'
May 5, 1900.J
of the early departure from the United States of a Civil Commission to enquire into and in- stitute a permanent system of administration for the Philippines in place of the Military rule hitherto, necessitated by circumstances, and it is to be hoped that their recommendations will move towards less onerous taxation and regula. tions, which will assist instead of interfering > with the natural expansion of the trade of these fertile islands. At the Philadelphia Commercial Congress held last October, which was a great success and calculated to have valuable results, among other interesting points brought forward, our representative, Mr. Townsend, dwelt strong ly upon this subjectand his remarks are well worth attention....
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
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and the navigation by foreign steamers of the | tion of sanitary precautions should be tolerated for a moment, but that on the contrary it be- Inland waters of China. These, I think, most important for us here, and I hope that | kovos us mest earnestly to enquire into, and during the current year we may see these ques- discuss and examine every suggestion for the tions in a fair way to be satisfactorily settled. | improvement of the sanitary conditions of. Our Chairman has also referred to our financial | city and for the prevention of overcrowding position, which it is plossing to see is no sound, With these few remarks, I beg to second the adoption of the report and the accounts.
The report and accounts were unanimously adopted.
NEW MEMBERS,
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The Banitary Board has done much good work in taking steps to close houses which are unft for human habitation, but it is beco idg a serious question whether a condemnation of certain streets is not required in order, secure a greater circulation of air in the over- crowded quarters of our city,
The CHAIRMAN said he had very much plea.
Even, however, if you consider the causes of sure in proposing the confirmation of the elos- tion, since their last annual meeting, of the plague to be at present too obscure to justify following members:-Mr. W. S. Bailey (nowany such wholesale remedy as demolition and Messrs. Bailey and Co,), Messrs. McGregor reconstruction, I should like to draw, your ats Brothers and Gow, Mr. D. Haskell, Mr. R. C. tention to two osuses at work in our midst Wilcox, Messrs. L. Seulfort and Co., Messrs. which the mere ordinary man in the street Banker and Co., Mr. L. A. Levy, Mesaro. U. would imagine must form very important fac Nervegna and Co., Dr. Jordan, the Deutsche tors in propagating and continuing this epidemic Asiatische Bank, the Imperial Bank of China, in our midst. The first is the presence of night Messrs. Hotz s Jacob and Co., Messrs. H. soil in our drains, and the second is the presence Price and Co.
of decaying vegetable refuse in our drains. The presence of night soil in considerable quantities In our drains is attested by the last report of the Sanitary Surveyor, Mr. Drury, in which he #Y! :---
The apparent omission on the part of the Dominion Minister of Customs to in- clude Hongkong in the list of Colonies and Dependencies of the Empire entitled to the benefit of the British Preferential Duties in Canada having been pointed out by the agent of the Canadian Pacific Railway, your Com mittee have addressed the local Government on the subject, and asked His Excellency to bring the matter to the notice of the Secretary of State for the Colonies. Already some trade has been diverted from Hongkong in cense-
The following were eleated on the Committee: quence of this omission, and in the future such—Mr. R. Gray (Chairman) the Hon. J. J. Kes a drawback might have a for wider effect, wick (Vice-Chairman), Messrs. H. Smith, H. M. No it is to be hoped that this matter will Bevis, R. L. Richardson, A. M. Marshall, C. 8. soon be rectified.
Sharp, N. A. Siebs, and A. Haupt.
This was all the business..
You are aware how fally we have been represented on the Legislative Council by Mr. Whitehead, who deserves our thanks, and is now on a well-earned holiday, and in whose place for the time being we have just elected
Mr. Herbert Smith.
In regard to the Secretaryship, I sauuot speak too highly of the care and attention given to the affairs of the Chamber by Mr. Wilcox, whose works, as I have before remarked, is steadily increasing and requiring more and more time and attention. (Applause).
The General Committee has dwindled down to five representatives, four of its members having recently gone home, three of them with the intention of returning, but Mr. MoConachis, who has rendered valuable ---servios; on the Committee for many years will, I understand, remain at home. It will be for you to-day to elect a new committee as well as a chairman and vice-chairman. The remaining members of the outgoing Committee have agreed to serve again if elested.
Mr. HERBERT SMITH seconded, and the motion was carried.
ELECTION OF COMMITTEE,
MR. H. E. POLLOCK ON SOME SERIOUS LOCAL PROBLEMS.
At the City Hall on Wednesday evening, the 2nd instant, Mr. H. E. Pollock read a paper before the members of the Hong- kong Odd Volumes Society on "Some serious local problems and a few suggestions for dealing with them." There was a good atten- dance, H. E. Major-General Gascoigne, C.M.G., and Mrs. Gascoigne, Sir John Carrington, Kt, C.M.G. (Chief Justice), and the Hon, W. Meigh Goodman (Attorney-General) being among those present.
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The Hon. F. H. May presided. In opening the proceedings he said Mr. Pollock, who is well known to you, has kindly offered to-night to read us a lecture upon Some serious local problems and a few suggestions for dealing with them." In this rapidly growing colony there must necessarily be many problems which are not at all easy of solution. I am sure we shall all listen with a great deal of interest to what Mr. Pollock has got to say on this most important and most interesting subject. (Ap- plause..
