142
80:
whose advice the Government acted liquidate the bill by paying so much per month out of their salaries and fees? Enclosing my card, I ́remain, dear sir, yours faithfully
ENQUIRER.
Hongkong, 11th February, 1899.
REVIEWS.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRÉSS AND Martin Ward, a young Englishnan whose father had settled and died in Tangier, for Kathleen Jerrard, who had been adopted in infancy into the household of Martin Ward the elder, A Mr. Bensuquin, who had been appointed the executor of the latter's will, endeavours to replace young Ward in the girl's affections, and as Bobaracter study Bensaquin, who pursues his villanies with a gentlemanly absence of malevolence, is excellent. Side by side with the principal love tale there also runs & Moorish one. With the strong love element piracy and captivity, and a pleasing style, Mr. Dawson's book is an eminently readable one.
13
Ricroft of Withens. By HALLIWELL SUTCLIFFE,
London: T. Fisher Unwin. 1898. TAKING the main features of the plot "Ricroft › of Withens" may be described as "Lorna Doone
in a Yorkshire setting. The treatment, however, is original, the writing vigorous, and the inter- ast well sustained. Riuroft leaves his York- shire moor for a time and is with Prince Charlie Hát Culloden. On his return he heads a párty *formed for the breaking up of the Carlesses, or tire Lonely Folk" as they are called, who 00- ›ompy an almost inaccessible valley all to them. selves and have long barried the neighbourhood. The book is a decidedly enjoyable one, and had it appeared before instead of after "Lorna Doone" it might perhaps have become almost as famous.
An Enemy to the King. From the Recently Discovered Memoirs of the Sieur de la Tour- noire. By R. N. STEPHENS. London: Methuen & Co. 1898. (Hongkong: Kelly & **Walsh, Limited.)
An historical novel of the times of Henri III. and Henri IV. of France, Mr. Stephens's book is a good specimen of the school it represents. "Love and fighting, plots and counterplots, make up an exciting narrative, the narrator being the Sieur de la Tournoire, the hero, who in the opening paragraph says:- ***Hitherto I have written with the sword.
|
That Little Catty. Dr. Barrère. Isabel Dysart. By M18. OLIPHANT. London. Macmillan & Co. 1898. (Hongkong: Kelly & Walsh, Limited.j
Or the three tales named in the title the first is a pleasant little comedy, the secoud a ghastly tragedy whose incidents are wildly improbable, and the third a rather strong drama. The plot of Dr. Barrère may be very briefly described. The doctor becomes engaged to & Miss Surtees, who has a wild young brother. This brother kills a man, is tried for murder, and condemned. Dr. Barrère, who bad been an involuntary witness of the crime, was the principal witness against the accused, and the keenness of his suffering at being placed in such a position may well be imagined. Strong efforts are made to obtain a reprieve for the condemned man, but they appear to have little prospect of success. Barrère, who has made up his mind that there shall be no death of shume, arranges with the doctor of the prison that the latter shall go away for a fortnight's holiday and leave him in charge. Having thus obtained medical charge of the condemned man be, ou the morning fixed for the execution, surreptitiously gives him poi- sou, and almost simultaneously with the death the reprieve arrives. Stricken with remorse and grief he at once leaves the town and is never heard of again. It had previously been ar ranged that the body of the condemned man should be given to his relatives after the exebution, and this arrangement is carried out after the death from supposed heart failure. It might have occurred to Mrs. Oliphant that objections would be raised to a near connection or friend of a condemned man taking full medical charge of him, but assuming those objections to be overcome it is certain that if death followed there would be an inquest and a post mortem examination and that the doctor, FROM Mr. Andrew Balfour's pou nothing but being rather an important person on such oc- good work is to be expected; and in the book casions, would not find it easy to do the vanish- before us the expectation is not disappointed. ing act. Setting aside its improbabilities, how- Allan Oliphant is the son of a Tweedside gentle-ever, the tale is sufficiently creepy for the most man. The tale purports to be written after morbid appetite. Cullodon.
after the fashion of greater men, and requiring no secretary. now take up the quill to set forth, correctly, certain incidents which, having been noised about, stand in dan. ger of being inaccurately reported by some imitator of Brantome and De l'Estoile." If all the world is to know of this matter, let it know thereof rightly." The Sieur belonged to the Huguenot party and had an adventurous
· career in 'his early manhood.
'To Arms! Being some Passages from the early Life of Allan Oliphant, Chirurgeon, written by himself, now set forth for the first time by ANDRew Balfour, and illustrated by CECIL W.-GUINNEL. ` London: Met- huen & Co. 1898. (Hongkong: Kelly & Walsh, Limited.)
44
"Isabel Dysart" is a tale of quite a different character. The heroine, a Scotch girl, has two lovers, a young doctor and a young minister, and the contrast between the characters of the two men is well worked out. The doctor is am-
minister of a nobly self-sacrificing disposition. The doctor is successful in his profession and becomes Sir William " but it is the minister that in the long run wins Isabel.
**
I have held aloof," says Allan, deeming the matter an act of folly, and indeed having little sympathy with the unhappy prince; but what has come to pass has stirred me and brought to my mind thoughts of another rising, less welbitious, clever, and not over-scrupulous; the planned, less brilliant, but as unfortunate. It because the days of 1715 run some danger of being forgotten that I have set me to my task, for my thread of life became, for good or for ill, strangely interwoven with the events of that rash, half-hearted effort of the prince's father to win back his own. Did I indeed rely solely for interest on the tale of Sheriff-Muir I had never made « beginning, bat, haply for my writing, very curious, and without doubt somewhat marvellons mischances and adventur ings fell to my lot, such as are not common to all men, and it seems to me well worth the telling."
