"6.-After the withdrawal of the British troops, all the rest-houses, eleven in number, built by Great Britain upon the routes leading from the Indian frontier to Gyantse, shall be taken over at original cost by China and rented to the Government of India at a fair rate. One-half of each rest-house will be reserved for the use of the British officials employed on the inspection and maintenance of the telegraph lines from the marts to the Indian frontier and for the storage of their materials, but the rest-houses shall otherwise be available for occupation by British, Chinese and Tibetan officers of respectability who may proceed to and from the marts.

"Great Britain is prepared to consider the transfer to China of the telegraph lines from the Indian frontier to Gyantse when the telegraph lines from China reach that mart and in the meantime Chinese and Tibetan messages will be duly received and transmitted by the line constructed by the Government of India.

"In the meantime China shall be responsible for the due protection of the telegraph lines from the marts to the Indian frontier and it is agreed that all persons damaging the lines or interfering in any way with them or with the officials engaged in the inspection or maintenance thereof shall at once be severely punished by the local authorities.

"7.-In law suits involving cases of debt on account of loans, commercial failure, and bankruptcy, the authorities concerned shall grant a hearing and take steps necessary to enforce payment; but, if the debtor plead poverty and be without means, the authorities concerned shall not be held responsible for the said debts, nor shall any public or official property be distrained upon in order to satisfy these debts.

"8.-The British Trade Agents at the various trade marts now or hereafter to be established in Tibet may make arrangements for the carriage and transmission of their posts to and from the frontier of India. The couriers employed in conveying these posts shall receive all possible assistance from the local authorities whose districts they traverse and shall be accorded the same protection as the persons employed in carrying the despatches of the Tibetan Authorities. When efficient arrangements have been made by China in Tibet for a Postal Service, the question of the abolition of the Trade Agents' couriers will be taken into consideration by Great Britain and China. No restrictions whatever shall be placed on the employment by British officers and traders of Chinese and Tibetan subjects in any lawful capacity. The persons so employed shall not be exposed to any kind of molestation or suffer any loss of civil rights to which they may be entitled as Tibetan subjects, but they shall not be exempted from all lawful taxation. If they be guilty of any criminal act, they shall be dealt with by the local authorities according to law without any attempt on the part of their employer to screen or conceal them.

"9.-British officers and subjects, as well as goods, proceeding to the trade marts, must adhere to the trade routes from the frontier of India. They shall not, without permission, proceed beyond the marts, or to Gartok from Yatung and Gyantse, or from Gartok to Yatung and Gyantse, by any route through the interior of Tibet, but natives of the Indian frontier, who have already by usage traded and resided in Tibet, elsewhere than at the marts shall be at liberty to continue their trade, in accordance with the existing practice, but when so trading or residing they shall remain, as hereofore, amenable to the local jurisdiction.

"10.-In cases where officials or traders, en route to and from India or Tibet are robbed of treasure or merchandise, public or private, they shall forthwith report to the Police officers, who shall take immediate measures to arrest the robbers, and hand them to the Local Authorities. The Local Authorities shall bring them to instant trial, and shall also recover and restore the stolen property. But, if the robbers flee to places out of the jurisdiction and influence of Tibet, and cannot be arrested, the Police and the Local Authorities shall not be held responsible for such losses.

"11.-For public safety tanks or stores of kerosene oil or any other combustible or dangerous articles in bulk must be placed far away from inhabited places at the marts. "British or Indian merchants, wishing to build such tanks or stores, may not do so until, as provided in Regulation 2, they have made application for a suitable site.

"12.-British subjects shall be at liberty to deal in kind or in money, to sell their goods to whomsoever they please, to purchase native commodities from whomsoever they please, to hire transport of any kind, and to conduct in general their business transactions in conformity with local usage and without any vexatious restrictions or oppressive exactions whatever.

"It being the duty of the Police and Local Authorities to afford efficient protection at all times to the persons and property of the British subjects at the marts, and along the routes to the marts China engages to arrange effective police measures at the marts and along the routes to the marts. On due fulfilment of these arrangements, Great Britain undertakes to withdraw the Trade Agents' guards at the marts and to station no troops in Tibet so as to remove all cause for suspicion and disturbance among the inhabitants. The Chinese Authorities will not prevent the British Trade Agents holding personal intercourse and correspondence with the Tibetan officers and people.

