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NG LUN NGAI-HA
The person in Hong Kong who had the most direct influence on Sun's thought was Ho Kai, a founder and also a teacher of the Hong Kong Medical College, teaching medical jurisprudence and physiology.1 Ho was the son of a missionary of Cantonese origin who later settled in Hong Kong and became a businessman. Ho himself received his early education at the Central School and then left in 1872 to continue his secondary and then university education in Britain. He returned in 1882 as a qualified medical doctor and barrister. As a prominent civic leader, he served as the Chinese representative in various Government councils and boards, including the Legislative Council and the Sanitary Board. He was a great promoter of Western medicine and education for the Chinese in Hong Kong. In addition to the Alice Memorial Hospital and the Hong Kong Medical College, he was also a founder of the University of Hong Kong and patron of a number of Anglo-Chinese schools. In the Sino-French war of 1884-1885, when China failed to protect Annam, the Chinese seamen and coolies in Hong Kong reacted patriotically in boycott against French ships. Ho began to be concerned with the fate of China and the need for her modernization. From 1887 onwards, Ho began to contribute articles to the local English language newspapers, expressing his views on affairs in China. Most of his reformist essays were translated into Chinese or rewritten by Hu Li-huan and published both in Hong Kong and in China.2 Hu also received part of his education at the Central School both as a student and then as a student-teacher between 1862 and 1872. Unlike Ho, whose education was mainly in English, Hu had received very solid education in classical Chinese, and later won great fame as a gifted prose writer, scholar and poet. He was also a comprador and a very successful businessman.
Because of Ho's and Hu's prominence in Hong Kong, their essays must have caught the attention of many intellectuals. Ho's first essay was a long critical review of Tseng Chi-tse's article, "China, the Sleep and the Awakening". The review was published in the China Mail on February 12, 1887, three days after Tseng's article appeared in the same paper. Ho argued that the real cause of China's troubles lay not so much in her military weakness as in her "loose morality and evil habits, both social and political". He strongly emphasized complete and sweeping reforms in China's administration. More specifically, Ho demanded a new basis for recruiting officials as the existing civil examinations involved no knowledge of modern science or arts and were worthless as a test of real ability and talent. He also considered