting that this scarcity was artifically produced by the cornering tactics of influential speculators acting in connivance with certain of the provincial authorities who refused to open the public rice granaries to satisfy the necessities of the starving people. That such was the opinion of His Majesty's Legation stated quite clearly in my note to Prince Ching of the 21st ultimo, and also in the conversation which I had with his Excellency Liang-tun-yen on the previous day. On that occasion Liang hinted that the riots were in great measure due to the action of myself and certain of my colleagues in insisting that the prohibition of export of rice from Changsha should be issued only in accordance with the terms of article 14 of the Mackay treaty, and that it should, therefore, not be enforced till after the expiry of the stipulated notice of twenty-one days. His Excellency said that the people of Changsha had been inflamed against the governor for yielding to foreign pressure in this matter. I have little reason to think that Liang-tun-yen really meant what he was saying, and I was fortunately able to point out to his Excellency that in any case this was a baseless fabrication, and that, as a matter of fact, owing to a drop in the price of rice in Shanghae, it had not paid the shipping firms to export rice from Changsha during those twenty-one days.

Negotiations in regard to a previously existing irregular prohibition of the export of rice from Hunan had been carried on for some months previously hetween His Majesty's consul-general at Hankow and the Viceroy and the governor of Hunan and between this legation and the Wai-wu Pu, and in view of subsequent developments I have had a detailed memorandum on the course of these negotiations drawn up by Mr. Phillips, assistant Chinese secretary to His Majesty's Legation, which I now have the honour to forward for your information. I hope that the action which I took will meet with your approval,

As before stated, at the interview which I had with Liang-tun-yen on the 20th ultimo, his Excellency sought to lay the blame for the riot at the door of His Majesty's Legation, and I was surprised to find three days later in the "Peking Daily News," which is regarded as the organ of the Wai-wu Pu and as receiving direct inspiration from the press bureau of the department, the enclosed leading article, which reproduces in a one-sided manner the tenor of my conversation with Liang- tun-yen. It states in so many words that the Government was powerless to resist the unreasonable demands of the British legation, and that the riot was the approximate consequence of the foreign protest; but it makes no mention of the fact that we had, on the contrary, been striving for months to find some legal means of providing for the wants of famine-stricken Hupei without interfering unduly with the natural rights of Hunan to retain sufficient rice to meet the demands of its own population, nor does it refer to my statement that little, if any, rice had been exported during the twenty-one days.

The obviously inspired attacks on His Majesty's Legation and British policy generally in native papers, and especially in the "Peking Daily News," have become far too common lately, and the leakage as to our representations, whether accidental or intentional, certainly takes place in the Wai-wu Pu, and I had meant to take an opportunity of pointing out to Liang-tun-yen the impropriety of communicating to a newspaper a one-sided account of a conversation at the Wai-wu Pu with a foreign representative. The events, however, of the past few weeks have proved too much for his Excellency, who has had to request a short leave of absence from his duties for reasons of health, and the day that I called at the Wai-wu Pu with the intention of speaking on this matter, none of the presidents or vice-presidents were present, though it was a diplomatic reception day. I accordingly asked Mr. Campbell to

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