Directory_and_Chronicle_1918 — Page 150

82

CONVENTION BETWEEN FRANCE AND CHINA

A sum of five hundred thousand Taels shall, however, be paid on account im advance at one time, and at Tientsin, on the 30th November next, or sooner if the Chinese Government judges it convenient.

A Mixed Commission, appointed by the Minister of France and by the Chinese Authorities, shall determine the rules to be followed in effecting the payment of the whole of the indemnity, the verification of the amount, the giving of receipts, and in short fulfilling all the formalities required in such case.

Art. V. The sum of eight million Taels is allowed to the French Government to liquidate the expenses of its armament against China, as also for the indemnification of French subjects and protégés of France who sustained loss by the burning of the factories at Canton, and also to compensate the Catholic missionaries who have suffered in their persons or property. The French Government will divide this sum between the parties interested, after their claims shall have been legally established, in satisfaction of such claims, and it is understood between the contracting parties that one million of Taels shall be appropriated to the indemnification of French subjects or protégés of France for the losses they have sustained or the treatment to which they have been subjected, and that the remaining seven million Taels shall be applied to the liquidation of the expenses occasioned by the war.

Art. VI. In conformity with the Imperial edict issued on the 20th March, 1856, by the August Emperor Tao Kwang, the religious and charitable establishments which have been confiscated during the persecutions of the Christians shall be restored to their proprietors through the Minister of France in China, to whom the Imperial Government will deliver them, with the cemeteries and edifices appertaining to them.

Art. VII.--The town and port of Tientsin, in the province of Pechili, shall be opened to foreign trade on the same conditions as the other towns and ports of the Empire where such trade is permitted, and this from the date of the signature of the present Convention, which shall be obligatory on the two nations without its being necessary to exchange ratifications, and which shall have the same force as if it were inserted word for word in the Treaty of Tientsin.

The French troops now occupying this town shall, on the payment of the five hundred thousand taels provided by Article IV. of the present Convention, evacuate it and proceed to occupy Taku and the north-east coast of Shantung, whence they shali retire on the same conditions as govern the evacuation of the other points occupied on the shores of the Empire. The Commanders-in-Chief of the French force shall, however, have the right to winter their troops of all arms at Tientsin, if they judge it convenient, and to withdraw them only when the indemnities due by the Chinese Government shall have been entirely paid, unless the Commanders-in-Chief shall think it convenient to withdraw them before that time.

Art. VIII.It is further agreed that when the present Convention shall have been signed and the ratifications of the Treaty of Tientsin exchanged, the French forces which occupy Chusan shall evacuate that island, and that the forces before Peking shall retire to Tientsin, to Taku, to the north coast of Shantung, or to the town of Canton, and that in all these places or in any of them the French Government may, if it thinks fit, leave troops until such time as the total sum of eight million taels shall have been fully paid.

Art. IX.-It is agreed between the high contracting parties that when the ratifications of the Treaty of Tientsin shall have been exchanged an Imperial edict shall order the high authorities of all the provinces to permit any Chinese who wishes to go to countries beyond the sea to establish himself there or to seek his fortune, to embark himself and his family, if he so wishes, on French slips in the ports of the empire open to foreign trade. It is also agreed, in the interest of the emigrants, to ensure their entire freedom of action and to safeguard their rights, that the competent Chinese authorities shall confer with the Minister of France in China for the making of regulations to assure for these engagements, always voluntary, the guarantees of morality and security which ought to govern them.

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