To these ends I caused to be addressed to the several
powers occupying territory and maintaining spheres of influence in China
the circular proposals of 1899, inviting from them declarations of their
intentions and views as to the desirability of the adoption of measures
insuring the benefits of equality of treatment of all foreign trade
throughout China.
With gratifying unanimity the responses coincided in this common policy,
enabling me to see in the successful termination of these negotiations
proof of the friendly spirit which animates the various powers
interested in the untrammeled development of commerce and industry in
the Chinese Empire as a source of vast benefit to the whole commercial
world.
In this conclusion, which I had the gratification to announce as a
completed engagement to the interested powers on March 20, 1900, I
hopefully discerned a potential factor for the abatement of the distrust
of foreign purposes which for a year past had appeared to inspire the
policy of the Imperial Government, and for the effective exertion by it
of power and authority to quell the critical antiforeign movement in the
northern provinces most immediately influenced by the Manchu sentiment.
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