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THE HONGKON) WEEKLY PRESS AND
(Daily Press 6th October.)
The
We take it that such pre- | BAD CHINESE IN SOUTH AFRICA. paredness inspired certain promises; for example, the undertakings of the MACKAY Treaty. Were we disposed to emulate the boldness of the modern prophet, and to fix a date, we fear our temptation would be to name the Greek kalends, Reading further in this testimony in the Daily News (the curious will find it reprinted for them in yesterday's Daily Press) we seem to recognise an old friend. The "Yellow Peril" people have apparently converted the Rev. TIMOTHY RICHARD, who introduces to us the Yellow Peril as a widespread and well organised Asiatic conspiracy against the White Peril. The people of Asia are sick of the White Peril. The arrogance of Europeans has become unbearable to them. China feels this more keenly than the other Asiatic nations. The Boxer rising was but an expression of that feeling." Can candour further go? We now learn from a mission- ary that the Boxer rising was entirely due to the unbearable arrogance of the Euro- peans against whom it was directed. It was chiefly directed, it may be remembered, at the colleagues and coufréres of the reverend deponent. Was it that the Boxers even then had learned all that their teachers had to teach ? This combination of Asiatic peoples, though: what ofthat? Dr. RICHARD says it is an Asiatic League, already ten "Statesmen from Siam, India, years old, and Persia, as well as from China, are influenced by the League, and visit Japan solely in connection with its objects. These are to resist the West with its own weapons, but with an Army far superior in numbers." This is distinctly thrilling. It is, moreover, definite. For ten years, just the period that our new Alliance is to run, Japan has been holding meetings of the conspirators who are to apply to the arrogant West the teachings of its own teachers. That Anglo Japan Treaty may stave off the evil day for ten years; but even if it do not, there is a grain of comfort to be found in Dr. RICHARD's own testimony. All Asia is not so firmly knitted together as those mysterious assemblies in Japan would seem to indicate. China herself is the traitor in the camp. Although she feels European arrogance more than the other Asiatics do we read that "China does not intend to lie at the mercy of Japan. It is a mistake to suppose that Japan is going to do what she likes with China.' Much is here implied. There is a suggestion of Japanese arrogance and possible encroachment; and that the arsenals that China is storing, and the troops she is training (with Japanese officers, by-the-way) are not aimed solely to waist in the Asiatic League's grand kick at the White Peril. There is-and this, as Dr. RICHARD knows, is no new thing in China—an arrière-pensée, a determination to reserve one cartridge for her friend Japan, if necessary. That sort of thing is sufficient to satisfy most men that the Yellow Peril is not so yellow as it has been painted; and it satisfies us that, as we suggested in opening, the Rev. TIMOTHY RICHARD was unwise to put dates to his prophecies.
On September 21st, a general meeting of the Toyo Kisen Kaisha adopted a proposal to increase the company's capital by yan 6.500,000, for the purpose of building two steamers of 12,000 tons each for the service between Hongkong and San Francisco. The net profit for last half-year was declared at you 235,587, including yen 20,899 brought over from last account. Of this sum, yen 16,000 was placed to the reserve, yen 195,000 was allotted for a
[October 7, 1905.
in all such enses of shutting the stable door after the horses have been stolen, rigid investigation was made after the attacks upon the farmers as to the whereabouts of the Chinese supposed to be on the mines. The result of the enquiries was certainly not reassuring, it being found that some hundreds were missing. Why the precaution of duly
calling the rolls " was not resorted to before, it is difficult to surmise. It is use- less to regret that so obvious a precaution was not taken; but at least it may be con- aidered certain that it will not be overlooked in the future; and it may be hoped that this, combined with more vigilance, and also with the probable capture and punish- ment of the miscreants, may prove sufficient to put an end to the danger, which certainly appeared at first sight to be alarming. The number of men who have contrived to get away from the compounds seems to point to the fact that there must have been many rascals who have joined with the bona fide labourers with the distinct object of getting free of restraint at the first opportunity and entering upon a career of robbery and violence. No doubt these geniuses put their heads together on board the ships which brought them from China: and were thus able to combine at an early date after their arrival to carry out their sebemes.
