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CRANMER-BYNG AND SHEPHERD
14 They had every reason to be alarmed on account of the continual attacks from pirates on coastal villages in Kwangtung and other places during the period from about 1787 until 1810. See A. W. Hummel: Eminent Chinese of the Ching Period, 446-8. Also C. F. Neuman, History of the Pirates who infested the China Sea from 1807 to 1810.
15 Macartney took with him on the embassy a "gardener and botanist”, David Stronach. For the botanical side of the embassy see J. L. Cranmer-Byng, op. cit., 317-19.
16 These nets are known locally as "stake nets" or tsang pang are lowered and raised by means of a tackle. They are frequently used along the coasts of Kwangtung today. The fishing season is from February to mid-September,
17 The island is now reasonably well covered with pine trees and there are a few small feng-shui woods of deciduous trees. A large number of kites have been observed using pine trees on a ridge in the centre of the island as a roost during the winter months.
18 Parish knew the island, which he had been sent to reconnoitre, under the name of Cowhee. Now he learned that the inhabitants called it Toong Shing-ow-a. However, this name does not appear to have survived and the island is now always known as Ma Wan4 and was so called as far back as 1859. See Rev. Krone, op. cit. (note 8) p. 73. The word Cowhee was probably a phonetic rendering of the name of an island between Ping Chau island and Hong Kong island known as Kau I Chau 交椅洲.
19 By the small island to the south-east Parish presumably meant Tang Lung Chau## which now has a small light-house on it. There is now a small harbour with a jetty at Ma Wan village, and this is the normal place for landing on the island today.
20 This is a doubtful statement.
21 The word as written in the manuscript report is clearly "profil". I can only suggest that Parish meant "profile", and was using it in a technical, military engineering sense, meaning "outline". A reading of Tristram Shandy and other eighteenth century books about sieges and defence works might give a clue to its technical meaning at that time,
22 From the anchorage position marked on the chart this must refer to the bay of Tsing Lung Tau. Today Ma Wan is connected to the mainland by a regular ferry service running from the bay of Sham Tseng, where the Hong Kong Brewery is situated.
23 By the word "bay" in this context Parish appears to refer to the wide bay formed by the northern coast of Lantao from its headland opposite Tsing Lung Tau to Chek Lap Kok opposite Tung Chung bay, but the wording is somewhat ambiguous at this point.
24 Probably the western arm of Luk Kang
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· + +
on Lantao.
25 Tung Ku #island opposite Tap Siak Kok on the Castle Peak peninsula. It forms part of the Urmston Road.
26 See Charles Tulse, Local Master's Handbook. Seamanship Illustrated (Hong Kong University Press, 1960).
27 See photograph of the "race" between Ma Wan and Lantao on page
It is interesting to know that Professor Deryck Chesterman of the Department of Physics in the University of Hong Kong is carrying out research into the currents off Ma Wan and their effects on the sea bed.