CO885-6 — Page 210

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

יוו

Reference :-

C.O. 882

6

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

1

76

INDEX to Administration Report, Wei-bai-wel, 1898–1902.

PAGE.

Introductory duties of Commissioner and Assistant Commissioner defined

70

The Village Administration

77

Land Administration

79

Land Settlement and Survey

RO

Administration of Justice

Police Affairs

Crime on the Frontier

Guols ...

Legislation

Revenue

Expenditure, Public Works and Roads

Possibility of increase of Revenue

Mining

...

Education. (Chinese)

Hospitals and Sanitation

...

The Retention of Jurisdiction in the Chinese City of Wei-hai-wei. Salt Taxation

91

92

Postal Arrangements

12

Telegraphic Communication

903

Curt roads on the mainland

Afforestation...

010

Meteorological, &c. ...

Wei-ni-wei compared with Hong Kong us a free port

Little possibility of development of local industrica .......

The walled City of Wei-hal-wei aul its connection with Chineso crime in

the territory.

Organization of a new Civil Police Force and a Military Guard

The Mahto Municipality and Police

183

91

95

105

9065

***

97

38

915

Government Printing

Administrativo Staff

***

100

A GENERAL REPORT on the Civil Administration of the Territory of Wei-hai-wei, 1899-1901.

1. At the close of 1901 I was instructed by the Commissioner to draw up a short report showing briefly the general features of the New Settlement, and furnishing such details as to area, population, education, revenue, &c., as were then available.

A copy of this memorandum is attached herewith (vide Appendix 1). 2. The present report, therefore, deals in the main with the general work of the Civil Administration, and discusses the general position of the Settlement.

Before entering into details it may be well to state that the respective duties of His Britannic Majesty's Commissioner and the Assistant British Commissioner are roughly as follows:-

The Commissioner deals with all administrative questions of a new nature, controls the financial arrangements, supervises and inspects the district from time to time, and conducts all the correspondence with the Home Government, Consular and Colonial officials, and local people. The Commissioner is also constituted a Court of Appeal under the Order in Council of 1901, and can make and proclaim, subject to approval of the Crown, Ordinances to carry out and enforce local requirements.

The Assistant Commissioner is in sole charge of Chinese Affairs on the Mainland, and is also a District Magistrate under the Order in Council. His main duties are to collect the revenue from the Chinese landowners, to hear and settle all civil and criminal cases in the district on the mainland, control the village headmen and preserve peace. He is now also in charge of the Municipal affairs in Mahto, the listrict gaol, the collection of junk customs and registration of fishing and trading junks. He also conducts all correspondence between Chinese officials and the British Government. The Sub-Magistrate in the city of Wei-hai-wei consults with him direct about all business connected with the Chinese walled city.

The proposal to abolish the appointment of Assistant Commissioner, Wei-hai-wei. To propose to abolish the post of Assistant Commissioner presupposes that the Commissioner who will in future discharge the duties of this post is versed in a knowledge of Northern Chinese. Without this knowledge it is impossible for the Commissioner to do the work of the Assistant Commissioner-which lies almost entirely with the Chinese-satisfactorily. The chances are, however, that the Colonial Office will always find great difficulty in obtaining any Colonial Officer as Commissioner

77

from the Eastern Crown Colonies with the necessary Chinese qualifications, because the civil servants of these Colonies, who would presumably be eligible for this appoint- ment, all learn Southern Chinese, which is of little or no service in the North.

It is true that there is not enough office civil work for two senior civil servants to do, as the work is at present arranged, but it is possible to rearrange the staff as set forth below so as to retain an Assistant Commissioner and also create a saving of £376 on establishment.

3. At present the Civil Service Office Staff consists of the following members:-

Commissioner:

Assistant Commissioner Interpreter and Secretary

Financial Assistant

£500 per annum.

200 per annum.* 300 per annum.

Total

£1,000

4. The Government Office Staff could be arranged as follows:-

Commissioner:

Assistant Commissioner

One Chief Clerk and Interpreter

One Financial Clerk

Total

£500 per annum.

70 per annum.

60 per annum.

£630

5. Under the new arrangement, the Commissioner would personally supervise the finances, assisted by the Chinese Clerk to keep accounts.

The Assistant Commissioner could act, if necessary, as Secretary to the Commis- sioner, as well as administer Chinese affairs.