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The roll of members has gone on increasing, I am glad to say, no less than 15 new members having been elected since last meeting, whose
●lection you will be asked to confirm directly. We have lost three during the year, two by death, one of whom, Mr. Granville Sharp, we all miss here today. Mr. Sharp was a regular atten-
Mr. Pollock said-Ladies and Gentlemen, dant at these meetings and we always listened propose to discuss with you this afternoon with much interest to the trenchant expres.
some local problems which, as I conceive, im- sion of his views, even if we did not entire-peratively demand a solution, and I shall aug. ly coincide with them.
gest certain remedies for the present state of affairs; but by chief desire and my chief hope is that some of you who are listening to me now will not rest content until you have thought out and put into motion some remedies of your own; and thus prevent matters from being allowed to drift in the future as they have drifted in the past. The pressing problems which require to be grappled with are difficult ones and we must, therefore, apply our collective wisdom to the task, if success is to be secured.
I have again to remark on the still im- proving financial position of the Chamber, As will be observed by the statement of accounts; our Reserve Fund amounted at the end of the year to $10,000, and I am glad to inform you that this has since been increased by the addition of $2,000, taken from the balance at credit. and placed on deposit at the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. We have had no opportunity ́of making use of the Pinnacle Rook Fund.
Having now touched upon most points dealt with in the Report, before proposing its adop. tion, the Committee will be glad to hear remarks on these or other subjects on which any mem bere present may desire to express opinions. (Applause.)
There being no question or remarks on the -report by members, the CHAirman moved that the Committee's report and Secretary's accounts for 1899 be passed.
Mr. RICHARDSON said-Gentlemen, after reading the report issued last week and hearing the speech by our Chairman, we must, I feel sure, each one of us, acknowledge that in one
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I will subdivide my subject for the sake of convenience, into three hendings, which I will call.
(1st) The Plague question, (2nd) The Food question; and
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Under clause No. 8 of his contract the con- servancy contractor is supposed to remove all night soil from the private houses in the Hill District, but in the City, this is done by various irresponsible coolies in places every night or every other night, according to the class of person dealt with; these coolies receive a small payment from the house occupantà but none for delivery at the conservancy boat. There is no sanitary staff for the supervision of the removal of night soil during the night, thus rendering the provisions of the contract useless. There being no staff for the supervision of the regalar removal of night soil from private houses, to enforce the provisions of the contract, the result is from evidence and observations that in the case of the Hill District soil it is emptied into nullahs, and in the city I find that much of it is emptied down the storm-gullies and drains and it is not to be expected that a Chinese coolie will trouble to remove the soil to the boat if he can safely empty it into a convenient gully-and this after the Government have expended $275,600 to divert sewage and sullage from the storm drains. I would point out that storm gullies are not trapped and that the gases from the storm drains escape at these points which are situated generally ten fest from some shop or house front; also that this small flow of sewage in the storm drains in the dry season is more harmful than the original full flow which they used to get and which naturally possessed better self-cleansing power; furthermore the sub-soil in the locality of these old storm drains still continues being polluted, and, as Mr. Chadwick prophesied (in Als 1889 Report on Sanitation in this Colony), "has now," no doubt, become an hotbed for disease and epidemio. (For further particulars as to misuse of storm drains vids the Honour- able Director of Public Works Annual Report, 1898).”
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That is what the Sanitary Surveyor says in his Official Report dated the 5th August last.
The presence of large quantities of vegetable refuse in our drains in a new terror which has been revealed to us by the recent report of the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon, Mr. Ladda, în¡ which he says, under the heading Hawkern :-**
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Consequent upon the crowded state of the markets, and the increased demand, the num- ber of so-called hawkers of vegetables has been largely augmented, especially: during the past
(3rd) The Housing of the Working Classes | ten years, so much so that many of the bys question.
THE PLAGUE QUESTION.
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streets of the city are often blocked up com- pletely by them. These people, who are not hawkers in any sense of the word, simply take up a fixed position where they are legat likely to be interfered with by the Polios and remain in the same spot until they have sold off, all their wares, disposing of the refuse, therefrom by stuffing it down the nearest drain and
Sproos
To take these three question in their order→ the plague question is one of supreme importance. It causes not only a considerable annually recurrent éxpenditure to the Government of this colony and to property owners, but it also involves severe commercial restrictions upon assistance in the work done by our Committee vessels journeying from here to adjacent places. From the decomposition of this vegetable and very able Secretary in the past year. Our
gases arise, which may No doubt the legislation pamed last year was | mat Chairman has just now referred in particular a stop in the right direction in that it increased certain conditions, highly injurious to public to a few of these questions of interest to ns from the size of cubioles and also the ventilation | health. These men never have hawked, and
coming into houses, but, in view of the fact | noves, will hawk, their goods
word, and in dual system of Customs in the Two Kwang | that the plague has become an annually raour Bömplody si sotéis with the abolition of pirusy rent dise
way or another we have received a measure of this port by the imposition of quarantine on | refarning next day to repeat”: thə -
which I would point out the abolition of the / 4
cepted