This book is concerned with the attitude of the British government to aspects of British financial and industrial enterprise in China from 1895, when defeat in war by the Japanese exposed China's weakness, to 1914, when the European countries had in effects to pull out. It was a period of considerable economic and political activity by government and enterprise of the major powers as well as Britain Russia, France, Germany, Japan, and the United States. Two areas of British policy are explored: relations between the government and those countries which were also seeking to advance their position in China and those between the government and financiers.