5. Native produce, accompanied by a certificate that the coast trade duty has been paid at the second port, may be carried to any other port or ports in China without payment of further duty to the maritime Customs, 6. Native produce, carried from Shanghai to Hankau or Kiukiang, or vice versâ, pays a full import or export dnty, and coast trade duty. While the river trade continues under the provisional rules now in force, these duties will be levied at Shanghai. If the produce in question be entered for reëxport to a foreign port, the coast trade duty will be deposited and refunded, as provided in paragraph 2 of this Rule. The system of levying duties and taxes common in Asiatic countries, by which each province or district raises within its own borders what is necessary for its own defense and government, is recognized in China; and these new trade arrangements contravene it, inasmuch as the duties paid on imports and exports at Shanghai do not reach Hankau or Tientsin, either directly, or through the Imperial treasury at Peking. The officers at ports, where drawback certificates are presented instead of cash for import duties, may, in their view of the procedure, reasonably complain at this diminution of their particular revenue, while they are held responsible for the support and management of their particular jurisdiction. The mode of settling this difficulty has not yet been arranged, but as it is one of those questions which affect the Chinese government alone, it will probably be settled by themselves, after the custom-houses opened on the Yangtsz' have gone into operation. The Chinese government has never had rules for drawbacks, nor an approach to the system; it could not hope to carry out such plans of paying duties as are involved in the bonding and drawback systems of western countries, with the untrustworthy native agents it has at command. The privilege of re-exporting goods which were unsaleable at the port where they had paid duty, was first clearly conceded in Art. XX. of the American Treaty in 1844, and reäffirmed in those subsequently negotiated with foreign powers. The object of the provision was solely to benefit the foreigner in the sale of his goods, and had no reference to native produce passing from one part of China to another, either inland or coastwise. When goods are to be re-exported, they are sent to the Customs with the following form filled out, and the packages in the condition required by the treaty : Vessel DRAWBACK SHIPPING BILL. 1, Port Marks and Description of Quantity. Quality and Description Value. of Goods. from Examined. _claim Drawback on the abovenamed Goods, imported by date ex the duty on which I declare to have been duly paid. (Signed) After examination and approval of the produce, the following certifi cate is issued in Chinese only, and is valid at the Customs for its amount; the form here inserted is the one now issued at Canton. 同治 月 日 存執數本伊給 該自其 持商應稅報 大清督理粵海關部 此收照餉稱為 The drawback certificate issued at the Shanghai Customs quotes the treaty regulations, and is fuller than the above in other respects. There are trifling variations in the form of this and the next certificate used at the other ports, but these will suffice to exhibit their general arrangement. Exemption certificates are called for by the consignee at the time of their shipment, and are presented at the port where they are taken. They merely state that the within-named foreign goods having paid the legal duty on them, if taken to another port in China, are not to be charged with it again. A time is specified in the certificate when it is EXEMPTION CERTIFICATE GRANTED AT SHANGHAI. 照執徵重免給發關海江 征照執往完並運給 監督江南海關 巡蘇松大兵備道 須呈給船貨赴底課道 至照免名物該簿復 免驗重 前口相欲 重明征運經呈符篇 The blanks issued from the Shanghai Customs respecting the trade in the interior, such as the Barrier Pass 卡查單, the Inland Pass 存 根, the Inland Certificate 報單根, the memorandum of Inland Duty. 內地貨稅驗單, and the Release Order of Barrier 過卡准 單, , are all issued in Chinese only, and need not be inserted. They are much less used than those blanks required for the coastwise trade, and are likely to receive many modifications. On the Inland Certificate, it is the usage to affix a declaration in English, signed by the foreign trader, of his ownership of the goods, and that he will pay the transit duty when the goods reach the Barrier nearest their port of destination, as is required by Sect. 2 of the Transit Dues' Regulations. Section 9. PORTS ON THE YANGTSZ', AND TRADE IN THE INTERIOR. THE stipulations of Art. X. of the British treaty of 1858 deferred the opening of the ports on the Great River until its banks above Chinkiang should be cleared of outlaws, and peace restored to the adjacent regions as far as Hankau; but these provisions were set aside in 1860 after the return from Peking. It should be said to the credit of the Chinese Government, that when its high officers had agreed to the commercial changes involved in the new treaties and regulations of 1858, they exhibited no reluctance