The advantage of this suggestion is that there will always be one local official who will be acquainted with the local dialect and native people. If the Commissioner knows the Northern Mandarins, he can share the Chinese work with the Assistant Commissioner. If he does not, he can concentrate his attention upon the English side of the administration and leave the Chinese side to the Assistant Commissioner. In the absence of the Commissioner, there will be no locum tenens to hand to take his place with the proper qualifications if the appointment of Assistant Commissioner is abolished. It would be, therefore, better to reduce the expenditure on the posts of Financial Assistant and Secretary, and Interpreter, and retain the appointment of Assistant Commissioner.

The Village Administration.

3. During 1899 the district on the Mainland was not administered by the British Government, except in the immediate neighbourhood of Mahto, and no land taxes were collected, as there was no civil officer then available for carrying out this duty. In 1900 Mr. Barton was seconded from the Consular service for duty in the Settlement, and the work of registering the villages was begun. This work was continued throughout 1900, and is now complete. The registers are kept in Chinese, and show the names of the headmen of the villages, the number of families, the sexes, the acreage of land cultivated, and the occupations of the villagers. It is difficult to fix the exact number of villages, as some villages are really only sub- divisions of larger villages. It may be stated, however, that approximately there are 316 villages in all. The average number of persons in each village is approximately 375, so that the present village population within the ten mile area can be safely calculated to be not less than 118,000.

4. Since the registration of the headmen of the villages has been carried out, there has been practically no difficulty experienced in dealing with the Chinese villagers. The headmen understand now that they must obey a summons from the District Magistrate, and produce any person living in the village they are responsible for.

• Now paid out of Municipal funds from the Island.

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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

11C.O. 882

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5. As far as is consistent with justice, the patriarchal principle of family responsi- bility is strictly enforccil in official dealings with the Chinese. The members of a family are in practice responsible for the acts of the individual of the home, and the headmen are similarly responsible for the conduct of the whole village community. This system works extremely well, because it is based on Chinese customs and usages of great antiquity.

The authority of the village patriarchs is great, and tends to keep the over- populated country steady and law-abiding. The headmen are elected by the village folk, and report their election to the Magistrate. No official emolument is given the village tribunals by the Chinese Government, and the British Government follows

the same course,

The position of a village elder, however, besides being one of dignity and respect, brings in certain small fees of office and other small charges (such as commissions on ruising subscriptions for religious observances, festivals, on collecting the land tax, un arbitration in family disputes, on arranging marriages, funerals, &c.), that make it worth his while to act without a salary. In none of the villages within the Wei- hai-wei area are there any official representatives, or ti pao, of the local Chinese Magistrates. In this part of Shantung the tribunals of the village elders have prac- tically no connecting link with the district authorities and are entirely self-governed.

6. As a rule, the character of the headmen is good, and there is practically little or a crime in the villages, except theft of firewood, vegetables, and cereals, and gambling. As a rule, the village tribunals prefer to settle their disagreements at kome, but if the offence is a serious one, or if the offender belongs to a powerful family, the headmen send complainants to the District Office. The Chinese of the district take full advantage of the personal accessibility of the District Magistrate, and evidently appreciate dealing direct with him.

7. In serious criminal cases it is found difficult to move the village elders to do more than give information against their own fellow villagers, and it is equally diflicult to get the villagers to give evidence against each other in court. When two or more villages are embroiled, however, little trouble is experienced tracing the crime or getting evidence.

The headmen of the district are the Magistrates' right hands, and all instructions to the Chinese are issued by him to them, and they are bound to assist in executing all processes of law.

8. As a people, the villagers of Wei-hai-wei are exceptionally quiet and law- abiding. They are not, properly speaking, inhabitants of the Shantung Province proper, but descendants of certain Iupeh Chinese, who are said to have immigrated to north-east promontory of Shantung some 400 years ago, after being defeated in a dynastie struggle, and driven out from their native province.

The villagers are abjectly poor and destitute-to have enough to eat is with them snonymous with to be well off-fully fifty per cent. live from hand to mouth, and riany thousands emigrate yearly to Corea and Manchuria; Jabour and living is, per- haps, rougher and cheaper in this part of Shantung than in any other province. In disposition the Chinese here are much more good tempered, and cheerful and open than the Southern Chinese. Their physique is magnificent, and very little disease exists among them. Only about twelve per cent. have received any education.

The Shantung villagers living along the cast coast provide some of the best sailors and fishermen in China.

