227
THE
HONGKONG MERCURY AND SHIPPING GAZETTE.
THURSDAY, 11TH OCTOBER, 1868.
If the Chinese Issue of the Daily Press is by any means a correct transcript of the sheet presented to the bewildered gaze of the subscribers to the English Edition of our morning contemporary, it is not at all to be wondered at that the Chinese Community of Hongkong are perturbed in mind and uncertain whether to go or to stay. In the Daily Press of yesterday there are three different statements bearing on the present position of affairs in Hongkong: In the Leader with which our contemporary opens the Ball, the terrible depression in the value of property existing in the Chinese town, estimated by the Daily Press at 20 per cent, is attributed, with a profanity of expression unusual in well conducted English papers, to the apprehension excited in the Chinese mind by "the Gospel according to Sir Richard" preached through the medium of the new Ordinances. This assertion, prefaced by the words "It is unquestioned" is so unqualified and of so positive a nature, supported, as it is by a reference to experience, that it is with no small degree of astonishment that, in the same page, in the City Article (or the apology for one published under the heading Commercial Intelligence,) the reader finds it laid down that "one Important cause" of the extreme dulness pervading all mercantile and business circles may be traced to the tightness of the Canton Money Market." Stringency is the word our contemporary uses, we prefer however the more ordinary form of expression. The cause of this scarcity of money in the Canton Market is unknown to our contemporary, the only wonder being that he did not at once attribute it to the Stamp Act. We can supply him en passant for his text City Article with one item of intelligence which may tend to throw some light on the depreciation of house and land property in this Colony just at present, and which may have some share in producing the present monetary crisis. One of our largest banking establishments is, we have been given to understand, calling in all its money lent out on the security of household property, the terms of its charter not allowing it, under any certain circumstances, to advance money on mortgage. Hence an excessive demand for accommodation, a corresponding rise in the value of money and an equivalent fall in the value of house and land property, especially among the Chinese, who had availed largely of the easy terms offered by the Bank in question at its first establishment and who are, therefore, now in many instances very seriously inconvenienced.
Our contemporary in a second article in the same paper enters con amore upon the question of the future of Kowloong, and foretells for it a greatness and grandeur that, if it is ever to come to pass, must result from and be accompanied by a corresponding degree of greatness and grandeur on the part of this Island of Hongkong. If, as the Daily Press would have us believe, Hongkong is being rapidly depopulated by the exodus of the Chinese population, the mainstay of the place, who are frightened away by Sir RICHARD's preachings, if the European merchants are, some of them, preparing to depart, if property has already decreased in value 20 per cent, with what degree of consistency does he discuss the future of Kowloong and predict its greatness. It is like discussing the pleasures of life and its prospects with a man who has been told he is at the point of death. Consistency never was, we believe, a virtue with our contemporary. But enough of the Daily Press and its follies; let us consider for a little what has in reality been the effect of Sir RICHARD's reply to the memorialists (Chinese), and how far it has tended to improve the aspect of affairs.
His Excellency's reply went fully into the objections urged by the Chinese in their memorial against the new Ordinances seriatim. It explained away difficulties, removed apprehensions, laid bare the rationale of the whole action of Government. An analysis of the Memorial and of the reply will afford ample proof of this. The style of the document was simple and severe. In tone it was authoritative and at the same time conciliatory. Just such a state paper as would accord in all points with what the Chinese would, a priori, expect from a government at the same time strong and just. The form of government under which they have been trained is eminently patriarchal. The greatest care was taken by H.E. the Governor to ensure the correct rendering of the Reply into the Chinese language; neither side nor trouble was spared, and from all we have heard, we can judge ourselves, we believe we may congratulate Sir RICHARD on his success in putting his ideas clearly before the Chinese in their own language. One or two trifling errors have been pointed out to us, but they are unimportant in themselves. The result among the Chinese Merchants is most gratifying. The general expression, say among the Queen's Road shopkeepers, is one of satisfaction that now they understand the matter aright. They confess to have been led into error, and not to have, up to the date of the reply, understood either the principles or the details of many of the new laws and regulations. We do not believe that, with the exception of one or two who are so closely connected with the piratical interest that it would not be good for them to remain much longer in Hongkong under the new regime, any of the Chinese merchants will leave the Colony. We never did believe it probable. But when the thing that is not is so pertinaciously asserted time after time by some who have possession of the public ear, it becomes a duty to assert what to all men of ordinary sense appears a truism and unnecessary to state,—i.e., Hongkong possesses in its position, in its security, in its good government, in its stability, too many advantages as compared with any port in China, to render it anything but an act of folly for people to leave it, even if the public burdens were much heavier than they are or ever likely to be.