News of an unpleasant character with respect to the Chinese immigrants into South Africa has of late come to band. It appears that there have been more than one attack upon isolated country homesteads in the Transvaal, made by bands of Chinese desperadoes, who have contrived to escape from the compounds in which they are supposed to be confined; and that in some instances they have per petrated not only robberies but also murders.
matter has naturally exercised the authorities in the Transvaal considerably and no efforts had teen spared to bring the perpetrators of the outrages to justice. The event is certainly very unexpected; and it forms a warning of the care that is required in dealing with Chinese even in the most ordinary way, when there is any opportunity of combined action on their part. The matter, as might be expected, has been seized upon by those who have all along been opposed to Chinese immigration to denounce the system as a whole, and to point once more to the iniquity of introducing the Asiatic labourer into the South African mines. These denunciations, it is needless to say, go far beyond what is really warranted by the occurrences; but, at the same time, it is impossible to ignore that the incidents draw attention, in a painful way, to a some what serious aspect of the matter which bas, not altogether unnaturally, been over- looked. The idea of there being any serious danger of attacks of this kind by Chinese upon Europeans in a country governed by the latter might fairly be considered by those acquainted with Chinese habits and instincts as an unlikely contingency. The Chinese as a rule have a wholesome fear of coming within the reach of justice, and in any places where Europeans are in the ascendant, they are as a rule, little inclined to
violence against the foreigner. In the interior, where the Chinese are in overwhelming majority and where they have every hope that their authorities will be slow to punish them for attacking possibly some isolated mission station or tected traveller, they are inclined to violence often, as we know by painful experience of a serious character. This is, of course, easily understood; but it is something new to find such action resorted to in a Colony under the British Government. A cousideration, however, of the nature of the country will to some extent explain how sach an idea may have entered the heads of some of the immigrants in the Transvaal. Up to the present day the farms in that country are separated by wide distances, many of them, indeed, being almost isolated, so that in the event of any attack made by numbers, it is impossible to obtain any effective assistance. This fact would be easily discovered by any and were opposed by four-storey houses across rascals who might form part of the im-congested one, and the houses were, ar it were, migrants; and it would not take them long to perceive that the conditions of the country afforded,marauders just the opportunity that the Chinese so much like, that of joining together to attack a few defenceless individuals far inferior in num.
bers.
resort
to
some unpro-
Some of the poorer small Dutch homesteads are, if taken unawares, entirely at the mercy of any attacking band, and the temptation seems to have been too much for some of the men who had got away from the compounds to which they were supposed to be confined. Naturally the
Fortunately there are persons upon the spot well acquainted with Chinese ways, at the head of whom is Mr. JAMIESON, formerly of the Consular Service in China; and no doubt it will be found possible to devise means which will check attempts of this nature in the future; the chief of which, of course, will be ascertain- ing, by careful enquiry, who among the im migrants may be regarded as suspicious or dangerous characters. Meantime there is increasing vigilance both in the mines and among the police which, it is to be hoped, will have the effect of making further out- rages of this nature sufficiently hazardous to put an end to their being attempted.
HONGKONG SANITARY
BOARD.
the 3rd October at the Board Room.
A meeting of the Sanitary Board was held on Hon. Dr. F. Clark (President) prosided, and there were also present: Major Josling, Dr. W. W. Pearse, M.O.H., Mr. A. Rumjahn, Dr. Macfarlane, Mr. H. W. Slade, Mr. F. J. Badeley, Mr. A. W. Brewin, Mr. Lau Chu Pak and Mr. G. A. Woodcock (secretary).
DEFICIENT EXTERNAL AIR.
An application was made for a modification of the requirements of section 153 of the Public Health and Buildings Ordinance 1903 in respect
of Nos. 41 and 43 Hillier Street.
The M.O.H. reported that although the street was nearly 13 feet wide he could not recommend the granting of the application for the following reasons:-The houses were four-storey houses,
the street. The neighbourhood was a very in the bottom of a pit. The ground falls very rapidly down from Hollywood Road across Circular Pathway to Queen's Road, and there- fore the houses in question were not well situated for efficient ventilation.
On account of this report the Board previous- ly refused the application.
The further application forwarded by Messrs. Palmer and Turner, architects, in respect of these houses stated that to comply with the ordinance and obtain external air to these houses, it was necessary to set back the external walls for a distance of eight feet, a space so small that it was questionable if the houses would be at all impaired thereby as regards back the front walls a modification could be. granted for the first and second floors; omitting
dividend at the rate of 12 per cent per annum, ¡ question arises how it was that these men light and air. As an alternative to setting. and the balance of you 24,587 caried forward were able to absent themselves without being discovered. On the principle usual
to next account.
$