...
4
regard to their fitness for the post, and whose chief concern is to collect as much money as possible during their brief tenure of office in Canton.
Means of Communication.
Probably in no other part of China are the means of communication so elaborate and so easily capable of improvement as in the Canton Delta. Steam-launches towing commodious passenger-boats ply constantly between Canton and almost every important town in the delta. There is daily communication between Canton and Hong Kong and Canton and West River ports; also a bi-weekly service of cargo and passenger steamers to Shanghae and Tien-tsin direct; Samshui and Fatshan have for some time past been connected with Canton by rail; the main line to Hankow is now open for 45 miles, and in a year's time the Canton-Kowloon Railway will be open as far as Sheklung, on the East River, 40 miles from Canton.
All these lines run through some of the most thickly populated districts in China, and this gradual extension of railway facilities must inevitably make for improved conditions of life and the prosperity of the people of the province.
In the city of Canton itself little has been done to improve means of communica- tion, which remain as they were centuries ago. The streets are narrow, crooked, dark, and dirty, and so congested is the population and so valuable the property that the widening of the streets in the city to any appreciable extent is apparently out of the question. In the suburbs, however, the construction of a bund along the river front, with an extension into the country outside the East Gate, provides a means of carriage and horse exercise which the Cantonese are more and more taking advantage of. The completion of this bund has been considerably delayed owing to the refusal of the authorities to employ foreign assistance and the financial difficulties which seem to be inevitable in all Chinese Government enterprises.
Of outward signs of Western civilization there are no lack in Canton. A telegraph service has been in existence for some years; to this has recently been added a telephone service, and, more recently still, wireless communication has been installed between Canton, Whampoa, and the Bogue Forts. A British Company provide a large number of houses in the city, including the principal yamêns, with electric light and fans, and a recently completed waterworks, under Chinese management, supplies the city with clean water at moderate rates.
There are either completed or in process of erection an arsenal, powder factory, mint, cement works, a paper mill, and railway stations, works, and shops. Foreign buildings are springing up in all directions in and around the city; most of the new schools are erected in foreign style, and the better class of shops are adopting brick and stone façades and plate-glass windows. Outside the East Gate extensive barracks have been put up to accommodate the Lü Chün, which were recently favourably commented upon by a British General.
Education.
So far as we can gather, the advance in education on modern lines in Canton has not been so great as in other parts of China. This may partly be accounted for by the proximity of Hong Kong, with its superior educational facilities for Chinese boys- partly by the fact that the well-to-do Cantonese have, until quite recently, been in the habit of sending their sons to complete their studies in Japan.
There are, of course, the usual number of schools established under the new system of education promulgated by the Government in 1903. These include a provincial college, a normal school, middle schools, and several elementary schools.
In the college instruction is given in the following subjects :--
1 Chinese classics and history.
2. English, French, and German languages.
3. Foreign history and literature.
4. Mathematics.
5. Science, chemistry and physics.
6. Geography.
7. Philosophy.
8. The art of war.
9. Gymnastics and deportment.
5*
English is taught by an American Professor, German by a German, French and all other subjects by Chinese Professors, the majority of whom received their training in Japan.
It is characteristic of the educational methods of the Chinese Government at the present day that, although the demand for instruction in English is greater than that for any other foreign language, not a single Englishman is engaged in teaching his own language in the Government schools of Canton.
Last year there were 300 students, of ages ranging from 17 to 30, on the books of the Provincial College. No fees are charged for tuition or board, the college having been richly endowed out of Government funds by a former Viceroy.
No degrees have yet been conferred, but by the Regulations of the Board of Education the college las power to confer the degree of "Chü Jen on students who pass a satisfactory examination on the completion of the full course of eight years.
The Government Normal School for the training of teachers, which is housed in an immense block of buildings, erected on the site of the old examination halls, close to the South Gate, has not so far been a success. The better class of Cantonese have refused to send their sons to this school, partly because there are several Japanese on the teaching staff and a reaction has lately set in against education on Japanese lines, partly because some of the large mission schools, notably the American College in Honan and the Roman Catholic College in the city, offer a far better training, not only in Western learning, but in the Chinese classics. The two schools above mentioned were quite full last year.
The opinion seems to be gaining ground amongst the Chinese that too much stress has recently been laid on the advantages of a purely foreign education, with the consequent neglect of their own language and literature, and an indication of this feeling is to be found in the recent opening of schools in Canton, under Government auspices, for the exclusive study of Chinese.
At Whampoa there is a naval college for the training of cadets, but in the absence of any serious attempt to reorganize the naval forces of Canton, it does not appear that this school can be of any practical utility to the country.
At Whampoa is also an elementary military school in connection with the larger military college outside the East Gate, where officers are trained for the new Lu Ch'nn or territorial army.
Native Press.
One of the inevitable results of the political awakening of an oriental people appears to be the rapid growth and widespread influence of a native press.
In Canton there are now fifteen Chinese newspapers, most of them dailies, which have a large and rapidly increasing circulation in the city and throughout the province. They are, with few exceptions, revolutionary in tone and intensely anti- foreign. The influence they exert over the people of Canton, always impatient of official control and ready to resist foreign interference in their affairs, must at times prove most embarrassing to the Viceroy and his advisers, but he either will not, or dare not, enforce the new press laws against them.
Their criticisms of the actions of foreign Governinents and officials, especially their references to the affairs of Hong Kong, are almost invariably prejudiced, hostile in tone, and often wilfully inaccurate. We have on frequent occasions lately had occasion to draw the Viceroy's attention, both on our own behalf and on behalf of the Government of Hong Kong, to what appeared to us deliberate attempts on the part of some of the most widely read newspapers to stir up trouble between foreigners and Chinese, both here and in Hong Kong, but in no case has the Viceroy shown that he realized the gravity of their offence, or taken any effective steps to express his displeasure at this conduct. His Excellency usually contents himself with retaliating that the Hong Kong press, both native and foreign, is equally reprehensible and unfriendly towards his Government.
The recent action of some of the native papers in publishing official documents and Confidential communications from foreign Consuls to the Chinese authorities appear to us to constitute a serious drawback to the efficient conduct of international business in Canton, and the Viceroy's refusal even to express regret for a particularly flagrant publication of a foreign Consul's despatch a few weeks ago is significant of the attitude of his Government towards foreign interests and fraught with serious possibilities for the future of international relations in this part of China.
0
137.
7
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.