to carry them out as soon as arrangements could be made. To open the trade of this central river to foreign vessels was a hazardous experiment, while its largest cities were in the possession of rebels; and the authorities hesitated to venture on it. They did so at last, and the ports of Chinkiang, Kiukiang and Hankau, were thrown open to commerce in 1860. The insurgents occupied Nanking at this period, and commanded a score or two of miles of the southern bank west of it, but steamers passed by their ports, and hitherto they have not seriously molested the trade. A brief notice of the region watered by the Yangtsz' is all that is here necessary. The name of this river on foreign maps thirty years ago was Kyangku, which was oddly misapplied from Du Halde's map by taking the words Kiang-kau Ii.e. River's mouth, as the name of the river itself. On Chinese maps, it has no single name; the foreign designation is derived either from the Son of the Ocean's River, or more probably from I the River off Yangchau, the large city north of Chinkiang on the Grand Canal. Its most common terms among the natives are Ta-kiang ★I, the River, or the Great River, and Chang-kiang, I the Long River; these names are dropped near the junction of the rivers Kialing or Min in Sz'chuen, for that of Kinská kiang I or Gold-sand R., which is retained to the junction of the Wúliang kiang, after it leaves the province of Yunnan and reënters Sz'chuen. Thence it is called Plutsu ho till beyond the Tibetan frontiers, where its main stream is called Murus-ussu, or Tortuous waters; these last names are Tibetan words. The entire length is over 3,000 miles, and in respect to its navigableness and uniform sup ply of water, the vast population of its shores, the fertility and productions of its basin, and the arrangement of its own channel running from west to east, while that of its numerous tributaries come in from the north and south, it is unequaled by any river in the world. Proceeding up the stream, the first large affluent of the Yangtsz' is the Yun-ho 運河 or Grand Canal, which enters it on the north side The opposite Chinkiang, and since the silting up of the Yellow River, now drains the largest part of both Kiangsu and Nganhwui provinces, through the lakes and rivers which here discharge their surplus waters. The next in importance, not enumerating six or eight lesser ones in Nganhwui, is the Kán kiáng in Kiángsí, which comes in through Lake Poyangat Húkau; by this means all the cities in that province are rendered accessible to other parts of the empire. River Hán at Wúchang fú is the next large tributary; it opens up communication with the province of Hupeh, and part of Shensi. Larger than either of these last two is the contribution of Lake Tungting at Yohchau fú in Húnan, where the combined waters of the rivers Siang, Tez' and Yuen in that province, swell the already enormous volume of waters flowing from the west. Passing up the main trunk, we now meet the Tsing, the Wu, the Chih-shui, the Ché-hung, the Pu-to and the Ta-chwang coming in on the right bank. Ou the northern shore are the larger affluents of the Kiá-ling, the Loh, the Min, the Yalung and the Wú-liang, all of them in the province of Sz'chuen, and each of them equal to most European rivers. Beyond the last named, the headwaters are useless for navigation, but their perennial supplies from the meltings of Himalayan snows on the eastern slopes of the Bayenkara, give this magnificent artery its title to be called the Son of the Ocean. It is impossible with our present information to give the grand total of miles of navigable waters which are in the basin of the Yangtsz', but it probably exceeds 5,000 linear miles below Patang in Sz'chuen. The area of the basin is computed at 740,000 square miles. The tide is perceived about 400 miles from its mouth. The explorations and charts of Capt. Blakiston of the British army, have made known the character of the main trunk as far as Chungking in Sz'chuen. The ports now opened to trade are three, Chinkiang, Kiukiang and Hankau. CHINKIANG .e. Guard of the River, is the chief town of Chinkiang fú, a small prefecture which stretches across the province of Kiangsú to that of Nganhwui, east of Nanking. It is divided into four districts, and the position of the city at the junction of the Canal with the Yangtsz', has always made it one of the most important posts on the river. It was captured by the English troops, July 21st, 1842, and restored the same year; to be again captured by the Taiping insurgents in 1853. The Imperialists retook it in 1857, and found it to be utterly destroyed. It is now in their hands, and some inhabitants are resettling it, but many years of peace must elapse before it can recover the prosperity it enjoyed before 1842. The interruption of the course of the Grand Canal across the country to Tientsin, by the silting of the Yellow River near Hwaingan fú, so that boats no longer cross there, has materially diminished the importance of this city. C.G. 28 |