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The next attack on the Colony is under the masked battery of "Religious and Social Influence". Our unprejudiced savant says:- "The benefits derivable from our laws, institutions, and religions, can never be conferred on the Chinese by our Colonisation of Hongkong. We are here in fact, almost as much isolated from China as if we were located in the Eastern Archipelago. By the adroit policy adopted by the Chinese authorities, a "cordon sanitaire" if I may so express it, has been drawn round Hongkong. No Chinaman is permitted to come here willingly except he be a thief, or a pirate or a spy - no converts from Hongkong would be favourably viewed by the respectable Chinese on the mainland.
Early shipping in the Colony has had its survey in these notes (see 17-3-33) and the opening up of steamship traffic between Hongkong and other parts of the world by the P. & O. Company goes back to the early Forties, as already mentioned (31.8.33). The purely local shipping lines, however, have their origin in tentative efforts to maintain regular service between this Colony and Canton, Macao, and the coast ports, and a resume of the foundation of the two older Hongkong shipping companies might be given here.
As early as 1848 the Hongkong and Canton Steam Packet Company had been formed locally, with good prospects, but it went out of existence after about five years. The directors of the concern were Messrs. D. Matheson, A. Campbell, T.D. Reaves and F.T. Bush, it being apparently a joint British and American enterprise. Spasmodic and irregular connexion with Canton and Macao continued until the Sixties, when the Hongkong Canton and Macao Steamboat Company was born. This enterprise was commenced in October 1865, with a capital of $750,000, divided into 7,500 shares of $100 each. The chief promoter of the Company was Mr. Douglas Lapraik, who had been (in the forties) one of the Colony's earliest watchmakers, but turned to shipping enterprise, and was also concerned in the formation of some of the oldest dockyards out here. Mr. Douglas Lapraik was represented on the first board of directors being Messrs. J.J. dos Remedios, A.E. Taucher, A. Sassoon, R. Salomon, D. Ruttunjee, and Bapoorjee Pallunjee Ranjee, so it will be seen that the enterprise was of a decidedly international character.
It is interesting to find in references to the formation of this local concern that several American vessels had already been established as river steamers trading to Canton, and the new company bought them up, the steamers being the Kinshan (a name still perpetuated), White Cloud and Fire Dart. Competitors remained, but the company bought them out in August 1866, and additional river steamers coming within the company's fleet are given in the old records as the Kiukiang and Poyang. The Canton authorities in February 1866, finding that this trade with the city benefited it as much as Hongkong, placed facilities in the way, and permitted the river steamers to land and take in cargo and passengers at Chuenpi, just below Whampoa, so that trade was steadily developed from then on. In 1871, it is chronicled, the Steamboat Company bought up two further competing vessels, the Spec and the Spark.
It is worthy of record that when H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh visited the Colony in 1869, he had the Kinshan placed at his disposal by the company, and travelled by her in November that year, on a visit to Canton and Macao.
In 1880 the Steamboat Company came to a friendly arrangement with Messrs. Butterfield and Swire, who were running an opposition service, and the concern started on its new status, on an arrangement which operates until to-day.