"Tibetan subjects trading, travelling or residing in India shall receive equal advantages to those accorded by this Regulation to British subjects in Tibet.

"13.-The present Regulations shall be in force for a period of ten years reckoned from the date of signature by the two Plenipotentiaries as well as by the Tibetan Delegate; but if no demand for revision be made on either side within six months after the end of the first ten years, then the Regulations shall remain in force for another ten years, from the end of the first ten years; and so it shall be at the end of each successive ten years. "14.-The English, Chinese and Tibetan texts of the present Regulations have been carefully compared, and, in the event of any question arising as to the interpretation of these Regulations, the sense as expressed in the English text shall be held to be the correct sense.

"15.-The Ratifications of the present Regulations under the hand of His Majesty the King of Great Britain and Ireland, and of His Majesty the Emperor of the Chinese Empire, respectively, shall be exchanged at London and Peking within six months from the date of signature.

"In witness whereof the two Plenipotentiaries and the Tibetan Delegate have signed and sealed the present Regulations.

"Done in quadruplicate at Calcutta, this twentieth day of April, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eight, corresponding with the Chinese date, the twentieth day of the third moon of the thirty-fourth year of Kuang Hsü. "(L.S.) E. C. WILTON,

International postal convention, and convention concerning the exchange of parcels post-May 26, 1906.

[The International Postal Convention, and the Convention concerning the exchange of parcels post, with their respective Règlements d'Exécution, which were concluded at Rome on May 26, 1906, do not appear to have such a particular interest in relation to China as to warrant the reproduction of the texts in the present compilation.

China gave notice of its adherence to the postal convention by a dispatch dated February 5, 1914, addressed by H. E. Sun Pao-chi, President of the Council of Ministers and Minister for Foreign Affairs, to the President of the Swiss Confederation, of which the translation is as follows:

"The Chinese Government, deeming that the organization of its domestic and international postal service (the creation of which dates from 1896) is sufficiently advanced to justify the establishment of closer relations, equally more advantageous to both parties, with the countries of the Union, desires to enter the Universal Postal Union.

"In conformity with Article 24, paragraph 2, of the Universal Postal Convention of May 26, 1906,* I have therefore the honor to notify the High Federal Council of the *Article 24 reads (in translation from the French text) as follows: Adherences to the convention

1. Countries which have not taken part in the present convention are admitted to adhere to it upon their demand. 2.-This adherence is notified diplomatically to the Government of the Swiss Confederation, and by that Government to all the countries of the Union.

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3-It implies, as a matter of course, accession to all the clauses and admission to all the advantages for which the present convention stipulates.

"4.-It devolves upon the Government of the Swiss Confederation to determine, by common consent with the Government of the country concerned, the share to be contributed by the administration of this latter country towards the expenses of the international bureau, and, if necessary, the rates to be levied by that administration in conformity with the foregoing Article 10."

Article 7 of the final protocol of the Universal Postal Congress at Rome, signed on May 26, 1906, contains the following provisions: "Salvador, which forms part of the postal union, not having been represented at the congress, the protocol remains open to it in order that it may adhere to the conventions which have been concluded there, or only to one or other of them. . . . The protocol likewise remains open to the Chinese Empire and the Empire of Ethiopia, whose delegates to the congress have announced the intention of those countries to enter the Universal Postal Union on a date to be fixed hereafter."

adherence of China to that convention, as also to the Règlement d'Exécution appended to it, to date from March 1 next.

"In order, however, to permit of undertaking, if there be occasion, in certain respects, an adjustment of the existing procedure in so far as concerns the exchange service, the Chinese Government desires it to be understood that the provisions and regulations of the Union will come into full effect as regards China only from September 1.

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Accept, etc."

By a dispatch of May 16, 1914, to the President of the Swiss High Federal Council, the Minister for Foreign Affairs likewise gave notice of China's adherence to the parcels post convention, in the following terms (as translated from the French text):

"The Chinese Government, which by its dispatch of February 5 last notified the High Federal Council of China's adherence to the Universal Postal Convention of May 26, 1906, furthermore desires to participate in the international service for the exchange of parcels post of the Universal Postal Union.

