April 11, 1895.J
HONGKONG VOLUNTEER CORPS
ANNUAL INSPECTION.
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CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
will not only continue to hold this record yourselves, but that your excellent example will be followed by others. When I go away! from the colony I shall still take an in terest in this Volunteer Corps, and I hope as there are four Maxim guns still lying idle that men will be coming forward to man them, and challenge you for the prizes, so that there may be established a good feeling of rivalry. I hope that before long that will be the case, and that the force will reach its maximum number. I now wish you good-bye.
'The Corps then gave three hearty cheers for Lieutenant-General Barker, Mrs. Barker, and Miss Barker.
J. LEACH.
271
OPENING OF THE KOWLOON INSTITUTE.
On the afternoon of the 2nd inst. His Excel- ency the Governor, Sir William Robinson, opened the Kowloon Institute for Soldiers and Seamen. There was a very large attendance of ladies and gentlemen. The proceedings open ed with a hymn and prayer, and then
The Rev. G. GOLDSMITH, Seamen's Chap. lain, explained that in 1891 he was asked by a friend to erect a place at Kowloon as a recreation room, institute, and refresh- ment room, in connection with St. Peter's Seamen's Church. In September of that year the Government granted a squatter's licence. and they accordingly "squatted" in the mat
to Lieut.-General Barker, who was then acting as Governor, that the mat shed was erected, and it had proved a great suo. cess. A further advance was made, the result being that they had a lease granted by the Go- vernment from 1st January, 1893, for 73 years at a nominal rent, and the present building was erected. The Governor had been very kind to them so far, and he was kinder still to come and open the Institute. (Applause).
On Wednesday afternoon Lieutenant-General Digby Barker conducted the annual inspection of the Hongkong Volunteer Corps on the Parade Ground. Major Pemberton, of the Rifle Brigade, commanded the Volunteers, Captain Gordon, Adjutant, Royal Artillery, commanded No. 1 Field Battery, and Captain Murray, A.D.C., commanded the Maxim Gun Corps. The Gene- ral's staff consisted of Colonel O'Gorman, Major Botfield, and Captain Thomas, and Colonel Bar- row, of the Hongkong Regiment, was also pre- sent. Considerable interest was attachel to the proceedings, inasmuch as this was the last time Lieutenant-General Barker will make an official inspection before his return home. We understand | CRICKET DINNER TO THE HON. A. shed adjoining the Institute. It was due he leaves the colony in the Empress of China on the 16th inst. The Volunteers were put through a stiff hour's dri.1, and, as the General
On Saturday evening the committee of the remarked, it reflected considerable credit upon Cricket Club, together with a few of those mein- them. They first of all marched past in line,bers of the Club whose exploits in the cricket then performed a variety of brigade movements, field in the present and in the past entitle them and also manual exercises, and the work was to be described in this sense as prominent mem- throughout watched with keen interest by bers of the Club, entertained their President, hundreds of spectators. At the conclusion of Mr. A. J. Leach, at a farewell dinner in the the drill,
Pavilion. A cricket ground does not commend Lieutenant-General BARKER Bard-Major itself very strongly at first sight as a parti
His EXCELLENCY-Ladies and gentlemen, a Pemberton and members of the Hongkong cularly suitable place upon which to serve a few weeks ago I received an invitation from the Volunteer Corps, I am very pleased to see the dinner, and the meal inevitably partook to some
Rev. Mr. Goldsmith to perform the ceremony of progress which you have made in efficiency and extent of the nature of a picnic in consequence; opening the Kowloon Institute, and need not say appearance generally. It is only the second but it was considered that it was in a certain I accepted that invitation with a great deal of annual inspection you have had since the re-degree appropriate that farewells should be pleasure. My appearance upon this platform organisation of the old corps and the addition of spoken on a spot which has been the scene of so to-night is, I think, a substantial assurance that Maxim Gun Company, and you have done many straggles in which Mr.. Loach has taken I have come here willingly to perform that yourselves great credit. I consider you havÉ™ a leading part, which must recall to him a ceremony, and to perform the duty that has turned out very fairly smart, and the drill has thousand memories, some of than inevitably sad, fallen upon my shoulders, and which I grace- been very fairly done. There were a few little but none, we venture to say, that are painful or fully accept. In the remarks which Mr. Gold- shortcomings, which, no doubt, with more disagreeable; and which is associated in his smith made you will have gathered that this practice, will soon be got rid of; but on the mind, as he said, with so many of his happiest institution. like many others, has sprong whole I consider the drill very creditable indeed. hours in the colony. Members of the Club are from a small beginning, and from the mat- This will probably be the last time I shall see
uot unnaturally chiefly interested in their Pre-shed which you can see from the window it has you on parade, and I wish to express my great sident's qualifications as a comrade and as expanded into this large and commodious build- thanks to all ranks for the way in which, by first cricketer, but His Excellency the Governor, ing. which is sufficient to accommodate a very having joined this corps and then giving their who did the Cricket lub the honour of being large number of people, and which is evident. attendance and their time, they have helped on present upon the occasion, would not allow thely suitable for the requirements for which the good cause of volunteering. I was told when occasion to pass without testifying also to his it is intended. In his remarks, with that I took a great interest in re-organising this corps professional worth and ability, and in a speech humility that characterises him, Mr. Goldsmith that there was no use in ever thinking that which came with particularly good grace said very little about his own exertions the number of members would reach a hundred from one who could speak as au
old (applause)-exertions which have been actuated and I am very glad to hear that that number cricketer as well as an official chief he expressed by that great principle of love, which is the has been exceeded, and hope it will remain so all the hope, in happily chosen words, that Mr. greatest thing in the world. I along. I only ask you to go on with this good Leach has been lent, not given, to Singapore; I am' within the mark when I say that had it service and persuade all those you can to follow and that the next time the Pavilion is illuminated not been for Mr. Goldsmith this institution would your good example.
