November 21, 1909.7
may see
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
871
Speaking on behalf of the unofficial members, I can confidently say that we have all listened to your farewell speech with equal interest and regret, with great interest because of the im portant questions with which it deals, with per- sonal regret because we recognise that it is the last occasion on which you will address this Council. I can assure you, Sir, that we most cordially reciprocate the expressions of good- will that have fallen from you. The relations between the head
(Applause.) of the Executive and this Council, during your Excellency's tenure of office, have been marked with the best of feeling, and I am süre that all my colleagues will agree with me that every opportunity has been given by you for the ventilation and discussion of debatable questions. For my own part, I can truly say that I bave always received the greatest consideration at your hands; that for any subject I desired publicity you have afforded have had the good fortune to be able to pat me every facility; and any proposals that I forward for the benefit of the Colony have received your prompt attention and your earnest Colony in many respects much better than Your Excellency will leave this
you found it. Public works have made some initiate them than actually to bring them to com: progress, bat perhaps more has been done to
pletion. You have sown where your successor will reap. Works commenced in your time will be completed during his term of office. The bounds of the Colony have been extended, the population considerably increased, its impor tance enhanced, and its revenue very largely augmented, co largely, indeed, that the sanitary may be gradually carried into effect without in- improvements, which are now so very necessary, creasing the taxation. That progress will, I am sanguine, continue, Neither emporary commercial depression nor the recurrent out- breaks of plague will be able to permanently arrest it; and I trust that Your Excellency will be able to note from your new post in Ceylon the onward march of that improvement here that you have laboured to promote. (Applause.) I must not monopolise the time of the Council.
Ordinance has been passed, under the provi- of Sir Robert Hart, and also, of the late Li Hung. sions of which the houses of the future will Chang, but the committee appointed by the Vice- be of a more sanitary type, and surface over- roy to report upon them reported unfavourably crowding that is found in the Chinese part aud the matter was shelved, in spits of frequent of the City of Victoria, will be no longer protests, until the whole position was consider. possible. An able bacteriologist has been ed by the Treaty Commissioners, and the added to the permanent staff, for whom a proposals were definitely accepted. The value suitable laboratory is being built, and from his of Waichow on the East River may not be original researches valuable results have so apparent at pr sent, but it was added at already been obtained, and still more important my suggestion, as in my opinion it may one discoveries may be expected in the future. day be a valuable link in the direct trade So far it cannot be said that we have been between the rich East River valley to the more successful here than in other countries north, and Hongkong, the land communication in discovering the onuses or checking the between Waichow and Mirs Bay presenting ravages of plague, but investigation and ex- no enginearing difficulties. (Applanse.) Dur- periments made during the epidemic of ing the evenful five years of my administra- this year afford a Lope that next year tion Hongkong has been brought face to face a step in advancy in prevention, with typhoon, war, pestilence, and famine, and and treatment, should, unhappily, the plague I look back with admiration to the behaviour of again develop in epidemic form. In the the colony in every contingency. Abounding treatment of Malaria We have profited charity and generosity accompany the buoyant by the light thrown upon its cauration by the energy of the community, and I find that within experiments of Celli Ross and other investi- the five years over $425,000 have been subscribed gators, and systematic arrangements have been in aid of the widows and orphans of our soldiers made to control the qullabs and pools in which and sailors who fell in the South African war; the anopheles mosquito bas hitherto b.ed along in aid of the famine-stricken people of Kwang-support. the face of the hills that dominate the city.si; in aid of the sufferers by the destructive Over $93,000 have been expended already in typhoon of 1900; and in aid of the fund for this work, with the result that while in 1902 the erection in London of a memorial to our 3,795 cases were admitted to various civil and late revered and beloved Queen; and this military hospitals, the number of cases reported in addition 10 the local charities of this year to the present date is 2,408; It is
the Chinese portion of the community, of which to be hoped that with perseverance and but few realise the extent, or the economy and thoroughness in the destruction of the anopheles ability with which they are administered. It mosquito this danger to the community will ulti- has been my pleasant duty to open two hospitals mately be removed. To more effectually carry within the past year, built by the Chinese out the recommendations of the two experts to community at an expense of $140,000, and whose reports I have alluded it has been decided affording accommodation to 136 patients. Ao to recommend the formation of a bod of rustees equally pleasant task has been the opening this at whose disposal funds will be placed for the month of the Victoria Jubilee Hospital for necessary operation of remodelling this over- Women and Children on Barker Road, built crowded city. That any system of sanitation by joint subscription and grant from Colonial with even scrupulous cleanliness could ronder funds, in commemoration of the Jubilee of Her healthy areas in which the register. d population Majesty the late Queen. I will not weary you is 1,000 to the acre or 640,000 to the square with further figures. I desire but to emphasise mile (and I have reason to believe that the some of the salient features of the time during registered population is considerably below the which I have been Governor of the Colony, real density), is not to be expected. The difficulty have especially dwelt upon the treatment of the must be solved by the creation of a new city by problem to be solved on the New Territory because resumption, ra-sale, and reconstruction; and with on the experience of the 400,000 Chinese in this the steady operation of such a trust as is proposed Colony is formed the Chinese estimate of there is no reason why this necessary improvement British justice and of the security that is to of Victoria should not be effected within twenty be found under the British flag, and years, at a moderate cast to the inhabitants, who, it surel, as the water of the great rivers flow must be remembered, have the happy distinction from the snow- capped mountains to the sea, of bearing the lightest burden of taxation of so surely will the estimate of our qualities as any colony in the British Empire. (Applause.) In a nation flow from sea to mountain, following the elementary principles of sauitation by pre- the lines of trade to their extremest limits. venting surface overcrowding we are far behind To every one of us who lifts his eyes from the Chinese, who even in their largest cities the immediate exigencies of the business of the keep down the general height of their houses hour and looks into the future, this conviction to one story. When Victoria has been carries with it a sense of great responsibility, reconstructed I hope that the four-storied and apart from our national sense of justice tenement-house will have ceased to exist.
