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Trustees which His jesty will not appoint and over
which His Majesty's Government will have no control. whatsoever, the rest of the Report, except in so far as it is an account of the Deputations' journeyings in China, merely offers advice which may or may not be
accepted. In view of the present condition of China
it was impossible that such recommendations as the
Deputation decided to put forward should take any
other form. Were the Deputation in the Yangtze Valley
at the present moment, ita members would find great changes in the political situation since they visited it in April last. But I submit nevertheless that the general condition of China is essentially the same now as it was then, and that a more determined en- deavour on the part of the British members of the Deputation to get a grasp of the Chinese situation might have enabled that body to make sugestions of more practical utility. As it is, if the proposed Board of Trustees should be accepted by His Majesty's Goverment, the Advisory Committee will have either to offer no advice whatsoever (to say, in effect, to the Board "Here are 11 millions sterling, do what you like with them") or to endorse the Deputation's advice which, by the time the pronouncement is made, may be, and indeed probably will be, even more remote from the reality of circumstances in China than it is t at present. But it appears from the authorised state- ment by the Statutory Committee and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affiara, as quoted by the Deputation from the Peking and Tientsin "Times" of the 26th May last, that His Majesty's Government has already agreed to confer on the proposed Board complete
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