The reader will agree that the tale certainly is well worth the telling. Allan is a witness of the battle of Danblane, and afterwards he is twice kidnapped, being taken on the first occasion to France, where he is imprisoned; and afterwards, on his return to England, by a mad doctor, who purposes to use him for experimental purposes. Through this stauge tale of adventure there rans a pretty love story.
Bismillah. By A. J Dawson. London: Mac- millan and Co. Limited. 1898. (Hong- kong: Kelly and Walsh, Limited.) The scene of Mr. Dawson's ́tale is laid Morocco, and the plot turns on the love of
The Times of India Calendar and Directory for
1899.
This standard book, which long ago attained a bigh reputation for completeness aud accur- asy, keeps well abreast of the times, the new volume, as each of its predecessors, showing some fresh features and being well up to date. A list of its contents would occupy too much space, but we may mention that besides com- mercial directories for, Bombay and Karachi, arranged alphabetically and by trades and streets, and lists of European and the principal Farsee, Mahomedan, and Hindu local residents and European residents in the Mofussil, it contains complete Indian Army and Civil lists; partio- ulars of the rapidly increasing number of manufacturing and other public companies; comparative statements of the finances and imports and exports of India; tables of exchange, weights and measures, etc. Among the additions this year we notice the City of Bombay Im provement Au 1898. The book is well printed and bound and this year gives portraits of Lord and Lady Curzon,
.
[February 18, 1899.
GREAT EASTERN AND GALE DONIAN GOLD MINING CO., LIMITED.
Hongkong, 14th February. Mesers. Lutgeus, Einstmann & Co., General Agents of the Great Eastern and Caledonian Gold. Mining Co., Limited, inform us that a telegram has been received from the mines stating that 385 tons of quartz from Great Eastern Mine was crushed, yielding 288 oss. The quartz from the Zulu mine has not yet been crushed. Crushing will be recommenced at the earliest possible moment. ⠀⠀
17th February.
We are informed by Messrs. Lutgens, Einst mann & Co. (General Agents of the Great Eastern and Caledonian Gold Mining Co., Ld.) that, owing to the misuse of a code word by the Manager at the Mines, the result of the clean up was wrongly stated as 288 ozs. instead of 18 ozs. In reply to a telegram inquiring what the bullion had realised, Mr. Georg wires:
*18 lbs. I have made a mistake", should read thus-18 oz. The Mill bas run 21 days. Eastern crushing entirely wrecked. Foul play; probably chemicals. Should yield at least 8 dwts. per ton. I have already recom- menced battery, Zulu. Every précaution has been taken to secure. 400 tons Zulu should. yield at least 500 ozs,' The telegrams can be seen by shareholders at the office of the Company.
**
THE SHANGHAI LAND INVEST- MENT CO., LIMITED.
The annual meeting of shareholders in the above company was held at the offices of Messrs. Gibb, Livingston & Co., Shanghai, on the 8th February. Mr. H. R. Hearn presided and amongst these present were Messrs. H. R. Kinnear, E. Jenner Hogg, and C. J. Dudgeon (directors), H. Snetblage, Crawford Kerr, J. M. Young, C. Thorne, R. S. Harvey, P. H. Pur- cell, W. H. Poate, H. P. Wilkinson, H. F. Bell, H. E. Campbell, H. Mooga, L. Moore, E. H. Davis, W. Lamond, and A. McLeod, representing in all 2,303 shares.
The notice convening the meeting having been road.
The Chairman said-The report and accounts have been in your hands for some days and I may be permitted to take it for granted that you will consider them as read. What will of course have first attracted your attention is the fact that, though the dividends for the year paid and proposed exceed those of '97 by Tls. 7,000 the ratio for the half year that we pro- pose shall be distributed is but 6 per cent, as against 63 per cent. last year. It must not be argued, however, that this indicates lessened prosperity to the Company, since it must be re- membered that more than 4 per cent of the dividend last year came out of profits
property. Our anticipations of a sale of
-
this year in equal ratio to that of last were indeed fully warranted as far as our ren- tals were concerned, the receipts from these having been as is now shown Tls. 29,514 over those of '97. The expenditure incidental to these, however, has been greatly heavier, being Tls, 32,099 against Tls: 21,247, and this has disturbed our calculations. Of course, I am aware that this increase comes naturally from the greater number of buildings in occupa- tion, but there has been higher taxation and increase in insurance by reason of higher valuations for buildings. It is in unusual calls for repairs, however, that the point lies--in repairs to roofs owing to the heavy gales in the spring, in the substitution in many houses in Nos. 1 and 2 Estates of concrete paving for the back yards in lieu of broken tiles (considered necessary for sanitary reasons), and finally in other heavy constructional repairs to fire walls, eto. I do not know that I have any. thing to add to what is said in the report tauch, ing our several properties except I may mention that during the year Tls. 181,560 has been spent in new buildings, and that under the same head·· we shall this year require about Tls. 122,000. All our houses are let and the loss by thearoent fire in Hongkew was of course fully covered by insurance. The working account does not ap- pear to call for further comment than I have already, given to it. Turning to õukusmets