"In conformity with Article 20, paragraph 1, of the convention of May 26, 1906, concerning the exchange of parcels post. I have the honor to notify the High Federal Council of the adherence of China to that convention, as also to the Règlement d'Exécution appended to it, to come into full effect from September 1, 1914.

Accept, etc."

In regard to the effect of these adherences to the Rome conventions of May 26, 1906, the Postmaster General of China (Mr. T. Piry) had occasion to address to the Director of the International Bureau of the Universal Postal Union, under date of March 18, 1915, a communication of which the translation is as follows:

"I have the honor to request you to be so good as to communicate the following to the countries of the Postal Union:

Having effectively entered the Universal Postal Union on September 1, 1914, China ought from that date to enjoy the rights and benefits accruing, to all the members of the union, out of the provisions of the Universal Postal Convention (Article 24, §3, of the Rome convention).

"In that conviction, the administration of Chinese posts immediately sought to organize a direct exchange of mails between China and certain other countries.

While the majority of those countries have welcomed the proposals of the Chinese administration, and while others have not yet been able to carry them into effect because of preoccupations resulting from the war, there are some which have raised objections to the application of the provisions of Article 4, §§1 and 2, of the Rome convention, and of Article 1, §1, of the Règlement d'Exécution of that convention.‡

Two of those countries, for example, have forbidden the navigation companies subsidized by their Governments, and thus coming under the category of third services as defined in Article 3, §2, of the Universal Postal Convention, to receive aboard their vessels touching at Chinese ports mails presented by the Chinese offices.

In order the better to define the situation that has been created for it, China believes it necessary to recall that, at the time of notifying the Swiss High Federal Council of its adherence to the convention of May 26, 1906, as a matter of courtesy it invited the attention of those countries, with which it had previously concluded postal treaties, to the abrogation of those treaties in conformity with the stipulations of Article 29 of the said convention.

"As regards the effects of the entry of China into the Postal Union, it is incontestable that the adherence of this country to the Rome convention had the effect of rendering void

† Article 20 reads (in translation from the French text) as follows: Adherences to the convention

"1. The countries of the Universal Postal Union which have not taken part in the present convention are admitted to participate in it on their demand, and subject to the formalities prescribed by Article 24 of the principal convention in the case of entries into the Universal Postal Union.

2. Nevertheless, if the country which desires to participate in the present convention claims a right to levy a surtax greater than 25 centimes per parcel, the Government of the Swiss Confederation will submit to all the contracting parties the request for participation. This request is considered as acceded to, if within six months no objection has been raised.'

I

Article 4 of the convention relates to transit rates: §§ 1 and 2 of it read (in translation) as follows:

"1. The right of transit is guaranteed throughout the entire territory of the Union. "2.-Consequently, the several postal administrations of the Union may send reciprocally through the medium of one or of several of them, either closed mails or articles in open mail, according to the needs of the traffic and the convenience of the postal service."

Article 1 of the Règlement d'Exécution relates to forwarding of mails; § 1 of it reads (in translation) as follows:

"1. Each administration is bound to forward, by the most rapid routes at its disposal for its own mails, the closed mails and the articles in open mail which are delivered to it by another administration, "In the event of an administration finding itself obliged, by exceptional circumstances, to suspend temporarily the dispatch of closed mails and articles in open mail which are delivered to it by another administration, it is bound at once to notify the fact, if necessary by telegraph, to the administration or administrations concerned."

the provisions (in §1 of Article 44 of the Règlement d'Exécution)§ referring to the postoffices which various countries maintain upon its territory.

"Article 1 of the Universal Postal Convention || lays down this fundamental principlethat the Postal Union is composed of the totality of adhering countries (and not of postal administrations), which form a single postal territory. Article 44 of the Règlement d'Exécution of that convention can thereafter only define the limits of that single territory in enumerating:

"1) Countries which, not having signed the convention, but being politically dependent upon countries of the Union, cannot be excluded from the benefit of the same rights and privileges as the latter;

"2) Postal establishments maintained by countries of the Union outside the territorial limits of the latter.

