§ SIR CHARLES DILKEI beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether His Majesty's Government are yet in possession of the views of His Majesty's representative at 364 Peking on the subject of the heads of terms lately suggested by the commanders of the forces at Tientsin, as intended to accompany the dissolution of the com mission at present governing a consider able territory in the neighbourhood of Tientsin.
§ MR. A. J. BALFOUR (for LORD CRANBORNE)His Majesty's Minister reports that the Diplomatic Representatives, at a meeting held on the 29th ult., were unanimously of opinion that the proposals made by the commanders of the International forces at Tientsin, with regard to the termination of the provisional Government, should be accepted subject to certain modifications. These are as follows:—The addition of a provision allowing a bodyguard of 300 men for the Viceroy and the omission of the clause prohibiting the native police from arresting foreign misdemeanants: also of the provision allowing the foreign troops to continue to occupy private property, and of the clause limiting the number of Chinese war vessels at Taku.
§ SIR CHARLES DILKEI suppose we must assume that those are the conditions as they appeared in The Times. The Government have not told us of them themselves.
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURI think the right hon. Baronet is right.