# HILL DISTRICT RESERVATION
(Daily Press 29th March.)
In his recently issued book on Colonial Service, Sir WILLIAM DES Vaux, former Governor of this Colony, speaks with a certain amount of pride of the fact that during his administration, a measure devised by himself was passed, which proved "of inestimable benefit not only to the European population, but even to the richer Chinese." This was the European District Reservation Ordinance of 1888. At that time, as Sir WILLIAM DES Vaux writes, the high rents obtainable from Chinese-inhabited houses, crowded together as close as possible, had caused a continually increasing intrusion of such houses upon the quarter of the town formerly occupied exclusively by Europeans. "Little by little, but at a gradually increasing rate, the Europeans were being, so to speak, pushed out of the town of Victoria." It seemed as if Europeans would shortly only have the alternatives of living under the unhealthy conditions engendered by the overcrowding of a neighbourhood by Chinese-inhabited houses or of residing in the hill district at a heavy expense to their pockets. So the Ordinance—or rather Ordinances, for there were two dealing with the matter, Nos. 16 and 26 of 1888—were passed.
Nevertheless, a large portion of the area intended to be reserved has since practically been absorbed by Chinese, and it has been brought vividly to the attention of European householders that the process threatens to go on and deprive them of their stronghold, if we may call it so, at the Peak. Consequently, a petition has been got up by owners and occupiers of houses in the Hill district, and the Bill which was read for the first time at the Legislative Council meeting yesterday was the outcome of this agitation. The petitioners base their case upon the question of health, and rightly so. They argue that if the absorbing process mentioned above extends to the Peak, very serious results to the health of Europeans and their families will follow. "There being no other place for them to go to," the petition runs, "they would then be driven to reside below, where the conditions are highly prejudicial to their health."
The Hill district is undeniably "the healthiest part of the Colony for all those to whom life in the tropics presents the disadvantage of an unnatural environment; in fact, it is the only accessible part of the Colony which is fitted to be a healthy residential quarter for people accustomed to a temperate climate." The Chinese, on the other hand, are living here in their native climate, and do not suffer from the oppressive heat of the lower levels during the summer months as Europeans do. To show how pressing is the need in the European community for securing dwellings at the Peak, the petitioners urge the fact that the rent of houses there is nearly treble what it was ten years ago, in spite of the very great increase in the number of houses in the interval. But the number of reasonably available sites for houses in the Peak district is limited, and very few sites remain for additional houses.
The petition asks that this small part of the Colony be reserved for those who cannot live in equal well-being elsewhere, and claims that the future welfare of Hongkong and its value to the Empire depend to a large extent on the well-being of the European section, whose health it is therefore essential to preserve. We do not see how this can be gainsaid, and we trust that the prayer will be granted. The Chinese have hitherto shown no desire to occupy houses in the Peak district, and European families have consequently not suffered from the competition of Chinese in the part of the Colony most resembling their natural environment. But the fear has grown in them, inspired by the gradual ascent of Chinese houses from the lower levels upwards, that in the not very remote future, Chinese competition for Peak residences may arise, and in the limited available area, numbers of houses may cease to be open for Europeans.
Then they will be reduced to only one of the two alternatives spoken of by Sir WILLIAM DES VIEUX and mentioned by us above, namely, that of living with their families under unhealthy conditions. It is impossible not to recognise that this will be fraught with evil to the welfare of the Colony—"the welfare," as the petition states, "of its inhabitants as a whole, and its consequent value to the Empire."
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