[170]. According to Art. 12, these 5,000,000 taels were to be returned to the Chinese Government as soon as the line was in running order. It will be remembered that the government was responsible for the contribution of an equal amount of money to the capital of the Russo-Chinese Bank. It is probable that the money has been transferred from the Company to the Bank, so as to make it pay two bills, the one after the other. It has already been reported that the money was originally paid out of the Russo-French loan of 1895. If this report is true, the whole arrangement may be characterized as extremely clever on the part of Russia. Cf. p. 84, note 4, above.
[171]. Confirmed by the Czar on December 4/16, presented to the Ruling Senate on December 8/20, and finally published in the Bulletins des Lois on December 11/23, 1896. See an English translation of their text in the British Parliamentary Papers, Russia, No. 1 (1898), and China, No. 1 (1900), pp. 57–61; a Japanese translation in Tokushu Jōyaku, pp. 495–500. At the further extension of the railway by the agreement of March 27, 1898, supplementary statutes were promulgated on February 5, 1899. See ibid., pp. 516–520.
[172]. Articles 10–16.
[173]. Page 32, above.
[174]. The Chinese Minister to St. Petersburg at that time was appointed the first president.
[175]. Articles 18–27; Agreement, Article 1.
[176]. Article 8. Compare Art. 5 of the Agreement, which contains merely the former part of this arrangement, i. e., the protection of the railway and its appurtenances by the Chinese Government.
[177]. The Agreement, Art. 12; the Statutes, Art. 2.
[178]. The Agreement, Art. 10; the Statutes, Art. 3.