This Promise Was Subsequently Qualified, And On March 27 A Convention Was Signed At Pekin Giving The Russians The "Usufruct" Of Port Arthur And Talienwan, Which, Practically, Meant That Russia Had Obtained Those Harbors Unconditionally, And For An Indefinite Period.

France, on her part, obtained possession of the port of Kwangchowfoo, which is the best outlet to the sea

For the trade of the southern province of Kwangsi; she also secured a promise that the island of Hainan should not be ceded to any other power; and, finally, she gained a recognition of her claim, first advanced in 1895, to a prior right to control the commercial development of the province of Yunnan. This claim is as reasonable as that put forward by Germany with reference to the province of Shantung, but it is incompatible with the northeastward development of British Burmah. While these acts, which, virtually, amounted to mutilations of the Middle Kingdom, were being committed by Germany, Russia and France, England undertook to assert the principle of the "open door," the principle, namely, that, whatever territorial concessions might be made by the Pekin government, no nation could be deprived of its treaty rights in the ports ceded. That is to say, American citizens, British subjects, or the subjects of any other power which has a treaty with China containing "the most favored nation" clause, must be allowed to enjoy precisely the same rights in Talienwan, Kiao Chou and Kwangchowfoo as they would have enjoyed had not those places been surrendered to Russia, Germany and France respectively.

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Words from 182931 to 183188 of 191255