_Ibid._, p. 14, No. 39. Sir Claude MacDonald had already written to the Tsung-li Yamên, on December 10: “I have the honor to inform your Highnesses and your Excellencies that I have received telegraphic instructions from Her Majesty’s Government to address the Yamên with regard to the concession in Shan-tung which it is reported that the German Government has asked from China. I am directed to state that Her Majesty’s Government will demand equality of treatment for British subjects according to the treaty rights possessed by Great Britain, and that Her Majesty’s Government will require compensation on any points in respect to which those rights may be disregarded.”—_Ibid._, p. 28, inclosure in No. 70. Footnote 196: See _China, No. 1 (1899)_, p. 240, No. 322; _China, No. 1 (1900)_, pp. 12–13, 35, 146–147, 106, 233, and 241–244. Footnote 197: It is unnecessary to recount the painful negotiations in 1898–9 concerning the Tien-tsin-Ching-kiang railway concession, in which the German claim in Shan-tung was strongly presented, and had to be recognized to a large extent by the British Government. See _China, No. 1 (1900)_, pp. 14, 16, 17–18, 33, 118, 121, 175, 180. CHAPTER IV PORT ARTHUR AND TALIEN-WAN As has been said, it appears impossible at the present state of our knowledge to trace the exact connection of Russia with the German occupation of Kiao-chau.[198] What is of more direct interest to our study, and is more easily established by evidence, is the fact that, with the plea that she could not be denied what had been granted to Germany,[199] Russia closely followed the latter’s example,[200] and, under similar terms to hers,[201] demanded a lease of Port Arthur and Talien-wan, and also a railway concession between a point in the Manchurian line granted in 1896 and the ports. Recent years have seldom seen a situation so instructive of the character of the Far Eastern diplomacy in general, and of Russia’s method in particular, as the foreign relations in China which culminated in the conclusion of the Russo-Chinese Agreement of March 27, 1898. These relations were also unusually complex, owing to the position which England held therein, whose vast interests in various parts of China were at once brought in many-sided contact, not only with Russia, but also with other Powers interested in China.