[556]. See, e. g., pp. 10–30.
[557]. Tokushu Jōyaku, pp. 781–791.
[558]. It is said that the time-limit was extended, on January 1, 1901, for twenty years. See Tokushu Jōyaku, p. 783.
[559]. The company agreed to pay to the Korean Imperial House, through the Russo-Chinese Bank, a royalty amounting to one fourth of the annual profit. The company was to furnish all the capital, and was exempt from all kinds of taxes and dues (Articles 10, 11, 14).
[560]. The Kokumin, correspondence, April 18, 1903; Tokushu Jōyaku, pp. 781–782.
[561]. Toward the end of May, 1903, simultaneously with their activity on the Yalu, the Russian soldiers began again to cut trees at Mu-san.
[562]. Cf. Article 2 of the contract.
[563]. The Kokumin, correspondence, July 27, 1903. Lower down the stream, at Tatung-kao, the amount sometimes reached the annual value of 7,000,000 taels.
[564]. See an address by Eitaro Tsuruoka, who has recently traveled in Manchuria and is acquainted with several of the leaders of the bandits. The Dōbun-kwai, No. 53 (April, 1904), pp. 1–14.
[565]. The Kokumin, April 23, 1903. The capital of the syndicate was reported to be 5,000,000 rubles, of which 2,000,000 were said to have been furnished by the Russian Government.—Ibid., correspondence, June 19, 1903. This rumor was not authenticated. It is safe to say, however, that Baron Gunzburg’s connection with the syndicate was largely nominal. The present writer is not in a position to explain the relation of the notorious M. Bezobrazoff to the timber work on the Yalu.