October 5, 1907.]
narrow strait, in no part more than three miles, and at one point scarcely one m'le in breadth. This proximity allows the pirates and other plunderers of
the main to oross over to the isle by night, and there commit their depredations and atrocities. As there was no level space elsewhere, the English have built their town of Victoria along included, the town straggles to the length of 3 miles; breadth or depth it has none, being backed by ragged precipices and mountains which entirely shut it out from the healthy breezes of the ocean. Hongkong cannot be said to posses any vegetation at all; a few goats with difficulty find support. The rocks, which constitute the whole soil, are composed of rotten decomposing granite, which, as is well known (and was well known long before our men in authority took it as a settlement). is as pro. duotive of gases and malaria as any bad jungle in India. Scaroely a single man in our servic». whether European, Indian, Malay, or Macao Portuguese. has passed any time on the island without suffering most severely in health. The Chinese have always regarded the place as fatal to human life. and they will not live there beyond a certain season.
The mortality of our troops has been as one in three and a half. The diseases are endemic fevers, diarrhoes, dy sentry and pulmonic complaints. The Sapoys, having less stamina, suffer much more than the English soldiers. Our officers have been a obnoxious to disease as the common men. Rub
the seabeach. With the new Chinese bouses
beries were, and we believe still are, of nightly occurrence "It is very natural", says De Gutzlaff, "that depraved, idle, wicked characters from the adjacent main, should flock to the Colony. The islanders themselves, nearly all fishermen, are pirates when the opportunity presents. They are a roving set of beings, floating on the wide face of the ocean with their families, and committing depradations when ever it can be done with impunity. The stone. cutters have been working here for many years before our arrival: the majority of these men are unprincipled, they cannot be considered a, domesticated among us, and are in the habit of going and coming according to the state of their trade. The most numerons class who, since our arrival, have fired themselves on the island, are from Whampoa; many of them are of the very worst character, and are ready to commit any atrocity." Under the very shadow of the British flat these fellows hold their nocturnal clubs and secret societies. The members of these societies bind themselves to stand by one an other, and afford mutual protection. Thus the other Chinese are afraid of denouncing their crimes or informing against them. The proclamations of the governor seem to have had no effect in dissolving or even checking these
anti-social combinations.
It is true that Hongkong is conveniently near to Canto; but since the opening of Amoy, Ningpo, and the other ports, Canton ought not to be considered as the empo- riam. It is not a place of production it is not so much as a shipping-place; the teas, the silks, and all the commodities we were accustomed to purchase at Canton (because we were not then allowed to purchase elsewhere). are all brought at a very heavy expense of carriage, from great distances. Nor is Canton in any way the best avenue through which to ntroduce Christian conversion or European civilisation; for the population is perverse, presumptuous, turbulent, and altogotber the most indocile and the worst people in China.
At a committee meeting of the Kobe Golf Club held on Sept. 19th it was decided to hold the Amateur Championship of Japan on the 20th October. The Yokohama Golf Club have been ooramnnicated with, and have agreed to subscribe half the cost of the Cup, which is estimated at Y200. Conditions:-36 holes, medal play. Entrance fee Y3. Green fees will not be charged to competitors. The cap to be retained by the winner for one year, but not to be taken out of Japan. This year the championship will be played over the Kokkosan course; next year in Yokohama; and the Club over whose links the competition is played will present the winner with a replica of the Cup The competition is open to any amateur being a member of any recognised golf-club.
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
THE EVOLUTION OF HONGKONG..
[Written for the Daily Press.]
the 26th of January, 1841, when the Union As a Colony Hongkong had its natal day on Jack was officially raised on the spur forming the western boundary of Taipingahan, as well as on the Peak. This was in accordance with a circular issued six days previously by Capt. Charles Elliott, Her Majesty's Plenipotentiary, informing all British subjects that arrangements had been made between him and the Imperial Chinese Commissioner Kishen that the Island aud Harbour were ceeded to the British Crown, but that all just charges and duties to the Empire upon the commerce carried on there would be paid as if the trade were conducted at Whampoa.
The hoisting of the flag was, however, only the penultimate act of a long series of events, which may be said to have commenced as long ago as the year 1635, when the ship London despatched by the East India Company arrived in the month of July at Macao. Prior to this the Company had traded with Japan, where on the island of Hirado near the Goto Islands it had established a factory. It had also made attempts to open a trade at Amoy. but had met with but little success. The time was not propitious: at home the country was is the throes of revolution, and in China the Ming dynasty was falling, the present Manchurian rulers were rapidly consolidating their power, and the entire coast was in a state of turmoil.
