1887-1903
COLONIAL REPORTS- ANNUAL.
43
The Colony contributed $530,444.30 (17 per cent. of its revenue) towards the cost of the above, besides $45,000 in aid of the construction of barracks, and $45,300 for defence works, making a total of $620,744.30.
(2.) VOLUNTEER FORCES.
The total establishment of the corps is 350 of all ranks. The strength last year was one field battery (93) of six 2.5 q.f. machine guns, three machine gun companies (146) of four Maxim guns each, an infantry company (31), an engineer company (20), and a band (13).
The corps was re-armed with .303" Martini-Enfield artillery carbines and magazine Lee-Enfield rifles.
The .45" Maxim guns are being converted into guns of .303" calibre.
The expenditure on the volunteers, which is entirely borne by the Colony, was $28,644.23 for the year.
(3.) EUROPEAN AND INDIAN POLICE.
The European and Indian police are a Constabulary Force, being armed with Martini-Enfield carbines.
257
X.-GENERAL OBSERVATIONS.
The most important event of the year was the taking over and subsequent government of the New Territory, upon which I have already fully reported.
The plague again visited the Colony in epidemic form.
The flow of Chinese to and from the Colony is continual. Over sixty-one thousand persons emigrated from here, nine-twelfths of them going to the Straits Settlements, 7,500 went to San Francisco, and 3,500 to British Columbia.
One hundred and ten thousand Chinese returned to Hong Kong from ports other than Chinese, of whom 94,000 came from the Straits Settlements. The vast majority of these emigrants and immigrants merely pass through Hong Kong en route from and to China.