Sub-Enclosure.
finally terminated.
• may add that the Trustees could at least lessen their difficulties in this matter by imitating their predecessors of 1860 in getting cheap and inferior organ which would begin to break up two or three years. They prefer however not to do so, and can only hope that a really good organ in the Church may remain a monument of the friendly relations which have always existed between the Government and themselves after those relations shall have ceased.
I have (signed) Alfred Lister, Secretary to the Trust.
RECP
REGE 2 JAN 84.
TO THE COMMUNITY OF HONGKONG.
The Trustees of St. John's Cathedral find themselves compelled to appeal to the liberality of Residents here for assistance in providing the Cathedral with a new Organ, the instrument at present in use being so far deteriorated by climatic causes as not to be worth the very extensive repairs which alone could make it serviceable. Its state must have been evident to those who have attended Divine Service for some time back, and it is doubtful whether it can be used much longer.
The Organ was built in 1860 and paid for by public subscription. An Organ ought, doubtless, to last much longer than 23 years in a good climate, but, besides the fact that the mistake seems to have been made in the first instance of selecting a cheap instrument, in 1860 makers knew even less than they do now about guarding against the effects of tropical heat and damp. Moreover, by the unfortunate choking up of a roof gutter during a typhoon some years ago, the interior of the Organ (even then beginning to break up) was deluged with water.
It is proposed to give the order to Messrs. WALKER & SONS, who have just successfully erected a fine Organ at Shanghai, and whose representative has himself seen the damage (incredible to the workman who has never been out of England) which years of this climate are capable of effecting.
The cost of an Organ suited to the Cathedral, laid down in Hongkong, and set up, is estimated including the expenses of a skilled workman to come out and put it up at £2,000, say $12,000. This sum will not be regarded as extravagant if it is borne in mind that pipes which in England are made of deal, glued together, have, for the East, to be made of mahogany, secured with brass screws, everything else being similarly modified. An Organ so prepared should last, with proper care and occasional renewals of perishable parts, fifty or sixty years even in this climate.
It is evident that such a sum as $12,000 cannot be provided out of the current revenue of the Cathedral, which only meets, and even that with difficulty, the current expenditure. The Trustees feel assured, however, that the Community will not feel disposed to see the only considerable Organ in the Colony disappear from our midst, and they make this Appeal not doubting to meet with the same success as their predecessors a quarter of a century ago.
251
Sub-Enclosure.
finally terminated.
• may add that the Trustees could at least lessen their difficulties
し
a
in this matter by imitating their
getting predecessors of 1860 in cheap and inferior organ which would begin to break up two or three years. They prefer however not to do so, and can only hope that
a
within
really good organ in the Church
may remain a monument of the __ friendly relations which have always existed between the Government and themselves after those relations shall have ceased.
I have He. (signed) Alfred Lister, Secretary to the Trust : .
RECP
REGE 2 JAN 84..
TO THE COMMUNITY OF HONGKONG.
The Trustees of St. John's Cathedral find themselves compelled to appeal to
the liberality of Residents here for assistance in providing the Cathedral with a new Organ, the instrument at present in use being so far deteriorated by climatic causes as not to be worth the very extensive repairs which alone could make it serviceable. Its state must have been evident to those who have attended Divine Service for some time back, and it is doubtful whether it can be used much longer.
The Organ was built in 1860 and paid for by public subscription. An Organ ought, doubtless, to last much longer than 23 years in a good climate, but, besides the fact that the mistake seems to have been made in the first instance of selecting a cheap instrument, in 1860 makers knew even less than they do now about guarding against the effects of tropical heat and damp. Moreover, by the unfor- tunate choking up of a roof gutter during a typhoon some years ago, the interior of the Organ (even then beginning to break up) was deluged with water.
It is proposed to give the order to Messrs. WALKER & SONS, who have just successfully erected a fine Organ at Shanghai, and whose representative has himself seen the damage (incredible to the workman who has never been out of England) which years of this climate are capable of effecting.
The cost of an Organ suited to the Cathedral, laid down in Hongkong, and it up, is estimated including the expenses of a skilled workman to come out and put
at £2,000, say $12,000. This sum will not be regarded as extravagant if it is borne in mind that pipes which in England are made of deal, glued together, have, for the East, to be made of mahogany, secured with brass screws, everything else being similarly modified. An Organ so prepared should last, with proper care and occasional renewals of perishable parts, fifty or sixty years even in this climate.
It is evident that such a sum as $12,000 cannot be provided out of the current revenue of the Cathedral, which only meets, and even that with difficulty, the current expenditure. The Trustees feel assured, however, that the Community will not feel disposed to see the only considerable Organ in the Colony disappear from our midst, and they make this Appeal not doubting to meet with the same success as their predecessors a quarter of a century ago.
251
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