હું
December 26, 1908.)
CHINA OVERLAND TRÅDE REPORT.
*
through fear of the unpleasant consequences | velimitation of the waters of Macao which sure to follow. It is under these conditions are preceeding normally. It can hardly be that Mr. Roosevelt, having left the drea❘ said that no differences " exist between of responsibility behind him, has stepped China and Portugal. If no differ-nces forward, and doubtless his country, if for existed there would be no need for negoti the moment inclined to jab, will in the long ation. What we understand by the dementi run come to be thankful, There re fort is that the negotiations for this delimitation unstely sins that both in the Unite 1St tes- of the boundary are following normal and in England the present murky atmo- course and there are no acute differences sphere is beginning to clear, but the oreas likely to render the present negotiations display Bome considerable differences. futile. There is a long history attached to While Mr. ROOSEVELT does not besitate to these negotiations. The boundaries of the tell unwelcome truths in the full confidence oldest Colony in China have never apparent. that the nation will one day back him up, ly been properly defined, and it is alleged an English Prime Minister appeara ve ting by the Chinese that Portugal has made his spleen because a country, returning considerable encroachments, listorians, we after ita late orgies of socialism and read, are divided in opinion as to whether disorder has thrown out all his reaction- the possession of Macao by the Portuguese ary schemes. In view of the fact that the was originally due to Imperial bounty or country, everywhere that it has had the to right of conquest. The Portuguese first opportunity to declare its opinion, has took up their residence at Macao in 1557, pronounced against these revolutionary and for many years prior to 1848 a rental measures, the present persistence in keep. of 500 taels a year was paid to the Chinese ing up an unwholesome agitation is authorities. In 1848 Governor FERREIRA inexplicable, except on the supposition that DO AMABAL refused to pay the rent il any they are to be taken as councils of despair, longer and forcibly drove out the Chinese and deliberately meant, so far as possible, Custom House and with it every vestige of to initi te a c nt st of classes. Both are, Chin se authority. This bold stroke cost however, suggestive as seeming to indicate t'e Governor his life in the following year, a general movement towards a return to and it was not until 1887 that the sove- wise councils on both sides of the Atlantic, reiguity of Portugal over the peninsula was after the political insanities of the last thirty formally, recognised by China in a Treaty.
In the Protocol China coufirme the "
per petual occupation and Government of Macao and its dependencies by Portugal, as any other Portuguese possessi-n." the Treaty as ratified at Peking in 1888, Article II reads as follows :
years,
PORTUGAL AND CHINA,
W
China confirms in its entirety the second article of the protocol of Lisbon, relating to the perpetual occupation and government of Macao by Portugal.
It is stipulated that Commissioners appointed by both Governments shall proceed to the de- limitation of the boundaries, which shall be determined by a special convention; but so long
as the delimitation of the boundaries is not con.
cluded, everything in respect to them shall continue as at present, without addition, diminu tion, or alteration by either of the parties.
(Daily Press, December 23.) Some sensational information seems to have been circulating in Portugal for the past month or so concerning the relations of that country with Chion in regard to the delimitation of the Portuguese territory of Macao. In a London aper to hand by the latest mail we observe a Lisbon telegram in the following terms:-" It is learned that a serious dispute has occurred between the Chinese and Portuguese Governments oing to the fact that the former has claimed the .
It is noteworthy that the words "and Portuguese territory of Macao. The affair,;
dependencies which are used in the it appears, is a sequel to the seizure of the
Protocol do not appear in the Treaty itself. Tatsu Maru by Japan. The ve-sel, it will be Some attempts Lave been made to define recalled, was captured near Macao, and the the boundaries of the Colony since that Chinese (Japanese?) nutt or ties thereupon Treaty was negot ated, but, the Chinese protested that she was at the time in Portu-Government declined to recognise Portugal's guese waters appealing to Portugal fr sup- port in this contention. Portugal, however, declined to have anything to do with be matter saying that the Tatsu Maru had be in seized in Chinese waters. China is now take ing Portugal at her word, and according to advices recived here, the Chinese troops are inciting the natives to open revolt against the Portuguese authorities. " telegram further stated that at a ing of the Cabinet, hastily summoned, it was decided to dispatch the cruisers Adamastor
The
meet-
title to certain islands as forming part of the Colony of Macao, and the boundaries o the Colony are still undeliniitated. Further provision was made in the Treaty of 1901 fora settlement of this question, and båd the re
not been so much delay over the matter we would probably never have heard of the Talsu Maru affair and its regret able developments. Article IV of that Treaty
reads:
Such steps as are necessary for the repression of smuggling in the territory and waters of
CHRISTMASTIDE.
