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not do well and the increase of dock accommodation in the Far East promises severer com- petition in the future. As regards other industrial undertakings, though there was no heavy fall, only in a few unimportant instances was there any advance on the value of shares at the end of the preceding year.
The maintenance of existing and the creation of new industrial undertakings are be coming a matter of very great importance to the Colony, threatened as it is by serious cou- petition from other places in some of its principal sources of wealth in the past. A satisfac- tory feature of the year was therefore the initiation of arrangements to start one such new enterprise in the New Territories; a flour mill on a large scale is in course of construction at a favourable site in Junk Bay and is to be combined with an extensive farin for the rearing of pigs on the refuse material. Serious attempts to prospect for metals in those Territories were also put in hal during the year. If these prove the existence of minerals in quantities that will pay for their extraction the future development of the Territories will be greatly
assisted.
Various projects that have been mooted for the construction of railways to ports on the nninland of South China have maintained and enhanced the desire of Hongkong to have as soon as possible a trunk line through that country with a terminus in the Colony.
An opportunity occurred during the your of getting rid of the foreign control of the projected milway from Canton to Hankow on which no progr s was being made and which it was feared would under sucir control neither advance Britishr -Chinese-interests-or-the interests of Hongkong. On the 6th October with the approval of H.M.'s Government and under sanction of an Imperial decree the Government of Hongkong lent and the Viceroy of the Hu Kuang Provinces borrowed a sum of £1,100,000, repayable in 10 annual instal- ments. The security for the loan was the opium revenue of Hupei, Hunan and Kwangtung and the interest on it 41% payable half-yearly. The money was advanced to Hongkong by the Crown Agents at Bank rate-then 4%-and on being paid over to the Chinese Ambas. sador at Washington was at once utilized to redeem the Canton-Hankow railway concession from the various persons who had acquired interests in it from the original concessionaires. With the object of raising a loan to repay the Crown Agents' advance and at the same time to provide funds for the British section of the Canton-Kowloon railway and to meet other railway needs that might arise an Ordinance (No. 11 of 1905) was passed on the 16th October to empower the Governor to raise as occasion required loans not exceeding two mil- lion pounds in all. No loan was however raised before the end of the year.
Throughout the year attempts were being made in conjunction with H. M.'s Minister at Peking to get the Chinese authorities and particularly the Viceroy of the Liang Kuang Pro- vinces to negotiate arrangements for the construction and subsequent working of the Chinese section of the proposed Canton-Kowloon railway on the basis of Loan and Joint Working Agreements which had been drafted by the British and Chinese Corporation in consultation with the Colonial Office in London. These attempts had not succeeded at the close of the year.
In the meantime, however, the Hongkong Government with the approval of the Legis- lative Council, expressed at a meeting on the 21st September, decided that the British section of the line should be put in hand without waiting for the conclusion of the negotiations with regard to the Chinese section. By that date a preliminary survey and estimate of alternative routes had been completed by Mr. J. C. BRUCE, an engineer who had been seut from Eng- land for the purpose and had arrived in the Colony on the 16th June, and a route 21 miles in length, which passed through the Kowloon hills by a low level tunnel 2,460 yards long, along the west shore of Tide Cove and South shore of Tolo Harbour and by the villages of Tai Po, Ha Wai, Fan Ling and Sheung Shui to the Sham Chün River near the Lo Fu ferry, had been selected as the inost economical both as regards construction and working expenses and as best answering the requirements of a section of a trunk line through China.
Pending the completion of the final survey it was decided to commence throwing up the bank as soon as the centre line was located along the part of the line, 7 miles in length, which traverses the low-lying ground north of Tai Po. The negotiations and clerical work involved in the resumption of the large number of small padi fields required before construc tion could be started was expeditiously carried out by Mr. C. CLEMENTI, the Assistant Land Officer, and the first sod was turned on December 9th. The decision to use labour supplied by the elders of the surrounding villages for the earth work was found, as had been antici- pated, to obviate local difficulties arising from renoval of graves, "feng shui" prejudices,
&c.
15-
The introduction of a new rent roll to take the place of the rough one on which rents had previously been collected in the New Territories and at the same time of a new scale of rents produced several petitions from the village elders and some hesitancy to pay rents due. Regulatious for the collection of Crown rents in arrear in the New Territories made in September and re-enacted with slight modifications at the end of November enabled these difficulties to be got over and the payment of considerable sums for work on the railway bank doubtless assisted in getting in arrears shortly after the end of the year. Fears enter- tained at one time that the second crop of rice would suffer from want of rain were fortu- nately not realised and the New Territories remained prosperons and on the whole quiet throughout the year.
In conclusion I would refer to a few changes in personnel that occurred in the Colony in 1905. The Right Reverend Bishop DOMENICO POZZONI Succeeded the late lamented Bishop PIAZZOLI as head of the Roman Catholic Church and was consecrated on the 1st October. Commodore I. P. WILLIAMS took over the charge of the naval dock-yard from Rear-Admiral C. G. DICKEN on 29th September, 1905. Sir Paul Citater, Kt., C.M.G., resigned his appointment on the Legislative Council after serving on it for Fighteen years and has been succeeded by Mr. H. É. POLLOCK, K.C., as representative of the ratepayers. In the Colonial Service Mr. (now) Sir FRANCIS PIGGOTT, formerly Procureur General in Mauritius, arrived on the 23rd May to succeed Sir WILLIAM MEIGH GOODMAN as Chief Jus- tice, and since the 2nd August Mr. T. SERCOMBE SMITH has ably acted in the appointment of Colonial Secretary temporarily vacated by Mr. F. H. Mar, c..., who proceeded on leave on that date.
I have the honour to be,
My Lord,
Your Lordship's most obedient, humble Servant,
M. Nathan
Governor, &c..
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