"There can therefore be no warrant, in the text of the said Article 44, without violation of the principle laid down by Article 1 of the convention, for offices maintained by Union countries in other Union countries.

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The terms of the 2nd clause of Article 10 of the Rome convention, and those of Article 44, §2, of the Règlement d'Exécution, confirm the fact that only post offices operating in countries outside the Union can properly be comprised under §1 of the said Article 44. "It was, besides, impossible for China to ask, in advance of its adherence to the Rome convention, an adherence which could not involve any restriction or reserve,-the modification of Article 44 of the Règlement d'Exécution of that convention, as such modification could be initiated only upon the request of one of the administrations of the Union, and in accordance with the long and complicated procedure contemplated by Article 45.

Relying upon the principles inscribed in the Universal Postal Convention, and in agreement on this point with the jurists in international law of all countries, China considers that by virtue of its entry into the Union, the offices maintained upon its territory by other countries of the Union have ceased to have a legal existence.

"Although in consequence of the difficulties mentioned above and those that have their origin in the present events of the war, China has found itself obliged, in order not to impede the transmission of its mails, to continue temporarily for the purpose of its relations with other countries to have recourse to the intermediation of certain of the foreign post offices established upon its territory, or to accept this intermediation, it must declare that this course of action implies no recognition on its part of the legality of those offices, and furthermore that no status, in that respect, can be created by the written communications that have been or that may hereafter be exchanged in regard to them, either with those offices or with the administrations to which they belong.

"China protests against the maintenance, by the majority of the foreign post offices operating upon its territory, of tariffs lower than those fixed by Article 5 of the Rome convention, for the payment of postage upon mails exchanged by those offices, either between themselves or with the countries to which they respectively belong.

Article 2 of the Rome convention stipulates in effect that the provisions of that convention apply to mails originating in one of the countries of the Union and destined to another country of the Union.

"On this occasion, and to refute an opinion that has been expressed in China, the latter feels it should observe that the restricted Unions, contemplated by Article 21 of the convention, can, by their definition, be established only as between countries, and not between the offices maintained by a country outside of its own territory, and that country.

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As regards the tariffs applied by foreign post offices of the same nationality operating in Chinese territory, in their relations with each other, it is undeniable that the field of action for the exercise of the sovereign rights of a Union country, in the fixing of tariffs applicable to mails exchanged between its own offices, ends at the territorial limits of the other countries of the Union.

$ Article 44 of the Règlement d'Exécution relates to the jurisdiction of the Union; the relevant clauses of it read (in translation) as follows: "1.-The_following are considered as belonging to the Universal Postal Union:

1st. The German post offices established in China and in Morocco, as subordinate to the Postal Administration of Germany;

5th. The Principality of Monaco and the French post offices established in Morocco and in China, as subordinate to the Postal Administration of France;

6th. The post offices which the administration of the French Colonies and Protectorates of Indo-China maintains in China, as subordinate to that administration;

8th. The post offices which the administration of the British Colony of Hongkong maintains in China;.

11th. The post offices which the Japanese administration has established in China.

2. In the interval which elapses between the meetings, the administrations of Union countries opening in countries foreign to the Union post offices which are to be regarded as belonging to the Union, are to communicate the fact to the administrations of all the other Union countries, through the medium of the international bureau."

Article of the convention, under the heading "Definition of the Postal Union," reads (in translation) as follows:

"The countries between which the present convention is concluded, as well as those which may adhere to it hereafter, form under the title of Universal Postal Union, a single postal territory for the reciprocal exchange of correspondence between their post offices."

"China, having adhered as from September 1 last to the Rome convention concerning the exchange of parcels post, must declare that what has been said above, in regard to the temporary continuation, necessitated by circumstances, of the intermediation of foreign post offices established upon its territory, applies likewise to the parcels post service. Accept, etc."

