latest venture is framed on more modest lines—viz., the erection of a Mint at Hankow; the dies for the coinage were sent from Birmingham. This institution will possibly share the fate of the Canton Mint, set up some seven years ago, and which turned out dollars and smaller coins, but the dollars never got into circulation, as no two batches proved of like value owing to defective assay. Small coins are still struck, and find a market as charms against malign influences.
The railway from Tientsin to Peking, constructed under the direction of H. E. Hsu, should be completed before this work sees the light. The more important trunk line from Hankow to Peking is still in abeyance. But it is reported that a Belgian Syndicate has secured the privilege of advancing £4,500,000 sterling to be spent on the construction of the line, and the right to supply materials and engineers. As the line is to figure as part security, and the money is to be expended by Belgians, one would expect that this much needed and long projected railway would be built forthwith and finished with all speed. I hope that the report may prove well-founded, and that the Syndicate may ere long reap the reward of an enterprise so daring and not unattended with risk. This loan it would appear has been authorized by Imperial Edict, and the contract signed by Ching-Chi-tung and Sheng Taoti at Wuchang, also by the members of the Tsungli Yamen Peking. Sheng secured for himself a most unenviable reputation during the War, and has since posed as the promoter of the Chinese Imperial Bank Scheme, and financier of the Hankow-Peking railway. It is said that the Belgians were not alone in their offer of capital for the enterprise, but that the Chinese were fain to close with Belgium, being a small power without a fleet. It is quite possible, notwithstanding, that French and Russian financiers are not wholly uninterested
