Chester Holcombe to Prince Kung, March 7, 1879
Mr. Holcombe to Prince Kung.
I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your imperial highness’s dispatch of the 23d ultimo, in the matter of the ten transit passes taken out by Mr. M. A. Jenkins at Hankow, to cover the export of certain native produce from Szchuen. In it your imperial highness informs me that you are in receipt of a report though the Szchuen viceroy, from the deputy in charge of the Lekin station at Kwei-Chow, to the effect that upon the 23th of December last, Tsusi-Chishan, the agent of Mr. M. A. Jenkins, entered 15 boxes of gall-nuts, covered by transit passes Nos. 31 and 32 of 1878, and that the merchandise was examined and passed the same day; that Mr. Jenkins has presented only these two passes at the barrier; that he is very dilatory in transacting his business, and that no obstacles have been put in his way, &c.
I regret very much the necessity which I am under of troubling your imperial highness further in this business, but I yesterday received information from the United States consul at Hankow, of a nature diametrically opposed to the statements of the Lekiu tax deputy as quoted above. Mr. Shepard writes me that upon the 29th December, 1878, Mr. Jenkins’s agent shipped from Chun-Ching 15 boxes of gall-nuts weighing 28 peculs. They arrived at Kewei-Chow upon the 2d of January. The transit passes covering the produce were presented to the deputy who refused to allow the goods to proceed until the Lekin tax had been paid. Upon the 16th January the goods were still detained at Kwei-Chow with no prospect of being released. The other transit passes have not been presented because the Lekin deputy still refuses to recognize those already in his hands, &c.
Your imperial highness will see at a glance the wide discrepancy between these two reports. I beg leave to ask that stringent orders be sent with all possible speed direct to the Lekin deputy concerned to release the goods in question at once.
Mr. Jenkins has already been a heavy sufferer by the wrongdoing of this officer, and I doubt not your imperial highness will take proper measurers to put an end to this illegal and unfriendly conduct. It will be for your imperial highness to decide what steps should be taken towards an official who, if my information be correct, refuses obedience to the orders of his superiors, and then seeks to cover up his presumption with falsehood.
I have, &c.,