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reply, "are more especially made known unto the world. One is, the abundant trade it affor- deth. The second is, that they admit no stranger into their country. The third is, that trade is as life unto the vulgar, which in remote parts they will seek and accommodate with hazard of all they have.
ceived how and where intercourse with that "In these three considerations it is easily con- nation is to be expected; for it requireth no whither they may come, and then to give them more care than to plant in some convenient place knowledge that you are planted."
where trading could be carried on without mole- From the beginning the idea of a settlement, station with the mainland of China had been where to find it. familiar to the Company, bat the trouble was The Dutch had for many years sought permission to trade directly along the coast, but disappointed with their want of success had settled down on Formosa; place not inconvenient in respect of nearness, but a barren haven, an open road, and inncon- venient for shipping. Yat," it goes on to say,
"should we show ourselves to trade there with the Dutch, it should be guarded with those diffi- culties and infinite charges, as if it were a silver mine."
ko-Duob, who likewise onngged Abrasse trade at the moment when the in the East, made it impossible to prose cute power of that nation had been greatly reduced
with any prospect of success the trade either with Canton, or China generally."
It was to cut the gordian knot that Captain Weddell made his bold attempt to enter into relation with the high officials direct; commer- cially the visit was not a success owing largely it would seem to the obstacles placed in the way by the Portuguese, who refused to permit the supercargoes to live on shore, and the Company ever timid about entering on new enterprises did not for some time repeat the experiment. But meanwhile the entire aspect of affairs was Up to this time the Portuguese had been the changed. Although the Tartar dynasty was only European nation who had suy established confirmed on the throne in 1640, a series of trade with China. In 1622 the Dutch had
years elapsed before tranquillity was restored attempted to wrest from them the monopoly of the trade and had attacked the Portuguese the establishment of Courteen's association, to the empire. These events, combined with settlement at Macao, but had been repulsed. originally promoted and conducted by Captain The Dutch then attempted to found a station of. Weddell in 1635, accompanied by hostile their own in Taiwan in Formosa, and fortedit!) as | ceedings at Cantoo, in which they were Lime were successful; but intrigues and counsels, and want of support from head-quarterbe in Batavis, as well as the growing strength of the pirate Koxinga, afterwards taken into the service of the new Mauobu Dynasty, in the end had their effect in crushing out the Dutch. An agreement had been meanwhile come to between the English and Dutch to trade in common, but the Dutch, it was complained, did not fairly carry cut their share, ant this induced the English to act altogether on their own accouut. At first an effort was made to work with the Portuguese, and fix the headquarters of the trade at Macao, Partly from jealousy of the new comers whom they esteemed little better than interlopers, and partly because the authorities at Macao feared to incur the displeasure of their Chinese hosts, the Captain and Supercargo found their visit made unpleasant, and Captain Weddell determined to take his ship up to Canton. When he arrived and fire opened on the London. Probably well at the Bogue bis further progress was forbidden, informed as to the reason, which seems to have been the unauthorised action of the lower officials, Captain Weddell boldly bombarded and silenced th forts and went up to the anchorage at Whampos where the ship anchored. The consequence of his action was that he received an nvitation to sa audience with the Viceroy, who received him with honour, and in a friendly spirit and agreed to the English ships being permitted to trade on the sims terms as the Portuguese. There has alwa s existed an in- clination t look upon Captain Weddall's action as little better than that of a free-booter, and the Viceroy's attitude as dictated by fear. There is, however, no real reason to suspect the Viceroy
as other than sincere.
In the first place the Manchu authority had not yet been established at Canton, and in the next there is little reason to doubt that the resistance at the Bogue had really been brought about by Portuguesa intrigus noting on the military commander. The Viceroy was ap- parently only too pleased to utilise the English man as a counterpoise to Portuguese pretensions Exclusion of the Foreigner had never been raised to a principle of politics under the Mings. In 1622 we find the Company consulting the head of its Presidency, then temporarily sta- tioned at Bantam, regarding the proposed opening of its trade:-"Three things," is the
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Then, of course, followed the civil war at home, which reduced to the lowest the finances of the Company, and rendered it powerless to undertake any new schemes. A letter from one of the Company's agents, still at Bantam, is interesting from the light it throws on the con- ditions of the period. The experiment which you desire we should make with one of our small vessels for trade into China, we are certainly informed by those who know the present state and "condition of that country very well, cannot be undertaken without the inevitable loss both of ships, mer,
and goods; for as the Tartars overrun and waste all the inland country, without settling any govern- meat in the places which they overcome, so fleet at sea of upwards of 1000 sail of great ships some of their great men in China, with a mighty (as is confidently reported), rob and spoil all the sea coasts, and whatsoever vessels they can meet with: and how one of our feeble vessels would be able to defend themselves against such forces is easy to be supposed. As for the Portugals in Macao, they are-little better then mere rebels against their vicroy in Goa, having lately mur dered their captain-genera seat thither to them and Macao itself so distracted amonst themselves, that they are daily spilling one another's blood. wise, we must needs say we are in a very poor But put the case, all these things were other- condition is seek out new discoveri-s while sailors, soarce half sufficient to maintain the you will not allow us factors, shipping or
trade already you have on foot; and therefore the Dutch but laugh at us, to see us meddle in now undertakings being hardly able to support the old."
under which the writer was evidently labouring The excitement and suppressed indignation is a sufficient explanation of the absɔnes of never the loss a vivid iden of the conditions under grammer; but this unvarnished record gives us which our trade with Chins had its beginnings and doubtless in the long run the memory o the helpless condition of the English Gö had its influence in increasing the
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