HT
465
(Daily Press, December 24th.) The people of China have just been observing the Winter Solstice-a festival which the English-speaking house-boy of Hongkong usually interpreta as *the Chi- nese Christmas.' It is an interesting interpretation, and there is more in it than is probably dreamt of in the philosoply of the house-boy. The festival of the Nativity was not always celebrated by the Christain Church. During the first three centuries the Christians followed. the or dinary methods of reckoning time which prevailed among those around them, and it was not till the fourth century that the church fixed upon the twenty-fifth day of December for the commemoration of the day of the Nativity. Different causes bate been assigned for the choice of this date, and there are among the old writers those who opine that the festivities connected with the celebration of Christmas were intended to make up for the Saturnalia, conformably to the practice which had been acted upon from an earlier period, of smoothing the way for the conversion of the heathen by presenting their idolatrous ceremon es under a new form. And one writer says "there is not wanting reason to suppose that from the Winter Solstice being observed as the birthday of the sun, when that lumns ary, returning from the south, seemed to be restored to the world, the transition was suggested to the celebration of the birth of Him who in the light and life of the world." So much for the connection between the Chinese "Christmas" and our own, As to the pleasures we associate with the season, it will astonish many who are fond of mines pies to know that it used to be regarded in England as a point of orthodoxy, to partake of a mince pie because "this delegt- able dish was regarded with peculiar ayer- sion by the Puritans." All the favourite pastimes which we associate with the festival, such as music and dancing, dipping for nuts and apples, blind-man's-buff, and all the rest, were also regarded with f the utmost horror" by the Puritans, cursed them with a wiath that
-1
ti
+
est fanatical." It must therefore relief to all small boys and girls, know that the Puritans have ceased fro troubling and that the flum pudding ind the mince pie are in no danger of disappearing from the Christmas Also that Father Christmas is still alive to pay his annual visit even to boys and girls in Hengkong and China coast ports. Tuis has been described as an age child-worship -an age when the child is the centre of
menu.
attention for many, if not indeed, all cli ases of the community, and has a place in public and privat life unknown and undres ut of by parents and children of my bity years ago. We can realise this at Christe
and Dora and the gunboats Patria and Rio Macao shall be taken by the local Portuguese mas better thau at any other time of the
say
Lima to Macao immediately, as news was said to have reached the Government that conflicts had already taken place. Ev dent- ly the New York journalist must look to his laurels if in his genius for invention he is not to be outshone by his confrères in Lis- bon. It is quite unnecessary for us t that there have been no conflicts between the Chinese and the Portugue et Macao, and no crisis has been reached, or is likely to be reached, we think, over the delimitation of the boundaries of the colony. But some- body seems to be still filling the public mind in Lisbon with apprehension, for a Reu'er's telegram we publish to-day announces that it has been declared in Lisbon that there are no differences between China and Portugal in the negotiations for the
[
Government in concert with the Commissioner year for the windows of the shops, speak of the Imperial Maritime Customs, and similar eloquently enough of this sentiment of the steps in the Chinese territory and waters near
age, as also of many other changed, spects Macao shall be taken by the Imperial Maritime
of the observance of Christmas. Not only Customs in concert with the Portuguese has none of the "old honour” of Christmas Government of Macao. This co-operation is departed, but the development of rapid intended to render such steps effective on all communications in the last half needed, and to avoid at the same time any injury points in respect of which co-operation is
or 80 have brought about, the granth to the sovereign rights of either of the High of customs which serve to make the Contracting Parties. Special delegates from festival more honourel than ever h for the local Government of Macao and the Imperial Take the Christmas Card as ingage Maritime Customs shall proceed to fix the How many millions of these cards ard-now respective zones of operations and shall devise sold every year? They must indeed rou practical means for the repression of smuggling into many millions in the English-speakiug After a delay of four years these deleg tdcountries alone. Yet it was pot before 1862 have now been appointed, and it may be that the first Christmas Card was issued ty hoped that they will soon come to an ami-
a London firm. The first carda, bore pictures cable an! final settlement of the question.
of robins, holly &c., and were very morsent