The following arrangements, previously concluded, appear to have been cancelled by the adherence of the Chinese Government to the International Postal Convention and Parcels Post Convention of May 26, 1906:

With France, postal arrangement signed at Peking, February 3, 1900, and parcel post arrangement signed at Peking, October 21, 1904;

With Germany, postal arrangement signed at Peking, October 25, and at Shanghai, November 3, 1905, and parcel post arrangement signed at Peking, July 19, and at Shanghai, August 26, 1910;

With Hongkong, postal arrangement signed at Hongkong, December 12, and at Peking, December 29, 1904;

With Indo-China, parcels post arrangement, signed at Saigon, July 24, and at Peking, September 21, 1911;

With Japan, postal agreement and parcel post agreement, both signed at Peking, February 9, 1910;

With Natal, postal arrangement signed at Peitermaritzburg, October 28, and at Peking, December 27, 1905; and

With Russia, postal arrangement signed at Peking, February 6/19, 1909.

The texts of these arrangements (omitting formal parts) are printed herewith, in chronological order.

France.

ARRANGEMENT SETTING FORTH THE RELATIONS

ESTABLISHED BETWEEN THE

POSTAL ADMINISTRATION OF FRANCE AND THE POSTAL ADMINISTRATION OF
CHINA.

February 3rd, 1900

ARTICLE I.-EXCHANGE OF MAILS.-1.-There shall be between the Postal Administration of France and the Postal Administration of China a regular exchange of postal articles of all kindsordinary, registered, international or in transit, closed or à découvert by any means of transport, ordinary or special, now established and hereafter established, which each Administration may have at its disposal.

2. The exchange of mails between the two Administrations will take place through the French Post Offices established in China and the Chinese Post Offices established in the same localities as these French Post Offices. Other Offices may besides be designated on consultation for the exchange of mails wherever postal requirements may demand it.

ARTICLE II-TRANSPORT OF MAILS.-1.-The Chinese Post Offices will accept from the French Post Offices mails, closed or à découvert, destined for Chinese, French, or foreign Post Offices estab lished in or out of China, and will undertake to transmit them to destination by any means of transport at the disposal of the Chinese Administration.

2.-The French Post Offices will accept from the Chinese Post Offices mails, closed or à découvert, destined for Chinese, French, or foreign Post Offices established in or out of China, and will undertake to transmit them to destination by any means of transport at the disposal of the French Administration.

3. Each Administration will support the cost of maintenance of the transport services, ordinary or special, which it may establish for the carriage of mails, but will be entitled to claim payment of the transit charges hereunder stipulated in Article V.

ARTICLE III. REMITTING OF MAILS.-1.-The remitting of mails, closed or à découvert, from one Administration to the other will take place at the Offices or any other authorised places for exchange and will be made from hand to hand between agents regularly appointed for this duty.

2. The duplicate copy of the Way Bill, called Part, brought by the remitting agent and indicating the number of packages or bags remitted, will be at once signed by the receiving agent and handed back to him as acknowledgment of receipt. Inside each package or bag a Feuille d'Avis will be enclosed, containing the particulars called for in Article [XX of the "Règlement" appended to the International Convention of Washington] XXI of the " Règlement d'Exécution" of the International Convention of Rome.

3. From the moment this agent has taken delivery of the mails and issued an acknowledgment of receipt without making any observation as to the number or condition of the packages or bags, the despatching Office will be discharged of further responsibility, which thereafter will lie with the receiving Office.

ARTICLE IV.-POSTAGE AND DELIVERY.-1.-Each Administration will use its own postage stamps to frank any mail matter, whatever its destination, originating in its own Offices, and will deliver to the addressees free of additional charge in all the localities where it has a Post Office any mail matter, whatever its origin, which arrives duly and sufficiently prepaid by means of postage stamps of the other Administration.

2. Each Administration fixes its tariffs. It is understood that the French Administration will not apply to mail matter exchanged between its own Offices in China taxes lower than those adopted by the Chinese Administration. On the other hand, the Chinese Administration will comply, in respect of any mail matter it may exchange with the Union countries through the French Offices, with the stipulations of Article 5 of the [Convention of Washington] International Convention of Rome. The two Administrations will communicate to each other their tariffs.

3.-Mail matter destined for places inland where no Post Office, Chinese or French, is yet opened will be sent to destination through private agencies at the risk and expense of the addressees.

4. Should it happen that, on Chinese territory and in the same town, both a Chinese and a French Post Office exist, each Office will undertake the delivery of any mail matter arriving to its