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goods- true and absolute proof. I now repent. If my own personal appeal that I escape being sent to the Magistrate for formal examination is accepted I will with sincerity go through the punishment imposed publicly by the community. Afterwards I will always obey the advice and rules of the Yeuk. Should there ever be a time when I again do anything improper, then let the community send me to the Magistrate to face trial. I request this. Furthermore, I shall follow the rules of the Yeuk, and shall never dare to be overcome by shame and harm people or do anything of the sort. Because we fear verbal agreements, we have put this in writing, and have also kept several copies as evidence.
P.H. HASE
NOTES
Faure, in his The Structure of Chinese Rural Society: Lineage and Village in the Eastern New Territories, Hong Kong. Oxford University Press, Hong Kong, 1986, pp. 100-127. has discussed these arrangements in detail.
The documents from the Yung Sze-chiu collection are now held in the Sha Tin Public Library, Regional Council. The documents are to be found in two volumes, both with the number R802.79 4431, both with the title ([D] (A Collection of Exemplars of Documents and Couplets]). Accession numbers of the two volumes are 622670 and 622679.
My thanks are due to Dr. David Faure and Mrs. Nga-ching Miller for assistance with the translation. The two versions show minor variations in wording: these are not noted here.
MORE ON THE MAN THE EMPEROR DECAPITATED
In Volume 28 of the Journal, David Faure printed various folktales from the Eastern New Territories relating to the history of Ho Chan, in a Note headed "The Man the Emperor Decapitated".' Recently, a further story of the same sort was given to me by Tsim Foh-sang, a village elder of Tsap Wai Kon village in Sha Tin. Mr. Tsim was born about 1918, and was educated in his village. This story was written down by Mr. Tsim in 1981 as an interesting note on the history of Kau Sai. Mr. Tsim's story shows that stories about Ho Chan were current in Sha Tin as well as Kat O and Sai Kung, and were probably current throughout the Eastern New Territories. Tsim Foh-sang's note reads:
I was told that there is a Fung Shui site in the sea near Kau Sai. The name of this site is "A Golden Bell Hanging on a Silk Thread" (金鐘絲線) (#Bâ£), and it belonged to Ho, the Minister of the Left (左相). It was one of the ninety-