at night it may be to welcome him back to | probably not have been commenced and certainly An adjournment was then made to the Voldn. Hongkong in good health, in a still more respon- never completed. (Applause). I am sure that teer Parade Ground, where the General distri-sible position, and, if possible, with a more ex-ne of his pleasantest recollections, when, buted the prizes to winners, whose names were tensive wardrobe. published yesterday, in the annual carbine com- petition. After the distribution,
Lieutenant-General BARKER said Members of the Hongkong Volunteer Corps, it gives me very great pleasure to distribute these prizes. They represent, I am sure, the results of very careful and continnous work at the ranges-a work which is one of the important objects aimed at by Volunteers. I have already, a few minutes ago, expressed my satisfaction with what I saw on parade of your efficiency in field movements, and I am very glad to have the opportunity of saying a few more words to you. I have always taken a very great interest in the Volunteers. partly because I think it is a very good school of exercise for any man in this colony, and also because I consider it a very im. portant factor in the defence of this fortress. I think you have not yet attained quite the number that I should like to see reached, but still I am very satisfied to feel that you have attained, at all events, a position of permanence and that you are likely to increase in numbers. You are well assured that the right hand of good fellowship is held out to you by the regular forces. You have had the benefit and the good advice and the command of two mest able and willing officers; first Colonel Jerrard, and now Major Pemberton. The Maxim Gap Company has had the advan- tage of winning the able assistance of Captain Murray, and the Field Battery is still being commanded by that keen soldier Captain McCallum. A feeling of good natured rivalry has already sprung up between the members of the branches of the Corps as well as between those branches and other bodies, and I think it may fairly be said that you have now obtained a firm footing. As said on parade, you have done very well, and I only hope that you
L
am sure
in the course of time he retires from his The chair was taken by Mr. Travers, and, the labours here and goes to the old country, will be Queen having been duly honoured, the toast of the the opening of this institution. I very much evening was proposed by him in a few straight- regret. feeling so strongly as I do
upon the forward and well chosen words, which were charao-subject, that I have not been asked to open the terized by the eloquence of siccerity and good Goldsmith Institute instead of the Kowloon lu- feeling, and which appealed to his hearers far stitute in connection with St. Peter's Seamen's more strongly than any pouderous flights into the Church. There is only one little cloud banging realms of oratory could have possibly done; as over this building, and that is a slight debt of evidenced by the ringing cheers with which his $1,200, which hope will soon be dispersed. The concluding remarks were received, cheers which plate is going to be handed round this evening were repeated again and again when Mr. Leach at the close of the proceedings and I ask you rose to reply and when he sat down. The not to put your money on the plate only, but toasts of His Excellency the Governor, proposed to take home one of these cards and fill it up by Mr. Leach, and of the Cricket Club, proposed for $5 or $15, and as much more as you can by Mr. Stewart Lockhart in a neat little speech, spare, A wise and liberal legislature has placed concluded the speechifying and the meeting at my disposal a sum of money for the Be adjourned to the ladies' tent for a little music. nevolent Fund, and it affords me great pleasure to band Mr. Goldsmith a cheque for $100, and if he will accept a small cheque on behalf of mysef I shall be glad. (Loud applause). Now, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to make a few remarks upon institutions generally and this one in par- ticular. Institutions or olubs for seamen and soldiers based on the principle of providing them with amusement and instruction apart from the influence of intoxicating drinks are deserving of the sympathy and support of the wealthier classes. These institutions have arisen out of a combination of circumstances and feelings which mark the times in which we live, and will continue to mark them in the fnture. They represent the existence of wants Colonel Cockerill's engagement as New York which it is not easy to supply adequately Herald correspondent in Japan is not, the Hyogo from any other quarter, and Mr. Goldsmith and News says, to terminate with the war. Mr. Gor the members of this Institute have acted very don Bennett is said to anticipate an early re-wisely in applying a specific remedy to a specific opening of the fight for constitutional privileges want which has heretofore been felt in Kowloon. in that country, and to have determined, on that It may be argued that those classes whose interests supposition, to be specially represented there for these institutions will promote have done very some years to come.
well in former days without such aid, and that
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There is poor comfort in the reflection that our loss is Singapore's gain, but there is some consolation in the reflection that Mr. Leach will be in a certain sense still within hail; and it is not impossible that we may see him again wielding the willow on the Hongkong Cricket Ground, possibly, alas! as an enemy, but not impossibly as one of ourselves. In the meantime he will he remembered in Hongkong by all who know him as one who has in a pre- eminent degree possessed the qualities, dear above all others to Englishman, of being a good comrade, a good sportsman, and a gentleman.