Ambassador Rockhill to the Secretary of State.
St. Petersburg, April 24, 1910.
Mr. Rockhill reports that he called upon the minister of finance to-day. He says the minister has received a résumé of the department’s memorandum of the 18th instant handed to the Russian ambassador, and he expressed the hope that the minister would agree to full and friendly discussion of modifications to the Chinchow-Aigun project and other suggestions contained in the memorandum and not send immediate reply to all the points raised, as was done with the former memorandum.
The minister said that he was now sending a surveying party out from Harbin to go over the proposed line to study different aspects of the question, and that by next July he expected a full report, after the receipt of which a full discussion could be held.
Mr. Rockhill thinks no reply will be made to the last paragraph of the department’s memorandum until a full report has been received here.
Mr. Rockhill adds that the minister of finance is hopeful that some basis of agreement may be reached after a full, informal, and confidential discussion.