CO129-391 - Acting Governor Claud Severn Governor Sir May - 1912 [7-8] — Page 204

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Sir,

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27753

British Legation,

198

RECS SEP 12

Peking, February 8, 1912.

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mi virus id eth

I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt

of Your Excellency's despatch of the 27th. of December enclosing

copy of a comunication which you had addressed to His Majesty's

Consul-General at Canton on the subject of a claim to be made by

the Hongkong Government against the Chinese Authorities for the

suspension of traffic on the Canton-Kowloon Railway from the 7th.

of November to the 13th. of December.

I have deferred answering Your Excellency's

despatch until I had an opportunity of consulting Ir. Alston,

Councillor of this Legation, whose opinion on the question had

been asked by His Majesty's Consul-General at Canton.

After due consideration, I have come to the

conclusion that the claim should be presented to the Chinese

Government and not to the authorities at Canton. My reasons for

this are two-fold. In the first place, the presentation of a claim

to the revolutionary authorities at Canton would involve a de-

-gree of recognition which His Majesty's Government are not pre-

-pared to accord, and in the second place, the responsibility of

the Imperial Government is determined by the fact that the

request for tue suspension originally made to Your Excellency by

the Viceroy at Canton was subsequently confirmed by the telegram

sent by the Board of Communications.

I have accordingly presented a claim for the

amount named by Your Excellency to the Wai Wu Pu in a Memorandum,

copy of which I have the honour to enclose, but I think that it is

not improbable that the Chinese Goverment will disclaim liability

for those portions of the claim which relate to the period after

1