9. No rules and regulations have been framed for defining the duties of the headmen. Experience has shown that it is better to follow closely the lines of the former Chinese system, and to abstain from introducing new practices. The Chinese system gives the District Magistrate a free hand, is very economical, and can be Carried out by the Magistrate in person, as he travels on inspection duty.

The territory is not more than ten miles to the border, and with the new roads made and making all parts will be equally accessible shortly, and there is therefore no necessity for subdividing the district, or for appointing divisional committees of headmen. The absence of the clan system in Shantung makes it unnecessary to deal with the Chinese in groups and bodies as in the south. The Chinese villagers here are very democratic and independent, and always willing to interview the District Magis- trate without the intervention of headmen if they wish to.

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Land Administration.

10. During 1898 and 1899, no attempts were made by the British authorities to deal with the collection of the land tax. In 1900, after the delimitation of the frontier and the registration of the village holdings were completed, this question was taken in hand, and the land tax was collected for the first time at the close of 1900 and the beginning of 1901.

11. The land and buildings on the Island of Liu Kung was bought from the inhabitants by the Admiralty and War Office for the sum of £25,000, and the rents from these sources are collected by the Naval and Military Authorities locally and paid to the home Treasury. Theoretically, the Admiralty and War Office now hold the land and houses in the island as private tenants in perpetuity to the Chinese Government, and for such period under the Convention as Wei-hai-wei is held by the British Government. The other islands in the bay are uninhabited, and pay no land taxes. The total revenue derived from house and land taxes on the island is $9,900 a year.

12. The district on the mainland is comprised within the ten mile belt of land running round the bay, containing, roughly, 270 square miles. Of this area it is estimated that 49 square miles are above 400 feet, 17 square miles consist of river bed and foreshore, 9 square miles are occupied by some 300 villages and 6 square miles by sand dunes or dry river beds,

13. The leased territory is geographically an amalgamation of parts of the two districts of Yung-Cheng and Wen-Ting, which in turn form a part of the Chinese Prefecture of Tung-Chow-Fu. A line drawn from Camp Point to the village of Liu Liu Tsz, and thence through the village of Chang Chai Shan to the market town of Ch'iao Tou shows the original parts of the Wen-Ting district on the south-east and of the Yung-Cheng district on the north-east.

14. The collection of the land taxes is made in accordance with the tax lists published by the Chinese Magistrates of Wen-Ting and Yung-Cheng. The inhabi- tants of the leased area have not created any trouble over paying this tax; they now escape paying the commissions and fees formerly given to the agents of the Magis- trates, who collected the taxes.

The land collections in 1900 amounted to $5,840, and in 1901 to $6,480.

15. Very little more than this was collected by the Chinese Magistrates, and on the whole their district rent-rolls prove on enquiry to be reliable. The present rates have been in force since the commencement of the present dynasty in the seventeenth century, and no doubt some land has been reclaimed since then, but other land has also gone out of cultivation. Although the Chinese assessment is not strictly accurate, it is fairly approximate, and very little land escanes taxation. The soil, however, is so miserably poor, being so thin and covered largely with sand and broken stones, that it ranks (like nearly all the land in the cast of Shantung) lowest in value amongst all the assessed rents in the eighteen provinces of China. Here the average land tax of a mo (1-6th of an acre) of the best land is not much more than 10 cents, while the great majority of the land is assessed at only from 3 cents to 5 cents a mo. In the rest of China in more favoured provinces the usual land tax ranges from 15 cents up to 30 cents a mo, in proportion to the fertility of the land and its drainage, distance from popular centres, and difficulty in working. 16. In 1900 the Chinese practice of collecting the taxes was followed. In 1901, however, the following procedure was adopted, and has worked very successfully. The District Magistrate notifies the Chinese villagers that the taxes for the land must be paid in the autumn through the headmen of the villages. From the Chinese registers. lists are then made out of the headmen, and they are instructed to collect the whole land rent for their respective village, and to bring the cash money to head quarters, the list being so arranged that the 300 village headmen may all pay in their rents on successive days in about one month. As each headman pays, he is given a provisional receipt for the taxes and told to return again in about one month's time to receive the receipts for all the land taxes paid by each individual family in the village, which the Chinese writers in the District Office will have been making up in the meantime.

The Chinese appreciate this new system, as it obviates their waiting about in thousands for one or two months at the District Office, as formerly money was paid in by each individual tax payer, who waited till a receipt was given him by the office staff.