§ 13. Sir J. D. REESasked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether His Majesty's Government has decided not to agree to China's request that the opium accumulated at Chinese ports should be reshipped at her expense to India or to other non-Chinese ports in the Far East; and if so, what steps it is proposed to take for the protection of the opium owners whose action throughout has been legitimate and lawful, and who have acted in the faith that the treaty engagements of the British Government are inviolable?
§ Sir E. GREYThe Chinese Government requested that the opium accumulated at Chinese ports should be reshipped to non-Chinese markets, and they offered to pay the freight. No final decision has been come to in the matter, and I am unable at this stage to make any announcement on the subject.
§ 17. Sir J. D. REESasked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether the Secretary of State has information to the effect that the Chinese Prefect of Tenguyeh, finding certain fields under poppy at Hsin-Chai, in Yunnan, set fire to that village and shot down some 150 inhabitants as they attempted to escape; and, if so, whether his Majesty's Government will intimate to the Chinese Government that, in so far as such an act as this takes place in furtherance of the British.anti-opium policy, it may be regarded as an over drastic suppression of the growth and supply of a medicine and stimulant of immemorial use in the East?
§ Sir E. GREYHis Majesty's Government have received no information as to the incident in question.