Peking, Feb. 8.
The consolidation of all the petty foams secured upon the Salt surplus, initiated by the Chinese creditor banks after the Consortium's failure to respond to an appeal to undertake this task before Chinese New Year, has been! rudely interrupted by the insistence on the part of several Cabinet! members that the so-called loan, which entails no handling of real money, mhst be accompanied by it genuine advance of hard silver tol the Government. Mr. Chang Hu, who fathered the consolidation scheme in the Cabinet, has resigned as a protest against the obstinacy of his colleagues. His resignation has not been accepted, however, and it seems fairly certain that before long the Cabinet will have to capitulate and endorse the consolidation without a cash advance.
When the terms of the suggested agreement with the Government were first published it was sai that the Chinese loans totalled millions and the foreign advances 26 millions. Many persons who had been tracing the hypothecation of the Salt surplus were sur-! prised to find it swollen to such proportions. Less than a year ago it was the general impression that the total was about 20 millions. When Mr. Pan Fu was about to vesign an official statement put the Chinese, loans at 22 millions and the foreign loans at 18 millions. When the suggestion was made to the Consortium that that institution undertake the consolidation of these debts, Mr. Liang Shih-yi is said to have placed the total at about 74 millions, of which 93 ions were foreign. The loan then suggested was to have totalled 6 millions of which the _Government, after hank discount had been subtracted, would have secured 16 millions for the New Year. Now the banks suggest an issue of treasury notes for 96 millions to meet obligations only with no free money for the Government. The discount is 16 per cent., buf, subtracting this, there would still be over SO millions for the creditors.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.