An "Ultimatum" Which Arrived Too Late Phe question of extensions has again been brought, tg the fore in the vernacular pay which give their version of an \timatum" which has been deli fto: the Shanghai Municipal Council by the authorities of the Municipalsity. of Greater Shanghai.
"These papers revive the old complaint that the Council has been "enproaching," on Chinese territory Upuilding ' extra-Settlement roads opines 1914, Recently, a number of jerkers in the employ of the Coun-"gil have been reconstructing and repairing Hungjao Road and Great] Western Road. Learning of thi: the authorities of the Greater Shang-Wai Municipality dispatched officers from the Fah Hua Village® branch of; the Bureau of Public Safety to preterit them with an ultimatum forbidding them to continue work after! November 20, The matter was reported to the Public Works Departtment of the Council and several foreigners went to the scene and i sued orders that all implements used for the work should be removed fat once. The work accordingly was suspended in deference to the demands of the Chinese authorities, An Unfounded Report In this connection, another report was circulated to the effect that an. Agreement had been reached between the Shanghai Municipal Counil and the Chinese authorities by which the Chinese authorities would, upon payment of a large sum -of money by the Council, cede all lands under thet control on'this side of the: Shanghai-Hangchow Railway to the Council, who, on their part, would suspend all road building operations and road extensions on the other side of the railway track.
This report was brought to the attention of an official of the Coun-i), who said, most emphatically, that there was absolutely no truth vin it, There had, he said, been considerable amount of talk duri the past two or three years xegarding discussions concerning the out-wide ronds, but the Chinese authori-consented to any form-ion, Pending some sort of settlement of the municipal road extensions question, the status quo would be preserved and the Council was refraining from extending roads in any way. Nevertheless, if, it} were considered essential to keep the roads in repair for the increas ing traffic, this would be done.
As to the report referred to above! concerning Hungjao Road, we learn from authoritative sources that Hungjao Road, particularly, isa very busy road and it is used tensively alike by Chinese and foreigners and, so far-as the Chinese authorities are concerned, the military authorities attached to the Hungjao acrodrome make extensive use of the yond, and a Chinese mo-for bus service has been running for two or three years over it. The development of the area around Hung-Jao Road has been brought about Through an enormous amount of traffic, the carrying of market pro-duets, ete, over this road. Lately, the road has fallen into such a bad condition that it is totally unable to sustain the amount of the trafic Jead. Foy some months recently—in fact, from the early summer—the Council has been carrying out the work of metalling the portion of Hungjao Road between. Warran Road and the Hungjao Road Bridge.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.