Erroneous Chinese Story that Their Company was to be Taken Ever The "Eastern Times," a Chinese newspaper, on Thursday, startled its readers with the following truly exclusive star "Mr. Kao En-hung, Minister of Communications, -has instructed a certain Yao to come to Shanghai and negotiate with the Shanghai Mutual Telephone Ca. with a view to amalgamating the Chinese Telephone Ca, with the Settlement com. pany. More than 1,000 people are at present using the Chinese telephones and it is owing to the financial situation that the Chinese company cannot be maintained. After the amalgamation, all telephones on Chinese territory will be installed by the Settlement company, Tls. 10 to be paid for each pole. All sundry expenses will be borne by the Chinese. The present manager of the company is reported to be opposed to the amalgamation, on the ground that it is a loss of sovereign rights."
It may not be quite correct to say that the Shanghai Mutual Telephone Ca. gets more kicks than ha'pence, but the life of the management does consist very largely of kicks and the introduction of a joke is ever welcome. Mr, P. H. Cole, ths general manager and Mr. ©. W. Porter, the secretary, were highly amused. when the above was brought to their notice, for it could only have been expected that they would at least have heard a whisper about such negotiations, if there were any trath in the story.
Mr. Porter said:—"It is all news to us, for we have heard nothing about it. As a matter of fact, we have not installed any telephones on Chinese territory for over two years past, because there was so much argument about it. There have been protracted negotiations on this subject, with a view to coming to some agreement, which is no secret. The question of amalgamation, _however, has never come up so far as we know."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.