'The annual meeting of members' of the Shanghai General Chamber of Commerce was held at the offices on Tuesday afternoon. There were present Messrs. H. R. Hearn (Alfred Dent & Ca.) (in the chair), E. A. Probst (Iveson & Cv.), J. Graham (Nippon Yusen Kaisha), J. C. Bois (Butterfield & Swire), J. W. Harding (Turnbull, Howie & Ca.), J. H. McMichael (Frazar Ca,), Herbert Smith (Jardine, Matheson Ca.), Win. McDonald (Barlow & Ca.), Anderson (Ibert & Ca.), Arthur Anderson (D. Gilmour & Ca.), A. Kortf (Melchers Ca.), D. M. Moses (D. Sassoon, Sons Ca.), W. D. Little (Westall, Little & Ca.), T. Wood (Drysdale, Ringer & Ca.), J. Young (Rodeiwald & Ca.), and Drummond Hay (Secretary).
The Chairman said—Gentlemen: In the absence of the Chairman of the Chamber, Mr. Purdon, I now take the d The notice convening the meeting riy be taken as read as also the minutes of the last meeting which were duly printed and published.
'There was one matter then referred to which I thin'; calls for remark the question of the finances when it was resolved that 1 call of 20 Tis. should be made, in order to wipe off the deficit, 'That' call lisa been made, as you will observe from the report, and the deficit has been wiped out, leaving a small credit balance. T have an estimate before me for the current year, by which, on the subscriptions already collected, we shall have a surplus of about Ts, 400 at the end of the year, the total amount of subscriptions being' about.'Tls. 1,00 and the expenditure" about Tls. 1,200. This results from giving up the publication of the market report, the reduction in the Secretary's salary, and the sub-letting of a portion of the rooms.
There is very little to say with regard to the matters mentioned in the report. Chere is nothing new to be said about duty drawbacks or unchopped piece-goods, except that I have lately seen an advertisement taken from Manchester paper, in which several very prominent Manchester firms have warned stamp makers and others us to the danger they incur in assisting in this fraud. That is so far satisfactory. There has been some correspondence about the Telegraph Convention but do not think there is much apprehension about it at present. In this connection I may refer to the Desmond Telegraph Agency, which has been working in the direction of cheaper telegrams. Nothing has come of it so far, but while code messages vid Blagovestchensk were at one time rejected, there is now some hope of relaxation on that line, and we may hope to see some day messages going forward lower rate than now. I'should like here to refer in thankful terms to the China Association for the very prompt way in which they took up this question.. The Foreign Office was at once interviewed on the subject and a very satisfactory reply came from them, We cannot but recognise, through this instance, how useful the China Association is and is likely to prove for us. They have recently sent out copies of. their annual report, which shows how well they take uy each subject brought before them with reference to trade interests in the East. I notice, by the way, in that report, that they refer regretfully to the very small number of subscribers here, there being 30 in Japan while there are only about half a dozen in China. With reg to the appendix of our report, there is a letter from Chungking with reference to restrictions at the opening of that port, and a perusal of the Customs Statistics for that port convinced us that there was no solid ground for the charges there made.
I will now refer to one or two matters that have arisen since the report closed. One is a communication from the Shipowners'
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.