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northern port. We have made these pre- fatory remarks, in view of a widespread idea in the model settlement that it is not fair for the Municipal Council to compete with private traders, when the raison d'etre of the settlement is private trading. That seems to us a fair presentation of the spirit animating last year's public meeting at which the ratepayers were persuaded to prevent their governing representatives entering the arena as suppliers and fixers of electric fittings. We have managed, we hope, to indicate that municipal tra-ling at a place advanced to Shanghai's stage of development is not a question of principle to be answered "aye or no"; but a question for quan- titative analysis. In such an analysis, we would say that the supply of electric light and power, being a necessity of the general public, is not a privilege or perquisite to which any one member or section of the public can lay claim by any right of cus- tom or principle. The public of Shanghai was yesterday asked to sanction the sale to a private concern of its Municipal Electri- city Department. This proposal, though arising out of the project to allow a private firm to lay down a tramway system, was in- evitable so long as the evident prejudice against the whole principle of municipal trading was permitted to continue. Such a prejudice, we are convinced, was created expressly to stop municipal competition with a number of firms of electrical fitters; and it was that prejudice which did, in fact, defeat those who contended that the people, having undertaken the elec- trical supply by and for themselves, were
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
was liable to give its suffrage to the side which most successfully excited its mirth. The Rev. C. E. DARWENT might have been well advised to retort in kind, and ask:
"How would this read in the papers? 'Tenders for Governing Shanghai.-The tenders for running the Municipality of | Shanghai, maintaining public works, and
&c., levying rates,
were opened on Sunday; and Mr. Merchant's being the cheapest, the contract was let to that gentleman by his retiring predecessor.'
[June 12, 1905.
EDUCATION : THE OBJECT
LESSON OF CHINA.
(Daily Press, 8th June.)
The effects of the examination system which has for ages been in force in China, and which has had much to do with the formation of the Chinese intellect, are well worthy of consideration by those at home who pin their faith upon a mode of pro- cedure now rapidly approaching that of the Chinese.
It is somewhat curious that, A good many of Mr. DARWENT's critics were bound to cite the recent British scare while our educational authorities have for over alleged municipal extravagance. That years been discussing the effects of forced scare, we now know, was seriously exag-examinations, with the result that some of gerated. No allowance was made for the the best experts have been disposed to large proportion of municipal expenditure denounce the system as pernicious and sunk in really remunerative undertakings. mistaken, it does not seem to have occurred Common honesty drags this admission from to anyone to refer to the great object lesson us, for we are heartily in sympathy with on this subject, which is presented by what those who deprecate the costly mollycoddling has been produced in China by persistent and pampering introduced into municipal adherence to this very method. The Chinese legislation at Home by the Labour element. mind affords a very useful illustration of There is, however, a difference between the effects, both for good and for evil, which supplying gas or electricity for a town and, such a system is calculated to produce. say, ornamental trees for a slum. Again, cases China the test of severe examination for of municipal mismanagement were being scholastic degrees has been carried to lengths freely cited. Surely this is not against rea- never dreamt of in any other part of the sonable municipal trading? If the Shanghai world, and the whole course of Chinese Municipal Council were to mismanage the education is based upon the highest cultiva- Electric Department, the Shanghai voters tion of the faculty of most value under such have their remedy. They do not need to circumstances, that namely of accurate, but
Those who have had be told this, for when their representatives perfunctory memory. promised to manage it too well, they showed their power, if not their wisdom. One contributor, ou the side of the angels, remarked:
"The success of the previous electrical raid has evidently proved stimulating if it bas lightened our pockets, let us hope it has cleared our heads, and that Ciceronian eloquence will this time prove futile in making us part with what belongs in some part to ourselves, but
opposed to
are
entitled to extend their business to its collateral necessities. Municipal gas companies supply all kinds of gas fittings; the Shanghai Municipality was electorally forbidden to supply electric fittings, although it was supplying electricity. There
more importantly to the great mass of rate. Was no element of logic or reasonable
