CO129-382 - Public Offices - 1911 — Page 102

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of enquiry would have elicited a denial of the rumours in

the course of a day.

There is one point in Nr.Jamieson's despatch on which

a word of comment from me may be expected. He states

quite correctly the substance of the conversation he had

with me in September last year

on the subject of the addit-

ional charges on foreign opium in a Treaty Port. The Lega-

tion always held that euch taxation was illegal, but the

Chinese Government would not admit the justice of the

contention. The question is perhaps an arguable one and

at any rate it has become increasingly difficult in recent

Fears to enforce our view of it.

The whole position of Vls Majesty's Representative

in China with regard to the opium question is one of qon-

siderable delicacy and no little embarrasement, of which

to me

the Hongkong Government seem to show a very inadequate

vičnem trobad

+

appreciation. She Chinese Government and the Chinese

Authorities throughout the Empire know perfectly well thr

there is

a large body of public opinion in Freland and

elsewhere which will sustain them in disregarding the

striet