'Tax interesting Reply of the Board of Revenue to a Memorial from Li Hung-chang which contained certain proposals for the benefit of the China Merchants'
Company, exhibits that national undertaking, for so we may call it, in the position which foreigners have been accustomed to seo itin, The Memorial refers to a state of matters twelve months ago, but that scarcely diminishes its interest. Originally started with the view of making a serious inroad on the river and coast shipping trade, the China Merchants' Company has from the first been chiefly an official concern and has been the subject of maladministration. It's mismanagement, and worse, were long the reproach of those in whose hands the Company was for several years. Only & part of the earnings of the steamers reached the coffers of the Company, and to keep the line going heavy loans wore raised from native bankers. The Company was for several years buying experience, and if some of this was not such as foreign lines had to acquire, it was probably not worse than it would have had to learn in any other enterprise which was left to the usual corrupt practices of mandarins and their followers. Some years ago, about the time when the fleet and property of the Shanghai Steam Navigation Company were purchased, the official element in the man-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.