§ LORD CHARLES BERESFORDI beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can explain the present position of the settlement diptute at Shanghai, and whether the French Government have yet abandoned their claims to exclusive rights, control, and jurisdiction over a portion of this important port in the Yang-tsze Valley; whether Her Majesty's Government have ever admitted the French claim that their portion 1142 of the settlement at Shanghai is to be treated as the soil of France, while they claim and exercise equal rights of control with the British Consul in the British portion of the settlement; and whether the French have any justification for their claim that the Province of Szechuan is in the French sphere of influence.
§ MR. BRODRICKAs the result of protracted negotiations the extension of the International Settlement at Shanghai, in which all Powers, France included, possess equal rights, has recently been granted. The French Government are urging upon the Chinese authorities a modification of the character of the exclusive French Settlement, which has existed there for some time; but we are imperfectly informed as to the details. Szechuan is one of the two provinces in which it was agreed by the Declaration of January, 1896, that all privileges and advantages secured by either England or France should be rendered common to both Powers.