CO129-373 - Public Offices - 1910 — Page 280

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[This Document is the Property

Britannic Majesty's Government.]

279

No. No. of the baggage receipts.

10

No. No. and classes of the passenger tickets for adults and for children,

for which an allowance of weight was made.

The share of the destination railway for each destination station.

The total amount due to the destination railway.

15. The total amount due to the destination railway, as per passenger as well as per baggage accounts, must be paid by the departure railway or remitted for the account of that railway to the bank indicated by the destination railway, not later than the In case of non-fulfilment last day of the month following the one to be accounted for.

of this stipulation, the departure railway must pay to the destination railway a fine of 1:30 per cent. on the amount due for each day of delay.

The payment of money is made by the South Manchuria Railway to the Chinese Eastern Railway-in rouble currency; by the Chinese Eastern Railway to the South Manchuria Railway-in yen currency. Any difference in exchange, resulting from the above manner of settlement of accounts, is charged to the account of the railway which makes the payment.

16. Discrepancies which may occur in the passenger and in the baggage accounts, in favour of the amounts due or against the same, arc adjusted by the departure railway in the subsequent accounts by means of insertion of a special line below the corresponding stations of departure and destination (position) and the corresponding tickets and baggage, at any rate, not later than one year from the date when the wrong account was forwarded.

17. The destination railway has the right, within six months from the date of receipt of the account, to demand a correction of that account. The departure railway must, within two months from the date of the receipt of such demand, investigate the case and supply the destination railway with a reply. If such reply is not given within the prescribed time, the account, as indicated in the demand, will be considered as correct, and acknowledged for payment.

18. All the special or additional items acknowledged for payment must be included in the nearest accounts.

33063

CHINA RAILWAYS.

RECE

REG928 OCT 10

[October 10.]

CONFIDENTIAL.

SECTION 1.

[36549]

(No. 329.) Sir,

No. 1.

Mr. Max Müller to Sir Edward Grey.Received October 10.)

Peking, September 21, 1910. I HAVE the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your despatch No. 316 of the 27th ultimo in regard to the Bhamo-Tengyueb Railway.

I beg to state that I had no intention of suggesting that the Government of India should bear any share of the cost of the construction of the Chinese section of the line, and I had meant to make this clear when, in repeating Mr. O'Brien-Butler's telegram of the 21st July, I stated that the consul-general appeared to have gone beyond his instructions in discussing such points with the Viceroy. As you are aware, the idea of a concession for the construction of a railway line from the Burmese frontier to Tengyuch on the basis of the terms accepted by China for the Tien-tsin-Pukow line was brought to the notice of the Chinese Government by Sir John Jordan in October 1908, but I feel strongly that the first object to aim at is to secure an undertaking from the Chinese Government that they will undertake to construct their section of the line within a reasonable time, and that the question of the supply of the necessary funds may be left to subsequent discussion.

At an interview which I had with Mr. Hu Wei-te at the Wai-wu Pu on the 16th instant I took the opportunity to refer to the question of the Bhamo-Tengyueh Railway. I stated that I had recently forwarded, through his Excellency's Board, certain survey reports on the line supplied by the Government of Burmah, and had expressed a hope that a study of these reports might facilitate and expedite the survey which the Board of Communications were about to undertake over the Chinese section. I added that, though I had been informed verbally as long ago as the 26th May of this intention of the Board of Communications, it would be a satisfaction to me, and doubtless also to my Government, to receive official notification of the actual dispatch of a surveying engineer.

Mr. Hu Wei-te proceeded to descant on the almost insuperable difficulties of con- struction of such a line and the folly of constructing a an unremunerative railway in such an out-of-the-way district. In regard to the first point, I replied that a study of the surveys which I had forwarded to the Wai-wu Pu would show that the construction of a narrow-gauge line was not only feasible but would not even entail great expenditure. As to the second point, I requested his Excellency to study the notes exchanged between Prince Ching and Sir Ernest Satow in March 1902, as he would then be able to judge how moderate the present scheme for a line from Bbamo to Tengyuch, each Govern- ment constructing the portion in its own territory, was in comparison with what we were entitled to demand under the promise given by Prince Ching. If, however, neither the central Government nor the provincial Government were in a position to construct the line within a reasonable period it would doubtless not be difficult to arrange a loan on terms similar to those entered into for the construction of lines in other parts of the Empire. All that we desired at present was an assurance that railway communication between Burmah and Yüinnan would be shortly effected.

Three days after my interview I received the enclosed note from the Wai-wu Pu informing me officially of the appointment of an engineer to proceed to survey the line. The engineer in question is Mr. Low, the former managing director of the southern section of the Tien-tsin-Pakow Railway. As you are aware, Mr. Tuckey, the English chiel engineer on that section, was not able to work with Mr. Low; but there is little doubt that there were faults on both sides, and that probably Mr. Low was as much sinned against as sinning while he was at Pukow. He was educated in America and served under Mr. Kinder on the Imperial Railways of North China, and appears to be generally considered as a fairly capable engineer.

I have, &c.

W. G. MAX MÜLLER,

Vov

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