25
Geography
THIS chapter, and those which follow on the history of the Colony and its system of government, present a background picture against which the detailed descriptions in other chapters of the Report may be viewed.
GEOGRAPHICAL SETTING
The Colony of Hong Kong is on the south-east coast of China, adjoining the province of Kwangtung. It is just inside the tropics, being less than 100 miles south of the tropic of Cancer, and lies between latitudes 22°9′ and 22°37′N and longitudes 113°52′ and 114°30′E. The twin cities of Victoria on Hong Kong Island and Kowloon on the mainland stand on either side of the harbour, and are about 90 miles south-east of Canton and 40 miles east of Portuguese Macau. The jet age has brought the Colony to within little more than 24 hours of Britain, while the shortest air route across Eurasia between London and Hong Kong is 5,965 miles. The total land area of the Colony is 3984 square miles, made up as follows:
(a) Hong Kong Island, including a number of small adjacent
islets: 29 square miles
(b) Kowloon and Stonecutters Island: 33 square miles
(c) The New Territories, which consist of a substantial section of the mainland and over 230 islands: 365 square miles.
TOPOGRAPHY AND GEOLOGY
Hong Kong is part of a series of intruded domes of granitic rocks which cover south-east China. There are only small areas of sedimentary rocks in the Colony. The age relationships of the major groups of rocks are associated with the intrusions and mountain building of the Jurasside, Laramide and Alpine revolu- tions. These intrusions made the conditions favourable for the formation of minerals of some importance. Galena, silver, wol- framite, molybdenite, pyrite, magnetite, hematite, cassiterite, gold,