compels us so to deal with the Chinese But no reconstruction of the city, or advance people with whom we come in contact as to of material wealth should be allowed to satisfy them that in Hongkong they will find a interfere with the development by education Government fair and just, helping to shape the of the minds and character of the people. This destinies of a free community where commercial is the foundation upon which our hopes must activity is sustained and developed by that rest for the stability of the colony of the future, security without which no commerce can expand. and it is not being neglected. As the result (Applause.) I shall leave the Colony with a last- of a commission on the subject, a new ing and grateful remembrance of the assistance code has been arranged that will improve and support that I have invariably received from the present system Petitions were received the members of this Council which includes all from the European residents praying the members of my Executive Council. Fair for the establishment of a school for the and independent criticism no honest Govern- separate instruction of European children, and ment need fear, nor prudent Governor ignore, from Chinese residents praying for the and the changes between rough-hewn Bills and establishment of a school for the education of the finished Ordinances bear witness to the the better classes of Chinese. Both proposals care with which the members of this Council, were approved. The English school has been especially the unofficial members, have examined established in Kowloon by kindness of Mr. Ho the measures introduced, and the readiness of Tang, by whose permission a school just the Government to yield to sound objections. completed by him, at considerable expense, and In a Council whose discussions and debates have presented to the colony as a mixed school for been actuated by a strong sense of public duty, both races, was de o ed to the purpose of a and into which no element of personal rancour school for Europeans, the Government under- has ever entered, my duties have been light taking to replace it by building a school in indeed, and in bidding this Council farewell I Yaumati, which is now in course of construction.
do so with a lively sense of gratitude for the The school for the children of the better happy relations that have always existed between classes of Chinese has been established by private us, and an earnest prayer that the interests of enterprise. It was with great pleasure that I the many people who form the community of saw at last accomplished the opening of addi- this great port an Colony will always in the tional treaty ports and ports of call on the West future be safeguarded by members as able, River. The proposals now sanctioned by impartial, and single-minded as yon, gentlemen, Treaty were formally accepted by the Tsung-li to whom, as your President, I now say good-bye. Yamen in two interviews that had with that (Loud applause.) body at Peking in 1900. They had the approval
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Hon. Sir PAUL CHATER-Your Excellency,
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am sure my unofficial colleagues are anxious to address you, too, and no doubt they will fill in the gaps which I am only too conscious occur in my own. In conclusion, nothing now remains but to bid you, officially, farewell, and to assure you that the unvarying taat, patience, and good temper with which you have presided over the deliberations of this body, and the conscientions care you have taken in the admin- istration of affairs during the last five years will abide with us in the future. (Applause.)
Hon. Dr. Ho KAI-Your Excellency, As senior representative of the Chinese at this Council I may be permitted to add a few words to the remarks of the senior unofficial member, with which, I may say, I fully concur. Your Excellency has presided over as for a period of five years. During that time the deliberations and discussions in this Council have been conducted without personal ranoour, as your Excellency said, and with mutual good feeling, and this I venture to ascribe in a great measure to your consummate tact and courtesy and your fairness and sound judgment. You have just given us, Sir, a concise review of the salient features of your administration, and will you permit me to say, Sir, that your past administrative acts have given entire satisfaction to the community which I have the honour to represent, and havé, moreover, won the confidence and respect, the admiration and affection of the whole of the Chinese community. I am confident, Sir, that they will be fruitful of the best results to the Colony and the New Territory also, which has been newly acquired. Personally I cannot bid you farewell to-day without thanking you for your invariable kindness and consideration to myself and my colleague in this Council, Mr. Wei Yuk, in our capacity as representatives of the Chinese. No one knows better than” your Excellency that it is oftentimes an arduous task to represent the multifarious and many interests of this community in the Connell, but by your kindness and your great consideration and assistance we have found that task made very easy for us, and sometimes very pleasant, so that I myself cannot allow this occasion to pass without thanking your Excellency, most sincerely for your past kindness to us and