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being done, not only in the University of Hong Kong, but also in certain Universities in China, for example, those at Nanking and Amoy. Then again, such an Institute, if it is to be anything more than a waste of money and an encourage- ment for loafing, must have a well-qualified, capable and energetic staff. Such a staff cannot come from China, for men with the required qualifications and experience scarcely exist as yet. It would not easily be recruited from Great Britain, even if, as seems unlikely, its promoters were willing to appoint British subjects. Its staff might be recruited from America or from Germany, but is this desirable?
13. In my opinion, however, the greatest objection to the establishment of a permanent Board of Trustees is the fact that it will perpetuate the memory of the whole Boxer episode. Whatever the Board may be called in English, the Chinese will always connect it with the Boxer Rebellion. I submit that it is a gesture of doubtful friendliness to perpetuate a fund the source of which is money payable by China to His Majesty's Government as compensation on account of British subjects brutally murdered, robbed and outraged by Chinese. When I saw Lord Willingdon in May last, I told him what I felt about this; and I said, and he agreed, that any organization that it might be necessary to create in connection with the Indemnity Fund should be of a purely temporary nature. Possibly the objection which I have just put forward was in the mind of the veteran Chinese statesman referred to on page 15 of the Report as having expressed the view that all the money should be spent as soon as it became available. But this statesman is the only person referred to in the Report whose identity has been withheld.
14. I have already pleaded the claims of the University of Hong Kong. The Colony has been, and is still, passing through a severe ordeal: but it has shown remarkable powers of resistance and endurance, and it is a great satisfaction to record that the Hong Kong University has so far passed unscathed through a This period marked by violent agitation among Chinese students elsewhere. University can assuredly do much for the youth of China, and the whole attitude of the University's students during the last eighteen months has been a striking testimony to their appreciation of this fact. The Vice-Chancellor and one of the Chinese Lecturers have just paid a visit to the Straits Settlements and the Federated Malay States, and, though they made no public appeal they received spontaneous contributions amounting to 40,000 dollars from the Chinese there resident for the University's proposed Chinese Faculty. The Deputation admits (see page 83 of the Report) that its instructions were to allocate the Indemnity money for education and other purposes, but to keep education chiefly in view. I maintain, without any fear of serious contradiction, that the Hong Kong University is at the moment the enly institution in China for the education of the Chinese on which the Indemnity money could be spent safely, advantageously, and at once.
15. I venture, therefore, to suggest to His Majesty's Government that in the very difficult position which has arisen the best course would be to make over to the Hong Kong University the total capital sum for which it has asked, namely. £1,404,000. By the end of this year there will be lying in the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, to the credit of the Indemnity Fund, a sum which, according to the table printed on page 7 in the Deputation's Report. will amount to £1,686,938 7s. 11d. The sum asked for is, therefore, available.
16. In this connection I have to invite attention to the extract from the Deputation's minutes of the 20th May, 1926, quoted on page 63 of the Report. In this minute the Deputation expresses the opinion that expansion of the Hong Kong University would sooner or later necessitate its transfer to the mainland, and that it would therefore be a mistake to spend large sums of money on buildings on the present site. I cannot understand how the Deputation arrived at this opinion. None of the Chinese members have ever, to my knowledge, seen the University Dame Adelaide Anderson and Professor Soothill spent about an hour there on their way through Hong Kong to Shanghai. Lord Willingdon visited the University on three occasions. Not one of these members of the Deputation ever suggested that there was no room for extension on the present site; nor, so far as I am aware, did anyone connected with the University ever make such a suggestion to any one of them. The idea that the University should be moved to the mainland is entirely impracticable There is, moreover, ample room for expansion on the present site, especially as it is not contemplated that the University should ever contain more than about 500 students. Additional playing fields cannot be made on the present site, but they can be provided at a reasonable distance. The argument, therefore, that the University
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should not provide itself on its present site with the additional buildings which it requires is entirely without justification.
17. It may be objected that to give a large sum of money to the Hong Kong University would be unpopular in China. To this view I do not assent. The politicians and those journalists who are in the pay of the militarists would doubtless complain; but thoughtful Chinese of the better classes, who are not in the least anti-British at heart, would welcome the greater facilities which would be made available for giving their sons and daughters a sound education under conditions of security. It is such men who will count in the long run. The two Chinese members of the Hong Kong Legislative Council, Sir Shouson Chow and the Honourable Dr. R. H. Kotewall, sent, on the 30th March last, to Lord Willingdon, a letter, of which I attach a copy. The letter concludes as follows:-
We accordingly appeal with confidence to your Lordship and the other members of the Deputation for your support, and ask you not to be misled by fallacious political arguments into the neglect of an educational institution in which the Chinese have confidence, and which, if it could be provided with adequate funds, would be of incalculable value to the Chinese, not only in Hong Kong but throughout China.”
18. The Chinese are eminently people of practical common sense, and they respect hard-headed, practical wisdom in others. That His Majesty's Government should devote a portion of the Indemnity Fund to helping the Hong Kong University to establish itself and to be a centre of British influence in China. they would understand. What they would fail to comprehend is that, while refusing to cancel the Indemnity on the ground that such cancellation might have the disastrous effect of intensifying and prolonging civil strife in China by releasing large sums which would probably be used for warfare, the British Government should go to the trouble of elaborating a complicated and costly scheme, the effect of which would, in all probability, be that such money as is not spent on administration will find its way into the pockets of those same militarists whose activities are so loudly deplored.
I have, &c.
C. CLEMENTI,
Governor, &c.
The Right Hon.
Lieutenant-Colonel L. C. M. S. Amery, M.P.. &c.,
&c.
&c.,
Enclosure.
Right Hon. Viscount Willingdon, G.C.S.I., G.C.I.E.. G.B.E..
c/o British Consulate-General, Shanghai.
My Lord,
Hong Kong, March 30, 1926. HIS Excellency the Chancellor has already, we understand, sent forward for the consideration of your Lordship and the other members of the Boxer Indemnity Deputation a detailed scheme for the development and expansion of the University of Hong Kong. A pamphlet written by the Vice-Chancellor on the origin and growth of the University is also, we believe, in your Lordship's hands. We are members of the Court and the Council of the University, as also the two repre- sentatives of the Chinese Community on the Hong Kong Legislative Council. We know the feelings and wishes not only of the Chinese community of the Colony of Hong Kong, but also of the more conservative elements of the Chinese people generally. It is on this basis that we venture to approach your Lordship to express our appreciation of what the University has done, and our confidence that the strong clain of the University to share in any educational benefits to China which His Majesty's Government may decide to finance out of the Boxer Indemnity will not be overlooked.
2. We desire to emphasise at the outset that the founders of this University always insisted that the University was not for the Colony of Hong Kong alone, but for the Chinese people generally. It was on this understanding that the University secured supporters from Chinese throughout China, among the most enthusiastic of whom was the then Viceroy of Canton, his Excellency Chan Jen Chun.
3. Owing to financial and other internal difficulties and the unsettled condition of China which followed on the great European war, the University has experienced some set-backs. But it has educated students from all orer China, many of whom are now doing well; and it is perhaps not irrelevant to remind your Lordship in