whose voice cannot be heard, because payers, argument introduced; the interested traders their ratings do not entitle them to vote." put up an eloquent newcomer to address Without wishing at this late stage to the packed assembly of voters. The gentle-introduce side issues, we may remark that man, a lawyer, addkessed them as a jury, therein is indicated Shanghai's power to, as skipping from ad captandum declamations, DE QUINCEY might say, "quantificate the against taking bread" out of certain predicate." In some things, Shanghai- mouths, to facetious quotations that tickled lauders are communists; in others, individ- the lamb-like (we had almost said sheep-ualists. The community boasts of its like) voters to the slaughter. This meeting Municipal Council and its Model Settle- then, which, if it decided anything, con- ment; and allows a comparatively few demned municipal trading root and branch, ¦ individuals to settle everything. The while removing only a branch, was in Municipality may trade in land; but not evitably only the forerunner of another to in electric
fans ; its constituents remove the root; this task was essayed yes-
Municipal trading, but they terday. During a very long correspondence still look and long for a tramway that has been running in the columns of system because they fear that the private our contemporaries, we have noticed the firm fiually entrusted with the concession tendency to consider the question as one of may get too much out of them. A principle instead of fact. The opponents study of the Municipal Administration of of municipal trading in general argue, it Shanghai by a mind like Mr. ALLEYNE seems to us, as they have acted, very incon- IRELAND'S ought to be interesting, especially sistently. Thus, one reverend correspondent, if accompanied by an authoritative appendix the Rev. C. E. DARWENT, of a nonconformist on the psychology of the Model Voter. The church called the Union Church, writes a Rev. C. E. DARWENT asked the voters to very able summary of the arguments in think the matter over. Whether they. favour of municipal monopolies in the case did devote to it more thought than usual, of public necessaries; and is thus replied or whether he saved his most telling shots for the meeting, and hurled them at the wobbling crowd at voting time, we cannot at present say; but our telegram heading the adjoining column shows that those who dread municipal trading were mercilessly snubbed. Now the Council should be restored the power to extend its business to logical limits, for we are unable to see how electrical fittings can be "quantificated."
to :-
"How would this read in the newspapers? "Services for next Sunday. The Vice-Chairman of the Council will preach twice at the Union Church, and the Municipal Assistant Engineer and Surveyor will officiate at the Cathedral,
"Mr. Darwent and other reverend gentle- men are at present without employment in consequence of the expansion of Municipal management, and are leaving Shanghai with a large body of commercial refugees"
I am, etc., MERCHANT,'
That was very amusing, so dangerously amusing, in fact, that a Shanghai voters' meeting, which from its bearing usually seems to assemble in order to be amused,
*
Five hundred and fifteen deaths were
registered in Hongkong during April. Twenty nine occurred among the European and foreign community. Excluding the Army and Navy the death rate was 17.7 per thousand,
Ia
to do with the more educated Chinese have, indeed, been astonished at the powers which they possess in this respect. An instance is mentioned where a European who was studying Chinese translated roughly to his
C4
Teacher," as an exercise, about a column of the newspaper report of a legal case which and, on his asking his teacher whether he was attracting some attention at the time, had understood it, the teacher replied in the
affirmative and, to the pupils astonishment, in lieu of giving a summary, repeated sentence by sentence what had been blun- deringly translated to him--and id so as a matter of course, evidently attaching no importance to his ability to perform such a feat. This faculty of memory, invaluable no doubt, in certain directions, is probably to some degree hereditary with the Chinese, and is strengthened by the immense amount of mere learinng by heart, which forms the staple of their intellectual training. Something, of course, must be allowed for: their individual character, but, in the main,
the extraordinary powers of memory which the Chinese possess are, no doubt, due to education. We thus have in them a very good indication of what may be expected from a method of teaching which makes constantly increasing demands upon the mere powers of memory, as, there can be no question, has been the tendency of the examination system which has of late years been so inch pressed forward in England, despite the warnings of men like MATTHEW ARNOLD who were fully alive to its short- comings.
The ultimate effect of such a
system is to crush out individual thought and to bring the intellectual development a dead of a country to something like level-such as, indeed, is very generally found among the Chinese, who are proverbially lacking in anything approach- ing originality. The wonder is, perhaps, that they are able to retain as much initiative as they have and that everything like an original idea has not been educated out of them. It is not surprising that we seldom find a Chinaman rise to any height
upon any given subject out of his ordinary range. He is quite content to go by prece dent or authority and seldom troubles to test principles for himself. On the other